Talk:List of chess grandmasters/Archive 3

"Name" column
I've just seen the monstrosity that is the formatting of the "name" column. It really needs to be amended to use the sortname template. All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 11:50, 19 September 2021 (UTC)
 * It isn't a monstrosity, it's a piped wikilink which is put to simple and effective use to get the correct name sort and to link to chess bio articles. The table did originally display names in "Given Family" order and at different times used either sortname or data-sort-value= to get the names to sort correctly.  I  changed the table in November 2019 to use the "Family, Given" order as it is more natural here and makes it much easier to find entries.  This also reduced the article text by about 50K.   Adding 1900 more templates to the page would not be an improvement, but I welcome you to try it in a user sandbox to see if you think it is better. Quale (talk) 09:09, 9 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Monstrosity! Really?VarmtheHawk (talk) 16:33, 10 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Yes, a monstrosity. Why on earth is it listed in surname-forename order? It's hideous. All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 17:03, 10 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Using the sortname template would reduce the article text by approximately 12k, and in addition would render the list readable as names are simply never written in surname-forename order as it is unencyclopaedic. All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 17:03, 10 October 2021 (UTC)
 * A hideous monstrosity? On this planet, names are usually surname first as they do the the Encyclopedia Britannica and Dictionary of National Biography. And why do we care if it saves 12k? — Preceding unsigned comment added by VarmtheHawk (talk • contribs) 18:15, 10 October 2021 (UTC)
 * No, surnames are never "usually surname first" in the English world. It's kind of how it works, and I'm shocked somebody would try and state otherwise. I'm not sure if you've noticed but this isn't Encyclopedia Britannica or Dictionary of National Biography, this is Wikipedia. It's irrelevant to how those do it. It's like saying we should write articles in the manner Shakespeare wrote! We care if it reduces the article size per Article size. Yet another one of the "expert editors" who doesn't know policies. All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 20:13, 10 October 2021 (UTC)
 * The measure of Article size is "readable prose" (WP:RPS), and reversing the order of names would have relatively little effect on that, though I suppose it would get rid of commas. Bruce leverett (talk) 02:02, 11 October 2021 (UTC)
 * You can't pick and choose arguments that back you up, and then ignore other things. Yes, readable prose is one measure of article size, but there are, very clearly, two other measures of article size. All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 10:38, 11 October 2021 (UTC)
 * There is no good reason to have the surname first here. They should be written as they normally are in English, formatted so that the sort function sorts them by surname. It's up to somebody to make the change. Onetwothreeip (talk) 20:43, 10 October 2021 (UTC)
 * It appears that it's only Onetwothreeip and ItsKesha who want to dramatically change this article which has been worked on diligently for years for the chess community on Wikipedia. As was said, "Nobody owns the article" but there is not consensus here, and there aggressive tone you two are taking is unprofessional.VarmtheHawk (talk) 21:56, 10 October 2021 (UTC)
 * It is by no means uncommon to list people by surname followed by first name in English lanugage publications. MaxBrowne2 (talk) 21:59, 10 October 2021 (UTC)
 * It's a shame that you would need to take the time to point out the obvious. As the article is sorted alphabetically by last name, it would be odd to not list them that way. Thanks for reverting the edit. You beat me to it by a couple of minutes.VarmtheHawk (talk) 22:12, 10 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Can you find me those articles that list names by surname first please, ? And can you find me the policy that dictates such peculiar displaying of information? Thanks. All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 23:10, 10 October 2021 (UTC)
 * How about the phone book? MaxBrowne2 (talk) 01:13, 11 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Hi Max, I've just read the Wikipedia article for the phone book. It redirected me to Telephone directory, and as you can see, there is not even a list in this article. Nice try though. All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 10:38, 11 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Is there some policy that dictates the use of "given family" instead of "family, given"? Or is this just an "other stuff exists" argument?  Bruce leverett (talk) 02:02, 11 October 2021 (UTC)
 * It's the reverse, a WP:OTHERSTUFFDOESNTEXIST argument. For the record I don't really mind one way or the other how names are displayed and I'm not sure why Quale got rid of the sortname template. One might have a preference, but calling "family, given" a "monstrosity" is obviously hyperbole.MaxBrowne2 (talk) 02:09, 11 October 2021 (UTC)
 * I explained why I thought that "Last, First" order would work better for this table in May 2019; you can find it as the first item in the enormous wall of text on this page at . (Since this will be archived someday the edit itself was https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk:List_of_chess_grandmasters&diff=897017592&oldid=877814957&diffmode=source.)  I gave four reasons to prefer last first name order in this table and I still think those are valid and borne out by experience over the last two years, but reasonable people can differ.  (Unreasonable people can differ as well, and they almost certainly will.)  I don't think anyone was moved to discuss name order at the time, possibly because of the tl;dr problem with the size of my ruminations, but I'll listen to thoughts about it.  I didn't actually change the name order until this 13 November 2019 edit.  At that time the table was using data-sort-value=.  The earliest versions of the article from its very inception used sortname and I edited those extensively.  At some point someone changed the table to use data-sort-value instead, I think this was because there was advice deprecating the template and advising editors to use data-sort-value directly.  At some point I realized that piped links would automatically handle the sort order issue if the table displayed the Last, First order that dictionaries and other encyclopedias use.  In fact that name order has the same advantages here that induce other reference sources to use it, so it's better for readers for many of the same ease-of-use reasons that cause other encyclopedias to do it, and maybe good for wikipedia editors as well.  (Of course the FIDE Top Lists use that name order too, as do the rating lists.)  Quale (talk) 05:24, 11 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Yes, it's our style that we have given name before surname. This should be a non-issue, as they can still be sorted by order of surname regardless of which name is first. Onetwothreeip (talk) 09:05, 11 October 2021 (UTC)
 * All of your four reasons for having surname-forename are all invalid due to the existence of the sortname template. Here are four articles promoted to featured list status in October that all use the sortname template. List of commanders of the British 2nd Division, List of Billboard number-one country songs of 2014, United States presidential elections in Hawaii, and List of Gillingham F.C. players (1–24 appearances). You'll note that none of them have surname-forename ordering, and none of them include birthplace. The Gillingham list does feature the players' nationalities, but that's basically the same as Federation for this list. All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 10:38, 11 October 2021 (UTC)
 * For a reader scrolling through a long list, the utility of having the sort keys aligned at the left is obvious.


 * I have had trouble finding Wikipedia lists of people, sorted alphabetically by last name, that required non-trivial scrolling. For example, in List of United States representatives from New York, the part of the list under letter "A" almost fits on my screen.  That's one of the largest I have found.  But this list of grandmasters seems to have about three times as many entries as that list of representatives.  Bruce leverett (talk) 14:33, 11 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Apparently, someone deleted my comment from this talk page. I'm sure anyone who's interested can find it. From this I have learned that it is actually possible and acceptable to delete something from a talk page! And I've learned that this person also finds it acceptable for other editors (another one who shall remain nameless) to demean people, say they're operating in bad faith and demand an apology. As I've said before, no response will ever be good enough.VarmtheHawk (talk) 15:02, 11 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Your comment was clearly a personal attack, Varm, and it is lucky you weren't reported by . All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 15:32, 11 October 2021 (UTC)
 * This table would still have a sort key using the sortname template, Bruce. All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 15:32, 11 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Evidently I didn't make myself clear. Looking at the sortname template, I don't see a way to tell it to handle ...last=smith|first=John... by displaying "smith, john".  I can get it to sort by "smith, john", but the scrolling user will not see "smith" in the left side of the column.  If you think there is a way to get this effect, that would be worth looking into.  Bruce leverett (talk) 17:57, 11 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Evidently I haven't made myself clear - that's not how lists are supposed to work. There should be a major hint for you in the fact the sortname template won't display it as surname-forename! Look at those featured lists I mentioned above. None display it surname-forename. All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 19:29, 11 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Pray tell, explain to us how lists are supposed to work. After all these years, I thought I knew that "alphabetical by name" generally meant by last name. There are plenty of lists that do just that, and they know it. Contributes so much for the "polite and effective discourse" that this is supposed to be. VarmtheHawk (talk) 20:20, 11 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Admit you don't know how the sortname template works without saying you don't know how the sortname template works. All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 20:34, 11 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Go pound sand. The sortname template was replaced by data-sort-value some years ago.  Neither of those mechanisms is needed to get correct sorts when names are displayed in standard sortable order as in standard encyclopedias and dictionaries as the article does now.  But that's already been explained, so after this reply I won't explain it a third time. Quale (talk) 22:39, 11 October 2021 (UTC)
 * gO PoUnD SaNd. What does that even mean? Odd. The sortname template was inexplicably replace by you, incorrectly. All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 23:13, 11 October 2021 (UTC)


 * I was away from the keyboard for a while, and the conversation shifted of course, but I will place my reply here, and indent it just so, to make it hopefully clear which comment I am replying to.
 * I complained that the sortname template doesn't do what I want, and User:ItsKesha replied that, in essence, that was because I wanted something I shouldn't want. As we say in the software world, "that's not a bug, it's a feature!".
 * Hypothetically, if I wanted to use a template (rather than piped links), I could write a new template, by copying the sortname template and slightly modifying it, and use that. The benefit of using a template would be, that people wouldn't have to type the name of the grandmaster twice.  I like this idea, but since User:Quale is thinking of moving this whole mess to Wikidata, I would not bring up design tweaks like using a template here until the Wikidata question had been settled.
 * As to whether I wanted something that I shouldn't want, some other editors have covered a little of this ground. I agree that WP:NCP does not forbid us, or even discourage us, from using last, first in a list of people's names. WP:NAME doesn't either.  But thanks for covering that ground; I was ready to look over WP:LIST and the forest of guidelines/policies starting there, but I will assume you have already done so, and not found anything relevant.
 * I was somewhat more worried about the "other stuff" arguments. As I mentioned above, I have not found any existing lists of people, alphabetized by last name, that display last, first.  However, I am satisfied that this is because nobody ever really needs to do non-trivial scrolling through other lists; whereas the present list is on a different scale of size, and it is not surprising or alarming that the technique of displaying last, first is helpful for it.  Bruce leverett (talk) 01:37, 12 October 2021 (UTC)
 * I don't see much utility in using a template to replace the piped links, but maybe I'd have to see an example to make an informed judgment. The advantages of the piped links are that they are basic wikimedia syntax, do not add the overhead of 1900+ additional templates to the article, directly express intent (displayed name could hardly be simpler), treat all names uniformly, and are easy to generate, parse and manipulate mechanically with simple scripting.  Savings from not writing the name twice might be a little illusory because it is not infrequent that the bio article is under a different name than is used in the table.  Most often this is because the article title has to be disambiguated (usually with  ), but other times there are spelling differences between what is used in the table and in the bio article.  The sortname template allows for this by having a positional parameter for the sort key, but any time you would need to use that here would probably be a net loss for the template compared to the piped link.  But as I said, someone could try it and see how it works.  One bonus for a template is that it should be possible to change the template code to use "given surname" order instead without having to edit any rows of the table, but that's only a win if we decide to change the table back to that name order.  And at that point you really could use the sortname template instead, just as the article did at its inception in 2008. Quale (talk) 07:43, 13 October 2021 (UTC)

