Talk:Dents du Midi/GA1

GA Review
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Reviewer: David Eppstein (talk · contribs) 23:03, 10 April 2021 (UTC)

Comments from first reading (arranged by position within article, not by GACR rule number):

Overall impression:
 * Earwig found a copied web page but I'm pretty sure the copying went in the other direction so I'm not considering it to be a problem
 * This appears to give reasonably complete coverage of its topic
 * All claims have what looks like adequate sourcing

Lead section and infobox:
 * Good lead image, properly licensed
 * The lead text adequately summarizes the rest of the article without introducing additional claims, except one: the claim that Lac de Salanfe is an artificial reservoir does not appear later.
 * Added that claim in the rest of the article


 * There are multiple issues with the equality of prose here (GACR #1):
 * "They face...Its seven peaks": is the subject singular or plural? Pick one.


 * "Limestone rocks": this means separated pieces of limestone, like in a scree slope. I think the bulk sense of "rock" is intended, so "rock" should be singular.


 * "especially Valanginian in its upper part": I'm not sure what "especially" is supposed to mean here, and it's also unclear whether "upper part" refers to the upper part of the peaks, the upper part of the Valanginian time period, or something else. And since "Valandinian" refers to time, not type of rock, it is not clear how it is supposed to connect to the earlier half of the same sentence.


 * "Accessible from...are climbed since" is a little jarring of a juxtaposition because of the change in time, from something that has not changed (they have always been accessible from those places) to something fixed at a certain date.


 * "A footpath going around the Dents du Midi exists since 1975." this is a little unidiomatic. "Exists" is a weaker verb than "going around" and normally the stronger verb would be the main one in its sentence.


 * "a real local symbol": Does "real" have a concrete meaning here or is it just WP:PEACOCK?


 * "is used as much": is this a typo for "as such" or is it an unidiomatic way of trying to say "is often used"?

Names:
 * First sentence is a bit long, try breaking it into two.


 * "Pastor Jean-Baptiste Plantin": I don't think "pastor" is an official title, so it shouldn't be capitalized.


 * All the quotes should be straight quotes (see WP:CURLY) and at least one close quote is missing.
 * I think it's ✅


 * Why is Dent de Bonavau italicized?
 * I used the template Lang as it is a french name but removed it.


 * Again, nice and properly licensed image. In the captions of the images, it might be helpful to state what direction they are from (east, west, etc) and not just what town they are from, since most readers are unlikely to be familiar with the local geography.

Location:
 * Another good image that could use a direction in the caption.

Topography:
 * I think the fourth pass should be separate from the sentence that starts "There are three passes".

Geology:
 * I think Alpine orogeny needs to be mentioned here somewhere.
 * I don't know where to put this.


 * "which caused the rocks to protrude": what rocks? Maybe again this should be singular? But also the definite article suggests that it's referring to some specific rocks that we already know, rather than introducing a new set of rocks.


 * "were then linked": is this supposed to mean that a link was formed at this time, or that a link existed then but no longer exists now?
 * As explained they were connected but then the Rhône glacier separated them. Not sure how to make this clearer in the article.


 * "The summits of the Dents du Midi are formed mainly from limestone rocks formed during the Mesozoic and Cenozoic in the Paleocean Tethys.": since this is chronologically long before the Alpine orogeny, shouldn't it be earlier in this section? Also, since the Alpine origeny uplifted these rocks in the late Mesozoic and Cenozoic, is it accurate to say that the rocks were formed then? Especially the summits (the highest peaks), which the same paragraph contradicts by saying they date from the early Cretaceous and Triassic?
 * Not exactly sure what to do about this as I am not really familiar with those therms and I wrote the article almost a year ago (this article is a translation of my work in french from april 2020). I don't have a lot of time right now to fix this as well.


 * "Valanginian dating from the Early Cretaceous" is redundant and repeats the same thing. Which may not be a bad thing to do, but it should be phrased to make clear that's what it's doing rather than phrased to look like it is saying two different things when it isn't.


 * In general I think this whole section would benefit from being placed into chronological order: Triassic creation of the lower layers of limestone, then early Cretacious creation of the upper layers of limestone, then Mesozoic/Cenozoic uplift into mountains.
 * Same as fourth point


 * Was the flysch laid down during the uplift?
 * Are you talking about the end of the section?


 * Would it be possible for the image caption to say something about how the visible strata in the image relate to the text of this section?
 * I thought about it but I don't know how to phrase it

Hydrography
 * "The hot spring appeared": what hot spring? Where?


 * "Its origin was unknown until 2001, when a scientific investigation was conducted": what did the investigation conclude?

