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User:Apovolot/Expert peer review

See User:Apovolot/Expert peer review – my proposal. Apovolot (talk) 01:12, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

Question about blocked user

I contributed to a PR, and shortly after the requester was indef blocked. It seems silly to leave a PR on the page when it is unlikely anyone else will come by and make improvements based on my comments. Is there a way to set it up for archive, so page space can saved? Or does it have to stay up for the duration? Thanks. §hep • ¡Talk to me! 23:38, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

VeblenBot

I noticed that a full two-thirds of the "everyday life" section is in fact sports-related, so I thought it might be wise to make ==Sports== a separate section. Unfortunately this seems to actually on a sub-page of User:VeblenBot, which seems to me like a design flaw. Can this be re-organized without causing the bot to malfunction? — CharlotteWebb 20:22, 24 November 2008 (UTC)

My understanding is that the ten divisions in Peer review are the Wikipedia 1.0 divisions. Since Sports is not one of these divisions, I do not think it should be separate. Ruhrfisch ><>°° 00:20, 25 November 2008 (UTC)
I happened to catch this in my watch list; in general please make sure to clue me in if the bot needs updating. The present system is entirely based on downloading the contents of various categories. No actual change in the bot is required beyond adding another category to its list. Some on-wiki changes would be required to make the new page active.
By the way, both User:Geometry guy and I both can add additional categories to the bot using a web form [1]; I can consider giving this ability to other trusted people if they request it. — Carl (CBM · talk) 00:36, 25 November 2008 (UTC)
Thanks Carl , just to clarify, if the sections are not tied to WP 1.0, then I am fine with a sports section being added. Ruhrfisch ><>°° 03:16, 25 November 2008 (UTC)
If the WP 1.0 categories are too coarse for peer review, then it makes sense to split them into a finer set of categories. I don't know any part of the WP 1.0 system that relies on how peer reviews are sorted. — Carl (CBM · talk) 03:38, 25 November 2008 (UTC)

All That Glitters (TV series)

I set up the peer review page but the corresponding template did not appear on the talk page. It's like the edit to start the process never registered in the history. I tried starting again but that leads to a second review page. Can someone take a look to see what's up? Thanks. Otto4711 (talk) 01:16, 28 November 2008 (UTC)

  • Oh, you are too kind – I fixed it and then got busy IRL before I could let you know. Happy Thanksgiving,

Ruhrfisch ><>°° 02:37, 28 November 2008 (UTC)

Article suitability

I would be very interested to know if the article Petrevene is suitable for peer review. Technically speaking it is a C-class article, but I am interested to find out other users opinion of it and how I should go about improving it. I would very much like to push this article from a "C" to a "B" class . If you do not think it is suitable for peer review, do say and I will leave the matter to rest, but please can you direct me to any project or part of Wikipedia that I can turn to for help or advice.--P.Marlow (talk) 15:06, 30 November 2008 (UTC)

Very well then I will nominate it for peer review. If you have any issues with it being nominated, (with a genuine reason for its removal), please tell me I will remove it from the listings.--P.Marlow (talk)
Peer review should be able to handle any reasonably well developed article, not just those where editors are pushing for GA or FA. There's no guarantee you'll get useful comments, but there is certainly no harm in asking! Geometry guy 19:21, 1 December 2008 (UTC)
Here is the link to the relevant page: Wikipedia:Peer review/Petrevene/archive1. Thanks for your support on this, and please feel free to review the page and contribute suggestions for improvement.--P.Marlow (talk) 21:27, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

Please help with the backlog

There are 28 peer reviews in the backlog. Thanks to everyone who has helped, but we are getting further and further behind and any additional help would be greatly appreciated. Ruhrfisch ><>°° 03:11, 20 December 2008 (UTC)

Formatting oops

In trying to help with the backlog of articles needing review. I have made a mistake in formatting my comments. I would add a section to the archive page which looked separate enough. I did not think it would mess with the formatting of this page. Well it did. Sorry about that. If it weren't for the fact that bots are involved I would simply reformat the page myself. Since there are bots involved I can do nothing. I am changing how my comments are formatted under each review in the hopes that the bot will eventually update the page. Sorry.--Hfarmer (talk) 09:00, 22 December 2008 (UTC)

No problem and thanks for your comments. Adding the semi-automated peer review to a peer review stops it from being transcluded on WP:PR so I removed it. Also changed the headers to level four headers ====like this====. Finally, to help keep the PR page loading as fast as possile, once a review is done, the  Doing... is removed, and images like done are not used. The bot won't fix these, but I did. ;-) Ruhrfisch ><>°° 12:24, 22 December 2008 (UTC)

Bot problems

Neither PeerReviewBot nor VeblenBot seems to be running. I let Carl know, but he is traveling. The toolserver is down, so I can't run Carl's nifty tool for partial transclusion of peer reviews. Until the bots are working, no new PRs will bn listed here, and old ones won't be archived. Ruhrfisch ><>°° 12:50, 31 December 2008 (UTC)

Thanks as always to Carl – everything seems to be working again, Ruhrfisch ><>°° 13:14, 1 January 2009 (UTC)
Whoops – VeblenBot is working and new reviews are being added, but Peer Review Bot is not adding the SAPRs or archiving yet. Ruhrfisch ><>°° 13:29, 1 January 2009 (UTC)

Can't delete from the backlog

I have reviewed Oba Chandler and removed it from the backlog, yet it still shows on the PR page backlog listing. How do I get rid of it? Brianboulton (talk) 19:11, 5 January 2009 (UTC)

I have noticed the WP:PR page does not always update promptly, even if you bypass your cache. The backlog page itself does not show the review anymore – thanks for your review, Ruhrfisch ><>°° 21:26, 5 January 2009 (UTC)
Bypassing your personal cache is not sufficient for pages with transclusions: you need to purge the page (which means asking the Wikipedia servers to generate a new version, bypassing the server cache). A simple way to set this up is to click on "my preferences" and "gadgets". Under "User interface gadgets" you should find "A clock in the personal toolbar that shows the current time in UTC and also provides a link to purge the current page". Click on the box to enable it. Save your changes. Browse a few articles: you should find a clock appears just after "log out" at the upper right. Now clicking on this clock will force the Wikipedia servers to update the page you are reading, which means any transclusions such as backlog templates will be updated. Geometry guy 21:55, 5 January 2009 (UTC)

Article history

Didn't a bot once update the ArticleHistory after a PR is archived? Kinda a pain to do by hand... --mav (talk) 21:03, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

Not that I am aware of. It used to be that all of the article archiving was done by hand – User:Allen3 did it for years, then I did it for several months, and User:Peer review bot has done it since May 14, 2008. Neither Allen3 nor I (in the past) nor the bot do anything with the article history that I am aware of. I do know if an article makes FA, then User:GimmeBot updates the Article History and includes the previous peer review(s). Ruhrfisch ><>°° 04:27, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

Bot?

Tried to do Bride of Frankenstein, but it seemed to post to a separate page: Wikipedia:Peer review/Bride of Frankenstein/archive1 ... was that where it was supposed to go? Didn't understand that use of a "bot" Ched (talk) 04:59, 13 January 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for your willingness to review an article. It can be a little confuing at first, but all peer reviews are on their own separate subpages, which the bot transcludes on the main WP:PR page. Just go ahead and edit Wikipedia:Peer review/Bride of Frankenstein/archive1 and your comments will show up there and on the main pr page. Please ask if you have any other questions and thanks again, Ruhrfisch ><>°° 08:43, 13 January 2009 (UTC)
OK .. I see, the link at the right (for the section) actually links to the /archive1 page. Good deal. Sometimes it seems that every answer generates 10 new questions. I end up reading 3 pages of policy and guidelines and how to for every 1 page I edit. At this rate, I'll be a wiki-expert in say ...... about 20 years ... LOL. Thanks for taking the time to explain Ruhrfisch, I do appreciate how helpful so many of the wikipedians are. Ched (talk) 16:17, 13 January 2009 (UTC)

Break

I am taking a break from peer reviews for at least a week. I am burned out and the backlog will be OK for a week. After that, not sure what will happen.

AZPR will still do the semi-automated peer reviews and I think AZPR can update the backlog. If my break is longer than a week, I will not update the backlog at all (not even as AZPR) – do we want to continue the backlog? Is it useful?

