Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Belfast

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Contents

[edit] Two Really Helpful Pages

These two pages should be THE most helpful pages with regard to both assessing and improving Belfast-related articles on Wikipedia:

[edit] A start

The Mathbot is working. It catalogues the Belfast-related articles that have the WPBelfast tag added to their talk pages.

The Comments aren't working yet, but I hope to get this sorted with a little help from User:Kingboyk and User:Lar who have worked extensively on the very complex Beatles Project. My thanks to them both for help and guidance in setting up my second WikiProject: Belfast.

This project page needs a lot of tidying up, which I will do over the next couple of weeks. Much of what I have done is to 'steal' ideas and layouts from other, similar projects and edit them. After this I created many categories and useful pages related to the project.

All the articles in the main page of Category:Belfast have now had the {{WPBelfast}} template added to their talk pages. Some of these have been assesed by me, but the vast majority have not.

If nothing else, I think at this stage it is important to tag all the remaining Belfast-related articles with the template on their talk pages. You can do that when you are editing an article, or you can work your way through the list of categories - what ever works for you.

After that, we can get around to assessing each article based on quality (FA status, Good Article status, B-class, Start, Stub etc) and on importance (Top, High, Mid, Low).

An example of how to do this is:

{{WPBelfast|class=Stub|importance=High}}

.. if you want to assess the article as merely a stub, but with high importance relative to the scope of this project.

Note that:

{{WPBelfast||importance=Low}}

.. marks the article as having low importance, but it is still unassessed for quality (and will be added to the unassessed category by the Mathbot. While...

{{WPBelfast|class=Start}}

.. marks the article as having a start quality, but leaves the importance rating unassessed.

Comments as to what needs improving in the article can be added if you wish. To do this, add a subpage /Comments to the main article, type your assessment there and sign it with the four tildes (~~~~).

What we end up with is this page: Wikipedia:Version 1.0 Editorial Team/Belfast articles by quality. This is the page we will be working from to help us improve, keep track of, re-assess and organise all articles relating to Belfast.

What we are most concerned with at the minute, is adding the tag to the talk pages. After that, you should look on that page for articles which haven't been assessed yet, and assess them. The ultimate goal is to move each article up the scale, from Stub up to A-class (and higher, if possible).

I will be adding more guides and tidying up everything so that everyone should instantly know what they can do with this project, and how useful a tool it can be in collating and collaborating. Once you get used to it, its really very simple! :)

--Mal 01:41, 23 August 2006 (UTC)


Sounds excellent, I'll give this some dedication. Just a few comments..
" Update all {{infobox Belfast place}} templates to use include the new mapping function. "
Being the Locator map? There is one I have created a while back for Greater Belfast, is this the one in mind? Template:Location map Greater Belfast (See: Gilnahirk)
" Add new Template:Belfast history navigational template to the top of all Belfast-history related articles. "
I notice this template hasn't been created yet. I shall create or is there something in mind?. If there is an image needed for the Belfast history template, I'd be more than happy to get my walking shoes on and get the camera out. Just let me know.
--Dom0803 13:30, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

I copied the blurb from the Adelaide project and the London project. I've not got around to checking out all the links when I changed the references from London or Adelaide to Belfast.. though I left them there as a guide to see what may be of use later.

I'd suggest taking a look at the London one and copying the structure there as best as possible.

As for the map - I left that there too, and I remember you having mentioned that you're into mapping. Again, probably a good idea to look at the London version for a guide and for a bit of standardisation/consistancy.

Welcome aboard mate! :)

Thanks. I'll take a look at those links and familiarise myself with the workings. --Dom0803 15:36, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Queen's University

I was thinking of adding Queen's University as a landmark as it's shown quite often in websites related to northern ireland. Wikisquared 20:52, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

Sounds good to me. --Mal 01:49, 25 August 2006 (UTC)

It hasn't worked... when i edited the landmarks on this page my edit didn't show... could anyone else add this? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Wikisquared (talkcontribs).

