Talk:Convergence (routing)

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some fly-by feedback[edit]

I just noticed this page mentioned on the WikiGuide editing experience page, and was curious (especially because adding a page to a WikiProject is a trivial endeavour, so I could help out immediately). I do hope User:Pgallert will make an exception in this case to his policy of not contributing in areas of his expertise. Here are just a few quick observations/impressions on this article:

  • After I had followed the link "Convergence (routing protocol)", I was surprised that the article is not actually about the (presumably non-existing) routing protocol called Convergence like I would have expected from the name.
  • The first sentence of the lead section is not a definition of the subject of the article. It reads more like a textbook rather than a Wikipedia article. The last sentence looks a lot more like what I would expect: In a converged network all routers "agree" on what the network topology looks like. It would need to be slightly reworded, along the lines of "A converged network is a routed network in which all routers agree on the network topology." (just making this up off the top of my head, excuse the redlink). Perhaps that would be another indication that the article's title could be changed.

-- Nczempin (talk) 10:37, 31 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

That's interesting, thanks for the feedback, Nczempin. I've struggled with the name as well. The problem is that the notion of convergence in networking has multiple, totally dissimilar meanings. There is Convergence (telecommunications), describing something completely different (the transport of voice, video, and data over one infrastructure), and there are many issues with convergence that deal with a more mathematical notion of the word. So Convergence (router) might not work, and Convergence (networking) would be too close to the telecommunications subject. Suggestions?
The lead can be improved, I see that now. It was my very first article, and I didn't visit it for a long time. Will think about it and change.
--Pgallert (talk) 16:11, 31 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
perhaps Convergence (routing)? It strikes me that possibly [dynamic] protocols are only the means to achieve the end, which is convergence (the explanation on the link on the disambig page could perhaps be adjusted too). Another attempt [with options]: "Convergence is the [a goal] state in which all [involved; participating; relevant; ...] routers on a [[computer network|network agree on the topology." It may be a little terse for the lay reader to understand; but that can be dealt with in the rest of the opening paragraph. Convergence (networking) is also okay; I don't see immediately why it would cause (big) problems in relation to Convergence (telecommunications); it can be dealt with using a hatnote. Or perhaps there are other terms that are shared among the fields but have different meanings, and we can learn from the way they were handled in their articles. -- Nczempin (talk) 17:33, 31 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
 Done Moved the article to Convergence (routing). I also changed the lead phrase but will leave it to you or others to decide whether my change has really improved the description of the term. --Pgallert (talk) 08:47, 7 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Thinking about it again, the title is still not ideal because the term also relates to other, non-routing, protocols. An example would be the Spanning Tree Protocol, which is a layer-2 protocol to prevent switching loops, but I am sure there are more. Essentially convergence as described here is a protocol property. I could think of Convergence (network protocol property) but this looks clumsy. Another idea would be to have Convergence time as the main title, but this would have the disadvantage that a derived term becomes the main title of the article. Ideas? --Pgallert (talk) 10:02, 3 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

QUICK THOUGHT on parenthetical titling: Why not insert a preposition to eliminate the ambiguity? Ex: Instead of "Convergence (routing)" try "Convergence (in Routing)" or ...(v/v Routing) or... (of Routing) or (re: Routing). Obviously some of those examples are better / less problematic than others. Just a thought. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 209.77.152.101 (talk) 13:48, 19 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]