My thanks to all who have done peer reviews off the backlog, especially User:Finetooth and User:Brianboulton of late. Ruhrfisch ><>°° 22:17, 13 January 2009 (UTC)

Thanks again for your hard work. I personally find the backlog list useful. I'm in the middle of producing some statistics on FA, GA and PR for 2008; you may be interested to know that the average PR backlog for the year was around 11. Dr pda (talk) 08:56, 14 January 2009 (UTC)
The problem for me is that I am really burned out on peer reviews, but I am like one of those retired fire horses in stories that run to the station when they hear the alarm bell. For me, doing the backlog is the alarm – here are PR requests that will fall off the cliff and be archived without a response in X days – then each time I update the backlog X is a smaller number. I think I could quit and still do the SAPRs as User:AZPR. I am not sure I can quit trying to save everyone's orphans and also do the backlog. Ruhrfisch ><>°° 13:45, 14 January 2009 (UTC)
I can quite understand. I'll take care of updating the backlog for the next week, and I'll see if I can get others to help do this for the longer term, User:Finetooth and User:Brianboulton perhaps. Dr pda (talk) 01:13, 16 January 2009 (UTC)
Thanks so much – I assume you know about the chronological listing of peer reviews at wp:pr/d and PR and FA stats at WP:FAS? I will probably be back after my week off, thanks, Ruhrfisch ><>°° 02:45, 16 January 2009 (UTC)
Knew about the second, but not the first. I just used recent changes to find out if any had been done, and Ctrl+F to find reviews which hadn't been done from the next oldest date. Dr pda (talk) 07:52, 16 January 2009 (UTC)
Dammit, every time you do this I feel guilty and want to do more PRs, but then Sandy makes me feel guilty and I go do more FACs, then I want to get an article to GA and I notice the massive backlog, and all I really wanna do is promote articles! *cry* I guess I'll take a stab at one PR at the very least while you're gone... Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs (talk) 03:44, 16 January 2009 (UTC)
Thanks for the PR – I was not trying to make anyone feel guilty – sorry. Ruhrfisch ><>°° 04:31, 16 January 2009 (UTC)
Nah, it's fine, there's just too much for any one person to do, I just haven't accepted that yet. :) Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs (talk) 04:38, 16 January 2009 (UTC)

(outdent) I added directions on how I do the update of the backlog on the backlog talk page Wikipedia talk:Peer review/backlog/items. Feel free to edit them. Ruhrfisch ><>°° 22:58, 16 January 2009 (UTC)

I'm back – will keep at this as long as I can, thanks for everyone's covering during the past week. Ruhrfisch ><>°° 04:58, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

Automated Peer Review does not recognize File:Example.jpg

Now that images use File:Example.jpg ("File" instead of "Image"), the Automated Peer Review does not seem to recognize the code, so it should probably be updated. Gary King (talk) 16:58, 16 January 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for the heads up. I currently do the semi-automated peer reviews, but am clueless about how to modify the code – User:AndyZ wrote the script and has not been active here in many months. Does anyone know what to do? Ruhrfisch ><>°° 21:53, 16 January 2009 (UTC)
It needs a javascript expert, I think: the relevant code is at User:AndyZ/peerreviewer.js. If you search for "Image" in this code, you should find it. However, replacing "Image" by "File" won't work, since both are allowed synonyms. I'm not familiar enough with javascript to code for both cases. Geometry guy 23:02, 16 January 2009 (UTC)
Since only so many image files are recognized here, would it make sense to have it look for .jpg, .png, .svg and any others instead? Ruhrfisch ><>°° 04:01, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

List of pre-Stonewall American television episodes with LGBT themes

I set up one peer review but it didn't appear on the talk page, so I closed it and re-did it but the second request is not on the PR list. Can someone please fix whatever I cocked up? Thanks. Otto4711 (talk) 10:08, 27 January 2009 (UTC)

It's there now. You have to give the bot some time to add peer reviews to the list. Gary King (talk) 15:59, 27 January 2009 (UTC)
I will de-archive the first one and move the second one there and delete it in the next hour or two. Ruhrfisch ><>°° 16:19, 27 January 2009 (UTC)
Done, Ruhrfisch ><>°° 17:31, 27 January 2009 (UTC)

Less than a peer review

On more than one occasion, but one recent example being Wikipedia:Peer review/Battle of Princeton/archive1, I've wanted to provide just one narrow comment, without it "counting" as a peer review and removing its chances of getting a proper review. For this one, Brianbolton removed the PR request from the backlog with edit label to the effect that the article was being reviewed. As brian hasn't since done a peer review for it, I think he thought i was doing one, which i am not. So, could Battle of Princeton be added back to the backlog. And how should i label my less-than-a-peer-review comments sufficiently well to keep it from counting. I obviously want to help not hurt an article's development, but have just a very small observation to make. doncram (talk) 19:47, 3 February 2009 (UTC)

It is always a judgment call as to when to remove an article from the backlog – besides your comments, there was also some discussion of at least one of the sources. I added some quick comments too just now and think it is OK to take off the backlog. With 150 or more articles on peer review each month, they never stop coming. I am not sure how to label a comment so as to not to count towards removal from the backlog. Perhaps a sentence on the peer review (one line) and then comments on the article talk page? The problems is that when there are a few paragraphs in the "narrow comment", it looks like the PR request has gotten enough feedback to remove it from the backlog. What do others think? Ruhrfisch ><>°° 22:35, 3 February 2009 (UTC)

Userbox for the Peer Review backlog?

I notice over at Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates there is a template posted that serves a purpose like the PR backlog list. But as a template i guess you could choose to display it on your user page or at the top of your talk page. Hmm, yes, i just added it, easily, at the top of my talk page, at User talk:Doncram. The template (actually in Deckiller's user space) is this: User:Deckiller/FAC urgents. I don't want for there to be duplication, but perhaps having the PR backlog in template form instead of the current form would be helpful. Or, perhaps with the PR backlog in exactly the form it is in, a template / userbox can be designed that starts off with a statement like "I support Peer Review and like for my friends to support it too" and then incorporates the current PR backlock in small font. It could also have a link to some short article on "How to do a peer review". Does such a getting-started type article exist already?) We could ask any past/occasional PR reviewers to put the template/userbox into their own talk pages, and just keep it there. Sometimes they or their friends might notice one of interest and choose to peer review it. Also, we could ask people who have received a peer review to consider displaying the template as well as, is often done, asking them to consider doing a peer review themselves. doncram (talk) 19:28, 16 January 2009 (UTC)

Peer reviews with no or minimal feedback
If your review is not in the list of unanswered reviews, you can add it.
Thanks for a great idea and your recent reviews.I have the backlog notice on my resources page, but it is too big and clunky for a userbox. It is actually two pages – there is list of items at Wikipedia:Peer review/backlog/items (which is what gets updated) and there is the pink box that contains it at Wikipedia:Peer review/backlog. I suppose we could make a new userbox to incorporate the items. In fact, I just made one at User:Ruhrfisch/PRbox and here it is. Tweak as needed and then we can move it to a peer review subpage. The main problem as I see it is that eash day is a line – if there is a way to make the box a set width, that would help, otherwise when there are 7 or 8 PRs on a line, the box will be too wide. Ruhrfisch ><>°° 22:06, 16 January 2009 (UTC)
OK, I fixed the width and left justified the peer reviews. How does it look? Ruhrfisch ><>°° 22:26, 16 January 2009 (UTC)
Wow, great. I didn't see your replies here until just now. I've just been looking at the Wikipedia:Peer review/backlog/items page on my watchlist occasionally, without returning here, sorry. Looking at the code, I don't quite get it. Does this require separate updating for each new urgent Peer Review? I meant to make a template that just displayed the Peer Review backlog page, and would not require separate updating. It is not clear to me whether support/use of this template would now require a reviewer to update here and also at the Peer Review backlog page. Or do you mean to shift to using this and retire the separate Peer Review backlog page? Just trying to get my bearings. I think i may be confused because when i click on edit within the template, it is bringing me to edit the Peer Review backlog page itself? (While i thought it would bring me to edit the template). doncram (talk) 03:12, 2 February 2009 (UTC)
Thanks. Wikipedia:Peer review/backlog/items is the source is used for both the big pink backlog box at Wikipedia:Peer review/backlog which is at the top of the peer review page, and the new small user box at User:Ruhrfisch/PRbox. Wikipedia:Peer review/backlog/items gets updated at least once a day. Since one source is used for both, I see no reason to get rid of the pink box (which has bigger text). Thanks for the change to the userbox, Ruhrfisch ><>°° 03:39, 2 February 2009 (UTC)
Okay, as you've seen by following edits to comments/instructions within the Peer review backlog and within the PRbox template, i was figuring it out, that in fact this is fully automated. I like the small user box. Perhaps it should include the word "urgent", perhaps by showing "Peer reviews urgently needing feedback". That would clarify this is not all the Peer review requests needing feedback. Hmm, there should be a link to all Peer review requests, too? And, if one userbox is good, then maybe two is better: what about a userbox that displays all the outstanding peer review requests? Or all the outstanding peer review requests in a given subject area? Not sure what is feasible given the structure of the Peer Review requests page. Anyhow, I think this userbox is now ready for prime time. I put it on my Talk page. Thanks! doncram (talk) 04:10, 2 February 2009 (UTC)
Sorry to be unclear. It is not automated – the list of PRs at least four days old and needing feedback is maintained by hand. There is no list of all PR requests without feedback – usually if they have not gotten a response in 4 days, they won't get one at all unless someone does it from the backlog list. Thanks for your tweaks and edits, Ruhrfisch ><>°° 05:03, 2 February 2009 (UTC)
Having the userbox on my own Talk page works for me, it prompts me to consider reviewing one. No one else has linked to it yet. If it could it be moved to a permanent place at a peer review subpage, as intended, I would begin to ask people (particularly anyone who has recently personally thanked me for a review) to put it on their own userpages.
This should not prevent rollout. But also, I'd like for an optional message field to be added to the top of the infobox. If a message parameter is given, then the message would appear before the current phrasing. I myself would put in my perhaps-cornier-than-some-others-would-like phrase: "I support peer review and hope you might too", or "Doncram supports peer review, please consider helping" or something like that to precede "Peer reviews needing feedback:". I've programmed in templates before, but don't immediately know how to put in an optional phrase like that, altho i could figure it out. doncram (talk) 00:31, 7 February 2009 (UTC)

