Wikipedia talk:Browse/Archive 2

message: #remove from Geography: Antarctica, Landforms, Subterranea, Villages
Object/Disagree.
*Antarctica - since this is a continent, I cannot see why this is deemed unnecessary or non valuable. Some countries are even claiming parts of it (but not the US).
*Landforms are standard geographical features.
*:Category:Subterranean features are also part of our Earth Ancheta Wis 11:58, 16 Jan 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: By the way, invaluable means priceless, in other words, so valuable that they can't be bought, as if they were really good links, in this case, not useless, not bad at all. I understood what you meant by unvaluable, anyway. Ancheta Wis 22:33, 16 Jan 2005 (UTC)
replies: text:  Thank you. Conan 09:05, 17 Jan 2005 (UTC)

text:  Proposal Wikipedia:Browse/Reduced Conan 10:08, 25 Jan 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Proposal to replace some invaluable links

message: I'm NOT probably more fond of mathematics than most people - I did four years of it at university, including some graduate courses - but I just can't see that it deserves a place as a top level category alongside "Science" and "Technology". -- Danny Yee 07:25, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: It almost got pushed down because of a lack of topic-specific portals, but Oleg pushed back, and rightly so.  The knowledge contained in the Math pages is significant.  Certainly more so than the extremely large volume of "knowledge" we currently carry about mass-media entertainment. -- Fplay 06:42, 30 December 2005 (UTC)

text: It doesn't belong alongside science, but as a sub-category of it.  Go for it! 19:41, 31 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Mathematics a top level category? 

message: Hi, I'm wondering what you all think about Browse section like that of the German wikipedia, in which they link to the portals, not the categories themselves.  On the main page there is a "Portale" section which has links to different portals on the wikipedia - see  for the mathematics one.  I see that the english wikipedia also has some good looking portals, but they are on the bottom of the page, and are not categorized.  I personally think that a link to the portal is much more helpful than a simple link to the category, since the category is usually a mess of articles and subcategories, while the portals are thought-out, organized pages that present what wikipedia has to offer in a much more accessible format.  Right now of course, not all of the links on the Browse page have portals, but before I start working on it, what do you think? --Spangineer ∞ 23:09, May 24, 2005 (UTC)
: The German wikipedia has switched to a namespace, Portal:Mathematik , so your link is broken.  It's an interesting idea, but you know that you can add text to a category page that is thought-out and organized?  I'm not sure if the Portal: namespace has special page handling. -- Skierpage 09:30, 21 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Link to portals, not categories? 

message: I have added health sciences as, currently, categories such as nursing/ dentistry are only able to be accessed from the main page via the very broad category of 'applied science' and then as subcategories of health science. I think this is justified as information science and earth science have their own category. However, I am happy for alternatives to be proposed, or for this to be reverted if people do not agree. For example, nursing can be seen as a social science or even an art rather than science.--Vincej 09:43, 23 Jun 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Adding health sciences to science and nature category 

message: This is an exact copy of what appears on the Main Page! Of what use is it now?--Siva 16:15, 20 July 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  WHAT HAPPENED??!! 

