Wikipedia:WikiProject Stub sorting/Proposals/Archive4

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Contents

[edit] Proposals, April-May 2005

[edit] Subdivisions of {{broadcasting-stub}}

For the beginning of this discussion, see Wikipedia:WikiProject Stub sorting/Criteria/Archive16.

[edit] A suggestion to focus on "radio and tv"

One part of the suggestions made by User:Lifeisunfair is to change "Broadcasting" to "Radio and TV" thereby making it clear what technologies are being addressed. I don't think that I want to go through another round of changing the template title, but we could change the text to reflect a more focused scope. The current text reads

This broadcasting-related article is a stub.

My suggestion for changing would be to

This radio or television broadcasting-related article is a stub.

I think this is a reasonable sharpening of focus as it really is just reflecting what the topic really is.

Would this be OK with the folks here? Courtland July 2, 2005 01:33 (UTC)

It would be good, in that it cuts out possible definitions including printed media and films - both of which are covered elsewhere. Where would podcasting be covered? Website-stub? Are you going ahead with Canada-station(or bcast)-stub, BTW? It's been a while since you suggested it... Grutness...wha? 2 July 2005 02:01 (UTC)

[edit] Further split of UK-geo-stub

I've moved the following from further up the page, where i seemed to be the only person talking about it... Grutness...wha?

There are some 4000 geo-stubs marked UK-geo-stub. Scotland, NI, Wales and London have already been split off. Is it worth splitting the rest into the eight regions of England? I note that the Regions of England article seems to talk about various different types of split, and the main one seems to overlap several county boundaries (which would be the other logical split). Suggestions? Grutness...wha? 7 July 2005 07:31 (UTC)

There's been some discussion of this over at Category talk:Geography stubs - When I next get time (hah!) I'm going to do a tally of the UK geo-stubs, to see which individual counties could be pared off - I think there are a few. It might be a case of going the same way as with Africa-geo-stub: England as a parent of regions as a parent of counties. Trouble is, of course, there are traditional counties and governmental ones. Why does England have to be so difficult with its geography??? Grutness...wha? 00:51, 13 July 2005 (UTC)

I'm going to do a count-up, see which counties can be pared. Seems the Wikipolicy is to use current governmental counties. One editor is busy creating Channel Island stubs at a rate of knots, too, so that may also be splittable (now we need someone to do the same with the Isle of Man...) Grutness...wha? 00:37, 15 July 2005 (UTC)

UPDATE: What I would like to do, with the permission of WP:WSS, is start splitting county-based categories as soon as I know for sure there are over 100 stubs that can fit in there, rather than going through the formal one week debate (hopefully I'm trustworthy enough here for this not to worry too many people). Some editors seem to be getting quite impatient for this category to be split up, so the sooner it's started, the better. After counting 300 of the stubs, it looks likely that Lincolnshire, of all places, will be the first split (so far, nearly 50 stubs). I intend to use the current governmental counties, as per Wiki policy, but to keep some grouped so that we don't suddenly get 50 new categories (obvious ones like the Yorkshire counties, for instance, and Liverpool/Manchester/Lancashire). It would also probably be worthwhile maaking an all-encompassing England category and/or template, but I'll wait on that until a few counties are split off, so that the task is easier. I will report any new templates here as they are created. If anyone has any comments for or against this idea, please say now, before I start doing the split! (I'll wait a week for feedback before starting) Grutness...wha? 05:50, 16 July 2005 (UTC)

Count update: after counting the first 1000 stubs, not county yet has 100 stubs, but five counties (assuming you count Yorkshire as one county) make up almost exactly 1/3 of the stubs between them: Durham, Lincolnshire, Yorkshire, Dorset, and Somerset. Grutness...wha? 08:27, 18 July 2005 (UTC)
For. I think Grutness is well-qualified to make the split. — Fingers-of-Pyrex 14:52, July 18, 2005 (UTC)
Sorry, but I see a problem there: if we do it like this, I for one couldn't sort the not so obvious places into the pertaining county and/or region stubs, as I don't keep an atlas near; I had always hoped that stub sorting could be simple :) Lectonar 13:47, 21 July 2005 (UTC)
In which case tag it with "cleanup-context" on the grounds that UK geography articles need to tell you what county they're in. Joe D (t) 11:14, 26 July 2005 (UTC)
Didn't we all (sigh! :). If it reassures you any, then it will be like geo-stub and africa-geo-stub - there's no intention of removing the plain UK-geo-stub, and items can simply be dumped in there for further sorting. Also, most of the stubs (I'd say 90%) either say in the text which county they're about or have a category at the bottom with a county name as part of it. Grutness...wha? 00:39, 22 July 2005 (UTC)

[edit] The count - and how to split it?

Okay - I've completed the count-up of all 3869 unsubcategorised UK-geo-stubs. The problem now is how to split it. The governmental regions of England are remarkably arbitrary, and cut across existing county lines, let alone the traditional ones that many people still use. For that reason also, some of the labelling of places in particular counties is only approximate - I've found confllicting information as to whether Cleveland is still going as Teesside, or whether it has reverted to being part of Durham and Yorkshire, for instance.

Having said that, one thing is clear - several counties have well over 100 geo-stubs, and several other might be groupable for historical/geographic reasons (e.g., Lancashire/Merseyside/Manchester). The following look the best bets for a split:

Eight other counties (Northamptonshire, Somerset, Devon, West Midlands, Berkshire, Buckinghamshire, Hampshire, and Shropshire) reach the 90 stub mark. By chance, these could possibly be combined into pairs (Devon/Somerset, Hampshire/Berkshire, Northants/Bucks, West Midlands/Shropshire). For historical reasons, it would probably also be worthwhile having {{Cornwall-geo-stub}} (87 stubs), and maybe also a {{UK-crown-geo-stub}} for the crown dependencies of the Channel Islands and the isle of Man (45 stubs).

User:RHaworth, unaware of this count-up, created a {{England-geo-stub}} and accompanying category, which I temporarily turned into a redirect to {{UK-geo-stub}}, but which can be reverted to make a category to hold all these county stubs.

One good thing to note from all of this is that the redirect {{uk-geo-stub}} is very little used (only about 100 of the 3869 stubs use it), so it may be a potential deletion candidate soon.

I'd welcome advice from this. I'm still very much in "low-Wiki" mode at the moment, and this will be a lot of work. I'm also leaving information about this proposal at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject UK subdivisions and Wikipedia talk:WikiProject UK geography. Grutness...wha? 03:13, 26 July 2005 (UTC)

Somerset is about to go over 100 stubs, I've been going importing parish population data. Joe D (t) 11:14, 26 July 2005 (UTC)

