Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Spiders/Archive 3

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Request for information on WP1.0 web tool

Hello and greetings from the maintainers of the WP 1.0 Bot! As you may or may not know, we are currently involved in an overhaul of the bot, in order to make it more modern and maintainable. As part of this process, we will be rewriting the web tool that is part of the project. You might have noticed this tool if you click through the links on the project assessment summary tables.

We'd like to collect information on how the current tool is used by....you! How do you yourself and the other maintainers of your project use the web tool? Which of its features do you need? How frequently do you use these features? And what features is the tool missing that would be useful to you? We have collected all of these questions at this Google form where you can leave your response. Walkerma (talk) 04:24, 27 October 2019 (UTC)

First annual Tree of Life Decemberween contest

After all the fun with the Spooky Species Contest last month, there's a new contest for the (Northern hemisphere's) Winter holidays at Wikipedia:WikiProject Tree of Life/Contest. It's not just Christmas, but anything festive from December-ish. Feel free to add some ideas to the Festive taxa list and enter early and often. --Nessie (talk) 18:05, 12 November 2019 (UTC)

New Latrodectus species from South Africa

Latrodectus umbukwane has officially been described (unfortunately paywalled). Please see Draft:Latrodectus umbukwane, which I have started writing. I'm not a subject specialist on spiders so please feel free to contribute to the draft. Roger (Dodger67) (talk) 17:16, 29 November 2019 (UTC)

If you register at the World Spider Catalog [1] you can access the papers they are able to store there under Swiss law. Please reference the acceptance of this species there.
E.g. <ref name=WSC_s57793>{{citation |title=Taxon details ''Latrodectus umbukwane'' B. M. O. G. Wright, C. D. Wright, Lyle & Engelbrecht, 2019 |work=World Spider Catalog |publisher=Natural History Museum Bern |url=https://www.wsc.nmbe.ch/species/57793 |accessdate=2019-11-29 }}</ref>
Peter coxhead (talk) 18:55, 29 November 2019 (UTC)
Thanks Peter coxhead, would you mind checking that I've done the citation correctly. The infobox is also missing some detail that I'm not confident of doing right. Roger (Dodger67) (talk) 20:24, 29 November 2019 (UTC)
@Dodger67: I made a few small changes and then moved the article into mainspace at Latrodectus umbukwane. Do feel free to expand further if you can. Good start! I'm always happy to help if you leave a message on my talk page. Peter coxhead (talk) 21:56, 29 November 2019 (UTC)

‘Avalanche’ of spider-paper retractions shakes behavioural-ecology community

A spider researcher is suspected of manipulating data--two papers coauthored by him have been retracted, and several other retractions have been requested or are underway. I've searched WP for the first 14 publications on this spreadsheet and didn't come up with anything--I don't think we're citing him much, if at all. Thought I'd leave this here in case other papers of his get retracted also. Enwebb (talk) 14:12, 19 February 2020 (UTC)

I found Anelosimus buffoni, which only has a paper coauthored by Jonathan Pruitt as it's sole source. --awkwafaba (📥) 17:15, 19 February 2020 (UTC)
It looks like Pruitt is the 7th of 8 authors, and nothing in the article is about behavioural-ecology, so it's probably fine. Kaldari (talk) 01:07, 15 April 2020 (UTC)

Substantial revision of Sitticine jumping spiders

Looks like we've got a lot of work to do. See File:2020 Sitticine jumping spiders ZooKeys article.pdf. This affects the genera Sittilong, Sitticus, Sittisax, Sittiab, Sittipub, Sittiflor, Hypositticus, Calositticus, Attulus, Pseudattulus, Attinella, Tomis, and Jollas. I would like to propose that we ignore the subgenera proposed in the paper, just to limit the amount of complexity. In other words, let's first concentrate on getting the species and genus info up to date. By the time we accomplish that, someone will probably have published another revision. Kaldari (talk) 00:46, 15 April 2020 (UTC)

@Peter coxhead: Looks like you worked on a lot of these genus articles, in case you're interested. Kaldari (talk) 00:48, 15 April 2020 (UTC)
@Kaldari: thanks for the notification. I was always doubtful about Prószyński's new genera, but they were at the time accepted by the World Spider Catalog, so I followed it. I agree about the subgenera; among other issues, the WSC doesn't list them, so there won't be a secondary source.
However, I have a backlog of fern articles to fix, plus other stuff, so over to you for now. Peter coxhead (talk) 18:34, 15 April 2020 (UTC)

Taxonomic categories

Following a discussion at User talk:Sesamehoneytart#Spider taxonomic categories, in the interests of clarity, I would like to propose that for spiders we agree that there will always be a category for the family. This will produce very small categories for some families (e.g. Category:Viridasiidae), but it makes creating and maintaining the taxonomic category system much easier if there is a clear rule. WP:SMALLCAT does allow small categories as "part of a large overall accepted sub-categorization scheme", so we could accept this here, and put it into the WikiProject guidelines.

We might, perhaps, make an exception for monogeneric families.

Comments, please. Peter coxhead (talk) 06:20, 25 June 2020 (UTC)

While we're on the topic, I'd like to add genus categories to this discussion. What should the rules be for taxonomic categories based on genus? Should it be based on number of existing articles or existing species (regardless of absent articles here) or something else?
I've been monitoring bots going through and modifying categories, but without a consensus of what should and should not be done, I'm not sure what feedback to give. For a few recent examples (incomplete list), see Histopona, Cytaea, and Cryphoeca, just to name a few. Similar changes have been made to family articles too, for instance, this edit on Cybaeidae. Sesamehoneytart 21:12, 25 June 2020 (UTC)
I would support always allowing a family or genus category if we have at least one image for it. I'd like us to avoid creating subfamily, tribe, etc. categories unless they are really needed for some reason. Kaldari (talk) 04:30, 26 June 2020 (UTC)

