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dbannon

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Re: Wiki Article
« Reply #15 on: January 25, 2022, 01:08:29 pm »
Well, fair enough. Apparently the cosmologists are coming to a consensus that we do, in fact, live in an expanding universe so, should be OK.

But my personal belief is still that having obviously out of date content on the wiki does detract from the image of an active and progressive project. Anyone can, obviously remove content form a page, just not remove the page itself. Empty pages will come to dominate. Again, just like the stars getting further and further apart ....

 :D

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Thaddy

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Re: Wiki Article
« Reply #16 on: January 25, 2022, 01:21:16 pm »
Some pages are indeed blatangly wrong and should be deleted without issue.
Some pages are merely incomplete or reference old versions.
That is not that they have merit, as long as they are marked as such.
That means that someone can update without ignoring the effort made by the original author/editor of that entry in the wiki.
What I mean is just good manners.
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kupferstecher

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Re: Wiki Article
« Reply #17 on: January 25, 2022, 02:14:37 pm »
There were several discussions about the wiki lately. I guess this shows that a lot of users really want to see some improvements.

In my opinion the problem with keeping old stuff is not only to have a "bad impression", but also that it prevents improvement. If there are several articles about the linux installations, where to place new information? Adding some information, one has to consider all articles, because one wouldn't want to add redundand information. The several articles combined perhaps already contain the information, and the editor comes to the conclusion that there is no appropriate place for the combined information and its already there anyways. But scattered in outdated stuff.

Having no deletions also shows a certain community attitude, that too heavy changes maybe aren't welcome. And when I consider changes I respekt that unwritten law not to clean up an article but rather just add some information.

So I vote for deleting "bad" or really outdated articles and also for outdated translations. Doing a good cleanup maybe could bring a new drive to the wiki (and maybe not...).

As a mechanism an article could be marked as outdated and with a timelimit until the article could be 'rescued' by real improvements. If the time is passed and nobody touched the article, then it could be deleted.

An other variant, also in combination could be to mark certain articles to be outdated and block write access (and if available link to a current article). If a read only state is not possible in the wiki system then the outdated mark could also contain a "DO NOT MODIFY this article".

As far as I understand, in the wikipedia project they do quite a lot of deletions to keep everything clean.

Martin_fr

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Re: Wiki Article
« Reply #18 on: January 25, 2022, 03:11:06 pm »
Well, time to add my opinion...

1) Approval / Official status
Unless behind the name of the author is a fellow team member or appointed admin of ours (of that I seem to lack any knowledge) that page might be considered an imposition, due to its "official appearance" versus it's non-official status. Based on that conclusion, should it be deleted? (And if so, should I have not asked, but done it speedy?)  :) :) :)

If the page is to stay, it needs review/approval and eventually to be made a protected page....


2) How to requesting deletion
- How many of those who have the ability to delete, actually are aware of the https://wiki.freepascal.org/Category:Pages_for_deletion ?
- And how many are monitoring("watching") it? The wiki says 2 people are watching (I do not know who, the wiki does (as it should) not reveal that)
- Is that really the best way?
  Updating the page, takes it out of the "old pages" list... And few people will note.

IMHO a request should alert an admin. A request should not necessarily visible mark the page (i.e., for others) as "to be deleted". That would be for the admin to decide first.

Ideas?


3) Announcing/Marking as "to be deleted soon"

Adding a category, will at best be seen by someone "watching" the page. So this is only sensible, if the page has some amount of "watchers".
(and that would raise the question, if it should really be deleted).

Other visitors to the page, will hardly notice such a category.
IHMO (if an announcement is thought to be needed), the admin can:
- insert a template at the top of the page
- protect the page (the talk section is still active)
- decide, how much of the content already to remove by editing the page and removing selected content / optionally leaving a description of the removed parts

Unfortunately, I did not find any option to get info on the amount of (recent) "page views" (by non robots).

IMHO, in most cases, a "to be deleted" is deemed to not have enough value to be kept. But then, how would it validate the effort involved in an announcement process?


