Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Military history/Operation Majestic Titan/Archive 4

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RN ability or training for night-fighting

There's a comment in the HMS Hood article that the RN was well-trained in fighting at night by WW2, but I've never heard this before. Has one else? And if so, can you provide a cite? I'd like some confirmation one way before I delete the statement.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 01:44, 29 June 2010 (UTC)

As far as I know, the IJN were the only ones extensively trained for nighttime engagements by the time WWII began. Hope this was helpful. SpellingGuru (talk) 11:26, 29 June 2010 (UTC)

I know USN aviation was tooling around with night fighters and aircraft-mounted radar as early as 1939, but they didn't really get it off the ground until after Coral Sea (such as the PBJ-1s and VMF(N)-544). I'm afraid I know nothing about night fighting with surface ships except that it did happen in the Pacific. bahamut0013^words_deeds 11:45, 29 June 2010 (UTC)

I'm fairly certain that U.S. ships were decimated early on by experienced night-fighting Japanese destroyers. Am I correct in recalling Savo Island for an example? SpellingGuru (talk) 11:52, 29 June 2010 (UTC)

Yes and there is a ref for it on the Battle of Savo Island article, but that doesn't seem to shed any light on whether the RN did night training. Yoenit (talk) 12:46, 29 June 2010 (UTC)

The Brits smashed two Italian cruisers and two destroyers at Matapan and sank Scharnhorst in what amounted to a night action. As for sources, this book briefly mentions night fighting. This book (which I'm sure some of our editors have in their libraries) talks about it seemingly in great detail (though I can't tell for sure because it's not viewable in Google Books). This also mentions an emphasis on night-fighting in the interbellum, as does this one, but it too isn't viewable. Parsecboy (talk) 14:05, 29 June 2010 (UTC)

After Jutland the Royal Navy improved training for night fighting. In the thirties a great deal of emphasis was put on training for night-time battle by Admirals Chatfield and Fisher. Any decent work on the Royal Navy should have it in. For a specific cite, see page 417 of Marder, Arthur J. (1972). "The Influence of History on Sea Power: The Royal Navy and the Lessons of 1914-1918". The Pacific Historical Review. 41 (4): pp. 413-443. {{cite journal}}: |pages= has extra text (help); Unknown parameter |month= ignored (help).

For specific coverage of the United States Navy's night fighting at the start of the Second World War, see Hone, Trent (2006). "'Give them Hell!': The U.S. Navy's Night Combat Doctrine and the Campaign for Gualdalcanal". War in History. 13 (2): pp. 171-199. {{cite journal}}: |pages= has extra text (help) --Simon Harley (Talk | Library). 14:09, 29 June 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for all the leads; they've been quite helpful.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 17:35, 29 June 2010 (UTC)

Interesting, I've never heard about the RN's training for night battles. Granted, I haven't read a lot on them, but still. @Parsec, to be fair, the Italian cruiser/destroyer force were sitting ducks without radar and attempting to save a sinking cruiser... wouldn't have been hard to slaughter them, even with a minimum of night training. :) —Ed (talk • majestic titan) 20:08, 30 June 2010 (UTC)

That's true, but the way I see it, the aggressiveness with which Cunningham deployed his forces for a night action reflects the confidence he had in the preparedness of his men for night fighting. There was a reason Jellicoe avoided actively searching for Scheer (aside from the massive communication failures amongst his subordinates, of course). Parsecboy (talk) 20:45, 30 June 2010 (UTC)

Yes, there was a reason Jellicoe avoided looking for Scheer; because he, like every other battle fleet commander in the First World War, did not want to actually commit to a night action. That's not to say they didn't train for it before Jutland. --Simon Harley (Talk | Library). 20:49, 30 June 2010 (UTC)

It's worth noting that the RN at the start of World War II was, in many respects, a much more competent force than the RN of World War I. There was a widespread perception that the RN had underperformed in World War I and the 1920s and a lot was done to improve the fleet's combat efficiency during the 1930s. This really paid off in the early years of the war. Nick-D (talk) 00:23, 3 July 2010 (UTC)

Layout

With the new logo up I have a problem in that Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history/Maritime warfare task force/Operation Majestic Titan/navbox is now causing the page to align too far to the right; its off screen on my monitor and I have a feeling that there may be others who are experiencing this as well. Is there some way we can correct this? TomStar81 (Talk) 03:00, 13 July 2010 (UTC)

Hm. It doesn't look mis-aligned to me, so it might be tied to browser or resolution. The obvious way of fixing it would be to move the navbox down below the top (title) bar rather than aligned to the side of it; unfortunately, I suspect that will cause issues with the Iowa image below. Let me see if I can figure something out. Kirill ^{[talk] [prof]} 05:32, 13 July 2010 (UTC)

Please take a look and see if my changes fixed the problem you were having. Kirill ^{[talk] [prof]} 05:38, 13 July 2010 (UTC)

You are a miracle worker Kirill! This looks so much better; it actually fits in the window now. As to the Iowa image, in all honesty I think we could probably do without it; however it does help capture the awesomeness of the battleship as a whole. I'll wait and see if others have a different opinion, but for now the big issue is fixed. TomStar81 (Talk) 05:45, 13 July 2010 (UTC)

I like it, and if you're the only one whose crazy resolution is getting messed up, then you can suffer in silence!! :P

It is odd, since all I did was copy the code from the WP:MILHIST main page... that isn't messed up for you, is it? bahamut0013^words_deeds 12:07, 13 July 2010 (UTC)

It's probably due to the fact that the OMT logo is marginally wider than the MILHIST one, as is the OMT navbox. Kirill ^{[talk] [prof]} 12:33, 13 July 2010 (UTC)

Well, in that case, I'd suggest that Tom adjust the size of the new logo banner until the issue is resolved. And please don't tell me you are still using 800x600... I know we are supposed to be accessible to a wide variety of resolutions, but I will mock you for being such a dinosaur. And you better have a witty retort ready! bahamut0013^words_deeds 15:18, 13 July 2010 (UTC)

Necessary featured articles

I was updating the tally to reflect Kaga's promotion and I'm now curious about the "necessary FA" tally. Which ones are "necessary"? What is the difference between them and the rest of the FAs?--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 03:15, 16 July 2010 (UTC)

I added it a while ago. There is no list of necessary FAs or anything, but I just thought the original bar for featured articles was a bit weird as only around 50% of the articles will need to reach FA status for a featured topic. This one will be approx 100% if we reach that. Not really happy with the how it looks now. Yoenit (talk) 08:14, 16 July 2010 (UTC).

Overhaul?

I've had a light bulb moment, and I thought I would share it with all of you. Given that this is the best Special Project in the system at the moment I would propose that we redesign the special project pages to look like those the milhist page. Doing this has several benefits, among them the fact that we could establish a showcase page for our GA, A, FA, FPC, and FT groups we have, as well as allow us to create dedicated subpages for the ships and ship classes, weaponry, biographies, battles & campaigns. Moving all this information to dedicate pages would cleanup the main page for visitors, and allow us to keep the size down. Additionally, we could create a dedicated awards page to display the standard barnstars and medals that can be earned as well as those who have received the Titan's Cross.

