Wikipedia talk:Cleanup

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The project page was an alarming 137KB, so I moved 2006 to its own page. It would be helpful if people could go through Wikipedia:Cleanup/September (2005)to remove listings that no longer need cleanup. (I've done several blocks so far, but it's a big job.) -- Beland 01:19, 10 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

You are not alone! I have been working on the September/October 2005 pages but there is a lot of stuff to do there. Many of the articles don't need cleanup, they need wikifying, copyediting, stub tagging, even AfDing! I'll keep at it. --killing sparrows 03:54, 18 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Someone Put all of the listing back on this page again. Was there a reason I'm not aware of? --Lendorien 18:15, 24 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I removed a chunk of articles that were either significantly improved or were within the scope of an active project and marked as stubs (they'll get attention from workgroups there). Nswinton 21:48, 25 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Cleanup drive

This page is starting to get way too big. The listings go back to 2005, and few editors are that active in cleaning things up it seems. Maybe we need a cleanup drive for a week or so among the regular posters here to try and make a push to clean out a lot of entries. Another thing that probably needs to be discussed is what type of entry is most applicable to this page. There are a lot of entries that are very specialized and technical, chemistry, philosophy, maths, etc. While basic edits and research can be done by the average user, some of these things like philosophy need expert attention and are not really all that appropriate for listing here. What should be done in those cases? I know that I sometimes have sought out the wikiproject it might be applicable to and posted it there, though that's a hit or miss solution. I know several articles I've done that to that haven't been touched in months. Thoughts, advice, etc. are welcome. Incidentally, I think maybe this talk page needs to be archived again.--Lendorien 20:16, 18 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Gnome Day

Some points: - Wikipedia is in need of a massive, massive, massive amount of cleanup. From typos to wikification to bad prose to poor articles, the list goes on. Not to mention backlogs.

- People who perform cleanup tasks are known as WikiGnomes.

- There was a "Spring Cleaning" day proposed awhile back, but the page has been deleted (it was in userspace, and I believe the user left. I wish I could remember who it was so they could get credit for the idea.)

- June 21st is International Gnome Day.

You do the math. Basically, the day would be set aside for a massive cleanup effort by any and all editors who wish to participate. If there's enough interest I or someone else could set up a Wikipedia/WikiProject page for it with sign up list. There could probably be some sort of 'running total' of work done. (The original idea suggested shutting down new article creation and anonymous editing, but that will never happen.) This gives more than enough time to "rally the troops", as it were, a worthy cause, and an exciting moniker to make cleanup fun!

Thoughts? Crystallina 04:08, 28 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

That could work. I won't be able to do it though, I think I'll be off at nerd camp then. Oh well. --Burger ca t 22:30, 28 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I'd be for it. Though I'd suggest doing 2 days, maybe different ones for those who can't make the first one. I'd just be happy for a wikipedia:cleanup page drive. It's got hundreds of listings and is 162 kb in size!--Lendorien 20:18, 29 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Good idea. I think the Wikipedia:Cleanup thing should be a separate day, though. --Burger ca t 12:30, 30 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Well, something needs to be done. I feel like I'm one of only 2 or 3 editors who regularly try to work on clearing out the page, and since the scope of my knowledge, abilities and time is limited, it's a neverending battle that we're slowly losing. The page keeps getting bigger and bigger but few editors actually help clean it out. We also need to establish some guidelines on what to do with articles that need expert attention. There are about 20 or so I've identified that are so complex that only an expert will do. This page is too generalized for that type of thing, so they stay up for literally years. --Lendorien 15:32, 30 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I just set up a subpage for it: User:Crystallina/Gnome Week - it's a week now. Hopefully it'll get enough people to actually make a difference. Crystallina 20:51, 30 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Well poo. I'm not available for most of that week. I'll be out of town. i do wish you luck though. If I do have access, I'll definately jump in. Best of luck trying to get folks involved. Maybe something could be posted on the cleanup page at the top? --Lendorien 14:40, 31 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I'll probably cross-post this to the major cleanup projects' talk pages. And if people don't mind my adding it to the main page it'd be great, but I don't want to plaster this someplace if it isn't wanted. Crystallina 23:20, 31 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Why are clean up tags placed on the article page and not the talk page?

I looked at Tosca earlier today and noticed that the first category is a cleanup related tag. I think that few users are interested in what cleanup categories an article belongs to and having a cleanup category automatically placed ahead of categories that are more meaningful to an ordinary reader reduces the useability of wikipedia as a whole.

