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Unfinished business

In light of my imminent retirement, I'd like to take this opportunity to set down a few matters that I've been keeping in the back of my mind, but which are properly something the new coordinators should deal with as they see fit. In no particular order:

Category restructuring
The question of how the various category trees under our purview should be structured—particularly at the top level—is something that's been on our plate for more than a year now. Aside from the recent (but abortive) discussion about operational categories, we also have a restructuring workshop that's seen some debate but no moves to implementation yet. At some point, it will probably be necessary to bite the bullet and actually move forward on these issues; but it's likely to be an unpleasant task, at best, so I'd suggest not having it be the centerpiece of efforts right off the bat.
Template conversions
The infobox conversion effort has gotten off to a good start, but will probably require more prodding before it's finally finished.
Portal efforts
There was some discussion a while back about being more thorough in our portal coverage. Virtually every task force's scope would be a suitable topic for a portal; and portals are reasonably easy to create, and can be brought up to featured level with only a few days' effort. Some manner of portal creation/improvement drive could raise our prominence in that area significantly in fairly short order.
Permanent stubs
There was some abortive discussion at one point regarding the approach we should take to articles that, due to lack of available information, are expected to remain stubs indefinitely, but which are nevertheless useful to have because they form part of a series or are referred to in other articles. Some thought was given to the idea of encouraging the merger of these sorts of stubs into broader lists, which would be easier to maintain, less likely to be deleted, and eligible for featured status in their own right.
Core article contest
This was discussed in some detail above; as far as I know, the latest idea—basing the entry list on actual prominence—is waiting for exact page view data. In any case, more work is probably needed on the setup anyways.
Old featured articles
There remain a (small) number of featured articles—the ones commented out in our showcase—that have significant citation problems. At this point, it's probably a good idea to deal with them one way or another, either by systematically trying to improve them (via a contest of some sort, perhaps) or by systematically taking them to FAR.
New task forces
There have been a few interesting ideas bounced around for potential task forces; the most immediately feasible ones are military vehicles, Central Asian military history, and Mongol military history.

Comments are, as always, extremely welcome. Kirill 14:02, 28 February 2008 (UTC)

Thank very much for preparing this list. It is absolutely characteristic of you that you have taken the time and trouble to ensure a smooth transition. As always, your efforts, and your thoughtfulness, are very much appreciated and I, for one, will miss you. --ROGER DAVIES talk 14:12, 28 February 2008 (UTC)
I agree with Roger's comments that you will be missed not only by us but by the whole project. As for your suggestions I agree that we should create military vehicles, Central Asian military history and Mongol military history taskforces. I also agree that once the new coordinators are ready we should begin the plans for the core article contest. Kyriakos (talk) 08:17, 29 February 2008 (UTC)
The question is, how do we distribute tasks in an organized way? Wandalstouring (talk) 12:42, 29 February 2008 (UTC)
First, we need to agree what to focus on and in what order. I'm working on an action list for discussion which I'll post later. Second, we need to find the manpower. I've some ideas on that too, which will hopefully get discussion going. --ROGER DAVIES talk 13:01, 29 February 2008 (UTC)

Tag & Assess 2008

We need to schedule this in now. We have a number of logistical issues to resolve, such as who will write and run the scripts to generate the worklists. Maralia has offered input on this as part of the large number of excellent improvement suggestions that came out of the workshop. Let's start by firming up a date. Anyone object to April 1? --ROGER DAVIES talk 09:52, 1 March 2008 (UTC)

Perhaps a day earlier or a day later? Usually people do not take serious announcements seriously on April 1st since its April fools days. April also presents a problem for me becuase, as a student, I tend to get heavily involved in finals; although I grant you that the drive will likely be over several monthes. I will concede to whatever the consensus is on this pointTomStar81 (Talk) 10:21, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
Point taken. March 31? --ROGER DAVIES talk 10:48, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
OK. Wandalstouring (talk) 12:53, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
March 31 is fine by me; however, it means we have to hustle to get things up, organized, and running. TomStar81 (Talk) 20:06, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
March 31 seems good to me. Though as Tom said we better get moving. Kyriakos (talk) 22:52, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
Fine, Blnguyen (vote in the photo straw poll) 06:53, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

(outdent) I've spoken To Kirill (who'll generate the lists) and he'd prefer a bit more time. I've tentatively suggested pushing T&A08 back to 15 April start date. Any objections? This also means we have time to sneak in the B-class assessment drive first :) --ROGER DAVIES talk 14:45, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

There's been some discussion on the drive's talk page about the shape this could take. Input would be much appreciated. --ROGER DAVIES talk 22:53, 7 March 2008 (UTC)

B-Class assessment

Our B class assessment could profit from a drive. This should perhaps be done on a task force basis. Wandalstouring (talk) 12:44, 1 March 2008 (UTC)

Can you clarify please what you think needs doing? I see we have 4313 B-Class articles. --ROGER DAVIES talk 12:50, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
Take a closer look at a sample and check how many have been assessed according to our "new" system. You will see that most of them aren't and also that many of them no longer qualify as B class. On the other hand there are some stubs and starts that would be B class according to our system. Wandalstouring (talk) 12:55, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
I agree with Wandalstouring. It is useful to look at Category:Military history articles with incomplete B-Class checklists as well. That is incredibly bloated at the moment. Woody (talk) 12:58, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
Thanks. That's what I guessed you were talking about. It makes sense to prioritise this. At best luke-warm towards about trawling through stubs and starts right now though. That's a huge reservoir. --ROGER DAVIES talk 13:09, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
Hmm okay. Do we need a general recap on what kind of detail we want for B-class articles. Because the criteria doesn't mention length, some people will declare an article to be "comprehensive" at 2kb, even though it might or might not have exhausted all teh available info. Personally I usually don't tag anything less than 10k as B, although I've refrained from peeing people off with mass demotions. That might be why WP:VIET hardly has any Bs at all, because of my assessment... Blnguyen (vote in the photo straw poll) 06:53, 3 March 2008 (UTC)
Short articles with 2kb can be long enough if there is really little to say on a subject, so I think the assessment whether the length is sufficient needs some knowledge about the topic. Wandalstouring (talk) 08:41, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

(outdent) Frankly, it would be good to get this out of the way. It's not a particularly big job and useful to get on top of. I've asked Kirill about generating worksheets/worklists for this. He reckons he can do it by 10/11 March. This means we can run this drive as a curtain-raiser to T&A08 as if we get behind it, it should only take a couple of weeks tops to complete. If so, 3-stripes for 500 assessed, chevrons for per 1000 assessed and a gold wiki for the top scorer. It would be good to announce this in the February newsletter which is due to go out real soon now. So comments? Any objections? --ROGER DAVIES talk 14:51, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

