User talk:SandyGeorgia/archFASorting

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Old FA archive questions[edit]

See User talk:SandyGeorgia/archFASorting. Done:

  1. Harry S. Truman
  2. New York City
  3. Ebionites
  4. Jerusalem
  5. Yannis Makriyannis
  6. Atomic theory
  7. Montreal Screwjob
  8. Ronald Reagan
  9. Houston, Texas
  10. Solar system
  11. Campaign history of the Roman military
  12. History of South Carolina
  13. Roman-Spartan War
  14. Folding@home
  15. Serial Experiments Lain
  16. Windows Vista
  17. Ilaiyaraaja
  18. Global Positioning System
  19. New antisemitism
  20. United States Electoral College
  21. Anabolic steroid
  22. Mourning Dove
  23. New Jersey State Constitution
  24. Cathedral architecture of Western Europe
  25. El Greco
  26. Arctic Monkeys
  27. History of Solidarity
  28. Green Day
  29. United States
  30. EastEnders
  31. Charizard
  32. Queen (band)
  33. We Belong Together
  34. Law school of Beirut
  35. Metal Gear Solid

Harry S. Truman[edit]

Sandy, I came across Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Harry S. Truman/archive1 and Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Harry S. Truman/Archive1. Am I right in thinking that they should be at /archive2 and /archive1 instead of /archive1 and /Archive1? If so I'll have to ask an admin to do it as one of them is a move over history. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 10:44, 14 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Hi, Mike! It is unlikely that is the only situation of that kind, as we came across many variations while creating the articlemilestones. I cannot recall if we attempted to standardize, but it appears we did not. Because ... the difference does not impact the Articlehistory, which is correct nonetheless.
If you are telling me there is some current reason for fixing situations like this, wow, it's possible that could involve a lot of work because there could be other variations in the pre-2007 files. Does it impact some other process, bot, analysis, something? Are we safe to just leave it alone? Bst, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:37, 14 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Also, if memory serves (it doesn't always, and neither Gimmetrow nor Maralia are around to ask), GimmeBot would process a page, and kick out errors, which Maralia and I would manually review. It's also possible GimmeBot didn't kick out an error in this case? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:38, 14 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I'm building a database of every review for every FAC, and one of the assumptions I've made is that I can use the archive number to identify different FACs for the same article. If there are just a few of these oddities, it would be easiest to fix them so that my assumption is correct, but if there are hundreds that are weird like this I will probably have to change the way I identify each FAC, to use the full name of the file. Not a huge problem but it would be much easier to just fix these if I can. This is the only oddity I've found so far, so I'm hopeful there won't be many -- it's only an issue if there were multiple FACs, after all, since otherwise the early ones don't have "archive" in the name. Do you think there would be a problem if these were moved? I can see that articlehistory would have to be updated, and the FAC archives repointed; would anything else break? Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 16:08, 14 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]
OK, then there will be other oddities to watch for. I cannot guarantee there are only a few. You would need to also check for those that have no archive number; I'm sure there are some. I don't think there are hundreds, but several dozen could be possible. We would need to update FAC archives, articlehistory, and then check backlinks ... the main problem being that many times earlier FACs are identified in subsequent FACs and FARs, and those will get tangled. Could also occur in other places; we would need to check all backlinks. In other words, if you really want to do this, it needs a team effort like when Maralia, Gimme and I did it. I can help if we start slow, but we need to set up a page for tracking who has done what, unless you want to tackle it slowly by yourself. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:14, 14 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Ones without archive numbers are no problem -- it's only when there are two with the same number that it's going to be an issue. This evening I'll do the "What links here" research and see if I can come up with a clean list of what needs to be done; I'll post that here for you to take a look at. If I run into more of these we can talk about getting others involved, but let's wait and see -- I've looked at some earlier ones and found no problems yet. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 16:36, 14 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]
@Mike Christie: ah ha, if the ones with no archive number do not create a problem, then there will not be as many as I feared. Memory is coming back ... those ones with uppercase As were usually faulty creations by nominators, and I suspect there may not be as many. Because I think/hope we did usually try to fix them, but may have missed a few. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:43, 14 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]

OK, here's what I think needs to be done. After looking into it I found more complications since there is also an archive2.

First, here's the list of what page needs to move where -- these should be done in order, since two of them need to move to pages already occupied.

For the clean-up I am not sure it's worth trying to make old archived talk page links point to the right place. We need to fix articlehistory in Talk:Harry S. Truman, of course, and the relevant featured logs and archived logs for FAC should be updated to point at the right places. Each FAC should correctly give the new links to the prior FACs. The FAR for Truman should be updated to point to the right FACs.

There are six links we need to look at fixing on other pages. If there is an old page with an existing link to:

  • ...Truman (no archive suffix) it will be redirected to archive3, which is correct. No changes needed.
  • .../Archive1 it will be redirected to /archive1, which is correct. No changes needed.
  • .../archive1 it will find the first FAC but it was meant to link to the second FAC, now at archive2.
  • .../archive2 it will find the second FAC but it was meant to link to the fourth FAC, now at archive4.
  • .../archive3 or .../archive4 links point to pages that do not currently exist, so we don't need to fix them.

So only two of these need to be looked at. I think we could take care of both with a sentence added to the top of archive1 and archive2 saying that these FACs have moved and the reader may be looking for archive2 or archive4, respectively.

What do you think? Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 00:59, 15 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I think that probably works (emphasis on the order needed to make it work right). I can fix articlehistory when it's all done. I used to ask Ucucha to handle things like this, as he understood all the ins and outs. Maybe Nikkimaria can do the mergehist? Or do you have an admin in mind who will understand all the complexities? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 01:10, 15 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]
PS, in terms of when you do it, I am on the road for six hours tomorrow, headed to the cabin. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 01:12, 15 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I'll post a note at AN asking for an admin who is experienced in sorting out page move problems to take a look at this thread. Whoever volunteers should be able to do all the moves and leave the right redirects in place, and you can fix articlehistory tomorrow. I don't think any history merges are going to be necessary, are they? The histories will go to the new pages, as they should. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 01:15, 15 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Help request posted. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 01:21, 15 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I'd feel a lot better about getting a FAC, FAR, or TFA admin who understands articlehistory to do it. Not sure if histmerge is needed. Also, is it possible for you to hold off until day after tomorrow? I can't possibly fix an articlehistory while editing on an iPad from a hotspot in the car on a six-hour roadtrip :) . Bst, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 01:23, 15 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I can add a note to the request asking whoever picks it up to coordinate timing with you; there's certainly no hurry. Or I can pull the request altogether if you have someone in mind, or would rather poll specific admins. But I don't think the purely page-moving piece of this is hard, to be honest; it's just fiddly. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 01:26, 15 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]
No need to alter what you posted; they will read here. I can read while on the road ... just can't do complex editing. Bst, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 01:28, 15 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Request moved to Wikipedia:Requested_moves/Technical_requests#Uncontroversial_technical_requests. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 13:36, 15 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]
@Mike Christie:, what if I just do it all myself, via cut-and-paste, with attribution in edit summary and clarifying comments inserted at the top of each? If you agree, I can do it tomorrow. I suspect we did plenty of that when we were sorting out the original messes. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 14:38, 15 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]
It's done. I'll do some of the clean up tonight. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 15:27, 15 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Mike, wiped out from the drive, had some setBacks on the road, have not unpacked real computer, will fix articlehistory in the morning, bst, S
I think everything is good now -- thanks for the help. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 17:26, 16 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Another FAC archive mess[edit]

Here's another fine mess: New York City. In chronological order the archives are named:

  • archive1
  • archive2
  • archive3
  • Archive4
  • Archive5
  • archive4
  • archive5

The first three are OK. I'm packing it in for the night, so I'll put together the list of required moves some time in the next two days for you to vet, unless you want to take a crack at this one yourself. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 01:49, 5 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I renamed them Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 02:19, 5 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you! Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 02:19, 5 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
OMG, I remember that one kicking out on the GimmeBot error cat. I was up all night converting dementia with Lewy bodies to sfns, so am bleary-eyed now, but will have a look tomorrow. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 02:38, 5 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
PS, Mike, Why Do You Not Just Become An Admin ???? @Barkeep49: to enlist reinforcements :) SandyGeorgia (Talk) 02:41, 5 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I almost never do anything that would need the admin bit. These moves are a rare example; I guess I might occasionally block a vandal or protect a page if I were an admin. But an RfA seems like a lot of trouble to go through for something I don't expect to need. By the way I fixed some of the incoming links to the pages above; not sure if I got them all. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 13:38, 5 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I will doublecheck everything once I am caffeinated, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 13:40, 5 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
@Mike Christie: I can make a pitch that being an admin is a pretty cushy position that carries benefits that aren't always appreciated (both by non-admins and by admins who've just grown used to them and don't notice them any more). However, being content with the work you do is also a good place. So I won't give you the full pitch but know if you ever get more curious about RfA I'm happy to talk about it, as trying to help others through RfA is one of my main project-space tasks at the moment. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 14:56, 5 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Mike Christie there is still a lot tangled up in archives that I will fix. Ipad typing now ... with COVID stay-at-home, I cannot always get on real computer as dear hubby has to take conference and confidential phone calls in study, but I will get this done later. You are going to find more like this, because when we found messes that bad, we left them ... Gimmebot was able to handle the different names ... and was more concerned with a naming convention going forward ... there were several convoluted old messes like NYC. We should set up a system to help your workflow, so that the FA process admins who know how to do this (basically @Casliber, Nikkimaria, and DrKay:) can help with the moves, while I sort the articlehistory template, FA archives and backlinks. Maybe set up a workspace like Template talk:Article history/ToDo that we can all watchlist and where you can list any old messes as you encounter them?? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 14:33, 5 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Cas and Mike, nice work, I only had to fix a few minor things:
  1. 17 December 2004 Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/New York City/archive1
  2. 4 April 2006 Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/New York City/archive2
  3. 17 July 2006 Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/New York City/archive3
    Correct old nom link
  4. 18 September 2006 Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/New York City/archive4
    Fix in FAC promoted archive
    Correct old nom links
  5. 28 November 2006 Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/New York City/archive5
    Correct old nom links
    Article history was wrong: the fifth FAC was archived on 3 December 2006: [1]
  6. 31 January 2007 Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/New York City/archive6
    Corrected old nom links
  7. 10 June 2007 Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/New York City/archive7
Did not correct Signpost because they use a template I don't understand, and who cares. Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2007-06-11/Features and admins
Did not correct links in talk page archives for New York City

SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:32, 5 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the clean up. Let's hope I don't run into too many more of these. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 11:29, 6 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Mike Christie I do think you will find a dozen (maybe two dozen) like this. Remember, there was no naming convention for repeat events when Gimmetrow and Dr Pda started this venture to tame talk clutter. Editors were doing things like overwriting previous FACs and making up names. Gimmebot was concerned with making sure the NEXT number (archiveN) could be generated based on the LAST number, so was not concerned with uppercase variations. And Gimme programmed GimmeBot and set up Template:Article history to be able to handle name variations. Bst, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:43, 6 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Overwriting old archives! That's a surprise to hear, but I guess in the very early days folks were still figuring out how the process should work. If the worst of the problems are restricted to 2005 and earlier I'm not too concerned, because data from those days is not really representative of what FAC has been since 2006 or 2007. Still, I'd like to get all the data if possible. I'm working fairly slowly back through the list so I doubt it'll generate a high volume of work at any one time. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 16:02, 6 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, Mike Christie, the errors will stop once you get beyond the point where Gimmetrow/Dr pda kicked in and standardized the naming. And you shouldn't find too many in old archives, because a) they only occurred on repeat noms which weren't that common then, and b) Maralia and I did fix a number of them. We just didn't fix the uppercase Archive to archive, because they didn't affect GimmeBot. If you look at the history here, you can see we started this work sometime in the spring of 2008. So after you get past that, the going should be smoother. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:09, 6 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
OOpsie, messed up Mike Christie. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:10, 6 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
(No need to ping me on talk pages, just FYI (though I don't mind); I always watch talk page conversations for a couple of days.) I'm actually working backwards, rather than forwards; I have data from July 2007 to today and have not yet done 2004 through June 2007. That's why I'm just running into these now. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 16:15, 6 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Different old FAC fix[edit]

I just made this edit, which I'm pretty sure was right judging by the dates in archive1 and the fact that Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Ebionites is empty. Any reason the latter can't be deleted? Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 03:42, 12 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I believe you are correct, Mike ... best I can tell, it appears that GimmeBot moved the FAC to archive1, but just forgot to update it in archives. I can't detect any reason not to have a db-housekeeping delete at Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Ebionites ... perhaps Casliber will do the honors. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 03:50, 12 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Deleted now Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 04:03, 12 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks, both. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 04:17, 12 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Jerusalem[edit]

Another: Jerusalem had a FAC on 4/2/2007, which Raul decided to restart on 4/21/2007. Instead of blanking the page he actually started a fresh archive, but he made it Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Jerusalem/archive 1, with a space before the "1". Hence the second FAC is at Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Jerusalem/archive1. The moves are easy enough: "archive1" moves to "archive2", and "archive 1" moves to "archive1". Anything linking to "archive 1" is fine because that will redirect to the correct FAC. Anything linking to "archive1" will be incorrect. I plan to fix articlehistory on the article talk page and Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Featured log/April 2007, which needs to have both FACs listed rather than just archive1. I'll probably do it tonight unless someone beats me to it. To fix "archive1" incoming links I think it might be enough to post a note at the top of the page as we did with New York City saying "you may be looking for Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Jerusalem/archive2 which was originally at this page" and which won't be a redlink when this is done. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 12:26, 12 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Mike I will do this later today, after I am caffeinated, so you can keep moving forward. But this reminds me that any stats you do will have to be adjusted for restarts ... have a look at Roman Catholic Church, the winner of my tenure. One thing we might do, post-FAC, is un-restart them ... restore all the restarted text to the top of the page. I think the term “restart” gives you a universal search term. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 14:42, 12 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks; if you don't get to it I can do it. Re restarts: I am tracking them already so I can report on the pre-restart supports/opposes, the post-restart supports/opposes, or the combination (not usually very useful). Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 15:40, 12 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I am happy to do these ... looking at a long boring COVID winter :) Sometimes I may not get to them right away, but you can park them here and I will deal with them ... so you can keep moving forward on the real work. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:42, 12 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

All done I believe, with thanks to Fastily. Mike, here are the steps I did (in case you want to check):

  • archive1 moved to archive2: [2]
    • Previous FAC corrected: [3]
    • Updated in April Featured log: [4]
  • archive 1 moved to archive1: [5]
    • Incoming link note added: [6]
    • Updated in April archived log: [7]
  • Both were already listed in articlehistory and only needed pages updated: [8]

SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:29, 12 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Mike, I unarchived all the previous so we can keep a record in one place. Bst, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:46, 12 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Good idea. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 13:42, 13 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Edit links in individual FACs in the archive[edit]

Do you have any idea why Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Archived nominations/April 2007 doesn't show [ Edit source ] links against the title of each FAC, as Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Archived nominations/March 2007 does, for example? I use those links extensively when mining data from these FACs so I would love to know how to make them appear. As far as I can tell the page is laid out identically in each case. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 13:42, 13 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Mike, I will look when awake, but sounds like a templatelimits issue. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:50, 13 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
But first we have to find the problem in March with fatop and fabottom. I think we need DrKay on this. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:57, 13 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Does the out of order at Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Verbascum thapsus/archive1 vs Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Verbascum thapsus cause a problem? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:10, 13 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Where is the “this page is an archive” between Ataru and Jerusalem coming from? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:18, 13 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I think that was it;[9] still a problem in March, though. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:23, 13 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
DrKay I cannot determine what is causing all of Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Archived nominations/March 2007 to be included in fatop, fabottom banners, but it seems to be there from the earliest iteration of that month archive. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:58, 13 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
[10]! DrKay (talk) 17:30, 13 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Sheesh ... thanks!! SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:34, 13 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you both! Having those edit links is a huge time-saver for me. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 18:17, 13 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Nomination mystery[edit]

Who nominated Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Yannis Makriyannis/archive1? I'm wondering if this was somehow magically created by Gimmebot because of the rename at around that time -- I see you added the FAC template to the talk page yourself. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 19:24, 13 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

will investigate, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:24, 13 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Reading it I see it's supposed to be Deucalionite but I don't see how. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 19:28, 13 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
SHEESH ... people did whatever in those days before Gimmetrow got a system in place. Yes, It appears to be related to this and this so there must be another nom. I am not sure how you want that fixed in archive ... still checking. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:31, 13 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
OK, recalling the fixes I used to have to do in those days ... Before there was an established naming scheme in place, people would often go direct to WP:FAC and never put the nomination on the article talk page ... I would go back and check everyone of them. It appears that this was in fact the nomination, and I just added it to article talk. And, in those days, we didn't have an automatic nominator statement. So, yes, that is the out-of-process nominator. Bst, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:39, 13 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
The edit to WP:FAC is clearly by the nominator, so that settles that, but what did they do to create that file? I see [11] shows two deletes of that form of the name -- was it the case that every archive used to be created under that name and then would be moved by Gimmebot? But wouldn't that move the page history? Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 19:50, 13 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I dunno ... do we need an admin to look in? I am unsure if Gimmetrow did the same things as Maralia and I did ... SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:52, 13 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
See Mike ... you need the tools ... if you could see deleted versions, you'd be home free :) SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:53, 13 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
:o) Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 19:58, 13 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Atomic theory[edit]

Looks like this should be:

If this is correct, the first two will be OK because of redirects; the second two will need a bit of link management. However, at the end of Archive2 you've left a note saying that you think that's the fourth archive, so there may be two more missing.

Interim mess

Are you sure you want to take on the clean-up on these things, by the way? Looks like I'm finding about one per month, so there are probably a ten or twenty more of these. I can help out with the actual clean-up but for the more complex ones I'd prefer your eyes on the problem. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 12:43, 15 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I really do not mind, Mike. I would rather you be able to focus on your task, and with COVID crazy escalating all around me, the mindless stuff is actually helpful for me. Concentration on real writing or serious reviews has evaded me since the reaity of a long winter indoors sunk in. And as you get in to older dates, you will find more. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:49, 15 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
OK, thank you. This one really does need your attention, though, because of your comment about the second one being the fourth -- I hope you can unpick it all! Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 15:52, 15 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
OK, multiple times the nominator(s) overwrote Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Atomic theory with no archiveN.
In October 2006, I mentioned it was the third nom, and in November 2006, I mentioned it was the fourth time. So two do seem to be missing, unless I was just confused by all the moves.
Raul archived one on October 15, 2007 and one on Nov 27, 2007. But Raul did not always archive withdrawn noms, and I sometimes went back and added them when I caught them. And I often copy-pasted (shoulda had the tools to do it right), meaning history is lost when they did same again, overwrote, and those ended up deleted by Gimetrow.