Project tags and ratings appear on the talk page and cleanup tags about trivia sections or writing style etc. should appear in the same sort of place. In this way, the comments are visible to editors but invisible to readers. This is particularly important when robots are tagging thousands of articles at a time.

Tags raising serious issues of unreliability in an article or indicating it may be about to be deleted are reasonably placed on the main page, but general editorial advice should be on the talk page. --Peter cohen 18:54, 6 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I believe the reason they are on the article page instead of talk is so that it warns readers that we are aware the page needs improvement. RJFJR 19:12, 6 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

But if we rate an article as start-class, that equally shows that we are aware it needs improvement, but we do that on the talk-page. I think tags about more important editorial issues such as non-neutral points of view are reasonably placed on the article page. But do readers want to know about trivia sections being problematic? --Peter cohen 19:22, 6 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Rating an article as "start-class" constitutes more of an evaluation of its status than a call for improvement. Tagging an article with any maintenance tag is specifically a request for changes. Another advantage of placing the tags on the article pages themselves is that readers will become aware that trivia sections are problematic and hopefully will: (1) become editors in order to try to fix the issue, and (2) not exacerbate the problem of trivia sections. -- Black Falcon ^(Talk) 19:49, 6 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

You know, the more I think about this, the more I think that we don't have a really good reason for tagging articles with cleanup tags. The only reason I could think of was that readers would need to know. That's why dispute tags like {{neutrality}} are used, because some editors think that readers need to see them, while the dispute is being dealt with. Cleanup tags, in severe cases, can serve as reader warnings, but we're seriously overdoing it. When an article is in really bad shape, it's appropriate to warn readers that it may have quality issues. But all these minor things we have cleanup templates for: Wikipedia:Template messages/Cleanup... a section is very long? it needs spellchecking? needs expansion? contains a trivia section? None of these are things readers need to know, they're just things editors like to bring up in a way that's public. Except in cases where readers need to be warned about a problem they can have if they read the article, we should avoid warning them by placing these tags on the talk page. Also, I don't think we should be advertising to get editors this hard. We have stub tags that ask people to expand on topics that don't have much information. We have citation needed tags that show places where research can help. We do not need a big ugly blue box in order to pull in editors. Mango juice^talk 21:19, 6 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Just to be clear, I do think tagging is worthwhile, but there's no reason not to be tagging on the talk page instead of the article page. Mango juice^talk 21:20, 6 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I think it's very important that some tags go on the article page, because they are not just a spur to editors but also a warning to readers. Specifically, {{unreferenced}} and {{moresources}} are a warning that while the article may be true, it should not be relied on; verifiability is a pillar of wikipedia, and it's important to editors that an unsourced article does not meet our standards. In general, I think I'd be reluctant to see the other cleanup tags moved to the talk page, because they are likely to be missed there; but some tags such as the sourcing tags are so important that I would strongly oppose their removal. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 23:26, 6 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I agree, tags requesting sources should go on the article page. Also, cleanup that is so needed it may be hard to understand the article (like {{context}}) should go on the article, and certainly {{cleanup-afd}} should go on the article page - if an article could be deleted, it's appropriate to warn the reader. Mango juice^talk 12:14, 7 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I just noticed that this guideline: Wikipedia:Categories#Wikipedia namespace agrees with Peter's statement. Either Peter's right, or that part of the guideline needs to be changed to reflect Wikipedia practices.--Father Goose 17:44, 8 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Regardless of what policy says, practice is to put them on the main page. Frankly, I think it's good practice. Many folks don't bother reading the talk pages or a regular basis and would miss the tags entirely otherwise. Cleanup tags constitute a call for action on the page they've been put on, and help let editors know there is a problem. I know from personal experiance that cleanup tags help get articles edited. I've edited pages that I've gone to just looking for information, because I saw they needed help. Sometimes those tags can point out what one editor noticed that another might not. I think putting tags on talk pages would be counterproductive to getting a handle on the cleanup mess wikipedia is currently in because all it would do is make it less obvious. Incidentally, we'd love to have some help in Wikipedia:Cleanup. There is a huge backlog of things on this page and frankly, I'm one of the few people actually actively trying to clear things up. Please spread the word. I need help. --Lendorien 15:47, 11 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

This is "cleanup," not "mess up"

Some of the instructions in this page seems to become vague. As with the cleanup policy, this is a place to report article mess, it does not mean you can mess around regardless of what the title says (this includes this page). — N96 22:33, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

It is also not a wise decision to archive requests up to three years. I am concerned that it could slow down some running browsers. — N96 22:41, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

