Wiki - Lazarus Application Gallery / Projects using Lazarus

[trev]

The Wiki contains these two ever-growing pages:

* Lazarus Application Gallery
* Projects using Lazarus

and there is duplication between the two. Between 2012 and 2014 this issue was discussed on the respective talk pages. Time has continued to pass and the pages have continued to grow.

There are also other language pages of both, most are years out of date and many have mostly English content.

I propose doing the following unless there are any serious objections:

* Merge the two English pages and categorise
* Merge the each pair of other language pages and strip the English content leaving just the other language content.

If the merged English page is too big, retain the page as a table of contents and split the listings by category.

Any alternative ideas are also welcome!

[Handoko]

Also this one:
https://wiki.lazarus.freepascal.org/FPC_Applications/Projects_Gallery

Different URL, but exactly the same content:
https://wiki.freepascal.org/FPC_Applications/Projects_Gallery

[PascalDragon]

Different URL, but exactly the same content:

It's the same content, because they are the same. The backend database is the same for both wiki.freepascal.org and wiki.lazarus.freepascal.org, there are only some very small differences (like the logo).

[Handoko]

I know we are not to please Google. But Google advises not to create duplicate contents. Because it confuses visitors.

[arent]

https://wiki.freepascal.org/Lazarus_Application_Gallery should be merged into https://wiki.freepascal.org/Projects_using_Lazarus . No objections since 2014...

[dbannon]

yes, I agree Trev, but a big job !

Couple of 'discussion points'....

* Should there be a limit on the "column inches" (to use a dated term) taken up by one app ?

* I confess I looked, some time ago, at moving entries that appear to be abandon-ware 'somewhere else' but it quickly became a daunting task.   I suggest a shorter list of projects that are active and available  or even just still exist where they claim to be would be more useful than a much longer list of everything.

* Further, one difference between the pages is that one just lists them alphabetically, the other in categories.  Maybe thats useful but not to the extent that we should have two sets of basic data, could be have a second page that indexes the applications, or a sort function, ie, [alpha, category, activity ] ?

* Is that a database instead of a flat wiki page ?

Davo 

[trev]

yes, I agree Trev, but a big job !

The longest journey begins with the first step... or to keep it authentic "A journey of three hundred and sixty thousand miles begins with a single step" - Lao Tzu.

Couple of 'discussion points'....

* Should there be a limit on the "column inches" (to use a dated term) taken up by one app ?

Not unless someone wants to take on moderation of the resulting page(s). Anything excessive, including images, may get trimmed during the consolidation phase.

* I confess I looked, some time ago, at moving entries that appear to be abandon-ware 'somewhere else' but it quickly became a daunting task.   I suggest a shorter list of projects that are active and available  or even just still exist where they claim to be would be more useful than a much longer list of everything.

If I cannot track down the current location, I will simply move the content to a "legacy" page. The idea alone may be useful to someone wanting to reimplement it.

* Further, one difference between the pages is that one just lists them alphabetically, the other in categories.  Maybe thats useful but not to the extent that we should have two sets of basic data, could be have a second page that indexes the applications, or a sort function, ie, [alpha, category, activity ] ?

Maintenance nightmare and so very unlikely to be maintained.

* Is that a database instead of a flat wiki page ?

I don't intend creating a new database.

[trev]

The first steps have been taken ...

* Removed duped Multimedia items from Lazarus Application Gallery.
* Moved Multimedia category to its own page Projects using Lazarus - Multimedia
* Moved Components and Libraries category to its own Projects using Lazarus - Components and Libraries page.
* Moved "dead" projects to a new page Other projects using Lazarus.

[valdir.marcos]

The first steps have been taken ...

* Removed duped Multimedia items from Lazarus Application Gallery.
* Moved Multimedia category to its own page Projects using Lazarus - Multimedia
* Moved Components and Libraries category to its own Projects using Lazarus - Components and Libraries page.
* Moved "dead" projects to a new page Other projects using Lazarus.

Could you add a section or page for orphan components to help improve OPM?

[trev]

Could you add a section or page for orphan components to help improve OPM?

I could if I had any idea what "orphan components" were and how creating a section/page would help improve OPM (I'm assuming OPM is the Lazarus > Package > Online Package Manager) which is GetMem's project with which I would not wish to interfere.

[trev]

I have completed the merging of the English Application Gallery page into the Projects using Lazarus page and new category sub-pages <mops brow>.

Dead projects for which I could not find websites or links have been relocated to the Other projects using Lazarus page.

The foreign language pages remain to be merged. I deleted those that were 95%-100% English content.

[trev]

All done <phew>.

[dbannon]

Brilliant !

Typo under business For "Business-related software, eee the Projects using Lazarus - Business Software page. "

and, under "Miscellaneous", is there a reason why "Free Pascal Operating System" is quite so bold ??  I know its an aspect of the wiki (indeed, many wikis) but the words "Free Pascal Operating System" do appear more prominent than the other, higher level headings.  My first read said that below that point, it was only things related to a FPC OS, most certainly not the case.

Overall, a really impressive job, you must have put a lot of time into that !

Davo

[trev]

Thanks for spotting the typo

As for the bold OS heading - it's simply the next level heading - given the category has a single entry, I didn't create a new category sub-page for it.

Time? Just a couple of full days... I think... I really don't remember anymore

[Martin_fr]

Why is "Application Gallery" deleted, rather than being a redirect?

Its linked from outside the wiki. It must work in some way.