If adopted, this would also earn us bragging rights (which, of course, are the best kind of rights). What do you guys think about this? Should we pursue this, or just let it be? TomStar81 (Talk) 23:43, 31 May 2010 (UTC)

That's a grand idea. We can better associate ourselves with WPMILHIST that way (I think most members regard it as more WPSHIPS territory). I'm a bit leery of the idea of a showcase: the idea is that the whole project will be a showcase! That would eventally lead to everything being listed twice... the portal already has a "quality content" page, I think we could just transclude that? The only caveat I would have is that we would have to clearly mark the phase II through V pages that they are not active yet, and collaboration on those articles is a ways off. It would increase the maintenance load somewhat, but I can handle that since I'm not much good at article work. If nothing else, adding more light steel blue and tabs would be aesthetically pleasing. bahamut0013^words_deeds 12:22, 1 June 2010 (UTC)

Me likes pretty pages, so yes please. On a sidenote, would that allow me to start indexing articles for phases II to V? I understand the current project focus is completely on the ships and it will be quite a while before we are done with that, but I would prefer to start indexing for the next phases already to get an idea of the workload. Additionally it would allow people who don't care about ship articles, but want to contribute to the project with biographies/weapon/battle articles to get started. I think Buggie had something similar about getting started on phase V already a while ago? Yoenit (talk) 12:36, 1 June 2010 (UTC)

@Bahatmut: good, I was hoping you would like this idea because I suspected you would volunteer for the major work on the redesign :) @Yoenit: the answer here is tricky. Nominally, we want our editors to focus on phase 1 because mass focus will allow us to clear the phase sooner, and when that happens it will permit the team to move on the next phases as one large group, rather than as small teams. That said, we can not force editors to do something for the project, so those joining us have always been free to work on weaponry, biography, armor, and other articles of that type that will be needed down the road. Adding them as dedicated pages would show people that OMT will handle such articles in due time, but also risks editors getting ahead of the pack; which could adversely effect running of the phases. Bottom line: you are all free to work on any article you want that is within our scope, but running the wolfpack helps ensure we get the most out of the pack. TomStar81 (Talk) 20:55, 1 June 2010 (UTC)

You know me so well. I wouldn't mind getting a head start on biographies, since I know I can easily get most Americans and probably a good handful of Brits up to B-class. Other than that, I can tag the pages with a very carefully-worded box noting that they are not yet active. I'll take a closer look at MILHIST's layout later this week and see what I can plagirize. bahamut0013^words_deeds 12:13, 2 June 2010 (UTC)

Just as a note, there's already an index for Phase V. :) - The Bushranger _{Return fire}^{Flank speed} 18:12, 2 June 2010 (UTC)

Good job, Bushranger. Bahamut, what we could do is create pages for all of the involved phases then tag the pages we are not yet working on with {{WPMILHIST Archive}}. In this manner we can have the pages while noting that they are inactive, which in theory would keep most editors with the pack as we move through the phases. How does that sound? Also, for the redesign; I think adopting the colors scheme used for Portal:Battleships would help us distinguish our redesign from the redesign at milhist so that people can tell the two apart. Just a thought, but I figured I'd share it with you. TomStar81 (Talk) 19:15, 2 June 2010 (UTC)

Well, MILHIST might be easier since they have standardized templates for all that, but I'll look into it--probably this weekend if some troublesome personal issues abate. bahamut0013^words_deeds 11:23, 3 June 2010 (UTC)

No hurry, Sarge. Its not like the world will end if we don't meet some kind of deadline, so take your time. That way when we roll this out we can get it right the first time round. Also, if it would be easier to use the MILHIST format then so be it; I just suggested the battleship portal format since the color schemes were different enough that people wouldn't get the two confused if they were not paying attention :) TomStar81 (Talk) 21:27, 3 June 2010 (UTC)

FYI, if the desired result is a layout identical to the main MILHIST one, but with different colors, then a selectable color parameter could quite trivially be added to the MILHIST infrastructure templates that generate the layout. Kirill ^{[talk] [prof]} 03:13, 4 June 2010 (UTC)

I think this is a grand idea that needs expansion, bar the fact that our portal (should) already showcase our grand achievements. @ Yoenit. Way back in the archives of this talk I had a knack to lay out the formats for 3 4 and maybe 5, but retain only a slight amount know. Bushranger did Five up at User:The Bushranger/OMT Phase V, a link that should come up higher in this talkpage. I believe I can write my head off on Zinovy Rozhdestvensky and Oscar V. Stark. But, please, I now want to expand Leningrad-Novgorod Offensive while I have time before my delicious Russian lunch of salmon, cheese and God knows what else. Ping me about phase three or four if it needs setting up. Toodaloo, Buggie111 (talk) 06:59, 7 June 2010 (UTC)

I've just hit another issue: measuring progress. As it stands, any editor who upgrades the class of an article is responsible to edit the class for that article on its talk page, on that phase's article list, on the main project bar, and possibly the portal showcase if it's GA or higher. Now, with each phase to be on its own page, that means that a member would have to edit all that, PLUS the overall OMT progress bar, making a total of 4 or 5 tedious administrative edits just to tell the world that USS Schmuckatelli was upgraded from stub to start class, probably taking longer than working on the article itself was.

I was thinking that we could centralize the progress into a single sub-page, but then we couldn't transclude them to the phase pages that way... so the choice is to increase the administrative burden, or not have a good progress metric. I suppose that I could go through the phase updates once a week and update the overall progress bar. I'm still tinkering, maybe I'll come up with something. bahamut0013^words_deeds 16:14, 7 June 2010 (UTC)

K, I think I hit something that works. Everything is overall at Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history/Maritime warfare task force/Operation Majestic Titan/progress. Right now, it transcludes onto the main project page, but with everything but phase I noincluded out (for now). It transclude progress pages (such as Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history/Maritime warfare task force/Operation Majestic Titan/Phase I/progress), but each phase's progress subpage has a level 3 header, meaning you can click on the "edit" tab from the overall project page or from the main phase page (such as Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history/Maritime warfare task force/Operation Majestic Titan/Phase I). It's still the same amount of edits as folks are making now (assuming a one-at-a-time approach, it will be a bit more painful for myself and MBK to to mass clerking), and once we get into a second phase, we can worry about the overall progress bars and such.

For now, there is simply no getting around the fact that Portal:Battleships/Quality content will have to be done manually, and that it's usually up to MBK and I (usually the former is much more timely than I) about updating it. However, I'm going to make this appeal to OMT members:

If you are going to work on a Phase II, III, IV, or V article before we close Phase I, please update all relevant pages: The phase page, the phase progress subpage, the overall progress page, and showcase/portal page.

My watchlist is very full now with OMT and BBPortal pages, and I can't guarantee that I will catch it and update any that you miss. If the count is off now, it may be very hard to fix down the road. bahamut0013^words_deeds 18:49, 7 June 2010 (UTC)

Hyjacking this discussion: Bahamut, any chance we can get the index thingy back for this talk page? It's a pain to navigate without one. Yoenit (talk) 23:00, 7 June 2010 (UTC)

I second that, and for the list of ships as well. Parsecboy (talk) 02:31, 8 June 2010 (UTC)

At first I thought you were referring to the navbox, which is still there. Then I realized that the code I copied to the tab header from Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history/Tab header supressed the table of contents. I've removed the offending code. bahamut0013^words_deeds 17:45, 8 June 2010 (UTC)

No, no, the ship navbox/TOC. So we can go directly to whichever nationality of ships we're interested in.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 18:08, 8 June 2010 (UTC)

You might have to clear your cache, because I can see the nationalities in both the navbox and the Phase I page TOC. bahamut0013^words_deeds 18:29, 8 June 2010 (UTC)

Yes, thank you! names are not my forte. Yoenit (talk) 18:19, 8 June 2010 (UTC)

OK, now I see a navbox at the bottom of the page with all the phases, etc. Don't like it down there. Can it be moved someplace that will display on the first screen?— Preceding unsigned comment added by Sturmvogel 66 (talk • contribs) 18:37 8 June 2010

You mean the main page? It's there because the Milhist navbox and lead image crowd it something fierce. I think once we get a logo, we can shift the image out of the way and move it up a bit. bahamut0013^words_deeds 00:33, 9 June 2010 (UTC)

Logo

I've taken a good look at some layouts, and while I'm going to start some preliminary work later, I have to pose this: why don't we come up with a logo like WPMILHIST has? Since File:BS Bismarck.png is the logo we use for the portal links, why don't we gold tone it like File:WPMILHIST-composite-logo.png and add some matching text? Nothing too extravagent, but elegant and fitting. bahamut0013^words_deeds 15:26, 7 June 2010 (UTC)