The talk page shows the following initiated:

  1. Oct 10 2006
  2. Oct 13 2006
  3. Oct 15, 2006 facfailed (so one of those first two was overwritten and withdrawn)
  4. Next nom initiated Nov 26, 2006 without going through talk page, [13], that one failed Dec 4 But the archived versions indicate there was something initiated on Nov 22 ... so potentially another overwrite there.
After I got involved ... in Nov 06, noN had been moved (incorrectly by the nominator) to A2, where it is now, to make way for next one. In Feb 07, I moved noN to a3 temporarily and then back to a1. And the nominator(s) did it again, and Gimme moved it to a3. (GimmeBot was not concerned with uppercase, as they didn't foil the bot.) By the dates, it seems that we have all the pieces at October 06, but my notes seem to indicate there were possibly overwritten noms before Oct 06. To determine that, we need to see the deleted versions of Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Atomic theory. @Casliber and Fastily: if there are FAC noms at Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Atomic theory for Oct 13, 2006 or Nov 26, 2006, or Oct 27, could you put them at Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Atomic theory/Temp1 and Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Atomic theory/Temp2? From the dates above, there seems to have been one initiated on Oct 10, but another on Oct 13, which we don't have. And possibly one on Nov 26 (or Oct 27) that we don't have.
Whew. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 20:18, 15 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Wow. And yuck. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 20:32, 15 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Yep. There were no procedures then, and by the time Gimme, Maralia and I started trying to sort it, we were less concerned with the past than getting stuff set up right to move forward with an archiveN system. And nominators had been doing all crazy manner of overwriting previous FACs. Remember, we had no articlehistory so no one was tracking previous FACs on talk. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 20:34, 15 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I just started on this while walking out the door but need to stop and think about it. Will get on it in an hour or two. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 20:59, 15 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Cas did you forget us ? :) If there is a problem with REFUNDing a deletion by another admin, are you able to tell us if there is anything significant on those other dates? What used to happen back then is that editors would open and withdraw FACs before Raul ever even saw them ... SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:08, 16 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry got slammed by RL yesterday. This ([14]) is the first incarnation of Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Atomic theory, moved to its current location on Feb 12 2007 without a redirect. Sandy, on 20 Feb 2007, you moved next incarnation to Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Atomic theory/archive3 which was then deleted. Then comes this ([15]) also moved without a redirect. And that's it Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 20:30, 16 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks, Cas ... I see one of the nominator overwrites now, and can rebuild it from these pieces. Bst, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 21:02, 16 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

OK, Mike Christie with this info from Cas, I stepped through WP:FAC diff by diff to put together all the pieces. See my Sandbox. What is now at Archive1 contains FOUR overwrites (by the nominator) of Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Atomic theory. That is, there are actually three more FACs all within that one page, but I am not sure we need to reconstruct all of them. I can split them depending on what you say you need.

  1. Closed on Oct 15, 19:25
  2. Closed on Oct 23, 05:17
  3. Closed on Oct 27, 19:34, an IP nomination, Immediately removed from FAC by another FA regular, the FAC page received no commentary, so no need to rebuild.
  4. Closed on Nov 3, 19:50, but received only the passing commentary from Geogre ...
  5. And the fourth overwrite was later moved by someone to what is now Archive2.

So, can we split this in to only two FACs? The commentary through the Oct 15 close, and the commentary through the Oct 23 close, or do you also want a separate file for a third FAC that included only the one comment from Geogre? What is now at the last three FACs is all correct. I will do all the renaming after you tell me how many ways you want Archive1 split ... depends on your data purposes. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 21:54, 16 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Well, the goal is to capture FAC activity -- nominators, passes, fails, reviews. If these really were all separate nominations, and you can split them up without too much trouble, that would be great. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 01:02, 17 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
OK, I will sort out everything but No. 3, which was a driveby nom that was immediately removed with no commentary. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 01:14, 17 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

All right, Mike, I think it's done, but I'm dizzy. There were other errors in FAC archives caused because when Gimmebot closed a FAC late, the date at the top of the FAC was not the date it closed! I have tracked everything at Talk:Atomic theory/FAC archive sort. I pinged you in edit summary to the items that might mess up old numbers you have already done. Let me know if I missed anything ... that was crazy crazy. The nominator kept starting the same FAC without even signing. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 03:21, 17 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Dear God Almighty. What a cluster. Thank you so much for unscrewing it; I owe you a favour. I've been peeking over your shoulder as you did some of these; I hope that's the worst thing we run into. This won't screw up anything I've already done, I think, since I'm working backwards in time. I won't be looking at the next archive (February 2007) till some time in December at the earliest, so no more messes to clean up for at least two weeks. Thanks again. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 03:24, 17 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Good distraction from COVID ... you owe me nothing :) I'm worried about all the cut-and-pasting I had to do, but I made sure every step was documented, and moved the description of the whole thing to article space to create a permanent record. Sheesh, the things people used to do !! I'm remembering what led to our two-week rule :) By the way, there was a long period where withdrawn FACs were not archived. I'm off all day tomorrow to a very long dr. app't. Best, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 03:30, 17 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Withdrawn by nominator[edit]

If FACs weren’t archived if they were withdrawn, does that mean they are not recorded in any way except that the FAC will probably still exist, if not overwritten, and WP:FAC will have it in history? So they won’t be in articlehistory either? I may just have to exclude those if so; I don’t see an easy way to find them. What time period was this? Any guesses as to how many of these there might be? Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 13:02, 17 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
In car, ipad hotspot typing, planning to investigate this from real computer, do not recall time frame, but yes to your questions and there may be many, have idea of how to find them, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 13:29, 17 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
@Laser brain: checking if your recollection is the same as mine. There was a (long?) period where we encouraged nominators to withdraw sub-standard FACs so as not to tax reviewers, and when they did so, we did not count them as a “fac failed”, or add them to the fac archive or articlehistory. (Because Gimmebot only processed those added to FAC archive.) And IIRC you helped me with these even before you were appointed delegate by removing them from the page if you got to them before I did. When were you appointed delegate? I think I always used edit summary, “withdrawn by nominator”, so I might be able to scan fac history to get an idea ... sorry for ipad hunt-and-peck typing from car. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 13:47, 17 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Yep and that still happens at times. I would delete the nomination page and return the article Talk page to its previous state. So, as far as the bot is concerned nothing has happened and there would be no entry in articlehistory. However, there is a judgement call about whether there is any substantial feedback on the nomination page that should become part of the feedback record... in which case I'd just archive it as normal. The only time I delete them outright is if they are wildly unprepared or otherwise out-of-process. --Laser brain (talk) 13:57, 17 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
For as long as I recall, any substantive feedback on a FAC meant it got archived, not deleted, so if that rule held that would be fine -- I don't mind not tracking FACs that should never have been nominated and got no feedback. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 14:01, 17 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

My memory differs. Sample list:

  1. Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/American Enterprise Institute/archive1 Aug 2011 [16] FAC deleted
  2. Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Rings of Saturn/archive1 [17] FAC deleted
  3. Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Chuck Versus the Cliffhanger/archive2

Samples only. On this page alone, there are 62 instances of the word "withdraw". I am certain there was a time when ill-prepared articles that were withdrawn were not archived. Laserbrain could you use your tools to tell us if there was anything that would today be considered significant (as in, should have been archived) on these three sample deletions from only a short time period? I am fairly certain that by today's standards, we had many more what would today be called archivals than the records show. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:16, 18 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Oops, faulty ping. @Laser brain:. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:17, 18 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
All three of those were out-of-process nominations (the nominator didn't follow the directions) where you applied {{FACClosed}} with the "withdrawn" parameter and Dabomb87 deleted them. I honestly haven't used that parameter because it's easier for me to just delete it without that intermediate step. But, the current coords can use it to trigger the deletion workflow. The guidance we agreed on is using the "withdrawn" parameter if there was no feedback worth capturing, and the "archived" parameter otherwise. --Laser brain (talk) 15:47, 18 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks, Laser ... I have a recollection of telling nominators that if they withdrew (to spare reviewers from having to detail everything wrong), their nom would not be archived. Perhaps not worth looking for those instances, although I may check some from 2009 as a sample, and re-ping you for a look. Bst, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:01, 18 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Montreal screwjob/Screwjob[edit]

This one probably doesn't need fixing, but I'll mention it in case you think it should be fixed. Montreal Screwjob was moved to that title from Montreal screwjob on 12 June 2007 (see here). Both the FACs precede the move, so you would expect them both to be listed with the lower-case title, but in fact the first one is at Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Montreal Screwjob and the second at Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Montreal screwjob. Article history seems to be correct. I don't need this moved for the data collection I'm doing, but let me know if you think it should be changed. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 13:17, 20 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry, Mike, I got busy and forgot to respond here. You will find many like this, because Articlehistory was designed to be able to handle alternate names, and our work focused on sorting a system for moving forward. I would leave this alone ... unless ... you can think of some unforeseen reason that we should just sort them out while we're at it. There will be lots of them, because we did not try to sort stuff like this. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 00:27, 21 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
That's what I thought; no problem leaving this and similar ones untouched. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 02:34, 21 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Ronald Reagan[edit]

Here's another, but I think this is easy. Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Ronald Reagan/archive2 redirects to archive3, and I see no evidence that there was ever a FAC between 1 and 3. There's some history here but I think it's just some kind of early version of what is now archive3. So I think just deleting the transcluded archive2 from the end of Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Archived nominations/March 2007 is all that's needed; archive3 is already included in that page. That leaves a gap in the numbering, but that doesn't matter. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 16:52, 21 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

will look a bit later, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:02, 21 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Wow, that was interesting. What a rocky start with HappyMe22, and yet I ended up nomming them at RFA. Best I can tell, you are correct. This is a similar situation (in the same time period) to Atomic theory, where a novice nominator kept overwriting the noN FAC page, and Gimme and I kept trying to fix it. It looks like I got crosswise on the fixes here, and that I added 2 to the archive, which Gimme later moved to 3, and that we got crossed up. Best I can tell there is no now 2, and I will delete it from the FAC archives. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 18:34, 21 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Houston, Texas[edit]

Here's another. Nearly through with 2007 now. In order:

