User talk:AstroHurricane001/Archive 31

=April 2009=

April Fools
I'll revert it tomorrow when it's April 2 in my time zone: no harm in doing that. :) As for the signatures, take a look at this and every section under it. :) Acalamari 01:50, 2 April 2009 (UTC)

Tropical cyclones WikiProject Newsletter #25
Jason Rees (talk) 01:34, 5 April 2009 (UTC)

Outline of knowledge WikiProject update - 04/06/2009
As the country outlines have been approaching completion and more attention has been given to the non-country outlines and the Outline of knowledge as a whole, I've run into this...

Topic lists
As you know, we've been cleaning up sets of pages the links of which are displayed on the outlines.

One of the most prominent of the sets presented are the "List of x topics" (including "List of x-related topics) pages, and they are in a sorry state.

There's actually 2 different kinds mixed together in the same set: most of them are alphabetical indexes.

The others are non-alphabetical hierarchical lists. That is...

outlines!

So, I've been renaming the indexes to "Index of x articles" or "Index of x-related articles", and wikifying them (especially their lead sections). So far, all the country-related topics lists that are indexes have been renamed. It appears the new name fits so well that nobody favors the old name over the new. It's been over a week since that was done, with no complaints, so I've started on the rest.

As for the topic lists that are outlines, those can be absorbed or merged into the OOK. Even though this would entail a lot of renaming and reformatting, and cutting and pasting, these pages might still save us some work! I'm not sure how many there are, but that should become clear once the index pages are all renamed.

Feel free to join in an help. It's hog's heaven!

The Transhumanist 04:44, 6 April 2009 (UTC)

Talkback
Replies have been made at the help desk. If the problem is solved, please place ~ at the top of the section. Thank you,  Zoo  Fari  20:58, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

Outline of knowledge project summary, and future direction
In response to a friend on Wikipedia who was wondering about how I've been and what I've been up to, I got to spewing about our little endeavor, and well, I got so carried away I pretty much told him everything. :) The message turned out to be a pretty good summary of what we've accomplished so far and the overall plan.

See User talk:The Rambling Man

The Transhumanist 22:58, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

Update on the Outline of knowledge WikiProject & Geography WikiProject (Country outlines workgroup) - 04/16/2009
Momentum in the development of the outlines is continuing to build, even though we haven't added any new outlines lately. Plenty of work is being done on the outlines we already have.

Keep up the good work everyone!

Inspiration!
Kudos go to Buaidh, who has dived head first into outline development, continuing improvement of the country outlines, and doing so vigorously. Take a look at his contribs. He has taken the initiative and has been expanding those outlines' design and coverage. Be sure to let him know what you think of his work!

Coming soon: the Super Huge Expansion (it will be really really big)
Excitement (mine at least) is building as we approach the Super Huge Expansion, during which notices will be placed on thousands of subject talk pages and their corresponding WikiProjects (see below concerning which ones). Though not all on the same day! - this will take place over a period of weeks or months, because it's best not to open the flood gates all at once.

The existing outlines should serve as strong examples for editors who wish to develop new outlines, and so we need to complete them as much as we can before we start to take this to the next level (in about 3 months). The rewrite of the outline article (the draft, which explains outlines in detail), and the guideline on outlines and outline development, also need to be completed before the transcendence begins. These will help guide the decisions and actions of editors, and reduce confusion.

Projected outline, at the OOK WikiProject page
What's next? Where is the Outline of knowledge headed?

Well, it will grow, to encompass all of human knowledge.

But, is there a plan?

YES!!!

Currently under construction on the Outline of knowledge WikiProject page is a version of the outline that will display links to all the outline pages currently in the encyclopedia proper, links to all outline drafts, and redlinks to all planned outline drafts.

You can help. Please place links to the remaining drafts in there (with complete pagenames so we can easily tell they are drafts). Once all the draft pages are placed, please look over the overall outline for gaps in coverage, and add missing subjects. I expect there are thousands of missing subjects extensive enough to benefit from being outlined. New subjects should be included as red draft links. Thank you.