I'm down with it. TomStar81 (Talk) 21:53, 7 June 2010 (UTC)

Does anyone *cough*Kirill*cough* know the name of the font used there? I asked the author (Bellhalla), but he hasn't edited in months and is presumably inactive. bahamut0013^words_deeds 20:37, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

No idea, unfortunately; I wasn't involved to that level of detail in the logo design process. Kirill ^{[talk] [prof]} 03:31, 18 June 2010 (UTC)

Did he mention it in on of the WTMHCOORD archives (ie when we originally came up with the idea and logo?) —Ed (talk • majestic titan) 04:47, 18 June 2010 (UTC)

This task was finally taken at Wikipedia:Graphic_Lab/Illustration_workshop#OMT_logo. The only thing I need is background transparency, but if you all want to make a suggestion, go for it before Mono is finished and closes out the request. bahamut0013^words_deeds 01:41, 13 July 2010 (UTC)

Nice work on the overhaul. It stunned me for a moment. Buggie111 (talk) 03:08, 26 July 2010 (UTC)

Dreadnought stuff over at the LOC

Hey guys, take a look at "Topics in Chronicling America - The Dreadnought Battleship and the Pre-WW I Naval Arms Race"! It's got links to contemporary newspapers on the topic as well, which is cool, becuase I think only the NYT has free archives that go back that far. —Ed (talk • majestic titan) 06:32, 30 July 2010 (UTC)

Coordinator

I was wondering if there was any interest in codifying a coordinator to lead OMT, since we have grown to the scale of a major task force. I personally think of Tom as kind of our unofficial coordinator, but that's just me. bahamut0013^words_deeds 22:17, 2 August 2010 (UTC)

Well, all the task forces already have particular coordinators assigned to them, so it's probably reasonable to do so for the special projects as well, at least if they request it. The question, I suppose, would be the number; most task forces have one or two, but a few high-interest ones have three.

As far as who could take the job, all three assigned to the Maritime warfare task force are participants here as well; some of them would probably be willing to take this on in addition to Tom. Kirill ^{[talk] [prof]} 01:42, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

I don't see any need for a coordinator unless someone needs to be a delegate to some Foundation-related or WP:1.0 thing...  Ed (talk • majestic titan) 02:28, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

Agreed, I do not see the need as well. All of us work well together and I really do not see what benefit beyond ceremonial hat-collecting could come from such a position. (Sorry Tom) -MBK₀₀₄ 08:00, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

Exactly, the only real benefit would be to whoever gets to tote the hat around. Side note, apparently we are both insomniacs.  Ed (talk • majestic titan) 08:06, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

Yep, but I'm doing something constructive, I'm shifting my sleep pattern to be able to watch the upcoming spacewalks on the ISS on Friday and Monday. In case you haven't heard, there was a major component failure over the weekend. -MBK₀₀₄ 08:36, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

I had heard, but I didn't realize that they streamed them live. That's pretty cool.  Ed (talk • majestic titan) 08:57, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

But it's a really cool hat. bahamut0013^words_deeds 11:52, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

Naval Slang

To what extent should we include naval slang in the effort? For example, I'm told that US battleships had Gedunk bars that served treats to the sailors and marines, but that sort of seems like something we would only be concerned with in a sideswipe sense, ,not a head on sense. What do guys think? TomStar81 (Talk) 02:19, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

(Also, I'm honored to be considered for the position of special project coordinator here, but at the moment I think we can safely pass on the position for now. Given the number of coordinators that are a part of the effort already I think we have all the needed bases covered.) TomStar81 (Talk) 02:19, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

Why don't we just cross that bridge when we come to it, and instead focus on writing, copyediting, and reviewing articles so we can complete Phase I first?  Ed (talk • majestic titan) 03:09, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

If you see any articles like that which may qualify for Phase V, go ahead and add it to the list. We can always remove them if necessary once we get to that point. bahamut0013^words_deeds 11:32, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

On that point, I've been adding articles to parts II, III, and IV, but not everything is there yet and help would be appreciated as well as getting them in chronological order. -MBK₀₀₄ 15:21, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

I put together a very basic list of German guns here. Feel free to play around with it. Parsecboy (talk) 15:29, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

Sub-category for special project subpages

I've created Category:Operation Majestic Titan to serve as a central location for things related to this special project; if anyone has a bit of free time, could you please go through and put all the relevant subpages into the category? Thanks! Kirill ^{[talk] [prof]} 01:04, 13 August 2010 (UTC)

HMS Tiger at Jutland

Does anybody have Campbell's book on Jutland handy? I need to know when Tiger's Q and X turrets were hit. Was it before Beatty turned away at 3:57 UTC or later when he turned to close again?--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 21:14, 16 August 2010 (UTC)

I do not have Campbell, but both A.J Marder (Dreadnought to Scapa Flow) and Steel and Hart (Jutland) put the hits as happening simultaneously at 3.54, i.e. before the turn away. --Anthony.bradbury^"talk" 12:16, 17 August 2010 (UTC)

Campbell agrees. Page 71 of the Lyons Press edition. --Simon Harley (Talk | Library). 12:31, 17 August 2010 (UTC)

Thanks to you both.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 20:02, 17 August 2010 (UTC)

Autoupdate of the progress table?

I just checked the progress table (currently hidden here)to after an article was promoted to FA and found to my surprise that the sum of all articles in the project is 545 if you count the numbers in the table, not 542 as the bottom says. Also the progress bar is at 39 FA/FL articles, while the table says 40. Errors like this are perfectly understandable, as the table has to be manually updated everytime something changes, which is a total pain given the size of the project. Therefore I propose to switch to an automatic table, like all the taskforces do. Afterall the number of articles in our scope is bigger than some of the taskforces and it would save OMTbot a lot of work. Yoenit (talk) 09:12, 9 June 2010 (UTC)

I think we would need a separate OMT category for that, right? —Ed (talk • majestic titan) 09:20, 9 June 2010 (UTC)

I believe so yes, would that be a problem in any way? Yoenit (talk) 09:31, 9 June 2010 (UTC)

I'd certainly prefer it to be done automatically.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 15:58, 9 June 2010 (UTC)

It would be nice, but how would we implement that? Is there some kind of bot for this? bahamut0013^words_deeds 18:04, 9 June 2010 (UTC)

I have been looking at it a bit and it seems straightforward. User:WP_1.0_bot seems to do all the legwork. All we would need to do is adjust Template:WPMILHIST to include a parameter for adding the page to OMT just as those used for taskforces right now and tagging all relevant pages with it. Yoenit (talk) 18:30, 9 June 2010 (UTC)

Ah, OK. Well, we previously agreed that adding OMT to the MILHIST banner wasn't a good idea, but we could add an invisible parameter to add the category. Also, this bot seems to only to a tally, it wouldn't be able to update the list of articles, which only removes one necessary administrative edit out of many. That, and I'm not sure that it could divvy stuff up by phase unless we tweaked the template to include five different OMT parameters and categories. There would still be a big manual burden to tag all associated articles with this, but it would be a one-time expense.