2005 used to be archived, but someone moved it to here. It did have some effect on getting some articles fixed. Frankly, part of the reason this page is so huge is I'm practically the only one (along with maybe one or two others) actively trying to fix articles that are listed here on a regular basis. We need help BADLY. --Lendorien 17:37, 23 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Some could probably be re-entered at the top of the page - and if not dealt with "within a certain time" deemed undealable with. Some of the articles could be purged as non-notable, or delegated to other wikis. Is the garbledegook at the top of the page (at the present) vandalism or somebody trying to be clever and self-referential as to what needs to be done? Jackiespeel 17:08, 10 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

What garbledegook are you referring to? I'll respond also by saying that the main problem here is not that we have too many articles to cleanup, it's that no-one is actively trying to do anything. I'm a rare exception. It's getting frustrating.--Lendorien 20:09, 13 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

While we're cleaning things up, it's "Gobbledygook", not "garbledegook".68.228.161.135 (talk) 08:29, 23 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Radical Overhaul of Cleanup

Hello everyone,

I just arrived at Cleanup as I transition into more of a Metapedian and copyeditor, and I noticed from the page itself and discussions that it seems to be in utter chaos, in addition to the enormous backlog of entries and lack of editors contributing. As a system, this seems both unproductive and harmful to Wikipedia as a whole, as articles are seemingly sumped here in the expectation that "someone else will deal with it", leading to a sea of mediocrity and confusion.

I am of the opinion that Cleanup needs a radical overhaul, and I do have some ideas. I notice from above that some measures are being proposed. Perhaps it is time to focus more on cleaning up the structure of cleanup before actually cleaning up.

I have seen the comments at [1], and do believe that a concerted effort should initially be made to restructure cleanup before actually tackling the workload.

Any comments? I'm interested to know what those who have been here for longer think. -- The Rhymesmith 03:02, 17 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Well, I'll be honest. A page like this works fine, if you have enough people looking at it. I'll be frank though, as far as I can tell, all of 2 editors, of which I am one, have made much effort to actually WORK on the articles in the list. If anything, we need to recuit more editors to be actively involved. I won't say that a reorganization of this page, perhaps into a Wikipedia Cleanup wikiproject wouldn't necessarily be more useful, but for now, this is what we're stuck with. Int he short term, more editors would be a godsend.--Lendorien 00:31, 28 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I'd dearly love to help, and will as much as I can. This is actually one of my favorite things to do. I find the "tidying up" aspect of it sort of therapeutic and, to be honest, I'd be here all day every day if I could be. (And I just hope that doesn't make me sound too terribly crazy!) But my time is severely limited, so all I can promise is that I'll help out whenever and wherever I can. I seriously respect your work though, Lendorien, and that of so many others who have worked so hard to make this a better place. I hope very much, in time, to make even a fraction of the difference that you've made.-- edi 08:05, 28 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

P.S. I forgot to mention something that I've been wondering about for some time. I've noticed that there are lots of articles on the Cleanup page that are only there for lack of sources. Could those not be referred to the Unreferenced Articles project? I realize, of course, that they have a huge backlog too, and dumping a problem in someone else's lap isn't the same as fixing it, but it could get the articles some attention from people who are actually into that sort of thing. Personally, that's something at which I suck, so I ignore entries that say that. I'm much better at copyediting and otherwise cleaning up and "classing up" the writing itself, so I go to the Cleanup page to help, not to the Unreferenced Articles page. Isn't it logical to assume that there are people there who do the very same thing, but in the opposite direction? I dunno. I'm just thinking out loud, so to speak. You have much more experience, so your judgment on this will be better than mine. Thanks again.--edi 08:50, 28 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Well, I've made some edits to the page similair to that of Wikipedia:Unreferenced articles, including adding a volunteers list. Hopefully the change will encourage people to sign up. We'll see. Thanks for the praise, though I'll be honest when I say that I'm slightly lazy. I have a hard time dealing with content heavy articles. Like you, sourcing is not a big love of mine. I do it though on occasion when I can. Maybe leaving sourcing to the other project is not a bad idea. Certainly would cut down on the amount of articles listed here.--Lendorien 18:32, 28 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Only having entries that have a message at the top to be cleaned would help. Could there be some way to link the two? Danielspencer91 18:42, 29 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Another thought: There are lots of articles that have notes saying that they don't need anything but some expert attention. Why not refer those to the appropriate WikiProjects so that the people who have the knowledge are more likely to become aware of them? For instance, the entry for Jardin de Tivoli, Paris says only "the subject is interesting (history of Paris) ; it needs to be developed by an 'expert' with relevant information". Not a word about what I'd call "cleanup". So why not stick it here? They have a backlog of only 17 articles. They'll have a much easier time getting to it than we will, and they have the expertise to do it. What do you think? -- edi 22:15, 29 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I'd be wary to delete entries that don't have tags ont hem. Sometimes the tags are on the talk pages, and sometimes users remove them without checking the article. They should only be removed fromt he list if they've been read and checked.