No objections. Wandalstouring (talk) 16:11, 3 March 2008 (UTC)
Cool. I've trailed this in the February newsletter to get a bit of buzz going and created a (currently very basic) page for it at WP:MHA-BCAD. This can be fleshed out over the next few days. Kirill is happy about doing the lists. --ROGER DAVIES talk 08:10, 4 March 2008 (UTC)
Some comments about the draft drive page would be very much appreciated. --ROGER DAVIES talk 22:47, 7 March 2008 (UTC)

Gentlemen: this is now ready to go live. I've arbitrarily picked 18:00 (UTC) on March 10 as the launch time, which will be done by posting the worklist table (currently in a sandbox) to the drive page. (If it's not done by 18:15, it will mean I've been knocked over by a bus, kicked by a donkey or hit by lightning, and someone will have to do the honours.) Overnight, I'll send out announcements to the Top Twenty participants in the last Tag & Assess drive, inviting them to join in and mention it in Announcements. If that doesn't attract enough attention, we can mail the other 80-odd T&A participants. --ROGER DAVIES talk 05:19, 10 March 2008 (UTC)

Hmmm. We now have more participants signed up than we've got worklists. The obvious route is to add a second worklist containing 2000 or 3000 articles from Category:Start-Class military history articles or Category:Military history articles with incomplete B-Class checklists? Anyone object? --ROGER DAVIES talk 19:52, 10 March 2008 (UTC)

I would go with ones from the incomplete cat, but absolutely no objections. Woody (talk) 19:57, 10 March 2008 (UTC)
Ok. Otherwise, I'm going to ask Kirill to generate a 3000 article list A.S.A.P. We're already busy and the American editors will only just be thinking about leaving work for home. --ROGER DAVIES talk 20:13, 10 March 2008 (UTC)

What goes wrong with the B class assessment

The idea to make B class assessments for stubs is directing our precious manpower on a senseless task. The stubs do fail most criteria and we can not be sure that they will be improved in a manner that still reflects their assessment. Starts by contrast have already quite some substance and if changes occur these would usually not be that earthshaking. For them the B class assessment does make sense because one can see what needs to be improved in this article for reaching B class. So I strongly urge that the stubs get only part of the B class assessment drive when all starts have been finished and get eliminated a.s.a.p. from the current lists that have not yet been assigned. Wandalstouring (talk) 10:11, 23 March 2008 (UTC)

Agreed. No-one is being asked to do B-class assessments for stubs. It would probably be a good idea to overhaul the way classified articles are being handled generally and I'm working on a few notes at the moment. --ROGER DAVIES talk 10:24, 23 March 2008 (UTC)

Stubs

We have 29,000 stubs. It is going to take huge amounts of manpower to organise these meaningfully. My feeling is that we should run a stub improvement drive, and use the task forces to work them up. I'm still mulling this over so I'd like to return to it later, but as a first step, we need larger, better organised task forces. I'll return to this below (#Task forces). --ROGER DAVIES talk 09:52, 1 March 2008 (UTC)

I don't think we can improve all stubs. In the Punic Wars for example some battle stubs contain all information available. Perhaps it would be a more convenient approach if we ask us what needs an article and what can be part of a larger article with a redirect to the corresponding chapter. A task force based approach would be convenient since you need some understanding of the topic to expand stubs or merge them into larger articles. Wandalstouring (talk) 12:50, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
I'm a bit luke-warm on this one. A key reason that articles are stubs is that no-one is interested in expanding them at the moment. I agree that some articles on important topics are stubs and need to be improved, but most of them are on relatively unimportant and low priority topics. --Nick Dowling (talk) 23:04, 1 March 2008 (UTC)


Template conversion

It seems to me that only

need updating. Is this accurate? If so, presumably this could be handled by a wiki-gnome or two fairly swiftly? Comments, --ROGER DAVIES talk 09:52, 1 March 2008 (UTC)

I have been working on the template conversions and have already done about 100 submarine ones. Shouldn't take much to get it all completed. Oh and don't forget about all of the ships ones. There are a considerable number that need to be updated in tandem with WP:SHIPS. MBK004 is someone to ask about that. Woody (talk) 12:46, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
If you feel you can take it on, would you care to do the necessary liaising? --ROGER DAVIES talk 13:16, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
Happy to. Woody (talk) 13:24, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
As an Australian military history obsessive, I'd be happy to take on the task of removing the ADF unit boxes. --Nick Dowling (talk) 23:04, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
I had been putting them off, preferring my comfort zone of ships and subs, so please do. ;) Woody (talk) 23:08, 1 March 2008 (UTC)

How is this going, by the way? Close to completion? --ROGER DAVIES talk 09:49, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

The following featured article have citation problems. I suggest we list them in talk and invite editors to either get them back to up to strength (say, WikiChevrons per article improved) or refer to FAR. The articles are:

  1. Battle of the Bulge (citation problems)
  2. Battle of Hampton Roads (citation problems)
  3. Battle of Inchon (citation problems)
  4. Battle of Jutland (citation problems, unusual sections)
  5. Blitzkrieg (citation problems)
  6. Chemical warfare (citation problems)
  7. Civil Air Patrol (citation problems)
  8. First Crusade (citation problems, no clear references)
  9. Isaac Brock (citation problems)
  10. Kammerlader (citation problems)
  11. Polish-Muscovite War (1605–1618) (citation problems)
  12. Second Crusade (citation problems)
  13. Shrine of Remembrance (citation problems)
  14. Siege (citation problems)
  15. Stanisław Koniecpolski (citation problems)
  16. Swedish allotment system (citation problems)
  17. Virtuti Militari (citation problems)
  18. War of the Spanish Succession (citation problems)
  19. William III of England (citation problems)
  20. William IV of the United Kingdom (citation problems)
  21. Witold Pilecki (citation problems)

Thoughts? --ROGER DAVIES talk 09:52, 1 March 2008 (UTC)

PS: This lot are ideal candidates for being dealt with by Task Forces. --ROGER DAVIES talk 09:54, 1 March 2008 (UTC)

We could start a drive for the older FA articles. I agree that awarding the chevrons for articles improved may be a good idea, but I am not sure how much pahzaz we'd get from our task forces on this point (although I have been suprised by our task forces before). TomStar81 (Talk) 10:21, 1 March 2008 (UTC)

I like this idea - the project's large number of FAs is one of our main claims to fame, and it makes sense to preserve the FAs. It needs to be noted, however, that some of the articles are now so far beyond FA standard that they need a comprehensive re-write to be savable. --Nick Dowling (talk) 23:04, 1 March 2008 (UTC)

Yes, some articles have content problems aside from the general no refs problems from the stone ages. I would be surprised if only 10% of the featured articles are from the old old days though... Blnguyen (vote in the photo straw poll) 06:53, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

Task forces

I can't help but feel that the key to increasing the number of involved editors is through the task forces. These may well provide a greater interest-focus and thus more motivation than the slightly more abstract concept of a Milhist wikiproject. I suggest we focus on reforming/regenerating task forces. Here are some related ideas for discussion:

  1. Every task force should have at least one coordinator attached to it. This would mean having the responsible coordinator/s named at the head of every Task Force talk page.
  2. The coordinator would help administer any drives involving the task force.
  3. Task force membership needs to increase. I suggest an "Introduce a friend" drive, on each task force page. The objective is that every TF member introduces one new member. Additionally, TF membership can be increased by advertising in associated Wikiproject pages.
  4. We set a minimum caucus size for new task forces, say six members.
  5. Each TF has its own portal (Kirill's excellent idea). He points out that is relatively easy to get these to featured status.
  6. The TF plays a role in drives - e.g. any stub improvement activity, rescuing featured articles etc.