I'm going to ask a friend of mine if he has any semi-automated tally tools. Maybe we can run something supervised once a week or so to do the math for us. bahamut0013^words_deeds 21:18, 9 June 2010 (UTC)

Well, Max told me that indeed the bot is quite feasable, and since {{WPMILHIST}} already assesses the quality, we don't need the parameters like I thought, just the categories. But since this only handles one of the necessary edits, we can also go to Wikipedia:Bot requests to get something that can handle all of our needs, and not just the one. If we get consensus on this, I can make the request. I'm going to ping one of the programmers to see what is feasable and what is not. bahamut0013^words_deeds 19:04, 10 June 2010 (UTC)

OK, so I've prettymuch confirmed that we would have to modify {{WPMILHIST}} for this to work. Previously, we agreed not to do that, so I want to get consensus, then an admin to edit the protected template. We also have to answer the question: should it be visible (aside from categorization) or not? I fear the other task forces and/or special projects might not like that. bahamut0013^words_deeds 18:46, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

Oke, three things. Firstly I would support modifying the MIlHIST template. Secondly, I don't care whether it should be visible or not. Lastly, I really don't give a shit what the task forces have to say about it. We are building an encyclopedia here, not holding a popularity contest about who gets to be on the template. Yoenit (talk) 09:22, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

Thinking about it again, I actually do care whether it is visible or not. It's an excellent way to introduce the project to people who are interested in battleships. I don't see any grounds for objection with the other projects (they can do the same) and taskforces. After all, our articles are also within scope of at least one taskforce, so it can only be beneficial for them and the encyclopedia overall. Yoenit (talk) 09:45, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

A couple of points:

1. You don't need to worry about whether anyone is going to complain about adding an extra parameter for this group; the task forces already have them, and the MILHIST coordinators have discussed (and, in principle, approved) adding parameters for special projects already. (In reality, I think the coordinators are pretty much the only people who concern themselves with the innards of that template in any case; everyone else just wants it to work.)
2. It would be trivial to add a single yes/no parameter indicating whether an article was associated with OMT; however, this may not actually get you everything you want.
3. More interesting might be a selectable parameter that would indicate not only that the article was part of OMT, but also the phase in which it was listed. This wouldn't be difficult to code, but may require some more work on your part to tag the articles correctly.

In any case, I'd be happy to add the needed parameters and categories once OMT decides what exactly it wants them to indicate; please leave me a note when you guys are ready to move forward with something. Kirill ^{[talk] [prof]} 19:45, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

straw poll

This seems to have died, time to start it up again. A little straw poll to see if anybody objects.

Proposal: Add a visible parameter for OMT to MILHIST template, similar to those used by the taskforces, to allow categorization and possible bot-automated updates.

The main purpose is to allow us to automatically updates of progress tables and lists. A visible parameter would also increase the knowledge of the project and help us find editors interested in the special project.

• Support I would support this proposal, even if it is changed to an invisible parameter. Yoenit (talk) 18:28, 26 June 2010 (UTC)
• Support - don't care if it is visible or invisible, but it'd be nice to have a category...less manual labor for poor MBK. —Ed (talk • majestic titan) 19:38, 26 June 2010 (UTC)
• Support: this fell off my radar, but I'm still willing to liason with the bot folks about getting this off the ground. bahamut0013^words_deeds 21:13, 26 June 2010 (UTC)
• Support I was actually under the impress that this was already being done, so I am rather surprised to see the matter still open as it is. TomStar81 (Talk) 17:06, 27 June 2010 (UTC)
• Support - seems fine to me. Parsecboy (talk) 18:18, 27 June 2010 (UTC)
• Support I don't see why not.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 03:04, 24 July 2010 (UTC)

Implementation

Assuming that everyone here still wants to proceed with adding OMT tracking to {{WPMILHIST}}, I'd like to know whether people would prefer:

1. A single yes/no parameter for OMT
2. A multi-value parameter for OMT that would specify the phase in addition to the yes/no choice

Once we have an answer, I'll proceed with generating the needed template code. Kirill ^{[talk] [prof]} 02:10, 24 July 2010 (UTC)

• I think that code for the phase will be damn handy for all the non-ship articles that fall into the purview of the TF.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 03:05, 24 July 2010 (UTC)
  • Agree with Sturmvogel. TomStar81 (Talk) 03:17, 24 July 2010 (UTC)
    • It wouldn't be nearly as useful with the single parameter. bahamut0013^words_deeds 02:40, 25 July 2010 (UTC)
      • Multi parameters sounds awesome and usefull. Yoenit (talk) 08:46, 25 July 2010 (UTC)
        • Agreed. Kirill the miracle worker strikes again. :) —Ed (talk • majestic titan) 01:59, 28 July 2010 (UTC)

Implementation ready for testing

Okay, I have a (working?) implementation ready for testing at {{WPMILHIST/sandbox}} that works as follows:

• There is a single parameter (Operation-Majestic-Titan= OR Majestic-Titan= OR OMT=) for the special project
• This parameter accepts a phase number (1-5 OR i-v)
• Based on the parameter, the template generates:
  • A tag (with phase number) in the banner
  • A category for the special project
  • A sub-category for the class within the special project
  • A category for the phase
  • A sub-category for the class within the phase
• Unrecognized values for the parameter will show up as "Phase ?"

I would appreciate it if people here could test out the sandbox version and let me know (a) whether everything works as intended and (b) whether you'd like any changes to the functionality before we go live with this version. Kirill ^{[talk] [prof]} 19:52, 12 August 2010 (UTC)

I did some quick testing, looks great! I like that there are also categories for phase ?, so you can still add pages if you dont know which phase they belong to and sort them later. I also think "OMT=" is gonna be almost exclusively used as the full parameter names are quite long, though I suppose there is no reason to remove once they are created. Al we need now is an image for the tag. Yoenit (talk) 20:39, 12 August 2010 (UTC)

A bit of testing, and it seems to work fine. I added in the icon. Would it be possible to link the the individual phase pages if the template has them designated? I think we also need an NA category for the projectspace, templates, and portal. bahamut0013^words_deeds 20:50, 12 August 2010 (UTC)

Yes, I can add links to the individual pages. Would you like a link on "Phase ?" as well (and, if so, to where)?

As far as non-article pages are concerned, I'm not sure I really see a point in tracking them, since there's no real value to the counts, and since none of the task forces track them individually. Certainly, tagging project-space pages with a project banner seems like it would just be extra work, since that relationship is already obvious from the page name itself. Kirill ^{[talk] [prof]} 20:57, 12 August 2010 (UTC)

I see your latter point. As to the former... Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history/Maritime warfare task force/Operation Majestic Titan/Phase I on Phase I, etc. Would that require editing Template:WPMILHIST/Special project phase? bahamut0013^words_deeds 00:40, 13 August 2010 (UTC)

Wait, I'm confused—do you mean that "Phase ?" should link to the "active" phase (currently Phase I")? Or something different? Kirill ^{[talk] [prof]} 00:55, 13 August 2010 (UTC)

Nah, he understood you wrong and thought you meant a random phase number with the question mark. I think the link for articles of an unknown phase (phase ?) should go to OMT's main page. Yoenit (talk) 08:05, 13 August 2010 (UTC)

Yeah, I did think it strange you were asking what seemed to be blindingly obvious, not realizing you were referring to the unknown phase. Well, the template already links to the OMT main page, providing a second link right next to the first is redundant. bahamut0013^words_deeds 11:39, 13 August 2010 (UTC)

Ah, okay. I'll try to add the links in at some point in the next day or so. In the meantime, are there any other changes we need to make? Kirill ^{[talk] [prof]} 12:10, 13 August 2010 (UTC)

Okay, I've added the links to the phase page; please test this out.

