Wikipedia talk:Stable versions/relation to other projects

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[edit] Making "featured articles" obselete

The following was recently added to the proposal by Zondor, who has been the main backer of this proposal: "Stable versions strongly intends to replace and supersede Featured Articles and obsolete its maintenance and removal processes." It is buried in a response to a possible objection and was added on this edit.

Laying aside the bad grammar ("versions…intends"? "obsolete" as a verb?), it makes me wonder: has this proposal been a Trojan horse all along? I completely disagree with this, and don't remember seeing it mentioned even once in the month or so we've been kicking this around. If that is, indeed the intent of this proposal, then I'm probably opposed to the proposal, and I apologize if my supportive remarks have been based on a misunderstanding. -- Jmabel | Talk 21:40, 31 December 2005 (UTC)

We sometimes refer to the stable versions proposal as "stable versions", which makes it a singular noun phrase, although it sounds odd.
Grammar aside, I agree that I don't think Stable versions would supplant Featured Articles in any way. They have entirely different purposes (FA exists primarily to select articles to display on the main page), and I assume FA would still have much higher standards than a stable version - otherwise stable versions would almost never be published. We have only a few hundred FAs. On the other hand, there is the question of whether we would feature the stable version or the working version of the featured article. Deco 22:04, 31 December 2005 (UTC)
Too strong of a statement retracted. The working versions should be shown first prominently, then stable versions. -- Zondor 01:52, 1 January 2006 (UTC)
Retraction gratefully appreciated. We're still on the same page, so to speak. -- Jmabel | Talk 02:07, 1 January 2006 (UTC)
You're welcome. Working version first because we don't want to lose that instant gratification. On the other hand, it should be stable version, because once the stable version is published, it is regarded as "complete" and is time to move on to other articles. -- Zondor 02:14, 1 January 2006 (UTC)
I also strongly disagree with this statement. There should always be a push for a new and better stable version - no article is ever "complete". Moreover, if the stable version is to be viewed as a "final" version, this would set a standard for publication that is very high, when really I would think it more useful to have early stable versions where the article is relatively short, maybe lacks diagrams and has minimal references, but still touches on all the most important areas of the topic. Deco 02:21, 1 January 2006 (UTC)
I don't think that is a point of general agreement. I think a lot of us are saying that it would be good to have both a stable and a working version of a lot of good articles, but that definitely would not carry an implication that these articles are finished. -- Jmabel | Talk 02:23, 1 January 2006 (UTC)
They strictly are not completed as there is a lot of room for improvement but they are just good enough. I consider it a good strategy to take to nudge users to other articles to distribute the load. Although improvements should for ever more be encouraged rather than discouraged, I imagine it would give editors the incentive, a goal to work towards achieving a stable version as a prize (rather than featured articles). In such a case, contributors would think twice before submitting it as a stable version, and finish off the contribution to the article to give other articles a chance. -- Zondor 13:33, 1 January 2006 (UTC) And when the article already has a stable version and its shown by default, it would give a contributor a greater sense of satisfaction if they achieve to supplant it. A newbie would feel good about the ability to edit a high-traffic page, whereas an experienced editor would feel good about supplanting a stable version that people rely upon. -- Zondor 20:03, 1 January 2006 (UTC)

It would be great if we could give the readers the option to browse the versions of the articles by default. -- nyenyec ☎ 03:16, 1 January 2006 (UTC)

Since Wikipedia is about being editable including wiki articles, stable versions themselves as well as the MediaWiki interface, let the default view be editable. Either the latest version or the stable version can be set to be the default as an editable functionality. This is a new privilege or right assigned to an access level, perhaps most suitable to registered users. -- Zondor 07:52, 2 January 2006 (UTC)

On a per-article basis? That could be rather confusing, going back and forth between stable and working versions as you click links. It would blur the distinction. I think a user preference is more appropriate.
An interesting issue just did occur to me though. I generally assume that links in working versions would take you to other working versions, and links in stable versions would take you to other stable versions. This allows the two to be published separately and prevents misleading the reader. But what if you want to link an article from a stable version that has no stable version yet? It'd be nice if the software could automatically link the working version with a suitable warning of some kind until the stable version becomes available. Deco 08:14, 2 January 2006 (UTC)
By default, I would only encourage the current version to be shown for anonymous editors (they can't set preferences!) with a prominent link to the latest stable revision. We must allow maximum chance that errors are corrected on the latest stable revision. I would hate to expand an article to a large degree (as I did witb Btrieve and Windows 2000) and not have my changes be seen immediately by people - this negates any effort I might put into the article! - Ta bu shi da yu 09:09, 2 January 2006 (UTC)
Of course, it has just occured to me that we could set a cookie for each visitor which allows them to set a preference no matter if they are logged in or not... - Ta bu shi da yu 09:10, 2 January 2006 (UTC)
On per article basis because each article has its own situation to deal with appropriate for its own context. The default view is regarded as the recommended view. For example, when a stable version has just been published, it is left on the stable version view to show off and to garner many eyes to find any mistakes. After, say a few weeks, it has been viewed enough already, and we then want to work on the next developmental version for its default view to be the same. In other words, the default view can help pronounce the state of the article. -- Zondor 21:55, 2 January 2006 (UTC)