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Wikipedia:Featured list candidates/2012 in spaceflight/archive1

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

The list was not promoted by Hahc21 10:01, 15 March 2013 (UTC) [1].[reply]

2012 in spaceflight edit

2012 in spaceflight (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

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Nominator(s): — Michaelmas1957 (talk) 06:56, 6 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I am nominating this for featured list because I have recently finished a major cleanup and sourcing effort, adding reliable references for every orbital and suborbital launch in 2012. As far as I can tell, the list is complete – no major launches are missing – and it meets the FL criteria. As well as listing all of 2012's launches, it includes useful and properly-sourced information on EVAs and deep-space exploration. — Michaelmas1957 (talk) 06:56, 6 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Resolved comments from --Tomcat (7) 14:06, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]
*General comments
  • The tables do not meet WP:ACCESS. I added column headers as a start, but captions and row headers should be added.--Tomcat (7) 21:45, 9 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Must confess I'm not very good at formatting wikitables, particularly very large and complex ones like this – I usually focus on the content and sources. Could you or another editor help out with this? Thanks. – Michaelmas1957 (talk) 12:44, 16 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Cells in the Remarks columns are often blank. I would advise using en-dashes or something similar, because currently it looks like the page is not finished.--Tomcat (7) 21:45, 9 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Done. – Michaelmas1957 (talk) 09:02, 10 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • References need a clean-up. Inconsistent date formats, questionable reliability (particularly blogs).--Tomcat (7) 21:45, 9 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Fixed ref formatting; will get on to reliability issues shortly. – Michaelmas1957 (talk) 10:26, 10 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Removed and replaced unreliable blog refs; let me know if I missed any. – Michaelmas1957 (talk) 12:39, 16 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Comment McDowell is not a blog and I believe a previous discussion has already established that it meets the criteria for WP:SPS, although I do not recall where. --W. D. Graham 19:19, 16 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry, that was a misjudgement on my part.– Michaelmas1957 (talk) 19:59, 17 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • I am not sure about the accessibility of the first table, mainly because of the "sections" within table (eg January, February). I think they are used as column headers, which are disregarded. The table is complicated and I must confess I am not an expert in accessibility. I will ping User:RexxS. Regards.--Tomcat (7) 14:06, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]
    • The months, January, February, ... are not marked up as headers and won't cause any problems for screen readers in this case, although the nature of the organisation of the table (where the 11 pieces of data for each launch are wrapped onto 3 lines) rather precludes making the table navigable by a screen reader, other than by left-to-right, one row at a time. I'd prefer to consider the table as a layout table that is designed merely to present the information in a convenient form for a sighted reader. We are probably aiming too high if we try to fit 11 pieces of data into each row - as we would need to make a more accessible table:
Date and time (UTC) Rocket Launch site LSP Payload Operator Orbit Function Decay (UTC) Outcome Remarks
9 January 03:17:09 Long March 4B Taiyuan LA-9 SAST Ziyuan 3 MLR Low Earth Earth imaging In orbit Operational –
9 January 03:17:09 Long March 4B Taiyuan LA-9 SAST VesselSat-2 Luxspace Low Earth Earth imaging In orbit Operational –
As you can see, one launch would require being 'unpicked' into a row for each payload - and even that won't allow us to create useful row headers because of the duplication of key information. So, in brief, we could improve accessibility of these tables, but it would be a small gain for a large effort - particularly as the templates seem to be used in about 70 pages and we'd need to check each of them if changes were made. My recommendation is to accept that it's not perfect, but probably about the best we can manage under the circumstances. I wouldn't oppose this list on the grounds of accessibility of that table. --RexxS (talk) 22:02, 1 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • I am actually impressed by this list. It still needs an expansion of the intro, and perhaps a bit more detail under the Europe entry in the top summary table. Nergaal (talk) 20:07, 14 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Done. – Michaelmas1957 (talk) 11:14, 15 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support, high quality, incredibly well sourced, meticulous in citations. Also, SCIENCE! — Cirt (talk) 17:03, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Resolved comments from --Tomcat (7) 11:16, 5 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]
*Quick comment still see reference issues, eg some questionable sources (FlightGlobal, etc), [2] does not show the content. Regards.--Tomcat (7) 19:22, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Fixed the Khrunichev source; I don't see what's wrong with FlightGlobal, though. – Michaelmas1957 (talk) 01:05, 24 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Overlinking of ISS Pirs and ISS Quest in the EVAs section--Tomcat (7) 13:40, 27 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Fixed. – Michaelmas1957 (talk) 16:03, 4 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Ref 125 Septiembre histórico: Satélite Miranda está en órbita is dead, and no archives--Tomcat (7) 13:40, 27 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Fixed. – Michaelmas1957 (talk) 16:03, 4 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Ref 10 Astronauts take spacewalk to find ammonia leak is dead, and no archives--Tomcat (7) 13:40, 27 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Fixed. – Michaelmas1957 (talk) 19:46, 4 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Some unneeded capitalization--Tomcat (7) 13:37, 27 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Ref 137 needs a language note and publisher information--Tomcat (7) 13:40, 27 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Fixed. – Michaelmas1957 (talk) 19:46, 4 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Foreign language titles could be translated into English, as Ref 94 demonstrates--Tomcat (7) 13:40, 27 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support nitpicks were resolved. Regards.--Tomcat (7) 11:16, 5 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Question - did the accessibility of the table get resolved? I find it hard to work out as a sighted reader, so I'm not sure how this comes across to a screen-reader user. The Rambling Man (talk) 18:10, 28 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Quick answer - it's usable, if not optimal. --RexxS (talk) 22:02, 1 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]
RexxS, as always, thank you so much for spending so much time helping us to decipher our way through some the accessibility hurdles. I can honestly say that, as a visually able reader, I find the current table to be too complex. I hope we can simplify it for everyone. The Rambling Man (talk) 20:25, 2 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose really sorry but I find the table virtually impossible to navigate. The Rambling Man (talk) 20:01, 4 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Could you explain why that is the case? Regards.--Tomcat (7) 11:14, 5 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]
The rows don't seem to follow the key, either in content or colour, there seem to be multiple rows while the key indicates singles rows, it's very hard to know what's what. The Rambling Man (talk) 11:24, 5 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I agree with TRM. I am not happy with Level 3 headers inside a big table that only have row headers at the beginning. Are we supposed to scroll back to the beginning each time we want to know which thing is which? My recommendation is to break the table into 12 tables, each for each month, with their correspondent row headers to identify the content. In my opinion, as it is, it doesn't meet accessibility. — ΛΧΣ21 17:05, 7 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]
The dates are already noted in the Date and time cells, so there should no problems. --Tomcat (7) 18:04, 7 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I have to say that my oppose is still here, stronger than ever, the list is far too difficult for me to interpret. It seems my esteemed colleagues think otherwise but I cannot support this list in its current format, it's far too confused. The Rambling Man (talk) 22:13, 8 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I understand your concern, but I'm afraid that I'm limited to improving the list's sources and content - I don't really know my way around these complex wikimarkup templates. If a more skilled editor could do some work on the table's layout, that would be a great help. – Michaelmas1957 (talk) 22:17, 8 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Question - What is the FL policy on redlinks? To me it looks messy and I'd prefer them simply removed rather than red. This is the only thing holding me back from a full support !vote just now. Cabe6403 (Talk•Sign) 09:13, 7 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]