Somerset is actually considerably over 100 already. The reason I didn't suggest separate stubs for each of the eight I named above is that I didn't want to suddenly swamp everyone with 14 or 15 new stub categories. The full counts are as follows:
Durham - 456; Yorkshire - 298; Dorset - 244; Lincolnshire - 157; Northamptonshire - 144; Somerset - 136; West Midlands - 133; Buckinghamshire/Milton Keynes - 124; Berkshire - 115; Devon - 104; Hampshire - 104; Shropshire - 92; Cornwall - 87; Gloucestershire - 87; Sussex - 87; Kent - 85; Merseyside - 82; Norfolk - 80; Wiltshire - 78; Cumbria - 74; Manchester - 74; Staffordshire - 70; Essex - 68; Lancashire - 68; Derbyshire - 67; Surrey - 64; Hertfordshire - 60; Leicestershire - 57; Rutland - 55; Cambridgeshire - 49; Suffolk - 46; Warwickshire - 44; Nottinghamshire - 40; Cheshire - 39; Oxfordshire - 32; Channel Is - 26; Tyne and Wear - 26; Worcestershire - 26; Bedfordshire - 25; Bristol - 25; Northumberland - 24; IOW - 21; Herefordshire - 19; IOM - 16; plus 63 from more than one county.
Grutness...wha? 11:41, 26 July 2005 (UTC)
How sure are you of your figures? For instance, the count of 55 for Rutland is suspiciously high, especially as there are only 23 articles in Category:Rutland and all subcategories. Susvolans (pigs can fly) 11:59, 26 July 2005 (UTC)
Pretty sure. I counted all of the stubs by hand, and noted down where each article said it was. Those that didn;’t name a county (depressingly, about 10%), I relied on my trusty RAC road atlas. As to Rutland, it surprised me as well, but... well, here’s the list:
Ashwell, Rutland, Ayston, Barleythorpe, Barrow, Rutland, Barrowden, Bearpark, Belmesthorpe, Belton-in-Rutland, Bisbrooke, Braunston-in-Rutland, Brooke, Rutland, Burley, Rutland, Caldecott, Rutland, Clipsham, Cottesmore, Rutland, Edith Weston, Egleton, Empingham, Essendine, Exton, Rutland, Glaston, Great Casterton, Greetham, Rutland, Gunthorpe, Rutland, Hambleton, Rutland, Ketton, Lyddington, Lyndon, Rutland, Manton, Rutland, Market Overton, Morcott, Normanton, Rutland, North Luffenham, Oakham, Pilton, Rutland, Ridlington, River Eye, England, Seaton, Rutland, South Luffenham, Stoke Dry, Stretton, Rutland, Teigh, Thistleton, Thorpe by Water, Tickencote, Tinwell, Tixover, Tixover, Rutland, Upper Hambleton, Uppingham, Wardley, Whissendine, Whitwell, Rutland, Wing, Rutland!
One or two may have slipped through (the stats program I use accepts the first non-ambiguous term, so If I typed DUR for Durham, it would accept DU as Durham then overwrite it with the R for Rutland), but it's very close to accurate. Grutness...wha? 01:49, 27 July 2005 (UTC)
I noticed your post at the UK geography WikiProject, I'm of the opinion that we should use ceremonial counties because I believe that's what most geographers use, and they're the ones most commonly refered to. -- Joolz 12:11, 26 July 2005 (UTC)
I'd be happier doing that, too. Sadly, Wiki policy IIRC is to use the standard administrative divisions whenever possible. Grutness...wha? 01:49, 27 July 2005 (UTC)
From Wikipedia:Naming conventions (places): "it is acceptable to use ceremonial counties as geographic references, as this is often more in line with common usage" so I think that gives us some leeway, since these are geographic stubs -- Joolz 10:48, 28 July 2005 (UTC)
OK. I've used that - far easier, since most of the items had appropriate categories listed. I may have still slipped up a little with Teesside places around the Durham/Yorkshire border, but I hope not too badly. using ceremonial county means the Lancs/Manchester/Merseyside one's a bit more problematical, so I've left it for now. The first county split went well (Durham, Yorkshire, Dorset) and reduced the main category by over 25%, and I've started on Lincolnshire. The next few individual counties I'm thinking of splitting off are:
  • {{Northamptonshire-geo-stub}} (c 150 stubs)
  • {{Somerset-geo-stub}} (c 140 stubs)
  • {{WestMidlands-geo-stub}} (c 140 stubs)
  • {{UK-crown-geo-stub}} (for the Channel Islands and Isle of Man; c 50, and growing fast). The latter I'll only do if there are no complaints, since it doesn't yet reach criterion, but the stubs don't really belong in their current category, since they're not part of the UK. I'm also not totally happy with the name.
Those should cut the initial 3900 stubs down to just 2250 or so. Still huge, but a significant reduction. Grutness...wha? 05:33, 1 August 2005 (UTC)
I'm adding {{Northumberland-geo-stub}} to the list - it's gone from 24 to over 124 in less than two weeks. Grutness...wha? 07:22, 6 August 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Parallel the permanents

Just another dig at all this counting business. The intention is that all stub categories should dwindle to empty eventually, so why should a stub category not start out with fifty or even just a dozen entries. There is another, equally important consideration: what will editors actually use? If the stub categories are too complicated, people will say "I can't be bothered to find out if this area has a county or regional stub category - I will dump it in UK-geo-stubs and leave Grutness to re-allocate it".

I suggest that the stub categories should rigorously parallel the 'permanent' categories. Eg. Bunwell has a permanent category of Villages_in_Norfolk, so its stub category should be Norfolk_stubs or Norfolk_geography_stubs (I don't mind which). Note that we will need a lot of new categories but we do not need lots of new templates - try {{England-geo-stub|Fooshire}} which gives:

   This article is a stub relating to Fooshire in England. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it.
Do not use this template yet - see this discussion. Please continue to use {{UK-geo-stub}}

Category:Fooshire stubs

--RHaworth 05:18:05, 2005-07-28 (UTC)

A few things.
First, as you can see from the discussion above, the aim is not to have a stub category for each individual county, but simply to reduce the main body of stubs by paring off the few largest categories. Sure, the aim is to have them qall dwindle in size, but it's far more sensible to have editors only need to sort through a few well-populated categories rather than many virtually empty ones. Say, for example that you were interested in towns in England, but in no specific place in England. It would be far easier for you to pick through ten categories each with 200 items than 50 each with 40 items. The aim is not to be comprehensive in splitting everything off, but rather to have things at the optimum size for editors.
Second, please don't use this sort of metatemplate - heavy-use templates are still a massive strain on the servers. There has been no "all clear" given that MW1.5 can handle all the previous problems with heavily populated template-driven categories, so it's safer not to risk using them until they've been okayed.
Third, it's a bit late to do that anyway, since a few of the categories have already been started - with more appropriate icons than a generic George.
Fourth, having said all that, parallelling the "main" categories is a very good idea, one which would be a very good one to follow. There are a few villages that I've noticed that are in more than one county category, but there would be no problem giving them two stub templates.
Grutness...wha? 10:01, 28 July 2005 (UTC)
How on earth does {{England-geo-stub|Dorset}} impose more load on the servers than {{Dorset-geo-stub}}? -- RHaworth 10:53:39, 2005-07-28 (UTC)
The England-geo-stub would be used on some 3600 stubs. We've been told many times that templates should not be on more than a few hundred stubs, as this places a big load on the servers. The same reason is why we stopped using metatemplates in gemeral wherever possible. Having separate templates for each stub type limits the number of articles which use any particular template. The problem is apparently exacerbated when an icon is on the template, too. this gives some of the information about the problem as it was before the upgrade. As I said, this may have been countered somewhat by MW1.5, but no-one's confirmed any improvement, and given that Wikipedia as a whole is growing exponentially, any solution there may or may not have been is likely to only have been temporary. Grutness...wha? 11:03, 28 July 2005 (UTC)

Just a thought with regard to stub sorting in the UK - how about grouping Buckinghamshire, Berkshire and Oxfordshire together? The three together make up the Thames Valley, after all. -- Francs2000 | Talk 03:07, 6 August 2005 (UTC)