One question that occurs to me is whether we need to break down the unclassified (Phase ?) articles down by class. Do you anticipate that articles will remain in that category for a significant period of time, or will that category only be used to catch tagging errors? In other words, will every newly tagged article be assigned to a phase? Kirill ^{[talk] [prof]} 02:54, 14 August 2010 (UTC)

I think it would be a temporary holding category, so categorizing it by quality wouldn't be very useful for any purpose. If we need to discuss about which phase an article falls under, we can do so; thus far, discussions like that haven't taken more than a few days. Or we can just use the 8-ball. bahamut0013^words_deeds 03:13, 14 August 2010 (UTC)

Okay, I've changed the template so that only the main category is generated for unknown-phase articles, not the class ones. Unless there are more comments today, I'm going to create the needed categories and take this template live tonight; so, if anyone would like to see other changes before then, now would be the time to speak up. :-) Kirill ^{[talk] [prof]} 14:37, 14 August 2010 (UTC)

Implementation live

Okay, I've moved the template changes over to the live banner and created the necessary categories. Please go ahead and start tagging articles, preferably for all the phases, so that we can verify everything is working correctly and trigger the assessment bot to create the needed statistics for every phase. Kirill ^{[talk] [prof]} 01:31, 17 August 2010 (UTC)

I'll make a quick assessment run now (the gnome in me is salivating!). We've got articles listed for all the phases, but only phase 1 is completely filled out, so from now on, when you list another article, please remember to tag it as well. -MBK₀₀₄ 01:52, 17 August 2010 (UTC)

I cannot tag the popular culture parts of Part V due to the fact that the articles do not meet the inclusion requirements for the MILHIST project as a whole. -MBK₀₀₄ 03:21, 17 August 2010 (UTC)

Scope point 8 allows you to add any popular culture stuff relevant to the project, but the popular culture section in phase V is a bit iffy anyway as it is just a collection of stuff with battleship in the name. I say ignore it for now and have critical look at that section sometime in the future, using milhist scope point 8 as the criterium for inclusion. Yoenit (talk) 06:55, 17 August 2010 (UTC)

Looking pretty good thus far. Hopefully, the bot will cycle through soon so we can make sure the entire process works. If it does, Kirill really needs to be put in for the TC for picking up where I stopped. bahamut0013^words_deeds 12:18, 17 August 2010 (UTC)

Do we know how often the bot cycles through? The log is showing activity but the table is not showing up. -MBK₀₀₄ 03:37, 20 August 2010 (UTC)

Looks like it's finally gotten around to creating the statistics now. :-) Kirill ^{[talk] [prof]} 04:13, 20 August 2010 (UTC)

Now that this has been active for a few days, does anyone have any further comments or requests? Or is everything working the way you guys need it to? Kirill ^{[talk] [prof]} 12:39, 22 August 2010 (UTC)

It seems to be working alright! Thanks, Kirill. bahamut0013^words_deeds 12:03, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

Same here, thanks Kirill! Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 15:17, 25 August 2010 (UTC)

No problem. Is there any interest in adding the "attention needed" categories, or is that not really useful here? Kirill ^{[talk] [prof]} 03:16, 28 August 2010 (UTC)

I'm not inclined to think so; IMO, they're pretty obvious.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 03:26, 28 August 2010 (UTC)

While automating that couldn't hurt, I'm not inclined to worry about them too much... we already organize that manually on the article lists, I think. bahamut0013^words_deeds 03:47, 28 August 2010 (UTC)

Question on reliability of source.

I currently have German Type UB I submarine up at FAC and someone asked if the Historical Handbook of World Navies. is a RS. I know that this is about U-boats and not BBs but I've used the source for other Austro-Hungarian Battleships before and I'd like your opinions on this matter so I know whether to replace it on any of the article that I write or if it's acceptable and I can keep it. Thanks,--White Shadows ^{Nobody said it was easy} 18:29, 14 August 2010 (UTC)

Here is the actual link on the article [1]--White Shadows ^{Nobody said it was easy} 18:31, 14 August 2010 (UTC)

The website seems to be a hobby project of a guy called Oskar Myszor. Unless mister Myszor has published books or scientific papers about ships before (nothing relevant on google scholar/books at a glance), he fails the requirements given forself published sources. So no, this is not a reliable source as far as I can determine. Yoenit (talk) 21:49, 16 August 2010 (UTC)

Hello. Oskar Myszor is autor in one of two biggest Polish magazines about warships [2], [3]. Google "Okręty Wojenne Oskar Myszor" shows many articles. I don`t know, it`s enough? PMG (talk) 12:51, 27 August 2010 (UTC)

Yep, that should do it. Nice Yoenit (talk) 13:11, 27 August 2010 (UTC)

Cyclops

Does this project intend to include the Cyclops class of 1871? They certainly would not now be considered to be battleships, but were built at a time when the definitions were somewhat fuzzy. HMS Warrior, for example was described as a fourth-rate and as a frigate. If the Cyclops ships should be here I can create them. Photographs may be difficult. --Anthony Bradbury^"talk" 19:48, 17 August 2010 (UTC)

No, anything before about 1882 is really an ironclad, although the boundary does get a little fuzzy. But don't let that stop you if you want to start the article. Even ironclads need love.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 20:02, 17 August 2010 (UTC)

While we are on the topic, what about the Colossus class. Somebody seems to think they were battleships. Note the article is actually misnamed and the class was commisioned in 1882, not launched. Yoenit (talk) 20:16, 17 August 2010 (UTC)

I'd call them ironclads personally. Battleships vs ironclads is a common mistake, IMO. I had to do a bunch of renamings when I was cleaning up the list of French ironclads a little while ago. One nice side benefit about calling them ironclads is the period is short enough that you don't generally have multiple ships with the same name, which allows us to get rid of the disambiguator date in the title. Forex Suffren is used once each for an ironclad, a pre-dreadnought and a WWII-era cruiser. Of course, that doesn't do much for navies that use a prefix.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 21:25, 17 August 2010 (UTC)

Quack quack quack... bahamut0013^words_deeds 23:47, 17 August 2010 (UTC)

Hey, why shouldn't I use my one good line from the magic 8-ball? Slightly more seriously maybe we should specify a start date or something?--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 01:30, 18 August 2010 (UTC)

Just to stir things up a little (tongue-in-cheek) could I say that any ship which was intended to lie in the line-of-battle is, by definition, a battleship. Although not all ironclades were so intended. But then again a number of ironclads, such as the Cyclops class, were intended or considered fit to lie in the battle line of other countries. Changing tack, I notice that we have a disappointingly large number of stub-class articles here. I will get onto improving them, at least to start-class and hopefully beyond, tomorrow. --Anthony Bradbury^"talk" 21:12, 24 August 2010 (UTC)

You're talking about roles like battleship, corvette, monitor, etc., but ironclad is a general description of their construction and design that encompasses all those roles.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 21:56, 24 August 2010 (UTC)

That would mean USS Texas (1892) is not a battleship, as she was intended to steam directly at her enemies and try to ram them. Yoenit (talk) 22:28, 24 August 2010 (UTC)

Well, our agreed-upon criteria revolves around guns, armor, and displacement, not about construction or intent. That's factored into a lot of the "battleship or not?" discussions, such as the Kirov-class battlecruisers. Of course, I know that's not a hard-and-fast rule, but if we want to redefine the standard of what a battleship is, we will have to revisit a lot of previous discussions. bahamut0013^words_deeds 11:39, 25 August 2010 (UTC)

Incidentally, the French Navy launched a "Suffren" in 1965 as well. --Anthony Bradbury^"talk" 21:15, 24 August 2010 (UTC)

Indeed.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 21:56, 24 August 2010 (UTC)

Reliable source

Hi all is Naval history.net classed as a reliable source ?--Jim Sweeney (talk) 18:06, 11 September 2010 (UTC)

There is no piping ( "|" ) in external links... ;) Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 18:52, 11 September 2010 (UTC)

I think that the link is broken....--White Shadows ^{Your guess is as good as mine} 18:08, 11 September 2010 (UTC)

Here it is without trying to be clever http://www.naval-history.net/xGM-Chrono-01BB-Anson.htm --Jim Sweeney (talk) 18:13, 11 September 2010 (UTC)

Since I don't see any sources, I don't think so. However, I've found it confirmed by other sources so it can be a guide for your research.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 18:29, 11 September 2010 (UTC)

I would call this a "backup source", a source that would need to be authenticated independently with other sources to confirm its authenticity. That said, if you can back up the information as a noted above it could in theory be added to the article. TomStar81 (Talk) 18:41, 11 September 2010 (UTC)

I've been told before that it isn't reliable... I really wish it was, though. :/ Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 18:49, 11 September 2010 (UTC)

Well it could go either way, much like Uboat.net. It can be a RS if you give the other sources to confirm it and I guess it could be used on things like DYK and GA's but you may want to look elsewhere if you plan on going to FAC with an article that uses it.--White Shadows ^{Your guess is as good as mine} 18:52, 11 September 2010 (UTC)

Thanks all --Jim Sweeney (talk) 21:31, 11 September 2010 (UTC)

RN battleships

Hi All i have reworked the List of battleships of the Royal Navy to the same format as List of battleships of Germany. All the material is taken from the ships articles and is about 99% unreferenced. Not being an expert in the subject can anyone suggest a good book on RN battleships ? and I would appreciate some advice on how much details goes in the propulsion sections. At present the List of battleships of the Royal Navy#Admiral class has:

2 × Humphries compound inverted steam engines

2 × screws

While the List of battleships of the Royal Navy#Queen Elizabeth class has:

24 × boilers at 285 psi maximum pressure

4 × direct drive turbines

4 × shafts, 75,000 shp at 300 rpm

2 × oil driven 450 kW dynamos

2 × turbine driven 200 Kw dynamos

1 × reciprocating engine driven 200 kW dynamo added shortly after commissioning.

