User talk:Tom.Reding/Shortlist of minor planet redirect candidates

(minor) proposed edit changes to filters and templates[edit]

First of all, I think the filters should also exclude asteroids mentioned as being centaurs or jupiter trojans. I don't believe TNOs would apply in this case, as most of them are far beyond your highest numeric inclusion. Additionally, perhaps asteroids in certain asteroid families should be included?

for the template, I would also suggest adding the discovery date of the object as I have found it useful to add that to show the date it was discovered compared to other objects discovered that same year. I have already done so for nearly all objects discovered since ~2006, and before ~1900. exoplanetaryscience (talk) 17:44, 10 January 2016 (UTC) discovered date added to template[reply]

Here are the 17 Category:Jupiter trojans on the shortlist:

~ Tom.Reding (talk ⋅dgaf) 19:12, 10 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Only 2 pages on the shortlist contain "centaur": 5000 IAU and (79983) 1999 DF9. ~ Tom.Reding (talk ⋅dgaf) 19:32, 10 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Category:Numbered asteroids – used in redirects[edit]

Hi Tom, in this discussion, I obviously have misunderstood a comment by you about the usage of Category:Numbered asteroids in redirected articles (quote: 201 minor planet redirects already in the cat had their sortkey changed from alphabetic/non-existent to numeric, instead of removing the cat (sorry).), so I have already removed that said category from about half of these 201 redir-articles, before I read your following post:

The 201 categorized redirects were done intentionally, so there's no need to change anything. I'd rather fix an existing category on a redirect than to remove the cat. Otherwise, this would send a mixed message to future editors, or the cat might be lost if/when the redirect is reverted, if the cat was added to the redirect. Keeping Category:Numbered asteroids clean of redirects is not a particularly worthwhile task, especially for those articles bouncing in and out of redirect; it's best just to keep the category on the page ~ Tom.Reding (talk ⋅dgaf) 16:34, 7 January 2016 (UTC)

I have great difficulties to follow your "mixed signal" sent to future editors and the "bouncing in-and-out article" arguments. All I see is that >90% of all redirects do not have this category, and that the category's name should probably be changed from "Category:Numbered asteroids" to something like "Category:Numbered asteroid articles" in order to make sense. Well I don't know. I just want you to know that I stopped removing this category from the remaining 100+ redirects until further clarification. Cheers, Rfassbind – talk 08:34, 12 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]

I appologise if your confusion is related to my "(sorry)"—that was lightheartedly directed towards Kheider and Praemonitus, who said that the category shouldn't be put on all redirects (which it wasn't; just those 201). Since I responded in 1/2 hour to your intention of reverting those, I didn't see a problem.

In my opinion, it's now up to them to decide (after considering my concerns above) whether or not you should continue and finish the job, or put back those ~100 cats on redirects. Since they didn't object to my concerns on WT:AST, I doubt they would here, but I could be wrong.

Either way, thanks for being forthcoming. We all appreciate it, and it's no big deal. ~ Tom.Reding (talk ⋅dgaf) 17:26, 12 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]

I would say leave well enough alone for now. This project is progressing well and will work out the quirks fairly quickly. We might have a better idea as we progress. -- Kheider (talk) 17:46, 12 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Statistically implausible sequence of notable minor planets[edit]

While everything is possible, almost all minor planets numbered between 9,001 and 10,000 are still regarded as notable. This statistically implausible density of notable minor planets could be further revised (I see you already redirected 5 of them). If you want me to, I'll complete your Shortlist of minor planet redirect candidates and redirect those articles, for which no coverage is available, i.e. the non-notable ones. Just let me know. Rfassbind – talk 11:30, 12 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Good find. I see what you mean, almost all numbered b/w 9,901-10,000 (List of minor planets: 9001–10000#901) are still articles. This is probably because the first round of bulk-redirects I did last year had very specific criteria, which would only included links to the JPL/MPC (or similar) databases. These appear to have gotten through that loophole. Being numbered < 10,000, though, all of them that are still articles should be added to the shortlist. ~ Tom.Reding (talk ⋅dgaf) 15:43, 12 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Wait, a lot of them are > 2,000 bytes, probably because of all the empty parameters in {{Infobox planet}}. So remove the empty params first, then add those < 2000 b to the list. That is how they got though... ~ Tom.Reding (talk ⋅dgaf) 15:49, 12 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]

I already have code that does this automatically, so I can do the removing quickly. ~ Tom.Reding (talk ⋅dgaf) 15:51, 12 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Nevermind, I specifically designed it to not work in infoboxes, hah, which will take some time to undo. Go for it. ~ Tom.Reding (talk ⋅dgaf) 16:03, 12 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]

For most (65%) of the asteroids on the page, I removed the empty infobox parameters for articles sized between 2000-2500 b, since removing the parameters only removes as much as 500 b, effectively keeping the empty parameters on potentially noteworthy asteroids. The other 35% had their parameters remove indiscriminately (before I decided to impose size limits).

Current statistics for List of minor planets: 9001–10000: 1 #REDIRECT, 80 >= 2000 b, 43 < 2000 b, and 39 are < 2000 b and not on the shortlist (require investigation).