Looks like you fixed it. :) --Mal 01:26, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Roads in Belfast

Can someone help me fix the articles?? --TheM62Manchester 10:39, 26 August 2006 (UTC)

It would be helpful to list the articles in question here maybe. There doesn't seem to be a structure regarding roads in Belfast (or is there?). If there were enough articles with comprehensive and notable material in them, then perhaps a main article and a category could be created for either Belfast roads or Roads in Northern Ireland. You'd have to be careful what you call the article, and the scope of it though - see Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Main Roads of Belfast for reasons to object to such an article.

I'd be glad to help out though. --Mal 21:00, 26 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Auto peer review semi-bot

I've used semi-automatic javascript which some kind editor has coded for Wikipedia to review selected Belfast-related articles. The script churns out some generic tips on how to help improve articles to Featured Article status, so I've used it and included the output on the talk pages of a few of the more highly-rated (currently) project's articles:

--Mal 06:44, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Belfast history template

I created a little something in my sandbox, as it still hadn't been created... useable? Feel free to edit it. User:Dom0803/Sandbox Unfortunatley there's no decent pictures of RMS Titanic to stick in it (possibly our most famous historical piece?), so instead I used the picture of the city hall in construction. I was going to use Samson and Goliath, but to be quite frank (shirley anyone?), they've played absolutely no part in our history.. nothing substantial enough to be considered a great piece of history anyway. They're mearly a landmark for being big and bright yellow. --Dom0803 21:45, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

I think that besides being a landmark on the Belfast City 'skyline', they were also notable at one point as being the largest cranes in Europe or something. They've certainly been handy in the past for giving people employment because of their combined power of weight-lifting. I prefer your choice of the city hall in construction though - the cranes were built around 1970 I think.. but the construction of Belfast City Hall is a lot older.
I had a quick look at the template. Hopefully our images legislation guru, Stu can tell us something about the copyright problem. --Mal 01:36, 2 September 2006 (UTC)
BTW - I'm not sure how useful the template will actually be, but I've not looked at the Adelaide project to see how they use their one.
.. and I've just noticed that Belfast has been successful as the Wikipedia:WikiProject UK geography's collaboration of the month. For anyone who's interested in helping to get the article up to FAC standard, there are many resources and a guide available on the Geography project page. --Mal 01:52, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Userbox

How about establishing a userbox for this project, such as the one at the Croatia project? Cordless Larry 17:09, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

There is one. ;)
{{User WPBelfast}}
You fancy joining in with this and/or the Northern Ireland Project? --Mal 17:16, 3 September 2006 (UTC)
Sure. I created an article for St George's Market today, so that's a start. Cordless Larry 17:21, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Discussion from main page

  • Greater Belfast - I redone most of this article.. it still needs a lot of work. I'm going to write a bit about the industrial estate, and some of its other features, such as Makro, Musgrave Cash & Carry, etc etc. I believe this article should have a rather high importance to this project. --Dom0803 15:40, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
    • Hey guys. Good work so far. If you see any Belfast articles that haven't been tagged yet, please put the tag on their talk pages. So far 650 articles relating to Belfast have been tagged. A simple guide if you have any doubts is to 'tag it anyway at this stage: we can always untag articles when we go to assess them.
    • Just a reminder that this page should serve as a guide. The project hasn't been fully set up yet, and I will be adding pages which we can put notifications in this form. I think this section here should basically just list newly-created articles - no signatures or comments. Otherwise this page will become very large and convoluted. There's going to be a log page and various other pages within the next couple of days, and I'll let you know when I've created them. Let's keep this as it is for now though, and then we can move this discussion to another page later. --Mal 01:01, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] {{infobox Belfast place}}

I'd like to add the infobox to an article or two, but I don't know how! I know by putting in {{infobox Belfast place}} that it'll pop up, but I have no idea how to enter the custom fields! Usually I have to rip them from other articles, but I don't know of any with it, plus I'd like to learn how to do it myself without ripping other articles. --Dom0803 12:24, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