I suspect it should be closer to the Queen Elizabeth example ? I will try and get some text added to each section as well.--Jim Sweeney (talk) 03:19, 13 September 2010 (UTC)

First off, I'd delete everything before the Admiral class of 1882 as they're more properly ironclads, not even pre-dreadnoughts. That's way too much info for the QE class; I'd only put in # of propeller shafts, engine type and # of boilers. As for books there are a number available that are decent. The Oscar Parkes book is probably the best one-volume history, although it gets a little erratic for the last couple of classes. The next best bet would be R.A. Burt's trilogy on the battleships. You can find details on my library page.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 04:07, 13 September 2010 (UTC)

Thanks deleted those prior to the Admiral class. --Jim Sweeney (talk) 04:30, 13 September 2010 (UTC)

The following are not units of the Iron Duke class and should be given their own section as unique vessels: HMS Agincourt, HMS Canada, and HMS Erin. Also, HMS Canada had 14 inch guns opposed to 13.5s, and Agincourt had 12s. Dreadnought was not a "class" per se and should be listed as a single ship the same for Vanguard (what I'm saying is do away with the main links to class articles here). You are also missing two classes: Lion class battleship and N3 class battleship. -MBK₀₀₄ 04:52, 13 September 2010 (UTC)

Also, Canada had a sister ship which was converted to an aircraft carrier on the ways: HMS Eagle (1918) and that should also be listed. -MBK₀₀₄ 04:55, 13 September 2010 (UTC)

Great will get round to them --Jim Sweeney (talk) 04:57, 13 September 2010 (UTC)

Would you list Agincourt Canada Erin together, or in their own section like Dreadnought ? --Jim Sweeney (talk) 05:01, 13 September 2010 (UTC)

Good question, technically they are each the lead ship/only ship of their respective classes (for their foreign owners) but were each requisitioned at the outset of the war. I'd say separately but I would also support a single section. -MBK₀₀₄ 05:09, 13 September 2010 (UTC)

I did the singletons among the British BCs as their own sections, if you want to use that as a guide.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 05:29, 13 September 2010 (UTC)

It seems that at least Agincourt and Erin are similar enough to warrant combined inclusion, but what to name it? bahamut0013^words_deeds 14:44, 13 September 2010 (UTC)

Similar? 14 x 12-inch guns vs 10 x 13.5-inch? I don't think so. Don't be confused by the fact that both were bought by the Turks; Agincourt was originally designed for the Brazilians. I've cleaned up the mess in the Erin article that might have contributed to the confusion.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 14:59, 13 September 2010 (UTC)

Another question folks. The article is already 79,000 bytes and only half finished. What would be the consensus in splitting ? The obvious place would be pre and post Dreadnought. --Jim Sweeney (talk) 20:49, 13 September 2010 (UTC)

List of pre-Dreadnought battleships of the Royal Navy and List of Dreadnought battleships of the Royal Navy are good ideas.--White Shadows ^{Your guess is as good as mine} 20:56, 13 September 2010 (UTC)

That's actually a very good idea. It will help keep them down to a more manageable length.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 22:06, 13 September 2010 (UTC)

There could also be a List of monitors and coastal battleships of the Royal Navy for those that were taken off the current list.--White Shadows ^{Your guess is as good as mine} 23:30, 13 September 2010 (UTC)

No, I'm already planning on a List of ironclads of the Royal Navy, although I'm uncertain if I'll break it down further into turret ships, broadside ironclads, breastwork monitors, etc., or not.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 23:51, 13 September 2010 (UTC)

If that's the case then where are the ones taken off the list going to end up? As for your issue, I think that they all should just belong in one list if it is not too long.--White Shadows ^{Your guess is as good as mine} 10:56, 14 September 2010 (UTC)

They'll go on List of ironclads of the Royal Navy, like I said; once I get around to building it. And, yes, there are a lot of ships that will belong on it.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 12:53, 14 September 2010 (UTC)

Ok folks this article has now been split into two

• List of pre-Dreadnought battleships of the Royal Navy
• List of Dreadnought battleships of the Royal Navy

The post Dreadnought is still 61000 bytes but more manageable - one note the meagre sources I had means the the pre Dreadnought article is unreferenced and the post Dreadnought has exhausted what little I had to hand. So any help appreciated. --Jim Sweeney (talk) 12:24, 15 September 2010 (UTC)

On another note I have enjoyed working on them - so I can now see where your coming from. --Jim Sweeney (talk) 12:26, 15 September 2010 (UTC)

Civic Assistance

I know this is outside our specific scope at the moment, but I am asking if a few good men would be willing to take on the task of getting the protected cruiser USS Olympia (C-6) up to featured status. News reports state that the ship is in dire need of assistance and may be scrapped or sunk if funding is not found soon, and since Olympia is a gun ship and a rather famous one at the that I feel compelled to see if we can lend some assistance to the cause; a main page appearance for Admiral Dew's flagship may help generate interest in the ship, which in turn could help the museum people spread the word about the ship's current status and and badly need repairs. I'd sweeten the deal by offering a Ship's barnstar to the editors who get the cruiser to A-class status and WikiChevrons to the editors who get the ship to FA status. How about it? TomStar81 (Talk) 20:22, 6 September 2010 (UTC)

Large train of logic there... I'll check my sources, if any of them mention anything zabout it, and might expand it a bit. A real editor like ed could do the rest. Buggie111 (talk) 20:27, 6 September 2010 (UTC)

USS Olympia: Herald of Empire, seems to be a good book, comparable to the one I tidied up part of Oklahoma with. Buggie111 (talk) 20:33, 6 September 2010 (UTC)

his seems to be a preservation website. Buggie111 (talk) 20:38, 6 September 2010 (UTC)

I'll have a look-see tomorrow and see if I can't add some as well. Parsecboy (talk) 02:33, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

The New York Times' archives should have stuff. Also, general books about the naval side of the Spanish-American War probably hold some things. For more recent times, we'll probably need the book Buggie mentioned. I'll take a look at my uni's Scientific American archives tomorrow too. Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 03:38, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

I will help out, but I don't have a lot of free time right now. Yoenit (talk) 06:19, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

The book Buggie mentioned is available on Google Books, I'm using it right now to rewrite the Manila section. Parsecboy (talk) 12:55, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

It cuts off just after the battle, however. Buggie111 (talk) 13:15, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

I've requested Musicant's U.S. armored cruisers : a design and operational history from ILL which should provide the technical history of the ship once it arrives in a couple of weeks.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 16:51, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

I've got a good deal of the technical stuff up, but see what Musicant can add. Also, Google Book cuts off Cooling's book at page 49 - anybody got easy access to it from a local library? Parsecboy (talk) 17:00, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

I've added a bit from Harper's Weekly and Scientific American, and each have one more article, so I'll try to get back to them asap. Yoenit, random tangent, but once I get my camera, I'll be sending you that Massachusetts article Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 17:47, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

