Talk:Origins of the American Civil War/Archive 3

message: I reverted to 172's version because:
* The origins lay in the interplay between political, economic, and cultural forces is fluff.   You could say the same thing about any war in history, or the invention of television, or the writing of Bleak House.
*172's version is an accurate summary of the article.   If someone disagrees with the article, they can contest that content (please don't though!); neutering the lead is not the answer. Markalexander100 04:45, 7 May 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree, but was too timid to revert (I don't want to get caught in the VV/172 crossfire). --mav 05:22, 7 May 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: First sentence revisited

message: Thought I should mention, I started discussing the way this article was split up again in the /categorization subpage before it got moved to /Archive 2, and the discussion is still going on over in /Archive 2 now. Should I bring it out here? Bryan 22:53, 15 May 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: I'd rather not do that. 172 23:05, 15 May 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: Perhaps I should move /Archive 2 back to its original title, then, since it's got active discussion instead of old static text. Bryan 23:11, 15 May 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: I've just come back to this article after wandering away for a while, and don't consider this resolved yet. Discussion ongoing in /Archive 2. Bryan 00:10, 5 Jun 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: Article naming discussion

message: It occurs to me that a few highly productive WP members are discussing this topic on a little-visited Talk page, that it has little if anything to do with OACW in particular, and that it is complicated by temporary technical limitations and worries about precedent.  Can we move this to a more appropriate page and invite a broader audience to comment?
Specifically:
# This is a question of nomenclature.  Choosing accurate and concise names can be difficult.  Far from being trivial, the naming of sections, pages, articles, and categories is deeply important, even though naming decisions are often made in haste.  The question of how to name and subdivide lengthy works, in universal Style Manual fashion, should be answered carefully (and answers should be qualified where necessary).
#* For borderline cases, consider stubs (which can be renamed as further detail clarifies content) on the one hand, and detailed books (with preset divisions of 20,000-word chapters into 2,000-word sections, and brief titles for each of section, chapter, and book).
# This is also a question of interface.  Most visitors are limited to some combination of what their monitor can show, what their browser can display, and what our collective style has inspired us to create.  
#* "Keep pages under 30k!" is an artefact of current browser limitations.
#* The need of maintaining "by hand" a single TOC for an article which is visibly split into a number of distinct "pages" can also be overcome with better technology.  We should keep in mind when making Style Guidelines(TM) to distinguish b/t guidelines for the imperfect present and suggested guidelines for a more perfect future.
#* See the Int'l Herald Tribune for another take on paging.
# This is a question, lastly, of hard vs. soft style guides.  How strictly should guides be followed?  How much is up to the discretion and energy of the primary editors of an article?  How worried should we be about setting precedents, and about uniformity?
#* I like having a variety of styles around, and waiting for obviously excellent designs to emerge.  Choosing among and arguing about a number of flawed designs may only hinder good designs from appearing.  None of the designs suggested so far really appeals to me; of course I (slightly) prefer the layout I suggested to what was here before, but I'm still waiting for a good solution to emerge.  Meanwhile, there are REALLY IMPORTANT changes going on around WP that have nothing to do with how long pages are displaye.d  (:  see below for my Table of Mediocrity.
# ~~ +sj+ 01:00, 19 Jun 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: Excellent comments by Sj. They deserve careful and detailed consideration and elucidation on another page, so that these proposals can be applied to a number of other articles. 172 03:38, 25 Jun 2004 (UTC)

text: Hacking things up into a series is never "just right" since there is no quick (20 - 30 KB) summary of the whole topic. Thus those users who don't want so much detail are not served. See wikipedia:summary style. --mav 03:54, 18 Jul 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  A Deep and Serious Issue 

message: Design type	Naming                                                                                                                                            	Size                                                                                            	Table of Contents
Single page	Short.  Clean.  Honest.  What's not to like about that?  (:                                                                                       	Too long. Slow loading; browsers currently load entire page at once; breaks some older browsers.	Simple, complete.
Tree-like       	Short parent name. Long child names; sometimes complicated.  Most external articles need only know the title of the parent node, and link there.  	Just right.  Tree nodes limited to < 30k.  Content refactored accordingly.                      	Complete within each self-contained node.
Serial          	Single short name for all nodes, clarified with 'page number'.  Most external articles need only know the title of the first node, and link there.	Just right.  Serial nodes limited to < 30k.  New pages started every 20/25k.                    	Complete in first node; needs updating by hand.
It seems that removing or working around the technical limitation would alleviate the problem most cleanly -- everyone likes a single autogenerated TOC, a single searchable page, and the interface of scrolling down until you're done with the article. +sj+ 01:00, 19 Jun 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: Excellent comments by Sj. They deserve careful and detailed consideration and elucidation on another page, so that these proposals can be applied to a number of other articles. 172 03:38, 25 Jun 2004 (UTC)

text: Hacking things up into a series is never "just right" since there is no quick (20 - 30 KB) summary of the whole topic. Thus those users who don't want so much detail are not served. See wikipedia:summary style. --mav 03:54, 18 Jul 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: Table of Long-Pages Design Mediocrity

message: Mav, Bryan, and Sj:
I just took the OACW article out of the U.S. history series and started a new article on History of the United States (1849-1865), which can contain the 20-30K summaries of both OACW and ACW. If there are any objections to this, please go ahead and revert any of my changes. 172 03:38, 25 Jun 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: Then this article should itself be a survey article for the OACW series. I still plan on finishing Talk:Origins of the American Civil War/Origins of the American Civil War to make that happen (I'm glad to see that Brian has helped a bit). The OACW part of History of the United States (1849-1865) seems to be the right length while the ACW is way too short. There also needs to be other sections dealing with other aspects of the period that are not directly related to the ACW. In fact the whole division seems wrong since the main period of Indian Wars are therefore split in two. --mav 03:51, 18 Jul 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: I must admit to drifting away from this summary-writing project in the hopes that it would somehow magically complete itself, but I guess I'll come back now and pitch in some more work since that didn't happen. In a few days, though, this weekend is too busy for heavy lifting. :) BTW, found another article that's been split up in an arbitrary manner; USS Tennessee (BB-43). I think I'll make myself a list over on my user page so I can work these over once this one's settled into a form that is generally accepted. Bryan 05:01, 18 Jul 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: New article on History of the United States (1849-1865)

message: Oughtn't the crisis between the secession of South Carolina and the beginning of the war be discussed in this article?  In particular, stuff like the failed Crittenden Compromise plan, and so forth, seem to belong here more than to American Civil War. john k 04:46, 19 Oct 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Secession Crisis