Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Astronomical objects

Ring Galaxies vs Ringed Galaxies?

Harald Khan Ճ pointed out a possible issue with NGC 1300, NGC 1365, and possibly some others being misclassified as ring galaxies. The NED database lists the type of these as including "(R')" so I wonder does that mean they are ringed galaxies or ring galaxies? Harald wrote on this subject:

According to Phillip's Astronomy Encyclopedia from 2002, ... ringed galaxies are not the same as ring galaxies, where collisions and near encounters are the preferred explanations; in contrast to ringed galaxies where stellar dynamics are the cause. Supposedly, bars could later on turn into such rings through these dynamics.

Please assist. Thanks. WilliamKF (talk) 20:57, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

Category:Gamma ray bursts

Category:Gamma ray bursts has been proposed to be renamed at WP:CFD to Category:Gamma-ray bursts, and appropriate subcategories. 76.66.198.171 (talk) 08:12, 4 January 2009 (UTC)

PSR B1259-63

Someone might want to look at PSR B1259-63, it's a CarloscomB article, so it had grammar errors making it hard to read. A comment from the talk page states that it's factually wrong, so I've done some corrections on it to remove the false data, and excessive category subscriptions. 76.66.198.171 (talk) 08:32, 4 January 2009 (UTC)

Well I've been reverted, so the starbox with several wrong facts is still on the article page. 76.66.198.171 (talk) 09:27, 4 January 2009 (UTC)

I did a re-edit and added cites. Please let me know if there are any errors remaining. Thanks.—RJH (talk) 22:03, 6 January 2009 (UTC)

It looks better... but the SIMBAD page is about the binary system not one star or the other... (it wouldn't make sense to have a B2e neutron star, since the non-degenerate companion is specifically noted as a B2e in the original article references) The 10 for apparent magnitude also seems suspiciously high for a pulsar. 76.66.198.171 (talk) 19:15, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

Okay, I think I've removed the non-pulsar data.—RJH (talk) 20:37, 9 January 2009 (UTC)

I wonder whether it may instead be better to expand the scope of the article to the complete pulsar+Be star system. Is there a designation that applies to both, so we could put the article there? Icalanise (talk) 11:53, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

Most of the references say either the "PSR B1259-63 system" or the "PSR B1259-63/SS2883 system". A few say the "PSR B1259-63/Be" system. I think it would make sense to just use the current name for both and then bold-face and redirect the various designations.—RJH (talk) 19:59, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

The spanish Wikipedia is using TYC 8997-1597-1, the Tycho catalogue designation, as the name of the binary system. 76.66.198.171 (talk) 21:17, 16 January 2009 (UTC)

That looks to be the Simbad query name as well. I couldn't find any google scholar hits though.—RJH (talk) 21:43, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

Solar core → Stellar core

Solar core has been proposed to be renamed Stellar core at WP:RM 76.66.198.171 (talk) 05:12, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

I oppose this change, as (a) we know by direct observation (via neutrino measurements, & helio-seismology) a lot of specific details about the internal structure of the Sun which we must infer almost entirely from theoretical modeling for stars; and (b) Stellar cores vary tremendously over the range of stellar types, from newborn O stars to pre-supernova Wolfe-Rayet stars to M-dwarfs. The current solar core article is really just about the Sun. If we had a good article on stellar cores, surveying all the known types, we might well include a section describing the Sun's core as an example, but it seems premature to me until we have the latter. (I suppose it would be better to collect comments at one place, and I guess talk:Solar core is the right place.) Wwheaton (talk) 07:41, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

Discussion about the move should occur on Talk:Solar core 76.66.198.171 (talk) 18:49, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

Dark matter in the Galaxy article.

