Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Eastern Hills, Bogotá/archive1

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

The article was archived by Sarastro1 via FACBot (talk) 21:24, 6 May 2017 [1].

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Eastern Hills, Bogotá

Nominator(s): Tisquesusa (talk) 20:34, 21 March 2017 (UTC)

This article is about the Eastern Hills of the Colombian capital Bogotá.

1. - article is imho complete covering all areas and linking to specific main articles for further reading
2. - list of sources is extensive and reliable
3. - images are there to show the location and different characteristics
4. - infobox, tables and other features are complete
5. - other, supporting articles (geological formations, rivers, earthquakes) are in preparation or have been newly created already

In general, I think the article meets the standards for FA. Please review and I am open to comments about the contents of the article Tisquesusa (talk) 20:34, 21 March 2017 (UTC)

• Oppose (for now at least). There are an excessive number of images (and too many galleries), many of which are forced into sections which creates large area of white space. There are a lot of out-sized images and too much sandwiched text between two images.

In terms of the sources, there is no need to have so much capitalisation in the names or titles, and you need to ensure the formatting of the references is consistent (There are examples of p.1 and p. 1 and some page ranges that are p, not pp. - The Bounder (talk) 09:05, 22 March 2017 (UTC)

• Just popping back to see progress on this. Although there have been great strides in sorting out some of the images, I see that there are still too many of them, and a number of those that remain have the sizes forced to 350px, which is against the MoS guidelines. Pushing the guidelines isn't a problem in itself, but it's forcing large areas of white space into the article and dominating the page, even on a wide monitor. I strongly suggest you read through MOS:IMGSIZE and act accordingly. All the best, The Bounder (talk) 18:40, 5 April 2017 (UTC)

The images are there to inform and highlight the text. The quality of a Featured Article depends on the information, the amount of sources and the informational level of the article. Where do you see "white spaces"? I have deliberately scaled everything to the text. "there are too many images" is a personal flavour, not an in-depth review of an article where clearly a lot of work is put in. I follow the guidelines and additional to that have an own style, something that is perfectly accepted in Wikipedia as many articles have slightly different styles and wordings, use of lay-out, images, tables, etc. Personal flavours not directed towards the content of an article are not relevant remarks. If you don't like images, you can avoid looking at them. But there are many people around who do like images and are much more visually than textually focused. Those people profit from the images and would be denied service by forcifully removing them to accommodate a "desire" by people who don't have any interest in them anyway. The image sizes are important too; the majority of images in my opinion are too small, certainly for readers with less eye-sight (not me, I write for others). They are served with larger images, showing more clearly what is the illustration of the text. Those people again would be denied service if images are scaled down. If you have an in-depth review of the article, I am all ears. But if an article of this size, quality, completeness and full referencing using many online accessible sources would "FAIL" a FA review, then so be it. Tisquesusa (talk) 19:50, 5 April 2017 (UTC)

Hi Tisquesusa, Please don't think I'm attacking you or the article, but these are valid concerns. Point 3 of the FA criteria is that "Images follow the image use policy", of which sizing is one element. That's not "personal flavour", or even just a guideline: it's policy. It's fine for you to say that you "have deliberately scaled everything to the text", but that scaling goes entirely out of the window when the page is viewed on a browser of a different size, and there are very large areas of white space when I view the article. If you choose to ignore the policy and not to address the size problem, that is up to you, but my oppose will stand because if it. All the best, The Bounder (talk) 20:34, 5 April 2017 (UTC)

Comments by Finetooth

This is a fascinating article marred by significant layout flaws. I find the prose to be generally professional, and that makes me want to encourage you. After spending quite a bit of time reading and taking notes line by line, I've decided to stop about midway through the History section to see how you respond to what The Bounder said and what I have said below.

Layout

• I agree with The Bounder's comments above about the excessive number of images. There are way too many. I suggest that you choose only the ones that are necessary to illustrate a point or points in the text and to place them, generally at default size, entirely within the section they refer to. All the rest of the images will still be accessible via the Commons. (As an aside here, I would note that each image that you decide to keep will need alt text, and the thought of creating alt text for all of these images might by itself induce you to avoid illustrations that are purely decorative.)
• The collapsible lists create a similar layout problem. In addition, according to MOS:COLLAPSE, they will likely create accessibility difficulties. I suggest rendering the essence of these lists as straight prose and deleting the "show–hide" lists.

I have trimmed down on the images, the ones remaining indicate the important features. Not all readers are equally visually focused. The lists have been uncollapsed and the flora and fauna made into a separate list linked in the article.