Seismicity and landslides
 * How does the chronology of major landslides connect with the earlier claim in "Geology" that the Éperon, once the highest point, collapsed in the 18th century (not overlapping with any dates in the chronology)?
 * The Éperon collapsing is a theory and is not mentioned in the source. Landslides are considered major when they interfere with the life of people (like the 1925 one).

Fauna and flora
 * Génépi goes to an article mostly about a liquor.


 * "herds of cows are sometimes settled": would "pastured" be a better verb?


 * Is there any chance a photo of plants or animals taken in these mountains could be found?
 * I put pictures of almost every animals and plants from these mountains in the article but someone removed them because there were none taken in the mountains. To my knowledge, Commons doesn't have anything of the sort.

History
 * The actual content of this section is only about climbing. Why is it given a more general label, and given a separate section of its own outside of the section for other activities?
 * This section talks about the history of people on the Dents du Midi, and the Activities section is there to explains the existing ways to get to the top of the mountains. Plus it's not all about climbing.


 * Why is "Ancient" capitalized?


 * "the first ascents" maybe should be "the first recorded ascents"?


 * Some people (Auguste Wagnon) are referred to repeatedly by first and last name, while others (Beaumont and Breugel) never get more than just the last name. I think a better convention would be to give both first and last name for the first mention of every person, and then after that to list them only by last name.
 * I think ✅


 * "founder of Wild Heerbrugg Heinrich Wild": MOS:BLUESEA.


 * "represents a revolution": represented, maybe?

Sports tourism
 * More non-straight quotes.
 * I think it's ✅


 * Linking trail running within the start of the name of a particular even seems a bit of a MOS:EASTEREGG to me.


 * What is "the precursor of the trail" supposed to mean?
 * I guess it's ✅.


 * "birth of a footpath": kind of an awkward metaphor. Maybe more literal wording would be better.


 * "the ridge of Soi, which is equipped": equipped with what?

Economy
 * "the image of the Dent du Midi being widely used": which dent? Or should it be plural?


 * Finally, an image that I am skeptical is properly licensed. What evidence is there that the uploader of this poster owned its copyright in order to release it?
 * This image was uploaded by Champéry Tourisme. It is more than likely that the poster was made for them in the 50s, so I'm guessing they own the copyright and decided to share it.

Environmental protection
 * I found this section a bit confusing, because it appears to be stating that only two small pastures on the mountains are public land, suggesting that everything else (including the high peaks) is privately owned. Is that really true? Or is it merely that these pastures are subject to higher levels of protection than everything else? Does protection mean that it is preserved only from certain uses (like constructing buildings) or does it mean also that visitors are forbidden from entering?
 * Gave it a try. Let me know if it's still not clear.

Culture
 * Would it be possible to list notable artists who painted these mountains?
 * There are tens of them mentionned in the source. I was thaught on french Wikipedia not to get into specifics if I can't name all of them. I could name just a few if that's alright here (in the source there's five or six with biographies and the rest is in a gallery format. I guess the ones with biographies qualify for "notable").


 * Dates of the books would be helpful. Are they chronological?


 * In what sense is the use on coats of arms and currency "popular culture" as distinct from "cultural works"? Both of these subsection titles are vaguer than they need to be.

References
 * Footnotes 19, 21, 23, 26, 27, 41-44, 46, and 48 end with a doubled period.


 * Footnote 33 ("Vallauri 1924") doesn't match the date given for Vallauri, giving me a big red error message "Harv error: link from #CITEREFVallauri1924 doesn't point to any citation."


 * Many of the footnotes are incorrectly labeled with the internet hostname they are from (e.g. www.hcaloz-guide.ch) rather than the name of the web site they belong to (Hubert Caloz Guide).

Overall, this is a pretty good article, but I think it still needs a fair amount of copyediting to meet the good article criteria (primarily criterion 1). I'm placing the nomination on hold to give you time to make these changes. —David Eppstein (talk) 00:44, 11 April 2021 (UTC)
 * Thank you for your thorough review. As mentioned it comes at a bad time as I do not have a lot of time right now. I hope most of my edits have already improved the article. - Espandero (talk) 11:15, 11 April 2021 (UTC)

Second reading
Lead "dating from the Valanginian in its upper part": the prose is now more idiomatic, but my concern about which of multiple targets the pronoun "its" refers to is still present. Moreover, why is only the timing of the upper part lead-worthy? Is it accurate to say "dating from the Valanginian" if that is actually the more recent of the dates of those rocks?

"A footpath around the Dents du Midi exists since 1975.": You "fixed" my complaint about exists being a weak verb by removing the stronger auxiliary verb that was overshadowing it, but it is still a weak verb.
 * English is not my first language so I'll be honest and say I have no idea what a "weak verb" is. Feel free to help. (I looked it up on Google, it didn't help)

"represents a local symbol": what symbol does it represent?