New or revived Mygalomorphae families

The World Spider Catalog has accepted a major revision of mygalomorph families by Opatova et al. (2019) (see doi:10.1093/sysbio/syz064). The table in the article Mygalomorphae has been updated, and I have updated the taxonomy templates, but

  • new family articles need to be created
  • new taxonomic categories may be needed
  • all the relevant genus and species articles need to be sorted
  • the articles on the families in which the genera were previously placed need to be revised
  • the Wikidata items need to be checked for the parent

Sigh! Peter coxhead (talk) 09:52, 10 July 2020 (UTC)

If you can work on any of these, please leave notes below to avoid duplication. Peter coxhead (talk) 09:45, 10 July 2020 (UTC)

Families and genera affected

Anamidae Simon, 1889 – article and category created; Wikidata item expanded

  • Aname L. Koch, 1873 – genus and any species articles checked for family change; parent changed in Wikidata item
  • Chenistonia Hogg, 1901 – genus and any species articles checked for family change; parent changed in Wikidata item
  • Hesperonatalius Castalanelli, Huey, Hillyer & Harvey, 2017 – genus and any species articles checked for family change; parent changed in Wikidata item
  • Kwonkan Main, 1983 – genus and any species articles checked for family change; parent changed in Wikidata item
  • Namea Raven, 1984 – genus and any species articles checked for family change; parent changed in Wikidata item
  • Proshermacha Simon, 1908 – genus and any species articles checked for family change; parent changed in Wikidata item
  • Swolnpes Main & Framenau, 2009 – genus and any species articles checked for family change; parent changed in Wikidata item
  • Teyl Main, 1975 – genus and any species articles checked for family change; parent changed in Wikidata item
  • Teyloides Main, 1985 – genus and any species articles checked for family change; parent changed in Wikidata item

Bemmeridae Simon, 1903 – article, category, list of species article created; species removed from other family categories; Wikidata item expanded

  • Homostola Simon, 1892 – article updated (no species articles); parent changed in Wikidata item
  • Spiroctenus Simon, 1889 – article updated (no species articles); parent changed in Wikidata item

Entypesidae Bond, Opatova & Hedin, 2020 – article, not worth a category yet, list of species article created; species removed from other family categories; Wikidata item expanded

  • Entypesa Simon, 1902 – article updated (no species articles); parent changed in Wikidata item
  • Hermacha Simon, 1889 – article updated (no species articles); parent changed in Wikidata item
  • Lepthercus Purcell, 1902 – article updated (no species articles); parent changed in Wikidata item

Euagridae Raven, 1979 – article and category created; Wikidata item expanded

  • Allothele Tucker, 1920 – article updated (no species articles); parent changed in Wikidata item
  • Australothele Raven, 1984 – article updated (no species articles); parent changed in Wikidata item
  • Caledothele Raven, 1991 – article updated; species article updated; parent changed in Wikidata item
  • Carrai Raven, 1984 – article updated; species redirect updated; parent changed in Wikidata item
  • Cethegus Thorell, 1881 – article updated; species article updated; parent changed in Wikidata item
  • Chilehexops Coyle, 1986 – article updated (no species articles); parent changed in Wikidata item
  • Euagrus Ausserer, 1875 – article updated; species articles updated; parent changed in Wikidata item
  • Leptothele Raven & Schwendinger, 1995 – article updated; species redirect updated; parent changed in Wikidata item
  • Namirea Raven, 1984 – article updated (no species articles); parent changed in Wikidata item
  • Phyxioschema Simon, 1889 – article updated (no species articles); parent changed in Wikidata item
  • Stenygrocercus Simon, 1892 – article updated (no species articles); parent changed in Wikidata item
  • Vilchura Ríos-Tamayo & Goloboff, 2017 – article updated; species redirect updated; parent changed in Wikidata item

Ischnothelidae F.O. Pickard-Cambridge, 1897 – article, not worth a category yet, Wikidata item expanded

  • Andethele Coyle, 1995 – article updated (no species articles); parent changed in Wikidata item
  • Indothele Coyle, 1995 – article updated; species article updated; parent changed in Wikidata item
  • Ischnothele Ausserer, 1875 – article updated (no species articles); parent changed in Wikidata item
  • Lathrothele Benoit, 1965 – article updated (no species articles); parent changed in Wikidata item
  • Thelechoris Karsch, 1881 – article updated (no species articles); parent changed in Wikidata item

Microhexuridae Bond, Opatova & Hedin, 2020 – created redirect to genus (monotypic family); created Wikidata item

  • Microhexura Crosby & Bishop, 1925 – article updated; species articles updated; parent changed in Wikidata item

Microstigmatidae Roewer, 1942 (only some genera) – article updated a bit; article may need more work

  • Angka Raven & Schwendinger, 1995 – genus and any species articles checked for family change; parent changed in Wikidata item
  • Ixamatus Simon, 1887 – genus and any species articles checked for family change; parent changed in Wikidata item
  • Kiama Main & Mascord, 1969 – genus and any species articles checked for family change; parent changed in Wikidata item
  • Xamiatus Raven, 1981 – genus and any species articles checked for family change; parent changed in Wikidata item

Pycnothelidae Chamberlin, 1917 – created article, list of species, and cat page

  • Acanthogonatus Karsch, 1880 – article updated; species articles updated; parent changed in Wikidata item
  • Bayana Pérez-Miles, Costa & Montes de Oca, 2014 – article updated; parent changed in Wikidata item
  • Pionothele Purcell, 1902 – article updated (no species articles); parent changed in Wikidata item
  • Pycnothele Chamberlin, 1917 – article updated (no species articles); parent changed in Wikidata item
  • Stanwellia Rainbow & Pulleine, 1918 – article & species article updated; parent changed in Wikidata item
  • Stenoterommata Holmberg, 1881 article updated; species articles updated; parent changed in Wikidata item

Stasimopidae Bond, Opatova & Hedin, 2020 – created redirect to genus (monotypic family); created Wikidata item

  • Stasimopus Simon, 1892 – genus article, species articles and category updated; parent changed in Wikidata item