Kirill mentions that there are a few interesting ideas bounced around for potential task forces; the most immediately feasible ones are military vehicles, Central Asian military history, and Mongol military history. These, I suggest, we could ahead with, subject to the comments above.--ROGER DAVIES talk 09:52, 1 March 2008 (UTC)

A preliminary look suggests that most of this sounds like a good idea, although I will confess that I have some reservations about having a coordinator appointed to the head of each task force (although maybe I'm just misunderstanding you). As an alternative I would suggest holding a head task force approval vote with the coordinator vote, or perhaps delegating power to the coordinators to appoint a head guy for the task forces. My primary concern about having one coordinator attached to a task force is that the coordinator may not be particularly familar with the subject material, which may adversely effect the efficency of the task force and, by extension, the project. TomStar81 (Talk) 10:21, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
Point of clarification my main reservation with this is that I see it as a kind of "president/cabintent" thing where people are assigned tasks here. My other reservation about this stems from the topic: what happens if I have no idea at all what the problem is and someone comes crawling to me for help. What am I supposed to do? Thats where much of my concern is. TomStar81 (Talk) 16:53, 10 March 2008 (UTC)
Copied to the foot for clearer commenting --ROGER DAVIES talk 10:24, 12 March 2008 (UTC)
It's not really to head it, more to maintain it and jolly people along. this doesn't need much specialist knowledge. In principle, also, there is no reason why editors can't do the TF lead job, perhaps by election within the TF if necessary. --ROGER DAVIES talk 10:51, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
I have been reading a bit on the subject and I think Early Muslim military history task force needs an expansion to the present time(they urged for this when the task force was created), simply because they have a different concept of history and of defining war. The current definition that they are until 16th century AD is rather artificial and only imposed by us Christian because we could think of them only as counterpart to the Medieval warfare task force (a term regarded by Muslims as limited to the Christian lands). I know that we are likely to encounter sensitive issues with expanding it. There are some editors who stress the "our fighters seek death more desperately than life". For this reason the first priority would be to give a good definition of the Muslim point of view on history and especially military history and how it did and still does affect warfare of this religious group. Wandalstouring (talk) 12:27, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
No problems with any of that. --ROGER DAVIES talk 12:38, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
I've left a brief note on the task force talk page mentioning that expansion of the scope has been proposed. That seems the been forum for discussion, don't you think, perhaps with a mention and a link on the main Milhist talk page. --ROGER DAVIES talk 13:55, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
I notified the members since this was their aim and we bargained with them for the current solution, so there shouldn't be much discussion fulfilling their original wish. Wandalstouring (talk) 16:46, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
In light of the low level of interest by members, and the logistical difficulties outlined by Kirill here, I suggest we shelve this for say six months? Is this acceptable? --ROGER DAVIES talk 07:46, 8 March 2008 (UTC)
I totally agree with the idea. I proposed something like this a year ago and nothing was done about but I still think it is a great idea. The way I see it is that each cordinators nominates a few taskforces that they are willing to look after. And there jobs inside the taskforce should be to maintain the to do list, archive the page, help people with queries, etc, etc. I also agree with the expansion of the Muslim taskforce. I also agree with the military vehicles, Central Asian military history, and Mongol military history taskforces. Kyriakos (talk) 22:18, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
In the longer term, I'd like to see TFs for Indochina/Vietnam and the Spanish Civil War too. In the shorter term though, perhaps getting the existing TFs up to full steam should be a higher priority than adding new ones? --ROGER DAVIES talk 07:46, 8 March 2008 (UTC)
I like the idea of coordinators also coordinating task forces. I'm not sure about the need for portals though - once they're created they're rarely edited, which indicates that few editors use the things and they're not worth the effort which is put into them. --Nick Dowling (talk) 23:04, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
Portals aren't really much value for time, unless you use what Portal:India did with a randomly selected article from an FA pool. Blnguyen (vote in the photo straw poll) 06:53, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

(Outdent) Is it worth pursuing the idea of galvinising the TF and boosting membership at the moment? Or should this be re-tabled in a month or so? --ROGER DAVIES talk 23:20, 7 March 2008 (UTC)

Point of clarification my main reservation with this is that I see it as a kind of "president/cabinet" thing where people are assigned tasks here. My other reservation about this stems from the topic: what happens if I have no idea at all what the problem is and someone comes crawling to me for help. What am I supposed to do? Thats where much of my concern is. TomStar81 (Talk) 16:53, 10 March 2008 (UTC)

  1. Good point, Tom. First, we are elected because we are trusted by the community to coordinate, it's what the job title is. This proposal simply deepens the effective level of coordination. Second, coordination is about keeping people informed about developments and trying to inspire or motivate them. Third, we have no power so there is no element of compulsion. The project is a "coalition of the willing". So while, in theory, we can assign tasks as much as we like, they will only get done if people want to do them. Finally, coordinators here do need things to do: we've got nine capable and experienced people largely underemployed moving articles from A-class review to A-class archive, deciding who gets Chevrons w/ Oak Leaves etc. This is a terrible waste of resources. Better surely, to try instead to growth the task forces and get them the capable of autonomous mini-drives and so on? --ROGER DAVIES talk 10:24, 12 March 2008 (UTC)
  2. On your other reservation, if you don't know the answer to a question, it never hurts to say so and ask, in turn, someone who does :) And, to be honest, there's no shortage of places to ask. --ROGER DAVIES talk 10:24, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

Finally

First, the key thing that came out of the referendum was the members' desire for a mid-course between strong leadership and no leadership at all. To reflect this, I propose that we scrap the term "assistant coordinator" and have "coordinators" and a "lead coordinator". I'd feel more comfortable with this too :) Thoughts, preferably preceded by "support", "oppose" or "comment" would be helpful. --ROGER DAVIES talk 09:52, 1 March 2008 (UTC)

