Board Thread:Wiki discussion/@comment-18014300-20180717074641/@comment-6517-20180719083331

Master Sima Yi wrote: I'm a bit disappointed the discussed option of the term "active" over "floruit" is not being listed as an option here. Like I have mentioned over on Discord, this is my preferred option as it is much more clear to non-native English speakers and non-academics (as you clearly mention it is an academic term, and I see no reason why we need to be academical). I'm very opposed to using any sort of term where I have to look up what it means when a much more clear option is available.

In this regard, I agree with Jasca that this stays in the infobox only, as it may give the wrong indication (and has for me in the past on Wikipedia) when it's listed next to a birth or death date, or in their place.

I think the purpose of this poll is really to decide whether we even use floruit at all, before we attempt to decide which exact words to use. For my part, I assumed Sol's use of floruit only in this poll was for ease of reference, and that if option #3 was chosen, we would then decide whether to use "floruit", "flourished", or "active" as our field name.

Sol Pacificus wrote: s I recall, no one ever actually proposed "active" being used as a notation for dates, for example: Shao Jun (active 1505–1567) which is why it's not listed as an option. Nobody has proposed this. Probably because it's not an option anybody wants to see.

The idea of using "active" as our preferred term only works when its usage is restricted to the infobox. In this situation the term is defined by the dates (and location) listed against it in said infobox.