Where's that policy saying we can't list names as surname, forename again? Oh wait, there isn't one. MaxBrowne2 (talk) 21:59, 11 October 2021 (UTC)
 * MOS:NAME Onetwothreeip (talk) 22:03, 11 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Also WP:NCP. Embarrassing. All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 22:38, 11 October 2021 (UTC)
 * WP:NCP only governs the titles of articles. Embarrassing indeed, but as usual the egg is on your smug face.  Quale (talk) 22:41, 11 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Congratulations on demonstrating once again you know absolutely nothing about how Wikipedia policies are utilised. But you keep being angry and aggressive, I'm sure it will serve you well. All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 23:13, 11 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Man, you are dense. The very first line of WP:NCP is "This guideline contains conventions on how to name Wikipedia articles about individual people."  I probably shouldn't have to point out that this is not an article about an individual person, and the table entries are not articles about individual people.  But keep digging, you'll get there eventually.  Quale (talk)

Thank you ItsKesha for your polite and kind words. As a matter of fact, I studied genetic algorithms with Dr. John Holland and sort algorithms are actually something that can be understood by a junior highester. And even though I said I wouldn't, here's good example: Bibliography of World War II. I actually ran across that when looking to see what the sortname template, so I owe you my thanks. VarmtheHawk (talk) 22:43, 11 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Well done on discovering how a bibliography works mate, I'm so proud of you! I've only included them in two articles I've created. This has nothing to do with the vast majority of list articles such as this. But go off. All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 23:13, 11 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Just when I thought my day couldn't get any better, you've identified yourself as the author of the definitive account of an obscure 1929 soccer exhibition match. Despite some pretty obvious errors (which I will be happy to fix with your permission), the article is well-written (interestingly, much like this article). I do find it curious that you aggressively criticize this article for using the format "last name, first name" when you do exactly the same thing in your bibliography. And that you claim that the identification of city of birth of Chess Grandmasters is "pointless and irrelevant," in light of the fact that the two main characters in the 1929 match, John Langenus and Gaspar Rubio, fail to even include this exhibition match in their Wikipedia biographies. At any rate, let me know if you want me to help on the fixes to the article. BTW, isn't it about time to put this nonsense to rest? VarmtheHawk (talk) 01:25, 12 October 2021 (UTC)
 * This article is not a bibliography, but can someone say why they prefer the names written surname first? Onetwothreeip (talk) 06:45, 12 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Additionally, I'd love to see any policies that argue, recommend, or suggest it to be written as surname-forename, ideally accompanied by a few examples of featured list articles of it being done in that manner (not a bibliography, and certainly not a phone book(!)). Can you spare a sq... Wikipedia policy? One measly policy? All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 08:48, 12 October 2021 (UTC)
 * I will repeat what I wrote above, to spare you searching through this lengthy discussion:
 * For a reader scrolling through a long list, the utility of having the sort keys aligned at the left is obvious.


 * I have had trouble finding Wikipedia lists of people, sorted alphabetically by last name, that required non-trivial scrolling. For example, in List of United States representatives from New York, the part of the list under letter "A" almost fits on my screen.  That's one of the largest I have found.  But this list of grandmasters seems to have about three times as many entries as that list of representatives.
 * Now the truth is, I do not know what was the original rationale when User:Quale, or whoever, switched the list to show surnames first. But when I spent a few minutes actually using this list and the list of representatives, this was the issue that jumped out at me.  Bruce leverett (talk) 15:12, 12 October 2021 (UTC)
 * As I've said before, no explanation will ever be good enough. This (non)issue started on a whim on 19 September and very detailed rationale have been given for leaving the list as is. The consensus is to leave it as is. Let's move on to the (inevitable) next issue.VarmtheHawk (talk) 16:04, 12 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Where is this "very detailed rationale"? All that's been said is "I changed and I like it this way". "I have no policies or examples". "Bibliographies are like this". "The phone book is like this". "Here are some words". Unfortunately for your sake the arguments put forth obviously hold no water. You can't just ignore the complaints and say "nothing will ever be good enough" and that it "started on a whim" just because you don't like the answers you've been given. All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 16:38, 12 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Isn't that why the table has anchors. I think that's your complaint, it's not really clear? All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 16:38, 12 October 2021 (UTC)
 * One of the best (and worst) features of Wikipedia is that anyone can express their viewpoints. Unfortunately, they can also disruptively edit good articles. On the "birth place" issue, such editing had to be reversed 7 times by the subject matter experts. If the "names" issue was easy to edit out, I'm sure you would have done it. You've expressed your opinion in your own inimitable fashion. It was rejected after careful explanation. There is a formal process for resolving issues that you have chosen not to use. Let it go.VarmtheHawk (talk) 17:15, 12 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Could you butt out? I have at last got this guy to be courteous with me, and I'm trying to enjoy it.  Bruce leverett (talk) 17:26, 12 October 2021 (UTC)
 * "Experts" who don't know the policies of this website? Thanks for the laugh! Good article? It's far too long and has several issues which several users have brought up. All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 17:31, 12 October 2021 (UTC)
 * The table has an anchor for each letter of the alphabet. If you want to see the entry for Mališauskas, Vidmantas, you might go to List of chess grandmasters#M, and then scroll down to his name.  Anchors and scrolling are complementary techniques for finding things in very large tables.  Bruce leverett (talk) 17:26, 12 October 2021 (UTC)
 * You'd do exactly the same if you wanted to find Vidmantas Mališauskas? All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 17:30, 12 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Re: anchors: I never use the TOC to find things in the table, but others might find it useful. On a device with a real keyboard most often I use Ctrl-F to search the page.  But at least on my Android phone the mobile page does not include the TOC, so relying on the TOC for navigation seems unwise.  It's much easier to find the names on the narrow screen of a mobile device with the names displayed with surname first. Quale (talk) 06:08, 14 October 2021 (UTC)

Neither MOS:NAME nor WP:NCP, which were quoted to me, have anything to say about the "surname, forename" format. Besides, wikipedia has no firm rules, nor is there any requirement for consistency across the entire project. Articles on similar subject matter can and do use different varieties of English, different date formats, different citation styles, different header organization, different anything, according to the preferences of the articles' respective editors. Repeated demands that we link to other list articles that use "surname, forename" format can therefore be safely ignored. Nor does the mere existence of a template mean anyone is obliged to use it, if it doesn't achieve the effect the editor wants.

So in the end all we have here is disagreement over personal preferences over name formats, of no more significance than national English varieties or date formats. WP:ILIKEIT v WP:IDONTLIKEIT. The only policies in operation are WP:CONSENSUS and WP:IAR. MaxBrowne2 (talk) 17:58, 12 October 2021 (UTC)
 * MOS:NAME says "Standard English-language text formatting and capitalization rules apply to the names of individuals". I don't think that could be any clearer. All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 20:38, 12 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Can someone please tell me why they prefer the names written surname first? I don't want any policy arguments or any examples from other articles, I just want to know why anybody wants it this way. Please don't say anything about the reason being obvious. This is not a rhetorical question, I really want to know. Onetwothreeip (talk) 21:10, 12 October 2021 (UTC)
 * I gave four reasons earlier on this talk page, originally in 2019 at but also referenced earlier in this talk section.  Another reason I didn't mention in 2019 is that the combination of names in Western and Eastern name orders is a little disorienting when you are scanning the list looking for a name and it can be hard or impossible to tell how the list is sorted.  (Unless you edit the article, which is pretty inconvenient and impossible in PDF or dead tree versions of the article.)  Similar problems arise with Spanish names as they often have two surnames and the correct sort is often not easily apparent.  For example of the latter, the start of the table looked like this on May 1, 2019:
 * {| class="sortable wikitable"