Second, as you may have noticed, in my private citizen capacity, I've given every coordinator who has served in the past two completed terms a Wikiproject barnstar for each term served. I would like to see this become an informal tradition. --ROGER DAVIES talk 09:52, 1 March 2008 (UTC)

Kirill (for which he deserves thanks) has updated the election history titles so that's one thing done. --ROGER DAVIES talk 23:08, 7 March 2008 (UTC)

Admins

Bouncing off an idea from MBK004 over at WP:SHIPS, would there be any interest here in creating a list of admins who are active within the project? It may be useful for the contributers to know who they can turn to if they need admin related help. TomStar81 (Talk) 23:51, 1 March 2008 (UTC)

That's an excellent idea. --Nick Dowling (talk) 00:34, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
I agree with Nick. I think it would be great. Kyriakos (talk) 00:43, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
I don't know how much benefit it would bring, just do it. Wandalstouring (talk) 11:08, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
Neither I, because four of us (coordinators) are already admins, so if any member would need help he can easily ask them. I propose that we should mark admin coordinators with an asterisk on the main project page. --Eurocopter (talk) 11:17, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

(outdent) How were you thinking of implementing it? A separate section at the top of the members list, or an asterisk after an admin's name in the list itself? Or somewhere else? I'm against the idea if it's merely a trophy cabinet but would support it wholeheartedly providing it's a resource of admins to whom one can turn for help with non-contentious matters (or even for neutral advice on contentious matters). Restricting this to just the coordinators who happen to be admins goes against my personal philosophy of de-centralising wherever possible, though I don't expect everyone to agree with me on that :) --ROGER DAVIES talk 12:13, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

This would be a project wide list for those contributors who need the help of an admin, not just coordinators who happen to be admins. The idea is that a list or our projects admins could/would be useful to the projects contributors who need admin-related help but aren't sure who in the project has access to the tools. I was thinking that we could do what SHIPS did and list people with access to such tools out on the main profect page (in our case, below the project coordinators) as a kind of directory for those seeking admin help so they can see the User names who've been granted admin privileges here (although I am open to suggestions about where to put this). To be fair, we can offer admins the chance to opt out of this, but on the whole I think it a good idea. TomStar81 (Talk) 00:14, 3 March 2008 (UTC)
The place to add this is probably in an Admin section of the Logistics dept. Oh, and I think admins should add themselves. Thoughts? --ROGER DAVIES talk 13:01, 3 March 2008 (UTC)
OK. Wandalstouring (talk) 16:10, 3 March 2008 (UTC)
Thats fine by me. TomStar81 (Talk) 17:35, 3 March 2008 (UTC)
I agree that admins should be asked whether they want to opt-in to this. --Nick Dowling (talk) 08:01, 4 March 2008 (UTC)

I raised this here and the response has been underwhelming :) What do we do next? Decide how to implement it and then do so? --ROGER DAVIES talk 23:00, 7 March 2008 (UTC)

Yep, I suggest someone draw up a preliminary list of names, then we ask those most active on WP:MILHIST discussion pages/Milhist pages whether they wouldn't mind being a point of contact in case of mopping up needing doing. Woody (talk) 23:02, 7 March 2008 (UTC)
And, in this context, include them in the Logistics dept, or on the members list? (Oberiko seemed to think that admins ought to be flagged as a matter of course because of potential bias though I don't see the bias myself.) --ROGER DAVIES talk 23:06, 7 March 2008 (UTC)
Might be better in the Logistics section, as the members list is quite long, and already crowded with brief descriptions of everyone's specialties. Wading through that to find Admins, even if the word "Admin" were to be bolded or something, doesn't seem particularly efficient or desirable to me.LordAmeth (talk) 23:57, 7 March 2008 (UTC)
Is anyone interested in moving this forward? That is, having - in the Logistics dept - a list of admins who would be willing to help out... Woody has proposed asking individual admins if they'd be willing to be listed. Perhaps he might be interested in putting this together? Assuming nobody objects, that is --ROGER DAVIES talk 09:54, 12 March 2008 (UTC)
I agree the logistics dept should probably have the list. As a starter, are all the coordinator admins willing to list their names. Woody (talk) 14:00, 13 March 2008 (UTC)
  • Yes:Woody
  • Yes: Roger Davies
  • Yes: Nick Dowling
  • No:


Coordinating within the project

Just mulling things over for input, at the moment, but the main thought is focusing on ways in which coordinators can play a stable ongoing role in the project's development.

  1. Have a slightly more formal coordination role in Task Forces and project pages? (Say a Coordinator/s: hatnote at the top of each showing which coordinator/s has/have adopted it and should be contacted in case of questions/problems.)
  2. Take a more active, but informal, role in dispute resolution? I hadn't realised before how many squabbles are going on at any particular moment within the project. These are an awful waste of editing energy and not good for esprit de corps.

Comments? Suggestions? --ROGER DAVIES talk 23:18, 7 March 2008 (UTC)

I like the idea of having coordinators oversee individual task forces, as that might give me the motivation, the push, that I need to really focus on a given set of tasks and feel that a single given thing is my responsibility. This might also help galvanize (thanks for the word - good choice) the Task Forces and get things moving better.
For what it's worth, despite having admin privileges, I don't personally care much for getting myself involved in dispute resolution, and I don't think I'm good at it either. Even so, if the other Coordinators wish to tack that on to their (our) list of informal responsibilities, and move towards members (editors) asking for our help more often in resolving these kinds of issues, that'd be a good thing I think. LordAmeth (talk) 23:55, 7 March 2008 (UTC)
I too think that my skills lie in directions other than dispute resolution :) --ROGER DAVIES talk 15:18, 8 March 2008 (UTC)
Kyriakos and Nick Dowling also have indicated their general support for leading TFs so we're moving forward :) --ROGER DAVIES talk 00:16, 8 March 2008 (UTC)
OK because I have utterly little to do. Wandalstouring (talk) 09:30, 8 March 2008 (UTC)
If you're up for it, there's an important job that will need doing soon. When the B-Class Drive starts, we're bound to get complaints from editors whose articles have been downgraded because they've failed one or two (or more) of the B-Class criteria. Fairness demands that we review the review if asked (and many will ask) and respond. Is this your sort of thing? If you can help, that would be great. --ROGER DAVIES talk 15:17, 8 March 2008 (UTC)
Happy to do it all to be honest. I dabble in DR when neccessary and I am happy to re-review and expand on the comments when neccessary. I would be able to be a point of contact for a task force as well. Woody (talk) 15:51, 8 March 2008 (UTC)
Thanks for the offer! It wouldn't be necessary to do it all though as I hope we'll have several hands to the pump (including mine). Best is to aim for a very quick response time as that shows that complaints and grumbles are being treated seriously. --ROGER DAVIES talk 15:59, 8 March 2008 (UTC)
I've added you to the hatnote on the BCAD drive page. I'd be grateful if you could take a look at the page which is pretty much ready and check it for typos, missing info etc. (The worklists themselves should arrive from Kirill RSN.) --ROGER DAVIES talk 15:44, 9 March 2008 (UTC)
Thanks for the CE, Woody :) --ROGER DAVIES talk 04:09, 10 March 2008 (UTC)
Yeah, I have no prblem with this. I'd be happy to reassess for some disgruntled customers. ;) Kyriakos (talk) 20:39, 9 March 2008 (UTC)
Cool, but don't forget. NO CASH REFUNDS! --ROGER DAVIES talk 04:09, 10 March 2008 (UTC)
Many thanks to Woody, Kyriakos and Blnguyen for signing up as BCAD drive coordinators :) That pretty much gives us 24-hour cover, I reckon. --ROGER DAVIES talk 04:09, 10 March 2008 (UTC)
You can also sign me up, I was afk for 4 days. Wandalstouring (talk) 15:34, 14 March 2008 (UTC)
Thanks! Done. --ROGER DAVIES talk 16:37, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

