Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Stub sorting/Proposals/Archive/Jul-Dec2008

hiking onwards
Trying to stub-sort Roadwalking. Gave it hiking-stub, which produced a message to say that it was subject to an SFD (following discussion in the archived talkpage). Looked at the SFD, and the verdict was already "delete", so I cancelled my edit. So: What category can we use for this item? There seems to be no suitable broader category to include "recreation", "outdoor activities", "walking" etc, where we can stubsort any aspect of walking other than trail-stub or climbing-stub. Any ideas? I'd expect to find something under either "Leisure" or "Transport" but can't see anywhere. PamD (talk) 16:04, 2 July 2008 (UTC)
 * sport-stub is probably too broad, I'm thinking. What about proposing a walking-stub? Her Pegship  (tis herself) 18:13, 2 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Walking-stub would simply re-create hiking-stub under a different name. This one's a bit of a puzzle, though. We've had occasional suggestions for some sort of outdoor pursuits stub, and perhaps it's worth reviving that as a proposal again. Grutness...wha?  01:39, 3 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Walking-stub has the merit of covering more ground (pun intended) than hiking-stub...Outdoor-sport-stub would be too broad; perambulation-stub too obfuscatory... hmm. Her Pegship  (tis herself) 18:20, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

possible new stub
look, i just finished reading the novel Brooklyn Follies by paul auster, and I saw it was listed as a crime novel stub here. that is definitely not the case, so i checked other stubs in literature and none fit! children, crime, fantasy, historical, horror, mystery, philosophical, romance, science fiction, spy, thriller, war novel, western, and young adult are the only types. I was thinking that this book, as well as probably many others fits a genre that should be called something like "life/events/every day experiences/trandescending time of a person's life" novel, as it is just about a certain year in the character's life and what happened there. I don't know if i'm making myself clear. another example is kennedy's A Confederacy of Dunces, or amelie nothomb's Attentat, which is just about the crazy things/people in life. any suggestions for a name? or did i miss an existing genre for this?190.31.247.244 (talk) 20:45, 3 July 2008 (UTC)
 * I don't know how it got stubbed as a crime novel. It's now under 2000s novel stubs. Stub categories tend to be fairly broad and basic; if you find a permanent category that fits, please feel free to assign it to that article. Cheers, Her Pegship  (tis herself) 22:14, 3 July 2008 (UTC)
 * BTW, the term you'rem looking for is probably Slice of life. Grutness...wha?  00:49, 4 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Nice one, I didn't know the term Slice of life190.31.247.244 (talk) 19:42, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

Addition to instructions
It's been pointed out to me that the proposal instructions had no details on how to propose upmerged templates, so I've added a sixth point to them - please check that it's right and amend if necessary! Grutness...wha?  23:50, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

Added note to instructions
I've finally got fed up enough of people proposing things that have already been listed at SFD to add a note to the top of the instructions section of this page. Please edit/amend as necessary! Grutness...wha?  23:45, 4 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Gah! It was already there - I've made it more prominent. Grutness...wha?  23:49, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

Overhaul of stub-templates
This is more of a meta-proposal about stub-templates than a template proposal (and more long-range) so I'm putting here not on proposals list. While looking at Old City Hall (Philadelphia), I saw three different stub-tags. Each of the tags contains duplicate content from the others (the generic "help improve" text) but also each of which uses different formating for the image (wrap text next to it vs inlining), different links and linkformatting in the standard text, etc). Also, none of them use or some variant that other stub-tags use, etc. So here's the proposal...have a generic   template that to standardize all the formatting, and then a stub-template would just pass it the specifics of the stub (via icon= and desc= fields, for example). Would help simplify the stub templates themselves and standardize and improve the layout of pages that use them. DMacks (talk) 17:39, 12 August 2008 (UTC)


 * I'd suggest you check the archives of this page. A suggestion like this comes up on average once every couple of months, and though it sounds appealing on the surface, there are numerous reasons why it is not such a good proposal in the long run - which is why it's never been adopted. Grutness...wha?  02:06, 13 August 2008 (UTC)
 * I had (and just again) browsed the TOCs of the three archives of this talk-page, nothing sounded related. But if it's been discussed and current ad-hoc solution was found to be better, that's fine. DMacks (talk) 03:41, 13 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Hm - my mistake - I misread what you were actually proposing (I was thinking it was a suggestion to combine the several stubs on a page into one larger metatemplate). Your idea certainly has merit, but - as Pegship points out below, while it would work fine if all stub making was rigorously controlled, too many individual editors make their own templates "on the fly" for us to keep them all uniform in the long run. Grutness...wha?  01:57, 14 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Hi DMacks...I feel your pain. I think the reason for the proliferation of variants is that when someone creates a stub template, they usually copy from another existing template, regardless of the code. Plus I'm not sure all the stub sorters know there's a "master" code on the WPSS page. So cleanup would certainly be admirable, but I think it wouldn't be long until entropy set in again. Cheers, Her Pegship  (tis herself) 15:58, 13 August 2008 (UTC)