! Name !! Born !! Died !! Year !! Most recent federation
 * Jacob Aagaard (FIDE)||1973-08-01||||2007||
 * Nijat Abasov (FIDE)||1995-10-14||||2011||🇦🇿
 * Hasan Abbasifar (FIDE)||1982-08-11||||2013||
 * Farid Abbasov (FIDE)||1979-01-31||||2007||🇦🇿
 * Thal Abergel (FIDE)|| 1982-10-13||||2008||🇫🇷
 * Bosko Abramovic (FIDE)||1951-02-14||||1984||🇷🇸
 * Aryam Abreu Delgado (FIDE)||1978-07-09||||2008||🇨🇺
 * Péter Ács (FIDE)||1981-05-10||||1998||🇭🇺
 * Michael Adams (FIDE)||1971-11-17||||1989||🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿
 * }
 * The entry for Aryam Abreu Delgado looks a little out of place. It isn't clear from looking at the table why it's sorted that way.  It's actually sorted Abreu Delgado, Aryam.  Eastern name order poses similar challenges for the reader, although usually not as severe.  Using surname first makes the sort easily apparent and makes it easier to find names in the very long list.  My guess is that these are some of the reasons why dictionaries and encyclopedias list entries surname first, and it also works better here.  Quale (talk) 07:24, 13 October 2021 (UTC)
 * What are the reasons that you have for supporting the surname first in this article though? I am assuming you support that. I don't see what the issue is with Aryman Abreu Delgado's name in this table, if Abreu Delgado is his surname, but I would like to focus on why editors want to have it surname first. Onetwothreeip (talk) 09:12, 13 October 2021 (UTC)
 * I don't see the point in repeating myself over and over again. I already pointed you to four reasons I gave in 2019 and another one here that amplifies why it's easier to find players in the long list when surname is listed first.  If you don't find those reasons convincing, so be it.  But don't repeatedly ask for things that have already been given.  Quale (talk) 05:20, 14 October 2021 (UTC)  I did just add a sixth reason in a reply earlier in this section—it's much easier to find names on a narrow mobile screen (phone) when they are displayed surname first.  Quale (talk) 06:12, 14 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Just to be clear, I'm not part of any toxic arguments that are going on. I'm not arguing against the reasons, at least not yet. I cannot rely on reasons that people have given in 2019 or why dictionaries may use certain formats, only reasons that people give now. You have made an observation of a difference between the two formats, and I will presume you believe this is a reason to have the surname-first format, although you haven't explicitly said so.
 * You are saying that having the given name first can look "out of place" for entries with surnames of more than one word, and you are also saying that it is easier to find entries with the surname first. These seem very similar, but we can take these as separate. If you have any other reasons, or if I have misunderstood any of your reasons, I would be grateful for you to elaborate.
 * To anybody else, I would like to hear any other reasons editors have for preferring the surname written first. I am collecting the reasons first. Onetwothreeip (talk) 07:22, 14 October 2021 (UTC)
 * So much WP:IDHT and WP:BLUDGEON. Nobody is obligated to WP:SATISFY you. MaxBrowne2 (talk) 16:25, 14 October 2021 (UTC)
 * You previously asked editors to provide policies against listing the surname first, so I would expect you to be the last person to make this sort of comment. I don't think I could have made it any more clear, apart from writing it explicitly, that nobody is obligated to answer my query. I am canvassing people's opinions as there is a lack of understanding on this talk page for why some editors may prefer the surname written before the given name in the table. If you do not wish to provide reasons or if you do not have any, feel free not to respond. Onetwothreeip (talk) 01:28, 15 October 2021 (UTC)
 * }
 * The entry for Aryam Abreu Delgado looks a little out of place. It isn't clear from looking at the table why it's sorted that way.  It's actually sorted Abreu Delgado, Aryam.  Eastern name order poses similar challenges for the reader, although usually not as severe.  Using surname first makes the sort easily apparent and makes it easier to find names in the very long list.  My guess is that these are some of the reasons why dictionaries and encyclopedias list entries surname first, and it also works better here.  Quale (talk) 07:24, 13 October 2021 (UTC)
 * What are the reasons that you have for supporting the surname first in this article though? I am assuming you support that. I don't see what the issue is with Aryman Abreu Delgado's name in this table, if Abreu Delgado is his surname, but I would like to focus on why editors want to have it surname first. Onetwothreeip (talk) 09:12, 13 October 2021 (UTC)
 * I don't see the point in repeating myself over and over again. I already pointed you to four reasons I gave in 2019 and another one here that amplifies why it's easier to find players in the long list when surname is listed first.  If you don't find those reasons convincing, so be it.  But don't repeatedly ask for things that have already been given.  Quale (talk) 05:20, 14 October 2021 (UTC)  I did just add a sixth reason in a reply earlier in this section—it's much easier to find names on a narrow mobile screen (phone) when they are displayed surname first.  Quale (talk) 06:12, 14 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Just to be clear, I'm not part of any toxic arguments that are going on. I'm not arguing against the reasons, at least not yet. I cannot rely on reasons that people have given in 2019 or why dictionaries may use certain formats, only reasons that people give now. You have made an observation of a difference between the two formats, and I will presume you believe this is a reason to have the surname-first format, although you haven't explicitly said so.
 * You are saying that having the given name first can look "out of place" for entries with surnames of more than one word, and you are also saying that it is easier to find entries with the surname first. These seem very similar, but we can take these as separate. If you have any other reasons, or if I have misunderstood any of your reasons, I would be grateful for you to elaborate.
 * To anybody else, I would like to hear any other reasons editors have for preferring the surname written first. I am collecting the reasons first. Onetwothreeip (talk) 07:22, 14 October 2021 (UTC)
 * So much WP:IDHT and WP:BLUDGEON. Nobody is obligated to WP:SATISFY you. MaxBrowne2 (talk) 16:25, 14 October 2021 (UTC)
 * You previously asked editors to provide policies against listing the surname first, so I would expect you to be the last person to make this sort of comment. I don't think I could have made it any more clear, apart from writing it explicitly, that nobody is obligated to answer my query. I am canvassing people's opinions as there is a lack of understanding on this talk page for why some editors may prefer the surname written before the given name in the table. If you do not wish to provide reasons or if you do not have any, feel free not to respond. Onetwothreeip (talk) 01:28, 15 October 2021 (UTC)

Number column
It's unnecessary per MOS:LIST. The article's lead says the total number, so "identifying the number of GM's" isn't a problem. All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 12:05, 14 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Having a number column allows one to answer questions such as, how many deceased grandmasters are there, how many female grandmasters are there, easily determine how many grandmasters there are from a particular country, how many titles were awarded in a certain year, etc. Greenman (talk) 20:50, 14 October 2021 (UTC)
 * That kind of information should be written as prose in the lead. All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 23:31, 14 October 2021 (UTC)
 * I don't think adding thousands of words to the article trying to cover all the search options is a good idea. There are perhaps 50 federations alone. It's far easier to navigate as a sortable list. Greenman (talk) 23:40, 14 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Thousands of words? It's a few sentences, not Ulysses. For federations, a mini-table underneath can easily be added. See this article, a featured list article might I add. Lot of prose to cover various criteria within the article, un-numbered list. All bases covered. All my warmest wishes,

ItsKesha (talk) 23:51, 14 October 2021 (UTC)
 * I agree with removing the number column, and information about how many grandmasters are in certain locations or have particular genders would be good information to display regardless. I encourage this to be done boldly. Onetwothreeip (talk) 01:30, 15 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Greenman is right, it would be a lot of words. There are in fact 94 federations (including FIDE which isn't really a federation, but one GM was awarded the title under the FIDE banner) so something simple such as indicating the number of GMs per federation would require a table of 94 rows on its own.  This is not "a few sentences".  Keeping these counts in prose would also need excessive maintenance, since every time a new row is added to the table or a GM dies the counts would need to be updated.  That's pointless article churn and an invitation to introduce errors in the counts.  The number of GMs in the lead is maintained automatically as entries are added to the table, but other counts would require error-prone manual updates.  The numbers also allow readers to find things we wouldn't likely include in prose.  For example, by sorting the table by Title Year you can see how many GMs earned titles in the first 50 years from 1950–1999.  Quale (talk) 07:00, 15 October 2021 (UTC)
 * We don't know how many words it would be, it's completely hypothetical and there is barely any detail for that proposal. We wouldn't necessarily need to use a table to show how many grandmasters are from each federation, or a table to be 94 rows long. Whatever it is needn't be in this article either, it could be in another article. This is all far too distant from anything concrete though, unless someone wants to suggest something specific. Onetwothreeip (talk) 09:02, 15 October 2021 (UTC)
 * With the static row numbers, the type of questions that User:Greenman mentions can generally be answered by pointing and clicking. I am old enough to remember when pointing and clicking was something new.  I am genuinely surprised to see younger editors advocating going back to "manual" methods.  Bruce leverett (talk) 17:48, 15 October 2021 (UTC)
 * That's not what is being discussed here. This is about the lack of utility for the number column. Onetwothreeip (talk) 21:50, 15 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Sorry for the belated reply ... Indeed I was discussing the utility of the number column. Bruce leverett (talk) 01:11, 16 October 2021 (UTC)
 * The original proposer seems to have acknowledged the utility. However their proposed alternatives all require manual work, and don't seem practical (adding extra multiple extra lines of text and tables, and manually updating these with each change), so I see nothing more elegant than the current sortable number column. Greenman (talk) 22:09, 15 October 2021 (UTC)
 * I haven't acknowledged any such thing, please refrain from making misleading comments. And what's wrong with "manual work", are we supposed to ignore all faults contained in the article and the list out of laziness? Adding extra multiple lines and manual updating happens any time a new grandmaster is made, there's no issue then, is there? Any realistic queries/key information regarding the table should, by and large, be written in prose in the lead. It requires minimal effort on the part of any editor to update a number in the prose if a player dies or if new grandmasters are announced, in fact it requires more effort to edit the table to insert the date of death or the new players! It's pure conjecture to say such updating of information is prone to error. All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 22:34, 15 October 2021 (UTC)
 * My mistake, I understood your suggestion to add manual tables and text to cater for the information lost by removing the numbering as an acknowledgement its utility. Greenman (talk) 14:39, 17 October 2021 (UTC)
 * We can't use the number column for anything though. It doesn't tell us how many grandmasters match certain criteria. Onetwothreeip (talk) 22:37, 15 October 2021 (UTC)
 * This is a sortable table. You can click on the arrows and sort by various criteria. Greenman (talk) 14:39, 17 October 2021 (UTC)
 * It's sortable, not filterable. All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 16:37, 17 October 2021 (UTC)
 * You can use the number column to readily answer questions such as how many GMs were born in 1966. Sort by the Born column, note that the last and first rows with birthdates in 1966 are 602 and 571, then subtract to show there are 32 GMs who were born in 1966.  The claim that the number column can't be used for anything is demonstrably untrue.  Quale (talk) 06:57, 21 October 2021 (UTC)
 * 602-571 is 31. All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 09:19, 21 October 2021 (UTC)
 * See Fencepost error. Bruce leverett (talk) 14:21, 21 October 2021 (UTC)
 * I know. I was just doing what I was told by Quale. Ultimately, the onus shouldn't be put on users to click and scroll and click and scroll to find various information. But for some reason people want to make it more difficult to navigate and find information and are avoiding change, because... 🤷 All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 20:36, 21 October 2021 (UTC)
 * User:Quale first did the arithmetic, and got the right answer. He didn't tell anybody to do anything.  Nobody asked or told User:ItsKesha to offer a "correction".  Bruce leverett (talk) 01:20, 24 October 2021 (UTC)
 * I wrote that subtraction shows the number, I didn't tell you to calculate 602 − 571. It doesn't take very much thought to realize that if there were a single entry to count it could start on row 509, and since the computation 509 − 509 = 0 is clearly wrong, you must subtract one less than the lower bound, so the subtraction is 509 − (509 − 1) = 1.  Quale (talk) 05:27, 22 October 2021 (UTC)
 * "602 and 571, then subtract to show there are 32". Just quoting you mate. But again, you demonstrate an issue with forcing users to do their own mathematics. If the table was filterable, you'd have a valid point in having a number column. But it isn't. It's funny how no other featured lists thinks this is an issue. It's funny how you are 1000% right on everything, and everybody who has any objection is 1000% wrong. Please read this policy and rethink your entire approach to this, thanks. All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 14:08, 22 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Get lost. Quale (talk) 06:28, 23 October 2021 (UTC)
 * I take it you have read SQS by now, then? All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 09:56, 30 October 2021 (UTC)

Birthplace
Unsourced, pointless, and irrelevant. Should be removed instantly. All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 02:47, 6 September 2021 (UTC)
 * Sourcing for every birthplace is in the notes column as is explained directly in the article text. As for the rest, your opinion isn't any better there either. Maybe you should try to improve the encyclopedia some way other than doing random drive-by shootings on articles you haven't contributed to and don't understand. Quale (talk) 03:59, 6 September 2021 (UTC)
 * The very first source for Jacob Aagaard doesn't contain the placename Horsholm, the word "Di Felice" isn't a valid source, the "title application" doesn't contain the placename Horsholm. There's literally no mention of birthplace explained "directly in the article text". Maybe you should try to improve the articles you have contributed to in a satisfactory manner rather than being so defensive about your atrocious attempts at sourcing being validly questioned and your poor edits being reverted. All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 09:37, 6 September 2021 (UTC)
 * In the "References" section, there is a full citation of DiFelice's book. Since the list has thousands of entries, most of which refer to DiFelice, it is normal and unsurprising that references to DiFelice are abbreviated to just the name, rather than using the full citation.


