Talk:Algorithm/GA1

GA Reassessment
The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the reassessment.''

I'm reassessing this article for GA sweeps, to double-check all old GAs. This is the first part where i do a skim-check, then part two, the full review, may occur later. There's one major thing I notice with this article: The references are all in MLA format. They need to be converted to wiki format. I'll give you five days to fix this. If it is, I'll do a full review of the article. If not, I'll delist it. Wizardman 22:14, 18 August 2009 (UTC)


 * I'm not entirely sure what this means. Could you explain what you mean by MLA vs wiki? And also, could you point to which GA guideline the current referencing style infringes? Thanks. RobHar (talk) 22:44, 18 August 2009 (UTC)
 * I mean right now all the references are (Name: #-#) format, when they really should not be. They should be in either Harvard referencing style or in a style where clocking it can bring the viewer straight to the reference. Wizardman  22:48, 18 August 2009 (UTC)
 * WP:CITE says that any consistently-used format is acceptable. Moreover, choice of style alone is not a sufficient reason for changing an established referencing style. However, I would rather see this article delisted if it will prevent this sort of discussion in the future. &mdash; Carl (CBM · talk) 00:10, 19 August 2009 (UTC)
 * It's also true that the refs in this article are not consistent, although "(Kleene 1967:45)" seems to be the predominant style. They should be consistent, at least. &mdash; Carl (CBM · talk) 01:15, 19 August 2009 (UTC)


 * Wizardman, the GA criteria do not specify any particular style of citation formatting. You are supposed to be assessing this article against the GA criteria, not your own personal preferences. --Malleus Fatuorum 00:18, 19 August 2009 (UTC)


 * Actually, I do favor delisting this article at this time, due to concerns about the content, especially in the lower sections. Having a review underway makes it harder to do significant editing. Once the content is improved, we can always have the article reviewed again. &mdash; Carl (CBM · talk) 00:32, 19 August 2009 (UTC)


 * Unless I've missed something in WP:CITE, there's nothing wrong with MLA format (although I personally find it a pain). The only minor issue is that it is a bit inconvenient to see an inline reference and then have to scroll down to the bibliography to search for the proper full citation (no linking function as with the ref tags). Again, though, it's a minor issue, and should not be used to pre-empt a proper review, especially at the GA level. Dabomb87 (talk) 01:13, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

The GA requirements require that citations exist, not that be Harvard, Turabian, APA, MLA, or any specific style. This is not a reason to delist the article. -- Avi (talk) 19:57, 19 August 2009 (UTC)


 * Someone else review the article then. I still think the way the cites are is an issue but i don't care enough about this to fight it. Wizardman  03:42, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

WP:CITE says that "Any of these styles is acceptable on Wikipedia so long as articles are internally consistent." I think the current article is not internally consistent. For example, references with page numbers have been formatted using at least six different styles: (Smith 2008:1), (Smith 2008, p. 1), (Smith 2008, p. 1) with hyperlink, (Smith:1), (Smith, p. 1), and (Smith, p.1). I do not agree with the original verdict that the MLA style is bad – besides, I didn't even notice a single example of pure MLA style, which would be (Smith 1). However, I agree that mixing up all these different styles is not appropriate for a GA. — Miym (talk) 22:07, 20 August 2009 (UTC)
 * The history section is way long and full of not incredibly important stuff. Please move it to a separate article and summarize its main points. Pcap ping  01:26, 22 August 2009 (UTC)
 * There already is a split-out article called Algorithm characterizations that deals with much of the history. The history section in the article is appropriate length (and was added to address an article-improvement suggestion a number of years ago). I'm going to revert this silly banner above the page. Bill Wvbailey (talk) 03:33, 22 August 2009 (UTC)


 * Some footnotes do not correspond to any discernible reference, for instance "Valley News, p. 13". Pcap ping  18:09, 22 August 2009 (UTC)
 * Fixed.Wvbailey (talk) 14:52, 7 September 2009 (UTC)


 * The very 1st reference, "al-Daffa 1977" that's supposed to cover the etymology is also non present. I can't be bothered with much more checking, except to say that I find the prose really convoluted: the repeated direct references to the sources become very distracting. You already know my opinion about the marginal value of much of the information in this article, which only serves to dilute important stuff. Computability is not mentioned anywhere except in references for instance. The article does not introduce itself as chiefly an etymological or historical treatise, but that's what it is... I would delist it, but I'm irrelevant around here. Pcap ping  18:52, 22 August 2009 (UTC)
 * The spelling of the al-Kwhowârizmi's name, and the exact historical details (i.e. scholarship, truth) has been a matter of great contention in this article; what the reader sees now has been reverted, altered and messed with probably 100 times; all that I can do is quote this from Knuth (The Art of Computer Programmeing, Vol. 1 2nd Edition: Fundamental Algorithms 1968, 1973:1-2); he gives no source for this that I can find: "Finally, historians of mathematics found the true origin of the word algorism: it comes from the name of a famous Persion textbook author, Abu Ja'far Mohammed ibn Mûsâ al-Kwhowârizmi (c. 825) -- literlly, "Father of Ja'far, Mohammed, son of Moses, native of Kwhowârizm." Khowârizm is today the small Soviet city of Khiva. Al-Khowârizmi wrote the celebrated book Kitab al jabr w'al-mugabala ("Rules of restoration and reduction"); another word, "algebra," stems from the title of his book, although the book wasn't really very algebraic. ¶ Gradually the form and meaning of "algorism" became corrupted; as explained by the Oxford English Dictionary, the word was "erroneously refashioned by "learned confusion" with the word arithmetic. The change from "algorism" to "algorithm" is not hard to understand in view of the fact that people had forgotten the original derivation of the word. An early German mathematical dictionary, Vollstandiges Mathematishes Lexicon (Leipzig, 1747), gives the following definition for the word Algorithmus: "Under this designation are combined the notions of the four types of arithmetic calculations, namely addition, multiplication, subtraction, and division." The latin phrase algorithmus infinitesimalis was at that time used to denote "ways of calculation with infinitely small quantities, as invented by Leibnitz." ¶ "By 1950, the word algorithm was most frequenty associated with "Euclid's algorithm,", a process for finding the greatest common divisior of two numbers which appears in Euclid's Elements (Book 7, Propositions 1 and 2.) It will be instructive to exhibits Euclid's algorithm here: [etc]." Knuth (pages 225-227) offers an interesting history of various computational notions such as "subroutines", "coroutines", "interpretive routine", "buffering", "semaphores" and "concurrent process". Wvbailey (talk) 15:30, 7 September 2009 (UTC)