An anonymous editor is insistent upon adding a proviso to the first paragraph of this article regarding the "possible hypothetical" nature of dark matter. It has been discussed before and I think the consensus was just to state "dark matter" as one of the components (and thereby ignore MOND, &c.) The current discussion is at Talk:Galaxy#Dark_matter. Please take a look and help us reach consensus. Thank you.—RJH (talk) 21:54, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

OH masers

OH masers was recently turned into a redirect to Hydroxyl radical, after having been a very short stub for quite a while. 76.66.198.171 (talk) 22:11, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

Seems to be an improvement.—RJH (talk) 21:51, 13 January 2009 (UTC)

Epsilon Eridani peer review

Currently in progress at Wikipedia:Peer review/Epsilon Eridani/archive1.—RJH (talk) 21:56, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

Jupiter Trojan peer review

Currently in progress at Wikipedia:Peer review/Jupiter Trojan/archive1.—RJH (talk) 22:32, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

List of most luminous stars

A problem has become more and more pressing on the List of most luminous stars, which is in danger of turning into an embarrassing mess. See here for further discussion. Thanks — Wwheaton (talk) 22:27, 8 February 2009 (UTC)

Habitability of Brown dwarfs

I added this to the article on Habitability of Red dwarf systems. As it is original I thought I would ask serious scientists to look at it and decide whether or not to keep it. Proxima Centauri 2 (talk) 19:28, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

I have reverted that insertion in the lead of Habitability_of_red_dwarf_systems, as it was unsourced original research and "unencyclopedic", so it does not belong in article space. As far as the question goes, I think the answer is probably "yes, they might", although at this point nobody knows for sure. However, Europa is considered by NASA and many scientists to be a possible abode of life (and Jupiter does not even qualify as a brown dwarf, being too small), so it is a good question. If you can find a reliable source (and there certainly are some for Europa), the issue could be raised in the article, though I would not put it in the lead. Wwheaton (talk) 19:53, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

main belt asteroids

See WT:AST, someone has mentioned possibly deleting most of the stub articles. 76.66.196.229 (talk) 06:50, 19 February 2009 (UTC)

We had a big discussion about this last spring, which is now in Archive 8 under "2 Asteroid articles". I notice there has been some activity since about the subject, which I need to examine. My initial position was:

"There are excellent tables at JPL and the Minor Planet Center that are maintained by professionals (and constantly updated by funded computer systems!), and how can or should we compete with those manually when tens of thousands of objects are at stake, and hundreds of thousands are obviously in store due to the NEO and LSST programs? We would not try to do this for stars. For asteroids, let us have some minimal criteria of notability, beyond being an entry in a catalog. If we just limit it to objects that require some words describing why they are interesting, and a reference or two, I think that will give us all the articles we need, and likely more than we can handle."

We discussed the possibilities of having a table with key properties, which would link out to JPL or the Minor Planet Center for more detailed information, or to articles of our own when there has been any real human effort involved in adding material, context, or references. I expect there is more to say about all this, but please remember that some of the data for asteroids may change fairly often, and we do not want to get ourselves into the situation of having thousands of articles that have to be updated continuously, else they become meaningless. I urge people who have an interest in this subject to at least glance over the work done in the archives, since Archive 8 at least, before continuing the discussion, lest we just go in circles. And remember that we do have articles for thousands of earthly counties, towns, islands, etc, that are not very important.

It would be nice to come to some conclusion on this nagging subject, that will keep it from coming up again and again. Thanks Wwheaton (talk) 19:48, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

I am the "someone" Wwheaton mentioned who proposes to delete most of the asteroid-stub articles. At Wwheaton's suggestion I have read the archived discussion, and it seems to me that consensus was that these stubs are not notable. This thought was expressed by almost everybody who partook in that discussion in one way or the other. The only question seemed to be how to rework the available information into some kind of list. I propose to try the following: first of all ask the editor who operates the bot that creates all these stubs to discontinue his bot. Secondly, he is propbably the biggest expert on how to incorporate this information into a list with minimum effort. Debresser (talk) 20:55, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

I object to this interpretation. I do not see any consensus in that discussion. Moreover, there seems to be a consensus to keep named asteroid's articles. Ruslik (talk) 09:23, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

I did some analysis on that archive. In favor of deleting them as separate articles but making a table of the most important information contained in them were: Rick Block, Wwheaton, Kheider, J293339, Stifle, Alai. Against was Captain, who created a lot of them. Razor agreed that "we might be taking it a little too far" but in the end was in favor of keeping all these asteroids as they are named. Just deletion was the opinion of SarekOfVulcan.