Genera removed

Other

Mecicobothriidae

The family Mecicobothriidae, whose article is currently at Dwarf tarantula, is now monogeneric, with only Mecicobothrium left. So the family article should be merged into Mecicobothrium according to our usual practice. However, I wonder if it's best left for now, given the recency of the changes. Any views? Peter coxhead (talk) 11:12, 16 July 2020 (UTC)

List of FAMILY species

I'm not a great fan of the "List of FAMILY species" articles; they were useful once, but now there are articles for all families and most genera, the more usual practice of having a genus list at the family article and a species list at the genus article seems to me better: there's less redundancy and so it's easier to keep everything updated and consistent. However, if someone wants to create them, the following are missing:

Some of the relevant genera and species may still be in the old family lists. Peter coxhead (talk) 08:57, 19 July 2020 (UTC)

Eutichuridae now Cheiracanthiidae

The World Spider Catalog at [2] now recognizes Cheiracanthiidae Wagner, 1887 as having priority over Eutichuridae Lehtinen, 1967. The article Cheiracanthiidae has been moved, and the taxoboxes of all genera and species in the family will be correct (possibly after a null edit), but all the article texts need to be checked. Sigh... Peter coxhead (talk) 12:32, 7 August 2020 (UTC)

Species identification

Zygiella x-notata?

Hello spider people. I took an image of some mating spiders (image right) and tentatively identified them as Zygiella x-notata - is this correct? They were beside a window in the UK, in August. Thankyou for your attention. PaleCloudedWhite (talk) 11:19, 9 August 2020 (UTC)

@PaleCloudedWhite: it's highly plausible, but most spiders are difficult to identify even given a full set of images from above and below (precise identification relies on the genitalia). Zygiella as a genus is distinguished by the "missing sector", as in this beautiful photo. It's not generally easy to distinguish Z. x-notata and Z. atrica in the field, but "missing sector spiders" around windows in my part of the world (West Midlands, UK) have always been Z. x-notata in my experience. Peter coxhead (talk) 10:34, 25 August 2020 (UTC)

Reminder: "Category:Spiders described in YEAR" is only for species

Probably no-one who watches this page needs reminding, but I've noticed that there are many genera in the "Spiders described in YEAR" categories, which is wrong. All the "Spiders described in YEAR" categories are subcategories of "Species described in YEAR". In fact, all the "GROUP described in YEAR" categories are really "GROUP species described in YEAR" categories; I've long thought that it was a mistake not to use this form of title. (For monotypic genera, categorize the sole species redirect.) Peter coxhead (talk) 19:52, 4 September 2020 (UTC)

I did continue to work on this, and as of right now there should be no genera in the "Spiders described in YEAR" categories. Peter coxhead (talk) 08:56, 13 September 2020 (UTC)

Short descriptions

Should we create any guidelines or conventions for spider-related short descriptions? Based on the guidelines at Wikipedia:Short description, I imagine a short description for a species article would look something like: Jumping spider native to Africa. I'm less certain about the higher level taxon articles. I would suggest that we avoid any mention of geography though, since that often changes as species are added and removed from higher taxons. Which of these seem best:

  • Spider genus
  • Genus of spiders
  • Jumping spider genus
  • Genus of jumping spiders

Other ideas? Kaldari (talk) 18:41, 15 September 2020 (UTC)

I've just been adding "Genus of spiders", because that's enough information for most people, but I'm open to other options. Including family would be easy, but indigenous areas are a bit harder to discern from non-native areas, and locations are subject to change if they are discovered in new places. Sesamehoneytart 13:25, 16 September 2020 (UTC)
If the family has an English name that is reasonably well known and unambiguous, like "jumping spiders", I would be inclined to use that, but for most spider genera, "Genus of spiders" seems enough to me too. Peter coxhead (talk) 16:43, 16 September 2020 (UTC)

Class assignment editing

There have recently been a number of significant expansions of spider articles as part of what seems to be a class assignment. Mostly they are useful and well sourced, but they need a lot of wikifying. The editors sometimes:

  • fail to italicize genus and species names.
  • don't follow the Manual of Style as regards section headings, generally using title case rather than sentence case.
  • use curly quotes instead of plain quotes.
  • put references before instead of after punctuation and/or leave spaces between multiple references.
  • often use "the" when referring to the species by its scientific name, e.g. writing "the Tigrosa helluo". (Scientific names of taxa are treated as proper nouns; names of species and genera are singular; English doesn't use "the" before singular proper nouns – it's like saying "the Peter".)
  • divide the text into very small sections, generally not favoured in the English Wikipedia.
  • use 'journalistic' rather than 'encylopedic' language.

They also don't seem to include anything much on taxonomy, which should be standard section of an expanded article.

So plenty of work to do! Peter coxhead (talk) 09:43, 21 October 2020 (UTC)

Article structure proposals

Many other wikiprojects have an agreed "article template", outlining a possible structure for articles falling under the wikiproject. We don't.

A very detailed page was recently created at Wikipedia:WikiProject Spiders/Article formats by a relatively new editor, Shreenidhipm, without any discussion here. It seems to me that it's (1) far too detailed (2) inconsistent with the usual order of sections in articles about organisms.

I've put up my proposal at Wikipedia:WikiProject Spiders/Article structure. This is based on looking at a range of existing articles, particularly the sole FA article.

