User:Caroig/Arbitration

The story This issue now speads on too many pages and thus is too difficult for anyone to follow so I'll try to sum it up a bit here, giving the necessary links for those who'd wish to look into the matter more in deatil. I accept I might sound a bit edgy and that's now difficult for me to expect good faith from certain users after all that's been written, after so many discussions were dismissed, numerous false statements were made, so many off-topic comments … I simply think that this issue could have been handled in a decent way, if there were any objections, they should have been clearly stated first at one place and then a normal discusssion should have followed.

The Geobox The Geobox is an infobox template that can be used for any geographical feature. It produces a neat output while the data is entered in a simple way that is transparent without a need to study the documentation unless the user whishes to use it's advanced features. There are many of these such as unit conversions, automated locator dot placement or location overlay maps, automatic field value calculations. If a user wishes to add an infobox to some geography related articles with a map from their area they can use just one template, without a need to look for a suitable infobox for river, settlement, national park, cave … They can learn to use just one template. It also gives the reader advantage of always being presented the data in a unified style. The unified data format also enables any automated tool to easily parse it. See a Geobox for a mountain range, a mountain, a valley, a river, a protected area, a settlement, a castle ruin, a bridge, a bell, it's being considered for User:Kranar drogin/Geobox race track.

There are two version of the Geoboxes. First, there were feature specific templates such as Geobox River, Geobox Mountain Range. These have been replaced by a more powerful single Geobox, which is fully backward compatible with any previous Geobox, to upgrade all you need to do is replace e.g. {{Geobox River … with {{Geobox | River …. The new system is easier to maintain, enables the template to be used for any geography related feature without any additional coding. For the record, Geobox River is, as of writing this, used in 5120 pages with most major river using it, {{tl|Geobox Settlement}} in 1825 pages, Geobox Mountain Range in 189 pages (there's no other template for ranges), {{tl|Geobox Protected Area}} in 230 pages, {{tl|Geobox Region}} in 134 pages and the new Geobox in 1273 pages.

The code's pretty big, yet the technical Pre-expand include size, Post-expand include size and Template argument size are well bellow any recommended values (check e.g. Necpaly, where most of these values are generated by the Geobox template and compare it to e.g. New York City with no Geobox but numerous referencing templates and also notice the terrible lag in generating the page after any edit.) This is another example of off-topic comment. It's fair to object to the size of the code but that's not what we're discussing here.

None of the original versions created any categories whatsoever nor did the new geobox until on 2007-09-23 a user expressed an interest in some tracking system and I suggested two solutions. In Template talk:Geobox (bottom part of the section) the first auto-categorization was announced, while some users appreciated some users were objecting but their objections were of just personal opinion nature. Anyway I clearly stated that should majority of users disagree the feature would be removed, that it was simply a try out and asked for any ideas.

CfD On 2007-10-19 User:Darwinek put a suggestion on my talk page. The section started with "May I have a suggestion?". He and later another user made just vague comments: "I think these categories shouldn't show up", "I am sure there is something in WP:MOS/WP:CAT". The discussions should have been better put on the Geobox talk page as the topic had already been discussed there. Anyway, if these users were so sure there was something bad with these categories it should have been clearly expressed. I repeated the catgories weren't necessary and looked-up a part of the policy I thought they might have been referring to and offered my view. User:Darwinek then removed the part of the code responsible for category creation without any rationale ([]) which I reverted. Nothing happened for some time.

I was surprised the discussion didn't continue and some days later the category appeared at Categories for discussion/Log/2007 October 25. Only then I discovered Village pump (policy)/Archive 2 and was real shocked, I was accused of breaking dozens of policies by snapping in their links only, accused of being unwilling to cooperate and claiming ownership, "dunking" the Geobox 2 template was brought too, it was claimed the previous discussion hadn't lead anywhere (while those who objected didn't continue in the previous discussion), off topic issue of creating an unapproved bot was used; no-one ever stated the "categories were needed" etc. After numerous calls to start a discussion it was opened at Template talk:Geobox.

I thought the main discussion was being held on the Geobox talk page and the opinions expressed didn't create any consensus I concetrated on explaining my views at the Geobox talk page where a solution had been looked for. Yet a few days after, the discussion was closed, the result being, though they were so many conflicting views, to delete and it was carried out promptly. The admin who closed the discussion suggested any objections be posted on her talk page first which I did yet didn't get any answer for almost two weeks. I also started, as the guidelines suggest, RfC but it failed to get any attention. So I created the second system, first offered for discussion at RfC and also explained at Template_talk:Geobox in which I tried to address all objections. The major difference was the template only created country specific categories only if it was set to do so. It was clearly stated these categories were of a tempoarary nature and could have been redirected to some existing categories when the work has been finished. Yet the new categories were deleted without any comments. Neither User:Darwinek nor User:BrownHairedGirl have shown any interest in at least reding the RfC and the subsequent explanation of the new code. Earlier I expressed my view if the topic was obviously conflicting it could have been relisted to allow for discussion, other editors might have been invited. There are many reasons why I disgree with the closing of the debate, e.g. it is said the admin evaluates the voices which I find OK seeing the texts some editors produce, yet why is Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus's vote taken into consideration at all as it doesn't state any reason for his vote and is absolutely off-topic (a WP:JUSTAVOTE)? After my objections after deleting the second category scheme at User talk:BrownHairedGirl she placed a request at Deletion_review/Log/2007_November_13. Unfortunately, the merit of the thing was not discussed at all, this user just raised various off topic comments (the size of the template). One user asked for some explanation, which I provided in a longer post where I tried to explain the whole situation, yet User talk:BrownHairedGirl dismissed it as off topic while not addessing any of the issues I raised.