 * The birthplace column goes back to January, not back to May. As for whether it is "useless" or "irrelevent" [sic], that is the sort of thing for which one, almost by definition, needs to get consensus.  When I see someone delete large quantities of sourced information because he/she thinks it is "useless", usually I find that it is an IP editor, and I do not hesitate to use the word "vandalism".  Bruce leverett (talk) 12:29, 6 September 2021 (UTC)
 * The sourcing for "DiFelice" (sic (lol)) needs massively improving, yous really need to correctly use the Sfn template to do it properly. It's definitely not "normal" how it is used now, it's lazy, shoddy, and just completely useless. And its you who needs to get consensus to add the information and prove it's not pointless, as it's clearly against WP:UNDUE, and WP:INDISCRIMINATE. What purpose does it actually serve? I've seen and edited dozens and dozens of articles which feature, and revolve around, nationalities, and none of them see the need to include birthplace as in such a context it is completely unimportant. It's already been removed once by who used the valid policy of WP:DIRECTORY to back up his side, and this user was ignored too by people steamrollering over legitimate policies and reasoning. All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 13:05, 6 September 2021 (UTC)
 * It's definitely undue for this article, and very unusual for list articles. Onetwothreeip (talk) 21:05, 6 September 2021 (UTC)
 * I think it's relevant because chess players often change their federation. I don't think we should be constrained by other list articles. Pawnkingthree (talk) 21:13, 6 September 2021 (UTC)
 * It's hard to see beyond the removing user's arrogance, hostility, sarcasm and Wikilawyering, and the aggressive manner they have gone about things is counter-productive and verging on vandalism, but I tend to agree that the place of birth is out of place, or at the very least needs to be better sourced. Greenman (talk) 21:44, 6 September 2021 (UTC)
 * An entry changing their chess federation isn't relevant to whether we include their place of birth. Onetwothreeip (talk) 22:24, 6 September 2021 (UTC)
 * I didn't add the place of birth column, but at the risk of cutting across the guy who did, I'll try to defend the idea. The fact that Di Felice's book includes place of birth leads me to assume his readers are interested in that information, and I also assume that his readers are cut from the same cloth as our readers.  Di Felice has even researched place of birth in cases where it wasn't available from the title application, e.g. Aagaard.  I realize that many, or most, Wiki biographies don't give place of birth, but many of them do, particularly all the World Champion biographies I have looked at, as well as other famous players (Reshevsky, Flohr, Korchnoi, Vidmar; but I admit, not Bohatyrchuk).  Words like "useless" and "irrelevant" don't ring a bell -- useless for what? irrelevant to what?  This list is high in the popularity ranking among chess articles, so one should not be casual about decisions about what goes into it.  Bruce leverett (talk) 00:15, 7 September 2021 (UTC)
 * We can't assume Di Felice readers are interested, or that those readers are similar to Wikipedia readers. The latter is almost certainly not the case, as Wikipedia readers are a much wider audience. All the chess players you mention have their place of birth in the infobox of the respective Wikipedia articles, which is where the information belongs, not here. Onetwothreeip (talk) 07:31, 7 September 2021 (UTC)
 * There hasn't been any further movement on this but I think some compromise would be appropriate. Listing the birthplaces of chess players is clearly indiscriminate and not notable enough for a list like this (we don't even list nationality), but we can include more than one chess federation for players who have changed federations. Onetwothreeip (talk) 07:44, 19 September 2021 (UTC)
 * The assertions that the birthplace column is "clearly indiscriminate" and "not notable enough" are unconvincing. Your observation that the articles I mentioned have birthplace info in the infoboxes, as well as in the articles themselves, is not an argument against notability.  Since editors and readers of chess biographies are evidently interested in birthplace info, presumably the readers of this table are interested as well.  Bruce leverett (talk) 01:18, 20 September 2021 (UTC)
 * An intervening edit by another editor is getting in the way of my reverting the deletion of the birthplace column. I will revert both edits, but then will restore the intervening edit.  Sorry for any inconvenience.  Bruce leverett (talk) 01:22, 20 September 2021 (UTC)
 * Now that I have examined the intervening edit, I am disinclined to restore it. It removes the little things that you can click on at the top of each column to cause the table to be sorted on the contents of that column.  I suspect that this was an unintentional error.  Bruce leverett (talk) 02:18, 20 September 2021 (UTC)
 * Oops. It has been pointed out (in an edit summary) that the intervening edit was not incorrect, in that it did not remove the sort buttons, but only rearranged things slightly.  Back to my original plan.  Bruce leverett (talk) 14:36, 20 September 2021 (UTC)
 * Birthplace is a feature of all biography infoboxes. Articles which are lists of people, as is this article, are not meant to include birthplaces. Your assertion that people like it there is unfounded, but only rests on a WP:ILIKEIT argument. This information is self-apparently indiscriminate, as there has been no attempt by anybody to show the discriminate nature of this information.
 * There is plenty of information, by the same foundation, that has as much reason to be in the table as their birthplace. We also do not include their religion, their place of death, their spouse or even the country they were born in. Onetwothreeip (talk) 07:21, 20 September 2021 (UTC)
 * What is the basis for your claim that "Articles which are lists of people ... are not meant to include birthplaces"? I do not see anything in, for example, WP:STANDALONE that would lead to that conclusion.


