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Portal:Africa

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I've been working on this portal for about three months and submitted it for peer review last month. I think it meets all of the featured portal criteria and am thus nominating it for consideration. Any suggestions for improvement would be most welcome. — Black Falcon (Talk) 19:48, 30 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

  • Okay, a few questions/suggestions. How does /Featured article rotate? Is it the same featured article 12 times a year, once a month? I'd also suggest a lighter color for the headers, as the black seems to overshadow the text - but this is just personal preference, really. Finally, would it be worth it to merge the /Suportals and /Wikiprojects pages? Since there is a good amount of overlap, two sections, as opposed to one, seems sort of wasteful. On my screen at least, /Things you can do and /Wikiprojects are just about even with each other, but /Subportals leaves a good amount of tanspace under /Wikiprojects that doesn't need to be there. Finally, /Countries of Africa also has a large amount of whitespace. How could it be rearranged to minimize this? Picaroon (t) 20:58, 30 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • The /Featured article box is set on a daily rotation. So, yes, each article appears 12 times a year, on the same day each month. However, such a system can accommodate only 31 articles and I've been able to identify 31 Africa-related FAs (see here for the list). So, as soon as another Africa-related article is featured, I would have needed to change the rotation system to either (1) a weekly rotation that accommodates 52 articles, or (2) a random rotation that changes every time the page is refreshed. I might as well change it now. Which rotation would you suggest?
    • I have changed the header colour from black to dark khaki and also lightened the portal's background colour. Is that better?
    • I will tinker with the layout over the next hour and post more detailed comments then. Thanks for your comments, Black Falcon (Talk) 22:36, 30 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
      • I have edited the various "featured picture" pages (see contribs) to standardise their length. I have also started doing likewise for some of the longer "featured article" page. The /Subportals and /Wikiprojects boxes should now be more even. Do you still think it's worth merging them, considering the fact that doing so will generate extra whitespace?
      • I'll keep working on /Countries of Africa. A horizontal format might reduce whitespace ... my worry is that it would look cluttered. Still, I'll test a horizontal format. Alternately, I could forgo the idea of dividing by regions and simply list the countries alphabetically (as at Portal:Latin America/Countries of Latin America). — Black Falcon (Talk) 23:33, 30 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
        • I think that a horizontal format (which would minimize whitespace) results in too much clutter: see these two versions. Both are incomplete, but already cluttered. I can try to implement the model of Portal:Latin America (a featured portal), but that requires leaving out the map and forgoing grouping of countries by region. Would something like that be preferable to the current version? Black Falcon (Talk) 02:05, 1 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Looks good, so I support the nomination. The only other issue I have is that the featured picture, at 200px is a bit small. I'd prefer 250px - 300px, but again, this is just my preference. Picaroon (t) 23:39, 30 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comments: Overall it is good. But, this is a portal on an entire continent. So I would expect the page to be a bit more enriched to be a featured (one of the best) portal:
    • We may consider having a separate section for Selected biography and/or Selected country to help feature more aricles on the page at the same time.
    • header-color (khaki) should be a bit more darker to increase contrast with header font color (white). Arman Aziz 23:52, 31 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
      • That, or the header font could be made darker. Picaroon (t) 23:55, 31 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
      • Regarding a biography and/or country topic box: there are only 6 Africa-related featured biographies and 6 FAs about countries. Are you suggesting presenting those separately from the other 19 Africa-related FAs or introducing topics boxes for non-featured articles? Black Falcon (Talk) 02:11, 1 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]
        • Yes I am suggesting to put these featured articles in separate boxes. That would serve two purposes. From reader's perspective, it would mean more information on Africa from the portal page without going into archives. For editors, it would encourage them to improve other country and biography articles to add them to the portal. One of the purpose of portal is to encourage editors to develop more articles on the topic. For countries, however, we can consider having even non-featured articles on portal since countries are the primary building blocks of a continent.
        • The black font color has increased the contrast. I have also changed the border color to black. Does it look better?