(unindent) I moved it to Wikipedia:Peer review/PRbox just now. I am not sure how to add a personalized parameter at the top. I had thought to leave a message on the talk page of every volunteer to let them know about the box. Ruhrfisch ><>°° 03:39, 7 February 2009 (UTC)

PR not appearing in talk page

Followed the instructions, however the peer review I created is not appearing in the talk page, despite purging the talk page. Any suggestions please? Socrates2008 (Talk) 08:23, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

Fixed. Dr pda (talk) 08:51, 4 February 2009 (UTC)
Thanks! Socrates2008 (Talk) 08:56, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

Problem with template

Resolved
 – Please excuse my ignorance. Rambo's Revenge (talk) 15:29, 6 February 2009 (UTC)

I found a problem with {{peer review}} today. I posted the details of the problem at it's template talk page, however this page gets a lot more attention so I thought I would also refer to it from here. It involves a problem caused if articles are moved whilst at peer review. I'd appreciate it if people would take a look. Many thanks, Rambo's Revenge (talk) 11:34, 6 February 2009 (UTC)

It wasn't a problem at all, just my own ignorance. Sorry to bother anyone. Rambo's Revenge (talk) 15:29, 6 February 2009 (UTC)

PR follow up?

This is something of a grumble. I've found myself disappointed on several occasions recently after going through the work to review an article, only to have the original poster take no further action to address the suggestions. For me this is discouraging and at this point I tend to look for requests from users I've seen do good work in the past (knowing that they're more likely to use some of the input). Perhaps others feel the same?

Would it make any difference if the archival of a PR auto-generated a notification to the original poster with a gentle reminder requesting that they implement the suggestions? Thanks.—RJH (talk) 17:11, 12 February 2009 (UTC)

Don't know if this will make you feel any better, but it has sometimes been months before editors follow up on suggestions I've made in reviews (see Le chemin de fer, for instance.) But they did get done eventually! I do agree that it has made me less likely to review further articles; I now do a 5–6 item "starter list" (per a suggestion I think Ruhrfish made months ago), and only proceed further if I see the editor actually responding to that. Less frustrating, and I'm only spending considerable time on articles where somebody's actually likely to use my review! MeegsC | Talk 19:48, 12 February 2009 (UTC)

(ec)I agree it can be frustrating. My consolation is that the link to PR remains and the PR remains for whoever to use eventually. I agree with MeegsC – especially for someone who I don't know, it is often easier to do a brief review and more if they respond. Carl runs the bot that archives PRs – we'd have to ask how feasible it is to leave a message via the bot on archiving. Ruhrfisch ><>°° 20:15, 12 February 2009 (UTC)

A followup note at the time of the archiving would provide a nice reminder to the requestor, and I think it would make a difference in many cases. People often respond to friendly reminders. The followup notes could also include a request to them to consider doing a peer review themselves, and could even include the new userbox showing the peer review backlog. The reminder could simply be a new template version refined somewhat for this specific use, which covers all that, and which further shows to anyone watching, what is the PR backlog. Like how DYK awards show on user talk pages, forever afterwards, it would provide advertising for this more valuable but so-far-less-visible PR process. doncram (talk) 20:24, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
Thank you.—RJH (talk)

Backlog warning

A note to those who look at this page: on 11 February 8 Peer review requests were added, and will join the backlog in a couple of days, unless willing reviewers catch them before they get there. Brianboulton (talk) 00:36, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

PR statistics reported in Signpost

PR graphic
PR graphic

The current issue of Signpost includes an article which graphs measures of performance for FAC, FLC, GA, and PR. Does this tabulation of the number of outstanding PRs, reviewed and unreviewed, mean anything? It looks to me like someone graphed what he/she had a program available to plot, not what is relevant. I have the impression it would be far more relevant to tabulate the number of PR requests getting closed having automated reviews, not having automated reviews (few or none), having non-automated reviews, and not having non-automated refers (remarkably few). Or graph timeliness of reviews given. Methinks the good work done here is not being recognized adequately by the current Signpost article. doncram (talk) 06:45, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

I am the author of the article. I was not evaluating the performance of the various content review processes, but rather investigating their activity over 2008, i.e. how busy or backlogged each of them was. For example did the number of articles being submitted for peer reviews stay the same throughout the year, or did it increase or decrease? There are currently 97 articles on WP:PR—is this up or down on last week? last month? last year? That was what I was looking at; the black line in the graph tracks the number of articles listed on the PR page over the course of the last year.
However just looking at the number of articles requesting a peer review doesn't say anything about how many actually got a peer review, which is where the red line on the graph comes in. This shows the count of the number of articles listed at Wikipedia:Peer review/backlog/items. Articles are added to this if they have not received a review beyond the automated peer review after three or four days. Thus if articles were not getting reviewed this red line would continue to rise rapidly; the fact that it does not is due largely to a small number of people who review articles on the backlog list. For most of 2008 User:Ruhrfisch was almost single-handedly responsible for ensuring that articles which got onto the backlog list were reviewed.
The conclusions I draw from this data are firstly that the activity of PR was relatively constant throughout the year (with some peaks and troughs of course)—there is no increasing or decreasing trend visible; and secondly that the number of articles which have to wait more than three or four days for a review is small. This is what I said in the Signpost article.
If you wanted to evaluate the performance of PR then, yes, you would need to look at different variables, but that was not my purpose in the Signpost article. Dr pda (talk) 10:32, 16 February 2009 (UTC)
Thanks for an interesting article – the main difference between PR and GAN/FAC/FLC is that PR has a smaller time window to review things in (since PRs without a response are archived after 14 days). I am not sure what other stats to look at – the number of articles that have gone through PR and are FA or FL or GA six months after is pretty high, but that is my gut feeling.
Since March 15 2008 almost no article has been archived by the bot or me that had not recieved some feedback (and that went back to Feb 22 2008 on the backlog list, so we are near the one year anniversary of all PRs get feedback). The exceptions are for articles where the person listed them at FAC or FLC without PR feedback (in which case the bot archives the PR, see below), OR cases where the nominator closed the peer review without feedback (some people are impatient and the backlog can sometimes be a wait over 10 days). Ruhrfisch ><>°° 16:41, 16 February 2009 (UTC)
As a small on the side comment, we're about to advertise WP:Article alerts across all WikiProjects, so it should raise the activity across all workflows like WP:FAC/WP:PR/etc... I'm also starting to write an article for next week's Signpost. Headbomb {ταλκκοντριβς – WP Physics} 03:31, 19 February 2009 (UTC)

Bot archiving of Zanzibar Revolution

Hi, I listed this article for peer review after I withdrew it from FAC. However the peer review bot seems to have archived it already (within a day of it being listed). This is perhaps due to the fact that the FAC bot still hasn't archived the FAC discussion. Is there a way to reopen the review and stop the bot from closing it? Cheers – Dumelow (talk) 11:43, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

That is exactly what happened – see here. The bot checks once a day and automatically archives articles that are also listed at either FAC or FLC. I just checked and this is still listed at FAC. Once it has been removed from there, drop me a line on my talk page or here (I watch both ;-) ) and I will restart the Peer review. It makes no sense to do so until the FAC is archived or else the bot will close the PR again tomorrow about 10:00 UTC. I did run the semi-automated peer review as AZPR and will link that next. Ruhrfisch ><>°° 16:33, 16 February 2009 (UTC)T
Many thanks, the FAc has been archived now so it should be OK to reopen the PR. Thanks for your help – Dumelow (talk) 08:26, 18 February 2009 (UTC)
It will take the bot an hour or so to relist it, but I just restarted it at the same place, i.e. Wikipedia:Peer review/Zanzibar Revolution/archive1. Ruhrfisch ><>°° 12:23, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