But it's not just an editing task list...

During the upcoming "Super Huge Expansion" (mentioned above), the article talk page and WikiProject for each of the subjects listed on the projected outline will receive a notice requesting the creation and development of the outline page for that subject. Each notice will also explain how a subject's outline will integrate into the Outline of knowledge and into Wikipedia's navigation system as a whole.

See WikiProject Outline of knowledge.

Topic lists
The nice thing about a reverse outline is that it turns up problems that exist in the publication being outlined, which provides opportunities to fix them. Since we get very little or no opposition to fixing problems even on sets of hundreds of pages, we've been plowing through them.

One of the biggest problems in Wikipedia that our work on the Outline of knowledge has uncovered so far is with the set of topics lists. Their titles, in the forms "List of x topics" and "List of x-related topics" are ambiguous, and they are not the most common terms for describing their content. See WP:COMMONNAME. To make matters worse, the set is divided between 2 competing types/sets of pages: alphabetical indexes, and outlines.

In an effort to sort out this mess, the indexes are being renamed, and the outlines are being reformatted and moved, or merged, into the Outline of knowledge.

So far, almost 300 topic lists have been renamed to indexes. Nobody has objected to the names chosen, but one editor has expressed reservation on the approach - he was concerned it would cause confusion by having 2 title standards in place at the same time for these. Though he himself was not confused, nor did he object to the titles. And nobody else has expressed confusion or dissatisfaction with the new titles either. It has been over 2 weeks since the renaming has begun, and since no confusion seems to have been caused, and since there is no opposition to the new names, I plan to continue with the renaming.

Also, one topic list has been merged into its corresponding outline so far: List of transport topics was merged into Outline of transport. It turned out very good. List of cell biology topics is currently being merged into Outline of cell biology (see the link dump in hidden comments at the end of the outline).

I'm not sure how many lists have "topics" in their titles, but Google turned up 788, and these appear to include the ones that have already been renamed to indexes. Subtracting those renamed so far, there are about 500 more to go.

Watching tips
I thought you might want to compare notes on the methods we use to watch over the outlines. Here's how I keep an eye on things...

My watchlist had so many thousands of articles in it that I finally just deleted them all. Now I have it set so that I have to manually add pages to be watched, and I use it only to watch trouble spots and collaborations I'm participating in.

Because I like to watch specific sets of pages at a time, I use "Related changes" on list pages. That way the results are not watered down with edits from pages I'm not immediately concerned with.

I always use WP:POP and Related changes together. With POP installed, you go to a link list, like User:Buaidh/Country outlines of the Americas, then click on "Related changes" in the toolbox menu, and then hover the mouse cursor over the diff and hist links so you can look at those without clicking on them.

It's pretty fast.

The technique turns Wikipedia's list system into a crystal ball.

Update Scanner
Penubag recommends Update Scanner, which is a Firefox add-on that periodically scans pages and pings you when a change is detected. You can even set its level of sensitivity for each scanned page (e.g., "ignore changes of 100 words or less").

I'd use it, but I don't have a computer. :(

See also WP:OTS for more power tools and techniques, and User:Penubag/optimum toolsets for some more nice addons, that do a variety of things.

I'm always looking for new power tools and power skills, so if you know of any, please share (let me know)!

The Transhumanist 04:57, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Do not read this one - The Hunt - Outline of knowledge WikiProject - 04/17/2009
While surveying libraries, their outline-related resources, and our coverage of them, I came across something funny...

What subclass is the Bible in the Library of Congress Classification?

Do you think they'd like this one at WP:DYK? (Nope. They didn't.)     :)

Libraries
For months, I've been sitting at a terminal in one of the largest libraries in the country, and I haven't even looked around at the available resources.

Until a few days ago.

I'm overwhelmed.

When compared to libraries, Wikipedia is small. (See Digest of Education Statistics 2008, Chapter 7:Libraries and Educational Technology Libraries, and turn to page 617).

But is that a fair comparison?

Yes.

Why?

