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The following is an archived discussion of a featured article nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was not promoted by SandyGeorgia 23:24, 22 June 2010 [1].

Age of Discovery

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Age of Discovery (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

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Nominator(s): Uxbona (talk) 22:24, 14 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I am nominating this for featured article because I think it is now quite complete, giving an extensive and referenced view of historical occurrences crucial to understanding the early modern era and globalisation. There are several interesting articles related to the theme in different areas (such as economics, geography and even medicine) and the "Age of Discovery"/Exploration article helps with context. I thank any collaboration to help tune details. The topic is extensive, so tried to avoid excessive detail, and focus on exploration and travel, keeping the chronological order, to help understand the evolution of events often linked.Uxbona (talk) 22:24, 14 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]

  • Comment - It appears that two sources are broken; the Robert L. Hall link does not check out and neither does the scitizen link. There are no disambiguation links. ceranthor 02:15, 15 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks Cerantor: Hall and Scitizen links activated; hatnote with disambiguation done (assumed that was the issue)--Uxbona (talk) 20:54, 16 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you, corrected all the links. Hall's is not on-line now, but it his widely quoted, and got a link with limited access to the article; Re-connected Diamond, changing from the publisher's page to the wikipedia entry, which is quite informative, as the book itself its not readable on-line. --Uxbona (talk) 08:08, 15 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks. There's now another dead link to http://www.dedicatedwriters.com/pape Ucucha 16:03, 15 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry, now it links.--Uxbona (talk) 17:49, 15 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks again. Ucucha 17:54, 15 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Sources review: Considerable work is necessary on the References and Bibliography sections:-

  • References
    • Many of the short citations lack page numbers
    • None of the on-line citations are properly formatted (73, 74, 78, 82, 83, 84, 85, 89). See WP:CITE for information on citation formatting. It is essential that, in each case, the publisher and last retrieval date be given.
    • In some cases it is not clear what sources are being cited: Refs 2, 7, 75 for example
    • 18 is an unreferenced footnote which needs a source. It also needs to be corrected grammatically.
    • 82 is in Russian
    • 104: inadequate information - this book is not listed in the bibliography. We need author's full name, date of publication, publisher, ISBN if relevant and page number(s) cited.
    • Page ranges should be separated by endashes, not hyphens
  • Bibliography: Lack of consistency in entries: publishers omitted in some entries, missing ISBNs, unnecessary page range included. The Alvarez book is presumably in Spanish. Why are some online sources listed here but not others?

Also, I am a little concerned by your comment, above: "...Re-connected Diamond, changing from the publisher's page to the wikipedia entry, which is quite informative..." Does this mean that you are citing to a Wikipedia page? Brianboulton (talk) 16:00, 15 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Page ranges endashes: done.--Uxbona (talk) 20:54, 16 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you so much for careful review, Brianboulton: will correct it; I've never meant citing wikipedia, just linked to the overview page about the book, as the book itself is not on-line. I can remove it if its misleading.--Uxbona (talk) 17:49, 15 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Further sources comments: Some but not all of my concerns have been addressed. There are many referencing issues that need to be settled before this article is ready for promotion. Outstanding matters:-

