Wikipedia:WikiProject Systems/Announcements/Archive 1

Welcome at this archive of talk pages of the WikiProject Systems. This pages stores closed discussion, so pleace don't edit here. These announcements here are stored chronologically. For questions en remarks, contact Mdd.

April 2007: The initiative
On 20 April 2007 this project is initiated by Jonathan Bowen and Marcel Douwe Dekker. The cause for this step was the elimination of the Category:Systems on 17 April 2007 from the English Wikipedia, see. This category contained a treasure of information with 27 subcategories and 125 articles. This had become an example for 18 other different languages, who had matching categories.
 * 20 April - WikiProject Systems initiated

Opponents stated however, that the categorization of anything named a "system" … is a form of overcategorization. The opposition lead by Jonathan Bowen gathered some support from England and Holland to Russia and Indonesia. But they couln't turn the tide. So new options were discussed and three days later, this WikiProject got started.

On the talk page of the WikiProject Systems both speakers in favour and opponents started searching for a new Category:Systems. This started with the protest of Jonathan Bowen on 20 April against the delete-decision of the Wikipedia administration, see.
 * 25 April - Search for new Category:Systems

When things didn't become clearer, Marcel Douwe Dekker came 23 April with a proposal for a rather theoretical new top down solution, see. In the meantime Bowen had started reorganize articles in new subcategrories buttom up, with lead to a more practical solution. Today the discussion was still going on and you is still welcome to join.

The discussions about an alternative Category:Systems agreed on one proposal for a new structure for the Category Systems. After an attemped to audit this new situation, we agreed we should get the Category:Systems relaunched, and solve new problems along the way. We agreed that this Wikipedia Systems project will monitor the new category.
 * 27 April - The Category:Systems relaunched

In the new structure the Category:Systems is the high level category in this field, merely for general articles about theoretical Systems priciples. For the articles about things called system new categories are created to group them, like the Category:Physical systems and Category:Conceptual systems. It became clear that we shouldn't group everything called a system:

''Only things that are semantically "systems" (as considered by some field of study) should be included somewhere in the hierarchy. For example, if a pop group used the word "system" in their name, it would not be appropriate...''

May 2007: Getting started
This week a first orientation started on the whole of articles in the field of systems. Hereby articles were tagged on the talk-page with a Template:WikiProject Systems. For example: the Talk:Donella Meadows is tagged with the code:
 * 1 May - Assessment of Systems articles started



The first part of the code  {{WikiProject Systems  activates the template. In the second part you can rate the article by quality, here named class, and by importance.

The rating of quality must be done according to general assesment rules: in short there are 6 grades or classes: stub, start, B, GA, A and FA. For a Good Article (GA) grade articles have to pass a good article nomination process. And for A and FA grades articles have to be peer-reviewed. So the grade one can give to begin with are from Stub to B.

The rating of importance is an other story. You can rate the articles from None, Low, Mid, High to Top. This rating is however made from a WikiProject Systems point of view. So this important rating is relative. It tells about the importance the article has in the field of Systems. In fact, this rating tells about the place the article or category has in the global structure in field of Systems, Systems theories and Systems scientists.

You can help by tagging more Systems related articles in a similar way.

In the past five days more then 250 article within Wikipedia are located in the field of systems and assessed. ... read more
 * 6 May - More then 250 Systems article's assessed

This week the website of this project has become fully operational. The design itselve is based a concept from Turnkey Project, which was inspired by a French original.
 * 7 May - Website WikiProject Systems operational

The WikiProject Systems website mainpage offers most of the information that the participants need: For example the announcements, the directions for editing articles, a frequent planning and tools for assessment. Furter more there is one central talk page for the hole project. The remaining parts of archives, articles, categories, lists and templates are just tools in the back.

The construction of the website itselve remains flexible and can be adapted to new lines of work in the project. Suggestions about this are always welcome at our Project talk page.