Because we have growth potential. :)

And we cover everything, including libraries!

Guess what else I found?

Hunting for outlines
I began to study libraries and librarians, since they are experts in organizing knowledge. And of course I turned to Wikipedia to see what we had on the things I came across...

And while doing so I kept running into outlines on Wikipedia that are not (yet) part of the Outline of knowledge.

When I come across non-OOK outlines, generally I rename them, and reformat them to our standard outline format. But there is the occasional exception.

Here are some outlines I just added:


 * 1) List of energy topics --> Outline of energy (it converted great)
 * 2) List of Dewey Decimal classes --> Outline of Dewey Decimal classes (no conversion)
 * 3) Library of Congress Classification --> ??? (no rename, no conversion)

The last 2 are outlines by their very nature, and so our standard outline subheadings didn't seem to fit. So I left them as is.

I renamed the first 2, but the last one is the name of the outline, that is, the topic itself is an outline, and that outline is presented as the article's content, so I left the name as is. For now. This needs more thought.

Of course, that's not all. Concerning those last 2 outlines above...

Alternate outlines of knowledge
...not only are they outlines, but they are outlines of knowledge! Well, the top few levels, at least.

Uh, so?

What happens if we linkify them? :)

That is, what happens if we linkify their classifications to Wikipedia's outlines? :)  :)   :)

They become alternate top ends to the OOK
Yep.

What can you find?
I challenge you to find some "hidden" outlines.

I dare you to take a look around Wikipedia for hidden outlines (that is, outlines not yet hooked into the OOK), and add your kills to WP:WPOOK.

My trophies are already there.

May the hunt begin!
The Transhumanist 20:02, 17 April 2009 (UTC)

Pine Island Bay
Hi. I know you've done the work putting in the information on the volcano and glacier speed up so I think you are the person to suggest this to. After having a think about the Pine Island Bay article I think the best thing is to incorporate it as a section in the Amundsen Sea article along with a redirect. I have mentioned this at Talk:Pine Island Bay along with my reasoning if you'd like to comment. Polargeo (talk) 08:54, 22 April 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for the comment. I appologise in advance for this because I know that you have a good understanding of the issues but I think it is important to make some of the science clear from my perspective before continuing with the edits. According to the Steig paper in Nature (22 Jan 09) West Antarctica warmed less than 1 degree over the last 50 years. The tendancy is to think of Antarctica like Greenland or mountain glaciers which may be massively affected by surface melt. But take Pine Island Glacier (PIG) for example. It is 2 km thick, if the average annual surface temperature warmed by half a degree say from -24.0 C to -23.5 C it has no influence on the motion of the glacier. Just 100 km inland (mid way up the glacier) most years there is no surface melting at all and the odd year where there is melt the surface is only slightly glazed (say the top 5 mm). However, PIG has accelerated massively and nearly doubled its speed since the 1970s. Due to the fact that other glaciers in the area are doing a similar thing most scientists think that this is due to the one thing that connects them which is the Amundsen Sea that they all flow into. There is evidence of deep warm ocean water being pushed up onto the continental shelf. This water originates in the mid Atlantic and is there anyway, global warming or no global warming. It may be just normal cycles in weather systems driving this ocean circulation; it may be el nino type effects or changes in the ozone layer affecting the Antarctic Oscillation or may even be global warming but we don't know yet. One worry is whether PIG can sustain this extra speed up or is there a tipping point where we will observe major retreat. This is a worry as the West Antarctic Ice Sheet is a marine ice sheet. The bedrock under PIG is below sea level (even though the top of the glacier is well above sea level) the bed also slopes downward inland. So you can see there is nothing to stop a major retreat which could affect the stability of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet. This is what Terry Hughes (Who I've spoken to) meant when he coined the phrase "Weak underbelly of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet" when refering to the Amundsen Sea sector in the 1980s. I also know that David Vaughan, who discovered the volcano, thinks that the most likely cause of PIG's acceleration is ocean based and has noted this in published papers.Polargeo (talk) 08:37, 23 April 2009 (UTC)