I'd thought of grouping counties - at least as a temporary solution until they got large enough for separating out (I even mentioned a few possibilities above). Bucks and Berks are big enough though (especially if Milton Keynes is included in Bucks) - they each have over 100 stubs. At the moment I'm separating out a few at a time, since a huge amount of work is going on with UK counties, and I suspect most of them will end up with separate stub templates (for example, when I first counted a couple of weeks ago, there were 24 Northumberland stubs; there are now over 120). If combining is necessary, I'd be more tempted to combine Oxon and Glocs (the two Cotswold counties), Norfolk/Suffolk, Leics/Rutland, Hereford/Worcs, and possibly Hants/IoW (the last three pairs have historical ties, anyway) although I suspect that it'll simply be a case of waiting until each county have enough stubs. Other than those currently awaiting split, Bucks, Berks, Hants and Devon have over 100 stubs at present, and five others have 90 or more. I'm just not keen to suddenly start off 30 or so new stub categories at one time! Grutness...wha? 06:45, 6 August 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Hill stubs

A lot of the stuff in the category comes from hill articles. Who says we should have a UK-hill-stub category? It would help that group of people who are expanding the British hill articles. --Mark J 20:42, 20 August 2005 (UTC)

No - see note at the bottom of the page about river-stub. Individual geographical features are a very bad idea for stub categories - they cut across the idea of dividing by region (which is very thoroughly organised and would take a massive effort to change, and they don't really help editors anyway, since most editors know features of a particular region rather than knowing one particular type of feature nationwide or worldwide. Such feature-stubs are actually specifically mentioned on Wikipedia:Stub as bad ideas for stub types (para. 5 of "New stub categories")! Grutness...wha? 01:40, 21 August 2005 (UTC)

[edit] The "little" counties

What should the counties with a smaller number of stubs like Wiltshire, Derbyshire, Kent, etc? Should they use England-geo-stub?

For now, yes. If they get to be big enough for their own stub categories, then these will probably get made... but England-geo-stub would be the best place for now. This is also the way the geo-stubs work elsewhere (there isn't a separate Saskatchewan-geo-stub yet, so it uses Canada-geo-stub, for instance). Grutness...wha? 01:35, 22 August 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Diving-stub

moved to the correct place on the page

We need a category {{diving-stub}}. Anthony Appleyard 05:53, 23 July 2005 (UTC)

Do we? Are there at least 60 diving stubs? Grutness...wha? 09:50, 23 July 2005 (UTC)
Not as far as the category is concerned. There are only four articles in there now. They all have an existing stub type so the diving-stub double stubs them. There was a fifth entry but I removed the stub from it as it was a disambiguation page. I haven't seen any evidence to indicate that there are sufficient diving related stub articles to warrant this stub type. --TheParanoidOne 11:48, 23 July 2005 (UTC)

===U.S. Interstate Highway Stub=== (created, see below) This stub category needs to be created... US-road-stub has over 600 articles in it I believe... and a forthcoming Wikipedia:WikiProject_U.S._Interstate_Highways will need this classification as well. Any objections? --Rschen7754 21:49, August 3, 2005 (UTC)

See below Grutness...wha? 01:54, 4 August 2005 (UTC)
What's the count of potential Interstate stubs? I can't believe it would be many—most of them should be full-fledged articles. — Fingers-of-Pyrex 03:44, August 4, 2005 (UTC)
Actually just about all of the interstate routes... since there is a new wp. There are several 1 par long articles on Interstates as well as longer ones that dont meet the standard and are as different as the desert and the ocean. --Rschen7754 05:00, August 5, 2005 (UTC)

I created this as {{Interstate Highway Stub}}... who wants to type out the U.S. part? --Rschen7754 16:34, August 10, 2005 (UTC)

[edit] U.S. Highway Stub

This stub category needs to be created... US-road-stub has over 600 articles in it I believe... and a forthcoming Wikipedia:WikiProject_U.S._Highways will need this classification as well. Any objections? There are 50-100 stub articles that are clogging up road-stub that could be put in this category.--22:14, August 3, 2005 (UTC)

Couldn't one stub (maybe {{US-highway-stub}}) cover both highways and interstate highways - especially for those of us outside the US who haven't a clue what the difference is between them...? And would the various state route stub categories be subcategories of this/these or not? Grutness...wha? 01:54, 4 August 2005 (UTC)
U.S. highways and U.S. interstates are separate in the U.S. way of thinking, so I don't think they should be combined. (I question the need for an Interstate stub; see above.) State routes would not be a subcategory of U.S. highways; they would stay subcategories of U.S. roads. With 50-100 articles, I'd agree on the creation of {{US-highway-stub}}. — Fingers-of-Pyrex 03:52, August 4, 2005 (UTC)
OK - I'll defer to your knowledge of things in the US - if "Fingers" says it's a good move, chances are strong that it's a good move. Grutness...wha? 01:32, 5 August 2005 (UTC)
Seems ok to me too, though I'm a little bit confused. We're just going to put highways that are part of the U.S. Highway System in here, right? The problem with {{US-highway-stub}} is that some might put state and interstate highways in as well, since, after all, they are highways within the US. Maybe {{UShighway-stub}} would be better? Based on what I've seen, I think the dash usually is used to take split off regions, which shouldn't be the case here, IMO. --Spangineer (háblame) 11:38, August 5, 2005 (UTC)
The dash is used to split off countries as well - we have US-bio-stub, US-geo-stub, US-struct-stub, US-road-stub, etc. In proably 50% of stub types, stubs are split by theme then location (with a few exceptions), and take the form location-theme-stub. Sometimes the location is a city, state or region, but usually it's a country. As I see the above, we have US-road-stub as the parent, with US-highway-stub and the various state highway stubs (as and when created) as the children. There are already several state highway stub categories (California is one I can recall), all of which have horribly formed stub names, too, IIRC (they should all be taken to sfd to correct them). Grutness...wha? 12:53, 5 August 2005 (UTC)
Yes, that is my understanding, too. Only highways that are part of the U.S. Highway System will go here. I'm sure there will be stub missorting here just as with other stubs. With a proposed WikiProject, one would think they would be vigilant about keeping it sorted. — Fingers-of-Pyrex 13:10, August 5, 2005 (UTC)
When I said "regions", I was including countries. With the US-road-stub, it applies to all roads in the US, so it would seem natural for US-highway-stub to apply to all the highways in the US. But it doesn't—there are hundreds or thousands of "highways" (state highways, interstates, etc.) that aren't part of the specific set of highways known as the U.S. Highway System. The stub name should recognize this, I think. Maybe it's not a big deal though. --Spangineer (háblame) 14:56, August 5, 2005 (UTC)
I understand what you mean. US-highway-stub could be construed to mean any highway (any type) in the US. UShighway-stub is supposed to imply stubs for U.S. highway system highways. (Why are they called highways anyway? New, better roads were elevated some to try to prevent flooded roads? And what about the term freeway? Free as opposed to a toll road (turnpike)? There's no article that I can find on road terminology. But I digress.) I don't have a problem with naming the new stub UShighway-stub. — Fingers-of-Pyrex 15:25, August 5, 2005 (UTC)
Would it make more sense to have {{US-highway-stub}} be all US highways, and then as children have {{US-interstate-stub}} for Interstates and the individual state stubs as necessary? As it appears that there is little distinction, beside numbering, between highways that are part of the U.S. Highway System and other state highways. Incidentally, many US Highways get called Routes, atleast where I live... --Mairi 19:48, 5 August 2005 (UTC)
No, that's exactly what we don't want. What is proposed is a separate stub category for highways in the U.S. Highway system. And from my point of view, there is a huge distinction between U.S. highways and highways of individual state highway systems.
For clarity, here is what the stub types page could show if both this and the interstate stub categories get created.
Or maybe down the road:
— Fingers-of-Pyrex 20:28, August 5, 2005 (UTC)
If there is such a difference, U.S. Highway system ought to be made clearer, as it currently says The United States Highways are state highways, funded just like any other state highway. --Mairi 21:36, 5 August 2005 (UTC)
I'm kinda making this up; take it with a grain of salt. I suppose there is the physical highway, and then there are the route designations. The states I'm familiar with have state-designated routes on primary and secondary highways. Each state has different schemes for numbering their routes. To facillitate interstate travel, the U.S. Highway system has its own route designations that stay constant as they cross the states' borders. In a particular state, even though one only (usually) sees the U.S. route designation, most of the time, the highway also has a "hidden" state route designation. (For examples of this, see Knox_County,_Tennessee#Tennessee_State_Routes and Tennessee State Route 1. So when I read the sentence that you quote above (which I agree is not clearly worded), I interpret it to mean that the individual states maintain their own highways. In other words, they maintain those "hidden" routes that are overlaid with a U.S. route number the same as they maintain their other highways that are not U.S. routes. The U.S. federal government distributes highway monies to the states, but I'm not sure on what basis—perhaps the mileage of U.S. routes and interstates in each state. — Fingers-of-Pyrex 22:51, August 5, 2005 (UTC)
Perhaps we name the stubs US-route-stub? Individual states could be named, for example, Michigan-route-stub? If a general stub category for state routes was to be proposed, it could be US-stateroute-stub? (I don't like that last one.) — Fingers-of-Pyrex 22:57, August 5, 2005 (UTC)
US-route-stub sounds good and clear to me. Assuming that useage is common thru-out the country. Things of the form Michigan-route-stub sounds like a good idea (we currently have {{Arizona State Route Stub}}, but also {{California State Highway Stub}}, which have naming issues anyway). Not sure what to do about US-stateroute-stub, tho. USstatehighway-stub would be clear enough, but not consistent with the other names (and I don't care for sticking that many words together like that) --Mairi 23:55, 5 August 2005 (UTC)
A thought here. AFAIK, like with state parks, the US is the only country which has separate interstate highways and state highways (I haven't heard of the term re Australia, and can't think of anywhere else it might apply). Why not just interstate-stub, statehighway-stub, and UShighway-stub? Also apologies if this makes no sense from an American viewpoint, since here we have national and provincial highways but the two terms are largely synonymous (ironically, they're both generally known as "State highways"). I'm still getting to grips with how Hawaii can have "interstate highways". Grutness...wha? 01:12, 6 August 2005 (UTC)
Those names are not offensive to me. Let's say two weeks, months, years down the road, some other entity needs a statehighway stub. Would we change these names at that point to USstatehighway-stub. That's not offensive to me either, but I expect one could find fault with it. After thinking about it some more, I'm liking the "route" name more. Perhaps we should let the wikiprojects shape up first, and revisit this in a month or two?
P.S. From what I think I know: Hawaii wasn't originally going to have interstate highways. (I don't think Alaska has any.) But it's all about the funding! Hawaii needed freeways, expressways (bigger and better roads), so somewhere along the way, they were added so they could get a share of the monies. (Here's that grain of salt again.) — Fingers-of-Pyrex 01:20, August 6, 2005 (UTC)

