Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Alodia/archive1

The following is an archived discussion of a featured article nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was archived by Ian Rose via FACBot (talk) 23:28, 4 May 2018 [1].

Alodia

Nominator(s): LeGabrie (talk) 21:27, 16 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]

This article is about the Medieval Nubian kingdom of Alodia, which lasted from the sixth century to c. 1500. The article covers what is known about its history, geography, government and culture. LeGabrie (talk) 21:27, 16 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Comments by Lingzhi

Is this your first FAC? You have some serious work to do on your notes & references. Fix as many as you can; ask if you don't know what to do.
Zarroug 1991, p. 7-8. P/PP error? p. 7-8.; Hyphen in pg. range;

Fixed.

O'Fahey & Spaulding, p. 19. Harv error: link from CITEREFO'FaheySpaulding doesn't point to any citation.

Fixed.

Abu Manga 2009, p. 377. Harv error: link from CITEREFAbu_Manga2009 doesn't point to any citation.

Fixed.

O'Fahey & Spaulding, p. 31. Harv error: link from CITEREFO'FaheySpaulding doesn't point to any citation.

Fixed.

MacMichael 1922, p. 183. Harv error: link from CITEREFMacMichael1922 doesn't point to any citation.

Fixed.

Zarroug 1991, p. 77-79. P/PP error? p. 77-79.; Hyphen in pg. range;

Fixed.

Welsby & Daniels, p. 334. Harv error: link from CITEREFWelsbyDaniels doesn't point to any citation.

Fixed.

Welsby 1991, p. 307. Harv error: link from CITEREFWelsby1991 doesn't point to any citation.

Fixed.

Welsby 1991, p. 159. Harv error: link from CITEREFWelsby1991 doesn't point to any citation.

Fixed.

Danys & Zielinska, p. 183. Harv error: link from CITEREFDanysZielinska doesn't point to any citation.

Fixed.

Drzewicki 2016, p. 16. Harv error: link from CITEREFDrzewicki2016 doesn't point to any citation.

Fixed.

Drzewicki 2016, p. 8. Harv error: link from CITEREFDrzewicki2016 doesn't point to any citation.

Fixed.

Drzewicki 2016, p. 47. Harv error: link from CITEREFDrzewicki2016 doesn't point to any citation.

Fixed.

Harv warning: There is no link pointing to this citation. The anchor is named CITEREFAbu-Manga2009. Sort error, expected: Abir1980; Caution: Missing pagenums for book chapter?

Fixed.

Abir, Mordechai (1980). Sort error, expected: Abu-Manga2009;

Fixed.

Crawford, O. G. S. (1951). Missing Identifier/control number, e.g. OCLC;

Fixed.

Danys, Katarzyna; Zielinska, Dobrochna (2017). Missing identifier (ISSN, JSTOR, etc.);

Fixed

Drzewiecki, Mariusz (2016). Caution: Missing ref= anchor?;

Fixed.

Edwards, David (2001). Missing identifier (ISSN, JSTOR, etc.); Missing archive link;

Fixed.

Gonzalez-Ruibal, Alfredo; Falquina, Alvaro (2017). Missing identifier (ISSN, JSTOR, etc.);

Fixed.

(in German) Grajetzki, Wolfram (2009). Missing identifier (ISSN, JSTOR, etc.); Missing archive link;

Fixed.

Hasan, Yusuf Fadl (1967). Missing Identifier/control number, e.g. OCLC;

'Fixed.

Hatke, G. (2013). Missing Publisher; Missing ISBN;

Fixed.

Jakobielski, Stefan (2013). Missing Publisher; Missing ISBN;

Fixed

Harv warning: There is no link pointing to this citation. The anchor is named CITEREFMachMichael1922. Missing Publisher; Missing Identifier/control number, e.g. OCLC;

Fixed.

Mohamed, Abdelrahman Ali; Bakhiet, Fawzi Hassan; Salih, Muawla Mohamed (2014). Missing Publisher; Missing ISBN;

Online source. Probably needs to be referenced differently?

Obluski, Artur (2014). Sort error, expected:

?

O'FaheySpaulding1974; Missing Publisher; [I'm not sure this sort error is a valid one...]

Nope, it isn't. Publisher has just a funky name.

Obluski, Artur (2017). "Alwa". Sort error, expected: Obluski2014; Missing ISBN;

Fixed, I think?

Penn, A.E.D. (1934). Missing identifier (ISSN, JSTOR, etc.); Missing archive link;

Fixed.

Power, Tim (2008). Missing Publisher; Missing ISBN;

Fixed.

Spaulding, Jay (1974). Sort error, expected: Shinnie1961; Missing identifier (ISSN, JSTOR, etc.); Missing archive link;

Fixed.

Shinnie, P. (1961). Excavations at Soba. Sudan Antiquities Service. Sort error, expected: Spaulding2007; Missing Identifier/control number, e.g. OCLC;

Fixed.

Taha, A. Taha (2012). Missing identifier (ISSN, JSTOR, etc.); Missing archive link;

Fixed.