 Doing... Peer reviews

The  Doing... template in the PR backlog should only be used when the promised review can be delivered fairly speedily – within a few days at most, I would suggest. The presence of the template deters other reviewers who might otherwise look at the article, so a long "doing" may keep an article unattended in the backlog longer than necessary. Brianboulton (talk) 20:29, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

Agreed. I sent a gentle reminder to the person whose doing template has been in the backlog for over a week and he said he would get to it today. How long should we wait for such reminders? Ruhrfisch ><>°° 20:47, 16 February 2009 (UTC)
A reminder after three days would be appropriate, I think. Brianboulton (talk) 23:55, 16 February 2009 (UTC)
Sorry... :) --Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs (talk) 00:44, 17 February 2009 (UTC)
Thanks for your review, Ruhrfisch ><>°° 03:29, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

Symphony X

Second nomination on 18 February by User:Huntthetroll Brianboulton (talk) 00:41, 19 February 2009 (UTC)

Thanks, I will leave a friendly reminder on the nominator's talk page and add them to my "hall of fame" – if they do it again, I'll remove any over one that day. Ruhrfisch ><>°° 02:42, 19 February 2009 (UTC)

Science FAC symposion

I'm letting you guys know about it because a lot of what is said there is also relevant for you guys. Plus your feedback would definitely be both relevant and appreciated. Headbomb {ταλκκοντριβς – WP Physics} 04:03, 20 February 2009 (UTC)

Please review my draft article

Hi there,

I created a new page for VSP Vision Care. Please review. I do work for this company. Thank you.

User:Elizba/New article

Thank you for your request. Please follow the instructions on the WP:Peer Review page concerning the procedure for nominating an article for peer review. There is a lengthy backlog of items awaiting review, so you may have to wait a while. Brianboulton (talk) 00:52, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Another backlog warning

The PR backlog stands at 18 at the present time. Another 14 articles have been added in te last three days. The backlog could grow to unmanageable proportions unless more reviewers get active. Please help if you can by reviewing an article. Brianboulton (talk) 00:56, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

I will review at least two tonight and plan to leave Wikipedia:Peer review/PRbox on the talk page of each person signed up as a PR volunteer at WP:PRV. Ruhrfisch ><>°° 02:20, 25 February 2009 (UTC)
Leaving the notices took longer than expected, but seems to have helped. Ruhrfisch ><>°° 11:52, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

List of Gothic architecture

I think someone has tried to withdraw this from PR but I don't think the procedure has been fully carried through. I've taken it out of the backlog. Brianboulton (talk) 08:58, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

I fixed it and archived the peer review and left the proper archived notice on the article talk page – thanks. In general, peer reviews are not blanked, just archived with a link to the old peer review left on the article talk page. Ruhrfisch ><>°° 11:50, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Coordinators' working group

Hi! I'd like to draw your attention to a new working group, an effort to bring both official and unofficial coordinators together so that projects can more easily develop consensus and collaborate. This group has been created after discussion regarding possible changes to the A-Class review system, and that may be one of the first things discussed by interested coordinators. We are also planning a better coordinatopn among all projects and centralizing.

All designated project coordinators are invited to join this working group. If your project hasn't formally designated any editors as coordinators, but you are someone who regularly deals with coordination tasks in the project, please feel free to join as well. — Delievered by §hepTalk on behalf of the WikiProject coordinators' working group at 20:43, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

I signed up as an unofficial coordiantor Ruhrfisch ><>°° 02:59, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

A discussion on the assesment scale is currently taking place at here. It would be nice if someone could act as a link between PR and there. Headbomb {ταλκκοντριβς – WP Physics} 02:41, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

PR really does not get involved in article assessment, but typically leaves that to WikiProjects. I will say that there too Ruhrfisch ><>°° 02:59, 2 March 2009 (UTC)
It's not really about getting involved in assessment, more than it is bringing your experience with peer review to shed some light on some aspects, as well as being a "go to" person when stuff related to PR (or stuff that PR people could give insight on) is brought up.Headbomb {ταλκκοντριβς – WP Physics} 04:05, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Messed up archives for Ralph Bakshi peer review

Please see the following:

The February 2009 peer review is the one I'm currently making notes at. If anyone know how to sort this out so all the archiving is clearer, please do so. Thanks! Carcharoth (talk) 14:47, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

I don't understand the problem – peer reviews conducted here (at WP:PR) are separate from WikiProject peer reviews and do not normally list those separate WikiProject peer reviews. The article's talk page correctly shows all of the peer reviews (here and WikiProject) and all six FACs. Can you please explain how this is messed up? Do you want me to delete the redirect? Ruhrfisch ><>°° 19:12, 1 March 2009 (UTC)
I didn't realise peer reviews took place on archive pages, and I didn't realise project reviews were dealt with separately. :-) The redirect is confusing – maybe that could be sorted out, as you say here. Carcharoth (talk) 04:06, 5 March 2009 (UTC)
I deleted it and fixed the links to the page except the above. Hope this is OK. Ruhrfisch ><>°° 05:28, 5 March 2009 (UTC)

Peer reviews, February 2009

As a matter of general interest, 137 articles were archived by WP:Peer Review in February 2009. These had received a total of 190 reviews (not counting odd, isolated comments). 75 editors contributed at least one review, but the process is over-reliant on a relatively small number of reviewers. The main contributors in February were:-

  • Finetooth 33 reviews
  • Ruhrfisch 24 reviews (despite a break at the beginning of the month)
  • Brianboulton 24 reviews
  • Dabomb87 11 reviews
  • Doncram 6 reviews

With more than half the reviews coming from five editors, the process is less effective than it would be if articles received comments from a wider range of reviewers. Perhaps the large number of "occasionals" would consider making more regular visits? Brianboulton (talk) 12:40, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for doing this – my hope is that the PR backlog user box might help. Ruhrfisch ><>°° 02:14, 14 March 2009 (UTC)

See Latest Talk:Kripalu Center Item

See heading.Calamitybrook (talk) 01:21, 16 March 2009 (UTC)
What do you mean?—Chris! ct 01:33, 16 March 2009 (UTC)

This was left in the Islais Creek peer review – I moved it here. Not 100% sure what is meant either – I archived the Kripalu Center peer review as the bot could not (the PR tag had been removed from the article talk page). Now from the talk page copmment it seems that Calamitybook felt that the PR was not to his/her liking?? Ruhrfisch ><>°° 04:33, 16 March 2009 (UTC)

Heads up

Just a heads up that a class of entomology stduents are working on 35 articles, all on insects, all of which are probably headed to PR. There are three listed so far – see Wikipedia:School and university projects/ENTO 431. Ruhrfisch ><>°° 03:59, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

More have been listed at PR since. Fortunately, most so far seem to have picked up early for review by knowledgeable editors. I don't much fancy my chances with these. Brianboulton (talk) 14:12, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
Last year the professor listed the last 10 PRs herself all on the same day – presumably as the students had not listed the articles at PR yet. I have left a polite note letting her know the rules have changed since. The problem is that 35 bug articles tend to overwhelm the knowledgable reviewers eventually, but so far, so good. Ruhrfisch ><>°° 15:23, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
It might be worth advising the prof that some of the articles may be subject to waits before review. Unless they want the likes of me to have a go, which I don't really recommend. Brianboulton (talk) 00:02, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
She has not responded in any way to the message I left at her talk page, and has not contributed here since Feb 9, so I am not sure how much good it would do. Ruhrfisch ><>°° 02:35, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Vote on date autoformatting and linking

The Vote on date autoformatting and linking is now open. All users are invited to participate. Lightmouse (talk) 14:57, 31 March 2009 (UTC)

Peer review statistics March 2009 (archived)

(February figures shown in parentheses)

Number of articles reviewed: 147 (137)

Number of review contributions excluding brief comments: 242 (190)

Number of reviewers submitting at least one review: 83 (75)

Main reviewers:-

  • Ruhrfisch: 31
  • Finetooth: 29
  • Ealdgyth: 28 (source comments)
  • Brianboulton: 20
  • Natural Cut: 9
  • ChrisTheDude: 6
  • Hornoir: 6
  • Doncram: 4
  • Dabomb87: 4
  • Ilwyrch: 4

Brianboulton (talk) 13:09, 2 April 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for tracking this – can't ... stop ... reviewing... ;-) Just for comparison purposes, the PR stat at WP:FAS is from the number of PRs opened in the month (based on the semi-automated peer reviews). Ruhrfisch ><>°° 02:57, 3 April 2009 (UTC)
...whereas my stats are based on PRs closed during the month. The idea of publishing them is the hope that some presently occasional reviewers will be inspired to break into the top half-dozen, perhaps even to try to knock the great Ruhrfisch himself off his perch! Brianboulton (talk) 23:34, 3 April 2009 (UTC)
Well i for one am glad to look my name up...rats, if only i had done one more i woulda not been in the lowest rank...okay i'll try harder. :) Thanks for tallying this! doncram (talk) 01:22, 6 April 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Peer review is getting full (Apr 05, 12:35 UTC)