Geology: request to find a way to mention Alpine orogeny: Nothing has been done.
 * As mentioned, I do not know where to put this. Feel free to help.

"were then linked", now "were then connected": underlying concern about vagueness of what "then" means has not been addressed.

Concerns about timing and chronological ordering have not been addressed.
 * I do not feel chronological order is important here. The paragraph is short and gives enough information to know the chronology of formation. If this is really necessary I cannot make this change before Friday.

Lack of information about how the flysch mysteriously appeared has not been addressed.

I could go on but I think it's safe to say that the revision so far has addressed only the superficial wording issues and that any deeper concerns remain. Still on hold. —David Eppstein (talk) 23:51, 18 April 2021 (UTC)
 * : As mentionned, I do not have a lot of time right now. If needed, I can make further revisions on Friday. - Espandero (talk) 07:59, 19 April 2021 (UTC)
 * The only progress has been negative — the latest changes, a week ago, introduced a link to "sandstone" with link text "gritty limestone" which is I think is just a mistake (silica and carbonate are totally different minerals from each other). —David Eppstein (talk) 06:01, 26 April 2021 (UTC)
 * What do you mean "the only progress"? I have corrected more than one thing. It would really help if you could talk to me instead of acting like this was a school test. I feel there are things you could help me with but you don't seem to aknowledge my comments. This is the first time I ask for a review and the reviewer doesn't interact with the article. You seem to understand better than me some of the changes you're asking so why can't you help me? And the fact that you come here once a week really isn't helping. - Espandero (talk) 10:00, 26 April 2021 (UTC)
 * I am coming back after that long because I am trying to give you enough time to make substantive reviews. And this is not really a situation where I just tell you exactly what the new article should say and then you make exactly those changes. I've identified issues where the article is currently problematic but they need substantive edits to fix and I can't be both the person who does the research and performs those edits and also the person who reviews the results. —David Eppstein (talk) 17:36, 26 April 2021 (UTC)
 * Yes but when I say "I don't know how to do a certain fix" or "I don't think that change is necessary" and you come back a week later just saying "nothing has been done" then what am I supposed to think? As far as I'm concerned right now I have addressed everything you mentioned and I was waiting for you to answer to make some changes last Friday. And I don't think any of the things I need help with need research. It's mainly about vocabulary (see the parts where I've put "feel free to help", it's about the Alpine orogeny and the weak verb thing). - Espandero (talk) 07:20, 27 April 2021 (UTC)

Closing the review
Long after this discussion, nothing has happened.

Serious issues with the chronology of the geology section, raised in the GA review, have not been addressed, and indeed have been quickly set aside with "I don't know how to do this", as if it is only possible to make changes if led by the hand with a precise description of what the new content should be - The Alps, in general, were created in the Alpine orogeny, which happened beginning roughly 65My ago but were a long ongoing process. Our article does not need to detail that whole process (that would be off-topic) but its statement that they appeared, as if from nothing, at the precise date of 60My ago is misleading and unhelpful, and its summary as a collision only between Africa and Europe is inaccurate. - The section is out of chronological order, with the mountains being created first and only later a description of the creation of the rocks they were made from. My request to fix this was met with "Not exactly sure what to do about this ... I don't have a lot of time right now to fix this". - Within the part of the section on the creation of the rocks, it is again not possible to understand the chronological order of the layers. - This chronology is extremely relevant for understanding the banding pattern of the image in that section and no such understanding is evident in the article.

Later on, my question about internal contradictions in the chronology of landslides was met only by excuses rather than any attempt to clarify the article. The same excuses and lack of interest in improvement were the response to my observation that the section on history went into inappropriate detail on one specific facet of history (the history of climbing the summits), which made more sense as part of the section on activities one might perform on these mountains.

It's a shame, because I still think this is close, and many of my other requests were reasonably handled, but I don't think I can pass this at this time. —David Eppstein (talk) 07:32, 24 May 2021 (UTC)
 * I am extremly disappointed that this is the way you chose to proceed. I have tried to talk to you numerous times and you have failed to answer on every single occasion. The way you treated this procedure really made me feel like my opinion on my own work didn't matter. I was waiting for you to answer to my last message and was not expecting this kind of answer. I really think this should have been a discussion, but you simply never answered any of my messages and you never addressed anything I said. What you call "excuses" were my attempts to make conversion as to how to approach certain things. You could have given me advices but instead you chose to stay silent. Since you never answered I was never able to make the changes left.
 * I would simply ask that you never review any of my work again because I do not feel we have the same philosophy as to how this should be conducted. This is the third time I nominate an article of mine and the first time I get a fail. It is probably the most disappointing "discussion" I have had on Wikipedia. Best regards anyway, Espandero (talk) 07:54, 24 May 2021 (UTC)