Comments, improvements, please. In particular, what are project members' views on the order of the "Description" and "Taxonomy" sections? I prefer "Description" first – it seems to me that this is what most general readers want first of all, and "Taxonomy" sections, if complete, will have cladograms and other rather technical material. On the other hand, "Taxonomy" before "Description" seems common in animal articles. Peter coxhead (talk) 07:43, 16 November 2020 (UTC)

Hi Peter coxhead, I am a Teaching Assistant for the behavioral ecology course working on spider species pages. We looked at the existing article template and felt it lacked enough detail. We took input from several spider researchers to come up with the detailed headings and sub-headings that are particularly relevant for spiders. I understand that this is far too detailed, but this is meant to serve as a nearly exhaustive list of topics that a spider page should cover. In my experience, species pages with GA status are ones that cover a diversity of topics. I welcome all edits and suggestions.Shreenidhipm (talk) 19:57, 1 December 2020 (UTC)

@Shreenidhipm: thanks for your response. The first thing to say is that it's great to see spider articles being expanded or created, and none of my comments here are meant to detract from that. All sourced content is valuable; style can be fixed later.
It would be very helpful if the students were provided with a basic guide to the style they should be using in articles. Quite a bit of their work will require considerable copy-editing: see the list in my post above this one. The MoS has a number of style features that can be surprising to new editors. Those from North America in particular usually find the de-capitalization of section titles, English names of species, etc. somewhat odd. I'm also surprised how often students don't consistently italicize scientific names at the genus rank and below, or how often they have wrongly used a capital letter for the specific name.
The problem for me with the template is that it seems to have encouraged the creation of articles with many short sections. This is not the usual style here, and I would expect that eventually short sections will be copy-edited into fewer larger ones. The template seems to have encouraged a "bottom up" style of article construction, whereas I think that "top down" is better: start with the basic sections, and subdivide them if, and only if, they become too long. Students sometimes seem to have felt that they must have all the sections, and have then padded them out with material on the genus or even spiders generally. It would be helpful to say that if there's no relevant sourced information on the taxon that is the target of the article, then leave the section out.
A major omission from most of the student-created articles is the "Taxonomy" section; if present, it's usually thin compared to other sections, but this is one of the four or five sections that should be present in any non-stub spider article. Peter coxhead (talk) 06:57, 2 December 2020 (UTC)
@Peter coxhead and Shreenidhipm: Thanks for working on this! I think that Peter coxhead's template at Wikipedia:WikiProject Spiders/Article structure is a good guide for how a Wikipedia spider article should be written. Because this is an encyclopedia we want to discourage students from simply listing facts and instead encourage the writing of coherent sections of prose. As such, an article should have a small number of well fleshed-out sections, and the sections listed by Peter reflect what we typically expect from a Wikipedia article about an animal. A few specific comments: Assuming that the students are working on species articles, a spider species is very rarely going to have a different physiology than the rest of its genus, so I wouldn't expect to see a Physiology section (which is the most developed section at Wikipedia:WikiProject Spiders/Article formats). Also, most spider species have little to no published research about their behavior, so fleshing out a Behavior section will often be challenging, much less 9 separate behavior sections as suggested at Wikipedia:WikiProject Spiders/Article formats. Finally, I'm skeptical of including a Genome section, as the ones I've seen so far are far too technical for an encyclopedia article. Very few spider species have had their genomes sequenced anyway (less than a dozen last time I checked). I made a few minor changes at Wikipedia:WikiProject Spiders/Article structure. Hope they make sense. Good luck with the project! Kaldari (talk) 16:57, 2 December 2020 (UTC)
@Peter coxhead: Thank you for your suggestions. I will pass this feedback on to them. Students will be polishing their articles over the next two weeks. We will ask them to review the MOS and merge subsections that are too small into larger sections. I agree with Kaldari that the physiology section is likely to be similar across the genus. I think spider behaviors are fascinating and it is worth including as a section in any species page.One way to fuse both formats would be to add a description of the kind of information one can find under the broad headings suggested by Peter. Shreenidhipm (talk) 17:36, 2 December 2020 (UTC)
@Shreenidhipm: I notice that few students make much use of the World Spider Catalog. It's regarded as the most reliable and up-to-date secondary source of information such as the circumscription of families and genera. Although it needs interpreting (see Wikipedia:WikiProject Spiders/Style guide#Synonyms), it's a good source for a list of synonyms to be put in the taxobox. Peter coxhead (talk) 07:01, 3 December 2020 (UTC)

List of Salticidae genera

The article List of Salticidae genera is somewhat out of date (there were a significant number of changes in 2018–2020, for example). Also, for such a large family, there seems to me to be a need for at least some breakdown by ranks within the family. I've prepared two updated versions, one at User:Peter coxhead/Work/Salticidae genera by subfamily now at List of Salticidae genera and one at User:Peter coxhead/Work/Salticidae genera by tribe. Both are mostly generated from a single Excel spreadsheet I prepared starting from Maddison (2015). I'm inclined to use the "by subfamily" version; most of the taxonomy templates for Salticidae genera now have the subfamily as the parent, and I don't myself think we want to create what would inevitably be stub templates for all the tribes. Tribal-level groups would also be difficult to maintain; since the World Spider Catalog doesn't go below families, you have to keep looking at the original literature, which is quite enough work for subfamilies.

(As an aside, it's complicated by Jerzy Prószyński. His Salticidae website is fine for information about individual species, but he uses his own "pragmatic" classification, whereas almost every other arachnologist now relies on molecular phylogenetics. He is also dismissive of the ICZN's rules on priority. Hence his new genera and species are often overturned or have to be renamed. See, e.g., the muddle created by his Sitti... genera, briefly discussed at Sitticini. At one time, we had articles for all five new genera, but only one is now accepted under his name.)

What do others think? Peter coxhead (talk) 08:38, 31 August 2020 (UTC)

I haven't been following salticid taxonomy in the last years, was focused on species-level :) So if you think the salticid subfamily groupings are now better than they used to be when I started this list, go with them, I'd say. I also don't think tribal level is worth the effort, because these are probably also in flux… --Sarefo (talk) 03:59, 2 September 2020 (UTC)
@Sarefo: thanks for your response. I think that since Maddison's 2015 classification, virtually everyone except Prószyński has been using that system – at least all the papers describing genera created or revived since 2015 that I've looked at seem to support this view. But I agree that tribes are a different issue. Prószyński again causes issues at this rank, since he's created a lot of new genera, not based on phylogenetic evidence and so not fitting into Maddison's phylogenetic classification, but using his own informal groups. Peter coxhead (talk) 10:00, 2 September 2020 (UTC)
@Peter coxhead: I'm fine with the subfamily version. I agree that using tribes would be too much trouble to keep up with. Kaldari (talk) 17:33, 2 September 2020 (UTC)

 Done I have updated List of Salticidae genera to the "by subfamily" version. (For now, I've left the alternative "by tribe" version at User:Peter coxhead/Work/Salticidae genera by tribe.) As far as I know, all the taxonomy templates for Salticidae genera have been updated accordingly, and now have at least the subfamily as the parent. There are a few red-linked genera right now. Peter coxhead (talk) 08:36, 3 September 2020 (UTC)

New taxa for the new year

Just when you think everything is done and dusted a new revision of several taxa is published.

