Category talk:Messier objects

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[edit] sorting

I had been adding sort keys to the individual Messier objects' articles, but then I realized that they won't be in order without leading zeros (example: M10 would be [[Category:Messier objects|010]]). Is this better, or would it be too confusing for some readers to see most of the articles listed under "0"? Ardric47 20:34, 8 April 2006 (UTC)

• That's a good idea. It's how it's done with other categories (Category:HD and HDE objects, etc). 132.205.44.134 02:32, 11 April 2006 (UTC)
  • The sorting is a mess. Crab Neubla is sorted under "1" for instance. They should either all be sorted under their numbers even if it means having the order be 1-10-11-2-20 etc. or they should all be sorted under either their name (Crab Nebula) or if not available like (Globular cluster MXX for instance.--Kalsermar 18:23, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

We can do both, using categories on redirects. Every named object should have a redirect from it's code, and we can add that page to the category with the number as a sort key. SeventyThree^(Talk) 14:39, 29 April 2006 (UTC)

That sounds good, but I'm worried that it might cause confusion about how many Messier objects there are. Obviously, one could check the page Messier object, but then they might wonder why there are twice as many members... Ardric47 00:33, 30 April 2006 (UTC)

Split the category into two? Category:Messier objects by name and Category:Messier objects by number or something, and leave a note at the top of the by-name category mentioning that it is not a complete list (since not all the objects have names). SeventyThree^(Talk) 01:13, 30 April 2006 (UTC)

Excellent! But are we allowed to do that? Ardric47 02:34, 30 April 2006 (UTC)

Be bold, I guess - I can't really see this being controversial. I'm going to wait a few days for more comments before I start, in case somebody has a better idea. Do you think that we should use this category as a parent for the two I mentioned above, or use this as the main cat and have a subcat for named objects? SeventyThree^(Talk) 12:57, 30 April 2006 (UTC)

I think that this should be the main one and Category:Messier objects by number, the one with sortkeys, should be a subcategory. Ardric47 02:54, 1 May 2006 (UTC)

There is no point to create duplicate categories. The proposed way (e.g. [[Category:Messier objects|010]] for M10) is the way to go. This catalog is so short that dropping the first zero(s) doesn't much mess the ordering. But if you're sorting the NGC or HD numbers, zeroes should be there because they'll be eventually thousands of articles.--Jyril 06:38, 1 May 2006 (UTC)

The problem with that is that some articles don't have the M# in the title. If we change them to sort by number only, then it's going to be hard to find Ring Nebula without knowing the M#. Conversly, since the M# isn't mentioned in the article title it's going to be hard to find an article by M# if you don't realise that it's filed under a name. Bode's Galaxy and Cigar Galaxy are currently filed under 8, but there's no way of telling which one is M82 without looking at them both.

I'm neutral on the zeros - it'll be a bit surprising if you're not expecting it, but it is quite logical. SeventyThree^(Talk) 11:43, 1 May 2006 (UTC)

Well, I for one, expect that a Messier object category should be sorted by a Messier key and not some other sort of key, like common name. It seems to work well the the Bayer and Flamsteed designations (category|constellation, designator) 132.205.45.148 04:00, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

It works fairly well, but that's partly because the articles have more consistant names. There are still some problmes though - in Category:Bayer objects, for example, g Carinae is hard to find. The article is sorted by "Carina, g" as seems standard for the category, but there's nothing in that section of the category to tell me which of the several "HD xxxxx" entries it is.

Having thought about this a bit more, I don't think 2 categories is a good idea because it will isolate named articles from the numbered ones. For Messier objects, we could sort the "M xx" acticles by number (redirect of not), and then add the non-redirects to the category with the article name as a sort key? SeventyThree^(Talk) 20:24, 13 May 2006 (UTC)

I'm going to go ahead and do this category, since it's fairly small. I'll undo if necessary. SeventyThree^(Talk) 12:05, 18 May 2006 (UTC)