Portal talk:Chemistry/Archive

Scientific peer review
A scientific peer review has been started and we're looking for Wikipedians who are members of the scientific academic community to run for the board. If you want to give it a shot come over and post a little about yourself. New nominations are being accepted until the 00:00 on the 17th March.

The project aims to combine existing peer review mechanisms (Wikipedia peer review, featured article candidate discussion, article assessment, &c.) which focus on compliance to manual of style and referencing policy with a more conventional peer review by members of the scientific academic community. It is hoped that this will raise science-based articles to their highest possible standards. Article quality and factual validity is now Wikipedia's most important goal. Having as many errors as Britannica is not good–we must raise our standards above this. --Oldak Quill 18:17, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

Chemistry news format
I noticed that the chemistry news format is different from that of biology and physics. They have it in combination with Wikinews. Would it be a good idea to align chemistry with physics? Your thoughts are welcome V8rik 22:57, 10 June 2006 (UTC)
 * Yes, I like that, thanks for pointing it out! It's a really nice way of doing things, though oddly Biology doesn't include their new stories on their portal (did I miss something?).  One thing, would you be able to help write stories for it, V8rik?  I find it does take a while to find stories that are either interesting or major or (prefarably) both. Walkerma 00:30, 11 June 2006 (UTC)


 * I noticed too that wiki biology did not carry wikinews, I did it for them (hope they like what I did). The wikinews portal is currently blocked so I requested support. The first all-carbon persulfurane molecule sounds like news to me (bit exotic though) I am currently reading up on it. V8rik 21:59, 12 June 2006 (UTC)
 * I vaguely remember putting "In the news" on here at the time of the Nobel prize: I certainly took a look at WikiNews, and they didn't have any chemistry stories, which explains why the format was/is different. To be frank, it was an experiment which I didn't expect to last, although I'm happy that it seems to have a longer half-life than expected! Physchim62 (talk) 12:48, 21 June 2006 (UTC)

forthcoming exams for chemistry
plz send me information for the forthcoming exams to be conducted for chemistry of CBSE.

Uranium compounds
I want to create Pages of the compounds listed in category:Uranium compounds in the german WP. Therefore it would be nice, if someone moves all the nice structure-pictures from here to the Wikimedia Commons to enable shared use. Thank you. Augiasstallputzer 15:33, 29 June 2006 (UTC) Images: Image:U3O8lattice.jpg, Image:UO2lattice.jpg , Image:UO3 gamma lattice.jpg , Image:UF6solid.jpg , Image:UF4solid.jpg
 * I would suggest putting these on Commons yourself, they are all public domain. Good luck, Walkerma 01:40, 1 July 2006 (UTC)

Chemistry refrences?
I was wondering where I can find some good chemistry references, particularily for properties and descriptions of chemical compounds. Google-ing chemical compounds was no use for me as there was little information on most pages (such as the name, CAS number and occasionally the melting/boiling points but no descriptions) and I can't find any books on the compounds I want (except on Amazon, but they're extremely pricey, upwards of around $100 (€78, £54).) I noticed a red link that should go to a list of chemical resources. Could you help me out?

Thanks!

Evan  Robidoux  03:05, 6 July 2006 (UTC)
 * WikiProject Chemicals/Data is where the chemical resources list appears to be hiding at the moment :) Physchim62 (talk) 09:15, 7 July 2006 (UTC)
 * Another source with such a list is Chemical sources. The list is still quite a mess, but getting there, I hope.  All pages about chemicals will get a link to that page, for now in the 'External links' section.  --Dirk Beetstra T  C 23:43, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

DYK
I've seen some other portals with DYK sections of their own - does anyone else think that's a good idea for this one? riana_dzasta 11:20, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

Tweaks
Hi everybody, I've made some small changes here and there, feel free to let me know whether you think they work or not! I think that things that still need to be done are: Thanks, riana_dzasta 10:35, 12 November 2006 (UTC)
 * Changed header colour to something more visually appealing - Physchim62 made them match the chem infobox last year, but I think this scheme is a bit nicer to look at.
 * Changed the layout a little bit - switched the boxes around. Especially the picture at the top - grabs the eye.
 * Added a 'related portals' section. Not entirely satisfied with the content in that, so please change it as you see fit.
 * Tweaked the intro a little bit.
 * Created Category:Chemistry Portal to keep all the pages together.
 * Add a DYK section and perhaps a biography section.
 * Add a Wikimedia section. Done. riana_dzasta 14:04, 12 November 2006 (UTC)
 * While this is probably a little ambitious: perhaps a "major topics" navbox similar to this I tried to do something similar here, using BranchesofChemistry, but it doesn't seem to working properly, I have a syntax error somewhere which I can't seem to fix.

