Note:Peer review is the process of review by peers and usually implies a group of authoritative reviewers who are equally familiar and expert in the subject. The process represented by this page is not formal peer review in that sense and articles that undergo this process cannot be assumed to have greater authority than any other.
Wikipedia's peer review is a way to receive ideas on how to improve articles that are already decent. It may be used for potential good article nominations, potential featured article candidates, or an article of any "grade" (but if the article isn't well-developed, please read here before asking for a peer review). Follow the directions below to open a peer review. After that, the most effective way to receive review comments is by posting a request on the talk page of a volunteer.
Nominating
Anyone can request peer review. Editors submitting a new request are encouraged to review an article from those already listed, and encourage reviewers by replying promptly and appreciatively to comments.
Add {{subst:PR}} to the top of the article's talk page and save it.
Click within the notice to create a new peer review discussion page.
Complete the new page as instructed. Remember to say what kind of comments or contributions you want, and/or the sections of the article you think need reviewing.
Save the page with the four tildes (~~~~) at the end of your request to sign it. Your peer review will be automatically listed within an hour.
Avoid re-editing your own nomination. This makes your nomination disappear from the List of unanswered reviews, resulting in delays in it being picked up by a reviewer. If this has happened, add your peer review to Template:Peer review/Unanswered peer reviews sidebar by clicking here.
Please consider reciprocity and every time you nominate a review, respond or add to another review (current list here), so that you won't have to wait too long before someone comments on yours.
To change a topic
The topic parameter can be changed by altering the template {{Peer review page|topic=X}} on an article's talk page. The topic (|topic=X) on the template can be set as one of the following:
arts
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All types of article can be peer reviewed. Sometimes, a nominator wants a peer review before making a featured article nomination. These reviews often wait longer than others, because the type of review they need is more detailed and specialised than normal. There are some things you should know before doing this:
Have a look at advice provided at featured articles, and contact some active reviewers there to contribute to your review
Please add your article to the sidebar Template:FAC peer review sidebar, and remove when you think you have received enough feedback
Step 3: Waiting for a review
Check if your review is appearing on the unanswered list. It won't if more than a single edit has been made. If you've received minimal feedback, or have edited your review more than once, you can manually add it to the backlog list (see Step 2: Requesting a review, step 6). This ensures reviewers don't overlook your request.
Please be patient! Consider working on some other article while the review is open and remember to watch it until it is formally closed. It may take weeks before an interested volunteer spots your review.
Consult the volunteers list for assistance. An excellent way to get reviews is to review a few other requests without responses and ask for reviews in return.
Your review may be more successful if you politely request feedback on the discussion pages of related articles; send messages to Wikipedians who have contributed to the same or a related field; and also request peer review at appropriate Wikiprojects. Please do not spam many users or projects with identical requests.
Note that requests still may be closed if left unanswered for more than a month and once no more contributions seem likely. See Step 4.
Step 4: Closing a review
To close a review:
On the article's talk page, remove the {{Peer review}} tag on the article's talk page and replace this with {{subst:Close peer review|archive = N}}, where |archive=N is the number of the peer review discussion page above (e.g. |archive=1 for /archive1).
On the peer review page, remove {{Peer review page|topic=X}} and replace this with {{Closed peer review page}}.
When can a review be closed?
If you are the nominator, you can close the review at any time, although this is discouraged if a discussion is still active.
If the review is to determine whether an article can be nominated for GA, FA or FL status, and a reviewer believes it has a reasonable chance of passing these, they may close the review and encourage a direct nomination (see here).
If a review is answered and the nominator is inactive for more than one week.
There is a script to help automate closing peer reviews. To use the script:
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When you view a review, click on the tab that says "More" and then "Close peer review". The tab can be found near the "History" tab. This should update the article's talk page and the review page.
If you're going for featured status, you have got to find better sources. The nintendo instruction booklet and the nintendo.com refs are probably okay, but PeachParadise.com is a personal website, and the Nintendoland.com article is just pathetic. To quote from the lead paragraph: "...in Super Mario Brother 2 she proved that she could take care of her problems herself and was if you ask me, the best character of choose. In Super Marsio RPG she joins Mario and the other in their fight against the mysterious Smithys and ..." and beyond the grammar and spelling, actually contains false info (see "Quote #1 at the bottom"; it was not supposed to be Peach saying "our Princess is in another castle"). And Gamefaqs can be submitted by anyone, so they aren't reliable either (also, you can't link to them, which is annoying). I know that online resources are limited, so I don't envy you trying to fix this. I'm sure that Nintendo Power issues would contain some good references, though, but they might be kind of hard to dig up. An extensive library would have them, but I bet a lot of libraries wouldn't have subscriptions... Mangojuicetalk00:17, 1 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
This is pretty well-written, barring a few eccentricities (such as "clasps"). But there are a couple things that could use improving: the Talk: is messy, and not nearly as good as the article, and some people will look at the talk; and the desciption of the actual in-game activites seem lacking. Now that I've read it, I am curious: what bosses are there? What sorts of puzzles? Is there any more to the story? Do beloved characters appear? What do they do? Where does the game fit in the larger Zelda universe? etc. --Maru(talk)02:14, 21 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
(1) Needs some analysis of the critical reaction to the game, at the time and today. (2) No reference section. (No references even). The first point probably applies to many of these articles. The second may apply to many of the others as well. Christopher Parham(talk)05:36, 23 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
This article is a start, but it needs much work before it achieves FA status. The most important thing I see is that it includes no more information than someone might find by surfing the internet for a few minutes. This game is hugely popular and highly influential; the literature on it is out there. Someone needs to gather up some books on video game history (there are many) and add important details like what the climate was like at Nintendo at the time, where the idea came from, what influences are found in the game, how Nintendo marketed the game, what the reaction was like in both Japan and America, etc. If someone went to a research library and added information from other academic disciplines, it'd be icing on the cake (Japanese cultural studies, popular culture studies, new media, women's studies, etc.) By the way, this goes for the other video games you've listed here for peer review, as well. BrianSmithson11:56, 23 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
This is better than the first Zelda's article. I really felt like I had an idea as to what the game actually was. But a screenshot of the overworld, some more links and references, and some historical context would be nice. Did it have any effect on the console wars? Did Miyamoto take any flack for it? How involved was he? Plus the Talk: page is still messy. PS: the introduction has some strange-sounding locutions. You might want to scrutinize that. --Maru(talk)02:27, 21 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
The gameplay section should probably be consolidated. It doesn't need to be sectioned off. It could probably also benefit with citations from the game manual or a player's guide.
The development section needs a good deal of expansion. Explain the process of developing this particular game, like how the story was written. Listing the developers isn't enough.
Check old gaming magazines for reviews, the reception section is empty.
Try and weed out details that are trivial. This is a general encyclopedia artical, not a fan's guide.
An additional note: complete dates should always link to the year in general for user preference purposes. Only link to year in video games when the year stands on its own. Jay3218323:13, 24 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
A few gripes here. First: far too screenshots. What's up with that? Don't be afraid to borrow from the Bosses page (but even that needs in-game action shots). Also: Trading Sequence? WTF? This is not Gamefaqs.com. This article also has even less context than the previous two. Wasn't this really popular? I vaguely recall EGM rating it the #1 game of all time, or something like that. Didn't it inspire anything (possibly Boktai)? --Maru(talk)02:37, 21 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
They liked Majora better than Ocarina? I'm kinda surprised. But actually I was talking not about the ratings, but an issue they ran a year or two ago, "The Top 100 games of all time". No 1. was some Zelda game which I thought was Link's Awakening. --Maru(talk)19:58, 21 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
This is probably the best one so far. HOWEVER: next to no screenshots. Bad! Very bad! Also, a brief list of significant weapons should be added (yes, I know there is a link to a comprehensive article, but the ocarina and sword are so important that they should at least get a mention on the main article). And I'm a bit chary of the attention given to bugs and speculation. Like the others, historical context would be appreciated, but ther than that, good work. --Maru(talk)02:54, 21 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Very weaselly With its innovative gameplay, it is widely considered as one of the greatest video games of all time in both game console and PC games combined and is the highest rated game by game critics of all time. Many people even consider it to be the best game ever created. This needs to be cited. This was actually the game that I hated so much that it turned me off gaming for the rest of my life. I haven't purchased a video or computer game since, because this one was so bad I couldn't stand it. (don't really remember why, except that there was an obnoxious faerie that didn't do anything but block the screen) The whole "success" section lacks references, which is lamentable (was it really that popular? I rather assumed everyone hated it as much as I did)... as a matter of fact, the whole article lacks any references at all, which are a prerequisite for FACs. Tuf-Kat04:24, 21 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Are you nuts? OOT was insanely popular. We're talking Halo level here. But I don't really know where one would find references for that. --Maru(talk)04:31, 21 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
I guess I don't hang out with the right crowd. (I hate Halo too, but at least I know people who like it) Surely people have written about the success of OOT, and one could always document sales figures as a start. No doubt reviews have been published, presumably positive. --Tuf-Kat04:36, 21 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
It says that, but there's no references section, so as far as I know, it's completely made up. (I'm not saying it is, but that's the point of having references) And that's not enough to support "without question one of the most successful video games of all time" -- it doesn't even claim how it ranks in sales, much less establish that it qualifies as "without question one of the most successful". It doesn't provide so much a single reference for "Critically the game was widely commended as a seamless transition from 2-D to 3-D". Just for the sake of argument, I don't believe it one bit -- provide some sources so I can be proved wrong. Tuf-Kat04:47, 21 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
This article is in the process of becoming a featured article. Are there any edits that should be justified? Is there anything that is missing? —Hollow Wilerding21:30, 3 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Some more referneces, my dear Hollow. Try and retrieve one for the masks, since I'm sure there will be whiners come nomination time. --DrippingInk01:43, 4 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]
"The gameplay for The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask involves the dynamic Fixed 3d environment that appears in The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, but is structured differently." Fixed 3D means real-time 3D characters against prerendered backgrounds; Ocarina of Time used it for some in-town scenes, but (according to the Fixed 3D article) Majora's mask didn't use it at all. I think this sentence is trying to say that the two games use the same main graphical engine, basically.
Need a much more explicit discussion of what was the major departure from Zelda gameplay: the @%#%! time limit. Arg! (Me, I play videogames to relax, I don't need a BIG TICKING CLOCK (or giant creepy moon) hanging over my head every second. OK, end of rant.) —Bunchofgrapes (talk) 03:37, 4 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]
OK, some more:
The lead mentions that it is "darker" than Ocarina; in fact one of the notable things about Majora's Mask was that it was the darkest of the whole Zelda series, I think. The stylistic aspects that leant this darkness should be discussed.
The "Songs" section belongs on GameFAQs, not here. A mention that various spells are cast by playing the Ocarina should be enough.
Comments (I mistakenly posted these to the archived page, since your comment was added there):
Needs more on development and similarities/differences compared to Ocarina of Time.
The gameplay section is extremely dense and doesn't actually describe the gameplay; it describes assorted details of the gameplay. My impression of the "Masks" and "Transformations" sections is that everything they say combined that is essential could be described adequately in two paragraphs. Worse, there's almost nothing on the three-day time system, which is the most important aspect of MM's gameplay! There should be a separate section that treats it in-depth.
Use more and better images to illustrate key aspects of the gameplay, and show more interesting locations. Write more useful image captions. Take the "Link in his Deku form." image for example -- sure, that is Link in his Deku form... and that is interesting how? "An image of Link's ocarina." is even worse.
Cut the list of songs; this isn't a walkthrough.
Two random quotes don't make a "reviews" section. Further, reviews are not enough; broader influence should be covered as well. Fredrik | tc21:59, 3 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]
I believe that there are plenty of relations to Ocarina; this is an article about Majora's Mask, and we don't want to compare everything to its predecessor.
I will cut the descriptions of the songs into a list of the songs Link can learn, and it will look more original.
Three reviews certainly don't make a reviews section. That is why I'm still searching for adequate websites.
The images are supposed to exemplify Link in his many forms — although not even having an image of Link himself is questionable.
Standard complaint of not enough screenshots. Didn't Wind Waker have a revamped, complex branching combat system of some sort? The organization of sections seems somewhat strange- the plot coming after cel shading? The gameplay section seems lacking on new gameplay mechanics like sailing. --Maru(talk)04:37, 21 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
A script has been used to generate a semi-automated review of the article for issues relating to grammar and house style. If you would find such a review helpful, please click here. Thanks, APRt12:55, 8 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Obviously, the article needs a good copyedit and more wikilinks. Once that's taken care of, my main concern is that after story and gameplay, the article's basically a big list. The story needs work too, it's a very detailed description of the opening, then ends with "Oh yeah, then Mario finds eight partners and gets the stars". --Pagrashtak15:53, 12 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Also, you could add more images (maybe an image of every major character). About the story line, if you have the player's guide, that would probably be a big help. Bcem217:43, 12 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Hey Eternal, although the article is well written, I find that a common criticism I have about this and other video game related articles is that they read more like a strategy guide introduction (list of characters, summary of story, etc.) and less like an encylopedia entry. As a form of entertainment, I feel that video games should be held to the same standards of an article for a musical artist, song, movie, etc. That means there should be outside research into:
Critical reviews -- As a "sequel" to the beloved Mario RPG, I know there was initial hestitation in the change to 2D paper cutouts as the characters.
Sales -- Did it sell well? What was its competition? Sales figures or rankings should be available.
Influences -- Why did the designer make this game? And why change to paper figures when the format in Mario RPG was so popular? Was it influenced by anything previous, as its graphic style seems pretty unique? Perhaps some quotes from Nintendo or the designers should be included to show their thoughts on the game.
Awards -- Did the game win any awards?
Again, it is well written, but as it stands now, it is more of a game overview and less about the game history, i.e. sales, creation, etc.
