Talk:List of glossaries

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Wouldn't it be simpler to let 'glossary' describe what a glossary *is*?

Then it would not be necessary to use the term w:core glossary and defining dictionary all over the place, as is necessary as long as 'glossary' as such is redirected to the wikipedia list of glossaries.

This is not terrible, but it's something that should be a policy decision, not an accident. The idea of 'glossary' itself has a history and can't simply be ignored.

Absolutely. I think it was me that made the page glossary into a redirect to here -- my intention was that this was just a temporary measure until glossary actually got an article written -- Tarquin

Contents 1 Wikipedia Glossary 2 Don't panic 3 Glossary article is missing 4 Removal of references section 5 Mass deletion/move of glossaries to Wiktionary?

[edit] Wikipedia Glossary

Shouldn't wikipedia's glossary be more accessible. I think it would be likely people will want that glossary so they will do a search for "glossary" and get this page. Thus I propose a link at the top of this article where the wikipedia glossary can be found. Anyone disagree?

[edit] Don't panic

Despite my draconian edit just now (removing everything but the incidental links), nothing on this page has really been lost. The links that were to actual glossaries are now at Category:Glossaries and most of the others were links to lists of technology terms from Federal Standard 1037C, many of which are listed in Category:Lists of terms. - dcljr 08:20, 25 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Well, I have argued in the past that lists have advantages over categories (e.g. ability to annotate, to add red links, to use redirect titles and so on); and that there should at least be a presumption that lists and categories run in parallel.

Charles Matthews 08:53, 25 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Okay, but:

1. these links were not annotated (apart from the mention of Federal Standard 1037C), nor did they have "redirect titles" (I assume you mean "piped" links?)
2. you can add red links to the source of the category page itself; I've seen this done
3. given the two above points, I'm not sure I see the purpose of the duplication, especially when you consider how unwieldy list pages can get (harder to manage, IMO)

I do acknowledge one advantage that you didn't list (unless this is what you meant by "annotate"): subcategorization on the same page (e.g., the sections ==History==, etc.). Subcateg. is, of course, possible on categ pages, but not so you can see the article titles in the subcateg's all at once. - dcljr 19:30, 25 Oct 2004 (UTC)

"Related changes" doesn't work on categories, as it would on this page. Thus I'd leave this page in addition to the category (good work on that BTW). -- User:Docu

I made detailed arguments about this on the mailing list a while back. For example, if I want to spin out a sub-list from a list, it's a quick edit to do it, rather than changing categories on dozens of pages. So I'm not in general sympathetic to arguments about 'duplication'; wikis handle functional duplication rather well. Charles Matthews 21:03, 25 Oct 2004 (UTC)

I've restored the list of glossaries to this page; it still doesn't include the Technology section since those weren't glossaries, but I did include a link to Federal Standard 1037C in See also in case someone is looking for it here. - dcljr 22:09, 26 Oct 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Glossary article is missing

Currently the entry on glossary just redirects to this entry. I suppose that there should be an entry for glossary. See also Ontology_(computer_science) Hirzel 11:34, 10 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Removal of references section

I would strongly suggest that we put back the Reference section. Wiktionary is a sister project of Wikipedia. If people feel strongly that the items here should be all at Wikipedia, then we can move the GFDL contents over here to Wikipedia with no problem. The point of any page is to be a resource to our visitors, and removing relevant content is not necessary, imho. Brettz9 04:16, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

I removed those items because they weren't glossaries. Lists of terms don't belong here, no matter how useful they are. Also, if some topic belongs in Wikipedia, then all you have to do is create an article. Rfrisbie^talk 12:08, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

But if they link to definitions, I respectfully don't see any real difference--it's just a matter of display. As far as duplication, I personally think all of the work here should instead be moved to Wiktionary (albeit with a place for links to lead to Wiktionary), since that is the place which Wikimedia has set aside for short definitions. There is a lot of work going over at Wiktionary that I don't think needs to be duplicated (assuming Wiktionary is not going to be merged into Wikipedia given the tendency of people to want to bring everything into Wikipedia). Brettz9 08:19, 19 October 2006 (UTC)

At least from the perspective of Wikipedia, the difference is between a "list of terms" (see Category:Lists of terms), intended for words linked to articles (if they're "mislabeled," they're in the glossary), and a glossary (see Category:Glossaries), intended for words and their definitions in the same place. It's a simple yet clear distinction. These Wikipedia:Contents pages are going through a major cleanup (see Wikipedia talk:Contents) to remove "off topic" links for given pages. Since Wikipedia is not a dictionary, I think the distinction should be maintained. At most, I believe Wictionary should be linked from the See also section, which it is. Rfrisbie^talk 12:27, 19 October 2006 (UTC)

This collection of glossaries definitely belongs here in Wikipedia. I don't know if this is being repeated elsewhere, but there is an attempt to remove textile manufacturing terminology to Wiktionary, and once one goes, the rest may follow. Noisy | Talk 10:37, 21 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Mass deletion/move of glossaries to Wiktionary?

• List of Basic English core words
• Textile manufacturing terminology
• Glossary of sexual slurs
• Bicycling terminology
• more?

are all up for AfD/copy/move to wiktionary. It seems to be being coordinated by Dmcdevit, who's an admin and arb-com member so presummably knows what he's doing and has done the relevant background investigation/reading, but I'd still kinda like to see a longer discussion on the topic of glossaries as a whole, before they get moved piecemeal across. Plus, if there is consensus to move, then a mass-move discussion would be easier anyway.

Older formal discussion was at Wikipedia:Deletion policy/Lists of words, which does seem to agree with the moves. See also: Category talk:Glossaries

Glossary of graph theory is identified as one worth keeping at Wikipedia by the nom here.

Personally, I see glossaries as being part of the "almanac" aspect of Wikipedia, and would much prefer that they all stay here.

The main value in keeping them here, is allowing people to browse more easily, from article to glossary to article to glossary etc. Much like how the lists of basic topics subset of articles work, or how navboxes like {{sem}} work, giving an overview of a topic in various condensed ways.

The main argument against moving them across, is browsing between them is hard: 1) It's currently quite a jarring, unbalanced, and complicated experience to browse back and forth between wikipedia and wiktionary. 2) Different links will be unavailable or up-to-date at each site (eg some of the redlinks at wikt:Transwiki:Textile manufacturing terminology are never going to have dictionary entries). 3) Moving these glossaries to wiktionary will isolate them from the groups of articles they form a useful part of.

But I don't know much about Wiktionary (and I'm under the impression that WiktionaryZ might supercede it somewhat-soon? I hope so, it looks fantastic), so I'm trying not to be too stubborn about it all :) Thoughts? --Quiddity 19:04, 21 October 2006 (UTC)

I'm opposed to the principle of removing glossaries from Wikipedia. When I see an actual glossary, that also links to the corresponding articles on the block, I'll weigh in on keeping it. Rfrisbie^talk 01:00, 23 October 2006 (UTC)

The whole point of a glossary is to provide a list of terms relevant to a subject. Yes they are short defintions such as you might find in a dictionary, and on their own would be candidates for wiktionary no question. However, if you decompose all of these glossaries and place the terms alphabetically into a dictionary, what happens to the link between the group of words and the subject to which they relate? I think that a glossary is an important part of the definition of a subject. If you want to obtain general knowledge of a field, then a look at the terminology used within it will get you a long way there. SilentC 01:39, 23 October 2006 (UTC)

I'm also opposed to removing glossaries from wikipedia and I have started a discussion on this issue at Wikipedia_talk:What_Wikipedia_is_not#Glossaries. Luigizanasi 04:38, 23 October 2006 (UTC)