Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Guild of Copy Editors/Backlog elimination drives/May 2011

Special Barnstars for 2009 articles

The oldest articles are often the hardest to do. The extra rewards are a good idea. --DThomsen8 (talk) 21:39, 12 April 2011 (UTC)

Requests Page

The May Drive Projects page should have a link making it easy to get to the Requests Page. --DThomsen8 (talk) 21:44, 12 April 2011 (UTC)

Don't forget, there's a link to the Requests Page at the top of all GOCE pages. —Torchiest ^talk_edits 21:48, 12 April 2011 (UTC)

An idea

Since this drive technically marks the one year birthday of the Backlog elimination drives, I feel we should do something special. Unfortunately, I won't be able to help out much, but I'm sure whatever it is will be excellent. Does anyone have any ideas? The Utahraptor^Talk/_Contribs 02:12, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

Errors in totals

The Progress chart says there's 700 2009 articles remaining; my calculation off the table gives 423 (FWIW the final count given in the March drive was only 467). The 4000 looks to be wrong too. Are these figures intentionally wrong? --jjron (talk) 15:05, 28 April 2011 (UTC)

Those were just rough estimates when the drive page was initially created. They will be corrected when the drive begins. —Torchiest ^talk_edits 01:29, 29 April 2011 (UTC)

Fair enough, though it's going to be harder to get them right now that the drive's under way. --jjron (talk) 15:44, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

I have updated the data with some more accurate estimates. --Diannaa ^(Talk) 19:07, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

Orphan status

Does the copy-editing task include correcting orphan status? Usually I do, and I add links in the article, and I always add talk page project templates, which is also my procedure with rescue articles and other articles I edit. Grammar, spelling, sections and subsections, clarity, all part of the task, but what about orphan status?--DThomsen8 (talk) 11:48, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

Technically I don't think so, though, like you, I usually try to do so. I look at this as much as being about making articles better and improving WP overall, and in so doing we might often go beyond the strict definition of copy-editing. Once or twice in the past I've hit orphan articles that I couldn't think of anywhere to legitimately link to them from though, so have just tagged them (or left them tagged) as orphans. --jjron (talk) 15:51, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

It is more wikifying than copyediting, but it is good that copy-editors are paying attention (and care enough) to do those tasks whilst copyediting. More Kudos to all that do :¬)

Copyediting an article is more than just correcting spelling, grammar and prose. Structure, formatting and general fixes can also be seen as copyediting. For example I have just looked at an article and removed a section to put the text as an external link, corrected normal copyediting tasks (prose, spelling, grammar, deitalicise, application of MoS), added a para to the lead, changed into the past tense throughout the article as the group has disbanded, wikified some links, fixed headers (level 3 to level 2) and a few other things. It is down to the comfort level of the editor as to how many of those tasks they perform above and beyond the normal copyedit functions (prose, spelling, grammar, italicising titles, article format, ensure it follows MoS etc.) Chaosdruid (talk) 16:36, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

Many of the articles have not been edited much since they were created, so it is best to do as much as you feel you have time for. It might be quite a while before anyone knowledgeable improves some of the articles again. Reminder to please make sure all relevant maintenance tags are removed for the improvements you decide to do. --Diannaa ^(Talk) 19:06, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

By mentioning certain tasks, I did not mean to give an exhaustive list of what copyediting is at least to include. I would summarize the above to say that removing orphan status is a good idea, and often done while copyediting, but not a required or essential part of the task. --DThomsen8 (talk) 22:28, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

Fixing dashes

I am running a script to fix dashes as part of my copyediting. See:

fixed dashes using a script

which is fixed [[MOS:DASH|dashes]] using a [[User:GregU/dashes.js|script]]

Caution: certain templates may not be handled properly by this script, but that seems to be the rare case. Check out the end of my talk page for details on two cases.--DThomsen8 (talk) 23:10, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

I believe the script is working properly, as I said on your talk page the other day. I suspect that this problem is because the template users are trying to put in a range 3-4 rather than using "3 or 4" (which works fine as I showed you in the example on your talk page). The template documentation does not show how to correctly use it in that situation, though other users of it have put two templates on other pages, one with 3 and one with 4.

