Wikipedia talk:GLAM/National Maritime Museum

Reliable source

In regards to the question posed on the main page, I don't see any reason why this information wouldn't be a RS. A summary of a ship's service history based on archival records assembled/interpreted by experts on the topic should definitely be a RS, unless there's a significant underlying problem with the records (which I suspect is very unlikely). Nick-D (talk) 22:57, 25 February 2011 (UTC)

Glad to hear it. Hopefully we can establish a consensus about this at the beginning of the project, rather than halfway through. I've updated the page with a sample of the data in its original format, here: Wikipedia:GLAM/NMM/Sample data The Land (talk) 09:41, 26 February 2011 (UTC)

That looks pretty useful. Nick-D (talk) 09:47, 26 February 2011 (UTC)

I don't have any doubts that NMM is a reliable source. I'm more interested to know whether there are precedents in which reliable sources are published under a Wikipedia-compatible licence, and the content is copied verbatim into Wikipedia. What should we then do about citation and attribution? --Deryck C. 12:53, 26 February 2011 (UTC)

There is some precedent for incorporating material from DANFS (the basic method is {{DANFS}}) and the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica (using {{1911}} and derivatives). It should be no problem to create a similar system of templates for this material. Parsecboy (talk) 14:48, 26 February 2011 (UTC)

Yes, that would be a good idea. A template would also help track the use of the material. Something along the lines of {{cite DANFS}} could be used to support inline citations. Though do note that this information, unlike DANFS, is not presented in a prose format - it is rather more like a timeline with a set of date / event pairs for each ship. A bit of human effort is needed to convert it into prose. The Land (talk) 16:16, 26 February 2011 (UTC)

Given that the material here is generally fragments of sentences, it's not going to be directly included in the prose of articles like the material from DANFS and the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica was, so I'm not sure that a template is needed or would be helpful - it seems to me that the best way to handle this is to reference the NMM data when it's used. It's probably worth noting that the decision to incorporate prose from DANFS and the Encyclopedia Britannica verbatim is now often regarded as a mistake given the problems with this material (DANFS being biased and full of inaccuracies and the 1911 EB being out of date). Nick-D (talk) 22:24, 26 February 2011 (UTC)

Indeed - however, not *every* fact included with NMM material will get an inline citation, so a template is probably still a good idea...? The Land (talk) 16:05, 27 February 2011 (UTC)

I haven't marked myself as a participant but I am probably a fellow traveller with your ideals. I see the base DANFS template as more a tag saying "don't blank me this isn't a copyvio" than a constructive template. Most of the time I've seen it, it doesn't have the optional parameter that identifies which part of DANFS the text comes from. GraemeLeggett (talk) 12:17, 1 March 2011 (UTC)

Photos

Have just suggested we can make use of some existing Flickr Commons photos from the NMM while we're still sorting the details of the data out - anyone up for it? The Land (talk) 13:57, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

Sound like a good idea - I've just added a NMM photo to Hornpipe. Is the NMM interested in donating photos to Wikicommons? Commons:State Library of Queensland provides a recent (and very successful) model for this. Nick-D (talk) 23:59, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

It might be worthwhile to point out a benefit such a donation can provide to the NMM. The Bundesarchiv donation from 2008 resulted in hundreds of corrections to caption information and the like. Having dozens of knowledgeable eyes on these pictures will help correct errors that undoubtedly lurk in the NMM collection. BB-PB (talk) 01:54, 19 March 2011 (UTC)

Oddly enough I have mentioned the subject ;-) They aren't interested at the moment; though the more good examples of wiki collaborations there are, the easier it will be to persuade people to take part in future. The Land (talk) 14:57, 19 March 2011 (UTC)

The Flickr search facility is very so-so. This is partly because of the wording of the captions. You really need to do an initial browse of the lot.

It is a pity the scans are so small. A £240 scanner could just as easily have produced much larger pictures.

There are some photos of the steam line-of-battle ships as hulks or when being broken up. Lambert's Battleships in Transition has the breaking up photos, and has better captions for them. I felt very sad looking at the photos of the Edgar, Hannibal and Duke of Wellington being broken up. The photos of the gun deck of the Atlas when she was a hospital ship are interesting.--Toddy1 (talk) 15:10, 19 March 2011 (UTC)

Quite agree re the Flickr search; if many of the images end up on Commons with better metadata, then all the better ... The Land (talk) 16:33, 19 March 2011 (UTC)

Also, yes, they are quite small - but much better than nothing... I've retouched one of the photos with the worst damage, see [1] here. The Land (talk) 20:10, 19 March 2011 (UTC)

I am interested in this effort. I've added Sir Walter Raleigh's House at Blackwall to Commons and placed it in a couple of articles. - PKM (talk) 19:19, 20 March 2011 (UTC)

And File:North landing, Flamborough Head, Yorkshire.jpg. - PKM (talk) 20:12, 20 March 2011 (UTC)

Remember to check for duplicate images already on Commons - I found this image on the Flickr list, which was already uploaded here (though without a source). Parsecboy (talk) 23:01, 20 March 2011 (UTC)

Housekeeping

I'm happy help with project page setup, templates, userboxes, navboxes, and other housekeeping when you're ready. - PKM (talk) 20:47, 20 March 2011 (UTC)

Suggest this retouched image for project templates. - PKM (talk) 00:23, 21 March 2011 (UTC)

