Wikipedia:WikiProject Volcanoes/Categorization

The root category for this WikiProject is Category:Volcanology. The major category, Category:Volcanoes, should be reserved for articles about types of volcanoes and volcanic features, while specific individual volcanoes and volcanic belts / fields / regions / zones should be listed in the appropriate subcategories.

How to
Volcanoes and structures
 * Ensure that the article in question has the correct country-specific, region-specific, or ocean-specific volcano category, e.g. Category:Volcanoes of the United States, Category:Volcanoes of Mars, Category:Volcanoes of the Atlantic Ocean.
 * If it is not in the appropriate list article, such as List of volcanoes in New Zealand, List of extraterrestrial volcanoes, etc. (see Category:Lists of volcanoes for current choices), add it (free deorphaning).
 * Next, please ensure that it has the correct volcanic type categories (one or more, in some cases):

Volcanic eruptions
 * Articles about a particular volcanic eruption should be listed in Category:Volcanic events, while articles about types of volcanic eruptions are listed in Category:Volcanic eruption types.

Volcanic lakes
 * Articles about lakes located within volcanic craters and calderas are listed in Category:Crater lakes. Which has grown to contain over 200 articles, and it is already perhaps the most comprehensive list of crater lakes available anywhere.  A convincing demonstration of the power and magic of Wikipedia!

General topics
 * Articles about general topics in volcanology may be listed in Category:Volcanology.

Volcanology
 * Articles about notable volcanologists/vulcanologists are listed in Category:Volcanologists.

HotCat
A useful tool for categorization work is HotCat, which allows you to edit in cats from a dynamic list on the page by clicking on the categories bar.

Category sorting
It is important that volcano names which begin with "Mount" or "Volcán" or some such words are sorted based on their actual name, not the generic prefix. The easiest way to ensure this for all categories in an article is to place the magic word before the category tags. This will apply the sort key to all categories at once, without having to enter something like "|Rainier, Mount" in several category tags. See Template:DEFAULTSORT for more info.

Category cleanup

 * A comprehensive cleanup of the subcategories in Category:Volcanoes was undertaken during the first weeks of this project, since previously entire trees like Category:Archipelagoes (every island group in the world?) and Category:Saint Helena (including every single thing about this little island) had been mis-filed as subcategories of Category:Volcanoes by ocean. Most category problems and errors have now been fixed, and any other new or unfixed errors should be taken care of as they are found.

Category trees
Category trees are dynamically-generated categoritical structures (they require JavaScript to be enabled), press the [+] to expand them. The main listing can be found using, and see mw:Extension:CategoryTree for more info.

Category:Volcanism by country
Following category discussions, the volcano lists have been listed under their respective categories (eg. List of volcanoes in Antarctica is categoriezed under Category:Volcanoes of Antarctica.