I hope you found this helpful. I don't want to sound critical -- I love my video games as much as the next geek, and would enjoy seeing more video games on the front page. Best of luck with the article. --Ataricodfish19:52, 12 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]
References and inline citations are a must if your aim is FA. Also, the "characters" part of article is full of sections way too short. One paragraph sections are bad. You can remove the headers and just bold the character's name. More pictures would be nice, though not a requirement for FA. It shouldn't be difficult to get screen captures or promomaterial to illustrate. Circeus17:24, 14 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]
What Ataricodfish and Circeus wrote above are essential. What I offer is an idea: if the character are not filling sub-sections well, consider creating a table for them, like this with an image, their name, some notes, and color-coding according to villian/hero or someother criteria. --maclean2505:07, 16 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]
All the bases have been covered Plot-wise, but there is very, very little on the unique battle system, and even less on the Bros. Attacks performed outside of the fights. -- gakon5(talk)
Needs references. Needs to approach the subject matter from a different angle, I think. The game-by-game breakdown is not the best approach for fictional-character articles; compare how Bugs Bunny looks now to how it was a year earlier, and you'll see what I mean. Also refer to Lakitu for an article that gives an overview of a character without dwelling too much on a play-by-play of all the character's game appearances. But you knew that already, Link. Why the mass peer reviews for articles that are clearly not near-FA quality? BrianSmithson19:02, 23 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
I didn't say that you couldn't get an article to FA quality (though you should be careful about taking too much credit for any of the pages you mentioned; they all have had many editors). But according to the peer review rules, an article is supposed to be near FA quality to be listed on this page. BrianSmithson23:17, 23 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
A few things I noticed: The times don't make sense - 1000 AD is not quite "the Present time", is it? And "Dark Ages" usually refers to the middle ages as well, so if that is a quote from the game, it should be in ""s. That is explained later, but confusing at the beginning. The bit about Chrono perishing makes little sense, especially under the heading of the device - obviously, person and device are different things. They should be treated as such. And what are "overworld-map random battles"? Actually, the whole gameplay section is not particularly clear for anybody who is not a gamer and/or has not played this or at least similar games. How can a robot from 2300AD become dormant in 1999?
I would avoid using the "of xyz game fame" phrasing and simply mention the name of the games those people worked at before.
In general the tone of the article should be more formal. I know this may be hard to achieve, but sentences such as Chrono Trigger is about a group of adventurers who travel across time to save the planet's future. strike me as being too familiar.
Optional events due to forking of the storyline should be described as such before they are detailed.
Overall it looks fine, at least with regard to its subject matter. In a number of places, however, it relies a little too much on familiarity with the games. For example, just who are Rick, Kine and Coo? Also are there any references you can add? Thanks. — RJH19:07, 2 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Wow, I'd completely forgotten about this game, but I remember playing it all the time. The article needs a better lead section. There are some problems -- There are also three types of crystals. Yellow crystals give tips and reveal points of the story. These have not been listed here. -- except you just did, I know that's not what you meant, but that's what it says, also it says there are three crystals and then describes four. There's at least one sentence in second person (Your character has two basic moves). This article says a lot about what happens during the game, but doesn't mention sales, reviews, legacy (are there any other games with evolution as a central theme?). Also, there's no references section. Are there any external links that would be relevant? Forums or strategy guides or anything? Tuf-Kat04:16, 21 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah, when I expanded this article into full, I took a lot from a walkthrough that I wrote for a friend of mine years ago... I should really go over it with a fine-toothed comb... I think that would clear up a lot of the quality and consistency issues... as for other things, I think we should add more screen captures and place them on the left side, or the middle, or just not on the right side... as for other things... I'm not sure, I'll have to think about it... although I think it'd be great to get an underdog on the front page. Canadian Paul04:06, 22 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Referencing is haphazard. Example: the first paragraph in "Among Muslim nations and groups after 1948" mentions statements by political leaders and sales figures, but doesn't reference them. In the next section "Egypt" the first two (long) quotes are referenced thoroughly, but then there is no link to find out more information about Fares Bela Gewad. Iran begins vaguely, but then improves. "Other contemporary appearances" needs citation, and fact-checking. Alarmingly, a criminal neo-Nazi group in Greece Hrisi Avgi, is described as the minority party (which is actually PASOC). That error, which I plan to fix after writing this, but it destroyed the credibility the history section had built up for me. Jkelly02:51, 27 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
This is a long and detailed article about a subject in theosophy, and mainly the hard work of a single editor. It may benefit from an in-depth review. ‣ᓛᖁᑐ02:40, 20 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
I second Jossi's concerns. Let me give an example. There's a discussion of Leary's model in the article which definitely sounds like original research. Has anyone else, ever, made that comparison? If so, did they come to the conclusions presented in the article? If so, cite them. Otherwise, it's not verifiable. Best of luck. Jkelly04:30, 3 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]
I agree about the original research. The concept of different levels of spiritual attainment/existence is a valid topic: it's a recurring theme in various religious contexts. But there are a number of pages that tackle this already - for instance, Subtle body, Septenary (Theosophy) and Plane (cosmology) - from an objective and comparative basis. Spiritual density, however, seems to be expounding a largely unsupported personal take on the subject. Tearlach13:37, 9 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]
I've expanded a rewritten this page in the last few weeks in the hope of raising it to FA standards. It is a somewhat difficult subject to write about since it is a very amorphous topic, but I feel this covers all the important areas. The images are only vaguely relevant, but it is difficult to photograph an economic theory. Some copyediting might also be required. - SimonP22:16, 19 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Any suggestions? Charts were embraced by the critics of mercantilism, and some of the series at free trade quite clearly show the errors in mercantilism, but are perhaps to detailed for this article. - SimonP02:09, 20 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
The causes section seems unusually named- mabye adoption or some other term would better describe the acceptance and practice of the theory.--nixie03:02, 20 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
I have been editing this for quite a while now. I have done a fair amount of investigation and have nearly completed the article — I have two things left to do: write about the Microsoft SQL Server Network Library and write a brief overview of how the different components fit together into the MDAC architecture. However, I would like to solicit feedback on my efforts so far. - 203.134.166.9908:47, 19 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Update the software infobox to the latest version and include a screenshot (if no GUI element is possible then include a screenshot of the header files). Cedars23:35, 19 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Adena Culture is interesting. Please read this! Please help out on this US history/Archaeolgy stub. It's not enough yet, and this is an interesting topic. It's my pet article and I would like some help with it. Assistance please! - Vermoskitten04:30, 19 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Why did you delete the following sentence from the article, containing a link to a discussion by the well-known and respected folklorist Americo Paredes on the official Smithsonian Institution website? -- From the early 20th century, Mexicans and Mexican-Americans called Rangers by the unaffectionate nickname "Los Rinches".AnonMoos04:28, 20 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
In whole truth, I didn't actually delete it as such. In fact, I didn't even notice that sentence existed. All the current contents were ellaborated by myself at a Temp page, taking as model the text of the article as of its September 8th version; that is, before you posted it. When I pasted my finished version, your contribution was unintentionally removed. Now that you bring it to my attention, I'll add that information into the article, albeit not as an isolated and unrelated sentence as you originally added it but integrated within its context.
Nevertheless, I want to point out that the issue of the turbulent relation between Mexicans, Tejanos and the Rangers has been widely addressed already, especially at the Early 20th century section. I suggest that you read the article thorougly, and you'll see that it doesn't exactly praise their role in said events. Therefore, it's not like I'm trying to remove sensitive information nor whitewash the Rangers' image, like your post at the Talk Page ("POV? Los Rinches") seems to suggest. Thanks for your contribution! - ShauriYes babe?12:25, 20 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Then it should have been part of your editing procedure to take into account edits made between Sept. 8th and 18th -- when the article not only didn't bear any warning against editing it, but in fact actively solicited users to edit it to bring it up to "featured Texas article" status. AnonMoos18:36, 20 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
I refrained from re-editing the article to include it, because I wasn't sure on what grounds it had been removed in the first place, and so wasn't sure that it wouldn't have been promptly removed again (triggering a revert war). However, it all seems to be satisfactorily resolved now... AnonMoos22:23, 20 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
No argument about that. In fact I did take them into account, but unfortunately yours got through accidentally, mostly due to an unfortunate event with an editor who removed part of the text in a somewhat odd event. My bad a thousand times - I apollogize, and I intend to re-add your contribution asap. Are we at peace, Moos? And by the way, what's your opinion about the article itself? See any way it can be improved? Hugs, ShauriYes babe?19:57, 20 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
What a finished article. I am very impressed with it. I have made some minor edits and removed some quotation marks where I felt that italics were enough (in one case I reinserted them, though). When it comes to FAC, I'll vote for it.--Wiglaf18:45, 20 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Well, it still needs a bit of work :) (not reviewing content) :
Lead may need to be three paragraphs for an article this size
"Creation and early days" - A few paragraphs are a little on the short side, but not too bad
"The Mexican–American War" - last paragraph too short and probably needs to be wikified
"Modernization and present day" - some paragraphs too short and there's a one sentence paragraph at the end there
"High-profile busts" - one sentence paragraph in intro
"John Wesley Hardin" - too short in comparison to other sections
"Rangers' badges and uniforms" - some paragraphs too short
"Notable Texas Rangers" - something other than "notable" would be nice here
"External links" - couple links could use better descriptions
As I told you the other day at your Talk page, Ryan, thank you so very much for the input. I've addressed all your suggestions as thoroughly as possible. Thx again! Shaurismile!17:01, 12 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]
The most important thing is to get a references section. Several items will also need footnotes, such as the statistics in the Fan Demographics section. Several sections, such as NEXTEL Cup, Historic moments, and Video games, are too short, and should either be expanded or merged into others. The article as a whole also has a somewhat overly positive tone. More images would also be good, though it is obviously difficult to obtain good ones. - SimonP01:49, 17 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
One recommendation for images - especially for public domain ones - is to check the U.S. military web sites. All of the branches sponsor a NASCAR team in one capacity or another and all of them have public domain photos from races on their sites (this trick also worked for college football). There are also some images in varying states of "fair use" on individual driver articles. RADICALBENDER★22:15, 19 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
For what must be such a large and wide-ranging subject it seems a little on the short side to me. I know nothing about French politics so I can't make specific content suggestions, but on a basic Wikipedia level the complete lack of a references section also counts against it for the moment. Also, there's no lead section above the contents box, which should always be the case – the piece needs a decent introduction / overview. Angmering11:56, 17 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
This article seems quite good, pretty unique to Wikipedia, complete, and well-written. It has no pictures, though. I hope to get it featured, so I'm looking for any problems that might show up. Thanks in advance! JesseW, the juggling janitor 19:11, 15 September 2005 (UTC)
Yes, it is long. That's one reason I think it could be featured. Thanks for the suggestion about pictures of characters. JesseW, the juggling janitor 06:16, 19 September 2005 (UTC)
This article is really just a long list of different jokes, sorted by type. A better title for the article would be 'List of Russian jokes'. I would expected this article to contain a historical background on Russian humour, compared with other countries and maybe also a comparison of different regions in this vast country. Also, length has nothing to do with an article's potential in being featured. -- Cugel08:04, 19 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for the historical background, comparision with other countries, and regional variations suggestions. As for length, it is one of the factors in FAC, although hardly one of the important ones. I appreciate the suggestions. JesseW, the juggling janitor 21:22, 19 September 2005 (UTC)
Not only do I have a personal connection with the city and therefore would like to see it someday as a Featured Article, I think it is well-written and rather thorough, especially on its culture, which is a part that many city articles seem to lack. It also lists a few sources, but I know that a large number of sources seem to be preferred for FACs, so if you could list improvements that that might need, that'd be great. Although I am not a major contributor to the article (very minor edits here and there) I feel that a peer review might show what needs to be improved should it be nominated for FA-status.
Also, if anyone can help claify what copyright the map would fall under, that would be greatly appreciated. I've been asking around but I haven't really gotten a concrete answer.
Some references urgently required, e.g., 'Although the Sendai area was inhabited as early as 20,000 years ago'. The text at the top is bumped up against the map. Spell out '1' and '8'. What is a 'designated' city? Avoid 'found at' and 'found in' more than once or twice. Some of the English is unidiomatic, and the whole article needs a thorough copy edit. Some of the sections are too short, as is the article as a whole. There's not enough comparison with other cities/parts of Japan. Tony14:00, 17 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for the input The '20,000 years ago' part is implied later on briefly:
[...] Tomizawa Site Museum, which is built directly above a 20,000-year-old stone age excavation site
I don't know how well that would work, but I'll look into the Japanese article to see how they reference it and work on translating at the same time. I'll try to search for sources sometime in the future. I've added a link for the "designated city" portion, replaced 1 and 8 with their respective words, and will find and replace the "found" phrases in the near future. I noticed that the sections really grouped together various things into one or two paragraphs. What I plan to do is get more information from the ja.wikipedia article and then find sources to back the information up. I get most of what you mean, but the only thing I'd like clarification for is comparisons with other Japanese cities. What kind of comparisons would be helpful? Cultural? Demographic? Economic?
I too have personal relationship as I lived there for a year while studying abroad. Truly an amazing city. SO amazing I want to live there permanently. Anyway I added some information about the University. But what I find most concerning is that there are no images of demographical data and such. When I go to a geographic page, that kind of data is what I want to know. I want to know where the people are. What variation of house prizes there are in different areas. What kind of jobs one can get there and so on. Seriously needs to be added. Lord Metroid20:30, 30 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I have been trying to edit this article for several months, yet it seems to keep growing without purpose, especially now that some Wikipedians have voted in a "policy" that means that street names that are never used in their English form are used in their English form because of the belief that the average Wikipedian is stupid. This leads to every guide book I've ever seen referring to "rue St-Laurent", as well as most English-speaking residents, however the article speaks of "Saint Lawrence Street".