So there was clear consensus, with 6 users (7 including myself now) in favor of turning all the stubs into redirects to a table, and 1 deletionist and 1 preservationist and 1 user dancing on both weddings to keep things balanced. :) Debresser (talk) 14:24, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

Wwheaton actually said: I have no problem with an article for each named asteroid. So he did not support deletion. There is also Spacepotato who obviously was unhappy with deletion. So I can count 5 against deletion (including me). No consensus, in my opinion. Ruslik (talk) 18:06, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

You seem to suffer from a bias. Spacepotato wasn't unhappy with the deletion in and of itself. And Wwheaton was the one to initiate that discussion and this one too, and he also said there "I really do think it is madness" and is clearly in favor of a list in stead of separate articles. By the way, he is around, so he will state his opinion himself, I guess. Which leaves you and the user who created these stubs as their only defendants. Which makes a clear consensus to delete, IMHO. Debresser (talk) 18:46, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

With this debate appearing again, I suppose as one the people who created these articles, I ought to show up at a debate regarding their inclusion. It has been nearly a year since I finished creating the asteroid articles. During that time, I do not believe that concerns raised last time have come to fruition. Keeping the articles maintained and vandalism-free has not been a serious difficulty and the articles look just fine. The issues regarding Special:Unwatchedpages were dealt with when I added thousands of the asteroid articles to my watchlist. If there are still many of the asteroids still on that page, can someone please give me the article names? I will go add them to my watchlist. (I'm not an admin, so I can't see that page.) Most asteroids being discovered today are not named, so the rate of adding new articles will not be all that high. I do not believe Wikipedia will gain anything from putting these asteroids into a list and I believe that Wikipedia will certainly lose something from deleting them. Captain panda 02:23, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

I am glad you are here to partake in the discussion. I agree with you that "keeping the articles maintained and vandalism-free has not been a serious difficulty" and I am happy that "the rate of adding new articles will not be all that high". But I disagree that "the articles look just fine". If an article is a stub and there is no reason to suspect that it will be anything more than that, we shoud consider Wikipedia:Stubs which warns: "When you write a stub, bear in mind that it should contain enough information for other editors to expand upon it. The key is to provide adequate context — articles with little or no context usually end up being speedily deleted". Which is precisely what I think should be done. Just copy the basic info into a list and turn the article into a redirect. You did a nice job of making a dime look like a dollar by adding an infobox and Wikipedia markup, but the content is still a dime's worth. No offence to your dedicated work, but let's face it. Debresser (talk) 10:38, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

It seems that you are advocating deleting all stubs in Wikipedia (about 1,500,000 articles). It is a pretty radical proposal! I advise you to go to WP:VPR and make a proposal there. I am very interested what reaction will be?! Ruslik (talk) 16:54, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Well, that wasn't really what I had in mind. :) Debresser (talk) 16:58, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

It might be hard to expand the majority of those articles, but should that automatically qualify them for deletition? I think that a list could clutter the information. --Harald Khan Ճ 18:21, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Not deletion, but turning them into a list. That list should obviously present the important information in a clear way. Debresser (talk) 19:14, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

WP:MERGE does list criteria for combining pages, and one of them is when a "page is very short and is unlikely to be expanded within a reasonable amount of time". A problem arises when you consider the number of rows on the asteroid infoboxes then contemplate how those would look on a mass table. I'm not sure if that would be a useful activity. Perhaps a format comparable to a list of TV episodes page would work. E.g. List of Heroes episodes. perhaps we just need to keep a few basic data, such as name, a, e, i, P and spectral class in the data row, then describe anything else interesting in the text box below.—RJH (talk) 20:00, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

The discussion in moving in the right direction. Not if, but how. Debresser (talk) 20:36, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Our older proposals: I am copying two table suggestions in from the May 2008 discussion, perhaps we can build on them:

__________________________________

Rick Block's suggestion:

I don't think there's any reasonable way to include a,e,i,etc. without making the table overly wide or using a show/hide sort of approach. Using show/hide, this might look like the following (note there are 2 physical lines per entry since show/hide seems to introduce a 2nd line):