message: While the United States has over 9,000 public libraries, not one person has suggested implimentation of the Dewey Decimal System? While there is no doubt a western influence over the system (see 200s, 800s, 900s), the DDC continues to be used and implemented worldwide. Think of the relevance that wikipedia could then have to actual print libraries!
A wikiversion could make minor adjustments to culturally biased sub-categorizations where necessary, just as many private libraries have chosen to do.
Let's not re-invent the wheel and instead concentrate on making great articles.</br>
IMPLEMENT THE DEWEY DECIMAL SYSTEM FOR CATEGORY NAMES!
: If you want the Dewey Decimal system, you'll find it in the Wikipedia:Dewey Decimal System page.  We here at Wikipedia allow a number of different top-level categorisation schemes.  My understanding of what the community here wants to achieve for the categories used on the front page is something even more user-friendly than Dewey Decimal.  If you prefer something a little more rigorous, there are many to choose from at [Wikipedia:Category schemes].  I believe the reason none of us have suggested library schemes is because, although they're comprehensive, they're user -friendly just like Unix is, in that both are choosy about who they're friends with :) --TimNelson 12:16, 8 Jun 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: If the Dewey Decimal System is so great, why doesn't the U.S. Library of Congress use it ? (see Library of Congress Classification). You may be as surprised as I was, to learn that Wikipedia is flexible enough that we don't have to agree on a particular system. Feel free to label each Special:Categories with the appropriate Dewey Decimal number using the Wikipedia:Dewey Decimal System. Other people can add whatever other labels they like. Wiki is flexible to use all categories at the same time. Some discussion at http://CommunityWiki.org/ReserveWiki . --DavidCary 17:59, 20 Jun 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: LC's classification system was invented before Dewey. Dewey wanted something simpler for the general public. LC is great if you have a vast collection and want really specific classification areas. Dewey can be pretty fine tuned, but each has their place in the Big Picture of Library Science. Cheers - Her Pegship 19:39, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

text: The DDC helps people locate physical books on library shelves and clusters books on similar topics in close proximity on shelves. In an electronically indexed and cross-referenced body of knowledge such as this it is unnecessary and requires a level of indirection that complicates things. Unlike in a physical library there is no difficulty in inserting new documents into locations "between" existing documents, and the use of natural language terms in searching and browsing is sufficient and less arbitrary than assigning numbers to categories. We also do not need to spend effort on maintining the "correct" association between numbers and categories and articles, that would be wasted effort.
DannyStevens 01:31, 12 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: June 07, 2005 - DISASTER! Implement the Dewey Decimal System!

message: Library Science says to use five basic facets to classify things (see my comments on Wikipedia_talk:Category_schemes).  I suggest that we adopt three of them for some of the major categories, namely Personality (Topic), Time (History), and Space (Geography).  Additionally, I suggest that, to achieve simplicity, and avoid scaring non-ontologists (ie. people who don't care about the organisation of knowledge), that we put the top-level headings from Topic alongside History and Geography.  As Personality facets, I'd suggest Arts, Science & Technology, Human Systems (aka Social Science), and Religion (these are the traditional four university faculties).  You'd end up with this sort of translation:
* Arts (includes chunks of what's currently listed as culture)
* Human Systems (includes culture, personal life, and society)
* Science & Technology (includes Science & Nature, Mathematics (as only one link), and Technology)
* Religion (includes various links to that)
* History
* Geography
I think after a reorganisation link this, there would be a bit of fiddling with the minor categories, but we'd end up with a better overall system.
Also, could we put the portals in with the rest, and mark them with a + or something?  And for the major headings (ie. Arts), can we link to all three of the Article, the Category, and the Portal?  
Since someone said that we should make mockups of proposals, try this: User:TimNelson/Browse.  To forestall discussion, the Religions are those over 1% of the world's population, ordered by size.  I've done as little rearrangement of the subcategories as possible, except extracting the ones to create Arts, and seriously compressing Mathematics.  Also, if anyone knows how to link to Portals, let me know.  
TimNelson (Sat Jun  4 15:01:02 UTC 2005)
:I too think links to portals would be much more helpful than links to categories.  Also, you might consider putting a "more" link at the end of each category that links to a list of topics on that subject; for example, after the religion section, put in a link to List of religions.  That way there's a way to get to virtually any article on wikipedia.  Also, is there a reason you chose that specific order (top to bottom)? I'd personally put arts in the second or third position, and I'd probably include religion as a subcategory of human systems.  But I'm no organization expert.  --Spangineer (háblame) 18:22, Jun 4, 2005 (UTC)
::My choice of ordering was a) according to the library science acronym PMEST, with Personality/Topic first, Space/Geography second, and Time third, and b) in alphabetical order by topic (Arts, Human Systems, Science, Religion -- oops :) ).  But see also my comments below about my historical approach.  --TimNelson 04:32, 5 Jun 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: why would you want to replace mathematics by religion? --MarSch 20:30, 4 Jun 2005 (UTC)
replies: text:  I'm approaching it from an historical point of view.  In the beginning (of the University), there were only two fields of study, Theology and Philosophy.  Philosophy eventually gave rise, AFAIK, to Arts, Science, and Social Science (which is why you get a Ph.D).  That's why I've put Religion last, even if alphabetically, it comes before Science.  As with everything, it depends on your point of view.  --TimNelson 04:32, 5 Jun 2005 (UTC)