Thanks. It looks better than before but still has large white spaces and an overabundance of visuals, including the two collapsing templates. It would be relatively easy to eliminate images such as the white-tailed deer from Kansas that seem only tangentially related to the Eastern Hills of Colombia, and it would not be difficult to turn the hydrology table into a paragraph or two of straight prose. These are just examples, not a complete list of possible improvements. Rather than poring over the Manual of Style for an answer to every question that pops into my head, I have often looked at WP:FA to see what others have done to meet the criteria. For example, you might find Mendip Hills worth looking at. Finetooth (talk) 17:15, 28 March 2017 (UTC)

The white-tailed deer is really key to most of the history of the Eastern Hills. It was the most abundant species and the main ingredient of the food of the Muisca. I've linked sources on that here, others are at Aguazuque and related preceramic sites. Same for the spectacled bear. It may be today it's a very restricted species, but just last week one of those was killed in Fómeque, just to the east of the Eastern Hills. It's important to point those species out, so having them in an image. Pity we don't have a white-tailed deer from Colombia and the nice picture is from Kansas, but that doesn't make it an "irrelevant" picture, it's just a nice example (honouring the photographer/uploader of that one to Commons). Ideally all photos are from the Eastern Hills themselves, which works for other images, but for the white-tailed deer that would be impossible; the urbanisation of the area doesn't allow for sightings of those deer in the Eastern Hills. Tisquesusa (talk) 00:04, 29 March 2017 (UTC)

I think it would be fine to keep the white-tailed deer if you think it is important. I meant only to use it as an example of something that could possibly be removed in order to resolve the layout problems. Unless you can find a way to eliminate the big white spaces, for example, the article will not likely meet the FA criteria. I realize that the images are important to you and that it might be painful to remove many more of them or to reduce their sizes, but when you nominate for FA, you are asking everyone who takes part in the process to agree that the article is as good as possible. That necessarily means conforming to the encyclopedia's layout guidelines as well as a large number of other guidelines to be found in the Manual of Style. I hope this explanation helps. Finetooth (talk) 16:01, 29 March 2017 (UTC)

Lede

• "The NNW-SSE trending mountain chain..." – Compass directions in Wikipedia are generally spelled out unless part of a street address. Maybe "the mountain chain, which trends north-northwest to south-southeast" would better conform to the Manual of Style. Ditto for other similar instances in the article.

Solved

Hydrology

• Various rivers and creeks flowing into the Bogotá savanna are sourced from the Eastern Hills, with as most important rivers from south to north..." – Word or words missing?

The ":" refers to the table directly below, now expanded to be easier to read.

Ah, I see. I missed the importance of the colon on my first pass-through, and I find the sentence structure confusing. Instead of "Various rivers and creeks flowing into the Bogotá savanna are sourced from the Eastern Hills, with as most important rivers from south to north:" might I suggest this for clarity: "Various rivers and creeks flowing into the Bogotá savanna are sourced from the Eastern Hills. The most important rivers from south to north are:"?

Flora

• "A study of the vegetational cover has revealed the presence of 29 types of vegetation covering 63.16% of the total area. The remaining 36.84% is used by urban settlement, agricultural lands and quarries." – Better if rounded to nearest whole numbers; i.e, "about 63 percent" and "the remaining 37 percent"?

Solved

• " In the Eastern Hills a total of 443 species of flora have been identified, of which 156 species in 111 genera and 64 families of vascular plants." – Word or words missing?

The 156 species refer to the families of vascular plants.

I'm still confused by this. Does this mean that 156 of the 443 identified species belong to 111 genera in 64 families? What about the other 287 species? Finetooth (talk) 22:59, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

I've reworded it. And I am adding the geological formations to solve those red links. Tisquesusa (talk) 23:16, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

• For the sake of readability, I'd suggest reducing the long list of species, most of which are redlinked, to a small sampling.

Made into a separate list; there many red links are present but I've added the photos available at Commons to invite writers to create those new articles. Imho a plant that has an image on Commons should have an article too.

Adding red links to the separate list seems entirely appropriate to me. Finetooth (talk) 23:12, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

History

• " at the summer solstice of June 21, the Sun rises exactly from Lake Iguaque..." – I think you need to say explicitly where the observer is standing to see this effect; i.e., "as seen from El Infiernito, the Sun rises...".

True, I have added the location; the solar observatory itself.

• "A similar site in the Muisca astronomy was the location where the Spanish conquistadors built the precursor to the under the early Colombian government..." – Word or words missing?

That's right, added "church".