Name	Alternate name	Group	Discovery date	Discoverer	Orbital/physical characteristics	More information
20813 Aakashshah	2000 SB274	Main-belt	2000-09-28	Lincoln Laboratory	Data table H: 14.4 a: 2.6767409 e: 0.1117672 i: 2.98933 Node: 196.60418 peri: 307.92848 M: 164.07487 Epoch: 3871.4664786	JPL SBDB
677 Aaltje	1909 FR	Main-belt	1909-01-18	August Kopff	Data table H: 9.70 a: 2.9548394 e: 0.0497858 i: 8.48963 Node: 272.90478 peri: 280.18136 M: 123.27949 Epoch: 3965.1872566	JPL SBDB
2676 Aarhus	1933 QV	Main-belt	1933-08-25	Karl Reinmuth	Data table H: 12.8 a: 2.4032459 e: 0.1263205 i: 4.55345 Node: 289.75298 peri: 45.51728 M: 12.54766 Epoch: 4553.0696866	JPL SBDB

I'd be willing to write some code to construct tables like this (based on the data at JPL or some other available source). -- Rick Block (talk) 01:10, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

__________________________________

Wwheaton's alternative:

Here's my cut at a table, for the same three objects Rick Block has done above:

No. / Name	Alt. Name	Year	H	a	e	i	Node	Arg Peri	Anom. M	Epoch TJD	Full data
20813 Aakashshah	2000 SB274	2000	14.4	2.6767409	0.1117672	2.98933	196.60418	307.92848	164.07487	3871.4664786	JPL SBD
677 Aaltje	1909 FR	1909	9.70	2.9548394	0.0497858	8.48963	272.90478	280.18136	123.27949	3965.1872566	JPL SBD
2676 Aarhus	1933 QV	1933	12.8	2.4032459	0.1263205	4.55345	289.75298	45.51728	12.54766	4553.0696866	JPL SBD

I have included the absolute magnitude H, and the six principle orbital elements. In order for the orbital elements to be meaningful, it is also necessary to give the epoch time when they apply, since M changes rapidly and the others may also change, though usually very slowly. In order to save column space I have given this as Julian Date - 2450000.00. The choice of 2450000 will work for epochs from around 1995 to ~2023. (I am just guessing all the data at JPL have been generated for epochs since 1995, but there might be a few with no recent observations that are earlier.) There would need to be an explanatory header at the beginning defining all these, or a footnote at the bottom.

I have just copied the values from the JPL pages, but I actually am in doubt whether we need to have quite so many digits. Anybody doing high precision work is likely to go to the JPL tables directly anyhow, and I suspect we could get by with about 6 digits for the six primary orbital elements, and 7 or 8 for the epoch. This would save ~12 to 15 spaces. I have omitted the nominal size and albedo because these are not available for the newer objects, since they need photometric observations in visual and IR. We could add them if we think we have the space, and don't mind leaving them blank when unavailable.

The orbital period is redundant with a, but so useful I think it might be added also, in years to say, 3 digit accuracy. It seems to me we have the space if we reduce the accuracy on the orbit elements a bit. I dropped Group as largely redundant with the orbital elements; if we want to re-instate it I think I would put it in as a 2 or 3 character code, (eg, "M-B"), with an explanation decoding it in the footnote. Spectral class could be treated in the same way; it is not available for most objects. I reduced date of discovery to just Year, since it seems to me that it really only tells us if an object may have lots of (likely lower-precision) earlier observations or not. I also thought the discoverer was of marginal scientific interest, and therefore punted that.

My goal here has been to put the data in a form that can be used quickly by anyone looking for moderately accurate information about the main properties, in a format that could be read by computer for some statistical purposes, or even to generate rough (arc minute?) ephemermis info, but not good enough for high-precision positional work. Anything that drastically breaks the table format we choose -- whatever it is -- should likely have an article with the details in any case.