Raul mentions resetting the nom at the top of the last FAC; he uses "reset" to mean a restart (wipe and continue in the same file) but he also uses it to mean starting a new nom immediately, and here I think that's all that happened. Can we have Archive1 -> archive1 and archive1 -> archive2? I should also mention that Vanamonde93 kindly gave me pagemover rights so if there is anything you can't do for which no other admin rights are needed, I can help. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 21:58, 21 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Will look after dinner. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 21:59, 21 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Feb 11 archived,[18] Gimme moves to 1,[19] Gimme clears redirect,[20] and Raul later agrees with the renominator to restart it,[21] (which is different than what Raul called a "restart"). The nominator talked him in to this one. Promoted, [22]
Move 2005 nom, [23]
So yes, we agree on the moves needed, doing that next and will fix articlehistory. But when Raul used the word "restart", he typically meant blank the page, and restart the nom immediately without archiving it. But often he did this "reset" when the nominator convinced him to start it over after it had been archived. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 00:08, 22 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • archive1 --> archive2 [24]
    • updated in Feb 2007 archived noms [25]
    • corrected in next nom [26]
    • corrected previous FAC [27]
  • copy Archive1 to archive1 [28]
    • redirect Archive1 to archive1 [29]
    • added note [30]
    • corrected in Sept 2005 FAC archived noms [31]
  • Updated article history [32]

Done, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 00:30, 22 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Solar system[edit]

Another easy one, I think. The FACs are:

But if you look in the featured log you see Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Solar System which is empty. I think Gimmebot cleared this because of the capitalization change. So I think it's archive1 -> archive2, the one with no subpage -> archive1, and delete the empty one. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 22:18, 21 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Mike, I've run out of steam and will look at this one tomorrow (and will figure out date). Trying to get WP:URFA/2020 going has zapped me, but FAR has finally come to life again! SandyGeorgia (Talk) 00:49, 22 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
No hurry. Thanks for the Houston fixes above. I've finished going through the February archive so there'll be no more till I start on January 2007. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 11:41, 22 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Finally starting in after waking up to URFA/2020 needing work!

  • First FAC:
Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Solar system
Initiated 2006-08-03, archived 08-10 [33]
archived at Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Archived nominations/August 2006 (where the entire archive was whacked by a faulty strike in a previous FAC)
initiated Feb 2 2007, promoted 17 February, but what the heck? [34] It was initiated at no N but moved by Maralia to archive1, so how did no N get back to the first FAC? Ah ha, I see ... a difference in capitalization between the two.
archived correctly at Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Featured log/February 2007
But with capitalization issue, Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Solar System, when Maralia moved it, she did not update archive

So:

Moved archive1 to archive2 [35]
Add note [36]
Correct in Feb 2007 archive [37]
Copied Solar system to archive 1 over redirect, do not want to lose history, and added note [38]
Redirected Solar system [39] do not want to lose history, so no delete
Corrected in Aug 2006 archive [40]
  • Update article history [41]
Mike Christie on deleting the above ??? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:16, 22 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I guess it's harmless where it is. Cas, what do you think? It's debris from some FAC errors and never had real content. Sandy, if we leave it where it is we should probably put a note on it saying to ignore it, but I can't see any reason not to delete it.
Also I saw your note about the mispaired <s> tags; I have fixed scores of those as I've been going back through the archives. There was a change in how some html tags are parsed a few years ago and it meant that some closing tags no longer successfully closed some preceding opening tags (not just strikes, but e.g. colours too). A bot went through and fixed some obvious errors but there were plenty left over. The result is what you saw -- everything from the error to the end of the page is struck (or green, or whatever). Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 19:24, 22 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Done now Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 23:28, 22 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 23:42, 22 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Campaign history of the Roman military[edit]

For this one I don't think any moves are needed, but I have a question. Here's what happened. The first FAC was at Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Campaign history of the Roman military -- nominated 2/2/7, archived 2/5/7. Then the nominator decided to restart in the same file; you noticed it and created Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Campaign history of the Roman military/archive1, which is just a copy of the first one at the point in time it was archived. But when the nominator restarted, they didn't do so by blanking the file; they restored the entire old FAC, and new comments were appended. My question is: should we put a top/bottom template pair, possibly even a collapse, around the material in the second FAC that actually was posted in the first FAC? Otherwise someone reading that second FAC is going to think those comments were made during the second FAC. This makes no difference to my data collection, by the way; once I figured out what happened I made sure I was only capturing comments from after the restart. It's just very confusing to read, and if anyone ever wants to look at that FAC again they'll have no way to see what happened. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 22:54, 22 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Ugh. Not my favorite article :( I will look tomorrow, since I spent the entire day sorting WP:URFA/2020 and don't want to take on anything that requires brain power this time of night :0 SandyGeorgia (Talk) 23:26, 22 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Had a look, followed your recommendation and hatted the old copied commentary. [43] Everything is in the right FAC archive, and artilehistory is correct, so nothing more needed. Glad that one was easy :) SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:41, 23 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Yes; makes a change! Thanks. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 16:53, 23 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Weird article history[edit]

So I've been clicking away at WP:WBFAN and I found something that piqued my curiosity. How was History of South Carolina once kept at FAR and is listed at WP:WBFAN if there's no record of it being promoted as a Featured Article in the first place? Such a weird article history. RetiredDuke (talk) 21:15, 2 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Will look when home, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 21:17, 2 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

First, multiple wrong dates to be sorted. Second, see comment at the bottom here. Third, Aloan mentions in the FARC that it was promoted on Aug 2.

Summary: looks like a unique situation, complicated by multiple errors as we tried to reconstruct it. See dates in move history: [44]

FAC 1
July 25 archive [45] [46]
FAC 2 July 26
New FAC initiated [47]
August 2 promotion by Raul [48]
Added to Featured log August [49]
Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/History of South Carolina is still in that archive, but a red link because of subsequent moves.
No indication anywhere that there was a second archive by Raul ... it looks like one of the errors was mine here. As we were sorting for building articlehistory, I thought that was an archive, not promote (who know why)
FARC
Aug 18 FARC [50]
August 24 defeatured by Raul
Complicated because someone entered a farcfailed template on talk.
FAC 3
Raul re-initiated on Aug 23: [51] [52]
Archived Aug 27 [53]
No indication in Rauls' contribs or in archives of a January 2006 archive. But it looks like no one changed the template until Jan, so that is the date Gimmebot picked up, and some people continued to add to the FAC as it was still listed on talk, although it had been archived in August. [54]
To correct
  1. FAC 2 was a promote, not an archive
    Correct link in Aug 2005 promote archive (already reflected in tally) [55]
    Remove from July 2005 archived nominations [56]
    Adjust tally in FAC archives [57] (promote was already correct)
  2. FAC 3 date is wrong in articlehistory, it was archived in August not January
    Corrected a mess of errors in articlehistory: [58]
    Capped commentary entered at FAC 3 after FAC closed while template remained on article talk: [59]

@Mike Christie and RetiredDuke: Whew. I will make these fixes after dinner. Mike, this may affect things already done? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 23:15, 2 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

No, haven't reached 2006 yet. About to do January 2007. What a mess! Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 00:21, 3 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
The farther back we go, the worse it will get ... it was "anything goes" until GimmeBot and articlehistory got going, and trying to sort it involved stuff like this ... errors were made. Ugh, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 00:23, 3 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Oh wow, I wasn't expecting this as an answer. Great investigative skills. RetiredDuke (talk) 23:47, 2 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Having been there done that, things like this were frequent. In the days before Gimmetrow/Gimmebot, it was whatever anyone did, and when we tried to reconstruct it all in articlehistory, it was a monumental task. This is why I do not get discouraged when I see the number of articles at URFA/2020-- I've been through many huge undertakings :) Amazing that you caught this! SandyGeorgia (Talk) 23:53, 2 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

@DrKay: see the mess above. History of South Carolina is not listed at WP:FFA (it was only featured a few days). I am concerned that if I add it there, it may mess up some stats somewhere ... leaving that part to you. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 00:18, 3 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Roman-Spartan War[edit]

The only FAC for this article under this name is at Archive1: Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Roman-Spartan War/Archive1. The article was moved before its next FAC, so I think just a move to the lower-case name and let the redirect do the work? Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 02:24, 3 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

IIRC, leaving Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Roman-Spartan War is OK? Will do tomorrow, ipad typing now, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 02:37, 3 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, that's fine; I misread the talk page -- I thought that FAC was after the name change. But yes, it can stay there. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 02:57, 3 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
All done (for the day), SandyGeorgia (Talk) 03:53, 3 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Folding@home[edit]

Another upper case Archive. Looks like:

and a note at the top of 1 & 2 to say this might not be what you're looking for? Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 09:41, 6 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

In the morning, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 09:52, 6 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • archive2 --> archive3
Move [60]
Update in Sep 2012 featured log [61]
Add note at top [62]
  • archive1 --> archive2
Copy paste over redirect [63]
Update in Jan 2007 archived log [64]
Correct old link [65]
Add note at top [66]
  • Archive1 --> archive1
Copy paste over old [67]
Redirect Archive1 [68]
Update in Dec 2006 archived log [69]
Add note at top [70]
  • Update Article history [71]

Done, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 18:58, 6 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Three more upper case Archives[edit]

Three more from December 2006.

Serial Experiments Lain[edit]

Archive1 --> archive1 [72] (left redirect)
Note at top [73]
Update in Dec 2006 archive [74]
Update article history [75]

Windows Vista[edit]

  • archive2 --> archive3
Move [76]
Add note at top and update links [77]
Correct in Dec 2007 archived log [78]
  • archive1 --> archive2
Copy over redirect, Add note at top and Update links [79]
Correct in Jan 2007 archived log [80]
  • Archive1 --> archive1
Copy over old archive1 and add note at top [81]
Redirect Archive1 [82]
Correct in Dec 2006 archived log [83]
  • Update article history [84]

Ilaiyaraaja[edit]

  • archive1 --> archive2
Move [85]
Add note at top, and update links [86]
Update in Mar 2007 archived log [87]
  • Archive1 --> archive1
Copy Archive1 --> archive1 [88]
Add note at top [89]
Redirect Archive1 --> archive1 [90]
Update in Dec 2006 archived log [91]
  • Update article history [92]

Thanks for taking care of these, by the way; it's a big help. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 11:54, 6 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Apparently missing history[edit]

Two (so far) in December 2006 that I apparently can't see some history for.