Azarkina, Galina N.; Haddad, Charles R. (30 December 2020). "Partial revision of the Afrotropical Ballini, with the description of seven new genera (Araneae: Salticidae)". Zootaxa. 4899 (1): 15–92. doi:10.11646/zootaxa.4899.1.4.

I'd do it myself if I had any relevant skills but I'm a complete beginner at spiders, and not even a beginner at taxonomy, so I thought it best to post about it here. Roger (Dodger67) (talk) 14:29, 31 December 2020 (UTC)

Pinging Peter coxhead, Sarefo, Kaldari et al. Roger (Dodger67) (talk) 14:33, 31 December 2020 (UTC)
Well, the ones I've checked seem to have been accepted by the World Spider Catalog. If I'm a bit cautious, it's because I created pages for new Salticidae genera created by Prószyński, only for many of them to disappear. Salticids do seem to be something of a troublesome group. Peter coxhead (talk) 09:52, 1 January 2021 (UTC)

Articles on nomina dubia

While working on converting the last few spider articles to automated taxoboxes, I came across the following, all of which are considered nomina dubia by the World Spider Catalog. All are stubs, and almost all were created by the now blocked NotWith.

My inclination is to nominate them for deletion. Views please. Peter coxhead (talk) 10:45, 12 January 2021 (UTC)

Yes, please nominate for deletion. Kaldari (talk) 14:50, 12 January 2021 (UTC)
These in particular have little to no information besides an infobox. I'd say delete or redirect to genus- many of these species are mentioned in multiple sources. That's not a blanket yes for all nomen dubium, however. I'd be more hesitant about something like Tliltocatl aureoceps, which has a bit more about the history of the original species and type description as well as how it got its current status. Sesamehoneytart 16:00, 12 January 2021 (UTC)
@Sesamehoneytart: see Stenaelurillus setosus, a nomen dubium that I expanded, so I don't mean all nomina dubia for sure. Just ones like those above that are stubs with no useful information.
I've been in correspondence with the WSC about some other problematic names which appear in some Indian sources but are not in the WSC. Some seem to be cases like "Bavia kairali" in which published descriptions don't meet the requirements of the ICZN, so the species itself is probably ok, but it doesn't have a valid name and so won't be put into the WSC. They are still pursuing these.
An issue in all these examples is that the existence of a Wikipedia article that gets mirrored and copied on other websites lends spurious legitimacy. Peter coxhead (talk) 20:03, 12 January 2021 (UTC)
@Peter coxhead: Actually I guess redirecting them all to the corresponding genus might be the best solution. Kaldari (talk) 00:12, 13 January 2021 (UTC)
@Kaldari: it's certainly simpler; a problem at AfD is often that editors there don't understand taxonomy. Peter coxhead (talk) 06:48, 13 January 2021 (UTC)
@Sesamehoneytart and Kaldari: following your suggestion, I've redirected Alopecosa reimoseri and Alopecosa strandi to Alopecosa § Dubious names. I don't think we should create such redirects, but if an article has been created, this is a way of dealing with it. If everyone is happy, we can do the same for the rest of the list above. Peter coxhead (talk) 07:22, 13 January 2021 (UTC)
That looks good to me. Kaldari (talk) 15:47, 13 January 2021 (UTC)
I agree- no need to go out of our way to create redirects, but if they exist, I think this is the best way to deal with them. I used to ignore the doubtful names, but more recently, I've been listing them at the bottom of the species list with a link to what "nomina dubia" means. For a couple of examples, see Walckenaeria#Species and Heriaeus#Species. I started listing synonyms and nomen dubia at the bottom of species lists to show that the name isn't forgotten, but isn't in the species list for a reason. Sesamehoneytart 16:37, 13 January 2021 (UTC)

No manual taxoboxes?

As far as I can tell, based on searching for hastemplate:Taxobox "Order Araneae", there are now no spider articles with manual taxoboxes. All use one of the automated taxoboxes now that I've fixed the last few "odd" ones. Or does anyone know otherwise? Peter coxhead (talk) 20:04, 18 January 2021 (UTC)

I've been trying to hunt them all down too. There are still some taxa without articles at all, for instance Laminion (Laminion), but it's rare that I find a manual taxobox on existing ones. Sesamehoneytart 15:35, 19 January 2021 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Sandbox organiser

Sandbox Organiser

A place to help you organise your work

Hi all

I've been working on a tool for the past few months that you may find useful, especially if you create new articles. Wikipedia:Sandbox organiser is a set of tools to help you better organise your draft articles and other pages in your userspace. It also includes areas to keep your to do lists, bookmarks, list of tools. You can customise your sandbox organiser to add new features and sections. Once created you can access it simply by clicking the sandbox link at the top of the page. You can create and then customise your own sandbox organiser just by clicking the button on the page. All ideas for improvements and other versions would be really appreciated.

Huge thanks to PrimeHunter and NavinoEvans for their work on the technical parts, without them it wouldn't have happened.

