Archive:Weekly Wiki/August 22, 2007

August 22 Weekly Wiki

• So...are we doing this again this week? --Carl Jantzen 09:41, 22 August 2007 (CDT)
• Sure why not? :-) Anton Sweeney 09:43, 22 August 2007 (CDT)
• I'll try to show up, but I just got back from a trip from halfway around the world, with wife and baby. Recovering (and reading mail) will take time! --Larry Sanger 09:59, 22 August 2007 (CDT)
• Meh, its not like I have a real life :-P Denis Cavanagh 10:00, 22 August 2007 (CDT)

Subpages

I'm wondering if User:Chris Day could maybe give us a quick update on where the Subpages project is at and what we can expect/will need to do once it goes live? Anton Sweeney 09:45, 22 August 2007 (CDT)

I'm not Chris Day, but I did get an email pointing me to this page today, maybe that information is helpful. --Carl Jantzen 09:47, 22 August 2007 (CDT)

It is important that everyone contributes to that poll (CZ:Subpages/Which_style?). There are instruction on how to use the subpages on both the vertical ({{subpages2}}) and horizontal ({{subpages9}}) templates. They are still in the testing phase. I have tried to help people set up the subpages correctly when I have seen the edits going in that direction but I have not started any sort of mass addition of subpages except for testing puposes.

There is still one issues to resolve; where do we place the metadata page? It is a technical issue vs an aesthetic issue. It is technically easier to have it on a template (i.e. Template:ARTICLENAME/Metadata), but more intuitive to have it on as a subpage (ARTICLENAME/Metadata). So bear in mind any use of subpage templates now may involve tweeking at a later date. Finally, which ever style is chosen as the favored one, it will be transfered to the {{subpages}} template, so neither 2 or 9 will be the final template. So again, more tweeks will be required in the future if either is used now.

Having said this, I think it is good for you all to experiment with the subpages since the more feedback we get now the more user friendly the final product will be in the end. The real final word is that a bot will place the subpages template on all pages in main space when the subpages template is given the real green light. That transition will be very intense since we will have to manually transfer all the talk page checklists to the metadata page (another reason why we need to intentify the real home for this critical page before we start doing this en masse. Chris Day (talk) 10:32, 22 August 2007 (CDT)

By the way, if anyone is interested in the technical side of the metadata page location I have outlined the details here; Test_article/Signed_Articles. Note, I have also offered a partial solution to the problem that would allow the metadata information to reside on a subpage rather than a temaplate. It's not perfect but it works. Chris Day (talk) 10:45, 22 August 2007 (CDT)

Article Metadata and Definition

Here is a simple question: Why don't we have a topic's definition on the Metadata subpage instead of its own template page? It would be nicer to have all that info in the same place, and I think it makes sense to keep actual content in the main namespace rather than the template namespace. -- Carl Jantzen 09:46, 22 August 2007 (CDT)

Because it's easier to build out Related Articles pages this way. What we need, clearly, are ways to edit particular hard-wired fields within a page. On the other hand, it's too early in the game to hard-wire our fields. --Larry Sanger 10:16, 22 August 2007 (CDT)

Related Articles

I'm about to start compiling a list of Related Articles for the article on Nathanael Greene (American Revolution General), but I'm not really sure what the proper "parent topic" would be. I was thinking either American Revolutionary War, or maybe even just military. Suggestions welcome. --Todd Coles 10:03, 22 August 2007 (CDT)

American Revolutionary War sounds pretty good. --Carl Jantzen 10:04, 22 August 2007 (CDT)

Agreed - I think just 'Military' is too broad. Anton Sweeney 10:13, 22 August 2007 (CDT)

I agree as well. See CZ:Related Articles for helpful hints. --Larry Sanger 10:16, 22 August 2007 (CDT)

Subpage Style Voting

I guess the assumption of subpages is that we have to standardize on just one type of navigation aid. Personally I think that maybe (at least for now) we should allow principal authors to choose which type of navigation to use for their articles, but since there is already a vote going on you might as well cast yours here: CZ:Subpages/Which style? Carl Jantzen 10:10, 22 August 2007 (CDT)