text: Good idea. Conan 08:52, 5 Jun 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Proposal for some category changes 

message: Template:Main portals and Template:Categories have exactly the same content as the two main parts of this page, except that I'm sure they are slowly diverging.  I think the content should be re-synched and those templates simply added to this page, to prevent duplication of effort, and to make sure everyone who's using those tables gets the benefit of all the improvements made to them.
Also, Template:MainPageIntro duplicates the navigation bar at the top of this page.  I think a new template should be created so both this page and the main page can be kept in sync. -- Beland 20:39, 23 July 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: It turns out  takes care of the latter.  I put it on this page, which resulted in the addition of Philosophy, which is odd in that it doesn't transclude a Wikiportal like the others. -- Beland 05:23, 24 July 2005 (UTC)

text: SteveVertigo (SV) points out that the  does not include a quick link to the actual list of categories below the portal. I propose augmenting the links bar with a link to a heading ===Subcategories and articles:===. Since Komencanto has augmented the links with a 9th, it now laps beyond 1 line; thus the link could be named literally "Subcategories and articles:" with little impact to the layout. Also, in case someone wishes to shorten up the layout, then the "Subcategories and articles:" link  could be named literally "→" with the heading as above, which would satisfy SV's criticism. If no one else has objections, I will proceed with the changes as above after a wait of a half-day or so. Ancheta Wis 15:39, 24 July 2005 (UTC)

text: Sorry, Beland, the 8 portals link needs to also handle the case for the Browse Wikipedia page. What we need is a template which can handle the extra arguments for the Subcats and Articles link for SteVertigo. Since Browse Wikipedia does not really have a place for me to put in a corresponding Subcats and Articles link, I had to fallback to the previous version of the 8-category bar. It will take some extra work to get the 8-portal template working for the Browse Wikipedia case. Komencanto and Elfguy, any other ideas? Ancheta Wis 18:50, 24 July 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Need to sync with template forks 

message: Should the portal section here be merged with Portal:Browse? -- Beland 05:04, 7 September 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I believe so, since it was originally placed thare because it was nowhere else. I went ahead and removed it. - Trevor MacInnis(Talk | Contribs) 11:49, 7 September 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Redundancy with [[Portal:Browse]] 

message: As a newcomer to Wikipedia, I found the three main topical browse pages - this, Portal:Browse and Wikipedia:Browse by overview - extremely confusing.  I believe much of my confusion was because they missed a good deal of parallel structure for the entries beneath the main headings.  I took some time to add entries to "fill in the blanks," such as adding history by country categories here, but they have been reverted.  I've read on more than one occasion that various versions of user guides are "too big."  However, I believe this perspective often comes at an unnecessary learning curve price to the novice and intermediate user. Usability should be just as valued a criterion as brevity for navigation aids.
I propose that, whenever possible, these three main topical browse pages have parallel structures in terms of the eight main categories and bottom-level entries - category/portal/article for X - (e.g., :Category:Art/Portal:Art/Arts).  The use of additional non-main headings should be allowed some flexibility, based on related entries (e.g., "Entertainment" for portals).  — RDF talk 05:10, 15 September 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Parallel structure with [[Portal:Browse]] and [[Wikipedia:Browse by overview]] 