 * If you are interested in adding columns for religion, place of death, spouse, etc., best of luck. It's a lot of work to add a new column to this table; somebody has to really care about it or it won't get done.  Bruce leverett (talk) 13:49, 20 September 2021 (UTC)
 * I could find 1,000 lists that don't include birthplace. Can you point us in the direction of some that do please? All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 15:57, 20 September 2021 (UTC)
 * List of presidents of the United States by home state Bruce leverett (talk) 17:21, 20 September 2021 (UTC)
 * Well done, you found a list that is specifically about geographical locations. Now, bear in mind that this isn't a "list of chess grandmasters by hometown" or whatever. All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 17:39, 20 September 2021 (UTC)
 * I have to ask you to stop engaging in bad faith. You're obviously aware that the article you've mentioned is specifically a list of birth places, and you are aware that I was not proposing this list includes religion or place of death. Onetwothreeip (talk) 07:24, 21 September 2021 (UTC)
 * The existence of the article about "home states", with a table column giving birthplaces, is the last nail in the coffin of the claim that birthplace information is not notable.
 * I was specifically asked to find such an article by User:ItsKesha. For finding it, and posting a link to it, you have accused me of bad faith.
 * Removing 30K bytes of notable birthplace information is barbarous, if not vandalism. For restoring the removed information, User:ItsKesha has accused me of making an unconstructive edit.
 * I am backing out of this -- I can't do it all myself. Bruce leverett (talk) 19:06, 21 September 2021 (UTC)
 * Blatantly not Vandalism, so that accusation is further bad faith. Onetwothreeip (talk) 23:19, 21 September 2021 (UTC)
 * This is supremely hilarious. Thanks for the laughs, Bruce. All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 15:10, 22 September 2021 (UTC)
 * Birthplace is standard biographical information. It is certainly not common in Wikipedia to include birthplace in lists of people and this is informative, but not dispositive.  Sometimes it's good to be a leader rather than a blind follower.  Many of the GMs do not have standalone articles so this article may be the only place in Wikipedia with birthplace information.  There are other reasons why birthplace might be desirable to include in this page as well, even if the information was available by clicking 1900 links to biography articles.
 * The most commonly used sources on this page in decreasing order of usage are:
 * Di Felice (GM title year, birthdate, birthplace, death date, federation history; includes other information not used in this table such as death place, full title history (IM, WGM, etc))
 * FIDE Profile (GM title year, birth year, current federation)
 * title application (federation when title was earned, birth year and sometimes month and day, sometimes birthplace)
 * Gaige (birthdate, birthplace, death date, GM title year, federation history; includes other information not used in the table such as death place and full title history)
 * Birthplace is in three of the four most-used sources for the page, including Gaige, the standard chess biographical dictionary. (Gaige is more of a chess biographical bibliography, really).  Inclusion in standard chess biographical works is an indication that readers seeking this information might expect places of birth and death to be given.
 * I think at some point this table will be replaced by a query against wikidata. In an ideal scenario the reader would be able to select the columns they want to include in the query results.  I don't know how far away this future is, it could be days or maybe it will be years.  Querying wikidata for all GMs has been more or less feasible for many months now, but there are some issues which in my mind at least include providing sources and performance. It's also hard to rely on a database query to be essentially the entire page.  For example, how would page history recorded if the page was the result of a query?  (In the future would a user be able to see what the page looked like on October 9, 2021?)  Quale (talk) 09:37, 9 October 2021 (UTC)
 * The is clearly not consensus for deleting the "birthplace" column, so I am restoring until those that want it deleted can make a proposal. It is interesting that those opposed to deleting the column are the ones that are contributing to the article in a constructive fashion. Those who want to delete it are in attack mode. Is this some sort of "Wikipedia gambit?" VarmtheHawk (talk) 16:33, 10 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Literally nobody opposed to deleting has given one policy based reason for the inclusion of a birthplace column. "Because I like it" is not a valid reason. The fact you are resorting to ad hom comments says it all. All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 17:03, 10 October 2021 (UTC)
 * This isn't a mirror of chess books and biographies. There is no valid reason for the inclusion of birthplace in this list, it's completely irrelevant and against all policy as mentioned by not only myself but by too. All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 16:54, 10 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Wikipedia content is based on reliable sources, so the information those sources provide gives Wikipedia a hint at selecting what to include. It's a hint, not a requirement, so there is quite a bit of information in our sources that is not included in this article such as lifetime maximum rating.  You can say birthplace is irrelevant over and over as many times as you care, but that will never make it anything more than your WP:IDONTLIKEIT opinion.  On the other side I do like birthplace, but in addition to that I have demonstrated that the reliable sources providing the most similar information to this article include birthplace. If this article were titled List of chess grandmasters by birthplace would you still argue that birthplace was irrelevant to the article?  Well, consider this article to be a content merge of List of chess grandmasters and List of chess grandmasters by birthplace because maintaining two articles with all information overlapping except for one column would be unnecessary.  Quale (talk) 05:55, 11 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Birthplaces would be fine for an article titled List of chess grandmasters by birthplace, and I would have nothing against that article existing. At some point however, we have to draw a line between what should be included in a list and what shouldn't. In List of chess grandmasters, that excludes birthplace because there is too much content in this article. The place of birth for chess grandmasters belongs on Wikipedia, but not in this article. There are many list articles which contain similar information and Wikipedia can have more than one list about chess grandmasters. Onetwothreeip (talk) 08:57, 11 October 2021 (UTC)
 * This is the list of chess grandmasters by birthplace article. It's good that you have nothing against it existing.  We have drawn the line at what to include in the list and it's what we maintain in the article now.  In the future we might decide to add more, although at the moment the most reasonable candidate is place of death and I'm not ready to add a column for that at this time.  Quale (talk) 22:33, 11 October 2021 (UTC)
 * It's nothing to do with "I dont like it", as I have given you several policies, as well as the fact that it simply isn't used in such lists. Whereas you and people on your side have demonstrated zero policies that would necessitate the inclusion of birthplace, and have given zero examples of lists that include the information, particularly high-quality featured lists, beyond some list of Presidents by home state. All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 10:05, 11 October 2021 (UTC)
 * You haven't given me squat and you certainly haven't mentioned any applicable policies. You haven't even provided any relevant guidelines, and guideline is a step down from policy.  You can repeat your nonsense over and over again as often as you like, but once I've responded to it I don't feel compelled to confront your repeated regurgitation of the same invalid claims every time. Quale (talk) 22:33, 11 October 2021 (UTC)
 * 👍 Try reading my third comment in this section. All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 23:02, 11 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Your third comment mentions WP:UNDUE, WP:INDISCRIMINATE, and WP:DIRECTORY.
 * WP:UNDUE is about representing different viewpoints in a controversy. That isn't relevant in this table.
 * WP:INDISCRIMINATE at least says something inspiring: "merely being true, or even verifiable, does not automatically make something suitable for inclusion in the encyclopedia". But how does this help us to decide which columns should be in the table?  How does it apply to Birthplace, but not to Federation, or Sex?  I do not see anything in this policy that brings these decisions any closer to cut-and-dried.
 * WP:DIRECTORY doesn't seem remotely related to this table or to the column in question.
 * So, these three policies, while impeccable, are not obviously applicable to the question at hand.
 * I have also looked at WP:NLIST and some MOS pages linked to from it, but while there is some material about what topics are appropriate for lists, and what entries are appropriate for a list given its topic, there is nothing much about columns. Bruce leverett (talk) 03:00, 12 October 2021 (UTC)
 * "Undue weight can be given in several ways, including but not limited to depth of detail, quantity of text, prominence of placement, juxtaposition of statements and use of imagery". I've given you several featured lists. I've given you several policies. You have no examples apart from somebody joking about the phone book, and you have no policy-based arguments. All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 07:39, 12 October 2021 (UTC)
 * As I said above, WP:UNDUE is about representing conflicting viewpoints; one of the examples is "the article on the Earth does not directly mention modern support for the flat Earth concept". I assume you're not complaining about something like that.  WP:UNDUE is part of WP:NPOV, and that's not what we are arguing about, obviously.  However, I note that far more experienced editors than yourself have made the same mistake (in other talk pages and edit histories).  I don't know of another paragraph of policy or guidelines that expresses the same sentiment as WP:INDISCRIMINATE, but gives helpful examples.  It's a problem.  When I see that someone has inserted irrelevant stuff into an article, I usually find that I have to argue with them from first principles, rather than citing some convenient policy.  You have the same problem here, and in a perverse way, I sympathize.
 * Repeatedly asserting that birthplace information is irrelevant doesn't make it irrelevant. Perhaps you have some criteria of relevance that you know well enough, but have neglected to explicitly state?  So far only User:Quale has offered criteria of relevance, i.e. he points out that several sources include birthplace information.  Bruce leverett (talk) 21:11, 12 October 2021 (UTC)
 * "including but not limited to depth of detail". Depth of detail. The article is giving undue weight to the people's birthplaces. It's not important to this table, as it isn't a list of chess grandmasters by birthplace. Depth of detail. All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 23:02, 12 October 2021 (UTC)
 * It is not giving undue weight to birthplace. To support a WP:UNDUE claim, you must show that emphasis in the article is out of line with the emphasis found in reliable sources on the subject.  Since three of the four most used sources for the table include birthplace, this is direct evidence that birthplace is not undue weight in this context.  Checkmate, as we might say.  And Bruce is correct about the other two policies, they are not relevant to the question.  Quale (talk) 07:08, 13 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Yes it is. The table right now is saying their birthplace is of supreme importance, when it has absolutely nothing to do with the list. And why have you invented a quote/line of policy? That part about emphasis appears literally nowhere in the WP:UNDUE policy. What are you doing? All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 10:58, 13 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Never say die, ItsKesha. There's nothing in the article that gives birthplace supreme importance, it's treated the same as birthdate, date of death, etc.  The WP:UNDUE policy says: "Neutrality requires that mainspace articles and pages fairly represent all significant viewpoints that have been published by reliable sources, in proportion to the prominence of each viewpoint in the published, reliable sources."  Note that UNDUE really talks about viewpoints rather than facts, so it doesn't really apply very well to simple factual biographical data.  But in this case, concerning "proportion to the prominence of each viewpoint in the published, reliable sources", the truth is that three of the four main sources for the article include birthplace so the proportion containing birthplace is 75%.  Also for any unfortunate paying attention at home, my paraphrase that "to support an UNDUE claim you must show that emphasis in the article is out of line with the emphasis found in reliable sources on the subject" is an accurate account of what is in the policy. Quale (talk) 05:45, 14 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Determining whether content is due or undue relies on all published reliable sources, not only the ones used in the article. I doubt anything like 75% of reliable sources about a grandmasters would include their birthplace, or would include much more than this article includes. Onetwothreeip (talk) 07:36, 14 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Bullshit, that is absolute fucking nonsense. Any single fact is in a small percentage of all reliable sources on any topic.  Birthplace would not be included in any article if a majority of reliable sources had to report it.  We could not include Abraham Lincoln's birthplace in his bio if we required that a majority of sources on Lincoln include his birthplace.  Quale (talk) 07:07, 15 October 2021 (UTC)
 * I never said anything about the information needing to be in a majority of sources, so it looks like you've blown over for no reason there. Onetwothreeip (talk) 08:58, 15 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Do you mind retracting or amending that comment, it's needlessly offensive and aggressive. All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 15:02, 15 October 2021 (UTC)
 * What you wrote is "Determining whether content is due or undue relies on all published reliable sources". That is false.  It only depends on reliable sources that express a viewpoint about the specific claim in question, and this is often much narrower than the article topic as a whole.  Also as Bruce said first and I iterated and then reiterated, WP:UNDUE does not apply to birthplace in this article because birthplace is not a viewpoint.  Attempts to use policy to argue that birthplace can't be in the table are futile because policy doesn't say anything about whether any particular fact can or can't be included in an article, with a very few exceptions such as requirements of biographies of living persons.  Instead Wikipedians use editorial judgment to determine which facts to include in articles and which facts to leave out.  Disputes over relevance and importance are not uncommon, and should be resolved by discussion and an attempt to reach or at least determine consensus.  Although policy discussion has been pointless since none of the policies apply to the questions raised, the argument that similar lists of persons don't include birthplace or are listed given name first is on point because they address how editorial discretion might be applied.  Then it can be opposed by the argument that because sources include birthplace and list surname first, it could be reasonable to do that here as well.  And we still won't agree, but at least the arguments would actually apply to the questions at hand rather than being totally irrelevant.  Quale (talk) 07:17, 21 October 2021 (UTC)
 * This is going round in circles because at this point you are clearly refusing to read what has already been wrote. The argument about similar lists not including birthplace/the naming order was already given, the highlighting of several featured lists for what a good list looks like, and to demonstrate the aforementioned, has already been done. All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 09:19, 21 October 2021 (UTC)
 * You are the one with reading comprehension problems. I said those arguments were on point, and in fact they were just about the only relevant statements you have made on this page.  It was an effort to try to orient you in a direction that isn't a complete waste of time.  You started this section by claiming that birthplaces are unsourced which is absolutely false.  Later you said WP:UNDUE applies to this article, but as has been carefully explained to you, it does not.  Your other flailing attempts to demonstrate policy that might apply missed wildly as well.  I know you are wikilawyering as hard as you can, but really you should stop before you embarrass yourself even more—you have no talent for that kind of argument.  If you have other arguments not yet expressed that are based on some evidence and not your lack of understanding of policy, go ahead.  Otherwise I'm quite content to let this discussion end.  Quale (talk) 06:20, 22 October 2021 (UTC)
 * You said my mentioning of featured lists was akin to "repeated regurgitation". So, do you agree or disagree with featured lists and their presentation of information? Thanks for the rude and insulting comments by the way, you're a really classy individual. All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 14:08, 22 October 2021 (UTC)
 * To clarify, "regurgitation" was primarily intended to describe your repeated squawks that birthplace is "irrelevant" both on the talk page and in edit summaries. But I did include it in a reply directly below a comment in which you mentioned featured lists and I didn't make it clear precisely what I considered regurgitation.  Discussion how this list contrasts to featured lists is reasonable.  I don't have an informed opinion about featured lists so I'll leave that to others to talk about.  Your opinion of me interests me not in the least, so say whatever you like about that. Quale (talk) 06:43, 23 October 2021 (UTC)
 * So you're admitting you don't know how an article can qualify as a featured list, and yet you have continuously argued against those disagreeing with you by mentioning featured lists? Please, make it make sense. All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 09:56, 30 October 2021 (UTC)
 * No. I wrote "I don't have an informed opinion about featured lists so I'll leave that to others to talk about" because I don't have an informed opinion about featured lists and I'll leave that to other people to talk about.  I don't think featured lists have any particular relevance to this article, but if you want to talk about featured lists, go ahead.  The only reason featured lists entered the discussion is because you have mentioned them a few times.  My disagreements with you concern the many other baseless claims you've made.  Quale (talk) 08:54, 31 October 2021 (UTC)

