Wikipedia talk:Articles for improvement: Difference between revisions

Considering that TAFI has now been approved to run on the mainpage, it might be easier to manage if we have more editors helping around. How about getting TAFI to the sign post. From what I remember, Snuggle gained quite a bit of membership and help from members after going to the Signpost. TheOriginalSoni (talk) 21:15, 29 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I'd like that. How do we do it? AutomaticStrikeout (T • C) 21:21, 29 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/Newsroom/WikiProject desk seems to be the place to be. User:Mabeenot seems to be the guy to ask. If we ask nicely, maybe he could shift TAFI to one of the earlier dates than in February. (A side news also seems to be a good advert, if not very good) TheOriginalSoni (talk) 21:47, 29 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Would you like to make the request or shall I? AutomaticStrikeout (T • C) 21:53, 29 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

You know the project better than I do. Its better you do it. TheOriginalSoni (talk) 21:57, 29 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Ok. Were you thinking of a sidebar request or an interview request. AutomaticStrikeout (T • C) 22:00, 29 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Interview request if possible to be posted soon enough on the signpost (not as late as February). Sidebar request if the interview is not available early enough. TheOriginalSoni (talk) 22:01, 29 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I don't know. It seems kind of pushy to ask that other projects be bumped backwards. AutomaticStrikeout (T • C) 22:04, 29 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Note to self-Always remember NOT to be pushy.[I seem to forget it all the time] How about just asking for a sidebar request for now; and an interview for as early as he can possibly give us. We really need that coverage earlier than afterwards. TheOriginalSoni (talk) 22:12, 29 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Sure, I'll see what I can do. AutomaticStrikeout (T • C) 22:17, 29 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Done here. I'd suggest that you leave Mabeenot a note on his talk page regarding the interview request. AutomaticStrikeout (T • C) 22:22, 29 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Posted. TheOriginalSoni (talk) 23:23, 29 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Renewable resource is listed twice

It's marked to come up again on Jan 12th, and it's the current article for improvement. --Nick Penguin_(contribs) 00:50, 3 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

That's a mistake. You're more that welcome to fix that up. No consensus required. :)--Coin945 (talk) 03:34, 3 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Given the widespread consensus on the matter, I'm changing the second iteration to Farmer. --Nick Penguin_(contribs) 03:43, 3 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Given the extreme amount of consensus on the recent selection of Farmer for a TAFI, what is the legit procedure for determining and article, and then archiving of selected articles? It looks like articles that did not get selected just get moved down the page. --Nick Penguin_(contribs) 03:50, 3 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

There are archives, headquartered here (successful) and here (unsuccessful). However, those archives aren't always being used. AutomaticStrikeout (T • C) 15:05, 5 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I archived some old nominations, and made links to the archives on the main project page. --Nick Penguin_(contribs) 17:41, 8 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Need to monitor TAFI effectiveness

Once TAFI goes live on the Main Page (and I am not a great fan of that idea) I want to see some sort of monitoring of its effectiveness. Tagging articles as stubs and having PRODs and the huge range of maint tags does not get us very far, so why will TAFI do any better? Sorry about the negativity but that's the way I see it in this case. -- Alan Liefting (talk - contribs) 08:03, 5 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I would say the best way to monitor it's success it to become involved and improve the selected article. But if you choose not to be involved, you can look at the before and afters of any of the past articles, by looking on the talk page and clicking the link on the Former TAFI banner. Entertainment and renewable resource are success stories, but certainly not all of them are going to be winners. --Nick Penguin_(contribs) 00:57, 6 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

It sounds like Alan Liefting is becoming involved by suggesting that we monitor how effective TAFI is after it starts appearing on the main page. I think that an ongoing discussion on this talk page, with observations on the effectiveness of TAFI articles that appear on the main page, is probably the best way to do that. One important observation will be how effective TAFI main page articles have been in attracting and keeping new editors, since that was one of the main reasons for doing this. First Light (talk) 06:00, 8 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

It would be nice (and this probably already exists) to log some centralized list of before/after/diff links, that would make the sort of review Alan suggests easier. I'm more optimistic than Alan, but I'm even more of a believer in data. :) --j⚛e decker ^talk 17:22, 8 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

The talk pages of articles get the {Template:Former TAFI} tag, which has start and end links to the page history. Talk:Entertainment is a good example of improvement. It would be possible to get a centralized list of these diffs. --Nick Penguin_(contribs) 18:12, 8 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Unanswered questions