Being unfamiliar with the coding, I have given no consideration to the difficulties in generating a table, for thousands of objects, in this format. It may be impractical, in which case I bow to the necessities of the case. Anyway, let me know what you think. Bill Wwheaton (talk) 16:01, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

__________________________________

Looking at them afresh, I rather like the hide/show scheme Rick Block proposed, which I had forgotten. I am not too happy about mass deletion of existing articles out of respect for Captain Panda's labors, except as it causes Wiki administrative or institutional problems, which is a subject that I have no insight about. (I've posted requests on talk pages of a couple of administrators who commented earlier, asking for their views.) Personally, I think the table should be organized by number, as this has a (very rough) correspondence with history and observability, also would mean it will only expand at the bottom, so that the organization by rows would be somewhat stable. I favor including the major physical parameters (six orbit elements & epoch; orbital period; magnitude H; estimated size (from comparison of optical and IR brightness) when available; spectral class when available, rotation period if known; the name when there is one, plus wikilink to any article that exists, plus links out to JPL & MPC pages with more info, plus the things I've forgotten. I think the orbit data should be limited to fewer digits than I show above, (? 5 or 6?) both to conserve space, and to avoid the need to update the tables often due to planetary perturbations, etc. Wwheaton (talk) 00:48, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Unless I am mistake, hide/show is discouraged in mainspace due to problems with text-only browsers and universal access. DGG (talk) 01:15, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

I have just checked the orbit elements from the three asteroids we used as examples above against the current JPL links. The agreement is not very good, even for those elements that are expected to be nearly constant. Some of this is due to planetary perturbations, and some due to improvements as new data come in. The bottom line is that we can round off the elements and save some column space, but how much is the right amount is likely to be a hard question. Also, as I feared last year, the values given in our current articles are likely to be outdated already. Wwheaton (talk) 02:08, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

I also like that first table by Rick Block best. This is The Right Thing To Do, in my opinion. Debresser (talk) 13:24, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

• Comments by RJH (talk):
  • 1. If this goes forward, I'll assume this is going to be a different tree than the existing List of minor planets pages. Perhaps 'List of named minor planets'?
    2. No offense, but neither of the tables seems wholly satisfactory to me. They both include columns that I expect have very marginal value to 99.9% of the wikipedia readers. These are better provided by a simple note with a JPL link. Node and Arg Peri seem questionable. OTOH, I think that semi-major axis and orbital period would be of interest to more readers; perhaps inclination and ellipticity as well.
    3. Some of the fields would be better presented in a text block below the stats. For example, for 20813 Aakashshah: "This is a main belt asteroid that was discovered 2000-09-28 by the Lincoln Laboratory. It is named after Aakash Shah (b. 1988)." Long tables of data are deathly dull; I think we need this to be more engaging for the reader.

I agree with the suggestion made by RJH in point 2. And I also agree with the suggestion to skip part of the decimals. Debresser (talk) 21:22, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Hmmm, dull is in the eye of the reader I think. A log or trig table was dull unless you needed to do a calculation based on it. I favor all six of the standard Keplerian orbital elements, plus the epoch and the period, because they tell you where the thing is. With a fairly simple calculation (that could be put int a programmable calculator, for example) one can calculate the actual Cartesian position and velocity of the object at other times, subject to planetary perturbations not being serious and limited by the precision of the elements, of course. You cannot do these things without the node and argument of the perigee. You can figure where the object will appear in the sky with few minute-of-arc accuracy, for a telescope. You can also estimate the closest possible approach of an asteroid to the orbit of another body whose elements are known, such as the Earth. You could search for possible near approaches of a mission spacecraft, to Jupiter say, to an interesting asteroid en route, or the energy (or rocket delta-v) required to travel from a planet (eg, Earth) or asteroid to another asteroid. Then with spectral type, you could make a preliminary list of viable candidates for extraterrestrial resource use. You could also get such information manually by plowing through thousands of stubs, but one table would be easier (assuming we can find a usable compromise between accuracy and number of digits, of course.)

Hmm, well I enjoy mathematics but I'm not sure why I would find looking up a log value enjoyable. Perhaps for the end result?