One area that is much too long is "Merger and demerger." I would suggest moving it in its entirety to History of Montreal. Some sections should also be turned from lists to prose, for instance compare the education sections in Toronto and Montreal. The sports section needs a similar rewrite, with the lists perhaps moved to a subpage. One thing I am quite surprised by is the lack of a culture section. - SimonP04:45, 15 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
The Roads section seems to uneven. The first half discusses the road network and traffic patterns, whereas the second half discusses naming conventions and language differences. I suggest splitting these sections with more appropriate titles. Integrate the 'road network/traffic pattern' section with mass transit discussion. --maclean2506:38, 16 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Trim and rationalise on the clause level ('festivals and events'—aren't festivals events?) as well as on a larger scale (table of sports venues?). The opening has some overly short paragraphs, and includes inappropriate information for an introductory section (secondary schools? Keep it to an overview that will prepare the reader for the greater level of detail in subsequent sections). Tony13:44, 17 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
I have been working on this article for a while, and would like suggestions for further improvements (with the goal of getting this article featured). Pentawing01:01, 14 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Good work on this, it is getting pretty close to FA status. One problem is that there are a whole bunch of uncited statistics, especially in the first paragraph of the Academics section, and in the Libraries and museums section. The images also have some problems. Image:UMichAngellHall.JPG, Image:UMichArtMuseum.JPG, and Image:MichiganDiagFall2004.jpg are all much too dark, and it is hard to make out any detail. These could be artificially brightened, but ideally they should be replaced by pictures taken when the structures are not in the shade. Image:Michiganstadiumgame.jpg is claimed as fairuse, but gives no justification. I personally doubt this image can validly be used under fairuse. The stack of templates at the bottom is also unsightly. This is a project wide issue, but having three templates with wholly different formatting is quite ugly. Consider creating a specialized template that merges the three together, such as how {{UK ties2}} recently replaced the plethora of boxes at United Kingdom. Alternatively you could alter the three to one standard design, which could also help several other pages. - SimonP05:07, 15 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
I am going to take some pictures around campus in the next few days, as well as finding sources to back up (or modify) the statistics. Pentawing22:37, 15 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
The prose needs a thorough copy edit before nomination as a FAC. To pluck out a few examples from the first three sentences:
Remove 'located'.
'primary' could be replaced by a better word.
The distinction between 'research' and 'public academic' institution is unclear; why 'leading' and 'top' in the same sentence—reword so you don't need two very similar epithets; same with 'world's' and 'worldwide'.
Merge the first two paragraphs.
Remove the repetitive 'school' within the parentheses.
'consistently vs 'perennially'—this is the same problem; you aim for slight variety where that need points to poor wording in the first place.
'some of' --> 'among'.
What is considered to be a 'Public Ivy', and what is that, anyway?
Avoid 'also' unless absolutely necessary.
Also, consider citing hectares as an equivalent for acres (certainly not thousands of square metres).
Please consider finding a collaborator who might sift through the whole article thus. Tony13:39, 17 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
For several years, I have been working on the article on industrialist and millionaire Henry Huttleston Rogers (1840-1909), a working class youth born and raised in Fairhaven, Massachusetts (a whaling town). In the spirit of Horatio Alger, he struck out with a small savings to find his fortune, worked hard and sacrificed, and became one of the principals of Standard Oil. As of a 1996 publication, he was considered one of the 25 most wealthy men of all-time in the United States. An unusual aspect of this fellow is that he was a generous but low profile philanthropist, even as his ruthlessness in business earned him a poor public image and the nickname "hell hound".
Although much has been written on this fascinating man, who was the Virginian Railway's co founder and financier, there has only been one true biography published to-date. The more I have learned about him, the more I want to learn (and perhaps write) more. While working on his article, I created a new one on his wife, Abbie G. Rogers, and some of the content is duplicative. After Abbie died, he cultivated friendships and financially mentored Mark Twain, Helen Keller, and did tremendous behind-the-scenes work with Ida Tarbell and Dr. Booker T. Washington. I have added Rogers related information to the articles on each of these famous people.
I would appreciate any help to improve this article. I hope other Wikipedians will also find this man to be as fascinating as I have. I think the article has even more featured article potential than the one on the Virginian Railway's other founder, William N. Page.
The article is too long. One idea I have is that we can move most of the details about his children to the separate article about his first wife and place one of those messages (ie For details on his first wife and children, see related article Abbie G. Rogers).
One last note: This article (like those on the other famous people named above) is one of those on Wikipedia which is pulled into many other web resources (mirror sites?). If you doubt this, just do a search (Google, Yahoo, etc.) on Henry Rogers, and you will see the many websites which use the current text in Wikipedia as their source. So, our efforts here may especially help Wikipedia continue to grow as a reputable and quality resource on the Internet. Please help make Henry H. Rogers a better article.
It looks pretty good, but I did not have a chance to read it all, so I'll just give some general advice on what it needs to be a featured article. 1) Separate the references and external links into a references section that includes all the resources actually used as references to add or fact check material in the article, and leave the rest in an external links section. Format the references with full citation information such as author, publisher, date, etc as in Wikipedia:Cite sources. Inline citations for important point using a format such as footnotes or (Hubbard 1909 pg 35) help with the verifiability of the article and really make a strong case for a featured article. 2) Many short paragraphs and sections throughout. The break up the prose and make for poor flow and highlight areas that either need to be expanded or merged with related material. There should pretty much never be a subsection without a full paragraph. That's all for now, but if you finish those let me know and I'll see if there's anything else that would keep this from being a successful FAC. - TaxmanTalk15:51, 13 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
This article was WP:COTW last week, and I want to continue the momentum toward featured article. I know it still needs more depth, though, so I would welcome suggestions from experienced Wikipedians.Mamawrites20:46, 12 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Three basic improvements that will need to be made are: a longer lead, more references, and proper copyright tags on all the images. - SimonP 23:51, September 12, 2005 (UTC)
There's some really good information here, but lots of problems, too. The prose needs thorough copy editing, and rewriting in places; the opening is a particular problem:
'A girl is a female human child, as contrasted with a boy (a male child). When a female person is a "girl" varies in different societies; however, in most cultures it is typically applied to a female child from birth until the late teens.'
As contrasted with an adult female too, so better not to capsize the flow here. 'When' should be 'The age beyond which females are no longer considered to be girls'. Remove 'person'. Why is 'however' used when not contradicting the previous statement? What does 'it' refer to (this should always be crystal clear)? Remove 'child' as redundant.
Phew, that's a lot of change for one and a half lines. Then my eyes stray down to the next sentence: 'living girls'? What, as opposed to dead ones?
Please find one or more collaborators to help.
Apart from the prose, the other problem is that it's far too short and in many respects lacks depth. Please provide much more on gender roles, and why not merge usage with this section. (We don't want it to overtly look like a dictionary, anyway.) So many of your statements require MUCH more support (not that I disagree with them—it's a matter of gaining authority and comprehensivity, and pursuing fascinating leads.)
It's stubby, I'm afraid—the whole thing. Maybe the scope needs to be more tightly delineated; this topic is an encyclopedia in itself.
Before trying for FA status, a References section needs to be added so that you may cite the sources used when compiling this article. The Featues Article criteria also require a lead section long enough to summerize the articles topic. As a result, the current one sentence lead is likely to raise objections at this time. There is also an unknown copyright status on the first image in the article (clicking on the image as a link will take you to a page with information on the image). The copyright status of all images used in article applying for FA status is routinely checked with any issues commonly preventing promotion of candidate articles. --Allen3talk 01:27, September 12, 2005 (UTC)
I second Allen's concerns. Also trivia sections are, in general, inappropriate for a featured article. Try to merge the factoids listed there into other parts of the article. - SimonP 17:57, September 12, 2005 (UTC)
Good article. I've made a few changes. I really like the voice in this article, however there are some issues that must be resolved:
The claim that "they are largely credited with popularising items like studded belts, low-slung jeans, trucker caps and tight-fitting T-shirts in the United Kingdom." needs a source. Who credits them with these things?
The claim that "the band was then courted by virtually all of America's major labels" is too sweeping, try listing some of the big labels instead.But a list of some of the labels would still be appreciated.
Out of curiousity, who gave the band the $1000 worth of pornography?
The fashion claims from the last paragraph of the The Fake Sound of Progress also need to be backed up as do the ones in the Boy band section.
"most notably the apathy of their detractors" concerns me. "Our Broken Hearts" clearly is about apathy and it may allude to the cynicism of their detractors. But I question whether it talks about the "apathy of their detractors". Worse still is the use of apathy and hatred in the same sentence - these two terms typically contradict one another.
"proving beyond all doubt the band have truly established themselves as part of rock's premier league." is probably a little too close to gushing.
"textbook metrosexuals" is not a sound factual statement. I would accept "metrosexuals" without the textbook tag though.
Wow. This is very well written, and quite comprehensive to my first glance. If I saw this on FA, I think my only objection would be its length. Unfortunatly, I'm not sure how to suggest to bring it down any... it seems like just about all of it has been divided up into subsections already. In analyzing this, I think that even the length is passable... each section is indeed in summary form, which is good. Hm. Sorry I can't help more right now. Maybe others'll have more constructive criticism? Fieari 06:41, September 12, 2005 (UTC)
This is an impressive article, and I don't think its length is a problem. As such an important subject it will, however, need to be immaculate to get through FAC. One quick suggestion is that the very brief "The word people" section be merged into the longer "Terminology" one. The "Mind" and "Psyche" sections also need a rewrite. Why are they almost wholly focused on psychoanalysis? While a notable theory, it is far from the only one, and today is not even very widely held. The "Religion and philosophy" section reads like a list of bullet points. I think a general overview, such as what we have in the lead sections of the religion and philosophy articles, would be far more useful than the current far from comprehensive listing of worldviews. - SimonP 18:13, September 12, 2005 (UTC)
My only suggestion is to double check the image copyrights, but the length does not bother me as much as it could others. Though, the Table of Contents could be shortnened a bit. Zach(Sound Off)18:15, 12 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Soon I'm going to be opposing FACs for articles where raster images are in use for content more correctly displayed using vector graphics in the SVG format. Human contains five such works, the pioneer 11 image, the migration map, the skin color map, the brain, and the psyche. Because the human image was fairly simple, I recreated it using Inkscape, althought it took me a while. :) The migration map looks like it was orignally created using Illustrator, ... I would be glad to assist converting it to a SVG (the landscape can stay a raster object), but it is a truly wonderful image which really must be placed into a more editable form before this article reaches its potential. The skin color map looks like someone should be able to provide a SVG version, the psyche, I could convert if no one else gets to it before me. The brain I don't really care about, but it's missing source information, so something should be done about it.
I noticed that many of your images are not very big. Requests for larger images are a common question asked in the wikipedia mailbox, since our software autoscales you should always use the larges images possible. Generally I like to see images at least 1200 pixels in their largest axis, and preferably larger. This is an article of such quality that I think the desire to reprint it will be great, as a result I would oppose featuring this article for low resolution images where I might not another. The USDA should be contacted and at least asked about the two girls image, if they do not have a higher resolution version I will not oppose on the basis of that image. The skeleton is great, (thanks Raul) although a more isolated photo would be better if one ever became available. Vitruvian Man is good considering its use. The freud image is too small and copyrighted, it should be replaced the current text of the article does not justify a claim of fair use. The photo of the thinker is untagged and probably copyvio, 2D renditions of 3D art do not have the same copyright status as 2D renditions of 2D art. It is also low resolution, higher would be prefered but isn't a deal breaker considering the use of the image. Cavehand's resolution and image quality are poor. Again not a deal breaker, but I think the article would be greatly enhanced with a better image. Okay, I've given you enough reasons to hate me now. Feel free to contact me to help with making any changes resulting from my comments. --Gmaxwell03:17, 13 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
I've found a somewhat higher res Freud image, looks like it is from the same series, confirmed taken in 1921, so it's PD-US. I've uploaded the image on commons and changed the article. --Gmaxwell03:37, 13 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
The prolific Krofft team was very influential in children's television, producing many oddly formatted, highly energetic, and special-effects heavy programs. appears rather opinionated. I suggest you remove it and quickly mention some other shows the two made.
The lead section is too short. I suggest you merge the overview section into it.
Nowhere in the article does it state how the Marshall's ended up in that world.
I would mention the Marshall's before discussing the natives (because they are the main characters) and the other visitors afterwards.
The images need fair use rationales.
There's no reference section which shows what sources were used to write the article. This needs to be seperate section from the external links.
The article could use a copyedit as there's a lot of hard to read long sentences. - Mgm|(talk) 09:32, September 12, 2005 (UTC)
Thanks, I'll try to see what I can do. As for the "images need[ing] fair use rationales", I'm not exactly sure what to write when it comes to this, is it on the photo tutorial? I'm running the piece over with a fine-tooth comb, and your sugguestions will be taken to heart. Thanks, [[User:Mysekurity|Mysekurity]] [[additions | e-mail]]00:11, 13 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
I wrote the majority of the current article and the main source I used was the DVD box sets for the first two seasons - I watched them and took notes as I went ( I've got the third season and have been meaning to give this article a reworking/expansion in light of it, but keep putting it off for various reasons). I put the references within the text of the article, indicating which episodes various facts were established in. I also have the "series bible" written by David Gerrold before production began, but it's pretty minimalist and some of the details directly conflict with what was eventually filmed so I haven't used it as a reference except in a few specifically mentioned cases. Bryan06:23, 14 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
It's a bit unwieldy. Some of the information on the characters could probably do with being split off into sub-pages. Also the lead is far too short – it doesn't even tell us which country this series is from, let alone what channel it aired on. Also, there seems to be hardly anything about the behind-the-scenes crew or production history of the series, writers, producers, etc. I think that any decent Wikipedia television series article needs that sort of information. (Indeed, I'd argue that a decent Wikipedia TV article should be *mosly* that sort of information, but that's a purely personal view). Angmering18:02, 14 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Its on the shorter side. Since Wiltshire is a sub-division (county) of a country, could I suggest Sikkim, which is also a subdivision (state)? Sikkim is a FA. You can gauge the length of the article, and contents to add. =Nichalp«Talk»= 18:15, September 11, 2005 (UTC)
Soon I'm going to be opposing FACs for articles where raster images are in use for content more correctly displayed using vector graphics in the SVG format. The maps really should be SVG, though I'm bringing that up with Keith Edkins directly. It would be neat to see the crest as a vector graphic, but I'd only expect that if the country had one we could use... Requests for larger images are a common question asked in the wikipedia mailbox, since our software autoscales you should always use the larges images possible. Generally I like to see images at least 1200 pixels in their largest axis, and preferably larger. TheStonehenge image is good but, but Image:Wiltshire.bridge.750pix.jpg is too small. It was uploaded by a wikipedia so we should ask for the highest resolution image they have. --Gmaxwell03:53, 13 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Most of this article was written by me and M.C. Brown Shoes. I'd like to get some input about what could be improved in the article, and whether it is comprehensible for someone not as familiar with the band. I guess it is too short to become FA (the band only was around for 9 nine months really), but I'd still like to get this article as good as possible, so pretty much any suggestion is welcome. This article was previously peer reviewed (archived here) in September 2005. --Fritz Saalfeld (Talk) 11:57, 24 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]
All articles are eligible for FA status, and this looks like a pretty good one.