Featured lists; don't feature columns like birthplace unless it's absolutely necessary per the article; don't contain arbitrary number columns that serve no function; have prose which details pertinent information from the table in a condensed format; have sufficient sourcing; don't feature names by surname first; often have supplementary tables which also condense the information in the table in a digestible format which might not necessarily lead itself to prose. I've given you several examples of featured lists already which demonstrate all of the above, and there's a good reason they're featured lists - they abide by Wikipedia policy, they're well written, they're well constructed, they're easily manageable to read and navigate. None of this can be applied to this article in it's current format. All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 11:21, 31 October 2021 (UTC)

Urgent need to simplify list
After 2 months of long discussion, there is still no consensus. The talk page could get bigger than Wikipedia's biggest article itself (at the moment). I have considered a few things: 1. There needs to be good reasons for whether each column should stay or not. 2. The records should be split into alive and dead grandmasters, or what FIDE currently recognizes and the rest/others. 3. The number column could be removed, as a statistic article could be made consisting of tables of how many people have this title year/federation etc. 4. I don't think the article should be split by an arbitrary date, as people would prefer an inclusive list. Splitting by date is most likely to affect that. 5. In the notes column, I was wondering whether every title application was associated with Di Felice/Gaige. Hopefully, this summary would clear up a few things and reduce confusion. zsteve21 (talk) 16:58, 30 October 2021 (UTC)

You may want to review the talk page for WP:AS as you are specifically identified as someone whose objective is to simply split articles for no good reason. Specifically: "There seems to be a recent trend of a couple of people (Blubabluba9990, Zsteve21, and Onetwothreeip) using the Wikipedia:Database_reports/Articles_by_size page and going around to each page and trying to split articles or edit them in some ways incorrectly to try to shrink the size. Is there any description that can be added to this page such that it can be clarified that simply trying to split articles because they're relatively large and ONLY because they're relatively large is not good editing etiquette? Especially when the splitting is being done by non-subject matter experts they seem to commonly make mistakes when splitting and are done without consultation of the regular editors of the pages."

Also, the discussion on the talk page of List of Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy launches as well as your statement that "I am just a novice Wikipedia editor on my own who wants to make articles have manageable markup sizes." And it seems pretty clear that there is a consensus not to split this article. Dr. Grampinator (talk) 18:33, 30 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Future changes in the organization of the article will evolve organically from people who actually give a damn about chess, not at the insistence of disingenuous trolls and article splitting activists. MaxBrowne2 (talk) 17:05, 31 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Play the ball, not the man. All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 11:21, 31 October 2021 (UTC)
 * This talk page demonstrates that not everyone agrees that there's an urgent need to make any changes to this article. Regarding your question about the notes, Di Felice 2017 and Gaige 1987 are books published in 2017 and 1987 respectively.  (See the bibliography for details.)  It's probably apparent that they can't be used to confirm all details for players who earned titles after they were published.  In fact over 500 GMs were born after Gaige 1987 was published.  Quale (talk) 09:09, 31 October 2021 (UTC)
 * 1. agree; the birthplace column simply has to go as per every featured list imaginable. 2. agree. 3. agree per disussion. 4. no opinion, was a suggestion based on a comment by another user. 5. the sourcing needs to be improved by using Sfn template. Additionally, the name column can be improved by using the sortname template. All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 11:21, 31 October 2021 (UTC)

Proposal for columns which could/should be removed
Looking through dozens of featured lists of similar high-end achievements in sport alone to get a complete grasp on the issues within this list, and I've noted that there are several pieces of information included in this article which are never mentioned in these other articles. Currently, the list has the following columns.

As per the dozens of examples I will list below, as well as many more, I propose that the following columns only should be used, based on the fact that several of the above have no bearing whatsoever on the crowning of an individual as a grandmaster, and therefore, the purpose of the list.

See examples as follows: Green Bay Packers Hall of Fame, Poker Hall of Fame, List of members of the Hockey Hall of Fame, ICC Cricket Hall of Fame, NWA Hall of Fame, Ipswich Town F.C. Hall of Fame, Premier League Manager of the Month, Ballon d'Or, List of first overall NBA draft picks, List of first overall NHL draft picks, List of first overall Major League Baseball draft picks, List of Premier League winning players, List of Premier League hat-tricks, List of France national football team captains, List of members of the Baseball Hall of Fame, 50 Greatest Players in NBA History, Australian Cricket Hall of Fame.

can be used to indicate certain things such as female players/deceased, as seen in several of these lists. I have no truck with FIDE ID, and of course the name should use the Sfn template. As there is a "notes" column, a usage of the efn template would ideally be implemented for specific notes i.e. second Federations.


 * Thanks for furnishing the links to list articles, which are interesting to look at.


 * Many of these articles are about "halls of Fame". Chess does have a Hall of Fame, and the article about it is World Chess Hall of Fame, which has two lists of inductees (one for the United States HOF, the other for the World HOF).  Those lists might, I suppose, be more to your liking.  They don't have many columns, and they don't have very many rows either (the HOF is not very old and not very large).


 * These are fine lists, but I am not motivated to make List of chess grandmasters look more like them. The chess milieu is evidently very different from those of these different sports, and people who read about chess have very different expectations from people who read about other sports.  Our list follows (and should follow) the conventions already established in its sources, not the conventions established for baseball, hockey, cricket, etc.  Bruce leverett (talk) 01:46, 1 November 2021 (UTC)
 * Not even half the articles are about a Hall of Fame, but that's clearly besides the point. As I explained in the first 10 words, they're about high-end achievements in sport. This too, is a high-end achievement in sport. They're not "fine" lists, they're featured lists. This one isn't. The list shouldn't follow conventions of third party sources, it should follow the conventions of Wikipedia. And it's not just baseball, hockey and cricket, it's football, poker, gridiron, literature, music, films, mathematics, military, awards and decorations, space, and many many others. All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 07:15, 1 November 2021 (UTC)
 * Clearly you are concerned that if this list were nominated for Featured List status, serious objections would be raised along the lines you have suggested. I rather doubt it, but I shouldn't try to argue with you about it in this talk page.  The right place for such an argument would be during the review process, i.e. somebody would have to nominate this to be a Featured List.
 * I'm not being facetious. In WP:Featured lists, I can see that far less substantial lists have met the criteria; but I don't see anything about chess.  Perhaps we active chess editors have not been thinking along these lines.  I understand that nominating anything to be Featured entails a lot of time spent fixing issues raised during review, so it is not a step to be taken lightly, but it is intriguing, to say the least.  Bruce leverett (talk) 19:59, 1 November 2021 (UTC)
 * I could have done a little more homework first. Featured lists have been discussed in this talk page before, in 2010: Talk:List of chess grandmasters/Archive 1.  The German version of this article has the German equivalent of Featured List status.  Bruce leverett (talk) 02:34, 6 November 2021 (UTC)

That's why I came here to convince those interested in chess to do something about it, because this page/topic isn't limited to the chess enthusiasts. zsteve21 (talk) 09:51, 3 November 2021 (UTC)

I agree with a split, or other ways of condensing information. Splitting based on deceased and living grandmasters would be the most wise, since the article size seems to be based on text. Blubabluba9990 (talk) (contribs) 19:08, 4 November 2021 (UTC)

