Wikipedia:Peer review/Computer/archive1

Computer

We almost completely rewrote this article with a view to getting it to featured status. Any and all input that can help us towards that goal is appreciated. We've approached this article trying to provide a good overview of computer fundamentals and a starting point for the many many computer-related articles on Wikipedia. I realize that laundry lists are frowned upon in featured articles, but considering that this is a hub-type article, I think the link tables are an appropriate and sane way to organize links to sub topics. They certainly are not there to compensate for a lack of article content, since I believe we've done a good job of writing an overview of the core concepts. Thanks in advance for your help. -- mattb @ 2006-11-12T01:04Z

• Please see automated peer review suggestions here. Thanks, AZ _t 17:58, 12 November 2006 (UTC)

Let me note at the start that articles on general concepts are the most difficult to write on Wikipedia, as they require broad knowledge and the ability to sift out important information from unnecessary detail. Writing an article about a narrowly defined subject (e.g., a famous celebrity) is easier because what can be said is naturally limited.

You have tackled an extraordinarily difficult task and I hope you are not discouraged by my criticism. I think Wikipedia desperately needs to improve its coverage of general concepts and your efforts are appreciated.

• Too many pictures.
• Machines, according to our own article, are mechanical or organic devices. Computers of today are electronic.
• Second sentence defines a program. Does this really belong here? Try to define computer while introducing as few new definitions as possible.
• Listing the physical forms computers take seems a bit of a distraction.
• Too much detail on programming languages. Not sure the subject should be mentioned at all. A table of existing programming languages is completely unnecessary.
• Professions and organizations is tangential.

For a topic of this size I encourage you to take a top-down approach. Rather than simply reorganize the information other people have presented, create an outline of major topics that need to be discussed. Create sections for each major topic, label them as stubs, and wait for others to fill them in. I used this technique with good results in Operating system.

Hope that helps, and again, I appreciate your efforts. --Ideogram 12:57, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

Okay, point-by-point:

• • • How are there too many pictures? The number of pictures is totally justified by the amount of text. I'd understand the concern if they were stacked on top of one another, but (at least by my screen resolution) they are well spaced. Pictures add a lot to an article and make huge blocks of text far less daunting.
    • Then the machine article needs to be corrected, not this one. OED's first definition of "machine" is: "A structure regarded as functioning as an independent body, without mechanical involvement." Computers fit that description fine. What's more, computers have not always been electronic and the concept of a computer transcends implementation.
    • I definitely think so. The major defining characteristic of a computer is its programmability. You can't discuss computers without defining programs.
    • On the next three points I disagree because I endorse the hub article approach to making articles on broad topics (see Physics). Someone seeking general information on computers may very well find it useful to see an overview of many related topics in that article. Frankly I hate the daughter article idea because someone looking for information about computers will understandably go to the "Computer" article. I see no utility in forcing people to hunt for one small and easy to miss link within that article to "List of computer-related topics". I hate these "list" articles in the first place since they only seem to be duplicating functionality that categories should accomplish. Since there are so many topics related to computers on Wikipedia, we decided that the organization tables would be a good way to keep this information readily available to readers without having a gigantic "See also" section. This isn't to say I don't see validity in the idea of child articles, but here I think it would be a terrible mistake. I've always found it odd that FAC reviewers tend to be so adverse to any form of lists; even well-executed and useful ones.

What you may not realize is that we have done exactly as you suggested. The current article is not a reorganization, but an almost complete rewrite. We've intentionally kept parts of the outline but have focused the article mainly on the programmability aspect of computers. The most difficult thing with articles of this broad scope, I think, is that everyone has a different idea of how they "should" be written (everyone I've talked to, at least). I don't think our strategy will please everyone any more than I think another rewrite would please everyone. I'm trying to figure out what parts of the article may not flow well for the reader, what needs to be clarified, etc. I realize it may very well be a pipe dream to get this article to FA status due to the aforementioned problem of nobody really agreeing on how broad scope articles are written, however I'd like to try to address the rough edges here and see whether the general organization we've chosen can possibly hold up under the FAC gauntlet. -- mattb @ 2006-11-19T18:45Z

My impression of FAC is they don't care about organization as long as you have lots of references. If all you are interested in is getting the star my comments will not help you. --Ideogram 02:23, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

Allow me to also point out that another article on a fairly broad topic, Enzyme, also uses a largish table partially to organize some links. Thank you very much for your input! -- mattb @ 2006-11-19T18:58Z

• Move everything in the "Further topics" section to child articles. This is what links are for. Use the additional space for more detail about the essential topics. --Ideogram 13:04, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

You asked for help; I gave you my opinion; I'm not interested in having an argument. --Ideogram 19:10, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

I'm not trying to start one; I'm merely explaining why we did things a certain way. -- mattb @ 2006-11-19T19:39Z

All right, let me think about it and get back to you. --Ideogram 19:49, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

• I promised to PR this great try to get one of the more important topics up to FA status, but I have to say it is hard to point out anything specific. As already discussed at various places probably a hundred times, it is hard to know exactly what to include in this kind of umbrella article. I can't think of any important topics that has not been included, but I have a feeling that if this goes on to FAC, at least a few people are going to note or point out that there is relatively little information on what most people call a "computer" nowadays, a personal computer. Some might want to have a PC subsection in this article. I think you have done the best to point out the differences already in the article summary, so I see nothing more that can be done, but it might be a good idea to think about how to reply such comments (and it wouldn't hurt to actually have a picture of a modern PC in the article). Another such note might be that a "usage" section is missing. I do not see how it would be possible to have such a section considering almost everything we use today has some sort of computer in it, but the same goes here, think about arguments against such requests. Stylewise the article is very well organized, but I would like to see a standardized format for the further reading tables, that is, same width (be it percentage, em or pixels) for the first, second, (and so on) columns, and full width for all tables. Not the most important though, but that probably says more about how good this article looks than about anything else. Oh, and in the first table (Defining characteristics of five first operative digital computers), I think the cells marked "Partially, by rewiring", should probably not be more red than the cells marked "No", but instead less red or even yellow or something. Hope that helps a little... And great work! – Elisson • T • C • 23:38, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

I would loose the tables at the bottom and just do "see also: Category:computers". I think that the table of computer charicteristics should be shuffled off to the side somehow rather than breaking the text. The history of computing should be shortened. The example section should be removed. Overall I think the article needs to be really tightened up. More references = good. -Ravedave ^{(help name my baby)} 05:41, 28 November 2006 (UTC)