Check Yoenit (talk) 17:55, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

Just to note, Kevin Murray has ordered USS Olympia: Herald of Empire and should have it soon. Parsecboy (talk) 17:59, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

I don't have access to any of these resources (Carleton's Library is proving very difficult to navigate, regrettably..), but I will work my technical magic on formatting stuff. Cam ^(Chat)(Prof) 19:10, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

Has anyone contacted the preservation group? On another hand, I'm gonna try and use some web sources to spice up the preservation section. Buggie111 (talk) 17:09, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Before I do anything else, I wanted to share this piece of information with everyone here: my dad's half of the family is apparently well connected to the dod and other folks of similarly minded interest, and according to them the plan as it currently stands is to have Olympia scrapped at the November if the funds are not raised in time. Given this, perhaps we should try and get her up on veterans day rather than on the anniversary of the battle of manilla bay. TomStar81 (Talk) 17:25, 20 September 2010 (UTC)

Another request

Currently, Aleksandar Berić is up for deletion at the request of the original author, a realative. From what it sounds like, this captain had his ironclad monitor Drava in one hell of a fight during the Invasion of Yugoslavia. It sounds to me that the individual might not be notable, but the incident and/or ship are. If anyone can help in expanding the article or converting it, that would be awesome. bahamut0013^words_deeds 12:51, 20 September 2010 (UTC)

Aircraft carriers

File:Pogrom bialystok2.jpg

Quickly! Form the lynch mob!

I was wondering why you guys are going for battleships before air carriers? The latter are more notable ships, more expensive, and more prestigious. Nergaal (talk) 00:20, 17 September 2010 (UTC)

Preference. The "Bird Farms" are just not as neat looking as Battleships and have not been around as long.--White Shadows ^{Your guess is as good as mine} 00:24, 17 September 2010 (UTC)

Heresy! No bloody bird farms! bahamut0013^words_deeds 00:32, 17 September 2010 (UTC)

Too Late! There's one FA aleady, and another up for ACR right now, plus more on deck!--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 02:04, 17 September 2010 (UTC)

I don't know about the bird farms being more notable or expensive - the naval arms race between Britain and Germany just about bankrupted the both of them, and they have done some pretty important things. I'd say the carriers still have a lot of catch-up to play.

There also have been far more battleships than there have been carriers, so it'll be much more impressive when it's all said and done. Parsecboy (talk) 02:57, 17 September 2010 (UTC)

Indeed. Plus battleships are just generally cooler. Cam ^(Chat)(Prof) 03:06, 17 September 2010 (UTC)

Truer words have never been spoken. Maybe I'm just biased, but a few battles involving under a dozen carriers each just don't hold up to the largest single naval engagement in history in terms of sheer awesomeness (and I mean that in the original sense of the word, not the "what, like a hotdog?" sense).Parsecboy (talk) 03:15, 17 September 2010 (UTC)

I don't get it. Does that mean I lose points? Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 06:50, 17 September 2010 (UTC)

Actually, I hope you all do turn to carriers once the BBs are complete. Cla68 (talk) 07:15, 17 September 2010 (UTC)

No, we shall commence Operation majestic U-boat! :P--White Shadows ^{Your guess is as good as mine} 10:51, 17 September 2010 (UTC)

I've been collecting too many books on the subject and there are a ton of sources available for U-boats (mostly on WWII) if/when we finish OMT. Uboat.net is still semi-good as long as you have a bunch of other offline sources and don't plan on taking it to FAC. Though I doubt that people who edit BB's would have much interest in these little subs.....--White Shadows ^{Your guess is as good as mine} 10:54, 17 September 2010 (UTC)

After a long Battle, why not take a Cruise[r]? Fifelfoo (talk) 10:59, 17 September 2010 (UTC)

Somewhere in the archives Tom talked about doing the cruisers once this is all finished, though that won't be for a long time.

@Ed: No, you just missed out on the opportunity for points. Parsecboy (talk) 11:25, 17 September 2010 (UTC)

Was that a sexual pun? I guess I don't get points either. :(

And our post-OMT project will certainly be Operation Noble Fleet Oiler. On this, I will brook no argument. bahamut0013^words_deeds 11:33, 17 September 2010 (UTC)

No, it was a joke by Eddie Izzard about how Americans need the original meaning of the word awesome, about how we use it to describe things like a hotdog. The punchline goes like this: an astronaut on the moon tells the President that it's awesome, and he says "what, like a hotdog?" to which the astronaut replies "like a million hotdogs, sir."

What about tugboats? Parsecboy (talk) 11:40, 17 September 2010 (UTC)

You could work on hybrid battleship-aircraft carriers such as the Ise class battleships and various US (and British?) hybrid proposals to keep everyone happy as a compromise solution. Alternately, I've started an article on the US Flight deck cruiser proposals (currently a stub) and developing it would make everyone equally unhappy as they were neither proper cruisers or proper carriers (or a good idea). Nick-D (talk) 11:42, 17 September 2010 (UTC)

I considered tugboats, but "oiler" is a funnier word. And the Ises are already in Phase I, while one pic is a selected picture on the portal. — Preceding unsigned comment added by bahamut0013 (talk • contribs)

I endorse the tugboat idea! Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 21:33, 17 September 2010 (UTC)

I'm for tugs, U-boats, fireboats or royal yachts. Buggie111 (talk) 23:28, 17 September 2010 (UTC)

collier > Replenishment oiler. Only those wussy modern dreadnaughts run on oil, real battleships used coal. Yoenit (talk) 07:42, 18 September 2010 (UTC)

+10 cool points for Ed and another 5 for Yoenit. bahamut0013^words_deeds 02:20, 19 September 2010 (UTC)

for offbeat names you would have a hard time outdoing Flat-iron gunboats.©Geni 00:53, 23 September 2010 (UTC)

Well, there are eleven German flatirons, so I'm in ;) Parsecboy (talk) 01:29, 23 September 2010 (UTC)

Missing One

Im wondering why the Ottoman battleship Mesudiye is not listed in the project. Though built as a center-battery ironclad she was later refitted into a predreadnaught like vessel and various sources like this one for example [[4]] Assari Tewfik was also rebuilt about the same time as Mesudiye, but i am uncertain of the details of her configuration after her refit. Mesudiye's armament and configuration changed completely and was similar in power and greater in displacement than many of the battleships initially built as such of the time, such as the USS Texas (1892), Russian battleship Imperator Aleksandr II, and SMS Habsburg for instance.XavierGreen (talk) 04:11, 20 September 2010 (UTC)

Magic 8-ball says that she's an ironclad; she's not the only one that was modified into a near-pre-dreadnought state, but we go by initial configuration.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 04:21, 20 September 2010 (UTC)

Ah but what did the Ottomans classify her as? The reason i am wondering is for her status in regards to the List_of_battleships_of_the_Ottoman_Empire page. Though this project might be restricted to ships built as predreadnaught types, the country lists of battleships should include all ships of that navy rated as such no? For example the Japanese navy officially rated the Fuso and Chen Yuan as battleships and they are treated in literature and by the Japanese government as such, despite the fact that this project does not recognize them as battleships.XavierGreen (talk) 04:30, 20 September 2010 (UTC)

You forget that the term battleship meant different things to different people at different times. I'm indifferent to what the Turks termed it; I only care if it meets our standard or not. The French called the Napoleon of 1851 a steam battleship; should we add it to our project? FYI, the Turks called it Muharbebe gemi or armored vessel after it was reconstructed, which is not what they called their battleships (Muharebe zirhli).--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 07:04, 20 September 2010 (UTC)

My concerns arnt about inclusion in the project, there about inclusion into the content of pages like List of battleships of the Ottoman Empire or List of battleships and monitors of Spain.XavierGreen (talk) 19:54, 20 September 2010 (UTC)

As far as I'm concerned they're pretty much the same criteria. Mesudiye belongs on (the un-yet written List of ironclads of the Ottoman Navy). I've only just begun on writing ironclad articles; I'll get there eventually.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 20:48, 20 September 2010 (UTC)

Seen here described as both an ironclad and a battleship. However I suspect the batttleship designation is to make HMS B11's achievement even more impressive.©Geni 20:11, 2 October 2010 (UTC)

Which lead article for Courageous-class GTC?