Split deceased grandmasters to own table
I think it would be worthwhile splitting the deceased into their own separate table/article. FIDE currently recognises 1739 grandmasters, which leaves the roughly 200 as the deceased. Also that source alone functions as a source for basically every piece of necessary information contained within the current table. All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 17:06, 14 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Thanks for making a reasonable proposal. I am not in favor of a split since it would greatly reduce the value of sorting the table on columns such as Title Year and Birthdate.  (Sorting the table on the Died column would quickly tell you the exact number of deceased GMs is 217.)  Also the reduction in size would be relatively small, 217/1948 is about 11%.  Given recent trends in number of GM titles awarded, the fraction of dead GMs is likely to drop in the future, making that split continue to be not especially effective in reducing the table length.  Quale (talk) 06:43, 15 October 2021 (UTC)
 * I would think there are a number of grandmasters who have died, but this article hasn't recorded their date of death. This could greatly alter any count of how many deceased grandmasters there are. Onetwothreeip (talk) 06:47, 15 October 2021 (UTC)
 * You would probably be wrong about that. I'm sure there are a small handful of deceased GMs who don't have dates of death listed in the table, but I would wager the number is in single digits.  FIDE removes deceased players from its monthly rating lists and every month I compare the rating list to the table to find newly minted and recently deceased GMs.  Quale (talk) 07:02, 15 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Agree, it is not an improvement to remove to a separate table and lose the current sortable utility. Greenman (talk) 14:43, 17 October 2021 (UTC)
 * That would rely on FIDE knowing when grandmasters die, which I don't know if we can assume either. Onetwothreeip (talk) 09:07, 15 October 2021 (UTC)
 * "it would greatly reduce the value of sorting the table" - what does this even mean? A 40k reduction in the size of the article is only relatively small as this is the longest article on Wikipedia! 40k should almost never be "relatively small". Oh, and 1739+217 doesn't equal 1948, so it appears there's an issue with the table? All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 10:19, 15 October 2021 (UTC)
 * There is a certain internal logic to treating deceased grandmasters separately, since FIDE treats them separately. Also, if there were a separate table for deceased grandmasters, the table for living grandmasters wouldn't need a date of death column.
 * On the other hand, the argument that it's convenient for all the GM's to be in the same table for sorting purposes also has merit.
 * Regarding the percentage of GM's who are deceased, I suppose that ultimately, we must reach a state where the great majority of GM's are deceased; but that will be many years in the future, and I am not sure it would be wise to plan that far ahead. The GM title as we know it has only existed since 1950; and the great majority of GM's get their titles as young adults.  Those two factors contribute to the current high percentage of GM's who are alive.
 * Arguments that start with "I would think" are problematic. If you don't do the homework on this, why do you expect your fellow editors to do it for you?  Are there, or are there not, a substantial number of GM's who are deceased, but whose death dates are not given here?  If you care about this question, go get the answer.  If you don't care, I don't either, thanks.  Bruce leverett (talk) 16:13, 15 October 2021 (UTC)
 * All GM's aren't in the same table currently. There's already a separate table, and rightfully so. But if FIDE no longer recognise the three who they revoked of their status grandmaster, and accordingly they are removed from the table in the article, then shouldn't the same apply to the deceased, as they too are no longer recognised by FIDE? All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 16:32, 15 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Who says FIDE no longer recognizes deceased GMs???? Lunacy. Quale (talk) 07:28, 21 October 2021 (UTC)
 * FIDE. All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 09:19, 21 October 2021 (UTC)
 * You're going to have to provide a citation for that claim. Actually the claim is completely daft, so you needn't bother. Quale (talk) 05:29, 22 October 2021 (UTC)
 * I already have. All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 14:08, 22 October 2021 (UTC)
 * You can ponder why a query that searches only living and recently deceased players doesn't prove the claim that FIDE doesn't recognize deceased GMs. Also, I missed responding to the important claim in your very first comment in the section that the https://ratings.fide.com site can be queried to source most of the data in the list.  A query on FIDE's site isn't a WP:RS for any of the data in the list.  For starters, most deceased players are not included.  But even for the living GMs a database query is not a reliable source because WP:RS requires "Additionally, an archived copy of the media must exist and be available to the general public."  This is a possibly subtle point that I think is commonly not understood.  Database queries of this kind usually do not have archived copies.  Since in the future there will be no way to verify what this query for GMs at ratings.fide.com returned for me at 07:14, 23 October 2021 (UTC), it fails WP:V and is not a reliable source for wikipedia. Quale (talk) 07:14, 23 October 2021 (UTC)
 * If FIDE recognised them as a grandmaster, they'd be included in their database of grandmasters. And why are you, yet again, making up a quote/line of policy? All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 09:56, 30 October 2021 (UTC)
 * FIDE doesn't publish a database of grandmasters, fool. The FIDE Golden Book 1924–2016 (Iclicki 2016) is sanctioned by FIDE and includes a list of all players who were awarded the GM title up to the date of publication.  It lists living and deceased GMs without any distinction between the two.  Quale (talk) 09:00, 31 October 2021 (UTC)
 * I must have invented the entire FIDE website then to back up my argument? Thanks again for insulting me, really appreciate it. And seeing as you've ignored it, I'll ask again, why are you making up a quote/line of policy, again? All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 11:21, 31 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Sorry, WP:RS says only "Additionally, an archived copy of the media must exist." The text I quoted, "Additionally, an archived copy of the media must exist and be available to the general public", is from WP:PUBLISH, but I failed to correctly identify its source.  WP:PUBLISH is not a guideline, but is instead an explanation of what "published" means in WP:RS and WP:V.  My observation that no archived copy of the FIDE website database exists is true whether measured by the shorter requirement from WP:RS or the slightly elaborated phrasing from WP:PUBLISH.  And for the third time, the FIDE website is not a database of grandmasters. Quale (talk) 05:36, 2 November 2021 (UTC)
 * That's funny, the ranking link has been archived 236 times. How is the list on FIDE's website not a list on their website? You are making little sense here. All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 22:01, 5 November 2021 (UTC)
 * "The ranking link"—I assume you are talking about the FIDE rating lists, if that is not the case then you will have to clarify what you mean. We use the rating lists to help maintain the article, but they are not sources for most of the entries.  For one, the rating lists don't include all the information we need.  The FIDE profile pages include more information than the rating lists do, such as the title year. Quale (talk) 03:10, 6 November 2021 (UTC)
 * The list includes name, their status as grandmaster, federation, and gender. The only other necessary information, the year they achieved the status, should be sourced through either their FIDE profile, or properly sourced through a third-party. External links and the name "Di Felice" do not suffice. All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 09:46, 6 November 2021 (UTC)
 * There was some discussion of the use of proper inline citations in the archive of this talk page (in 2010), Talk:List of chess grandmasters/Archive 1. Someone actually introduced them, here.  But some other editors complained that they made the article take a long time to load.  (It loads quickly enough now, on my home computer, for whatever that's worth.)  Also one can see that the References section becomes unwieldy, because each footnote has backlinks to all the places where it is cited; this is rather odd-looking, at least.  This style of citation was soon replaced, apparently due to the long load time problem.  Bruce leverett (talk) 14:40, 6 November 2021 (UTC)
 * You don't need to add a reference for every single line of the table like that, if every (other) line is using the same source. In the current format, the Sfn template is essential because right now the referencing of "Di Felice" is absolutely worthless. Either use that template, or merely use the website in conjunction with the book to cover all bases sufficiently. In fact, the latter of the two is clearly the better idea. You don't need an article to mention "Di Felice" 2000 times when you can mention it once, you don't need to abysmally reference things 2000 times when once, clearly, at the head of the table, in conjunction with the FIDE website, is highly sufficient and efficient. 19:44, 6 November 2021 (UTC)
 * The guidelines regarding "Publish" which you incorrectly quoted from only applies to "audio, video, and multimedia materials that have been recorded then broadcast, distributed, or archived. All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 09:46, 6 November 2021 (UTC)
 * Thanks for pointing out that the sentence I quoted from WP:PUBLISH does not apply here. I was wrong to claim that it did for the reason you state.  Quale (talk) 05:50, 7 November 2021 (UTC)
 * The sentence I started with "I would think" was not an argument. I'm here to discuss and collaborate with my fellow editors, not argue with them. If you withdraw those uncivil comments, I would be happy to presume it was a misunderstanding and we can move on. Onetwothreeip (talk) 21:53, 15 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Seems rather precious to me. Bruce's comments were not uncivil. Seems to me there's a small coterie of editors who cruise around all the largest articles in areas where they have no subject expertise and demand they be reduced. This usually leads to much annoyance on the part of people who actually know the subject. MaxBrowne2 (talk) 20:08, 16 October 2021 (UTC)
 * I can only speak for myself and I don't "cruise around" with anybody. Never have, never will. Onetwothreeip (talk) 22:57, 16 October 2021 (UTC)
 * A current discussion at WT:Article size suggests that you spend rather a lot of effort on large articles. You have no discernible interest in the subjects of those articles.  Quale (talk) 05:55, 22 October 2021 (UTC)
 * It would probably make the most sense to split the deceased and living grandmasters into their own separate article rather than just splitting them by table, given the size of this page. Blubabluba9990 (talk) (contribs) 16:33, 17 October 2021 (UTC) discernible discernable
 * I see no gain in such a move, only loss of functionality. MaxBrowne2 (talk) 18:30, 18 October 2021 (UTC)
 * What functionality would be lost? All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 23:14, 19 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Let's say you want to know who the first grandmaster from Belgium was. You can sort the table by Federation, scroll down to Belgium, and discover easily enough that it was O'Kelly in 1956. If the article were split you'd have to go to the separate dead GM's list to discover this. MaxBrowne2 (talk) 00:02, 20 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Doesn't sound like a loss of functionality, just a minor change? Again, rather than forcing the user to do everything you think they would do, it's very easy to put notes in the table to identify much more clearly who the first grandmasters from countries were, as in this featured list article. And there's three or four ways that a user can be directed to the other table. All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 06:23, 20 October 2021 (UTC)
 * "it's very easy to put notes in the table to identify much more clearly who the first grandmasters from countries were" – what a wonderful suggestion. Would those notes go in the list of living GMs or the list of deceased GMs?  Ceaseless bitching that the article is too long, and now you want to make it even longer.  (Those notes would need also need references, making it longer still.)  Also, not a very good idea.  Determining the first GM from a particular federation is only one of many kinds of questions someone might use this table to answer and it is not very easy to put notes in the table to answer all of them.  Quale (talk) 07:25, 21 October 2021 (UTC)
 * The notes would go on both tables, yes, it's that simple. I'm not suggesting to make it longer when I've already suggested making it shorter by approx 90k. Yes, things need references... like the title year, to find out who was made grandmaster first from particular countries, which is already in the table? If you think the table itself is demonstrably incorrect because a note needs a source for information already in the table, then the entire thing is flawed. I've already given several other suggestions for how to pre-empt many queries a user should have, negating the need for endless scrolling and clicking and incorrect maths. All mentioned above. But yet again you prove you haven't actually read the discussion and clearly just want to go flying in with two feet! All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 09:19, 21 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Finding out who was the first GM from a particular country is just one example of the kind of query that would be more difficult if the table were split into living and dead pages. Same applies if you want to find out how many titles were awarded in 1974, or how many women were awarded the GM title before 2000. The point is, for some types of queries, it is irrelevant whether or not the person is still living. MaxBrowne2 (talk) 21:57, 21 October 2021 (UTC)
 * So you think the table should be split by date? That's an interesting thought. Say, 1950–2000, then 2001–present? All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 23:14, 21 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Obviously I said no such thing. MaxBrowne2 (talk) 04:23, 22 October 2021 (UTC)
 * I know. Because obviously you are refusing to engage in any ideas to make any changes whatsoever to the table. As demonstrated by this most recent of comments. So what would your thoughts be on a split by date, rather than by living status? All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 14:08, 22 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Go sealion someone else. I'm done with you. MaxBrowne2 (talk) 20:31, 22 October 2021 (UTC)
 * You can't just call somebody a troll just because you can't back up your point of view and can't back up your continuous refusal to engage in discussion. You have provided no opinions or policies, I'm just querying why, doesn't make somebody a troll. All my warmest wishes, ItsKesha (talk) 09:56, 30 October 2021 (UTC)