Hope its helpful

John Cummings (talk) 11:20, 6 February 2021 (UTC)

New spider articles that need checking

QatarStarsLeague created a very large number of sub-stub spider articles in a short time, which can be found from here, that need checking:

  • The authority was always in parentheses, regardless of whether these are needed – this needs to be checked against the World Spider Catalog in each case, which is tedious; in at least one genus, Spintharus, the authorities were actually wrong
  • No taxonbar was present
  • (minor) Double blank lines before the stub template are needed
  • Distribution category/ies absent – I haven't always been fixing this
  • Citation is a bare URL, and is to the species list in the WSC, not to the species, which means it is not a source for the distribution for which it is used; I haven't been fixing this

Some articles already had taxonbars added, but not necessarily the authorities fixed. The genera involved are (list may not be complete):

All assistance appreciated! If you do work on any of them, please add above so we avoid duplicated effort. Peter coxhead (talk) 08:47, 8 May 2021 (UTC)

A couple of years ago, I did a similar thing- mass produced genus articles by using regular expressions to extract critical details from the World Spider Catalog. The patterns here are similar, and there's a lot of mistakes to be made. I get it, because I've gone through it. If you see anything wrong on one page- like the incorrect use of parentheses- it's likely wrong in other articles where applicable. I remember having problems with parentheses and diacritics as well because I didn't have a widely enough distribution of test cases. The sooner you find these errors and notify QatarStarsLeague, the fewer articles will be affected and fewer to articles to review later. Sesamehoneytart 22:00, 7 May 2021 (UTC)
Just for the record, QatarStarsLeague has been notified. Peter coxhead (talk) 08:49, 8 May 2021 (UTC)
I found some incorrect use of parentheses, incorrectly directed citations to the catalog should be revised by the creator or another bot. With that and other concerns they are rightly referred to as sub-stubs, objectionable without improvement, and certainly more effort to fix than creating from scratch. ~ cygnis insignis 12:37, 8 May 2021 (UTC)
@Cygnis insignis: certainly more effort to fix than creating from scratch – absolutely; they are a pain. I haven't been fixing the citation to the species list in WSC, rather than to the species, but it really should be fixed because it's used as a reference for the distribution, which is not in the list. Sigh... Peter coxhead (talk) 09:05, 9 May 2021 (UTC)
@Peter coxhead: What prompted the moan was a ref that was completely wrong, but I haven't seen that again. ~ cygnis insignis 09:37, 9 May 2021 (UTC) [modified 13:59, 9 May 2021 (UTC)]
  • @QatarStarsLeague: The article Carniella weyersi, the first I clicked when starting another round of improvements to your creations, contains a link to the species list of another genus – https://wsc.nmbe.ch/specieslist/3469 "Species list for Coscinida" – and that is not the first. This indicates to me the entire set needs to be checked and fixed by the creator. That revision would need to be regardless of whether they have been edited for other problems, users might rightly assume that the sole reference is correct. ~ cygnis insignis 12:05, 9 May 2021 (UTC)
@Cygnis insignis: whoops, I haven't been checking the original ref; I've been adding a taxonbar and then clicking on its WSC link, both to check that the Wikidata link was correct and to check the authority. Another sigh... Peter coxhead (talk) 17:56, 9 May 2021 (UTC)
I've now looked again at all those I had checked before, and fortunately QatarStarsLeague's list ref was the right genus. Peter coxhead (talk) 18:16, 9 May 2021 (UTC)
So polite, its seems I also forgot the taxobar … off I go. ~ cygnis insignis 18:36, 9 May 2021 (UTC)  Done ~ cygnis insignis 19:46, 9 May 2021 (UTC)

Fossil spiders

@Cygnis insignis, Sesamehoneytart, and Umimmak: (and anyone else who worked on these) I've only just noticed that QatarStarsLeague also created articles for fossil spiders, but used the WSC genus page as a reference; however it doesn't cover fossils – you need to use a different reference for these. See, e.g., Spintharus longisoma. Another sigh... Peter coxhead (talk) 09:17, 12 May 2021 (UTC)

Ill do a bit more. Is there going to another list for coordination? Maybe link fossilworks? They are mostly right in my limited experience. ~ cygnis insignis 10:24, 12 May 2021 (UTC)
@Cygnis insignis: I just noticed Spintharus longisoma because it showed up as a spider article without a taxobar. I think it's a matter of going through the genus articles listed above and seeing if there are any fossil species listed there. Peter coxhead (talk) 18:37, 12 May 2021 (UTC)

Requested move at Talk:Decoy-building spider#Requested move 1 September 2021

There is a requested move discussion at Talk:Decoy-building spider#Requested move 1 September 2021 that may be of interest to members of this WikiProject. ASUKITE 19:00, 9 September 2021 (UTC)

Troglodiplura

One of the members of this project may be interested in re-writing the article on Troglodiplura as a further four species were described by Harvey and Rix in 2020. They are on Wikidata – Troglodiplura beirutpakbarai, Troglodiplura challeni, Troglodiplura harrisi and Troglodiplura samankunani and also have articles on French Wikipedia.--Oronsay (talk) 22:16, 23 October 2021 (UTC)

 Done Someone could usefully create at least stubs for the other species. Peter coxhead (talk) 09:26, 24 October 2021 (UTC)

Use of Specieslist template

In sorting out the articles listed above, I've noticed that some editors aren't using {{Species list}} (alias "Specieslist") correctly in taxoboxes. A typical wrong use is as per this example: 

{{Species list
| [[Wamba congener|W. congener]]|<small>O. Pickard-Cambridge, 1896</small> – USA, Caribbean to Argentina
| [[Wamba crispulus|W. crispulus]]|<small>([[Eugène Simon|Simon]], 1895)</small> – Canada to Brazil, [[Caribbean]]
| [[Wamba panamensis|W. panamensis]]|<small>([[Herbert Walter Levi|Levi]], 1959)</small> – [[Panama]], [[Ecuador]]
}}

However, it's not how the template is meant to be used or works. Firstly, it automatically puts the second member of each pair in small text, so if you include small tags as above, the font size of the authority is doubly reduced, which is against the MoS. Secondly, it automatically italicizes the first member of each pair, provided it is presented as plain text. Thus: 

