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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 not promoted 16:58, 22 May 2007.

History of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

[edit]

Nominating on behalf of User:Tomcool. This article recently passed GA criteria, and I feel that it meets the criteria of FA. Prior FAC Nomination discussion did not seem sufficient enough for a denial. User:Tomcool has continued to make updates and this article seems to be in excellent shape. Please leave comments on talk page. PadreNuestro 01:39, 12 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

  • Comment Refs have to be formatted properly the web refs don't have publisher info, access dates, author info, and pub dates (if applicable in the last two cases). Also book info usually has the authors listed first in most cases, although the order of the info doesn't matter as much to me as long as it's all there. Quadzilla99 17:42, 12 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • Response Good comment, I'll get those refs cleaned up and "wikified" over the next 2 days. PadreNuestro 19:24, 12 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
      • Update I have cleaned up the web citations using citeweb templates. PadreNuestro 01:56, 14 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
        • Okay, they look good so far still need a little work. Templates are optional, you could use the ref format on Tourette Syndrome and Michael Jordan if you prefer to do them manually but the format looks solid. There's still some info missing like ISBNs for all the books that have them, some author info, and some pub dates. I know ISBNs often aren't available on older books but refs 4, 5, and 37 should have them (check for others). Ref 6 is missing author info, since it's on the web it should have pub date and a retrieval date (it says retrieved on May 13, 2001, should be retrieved on April 13, 2007 pub date is May 13, 2001). If there's no author and pub date info like in ref 1 then that would be fine, but if they have an author and a pub date they should be listed. Also the information that goes after this: "he counted 789 warriors from ten different tribes:[9]" would be better organized in a box perhaps (it looks uncouth if you have a high resolution computer screen, there's a blank gap in the text and the identations look awkward). Prose would be ideal but I don't see how that could be done. See here. Quadzilla99 03:48, 14 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
          • Thanks again for your comments. Based upon your comments I plan to do the following
            • Beef up references 4, 5, 37, and 6 based upon your recommendations
              • Update: I have updated references 4, 5, 6, and 37 as discussed
            • Replace the bullet points with a table as you have suggested.PadreNuestro 03:00, 16 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
              • Update: I spent some time thinking about this one. Don't think a traditional table is what would look best since we only have two heading categories (tribes and dates). I changed the list format to fit in tighter and I think it looks more "table-ish", but still retains a more appropriate list format. If you can think of a better way let me know. PadreNuestro 03:00, 16 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
              • Any other comments in this process are appreciated. PadreNuestro 04:21, 14 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Weak oppose—1a issues:
    • "In 1748, when Conrad Weiser visited Logstown, he counted 789 warriors from ten different tribes:" "Different" is redundant.
    • Other general redundancies, such as "in order" to (only useful in a extremely complex sentences or when the opposite is being pointed out, such as 'in order not to').
    • "For over ten thousand years, Native Americans populated this region." "More than" is often more elegant than "over".
    • "During this transition, the city population shrank to 330,000 in the year 2000." A bit awkward. Perhaps "In 2000, the population dropped to 330,000 as a result of the transition" or something along those lines.
    • "Meadowcroft Rockshelter, west of Pittsburgh, provides evidence that these first Americans occupied the region from that early date." You can probably drop the word "early" here.
    • "Today there are no steel mills in Pittsburgh, although manufacture continues at regional mills, such as the Edgar Thomson Works in near-by Braddock." Comma after "today" is a good idea, and "near-by" does not need a hyphen. Speaking of which, there are numerous hyphen issues throughout the article.
    • "In civic developments, in 1886, the third (and present) Allegheny County Courthouse and Jail was completed." "In civic developments" seems unnecessary. Also, you might want to rephrase this sentence to avoid "in <date>," repetition.
  • These are just random examples; the entire article needs a copy-edit by two or three editors. — Deckiller 08:13, 15 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Hate to do this, but shouldn't the title be History of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania? See similar FA History of Miami, Florida, and most other similar articles/categories the preference is to include the state name. --W.marsh 15:05, 15 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Repsonses
    • Those are some good points on the prose, any others would be appreciated. I will go through this with a fine tooth comb and make changes until the prose is "brilliant" (warning: I'm only "pretty smart"). Some of these might be matters of opinion, but I am not terribly opposed to changing something to an equal substitute as long as it keeps things moving along.
      • Update: I have made the prose changes that you identified but I have not yet had time to completely run through the thing again. Should be done later tomorrow. I am not the original writer so I should be able to give a fresh perspective and make some decent edits.
    • I think you're right on the title, good call. Not sure how to change the entire name of the article, but I'll look around and figure it out. I should be able to get to all points above late tonight or early tomorrow. It depends how long my taxes take me. Thanks again for the comments! PadreNuestro 17:18, 15 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
      • Question: The only way I can see doing this is to move the entire source code from "History of Pittsburgh" over to "History of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania" and then redirect History of Pittsburgh to History of Pittsburgh, PA. I don't mind doing this, but what are your thoughts on essentially losing the edit history of "History of Pittsburgh". If you think the move is necessary I will do so and make appropriate notes in the discussion page, but I would like your thoughts before proceeding. PadreNuestro 03:00, 16 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Update to comments

  • I have given this article a MAJOR copy edit and now feel that the prose is in very good (perhaps even brilliant?) condition. If you look at my edit history, you will see that I changed a significant portion of the first half of the article. I thought the second half was already very well written and made only small changes. I am now of the understanding that all the above conditions have been met. If I have missed something, please let me know and I will do my best to remediate the comment. Additionally, I welcome new comments that will help improve this article on its path to featured article status. PadreNuestro 02:38, 18 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Conditional support. Convert elink refs to proper footnotes in population tables. Upload free licence photos to commons and categorize properly.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  13:52, 19 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Requests Met

  • With my latest edits I have met all the above requests to the best of my ability. I would be happy to accomodate any additional requests in order to move this article forward. PadreNuestro 03:15, 25 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment—the prose has definitely imporved, but it still needs work. Also, the lead is still a little long for my tastes, but it's within the style guidelines. — Deckiller 17:52, 27 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • Response- I have spent some time thinking about how to improve the prose. My impression is that while the prose is in good shape, the overall read can be a little choppy on account of so much information getting crammed into a small space. An encyclopedia isn't a great format to discuss an article like The History of Pittsburgh; it would be more appropriately covered in a book. I read other traditional encyclopedia "History of City" entries, and this one actually reads much better. By that measure I am arguring that the article does in fact have a professional level of writing, but in the battle between eloquence and comprehensiveness, it leans more towards comprehensiveness. Here is a link to the 1911 EofB article Pittsburgh article in the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica, you'll see that the Wikipedia prose is of higher quality. I am more than willing to make additional changes based upon specific recommendations on improving the article, but at this point I am comfortable that the prose is in excellent shape considering the breadth of the topic. Your feedback is always appreciated. PadreNuestro 19:04, 27 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. 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.
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