4) Deletion is not permanent. Deleted pages can be restored.

And there is a log https://wiki.freepascal.org/Special:Log/delete


5) Policy

Having such guidelines.... If someone of the admin team wants to oversee their creation, or sign the guidelines off at the end.... fine. Otherwise, imho and afaik the status pro is that each admin decides on their own, or seeks feedback of other admins, or relevant contributors/users.


6) Deletion vs Delete+Lock vs Outdated

Afaik (need to test)
- once deleted, a new page can be created under the same name
- this does not affect the deletion-log
- the deleted page can still be restored (and afaik then becomes part of the history, from where it can be extracted / or maybe the new/replaced page needs to be moved away first.... something like that)

In certain cases:
"6.A" - it may be desired (after deleting the page / includes removing the history) to protect the empty url afterwards. So nothing new can be created.
"6.B" - not to delete the page, but:
  -- edit the page: add a version of the page, with "outdate header" (see point 3 above)
  -- edit the page again: remove content (empty the page) / add our own "deleted" message.
  -- hide all history, except the just edited "outdated" version (with selected content)
  -- optionally protect the page






As for the page from the initial post: https://wiki.freepascal.org/Lazarus-_Game_Developers_Edition
I had a look at it, and my gut feeling is: Yes, it should be removed.

There are 5 people who "watch" this page. No idea, if this is a result of the current discussion? Or if those are people still active?
But maybe, that would for this page validate some "announcement" process? Maybe "6.B" above?

As for one of the counter-arguments  "if someone wants to continue/pick up the idea":
- they are not likely to know about the current wiki page.
- if they did know about , they can request it to be restored
- if it should still be possible to find the page (maybe google??), a header "Outdated content" can be added, the page can then be blanked (aka content deleted, rather than page deleted), and (via delete and restore) the history can be truncated to the single "Outdated content" page.







In case someone is going to continue working on "policies". Here is another idea to be reviewed.

Pages like https://wiki.freepascal.org/Integer (there are such pages for every numeric type).
- Having an individual page for each such type, simple spreads and disconnects info, that should be kept together.
- There is https://wiki.freepascal.org/Variables_and_Data_Types
- And it overlaps with the documentation https://www.freepascal.org/docs-html/ref/refsu4.html#x26-250003.1.1
  (IMHO content addressed in the documentation, should not be repeated on the wiki)



kupferstecher

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Re: Wiki Article
« Reply #19 on: January 25, 2022, 04:44:39 pm »
3) Announcing/Marking as "to be deleted soon"

Adding a category, will at best be seen by someone "watching" the page. So this is only sensible, if the page has some amount of "watchers".
(and that would raise the question, if it should really be deleted).

If there are regular deletions and the 'announcement periode' is long enough then some people time by time may look in the category and start a discussion if they don't agree with the deletion.

There are 5 people who "watch" this page. No idea, if this is a result of the current discussion?
I wouldn't give too much on the number of watchers, their "watching" could be as abbandoned as the article it self.


Thaddy

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Re: Wiki Article
« Reply #20 on: January 25, 2022, 04:54:56 pm »
Well, I agree that everything written has its sell-by date (except George Orwell's 1984)
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skalogryz

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Re: Wiki Article
« Reply #21 on: January 25, 2022, 06:19:45 pm »
I've added Abandoned category... to collect any other projects/libs/ideas that are stated on the wiki, but didn't come up to life.

Maybe someone will be interested in reviving some of them. This will make a nice (hopefully little) graveyard.

Obviously with the popularity of game development, having Lazarus: Game Dev Edition makes total sense.
« Last Edit: January 25, 2022, 06:22:29 pm by skalogryz »

Thaddy

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Re: Wiki Article
« Reply #22 on: January 25, 2022, 08:55:33 pm »
Anything that I touched or wrote I will bring up-to-date. (Like finishing it.... mea culpa)
Everyting else, if it is a subject I know something about,  I may comment and/or discuss on.
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Kays

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Re: Wiki Article
« Reply #23 on: January 30, 2022, 04:34:17 am »
[…] Overall, I like what you say but maybe under the Contestable section, more information about the proscribed process ?  I believe almost all "to be deleted" pages will be contestable in one way of another so that model maybe needs more emphasis ?
I just kicked off writing a policy. It should be a community effort, so I’m inviting you to contribute.