{{Species list
| Wamba congener | O. Pickard-Cambridge, 1896
| Wamba crispulus | ([[Eugène Simon|Simon]], 1895)
| Wamba panamensis | ([[Herbert Walter Levi|Levi]], 1959)
}}

produces:

  • Wamba congener O. Pickard-Cambridge, 1896
  • Wamba crispulus (Simon, 1895)
  • Wamba panamensis (Levi, 1959)

This is the format that would be used for a list of synonyms. If you put the subdivision species list in a genus taxobox, so the names should be wikilinked, then use {{Linked species list}}: 

{{Linked species list
| Wamba congener | O. Pickard-Cambridge, 1896
| Wamba crispulus | ([[Eugène Simon|Simon]], 1895)
| Wamba panamensis | ([[Herbert Walter Levi|Levi]], 1959)
}}

produces:

Right now if you really want links with abbreviated binomials, the way to do it is: 

{{Linked species list
| Wamba congener{{!}}W. congener | O. Pickard-Cambridge, 1896
| Wamba crispulus{{!}}W. crispulus | ([[Eugène Simon|Simon]], 1895)
| Wamba panamensis{{!}}W. panamensis | ([[Herbert Walter Levi|Levi]], 1959)
}}

produces:

I have a sandbox version which allows an extra parameter: 

{{Linked species list/sandbox|abbreviated=yes
| Wamba congener | O. Pickard-Cambridge, 1896
| Wamba crispulus | ([[Eugène Simon|Simon]], 1895)
| Wamba panamensis | ([[Herbert Walter Levi|Levi]], 1959)
}}

produces:

I can make this live if there's a demand.

I don't think any of the "taxon list" templates should be used if you want to add information other than the authority to the list, e.g. distribution. In this case, use a standard * list, e.g. 

* ''[[Wamba congener|W. congener]]'' <small>O. Pickard-Cambridge, 1896</small> – USA, Caribbean to Argentina
* ''[[Wamba crispulus|W. crispulus]]'' <small>([[Eugène Simon|Simon]], 1895)</small> – Canada to Brazil, [[Caribbean]]
* ''[[Wamba panamensis|W. panamensis]]'' <small>([[Herbert Walter Levi|Levi]], 1959)</small> – [[Panama]], [[Ecuador]]

because the countries should not be in small font. Peter coxhead (talk) 14:00, 10 May 2021 (UTC)

I'm pretty sure this is 100% my fault, so I'll take care of fixing these. There have been more than a few significant updates over the past year or two, so I've been meaning to run through and do a general update anyway. For articles of genera with three or fewer species, I started listing them in the lead section and infobox instead of a "species" section because in these cases, it doesn't seem like enough information to justify its own section. I can't really think of an alternative place to put them, so I think I'll just omit individual species locations in those cases. I don't think a template version that supports links is necessary if the species are already listed and linked in the header section. Abbreviating the binomials also isn't necessary, just a visual choice I made because I personally don't like the name repetition. Sesamehoneytart 04:20, 2 November 2021 (UTC)
@Sesamehonytart: you definitely haven't been the only one.
|abbreviated=yes is now implemented in the live versions:
{{Linked species list/abbreviated=yes
| Wamba congener | O. Pickard-Cambridge, 1896
| Wamba crispulus | ([[Eugène Simon|Simon]], 1895)
}}
produces:
Peter coxhead (talk) 12:52, 2 November 2021 (UTC)

Categories for Families

This may have been brought up before, but the category "Araneomorphae genera" has about 2250 articles in it. Would there be any objections if I created "{family} genera" categories for some of the larger families the way Salticidae is done to make the "Araneomorphae genera" category a bit easier to navigate? Or is there a reason it is set up this way? Sesamehoneytart 18:00, 4 November 2021 (UTC)

I agree that the category needs to be diffused. Peter coxhead (talk) 23:11, 5 November 2021 (UTC)

Cladogram templates

A recent edit to Trephopoda uses a cladogram in the species section. I'm not aware of any style guidelines we have about cladogram templates, so I left it as-is for now and I'm bringing it here for discussion. My initial reaction is that it may be useful to show a genus position within a family, similar to the implementation on Tragelaphus, but at the genus level it doesn't provide any more information than a list of species does. Sesamehoneytart 18:42, 10 November 2021 (UTC)

@Sesamehoneytart: I don’t think the cladogram is implemented correctly in Trephopoda. It should show more branching than that. Surely some species are more closely-related than others. You can use a cladogram on an article for any rank, it just should have more information than that one, which is misleading at the least. --awkwafaba (📥) 03:56, 11 November 2021 (UTC)
@Awkwafaba: That was my thought as well. I'll go ahead and revert it and drop a message on that user's talk page. Sesamehoneytart 19:56, 19 November 2021 (UTC)

Eriauchenus

It looks like Eriauchenius now goes under a new spelling (or I might have misspelled it the first time around?) I don't know how to move a page or if I even have the authority, but I'm pretty sure there's a process to conserve the page's history. Can someone with a little more experience with the process take a look at it? Thanks! Sesamehoneytart 19:56, 19 November 2021 (UTC)

@Sesamehoneytart: done ✅ --awkwafaba (📥) 01:54, 20 November 2021 (UTC)
@Sesamehoneytart: the World Spider Catalog explains that it was an error by Forster & Platnick, 1984. I've fixed the taxobox and the spelling of the genus name at Eriauchenus, but all the species articles need to be moved before the rest of the genus article can be corrected. Peter coxhead (talk) 07:26, 20 November 2021 (UTC)
Should all be fixed now. Peter coxhead (talk) 16:59, 21 November 2021 (UTC)

List of Arachnologists

Our List of Arachnologists includes links, but some also have specific categories like "Category:Taxa named by Paolo_Brignoli" and "Category:Taxa named by Carl Linnaeus". Do we have a comprehensive list of author categories as well and/or can we merge these lists together? Sesamehoneytart 20:40, 23 November 2021 (UTC)

