Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Red Link Recovery/Archive 6

Database dump
When will be the next dump?Smallman12q (talk) 19:49, 8 January 2010 (UTC)
 * I've worked up a newer method of generating links directly from the live database, rather than relying on the periodic database dumps. See: Red Link Recovery Live tool. - TB (talk) 14:34, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

Extra test for punctuation errors
Is it possible to have the punctuation test check for replacement of single quotes (’) with apostrophes (')? I have done this roughly myself (example here) and discovered it is quite common. If the red link check can be expanded to deal with double quotes etc. that might also be useful. Tassedethe (talk) 14:31, 21 January 2010 (UTC)
 * Well spotted. When we find a mess of apostrophes and quotes, what should we change it to?  MOS suggests that we replace single quotes by apostrophes everywhere, and even ’ (that's a quote not an apostrophe) redirects to Apostrophe.  Do we simply get rid of all quote characters other than ' and " as found on the keyboard?  Certes (talk) 14:52, 28 February 2010 (UTC)

"add a note saying why"
1) I don't see the point of this. If the project is to determine which suggestions are correct, and remove the incorrect ones for the next database dump, the "add a note saying why" step just seems to create unnecessary extra work both during and when 'restarting' the project.

2) Understood too that you want to avoid random blanking of the pages, but reverting to an old edit just because you yourself did not work on the entries kind of defeats the purpose of other users' work on the project.

Please do not include "that's the way it always has been done" in your response. Thank you. Sct72 (talk) 00:51, 26 March 2010 (UTC)


 * What is this a reply to? —Paul A (talk) 01:16, 26 March 2010 (UTC)

WikiProject_Red_Link_Recovery/Punctuation/7 ''To keep the list tidy, remove suggestions that were correct and have been dealt with. Remove sections that no longer contain any lines. If you couldn't repair the link and the suggestion is incorrect, strike it out and add a note saying why. '' I do not agree with the procedure, therefore I am opening it to discussion. If there is a reason for it past what I have in #2 above, I would like to know. Thank you. Sct72 (talk) 01:35, 26 March 2010 (UTC)
 * I have received a notice on my Talk page, regarding:


 * The "add a note saying why" step is to prevent needless duplication of effort. The person who processes incorrect suggestions so that they don't appear in future lists needs to know why the suggestion is incorrect. If you just strike through the suggestion without explanation, that person has to go and look at the link and figure out why it was struck out. If you leave a note explaining why it's incorrect, that saves them having to do what you've already done.


 * I don't understand your question #2. Where did somebody "revert to an old edit just because they themself did not work on the entries"?
 * —Paul A (talk) 04:58, 26 March 2010 (UTC)


 * I have had to do that, see diff. I had previously asked the OP about removal of items from these pages but never received a reply (diff). I found that the OP had also removed items from the list without fixing them e.g. M14 rifle entry removed from list on Feb 28 (diff) but not fixed until after I had restored the entries and rechecked them all on Mar 7 (diff). This is the exact sort of reduplication of effort we are trying to avoid. Tassedethe (talk) 06:45, 26 March 2010 (UTC)


 * In regard to reverted edits, I believe I have undone some of the edits in question which had no summaries. I did this simply because there was no way to tell if the work had actually been done. There is nothing to stop someone from going on any page and crossing out a few lines without even reading them, the summary prevents work from having to be repeated. EmanWilm (talk) 11:16, 26 March 2010 (UTC)


 * Many things to address from "the OP" (crimony).
 * Trust. You want people to review suggested entries, but you don't trust their review enough without a stated reason. Instead of the person actually running the database dump, it sounds like an intermediary between the database person and the project volunteer.
 * Vandalism. With all of the types of vandalism done to Wikipedia - blanking, insults, inserting information, advertisement - the chances of a 'vandal' having the knowledge to go to a specific WikiProject to strike out random entries is almost nil.
 * Removal/"Fixed". When I originally started working on the project over a year ago, I did incorrectly remove struck-out entries. After the notification (in Feb '09), I learned from my mistake and did not think a reply was necessary.
 * The entry for M14 rifle on the project page was: M14_rifle links to Fleet_Anti-terrorism_Security_Team, try Fleet_Antiterrorism_Security_Team.
 * The only "Fleet" string visible on the M14 article page is Fleet Marine Force, so it was removed. Upon later investigation, the acronym FAST (for Fleet_Antiterrorism_Security_Team) on the article page is the red link in question. This could only be found by clicking Edit Page, or hovering over every red link on the page. Talk about needless effort!


 * I do not have a quarrel with eman, open2, tass, or the project, my concern is also for time and effort. If there's a quicker way to work through a project, I'll suggest it, if it's better or not. However, in the time going back over a year into my edit hiliststory, must have missed all of the other work I have done on the project, including the percentages I added to the main page to better track progress on the project. Whatever, may be time to find something different. Sct72 (talk) 04:22, 28 March 2010 (UTC)


 * Hi guys, TB here, please excuse my tardiness in joining this discussion. The original list handling instructions and associated templates were very much a thrown-together effort on my part four or five years ago.  The vast majority of the overhead incurred in the current system is in the form of project volunteer time, and I'd be quite amenable to someone optimising the process to minimise this burden.  ::List entries currently exists in one of four 'states':  new, fixed, falsepositive and needsanexpert.  The most common 'transformation' is (and always should) new->fixed, hence the simplest operation (removing the entry) is used to indicate this.  As the most common being made to the lists, it's likely that the majority of list handling errors will therefore also fall into this category - ie things will be deleted rather than left in or scored out.  Entries that are deleted without being handled have a very low cost in that they'll simply re-appear on the next generation of lists.  The next most common transformation is new->falsepositive, currently indicated by striking out and comnmenting.  While the striking out is a faily quick and easy edit, I'd agree that adding a comment makes it a lot more onerous.  My thinking it requesting it was twofold;  firstly, the cost of marking a 'good' list entry as a false positive is quite large - the relevant red link(s) will not only not get fixed, they'll never be suggested again in future lists.  Requesting a brief explanation of why it's a false positive acts as a stumbling block for an information saturated brain - possibly jarring it awake enough to notice something's wrong.  Secondly, I had expcted to use the explanations to fine-tune future generations of lists.  In practice, I've not made too much use of them as hit-rates have so far been well within acceptable bounds.
 * - TB (talk) 14:59, 3 April 2010 (UTC)