(in German) Török, Laszlo (1974). Missing identifier (ISSN, JSTOR, etc.); Missing archive link;

Fixed.

Tsakos, Alexandros (2011). Missing identifier (ISSN, JSTOR, etc.); Missing archive link;

Fixed.

Tsakos, Alexandros (2016). Missing Publisher; Missing ISBN;

Source is a blog. Probably needs to be referenced differently?

Tsakos, Alexandros; Kleinitz, Cornelia (forthcoming). Check date values in: |date= (help) Caution: Missing pagenums for book chapter? Missing Year/Date;

Forthcoming book. Probably needs to be referenced differently?

Vantini, Giovanni (1975). Missing ISBN;

Tried to find the ISBN, but didn't succeed. Maybe it doesn't even have one?

Welsby, Derek; Daniels, C.M. (1991). Soba. Archaeological Research at a Medieval Capital on the Blue Nile. The British Institute in Eastern Africa. ISBN 1872566022. Sort error, expected: Welsby1998;

Fixed.

Welsby, Derek (1998). Sort error, expected: Welsby2002;

Fixed.

Welsby, Derek (2002). Sort error, expected: WelsbyDaniels1991; Warning: Unexpected result – extra formatting in template? Missing ISBN;

Fixed.

Lingzhi ♦ (talk) 14:49, 18 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@User:Lingzhi Yes, this is my first FA-nomination, though I had two GA-nominations around a month ago. I fixed most stuff, but I need some help with these archive links, identifiers and proper reference of online sources. LeGabrie (talk) 21:22, 18 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]

I fixed two for you: "sort error, Abir goes before Abu-Manga" and "rm unexpected formatting". I think your sorting order is correct in one instance: Oblung does come before O'Fahey, and I need to tweak the script. There are other sort errors lower down the list though, and still several other errors. One error that may seem strange: Power, Tim (2008)." Missing Publisher; Missing ISBN;".. this error is because you are using {{cite book}} when you should have used {{cite journal}} instead, so the script thinks it is a book that needs a publisher and an ISBN. Plus you're missing a lot of info: Power, Tim (2008). The Origin and Development of the Sudanese Ports (‘Aydhâb, Bâ/di‘, Sawâkin) in the early Islamic Period. Chroniques yéménites |volume=15 URL : http://journals.openedition.org/cy/1685 ; DOI : 10.4000/cy.1685 |pages=92-110. And so on. Lingzhi ♦ (talk) 23:56, 18 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@Lingzhi Fixed Power and put Welsby&Daniels in correct order. What errors are left which need to be fixed? LeGabrie (talk) 12:06, 19 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]

You can, for example, go to worldcat and very often you'll find isbn, oclc or issn info. Other quite useful tools include IABot's Analyze a page for archiving links, User:Citation bot/use, and User talk:GregU/dashes.js for hyphens in your page ranges. Lingzhi ♦ (talk) 13:09, 19 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@Lingzhi Added the OCLC numbers and archiving links. LeGabrie (talk) 20:24, 19 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]

(←) Did you add those archive links by hand? I'm sorry I didn't explain there's a little checkbox labeled "Add archives to all non-dead references (Optional)". Check that & the bot will add whatever it can. I fixed another sort error and let a script fix your hyphens in pg range for you... Well you're missing some publishers. "The rise of Nobadia : social changes in Northern Nubia in late Antiquity" forex is jointly published by 3 or 4 organizations, but WorldCat just grabbed the first one, which is good enough for me: |location=Warsaw, Poland|publisher=University of Warsaw Faculty of Law and Administration, Chair of Roman Law and the Law of Antiquity. And so on, there are more erros or warnings. And if you want to know how I saw all these errors, read User:Lingzhi/reviewsourcecheck carefully. Lingzhi ♦ (talk) 23:06, 19 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@Lingzhi Ok I've added all missing publishers. I would like to ask you if you could take care of all that script stuff. Could you perhaps make a new list with all the errors that still need to be fixed, so we can get this references stuff done? LeGabrie (talk) 21:27, 20 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Hah! Take heart, you're 98% done, Only a couple little ones. Also, there are times when you just can't find some info or it just doesn't exist, so of course nothing is ever 100% completely perfect.
Mohamed, Abdelrahman Ali; Bakhiet, Fawzi Hassan; Salih, Muawla Mohamed (2014). Missing Publisher; Missing ISBN;
Tsakos, Alexandros (2016). Missing Publisher; Missing ISBN;
Tsakos, Alexandros; Kleinitz, Cornelia (forthcoming). Check date values in: |date= (help) Caution: Missing pagenums for book chapter? Missing Year/Date;
Vantini, Giovanni (1975). Missing ISBN;
Lingzhi ♦ (talk) 23:25, 20 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@Lingzhi Lucky me, already thought you had discovered yet a ton more errors. Added the OCLC number for Vantini 1975. Tsakos 2016 and Mohamed et al 2016 are online sources not published in any book or journal, and therefore have no ISBN's, publishers etc. Tsakos&Kleinitz hasn't been published yet. How to handle those? LeGabrie (talk) 13:05, 21 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@Lingzhi Hello? LeGabrie (talk) 10:23, 25 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]