Keep in mind that {{California State Highway Stub}}, {{Washington State Highway Stub}}, and {{Arizona State Route Stub}} already exist, as does {{US-road-stub}} which holds the 600+ road stubs on roads/highways located in the US. The difference between US Highways and state (route) highways is that US highways are managed/numbered by the AASHTO (I forget what that stands for) but maintained by the DOTs (as are Interstates). State highways are maintained/numbered by the individual state DOTs. I believe that a USstateroute-stub would not be adequate because eventually stubs for all 50 states will be created. (Idaho State Highway Stub, etc.) However, I'd like to have those who actually work on the US road articles and WPs weigh in on this. Also, the official term is US Highway, not US route.... most WikiPedia articles are named U.S. Highway 101 not U.S. Route 101(the latter is a redirect). (BTW: Alaska does have Interstates, but they are not signed. Interstate Highways in Alaska) So what I would propose is this:

  • {{road-stub}}
    • {{Canada-road-stub}} (for example)
    • {{US-road-stub}}
      • {{U.S. Interstate Highway Stub}}
      • {{U.S. Highway Stub}}- which only has highways which are marked with US highway shields Image:US101.png
      • {{California State Highway Stub}}
      • {{Arizona State Route Stub}}

etc... --Rschen7754 00:36, August 7, 2005 (UTC)

And just to confuse Grutness even more, besides the interstate highways in Hawaii and Alaska, there are also interstates in Puerto Rico which isn't even a state. BlankVerse ∅ 23:42, 18 August 2005 (UTC)
Sounds reasonable. And actually your example of Canada-road-stub would be a useful one to split off, too. BTW, I'd like to propose a very slight change to the way we deal with urban/suburban roads. Currently they're usually put in road-stub, which makes sense, but I'd like to propose that they only be put in there if there is no specific city-stub or city-geo-stub. In cases where these stubs exist, i think it mkes far more sense if they're put with the city (e.g., London-geo-stub, NYC-stub, Chicago-stub). Any thoughts? Grutness...wha? 00:55, 7 August 2005 (UTC)
  • Here's my two cents: A number of stubs that we have now are "WikiProject-specific stubs". In other words, they were specifically created by the participants of various WikiProjects so they could organize those particular stubs that they are working on. Therefore, if there is going to be a specific WikiProject that will only involve Interstate Highways, then there should be a separate stub for Interstate Highways. Likewise, if there is going to be a specific WikiProject that will only involve U.S. Highways, then there should be a separate stub for U.S. Highways. Zzyzx11 (Talk) 01:07, 7 August 2005 (UTC)

So is it okay to create the stubs as proposed above? --Rschen7754 19:10, August 8, 2005 (UTC)

Should the proposed stubs (as be Rschen7754) have dashes put into them (e.g. {{U.S.-Highway-Stub}})? BlankVerse ∅ 23:42, 18 August 2005 (UTC)
I'm creating it now... I won't just so they are consistent with the other road stubs. However noone sees what they are called anyway... --Rschen7754
It probably ought to be {{US-Highway-stub}} to be consistent with all the stubs other than road stubs... --Mairi 18:28, 23 August 2005 (UTC)
Actually, it should be {{US-highway-stub}} - or better {{UShighway-stub}}, as argued above. All the US state highway stub templates are misnamed and are on a list to take to sfd for renaming when we get through the backlog of redundant stubs. Definitely no full stops and definitely no gaps. Grutness...wha? 01:13, 24 August 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Diplomatic stub

Going through the backlog of Encylopedia Brittanica articles to be created, I came across Macedonian Question. There are a number of articles like this to be made; Oregon Question, Skane Question, Strait Question, etc. Diplomats also have their own lingo not found elsewhere, such as diplomatic rank, diplomatic minister, etc. Therefor I propose diplo-stub. Alba 18:00, 8 August 2005 (UTC)

At the moment, the "Question" articles would get hist-stub, but I see your point. {{Diplomacy-stub}} would be a solution to it (not {{diplo-stub}} - a bit too ambiguous. The first thing that came to mind for me was a large sauropod!). Would there be enough stub articles for it, though (if there are approaching 100 the answer is "yes"). Grutness...wha? 00:49, 9 August 2005 (UTC)
It should be noted that diplomats (their biographies) are sorted under politician-stub. It's probable that some of those people could benefit from further subcategorization, but in many cases it would merely split semi-randomly... --Joy [shallot] 21:54, 3 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Subdivisions of {{rail-stub}}

I have thought of several more sub-categories that could be added. Our Phellap 23:39, 8 August 2005 (UTC)

  • {{multiple-unit-stub}} for railcars, railbuses and multiple units
  • {{rolling-stock-stub}} for rolling stock (i.e. carriages, wagons, parcel vans etc.)