MoS, as far as I can glean, requires an ndash for a range of numbers and so the script is correct. I would suggest that checks are made and the wording "or" is substituted instead of the ndash. Always make sure that one has checked the preview before saving, or looked at the article after saving, to ensure that any problem is picked up. Chaosdruid (talk) 17:42, 2 May 2011 (UTC)

Thank you for your guidance. GOCE members, take note.--DThomsen8 (talk) 17:01, 7 May 2011 (UTC)

Mark Kopytman

This article, that was begun in 2006, appears a direct copy from the subjects web site with an all rights reserved copyright notice dated 2005. There is no earlier version that doesn't include all this stuff. I'm going to send it for a delete. Acabashi (talk) 17:48, 2 May 2011 (UTC)

Yes. Good catch. --Diannaa ^(Talk) 20:06, 2 May 2011 (UTC)

Kasauli

Advice on this one please.

I have flushed much of the rubbish but I have a problem with one of the sections: Kasauli#Central Research Institute. In a badly-formed article this is a well-written but completely unsourced section added by one-article-editor (User:Sanjaysaklani) on 11 January 2008. This looks to me like a copy-paste from somewhere but I can't find it - it may have been on the web then subsequently removed, or copied from a non-web source - is there a view about this sort of thing?

When I finish, (please don't pull me up on the state of it at the moment) this section will overweight it with something that is a detail within the context of the article. It looks substantial enough to deserve an article in its own right. The question is - do I just write a short precis and delete the section, or leave the section as is? If the former, is there a way to present to Wikipedia the possibility of a new article, which it seems to deserve, while not losing the information that exists? My inclination is to dump it but I'm not sure that this would be right.

Many thanks, Acabashi (talk) 21:34, 3 May 2011 (UTC)

Large sections if not the whole article appear to be copied from http://www.kasauli.net/blog/kasauli-info. Hope this helps. --Stfg (talk) 21:53, 3 May 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for doing that check. I did find this one but it's later, from 22 December 2008, so it's probably a mirror with slightly adapted text. Appreciate your help. Acabashi (talk) 23:12, 3 May 2011 (UTC)

My opinion: I too was pretty sure the more professionally written text is copy vio, but I was unable to find a source. If you could write a summary that would be great, as it would eliminate the copy vio and keep this section from overwhelming the article. --Diannaa ^(Talk) 00:32, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

Will do. Acabashi (talk) 01:51, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

• Copied from this site, maybe, and one paragraph from here. The spammy tone alone calls for a rewrite. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 02:02, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

Thanks. Difficult to know what is the chicken and what is the egg. I'm going to pair it down to disinterested style. Acabashi (talk) 02:28, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

Howard Bashaw

Here's another one.

Article started in September 2010 by Contrappunto71 - check the comments here. I have begun some tidying on it but look back to before I started. Then look at AMP (copyright 2009) for the biog, and link through to "list of pieces" for all the copied listings.

Three now - this is getting boring - I could be losing word totals, so I'm going to reduce this one to a stub. There are some secondary mentions in GBooks and his record company might be associated with a major but I'll leave that to others and add a notable temp.

Acabashi (talk) 02:19, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

As what I have done is quite drastic, I would like a review from a coordinator please before I sign it off. Reasoning is on the talk page: Talk:Howard Bashaw. Thanks. Acabashi (talk) 18:25, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

The number of words in the article is calculated before you edit, so chopping it down should not really affect your drive totals. (If you need to recalculate you should use the one before your first edit in the history, open it up and run the words script.)

I have taken a quick look. I cannot tell if the CD's are self-published or not so I think you may be right to remove them. Many that appear in searches are of his work being used in compilation CDs rather than him as a whole.

His works should be listed if they were published by a musical score publishing company. I also notice he seems to have won an award [1].

As he is published, is a professor, has won at least one award (albeit second place), is mentioned a fair amount of times online for his scores being performed, his instrument playing and his participation as a judge, (as well as in the news such as [2] from Canada.com and [3]), I think it is fair to say he passes muster on notability. Chaosdruid (talk) 19:41, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

Apologises Chaosdruid, I understood I had made a faux pas over notability as soon as I saved the message, and you made effort over this. Someone named as professor is, by default, automatically assumed as notable by Wikipedia, unless non-notability is blatantly obvious. I shall add your [4] and the [5] as an external if I can't fit them into the text, and this one too Alumi Profiles. The through link from the Google page search to the second place award didn’t mention him from my end. The list of works I'm going to add back although I can't find any publishing companies for them - assuming good faith from the original edit - if you think they should go it's easy to remove them. I'm not going to add the list text into my total - that would be too cheeky. Many thanks. Acabashi (talk)

Zonouz

I spent a lot of time on this article in March; while some of my edits have apparently been kept, it's in the backlog again with the original tag (I usually remove both the original and GOCE tags when I'm done). Can't bring myself to copyedit it again; what happened?--Miniapolis (talk) 14:11, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