Norse stub
I'm unsure of exactly how to create a stub/category/template, so could someone else please create a stub cat for all articles relating to the Norse, not just Norse mythology. Thank you, ErikTheBikeMan (talk) 19:07, 20 September 2008 (UTC)
 * Best thing to do is follow the instructions at WP:STUB and actually propose it, which is done on the main WP:WSS/P page, not the talk page! Grutness...wha?  21:52, 20 September 2008 (UTC)

Scientist icons
At the risk of sounding a bit prissy about political correctness, I'm a little concerned at the standardised "Lego man" and flag icons being used on recent stub templates, e.g., on the recent range of scientist stubs (like Netherlands-botanist-stub). In the past we've tended to try to find a photo of a real person to represent these stub types, or if there isn't one, just the flag - and the standardised white-skinned male rankles a little (especially for countries where white skins are in the decided minority - Brazil-botanist-stub, for instance). I like the general idea of a generic figure, flag and symbol, but this ain't doing it. Grutness...wha?  00:21, 13 December 2008 (UTC)

Good point, hadn't thought of that and I'm sure Waacs didn't either. I would prefer a real person too instead of a lego figure. The Bald One      White cat 13:49, 13 December 2008 (UTC)


 * That is a good point, really hadn't thought about that at all. The problem I have with a real person is that the icon is supposed to enable people to tell at a glance what the stub notice is about, however we have Albert Einstien on atleast 2 stub templates, Van gogh on various painter and artist templates, Newton on plenty of Mathematian templates (inc Asia?)  and who can tell me which stub icon this image is on [[Image:Przyrodnicy_zawadzki.jpg|30px]].  I really do like the idea of figure, flag and symbol so what if we change the "legoman" image to something like [[Image:Crystal Clear app personal.png|30px]] or [[Image:Ico pers.png|30px]].  I'm sure we can find something suitable,that would show up well against most flags. Waacstats (talk) 13:54, 22 December 2008 (UTC)

Archiving
Howdy all, and happy nearly-new year! I have been pondering two aspects of proposal page maintenance, to wit: 1. Keeping up with closures, and 2. Moving closed items to archive pages, as well as 2a. whether keeping the proposal page history is moot. The current system:
 * 1. A discussion on WikiProject Stub sorting/Proposals/2008/December is closed.
 * 2. After the recommended action is taken OR the discussion has lingered on the Proposals page more than a month after closing, the discussion is cut and pasted into the separate archive page.
 * 3. The actions taken or pending are listed on the archive summary page under the appropriate month.
 * 4. Items still needing creation are listed on the To do/To create list.
 * 5. Eventually the original page for that month's proposals is deleted as blank.

This means I end up having to update the month's archive page, the master archive list for the year, and the to do list. (Because let's face it, nobody else is working on this.) The "to do/to create" list was originally a brief list on the "to do" page which got monstrously large, thus was given its own page to make it simpler for people to find templates that needed creating in their particular subject area.

What I'm looking for is suggestions as to how to eliminate some of this duplication, thus simplifying stub sorting and decreasing my work load. Possibilities:


 * We leave all discussions on the current page until (a) they're all acted on or (b) over a month has passed. Once either of these happens, we remove the page from the Proposals listing and tag it with an archive label. The downside is that the Proposals page remains pretty long; the solution would be to be sure only 2 or 3 months at a time are listed.
 * We eliminate the To create page and direct people instead to the archive summary page to browse for redlinks for items not yet created. The downside to this is that only the current calendar year is displayed.
 * We eliminate the archive summary page and keep the To create page, as the individual months' archived pages show what was created.

Or any combination of the above. Any ideas? Her Pegship  (tis herself) 21:16, 29 December 2008 (UTC)


 * I like the first idea - as to the length of the page, it's easy enough to load just one month at a time, so it shouldn't prove too much of a problem. I'm less keen on the second idea - I feel the To create page is a useful tool, so I wouldn't want to see it go. The third idea does make some sense, though. If we're keeping the entire month of proposals anyway, we don't really need to summarise what happened anywhere. So yes to parts 1 and 3, but no to part 2 IMO. Grutness...wha?  22:11, 29 December 2008 (UTC)