Talk:ZX81/GA1

GA Review

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Reviewer: Ritchie333 (talk · contribs) 11:41, 18 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I'll give this a go. The article is 85K, which implies it's quite long, so it may take a while to whittle thought everything. --Ritchie333 ^(talk) ^(cont) 11:41, 18 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Okay, I've had a look now and here's what I've found.

Lead

Was the Timex Sinclair 1000 really that commercially successful in the US? The detail of the article suggests it had a brief initial success, then failed.

It wasn't successful for long, but it was very successful over a short period - as the article says, it sold 550,000 units. That's a big commercial success by any description. Prioryman (talk) 23:29, 18 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Best change it to "briefly successful in the United States". --Ritchie333 ^(talk) ^(cont) 14:47, 20 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I've added a bit about how Timex "enjoyed a substantial but brief boom in sales", which I think gets across the same point. Prioryman (talk) 12:31, 21 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Features

Regarding memory - if the display takes up 768 bytes, adding on another 125 for system variables leaves you with 131 for your program, so how did 1K Chess get 672 bytes available?

I was never much good at programming the ZX81, but one thing I do remember about it is that absolutely everything is done in memory. This means that if you have a lot of code the display starts to fall to bits, as it's being overwritten by your program. There are various tricks available for optimising the use of memory. The full code of the 1K Chess program can be found at http://users.ox.ac.uk/~uzdm0006/scans/1kchess/ . Prioryman (talk) 23:55, 18 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I think it was because screen memory is all ASCII based, and the newline character blanks the rest of the line, so the display is variable between 24 bytes (blank screen, all newlines) and 768 (all 32 characters of each of the 24 lines used). Change "768" to "up to 768" and that will fix that. --Ritchie333 ^(talk) ^(cont) 14:47, 20 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Ah, now I remember - you're right. I've made that change. Prioryman (talk) 07:45, 21 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Comparisons between ZX81 and other computing devices (table)

I'm not sure the list is particularly good. Looking at WP:EMBED, it suggests trying to collapse list data down into prose if you can. You can probably get rid of this list entirely, to be honest, as comparisons to contemporary micros are listed later on in the "Marketing" section.

The list does something completely different from the comparisons in the "Marketing" section. The list is intended to highlight the comparative hardware choices on offer and provide some context for the feature set that Sinclair chose to include. It was compiled by a magazine, Compute, specifically for that reason. The comparisons in the "Marketing" section are Sinclair's own comparisons - which as you've rightly said were probably cherry-picked to show the ZX81 in the best light - and focus purely on price, not hardware. Prioryman (talk) 20:29, 22 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Okay, now I see the list is direct from a source, that makes more sense. --Ritchie333 ^(talk) ^(cont) 09:10, 24 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

References

Per WP:MOS#Notes and References, "Notes" should read "References", while "References" should read "Works cited"

I've previously used "Notes" and "Bibliography" in featured articles (see Sinking of the RMS Titanic for an example) so I've gone with that. Prioryman (talk) 08:03, 20 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Isn't that just a specialised case of WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS? I'd prefer going with what the MOS says. --Ritchie333 ^(talk) ^(cont) 14:47, 20 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I had a look at your link but there isn't a "Notes and References" section of the MOS and I can't see any mention of using "Works cited". Could you please clarify what you are citing? I've specifically used the terminology mentioned above because it was recommended by FAC reviewers. Prioryman (talk) 07:43, 21 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I think I was a bit unsure as to what you meant, but what's currently there "References" and "Bibliography" seems to look okay. --Ritchie333 ^(talk) ^(cont) 09:10, 24 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

The citation for units sold, and several other sales figures, are cited directly to Sinclair Research, which is a primary source. There's a possibility of mild puffery with that - might just be seeing if an alternative source can back it up, or stating specifically where it comes from. For instance, regarding the ZX81 / Apple comparisons, who's to say they didn't just pick the most expensive Apple package going and compare it against that?

Well, the sales figures came from Sinclair, don't forget. I'll see if I can find a secondary source but they would just be quoting a Sinclair press release so why bother with the middle man? Prioryman (talk) 08:03, 20 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

You can probably solve that by stating "according to Sinclair" or "Sinclair stated" every time a sales figure or feature comparison comes up. Just sales figures on their own are probably okay. Sinclair did seem to like banging on about the number of chips in a ZX81 compared to a TRS80, though! --Ritchie333 ^(talk) ^(cont) 14:47, 20 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

In the end I found only one case of a sales figure cited directly to Sinclair (the 1.5 million figure). Everything else seems to be from a secondary source, unless I've missed something... Prioryman (talk) 21:26, 22 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

You can cite every back issue of Crash online here - I checked out the reference and it's got the correct issue and page number.

I didn't cite it directly to that website because I'm not sure about the copyright status; bear in mind WP:EL#Restrictions on linking. Prioryman (talk) 08:03, 20 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Disambigs

Timex Sinclair 2040 is a circular redirect

Turns out this was on a transcluded template Template:Sinclair computers and clones - I've stubbed out the wikilink for the time being. --Ritchie333 ^(talk) ^(cont) 09:10, 24 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Other issues

The end of the "Distribution" section has a one line sentence - might be worth seeing if it can be integrated into another paragraph.

Done. Prioryman (talk) 12:31, 21 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

"Sinclair Programs" is a redlink (I remember typing stuff out from it as a wee lad)

Created an article on it. Prioryman (talk) 21:27, 22 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Don't know if you can find anything on this, but I think a mention of Russian ZX81 clones might be worthwhile - it's certainly well known that they did a lot of hardware hacking on the ZX Spectrum later on the 80s.

They certainly did on the ZX Spectrum, but I've not been able to find anything on Russian ZX81 clones unfortunately... Prioryman (talk) 07:24, 23 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Summary

GA review (see here for what the criteria are, and here for what they are not)

Taking those comments on board, we get

It is reasonably well written.
a (prose): b (MoS for lead, layout, word choice, fiction, and lists)
See above comments
It is factually accurate and verifiable.
a (references): b (citations to reliable sources): c (OR):
See above comments
It is broad in its coverage.
a (major aspects): b (focused):
It follows the neutral point of view policy.
Fair representation without bias:
It is stable.
No edit wars, etc.:
There was a bit of an edit war last November, but nothing else
It is illustrated by images, where possible and appropriate.
a (images are tagged and non-free images have fair use rationales): b (appropriate use with suitable captions):
The Sinclair Research advert is copyrighted - how does it qualify as fair use here?
The advert is used specifically to discuss the marketing campaign for the ZX81, on which there's an entire section. The marketing was quite innovative for its day and has been the subject of a considerable amount of commentary. As the fair use rationale says, it's "To accompany critical commentary on Sinclair Research's marketing campaign for the ZX81, with reference to the layout, design, typography, language and purpose of this display advertisement." The use of that image has already been through the feature article review process. Prioryman (talk) 07:58, 20 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Well, I guess if nobody's CSDed it by now, it's probably okay. --Ritchie333 ^(talk) ^(cont) 14:47, 20 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Overall:
Pass/Fail:
This would be a good candidate for a featured article (again!) after this. For now I'll put this On hold until the above issues are looked at.

--Ritchie333 ^(talk) ^(cont) 20:01, 18 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Having reviewed again, it looks like all the comments are now resolved, so this is a Pass. Well done. --Ritchie333 ^(talk) ^(cont) 09:10, 24 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]