Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Guild of Copy Editors/Backlog elimination drives/March 2024

Wordcount
From what I have read, copyediting is not just about adding words. It can be as simple as changing an "i" to "I". It can even be removing words and even sentences in order to make the article more readble. However, the backlog elimination drives judges progress by wordcount, how does that work if you remove words from an article? Do you still get credited for that in your wordcount? MrBauer24 (talk) 21:56, 6 March 2024 (UTC)


 * You should take the word count of the article version *prior* to when you start your copy edit. So, if your article is, say, 1,000 words long, and you take out 100 of those words, leaving 900, you get credit for 1,000. Dhtwiki (talk) 00:21, 7 March 2024 (UTC)

Requesting review
Can I have a review of my copyedits on Literacy? There were some parts I do not quite understand. Mox Eden (talk) 05:53, 10 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Looks okay to me, and thanks for expanding the refs. All the best,  Mini  apolis  14:24, 10 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Since when did I expand the references? That was Citation bot's work. Mox Eden  (talk) 10:23, 12 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I'm busy IRL and here, and only took a quick look. You're welcome.  Mini  apolis  14:39, 12 March 2024 (UTC)

Review request (and questions)
Thanks, Mseingth2133444  ( talk / contribs ) 01:49, 13 March 2024 (UTC)
 * 1) Are the barnstars automatic? How do we get the barnstars?
 * 2) How often do the completed articles get checked?
 * 3) Review request: Can someone review my copyedits?
 * Thanks for your help. As I noted in your section of the drive page, I checked one of your two copyedits; we're copyeditors ourselves, and have limited time (I do, anyway) for checking the copyedits of others. Please see WP:GOCE/DRIVE. Barnstars earned are placed on your talk page after the drive. All the best,  Mini  apolis  13:34, 13 March 2024 (UTC)
 * The barnstars are calculated more or less automatically and are placed on editors' talk pages by coordinators, but you must have your entry in good order in order to get full credit. As Miniapolis indicated at the drive page, each article you've finished copy editing needs to have its own Completed template on its own line, along with word count and bonus indicators, such as *O or *R. As Kara Film Festival had a copy editing tag from January 2023, it qualifies for a 50% bonus, which will only be automatically calculated if the *O indicator is present.
 * The instructions say that 10% of the articles, especially of new editors, will be checked; but that target isn't always achieved.
 * I looked at "Kara Film Festival" and have suggestions. First, try breaking up your edits and explain them in edit summaries. You removed the specific mention of the KaraFilm Society as being instrumental in the founding of the film festival without moving it elsewhere. That's the only substantive error I could see. In terms of formatting, I wish you had left the Multiple issues template with each subordinate template on its own line, as well as the ending closure by itself on its own line, as you found it. It doesn't affect rendering, but makes it easier to read in raw editing mode, as well as less likely that the closure will be accidentally deleted if the last template is removed, possibly leaving the article unreadable. Dhtwiki (talk) 05:05, 14 March 2024 (UTC) (edited 05:24, 16 March 2024 (UTC))

Please review my first copyedit
This is my first drive and I just did my first copyedit of Siddharth Anand

Any feedback is appreciated.

Thanks! YordleSquire (talk) 01:05, 16 March 2024 (UTC)


 * Thank you for your help. Your edits look fine, and the copy edit has to be considered thorough by the number of edits. The only suggestion I can find to make is to link the first instance of "crore" (as well as "lakh", if that term is used), per MOS:NUMERAL ("Provide a conversion to Western numbers for the first instance of each quantity (For Indian figures, the templates lakh and crore may be used for this purpose)..."). Dhtwiki (talk) 05:29, 16 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I have implemented those suggestions. Thank you for the review! YordleSquire (talk) 14:20, 16 March 2024 (UTC)

Possible close paraphrasing issues
What happens if, during a copyedit, I notice that part of the article looks like it has been copy pasted from the source? Do I try to paraphrase or stop working on the article? Is paraphrasing part of a copyeditor's job? Mox Eden (talk) 16:17, 20 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I've paraphrased a sentence or two. If I see whole paragraphs taken from a copyright source (as opposed to public domain or CC-BY), I just remove and ask for COPYVIO revdel. Basic copyediting does not mention anything about COPYVIO, so it's strictly not your issue to correct.  Chris Troutman  ( talk )  16:22, 20 March 2024 (UTC)
 * But what to do if I have no idea how to ask for COPYVIO revdel? Mox Eden  (talk) 00:12, 21 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I'm not experienced in copyright matters, but see Copyright violations for an explanation of various WP policies and Copyvio-revdel for one way to ask for expunging such material. Dhtwiki (talk) 02:36, 21 March 2024 (UTC)

Wrong word count
I recently worked on an article, and both the Page Statistics tool and the script displayed an incorrect word count of 7,400 words. Given that the article seemed much longer than indicated, I had my doubts. To verify, I copied the entire article into an external word count tool, which revealed a word count of 19,955 words after Copyedit. This suggests that the word count prior to the Copyedit was considerably higher. Can I revert to a pre-Copyedit revision, obtain the word count using an external word counter, and use that count instead? Sheriff &#124; ☎ 911 &#124; 03:26, 21 March 2024 (UTC)
 * It's possible that a major portion of the article was in lists or tables; note that the page size script only works on prose. Using a revised count isn't of major concern, and you don't need to revert: just look at the revision right before you started working on the article. — Tenryuu 🐲 ( 💬 • 📝 ) 04:12, 21 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I removed the many bullet points, using a regex (FROM ^\*+\ *([\'A-Za-z0-9]) TO \n$1) in wikEd, from the version just prior to when you got started. I then ran the "Page size" script and it counted 21,962 words. That excludes the large table at the beginning. Dhtwiki (talk) 05:11, 21 March 2024 (UTC) (edited 05:14, 21 March 2024 (UTC))

Other tags
I noticed additional tags like Repetition and Copyediting that aren't listed on this drive page. Are they considered part of the drive? I presume they are included, but I just want to confirm to be sure. Sheriff &#124; ☎ 911 &#124; 03:18, 24 March 2024 (UTC)
 * They're both redirects to copy edit, so any articles tagged with them should be included in the backlog categories. — Tenryuu 🐲 ( 💬 • 📝 ) 04:14, 24 March 2024 (UTC)