The post-expand size of Wikipedia:Peer review is 2035141 out of 2048000 bytes (12859 bytes left). This is an automated message. -- VeblenBot (talk) 16:34, 5 April 2009 (UTC)

I have done the partial transclusion trick for everything larger than 9000 here and when I look at the page size on wp:pr/d (listed by date) it is down to 1220854/2048000 bytes. However, when I look at WP:PR it is much larger. Not sure what the problem is. Ruhrfisch ><>°° 17:10, 5 April 2009 (UTC)
I found the issue (see here), and have left a note for Carl. Dr pda (talk) 21:33, 5 April 2009 (UTC)
Found the underlying problem. Category:Language and literature peer reviews had been manually added to Wikipedia:Peer review/The Moon and the Sandals/archive1, causing both WP:PR and WP:Pr/d to appear in the category. I've removed this, so next time the bot runs everything should work OK. Dr pda (talk) 22:24, 5 April 2009 (UTC)
Thanks so much – I have removed the extra notices. Ruhrfisch ><>°° 00:43, 6 April 2009 (UTC)

Alfred Denning, Baron Denning

A slight confusion on the talkpage: the same peer review appears both open and closed. Which is the case? Brianboulton (talk) 09:02, 6 April 2009 (UTC)

At the time of the last peer review the article name was Lord Denning, thus the old peer review is at Wikipedia:Peer review/Lord Denning/archive1. I've updated the talk page to reflect this. Dr pda (talk) 22:40, 6 April 2009 (UTC)

Poll: autoformatting and date linking

This is to let people know that there is only a day or so left on a poll. The poll is an attempt to end years of argument about autoformatting which has also led to a dispute about date linking. Your votes are welcome at: Wikipedia:Date formatting and linking poll. Regards Lightmouse (talk) 09:10, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

Peer review gone missing

Can someone help me find the archived peer review for Aurora's drift, which is a redlink in the Milestones box on the article's talk page? This is presumably because the article's name changed midway through its FAC, to SY Aurora's drift. I thought the bot would fix everything, but apparently not this. Brianboulton (talk) 23:04, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

I have fixed it – the PR is still under the old name, so I changed the link. Ruhrfisch ><>°° 23:25, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

Something wrong with the numbering

Something has gone wrong with the numbering of the articles on peer review – see the list. It goes wrong after 6.1 Unification of Germany. Can this be fixed? Brianboulton (talk) 23:13, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

The whole text of the Germany article has come up on the PR page! I have tried, nd failed, to fix this. Brianboulton (talk) 23:36, 13 April 2009 (UTC)
I fixed it – the user has a version of the Unification of Germany article in her user page and apparently pasted that whole version of the article into the peer review. I went back to the first version of the PR request, Ruhrfisch ><>°° 00:32, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

Signpost dispatch on plagiarism

Editors here might be interested in the recently-published dispatch on plagiarism. Awadewit (talk) 23:52, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

Peer review statistics April 2009 (archived)

These figures relate to reviews closed in April. (March figures shown in parentheses)

Number of articles reviewed: 117 (147)

Number of review contributions excluding brief comments: 201 (242)

Number of reviewers submitting at least one review: 72 (83)

Main reviewers:-

  • Ealdgyth: 28 (source comments)
  • Finetooth: 28
  • Brianboulton: 22
  • Ruhrfisch: 22
  • Dabomb87: 8
  • TechOutsider: 5
  • Laser brain: 4

There were 91 peer reviews open on 30 April

Brianboulton (talk) 23:25, 2 May 2009 (UTC)

ItsJustSomeRandomGuy Peer review

ItsJustSomeRandomGuy

...has been nominated for a peer review. The page is here. Not a lot of people no of it's existance, though, for some reason. I'd like for anyone who has the time to check out the article as I have made a lot of contributions (here though, not in the actual article). I added all my contributions to the article after I finished in the sandbox. Thank you, Raaggio 21:28, 10 May 2009 (UTC)

Someone will get to it in the next 10 days at the latest, please be patient – Ruhrfisch ><>°° 02:12, 11 May 2009 (UTC)
Haha, no I'm not being impatient. I'm adding it to all the relevant pages and this was just one of them, sorry. I'm just the only one who was maintanencing the article, so not a lot of people knew about it (I added the project tags yesterday!). I apologize, Raaggio 14:45, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

Peer Review Limits – what to do with four in one day

For the first time since the current limits (one per nominator per day, no more than four at a time) began, someone has nominated four PRs in one day. There have been many who have nominated two in a day and I have always just left a note reminding them of the limits on their talk page and let it slide. I left the same note on the nominator's talk page in the case of the four, but am not sure what else to do, so I thought I would ask the community here. Thanks for any feedback, Ruhrfisch ><>°° 03:57, 6 June 2009 (UTC)

My bad – sorry about that, I should have checked a little more first. If possible, could we "hold" some of them until later (not cancel them per se, but just hold off for a while)? BOZ (talk) 04:06, 6 June 2009 (UTC)
The bot will link the semi-automated peer reviews in the next 6 or 7 hours, so let's let it do that, then we could archive two and de-archive them over the next few days. Thanks, Ruhrfisch ><>°° 04:07, 6 June 2009 (UTC)
Which two do you want to keep up and which do you to take down for now? Ruhrfisch ><>°° 04:08, 6 June 2009 (UTC)
Fair enough. :) Start out with Peanuts and Fantastic Four, then go with Jack Kirby and Alan Moore later? Thanks for being patient with me – I should have read the "Nominations" section more carefully. I won't nominate any more until these four are completed, and even then I won't rush into it. BOZ (talk) 04:12, 6 June 2009 (UTC)
I actually know a bit about three of four of these articles, so I will try to make some comments, though it might be several days with the backlog. Thanks, Ruhrfisch ><>°° 04:36, 6 June 2009 (UTC)
Hey, awesome. :) Note that another user just let me know that Al Williamson is up for peer review as well. BOZ (talk) 19:57, 6 June 2009 (UTC)

Peer review statistics May 2009 (archived)

These figures relate to reviews closed in May. (April figures shown in parentheses)

Number of reviews archived: 125 (117)

Number of review contributions excluding brief comments: 186 (201)

Number of reviewers submitting at least one review: 83 (72)

Main reviewers:-

  • Ruhrfisch: 38
  • Brianboulton: 16
  • Finetooth: 15
  • Illwrych: 6
  • Ealdgyth: 6
  • Tech:Outsider: 5

Brianboulton (talk) 00:23, 8 June 2009 (UTC)

Note: While preparing the above statistics I noted that a number of articles had been given comprehensive reviews that had not even been acknowledged by the nominating editor, let alone been acted on. I reviewed a couple of these: Blas Ople and Old Time Missionary Baptist, but there were others. This is poor etiquette; peer reviewing is a vital part of the process whereby articles are improved, but it is hard work for the reviewers, and time-consuming. If the reviews are then ignored, all such effort is wasted. Brianboulton (talk) 00:22, 9 June 2009 (UTC)
Thanks as always for doing this. I wonder if giving some sort of award or barnstar for doing a certain number of reviews would help attract more reviews or reviewers? (I would do PRs anyway and suspect the other two top reviewers would too.) As for the no responses, one possible approach is to give a partial review and say soemthing like "if this is helpful please let me know and I will make further review comments". Ruhrfisch ><>°° 02:18, 9 June 2009 (UTC)

Renaming "peer review" to "internal review"

Since Wikipedia:Peer review is different from peer review, I think we should change the name to Wikipedia:Internal review, to help avoid confusion between the two. When I first heard that Wikipedia has a peer review process, I thought it would involve soliciting a review from an accredited specialist in the subject area of an article who is otherwise unaffiliated with Wikipedia (i.e. not an editor, and definitely not one of the editors of the article in question). I was under that impression for a long time, until I read Wikipedia:Peer review. I think the name Wikipedia:Internal review would better describe the system we have in place, which is a group of Wikipedia editors writing a review of a Wikipedia article.

Many Wikipedia editors are accredited specialists, but since they’re editors they can’t provide as independent of reviews, because they’re affiliated with the publication (much more so than an author in a journal--a Wikipedian is kind of like a hybrid author-editor). The academic peer review process involves, say, three people; the author of the article, the editor of the publication, and the reviewer of the article (who is neither an author of the article nor an editor of the publication). It’s this independence from the other two parties (mostly the author) that ideally makes the reviewer capable of offering a totally detached appraisal of the article. Wikipedia’s current peer review system isn’t as detached as academia’s because a Wikipedian could potentially fulfil all three roles and the process is entirely internal to the publication.

