Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Vax gold key


 * 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   no consensus. -- RoySmith (talk) 04:43, 2 May 2014 (UTC)

Vax gold key

 * – ( View AfD View log  Stats )

This article has no references and no indication of notability. Normally I'd say speedy delete, but there seems to be no CSD category that allows speedy for products. Q VVERTYVS (hm?) 12:11, 19 April 2014 (UTC)
 * Delete. This is essentially VAX cruft.  It could be redirected to VAX, but I'm not quite sure why one would want to do so. NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 17:04, 19 April 2014 (UTC)
 * &hellip; except that it's not &mdash; not VAX, that is. The Gold Key was introduced in 1974 (see VT50), years before the VAX (1977).  Although it was used with VAX computers, it was also used with Rainbow 100 (8088/Z80), DECmate II (PDP-8), and Pro-3xx (PDP-11) personal computers, as well as DECstation (MIPS) workstations.  The creator of this article chose an unfortunate title; a request for move will complete its discussion period in a day or two, fixing the title.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 50.181.30.121 (talk) 19:05, 19 April 2014 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Computing-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 18:10, 19 April 2014 (UTC)


 * Keep. The Gold Key was a signature element of a consistent user interface implemented by Digital Equipment Corporation across multiple product lines.  The Gold Key article is still a stub, but it has potential.  Although there are, as yet, no source citations in the (minimal) text, the Gold Key is mentioned in articles such as VT52, WPS-8, and EDT (text editor), to be linked in a few days when the current requested move discussion period closes.  The Gold Key is discussed in contemporary and historic sources such as DEC Networks and Architectures by Carl Malamud.
 * Is there an objection that the Gold Key is primarily used by a single vendor? The Wikipedia precedent (e.g., Command key, Option key) seems to be that single-vendor keyboard keys are appropriate article subjects.
 * Is there an objection that the Gold Key rarely appears on new hardware? The Wikipedia precedent (e.g., Turbo button) seems to be that historic hardware is still notable (and &ldquo;notability is not temporary&rdquo;).
 * While this won't someday become a front-page featured article, I expect it can develop at least to the level of, e.g., Control-V.
 * 50.181.30.121 (talk) 18:35, 19 April 2014 (UTC)


 * Perhaps the topic has potential, but the current article does not in any way indicate this. If the article is expanded before the AfD expires, then we can reconsider, but currently it's not even at stub-level. Q VVERTYVS (hm?) 18:44, 19 April 2014 (UTC)


 * That was a spirited defense of the article, but it has not established notability for the key. Unfortunately, the book that you cited is a trivial mention; it is mentioned in passing on a single page.  Precedents do not exist in deletion discussions, as that is an "other stuff exists" argument.  If you wish you nominate option key for deletion, feel free to do so, but the existence of that article will not help this one. NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 18:53, 19 April 2014 (UTC)