Lead - looks good, but consider expanding just a bit
Comprehensiveness - looks good, but consider adding more on musical style
Sales - looks good, but consider adding some chart data to the discography section, such as the peak US position
Pictures - 1, 2, 3, 4 (free pics would be good, if possible, and the first pic (in the box) is of very questionable utility -- what does it illustrate? all fair use pics need a fair use rationale specifically aimed at this article)
Audio - looks good, though I suggest adding one or two more (I know they only released one album, but it might be useful to show some variety in their style) and integrating the sample somewhere in the article, rather than a stubby little section
References - 4 (may not be possible, but consider trying to find one or more print sources, especially a scholarly, broad-focused work)
Discography - looks good, but there's no need to have subsections for such a small discography
Format/Style - 2, 3 (why include the fansites in external links?; as noted, remove the subsections of discography and integrate audio sample into article, remove the parenthetical "sees" (e.g. "See critical reception of Maybe You've Been Brainwashed Too for more details"))
Overall, I think it's very well done. With the suggested tweaks to format/style and rationales for images, I think this would be ready for FAC. Tuf-Kat17:41, 24 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks a lot for your suggestions. As far as the sample goes, a link to it is also included in the article when the part is mentioned, is there another way to incorporate it better? And the fansites are included because the official homepage doesn't have much content (it's basically just a dead forum), while the fansites have lyrics, discographies, galleries, some audio, etc.
I hadn't any luck before trying to find any free images, or mentioning of the band in scholarly work, but I'll try to take care of the rest. Thanks again, and any other suggestions are still welcome. --Fritz Saalfeld (Talk) 21:00, 24 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Two previous peer reviews have suggested changes for this article. A recent rewrite has tried to implement those suggestions, but it has been controversial. Does the rewrite improve the article? If so, how can the article be improved further? --Alecmconroy11:29, 27 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
There's some repetition: "personal prelature" is explained three or more times; once is enough.
Activities: Does Opus Dei run its own churches, or do members attend Mass and receive other sacraments in parish churches? Does Opus Dei organize non-religious activities (for example, social, business, education, and networking) as, for example, Soka Gakkai does?
Membership: In addition to categories, interesting questions that readers might want to see answered in this article are (1) What is the process of becoming a member (e.g. is there a rite, or is it a paperwork procedure)? (2) What is the process of leaving Opus Dei, whether to resume being a Catholic in a diocese or to leave Catholicism? (3) Do members tend to come from specific groups (such as urban poor or suburban middle-class or migrants from other countries) or are they representative of the spectrum of Catholics? Also, the links to Supernumerary and Numerary lead to articles that are not about Opus Dei and should be removed.
Finances: The assets amount to over $30,000 per member. What do they do with those assets? Are the residential centers the main holdings, or are there other uses?
Some of these are quite open-ended and research may not be available; please do not feel obliged to answer all of them! Fg202:38, 30 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I am hoping some improvements can be made to the introduction as it seems somewhat clunky. Also looking for general suggestions about the article to improve it (I am hoping it will become "feature" quality in the not too distant future. Datapharmer04:22, 9 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
In many ways, this is the best single-song article I've seen on wikipedia. Here are some suggestions:
Section headings are not helping right now. Perhaps you can think of better ones? Choosing good headings will make expanding the article much easier.
In general, you don't need to write "(Source: [source])", you can just put the URL in brackets to generate a numbered "footnote-like" link [1]. There are more evolved and complicated things to do with superscripts, read up on it if you like (I can't be bothered, honestly, with that superscript stuff.)
This may be too fan-boy, but a more extended coverage of the lyrics would be wonderful I think, or at least a rough list of political hot-topics the song covers (bussing, etc., etc.)
What was the immediate critical reception of the song? Any reviews of the album that specifically mention it? Right now, there's no mention of contemporary responses. (This is probably the biggest thing missing from the article so far.)
Sdedeo, thanks for your suggestions. I just recently added the references section, so I agree that the "source:" notes aren't necessary and I will do something along the lines of your suggestion shorty. I will look at the section headings a little more carefully, as I haven't really thought about them too much (many were added by other people). Any suggestions for replacements or changes to the headings are welcomed. As for the lyrics, I will try and get in contact with a representative of Dylan to get permission to reproduce the lyrics, and I like the idea about linking the political issues but my knowledge of the references is somewhat limited in this area. As for contemporary responses, I don't know exactly what you mean. There is a section about the influence the song has had on other groups (including modern ones). Should this be separated between contemporary and original or are you talking about something else entirely? Thanks again for the suggestions, and I look forward to getting some other responses as well!
Oh, right, forgot about copyright issues re: lyrics. I wouldn't bother getting permission, though! Probably a long amount of work.
Re: contemporary responses, I just mean, what were people saying about the song in 1965? 1968? I did a quick lexis-nexis search of the New York Times, but couldn't find a review of the album. One of the first mentions of the song is in an article about the Weathermen, actually, and another says the song (along with "Like a Rolling Stone") "introduced 'folk-rock'" (that's at 27 Aug 1965; New York Times, page 17.) I was sort of imagining a greater response, however, so perhaps that's enough.
Also, re: section headings. If you expand the article significantly, definitely think about altering the section headings (that's the biggest mistake I see happening -- people think of them as set in stone, and choices made at the start are often not the best), but if the article stays about the same size, I think they're fine. Oh, also there was a book recently about Dylan's lyrics (forget the author -- some poetry critic.) You might want to check in there for more ideas.
Agreed that it needs more reviews -- I'll look through some of my books and see if I can find anything. A screenshot from the video would be nice too. Tuf-Kat 20:05, September 10, 2005 (UTC)
Yes, I have been looking for an online version of the video to link to, but so far I have not had any luck. Yahoo music had the video for a while, but it is no longer listed. If I can't find it soon I will try to get a screen shot. Are there any legal issues with this I should be aware of? I will also look into finding some reviews.
A screenshot of the video qualifies as fair use, so there's no legal problems to worry about. Tuf-Kat 22:39, September 10, 2005 (UTC)
There has been some major work done to this article over the last 24 hours to incorporate the recommendations received thus far. Sdedeo updated the Section Titles and the introduction, which is a great improvement in my opinion, and I have added quite a bit as well including a link to a video clip, a screen shot of the video, and the album cover of the original release. I also added some factual information and sources and improved the citations. If anyone is willing to take the time to glance at the changes it would be much appreciated.
Also, I am looking to add reviews of the song to the article as suggested. If anyone has any sources, feel free to contribute or direct me to the source if you do not ahve time. Thanks!
I've created a pretty comprehensive page on Scott Joplin's opera, Treemonisha. I've tried to be thorough about sources, particularly based on the limited amount of information available. I'd like to get some feedback on it. Thank you in advance!
LuxPerpetua21:36, 8 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
I think a more comprehensive plot summary would be appropriate, maybe a total of three or four paragraphs (maybe one paragraph per act, assuming it's divided into acts). Is there a reason Freddie Alexander is linked? Was she a famous singer in her own right or anything? If not, she should be de-linked. The qualifier about Edward Berlin being Joplin's "foremost biographer" should be removed -- a discussion of Joplin biographies and their receptions would be appropriate at Scott Joplin, but is out of place and not relevant here (especially unsourced claims about their relative merits). I'd like to see some more scholarly views of the work -- I've got a couple books that might say something useful, so I'll see what I can find. Tuf-Kat 20:10, September 10, 2005 (UTC)
Couple of things:
Freddie Alexander gets occasional, brief mention in lists of black women's history, mostly because she was Scott Joplin's wife, but also because she was a fairly outspoken activist, which is, I believe, how they met. I could be wrong. At any rate, I removed the wikification.
The qualifier about Berlin was added because because Berlin has been generally considered to be the most accurate of all of Joplin's biographers. Particularly after Joplin's death, there were many biographies written that were completely inaccurate, and for many years, biographies and general knowledge of Joplin was based on these apochryphal stories. From everything I've read (and studied in college), Berlin was the first author to actually research Joplin's life and clarify what was real and what was not, and is held by the Joplin historical society/the Joplin family to be a credible authority, if not THE authority, on Joplin. I wanted to be clear that it was coming from someone who had researched enough to make qualified statements - not someone just guessing. If you have a suggestion on how to more clearly articulate that, I'd be happy to hear it. :) (Let me see if I can find the statement made by the Joplin family about his work, actually. I could use that as a resource in establishing credibility.)
Re: scholarly views on the work, which is what I assume you're talking about, no? There are several schools of thought on the work, which are sort of related to each other. (1) Some people claim that the opera is too simplistic, the plot has holes (yes, it does), and that it's unrefined. (2) Everyone (particularly the folks from category one) pretty much acknowledges that it's hard to really objectively critique Treemonisha. Despite the fact that Joplin had a piano-vocal score published, it never actually went through the revision process that most operas go through before it ever is presented to the public. The operas you see by Mozart or whomever today would have been cut, added to, plot details changed, etc, as it was worked out on stage. Basically, any performance of it you see is a performance of an unfinished work. (3)There is debate over how much exposure Joplin actually had to grand opera, and as such, his intentions with Treemonisha. As a grand opera on the scale of Puccini or Verdi, Treemonisha is pretty laughable. As a folk opera, it is fine. Opinions on the work basically depend on which camp you place Treemonisha in... LuxPerpetua17:49, 13 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Also, the lead should be just two or three paragraphs. Much of what's there now ought to be under "history" or something. Tuf-Kat 20:12, September 10, 2005 (UTC)
I expanded the lead a bit with some of my sources, and changed the formatting and organization of the references. There's now a references section for works that are actually cited in the article, and an external links and further reading for those that aren't. It'd be nice to have some more images and snippets of a recording of a performance, but I don't think those're necessary -- it might worth seeing if anyone has anything they're willing to license appropriately. Tuf-Kat22:17, 13 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks. I wasn't certain on how to list resources, and for whatever reason, the Wiki servers been so slow lately that when I tried to pull up stuff, half the time it times out before I can get to it. I've been trying to load this page for over an hour now. :( Anyway, I'll see what I can do about pics and clips, but I'm not sure if the right to perform this is actually in the public domain, as his estate still exists and gets royalties for recordings and publishings. LuxPerpetua20:11, 14 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
I think we have a good start on an article that covers the historical role of VMI and its current place as a liberal arts college with a military environment.
First of all, it is a good introduction to the school. I commend you for the work you have done. I tend to be a tough editor and critic. So please do not take to heart the number of my queries below.
In the lead, I'd take out the information about the endowment and its alumni and move it into the body.
In the info box, I'd remove "address", because all it does is adds a ZIP code to the town, which is already stated in "location"
Under student life, I would include more about admissions. Who can get in? Just Virginians? What's the tuition like? There is also information about the physical plant that feels out of place. The honor code that leads the section off seems better placed below where the life of a "rat" is discussed.
The "Old Corps" is introduced without explanation. I presume that's the upperclassmen, but that needs to be stated.
"Sleeping and relaxing are luxuries of the past." That's a fine magazine sentence, but it feels out of place here.
"Sweat-parties" needs definition.
The first superintendent and Col. Crozet "imbued [VMI] with the discipline and the spirit for which it is famous" needs to be fleshed out since the former doesn't have an article and the latter's doesn't say much about what he did there. Where did these men get their military ideas?
You refer to Stonewall Jackson at first then go to Thomas Jackson. I'd call him Thomas "Stonewall" Jackson at first and Stonewall Jackson later on.
The section on WWI and WII seems more about alumni than the school's actual participation in the conflict, unlike the Civil War section. That information seems better placed under alumni than history.
Those abbreviations you use for alumni (VADM, BG, etc.) not only look ugly, but are going to be unfamiliar to most people. Maybe you could copy it to Word and "search and replace" them with more familiar forms and copy it back here.
The statistics on the composition of the corps of cadets and the information on women seems better placed up at the beginning of the student section.
I'd cite the name of the Supreme Court case, with the official citation, that let women into VMI.
You should mention Brother Rat, which I believe was a play before it was made into an early Ronald Reagan-Eddie Albert-Jane Wyman picture, oh, circa 1937. It's about VMI. Plus any other pop culture appearances VMI might have made.
I'd like to see more about the organization and governance of the school. How are the trustees chosen? How is the administration organized? What relationship does the school have to other public Virginia colleges? (Is there a state board of regents overseeing it, that sort of thing.) What kind of appropriation does it get from the State? Is there any affilation between the school and the state militia/guard?
Only two references and both are to web-sites? I checked the Library of Congress catalog and there's a number of books on the school, including one by Superintendent Smith. A better bibliography is needed. To start with, I'd give the citation to the print edition of the articles you cited.
That all said, I do believe you are on the way to a featured status and I commend your work.PedanticallySpeaking 15:43, September 7, 2005 (UTC)
Thanks for the excellent suggestions. Items 1 and 10 completed. Item 13, Brother Rat, now in VMI trivia section. I'll work on the others tonight. Rillian16:37, 7 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Whew! satisfy those requirements, and you do have a Featured Article! I could only add that I miss good clear photos of Alexander Jackson Davis's buildings, some of which might illustrate the architect's own entry. --Wetman23:23, 7 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Article fine as is
Article looks great in its current form! The student life section after the introduction is appropriate and it fills the space that was left open and blank in the earlier edits. The article is balanced in its facts and precisely written. Previous edits would state a fact, then quantify and or dilute the fact. For example, in the current edit, the rankings and ROTC comments are precise and to the point. Previous edits went into too much "watered down" detail. For example, previous edits were: 18% who make 20 year military careers, general peay acknowledges going from 40% to 70% is a challenge, for a small school of 1300 it does quite well: 1st of 20 something and 70 something of 2 hundred something, and so on and so on...Article in its current form states the facts:ranked first among public liberal arts colleges, all students are military corps of cadets, 50% commissioned in 2005 with 70% being a goal, largest per student endowment of any PUBLIC college, etc. This version as it is looks very good and any changes should be minimal. Noticed many of the edits made by rillian to VMI were followed up with revisions by the same to south carolina's version of VMI...is there a reason? The two schools are very different. VMI's current revision looks great and thanks to everyone for the input. How long are we going to leave the peer review notice up? Marshall318:58, 9 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
On military service, I think it enhances the article to know that 18 percent of the graduates go on to a 20-year career in the military. Why would that not be of interest to readers?