[…] I'm not technically qualified to rate the quality of the other Wiki material for the purpose of deleting it. […]
To add insult to injury: Rating foreign language articles is particularly tricky. The contents might be still correct despite the lack of any recent (non-maintenance) edits.

What I am missing is that a wiki page can be marked as Warning: content no longer valid but kept for historical reasons istead of deleted.
I've added Abandoned category... to collect any other projects/libs/ideas that are stated on the wiki, but didn't come up to life.
There is already Category: Outdated information. A hatnote could highlight such.

In my opinion the problem with keeping old stuff is not only to have a "bad impression", but also that it prevents improvement.
You have a point there. To cite a different user using a different line of thought:
Old text must be deleted from documentation to keep it good.
You just pointed out the biggest problem with wiki in general. Deleting old text written by somebody else is amazingly difficult. It is a psychological thing. Writing new text is much easier. That is why a public wiki can never be well structured. It will always be a mess.
Yet in the same thread you weren’t so keen on deleting stuff:
In the wiki/documentation the space is not critical, but old information could be marked as such. And put on less prominent positions. Or some information could be merged.
Nevertheless I wouldn't delete old information just to make things look more tidy. And I'm sure most members here hesitate to delete or even change the others documentation work and rather write a third tutorial on how to build an android cross compiler instead of updating the existing ones.

Unless behind the name of the author is a fellow team member or appointed admin of ours […] that page might be considered an imposition, due to its "official appearance" versus it's non-official status. Based on that conclusion, should it be deleted? […]
It says right at the top “this is a draft”. You could’ve protected namespaces if such edits weren’t welcome. It’s certainly easier to criticize those who do something.
[…] but both Lazarus and FPC is not well organized project. It has bugtracker, forum, wiki but all is rather unperfect and everything is moving very slowly. […]

If the page is to stay, it needs review/approval and eventually to be made a protected page....
There isn’t even a protection policy in place. I am not sure why some pages were protected. I could imagine the English Main Page was subject to repeated vandalism, but otherwise?

- How many of those who have the ability to delete, actually are aware of the https://wiki.freepascal.org/Category:Pages_for_deletion ?
- And how many are monitoring("watching") it? The wiki says 2 people are watching (I do not know who, the wiki does (as it should) not reveal that)
I can’t verify that, but these are very likely the two distinct authors.

IMHO a request should alert an admin.
There are settings/extensions for that, but updating the MW is overdue.

IMHO, in most cases, a "to be deleted" is deemed to not have enough value to be kept. But then, how would it validate the effort involved in an announcement process?
It’s both a (last) call for improvement and it makes you feel less uncomfortable about deleting it.

4) Deletion is not permanent. Deleted pages can be restored.
This remark is only relevant if someone would ever want to undelete a page.

Pages like https://wiki.freepascal.org/Integer (there are such pages for every numeric type).
- Having an individual page for each such type, simple spreads and disconnects info, that should be kept together.
- There is https://wiki.freepascal.org/Variables_and_Data_Types
I once merged the articles “Inc” and “Dec” to “Inc and Dec”. It [or its implementation] was met with critcism. Merging “Single” and “Double” was easier. Nevertheless, I think it’ indicative of the prevailing inertia.
[…] because the wiki pages were written by anyone who want to write, it is not checked by professionals and not organized properly. The result is messy. […]
From a non-developer’s POV:
[…] When I first started learning FreePascal, documentation was at times difficult to find for some very specific units, and I had to read the source files of those units to better understand what was going on and how to use those units.  While the Wiki is great, it can be at times difficult to locate exactly what you are looking for, and at times there are multiple pages about a similar topic, but with different solutions.  While I am very thankful that there is more than one way to do something in FreePascal, it does lead to some confusion when picking the right solution. […]
I think it would be worthwhile if contents were somehow curated.
[…] Somekind of instructing (and supervising) documentation core team wouldn't be a bad thing. […]
Because
See how sometimes the wiki displays totally out of date information. The articles are not attributed. A single page may have about 10 different contributors and may contain outdated information which is over 10 years old. It is not obvious who wrote what and when it was written, or who deleted or edited something written by another. Some of the contributors may have not been involved with Lazarus for a long time, and you don't know if you can contact them to discuss or clear up some issues about the code. […]