Indeed. Wwheaton (talk) 20:37, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

I really hope that nobody is using wikipedia as the basis of important calculations, as the data may become outdated and isn't necessarily being maintained or corrected. If you're not using the data for calculations, then I can't imagine why you'd need to know the 'Longitude of ascending node' or 'Argument of perihelion'. You'd be lucky to even find a non-astronomer that knows what they mean. Most simple tables of astronomy data I've seen only show basic things like orbital radius, orbital period, mass and size. :) —RJH (talk)

Also please see WP:NOT#STATS. WP:NOT is a frequently cited reason for deleting pages, so I try to avoid articles falling into one of those categories. Thanks.—RJH (talk) 18:31, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Nobody would use them for precision calculations, but I would hope we could provide data that suffices for minute-of-arc accuracy, or say 10,000 km in position of the object, which would be useful for the kind of overview estimates I mention above. And if this information is too detailed for a table, I cannot see providing it in separate articles, except for major bodies. Although no naive reader would know the meanings of the elements, many interested amateurs do, they are basic to knowing where the objects actually are, and their meanings are well-discussed and easily available (eg, orbital elements) within Wikipedia. Perhaps we should just have articles for a few hundred of the largest asteroids (? say > 100 or 30 km?) and let it go at that? Also, if we do not give the argument of the perihelion and the RA of the node, there is no point in giving the mean anomaly or the epoch of the elements. All of those are essentially only useful for locating a body in space at a particular time. The first three elements, a, e, & i, essentially give the size and shape of the orbit (they are normally nearly constant); the node, perihelion, mean anomaly, and epoch locate it at any particular time. I advocate keeping or dropping the latter four all together. Best, Wwheaton (talk) 20:37, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

I would not mind a short string for discoverer and date, say, but I was hoping for a table with a regular enough format that it could be easily read by a computer program, which could then do statistical studies of various kinds, as suggested above. A few-character code for "main belt", or whatever, is fine, but "This is a main belt asteroid that was discovered 2000-09-28 by the Lincoln Laboratory. It is named after Aakash Shah (b. 1988)." is enough irregular information to merit a stub, in my opinion. Anyhow, it cannot be all things to all people, and this is just my POV. Professional mission planners must have access to much better tables than we will ever make, of course, though even with lots of digits and briefly coded additional information, such a table would be much more compact and less of a burden on Wikipedia I would think, than thousands and thousands of stubs. Cheers, Wwheaton (talk) 08:59, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Detailed data tables should probably be on Wikisource or maybe Wikibooks. But it would be nice if we could make some type of periodic remote lookup queries to keep the data here updated. Thanks.—RJH (talk) 18:31, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Nosing around the JPL web sites, I find here much the kind of table I have been advocating:

   * Numbered Asteroids  (23 MB) or gzip compressed file  (8 MB)
   * Unnumbered Asteroids (23 MB) or gzip compressed file (8 MB)
   * Comets (359 KB) 

and

"Orbital elements and related parameters are also available for any asteroid (or comet) using our small-body browser. In addition, custom tables of orbital elements and/or physical parameters are available using our small body database search engine. We also provide fixed-format ASCII tables of elements."

I have just downloaded the numbered asteroids table, and it provides all I have been, wanting, and all reduced to a common epoch, for 207942 numbered asteroids, and all (that I've scanned) with H & G (IR) magnitudes, from which sizes can be estimated. Furthermore, it appears the data are updated very frequently by JPL. Total size when unpacked is ~23 MB. but I see no need to copy it here when we can just link to it and anyone can download it for their own purposes.

In the light of the easy availability of this information, I favor simply linking to the external JPL site, and having asteroid articles for only a few hundred or a thousand notable objects that are truly worth writing about. I think we should only have an article, beyond the most notable ones, when we have more to say than can be found in the JPL summary pages for each—which is quite a bit. Fairly simple computer programs can do moderate precision emphemerides from the orbit elements, but there is also a high-precision ephemeris program, HORIZONS, at JPL that one can use to run better projections, forwards and backwards, than any non-specialist is likely to be able to do without access to massive computing and programming resources. It seems to me that this changes the picture significantly. Wwheaton (talk) 08:09, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

This is a worthy suggestion IMHO, satisfying all of our needs both as to providing information as well as to being an encyclopedia. Debresser (talk) 11:17, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