I think that this process is broken. In a lot of cases it's hard to determine whether older articles on this list are still viewed as in need of cleanup without going through the whole article and reassessing it. Fair enough, some articles are obviously in a bad state. But a lot of others listed here have no cleanup banner, have undergone substantial edits since listing, and their status is unclear. Have they been cleaned up but just not removed from this list? Or did they never have a cleanup banner and parts are still in a mess? I think there needs to be some reliable method for logging progress, some reliable indicator of status that keeps this list in sync with what's actually happening to the article, and some reliable way of ensuring that articles are removed when they've been cleaned. Someone who finds a cleanup banner on an article, fixes it and then removes the banner could easily have no idea that they ought to remove the entry from this list, or even that this list exists. Conversely, someone could easily add a cleanup banner and not add an entry here. I'm sure I've done that. Given that the cleanup banner automatically adds to a category, and you can view the whole of that category, is there any need at all for this list? The discussion here, such as it is, could easily take place on the articles' talk pages? Matt 01:52, 1 August 2007 (UTC).

This project page is simply obsolete. Its origin goes back to before Categories were supported by the wiki software. After the tag/Category:Cleanup by month system was put in place, this page was kept around because some people objected to the new way of doing things, and wanted to continue the old way (puting an entry on this project page). Only a miniscule number are still done that way: How many are now on the page? A couple of hundred? In Category:Cleanup by month there are 25,000 articles listed there for cleanup. The tag/cat system does not suffer from the synchronization problem that this page does. And yes, comments as to what is needed should go on the talk page of the article. -R. S. Shaw 04:13, 2 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Oh. That is very confusing. The blurb at the top of this page ("Please report confusing/messy articles below and explain why they need to be cleaned-up" etc.) gives the impression that this is the main repository of cleanup lists and discussions about cleanup progress. It seems to me that we should we either wipe this list altogether, or at least put a prominent notice at the top saying that the list is incomplete and not always maintained, and directing people to the category lists and articles' talk pages instead. What do you think? Matt 17:57, 2 August 2007 (UTC)~.

Putting a clearer description at the top of the page would be a good thing IMO. Completely removing the page would probably upset some people. -R. S. Shaw 05:52, 3 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Wow. You've given me a bit of education and some things to think about, R. S. Shaw. I didn't know all the stuff you've said about Categories. I just wish people would indeed put their thoughts on the talk pages more often. Sometimes it's difficult to glean much useful information there when I'm trying to clean up an article, and that's frustrating. But in any case, thanks for the information! -- edi 08:15, 3 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Barnstar

Could someone create a barnstar for cleaning up articles, or is there one already, only i don't know about it? this barnster could motivate people to clean pages. Just a thought... Danielspencer91 18:33, 29 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Cleanup

Do we have a list available for articles that require clean up? One thing, is vandalism considered something that people can report need to clean up?

There is a category for Cleanup if that's what you mean. You'll find it on this page's category listing. --Lendorien 19:43, 2 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Cleanup by subject

Is there any way to find a list of articles needing cleanup organised by subject matter? Of the reams and reams of articles tagged for cleanup, I really know very little about probably 99% of them. If there was a quick way to find the 1% that I could help with, I'd probably be more inclined to do so. Matt 20:07, 2 August 2007 (UTC).

I've been pondering this. A good solution would be to cross reference all the cleanup categories with various topic categories to produce lists of aircraft/shark/fencing/BLP/whatever articles requiring cleanup. Then the lists could be distributed to the Wikiprojects and I think a lot more would get done. This isn't a straightforward operation but I recall User:Messedrocker doing something similar to produce a list of unreferenced BLP articles so it's definitely possible. Any thoughts? --Cherry blossom tree 21:23, 2 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

See Wikipedia:Pages needing attention. It's a set of pages by subject of articles needing cleanup or other attention. It was manual but fell out of use, and was then set up to have a bot classify articles based on categories, although the bot has not been run for some time, AFAIK. -R. S. Shaw 05:56, 3 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks, I wasn't aware of that page. At first glance, and I hope I am not doing anyone a disservice, the lists there seem to be rather haphazardly maintained. Picking up on what Cherry blossom tree said, perhaps a good solution would be a way to search for articles in the cleanup category AND some other given category(ies). Thus, to find articles about geometry needing cleanup, to pick an example at random, I would simply search for category = "All pages needing cleanup" AND category = "Geometry". If there was a way to do that "on the fly" then all the problems about running bots and manually maintaining lists might just go away? Matt 19:12, 3 August 2007 (UTC).