Global Positioning System[edit]

The nominator put up a malformed nom and removed it minutes later: [93] [94]
Raul archived it even though it was malformed[95] and these days we would delete it.
The dates were wrong in articlehistory, now fixed. [96]

New antisemitism[edit]

These look like fun ... and bring back bad memories of the first time we tried to sort those and gave up! Will get on them post-caffeine. Bst, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:24, 6 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Perhaps some edits were deleted because the nominator was a sock ? We would need the tools, and not sure it's worth sorting.
  • 04:25, December 19, 2006 Nominated [97]
  • 05:48, December 19, 2006 Deleted by [98] SarahSV
  • Then somehow (??) renominated on the 24th, when I moved it ??

It's in the December archive, but not in the articlehistory (which it should be). I need to know what you want to do, but it should be an archival. Perhaps Sarah can shed some light. Except for this one, all done Mike Christie. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 21:30, 6 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

If this (and GPS) are the sort of thing that we would now delete because there's no substantive review, I'm fine with just ignoring them -- the goal is to get a history of nominations, durations, nominators, and reviewers, so skipping these is fine. Thank you again for all this clean up! I will make the relevant changes in my data. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 00:41, 7 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Added to articlehistory: [99]

Mike Christie, won't leaving out things like this distort your analysis towards the way things are done now, which is different than the mess that existed pre-Gimmebot? I ask because you are now entering the older dates where you will find more and more, and more complex, messes just like this, because there used to be less standardization of how to handle these things.

More significantly, I remain concerned that data can't tell the story without accounting for changes that affected things just like this (and more) on the timeline of the evolution of FAC. The size and number of FACs have to be understood in the context of when many changes occurred:

  • inline citations became required
  • added the requirement that you had to be a significant contributor, or at least consult them, to nominate
  • stopped and/or started archiving these kinds of out-of-process noms (there were lots in the "olden" days, and each of us who encountered the handled them differently ... although Laser has a different memory, I know there were FACs that had commentary that I did not archive when the nominator withdrew ... we had a phase of doing that ...)
  • started requiring image checks (at the level Elcobbola did ... and Jappalang ... now we see less issues like we had then, with Fair Use often questioned)
  • started doing source reviews (Ealdgyth)
  • started requiring copyvio checks (after the Rlevse affair, can't remember the article)
  • started requiring a two-week wait to re-nom after the Tony the Tiger, WikiCup, etc. issues

So many changes along the way that affect the data (and many others), so how do you decide whether to leave things like this out or not, because these two were not atypical for what used to happen ... you are going to now get into the period where you will find all sorts of non-standard stuff in archives, because FAC then was a very different thing! Best, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 21:37, 7 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Here's more or less what I'm trying to do. We want to be able to answer (and quantify the answers to) questions like "Are nominations lasting longer?", "Are there more or less reviewers per nomination now?", "Are there fewer quickfails than there used to be?", "Has the oppose died out and if so when?", and a ton more -- you and I could probably think of twenty frequently asked questions without pausing for breath. All the questions worth bothering with are going to be about real nominations -- ill-prepared ones included, sure, but not a nomination that goes in and out of FAC in less than a day with nobody editing it other than the nominator. Omitting that sort of thing doesn't damage the quality of the data. So I'm not at all concerned about these two above. A nomination that stays up for two weeks in 2006 and gets no reviews at all -- yes, I do want that one, because "how many nominations are archived for lack of response?" is a FAQ. Similarly for a nomination with three quick opposes that is archived in less than a day -- three reviewers put in some work which should be recorded.
The events you mention all have an influence, and as you say there are others, so I think a brief timeline listing significant events would be useful. I am hoping that the data can be made available through a tool like the edit counter and so on; you could e.g. ask "How many times has SandyGeorgia reviewed one of Mike Christie's nominations?" or "Which FACs have received more than ten supports and not been promoted?" or "What was the most opposed FAC that was still promoted during Raul's tenure?" Any data that would help answer any such question is something I want.
The data I'm capturing is: nomination/archive number, date of nomination and of archive/promotion, list of nominators, list of reviewers for that nomination and their declarations and type of review (image, source, accessibility, content). As we've discussed this doesn't permit you to evaluate review quality, though almost all frequent reviewers take the job seriously. However, what it meant to take it seriously changed over time, so I think a lot of numbers that might come out of this data would have to be qualified by date range. I'm looking at December 2006 right now, and I see some detailed and thoughtful reviewing, but I also see a lot of support votes with no comment. What is expected of a reviewer has changed over time and the only way I can capture that is by the amount of text a reviewer puts on the page -- again an imperfect proxy but across 100,000 reviews I think there's going to be enough correlation to be useful. However, I can only measure the average -- I know how long the Dec 2006 archive is, and I know how many reviewers contributed to that archive, so I know the average length of a review in Dec 2006.
Does that answer your question? The TL;DR is that I only want data that relates to real nominations and to real reviews. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 23:42, 7 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Long day, Mike ... I will look at this tomorrow with better focus, Bst, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 23:56, 7 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Just to add that having now reached "New antisemitism" in the archive and capturing the data, I am including it; glancing at your notes above made me think there was nothing substantive there, but there are a couple of reviews so I'm including it. Though archive1 is actually transcluded twice onto that archive; the second one can surely go? Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 03:11, 8 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Yep, as I'm thinking through this, I'm worried about how many more and much worse the messes are going to be the further back you go and worried about discarding anything because ... that's how it was back then! You won't believe the stuff you will find, but that was FAC in the early days. But I 'spose I shouldn't worry because if you decide to rethink the approach, or want to add something back, we will have all of this documented in my archive and you can go back and re-check anything later. More tomorrow, long, tiring day, (edit conflict) ... ack, I missed that it was there twice, need to look ... it was the first one that was bad, no? The one that SV deleted? But that's the kind of discrepancy you will find ... sometimes they were archived, sometimes they weren't! SandyGeorgia (Talk) 03:14, 8 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

United States Electoral College[edit]

United States Electoral College is missing a FAR in its article history. I have no idea how to locate it, sorry. RetiredDuke (talk) 15:48, 6 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

(talk page stalker) I found Wikipedia:Featured article review/United States Electoral College/archive1 and Wikipedia:Featured article review/United States Electoral College, though I'll be damned if I can figure out why the latter page exists. Toccata quarta (talk) 16:26, 6 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
thx, will look at all these when the tree is up, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:43, 6 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
[100] FAR June 20, 2006 (malformed)
Defeatured [101] July 22, 2006
Had two FARs when botified here: [102]
Both are correctly archived; it is that someone messed up the articlehistory, not going to step back to find that, will fix articlehistory. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 20:47, 6 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Done, [103] SandyGeorgia (Talk) 20:52, 6 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
well, that took a chunk of time ... went back and found it anyway. The link was deleted here. Perhaps User:SMP0328. can explain (that is, I hope they aren't still doing things like that). SandyGeorgia (Talk) 20:59, 6 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Anabolic steroid[edit]

Five from November 2006. First up is this one which has "Archive" followed by archive1, 2 and 3, so we need to bump the last three up by one and move the first to archive1. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 18:51, 9 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Mike I just peeked at this one. Dumb question that may make things faster. Would it work if we sent Archive --> archive0 ?? Wouldn't that be an easy to solution to a number of them ... mañana, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 02:24, 10 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
D’oh! Yes, that would work perfectly. Brilliant idea. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 03:05, 10 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Will try it tomorrow then ... whee ! A breakthrough ... S
  • Wrong date in articlehistory: [104]
  1. Archive --> archive0 (leave redirect, so no need to add notes): [105]
  2. Update in Nov featured FAC archive: [106]
  3. Repair articlehistory: [107]

Done (extra time to go all the way back to find the correct oldid because the articlehistory date was wrong). SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:55, 10 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Aside[edit]

