Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/K-Vector


 * 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. One "keep" is by the SPA creator, and the other by a blocked sock. Not a rousing show of support for this article.  Sandstein  10:49, 1 December 2018 (UTC)

K-Vector

 * – ( View AfD View log  Stats )

No idea if this is notable or not but it is an essay rife with WP:OR and a massive undeclared COI by it's creator (per the sources.) In fact, all of the sources go back to the same people.

I'll also note the creator has removed the tags. Praxidicae (talk) 00:41, 9 November 2018 (UTC)


 * Hello, I am the creator of the article and I have removed the tags. The research is not WP:OR, all of the references are to peer-reviewed journals and technical conference papers that also go through a review process before they are accepted and published in the conference proceedings. I have declared the COI; thank you Praxidicae for catching it. The sources go back to the same people, because those people are responsible for developing, testing, and publishing the algorithm. I feel this article is an important contribution to Wikipedia, and I feel there are already other articles that are similar (see for example kd-tree which is an algorithm that solves a similar problem). Leakec —Preceding undated comment added 19:48, 8 November 2018‎
 * The problem is there's still a conflict of interest regardless of disclosure as you're connected with the content. Wikipedia discourages making direct edits to pages as such. – The Grid  ( talk )  13:47, 9 November 2018 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Mathematics-related deletion discussions. Bakazaka (talk) 01:08, 9 November 2018 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Computing-related deletion discussions. Bakazaka (talk) 01:08, 9 November 2018 (UTC)


 * Delete. The article relies only on primary sources. It is unclear whether the journal and the meetings where the sources are published are notable in their field (flight navigation and flight mechanics), but it is clear that they are not notable for the subject of this article (databases), and that their referees are certainly not specialists of the subject. Thus there is nothing suggesting that this is not WP:OR, and that the results would satisfy our notability guidelines. D.Lazard (talk) 01:56, 9 November 2018 (UTC)
 * Please see the comments in the discussion below about the sources that have been added. In addition, the comments discuss how notable the sources are in their field. Please let me know if this is sufficient to constitute changing your delete to a keep. Leakec —Preceding undated comment added 15:59, 13 November 2018 (UTC)
 * Delete. Per nom. -- Whispe ring  15:11, 9 November 2018 (UTC)
 * Please see the comments in the discussion below about the sources that have been added. In addition, the comments discuss how notable the sources are in their field. Please let me know if this is sufficient to constitute changing your delete to a keep. Leakec —Preceding undated comment added 22:10, 14 November 2018 (UTC)