message: Template:Categorybrowsebar has three basically parallel browse pages:  Wikipedia:Browse, Portal:Browse, and Wikipedia:Browse by overview.  Their distinguishing browse objects are categories, portals, and articles, respectively.  On its discussion page, I proposed Categorybrowsebar directly reflect these distinctions in its wording. On its discussion page, I also proposed Wikipedia:Browse by overview be renamed to "Wikipedia:Browse by article."  To clarify the meaning of this page, I propose it be renamed to "Wikipedia:Browse by category."  — RDF talk 05:17, 16 September 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: One year ago, Aug 29 2004 it was indeed named Wikipedia:Browse by category. In the course of time, it got shortened to Wikipedia:Browse. All of this happened by consensus. Before Aug 2004, there was only the WikipediaTOC of articles. When categories became widespread, Browse by category became viable, using the same scheme as for the Articles. It was at that time that the WikipediaTOC was renamed to Wikipedia:Browse by overview. Now that portals are starting to spread, it was only natural that the same outline scheme would appear. Ancheta Wis 02:24, 18 September 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Rename to "Wikipedia:Browse by category" 

message: Why isn't Business and Economics one of the top level categories? Pamri • Talk 09:26, 26 September 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:   Business and Economics 

message: I believe it is time to deep-six :Category:Personal life from the pantheon and promote something more useful like :Category:People, which would link to biographies etc. after consolidation with :Category:Lists of people. dml 18:24, 26 September 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Personal life 

message: Really nice. Thanks, whomever. Her Pegship 19:37, 7 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  New icons on this page 

message: I suggest that in addition to Birth year and death year categories we have the same for dates. eg Category Oct 21 deaths : Admiral Lord Horatio Nelson etc
ljd 12:54, 8 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:   Born on / Died on date 

message: This is the FRONT DOOR to Wikipedia for a lot of new users.  You guys really need to claim, to some small level, the ownership to the Categories (and their defining pages) you point to.  In particular, you need apply some pressure to ensure that the Categories that you directly point to meet some standards.
For instance, should the category have its own description of its scope, or should it just have a  that points to a page OF THE SAME NAME.  If there are singular/plural issues, then ensure that the redirect is there and points to the correct page.
There were problems, such as: Art/Arts!  It was a mess.  The only thing that makes sense is to insist that:
* You guys, in the browsing user interface, consistently use the singular "Art"
* That the existing page "Arts" get renamed/merged to "Fine art"
* That Arts then updated to redirect to "Art".
* "Category:Food and Drink".  OK.  No single page corresponds.  It has to point to Food and the Food page has to point to Drink in its opening paragraph or "See Also" section.  The problem was that "Food and Drink" was redirected to "Cuisine".  I fix that.  We probably should mark the talk pages of everything that Browse points to with a warning:  Make sure that that cat/page/redir conforms to our standards.
* "Movments" vs. "Cultural Movements".  Of course, the traveral should be a direct hit, not a visit to a disambiguaation page.  What to do?  Ether you guys say "Cultural Movements" or we move the pages around.  I do not care which.
: I changed the UI to "Cultural movements".  If you want it to be "Movements", you shove the current "Movement" stuff out of the way and claim ownership of it. Do not waste the user's time with multiple terms for one concept. -- Fplay 21:07, 19 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  FRONT DOOR issues: Owning the cat, page and redirect 

message: Heuristic is the large category of "Scientif method" etc.  Computer Science is part of computer and has a specialize set of heuristics.  Comp. Sci. is part of "Computing".  It is certainly not part of Nature.  If the Comp. Sci. types insist on top-billing, put them in Math or Tech, not Nature. -- Fplay 18:31, 20 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Heuristic and Comp. Sci. 