Well done. Should we add Portal:Molecular and Cellular Biology to the related portals section? --Bduke 20:22, 12 November 2006 (UTC)
 * Add anything you feel is relevant! I was a bit tired last night and half-doing that, half studying, so whatever additions you think are relevant are probably good :) The bit I did was a rushed job... riana_dzasta 23:39, 12 November 2006 (UTC)
 * Basically, I want to push for featured in a few months or so (it'll have to be a few months, as we need to show it's well-maintained), so it'd be nice to have lots of hands on deck! riana_dzasta 23:41, 12 November 2006 (UTC)


 * It looks nice. I'll help how I can. ~K 01:37, 13 November 2006 (UTC)


 * Thank you, ~K! Hope you don't feel like I'm messing with your baby... :) riana_dzasta 02:12, 13 November 2006 (UTC)


 * No, you are definitely not messing up "my baby". I learned long ago that I can do a good job, but WE can do a better job. ~K 05:49, 13 November 2006 (UTC)


 * Brilliant! :) Any suggestions to add to the ones I've put forward above? I'm attempting to act on those right now, but can anyone think of anything else? riana_dzasta 06:12, 13 November 2006 (UTC)
 * It's looking good, thanks riana! A DYK section seems like a good idea: remember that DYK articles are supposed to have been recently improved, the section should act as an incentive to editors to create encyclopedic material. Physchim62 (talk) 14:43, 13 November 2006 (UTC)


 * Looks nice to me, thanks Riana! I'll try to think about some topics for DYK; I think it should be (most of all) something fun! Thanks, Walkerma 16:25, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

← Regarding DYK, I noticed that the Biology portal seems to use it as a biology 'trivia' section more than anything else. Eg, polar bears are nearly invisible in infrared light, etc etc. But I agree with Physchim62. riana_dzasta 01:15, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
 * A "general trivia" section may be better than nothing, at least to get started, but a DYK section should change on (say) a month-to-month basis: at the very least, it should change from time to time, like ITN. Physchim62 (talk) 08:59, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
 * OK, I'll try to get something like that underway. In the meantime, would you guys mind having a look at this? I've made some (fairly major) changes and additions. Feel free to tell me if anything completely, well, sucks, and I'll happily db-author any subpages I've made if you feel they're not working. riana_dzasta 15:13, 14 November 2006 (UTC) PS And obviously feel free to edit in my sandbox, or edit the subpages I've made if you feel like they're incomplete. riana_dzasta 15:40, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

Made changes
Hey everybody, I went ahead and implemented my changes, since I waited for some commentary for 3 days and got none... I assume that means my changes are OK? :) Feel free to change anything you don't like. Cheers, riana_dzasta 03:49, 17 November 2006 (UTC)


 * Looks good. I have a few questions and observations:
 * 1) I like the Selected Biography section. How will the selected biography get choosen?  Who's responsible for changing it?
 * 2) What's the purpose of the Chemistry in Industry section? It just lists major industrial chemical suppliers.
 * 3) The How Can You Help? section seems redundant when right below it is the Things You Can Do section.
 * Otherwise, I like the new arrangement of sections and the new lists.
 * P.S. Don't worry about that fact that you got no immediate replies. Us chemists are slow folk. ~K 05:44, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

I had reservations myself about points 2 and 3. I noticed that the French chem portal had something similar (chemistry in industry), so I tried doing it here, but if you feel it doesn't work, I don't mind getting rid of it. I will also remove the How Can You Help section, it seemed silly to me too. As for the biography section, I don't mind changing it myself, perhaps on a weekly/fortnightly basis - I'll take care of it. I sort of set out 'guidelines' for choosing biographies on the candidates subpage, but that won't really get going until we have more people to help us out. OK, so I'll get rid of 'how can you help', and I'll leave Chemistry in Industry for now (just in case someone finds it useful). riana_dzasta 05:57, 17 November 2006 (UTC)


 * Sounds good. ~K 16:21, 17 November 2006 (UTC)