Judging by this, it looks like a POV issue (which I try to avoid; copyediting is tricky enough as it is). What's the best way to deal with issues like this?--Miniapolis (talk) 14:29, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

I have checked it and since Diannaa last edited there has only been one edit, by the IP. I have undone the edit as per my reasons in the edit summary [6]. Chaosdruid (talk) 18:06, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

This one is getting on my nerves. I am going to ask for semi-protection. --Diannaa ^(Talk) 18:59, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

Thanks, Dianaa – while my work can always use improvement, it's frustrating to see an article go backwards!--Miniapolis (talk) 22:34, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

The article is now protected for 3 months and I have watch-listed it as well. --Diannaa ^(Talk) 23:39, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

Stacking "Working" articles

It's been my understanding that we work on one article at a time. In choosing my next article, I check the revision history to see if someone else is working on it already (as well as, of course, checking for the GOCE in-use tag). I try to work from the bottom of the backlog (unless they're real dogs), but this time it seems like most – if not all – of the '09 articles are already on someone's "working" list. I have no illusions of staying on the leaderboard, but it would be a shame to leave holes in the backlog. Would someone please clarify? Thanks.--Miniapolis (talk) 22:52, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

Chaosdruid also noticed this problem. It doesn't matter if someone puts them on their "working" list; but if they are tagging a bunch of articles, especially old ones, and then not getting to them promptly, that is counter productive. Chaosdruid has now removed the in-use tags and the articles are available for editing. The user involved has been asked to stop doing this. --Diannaa ^(Talk) 23:38, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the clarification; sounds like if there's no in-use tag in place, the article is available for editing.--Miniapolis (talk) 01:26, 5 May 2011 (UTC)

I have more than one working article shown, but those are reminders for me, and with no in-use tag on those articles, anyone can go ahead with editing. With over 4,000 articles awaiting copy-editing, we certainly have enough to choose from. --DThomsen8 (talk) 17:08, 7 May 2011 (UTC)

This issue came up in March as well. Is it just that the word "working" is inviting us to read more into it than is intended here? If so, perhaps another template, such as {{Possible}} maybe, would serve better for personal reminders? --Stfg (talk) 14:47, 8 May 2011 (UTC)

Perhaps a new template should be created for this specific issue. There could be a new template which would read along the lines of Coming Soon, Eventually, or When I'm damn well ready! Of course I joke (badly) about this, but I believe that Stfg suggests a prudent course of action regarding the use of reminders. Perhaps the use of the {{Possible}}  Possible or the {{Later}}  Later templates might be mentioned in the Backlog Drive instructions as a suggested practice? (I do not mean to imply the use of this templates would give a drive participant an exclusive claim to an article rather I think this may serve to prevent misunderstandings between Guild members.) Does anyone else have an opinion on this? LeonidasSpartan (talk) 02:18, 9 May 2011 (UTC)

I have the articles I would like to work on in a spreadsheet with the links for the page next to the titles column and a column for word counts etc.  Working is the article you are working on and, as it is not really possible to edit several articles at the same time, there should not be more than one or two of them in a persons list :¬) The major problem was adding GOCE tags to several articles, thereby preventing other editors from working on them, rather than the working lists on the drive page. Chaosdruid (talk) 05:11, 17 May 2011 (UTC)

I don't think that having a new template(s) is productive. Nobody "owns" Wikipedia articles and having things tagged with "I might copyedit this later" doesn't really help anyone. As I understand it, the purpose of {{GOCEinuse}} is to avoid edit conflicts - not to "reserve" articles. The tag should only be on the page when it is actually being worked on. ► Philg88 ◄ ^talk 20:59, 23 May 2011 (UTC)

The idea wasn't to put some new tag on the page that one is interested in editing, but to put something less immediate than {{Working}} on the drive page. This because some people said they like to put reminders to themselves here of what they might work on in future. It's no big deal. (I keep these reminders in a text file on my desktop, which is just as easy. For that matter, I don't really see that the {{Working}} tags here are all that important.) --Stfg (talk) 21:48, 23 May 2011 (UTC)

Another option for an article that you expect to be a multi-day effort is the {{GOCEeffort}} tag, which can be left on until the task is complete. You don't have to remember to remove it at the end of your session, and whilst it sits on the article it acts as a promo for the Guild. Regarding the stacking of articles, this has only been a problem with one user, so there is no need to create new templates and procedures to deal with the one problematic user. We can just keep an eye on that user and encourage them not to do this any more. --Diannaa ^(Talk) 22:00, 23 May 2011 (UTC)

I'm back!

