Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Distributed Inter-Process Communication (2nd nomination)


 * The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review).  No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was   delete. Secret account 04:11, 20 October 2014 (UTC)

Distributed Inter-Process Communication
AfDs for this article: 
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Is this linux software notable? Frankly, I am not sure. It was the subject of edit warring and a bad faith AfD nomination years past. I will nominate it and hopefully a few people not involved in this article's sordid past will chime in. Safiel (talk) 01:17, 12 October 2014 (UTC)

Copy & Paste from the Talk page (unregistered users cannot create the nomination page):

I'm nominating this article for deletion.

Technically, this is the second nomination (not by me): The first was never really considered (speedy keep, because of an edit war). You can find it at Articles_for_deletion/Distributed_Inter-Process_Communication

The reasons I am nominating this are:


 * The latest version is from 2008 (3.0-alpha10). A long time in Linux kernel development, 6.5 years, with Sourceforge counting less than 500 downloads total (+150 on the 2.x beta).
 * It was never considered for inclusion in Linux. The article sounds as if this was part of Linux, but it isn't. In fact, I could only find less than a dozen DIPC messages in 15 years on the LKML; most of which e.g. dealing with its (ab-)use of the VH_SHM flag. It doesn't seem to have received any interest on the LKML...
 * It might not even support current 3.x Linux kernels.
 * The references (Scholar) are essentially uncited articles. 10 citations in 17 years, probably including some self-citations.

All in all, this project IMHO fails the WP:NOTABILITY guidelines in every possible way. 94.216.192.225 (talk) 10:32, 11 October 2014 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 188.104.88.132 (talk)

How often is this article read?
Safiel, DIPC was developed in mid-90s to early 2000s, and was among the first transparent distributed programming tools for Linux. It makes System V IPC work over a network while maintaining backward compatibility. Like any other design, it has pros and cons and one may wish to concentrate on the good or the bad. I think an objective way to approach this is to see how often the article is visited. If very few people read it, it can be removed. Otherwise keep it. That said, I was amused by the above anonymous author's reasons for removing this article. Unfortunately DIPC seems to attract hostility from certain people over the years, so my first reaction was to ignore them. But out of respect for Wikipedia's named moderators and readers, here are my short answers, in the same order as above:
 * Should the article for any tool that isn't downloaded frequently be deleted? How many people have downloaded Algol recently?
 * The use of the VH_SHM flag has a valid technical reason, as explained in DIPC's documentation. The flag was removed in later kernel versions so there was a need to find a remedy for DIPC to continue working. The fact that the word "(ab-)use" is employed to discuss a technical issue hints that the above anonymous author is not of good faith.
 * It does not support recent kernels. Again, not a good reason to delete an article.
 * ???. Please count again.Kkarimi (talk) 10:16, 12 October 2014 (UTC)


 * As a matter of fact, Algol 68g version 2.8 was downloaded 600+ times from sourceforge. It has 26 downloads per week, whereas DIPC is at minimum (<=1 per week). And of course, Algol does have historic significance. --188.104.88.132 (talk) 10:50, 12 October 2014 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Computing-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 02:06, 13 October 2014 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Software-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 02:06, 13 October 2014 (UTC)


 * Delete&mdash;I'm not seeing much in the way of independent, non-primary sources. There is a Linux Journal article, which is good, but it was written by the creators of the topic.  There are several articles in the primary literature also authored by the creators, but the citation counts aren't high enough to support an argument for notability on their own.  Not seeing anything in gbook, either.  Looks like a likely delete.  A note to Kkarimi:  please read WP:NSOFT and WP:NOTABILITY.  Notability is a term of art here with a very specific meaning.  The short version:  if people other than the creators have written in depth on a topic, then the topic is likely notable.  This looks like a cool piece of research, but most cool pieces of research don't get their own wikipedia articles because other people don't write about them.  If you're aware of a book chapter or magazine article that focuses on DIPC, please let us know.  Lesser Cartographies (talk) 17:31, 13 October 2014 (UTC)
 * Delete I don't see notability; this appears to have never been used or discussed by anybody but the authors; to little to warrant inclusion in Wikipedia IMHO. Please don't take this personally! --Chire (talk) 12:10, 16 October 2014 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.