On the rankings, simply stating that VMI is the best public liberal arts college is not NPOV without telling readers there are only 20 schools in the U.S. that fit that category. With hundreds of public colleges in the nation, someone could easily misinterpret these rankings to think the VMI was the highest ranked school across a much broader category. Many wikipedians feel that subjective rankings like those from US News are not encyclopdia material and should not be any article. Rillian01:02, 10 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Agree with Marshall3 and disagree with Rillian
Isn't Rillian the one who disputed several proven facts about VMI's rankings in the first place? (Check archived discussions) Those "misrepresentations" were proven, and in the end he had a bit of "egg on the face." Why does Rillian choose which versions are "correct" and which are not?
Who cares about 18 percent for 20 year plus career? That type of minutia is not on other school site articles. Just leave it as 70% goal with 50 % commissioned for 2005. Also, a ranking is a ranking. What type of be-littling statement is "for a college with only 1300 cadets, VMI does quite well?" That is patronizing and not needed. 20 of this 70 of that...MArshall3 is right. The article as it stands looks very good indeed.
Also, "VMI has graduated more generals and flag officers than any other state military college" is very important and should be placed in Notable Graduate section because it testifies to the excellence of the school. There are other "lesser-quality state military colleges" out there who mislead and misrepresent...when it comes to state military colleges, VMI is premier. This statement is important and is directly related to notable graduates. It doesn't need to be buried.
Finally, take out the statement, "While not directly affilliated to the us military." Who cares? It is VIRGINIA Military Institute...that says enough. Why the qualifying statement? It reads much better to state simply that all VMI cadets must take 4 years of ROTC and VMI offers ROTC for all braches of the military.
While I think the article is quite comprehensive, there are a few questions that come to mind, from a reader that knows ABSOLUTELY nothing about VMI at all:
Lead: a picture would be good here, just to give some more visual interest.
Lead: I am not sure that the mission statement belongs here, but would like to know what about VMI makes it different from colleges in general, and military colleges in particular, in terms of its goals and mission.
Early history: why was VMI founded? A need for such an institute in the state? Who/what organisation founded VMI?
Early history: "Living conditions were poor" - I assume this means that the cadets were housed in tents or similar. It would be good to explain this point, as the lead mentions the "spartan" environment current cadets live in. It is not clear what the difference between the current physically demanding environment and historical poor living conditions consists of - I could guess, but if I wanted to guess I wouldn't be reading the article!
Civil War period: These sentences are quite staccato. The first paragraph in particular would benefit from more flow.
Civil War period: The information on VMI being one of the three military schools to have students fight as a unit in war might be good to use in the lead, as it certainly makes VMI special.
World War I and II: Should this be combined with Civil War period in a section on other wars/military engagments that VMI has played a role in? I would assume there were other wars that VMI played a role in.
Student life: What makes it unique? What is in this section makes it sound like other military academies.
Student life: It would be good to have a photo of the barracks next to its description. What are the barracks like inside? Like a normal student dorm, or something different?
Ratline: A photo of a freshman in uniform would be good here: the reader would get to see the uniform, and the "straining"
Ratline: "The initial week is a crash course in everything VMI" - wouldn't the marching and weapon cleaning be more generic skills any cadet would learn, while the rules, songs and history be more specific to VMI. I think that it would be better to talk about the aspects of the cadet experience specific to VMI.
Athletics: What does it mean to "complete their eligibility"?
Parapet photo: While I guess this building must be on campus, what is its significance? The building is not referred to in the article.
Academic information: Is VMI known for any of its academic programs? The article gives the impression that academic life is not important.
I'm afraid there are several problems with this piece. For a start, the lead section is far too short - it should be a decent summary of what the article is all about. Also, many of the individual sections of the piece are also far too short to justify their inclusion - the sections on Steel Claw around the world, for example, should probably be merged into one piece of text rather than under the several little headings they are now. I'm also very unsure about the inclusion of the 'gallery' at the bottom - as I understand it, the fair use provision justifies using images if they're important illustration to accompany an article, which the earlier pictures in the text probably are but the gallery isn't, so ought to be removed. And the complete lack of references doesn't help much, either. I'm sorry if I sound overly harsh - what you've got here is a decent start at an article, but it's got a long way to go yet, I'm afraid. Angmering11:56, 16 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
To Angmering - Thanks for the review and I agree with you. The gallery images are scanned and the tags are right. I should rewrite the intro though and I am working on it after I update I will send you the link. Thanks
To Serapion - Thanks, that would make another item for trivia.
I want to have the article peer reviewed so that I can get suggestions on how it can be improved. What could be done to improve the article's flow? Are there any inaccuracies in the article? (I don't think so!) Any major points missing? Thanks. Mb100003:22, 7 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
I think the article needs to ease the reader into the topic a little more by a sentence explaining heraldry as a European monarchical institution that had differing traditions for men and women. Also many of the words that are linked on the heraldry page do not have links here. Otherwise it's a decent article, if a bit on the short side. Thanks. :) — RJH15:10, 8 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
This is far too short if you are thinking of making it a FA. I am sure the modern issues (with differences between the sexes in how the arms are displayed) must have been extensively debated. There must be historical complexities and cultural differences which should be touched upon, and you should be wary of anglocentrism; "heraldic heiress", for instance, is a concept which, as far as I know, only exists on the British Isles - but what about Spain and Portugal, with the Spanish practice of using both paternal and maternal surnames, for instance - doesn't that affect the use of arms as well? English-language heraldry handbooks seem mostly to ignore anything but English and Scottish heraldry, but Wikipedia should not. (When I saw the title I almost expected an article on women as depicted in heraldry, which would be a different but also interesting topic...) Uppland11:57, 9 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Well I saw your request sitting there patiently, waiting for someone to look at it. I happily obliged. Well... My personal opinion is: The opening paragraph "Chinese art is art....etc", needs major reworking as it is both irrelevant in some places & confusing on the whole. It should either be deleted all together or start with a brief overview of the timeline of Chinese art or something similar. The content is very broad & covers a wide range of Chinese art. Some areas, such as performing Chinese arts, need a bit more depth & research to delve deeper into the subject. Some internal links need creating so that every red link is blue. I would also suggest some horizontal bars to separate the performing arts, sculpture, painting etc, areas more clearly. Although it may be a problem, I would like to see a couple more pictures towards the beginning, just to spice it up. But other than that, you could add a simple timeline to the begininning (E.G: ???? BC- This painter was born. ???? BC- This guy created this piece of art. ???? BC- This artist died. ???? BC- This city reached a golden age. ???? AD- This event influenced Chinese art.). I think the article is very well done, but with these & possibly a few more tweeks & adjustments, it will be a FA in no time. Good work. Spawn Man14:36, 9 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Couple of problems with the images. Requests for larger images are a common question asked in the wikipedia mailbox, since our software autoscales you should always use the larges images possible. Generally I like to see images at least 1200 pixels in their largest axis, and preferably larger. All of the images are too small. Also, all of the images look like they are copyvio or at least of questionable status. Further, I would prefer to see some more images in a featured article on a subject related to art. In an article about art, I would consider image quality to be critical and would oppose this facinating article as a result. --Gmaxwell04:04, 13 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Please, pretty please, do not give this article featured status. Please? This is an article about an attention-seeking scumbag. I have known his children for my entire life. He has stated over and over again that he will say any horrific thing for attention. Feature status is attention. Why feed the trolls? Please don't do this. Rick Boatright00:49, 7 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
For the record I happen to think Phelps 'is a first class nut', however the subject matter is irrelevant as to whether or not an article is awarded featured status. I'm asking for peer review to gauge whether a featured nomination is likely to succeed for this article on it's own merits as a neutral encyclopidic article on yes, a particulary horrible specimen of humanity. Djbrianuk01:53, 7 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
It is a common and dangerous trap to think that ignoring Phelps is the answer to your problems. Does Phelps like attention? Yes. So do many serial killers. Should we ignore them? If you've known his family for as long as you claim, you should know what dangerous people they are. The more people that know about something dangerous, the better. 70.243.38.2801:39, 7 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
The answer to evil speech is more speech. A lesson we've learned in Topeka through a lesson taught us by this man. I know that. I don't have to like it. Rick Boatright00:04, 18 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
This article has been stable for a while, but I'm curious to see how it reads to a general audience. I'm sure improvements can be made based on peer review feedback, so this is the place to ask. Buffyg22:01, 6 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
I'm maybe not the 'general audience' you refer to since I study philosophy, but I must say that the section on deconstruction (the absolute kernel of Derrida's thought) needs expansion, as this is integral to understanding Derrida, and it is also a contentious issue amongst philosophers.--Knucmo200:08, 7 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
I've laid out a general plan for a complete rewrite of the deconstruction entry (see Talk:Deconstruction), which is in a deplorable state. I wanted to get some general feedback about the Derrida article before undertaking that, as I'd reckon a peer review ought to provide suggestions on how to improve the entry that's been previously overhauled before we use it as a point of reference for the one that needs to be. The more specific your feedback on the work that has been done, the better to prepare for what remains to be done. Buffyg00:19, 7 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Some remarks on reading through the article (which I think is very good):
That final paragraph on Marcus I couldn't parse properly; I imagine it could be removed totally, as it's a bit gossipy anyway.
It might be nice to include Searle's response to the whole Limited Inc. (which I remember as colorful, as far as analytic philosophers go.)
I believe I've got on hand all of the core texts for the Derrida-Searle debate, so I'm game for updating this. I had thought to do a full article on the Derrida-Searle debate and present a summary here. Buffyg13:19, 14 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Some stuff on the reception of Derrida in the USA versus Europe might be of interest. A widely made remark on his death was that Derrida's influence was greater, and lasted longer, in the lit departments in the United States than anywhere else; some went so far as to say that Derrida's influence in France was much less than in the US.
Organizationally, I think you should move sections 1-3 and 5 to later in the article: i.e., cover his bio first, his works next, interpretations of his works next, etc. But definitely, the brief bio should appear first.
As I've said, I think this is a very well-done article, and if things get fixed up a little, I'd definitely support it for FA status. Drop me a line. Sdedeo21:44, 9 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
It's a thought to see if it can be overhauled with the possibility of pushing it for the first anniversary of his death, although that's almost certainly far too ambitious. In any case I'm not sure how self-sufficient the article is and would prefer to do the rewrite of the deconstruction entry before putting this article up for FA. Along the way we might end up with reasonable entries for de Man, Lyotard, and .
This was listed as needing expansion, and I thought I could just as well give it a shot. Ended up spending one and a half hours on it, and I think it turned out pretty nice. What do you think? Any chance for WP:FAC? - ulayiti(talk)(my RfA)23:51, 5 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Yes it's a pretty good article; nicely written. I think that a FAC would require reference tags to support the various assertions in the text. — RJH19:14, 11 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
The =RCMP in wartime= has too many subsections. Remove those sub headings (subsections), and expand the =The RCMP in wartime= as a single unit.
Please keep the with of the images between 240-270px. In 800x600 it occupies too much space. Higher res images also mean more loading time for low bandwidth connections.
Expand organisation
=Modern Era= & =Creation of the RCMP= too short. Merge with another section if expn not possible.
Most of Canada's provinces, while constitutionally responsible for law and order, prefer to sub-contract policing to this professional national force that consequently operates under their direction in regard to provincial and municipal law enforcement very long sentence: split. another example: The RCMP was created as the North West Mounted Police (NWMP) in 1873, given the "Royal" title in 1904, becoming the Royal North West Mounted Police (RNWMP), and renamed to the Royal Canadian Mounted Police Force in 1920 when the RWNMP was merged with the Dominion Police
A front view photo of the police would greatly enhance the article.
Thanks for the input Luigizanasi and Nichalp. Nichalp, just wondering what you meant by a front view photo of the police. Do you mean like a RCMP officer in their day-to-day uniform?--Madison Gray02:31, 7 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah, I meant that, full length view. =Nichalp«Talk»= 08:27, September 7, 2005 (UTC)
I would like to see the "The RCMP in popular culture" section moved to the end, right before "see also" The history of the uniform and the ranks is in my opinion more important and should be talked about first. - Mgm|(talk) 04:51, September 8, 2005 (UTC)
I would like to submit the article for peer review so that I may receive constructive criticism and learn from them to write better articles. I would also like to have the article be in form with Wikipedia. --None-of-the-Above08:45, 5 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
It's a decent article, but I'd like to see some more detail on how EGG developed the idea of role-playing out of the old wargaming rules. Also the page doesn't mention his particular interest in pole arms, and his sometimes criticized writing style. The page could also use a little careful editing — I spotted a few minor errors. (Example: "to a the", "anniversary) As of 2005," [no period].) Thanks. :) — RJH16:22, 6 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Ok, good deal. Actually, come to think of it. It shouldn't be hard to find out, but finding a source that states this might prove more difficult. I will take a look into it. Thanks. --None-of-the-Above17:40, 6 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
If you can find a used/library copy of "Heroic Worlds: A History and Guide to Role Playing Games" by Lawrence Schick, I seem to recall it has an excellent, in-depth history of role playing games. :) — RJH14:49, 7 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Probably needs a copyedit, but it seems thorough and comprehensive. I'm going to try and find some sound samples to upload -- does anyone have any other comments? Are there any Hungarians around who can help? There's also a lot of red links that I'm guessing probably should be blue, but I did not transliterate the names correctly, or my source only gave a last name and I've been unable to find a first name, so anyone who knows something about Hungarian music, or classical music in general, or even just knows a bit of Hungarian, could look through it and see what links can be fixed. Tuf-Kat 04:38, September 5, 2005 (UTC)
The article would gain quite a bit with some better illustrations. The existing images are of very low resolution and generally poor quality. The 20th century section isn't very large. Perhaps there is a chance to find at least one good, high resolution, and color illustration to match up with the content there? --Gmaxwell04:10, 13 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Considering that whole of the "Classical music" section is only about six paragraphs, and 20th century is about a third of that, it seems fairly appropriate to me. Or are you not referring to the section titled "20th century" (which is a subheading of classical music), but the various sections which together document the 20th century? Because I agree a picture of a rock band or jazz singer or something for 20th century Hungarian music is needed. I'm going to see if I can't get permission for something. Tuf-Kat 04:57, September 13, 2005 (UTC)
This extensive article shows the historical development of this Park in South London. It has been enriched by comtemporary photographs. A good example of a local history with a national dimension.