I just realized that the "G" mentioned above and given in the JPL tables is not an IR absolute magnitude as I had presumed, but a spectral slope. I have struck over the incorrect text. Thus asteroid size is only very roughly indicated (by H) in the JPL tables. Wwheaton (talk) 20:48, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

Another source is here at the university of Pisa, which gives even more detailed information (including uncertainties in the elements, and even the covarience matrix) for the same list of objects; it says they are updated monthly. Both of these links are now listed in the main Asteroids article. Wwheaton (talk) 00:36, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

It seems to me we now need one or more definite proposals as to what to do with the asteroid stubs. I am thinking we should delete most of them. (The question of what to delete seems most pressing. I suggest keeping the articles for everything numbered up to the first one or two thousand ("old" asteroids), plus larger ones discovered since (based on a threshold H [this gives minimum size], value TBD), plus any others that have actual human-created information, text, references, etc beyond simply computer-generated numbers from the JPL & Pisa tables.) I further suggest we provide an index table, in numeric order, with the information in the JPL table (osculating elements, essentially), possibly some of the information from Pisa, absolute magnitude H, discovery date, a wikilink (on the number/name field I guess) to our article if we have one, plus a reference column with links to the JPL page for the object. Maintaining currently meaningful information does not appear too difficult, as both the JPL & Pisa tables seem to be kept up-to-date. There should clearly be explanatory information about the meaning of the columns in the table, as several are somewhat technical. I propose we take suggestions and modified proposals for a week or two (say till 15 March?) and then decide if we have come to consensus, and if we have, take action, so that this issue can be put to bed. Wwheaton (talk) 19:16, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

I think all but the most notable should be deleted. Where notability is not measured by the asteroid's number, but by its outstanding physical characteristics or being named after the president's dog. Even if that would mean just a 10-25 asteroids. All others should be included in the list and turned into redirects. Debresser (talk) 22:33, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

I think all named asteroids should be kept. I am fine with deleting any non-named asteroids, though. Captain panda 03:02, 5 March 2009 (UTC)

I do not know what is meant by a "named" asteroid. Is "1234 Panda" considered named or non-named? Debresser (talk) 15:54, 5 March 2009 (UTC)

Yes, a number/name pair is considered named when it is listed at the Minor Planet center and officially recognized by the IAU. The un-named ones usually consist of an identifier that encodes the year of discovery. The stub pages should be converted to redirects to the merged summary tables, rather than deleted. —RJH (talk) 20:21, 5 March 2009 (UTC)

In that case I am against keeping all named asteroids. As I said before, just those with outstanding physical characteristics or being named after the president's dog. I've seen a few of them (10-15) and they are dull. No reason to keep them as articles/stubs. That's what we are talking about here. Debresser (talk) 21:32, 5 March 2009 (UTC)

Jupiter Trojan

The article is a featured article candidate now. You can comment here. Ruslik (talk) 18:49, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

nebular stubs

I was wondering if we shouldn't create a {{nebula-stub}} ? 76.66.193.90 (talk) 06:44, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

O great, this it what the world was waiting for all these years. Another astronomy stub! Debresser (talk) 12:32, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

IF you look at WikiProject Stub sorting, you'll see discussion on various many types of star stubs. And what have you got against astronomy? 76.66.193.90 (talk) 12:37, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

That was said jokingly. In connection with my opinion about the bulk of the asteroid-stub articles. I'd recommend making a list first. Later on you can always have a look and decide: if there is anything more interesting than the most basic information about at least some of the nebula - make a nebula-stub, otherwise - don't. Debresser (talk) 12:39, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

What have asteroid stub articles got to do with a template for nebulae stubs? We already have stub articles on nebulae, just no specific template for them. I am *not* talking about articles, I'm talking about a _template_ for a specific stub type. 76.66.193.90 (talk) 12:45, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

I have an associate degree in astronomy myself, so the answer to your question is: nothing. But I do like to use common sense in helping build this Wikipedia encyclopedia. Debresser (talk) 12:42, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Then you should realize that nebulae are one of the basic things studied by astronomers over the centuries. 76.66.193.90 (talk) 12:45, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