Moved to Wikipedia:Village Pump (proposals)#Unanswered_questions.—cyberpower ^Chat_Offline 16:15, 9 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This discussion regards addressing matters to move forward on TAFI being utilized on Wikipedia's Main page. Northamerica1000^(talk) 17:12, 9 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Dated nominations

I've restored the dated nominations ~~because they were not archived to the project's archives. They were essentially wiped without archiving.~~

Regarding dated entries, should we create a time limit criteria, in which listings are archived after a certain amount of time? There's been some discussion of having more than one entry available on the main page at the RFC for TAFI, so perhaps we should leave the dated nominations in place for a specific amount of time. Northamerica1000^(talk) 18:17, 8 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I did archive them, it seems the search bars do not work even for existing archived content. Here are the archives. --Nick Penguin_(contribs) 18:21, 8 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Facepalm. My error. However, perhaps we should leave them in place in the nominations section for now, per the above. I've revised my comment above. Northamerica1000^(talk) 18:26, 8 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Update: I've restored entries in the Dated nominations section that have not received any oppose !votes. Those archived at Unsuccessful Nominations/August 2012 have been removed from the Dated nominations section. I concur that the latter are unlikely to gain much traction. Northamerica1000^(talk) 18:45, 8 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Archive search boxes

It appears that the archive search boxes are not functional at this time. Northamerica1000^(talk) 18:28, 8 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Belated comments

I did not know about the RfC or this discussion until NickPenguin brought it to my attention yesterday so I know I am late, but as I was intending to say something about the project as a result of my experience working on Entertainment I will comment here anyway.

My thought is that TAFI should really be TMAFI (or for short, MAFI perhaps). That is, this MONTH's article for improvement. When I began work on Entertainment as a result of seeing it nominated, I understood that it was TODAY's article for improvement and so deleted the tag after a day, before learning that the intention was really to run it for a week. What I have since discovered is that even a week is much too short a time to make a considered improvement on the type of articles that are nominated. Entertainment, for example, needed to be rethought completely if it was to be coherent, global and well-referenced. Adding bits and pieces was not going to help. My concern is that these sorts of articles not only need rethinking, they need globalising, good references, good links and good images. The rethinking needs some experience with the field (whether that be science, art, history, sociology, music or whatever) and there may be many new editors who who have that knowledge. However, even understanding the purpose of the lead section is not easy for newbies, let alone adding references or images.

So I am worried that improving vital or difficult articles and recruiting new editors may be incompatible objectives. One way to make them compatible might be for this team to be the supportive guides for newbies who are inspired to contribute some of their knowledge to articles they see nominated on the front page (in the manner of WP: Teahouse.) Another is that the nominated articles (or some of them) have smaller scope. There is a difference between administering the project and writing the content. New content contributors would need some immediate connection to supportive editors that would encourage and guide them to an understanding the community's expectations, the encyclopaedia's standards and its technological idiosyncrasies. This would require vigilance - I can say from personal experience that discovering the talk pages and finding the discussions can take a long time. Sudden deletions and additions and a frenzy of changes might be exciting and encouraging but they might also be completely confusing and off-putting without any accompanying discussion. And, as I said, thinking it through takes time as well, especially when the effort is coming from volunteers.

Entertainment, by the way, has now been through Peer Review. When I finish thinking through and incorporating the suggestions, (still working on it) I will nominate it for Good Article. Then maybe I will have time to contribute to a new TAFI/MAFI. Whiteghost.ink (talk) 03:13, 9 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

If you haven't seen the before and afters for Entertainment, you should look at it now and then. Whiteghost really did a tremendous amount of work on the article.

To the point about attracting editors, perhaps we should establish some sort of welcoming committee for this project. The idea is to get them to start and then keep editing, and the best way is to reach out, appreciate the contribution, and show the way. I think this program can be good at improving articles, but I worry it will be less effective at attracting new editors.