Here are those 39. If they meet the other list filters, they should be added to the shortlist. ~ Tom.Reding (talk ⋅dgaf) 16:55, 12 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Added the 27 pages tagged with "(x)" (redirects) to the shortlist. I left the 12 "(revise)" alone, for you to expand. ~ Tom.Reding (talk ⋅dgaf) 20:30, 12 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]

On 2nd thought, I'll add these 12 "(revise)" to the list, but with a note saying they're pending expansion, so no one accidentally redirects them in the near future. ~ Tom.Reding (talk ⋅dgaf) 00:56, 16 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Aye-aye. I'm already half-way through. Rfassbind – talk 14:20, 18 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Bot needed to rename footer template[edit]

Hi Tom, many/most minor planet articles still use a footer template with the outdated alias {{MinorPlanets_Footer}} instead of the {{Small Solar System bodies}}. The move/renaming of this template already took place back in 2007, but somehow, nobody cared to run a bot and update the template's new name in the thousands of articles using it. Wouldn't you be the right man for such a task? Cheers, Rfassbind – talk 12:20, 18 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Yes indeed I would. Since WT:AST#Category:Minor planets Sterilization will touch many articles, I will include this change as part of it. Thanks for letting me know. If you see any other easy to fix, uncontroversial, systematic problems, please continue to list them here. ~ Tom.Reding (talk ⋅dgaf) 13:56, 18 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]

New Discovery Categories: institutions vs surveys[edit]

Hi Tom, I just noticed your new parent category Category:Discoveries by institution, containing the new subcats Category:Discoveries by LINEAR and Category:Discoveries by LONEOS. Just to let you know that there is also a category Category:Asteroid surveys (created in 2008). It contains mostly articles about surveys, but also the subcat Category:Lincoln Near-Earth Asteroid Research with discoveries (asteroid articles), as well as the listing Category:Palomar–Leiden survey with all P-L designated asteroids.

These older categories are confusing, because they do not clearly make a distinction between the listing of articles about the survey and the listing of discovered asteroids by the survey. Obviously there is already a redundancy (Category:Discoveries by LINEAR Category:Lincoln Near-Earth Asteroid Research). Of course, what you're doing is sound and consistent. At the moment I struggle a bit to distinguish discoveries by "Institutions", "Observatories" and "Surveys" in combination with the categories about them/discoveries by them.

I have tons of articles/redirs to add to these categories, but there is no hurry. Just wanted to make sure you're aware of the redundancies and mention that some distinctions need to be clarified. -- Cheers, Rfassbind – talk 13:42, 29 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]

I was not aware of those, thank you!

Category:Discoveries by the Palomar Observatory is meant to contain objects that the JPL SMDB lists as "Discovered by Palomar", and not as part of the survey. I'll make a note on it and all related pages in Category:Discoveries by institution, and on all necessary subcats of Category:Asteroid surveys.

I don't care what the parent (Category:Discoveries by institution) is called, as long as it encompasses observatories, projects, institutions, etc., and follows "Category:Discoveries by <blah>". "Institution" was my best guess at an umbrella term. What do you suggest?

Category:Lincoln Near-Earth Asteroid Research has 1 asteroid and should be consumed by Category:Discoveries by LINEAR, since "Discoveries by" is explicit, LINEAR is not a survey, but an institution/project.

This is where your (and my) confusion lies: Category:Asteroid surveys and its parent Category:Astronomical surveys should either be:

renamed to be more all-encompassing, or
have their non-surveys removed and moved into a separate category which includes institutions and excludes surveys (like those I created), or
the cats can stay as-is, and simply add wording at the top saying "by surveys, we mean institutions and programs, too...".

I'm in favor of #2, since it's the least controversial (LINEAR isn't on Astronomical surveys, and has no place in that category).

Palomar–Leiden survey should stay where it is since it's a survey, and the category matches its article's title.

If you wish to categorize object by their actual-survey, I suggest you follow Palomar–Leiden survey's example, since it's straight-forward and doesn't interfere with the logic of other cats (that I'm aware of...). I'll put a note on Category:Asteroid surveys clearing this, at least, up. ~ Tom.Reding (talk ⋅dgaf) 15:06, 29 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]

It's just that LONEOS and LINEAR are also surveys (to me), and the Palomar Leiden Survey has follow-up campaigns (Palomar-Leiden Trojan survey), with the custom provisional designation "4835 T-1" (for which no cat exits), while the sortkey for the prime PLS campaing is not appropriate. I'll get back as soon as I have wrapped my head around the topic more closely. Sometimes I feel like torching all old categories and start from scratch (i.e. your category and new one) would be much simpler... Cheers, Rfassbind – talk 16:36, 29 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Well, the question is: what's the difference b/w a survey and a project? Astronomical surveys needs some more distinction on this issue, so it's best to defer to the astronomical community (and represent that view as best we can on WP). Going by their respective pages, the only references to "survey" on LINEAR are to Catalina, while LONEOS is referred to specifically as a survey by astronomers. That's my best ad-hoc solution at the moment.

LONEOS is referred to as a project on (153814) 2001 WN5, (434326) 2004 JG6, and LONEOS's WP page. Its main page and 'About' page don't bother making a distinction. So, I would say that if the object is referred to as being in the "LEONEOS-1" survey, then it's a survey object. Otherwise, I'd put it as a project-object.

Regarding PLS designations, I don't have a problem putting them in Category:Main-belt preliminary asteroids, for example (in 4835 T-1's case, Category:Hungaria asteroids). ~ Tom.Reding (talk ⋅dgaf) 17:08, 29 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]