  • A number of short citations to books still lack page numbers, e.g 41, 42, 47 and no doubt others
      • Page numbers are there, but you need to be consistent about page number formats. In general you do not include a space after "p." but on several occasions a space is included, e.g. in refs 19, 21 and 52 (also others). Page ranges require "pp." (see 49, 71 and various others). Brianboulton (talk) 22:38, 21 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Although the formatting of online sources has improved, there are still numerous problems:-
    • "Exploiting the Earth": UC Davis is not the publisher of this site. Thar author, Richard Cowens, says "I am posting these here for your entertainment", and later syas that the material is "in various stages of readiness for a book in preparation." In these circumstances, can this source be considered reliable?
    • "History of Europe by Richard J. Mayne" is a combination of title and author. They need to be separated.
    • "Jacques Cartier": why is this Britannica online article formatted differently from the Richard Mayne article? Both should show author, title and publisher (Encyclopedia Britannica online)
    • "The Cabot Dilemma": it should be noted that this is obtainable through a subscription service.
    • Smithsonisn, being a magazine title, should be italicised.
    • Some of your web sources remain unformatted, for example ref 75, the three Russian rfs 79–81, and 87. It is not clear why these are not listed with the other web sources
    • Some of the retrieval dates look ancient, e.g. "14 January 2007". Has the site not been accessed for three years? Note: this point not addressed yet. Also:-
      • L'Histoire is a magazine and needs to be italicised
      • The "on subscription" message should be formatted consistently
      • What is the "The Northern Lights Route" entry that appears at the end of the list of online sources?
  • The long footnote, now ref 14, remains ungrammatical ("short" should be "shortly") and remains uncited to a source
  • Ref 79 (formerly 82) still not marked as in Russian
  • Still no details given of he Hochstrasser book, in ref. 102
  • Alvarez book still not marked as in Spanish. Same for the Garcia (1991) book
  • Loewen item lacks publisher and date information
  • The Mutch entry should state that this is from the journal of the Royal Australian Historical Society. Details are on the Gutenberg link page. "Project Gutenberg" is a facilitator, not the publisher, and should not be shown
  • A very small point: formatting of ISBN numbers needs to be consistent. In most cases you have used a straight sequence of digits, in others you have divided using hyphens.

Brianboulton (talk) 16:41, 17 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Short citations page numbers done.
Formatting of online sources done (souce Richard Cowens replaced)
Long footnote corrected and sourced
Ref 79 marked as in Russian
Details given to Hochstrasser book
Alvarez source removed as unverifiable, Garcia replaced
Loewen item lacks publisher and date information
Mutch entry corrected
ISBN numbers made consistent--Uxbona (talk) 00:10, 21 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks again Brianboulton, that really helps. I'm addressing issues point by point, when not able to find page numbers, searching for similar alternative sources, meanwhile formated isbn numbers, ref 101. Left russian sources because intend to find sources in English. Hope to adress it all.--Uxbona (talk) 23:35, 17 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Perhaps you would ping my talkpage when you are through, and I'll check again then. Brianboulton (talk) 18:37, 20 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Just a few outstanding points per above. Brianboulton (talk) 22:38, 21 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Page numbers made consistent: done.--Uxbona (talk) 08:42, 22 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment I love to see big topic FACs, but this needs a deal of polish and upgrading sources. The sentiment in the lead that "Along with the Renaissance and the rise of humanism, it was an important driver for the start of modern era, ushering in a new age of scientific and intellectual inquiry.[4]" is utterly unexceptional, and could be referenced to almost any historian, so why Walter Pater? Also there is an obvious grammatical error. I see other issues along both of these lines. Johnbod (talk) 00:48, 16 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks Johnbod: Walter Pater and redundant references removed in introduction.--Uxbona (talk) 20:54, 16 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Note - Please be specific on English grammar/syntax or, better - heaven, really - help improving it, as I'm not an English native speaker (actually I'm portuguese). I've asked for peer review before for this also, but, as in collaboration, it was scarce. Thanks.--Uxbona (talk) 08:25, 16 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Opppose and Comment - Interresting topic! I will probably not have time to review the whole article but a thing that struck me was that the lead is quite short compared to the length of the article. Could it be expanded? Esuzu (talk • contribs) 22:30, 20 June 2010 (UTC) Sorry but I have to oppose this per criterion 2c. There are very few inline citations, many more will be needed for this to acheive FA status. Esuzu (talk • contribs) 19:27, 21 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Additionally there seems to be missing a lot of inline citations. Many of the paragraphs does not even contain one single citation. I'm sorry but I don't think this is ready yet. Esuzu (talk • contribs) 22:32, 20 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I understand, and will add more references were needed. Please consider that most of the assertions in the article are present in any common history book: I didn't felt the need to reference data such as Columbus having reached the Americas in 1492, as it would be fastidious. Still, I will make an effort to better reference some other parts. About the lead section it can be slightly extended, to give a more detailed overview, although three to four paragraphs are the norm. Hope it helps you changing your view. Thanks--Uxbona (talk) 20:58, 21 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]
The lead probably won't be needed to be expanded that much but some would probably be good. Esuzu (talk • contribs) 11:37, 22 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.
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