The sentence still does not make sense to me. It reads, "A similar site in the Muisca astronomy was the location where the Spanish conquistadors built the precursor church to the under the early Colombian government constructed Catedral Basílica Metropolitana de la Inmaculada Concepción." – Perhaps "The Spanish conquistadors built a church, a precursor of the Catedral Basilica Metropolitana de la Inmaculad Concepción, at a similar site in the Eastern Hills"? Or have I misunderstood something? Finetooth (talk) 23:23, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

The Spanish built their churches at sites where the indigenous Muisca celebrated their religious festivities. It was a way to replace the original Muisca religion and to submit the "primitive" indigenous peoples to the new rule. I think I've reworded it, but if it's still unclear I can rewrite. Tisquesusa (talk) 00:04, 29 March 2017 (UTC)

I took the liberty of making another small edit here. Please revert or alter if you think of a better way to put it. Finetooth (talk) 18:12, 29 March 2017 (UTC)

• "...after the deadliest of the conquest expeditions of advanced pre-Columbian civilisations. More than 80% of his soldiers did not survive..." – Deadliest for whom? If we consider the deaths of the conquered, was this expedition the deadliest?

It was explained in the next sentence but added the Spanish for clarification.

Thanks. I re-arranged the prose a bit for clarity. Finetooth (talk) 23:33, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

Muisca Confederation

• I notice that some of the links around words like "agriculture" and "salt" are what's known as Easter-egg links that take readers to an unexpected place. The MOS guidelines suggest avoiding links like this. Finetooth (talk) 18:02, 26 March 2017 (UTC)

The link to Nemocón was to indicate the important salt mining town, now replaced with a link to the mining of the Muisca. In some future a separate article about the salt extraction of the Muisca should be made, as it was their important characteristic.

I've also removed quite some links to minor topics that should have articles (are notable), but not the main ones. The main articles, of which the geological formations are in preparation, still have red links. Added another that I am preparing too. Thank you for the comments, compliments and thorough review! Have a great day, Tisquesusa (talk) 16:11, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

• I made quite a few minor copyediting changes today. Feel free to revert any that you think are mistakes. I will probably have more, but I'm getting too cross-eyed to continue just now. Finetooth (talk) 18:16, 29 March 2017 (UTC)

• I made a few more minor edits today, and I will now wait to see what other editors have to say and what you decide to do about layout and alt text for readers who cannot see the images. I don't know what to suggest about the collapsing templates. In my own writing for Wikipedia, I've relied on using existing templates that look good to me rather than creating my own. Template:History of Egypt looks good to me, for example, and this form could be used across a related series of articles related to the Muisca. WP:Template namespace has ideas, guidelines. What you have done already is well-researched and very interesting. Finetooth (talk) 17:01, 31 March 2017 (UTC)

Hi Finetooth, I have expanded the Climate section to solve the ugly white space that was there, adding a reference too. I've removed the large Muisca history template that is less relevant for the Hills and too extensive to show up in the mobile version. The timeline of inhabitation is important and more concised so I think that one showing up expanded (I've raised that issue in another discussion) on the mobile version shouldn't be a big problem. The only images that are now spanning the page are the forest fires, but they are important to highlight the constant (yearly) threat to the hills, the people living on the slopes of them and the way they are treated (thanks for the Bamby Bucket link!). I've added all the rivers that were red links and all the geologic formations in equally extensively referenced articles (I don't do stubs). The remaining red links of the Reservoirs, Earthquakes, Bogotá Fault and Suba Hills are in preparation. I've selected other images of the flora and fauna (the white-tailed deer was a subspecies from the US) and expanded on the captions to highlight the importance and in my view captions should be interesting to read too, not just "this is X", that is obvious from the image itself. What do you think of the article as it stands now? Cheers and thanks, talk) 02:11, 5 April 2017 (UTC)

• I'll wait to see what other editors have to say lest I get too involved in pushing you one way or another. Finetooth (talk) 17:42, 5 April 2017 (UTC)

• @Tisquesusa: Seeing your continuing struggles, I assume that there must be some basic misunderstanding of what we mean by "white space". We are not talking about spaces between the images on the right but rather about the huge spaces between sections of the text. For example, the distance between the last sentence of the Etymology subsection and the first sentence of the Geography section is (on my desktop screen) six inches, according to a ruler I keep in my desk. Instead of the usual continuation of the text, what I see is a blank space of about 50 square inches. There are similar blank spaces lower down in the article. I don't believe it's possible to fix this problem without removing more images. Every reviewer who looks at the article instantly sees this problem, and reviewers might well choose to go no further. This is a shame since the article in other respects has FA potential. Finetooth (talk) 01:22, 28 April 2017 (UTC)