No, let's definitely prescribe one set style--even if it's one that you and I, Carl, dislike as benighted, messy, bad design, etc. The question actually allows me to say annoyingly once again that this project is created not to indulge the idiosyncratic choices of our contributors, but to aid the end user in finding reliable information as efficiently as possible. --Larry Sanger 10:19, 22 August 2007 (CDT)

Given the way the poll is going i wonder if people understand your full reasoning behind the vertical version being superior to the horizontal for navigation. While the voting is still in progress I wonder if such a discussion should be started at CZ_Talk:Subpages/Which_style?. We have a lot of votes but no real debate. i suspect votes are going with aesthetics over function? Who knows for sure. Chris Day (talk) 10:37, 22 August 2007 (CDT)

Well, the reasoning is stated clearly enough, just very briefly, in the summary. If people aren't impressed by the reasoning, that's all right. In the long run, we'll redesign the whole thing anyway. Most important in cases like this is that it be clear that I am not simply personally legislating how things must be. It's very healthy, even necessary, for the leader to be overruled from time to time. --Larry Sanger 10:44, 22 August 2007 (CDT)

So you must be feeling very healthy right now :). But you make a good point, the look of the subpages being discussed in that poll is only going to last a long as it takes to get a good CSS skin. This is very much a precursor for the furture, so it's OK to look like Win95 (reference to the comment from Morton) for now. Chris Day (talk) 10:51, 22 August 2007 (CDT)

Sorry all - can't make Weekly Wiki time today as have a big client presentation on tomorrow. Just left a note on the discussion page though re subpages styles. --Ian Johnson 17:07, 22 August 2007 (CDT)

:-) Actually, I would say that we can easily fix various cosmetic problems with the horizontal template. I was assuming that we would be doing so. It's ridiculous that, for example, the tabs themselves are unnecessarily two rows high; the "PUMA" icons are cut off at the bottom, and the original items you had there were superior; if we must use letters, they should not spell out "PUMA"; the color should probably be changed from, what is that, lavender? (I really like the green on {{subpages2}}.) --Larry Sanger 12:37, 22 August 2007 (CDT)

There are some errors in the horizontal template. Also why not PUMA? I think it gives us more of a "bite". Rawr. --Robert W King 12:18, 22 August 2007 (CDT)

As always the cosmetic stuff is the easy bit to change. The icons are cut off at the bottom? The tabs are two rows high? These might be more examples of brower incompatability. Colour wise, the two templates are the same. Possibly you are referring to the experiment of having the base color be different for approved (green) vs not approved (blue)? Chris Day (talk) 12:24, 22 August 2007 (CDT)

Well, I'm deliberately using what most of our users will be using: Windows machine, IE 7.0. If I may suggest...you ought to be testing out your changes on such a setup, if you can, Chris. --Larry Sanger 12:28, 22 August 2007 (CDT)

Unfortunately IE is not made for a mac and i don't own a PC or have easy access to one. That is the world of biology for you. There are older IE version that work on a MAC my guess is that will bring in a whole new set of problems. Chris Day (talk) 12:32, 22 August 2007 (CDT)

Aha Chris, I think I knew that and forgot it. Here you go:

--Larry Sanger 12:43, 22 August 2007 (CDT)

Updated to include my screenie too.--Robert W King 13:04, 22 August 2007 (CDT)

And not only is it "PUMA"...it's: "PUMA?" What, aren't we sure of our felinity? --Larry Sanger 12:43, 22 August 2007 (CDT)

I just added my screen shot to your figure, for comparison. As for the question mark, I definitely question my felinity :) Chris Day (talk) 12:52, 22 August 2007 (CDT)

I'm almost certain that the "nowrap" code in the table is not working correctly in IE7. That was my fix for reducing the number of fields on the Subpage list 2 page; now A&B instead of A,B &C. Chris Day (talk) 12:56, 22 August 2007 (CDT)

Looks like IE six censors felinity. Chris Day (talk) 13:04, 22 August 2007 (CDT)

