Wikipedia talk:Featured portal criteria

Word count in summaries / blurbs

What is the acceptable word count for summaries? I have an empirically derived number but is this number consistent with expectations.

N = most recent Featured Portal promotions	Median word count of summary	Range of word count
13 portals	202 words	104 to 244 words

Is this what is expected? Cheers! Wassupwestcoast (talk) 18:16, 4 April 2008 (UTC)

Per ongoing discussion at the recent FPOCs for the Anglicanism portal, I suggest adding the following text to the criteria.

"For ease of readability, single-column text boxes should usually occupy around a third to two-thirds of the total screen height (around 100–225 words plus a picture), with a maximum of around 40% of screen height for double-column text boxes."

Espresso Addict (talk) 10:36, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

The intro box size seems to be about in the ballpark. Intro boxes with fancy banners and tabs tend to be a bit taller. The double-column size does not. Selected articles, bios and special topics are more likely to be in the 75% - 125% screen height range. Any of the other boxes, e.g., category trees, Wikinews lists and geographic infoboxes can be longer at times, depending on content. Full-width boxes on topics, lists and other contents sections also can be larger than the screen size. I can see the point of striving for viewability of an entire selected article/bio/special interest item on one screen and listed samples, e.g., DYKs, but comprehensive content lists, e.g., topics, should be allowed to fill the space required. RichardF (talk) 11:42, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

The discussion has related mainly to the Introduction and Selected articles/biographies. I agree that the length of list items, such as category trees or topics, isn't as important for the readability of the portal, particularly as they tend to fall towards the bottom of the page. Espresso Addict (talk) 11:58, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

I agree, but I intentionally introduced two other points since the viewing frame issue was raised. The first is that more than "Selected articles" and "Selected biographies" use this type of layout. Other article-type selections include groupings like locations, organizations, breeds and other topical categories. The second point is indeed that such a viewability discussion should apply to all types of boxes, particularly in terms of when it would be okay to require scrolling to see an entire box. RichardF (talk) 12:34, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

How about:

"For ease of readability, single-column text boxes containing prose (such as the Selected article) should usually occupy around a third to two-thirds of the total screen height (around 100–225 words plus a picture), with a maximum of around 40% of screen height for double-column text boxes. Boxes containing lists (such as Topics, Category tree) can be longer if the content requires."

Espresso Addict (talk) 12:52, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

That sounds reasonable to me. John Carter (talk) 13:57, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

I disagree. I just pointed out selected articles and related boxes typically are longer. Forcing them to be as short as proposed is an unnecessary restriction on covering typical article lead sections without losing key points. I counterpropose the target limit should be "no more than 100% of the viewing frame at 1024X768 screen resolution." RichardF (talk) 16:35, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

Personal optimum choices would be "about 2/3 of the screen without picture, or the extant lead section of the article", as the former is about what the featured article on the Main Page today is, and I think they've probably got a fairly good idea as to what works, and the latter is presumably the best summary of the content of the article. I have asked (possibly in the wrong place, I dunno) the editors of the main page how they determine how much material to include in the selected article at Wikipedia talk:FAQ/Main Page#How is the length of the Featured article section determined?, and think whatever their guidelines are, if they have any, are probably good ones. But what both of you say seems to be in the same basic range of the current Featured article. Questions that come to mind regarding some portals, like how long the lead sections are for portals that don't have a lot of FAs or similar to put in the portals, are what leads me to consider as little as 1/3 screen. John Carter (talk) 16:45, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

I believe that the entire lead section of a long article can be far too long -- for a featured or good article, it's often 350 to 400 words.

I agree that the main-page blurb is a good length. Actually it was one of the things I counted when I came up with my above word count -- they tend to come in at around 180–220 words. Espresso Addict (talk) 21:21, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

You've got a good point regarding the length of the a lot of GA/FA leads. The only real question I have is trying to figure out how to prune them so they still cover the subject enough to provide enough information to entice the reader and meet the shorter requirements at the same time. In some cases that's fairly clear, in others less so. And, considering the Main page basically is our "ultimate" featured portal, it's probably the best template we've got. Longer sections might make sense in portals where there are less sections or possibly those which deal with comparatively complicated subjects. I can't think of any examples right off, but I can't rule out the possibility out of hand either. John Carter (talk) 21:30, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