I'm extremely busy with my own FAC plus real-world responsibilities. However:
Mohamed, Abdelrahman Ali; Bakhiet, Fawzi Hassan (2014). Harv warning: There is no link pointing to this citation. The anchor is named CITEREFMohamedBakhiet2014.
Mohamed, Bakhiet & Salih 2014, Fig. 112. Harv error: link from CITEREFMohamedBakhietSalih2014 doesn't point to any citation. Lingzhi ♦ (talk) 10:53, 25 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@Lingzhi Fixed that. What do I do concerning Tsakos 2016 and Tsakos&Kleinitz forthcoming? LeGabrie (talk) 10:59, 25 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Tsakos 2016 won't require the same params (or throw the errors) when you use {{cite web}} instead of {{cite book}} for a website. A few issues with "forthcoming": (1) It is not listed in Help:CS1 errors#bad_date, so it will throw an error. (2)

Wikipedia articles should be based on reliable, published sources
— first sentence of Wikipedia:Identifying reliable sources

Since the source hasn't been published, it hasn't been vetted. To a lesser extent, it also goes against our principle of verifiable accuracy. Is there no other way to make the same claim? And if so, how important is the claim? Especially at FAC, reviewers will check that sources are rocksteady reliable. BB alluded below that the writing should veer far away from original claims—the idea is to paraphrase claims already confirmed by the literature. The experimental claims might work on another wiki, but we keep to the most reliable sources to best fit a general audience. (Put more succinctly, our job is to present the authoritative sources, not to find the truth.)

I repaired the two Tsakos citations and changed the second's date to "n.d." but it will likely be excised through this FAC on grounds of reliability. czar 01:02, 4 May 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Brianboulton

Oppose for the moment. This is an impressive article in a number of ways, but I have concerns on prose and presentation:

The Christianization and peak section ends with the statement: "In conclusion, and summarizing both the written sources as well as archaeology, the 9th–12th century can be considered as the Golden Age of Soba and the Alodian kingdom." This reads very much like an editorial opinion. I see that the statement is cited to Shinnie 1961 – what, specifially, does Shinnie say? Does he/she draw this conclusion?
A similar issue arises in the Aftermath section, second para, which begins: "Ignoring the possible Alodian influence in the formation of a kingdom in Fazughli, the Alodian legacy can be summarized like this." That is the editorial voice again, which needs to be suppressed.
Likewise, at the end of the Agriculture section: "It seems logical to assume that fishing would have played some role in feeding river communities, though at least at Soba it appears to have been only of minor relevance". Again, "It seems logical" reads as an editorial judgement – is this the source's conclusion?
Modern sources such as Zarroug, Welsby, Daniels, Adams and no doubt others should be properly "introduced" at first mention in the text, rather than just dropping in the name. There's also someone called "Bruce" whose name turns up with no indication or explanation as to who he or she is.
Sections should not be written in bulleted or numbered paragraphs.
There are numerous oddities of expression. "Long before Alodia becomes tangible as a kingdom..." is not idiomatic, neither is "concrete localization" ("exact location"?) which occurs in the same section. "some Alwa" is likewise strange. "Be it as it may, it doesn't seem as if..." is not encycopedic prose, nor are phrasings such as "it rather seems that..." There are many more examples – do not take this as a defining list.
The only prior review of the article seems to be the PR which you asked for "because I would like to get this article going for a 'Good article' status". That review does not seem to have covered the prose in detail, nor do you seem to have followed your intention to seek GA status. Thus, the article appears somewhat unprepared to be judged against the FA criteria. I think a top-to-bottom copyedit by a reviewer experienced in the FAC process is minimally necessary, if you are to meet these criteria. The copyeditor should be watchful for:

Statements which appear to reflect an editorial opinion
Odd phrasings when simpler English would suffice
Informal or colloquial expressions, e.g. there are several instances of "doesn't" and "can't".

As I said initially, I think this article is praiseworthy – but unready. I'm happy to wait a week or so for the necessary adjustments and copyedit, and will look again then. Brianboulton (talk) 09:59, 27 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@User:Brianboulton & User:czar I decided to freeze the FA-nomination and make the article a GA first. LeGabrie (talk) 17:51, 4 May 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Probably the right decision. I'll look out for it if/when it returns to FAC. Try to get the copyedit done. Brianboulton (talk) 18:36, 4 May 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Hi LeGabrie, I'll treat 'freezing' the nomination as a withdrawal and action accordingly. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 23:27, 4 May 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Closing note: This candidate has been withdrawn, but there may be a delay in bot processing of the close. Please see WP:FAC/ar, and leave the {{featured article candidates}} template in place on the talk page until the bot goes through. Ian Rose (talk) 23:28, 4 May 2018 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.