Doesn't look too horrible, Mike, but let's revisit my approach, because it is time consuming, tedious, and I have to set aside everything else and fully focus when I sit down to do these. Because neither of us has the tools, I have opted NOT to have an admin delete redirects, rather to scrupulously document cut-and-paste copying (WP:CWW) for two reasons: a) not to have to constantly ping an admin to delete redirects before I move to them; and b) realizing that past deletes make it hard for editors like you and me to see what happened. I don't want future editors, trying to figure these out, to encounter the same problem of not being able to see deleted revisions. So my thinking is that as long as I am following CWW and including permadiffs back to the explanation here, I am leaving a better trail for editors who look in ten years from now. But it makes for very hard work, compared to a simpler move, delete the redirect, then move again. Do you agree with the approach? The reason I worry is that you are going to start finding more and more of this, the farther back you go. I hope it's worth the effort. Oh, and I will prepare a timeline eventually as you mentioned ... I am so focused right no on trying to get Peer review re-invigorated for FAC, and WP:URFA/2020 off on the right foot. Bst, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:00, 9 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, if the method is a lot of work we need to find a quicker way. If we can agree on a method that is straightforward and doesn't require tools, I can do it myself, rather than dump these on you, though if you don't mind I would still like to drop these on your talk page so you can check me. I think if we do the moves in the right order, moving over redirects, and leave notes at the top of the possibly-mistargeted archives, then the only places that the links need to be fixed in is the FAC archives and the articlehistory template. I can do all of that, I think. How does that sound? If you want to try it I'll do these above and you can check my work. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 19:06, 9 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Well, ImADork, and have the t-shirt to prove it (Really), but I can never make a move over redirect work. What am I missing? I can do the first move (to the higher archive), and after that, I have to cut-and-paste them, which requires scrupulous documenting for attribution. The last batch took me almost four hours. I still don't mind doing it, but knowing that it is going to get worse the farther back you go, want to check my methods. Why can't I move over redirct? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:15, 9 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I don't know, but I did get given pagemover rights recently so maybe I can do it. Maybe you should have those rights too? I will want to be somewhere where I have more than one screen before trying it which won't be till tomorrow I think, so if some admin TPS swoops in and grants you pagemover rights before then give it a shot. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 19:17, 9 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Oh dear. If you are telling me I have been working like an idiot because I am missing a right I didn't know I was missing, oh my, I Am A Dork. I am not sure which admin I should bug about this ... getting embarrassed about bugging them at all. When I look at your rights, the difference is that I have filemover, while you have extendedmover. Looks like I got the short end, and have been working like an IDIOT as a result ... I thought I had all the rights. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:26, 9 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I don't know what moves-over-redirect failures you were getting, but Vanamonde was the one who gave me the pagemover bit, so pinging to see if they're available. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 19:29, 9 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I can't recall the error message, but I simply can't move over redirect. As far as I can tell. There is probably some stupid button I'm not pushing right. But the gadget I have installed that lists editor rights does indicate a small difference between what you have and what I have. I can't believe I have been doing this the hard way for so long.
  • Me: autoreviewer,extendedconfirmed,filemover,patroller,reviewer,rollbacker,templateeditor,*,user,autoconfirmed
  • You: autoreviewer,extendedconfirmed,extendedmover,reviewer,rollbacker,templateeditor,*,user,autoconfirmed
SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:35, 9 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

@Risker, Ealdgyth, and Nikkimaria: do I need some other editor rights to do what I have apparently been doing the hard way for years? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:36, 9 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I've added "page mover" right which matches you up with Mike. You could always consider adminship... Okay, I know. Risker (talk) 19:43, 9 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Since I was pinged; yeah, I gave Mike page mover rights a short while ago; SG didn't have that flag until a few minutes ago; it allows suppressing a redirect when moving; I believe you still need an admin to make the move when the new title has history. If you can point me to the necessary move, I'm happy to make it. Vanamonde (Talk) 19:49, 9 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks Risker, and Vanamonde93; well, clearly, I am too stupid for more advanced rights, because I didn't even know I was missing them :) There are many moves and much involved to correct archives, Vanamonde, so don't worry; this will be easy now!
Mike, I will tackle these the now-new-and-easier way once I've had a bubble bath and some time to recover from being demoralized about all the time I've wasted over the years. Yukky day, tomorrow is always better! Thanks, all SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:53, 9 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Mike, I'll start on these tomorrow, when I can fully focus. Please leave them for me, so I can test my new toy. Lovely day on Wikipedia :) Best, SandyGeorgia (Talk)

OK -- and if it turns out to be as easy as we hope, I can do my share of them since I have the same toys you do now. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 00:51, 10 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I'll go slow on the first one in the morning, so you can follow me. I'm pretty sure the first move will be standard, and the second over the redirect will now be easy, but the third will then be over an old file with a history, which can't be done without the tools to do a history merge. I think. So that I will still copy-paste, rather than having to bug an admin. But still, way easier. I am no longer in the same time zone as you (that is, IIRC, we once were in the same time zone, but I have moved), so I usually wake up to posts from you and spend a few hours getting caffeinated :) I'll start on them around mid-morning your time, after I get through my watchlist, and we'll see how it goes. Best, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 00:56, 10 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I live in Long Island, though I'm in the city tonight, but I'm often up by 4:30 or so so you might well wake up to posts from me even if you've moved to Greenland .... Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 01:02, 10 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Ha, ha ... it gets better ... I can sleep 'til noon at the drop of a hat :) But yes, I remembered you were on Long Island, and know that's why I wake up to the list. And then I have to get caffeinated, and then get through my routine stuff on the iPad (where my back doesn't hurt but I make typos), and then sit at a real computer and focus :) And now, to try to end this lovely day on a stress-free note, I'm going to go do some mindless cleanup of articlehistories-- something that has completely fallen apart since Gimmetrow was chased off by editors who took over FAC in ways that remind me of what is going on today ... but I digress. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 01:06, 10 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Mike Christie I am starting in now, but with the two new features (move over redirect, and use archive0) all of this became very easy, so there's no need for you to have follow my work-- you can go off and do something more important now :) Bst, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:44, 10 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Not too bad, Mike ... that only took about an hour, and an hour per archive-month is not unmanageable or as daunting as all the cut-and-paste was. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:41, 10 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Glad to hear it. I think your "archive0" idea is going to be a big time-saver, and I see no reason not to do those moves myself if all that's needed is to move a mis-named first archive when the second archive is already present as archive1. Even leaving the redirect in place is fine in those cases, though I would also update the archive month and article history. If I do those, do you want me to drop you a note so you can check I haven't screwed anything up? Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 01:51, 11 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I think we will be well served in the long run to keep all the records in one archive, like I have set up here. And now that it's easier, I really don't mind doing them. But it's up to you! SandyGeorgia (Talk) 01:57, 11 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]


Mourning Dove[edit]

Now at Mourning dove with lower case "D" but the FACs predate that so it doesn't make a difference. First FAC at Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Mourning Dove/Archive 1, second one at Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Mourning Dove; the second one can stay there so it's just Archive1 -> archive1. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 18:51, 9 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

  1. Archive 1 --> archive 1 (leave redirect, so no need to add notes): [108]
  2. Update in November FAC archived: [109]
  3. Update in articlehistory: [110]

Done, easy, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:00, 10 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

New Jersey State Constitution[edit]

Again retitled but again since the FACs so no effect. Two FACs: Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/New Jersey State Constitution/1 and Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/New Jersey State Constitution/archive1, so 1 -> archive1 and archive1 -> archive2. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 18:51, 9 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

  1. archive1 --> archive2: [111]
  2. add note at top, because old archive1 changes and redirect is overwritten: [112]
  3. update in Dec archive: [113]
  4. 1 --> archive1 over redirect (new tool !!): STALLED AGAIN!
    Now done, [114]
  5. update old FAC link at archive2 (because redirect is overwritten): [115]
  6. update in Nov archive: [116]
  7. update articlehistory: [117] (Now done), SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:39, 10 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

STALLED: error message, "The page could not be moved, for the following reason: A redirect already exists at Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/New Jersey State Constitution/archive1, and it cannot be deleted automatically. Please choose another name. @Risker and Vanamonde93: I still cannot move over redirect. Please don't do it for me as I need to learn what went wrong. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:11, 10 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

ah ha, I suspect the problem is that I should have unchecked the box to leave a redirect behind in the first move? If that is the problem, I need someone to delete that redirect. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:15, 10 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Redirect deleted (I could make the move, but you wanted to make sure it worked, I think?). Yes, unchecking the "leave redirect behind" box would fix this problem. If it happens again, or you come across an existing redirect that's preventing this move, you can still get around it without an admin, though, because your new flag lets you move the redirect; in this instance, you would send the redirect at Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/New Jersey State Constitution/archive1 to a placeholder title, send Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/New Jersey State Constitution/1 to Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/New Jersey State Constitution/archive1, and then move the placeholder title to Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/New Jersey State Constitution/1, where you presumably want to leave a redirect. You could also tag for CSD#G6; that category rarely has much of a backlog. This may be a bit messier if there's history at the redirects, but there's no silver bullet for that...Vanamonde (Talk) 17:27, 10 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks, Vanamonde93; this is what I needed to learn. But I still don't understand, then, what good it is doing me to have "move over redirect" ability if really, I can't ? ImADork. I misunderstood what was the new power I had ?? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:31, 10 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I'm no tech whizz, but my understanding is that deleting existing history when moving a page, and suppressing a redirect when moving a page, are different abilities in the software. The former is equivalent to deletion, and therefore will never be unbundled to the point where users could get it without an RFA-equivalent process. The page mover flag gives you the latter ability, which is generally good enough when moving over a redirect is concerned. The most usual case of needing to move over a redirect involves a page at XYZ that should be at ABC, and a redirect at ABC that's pointing to XYZ, thereby preventing the move. A page mover can get around this by doing a round-robin move, as I described above (there's better-written instructions at WP:PMR). Even if it's a messier situation, like New Jersey State Constitution, your new flag allows you to deal with most of the mess and leave some CSD-tagged pages for admins to clean up later, rather than having to wait for an admin and then circle back to perform some moves. Vanamonde (Talk) 17:40, 10 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks, Vanamonde ... I think I've got it now. Of course, since I will do this so rarely, I'll forget ... but will have this in archives when I need to remember. Thanks for the help! SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:43, 10 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Cathedral architecture of Western Europe[edit]

Just one FAC, so Archive1 -> archive1. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 18:51, 9 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

  1. Archive1 --> archive1, leave redirect: [118]
  2. Update in Nov FAC archive: [119]
  3. Update articlehistory: [120]

Done, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:19, 10 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

El Greco[edit]

A little weird, but should be easy: Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/El Greco 1 (withdrawn) and Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/El Greco. The second one can stay where it is so it's just moving the first to archive1.