Contest tallying

Hi everybody, a request on my talkpage means I think we need a bit of clarification. The Contest department has always been tallied up at the end of the month by Kirill, this month I did it. Dreamafter has asked me today whether he can tally it up at the end of the month given that I already have some articles in the contest and presumably he is thinking about a COI. What do the coordinators think. Should this be another one of the coordinators official duties or can anyone do it? Woody (talk) 15:07, 9 March 2008 (UTC)

Let a coordinator do it, these are trusted members of the community. If you have a possible COI, I can do it. Wandalstouring (talk) 15:14, 9 March 2008 (UTC)
Those were my first thoughts. I had originally thought about asking here for an assessment for my ones, though I am hoping most of them will be up for external assessment anyway, so it is simply about tallying numbers. The only COI comes from assessing the articles, everything else is simple maths. Woody (talk) 15:17, 9 March 2008 (UTC)
It seems that all the work has been done for this month or did I miss something? Wandalstouring (talk) 15:25, 9 March 2008 (UTC)
Everything is all done until the end of the month, yes. He has asked to tally up April's numbers. Woody (talk) 15:32, 9 March 2008 (UTC)
I agree with Wandalstouring. It really ought be done by a coordinator. People will start wondering what they pay us for otherwise :) --ROGER DAVIES talk 10:26, 12 March 2008 (UTC)
What do we get paid incidentally? Blnguyen (vote in the photo straw poll) 08:09, 13 March 2008 (UTC)
:) --ROGER DAVIES talk 08:21, 13 March 2008 (UTC)
Yeah well it doesn't matter in the end, because some guys rate their own articles anyway, so for GA+ it's done externally and properly, and for lower classes people can do what they want, so unless they arithemetically cheat....Blnguyen (vote in the photo straw poll) 23:51, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

Technical questions

1. Does anyone know a way of counting the number of articles in a large category, to arrive at a total? Is there a tool, for instance? --ROGER DAVIES talk 10:33, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

The normal way to do this is via external script/bot; I'm not aware of anything built-in that would generate that number. Kirill 10:44, 12 March 2008 (UTC)
Thanks, Kirill. The purpose was to monitor the impact of drives, like BCAD. What's complicated about that one is that we have Worklist A cleaning up Category:B-Class military history articles while Worklist B (Category:Military history articles with incomplete B-Class checklists) is adding to it. --ROGER DAVIES talk 10:55, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

2. Does anyone know if the articles in a category can be transcluded? The specific thought is ways of getting the contents of Category:Unassessed military history articles listed in WP:MHA#REQ. --ROGER DAVIES talk 10:33, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

No, they cannot; the only practical way to get a list of articles in a category is, again, via external script/bot.
(There are a number of bots—e.g. the one that puts together the auto-generated cleanup list for us—which essentially scan categories and pull articles out of them. It should be reasonably easy to get one of them to monitor the unassessed category as well, I think.) Kirill 10:44, 12 March 2008 (UTC)
Thanks again, Kirill. How would we get such a bot doing this? --ROGER DAVIES talk 10:55, 12 March 2008 (UTC)
WP:BOTREQ might be a decent method; but you might get a faster response asking, say, User:SatyrTN whether her bot would be able to do it, or if she knows of any other bots, offhand, that could. Kirill 10:57, 12 March 2008 (UTC)
Thanks. My next port of call then ... --ROGER DAVIES talk 11:27, 12 March 2008 (UTC)
User:SatyrTN has kindly offered to do this daily (nightly). Does anyone mind or should I press ahead and ask her to set it up? --ROGER DAVIES talk 19:04, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

Well my manual way is to just cut and paste from the list into text editor, then use the replace all to replace "*" with "}} <linebreak> {{" and it should be good to go. Blnguyen (vote in the photo straw poll) 23:54, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the tip. If the worst came to the worst, I was thinking of doing something similar but some of the categories have 200+ pages in each, so it gets laborious :) --ROGER DAVIES talk 00:10, 13 March 2008 (UTC)
It's pretty quick actually. It only takes about one minute for each slab of 200, and that's to delete the "A" and "B" and "C" heading. If you get a large cat with 200 entries all under "c" then you only have to delete that once and the "replace all" trick takes less than a minute. Blnguyen (vote in the photo straw poll) 07:11, 13 March 2008 (UTC)
You're right. The secret is doing it in page at a time, I think. I made up a file of 2000 and lost loads of time navigating. I can actually do a Word script that will automate some of this too. Thanks, --ROGER DAVIES talk 07:47, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

Main talk page archiving

WT:MILHIST gets a pretty decent amount of traffic now, so someone should probably keep an eye on the need for archiving; it's at about 200K at the moment. (I'd be happy to continue doing the archiving myself, if nobody else wants to do it; but I don't want to step on the toes of any coordinators that would prefer to handle it themselves.) Kirill 22:24, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