In the last week discussions started between Allan McInnes and Mdd with help from systems engineer Truthanado to improve the Systems Engineering article. The activities in this field lead to the start of an WikiProject Systems Engineering Initiative to coordinated further common activity. ... read more
 * 12 May - A new Systems Engineering Initiative

Today a new Category Systems is created in the Wikimedia Commons website: the site where all copyright free images for the Wikipedia are stored. You can reach this categories though cross references made in the category:systems and lower categories. Efforts are made to upload more images into these WikiCommons categories.
 * 14 May - Category:Systems in Commons

June 2007: Getting to work
A makeover of the Systems Engineering article is beeing initiated by gnusbiz. The discussion continues on the Talk:Systems engineering to get more structural improvement into the article.
 * 9 June - A Systems Engineering Makeover

After uprating the importance of the Chaos Theory article, Geometry guy gave us some insite information about the assesment in the Mathematics WikiProject. They experienced that too many articles are getting Mid and High importance ratings compared to Top and Low. So they have been trying to improve the situation, and have developed more detailed importance criteria to work with... read more
 * 25 June - Assessment in the WikiProject Mathematics

In the past two months Kenneth M Burke have rewritten the systems theory article, changing almost every part. The quality of this makeover however has been questioned, ... read more
 * 26 june - A Systems theory makeover

Today a new Category Systems theory is created in the Wiktionary website: This category is meant to collect a sytems related definitions in the Wikionary. A inventarisation brought the first 23 entries.
 * 29 June - A Category:Systems theory in Wiktionary

July 2007: Getting more structure
On 8 July 2007, the Did you know? template on the main page was updated with a fact from the new article on Debora Hammond created by Mdd. It stated:
 * 8 July - Debora Hammond on Did you know


 * ...that American systems theorist Debora Hammond explores new ways of thinking about complex systems that support more participatory forms of social organization?

More interesting fact from a recently created article, can be suggested on the Did you know? talk page.

The chaos theory article is the third main article in the field of systems science, that now has been restructured after the systems theory and systems engineering article. The goal of these reorganization is to harmonize these articles with each other and with the Wikipedia standaards. A discussion is started about this on the Chaos theory talk page.
 * 16 July - A Chaos theory reorganisation

On 16 July 2007, the Did you know? template on the main page was updated with a fact from the article Ralph W. Gerard created by Mdd. It stated:
 * 16 July - Ralph W. Gerard on Did you know


 * ...that the American neurophysiologist Ralph W. Gerard developed an intracellular recording microelectrode, that revolutionized research in neurobiology?

More interesting fact from a recently created article, can be suggested on the Did you know? talk page.

In the past month four more top categories have been created by Mdd and Jonathan Bowen. These categories are:
 * 19 July - New systems categories
 * Category:Systems scientists,
 * Category:Systems science literature,
 * Category:Systems sciences organizations and
 * Category:Systems science.

... read more

August 2007: Exploring further improvement
More the 60 articles in the field of systems and systems science are in need of immediate attention, ... see further
 * 7 August - Systems articles need attention

This month an intitiative started by Mdd to bring all mayor article in the field of systems up to the same standard lay out. These standards differ slightly for certain types of articles: thematical or biographical; longer, shorter or stub; article or category. An important target of these recreation is on the one hand to get the articles readily accessible. And on the other hand to create space in articles for further development.
 * 15 August - Makeover of systems articles

A start has been made with a Portal:Systems science. The portal templates are designed, the first content is stored and the portal is activated. Now the portal is in need of some more information from the field. Everybody can contribute by mominating or creating selected articles, pictures, systems scientists and "did you know" statements.
 * 27 August - A Systems science Portal

September 2007: A new ball game
In the past month almost all of the more then 60 articles, that needed urgent attention last month, have been corrected and brought up to a basic acceptable level. Now a new ball game can start improving current articles and fill in blanks by creating new articles. If you find any systems related article in a poor state that needing urgent attention, please tag it with the message |attention=yes in the WikiProject banner or let us know on the WikiSystems talk page.
 * 18 September - Urgent articles improved