message: The time has come to get the portals in a uniform level of quality.  Some of the them were getting stale and the browserbar was becoming a mix of Category: and Portal: .  Please work on the problem portals (and the cats and defining pages) until at least the Top 8 (or 10 or 12 or whatever the number is now) are uniform and then re-deploy them all in one fell swoop in some kind of consensus thing. And we still need more work on making sure that the organizatoin of the categories is PLEASING to the new user.  I mean, we have a sub-cat of "Humans" under the the Top 8 cat of "People" ?!? Arrrgghhh!!!   -- Fplay 06:53, 21 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Thank you for your work on the 8 Portals. --Ancheta Wis 10:35, 21 December 2005 (UTC)

text: What do we want?  I know what I want and what the user of Wikipedia:Browse wants: Uniformity for the "Category:Top 8".  Do we want to have the Categories carry the space and graphics and of the Portals?  It is easy to put them back on the Top 8 and let the Top 8 lead the way, but most Categories are lean and mean.  I find it burdensome to have to scroll down (to skip over the portals) to start browsing the categories.  Is just having a link or two to the corresponding portal good enough?  If not, they should all come back to the top (or somewhere in) of the cat or else will would have to make a parallel "portal browsing" strcture.  We already have "Categories:Portals" for a linear list.  Is that good enough? -- Fplay 19:18, 21 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: The current layout looks fine. I must admit that the Art Portal's offset from the current standard browsebar is a little jarring, but scrolling down a tiny bit is a small thing. The UI look and feel is largely uniform; we were on the same page with hardly any talk between us, which is a very good way to collaborate on edits. Again, well done. --Ancheta Wis 10:55, 22 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Portals moved back to Portal: namespace 

message: We need to keep Category, Portal and Overview uniform in navigation.  Of course, it would lovely if the Top 10 could be uniform, but we can fight that battle some other day. BTW: I happen to LIKE what Philosophy has done to customize their page to stress the whole East/West thing, but I note that they were not part of the Top 8. -- Fplay 19:11, 22 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  The [[triumvirate]] 

message: When I go to a public library and ask for the "Reference" section, that has a very particular meaning that does not include Wikipedia.  It is about Atlases and Encyclopedias, the Readers Guide to Current Periodicals  and stuff like that.  I think that stuff "about" Wikipedia, and other "special" lists like the "unusual articles" list (nose picking and all) should go to their own section.  My motivation is to show a level of seriousness on this clost-to-the-front-door page. -- Fplay 19:22, 22 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I feel justified in moving "Unusual" down to the "About Wikipedia" section: it starts with the "Wikipedia:" prefix.  The same will be done for anything that goes to Wikipedia: via a redirect. The "featured" stuff is also emphemeal, but the user will forgive that one.  -- Fplay 19:30, 22 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Reference is a loaded term... 

message: I noticed that the "Reference" column on the right is, like, one pixel higher than the left-hand column because the left-hand column is a nested table.  Gross.  If it would just do a "td" table data, rather than a whole next table, I bet it would line up.  Or maybe we could defeat the padding... -- Fplay 01:38, 24 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Nesting tables... 

message: I have attempted to unify the style of the indices, but I dropped the monospace.  Should we go back to monospace for all indices?  Things like "I" are a little narrow. -- Fplay 02:56, 30 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Indices: Monospace? 

message: New user:Biowolf has made a provocative edit on the Browse page. I have encouraged him to branch out if he does not wish this single edit to be reverted by others. --Ancheta Wis 02:51, 10 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Note about a contributor with but a single edit. 

message: What is the point of all the flag images on this page? There are 254 images, the page takes ages to load, and the flags serve no purpose whatsover. A clear case of self-indulgence and a disregard for whom the page is supposed to be for, the reader. Alan Pascoe 12:05, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Pointless flags 

message: I've just tried (NB tried) to bring some order to the African flags in the Geography section, to see if all the flags there might be laid out less messily. To do so, I used the ,  and  templates, but found I had to create a 'null' column in order for something moderately reasonable to appear, i.e.
 Africa
 
 
  ...
Unfortunately, however, a side-effect is that the column spacing is irregular. What do people think about this approach?  If they favor it, can anyone help fix the status quo?  (Once I know what a fix may be, I'll happily format the remaining flags.)  Or perhaps they should all be replaced by a link or links to List of countries by continent or the like?  Best wishes, David Kernow 16:35, 6 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Them messy flags