There are a fair number of stub articles for each, and it would help reduce the overall list from Category:rail stubs as it is getting rather over-populated.

Hm - wouldn't it make more sense to divide by country? I mean railbuffs are far more likely to know about the railways in one region than one type of item worldwide. A railways fan interested in British railways is far more likely to know about British rolling stock, British locomotives and British track than to know about rolling stock worldwide. And since there's already an {{Australia-rail-stub}}... (I know we have loco-stub for locomotives, but that wasn't a "sanctioned" creation here, and could easily be split up into UK-loco-stub, US-loco-stub and the like). Grutness...wha? 00:38, 9 August 2005 (UTC) (LNER A4 Pacific fan)
Yes I think using UK-loco-stub, France-loco-stub etc. would be a good idea. This could be extended to the railcars/multiple units and rolling stock, as I proposed above e.g. UK-rollingstock-stub or UK-multipleunit-stub (or alternatively UK-railcar-stub if people prefer shorter names). The categories UK-loco-stub, UK-railcar-stub etc. could then be subcategories of UK-rail-stub. Our Phellap 19:19, 9 August 2005 (UTC)
Well, {{UK-rail-stub}}, AFAICT, doesn't exist yet. It probably ought to be split off from {{rail-stub}} as soon as possible, considering the very large size of the latter category (and in parallel to the Australian and US counterparts.) After that settles down, we can see how far each category needs to be further pared down. So, oppose sort by rolling stock type for now until further sorting by nationality takes place, but this is not a hard position. --CComMack 22:47, 10 August 2005 (UTC)
I would agree more on subdividing by region than by equipment type. I got through sorting rail stubs out into the new {{US-rail-stub}} just yesterday, and suggested that we should probably add {{UK-rail-stub}} and {{Japan-rail-stub}} due to the number of stubs for those two regions, but I haven't made a count of them yet. BTW, when I started sorting rail stubs, there were well over 2,000 of them, and it's now down to around 700. slambo 19:08, August 11, 2005 (UTC)
I am in the process of writing articles on Dutch and French trains, so it might be a good idea to create {{France-rail-stub}} and {{NL-rail-stub}}. There are also a fair few stub articles about Irish trains so maybe {{Ireland-rail-stub}} should be created as well. Our Phellap 21:58, 11 August 2005 (UTC)
That should be {{Netherlands-rail-stub}}, not {{NL-rail-stub}}, BTW (as per stub naming conventions)! Grutness...wha? 14:31, 12 August 2005 (UTC)
Being the crazy 'Merkan that I am, would {{Ireland-rail-stub}} be a subtype of {{UK-rail-stub}}? My first thought is no, but it'd be nice to know for sure. slambo 11:10, August 12, 2005 (UTC)
Try saying that in Dublin. We'll all come and visit you in hospital afterwards! :) Grutness...wha? 14:27, 12 August 2005 (UTC)
No, the Republic of Ireland is a different country to the UK, so it wouldn't be a subtype. That would be like putting {{Canada-rail-stub}} as a subtype of {{US-rail-stub}}!! As a side point, a Canada-rail-stub should probably also be created as well, and any articles wrongly classified as US-rail-stub could be corrected. Our Phellap 13:27, 12 August 2005 (UTC)
That's what I thought. I haven't paid enough attention to that part of the world. We definitely need to prioritize these country subtypes. In the two sorts that I went through this month, it seems to me that UK and Japan were the most prevalent of the remaining rail-stubs, but now that you mention it, Canada had a significant number as well. I think best at this point would be to create UK-rail-stub and Japan-rail-stub, do the sort and see what's left. I suspect that Canada will then be the most prevalent, but that may change with your France and nl stubs. slambo 13:53, August 12, 2005 (UTC)
Probably best to start with UK and Japan. from there it will be easier to see which countries have large numbers of stubs and should be split off next. Otherwise we might end up with some very small categories. Grutness...wha? 14:31, 12 August 2005 (UTC)
I would argue to create all the country stubs mentioned above now, that way it will save messing about in the future. True some of them may not have many articles at the moment, but as I say am am in the process of writing French and NL locomotive articles, so the categories will be more populated in the future. I would also argue, that for the time being at least, the {{loco-stub}} articles should be reclassified by country. If there are enough articles, then perhaps, for example, a {{UK-loco-stub}} could be created in the future.
To summarise, I think the following stubs should be created: {{UK-rail-stub}}, {{Canada-rail-stub}}, {{Japan-rail-stub}}, {{France-rail-stub}}, {{Netherlands-rail-stub}} and {{Ireland-rail-stub}}. Our Phellap 14:34, 12 August 2005 (UTC)
Instead of stating what country stubs to create, I suggest seeking approval for creation of region-rail-stub, where "region" will be a continent, with nation-rail-stub being created when more than a certain number of stubs for a nation are discovered. Then the stub sorters doing the initial sweep will create what they find is required. (SEWilco 15:03, 12 August 2005 (UTC))
That definitely sonds reasonable - it would parallel how geo-stub developed. It sould also be possible to do a quick straw poll - take the first 200 articles and see where thy refer to - and work out a few of the more obvious candidates for splitting from that. Grutness...wha? 00:29, 13 August 2005 (UTC)
Seeing no objections and several supports for {{UK-rail-stub}}, I created it and just finished sorting into it (and I found a few more that I either missed on previous sorts or were created since then). {{rail-stub}} is now down to 437 articles, and the UK category holds 250 articles. slambo 20:47, August 12, 2005 (UTC)
I have also created the {{France-rail-stub}}, which currently contains 41 articles. Our Phellap 23:16, 12 August 2005 (UTC)
Created and sorted {{India-rail-stub}} and category. There are 38 articles currently marked with this stub template, and after another sorting pass through {{rail-stub}}, that category is down to 253 articles. slambo 13:48, August 23, 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Relatives stubs

The following was moved from further down the page - in the middle of a vote! - to its correct place Grutness...wha?

In { { bio-stubs } } I have come across people whose only achievement is to be a relative (spouses mostly) of someone who has an entry, a couple of times. Is there a stub-category for them ? MartinBiely 18:10, August 8, 2005 (UTC)

No, there isn't... Some of those articles should simply be merged with the article about their famous relative and/or sent for vfd (being a relative of a famous person isn't usually regarded as notability enough in the person's own right for an article). If the person is notable in their own right (which some will be), then simply tagging them with one of the nationality bio-stubs would probably be enough IMO. Grutness...wha? 01:04, 9 August 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Invertebrate stubs

The invertebrate-stub category is getting quite large: I propose stubs for major groupings within this category e.g. { { butterfly-stub } }, { { dragonfly-stub } } etc. Invertebrate people tend to specialise in one or more groups rather than being generalists, so this might encourage contributors to tackle some of these articles - at the moment they are rather swamped. And we're only at the tip of the iceberg in terms of coverage when it comes to inverts at present; good idea to tackle this before it becomes too big a task. --SP-KP 17:42, 9 August 2005 (UTC)