Dom try User:Setanta747/grid_test and feel free to muck about with it. :) --Mal 17:40, 5 September 2006 (UTC)
That'll do! Thanks. --Dom0803 12:15, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Pubs and bars

I noticed the are articles on the Northern Whig and the Crown Bar. How about one for the Kitchen Bar? Given that in its old location it was Belfast's oldest pub, I think it's worthy of mention. Cordless Larry 22:18, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

Wasn't that the oldest in Ireland until it was paid to move from Arthur square? -- but anyway, after it moved it didn't have the oldest bar status anymore. I may be thinking of a different one though. --Dom0803 14:39, 7 September 2006 (UTC)
The Brazen head is the oldest in Ireland. It was standing when Belfast was a twinkle in the Farset's eye! --Himselfetc 17:02, 7 September 2006 (UTC)
The articles on Kitchen Bar and Brazen Head do not exist yet. If anyone knows even a little about these pubs, please start stub articles on them. I have added both of these to the Wikipedia:WikiProject Belfast/Missing articles page. --Mal 01:06, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Tagging talk pages and assessing articles

Wikipedia Assessments within AWB. Click on the image to see it in better resolution
Wikipedia Assessments within AWB. Click on the image to see it in better resolution

Hi. If you still have work to do tagging talk pages and assessing articles, my AWB plugin might be of interest to you.

The plugin has two main modes of operation:

  • Tagging talk pages, great for high-speed tagging
  • Assessments mode, for reviewing articles (pictured)

As of the current version, WikiProjects with simple "generic" templates are supported by the plugin without the need for any special programatic support by me. I've had a look at your project's template and you seem to qualify.

For more information see:

Hope that helps. If you have any questions or find any bugs please let me know on the plugin's talk page. --Kingboyk 11:59, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Project directory

Hello. The WikiProject Council has recently updated the Wikipedia:WikiProject Council/Directory. This new directory includes a variety of categories and subcategories which will, with luck, potentially draw new members to the projects who are interested in those specific subjects. Please review the directory and make any changes to the entries for your project that you see fit. There is also a directory of portals, at User:B2T2/Portal, listing all the existing portals. Feel free to add any of them to the portals or comments section of your entries in the directory. The three columns regarding assessment, peer review, and collaboration are included in the directory for both the use of the projects themselves and for that of others. Having such departments will allow a project to more quickly and easily identify its most important articles and its articles in greatest need of improvement. If you have not already done so, please consider whether your project would benefit from having departments which deal in these matters. It is my hope that all the changes to the directory can be finished by the first of next month. Please feel free to make any changes you see fit to the entries for your project before then. If you should have any questions regarding this matter, please do not hesitate to contact me. Thank you. B2T2 17:34, 25 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] SFD notification

This message is to notify you that 2 stub templates and categories that are associated with this WikiProject ({{Belfast-stub}}, Cat:Belfast stubs, {{Belfast-geo-stub}}, and Cat:Belfast geography stubs) is up for deletion at WP:SFD. Please join the discussion. Thanks. ~ Amalas rawr =^_^= 19:09, 12 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Wikipedia Day Awards

Hello, all. It was initially my hope to try to have this done as part of Esperanza's proposal for an appreciation week to end on Wikipedia Day, January 15. However, several people have once again proposed the entirety of Esperanza for deletion, so that might not work. It was the intention of the Appreciation Week proposal to set aside a given time when the various individuals who have made significant, valuable contributions to the encyclopedia would be recognized and honored. I believe that, with some effort, this could still be done. My proposal is to, with luck, try to organize the various WikiProjects and other entities of wikipedia to take part in a larger celebrartion of its contributors to take place in January, probably beginning January 15, 2007. I have created yet another new subpage for myself (a weakness of mine, I'm afraid) at User talk:Badbilltucker/Appreciation Week where I would greatly appreciate any indications from the members of this project as to whether and how they might be willing and/or able to assist in recognizing the contributions of our editors. Thank you for your attention. Badbilltucker 21:13, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] To-Do...