Status update

Do we have a status update on where things are going right now?Sadads (talk) 17:38, 22 April 2011 (UTC)

Ping, Sadads (talk) 10:47, 22 May 2011 (UTC)

Yup. :-D The Land (talk) 15:03, 30 July 2011 (UTC)

Template:WarshipHist

I've added a hidden tracking category to {{WarshipHist}} and started some documentation for it. Andy Mabbett (User:Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 16:41, 30 July 2011 (UTC)

When there is nothing to add to an article from the NMM data I don't add the template. This means that any census of articles showing the template will not reveal which Wikipedia articles have been checked and then left unmodified.Acad Ronin (talk) 12:34, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

Data limitations

1) Spot checking I have found at least one case of vessel not in the database. HMS Grinder was a tender to HMS Anholt, but does not seem to have gotten into the files. Similarly HMS Dolphin (1813) does not appear to be in the data. I suspect that we will find other cases of ad hoc tenders on distant stations that never showed up in UK records. 2) Spot checking some dimensions, I found that with respect to HMS Anacreon (1799) that the dimensions from Winfield appear to be more complete, and more precise. I would use the Winfield data over the NMM data when both exist.Acad Ronin (talk) 18:46, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Acad - I have moved your comment onto the talk page, I hope that's ok. In terms of your points;

Of course.

The NMM don't claim this data is entirely complete - though given the size of it, it is fairly complete.

There clearly is info not in Colledge, Winfield, or the Naval Chronicle. I had hopes of finally solving some minor puzzles. I suspect that I will solve some, but other questions will remain open forever. Acad Ronin (talk) 21:12, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Dimensions - I would probably defer to Winfield regarding dimensions as well - or, indeed, any other source of equivalent quality.

So thank you on both counts! Regards, The Land (talk) 19:43, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

As I check the NMM data against what is in ship articles I have worked on, I am finding that there are many errors in the NMM data, including mixing of two separate vessels in one record, wrong years for vessels (the year in the NMM data may be the commissioning year or the year of construction, rather than the year of launch), wrong names for vessels, etc. One must use the NMM data with a great deal of caution.Acad Ronin (talk) 12:31, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

Hmmm. Interesting. Re the year - that is something important to note but it's a question of how the fields are defined rather than being an error. The problems with names or conflation of two separate ships are more concerning.

Interestingly enough from the NMM's point of view an assurance that the Wikipedia article is already better than the info they already have is quite valuable. And from our point of view, if down the line the NMM tell people "actually, all the research we've culled from our archive is already in Wikipedia" - which potentially is where this is going - that's very good for us. So please do keep up the good work. :-D The Land (talk) 14:14, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

It will be along while before all the info in the NMM database will be in Wikipedia, but we will keep plugging away. Regards, Acad Ronin (talk) 15:43, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

HMS Piercer (1804)

As being mainly active in the German WP I am interesetd to contribute to ships having served in both countries. I do, however, not intend to add my name to the contributors list as I will only from time to time be able to write articles. With my first piece on HMS Piercer (1804) I accidentally started with a ship not yet in the NMM data base. I din't really understand the different examples on HMS Dragon on this projekt page. Therefore, I'm not sure whether the NMM-template is correctly applied as the article does not contain data from the NMM but only from other sources. So, I would appreciate if some expert looked into my article. --KuK (talk) 12:38, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

Hi KuK. If an article does not contain information from the NMM data, then the template should not be applied. It is there as an attribution template - I have removed it. However, thanks for your work! Regards, The Land (talk) 13:28, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

Linking IDs to articles to help update NMM info?

Question: at the 'end' of this project, is the NMM going to collect up data we've added to tagged article and re-add it to their databases, and if so, what kind of information would they be taking, and how will they be taking it?

I'm asking in particular because I'm looking at volume XII, which contains a lot of entries for RAN ships, but am finding that the data we have in these cases far outstrips the NMM, or contains errors (such as HMAS Burdekin (K376) being entered as Burdeken, or the place of construction for HMAS Bataan (I91) being misspelled as Cockntoo). I'm not particularly technically savvy, but perhaps this could be achieved by tagging articles somehow with the NMM vessel ID. Then, some kind of program/script could be written that at the very least takes infobox data if the database had a corresponding blank entry, or if they're feeling more confident, replacing misspelled/error/low-detail entries. This would vastly increase the information directly at the NMM's disposal. -- saberwyn 00:23, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

Yes, that is the plan. The NMM have made it clear that they want to make use of the outcomes of this project. They haven't said how or when, but of course, museums making use of Wikipedia information is very much to be encouraged :-D. In terms of how we get the data out - yes, we will need to set up a table with correspondences between the NMM Vessel IDs and the articles. I have the Vessel IDs, names, and dates in a CSV file. I don't have the required technical skills, if anyone reading this does, please could they shout.... The Land (talk) 11:45, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

I certainly don't, but perhaps someone at WP:BOTREQ does? Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 13:56, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

Gooood point: Wikipedia:Bot_requests#Matching_index_to_articles_bot_for_GLAM_outreach

Documents?

Hi, would it be possible to get the NMM to scan and upload several papers from Sir Eustace Tennyson d'Eyncourt, 1st Baronet? I'd be interested in DEY/9 and DEY/10 in the above link, if this is possible... pinging User:The Land. Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 07:00, 11 November 2013 (UTC)