(IMHO content addressed in the documentation, should not be repeated on the wiki)
We can do that, we can implement such a policy if the Wiki became an integral part of the FPC/Lazarus projects. Currently it’s more like “Yes, we have a Wiki” and sometimes it’s mentioned in the source code. The only “real” use I am seeing is for release notes.
I think they mainly use the wiki as a kind of online CMS to be able to do changes after the initial release, but I don't think the wiki is part of the actual documentation process.
Frankly, it appears to me that you don’t need a Wiki for that (anymore). Gitlab has Wiki capabilities, so technically there is no need for the upkeep of a separate MediaWiki instance.
[…] I write the current wiki off as the "misc" bin of documentation, not belonging to the documentation
The wiki is meant for fast moving documentation, the docs for thorough slow moving docs […]
Yours Sincerely
Kai Burghardt

440bx

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Re: Wiki Article
« Reply #24 on: January 30, 2022, 04:40:07 am »
Just a thought...

I think it would be nice to have a "last edited" field in a wiki article.   That would give the reader an idea of how "fresh" the information is.
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Kays

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Re: Wiki Article
« Reply #25 on: January 30, 2022, 05:26:42 am »
I think it would be nice to have a "last edited" field in a wiki article.   That would give the reader an idea of how "fresh" the information is.
In the footer it already says “last edited on”. Then there’s the Page Information page. There’s a history. And I guess you could embed in the content something like {{REVISIONTIMESTAMP}}, but I seriously doubt that will bring about the long wanted change.
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Kai Burghardt

440bx

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Re: Wiki Article
« Reply #26 on: January 30, 2022, 06:35:07 am »
In the footer ... no wonder I missed it.
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af0815

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Re: Wiki Article
« Reply #27 on: January 30, 2022, 08:41:21 am »
You dicuss about the ENGLISH Wiki, but you have not in focus this must work for translated page too. In the discussio i never see one word about it to include this in the discussed rules.

So i say - take it or leave it. - delete all languages pages or make rules to maintain it

my2cents
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Andreas

Thaddy

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Re: Wiki Article
« Reply #28 on: January 30, 2022, 10:19:33 am »
So i say - take it or leave it. - delete all languages pages or make rules to maintain it
Well, currently the state of the wiki in general is:
- Not everything is translated
- and because of that there may be very helpful entries that are not available in English. (It works both ways)
E.g. Portuguese, German, French, Spanish and I forgot probably Nordic and Asian languages and more. I sometimes find gems that are simply not available in English.
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kupferstecher

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Re: Wiki Article
« Reply #29 on: January 30, 2022, 12:13:38 pm »
Yet in the same thread you weren’t so keen on deleting stuff:

Its true, I changed my mind a bit in that 5 years. But my old argument still is valid, I think. It don't want radical deletions, but I really vote for starting to clean up and delete.

1. Just outdated but ok stuff could be marked as such and put to read only.
2. Articles with spread information that actually belong together, should be marked and put to read only with only leaving one active article (or as many as useful).
3. Misleading stuff and abandoned projects should be deleted.

The idea of point 1 and 2 is to make it easier to start over with a new article or to merge information into one article. It is like a railing for the editor then. If by such actions the locked article content gets mostly redundand then it could be deleted.

That would somehow seperate the decission making from the action.

 

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