Reviewers should consider the usual elements, and whether an international audience would interested in an open space in South London that measures a few blocks in each direction today. LoopZilla 08:28:14, 2005-09-04 (UTC)
NOTE: I know the principle authors personally LoopZilla 08:31:39, 2005-09-04 (UTC)
It has potential, but an important aspect of a features article is brilliant prose, so the article would need to be trasformed from a list in to prose. Also it is very important to cite the references that have been used to write the article.--nixie11:47, 4 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Can a principle author reply to criticism? Here goes anyway... Surely Wikipedia of all places should be able to accept the classic format of a 'time line' The text of a timeline had to be as concise as possible. Szczels16:16, 7 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Parks are a important part of the development of London, so I'm sure it's a valid topic (internationally speaking). Apart from the fact that the article needs to be prose-ified and given a reference section. I believe it would benefit from an image in the lead which shows its location within London on a map. - 131.211.210.1211:55, 8 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
I also know the principal authors and in July stood in at short notice for one of them to lead a guided tour of the Park as part of the Lambeth Riverside Festival. The date sequence is a perfectly good way of introducing the history given all the links, including the full prose text of the previously published pamphlet. Given the history is on-going this article will be any case be updated and any additional information, like that I found when preparing for the walk, can also be added. The importance of this article about a Park both in Britain and internationally is that it illustrates a continual problem over social and political control of open spaces and activities that seem to threaten the establishment or that conflicts with other users. See the Public Space section of my website www.seancreighton.co.uk.
The article could really use a nice map of the area, preferably in SVG format (if you put in a raster one I'll just whine about it not being SVG :) ). Requests for larger images are a common question asked in the wikipedia mailbox, since our software autoscales you should always use the larges images possible. Generally I like to see images at least 1200 pixels in their largest axis, and preferably larger.
All of the photos on the article were scaled before uploading and are too small for good rendition in print. Considering the number and that they are all free, the editors of this article still get my applause.. but since it seems the photos were by wikipedians, we really should request they upload larger images. I think the listy nature of the article isn't very encyclopedic, but at the same time I think it's approiate for the sort of material covered... Why should we pad our trivia with lots of prose? :) Some in-article citations would be good. And Um, could we consider another name for the first external "cum diary" because US readers will read it as a short U and wonder if it's some kind of odd vandalism. --Gmaxwell04:20, 13 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
I think it's too chatty and bits are irrelevent. We don't need people referred to by their first name, nor the date of the release of Nelson Mandela. We don't need all the recent local politics either - will any remember Ecadorian volleyball in 18 months time? Does the Job Centre Plus really need a photo? It reads like a local history pamphlet. The history is lost amongst lots of trivia. The photos can be replaced by anyone as the site is totally accessible. Secretlondon00:32, 27 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
You are missing the points Secret London - there is no trivia every entry has been carefully thought about esp. the Ecuadorian Vollaeyball. Szczels21:19, 1 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]
I didn't write this article, but such a lengthy history on a famous band... I really like this article! However, before I nominate it for featured article, I want to make sure all the bad parts are removed. —MESSEDROCKER (talk) 04:02, September 3, 2005 (UTC)
If you want the article to reach "featured" status, you'll need to do something about the image copyrights. Right now, of the ones tagged "fair use", none of them indicates the current copyright holder, and none of them has a fair use rationale. Also, Image:1kiss1992.jpg and Image:1kiss1996.jpg do not give any indication of source, copyright holder, or copyright status. --Carnildo06:01, 3 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Needs a longer lead, singles discography (probably should just leave the studio albums and charting singles here, or something, and move the details to KISS discography) and a references section, preferably with inline citations. Tuf-Kat 20:16, September 10, 2005 (UTC)
This article concerns a technically and historically important part of the computer revolution. I've gone through it and made extensive minor edits, but it needs serious consideration by computer techs if it's to be considered for FA status. Please assist by commenting here and editing the article! It would be great to raise it to featured-article standard.
I particular, will someone please check whether the images are all OK with respect to copyright? Is Apple good about granting permission? Tony02:51, 3 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
I'll put my reveiw at the end, but I'm afraid that since Apple didn't license their software to others in the beginning (circa 1980s), they lost a considerable market share. That's why Microsoft leads the market. Still, Apple is a shrewd company, and I'm sure they learned from that mistake. HereToHelp21:36, 16 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
It looks good so far, but I think it can be improved. The article says that, "This was a landmark event for its time and had a massive impact...". How so? Is this in reference to the subsequent description, or just the fact that a product line had been trimmed down? It is unclear from the explanation. It later says that "Opinions were polarised over Apple's drastic changes to the Macintosh hardware." But what were these opinions? Surely there was a lot of negative feedback over the lack of multiple expansion slots. Did it require a box swap to get a CPU upgrade? If so, I'd see that as a big negative as well. Thanks. :) — RJH20:41, 5 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
My review:
References are missing. Absence of references means no FA.
Lead too short. Triple the size.
Immediately after becoming Apple's interim CEO in 1997... reads like a climax/anticlimax. Start with the performa series and why it was discontinued.
VP --> vice president
ADB, SCSI, Geoport serial could do with some more details
all-in-one -- use monolithic (suggestion)
Purists felt that... -- reference this statement to a site etc.
'"hockey puck" design -- I think flat would be more descriptive. "Round and flat hockey..."
=Technical= should either merit a top level heading or be merged with history.
MacNC project and CHRP -- Brief into needed.
OS 8.5 ---> 'Mac OS 8.5'? wikify
L2 cache, IrDA port and the CD-ROM etc -- wikify
versions had a slot dubbed the "mezzanine slot" -- reads odd. Is this considered an expansion slot?
Electricty consumption? (suggestion)
I think =USB= needs to be merged under technical and it be given a top level heading.
March 2003, 15 August etc. Dates have to be wikified
iMac (Flat Panel) (aka The New iMac in production, iMac G4 after discontinuation) That's a very long heading. Headings need to be as laconic as possible
Non breaking spaces hould be used between a number and a unit. 15 inch.
I think {{Promophoto}} should be used for the images instead of {{fairuse}}. Currently photopromo is only for people, but the tag does not explicitly say so. Just verify.
There are too many fair use images, free ones should be sought. I'm sure there are many wikipedians with Macs who might help.
Income garnered from macs worldwide?
advt. / disadvt of Macs? (eg. Costly in India so are rare.)
Countries in which macs are sold?/not sold?
Usage? Used by artist, video developers etc because of the accurate colour depth, resolution and speed.
weight
Some more about the OSes used
That it for now. I wont be checking for replies, so message me if you need any comments. =Nichalp«Talk»= 10:12, September 7, 2005 (UTC)
Packed full of trivia, would make a great FA one day. --PopUpPirate 23:16, September 1, 2005 (UTC)
It looks good to me. I only saw a few minor editing issues (A period instead of a comma: "Colby was not only involved... equipment>.< He also..." "Archeology" in one sentence, "archaeology" in the next.) — RJH15:24, 7 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
I've made a lot of changes to this article in the last couple of months, hoping that it might encourage others to join in, but as can be seen from the edit history, that hasn't happened. MacNeice is an important poet with a growing reputation, and I'd really like some input - one of Wikipedia's strengths is collaboration and a multitude of perspectives, which the article's currently lacking. -- ajn (talk) 08:48, 1 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
I know the situation you're in; my articles tend to be on obscure historical figures and in common with MacNeice, not too much information seems to be available on them. I'll try and give you a hand if you like. Do you know much about his west of Ireland ancestry? Fergananim16:01, 3 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
His grandfather alleged the family was descended from Conchubar MacNessa. Sticking to historical fact, according to Stallworthy the MacNeice family were a Protestant family originally from Stonehall near Ballysodare in County Sligo. MacNeice's paternal grandfather William was a schoolmaster who worked for the Irish Church Mission to Roman Catholics, married Alice Howell the daughter of a Welsh coastguard, and ended up on the island of Omey in Co. Galway, then Athlone and Dublin. His maternal grandfather Martin Clesham was from Killymangan near Clifden in Co. Galway, descended from early 18th century immigrants probably from the Hebrides, and converted to the C of I from Catholicism when he married Christina Bush, an immigrant from London. MacNeice's parents met in Dublin. So in fact his Irish roots mainly didn't go back very far and he had a fair number of non-Irish ancestors. I don't know a great deal about Irish history (I have a grandmother from Antrim but I'm English), and that's one of the areas that could do with filling in. John MacNeice is worth an article of his own - he was a very controversial figure as a Protestant bishop who supported home rule, he thought the Easter Rising and civil war were disastrous because of the violence, and he buried Edward Carson and was involved in a huge row about Carson's funeral and tomb. -- ajn (talk) 19:15, 3 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Very well done -- however, I feel the article is missing information on the poetry itself. In particular, it would be nice if there was a section (or perhaps something interwoven) that briefly discussed contemporary critical responses to the work. Right now when I finish the article I am still pretty uncertain what the poetry is like. For example, Berryman seems a central figure -- but does MacNeice sound like Berryman (I don't think so!) There is some stuff, mostly on the subject of his poems, but not enough on just things like, e.g., was he working in a Modernist aesthetic? Or something else? Sdedeo20:07, 12 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
That's the sort of area where I was hoping for outside input - I'm a scientist by education, I just don't have the ability to write easily about literature, though I have access to critical works. I'm not sure Berryman was a central figure - they had a personal relationship (though perhaps not as close as Berryman thought, he had a flair for exaggeration), but I can't see many poetic similarities. -- ajn (talk) 08:45, 13 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
I don't have the time right now, but why not start by quoting a few lines from some of his major works in the article? This would at least give a sense of what was going on, and might encourage others to take a look and pitch in. Sdedeo18:52, 13 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Article has recently been improved a lot by the medicine collaboration of the week. Would be nice to get some feedback especially from people with a non-medical background. The article has had a peer review before that has been archived here. Hope to get some good feedback and maybe this could be a FAC soon. --WS23:37, 25 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Hi. :) This is a comprehensive article that was, for the most part, easy for a person with a non-medical background to read. I felt that the exception was the section called Causes of pneumonia; I can't decide if it's all the Latin phrases with no explanation, or the density of the links that's causing me a problem. I am thinking that making that section into an annotated list, or perhaps changing up the prose a bit to make it less link-heavy and with a bit more contextual information, would be helpful.
One other set of comments I will offer have nothing to do with the prose itself; it's the pictures. They're well-chosen and generally quite clear. I would say that it would create some more visual interest on the page to not have them all on the right side. And this last bit is especially nit-picky, but -- the first diagram is very clear, but to read it, I had to navigate away from the main page because some of the text was too small to read at that resolution, and it took a bit for the bigger one to load. When one is on a slow Internet connection or at a public terminal, waiting for the larger version of that picture to load up may cause some users to log off altogether.
I hope this didn't come off as too negative; I am relatively new to peer review. :) Feel free to comment on my talk page for any other questions/concerns. --Jacqui★05:08, 28 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Don't apologize! Thank you for the input; if there were no criticisms, then the article would not get any better. I've worked on the layout - I had never experimented with the left side of the page, so you ended up opening a whole new world for me! The lead image is only 65kb, so I think it's more of a wikipedia loading issue. I went back to see if I could make all the words large enough on the original image and I think it would be too crowded, unfortunately. As for the causes of pneumonia, I am a bit unhappy with it as well. With over 100 microorganisms we could put there, choosing the important themes and some notable exceptions has been difficult. I'll give it another shot, though. Thanks again! InvictaHOG15:02, 28 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]
I've expanded the causes section a little. It can't ever be clear of Latin/Greek, but hopefully it reads a little better now with some explanation! InvictaHOG16:42, 29 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]
It looks quite good with the slight exception of the Pathophysiology section that has the odd bulleted-sections format, which is at variance with the format of the remainder. I didn't see anything in the article addressing the issue of reoccurance, which supposedly significantly increases your odds of acquiring pneumonia again once you've had it. Did I miss that somewhere? If not, could you cover that topic? Thanks. — RJH14:57, 28 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]
I converted the bullets into subheadings. I also added a sentence under Epidemiology addressing recurrence. Typically occurs because of an underlying predisposition to pneumonia. Let me know if you think that it deserves more mention - it's really more a matter of an underlying problem increasing risk InvictaHOG15:10, 28 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]
This would be a good topic for an FA. My notes:
FACs are always hit hard for any and all one-sentence paragraphs (two isn't good either) and one- or two-paragraph sections or subsections. It always hurts a little to see the "cleanly organized outline" sink into the background, but merging the sections and replacing the subheadings, where needed, with text does usually make an article read better.
I personally was surprised at the shortness of the "treatment" section. Particularly the very brief mention of mechanical ventilization. Eh, maybe it's just a personal bias: my wife was hospitalized with pneumonia at the beginning of the year and was kept under, on ventilation, for 10 days. Still, maybe there is something more that could be said.
I'd lose the "See also" section and rely on those links being in the text. It can actually be a little POV-ish deciding what class of related topics are the important ones that make it into that list.
I'd rename ==References== to ==Notes== and ==General references== to ==References==; at least, I think that's more typical. Maybe in medical articles it's not, though. Look around, see how recently featured articles do it, and try for consistency.
The article needs some in-depth copyediting, fixing grammar and flow throughout.