So far you have provided two insect types. Unless there are a significantly large number of butterfly and dragonfly stub articles, I think the higher level {{insect-stub}} (or something similar) might be more appropriate. I haven't looked at the category to see what the distribution of articles is, but I would imagine that branching off into the many high level invetebrate groups would be the way to go. --TheParanoidOne 20:15, 9 August 2005 (UTC)
I'd agree, although I can see Category:Insect stubs getting big quickly. Insect-stub would be a good start though - and possibly also crustacean-stub? Grutness...wha? 01:39, 10 August 2005 (UTC)
I did a rough tally of the invertebrate stubs category using a 5% count (42 articles). The number and groupings I found are:
  • Insects: 28
    • including 12 butterfly/moth articles and 4 beetle articles
  • Arachnids: 3
  • Worms: 3
  • Crustaceans: 3
  • Molluscs: 3
  • Other: 3
Given these (admittedly quick and dirty) results, {{insect-stub}} would certainly cut a big swathe in the category. {{butterfly-stub}} (with or without moths) might be worth doing immediately as well. --TheParanoidOne 20:35, 10 August 2005 (UTC)
{{insect-stub}} created. I'll do butterfly later on today. --TheParanoidOne 05:43, 17 August 2005 (UTC)
Having sifted through Invertebrate stubs, {{crustacean-stub}} and {{mollusc-stub}} seem to be suitable candidates for further splitting. --TheParanoidOne 21:55, 22 August 2005 (UTC)
Both created and being populated. --TheParanoidOne 05:29, 30 August 2005 (UTC)
Done. Of the remaining invertebrate stubs, ~20% are arachnids and ~16% are worms of various types. But seeing as this category is now at less than 200 stub articles, I won't bother dividing any further. --TheParanoidOne 22:55, 2 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Cthulhu mythos stubs

{{Cthulhu-stub}}

I saw a proposal for this, so in keeping with Wikipedia's be bold directive, I went ahead and created it. If there are no objections, I would like to start using it as soon as possible. Gate2Valusia Frying pan into fire? 21:25, 10 August 2005 (UTC)

  • Well, you know the old saying: "easier to ask for forgiveness than for permission." However, I don't want to set a precedent by defying proper procedure, so I've had my stub speedy deleted. (But there are still a lot of Cthulhu mythos-related stubs out there – as a mergist, I've been diligently looking for places to put them). Gate2ValusiaIn hot water again?..(contribs) 18:15, 11 August 2005 (UTC)


Sorry, but could you give us some numbers, and perhaps have a look at #Proposing new stubs - procedure? I didn't see much stubs pertaining to Ctulhu around Lectonar 06:41, 11 August 2005 (UTC)

Mmmm. The reason it was where you found it - uncreated in our archives - was because we decided not to create it. Having said that, it was fairly close to creation, and with the expansion in the number of stubs in recent months it might approach threshold. Is there an associated WikiProject on Lovecraft? If not, and if it doesn't come near threshold, you might have trouble convincing people of its worth. Grutness...wha? 06:51, 11 August 2005 (UTC)


[edit] Cthulhu mythos stubs (revised proposal)

This is a proposal to create the Cthulhu-stub template, to appear under the category Cthulhu mythos stubs. This new stub will be a sub-category of Fantasy stubs. Currently, Cthulhu mythos-related stubs are labelled with the largely generic {{Fantasy-stub}}.

First of all, be aware that the so-called Cthulhu mythos constitutes a large spectrum of writers and their creations. You will find that there are scores of authors who have written in the Cthulhu mythos genre, and the quantity of mythos-related stories numbers in the hundreds. Its popularity is underscored by Robert Bloch – the author of Psycho and himself a writer of mythos stories – who writes in his essay "Heritage of Horror":

. . . the "Cthulhu Mythos" is a literary creation far surpassing the word-worlds of Cabell, C. S. Lewis, or Tolkien in breadth and scope. . . While imaginary worlds abound in modern fantasy, few of today's writers set their sagas in Poictesme, Perelanda, or Middle-earth. But stories and novels based on the Mythos continue to proliferate. In terms of imitaton and inspiration, Lovecraft may well have had more influence on other writers than any contemporary except Ernest Hemingway.

If you are still not convinced, take a look at Chris Jarocha-Ernst's "A BIBLIOGRAPHY OF THE CTHULHU MYTHOS". This is a listing of about 900+ mythos-related works (!).

There are presently about 50+ Cthulhu-related stubs (some of which are borderline and are very close to becoming proper Wikipedia articles), constituting almost 20% of the Fantasy-related stubs. And this number is likely to increase, especially if a number of as-yet-unlabelled Cthulhu-related stubs are eventually designated as Fantasy stubs. If nothing else, just the sheer number of Cthulhu mythos stubs warrants the creation of a new stub category. (Note: In some cases, I myself have tried to wikify these stubs, but they still do not qualify as true articles. In other cases, I've merged stubs into other articles, or created new articles outright to house the stubs. All in all, I've eliminated several dozen Cthulhu-related stubs – but there's always the chance that some future editor will dissent and split these stubs back into articles.)

One problem is that most are of the Cthulhu-related stubs are labelled with the standard "Fantasy-related" template, which tends to disguise their true content. In addition, since most Cthulhu mythos stories are considered horror stories – or perhaps in some cases, science fiction stories – their placement here may make it difficult for editors to find Cthulhu-related stubs. Conversely, the presence of so many Cthulhu-related stubs makes the list harder to peruse by non-Cthulhu mythos editors.

I've also noticed that other users (mostly anonymous ones) regularly add new entries to the Elements of the mythos list in the Cthulhu mythos article. Most of these new entries are currently red links, but should bold editors go ahead and turn them into stubs, the total number of "Fantasy-related" stubs will skyrocket. Another complication arises when we consider that although most new entries probably come from lesser-known Cthulhu mythos stories, a significant number may originate from the Call of Cthulhu role-playing game. Purists, such as myself (who believe that only elements derived from mainstream Cthulhu mythos stories qualify as Lovecraftian fiction), might object to these new, yet obscure, additions, but their importance to others (especially role-playing enthusiasts) probably justifies their inclusion. With that in mind, Cthulhu mythos stubs are likely to continue to grow in the future.

Along with the reasons I have outlined here, we should also look at the issue from the point of view of the Cthulhu mythos devotees. Not only would a Cthulhu mythos stub be welcomed by such enthusiasts, it is probably also expected as well (just as there is already a tolkienstub in use). Furthermore, perhaps Cthulhu-editors would be more inclined to use a Cthulhu-stub if one were available – it would certainly leave no doubt as to which stub to use (for example, I once saw a Cthulhu-related article labeled with a Literature stub). Hence, I believe that a new Cthulhu mythos stub is needed.

Gate2ValusiaOh?..(latest mischief)..Playing by the rules this time.04:27, 12 August 2005 (UTC)