 * Keep. A quick google search will reveal the significance and credibility of AAS/AIAA conferences. As for the referees, they are notable in the subject of this article (k-vector). For example, Dr. Daniele Mortari, a university professor who has published over 240 articles and whose work has been cited 3441 times according to google scholar, has a long list of publications on this subject, as well as its application to star trackers (see the first citation on the Pyramid Start Tracking algorithm). I have added back in the COI tag after reading The Grid 's comment; thank you for clarifying.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by Leakec (talk • contribs) 19:31, 9 November 2018 (UTC)
 * Mortari is notable, but that doesn't mean everything he's worked on deserves its own article. Each topic has to stand on its own. XOR&#39;easter (talk) 13:48, 10 November 2018 (UTC)
 * This algorithm has been used in star-tracker algorithms (space instruments used to determine a spacecraft's orientation) including: Pyramid, considered the state-of-the-art, and Super k-ID which won the European Space Agency's (ESA) |First Contact Star Identification Competition. The former can be found in journal articles and in textbooks such as Star Identification published by Springer, and the latter can be found at the link provided (k-vector is even mentioned in the discussion of the teams). Leakec
 * Weak delete per nom. I might be persuaded to reconsider if independent sources with significant discussion of the subject are forthcoming, but as it stands, it's not meeting WP:GNG. SpinningSpark 00:05, 10 November 2018 (UTC)
 * Not sure if this qualifies as independent as it contains similar authors, but there is a journal article that was just accepted to IEEE (made it through peer-review but has not been published yet) that uses k-vector to sample points from any probability distribution. This contains significant discussion of the technique, but with a very different application than star-identification. Leakec —Preceding undated comment added 14:43, 10 November 2018 (UTC)
 * If it's not yet published, we are not going to be able to assess it, and it should not be used as a source on Wikipedia. In any case, if it has "similar" authors, that sounds to me like it will not be independent.  It can be used as a source when published, but it will not help to establish notability. SpinningSpark 15:10, 10 November 2018 (UTC)
 * Currently, that article is not listed as a source. I just mentioned it in case it would help to establish independence in the future. I did add a reference to the ESA competition (mentioned in the comment above) that does mention the k-vector independently (although not in depth). Leakec — Preceding unsigned comment added by 50.24.31.142 (talk) 16:31, 10 November 2018 (UTC)
 * I have found and added some independent sources that discuss the k-vector in depth and do not have any of the same authors; I have added them to the page. Please let me know if this is sufficient to constitute changing your weak delete to a keep. Leakec —Preceding undated comment added 13:48, 13 November 2018 (UTC)
 * The PhD thesis has Mortari as a supervisor, so not entirely independent.  For the other paper you added, it does not mention k-vector in the title or abstract so it is not possible for me to say at the moment how deeply, if at all, it discusses that topic.  I might request the paper, but I'm inclined to wait to see how others respond here. SpinningSpark 14:11, 13 November 2018 (UTC)
 * The paper titled "An Autonomous Star Recognition Algorithm with Optimized Database" features five mentions of the k-vector. I am not an astrophysicist but get the impression that it is a fundamental feature of the system that is used in the project, with the aim that "The k-vector technique is used for fast searching of the large-scale angular distance catalogue." I can give you a copy of the PDF as an attachment if you email me with a return address. &mdash; Frayæ (Talk/Spjall) 14:49, 13 November 2018 (UTC)
 * I just added another paper "Brightness Independent 4-Star Matching Algorithm for Lost-in-Space 3-Axis Attitude Acquisition" with independent authors that mentions k-vector approximately 10 times. I am happy to send you a PDF copy if needed. Leakec —Preceding undated comment added 15:59, 13 November 2018 (UTC)
 * Keep I am not concerned by the likely connection between the author of the article and the author of some of the references. There are enough references to meet WP:GNG and whatever the k-vector is it is used in serious projects where it is apparently useful. I thought the topic was notable when I reviewed it at AfC and I still think it is. &mdash; Frayæ (Talk/Spjall) 16:58, 13 November 2018 (UTC)
 * Comment. It appears from the added references that this topic may be notable in astronomy, and more specifically in celestial mechanics. But the article is presented (and categorized) as belonging to data base algorithmic, and its content is absolutely not notable in this field. For being acceptable, there are two possible ways for improving the article, both needing a major rewrite. The first method is to keep it as an article of data bases and algorithmic. This would need a comparison (complexity and practical efficiency) with the best algorithms of the literature. IMO these comparisons would be WP:OR, and the resulting article would not satisfy the criteria of notability in algorithmic.
 * The second method it to make this article an article of astronomy; in this case, it must be categorized in astronomy, and must clearly explain what is specific to astronomy in the method, and why the classical methods of sorting and searching do not work here. Having not read the original paper, I ignore whether such explanations would be WP:OR, or not. I suspect that there is presently no editor who has the competence for such a major rewrite. Therefore WP:TNT seems the best option. D.Lazard (talk) 17:01, 13 November 2018 (UTC)
 * I leave the following comment for your consideration. The k-vector is a data structure used in the k-vector range searching algorithm. This algorithm is used to perform orthogonal range searches in 1-dimensional databases. The primary application of this algorithm has been in solving the star-identification problem in star trackers. The star-identification problem requires multiple orthogonal range searches to be performed in a 1-dimensional database of interstellar angles (angles between stars). The reason this algorithm is used over others is the order of the algorithm (number of calculations to be performed by the algorithm) is lower than any other algorithm for the orthogonal range searching problem. The k-vector is a vector that organizes elements of a database, and is used in the k-vector orthogonal range searching algorithm; that is why it was presented as such. Leakec —Preceding undated comment added 20:01, 13 November 2018 (UTC)
 * The "K-Vector Range Searching Techniques" reference contains a speed comparison with binary search; probably the most popular and well known searching algorithm. I am happy to request this figure from the authors and add it to the page, but it may take a few days to get this information from them. Leakec —Preceding undated comment added 13:38, 15 November 2018 (UTC)

 Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
 * Draftify. Having now read the Pham, Low & Chen paper, I'm becoming convinced that D.Lazard's objections are valid and the best thing to do with this is to return it to draft space so these can be addressed.  The Pham paper is not about k-vector, it is about their own proposal.  It gives k-vector not much more than passing mentions in a list of rival algorithms.  They do give some comparative search times, but that's about all.  The paper does not even verify that k-vector has actually been used for this purpose, the apparent reason for the citation.  Having said that, the very fact that other researchers such as Pham are bothering to address it shows that it probably has enough notability to have an article after some remedial work is done. <b style="background:#FAFAD2;color:#C08000">Spinning</b><b style="color:#4840A0">Spark</b> 20:49, 13 November 2018 (UTC)
 * How do you propose that the article should be changed if returned to the drafting stage? Leakec —Preceding undated comment added 16:11, 14 November 2018 (UTC)
 * Pretty much what D.Lazard said. But let's see how this AfD closes first.  We can discuss this more when we know where this is going. <b style="background:#FAFAD2;color:#C08000">Spinning</b><b style="color:#4840A0">Spark</b> 18:30, 14 November 2018 (UTC)

Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Jovanmilic97 (talk) 07:46, 16 November 2018 (UTC) <div class="xfd_relist" style="border-top: 1px solid #AAA; border-bottom: 1px solid #AAA; padding: 0px 25px;"> Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.

Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks,  MBisanz  talk 01:11, 24 November 2018 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. <b style="color:red">Please do not modify it.</b> 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.