Hundreds of articles still need assessed. I don't know how many other people are helping with this, but I seem to have not only created this project, the NI project, the noticeboard, the portal and all the pages associated with each of those, but I seem to have tagged nearly all of the articles in both projects, I'm the only one who rotates any of the featured articles, bios and pictures, and I seem to have been virtually the only editor who has assessed any of the articles.

The reason I set all this up was to make it easier to keep track of what needed to be done so that other editors could use the projects as a guide or, if they'd finished working on one article and found themselves stuck with something to do, could refer to the projects to see which articles interest them.

I know there aren't that many editors from Northern Ireland on Wikipedia, or even that many interested in editing Northern Irish articles, but I know a few of you exist. I also know, from my short stint of experience in helping out the good people at The Beatles Project that a small number of editors were able to make a huge difference. So, if any of you could be arsed, I'd sure love some feedback here.

Are the projects useful? Do you use them? Have you got any suggestions to make using the projects/assessment templates easier etc? Prior to reading this, were you aware of either the Belfast WikiProject, the Northern Ireland WikiProject, the NIW Noticeboard, or the NI Portal? Which subpages do you refer to, if any?

Here's where we are with regard to the Belfast WikiProject: Wikipedia:WikiProject Belfast/Log.

The collection of articles that are tagged as being part of the Belfast project includes one Featured Article: RMS Titanic. It also includes one Good Article: Linfield F.C., and 36 B-Class articles.

Whether I get any help or not, I'm planning on attempting to get the GA up to A or FA standard, and the B-Class articles up to GA, but it would sure be a lot easier if there were other people out there who wanted to see these articles improved on the 'pedia.

There are also still 536 articles unassessed - there could be a couple more FAs in there, or A-class or GAs.

Help!

--Mal 23:48, 20 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Stupid question

I was looking at the St. Peter's Cathedral, Belfast, and clicking on the "what links here" button revealed, [1], I assume it is a template problem, I just can't see it, can someone advise? Fasach Nua 16:03, 1 February 2007 (UTC)

I'm not sure what you're asking here tbh. I can see a lot of talk pages linked to the article though. If that's the problem, as you see it, then I can explain it. The Belfast Project's template includes a task list which, at the minute, includes the St Peter's article. So each page that has been tagged with the template must therefore point to the St Peter's article (as well as another 15 articles so far as I can tell).
If you remove the St Peter article from the Belfast tasks template temporarily, you should be able to see a what links here list which is unfettered by all the tagged talk pages. Please remember to put the article back on the list when you've finished though. Hope that helps. --Mal 18:09, 9 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Gerry Storey

I found some details on Gerry while looking for some other information I needed, and thought he'd be worth creating an article about. There's not that much information available online about him, but it's likely he's received coverage in the national and local press, so wondered if anyone could help expand it or add missing information like his birth year etc? Thanks. One Night In Hackney 12:27, 17 February 2007 (UTC)

Added all that I felt I could. Hopefully someone who knows more about him can add more to this distinguished man's article. Thanks for adding it - keep up the good work. I left you a reply on my talk page btw. --Mal 14:51, 17 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Methodist College Belfast

Hi. I have been trying to clean up this article, taking out POV, exagerations and plain untruths. However certain wikipedians are just shovelling them back in. Thanks.--ZincBelief 00:08, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

Without having looked at the article in question, a first step in resolving this might be to remove the information you consider to be wrong, and ask for a citation before the information is reinserted, both in your edit comment and on the article's discussion page. --Mal 07:23, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Infobox flag straw poll

Hello fellow editors. A straw poll has opened today (27th March 2007) regarding the use of flags on the United Kingdom place infoboxes. There are several potential options to use, and would like as many contrubutors to vote on which we should decide upon. The straw poll is found here. If joining the debate, please keep a cool head and remain civil. We look forward to seeing you there. Jhamez84 11:50, 27 March 2007 (UTC)