Thanks for the input! I've ditched the see also and started to copyedit. The multiple sclerosis article we just finished used the references heading and it's certainly more in keeping with medical literature. I'll see if I can find better examples, though. I'm working on the section thing. I can certainly rearrange the complications and classification sections. What do you think about the pathophysiolgy section? I think it's fine with different sections because of the links to individual article. As for treatment, you're tempting us! We expect to expand the ventilator-associated pneumonia in the future to better cover the topic. At this point, there's so much more to be said about treatment that it's probably best to leave just the most common situations in. Luckily, pneumonia requiring ventilator support is quite rare. Not that it mattered to your wife, I understand... InvictaHOG16:42, 29 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]
You're welcome! Regarding the pathophysiology section: I think if a topic is extensive enough to have a separate article on it (and be linked in the "Main article: foobar" fashion), then it should merit a few paragraphs in a parent article like this. —Bunchofgrapes (talk) 21:48, 29 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Initial description as a disease characterized by fluid in the alveoli sounds a bit odd to my ears. I am used to thinking of pneumonia as and inflamation or infection of the small airways and alveoli, which can lead to fluid accumulation.
Some sections seem to assume bacerial pneumonia with only passing reference to viral eiologies.
There is a paragraph about treatment under the heading "hospital acquired pneumonias" which seems out of place.
Aspiration pneumonia is a common problem in hospitalized patients, but it is only mentioned in passing in the article.
Epidemiology section could perhaps consolidate information on common etiologies/organisms versus age, hospital status, etc.
Thanks for the feedback! I've started making some changes, moving treatment out of the hospital-acquired section, etc. I added inflammation to the initial line - most definitions hinge on consolidation of the air spaces. Since it's due to inflammation in every case I can think of, seems reasonable to add it in. All in all, pneumonia is a horrible term to cover. There's a multitude of vastly different disease states which share the name. We tried to focus on the most common types. So, we mostly speak about bacterial pneumonia. If there's any particular place we could expand on the other types, let us know! As for aspiration, all infectious pneumonia is caused by aspiration (except for IVDU, etc). In a way, the important thing is the host and his/her flora. We chose not to cover aspiration pneumonitis because, frankly, it's a different disease entity. I'll work on the epidemiology section. Thanks for your help; check back and let us know how we do! InvictaHOG08:12, 9 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Hello, I am requesting another peer review of this article, nearly one year on from the incident. The article's looking great, the facts are fairly "stabilized", and the story is no longer much of a current event, though the article may be a point of interest when the anniversary of the shooting comes about on the 22nd. KWH05:36, 18 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Very good well-researched NPOV article. I made some minor changes which I hope make it easier to understand.
Some comments from my read through:
"The officers were watching three men who they claimed were Somali or Ethiopian in appearance." - this doesn't appear to make sense in the context - "watching for" , perhaps? (or needs some further clarification)
The section on the killing is confusing because of the use of "their" rather than "his" or "hers" (Difficult call as I assume we don't know the sex of the officer and "his/her" is ugly), "officers" to refer only to firearms officers (so you end up with "...officers and the surveillance officer...") and the interchangable use of Hotel 3 and surveillance officer. It also reads badly as Hotel 3 is 'dragged' 3 times.
The timeline of the article has the police revealing the reason for the shoot-to-kill policy before the Muslim Council demanding to know the reason.
The section on "controversy over police procedure" has no inline references which lets it down. It reads as much more POV and WP:OR than the rest of the article as a result.
Personally, I'd leave it a while before going for FA status (although I'm sure it would qualify) because it is still current enough to need further work. - Yomangani11:19, 18 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks Yomangani... for what it's worth, I don't like the whole "Hotel 1,2,3" narrative either, but it is a paraphrase of a report of someone's leaked testimony, so there's only so much liberty to take with the wording. The bit on "controversy over police procedure" is probably one of the oldest parts of the article so although it's probably all from contemporary press reports, it wasn't fully cited. I do see how it seems different from other sections, though. Thanks again, KWH20:44, 22 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
This article is of highly variable quality. The introduction and the section on demining are very good; however, the section on the types of landmines was until recently riddled with spelling and grammatical errors. I cleaned up some of them but I am no expert in this field and I feel that we need to summon one to help. A quick look at the talk page shows contributors cringing with horror at it.
Things to work on:
Poorly written and incomplete section on types of landmines
Resubmission - would like this to be Featured soon, I'll admit I'm not too knowledgeable on the technicalities myself but its the sort of thing I'd like to read about. --PopUpPirate 00:07, August 31, 2005 (UTC)
You really need to do something about the image copyrights. In particular, the GFDL claims for Image:Spitfire.JPG, Image:Supermarinespitfire.JPG are almost certainly wrong, and I'm not certain that Canadian Crown Copyright is an appropriate license for Wikipedia -- it appears to have a "no commercial use" clause. --Carnildo07:37, 31 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]
These were some of my comments from the last review of this same article[2]:
"The first thing I noticed is that there is no mention of Lady Lucy Houston's important contribution to the early project. The page could do with sections about the plane's contribution to the air war over Europe, N. Africa, and elsewhere. (Weren't they withheld from France in 1940?)"
I just fixed up this article, shortened some sub-sections, enhanced others, added pictures, etc.Let me know what you guys think. Is this good enough that it can become a featured article, if not, what should I change toimprove it. Mercenary2k12:16, 13 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Likely not, this article is good. Every year it gets majorly rewritten - and becomes another yet another good article but it never reaches a level of stability where most people are happy with it. Rmhermen14:36, 13 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I don't know enough about the topic to give specific advice on the content, but the section titled "Benefits of chanting Vishnu Sahasranama" appears to be bordering on non-neutral. That portion could do with a lot less simple recitation and a lot more critical analysis. The quotes section looks to be poorly formatted and the bullets should be replaced by in-line text. Otherwise overall it looks pretty decent. Thanks. — RJH14:52, 30 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]
The benefits come at the end of Vishnu sahasranama and are part of the prayer. so it's not a point of view.
Well I'm sorry, but a simple recitation of a prayer is not neutral. It is entirely from the point of view of the religion and involves no analysis or critique. It is purely a form of religious advocacy. WP:NOT and Wikipedia:Neutral point of view. Thank you. — RJH19:35, 3 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
This was the quoted text from the prayer. I am not advocating a point of view.
Quotes are not expected to be neutral. Now, if someone can find some criticism of the prayer, it should be included. Are you aware of any such criticism of this specific prayer, Raj? I tried to address the format concerns in the quotes section, btw. Sam Spade21:01, 3 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Using a religious prayer as the only source of the text for an entire section without an explanation or analysis just is not neutral. Especially when it fills up an entire page. If that section was a page by itself, it would be put up for deletion. "NPOV policy often means presenting multiple points of view. This means providing not only the points of view of different groups today, but also different groups in the past." Please see Wikipedia:Neutral_point_of_view#Religion. Thank you. :) — RJH17:23, 10 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Sam, no specific criticism of the prayer. But two commentators, Sankara and Parsara Bhattar give different interprations to different names in the prayer. Sankara and Parsara Bhattar have written commentaries on the meaning of the 1000 names and come to different interpretations.
Please see for example,
the name #3:
"Nama 3: vashatkAra:
One who controls and directs (not merely pervades).
Sri Bhattar interprets the names VishNu, vashatkAra, and bhuta-bhavya-bhavat-prabhu, as additional elaborations of the name visvam. The root of the word is vas - to control as He wills.
It should be noted that Sri Bhattar has pointed out in his commentary for visvam that BhagavAn is everywhere with His shAdguNya paripUrNatva WHICH IS NATURAL TO HIM, in the commentary for vishNu that He permeates everything that HE CREATES AND POSSESSES, and in the current one for vashatkAra that He controls AS HE WILLS. Thus, all these guNas are not something that have been acquired or imparted by something external, but this is His will and schema.
The following passages from the sruti are given in support of the interpretation of this nAma:
sarvasya vaso sarvasya IsAna: - He is the Controller of all and the Ruler of all.
jagadvase vartatedam - The Universe is under His control.
The summarization from Nirukti is svecchayA yo sarvam vase karoti sa: vashatkAra: - One Who controls and directs everything and everyone as He wills.
Sri Sankara provides a very different interpretation for this nAma. He points out that BhagavAn is Himself the vashatkAra mantra, where vashat is a sacred sound (similar to Om, svAhA, etc). used on sacrificial offerings. It is also used in the anganyAsa and karanYasa practice before chanting the sacred slokas (e.g., sahasrArchis saptajihva iti saktyai sikhAyai vashat). Note the similarity of vashatkAra to Om kAra, a word with which we are familiar. VashatkAra is thus a mantra, and BhagavAn is the mantra svarUpi.
The explanation in terms of BhagavAn having control over all His creations is appealing because of the continuity it provides to the interpretations of the previous nAmas.
Thats exactly what we need, discussion of differences in interpretation, held by expert personages. Such citations are what make this a wonderful article! Sam Spade00:57, 4 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
It looks good overall and I don't see any major issues. In the last half of the "Teachings and significance" the prose is tending to drift from the neutral perspective a bit. For example, it asserts that "Aside Rama and Krishna there are many other human or animal forms which appeared on earth or elsewhere in the universe". This sort of statement needs to be qualified in terms of the religious beliefs. In the introduction it said there was a statement that "In any event, all Hindus believe that there is no difference between worship of Vishnu and His avatars as it all leads to Him". This is another global assertion that can not be proven. It might be better to say that "In any event, it is a tenet of Hindu faith that there is...". But that's just my 2 cents worth. Thanks. :) — RJH17:40, 10 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Hi; I started to look through this article to check it, but have some difficulties. I think that more specific attribution of beliefs and statements would help. Madhvacharya is believed by who? All Hindus? His followers? Shri Madhvacharya was born... according to who / which documents? (the formative years section is incomplete). Please give much more full references. Where did he teach? Who did he teach? Where did he study? What did he do? How did he come to prominence?
I think the whole section on Dvaita Philosophy should be a separate article, but it seems to be already at Dvaita in which case it should be deleted as redundant. Mozzerati 09:49, September 11, 2005 (UTC)
I randomly stumbed upon this article, and since breakfast cereal plays such an essential part in my life (and the lives of countless others), I figured it'd be cool to bring this up to FAC quality. I already added a history section; any other suggestions? I'm at a loss of what to do next. The PNM04:12, 23 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Consider renaming to "American cold breakfast cereal". Very U.S. POV, no mention of muesli, for example. Exclusion of hot breakfast cereals seems odd. Rmhermen 16:49, August 23, 2005 (UTC)
Nitpicking but the text under the image reads a bit goofily... I tend to prefer a quotation out of the text, ie, Breakfast cereals have their root in the temperance movement in the United States in the last quarter of the nineteenth century. Bit of POV in there too. --PopUpPirate 23:09, August 30, 2005 (UTC)
I would expect a section about the types or categories of breakfast cereal: wheat-based, rice-based, corn, bran, etc. A description of how different kinds are made and packaged, maybe? It needs a lot more information but this could turn into a really interesting article. --Yodakii 09:19:04, 2005-09-07 (UTC)
There has been a lot of improvement since the last peer review. A language spoken as a native tongue by 230 million or more people is significant. I hope this peer review will allow critical evaluation of the article, and enable us to upgrade this to Featured status. --Ragib19:58, 11 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]
From the article's intro: "Bengali is the English word for the name of the language and for its speakers.... From this point forward, Bangla will be used to refer to the language." Wha? The article should use the English word throughout. --NormanEinstein13:22, 12 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Very good overal, so I'll just focus on what it needs to improve of course, and I figure I owe you. :). Basically I would agree with what is mentioned in the to do list on the talk page, except I'm not sure what "complete tabulation of word lists" means.
Needs more citations. The top 15-20 most important facts should be cited directly to the most reliable source available. The number of speakers is particularly important because of the number of variables involved there. Mention what the different sources claim and why they vary. Other places that could use it are the diglossia discussion, dialects, phonology (what dialect is the given information based on?), the facts in the vocabulary section,
Taxman's demands and views on verifiability are problematic, if not bad per se. The idea that footnotes should fulfill an arbtirary quota is not constructive. They should be inserted where needed, not because someone has decided that there simply aren't enough of them. The final figure could be anything from a handful to the high 30s, depending on the individual article. I also don't agree in the least with the heavy focus on turning most of the article into an academic treatise by discussing sources in prose. The responsibility of which sources to include (mainly in the reference section) lies primarily on the editors, not on the reader, or we'll just reduce ourselves to glorified copyeditors. Citations can be nice additions, but they should be used sparingly. We're still an encyclopedia intended for everyone, not an academic caveat for the academia and their ilk, i.e. the (upper) middle class. Accesibility and readability to a large audience should as much as possible outweigh the needs of a tiny minority of highly source-critical and demanding readers. / PeterIsotalo16:06, 20 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]
There should be a discussion of the language history, not just modern history. It's only mentioned in the lead. An explanation of where the Apabramshas fit in and when Bengali became a distinct language would be good. 1000-1200 AD is what many sources say for Hindi, and I think it's the same as Hindi in that respect, but I don't know. A mention of the important sound shifts and other language changes should be covered. The Modern history section focuses on the publication of descritptions of the language and movements, some of which is good, but covering the history of the actual language is more important I think. Were any other scripts ever used for Bangla?
I'm not sure either that there's enough backing for using the term Bangla for the language throughout the article. "Bengali" is so much more common in English that you'd need a really strong reason to not use that name throughout especially given what the article title is.
Some short paragraphs in various places cause poor flow and should be merged, expanded, or removed.
The beginning of the grammar section seems to imply that morphology is inflection of adjectives.
Thank you for thorough feedback. I addressed some the address (really, the only ones I could). I took out the implication that morphology is only the changing of vowels and addeded what I think are the linguistically correct terms, but please feel free to correct me.
Tabluation refered to taking the long word lists that plagued the article and making them into graphics. User:SameerKhan placed that wonderful pie chart in the vocabulary section that took out basically the entire reason we had that task. There's still another big list o' words in the lexical variations of dialect section, but I think we'll be able to take care of that soon.
And we're figuring out the Bangla/Bengali thing ever so slowly.