Thanks as always for helping with these! Nothing too horrible here, I hope. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 18:51, 9 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, the rest of these are actually all easy ... only the fist one is involved. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 02:26, 10 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  1. (withdrawn) --> archive1, leave redirect: [121]
  2. update in Nov 2006 archive: [122]
  3. update articlehistory: [123]

Done, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:24, 10 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Arctic Monkeys and History of Solidarity[edit]

In both cases I was able to fix them by just moving a misnamed archive to archive0 or archive1 with no complex moves required; see Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Arctic Monkeys/archive0 and Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/History of Solidarity/archive1. I updated articlehistory and the FAC archives. I left the redirects in place since they're unambiguous. Did I miss anything? If not, I suggest I fix the ones that are this easy without asking you to help, unless you feel these moves need to be recorded in your archive. I'll still bring the complex ones here, but this appears to be it for October 2006. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 19:00, 19 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Easy peasy; yea archive0! You moved them, updated FAC archives, updated articlehistory; nothing else to do on those easy cases. So, I agree we don't need to keep a record of the ones that are just that simple (which hopefully will be most of them now that we have the 0 option). Hooray! SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:17, 19 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Green Day[edit]

I just cleaned this up but Special:WhatLinksHere/Wikipedia:Featured_article_candidates/Green_Day/archive2 says there's still a link left to archive2. This might be caching but I've tried forcing a refresh and also tried it from another browser while logged out, and it still sees a link, in Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Archived nominations/October 2006. Can you see where the link is? Wherever it is it should point to archive1 now. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 12:11, 20 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

hmmmm ... ‘Tis a mystery. DrKay is good at this sort of thing; shall I ping him or shall we ignore it? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:00, 20 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Well, it's probably not important here, but I'd like to know what it is so I can identify this sort of thing in the future. DrKay, can you see what's causing this? Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 15:22, 20 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Sorted by purge. DrKay (talk) 15:30, 20 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks; thought I'd purged but I guess not. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 15:31, 20 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

United States[edit]

I've finished going through the archived nominations for October 2006; I was able to fix almost everything, but this one is more complicated. There are five archives, correctly numbered archive1 through archive5, in articlehistory, but it looks like this one was never added to articlehistory. It should be archive4, so the existing 4 & 5 should be moved to 5 & 6. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 12:21, 20 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Raul removes
Raul archives
Something else went wonky there, will investigate. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:07, 20 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Oops, never mind, I misread (thought you said it was never archived) ... will work on this later. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:08, 20 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • Move archive5 to archive6 (do not leave redirect) [124] (unchecking the box to leave no redirect worked! so ... remember to update FAC archive first so you can easily get back there)
Note at top [125]
Update in June 2009 FAC archive [126]
  • Move archive4 to archive5 (do not leave redirect)
Update previous FACs [127]
Note at top [128]
Update in June 2007 FAC archive [129]
  • Move US2 to archive4 (leave redirect) [130]
Note at top [131]
Update in October 2006 FAC archive [132]
  • Re-do articlehistory [133]
  • Go back and check all what links here  Done

Mike Christie new tool worked like a charm (this one took extra long only because there were so many updates needed in articlehistory due to new insertion years ago affecting every subsequent actionN). But it is very important to understand when to leave a redirect and when not to on each move, per the message above this from Vanamonde. As long as you do NOT leave a redirect when you need to later overwrite, no longer need to copy paste and no need to call in an admin! (Wish we had known all of this a few months ago :) Read through my when I left a redirect versus when I didn't above ... SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:48, 20 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Got it. I used the "don't leave a redirect" flag a couple of times today already but not for pages where I expected to move something else, but I understand what is needed. I've finished going through October 2006 and there's nothing left to fix there, but I think there are some in that archive with errors from earlier in their history so I may drop another note here over the next few days. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 18:17, 20 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

EastEnders[edit]

How much do we care that an archived FAC is in the right archive month? This FAC for EastEnders has the right name, but articlehistory shows it as archived on 10/28/06 when it fact it was archived on 11/02/06. For the data I'm gathering this makes no difference, but if you think these should be fixed I am happy to move them -- it's just an edit to the two archives plus an edit to articlehistory. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 20:07, 20 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Sometimes that happened in the pre-Bot days when a post-FAC edit triggered the wrong date (then grabbed later by the Bot). I think we should fix them. It means an edit to articlehistory, two edits to individual month FACs, and also an adjustment of the tallies on the main FAC archive page. Would you rather I do these to save you time? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 20:09, 20 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
No, I can make the fixes; just wanted to check that these were worth doing. I did this one; I'll check with you if I run into anything more complicated. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 03:06, 21 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Charizard[edit]

I thought this was going to be easy but was stymied by some redirects. There are seven FACs for Charizard, all failed, and all are at the same non-standard name format, starting with Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Charizard 1. The numbering is fine. Moving each of them to archiveN would do it, plus updating the archives and articlehistory, but archive1 and archive2 already exist as redirects, pointing to 6 and 7 respectively. However, nothing links to those redirects. So I think if we get those two deleted as housekeeping, we can then move all N to /archiveN, and update the archives and articlehistory. Does that sound like a plan? Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 17:27, 23 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Sounds like a plan. I can probably do this, it's much less a bellyache than updating paleotempestology. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 17:34, 23 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Let me have a look after I finish a few things around the house ... I will ping you, Jo-Jo .. thanks! SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:48, 23 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

@Jo-Jo Eumerus:, yes, no pages link to any of these (except other FACs, which I will correct), so they can be deleted:

Mike, once Jo-Jo has performed the housekeeping deletes, I will do all the rest of the moving and updating to save you the time, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 18:00, 23 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Did the moves (admins can delete a target page of a move as part of a move). Thus two of the aforelinked redirects are gone. The other two will probably be dealt with by the double redirect bot. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 18:38, 23 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you, Jo-Jo; I will start the rest of the cleanup now. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 18:41, 23 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks, as always, Sandy! And thanks for the help, Jo-Jo. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 19:34, 23 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Queen (band)[edit]

Two problems here. There are two FAC archives listed in articlehistory: Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Queen (band)/Archive 1 and Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Queen (band)/archive2. If that were the only problem it would just be a move and a couple of quick fixes. However, there's also Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Queen (band) 2 in the September 2006 archive (not in articlehistory), and a redirect from Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Queen (band)/archive1 to Archive 1.

I was going to do the appropriate moves: Archive 1 -> archive0 and 2 -> archive1, just leaving articlehistory for you to fix, but that redirect is in the way. Nothing points to that redirect, though, so I think if we get the redirect deleted the moves will be simple. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 12:47, 24 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

See, my impression is that actually it should be Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Queen (band)/Archive 1 -> Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Queen (band)/archive1, Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Queen (band) 2 -> Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Queen (band)/archive2 and Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Queen (band)/archive2 -> Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Queen (band)/archive3? Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 13:58, 24 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
That's the standard way -- archive0 is a way to simplify it if necessary, since the main goals are naming them "archiveN" and having the Ns in the right order. For my purposes (database queries against these numbers) the Ns don't even have to be in the right order, since I have the nomination date in a separate field and can sort on that; I just need them named "archiveN" unless they're not at a subpage at all (e.g. Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Stopbadware). Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 14:05, 24 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
@Jo-Jo Eumerus: the archive0 was intended to give us a route to repair without having to ask for admin help. If you are willing to make the correct moves, that will work, but we hoped not to be bothering an admin every time. Let me know; I can do it either way. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:05, 24 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I can do the requisite moves, including the links at Special:WhatLinksHere/Wikipedia:Featured_article_candidates/Queen_(band)/archive2 since after this move they'd point to the wrong page. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 15:28, 24 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks so much, Jo-Jo; ping me when you are done and I will look in. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:30, 24 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I got them. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 16:05, 24 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks! I woke up to a bad start, finding cut-and-paste copyvio on a COVID article. I'll check the rest after breakfast (update in archives, articlehistory, etc.) SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:16, 24 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Done. [135] Mike Christie, I told you it was going to get worse :) The farther back you go, the more pre-Gimmebot oddities you will find. I am hoping/suggesting that you will limit your analysis to 2006 forward, and not even attempt to sort 2005 or 2004. Bst, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:54, 24 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

That might be sensible. I'm currently working on September 2006 (coincidentally the month of my first FAC promotion); do you think there's a need even to go back before that? If the goal is to get statistics about how FAC has changed, I think we're all agreed that mid-2006 is before standards were significantly increased, so 2006 FACs would serve as a baseline. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 17:09, 24 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
It's hard for me to answer that, because my impressions may be incomplete ... I started following FAC sometime mid-2006, and only know how bad it was before because of the work Gimmetrow, Maralia and I started doing in 2007. Maybe do one or two more months and see what you find? As you are seeing, anything was brought to FAC in the earlier days in any way ... the situation we have now is so different from the ill-prepared noms we had before we tightened things up. (Still meaning to do the timeline for you whenever I find time ... ) SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:12, 24 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
OK, I'll go back through July 2006 and we can see what we find. Just reading through, the archived noms were a very different look back then -- random drive by nominations of completely unreferenced articles. The promoted FACs sometimes look like more recent discussions, but often they were just short bullet lists of support votes.
I think I'll go ahead and dig through August and July 2006 in the next few days to see how many weird archive names there are. I can usually find most of them just be reading through. Now we have the pagemove right and we're using archive0 it seems to be down to one or two complicated ones per archive month, though that may get worse. And in some cases, like Queen (band), it's not just a weird naming convention, it's actually a missing FAC in articlehistory, so those need to be fixed anyway. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 17:25, 24 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

We Belong Together[edit]

Hi, Sandy; as mentioned in the WT:FAC discussion I'm going to go one month at a time (at most) through the old archives, so that should reduce the frequency of these cleanups. I'm going through September 2006 this month and have just come across We Belong Together. In order, the FACs are at (note the first three are all on the same page!):

Then:

Then:

I think this is not quite as bad as it looks. My guess is:

  • Delete the text of the 2nd and 3rd nominations from Archive 1. Now we just have five misnamed nominations.
  • Move archive1 to archive5 and fix links if necessary.
  • None of the others overlap with a standard archiveN name, so it's simple move for each, leaving a redirect behind in each case.