OK, I'll bite :) 50 stubs is still below normal stub category threshold, especially if the total number of fantasy stubs is 250 (which it is if 50 = 20% of it). It would be a reasonable threshold if there were a Cthulhu mythos-related WikiProject (which it sounds as though there should be, given some of your comments. I agree that these stubs are fairly difficult to place - they lie on the borders between fantasy, horror and sf - nmany of the authors int he field (such as Bloch) have worked in more than one of these genres and incorporate elements from all of them in their stories (I'm surprised you didn't mention August Derleth, BTW). As such, I've done a bit of a hunt and found the following: Cthugha, Deep One (Cthulhu mythos), Cykranosh, Lesser Outer God, Basatan, Y'Golonac, Pnakotic Manuscripts, Magnum Innominandum, Yibb-Tstll, Xiurhn, Nodens (Cthulhu mythos), The King in Yellow, Dunwich (H. P. Lovecraft), Chaugnar Faugn, Tulzscha, Ubbo-Sathla, Lomar, Shoggoth, Yellow Sign, Lake Hali, Carcosa, High Priest Not to Be Described, Olathoë, The Case of Charles Dexter Ward, Gnophkeh, Nyogtha, Prisoner of Ice, Shadow of the Comet, Elder Gods, Ithaqua, Aphoom-Zhah, L'mur-Kathulos, Arcane literature (Cthulhu mythos), Celestial body (Cthulhu mythos), Elysia, Fire vampire, Ghatanothoa, Shan (aliens), Ghroth, The Dunwich Horror, Celephaïs, The Shadow over Innsmouth, Kadath, Cerenerian Sea, Moon-beast, Oriab, Nightgaunt, Ythogtha, Azathoth, Glaaki, Zoth-Ommog, Cthylla, Summanus, Dhole (Cthulhu mythos), Yugg, Kthanid, Mu (Cthulhu mythos), Mi-Go, Miskatonic University, Abhoth (Cthulhu mythos)... that's 60, and it's barely scratching the surface. Mind you, all the Cthulhu and Lovecraftian articles seem to need a bit of a rethink in some way, there are redirects leading to redirects, sections leading to sections that loop back on themselves, cavernous abysses of uncanny resonance where the very bones of the planet seem to ring in... um... yeah, there'd be enough for a separate category, I think. Excuse me while I go and wash my keyboard. Grutness...wha? 05:25, 13 August 2005 (UTC)
And we must keep in mind that not necessarily all the above are in need of their own articles; some of them could go into a list of Cthulhu-mythos deities and/or Ctulhu-mythos beings, at least 2 belong in the book-stubs (Shadow over Innsmouth and The Dunwich Horror (and I would not have the slighest compunction to put them into fantasy-book-stub)). So, just to put things right (here I go again): stub sorting isn't about something being noticeable and/or important (there is no discussion about it: Lovecraft and his work are both, and I revere him (and it) very much), it is nothing more or less than a tool, and we don't need to create a stub-template for articles which are not written yet; IMHO, this one still doesn't pass the criteria for a specialised stub to be created...IÄ! Shub-Niggurath, dreaming in R'lyeh lies Ctulhu... Lectonar 13:07, 15 August 2005 (UTC)
  • There seems to be no broad consensus for creating a Cthulhu-stub, so (with reluctance) I have decided to let the issue rest. (Oh well, perhaps "when the stars are right"?)
    Gate2ValusiaOh?..(contribs)21:17, 19 August 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Another Corp-stub daughter

There are about 60 to 70 (perhaps more) articles in the Category:Corporation stubs about biotechnological, medical and pharmaceutical corporations, from Allerca (yikes) and Aeterna Zentaris to YM BioSciences. I hereby propose {{pharma-corp-stub}} or {{medical-corp-stub}} (I don't know which is more appropriate) and a matching category. Aecis 10:35, 12 August 2005 (UTC)

Since one of the parent category templates would be med-stub, med-corp-stub would probably be better. it would also allow for inclusion of companies that make medical equipment. Grutness...wha? 00:42, 13 August 2005 (UTC)

[edit] {{astronaut-stub}}

I propose an astronaut-stub for astronauts, cosmonauts and the like. This would feed from Category:Astronauts, Category:Astronauts by nationality et al. It would also reduce {{bio-stub}} as well as a number of country-bio-stubs. I have been able to find 50 stubs from the Astronauts category alone (at which point I stopped).

The majority of them are stubbed as country-bio-stub. This is what I have been using for astronauts so far as there is currently no suitable stub type. A few were also stubbed with {{space-stub}} which makes sense. Combined with a country-bio-stub, that's the closest thing to an astronaut-stub we currently have. --TheParanoidOne 22:15, 16 August 2005 (UTC)

Sounds like a good idea, especially with them currently lacking any suitable stub category. --Mairi 19:33, 19 August 2005 (UTC)
Created. --TheParanoidOne 20:41, 26 August 2005 (UTC)
Filled with stub articles from Category:Astronauts and its subcategories. Left articles with country-bio-stub tags dual-tagged for now. GeeJo (talk) 00:13, August 27, 2005 (UTC)

[edit] {{Georgia-geo-stub}} and {{GeorgiaUS-geo-stub}}

This is in the category of an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. (Sorry, I don't know the metric equivalents.) In pondering the possible future splits of geo stubs in the U.S., the disambiguation between Georgia (country) and Georgia (U.S. state) arose. I'm afraid that someone might jump the gun and create {{Georgia-geo-stub}} for the U.S. state. The early August count by Grutness shows 40 stubs for Georgia (country) and 64 for Georgia (U.S. state). Even though 40 < 60, I propose to create these two stubs at the same time to avoid any future messiness. — Fingers-of-Pyrex 14:38, August 18, 2005 (UTC)

Mmmm. probably a good idea. As for Georgia (in the Caucasus), most of those are already marked with Caucasus-geo-stub (which is a redirect to Euro-geo-stub) so it should be easy to split out. it would be easy to produce a list of articles for both categories. And 28.35 grams of prevention being worth 0.4536 kilograms of cure sounds silly. :) Grutness...wha? 00:00, 19 August 2005 (UTC)
Stubs and categories created: Category:Georgia (country) geography stubs and Category:Georgia (U.S. state) geography stubs. — Fingers-of-Pyrex 13:35, August 26, 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Maldives-geo-stub

Since I last did the geo-stub tally two weeks ago, someone has created more than 200 Maldives geography stubs. So, it seems a Maldives-geo-stub may be in order... Grutness...wha? 04:12, 20 August 2005 (UTC)

Done and populated, with the help of ace Maldivian stub-creator User:Oblivious. Grutness...wha? 23:29, 27 August 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Neuroanatomy stub

There are hundreds of anatomy stubs, and the list is becoming bloated. I propose a sub-stub, the neuroanatomy stub. Here's some examples of stubs that fit this category:

That's only up to "C". As you can see, this is a necessary category. Semiconscious (talk · home) 09:33, 21 August 2005 (UTC)

The anatomy page divides anatomy up according to major body systems:
which seems as as good a way as any to divide up this stub category. So following on from that, perhaps {{nervous-anatomy-stub}} might be better? --TheParanoidOne 10:15, 21 August 2005 (UTC)
  • I would suggest a {{neuroscience-stub}} since many of these articles do not only contain anatomy facts. Many of the stub articles have specific cellular or molecular neuroscience content and fit better within a neuroscience category rather than anatomy or bio-science or cell biology stubs. Nrets 15:44, 21 August 2005 (UTC)
  • I second the neuroscience stub. Good idea Nrets. How do we make it official? Semiconscious (talk · home) 21:04, 24 August 2005 (UTC)
  • Wait a week after the proposal - if no-one has objected in that time (I don't think anyone will, BTW), then follow the stub creation instructions at Wikipedia:Stub. Simple as that. Grutness...wha? 02:38, 25 August 2005 (UTC)

Why does the template feed into the Category:Biology stubs instead of a category of its own? Aecis 23:21, 28 August 2005 (UTC)

  • Should it point to Category:Neuroscience stubs then? We've not done this before! Semiconscious (talk · home) 04:19, 29 August 2005 (UTC)
    • Sigh. As I said - follow the stub creation instructions at Wikipedia:Stub! Yes, full details are given on that page of creating the template and creating the category to complement it. Grutness...wha? 09:17, 29 August 2005 (UTC)
  • Sigh? Sorry man, didn't mean to be such an inconvenience. I've got a lot of projects going on here on wikipedia. I missed your first post. Anyway, thanks for the link. Semiconscious (talk · home) 00:08, 31 August 2005 (UTC)
  • sorry about the sigh. WP:WSS really needs to make those procedures more visible though... Grutness...wha? 03:50, 31 August 2005 (UTC)
  • I added a link to it in the last step of the procedures on the top of this page. Hopefully that'll help some... --01:58, 1 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] {{card-game-stub}} and {{online-game-stub}}