With the school year ending just short of a month from now, I think I'll be able to spend some time on here during the weekends and the last week of school. :) Ocean Shores 21:57, 8 May 2011 (UTC)

Hi there! Welcome back. --Diannaa ^(Talk) 23:52, 8 May 2011 (UTC)

Firefox 4

Anybody else having probs with the javascript:importScript('User:Dr pda/prosesize.js'); getDocumentSize(); word count script on Firefox 4. I've got the latest V6 Java, and it seems to work on IE8 but not on Firefox any more - is there a fix? Acabashi (talk) 17:13, 9 May 2011 (UTC)

Still works fine for me - FF4.0.1, Win Vista Home Premium. I have the script installed, but running that link through the browser address bar also works. --jjron (talk) 15:23, 10 May 2011 (UTC)

Ovingham Middle School

I gave up on the Ovingham Middle School, which initially looked easy, only one paragraph to do. That paragraph has conflicting information. Because I could not see what was right, I sent an email to the school. No answer. Maybe someone else can figure out what to do. One vigorous way would be to delete the paragraph, or at least the conflicting information. What do others think?--DThomsen8 (talk) 11:35, 22 May 2011 (UTC)

I see duplication, but no real contradiction. How does the following seem to you?

After completing SATs, the year-sixes traditionally stage a performance at the end of the school year. Great thought goes into it and every year-six pupil takes part. Past performances have included The War of the Worlds in 2007. This year they broke the tradition of a play by doing an animation, but with the same attention to detail. The animation was named "Attack of the Brain Men". Every pupil took a copy home.

--Stfg (talk) 14:03, 22 May 2011 (UTC)

Looks good to me. Replace the article paragraph, and take credit for the copyediting. --DThomsen8 (talk) 17:34, 22 May 2011 (UTC)

That's generous of you, but you've worked on the whole article. I've stuck in the one paragraph, but credit for the article belongs to you.. Cheers, --Stfg (talk) 19:55, 22 May 2011 (UTC)

Sorry to butt in here, but I'd say strip the section. At best that needs one line, something like "The year-sixes traditionally stage a performance at the end of each school year." The rest is either POV, or belongs on the school website, not in Wikipedia. The article doesn't even tell me what a SAT is, so I don't care that this happens after it. The article's still got lots of other issues too. --jjron (talk) 08:01, 23 May 2011 (UTC)

Looking at that article further, it's really pretty poor (my guess is written by students at the school), and there's no apparent independent WP:NOTABILITY. In fact, the relevant content (which is very little) should probably be merged into the Ovingham article, and this article either made a redirect or deleted. See Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Common_outcomes#Education for an explanation. --jjron (talk) 08:20, 23 May 2011 (UTC)

• I completely agree with JJ. It's utter tosh, with notability, verifiability and peacock words issues. I've boldly gone ahead and redirected it per WP:LOCAL. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 01:52, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

Pocito Department

I copyedited Pocito Department but found it very difficult because parts of it were almost incomprehensible. In particular, the author referred to the "Canal Zone Fifth Barracks", which I still don't understand, and to "Carpentry". I interpreted the latter as being Carpintería (San Juan) because it was a location by its context but I am unsure that this was right. The whole article reads better now, but have I interpreted its meaning correctly? One could argue that I should have left the article for someone who knew the area to improve. However, it had already waited for that person for 18 months! Cwmhiraeth (talk) 13:20, 23 May 2011 (UTC)

Probably. That yellow map in Pocito_Department#Geography still refers to Carpentry as the fifth division of this department. They should probably be made consistent now.

It also includes Fifth Barracks as the first division. Given the context: "Further eastward the soil is shallower and composed of fine material from the Canal Zone Fifth Barracks", I'd suggest they're talking about canals in the division called Fifth Barracks, but I can't find any clear refs to this in a quick Google search. FWIW I've reworded it to "Further eastward the soil is shallower and composed of fine material from the canal zone of the Fifth Barracks division".

BTW the first sentence in Geography reads "... fifteen kilometers south of the capital, San Juan, and has an area of 515 square miles". Units should be made consistent, and I'm guessing Argentina is metric. --jjron (talk) 14:02, 23 May 2011 (UTC)

I changed square miles to square kilometres and I found some useful place names in the Departamento Pocito article in the Spanish language Wikipedia. Fifth Barracks was Quinto Cuartel.Cwmhiraeth (talk) 18:34, 23 May 2011 (UTC)

5K article count

Do 10K articles count as two 5Ks? Clarityfiend (talk) 04:08, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

Yes. See the FAQ. --jjron (talk) 15:04, 25 May 2011 (UTC)