Auto categorization The first auto-categorization system was not the best because of more issues which I acknowledged at RfD, namely:
 * The names of those auto categories were not very helpful to uninvolved reader
 * The scheme created too many "red-linked" categories which had to be set-up manually
 * The names didn't follow the recommended category naming guidelines

I first asked at the RfD if the suggested new scheme would be OK and as there was no further input I implemented them in good faith I addressed most of the problems, mainly as expressed by User:SEWilco, he/she offered various versions, e.g. "Category:Wikipedia Geobox Settlement in Slovakia". And how the scheme worked:
 * any article using the Geobox would have been put into a "Category:TYPEs with geodata" (e.g. Settlements with geodata) unless
 * a region related template were set-up, e.g. {{tl|Geobox category/settlement/Slovakia}} which could have put the articles into any categories, both existing or some new ones. I set-up temporary categories such as "Category:Settlements in Slovakia with geodata" and reasoned these might be used while the region (at that time Slovakia, Czech Republic and Illinois) were being worked on, i.e. a Geobox was being added systematically for each and every settlement (not by myself, I added just a few, for regions I knwo or where I could supply some images, e.g. Blatnica, Slovakia). It would help differentiate from those settlements which didn't have a geobox so far. And when all settlements had been "geoboxed", the {{tl|Geobox category/settlement/Slovakia}} would be tweaked to put all Slovak settlements into the standard "Villages in Slovakia" etc. categories. So those "with geodata" categories would have existed only temporarily. I do not undestand one thing, while it is reasoned the categories are for readers, the technical, editorial only categories such as "Articles with unsourced statement since August 2007" are OK though they are hardly of any benefit for the reader, esp. ehen there are five of them as in Bratislava. If they are there to inform the reader there's something wrong with the article then why is there the big box at the top of the page doing the same? I do not think the boxes are a good idea at all because a reader who's not familiar with Wikipedia policies might, when coming to the page, think something like "I shouldn't read the article at all, there's some serious trouble with it, it's been hacked or what." While a user or a reader, who would click on "Villages in Slovakia with geodata" would see there were many pages in the area which use that infobox, which is therefore probably a standard one and if they wanted to add their village, they would probably use it. Even if they were not going to do any edit, they could browse thru villages which are described in the same way, always with maps etc. From these reasons I do not think the use of creating further category-like templates which would only serve for tracking using the "What links here" would be helpful. Besides, while these would be usable with e.g. AWB, where you can create a list and sort it in any way, the categories can be used directly from the browser, even by inexperience users. One editor also asks if it is such a problem to paste a category at the bottom of the page. It's not, but it only works if the user knows what category to use for the location and if they don't forget to do so. If the categories are emitted by the template, the categorisation will always be systematic and transparent and should anyone want to recategorize the articles, they would just tweak one template. I would still prefer those Geoboxes which do not have a detailed category assigned to be put into Category:TYPEs with geodata though using multiple blank templates (using just one whatlinksher for the {{tl|Geobox}} deson't help at all as it might be used for river, mountain, bridge) might work as well, yet it is not so practical. I consider this the core of my proposal.

Objections While I personally don't care very much whether the categories are allowed to exist or not, I defend them as many users find them useful and as I strongly object that this feature which doesn't violate any basic principles on which Wikipedia is built, which is created in good faith to help both readers and editors is dismissed just beacuse they go against some rules and policies, while according to other policies thay might exist. There are obviously two contradicting approaches, a technical one: they go against policies thus they're bad and users': they help. It's my understanding of how Wikipedia works (which is expressed in WP:WIARM) that the rules and guidelines aren't to be followed blindly but be used to help improve Wikipedia. I'd also appreciate some comments on this issue as this was something I wanted to be brought up at arbitration.

I'd also like to ask anyone if they think something's not OK and in conflict with the policies to quote the line from the policy instead of just pasting "breaking WP:XXX". I wrote at the beginning I didn't find anything in the WP:CAT that would say the auto-categories were bad. The problem's these are just guidelines, a lot of things are expressed rather vaguely and when I read the chapter I look (and possibly everyone does) for the points that support my views and even this is subject to interpretation of each and every guideline. For me personaly lines saying "this is not to be followed blindly" or "unless a good reason exist" weigh more than lines saying "this shouldn't be" (which is not: this mustn't be).

And finally, I was accused of claming ownership by User:Darwinek. It's true that I'm the main editor who set these templates up and does most of the editing. However I'm not the main user at all. In the recents months most of my wiki-editing related to dealing with various users' requests, comments, bug reports which were all addressed. All the debates are recorded at Template_talk:Geobox and my personal talk page. I do not understand User:Darwinek's accusation as I always responded and reacted to his comments User talk:Caroig, implemented what he was suggesting User talk:Caroig and even in past sped up creation of a template following his request ({{tl|Geobox Region}}. He seems to have recently a problem with the Geoboxes for reasons unkown, he discourgaed User:Kotniski from using the geoboxes on Polish settlements saying the Infoboxes were aggreed to be used on Poland only while other templates are in used as well, and he also reverted User_talk:Mikeshk's edit in which he switched an Infobox to a Geobox (he's putting the Geoboxes systematically to all Czech settlements) with a "I like Infobox more" summary, which he later explained (in Czech): "but I want to have the municipalities in the Těšín region in Infoboxes" (WP:OWN?). I've never wanted and expressed that many times the geoboxes were enforced to be used, or were used to eat-up other templates. They are just here to serve those who find them useful. – Caroig (talk) 00:08, 15 November 2007 (UTC)