Sure, some flexibility is definitely called for, there are always special situations and we don't want all the portals to look alike! Actually, I don't know whether the length will correlate positively or negatively with complexity of subject -- when I did some counts of portal blurbs, my minimum word count came from philosophy. Writing short summaries should be relatively easy, as there's no requirement to summarise the entire article, merely to entice readers in. Espresso Addict (talk) 22:36, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

Surely others will want to voice their opinions on this. Anyone? --Secisek (talk) 16:38, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

I agree with Espresso Addict. 200 words is pretty much the upper limit for portal blurbs. OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 05:56, 26 April 2008 (UTC)

Done. I will add this to the critria and renominate the portal. Why was this so hard? -- Secisek (talk) 23:07, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

FWIW, please see [1]. -- Cirt (talk) 07:27, 29 October 2010 (UTC)

Tweaking the criteria

I propose that for any portals that are related to organisms (e.g. Dinosaurs portal, Dogs portal, etc.), they should all have a link to Wikispecies in the Wikimedia projects section. OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 16:12, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

Support - provided terminology is slightly clearer. Maybe "for all portals which have as their central focus subject a specific group of non-human lifeforms" or some other sufficiently verbose, obscenely obvious phrasing. Otherwise, unfortunately, someone might potentially try to indicate that any portal which deals with humans, which are organisms, would have to be included as well. I don't like it myself, actually, but... . John Carter (talk) 16:17, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

De facto quality requirements

I am wondering what the de facto quality requirements for showcase articles on a featured portal are. Do portals which are otherwise great generally fail if they showcase B-Class articles? If they showcase less than 10 articles (assuming no substitutes e.g. showcase biographies)? Any guidance from WP:FPOC insiders appreciated. On behalf of Portal:Anarchism, Skomorokh 13:49, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

A lot of portals showcase B-class, as long as they have used most, if not all, FA and GA. The common norm is to showcase at least 15 in each area (biography, article, picture, quotes). DYK is the exception to this rule. OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 17:50, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

Great, thanks. Skomorokh 20:45, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

B-class is okay, generally should not go lower than that in quality when researching for selections. -- Cirt (talk) 07:28, 29 October 2010 (UTC)

Proposed addition to crtieria

There have been a few recent comments about how the criteria do not specifically require that content in given portal sections be changed or rotated. I would suggest, if possible, that in some way it be clearly indicated in the page that having simply one article selected for a given section is not sufficient to meet FP criteria. John Carter (talk) 23:04, 29 November 2009 (UTC)

• Support. Do you have any proposed wording? Cirt (talk) 01:13, 30 November 2009 (UTC)
• It is an issue that is long overdued. I'm considering to implement changes this holiday. OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 05:35, 30 November 2009 (UTC)

"Interesting"

The use of the word "interesting" seems quite vague and subjective. I suggest either its removal or a change to something like "significant". Such a wording change would also allow us to compress that criterion into fewer words and sentences, thereby making it more succinct and straightforward. — Deckiller 03:59, 29 October 2010 (UTC)

Agreed. -- Cirt (talk) 07:27, 29 October 2010 (UTC)

Stale Portals featured? Why?

Why is the Portal:Cuba a Featured Portal? It has not been maintained for a long time. The "In The News" section has had no direct new postings since March 2010, and the import from Wikinews have sporadic use, and nothing since 15 October 2010. Similarly with the "Selected Biography" and the "Quote of the Day" sections which are stale and repeating.

I am at a loss as to why this is considered a "Featured Portal" when another portal in the group: Portal:Argentina is not, and has been maintained daily and painstakingly since February 2008 (check the "News", "Selected Picture", "Selected Article of the Month", "Archives", and "Did You Know" sections, which are frequent and up to date) -- (COI disclaimer: I am the chief maintainer of the Argentina Portal). -- Alexf^(talk) 16:22, 15 December 2010 (UTC)

See WP:Featured portal review. -- Cirt (talk) 17:08, 15 December 2010 (UTC)

You may also consider to nominate Portal:Argentina as a featured portal. OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 20:25, 15 December 2010 (UTC)