I'm ready to submit the GTC on the Courageous-class battlecruisers, but I'm not sure which article to use for the topic lead. They were built and served in WWI as battlecruisers, but spent the bulk of their careers as aircraft carriers so an argument can be made for either to be used. Now, perhaps this is the wrong forum considering our topic (and the thread above!), but I thought that I'd solicit opinions here as well.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 15:57, 22 September 2010 (UTC)

What you might try is something like this:

Courageous-class battlecruiser
Courageous-class aircraft carrier

5 articles

HMS Courageous (50)

HMS Glorious

HMS Furious (47)

If they don't like that, I would prefer to use the battlecruiser article as the lead, as that's what they started out as. You could then use:

Courageous-class battlecruiser

5 articles

HMS Courageous (50)

HMS Glorious

HMS Furious (47)

Courageous-class aircraft carrier

Parsecboy (talk) 19:39, 22 September 2010 (UTC)

(ec) It seems that the battlecruiser description is more appropriate... the leads define all three ships as cruisers first, and the carriers are sometimes known as Glorious-class. Also, the battlescruiser article is FA, while the aircraft carrier article is GA/A-class.

You know, I think that list of ships converted to aircraft carrier would be an excellent idea at some point! Quite a number of American, British, and Japanese battleships and cruisers were modified to carry aircraft by the end of WWII. bahamut0013^words_deeds 19:53, 22 September 2010 (UTC)

That's actually a pretty good idea although you'd have to be strict about the definition of "aircraft carrier". Or at least I would, as ships converted to seaplane carriers could be pretty lengthy all on its own. I rather like Parsec's first presentation of the topic template.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 20:21, 22 September 2010 (UTC)

Oooh, that does sound like a rather nifty idea. I think I might call dibs on this one. :) Assuming nobody else beats me to it, of course. :p - The Bushranger _{Return fire}^{Flank speed} 04:03, 23 September 2010 (UTC)

Help yourself, but I'd be intimidated by the numbers of escort carriers and light carriers converted from merchant and light cruiser hulls.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 04:13, 23 September 2010 (UTC)

Yeah, there are a lot of them: Independence class aircraft carrier, Sangamon class escort carrier, Long Island class escort carrier, Avenger class escort carrier, Bogue class escort carrier. You're looking at 60-odd ships, and those are just the American light/escort carriers. The Brits had HMS Activity (D94), HMS Audacity (D10), HMS Pretoria Castle (F61), two Nairana class escort carriers, and HMS Campania (D48) (in addition to several US-built lend-lease vessels). And of course, the Germans had a few, such as German aircraft carrier I (1915) and German aircraft carrier I (1942), among others. Parsecboy (talk) 11:22, 23 September 2010 (UTC)

In order to cut the numbers down, I'd probably use the discriminator that they'd have had to been laid down as other types of ships and converted afterwards. That might cut out most of the US CVEs. OTOH they're pretty widely known to have been built on merchant ship hulls. But you can make your own decisions about which ships to include, so long as you're consistent. One of the nice things about lists is that you can slice and dice them almost anyway you like, just so long as there's real value in doing so. Not much point, I believe, in a list of ships launched on Fridays between 10 and 12.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 16:47, 23 September 2010 (UTC)

As far as I know, only the Saipans, Casablancas, and Commencement Bays were built from the keel up as light or escort carriers, the rest were all converted merchantmen or cruisers. Parsecboy (talk) 17:40, 23 September 2010 (UTC)

Just out of curiousity, why did Glorious not have a pennant number? Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 04:31, 23 September 2010 (UTC)

She did, it was 77. I just removed it while fixing a cut & paste move about a year ago because there are no other HMS Glorious-es (see here). Parsecboy (talk) 10:59, 23 September 2010 (UTC)

Ok, I think I'm going to go with Parsec's first suggestion. But now I'm wondering exactly how to name the topic. Courageous class battlecruisers / aircraft carriers or somesuch? Thoughts?--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 18:44, 23 September 2010 (UTC)

Personally, I think "Courageous-class battlecruisers & aircraft carriers" is better; the "&" is more aesthetically pleasing than the "/", but that's MHO. I don't suppose there is any MOS or precedent for a FT/GT with more than one lead, is there? bahamut0013^words_deeds 22:14, 23 September 2010 (UTC)

Don't think that the templates can handle it.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 22:15, 23 September 2010 (UTC)

I think that a slash would screw up the page naming too – the slash would make the topic into a subpage. Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 07:17, 3 October 2010 (UTC)

Notability question

I have noticed lately that a ton of extremely short articles of battleships/battlecruisers get through GA. Do you guys really think that all of them are notable enough to warrant a separate article? If yes, please do something. To me it seems like many could do well with a merge into the parent class article. You guys should set some thresholds to encourage users to put more information into the ship articles than just the bare minimum. On this aspect alone I feel like if they were put though a review process (like AfD), some of them could actually get merged into the parent class because they add very little past the class article. Nergaal (talk) 19:33, 24 September 2010 (UTC)

Could you give some examples so we know what you're talking about? And generally speaking, WP:SHIPS treats all commissioned warships as notable enough for their own articles. I know a lot of older vessels are less reported on in modern sources, but there is usually a surprising amount of information that can be found by searching newspaper archives, old naval annuals, and the like. Parsecboy (talk) 20:18, 24 September 2010 (UTC)

From a quick peak at Phase I, I think(?) he's talking about Sturm's recent GAs on Russian pre-dreadnoughts. They're definitely notable, but 75% of the articles are specifications copied from the class article... not something I like to see. :/ Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 20:57, 24 September 2010 (UTC)

We have discussed this before, somewhat. The main obstacle here is the dearth of reliable sources for very old ships, especially the more obscure ones. But the assumption is that a commission is sufficient notability for a ship, and the references will come as archives are published, books written, and logs scanned and posted online.

If you think that we have a bias here, you could speak to the folks at GAR about article length. bahamut0013^words_deeds 21:47, 24 September 2010 (UTC)

Finding details of service for ships that never fought in a war is almost impossible unless you have DANFS or something similar available, and there aren't many equivalents out there. Naval history.net is great for the Brits in WW2, albeit unreliable, but I cannot find out hardly anything for most of the British BBs in WWI, other than their experiences at Jutland. One reason I haven't tackled many of them lest somebody complain about lack of completeness.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 23:10, 24 September 2010 (UTC)

If anything I did not realize anything about Sturmvogel's ones. It is the ones here that I found a somewhat troublesome - and it might not be the best example. I understand very well that old sources are really tricky and I congratulate you guys on doing such a fine job. What I have trouble understanding is creating articles besides the class ones when those articles aren't well developed. If sources are hard to find, why bother splitting them from the class articles in the first place? And when only two ships are present, a merge would not really be that unreasonable. Nergaal (talk) 04:46, 25 September 2010 (UTC)

Those are mine as well. Why shouldn't they have individual articles; they're notable and somebody will create one at some point. Why not me, and with the best effort I can command, versus somebody transcribing their entry from Conway's or something. The ship articles have details not given in the class article, not all that many, I'll grant, but all I find and thought significant. Hopefully some Russian speaker will come through and expand these using Russian-language material like user:East of Borschov did with Rostislav. I did pretty much do a copy paste of the basic description because I had so little to work with, which is not what I prefer to do, but I'm pretty well forced to do so to bulk them up to something longer than their infobox.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 05:21, 25 September 2010 (UTC)

Mississippi class battleship

In case anyone has not seen it the Mississippi class battleship A class review has been opened. I don't believe the author is a member of OMT and he would appreciate any assistance. --Jim Sweeney (talk) 12:05, 26 September 2010 (UTC)