So that’s why I think we should make this difference explicit and rename our process Wikipedia:Internal review. Also, we should rename Wikipedia:External peer review simply Wikipedia:External review, which would clear up a similar confusion there (partially identified by several editors at Wikipedia talk:External peer review#"peer"). External peer review has a bit more in common with academic peer review, but it is still not the same thing (e.g. the external peer reviews there tend to be unsolicited and unsystematic). So, are there objections to these proposed changes of names? Ecto (talk) 05:43, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

Peer review means review by one's peers. Wikipedia editors are not, in general, scholars: their peers are other Wikipedia editors. Their common field of expertise is writing Wikipedia articles. Geometry guy 07:42, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

oed.com: "1. The review of commercial, professional, or academic efficiency, competence, etc., by others in the same occupation; an instance of this."
The compound term has meaning beyond "peer". Volunteer editor is not an occupation. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 08:01, 16 June 2009 (UTC)
Geometry guy, Wiktionary also has a more precise and relevant definition at peer review that I think makes it clearer why we should avoid that term.Ecto (talk) 08:07, 16 June 2009 (UTC)
I agree with the renaming. I myself also had the same problem when I heard about peer review.--WillC 08:39, 16 June 2009 (UTC)
We could always call it "Wikipedia Review" (oh wait, that name seems to be taken ;-) ). If we change the name would we move every peer review ever done? What about the various WikiProject Peer reviews (active and defunct)? The first sentence says this is not the same as academic peer review, so I never had a problem. This is a big enough potential change that I think it should be publicized much more widely. I prefer the current name, but if the consensus is to move it, so be it. It would also be nice if the people proposing and supporting the name change actually did some peer reviews (hint, hint) or whatever you want to call them. Ruhrfisch ><>°° 19:32, 16 June 2009 (UTC)
Would we have to change every peer review ever done? I don’t know. I think we could rename the relevant pages, categories, and templates, as well as the most recent reviews, and then just leave the content of archives be (they’re archives after all). I’m not sure how moving a page effects its subpages, whether they just automatically migrate along with the page or not. Could we set up some kind of bot to make the transition easier if we do decide to go ahead with this change? I think we should rename the various WikiProject reviews as well, if no one from a given project objects.
Where should we post notices of this discussion? I suggest: Wikipedia talk:External peer review; active WikiProject review talk pages; Wikipedia talk:Featured article criteria; Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates, and; Wikipedia:Village pump (miscellaneous).
I don’t want to see any changes forced on the people who contribute to this process. Personally, I’m nowhere near as high quality of an editor yet to contribute to this part of Wikipedia (right now I’m just concentrating on figuring out how portals work), but I do plan to help out someday, once I get a Featured Article or two.Ecto (talk) 22:04, 16 June 2009 (UTC)
I posted notifications about this discussion at: Wikipedia talk:External peer review; Wikipedia talk:Featured article criteria; Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates, and; Wikipedia:Village pump (miscellaneous). I'm not sure which particular WikiProject reviews are active. Also, where else it might be a good idea to post notices? Ecto (talk) 06:27, 18 June 2009 (UTC)
Comment: I would be happy to support a name change for this process, subject to the following points:-
  • Provided it can be done without disruptive consequences (see Ruhrfisch above)
  • If the name is to change, I think "Preliminary review" would be a better name then "Internal review", for two reasons. First, because it would still be "PR". Second, because that name would more clearly identify these reviews as a stage in the formal review process which culminates at GA and FA.
Brianboulton (talk) 22:53, 18 June 2009 (UTC)

(out) I like Preliminary review as a name better than Internal review. What about either opening an RfC or perhaps listing this at Wikipedia:Centralized discussion? Ruhrfisch ><>°° 03:44, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

Well I don't know how these things work, but please feel free to take up my modified suggestion. Brianboulton (talk) 08:17, 19 June 2009 (UTC)
  • I see nothing wrong or misleading with existing name. It is a review by peers, isn't it? I doubt that a lot of people will confuse it with academic peer review (just like academic peers would not mind coexisting with Peers of England). Internal review seems unnecessary (all wiki-processes apart from OTRS are internal by default) and sounds too ... corporate. Preliminary? Not necessarily, although in real life it is perceived as a stepping stone to FA. Better than Internal though. NVO (talk) 18:03, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

I checked with Carl who provides all the bot support that makes PR run so smoothly to make sure it was technically not a problem if the name were changed. I still prefer the current name, but there is no technical reason not to rename it if that is consensus. Here is our conversation:

Hi Carl, there is a proposal to rename peer review at Wikipedia talk:Peer review#Renaming "peer review" to "internal review". My question is, would this be technically problematic with Veblenbot and Peer Review Bot? Or do you see any other problems or technical issues with a possible renaming? Thanks, Ruhrfisch ><>°° 03:50, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

No, there should be no problem. For the transition to be smooth, I need to be well informed ahead of time, and I need to be available the day the move happens, to update the bot. — Carl (CBM · talk) 03:55, 19 June 2009 (UTC)
Thanks, I am not sure there will be a name change, but wanted to make sure with you first that there were no technical issues involved if there were a change. I will copy this to the PR talk page too. Thanks again, Ruhrfisch ><>°° 03:23, 20 June 2009 (UTC)

Support any change "Peer review" is definitely misleading. Although... in the strictly literal sense of the term, "peer review" is not misleading. After all, articles are being reviewed by "peers" which would be other WP editors. But in the commonly used sense of the term, i.e., the wikitionary definition, it is misleading. Barring any technical difficulties, I think its a good idea to call it something else. "Preliminary review" would also be a convenient alternative. Call it "article improvement", "quality check", or "copyedit requests" for all I care, I just think it should be changed. --ErgoSum•talk•trib 16:47, 20 June 2009 (UTC)

  • Oppose Wikipedia:Peer review is clearly defined, and it is properly named as a peer review. It is performed by fellow editors upon request, analogous to peer review in academic journals (each journal being the publication of a kind of community of peers consisting of its authors and editors). It is a term in wide usage within wikipedia, while wikipedia:External review is not, AFAIK (I had never heard of it). There is no evidence of confusion between the two terms. Introducing a new term "Internal review", a term I associate with police department investigations of corrupt police officers, would introduce negative connotations and different confusions. Perhaps wikipedia:internal review should be redirected to whatever is the administrator recall/review process that some administrators say they will abide by. doncram (talk) 17:40, 20 June 2009 (UTC)
Further, peer review has immediate bearing on whether nominated-for-publication material is published in the publication of the community, and how it is presented in terms of style and so on, according to style guidelines for publications of that community. That is true in academic journals and in wikipedia peer review, where style matters are a central focus and style issues are often corrected during the peer review process. Thus, wikipedia peer review has immediate bearing on the publication / presentation of a wikipedia article, and also it is focused on determining immediate or future eligibility of articles for further publication in the set of Good Articles or Featured Articles. doncram (talk) 18:12, 20 June 2009 (UTC)
And, yes, I have performed peer reviews here. doncram (talk) 18:15, 20 June 2009 (UTC)
  • Oppose. "Internal review" has as much potential for misinterpretation as "peer review," and "peer review" is a much more accurate description of what is done here. Exploding Boy (talk) 17:44, 20 June 2009 (UTC)
  • Oppose. In my view it isn't broken, so I wouldn't try to "fix" it. I think that a change would be confusing to more people that the current name. Lvklock (talk) 17:47, 20 June 2009 (UTC)

So far we have not reached consensus on this matter. I agree with several of the above comments that "preliminary review" would make a more suitable name than "internal review" if we ever do decide to change.Ecto (talk) 00:02, 28 June 2009 (UTC)

Peer review statistics June 2009 (archived)

These figures relate to reviews closed in June. (May figures shown in parentheses)

Number of reviews archived: 115 (125)

Number of review contributions excluding brief comments: 130 (186)

Number of reviewers submitting at least one review: 60 (83)

Main reviewers:-

  • Ruhrfisch: 38
  • Finetooth: 24
  • Brianboulton: 14
  • Ealdgyth: 7
  • Ricardiana: 6

Brianboulton (talk) 13:34, 2 July 2009 (UTC)

Possible new PR limit

At WP:FAC the instructions say in part Users should not add a second FA nomination until the first has gained support and reviewers' concerns have been substantially addressed. I am wondering if peer review would benefit from something similar – what if no one could start a new PR request until any current PR request(s) they had made had received a substantial review and been responded to in some way?