There really are some creatively odd archives in these old files. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 13:15, 14 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Yep, Wild Wild West days ... will do later today, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 13:45, 14 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Steps:

  1. Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Archived nominations/September 2006 archive1 --> archive5, leave no redirect [136]
  2. Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Archived nominations/June 2006 Archive4 --> archive4, leave redirect [137]
  3. Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Archived nominations/April 2006 3 --> archive3, leave redirect [138]
    April 2, again incorrect, with old facfailed removed, April 3 speedy???, then nominated again April 17, and removed on April 18 [139] removed from talk on April 18, Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/We Belong Together/Archive4 actually also contains pieces of previous March and April nominations
    Never archived by Raul, caught later by me: [140]
  4. Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Archived nominations/March 2006 1 --> archive2, leave redirect,[141]
    Mar 20 Mar 5 initiated (incorrectly, since old facfailed was simply removed), Mar 20 facfailed
    Fix Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/We Belong Together2 [142]
  5. Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Archived nominations/February 2006 Archive1 --> archive1, [143]
    MESSED UP, fix [144]
    delete old, [145] Feb 25 Feb 25
  6. Update archives Sep 2006, Jun 2006, Apr 2006, Mar 2006, Feb 2006 (fix, messed up)
  7. Update articlehistory [146]

Mike Christie this is a bigger mess than it appears, and how we fix it affects your data. First, some of the dates are wrong; how much effort do I put in to fixing dates, when you may be tracking data on the length of FACs? Many start and end dates will be wrong the further back you go, as there was no system, and templates were added and removed by random passerbys. Second, the third nomination was "speedied" off FAC once by Raul, and then removed by the nominator (there were two April noms), and neither was archived. I later found it and archived it; there are TONS of those. So again, what do you want your data to reflect? We are getting in to, and will get in to more of, mixing apples and oranges because some of what is in archives was not archived by Raul, rather, was found by Gimmetrow, Maralia and me and added to archives. How much do you want me to fix depends on what you are trying to measure here. (Hint: I am trying to convince you to stop at July 2006, as your data will be more and more corrupted.) SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:54, 14 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

OK, I'll plan to stop at July 2006. Anything speedied off with little or no content can safely be ignored as if it never existed. You can put it in articlehistory or not; what I'll do is take whatever you tell me are the actual archives that contain real reviews, and I'll use those. They don't have to have consecutive numbers; the only requirement is that they all have the standard form of the name -- "archiveN" with a lower-case "a". And you don't need to fix the names for any archives that aren't "real" and that I won't look at for data. So in this case, for example, I think we want the first three, because those all have real reviews and are separate and weren't speedied. But the ones you're finding with little or no data in can be completely ignored, and it's up to you if you add them to articlehistory -- I'm not trying to match articlehistory. Does that answer the question? Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 17:27, 14 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]
OK, I will look at how much content is actually there, and do my best ... but don't want to get in to endless juggling archives (that is, now go back and remove something we added before, as that will create another level of confusion). Will leave the speedy out, and repair the April issues best I can. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:39, 14 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Re the old archives, yes, absolutely. In the fixes you've done over the last three months I had originally thought there was a reason to have all the archives cleaned up so that articlehistory matched the archive FAC pages and everything was in order, but I gradually realized as I watched your fixes that although that's helpful if any future editor wants to look at the history, the main thing is that articlehistory lists any non-speedied FAC. If ah is correct, editors wanting to improve the article can figure out what they might want to look at from that. The reason I would like the names in archiveN format is so that I can reliably connect the data I'm recording to the FAC I took it from, otherwise there's no way to tell if I made mistakes.
The next one I find, I'll come up with the minimum changes need to do just that, and see if it is simpler. It should be. In this case I do think it was worth cleaning up that first archive because an editor would get pretty confused going through to find out what happened in those FACs. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 17:55, 14 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Don't worry about the steps, Mike; because I know how DrPda, Gimmetrow and Maralia and I worked, I may know what things to look for that you might not know. I think DrPda and Gimmetrow scripts picked up any instance of templates changing on talk if they were mentioned in edit summary, so sometimes we found and added things to archives that had been missed. 'Tis a mess. That's why I am trying to be so careful to link all my edit summaries back to a permadiff of our discussion here, lest someone ten years from now be trying to do what Maralia and I did ten years ago! SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:58, 14 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Done, I think, but that one was hairy, and I made a mistake along the way and had to re-do. Let me know if you see anything wonky. Bst, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 18:32, 14 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

List of awards and nominations received by BoJack Horseman[edit]

  • Mike Christie apples and oranges alert: in the past, this would not have been archived, rather maintenance deleted. [147] If there are others like that, skews the data, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 00:33, 18 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]
    Yes, there's going to be a difference there, but it won't be hard to filter out -- anything archived within a day or so is probably worth ignoring no matter what year it happened in because it'll be a SNOW of some kind.
    By the way, I've figured out a way to handle archives with names like "Archive 1", "archive 1", and "Archive1". Unless you think there's some other reason they need to be fixed (e.g. fixing articlehistory if it's incomplete), I'm going to record the data from those and not leave you a note about them. That should leave fewer to clean up. I'll work on August 2006 in a couple of weeks time and we'll see how that goes. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 02:56, 18 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]
    Mike Christie still catching up. A separate concern is that malformed nom will show in monthly promote/archive stats, when that situation has never before been viewed as an archive (it would be either maintenance deleted, or moved to the correct page as a Featured list). Glad you are finding solutions to the increasing mess we will face as we go further back. Bst, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:04, 18 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]
    Yes, it'll show up. I've just signed up for a toolforge developer's account and will be looking into how I can make this data queryable, and one thing I think I'm probably going to do is set it up so that by default it ignores FACs with 2 or less days on WP:FAC. That will eliminate this FAC, and anything SNOW removed, and anything malformed archives that were quickly removed. I think that will help. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 17:28, 18 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]
    Interesting approach! SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:29, 18 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Mike Christie we are still struggling with this nominator and this FAC: Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Hemothorax/archive1. Fortunately, Laser closed it up quickly. But that's a real archive, happening as it should, and happening as the current Coords seem reluctant to action. It seems to me that your new plan (above) would discount FACs like this (less than two days), which used to be quite routine. So I am back to being confused about skew in your new data plan ... we used to routinely shut down ill-prepared FACs in a day or two, and that was a good thing! Why would we not even consider that in the data ? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 01:38, 19 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I agree that that nomination is not in the same class. I think what you’re seeing here is just the limitations of this sort of data. There’s nothing qualitative at all in what I’ve collected; no judgement of whether a nomination was too early, or whether an early archive was because of a quick well-judged oppose or instead because the nominator was blocked. Questions like that can’t be answered by the data I have. Instead the data can address quantitative questions — have opposes become less common; are fewer reviews necessary now for promotion than ten years ago; is FAC participation on the increase; are experienced nominators a larger fraction of the FAC page than was once the case. I think it’s likely that eliminating SNOW archives and instant withdrawals will clean up the data for the purposes of some questions, but every time you clean data you usually remove some signal along with the noise, and that hemothorax FAC is a good example of that. But perhaps the main point is that I won’t be removing anything from the data at all, so if someone disagrees, and decides they want to include those one-day archives, they can do so. It’ll be up to each user to decide what’s a valid way to pose whatever question they want to ask. Unfortunately, I’m sure lots of people will want to ask questions that the data is not designed to answer. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 01:55, 19 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Law school of Beirut[edit]

Sandy, is this sort of edit a problem? I was under the impression that we left old archives at the titles they were at originally. It only has a very minor effect on the facstats tool, but I don't think I've seen this done so long after the fact and wondered if there's any reason not do this. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 15:56, 6 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

@Mike Christie and Gog the Mild: that should not have been done. Article milestones are set up to handle name changes, and that just created an unnecessary mess. I have been meaning to raise this since Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates/archive84#Change of Title, since that could have been done during the FAC, and I could have done it ... it is just a matter of making sure one gets all the pieces, should this situation arise again. But after the FAC closes, it should not be done. See, for example, that article history Talk:Hi-5 (Australian group) is just fine, even though the article changed. I will make the corrections on the faulty Law School move .. @Steel1943:. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 18:59, 6 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Ugh. Steel1943 did this to every entry in the Article history, which was unnecessary and maybe too much to fix. The point is that articlehistory tracks ... articlehistory ... and can handle name changes. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:03, 6 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Mike, this is a total mess, and article history is wrong and missing Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Law school of Berytus/archive2. I think we need an admin to undo and re-do everything: I hardly know where to start, but am pretty sure it needs tools. We may need to ask DrKay or Casliber. The two different FACs, through several name changes, are not accounted for in articlehistory. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:10, 6 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Yuck. Steel1943 appears to have retired, so they won't be able to help. Let me know if there are pieces of it I can help with. I haven't seen any others like this, fortunately. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 20:17, 6 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I don't know what to do, Mike ... @DrKay:? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 20:19, 6 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]
If we have to leave it that way, it's not the end of the world. Let's see what DrKay says. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 21:31, 6 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Is [148] sufficient? DrKay (talk) 22:43, 6 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]
@DrKay and Mike Christie: I guess it's OK if all the pieces work for Mike and his data, but it is still very disappointing that the whole purpose of Articlemilestones was defeated by these crazy moves. The article was renamed in late 2020; every single entry in the article milestones should be under the name that existed at the time of the action. And now there are unnecessary redirects everywhere. I'm not sure if it's worth the effort to fix it all, though. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 18:29, 7 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]
It's OK for me. The only thing that could go wrong would be a query that depended on the exact name of the article, and I doubt that will ever be useful. I agree it's wrong as is but as you say it seems a lot of work to fix it. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 18:58, 7 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Metal Gear Solid[edit]

Just recording here for history, no changes needed, see discussion at WT:FFA. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 18:59, 26 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]

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