{{game-stub}} is now below 400, but is still heavy on at least two pretty discrete constituent elements: card games, and online games (mostly MMORGs). The former looks to be well over the magic 100, and even though it itself is a rather diverse group -- traditional standard-pack games, CCGs, and "boardless board games", it'd correspond to a monophyletic class as regards the underlying categorisation scheme. There's an existing {{poker-stub}} (somewhat undersized, with <30 articles) that this should either superclass or incorporate. The latter looks pretty decent-sized too. Alai 00:43, 22 August 2005 (UTC)

{{card-game-stub}} sounds like a good idea. Poker-stub could probably be merged into card-game-stub, unless it's likely to acquire quite a few new articles soon. Online games would belong in {{cvg-stub}}, and the consensus seems to be to divide that based on genre, and not platform (that discussions is further down on this page). --Mairi 01:26, 22 August 2005 (UTC)
As the card game one seems to be profoundly uncontroversial, and was earlier mooted, also without objection, I've been slightly speedy and proceeded to create this one. Alai 00:12, 28 August 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Other stub-related discussions

[edit] Animation-stub and Disney-stub

Today I replaced {{cartoon-stub}} with {{animation-stub}} on WP:WSS/ST. Under it, I added {{Hanna-Barbera-stub}} and {{Looney-tunes-stub}}. This is in the supercategory of Language and literature. I assume that it was located there because cartoon-stub was thought to cover comics as well? Anyway, I just noticed {{animation-stub}} listed under Theatre and film, which makes more sense to me. (I'll remove animation stub from the former if no one objects.)

But this brings up a second point: should {{Disney-stub}} be a subcategory of {{animation-stub}} considering it contains articles such as Compass Rose Corporation and Pleasure Island? Perhaps it should move to a subcategory of {{Corp-stub}}? I haven't done a count, but perhaps {{Disney-stub}} should be split into two: Disney-animation-stub and Disney-corp-stub? Thoughts? — Fingers-of-Pyrex 01:46, July 22, 2005 (UTC)

Mmm. good point. I don't know if we need to split it, but perhaps putting one of the italicised "See under" lines {{Disney-stub}}, see under Corp-stub below, or whatever, where it is on the animation list would make more sense. It would also make it more clear that it covered aspects of Disney other than just the cartoons. Grutness...wha? 04:54, 23 July 2005 (UTC)
Done. But I'm not 100% happy with Category:Disney stubs being a subcategory of Category:Corporation stubs—it looks out of place to me among the other generic subcategories. I guess I'd like it better if Disney was a subcategory of US-corp-stub, but that doesn't exist. If anyone has any better ideas, get to it. — Fingers-of-Pyrex 18:30, July 23, 2005 (UTC)
Update: I moved Category:Disney stubs to Category:Leisure corporation stubs. I'm 99 44/100 % happy. — Fingers-of-Pyrex 11:35, August 19, 2005 (UTC)

[edit] River-stub

I could have sworn that I'd seen this; has it been deleted? It would be very useful, as many rivers pass through different countries, necessitating either an invidious choice between country stubs or multiple stubs.

Deleted long ago. Not that many rivers go through more than three countries, and those that do can just be given the continent or region's geo-stub (Asia, Europe, Africa, and South America all have continent-geo-stub templates - Africa also has regional ones). And double-stubbing when a river goes through two countries isn't so bad. As for three countries... either is possible; technically three stubs is frowned on, but some of us turn a blind eye to a third template. So, for example:
Grutness...wha? 04:56, 23 July 2005 (UTC)

I'd have thought that there were rather a lot of rivers that flowed through more than one country (especially in Europe and Africa), but OK. There's at least one instruction somwhere that tells editors not to use more than one stub per article; does that need to be changed? --Mel Etitis (Μελ Ετητης) 10:44, 23 July 2005 (UTC)

Well, I did say "Not that many rivers go through more than three countries". And the rule used is "two different stub templates may be used, but using more than two is strongly discouraged" (third paragraph of WP:STUB#Categorizing_stubs). More than one stub is necessary a lot of the time. Grutness...wha? 11:07, 23 July 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Dynamic stubs

Many stub articles (i.e. substubs and good stubs) have no apparent potential of passing the stub line. Due to this issue, we should make a new template: {{dynamic-stub}}.

Just like there is a template called {{dynamic list}} for lists that have no apparent potenetial of becoming complete. --SuperDude 01:45, 9 August 2005 (UTC)

Not sure whether this item belongs down here under "Discussions" or whether it's a proposal (in which case it should be further up the page - but it's probably more of a discussin thing anyway. Actually, wev've had discussions on the WSS talk page about similar things in the past, ISTR. My two cents is that most things can pass the stub line. The few that can't aren't stubs, they're just short articles, so shouldn't have any stub template. All they need is invisible text saying something like <!-- although this article is small, it is no longer a stub - please do not add a stub template -->. Grutness...wha? 03:11, 9 August 2005 (UTC)
and this one would be naturally very subjective to use and to place; how would you define something which has no potential to grow (the only things that jump straight to my mind are kind of dicdefs, which shouldn't be around anyway) Lectonar 06:29, 9 August 2005 (UTC)
a bit of thinking aloud here... if we went the invisible text way, that could be added by a template called something like non-stub (not dynamic-stub - it's actually the opposite. It's the one type of stub-length article not likely to change!) Grutness...wha? 06:41, 10 August 2005 (UTC)
Sounds more like a Merge in search of someplace to be merged into. (SEWilco 06:46, 10 August 2005 (UTC))

[edit] Education stubs

Major problems exist with the various education stub categories. In the last week or so, {{edu-stub}} has been repointed at Cat:University stubs, and a new category and stub type, both miscapitalised, have been created: {{General-Edu-stub}} and Cat:General Education stubs. The main reason for this confusion is the current mishmash of names for categories and templates relating to universities and other tertiary institutions. What I propose is the following:

(there are also some other inconsistencies with the category names at present - noun university stubs and adjective school stubs - but they're a minor quibble for later).

This would require the following changes:

  • {{General-Edu-stub}} and Cat:General Education stubs - deleted
  • {{edu-stub}} and Cat:Education stubs - change in use
  • {{university-stub}} - change in use (currently a redirect to {{edu-stub}}
  • {{Canada-edu-stub}} and its category - change in name to Canada-university-stub
  • {{Hong-Kong-edu-stub}} and its category - change in name to Hong-Kong-university-stub (or better, HongKong-university-stub)

Thoughts? Grutness...wha? 00:19, 19 August 2005 (UTC)

I think that would make alot more sense than the current system. --Mairi 21:22, 25 August 2005 (UTC)
I agree. Even with all of the university stubs and stub categories I've created, it's all still a huge mess. The Hong Kong and Canada education stubs are particularly frustrating because they cover a much broader topic than they probably should. And on that note, what about {{seminary-stub}}? Should that even exist, since most of the schools in there could go into country categories instead? Same with {{lawschool-stub}}. Kamezuki 00:32, August 26, 2005 (UTC)
They might be a problem with the system, but I think tidying up the main part and worrying about those two later would be the best way to proceed. Grutness...wha? 01:51, 26 August 2005 (UTC)
Just to repeat what I already wrote at SFD - I already agreed with you about this at Wikipedia:WikiProject_Stub_sorting/Criteria/Archive16#Category:Education_stubs_and_the_situation_with_education-related_stubs_in_general --Joy [shallot] 23:14, 26 August 2005 (UTC)

Okay - I've made a start - any help would be appreciated, especially on changing articles with General-Edu-stub (removing the "General-")! I'm working my way through the Canada-edu-stubs moving them to Canada-university-stub. After that it will be the task of going through the University stubs, to see where they are all from and whether any other countries can be split off. Hong Kong should be fairly simple (it only contains about 40 items). Grutness...wha? 09:23, 29 August 2005 (UTC)