        • Just now I discovered that the portal is showing the same picture in selected article section as well as selected picture section at the same time. This gives a poor impression about the richness of the portal. I know this has happened because of random rotation. But, preferably there should be a coded way to avoid this, or we can consider eliminating either the article or the picture from the rotation. Arman Aziz 01:05, 2 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Randomized rotation for the FAs is much better than the static one. However, the khaki color/theme gives the feeling that it is about a safari expedition. A black color would be confusing as it is used extensively at Portal:Military history of Africa. Talking about rich content, could we please link the African military history portal from there? Overall, i support. -- FayssalF - Wiki me up® 15:14, 2 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • Thank you. I will tinker with the colours some more to see if I can find something better; is there any particular colour you think would work well? Also, the African military history portal is linked from the /Subportals box. Black Falcon (Talk) 21:21, 5 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Object with regard to the tab system: Countries is a redlink, and please don't use a tab to take the viewer to another portal (as you do with Military history). Otherwise, fairly decent.--cj | talk 03:23, 22 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • I've removed the redlink. With regards to the tab, what's wrong with it? It's the same topic, the military history one is just more focused. I think a tab is a good way to link to it and make it more prominent than the other subportals of this. Picaroon (t) 04:18, 22 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]
      • The tab system is used on portals to navigate within a portal. You're throwing the reader off by sending them to another portal with markedly different (and, just by-the-by, unattractive) formatting with no obvious way to navigate back to the portal they intended to read. Military history is a subportal. There seems no reason to maintain the tab system since you've removed Countries.--cj | talk 05:12, 22 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]
        • I was absent for the past week, which is why the "/Countries" tab remained a redlink. Following Arman Aziz's suggestion, I intend to use that tab to house a "Selected country" box (along with the flags box and a map). I have also replaced the link to the African military history portal with a "Projects" tab. It will take me some time to complete the two new tabs (and to make a few other updates), but I expect to finish today or tomorrow. Perhaps you could take a second look after I've finished (I'll leave a note here when I have). Black Falcon (Talk) 21:08, 22 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment the Countries tab is full of redlinks - the map, and quite a few next to it. Any way of fixing this? ~ Riana ⁂ 12:10, 23 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose I'm sorry, but I have to oppose this despite the fact that I like the tabbing system, which I regard this as a "ground-breaking" layout in portals. Selected countries are under construction. You should nominate the portal when it's complete. OhanaUnitedTalk page 20:31, 27 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • The "Selected country" box (and, by extension, the "Countries" tab) has been completed. Please see Portal talk:Africa/Countries/Selected country. The suggestion for a "Selected country" box was made during the course of this nomination, so that's why it was incomplete. At first I thought it would be something I could complete in 2-3 hours, but the page for each country ended up taking about 10-20 minutes, primarily to ensure a standard length so that the "Selected country" and "Map" boxes could be of equal size. – Black Falcon (Talk) 03:04, 29 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]
      • Are you planning to use "Random portal component"? I don't see the point of making 53 selected countries articles but always displaying the same one (currently Congo). Also, making all 53 doesn't justifying the term "selected", eh? Same issue goes to selected pictures and articles. You need to get random portal component working. Another suggestion from me is to create selected biographies of African people. A lot of work needs to be done before I'll support this nomination. OhanaUnitedTalk page 04:13, 29 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]
        • All three (FA, FP, and selected country) currently do use Template:Random portal component ... does it not work for you? If not, does it work if you click the "Purge server cache" link at the bottom right cornerof the page?
        • As far as the choice of "Selected country" as the box title, I suppose I meant it as "the country article that is selected/displayed (randomly) at this moment". I can't think of an alternate title right now and, unfortunately, none of the other geography-related featured portals really have a "subdivisions" box whose title I could emulate. Portal:European Union has a "Selected city" box and Portal:Texas has a "Showcase city" box, but neither case is really comparable since neither includes the full population of cities in the EU and Texas, respectively. I'll try to come up with some alternate names by tomorrow.
        • I think a biographies box should be fairly simple to create and populate. Would you suggest that I limit it to featured biographies only (following the 'featured' content theme thus far) or should it showcase GA-class and A-class (and perhaps even B-class?) articles as well? Thanks, Black Falcon (Talk) 05:00, 29 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment: This portal has come a long way after the Nomination! By the way, dear Falcon, viewed form IE, the selected country box and the map don't come side by side - they come one after another, which needs to be fixed. Perhaps reducing the image size of the map will do the trick. I attempted to do it myself, but the "edit" link with the map took me to a blank page! Arman (Talk) 06:39, 29 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • That's strange. I use IE as well but haven't encountered that problem; I even tested it with 5 different screen resolutions. I fixed the "edit" link, so it will now lead you to the proper target. Would you mind trying it now (I'd do it myself except for the fact that I can't replicate the problem and thus can't know what change fixes it)? Does changing the image size fix the issue? If not, what about removing the "center" parameter? If that doesn't work either, how about changing the width given to each box at Portal:Africa/Countries, with the relevant lines being <div style="float:left; width:60%;"> for "Selected country" (for which I'm trying to think of a better name) and <div style="float:right; width:39%;"> for "Map"? Black Falcon (Talk) 07:01, 29 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]
      • I have fixed the few remaining problems from my browser. I now support this featured portal candidate. One minor thing for Falcon, you may now consider taking out the country articles from the featured article roster. By the way, "Selected country" title seems alright to me. Arman (Talk) 00:39, 30 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]
        • Do you think that's necessary? After all, the "Selected country" and "Featured article" boxes serve substantially different purposes. Moreover, the probability that someone will encounter the same article during a single visit to the portal is quite low. There is an 18% chance (6/33) that "Featured article" will display a country article. If "Featured article" displays a country article, there is a 1.9% chance (1/53) that "Selected country" will display the same article. Thus, there is only a 0.3% chance (6/1749) that "Featured article" and "Selected country" will repeat each other. – Black Falcon (Talk) 19:36, 30 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Object on a few minor points:
  • Support Looks good. Joe I 01:13, 6 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment How come this nom hasn't closed yet? It's more than a month since the nom started. OhanaUnitedTalk page 22:10, 2 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • I'd like to see new comments/changes to support/continued opposition from the objectors: User:cj and User:Searchme (aka. Joe). feydey 20:56, 3 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
      • The specific issues raised by cj regarding the tab system have been addressed; I left a note on his/her user talk page a few days ago requesting that s/he take a look at the revised portal and comment again, but it seems that s/he is on indefinite wikibreak (see the note at the top of User:CJ). I am in the process of addressing the issues raised by Joe. – Black Falcon (Talk) 21:19, 3 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
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