A lot of busy talk pages now have automatic archiving set up. Is this practical here? As most discussions last a few days and then die out I don't see why it would be problematical. --Nick Dowling (talk) 07:08, 13 March 2008 (UTC)
Yes, because the bot works on how many days a given topic has been inactive. So it's not as though it will archive something that is ten days since creation but still active. Blnguyen (vote in the photo straw poll) 08:03, 13 March 2008 (UTC)
This came up before, a few months ago. There's a strog argument for automatic archiving and I'd certainly support it. --ROGER DAVIES talk 08:07, 13 March 2008 (UTC)
It's certainly feasible from a technical standpoint. The only drawback I see is that it makes the "if nobody objects in X days, we're doing this" approach to guidelines and such more difficult, since quiet sections may get archived away too soon; but if you guys have some method in mind for avoiding this issue, there shouldn't be any problems with getting a bot to archive. Kirill 10:49, 13 March 2008 (UTC)
At AN the simplest method of doing it is to add a confusing time stamp so adding 12:00, 13 March 3000 (UTC) to the section confuses the bots. Woody (talk) 10:53, 13 March 2008 (UTC)
That'll make them avoid the section entirely, no? I'd suspect that adding a timestamp of, say, 20 days in the future will make the bots leave the section alone for 20 days and then archive it; but I haven't actually tested that out. Kirill 10:55, 13 March 2008 (UTC)
You are correct on both counts I think. Leaving a crazy timestamp means that it needs to be manually archived. I think the second way should work as anticipated. Woody (talk) 10:58, 13 March 2008 (UTC)
Ah, ok. In that case, you should be able to have something like MiszaBot II handle things with minimal problems so long as someone remembers to do the timestamp trick when needed. Kirill 11:06, 13 March 2008 (UTC)
Hmmmm. I'm not very keen on the manual bit. Humans being forgetful and the fix being fiddly. Easier surely just to get the bot to archive 21 days after the last comment in a section? Having had a quick look at it, that, for example, would probably halve the size of the existing talk page. --ROGER DAVIES talk 13:34, 13 March 2008 (UTC)
I've just archived some of this now, largely because I haven't done it before :) --ROGER DAVIES talk 07:56, 14 March 2008 (UTC)
Another advantage of automating this is that it would remove the potential for editors to ever feel that another editor has 'hidden' their comments. --Nick Dowling (talk) 05:30, 16 March 2008 (UTC)
Is anyone interested in setting this up? I could do it but it would be my first time and I'm normally pants at technical stuff (a bit too trial and error for most people's taste). --ROGER DAVIES talk 09:06, 18 March 2008 (UTC)
If you need any help, I could set up the MiszaBot code. Kirill 12:31, 18 March 2008 (UTC)
Cool. Thanks, --ROGER DAVIES talk 13:08, 18 March 2008 (UTC)
And done. Kirill 13:15, 18 March 2008 (UTC)
Thanks for that Kirill --Nick Dowling (talk) 09:55, 20 March 2008 (UTC)
Thank you very much, Kirill. --ROGER DAVIES talk 21:15, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

Biography tagging drive

They've got one running for three months. They are happy to tag for Milhist (keep it simple: article classes and main TFs only, I thought) if we return the compliment during next tagging drive. Anyone object? And does anyone object if they give out our one- two- and three-stripes to top taggers? --ROGER DAVIES talk 09:09, 18 March 2008 (UTC)

Reactions, please? --ROGER DAVIES talk 13:21, 18 March 2008 (UTC)
Sounds like a good partnership. Canglesea (talk) 13:43, 18 March 2008 (UTC)
I see no problem with this plan. It would benefit both projects and make it easier for both projects. Kyriakos (talk) 20:08, 18 March 2008 (UTC)
Good. Blnguyen (vote in the photo straw poll) 23:42, 18 March 2008 (UTC)
Sounds good. One footnote though: we need to make sure that our editers are aware of this trade and that they get briefed on BIO's template prior to our tagging drive, otherwise we may have some confused people wondering why we are handling BIO articles. TomStar81 (Talk) 08:22, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

Crusades task force

Adam Bishop has apparently set up a Crusades task force under WP:MA. I'm not sure if it's intended to be a joint task force with us—there's a matching category on the page, but that could have just been left over from copying the page structure—but I see no real reason that it shouldn't be one. If that's something of interest, it would be nice if someone could contact Adam and work out the details; if the group is going to be one of our task forces as well, it's missing quite a bit of the necessary logistical infrastructure. Kirill 12:35, 18 March 2008 (UTC)

I think that this task force should be moved to our project, as the crusades were military actions. --Eurocopter (talk) 13:00, 18 March 2008 (UTC)
I doubt the underlying page location makes any substantive difference; cf. the Korean military history task force. Kirill 13:02, 18 March 2008 (UTC)
Good! I suppose we need to set up TF tagging and so forth. Again, of no one objects, would you mind doing the honours? --ROGER DAVIES talk 13:10, 18 March 2008 (UTC)
I have no problems doing the technical stuff, but I'd prefer it if one of the current coordinators would approach Adam/WPMA to make sure that they don't have any objections. ;-) Kirill 13:12, 18 March 2008 (UTC)
Will do. --ROGER DAVIES talk 13:13, 18 March 2008 (UTC)
Left a message on Adam's talk page. --ROGER DAVIES talk 13:20, 18 March 2008 (UTC)
Adam's replied. No problems. Could you go ahead please? --ROGER DAVIES talk 16:05, 18 March 2008 (UTC)
I'll try to do it tonight or tomorrow morning, unless I hear differently by then. Kirill 17:16, 18 March 2008 (UTC)
Ok, all done. Kirill 02:09, 19 March 2008 (UTC)
Thanks very much, Kirill. Just for future reference, what did this involve? --ROGER DAVIES talk 08:01, 19 March 2008 (UTC)
Basically the same procedure as creating an entirely new task force. The only substantive difference is in the first step, as the standard boilerplate needs to be edited to include references to the second parent project and so forth. Kirill 12:43, 19 March 2008 (UTC)
Ye, good idea Kirill. It is definately part of our scope so why not include them. Kyriakos (talk) 13:16, 18 March 2008 (UTC)
Hi guys, I didn't create this as part of the Military History project because, contrary to Eurocopter's statement, the crusades involve far more than military actions. But bviously that aspect is important, so I am happy to have a joint task force. Adam Bishop (talk) 12:58, 19 March 2008 (UTC)
Yes, there are some areas that won't fully overlap between the two parent projects. The dual-tagging scheme will allow the task force to neatly handle those where they come up, though; and since a lot (most?) of the material will be relevant to both, we might as well integrate things together. Kirill 13:11, 19 March 2008 (UTC)
Absolutely, the likes of Bernard of Clairvaux and places like Vezelay, are appropriate for the Middle Ages but not for Milhist. --ROGER DAVIES talk 13:48, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

7th Indian Division AfD

Might coordinators who are also admins consider closing this particular discussion, or informing whoever that closing it might be an option for consideration? I think a decision either way needs to be made, as the participants, including myself, now seems to be going round in circles without many new arguments or thoughts being added. My 2 cents. Buckshot06 (talk) 11:15, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

That's been an ugly discussion. I'd close it, but I've been involved in the discussion so it would be better if an uninvolved admin steps in to avoid any appearance of bias. --Nick Dowling (talk) 09:54, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

Source Check

Kosovo Forces fatalities cites the website [www.freerepublic.com/home.htm freerepublic.com] as a source for the information presented, but the site seems iffy to me. Could someone else take a look and tell me what you think? I want a second opinion on this before doing anything with it. TomStar81 (Talk) 08:22, 21 March 2008 (UTC)