It might be I am cranky from the weeks of the backlog in the teens or twenties. Anyway, what do people think of this as a proposal? Is is it practical? Is there support for such a change? Ruhrfisch ><>°° 01:36, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

In principle I would support this. However, my worry is that as a result, some editors would simply skip the PR stage and take their underdeveloped articles straight to FAC. There are enough of these half-cooked nominations there already, and as a fairly frequent FAC reviewer I tend to meet them. What I could do, as bureaucrat i/c the PR backlog, is only allow one nomination per editor in the backlog itself. If, then, an editor nominates to PR on successive days, the second won't be shown in the backlog until the first has been reviewed. That might help a little. Brianboulton (talk) 13:15, 2 July 2009 (UTC)
Apologies. Noticing a similar conversation on Brian's page and wondering if I might have missed something, I've now noticed that I did not have this page marked "watch", and I have missed all of the conversations taking place here for months. I've been thinking of doing quick reviews of articles that need lots of work and limiting my more complete reviewing to articles that I think might be close to FA quality. To some extent, I've been doing that already, but I have a tendency, perhaps, to over-review. I could do more if I was less thorough. Doing more fly-by reviews might not have much impact on FAC. Finetooth (talk) 22:35, 12 July 2009 (UTC)
I think limits are good, especially considering the "this page is getting full" notice that was recently posted below. This might not be a problem if we had more reviewers, but with only two productive reviewers, PRs often only receive the attention of only one or two editors. Perhaps shortening the time they remain transcluded would help. --ErgoSum•talk•trib 01:34, 16 July 2009 (UTC)
Thanks for the feedback – the peer review is getting full probelm is fairly easy to solve, just fix the biggest PRs so they only partiually transclude (I normally remove the full notices after the fix, but forgot to do so last time). Reviews are archived by the bot if they have been inactive 14 days (no minor or other edits), or inactive for 2 days once they are over 30 days old. I think that the time they are transcluded is about right – if something waits four days and then is on the backlog ten days before getting a review, then allowing another 2 weeks or so gives time for replies. Ruhrfisch ><>°° 15:20, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

Not listed automatically

"Your peer review will be listed automatically on this page within an hour."

This is not true for the peer review of List of World Heritage Sites in the Netherlands. Rubenescio (talk) 14:57, 22 July 2009 (UTC)

Hm. Neither for St. Johns River, placed at PR two days ago... --Moni3 (talk) 15:11, 22 July 2009 (UTC)
Both are listed at Peer reviews sorted by date. I looked at both PRs and could not see any errors. I will ask Carl, who runs the bot that listst things here if he can figurte out what is going on. Ruhrfisch ><>°° 15:38, 22 July 2009 (UTC)
This was a problem with the general category listing functions of the bot, not related to peer review specifically. Somehow the behavior related to empty categories needed to be changed. Anyway, I think it is fixed, let me know if the problem recurs. — Carl (CBM · talk) 15:55, 22 July 2009 (UTC)
Thanks so much (as always) for your very fast reply. I listed the five PRs that did not list both places on your talk page. Ruhrfisch ><>°° 15:56, 22 July 2009 (UTC)
Thank you for your efforts. Rubenescio (talk) 17:32, 22 July 2009 (UTC)

A moment in Peer Review history

At 22.22 GMT the peer review backlog reached zero. I can't remember it ever happening before. This is thanks entirely to reviewing work by Finetooth and Ruhrfisch beyond the call of duty. I have to spoil it later this evening, but it's an occasion worth marking. Brianboulton (talk) 22:37, 31 July 2009 (UTC)

Kudos to everyone who's been working hard at it (I've been bogged down by GA reappraisals, and really haven't helped as much as I want aside from MILHIST and VG partner reviews.) Virtual frosty beverages to all! --Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs (talk) 23:25, 31 July 2009 (UTC)
I think Finetooth deserves most of the credit for this milestone. I know we had zero at least once before when The Rambling Man was helping a lot – see diff. Speaking of milestones, I am about to do the last semi-automated peer review run with the new regime. Ruhrfisch ><>°° 01:41, 1 August 2009 (UTC)
So we need to do 6 during the next 24 hours to push it back down to 0. The next goal after that would be negative 10. (This is actually possible if we count reviews that occur before nominated articles can slither into the backlog).  :-) Finetooth (talk) 02:16, 1 August 2009 (UTC)
There's been at least one more zero (September 2008). Thanks to everyone who has done reviews recently; I look at the backlog almost every day, but I haven't had the time/found the articles interesting enough lately. Dr pda (talk) 08:17, 1 August 2009 (UTC)
Ouch! I suppose it's the longer/less interesting-looking articles that tend to find themselves in the backlog; titles like Deep Throat get pounced on as soon as listed for review, for some reason, while History of gravel, 1833–45 lacks suitors. Brianboulton (talk) 08:58, 1 August 2009 (UTC)

We just hit zero again – let's make a habit of this! Thanks to everyone, especially Finetooth, for all the reviews, Ruhrfisch ><>°° 03:02, 5 August 2009 (UTC)

I was hoping you'd finish that last one to get us back to zero. This time we are guaranteed almost a whole 24 hours of zero-ness. Finetooth (talk) 04:26, 5 August 2009 (UTC)

Good job guys, I respect what you do over here a lot. I wish I had more time to get in here and help. I've said this before, but any time I go to review an FAC and I see that you folks have been through it, I know my job is going to be a lot easier. Thanks sincerely. --Andy Walsh (talk) 04:39, 5 August 2009 (UTC)

And we are at Zero yet again! Ruhrfisch ><>°° 23:27, 7 August 2009 (UTC)

Peer Review Needed (Of An Article On Eastern European Dictatorship)

Moved here from the PR page, will also copy to Tito talk page

Dear Wikipedia. Could editors of Peer Review Board please do a reassessment of Josip Broz Tito article. The article is embarrassing. The Eastern European Dictator is portrayed as some sort of pop star (what is this all about) and should not be in any nominations other than the article that lacks NPOV. Also considering he was responsible for war crimes,mass massacres, torture & mass imprisonment makes Wikipedia look like ad for Eastern European Dictatorships. One to mention is the Foibe Massacres (there are BBC documentaries). Wikipedia has an article on this so it’s just contradicting itself. You have one feel-good article about a Dictator then you have an article about the Massacres he approved and organized with the Yugoslav Partisan Army. Then there were Death squads in Southern Dalmatia (the Croatians are putting up monuments for the poor victims & their families now). Also it’s important to mention that the Croatian Government is paying compensation to his former victims. Surely a more critical historical article should be written or this present article should be removed altogether. What is next? A Stalin feel-good article? What about the respect towards the poor victims who suffered those awful events? Can the editors please look into this?Sir Floyd (talk) 04:24, 4 August 2009 (UTC)

We only review articles that are nominated for a peer review. Peer review is for pointing out problems with articles. I have not looked at the Tito article yet, but it seems you already have a pretty good idea of some of the problems. Be BOLD and try editing the Tito article yourself – add sources to back up the changes too. Ruhrfisch ><>°° 11:30, 4 August 2009 (UTC)

Thanks Ruhrfisch Sir Floyd (talk) 02:00, 5 August 2009 (UTC)

Let's "fix" peer review

I've recently had my first experience with the Peer review process, and I've been left thinking that the process itself could use some help. Before going off and putting tons of thought into a proposal that may never receive consensus though, I wanted to start a conversation here. I wanted to make one thing crystal clear from the outset though: I am not attempting to disparaige the significant, meaningful, and long standing contributions that several of you (you know who you are!) have made to this project and therefore Wikipedia itself, to date. Bravo!

Defining the problem:
The main ssue with the current process can be summarized with one word: "Backlog". I think that the fact that a backlog exists at all is a significant issue. During a recent conversation it's become clear to me that there is a perception that the backlog is caused by "free-riders". Looking back through the archives, this appears to bee a long standing issue with this process, and there is and has been project specific policy enacted (and recently amended) in an attempt to fix it. That leads to the second part of the problem, which is that the project policies here are overly prescriptive. Wikipedia has an institutional memory now which basically states that "policy and guidance should be descriptive, not prescriptive". That there's obviously consensus here to "violate" that principle here makes that violation OK, but it shouldn't be assumed that the medicine will cure the problem.

Possible Solutions:
So, what to do, if anything at all? Doing nothing is certainly one possibility, and if that's what happens then so be it. I think that the problems can be fixed though, with the result being not only a better process but an improved Wikipedia overall.
Basically, the core of what I'm thinking is that "Peer review" should be a common, and central part of, the every day article editing process. Every page should automatically be considered to be seeking peer review. This change in attitude seems to fit well with the "Everyone can edit" Wikipedia principle, as well.
Logistically, I imagine that peer review would change by dispensing with the "request" system all together, and making the system as simple and natural as adding Wikiproject banners. Defining "how to participate" would be to simply restate some general standards and explain how to use some to be standardized peer review tools (which I imagine would consist of (re)utilizing some (existing) templates. I could easily envision an extended {{WPBS}}, which includes functionality similar to the {{Todo}} functionality... all of this could even be extended to fold the efforts here into the WP:GA and possibly even the WP:FA process, so that it is all a single process and we're all then "pulling oars in the same direction".