Portal:Cuba has been added to FPR. I have not nominated Argentina in the past two years out of COI. I don't think (maybe out of a wrong-sense of propriety) that I should be the nominator. In this case it got the better of me to see a related portal merrily going around unused and unmaintained for so long, yet featured. I am sure there are many more I don't now about. Thanks. -- Alexf^(talk) 20:31, 15 December 2010 (UTC)

There's no COI if you maintain the portal and nominate it. I did this for Portal:Environment OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 21:52, 15 December 2010 (UTC)

Non free content

Point 3 says "(see Wikipedia:Non-free content)." Shouldn't it be more specific? The important part, which should always be checked and fixed if needed, is that no non-free images should be used in portals. They are used only in article namespace, and no others; portal namespace is no exception. Cambalachero (talk) 23:08, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

Since non-free content cannot be shown in portal namespace, why does point 3 need to be more specific? OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 02:41, 5 May 2011 (UTC)

As it is, it would seem as if that was a complex policy with many rules to follow; but in this case, there's only one rule that counts. Cambalachero (talk) 02:51, 5 May 2011 (UTC)

Criteria

I've browsed some portal nominations and have found that reviewers use stricter standards than is apparent from the criteria page. I think it should be updated with these criteria explicitly stated. Abyssal (talk) 14:03, 16 July 2013 (UTC)

Linked credits

Criterion 3. calls for "linked credits" for selected pictures. This part of the criterion was added without discussion and context.

What I think it says is that the pictures should have proper credits on their local File page or on Commons and that image syntax should not be used to override the link feature. This requirement is evident on Wikipedia, covered in other guidelines, and need not be spelled out here. How it frequently translates to practice in portals is, however, problematic: an actual line of credits is added as a caption to the images. Even exemplar portals like Portal:London do this. Credits in captions is not required by any free license, in article space it's actually discouraged, it contributes nothing useful to the portal, and introduces an undesired implication of ownership.

I recommend removing "linked credits" from the criteria because it promotes this undesired effect on portal pages. – Finnusertop (talk ⋅ contribs) 04:47, 20 March 2016 (UTC)

I'm neutral on this. On one hand, I agree that it's extremely uncommon to have credits. On the other hand, Commons displays its picture of the year with full credit. OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 21:18, 20 March 2016 (UTC)

Update of FP criteria to allow automated updating

The recent failed RfC to close down portals entirely has highlighted the need for more automated updating of portals to keep them reasonably in-date. If this is to work, it must not be necessary to remove the automatic updating and thereby revert to high maintenance manual updating to allow featured portal status. Some changes to the criteria will probably be necessary.

One of the changes that is most likely to be almost universally used in automatically updating portals is the transclusion of selected article and biography leads instead of writing a summary specially for the portal, as the transcluded excerpt remains as up to date as in the actual article without additional work and does not require local referencing - any referencing can be done on the original, which is a click away and otherwise identical.

One problem that comes to mind is the restriction on the length of text to about 200 words (1b) Article and biography summaries should not significantly exceed 200 words in length. The lead of a featured article should be accepted as appropriate for inclusion as an excerpt, regardless of the actual length. If it was considered good for the featured article, it should be good for the portal. Cheers, · · · Peter (Southwood) ^(talk): 10:09, 5 July 2018 (UTC)

I'm not sure how many are still watching this talk page. This might be something to bring up on VP once we've stabilized our assessment criteria and come up with a solid proposal for FPo that might survive an RfC. — AfroThundr ^{(u · t · c)} 19:44, 5 July 2018 (UTC)

Tell me more!--Dthomsen8 (talk) 22:17, 4 January 2019 (UTC)

@Dthomsen8: What more did you want to know? — AfroThundr ^{(u · t · c)} 22:38, 6 January 2019 (UTC)

Have you (plural) stabilized the assessment criteria and come up with a solid proposal for FPo that might survive an RfC yet? Six months have passed!--Dthomsen8 (talk) 23:18, 6 January 2019 (UTC)

Well, the new portal assessment criteria were settled on quite a while ago (long discussion), and the result can be found here. As for the featured portal criteria, that bit ended up taking a back burner while we work on overhauling the remaining portals, and ironing out changes to the Portal guidelines (the activity of which you can see on the talk page). That will probably have to end with another RfC before everything's settled. Activity on these have slowed a bit, but we're still pushing ahead. Feel free to join the discussion. — AfroThundr ^{(u · t · c)} 14:15, 7 January 2019 (UTC)