Di Felice
Seeing this listed under almost every GM, at first I thought it was vandalism. I see it is a source, but the article itself needs to explain the meaning of this note, with details of what sort of source and how it is accessed, as its unclear in that context and currently unverifiable. Greenman (talk) 15:09, 25 January 2021 (UTC)
 * I'm open to suggestions as to what would be suitable. Currently the article says: "The Notes column includes all sources that were used to compile the information for each player."  and when you look at Di Felice in the references it says "Di Felice, Gino (2017), Chess International Titleholders, 1950–2016, McFarland, ISBN 978-1-4766-7132-1 (main source to verify titles awarded through 2016)".  I think it's reasonably clear that the source is a book.  In fact it's a dictionary-like listing of titled chess players through 2016 including brief biographical data (name, federations, birthdate, birthplace, date of death, place of death, title years, maximum rating).  Each reference can be found alphabetically under the player name.  It can't be used to verify titles awarded after it was published, but it is used in a few entries of GMs from 2017 on if it was used to verify their birthdate or birthplace when this information was not available from other sources.  (Other sources for birthdate or birthplace is usually the title application document.)
 * Some explanation of this might be appropriate in the article. Quale (talk) 03:57, 26 January 2021 (UTC)
 * I reckon just cite Di Felice once, and note that all titles awarded up until 2016 and some other info such as birth dates and places can be sourced to him, instead of repeating his name 1500 times in the table. Could do the same for Gaige. MaxBrowne2 (talk) 17:14, 7 November 2021 (UTC)
 * There are some entries in 2017 and later that are (well, were) cited to Di Felice because it was used to verify some information not found in the other references for the entry. For example, Di Felice lists "Quesada Pérez, Yasser" as an IM (2014) born in Villa Clara.  He did not become a GM until after Di Felice was printed, but Di Felice can still be used to cite his birthplace.  The only references left in the list now are his FIDE profile with no birthplace info and GM title application which says only that he was born in Cuba.  Fortunately his full birthday is on the title app, but in other cases I used Di Felice to provide dates or places of birth when they were not in the other references listed for the player entry.  The GM title app for Trần, Tuấn Minh gives his birthdate as 1997/01/01 but Di Felice says 21 October 1997.  The cases where Di Felice can be used to fill in some missing information for new GMs will become increasing rare in the future, of course, as many new GMs today and even more in the future will not have had any FIDE titles in 2016.  Quale (talk) 16:18, 20 November 2021 (UTC)

Sisniega birth place
According to this source (Encyclopedia of Mexican Literature), and confirmed in a tweet by his daughter, Sisniega was born in Chicago, to a Mexican father and American mother. He likely had dual nationality, as does his daughter. MaxBrowne2 (talk) 01:57, 21 November 2021 (UTC)
 * Gaige 1987 agrees that Sisniega was born in Chicago. (He became an IM in 1974 even though his 1992 GM title postdates publication of Gaige.)  I've made the correction.  Thanks for finding this mistake. Quale (talk) 05:12, 21 November 2021 (UTC)

Vidit birthplace
His chess.com and chess24.com player profiles both say Nashik or Nasik. Also there is "Wiki Buff":. This appears to be from an Indian collection of biographies, which I had not heard of before. It has photos of his parents and mentions his father's migraine clinic in Nashik. Bruce leverett (talk) 15:29, 19 November 2021 (UTC)
 * Thanks, that's good. We should figure out how to cite and fix this first at Vidit Gujrathi which also says Indore (it may have gotten that from Di Felice also, or possibly from this page) and then we can apply the same fix and sourcing here. https://web.archive.org/web/20121216045849/http://www.viditgujrathi.com/aboutme.html also indicates he was living in Nashik when he was young, even if it doesn't directly say he was born there as the wikibuff site does.  Quale (talk) 19:57, 19 November 2021 (UTC)
 * These are reputable sources that could be cited. Cobblet (talk) 03:55, 20 November 2021 (UTC)
 * Thanks, those are good finds. I've made the correction to birthplace here and in his bio page. Quale (talk) 15:32, 20 November 2021 (UTC)

While we're here, any light to shed on the mystery of Fırat's birthplace? Fırat's 2017 GM title application gives his birthplace as Barcelona, but his 2010 IM application listed İzmir. Di Felice says Izmir, but I don't think it's really sufficient evidence to break a tie. Quale (talk) 15:51, 20 November 2021 (UTC)
 * The chess school in Tekirdağ where he teaches says Izmir. Cobblet (talk) 17:07, 20 November 2021 (UTC)
 * Thanks. You are very good at finding these references. Quale (talk) 05:20, 21 November 2021 (UTC)

Rationale for the name of the article: "chess grandmasters" vs. "chess Grandmasters"?
Does anyone know or have an opinion on what the rationale is for naming the article "List of chess grandmasters" instead of "List of chess Grandmasters". I could see the case for capitalizing "Grandmasters" since it's a formal term, and the article focuses on players with the GM title, and not other players who have been labelled grandmasters more broadly --- e.g. players informally referred to as grandmasters before 1950, or Woman Grandmasters (WGMs). Thanks! Sportsfan77777 (talk) 06:03, 12 March 2022 (UTC)
 * Lower case is correct: see MOS:JOBTITLES. Cobblet (talk) 15:22, 12 March 2022 (UTC)
 * Both upper case and lower case are in use. I'd just shrug if someone moved the page to "List of chess Grandmasters". MaxBrowne2 (talk) 23:29, 12 March 2022 (UTC)
 * Correct. MOS:JOBTITLES is operative.  JOBTITLES says even the word "king" receives the lower-case treatment quite often... grandmaster is no exception. Le Marteau (talk) 02:14, 13 March 2022 (UTC)
 * Why is MOS:JOBTITLES operative? Grandmaster is not a job title.  Bruce leverett (talk) 02:19, 13 March 2022 (UTC)
 * "Job title" is misleading. It is, more properly, a "title" and as the guideline says:  Offices, titles, and positions such as president, king, emperor, grand duke, lord mayor, pope, bishop, abbot, prime minister, leader of the opposition, chief financial officer, and executive director are common nouns and therefore should be in lower case when used generically:
 * My reading of it is, on Wikipedia, if a title refers to an individual, it gets capped because it is a "proper noun". If it refers to the title in general, it gets lower cased because it is a "common noun". Le Marteau (talk) 02:45, 13 March 2022 (UTC)
 * Thanks! This sounds right. I thought it was correct already, but wasn't really sure why. Sportsfan77777 (talk) 14:16, 14 March 2022 (UTC)

Valery Grechikhin
This guy is real. Here is the article about him in Russian Wikipedia: ru:Гречихин, Валерий Дмитриевич. Yes, he was 61 when he got the GM title, and his FIDE rating at the time was around 2500. —Bruce leverett (talk • contribs) 10:33, 27 June 2022‎ (UTC)
 * Grechikhin was sourced with an inline citation as late as November 19, 2021, (see https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=List_of_chess_grandmasters&oldid=1056023562), but hundreds of inline cites were subsequently removed from the table. Di Felice 2017, p. 117 confirms Grechikin's dob, dod, and title year.  He isn't "unknown to FIDE", but it requires a little care to find him on FIDE rating lists since FIDE recorded his family name as "Grechihin" and alternately transliterated his first name as "Valery" or "Walery".  Early FIDE rating lists did not consistently include title information, but it's easy to find him listed as a GM on the http://ratings.fide.com/download/jan01frl.zip Jan 2001 list.  Apparently he was the first deaf GM, so if we could find some sources he would be an interesting subject for a bio article.  Quale (talk) 17:37, 27 June 2022 (UTC)

This article is so big it lagged my computer trying to edit it
Can we consider splitting this into multiple articles? Idk, by year of awarded GM title, alphabetically by last name, or by something else? My computer had to suffer 5-10 seconds or so of lagging after just about every action I did trying to edit this article. Endwise (talk) 15:26, 17 July 2022 (UTC)
 * I think that says more about the capabilities of your computer than the state of the article... my hardware is not exactly state-of-the-art (nor is my connection) and I have no issues viewing or editing it. I think the article is fine as it is. It has an alphabetic index at the top, and what makes it great is, it's sortable. Le Marteau (talk) 16:32, 17 July 2022 (UTC)
 * Actually I think the editing issue may be more about the browser than the computer. Trying to edit this article using Chrome I have the same problem even on a fairly high end system, but Firefox has no issues.  I think Chrome is trying to do something "smart" with the wikitext and this smart thing is bogging it down on the large page.  If you can, try editing with different browsers and report your experience to see if my observation is correct.  If you think about it, editing the page should be much easier for the browser than rendering the HTML.  Chrome has no issues rendering the page, but it gets stupid when trying to edit it.  Quale (talk) 22:32, 17 July 2022 (UTC)  Also, thanks to you both for helping to improve the list. Quale (talk) 22:39, 17 July 2022 (UTC)

Is the exact birth and death date so important?
As another way to reduce the article size, we could change the exact date to year of birth and death. An argument that supports this proposal is that the list has a title year column, which doesn't state the exact day that each person become a chess grandmaster. However, the event of being titled one is presumably more important than birth and death in this article, so what makes the exact birth and death date so important?

If you disagree with this proposal to any extent, please answer and explain the question above. zsteve21 (talk) 14:09, 22 July 2022 (UTC)


 * Generally speaking, biographers go to great effort to determine exact birth date. You will see this both in and out of Wikipedia.  Our main sources give the exact date, not just the year.  Biography articles specifically are encouraged to use the exact date (see MOS:BIRTHDATE). Bruce leverett (talk) 19:13, 22 July 2022 (UTC)


 * The exact date is very useful in sorting, e.g. youngest/oldest grandmasters, date of death for updating year articles. etc. Greenman (talk) 08:54, 23 July 2022 (UTC)

Bharath Subramaniyam H
What is the correct sort for Bharath Subramaniyam Harishankkar? Harishankkar is his family name. I think FIDE uses the sort "Bharath Subramaniyam H" which seems plausible to me for an Indian name, although the wiki bio page Bharath Subramaniyam has DEFAULTSORT set to "Subramaniyam, Bharath". Quale (talk) 05:44, 17 September 2022 (UTC)

Whitespace
Why the recent edits to remove whitespace? It improves source readability, and it costs us nothing. This is exactly the wrong direction to be going.

If you're thinking of saving disk space, well, first, it's not our disk space, it's WMF's disk space. If they need to save space, they can run bots to do what we humans are clumsily trying to do. Second, what's 30K bytes? You hardly have to open your wallet any more to buy 1GB. Bruce leverett (talk) 20:12, 14 January 2023 (UTC)


 * I thought it would be uncontroversial. I don't mind a revert. MaxBrowne2 (talk) 03:32, 17 January 2023 (UTC)

incomplete birth date
I refrain from making an edit of this huge artice (even section with table only) for that, but the table contains only the birth year 2000 for Joshua Sheng when his wiki page makes precise the birthday 2000-09-25. I guess there might be similar cases. (When the name is not a red but blue link, the page will probably give the complete data.) &mdash; MFH:Talk 00:47, 24 April 2023 (UTC)


 * I looked at Sheng's article and the full birthdate was added by an IP without a source, so I've reverted it per WP:BLPDATE. Pawnkingthree (talk) 01:06, 24 April 2023 (UTC)