 * Trivial mention there, true enough; there are certainly numerous other sources.
 * PDP-8 : The manual for the WPS-8 word processing system (as PDF here) introduces the Gold Key as a modifier/meta-key on page 1-8, then mentions it repeatedly as it describes each edit command which requires it &mdash; for example, the get-document command (page 5-8), the various ways to move the cursor (pages 5-8 through 5-12, Gold Key mentioned on every page), or the creation of superscripts and subscripts (chapter 9).  Appendix A lists every gold-modified key, and figure A-3 (page A-8) even illustrates the Gold Key (gold in the original photograph, distinctive but gray in the PDF's grayscale scanned image).
 * PDP-11 : The &ldquo;quick-reference&rdquo; manual for the RT-11 operating system (as PDF here) begins (chapter 1) with a summary of the commands of the KED/KEX text editors, almost all of which are noted as requiring the Gold Key.
 * VAX : The VAX/VMS Primer (as PDF here) dedicates chapter 2 to the EDT text editor, where it illustrates the Gold Key (figure 2-1, page 2-3), describes it (section 2.4.1, page 2-4), and illustrates its use (using mini keyboard diagrams) with every gold-modified editor command (remainder of section 2.4, through page 2-14).
 * 50.181.30.121 (talk) 21:19, 19 April 2014 (UTC)
 * I've added some sources, including those above, as general references, to be upgraded into inline citations as the main text is developed. Feedback on the suitability of those sources would be appreciated.  50.181.30.121 (talk) 03:44, 21 April 2014 (UTC)
 * Well, those sources look like they're all associated with the manufacturer, DEC. What you need to find are independent, reliable sources.  Manuals published by the manufacturer don't really count toward notability.  I've still got a functional DEC Alpha-based workstation, so I understand the draw of nostalgia, but Wikipedia does have inclusion criteria. NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 15:53, 21 April 2014 (UTC)
 * Would IEEE, CRC Press, PC Magazine, and the Free Software Foundation count as independent of DEC? I've added sources from those publishers to the article; as before, they'll be used for inline citations as the new text is developed, once the notability issue is resolved.  50.181.30.121 (talk) 22:02, 21 April 2014 (UTC)
 * I think they at least muddy the waters enough that it's now debatable. I'd say no on the FSF but yes to the others.  The remaining hurdle is whether the coverage is "significant", and people have different standards on that; I've been told that my standards are too high. NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 22:42, 21 April 2014 (UTC)
 * The CRC/IEEE book describes the Gold Key and its functions to a depth comparable to the DEC manuals, although it's a bit inconsistent in terminology, sometimes calling that key &ldquo;GOLD&rdquo; and sometimes calling it &ldquo;&lt;PF1&gt;&rdquo;. The other independent sources generally establish milestones of demand and longevity:  the Computerworld news item notes that newer Rainbow computers have a Gold Key kit available for backward compatibility; the PC Magazine product review tests a PC word processor created to bring Gold Key-style editing to MS-DOS; and the (current) FSF documentation describes how Emacs EDT mode supports Gold Key editing to the present day.  There are other examples of present-day software which supports the Gold Key (e.g., PuTTY), but their documentation likely has no deeper editorial review process than that of the FSF, and I haven't added them to the article.  50.181.30.121 (talk) 00:12, 22 April 2014 (UTC)
 * At one point, Wikipedia had individual articles on hundreds of Pokémon. That madness eventually came to an end.  However, we still have way too many individual articles on trivial topics that could be better described in a more general article.  I might support a merge to modifier key, but absent the existence of more substantial coverage, I don't see justification for an article on this topic.  Here's an example of an article about caps lock: KILL THE CAPS LOCK on Slate.com.  It's a rant about how much the author hates caps lock.  Unimpressive in terms of content, perhaps, but it's indicative of significant coverage.  Not everything needs an article on Wikipedia. NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 04:08, 22 April 2014 (UTC)
 * I added a bit more info to the article, based on non-DEC sources, if you want to take a look. As with any AfD edits, it doesn't seem worth putting much time into if there's a decent chance it will be removed anyway. Agyle (talk) 05:38, 25 April 2014 (UTC)
 * The comparison to Pokémon suggests to me that we should not delete. All of these articles were merged and redirected, not deleted. See https://toolserver.org/~dispenser/cgi-bin/rdcheck.py?page=List_of_Pok%C3%A9mon_characters for some of them. Andrewa (talk) 07:03, 28 April 2014 (UTC)


 * Comment. Most of the material here seems to be worth keeping, but it doesn't quite seem to justify a stand-alone article on the gold key. However, for users it was probably the most distinctive feature of DEC's VT range of computer terminals (to say nothing of their emulators and software designed to use them) and would be an obvious section in a general article on them. But instead, we currently seem to have about five or six separate articles on the more prominent members of the range. Failing that, a merge to modifier key would work, but if done should require some rewriting of that article, which currently discusses such keys just in terms of typewriters and personal computers - the VT terminals and their gold key were more or less an intermediate stage between the two. PWilkinson (talk) 22:06, 23 April 2014 (UTC)
 * One consideration is that the Gold Key is not a modifier key, at least not in the specific technical sense described in the modifier key article. The Gold Key is a prefix key which is not also a dead key, and is used by DEC and compatible software the way that Emacs uses the escape key.  (A modifier key would be held down while a second key is pressed, producing a single character code, while the Gold Key is pressed and released first, then the second key is pressed and released, together producing multiple character codes.)  For serial terminals of the 1970s–90s, modifier keys generally had to be designed into the hardware, while the Gold Key has always been defined and handled in software.  So if a merge is considered, perhaps the target should be a prefix key article?  50.181.30.121 (talk) 14:18, 24 April 2014 (UTC)
 * The definition in modifier key is based on dubious truthiness, not fact; personally I'd have put a period after "modifies the normal action of another key" in the opening, so the definition would include prefix/sequential modifiers, but that's just another subjective opinion. Agyle (talk) 05:38, 25 April 2014 (UTC)


 * Keep. Good topic, good material which certainly should be kept somewhere, and by implication then we need to somehow keep the article history. There might be a case for a merge and redirect (but I'm unconvinced obviously), and there was one when the AfD was raised, but even then not for deletion, and deletion now would be an overkill of overkill. Andrewa (talk) 07:12, 28 April 2014 (UTC)


 * Keep, or as a second choice, merge to an appropriate topic TBD. I do think notability is borderline here and could be argued either way, but strongly recommend keeping this article content for the reasons outlined at WP:HEY. --j⚛e deckertalk 19:44, 1 May 2014 (UTC)
 * Thank you for the pointer to WP:HEY &mdash; yes, like the Heymann article described there, this one was &ldquo;an unsourced, two-sentence stub&rdquo; when nominated for deletion, but has seen significant expansion during the AfD discussion. 50.181.30.121 (talk) 02:58, 2 May 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.