The problem is - trying to find all these other lists (more links?): and some topics do not fit into any of the categories.

Another possibility - articles get put on the cleanup/expansion/other general list so that anything obvious can be dealt with: after a set period list monitors assign the remainder to more specific lists. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.86.0.10 (talk) 13:28, August 29, 2007 (UTC)

Proposed new explanatory text

Based on the comments above under "Radical Overhaul of Cleanup", I propose adding the following note to the introductory text on this page.

The lists on this page constitute only a fraction of the Wikipedia articles tagged as needing cleanup, and they may not always be maintained as new articles are tagged or old articles are fixed. For an up-to-date list generated automatically from the cleanup tags that are placed on articles, see Category:All pages needing cleanup and Category:Cleanup by month.

Comments? Matt 19:27, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

Thank you! That will help. But I can't understand why this page is even here, if it's outmoded or redundant. It's unfair to have people thinking they have to enter pages here, if using the cleanup templates is the preferred method Bacrito 16:46, 5 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I added a revised version of the above. I am not terribly familiar with this process, so if anyone feels that the wording isn't quite right then please amend as necessary. Matt 22:16, 5 August 2007 (UTC).

I've taken the liberty to seperate the list stuff out completely and put it in its own section (with Legacy in the title as well as rewrite the intro to make it more generalized and refer to the noted lists rather than to posting on this page. Comments, suggestions and changes welcome. More links to other cleanup resources and projects would be most useful I think. --Lendorien 13:58, 10 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Articles with POV issues

Just a quick note. I feel that Articles with POV issues ARE appropriate for Cleanup, depending on the scope of the POV. A lot of times the POV issues are simply issues where the language needs to be made more nuetral. More complex cases that need expert attention should be directed to the associated project for that subject. --Lendorien 13:19, 6 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

What to do after cleanup

Once I've done some cleanup, do I just remove the {{cleanup}} tag, or is there some procedure to follow? And I guess the same question applies to {{unreferenced|...}} as well. Astronaut 15:07, 20 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

If you feel that the page is fine now, feel free to remove the tags. If you want a second opinion, you could post it here asking for it. --Lendorien 18:57, 20 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

format of the page

I was playing with placing the cleanup resource template on this page -- might be helpful as a way to direct people to other task forces, etc. If it's annoying feel free to remove. -- phoebe/(talk) 07:31, 25 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Suggestion

Some links to the various themed pages could be useful - slightly quicker than having to hunt around. Jackiespeel 00:17, 17 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Article length

Can something be done about it - a number of the entries seem to have been dealt with, and it takes rather a long time to download on dial-up (for those of us using several computers and wishing to see what can be done in passing). Jackiespeel 14:13, 28 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Repeating the above. Jackiespeel 13:51, 4 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Messy articles vs. sourcing issues

I'm interested in restructuring and neatening up some of the messier articles on Wikipedia. I find it frustrating that seemingly 86.9% (arbitrary guesstimate) of the articles in the cleanup category are there because of sourcing issues. Now that there's already a project for reference fascists, could we restrict what gets dumped into that category to neatness/organization/readability issues? Bacchiad 15:05, 5 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Can I echo this? I've been going through this list taking off old/deleted requests, and quite a few articles only seem to have "citations/refs" as an issue - can we tag these with {{unref}} and take them off our list? Cricketgirl 22:11, 15 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Stubs

Why are there stubs being tagged with this template? Does anyone believe that it is useful to do this? I would think this should only be used on substantial articles.--BirgitteSB 18:44, 10 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

agreed--the criteria for cleanup do not apply. Per WP:ATUB, they just have to show identification and some indication of notability. They do not have to be sourced. Please stop tagging them. And perhaps someone can go through with a bot or something and remove our tags from the stubs. DGG (talk) 04:24, 18 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Minor glitch

There appears to be a "barcode" of vertical lines (|) at the top of the page - can whoever's fingers in a twist be untangled. Jackiespeel 15:46, 16 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

What's the difference between "copyeding" and normal "editing"?

Seriously, I can't figure it out. --Arctic Gnome (talk • contribs) 02:47, 5 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Copyediting is the process of improving the English of an article - style of writing, spelling, punctuation, tone etc. Editing is the Wikipedia name for modifying an article. Cricketgirl 15:45, 15 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]