The bit about articles needing rethinking, I think this could be incorporated into the proposed To-do list. Maybe this should be established in the run up to the article going live into the rotation, project members establish the direction the article should go in. --Nick Penguin_(contribs) 07:58, 9 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Will there be a welcoming committee for the welcoming committee? Many of the current TAFI members joined or became active only recently, myself included. That aside, I think that we should still carry on, even considering the concerns about newbies. You have valid points. We will now have to consider the wider ramifications of expanding this project. One is that articles that are important and/or vital, both subjectively and objectively, will almost certainly be improved. Another, that once we go Main Page, we may find ourselves out of our depth for helping new editors. I think that both the welcoming committee and "establishment" ideas may work somewhat, but we should be careful not to turn into a glorified sandbox. By that, I mean that new contributors may be put off if we come on too strong with guidance or restrictions on the current article. They may come up with good ideas for improvement on their own and not want to be corralled into editing "the right way" right away. Caution, in this respect, will be vital. The RfC was only a beginning, and now we have means, we should reconsider the ends we are working towards, as Whiteghost says. - HectorAE (talk) 22:56, 9 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

It's called the Teahouse. See #Template:TAFI. Best. Biosthmors (talk) 23:48, 9 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Add Barnstar to Template Section

We have created a TAFI Barnstar a little while back. We should add it to the Templates section of the TAFI Templates page. We might want to change it a little bit to fit the current logo, and then we can suggest adding it to the Barnstar Main page here. Any thoughts?-Horai 551 (talk) 12:02, 9 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Comment – Directly below (draft 1) a copy of the barnstar from the archive page (here). The logo in it is already utilized by Wikipedia's Guild of Copy Editors. Northamerica1000^(talk) 15:47, 9 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Draft 1

		The TAFI Barnstar
		Thoughts? —Theopolisme 03:24, 15 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Here's a modified version with this project's current logo:

Draft 2

		The TAFI Barnstar
		{{{1}}}

Support draft 2 – and utilizing a barnstar for this project. Northamerica1000^(talk) 15:47, 9 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Support Draft 2 for distinguishing from GOCE. - HectorAE (talk) 22:02, 9 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Obviously let's go with #2: we've moved on :) —Theopolisme (talk) 00:06, 10 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Guidelines section added to main page

See the Guidelines page, which is transcluded to the project's main page. Northamerica1000^(talk) 16:47, 9 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Javascript to find random article of a certain class

I recently used some code from User talk:GregU/randomlink.js to modify my .js page to easily allow me to find articles of Stub, Start and C class. If you look at my .js page, the 3 functions below the addOnloadHook( function() make 3 links in the left sidebar, so when you click them one it randomly selects a Stub, Start or C class from any of the listed categories and opens the article in a new tab. Pretty handy, saves me from trying to come across articles to nominate by good luck and chance. --Nick Penguin_(contribs) 19:34, 9 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Project peer review has been added

Project peer review information has been added to the project's main page to encourage further collaboration, and a new project page has been created: Peer review. Northamerica1000^(talk) 20:24, 9 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Template:TAFI

I made some changes to the template that I think will actually help increase our odds of getting viewers to edit. Best. Biosthmors (talk) 22:55, 9 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I've directed newbie questions to the Teahouse. Biosthmors (talk) 23:45, 9 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

How do you feel about adding WP:FIVE, Help:Editing, and/or WP:FAQ in there somewhere too? 70.59.14.20 (talk) 00:37, 10 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Redundant?

Category:Members of Today's Article for Improvement duplicates WP:Today's article for improvement/Members, and is currently empty. Seems like a G6 housekeeping delete to me, but I'm happy to entertain thoughts. —Theopolisme (talk) 00:07, 10 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

The "to do" list

So I see here there was support for a to do list. I say we just put one in a section on the talk page. If we're going to introduce new people to how Wikipedia works, let's keep it fundamental. And that's what the talk page is there for anyways. There's no need to reinvent the wheel. Biosthmors (talk) 00:17, 10 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

@@ Line 134: / Line 134: @@
 I made some [http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Template%3ATAFI&diff=532263989&oldid=531943039 changes] to the template that I think will actually help increase our odds of getting viewers to edit. Best. [[User:Biosthmors|Biosthmors]] ([[User talk:Biosthmors|talk]]) 22:55, 9 January 2013 (UTC)</br>
 I've [http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Template%3ATAFI&diff=532271918&oldid=532265605 directed] newbie questions to the Teahouse. [[User:Biosthmors|Biosthmors]] ([[User talk:Biosthmors|talk]]) 23:45, 9 January 2013 (UTC)
+:How do you feel about adding [[WP:FIVE]], [[Help:Editing]], and/or [[WP:FAQ]] in there somewhere too? [[Special:Contributions/70.59.14.20|70.59.14.20]] ([[User talk:70.59.14.20|talk]]) 00:37, 10 January 2013 (UTC)
 == Redundant? ==