  • Red links are allowed. — ΛΧΣ21 17:02, 7 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]
To the best of my knowledge, FL doesn't have any policy that differs from the guidance at Wikipedia:Red link where the summary is "Red links for subjects that should have articles but do not are not only acceptable, but needed in the articles. They serve as a clear indication of which articles are in need of creation, and encourage it." If there are any redlinks to topics that have no prospect of being created as articles, I'd encourage you to remove them; otherwise they remain a good source of inspiration for editors looking for new articles to create. --RexxS (talk) 00:24, 8 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks Hahc21 and RexxS for clearing that up. In that case I move to Support - Cabe6403 (Talk•Sign) 11:48, 8 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Just a quick note: I've been checking some of the red links, so far at least two actually have articles under slightly different names. I've only really checked down to March so far and will continue to do so later if I get a chance. I would suggest the nom maybe go through and check that all red links are, in fact, red because an article doesn't exist and not just point at the wrong target. Cabe6403 (Talk•Sign) 11:59, 8 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I'm delighted that you've done that checking, Cabe, and I'm sure Michaelmas1957 will want to take on board your suggestion. This is yet another example of how the FLC process gets multiple editors involved in collaborating for the benefit of the encyclopedia. --RexxS (talk) 18:47, 8 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for bringing that to my attention - I'll do some redlink cleanup now. – Michaelmas1957 (talk) 20:43, 8 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Done – I've resolved redlinks that already have related articles. Most of the remaining redlinks would need a specific new article created for them (which, as RexxS noted, is why redlinks are allowed). – Michaelmas1957 (talk) 22:03, 8 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.
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