And if I do? That would not change my opinion in the least, because the subject at hand is not nebula, but building an encyclopedia. Debresser (talk) 12:52, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Oh, I'm sorry. Yes of course you should have a template for that. I just wish you would have less nebula-stubs and would use lists instead. Debresser (talk) 12:53, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Suggested format for {{nebula-stub}}:

Using ‹The template Category link is being considered for merging.› Category:Nebulae stubs as its matching category

76.66.193.90 (talk) 07:03, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Every stub is about only 1 nebula, so that should be Category:Nebula stubs. Debresser (talk) 13:27, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

---

So it's been a week, and I've just posted this proposal at WP:WPSS 76.66.193.90 (talk) 08:02, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Can't find it. Debresser (talk) 13:51, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

WP:WSS/P 76.66.193.90 (talk) 06:33, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

Category:Astronomical objects by year of discovery

Did anyone notice Category:Astronomical objects by year of discovery and subcategories? Are we going to use this categorization scheme? 76.66.193.90 (talk) 12:24, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

If we are going to use this schema, then can someone precreate year categories for every year in the 20th and 21st centuries? 76.66.193.90 (talk) 08:51, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Barnard 68

I am having a disagreement with User:Rotational over WP:LAYOUT, since he's using the 4th level heading, and I'm trying to correct it with the 2nd level heading format, at Barnard 68.

Additionally, I think it needs cleanup, since it appears to contain generic information about dark nebulae that would better be off in the type article. 76.66.193.90 (talk) 05:51, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

I did some moving, removing and layouting. Debresser (talk) 21:14, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

User:Rotational was officially warned. Barnard 68 has temporarily been protected. Rotational removed the whole thing from his talk page. Debresser (talk) 17:32, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

User:Rotational

Considering Rotational's preference for level-4 headers, he's also reverted my change to NGC 2818 to have level-2 headers (like other articles across Wikipedia). I've left a note at WP:Village Pump requesting community input on the issue. 76.66.193.90 (talk) 06:48, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

You probably already know this, but many times it seems to help when I act like a wiki rules lawyer and quote a section of the dogma in the edit summary. E.g. Converting to level 2 headings per Wikipedia:Manual of Style#Section headings.—RJH (talk) 21:30, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

I put this on his userpage last friday, after trying to talk to him without throwing it in his face. Then he also received an official warning there, so he deleted the whole thing. :) Debresser (talk) 23:19, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

Coordinators' working group

Hi! I'd like to draw your attention to the new WikiProject coordinators' working group, an effort to bring both official and unofficial WikiProject coordinators together so that the projects can more easily develop consensus and collaborate. This group has been created after discussion regarding possible changes to the A-Class review system, and that may be one of the first things discussed by interested coordinators.

All designated project coordinators are invited to join this working group. If your project hasn't formally designated any editors as coordinators, but you are someone who regularly deals with coordination tasks in the project, please feel free to join as well. — Delievered by §hepBot (Disable) on behalf of the WikiProject coordinators' working group at 04:49, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

Seems like RJH is the closest thing to a coordinator here... (or perhaps Icalanise) 76.66.193.90 (talk) 05:35, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

Funny, I'd always thought of the project membership as a herd of astro-cats. ;-) —RJH (talk)

Article alerts

Everyone loves this so far, so I don't see why you wouldn't love it as well.Headbomb {^ταλκ_{κοντριβς} – WP Physics} 18:08, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

Category:Eponyms of Trans-Neptunian objects to Category:Eponyms of trans-Neptunian objects

At WP:CFD a rename has been requested for Category:Eponyms of Trans-Neptunian objects to Category:Eponyms of trans-Neptunian objects

76.66.193.90 (talk) 06:11, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

Category:Eponyms of Trans-Neptunian objects

Category:Eponyms of Trans-Neptunian objects has been nominated for deletion. 76.66.193.90 (talk) 06:49, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia:WikiProject Astronomical objects/Popular pages

It would probably be a good idea to get the 100 top articles in Wikipedia:WikiProject Astronomical objects/Popular pages to a B-class or better (other than those that are ephemerally in the top 100 because of recent news)... 76.66.193.90 (talk) 07:53, 8 March 2009 (UTC)