That cite is to a post on the website's forum. Internet forums are explicitly ruled out as a reliable source in WP:V as they're almost always self-published by non-experts (see: WP:SPS). --Nick Dowling (talk) 09:09, 21 March 2008 (UTC)

Coordinator emeritus

This was raised (passingly) prior to Kirill's retirement but I think it deserves revisiting. The proposal is that Kirill becomes coordinator emeritus. I suggest initially on a session by session basis on the grounds that future coordinators ought not be bound by historic decisions in which they played no part. This formalises his contributions here (!?), acknowledges his past and on-going contributions, and makes me feeling less guilty about asking him to do us favours all the time :)

Thoughts, gentlemen? --ROGER DAVIES talk 10:49, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

Yep, I agree and I think that it is a good idea. Kyriakos (talk) 11:10, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

That sounds good to me, though it may be appropriate to raise this (nominal) increase in the number of coordinators with the project's general membership first. Kirill is doing excellent work in his 'retirement' but the other ex-coords aren't exactly slacking off either! --Nick Dowling (talk) 11:13, 24 March 2008 (UTC)
Who did you have in mind particularly, by the way? --ROGER DAVIES talk 11:11, 26 March 2008 (UTC)
OK, this has already been unofficial policy. Wandalstouring (talk) 11:51, 24 March 2008 (UTC)
Already unofficial policy to increase the number of coordinators, you mean? --ROGER DAVIES talk 11:55, 24 March 2008 (UTC)
Agree, as I raised this before and really think we should do something to thank Kirill for all the precious work he did for this project. --Eurocopter (talk) 13:50, 24 March 2008 (UTC)
The coordinator emeritus scheme is already policy. Wandalstouring (talk) 13:52, 24 March 2008 (UTC)
Ok, let's change the policy then... --Eurocopter (talk) 15:32, 24 March 2008 (UTC)
Eurocopter, your comments don't make sense. Wandalstouring (talk) 17:11, 24 March 2008 (UTC)
What i'm saying is that if we have to change the policy in order to make Kirill coordinator emeritus, I would completely agree. --Eurocopter (talk) 11:00, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

(outdent) After 48 hours, I think consensus is clear enough :) I'll make the appropriate announcement. --ROGER DAVIES talk 10:54, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

Well, thank you everyone! :-) Kirill 22:46, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

out of scope A-class candidacy?

Gregory R. Ball is currently on the A-class candidacy. I think it should be removed because I don't see how it is really in the scope. The subject of the bio is a 30 year old politician who spent a few years in the USAF and reached the rank of captain. I don't see any notable military achievements there at all, except that there is one sentence telling us that he was the personal assistant of the Chief of Staff, which doesn't appear to be a high ranking strategic/policy role but just a backroom paper organiser. Blnguyen (bananabucket) 00:42, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

Completely agree. Gheorghe Tătărescu, who was a Prime minister and Minister of War during WWII failed an A-class review last year because it was not in our scope, as he didn't have any notable military involvement/achievements, nor was involved in important military affairs. So, did Ball do anything notable for the USAF? --Eurocopter (talk) 09:11, 27 March 2008 (UTC)
Yes, it does seem out of scope; it's a bit surprising this wasn't noted during the peer review, though. ;-)
I'd suggest simply de-listing/de-tagging it, and leaving a note to that effect on the article talk page and/or with the main editor. Kirill 13:03, 27 March 2008 (UTC)
Done, Blnguyen (vote in the photo straw poll) 01:45, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

Content review medals

I've just had a flip through the past three months worth of assorted reviews. The following editors have started contributing regularly (some more than others) and weren't recognised last December:

Any objections to content medals to the above? --ROGER DAVIES talk 10:28, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

What for are these shiny objects? Wandalstouring (talk) 14:39, 27 March 2008 (UTC)
Pour encourager les autres. --ROGER DAVIES talk 14:59, 27 March 2008 (UTC)
This is the reword for handling the projects dirty jobs. Often (bit not always) that falls to the coordinators, since Mike Rowe isn't here to help us :) TomStar81 (Talk) 22:01, 27 March 2008 (UTC)
Agreed. I think that these editors deserve the medal. Kyriakos (talk) 22:36, 27 March 2008 (UTC)
Yep, all fully deserved. I think most people recognise the value of a barnstar in improving morale, expecially for long-term commitment and effort in often neglected areas. Woody (talk) 22:39, 27 March 2008 (UTC)
All duly awarded. --ROGER DAVIES talk 06:19, 28 March 2008 (UTC)
Thankyou kind gentlemen. Blnguyen (bananabucket) 02:45, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
You're welcome. TomStar81 (Talk) 03:31, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

Backlog

On the off-chance that no one noticed we have a rther large amount of bot-generate articles needing assessment at Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history/Assessment. Help with the assment there would be appreciated. TomStar81 (Talk) 08:25, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

OK, I've started to assess them. I should get them all done. Kyriakos (talk) 09:35, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
Done them all. Kyriakos (talk) 10:19, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

Logistics dept - copy editing

This seems stalled, with a growing backlog. Shall we encourage with the Copy-editor's barnstar for good work? --ROGER DAVIES talk 05:25, 5 April 2008 (UTC)

Absolutely. If it works for me individually then it will work for the project as a whole. TomStar81 (Talk) 05:32, 5 April 2008 (UTC)
Yep. I've noticed too that editors who are generous with barnstars get, um, priority treatment :) I'm just going to be bold and add something to the Logistics page. --ROGER DAVIES talk 05:43, 5 April 2008 (UTC)
Good idea, I think would help give some copy editors motivation. Kyriakos (talk) 06:14, 5 April 2008 (UTC)
Yep. Doing a beefy copy-edit can be really time-consuming. --ROGER DAVIES talk 06:17, 5 April 2008 (UTC)

(OD) I've added appropriate BS ideas throughout the Logistics dept. I'll add a reference to the Chevrons in the header. --ROGER DAVIES talk 06:17, 5 April 2008 (UTC)

Where are the new members?