I rewrote this a while back and finally got around to adding the extra stuff that was needed. We are sadly lacking any FAs on telecomms, and since this is a commonly used modulation scheme, I thought it might be a good place to start. With this lack of precedent, I'm particularly interested in whether there is enough/too much mathematics and whether the lead-in is thorough enough at the same time as not being dumbing-down. As well as other thoughts, of course. -Splash23:40, 21 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Hi Splash,
Here are my suggestions for the article:
Single quotation marks and italics are used throughout this article. Since they break the article's flow, try reviewing each use and consider whether it is really necessary.
Working on this...
Review the choice to make bold the phrases "binary phase-shift keying (BPSK)" and "quadrature phase-shift keying (QPSK)"
They both redirect here, like DPSK.
It might be worth minimizing the number of acronyms used in order to aid readability consider "The bit error rate (BER) of BPSK in AWGN can be calculated as:"
This is true. I will look through and see where acronyms may be avoided. Sometimes, the phrasing would become repetitive with them included, but I will squeeze them out where I can. The particular case of AWGN is because I don't like referring to it simply as "white noise" — a statistically inadequate phrase.
The obvious problem that stands out to the reader with differentially encoded PSK is an error in transmission seemingly won't be undone until there is another error in transmission. It might be worth briefly mentioning how communication systems overcome this difficulty in practice.
Hmmmm. I'll go and read up on this a bit. We should take care not to conflate two distinct, but similar, techniques. -Splash12:51, 22 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]
The article should start by explaining phase shift keying not listing the three most common classes of digital modulation. Instead place this in the body of the article.
Rephrase the first sentence so it avoids the use of brackets. Maybe "Phase-shift keying (PSK) changes, or modulates, the phase of a reference signal to convey data.".
"necessarily" is unecessary.
"comprises the 'symbol'" is bad grammar.
Since DPSK redirects to this page it should be bolded.
The sentence, "In exchange, however, its performance in terms of how many erroneous demodulations are made, is worse." has far too many redundant words.
Sentences shouldn't begin with "which".
The paragraph and sentence, "As for many digital modulation schemes, the constellation diagram is a useful representation and is relied upon in this article." goes nowhere.
I've expanded this to give a compressed overview of constellation diagrams. The wikilink to the main article should do the rest.
The equation for s1(t) is mathematically wrong. I think you forgot to drop pi from the last part.
Yes. The basis-functions were added by another editor who I mentioned this peer-review to.
"where 0 is represented by...and 1 is represented by...This assignment is, of course, arbitrary." might be redundant.
Think so? It shows why the basis functions are a handy representation.
Then I have no problem with leaving them in - it was just my opinion.
"the I- and Q-channels" introduces new unexplained notation stick to talking about the in-phase and quadrature-phase components.
It's a small point but instead of "The constellation diagram shows that" try "In the constellation diagram shown"
Consider merging the last two sentences to make "This yields much lower amplitude fluctuations than non-offset QPSK and is often preferred in practice."
Yes. They were originally so merged.
Instead of "power of 2 (2,4,8,...)" try "power of two".
Avoid the use of pronouns to address the reader (e.g. "we").
Introduce the function Q(x) textually before you define it mathematically.
Rather than defining Q(x) twice mathematically define it once in the form Q(x) = ... = ...
The "just" in "it uses just two phases" is redundant.
In "spacing around a circle which gives maximum phase-separation", "which" introduces a restrictive clause, try using "that".
Made 'power' a wikilink instead.
Instead of "which, since there is only one bit per symbol, is also the symbol error rate." try "Since there is only one bit per symbol, this is also the symbol error rate." Consider using a new sentence for all paragraphs that proceed equations maybe with the exception of those that just define variables.
I'm not sure what your second sentence means exactly.
You specify the basis function for BPSK but not QPSK. If you are going to discuss basis functions I believe that those of QPSK are equally deserving of mention. Especially since they might help with understanding in-phase and quadrature-phase components.
We have a choice here (a)Leave the constellation diag as it is, and present the basis functions for QPSK - this is instructive since they take the general PSK form which BPSKs basis function does not; or (b)I can rotate the constellation diagram to be on the axes. Then it is readily apparent that QPSK is two BPSKs, and the basis functions' presentation may be more straightforward. -Splash12:51, 22 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]
There is no signal versus time diagram in the article. At least one would be appreciated.
The final sentence before the example is an important one. There are two things that could be done to improve it. First make it clear that "only a small increase in Eb / N0" is needed to overcome the increased BER. Second you might like to stress that the BER does not account for phase shifts in the communications channel caused by something other than AWGN and that in such channels the differentially encoded PSK may come out on top.
This is a very good point. I've expanded the sentence into a short paragraph. What do you think? I decided not repeat the point in the final sentenc of the whole section; the one that deals with the graph.
"k<supthth" is probably a typo.
Try putting the footnotes in a section "Notes" and the other references in a section "References" in accordance with Wikipedia's other articles.
I intend all the current entries as references to back up the Applications section. Which ones do you think should be footnotes?
I really just meant that, by convention, most articles have a separate section for their Notes and their References. I've done this now. Some like the Nirvana article combine them and if you want to do this feel free.
Wow, that's mighty thorough. I'm working my way through the list, so I've struck out the ones I've done. Along the way, I added some questions about some of your comments. -Splash10:58, 22 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]
looks good, but it's too technical. show a diagram of a single bit (e.g. a sine wave reference from -20 to +20, a signal starting as a sine wave then turning into a cosine from about -5 to +10 and then returning to the reference sine wave from +10 onwards). I've had some success generating this with gnuplot and the erf function. If you don't have an easy way to generate these diagrams, message me.
I think you want to move discussion of other modulation techniques out of the article line, possibly to a navigation template.
move the applications section quite early in the article and include pictures
possibly split some of the maths out, particularly error definitions. Remember Wikipedia isn't paper so the article doesn't have to be complete in its self.
for example might be better represented by a warm fuzzy picture.
I find the statement "Analysis shows that" a bit strange for "this may be used either to double the data ..." since it's in some sense just a clear true statement / follows directly from the definitions of these concepts. I think just dropthe phrase.
try to make it so that you could know all of the basics of PSK without passing an equation. They should all stay in, but later and/or in more detailed articles.
Thanks. I'll work my way through the review up above first, since I'm already part way through dealing with it. But a discussion of some of your points is important now too. In the same order:
I will make a timing diagram, which lays a bitstream against a signal. I'm going to do this probably only for QPSK since it will also cover BPSK. The BPSK section can just point to "below".
Yes, a navbox. I've been thinking about making one of those. I'll do it if people want one, although the linear series between the three classes isn't very clear (what order would they go in?). My inclination is (as it was originally) simply not to mention the others, but rely on the wikilink to modulation to do the job. This article isn't about modulation or communications in general, after all, its about one particular shift-keying.
The various points about mathematics. I'm generally not keen to strip this down to words and pictures. The topic is more than that and, whilst we're not-paper, we are an encyclopedia. The coverage should not shy away from the more difficult parts of things. Spinning the maths out into other articles is something I considered, but decided I didn't like too much. This is because I would have to reproduce a large part of the contents of this article in each subarticle, and the only different material would be a few lines of math. Holding them in here I don't think does much harm — the non-technical reader can either use the rest of the Wikipedia to learn the necessary terms or just look at the graphs.
To the particlar point about basis functions. They are an important aspect of all digital modulation schemes, and I wonder what warm fuzzy picture you have in mind? A picture of a cos wave?
Ah, click! You mean a block diagram of the modulator. Yes, I agree. That would be an excellent idea and would show the meaning of the mathematics nicely. I shall make one! Again, I'll make it for the QPSK system since that absorbs BPSK and avoids repetition; perhaps it should just go straight in the Higher-order PSK section?
I'll have to think about the question about bandwidth. This is obvious to the technical reader, but is it obvious to the non-tehcnical? Is it intuitive to say "twice the data doesn't need any more bandwidth" is the same thing as "keep the data the same but halve the bandwidth"?
As laid out at present, you can cover the basics of each type of PSK without passing an equation. I'll think about an alternate layout that presents the mathematics in a seperate section or two, but will have to see if that leaves the non-maths parts at a couple of sentences each. That might be no bad thing, though. -Splash23:18, 22 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Nice to know that telecom articles are being improved but the article is too complicated for a casual reader. I would like to see an overhaul in the entire structure of the article. Here are my suggestions:
The lead is very complicated, it mentions terms that a casual reader won't understand. I would like it 'dummed down' and translated into simple English. Instead of saying phase of a reference signal (the carrier wave) you can use the term 'sinusoidal wave' instead. BPSK is the most simple to understand, so the BPSK concept should be introduced in the lead. In its most simple form a regular sinewave is used to represent binary 0; and a 'cosine' wave (180° phase shift) is used to represent binary 1. This should be supported by a diagram alongside. (You can clip the QPSK image, first line-0110 to illustrate this). This example is the most simple illustration, and a first time user should the concept through this example.
Now in the =introduction= mention the need for modulation techniques, and ASK, FSK. Explain about NRZ signals which are used.
Now create a new section =types of= . Under this include BPSK, DPSK, DEPSK, QPSK, OQPSK, M-ary PSK, MSK etc.
Under each of these headings briefly mentioned the mathematical representation, graphical representation (waveform), basic information, and advt+disadvt.
Remove all details such as constellation diagrams, error probability etc. Push them into dedicated articles where the generation receiving, and probability can all be discussed. =Nichalp«Talk»= 09:12, August 23, 2005 (UTC)
Thank you for being very specific with your suggestions. My concern with the route you suggest is that it will result in a series of articles which have to repeat a lot of the same background material (e.g. what is modulation, what is PSK, etc). These articles would also each be rather short, and would have to import a lot of context from elsewhere: the error-analysis for example would be incomplete without the pro/con discussion that would also be necessary in the main article. I suppose seeking an FA is less important than having good coverage, but would these short articles stand any serious chance at being an FA? A rearrangement of the content as suggested by the second reviewer above would keep it all in context, but move the mathematical features etc. to later on in the article: people can just stop reading when they've had enough. -Splash21:23, 23 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]
You wouldn't have to define what is modulation in each section. The lead is a summary of the article. It should be written last, and it is perfectly ok to have repetition here. So for the moment ignore the lead.
The intro will have more information on the basics of the topics. NRZ etc.
Under each section just explain the generation on the topic, such as Sq. Law Dev, Band Pass Filter etc., and why they are used. You can cover the entire topic (of say QPSK) in four paragraphs. Now 4x7=35+3 (give or take a few), which is of acceptable length. Short articles are allowed to be FA worthy, if anyone objects on the grounds "too short"; they have to provide expansion suggestions, else it is deemed inactionably in FAC.
I don't support the derivation of error analysis on this page. It becomes too technical. For example you can say that the disadvt. of a DEPSK system is that 1) a complex demodulator is needed; and 2) errors occur in pairs because of the XOR operation. More than enough.
If the article is written for dummies, I see no problem why this shouldn't be featured.
Ok, I will have to think about this. I'll add mentions of BP filters and NRZ, but we already have Band-pass filter (and they're not really part of the modulation consideration) and NRZ, and this article isn't about modulation or digital communications in general, so I don't think we need the full exposition of each component in an end-to-end system. We don't appear to have square law detector, but again it only needs a mention and a brief explanation — it's generic material that should be in a generic article.
I must confess to be somewhat disappointed that the only way this could become featured is to write it for dummies. Is that what a featured article is about? The article before I rewrote it was suitable for dummies, and was a disgrace. -Splash00:22, 25 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]
No, that's not what FA is all about. You can understand these technical terms, I can too, and so can 100-odd wikipedians. What about the thousands of readers who come to read about article content? Do we want to drive them away by using 'technical terms' that are not explained here? For example look at the cricket page. What we've done is to initally avoid the useage of cricketing terminology so that first time users won't be put off. We've gradually built up the terms by defining them, and using them in the article. It isn't crafted for dummies, but at the same time it hasn't lost its essence or quality.
No, I'm not asking for a fullblown account of the BPF etc. A line on what is does is enough instead of clicking the terms.
I want to see this through FA. I hope you are as optimistic as me. I'd like to help u out. However, I would prefer you structure the content as I've suggested before, before I move in and simplify the terms. =Nichalp«Talk»= 06:40, August 25, 2005 (UTC)
Ok, well, I (and HappyCamper) will finish adding the stuff that's been suggested and then any refactoring/etc can happen. I was short on time yesterday, which was why not much happened to the article. -Splash10:52, 25 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]
1) I'd have to echo Nichalps suggestion that the article be made more accessible to those that don't already know the subject. That doesn't mean dumbing the whole thing down, but does require careful planning and the adding of context to explain terms/jargon. It may require moving highly detailed material off to sub-articles in order to allow the article to be properly balanced. A careful attempt is needed to make sure the article gives proper amount of coverage to each topic in relation to its importance to the overall topic. That's basically the idea behind good Wikipedia:Summary style. As for accessibility, the majority of the lead should be understandable to the well educated person that doesn't know the subject at all. That is possible to do and still be perfectly accurate if you properly add context. Yes that can seem a little redundant, but doesn't have to if done right. The same for the introduction to each major subtopic. After that, proceed into as much of the detail as you need to. That way you get all the needed detail in, it's not dumbed down, but people who don't already know the material can at least dig into it if they want to. 2) To a higher level view the whole article seems to spend the most time explaining how each works and very little on where it is applied and how important/widespread its use is. The applications section is it as far as I can tell, but since the explanation of DQPSK, etc are split between the lead and the intro, I have to refer back and forth to those just to try to grok the applications section. The lead basically covers nothing but how the technology works, while it should give a broad overview of the subject. - TaxmanTalk 19:57, September 6, 2005 (UTC)
Thanks, Taxman. Well, I think the refactoring is 'all' we have left to do, along with a general copyedit to minmise acronyms and things. We're missing an image of the receiver structure, but HappyCamper tells me he's going to make that. So I'll go away and think carefully about what you've said. To the applications section in particular: yes, having more of it in the lead is a good idea. PSK is used so widely that listing all its usages would be an article of its own probably; it started with the NASA space program in the '60s I believe. Originally, and imo more helpfully, the applications section at the bottom so you only got to it once you knew what/where the PSKs are. The other reviewers have suggested moving it upward, and an anon already did it hence its current location. Anyway, I've been taking an extended break from the article but will come back to it now. Thanks for your suggestions. -Splash00:13, 8 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
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