In the Wikipedia field of cybernetics the idea has been brought up for a WikiProject Cybernetics and a Portal:Cybernetics. These ideas are also posted on the CYBCOM Cybernetics Discussion Group. There seems to be little response, yet. If you have any ideas about this, please let us know ... See further.
 * 25 September - WikiProject Cybernetics

October 2007: Moving on
Around the systems ecology article a new Category:Systems ecology is created. Hereby four subcategories and 35 articles are determined as close related. And among those four persons are determined as systems ecologists. If you have more information or doubts, please let us know. You can also classify more article into the new Category:Systems ecology.
 * 8 October" - A new Category:Systems ecology

November 2007: Moving on
Things are going a bit slower lately but the fighting vandalism remains. Every day at least ten article within the scope of systems get vandalized. An article like ecosystem is very popular and gets vandalized almost daily. We try to fight it where we can, by putting these articles on our watchlist and check all recent changes daily. If you find an article in the field of WikiProject that isn´t checked regularly, please let us know.
 * 16 November - Fighting Vandalism remains

Winter 2008
The Portal:Systems science has recently been grouped in the Science portalbar template, which is placed above multiple science portals. On this occasion Marcel Douwe Dekker has started extending the portals content.
 * 8 January - Systems Science Portal in the Science portalbar

Spring 2008
The Systems Science Portal is further extended. It now introduces 10 of the most excellent picture, 10 images and 10 systems scientists. If you have more suggestions, please let us know on the here
 * 4 March - Systems Science Portal extended

A new tool the Wikipedia article traffic statistics seems to give an interesting view on the popularity of the systems articles. With this tool sevreal listings have been made of number of views in systems articles in february 2008, see here.
 * 15 March - Wikipedia article traffic statistics

On top of several systems science article a tag has been placed with a link to the Portal:Systems science. This step is temporary to make some promotion for the portal itselve.
 * 21 March - Systems science portal promotion

On 25 July 2008, the Did you know? template on the main page was updated with a fact from the new article on Systems art created by Mdd. It stated:
 * 25 March - Systems art on Did you know


 * Did you konw ...that systems art is an art movement from the 1960s influenced by systems theory, which reflects on natural systems, social systems and social signs of the art world itself?

More interesting fact from a recently created article, can be suggested on the Did you know? talk page.

All developments in the field of systems psychology are collected and brought to you in the new systems psychology article.
 * 2 April - A Systems psychology article

On YouTube an initiative has been started by Mdd to collect movies on YouTube about systems, systems science and systems scientists. See here.
 * 7 April - Systems science on YouTube

In the past month two new Systems Science categories have been created for Systems biologists and for Systems ecologists. There are further plans for a Category:Social systems scientists and a Category:Systems psychologists.
 * 12 April - New Systems scientists categories

There is a new Category:Control theorists for researchers in control theory.
 * 22 April - New control theorists category

Summer 2008
On I July 2008, the Did you know? template on the main page was updated with a fact from the new article on Jacques Bertin created by Marcel Douwe Dekker. It stated:
 * 1 July - Jacques Bertin on Did you know
 * Did you know ... that French cartographer Jacques Bertin was the first to provide a theoretical foundation to Information Visualization?

Autumn 2008
On 16 Sept 2008, the Did you know? template on the main page was updated with a fact from the new article on Systems art created by Marcel Douwe Dekker. It stated:
 * 16 Sept - Mathematical diagram on Did you know


 * Did you know ... that despite the long-established use of mathematical diagrams (Voronoi diagram pictured), going back to the Ancient Greeks, the scientific study of them has only recently begun?

On 24 Sept 2008, the Did you know? template on the main page was updated with a fact from the new article on Systems art created by Btphelps. It stated:
 * 24 Sept - Béla H. Bánáthy on Did you know


 * Did you know ... that systems scientist Béla H. Bánáthy conceived of a conference where all attendees present papers, and the conference itself is an in-depth, extended conversation between all participants?