@Finetooth: Ah, thanks, now I understand better what you mean. It must be some setting with your browser, or Wikipedia settings as it is the {{clearboth}} template which should work fine, that's what's intended for. I use that to get the next chapter below the images in case they extend the section. In the case of "Etymology" there was no issue. But if there are more instances of that, let me know, I removed the "Etymology" one. Tisquesusa (talk) 02:27, 28 April 2017 (UTC)

comments by auntieruth

• As someone who likes to use images, I'm all for it, but it's possible to go overboard. That said, I love your images, although I can't read the text because the images distract me. :( I'd make a few suggestions. First, regarding the images: I'd suggest trying to incorporate them more textually--that is, switch them back and forth (left side/right side) to see if that reduces white space (white space=bad). Also, I'd use one of each, not multiples. I'd really make a concerted effort to categorize and subcategorize these images in commons so you can link to them via the commonscat box. This would make it easier for the ignorant but curious like myself to find them.
• Second point: I like the writing and it flows beautifully. There are some textual inconsistencies, one of which is this: are the white tailed deer extinct or not? If they are, they cannot be a dietary staple. If they are a dietary staple, they are obviously not extinct.Also shot dead=killed.
• Third, are there actually "sub" articles on these subjects? If there are, then you can expand much of your excellent descriptive work in those, with the images, and use the overlaying article to summarize those ideas. Just a thought.

Finally, also a thought: you use a lot of the verb "to be" when you could use some far more interesting verbs. Also, one last comment, I am one of those with a browser/settings (unexplained) that used to but no longer will expand collapsible tables.  :( auntieruth (talk) 21:26, 10 April 2017 (UTC)

sources okay. I use Earwigs program to check paraphrasing etc. had the most common text

Hi @Auntieruth55:, thank you for your review and comments.

• I have rescaled the images using the upright parameter, so it should be ok with your image setting
• I don't see white spaces left, if you do, could you post a screenshot where they are? I checked both on my laptop with 1920 resolution and on my phone (desktop version of wiki).
• I chose to position all the images to the right and all the text to the left deliberately; those who want to see the images and the captions check for the right and those who don't want images can read the text without """disturbing""" images to the left.
• most of the articles in the subpages have been either written by me or checked against my high standards. There shouldn't be any pages with issues left under the many blue links added to the article. If you spot one, please let me know on this page and I will work on it
• as a non-native speaker it could be my English with "to be" is too boring and may be improved with -as you say- "far more interesting verbs". If you want, please edit the article where you see fit or suggest individual improvements here.
• there should be only 1 collapsed table (the template) left, which I think is crucial to guide the reader to the history of the area. If it causes major problems, please post a screenshot to let me know.
• I noticed just now the coord template screws up the lay-out of the article completely, I don't know what's happening, but it seems to be outside of my realm. This is what I get: screenshot. I hope it will be solved soon or if I can do it and that we can pass the article to FA. I've reread the text and reworded for clarification. All the geologic formations have been added and described with extensive bibliography and references, the missing links will be added soon too. One or two remaining red links should show Wikipedia "is not finished" and be inviting readers to add their interests and/or knowledge to the specific articles.

Thanks again and good night, Tisquesusa (talk) 01:09, 18 April 2017 (UTC)

• I did a light once over on the section with the animals here There were incomplete sentences, and a few other problems. See if that works for you.
• The problem with white spaces hasn't gone away. I have no idea what to do with it. Although it is distracting. Let me know about this edit, and possibly I'll tackle some more. As a non-native speaker/writer, you do very well! auntieruth (talk) 01:45, 19 April 2017 (UTC)

@Auntieruth55: I checked with my own resolution (1920x1080) and the screen resolutions 1366x768, 1280x800 and 1024x768 and no white spaces appear apart from the rivers that should now be solved with the inclusion of the map in the table. In which section do you see white spaces still? Can you post a screenshot? Tisquesusa (talk) 18:42, 27 April 2017 (UTC)

Closing comment: This has been open for a long time now without attracting any support, so I'm afraid we will have to archive this now. It may be renominated after the usual two-week wait. Sarastro1 (talk) 21:24, 6 May 2017 (UTC)

• Closing note: This candidate has been archived, but there may be a delay in bot processing of the close. Please see WP:FAC/ar, and leave the {{featured article candidates}} template in place on the talk page until the bot goes through. Sarastro1 (talk) 21:24, 6 May 2017 (UTC)

WTF? Why this "archiving"? The article certainly is notable and good enough for an FA. There is no time limit to these reviews, many articles are many months standing in the GA review before they are even looked at. I have asked relevant questions with requests for examples for the remaining slight image/white space problem, without an answer until now. So there's no ground to "archive" this ongoing discussion. Tisquesusa (talk) 21:28, 6 May 2017 (UTC)

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