`      == Colours, flatlist, and accessibility ==  Hi, RexxS. I invite you to join the discussion about colours and the technical aspects of flatlist that is underway at Template talk:Physical oceanography#colours. Regards,    : Hi Dianna, I think that you and D have already covered most of what I would want to say. I've added a note about how it it affects my own colour impairment which may help to add some perspective on the issues. Cheers     == idea of merging into ``alternate air source`` ==  Don't think this merging would work at all. In diving usage the terms are very separate, even if the different systems may be attempting to solve somewhat similar problems. Users looking up any of these separate system (eg spare air, pony bottle etc) will NOT think of them by the term ``Alternative Air Source``. So for ordinary users referencing Wiki this common catagory is confusing. Nor is the usage of All Alternative Air Sources the same.... A Pony is only used as a backup for carrying an emergency ascent, a twinset for use during the dive itself, the octopus is not a redundant air supply itself etc etc. The single catagory also produces information overload, because of the many DIFFERENCES and methods of use.  The more I think about it the more I see this restructuring as VERY confusing and unhelpful  Best Regards HowieKor  — Preceding unsigned comment added by   •    : Hi Howie, thanks for notifying me of your concerns. All of the pages involved are on my watchlist, so I saw your comments at Talk:Bailout bottle#Merge with Alternative air source and Pony bottle? and redirect. I see that Peter Southwood has replied to you there, so I'll comment at that article talk page if there's anything useful that I can add. Cheers,     == Octopus wars ==  Hi Rexx Re your statement`` An improved system is to equip the regulator that is normally used throughout the dive (the ``primary``) with a long hose, typically 2 metres (6.6 ft) long. This is the regulator that is donated to a buddy who is out of air. The octopus or ``secondary`` regulator is then reserved for the donor diver and is on a short hose, mounted just under the chin. The principal advantage is that the diver who is in trouble will receive a regulator that is known to be working.``  I'm afraid the jury is still out on your claiming that this Hogarthian rigging style is actually ``an improved system``.  I'm sure you're aware this is HIGHLY controversial( you only have to track most scuba discussion boards), and this alternative is specifically criticised as unsubstantiated by BSAC http://www.bsac.com/page.asp?section=3201&sectionTitle;=Clarification+statement+on+Alternative+Supply+training+and+going+diving.  But that isn't my main criticism here.... I think having a small battle over the best octopus rigging on a general topic area such as Buddy Diving is totally defocusing and irrelevant. Remember, I did make room to say that systems did vary in ``standardisation``... I think this is enough in this topic area, but I would be interested in you're views Respect Howie      : Sorry Howie, but in Wikipedia, the only thing that counts is verifiability and my text is firmly sourced to a reliable source, while your text is unfortunately unsourced. It is irrelevant that I am of the opinion that it is an improvement, but it is highly relevant that my source holds that opinion. : From a personal perspective, I'm afraid that BSAC once again fails to keep up with developments that actually improve diver safety. It was the same story with nitrox, with trimix, with rebreathers. BSAC was slow to accept all of these - heck I've been diving long enough to remember BSAC preferring ABLJs to stab jackets because of fears that the diver might end up face down on the surface. Look at the statement they make. It admits three incidents of a diver's reg being snatched out of their mouth, and then fails to understand that training for that eventuality would reduce the stress in such situations. It boils down to ``There's nothing wrong with Hogarthian configuration, except that we don't teach it``. The only problem they can find is if the diver is using twin independents - and everybody knows that that configuration is only used for solo diving, so has no relevance to buddies. : It may be surprising to find that we cannot simply write what we know about about a subject, but we have to report what others (reliable sources) have already written. Feel free by all means to give a reference to a RS for the configuration that you wrote about. When you do, I'll be happy to attribute the statement about ``an improved system``. At present according to WP:ASF, only claims that are disputed among reliable sources need to be qualified. I have no intention of having any battles – and I'm very happy that you're contributing so much – but you really need to provide a lot more reliable sources for what you write. Cheers,     == Re your recent additions to Buddy Diving ==  Come on Rexx, don’t you think it’s totally over the top to have such an exhaustive discussion of the alternative ways to configure hoses and their consequential hand-over procedures, in such a general overview section such as Buddy Diving.  Why not move this very specialist discussion onto a separate topic in its own right?  After all, we are supposedly here to help expand subject knowledge for people who are generally unfamiliar with a topic, not to take general subject area and confuse or bore readers with obscure areas of specialist contention.  You are obviously very passionate about hogarthian long hose arguments, but cant we put this all into perspective.  Respect Howie        :I moved this down to the proper location.    :: Thanks Gene ) :: Well, look at it from the other point of view, Howie. Should the article describe just one way of gear rigging as if there were no alternative? Because that's how I found the article before I added the paragraph on a Hogarthian-style configuration. I certainly don't think there should be an article in its own right, as the scuba diving coverage on Wikipedia is already fragmented into a huge number of stubs and under-referenced articles. We should be trying to collect together similar topics and build decent-sized articles with quality references. For heaven's sake, we have  who runs Rubicon Research Repository and who can find references for us on almost any diving topic where a reference exists. Why do we still end up with paragraph after paragraph of unsourced claims – or just as bad, stuff sourced to somebody's blog or personal webpage? If we want to improve coverage of scuba diving, let's get back to the basics: read what the good sources say, and then dispassionately summarise them with citations. :: To answer your point, I actually think that breathing a long hose is more relevant to the topic of Buddy diving than to almost any other, since it is only in the context of diving with a buddy that the long primary makes a difference. I do understand though that you may not see it the same way. :: For what it's worth, I stopped being passionate about the long-hose arguments sometime around 1999 since by then the debates on rec.scuba and Scuba-L had reached a firm conclusion. I'm merely surprised that the same old well-refuted arguments are still being trotted out as if Jarrod Jablonski et al had never put any thought into how to configure diving gear. Cheers,     ::Well, I can't say that you've convinced me Rexx, but I'll respect what you're trying to achieve on this subject.  I do think that with the material you've added, the logical flow is rather disjointed at the moment. Why?-it attempts to encompass both octopus rigging convention in ordinary sport diving and that done in certain segments of more technical diving, all together.  What I'd like to do is keep what's there now and restructure it along lines of sport diving and tech diving practises.  will try to get this done in the next few days and will be interested in your comments..... Cheers......Howie    ::: It's ok for us to have different opinions - and it would be a dull world if we all thought the same, so I'm never going to worry about convincing you ) The main remaining difference is that I think you're still viewing the long hose as inseparable from tech diving, while I consider that a false distinction. I expect to be diving with approximately the same configuration whether I'm doing a 7 metre training dive for a novice at Stoney or a 100 metre trimix dive on the pump house at Dorot