Non-Approved Articles as Draft Articles

I noticed that the Japan article is actually a redirect to Japan/Draft. This makes sense, because Japan hasn't been approved yet, so it is actually a draft. It seems to me that this might have an additional advantage, namely that of preserving a continuous history of edits to an article (at the draft page), and then a continuous history of the approved state of the article at the main page. Or, to be more clear, this way the History of the draft page will show all edits ever, and the History of the main page will show only different approved versions. I believe this makes a lot more sense than the current procedure outlined at CZ:Approval Process, which creates a new draft page when the article is approved, effectively splitting the history of the article into pre-approval and post-approval sections. I think this procedure should perhaps be changed so that the article is MOVED to the draft page, then the main page (now a redirect to the draft) is made into a copy of the correct draft version. Any thoughts?

I set that redirect page up as an experiment. This has been discussed on and off for a few months now. See my recent comments on Matt_Innis' talk page. With respect to the current proceedure, i think the article IS moved to the Draft page as standard practice (thus preserving the history in one place), ask Matt, he has done quite a few approvals now. I suspect we just need to rewrite the whole approval procedure now that we have learned a bit more about the process by actually doing it. Chris Day (talk) 11:53, 22 August 2007 (CDT)

I'm glad to see that you like the idea (even had it first) of starting all articles as drafts (Matt_Innis'). I think this is something we should try to get adopted as a CZ policy. Do es something like this need to be an Editorial Resolution or can it just be discussed and written up on the Approval Process page? --Carl Jantzen 12:01, 22 August 2007 (CDT)

Catherine Woodgold first floated the idea, that I am aware of, in the following forum thread. Aleta Curry picked up the ball a month later. This should defintitely go through the editorial council, even if there is a strong community consensus, it would be a huge change to our current practice. Chris Day (talk) 12:11, 22 August 2007 (CDT)

Chris, I floated this idea already in the phase when there was just an e-mail list...... But heck, I am glad to see the idea is alive, and maybe even gets implemented.... Kim van der Linde 22:50, 23 August 2007 (CDT)

It looks like there was some good discussion about this as a policy there, and then the conversation just died out. I guess I'll try to revitalize that discussion over on the forum, and then try to find some council members to offer a resolution. --Carl Jantzen 12:41, 22 August 2007 (CDT)

The issue in the far past forum discussions about this is there were apparently objectionable things tied in with it related to approval, and Kim was arguing that draft articles only be viewable to people signed-in. Larry killed the idea, rightly so in my view. He said, "One decisive reason against putting 'draft' articles in a 'draft' area that only signed-in people can view is that it is precisely by seeing demonstrated the fact that the website can be edited that people come to edit the website. In other words, our single most powerful recruitment tool is an easily viewable article-in-progress and the statement: 'You can edit this article now!'"  —Stephen Ewen (Talk) 23:17, 23 August 2007 (CDT)

You cannot edit an article now. Now you have to apply, give evidence of your identity, get approved before you can edit. There is no objection to show at the main page an indication that there is not yet an approved version, but that there is a draft available. Maybe it should be viewable, maybe not, but in my ideas, you inly have to create an account, nothing more, no identification, no real names etc which will make it much easier for authors to start and to participate. Kim van der Linde 14:13, 24 August 2007 (CDT)

Subpages Template Incorrectly Places Article in CZ Live

I started working on STS-118 today, and just added subpages2, including the metadata page, indicating that it is of status 4 (external article). Yet the subpages2 template still indicates the article belongs to CZ_Live. Is this a bug, or am I doing something wrong? --Carl Jantzen 12:49, 22 August 2007 (CDT)

You probably have the category at the bootom of the article? I'll look. Chris Day (talk) 12:58, 22 August 2007 (CDT)

Haha, thanks Chris. Looking back at the edit history I guess I did put that link down there. The template works right, after all. :-) --Carl Jantzen 13:02, 22 August 2007 (CDT)

Not quite, there should be cleanup and underlinked cats in there too. You have found some sort of bug. Chris Day (talk) 13:03, 22 August 2007 (CDT)

Got that fixed, thanks for field testing, I would not have noticed otherwise. Chris Day (talk) 13:14, 22 August 2007 (CDT)