Wikipedia talk:WikiProject reform/Tagging

WikiProjectBanners
My templating plugin doesn't currently support this template. Do we see this template as being the future, or an interrim measure until something better (CSS?) comes along?

I would like to point out to projects which use my plugin with AWB (several) that modifying it to work with WikiProjectBanners might not be easy. I can't readily conceive of a way of telling the program which templates belong to WikiProjects, unless all such templates somehow "self identify". (If anyone has a better idea of the logical process the program should follow when encountering this template or when deciding whether to add one and which templates to move inside it, I can think about that how might translate into code). For now, I'm advising users to skip pages which contain this template. --kingboyk 19:07, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Could you explain the problem? (I couldn't find the plugin from your usepage.) I've come across an issue where templates within templates are not properly recognized by pywiki. Gimmetrow 20:48, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
 * I'm surprised you haven't seen it, it's done over 100,000 edits :) User:Kingbotk/Plugin. --kingboyk 21:02, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Possible addition to "over-tagging" section
I know that this has some serious flaws, which is why I'm proposing it here. This is a section which I think, sufficiently well revised, might be able to fit into the "over-tagging" section of the page.
 * This is not however necessarily going to be unjustified in all cases. For instance, the White House would clearly fall under the domain of a Washington DC project, while it would also properly be within the scope of the United States and Architecture projects. Two possible solutions to this problem, when it is a problem, might be to have banners which can be used for several projects that deal with related subject areas. It would also very likely be possible to request that each new project which is created create for itself a list of articles with which it would properly deal with and limit the placement of banners primarily to those articles which appear on that list. Such a list could be compiled from a generally respected reference work, like a dictionary, relating to the specific subject. If no such reference work exists, this could be taken as an indication that the project might not be justified in some cases. Also, by requesting that a new project proposal include some cause to justify its creation, perhaps by such a means, it would certainly reduce the possibility of projects with too narrow a focus being created. Clearly, however, for articles relating to recent developments, like elections and other current topics, this proposal would not work, but the existing listing of articles of each project could be used as guidelines for which projects would be related.

John Carter 17:54, 3 March 2007 (UTC)


 * Bleh. I see over-tagging as primarily a technical problem rather than a conceptual one; and would prefer to see it dealt with by technical means rather than by artificial limits on which articles may be tagged. Kirill Lokshin 18:16, 3 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Why do the tags have to be so big. I've suggested this for maintenance tags on articles as well. Why don't we make smaller versions of some tags? For articles with lots of stacked tags, the tag of the most applicable project could be a full one and the rest would be smaller. Using the example of a building in Houston, it would go something like this.
 * Project:Houston (full size)
 * Project:Texas (small)
 * Project:Architecture (small)
 * This wouldn't reduce overtagging, but it would reduce clutter. Mr.Z-man  talk ¢ Review! 20:29, 3 March 2007 (UTC)


 * You mean like the small option on WP:TPT? A lot of people seem to think that's not sufficient, in the long run. Kirill Lokshin 20:52, 3 March 2007 (UTC)


 * Maybe some sort of show/hide type thing for the secondary wikiprojects. The primary (top) project would be a full template, but the rest would just have "This page relates to WikiProject: Whatever", and the majority of the content would be hidden. Mr.Z-man  talk ¢ Review! 21:50, 3 March 2007 (UTC)


 * There wouldn't be any clear objection if a project which is clearly a more "focused" project of another project were to remove the tag of the larger scope project, would there? I'm thinking in the example of the Texas tag being removed when the Houston tag is placed, unless, for example, the building actually is some sort of Texas state office building, when its continued presence could be justified. That wouldn't necessarily be an instance of over-tagging, just of an article falling within the scope of a lot of projects. Many articles, particularly about people who move a lot, face the same situation. John Carter 21:39, 3 March 2007 (UTC)


 * Just so memories remain clear on this, it is precisely the removal of tags that needs to have careful attention paid to it. The senior tag would not be removed without the approval of the senior project.  Obviously, if the senior project agreed, then it would be removed.  I understood one of the purposes of this exercise was to avoid this type of removal, by having the junior projects somehow "nest" within the senior project so that no "removal" would be needed. Spamreporter1 02:04, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

It would be good to discourage such things as Zeldaproj, which displays three templates for one template call. A similar issue exists with some portal selected material banners. In fact, since most portals are associated with a wikiproject, "selected by portal whatchamacallit" should be an option in the wikiproject template, and displayed within the wikiproject template. Most major projects do this already, such as WP India, but for some reason Indian selected is still in use. Gimmetrow 22:18, 4 March 2007 (UTC)