Since 24 January 2008 there hasn't been any edit to the members list. I compared this with last year's when we had plenty of new entries during the months February and March. What goes wrong? Is it Kirill who attracted these new people or does this have another reason? Wandalstouring (talk) 09:03, 5 April 2008 (UTC)

I know new people have joined but are joining individual task forces rather than the project. We probably just need to consolidate the list again. --ROGER DAVIES talk 09:11, 5 April 2008 (UTC)
There have been quite a few actually, I have been welcoming one a day recently. The list is now at Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history/Members/Active instead of the members list. Woody (talk) 09:35, 5 April 2008 (UTC)
Thanks, I've just linked to this on the project template. --ROGER DAVIES talk 10:26, 5 April 2008 (UTC)
Yep, the list was split into subpages last December, so watching the main page wouldn't have shown any changes recently. Kirill 16:06, 5 April 2008 (UTC)

Update

Two months ago when I made the announcement to project members regarding the coordinator election i've also checked users contributions and noticed that almost 50% of them did not contribute in the past 6 months. I don't know if this is important or not, but shouldn't we update the list? --Eurocopter (talk) 15:09, 5 April 2008 (UTC)

I'll go ahead and run the update script today. :-) Kirill 16:03, 5 April 2008 (UTC)
Okay, the update's done. There's not as many changes as one might have expected, incidentally. Kirill 19:12, 5 April 2008 (UTC)
Ok, cheers. --Eurocopter (talk) 20:16, 5 April 2008 (UTC)


Article improvement drive

As Kirill says, this has been discussed above: #Core article contest, #List of articles, #Contest setup and #Some thoughts. This does need work on the details, and we're waiting for data on which Milhist articles are the top 50 viewed. Meanwhile, what prominence should be given this? This need not necessarily draw resources from any new Tag & Assess initiatives, as quite different skills are called for. --ROGER DAVIES talk 09:52, 1 March 2008 (UTC)

I think that this should be placed as a second competition on the contest page. I also think that if they can be found the for each taskforce the most viewed page that has to do with that country, region, technology, etc. However, I think that the selected articles should be under B class that way we would be encouraging the building up of lower class articles. Kyriakos (talk) 22:50, 1 March 2008 (UTC)

Focusing the article improvement drive on top viewed articles sounds like a good idea. Wandalstouring (talk) 11:07, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
It sounds ok in terms of catering for what the public wants, recentism, etc, rather than what might be necessarily the most important things. I am guessing that due to the large % of US readers, the Vietnam War (528k hits in Feb) and its main component articles will get a lot of hits. Same for Iraq and maybe Afghanistan. Rather than strict historical importance. I guess speaking as one of the regular at WP:VIET I would be happy if everyone piled up some more vietnamese military history FAs etc :). Blnguyen (vote in the photo straw poll) 06:53, 3 March 2008 (UTC)


Category restructuring

Yes, it needs doing but it will take up a huge amount of thinking/discussion time. I note that mrg3105 has participating recently in the restructuring workshop and that Carom did good work on categories last year. The way forward is probably to get more editors involved in a semi-moderated discussion but I'd like to defer planning of this for a couple or three weeks. --ROGER DAVIES talk 09:52, 1 March 2008 (UTC)

That would be a good idea, I think; we should all develope a little harmony in our tone before taking up any major moves. TomStar81 (Talk) 10:21, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
All the coordinators singing from the same hymn-sheet as it were?--ROGER DAVIES talk 13:11, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
I'm tone-deaf. Woody (talk) 19:19, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
Changing cats seems to be a touchy task, so I agree with putting it off for a bit. --Nick Dowling (talk) 23:04, 1 March 2008 (UTC)

Assessment Scale

Closed: Implemented, --ROGER DAVIES talk 05:55, 4 May 2008 (UTC)

Would it be worth rotating the articles on our assessment scale so that we keep our FA, A, GA, B, Start, and Stub examples more current? It may help improve moral among the contributers if they no artilces they work on end up used there as an example. TomStar81 (Talk) 05:39, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

Good idea. All the examples given are over a year old so an update is much needed and as stated it would be good or moral. Kyriakos (talk) 06:24, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

Indeed, very good idea. --ROGER DAVIES talk 06:28, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

I'm thinking that we could probably rotate the examples once a month, picking articles from the previous month to use as examples for the current month. How does that sound? TomStar81 (Talk) 06:35, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

Great idea, if someone remembers :))) --ROGER DAVIES talk 06:37, 16 March 2008 (UTC)
Add it to the list of coordinator responsibilites, someone should notice it there. On that note, when do we want to rotate the articles there? I think the first friday of the month would be best, but I am open to other poeples opinions. TomStar81 (Talk) 06:43, 16 March 2008 (UTC)
Sounds fine to me :) --ROGER DAVIES talk 06:49, 16 March 2008 (UTC)
Sound good and for the articles selected how about taking the articles from the contest entries. It would be pretty good for moral and possibly good for the contest. Kyriakos (talk) 07:40, 16 March 2008 (UTC)
That's a very good idea. Makes updating easier and much likelier to happen. It could be done when the contest tallies are updated. --ROGER DAVIES talk 07:45, 16 March 2008 (UTC)
I will do that when I evaluate the contest.Wandalstouring (talk) 09:31, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

Bonus for top viewed articles in contest departement

I want to introduce a bonus for improving in the contest departement a top viewed article that isn't only in the list because of a sudden outburst of interest for 2-3 days. For more detailed info visit Some statistics. Wandalstouring (talk) 15:18, 21 March 2008 (UTC)

Given that editors have only limited impact on the number of views 'their' articles get, I don't think that that would be fair. I imagine that World War II got roughly the same number of views a few months ago when it was a mess as it gets today after a lot of work has been put into it it to make it pretty good. Nick Dowling (talk) 09:50, 22 March 2008 (UTC)
There is a way of killing two birds with one stone here. It would involve keeping say the top twenty-viewed A-class and B-class articles for a rolling three month period. Editors then "adopt" a much-viewed article and take up it to the next group, earning say double or triple points for doing so. This would improve the quality of top-viewed stuff, and add a bit of friendly competition for for doing so. It would also move along the various core article contest ideas. Thoughts? --ROGER DAVIES talk 10:46, 22 March 2008 (UTC)
Given that the top-viewed articles also tend to be some of the more commonly edited articles, it could be hard to prove that the editor who 'adopted' the article was responsible for improving it. That said, I think that the best use of the readership data is to help direct efforts towards making sure that the more popular articles are accurate and a good advertisement for Wikipedia and this project, and this could be a good way of doing that. --Nick Dowling (talk) 10:54, 22 March 2008 (UTC)
Yes, it could but edit-counters (heavily used at FAC) determine that fairly easily. I agree that the most viewed articles should have effort directed at them. The question is how to best do it :) --ROGER DAVIES talk 11:16, 22 March 2008 (UTC)
Rogers suggestion that editors pick top viewed articles to improve and earn double points is OK. I don't think we should limit it to 20, rather we should set the limit at part of the 5,000 top viewed articles, giving our editors a broader area for choice. Wandalstouring (talk) 09:51, 23 March 2008 (UTC)

Well, speaking of the core contest, Vietnam War is probably the worst imaginable "high profile article" that I can think of. The article is basically only being edited by Americans of various persuasions, using the article as a coatrack for their foreign policy soapboxing, rather than telling us the details of histroy. Unfortunately, RM Gillespie is pretty much inactive nowadays....Sounds like something for a large bounty. Blnguyen (vote in the photo straw poll) 03:17, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

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