Anyway, this is just some thoughts that I wanted to share with those of you who are regular contributors here. You all know what you want to get out of Wikipedia much more then I do, so the last thing I want to do is to try telling you how to be a Wikipedian. Maybe we can collectively improve this project/procedure for the benefit of all, however.
— V = I * R (talk) 06:04, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

I think the essence of requesting a peer review is that it is a search for more specific commentary on the article. In general, yes, everything on Wikipedia is in the process of peer review, but that's kind of like saying "everyone is dying". Yeah, it's technically true, but not very indicative of what actually happens on Wikipedia. The biggest problem that plague PR is the lack of active peer reviewers, mostly because it's not easy and the types of comments that are sought are often more in depth questions rather than general.
Having PR be an everyday part of the process is a laudable goal, folding FA and GA into it, even more so. The problem is that all three areas suffer from a lack of warm bodies. And I am unsure of how you solve that essential dilemma. One of the things that always frustrated me about participation in peer review is that the hard work of reviewing often goes unnoticed by even those who requested the review in the first place, with that kind of response what editor wants to put in the time necessary to do intense review sessions? Another area of frustration was the lack of reciprocation, I often reviewed articles but only posted a few for review, (once I became experienced around here it wasn't really necessary anymore anyway), often I'd drop a hint for input on an article that I was working on, but hadn't requested a formal review for, more often than not those requests, like my review efforts were totally ignored. A final area that I have always been frustrated by was the abuse of peer review by people who don't need it. I'm not talking about the occasional request but about those editors who have compiled mutliple FAs and use peer review as a feather in the article's proverbial hat, for no other reason than to be able to say it was peer reviewed when they go to FA. If an editor knows what they are doing as far as FAs go, there really isn't a point in requesting a formal peer review. After all, PR isn't really an experts panel or anything. I've often found the easiest way to get reviews or copy edits is by personally requesting them. These are just a few of the issues that always bothered me as a peer review refugee.
Sorry to be so long-winded. The goal of improving PR is always a welcome one in my mind. I should also say that Ruhrfisch has improved this area monumentally compared to where it was in '06 when I first came around here. Thanks for listening.--IvoShandor (talk) 08:37, 11 August 2009 (UTC)
Personally, I don't mind the lengthy answer one bit, as these are exactly the sort of topics which I think should be discussed. I think that you touched on the foundational issues which I'm attempting to discuss here.
The "lack of warm bodies" is one area that seems fundamentally broken. In my view (which I readily admit is limited) the lack of warm bodies stems from a procedural wall to entry. "Peer reviewers" shouldn't be a sub-group of elite editors... we're all assumed to be on equal footing here (the "anyone can edit" ideology is essential to Wikipedia's functioning). Everyone should be a "peer reviewer". The practical aspect of this change in viewpoint is that there woudl be no more "requesting a peer review", as it would be considered to be an everyday aspect of reading articles on Wikipedia. Imagine, as a dedicated "peer reviewer", simply clicking Special:Random, reading the article, clicking the talk page, and leaving your feedback on the "peer review scratch pad" (picture a {{todo}} style talk subpage). That the "scratch pad" is on the talk page for your use would be as expected as it is to see Wikiproject banners, now (ie.: their usually there, but you're free to add them as needed if their not). Anyone could, and should, leave feedback; anyone could respond to that feedback as well.
What you mentioned about the "abuse of peer review" is sort of surprising, as well. "receiving a peer review" is, and apparently has been for quite some time, a step in the ladder of "The path to featured article status"... so, what you're describing is exactly what is recommended to have occur. I know that's the only reason that brought me here, originally. Making that a more natural part of the article editing process is another aspect which I'm attempting to address with this proposal, however. That's essentially why I mentioned better integration with GA/GAR and FA above.
Basically, I'm advocating opening up the process here. Everyone who visits a talk page should be a peer reviewer, and I'm sure that if you make it clear that "your opinion about the article is welcome here:", we'll begin seeing a deluge of participation in "peer reviewing" articles. It won't quite look the same, since the reviews will be much more collaborative, but that's in keeping with the nature of Wikipedia as a whole anyway.
— V = I * R (talk) 09:49, 11 August 2009 (UTC)
Everyone can edit on Wikipedia, and everyone can do a peer review. However, not everyone can do these things equally well. Some of us who choose to do many peer reviews do so, I think, because we have the skills and experience to do them well, and we want to help other writers and editors to improve the encyclopedia. Some of those other writers and editors have skills equal to or greater than our own, but many do not. If the current peer-review process disappeared and were replaced by an open process that included no formal guidelines for reviewing or seeking a review, I'd be far less likely to review articles by less experienced writers and editors. Reviews are hard work, time-consuming, and sometimes tinged with angst because a reviewer is often the bearer of bad news. In the absence of a formal process, I'd be disinclined to spend many hours reviewing articles at random. Finetooth (talk) 18:27, 11 August 2009 (UTC)
You're misunderstanding what I'm advocating, slightly. Part of what I'm asking here is, why are you waiting on requests? You're obviously a good reviewer, and you're correct that it is a skill. I don't dispute that what you're doing is valuable. One question I'm asking here is, is the current administrative burden worth your valuable time? Why are we particularly concerned about backlogs, here? I'm advocating that it is understood that there is a request for peer review for every article, at all times, because it is (or should be) an integral part of the assessment process.
Something along the lines of the request system could still exist, here. Rather than requests for assessment we could just have something like "peer review advertising". It would be understood that a request does not guarantee response, it's just a listing of a specific article for 7 (or insert other number) days, and they would simply go away after that. No need for a backlog at all (although, limits could still be established, since they would probably still be required...)
— V = I * R (talk) 19:14, 11 August 2009 (UTC)
If the backlog disappeared, we would have no efficient way to tell which of the submitted articles had gone unreviewed. Finetooth (talk) 20:14, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

(out) A bit of history to start with. The current system of the bot listing PRs here and sorting PRs by topics began in Dec 2007 – prior to that there were no topics and people added PRs by hand. About the same time the PR volunteers list was started. On March 15, 2008 I made a proposal that no peer review go without some sort of response – before this 40% or more of PR requests were archived with no or very limited responses. Since then neither I nor the bot have archived a peer review without a substantive response (the bot took over archiving from me a few months after this). The backlog was started as a way of making people aware of PRs with no responses, and it became even more important once the commitment was made to ensure every PR got a review.

The backlog exists because there are more PR requests than there are reviewers / reviews. As has been noted, WP:GAN, WP:FAC and WP:FLC also suffer from the same problem. The PR volunteers' list was a way to try and increase the number of reviews/reviewers. The daily and total limits on PRs are a way to reduce the number of requests. The idea of the limits came from FAC, where a nominator is basically limited to one FAC at a time. Since a commitment has been made to review everything, some people can (and do) request PRs without ever doing any sort of review in return. People requesting reviews here and at other places without ever giving back is the free rider problem, and similar to the tragedy of the commons. Historically we have had people request as many as TEN peer reviews in one day (before the limits were established).

One final thought before responding to the above suggestion directly. We need to look at what peer review is used for. Most PR requests are from people who are trying to improve articles, usually with FA or FL or GA in mind. These reviews are my top priority, and I figure if you can write an article that makes FA/FL/GA, you should be able to review here or elsewhere. Some people have written or improved an article and just want feedback on it. These two groups will usually make the changes suggested by a reviewer. Other PRs are from people who see a problem with an article and want the official stamp of PR to point out that and other problems. These can be things like "I just read the article on X and can't believe it is not better" or lately there seem to be more of the "I can't believe that the article on Y only has a Stub/Start/C/B class assessment". Peer review is a place for pointing out problems, but the reviewers do not generally take it on themselves to solve the problems. I also notice that many of these PR requests tend to be from people who have not edited the article in question much or at all, and these seem more likely to have the PR suggestions ignored. Lately we average about 120 PRs a month and every one of them where the requester is patient can get a review within two weeks. I do a lot of PRs because I have always found them helpful for my own work, and because I like to help others and this is something I can do. I find when I am trying to get something to FAC that I get too close to it, and PR is a good way to have other eyes look things over and find problems I missed. I do mention the PR at FAC, but it is from gratitude.

Finally, I see some problems with the proposal. First, it seems to me that reviewing everthing (when there are almost 3 million articles) is tantamount to reviewing nothing. The current PR system is useful because it connects people seeking feedback with people willing to provide it. Despite the lack of responses or edits based on reviews, I sitll think that most articles are improved as a result of PR and I like looking at the FAs and FLs and GAs and thinking I helped a little bit in making that better. If PR became click Random Article and suggect improvements, my guess it that there would be many more suggestions that would get no response or fall on deaf ears. My second problem with the proposal is that it seems to suggest we shorten PR to a week and allow requests to go without responses. While we do struggle to get an average of 120 or so PRs reviewed here each month, I think the proposal is a big step backwards if it results in PRs that go without a repsonse. That is very disheartening. Sorry for the long response, Ruhrfisch ><>°° 02:10, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

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