Personally I remain doubtful about these "Taxa named by" categories, because it has never been clarified, to my knowledge, as to whether transferred species are included, and in practice some editors do include them and others don't. In other words, do the categories mean "first named by" as is the case for "Category:Spiders described in YEAR", or do they mean "given the currently accepted name by"? Or possibly "given one of its synonyms by"? Peter coxhead (talk) 09:56, 24 November 2021 (UTC)
I've been assuming "named by" really means "described by", which only happens once even if the name changes. The only purpose for these categories I can think of is for research about the author. Sesamehoneytart 19:28, 24 November 2021 (UTC)
Yes, I agree that this is what it should mean, but I haven't seen a clear statement to this effect. It would be better if the category names matched the "described in YEAR" categories, I think. Peter coxhead (talk) 19:10, 25 November 2021 (UTC)
I've only seen it mentioned once, here. Jokes aside, are we not using the Category:Spiders by year of formal description category tree? I just added Griswoldella aculifera to Category:Spiders described in 1916 a few minutes ago- am I using the wrong categories? Sesamehoneytart 05:39, 26 November 2021 (UTC)
@Sesamehoneytart: yes, we should be using this category tree for all spider species articles and for redirects from the scientific name of spiders, either to the monotypic genus or to the vernacular name. Peter coxhead (talk) 08:45, 26 November 2021 (UTC)

Junior synonym for Stavelaya

For the genus Stavelaya, the WSC claims that Cnephalocotes dahli is the type species, though Microneta pusilla was correctly published before it. Microneta doesn't seem to be invalid, so is there a reason that the type species is not the earliest published description? Or is this an error in the WSC? WSC link Sesamehoneytart 19:12, 7 December 2021 (UTC)

It's possible for a junior synonym to be designated as a type species (obvious case, the person naming the genus designates a type that they believe to be a distinct species, but which is generally regarded as a synonym by other workers). It is unusual for somebody to designate a type that they believe to be a synonym, but that is exactly what happened here. Stavelaya is named and typified in this paper. This paper explains the synonymy. Apparently dahli was chosen as the type species because it has a physical type specimen; pusilla has an illustration, but no physical type specimens. Plantdrew (talk) 21:01, 7 December 2021 (UTC)

Task force proposal

Should we add a Salticidae Taskforce? I think 6000+ species will be hard to manage. Example here (pls improve). Leomk (Don't shout here, Shout here!) 10:20, 22 November 2021 (UTC)

Do it! I would sign up, but there is this crazy topic ban sanction that restricts me from editing salticid articles. ~ cygnis insignis 12:40, 22 November 2021 (UTC)

jumping spider

The article jumping spider begins "Jumping spiders or the Salticidae are a family of spiders.", I haven't investigated how 'factual' that is, probably less than a qualifiable statement—Salticidae (jumping spiders) are [or … is?] a family of spiders—, but want to draw attention to the plural in this construct. The article's topic (salticids) is correctly pluralised, or more properly inclusive, by virtue of the citations to verifiable and systematic nomenclature [its taxonomic arrangements of genera, etc.].

That is to say, I wish someone would move this to Salticidae. ~ cygnis insignis 13:06, 22 November 2021 (UTC)

@Cygnis insignis: me too! But we seem to be stuck with the provisions of WP:COMMONNAME. Sigh... Peter coxhead (talk) 09:58, 24 November 2021 (UTC)
Looks like Salticidae is already in the category. I guess someone beat me to it. The singular/plural for families threw me off at first too. The family itself is a singular object, Salticidae. Another way to think about it is "the group of jumping spiders", where the subject is "group". Including the common name can be a little tricky. Sometimes it is included in the opener (Felidae), sometimes the singular is specified (Pinaceae), and sometimes it's included in a separate sentence (Corvidae). I'm not aware of any guidelines for how to word it- looks like MoS basically says "editor's choice" Sesamehoneytart 17:25, 22 November 2021 (UTC)
WP:PLANTS discussed this for plant families. See Wikipedia:WikiProject Plants#Singular and plural with the names of taxa. I think this holds for spider families too. So "jumping spiders or the Salticidae" is o.k., "jumping spiders or Salticidae" is not. An analogy is "my friends, the Smiths", where "the" is needed with a plural proper noun. Peter coxhead (talk) 20:23, 23 November 2021 (UTC)

So... should i do it?Leomk0403 (Don't shout here, Shout here!) 07:51, 8 December 2021 (UTC)

@Leomk0403: not sure what you mean by "do it" – if it's move Jumping spider, I think it would need to be proposed and discussed first. Peter coxhead (talk) 13:30, 8 December 2021 (UTC)
@Peter coxhead: I mean, making the taskforce.Leomk0403 (Don't shout here, Shout here!) 13:36, 8 December 2021 (UTC)
Ah, right. Are there enough interested editors? Peter coxhead (talk) 13:39, 8 December 2021 (UTC)
Well, Cygnis insignis is in. @Sesamehoneytart, Hyperik, Seacactus 13, and Vihaking277:, any thoughts?Leomk0403 (Don't shout here, Shout here!) 13:46, 8 December 2021 (UTC)

@leomk0403 sounds great! I'd love to join! I already have made numerous edits to Jumping Spider pages and I also have a lot of fair-quality images to contribute :) Vihaking277 (talk) 12:36, 10 December 2021 (UTC)

um... @Vihaking277: that's not how you ping. This is the way.Leomk0403 (Don't shout here, Shout here!) 14:14, 10 December 2021 (UTC)

Taxonomy templates

Currently, only six Template:Taxonomy subpages related to spiders are tagged with {{WikiProject Spiders}}. However, these >4000 pages, apparently all tagged by Ser Amantio di Nicolao last year, are using {{WikiProject Arthropods}} despite being in scope of this project. I suppose they should be retagged? 1234 kb of .rar files (is this dangerous?) 10:37, 12 March 2022 (UTC)

The tagging of taxonomy templates isn't something that bothers me one way or another, but if they are tagged, then, yes, it should be WikiProject Spiders. Peter coxhead (talk) 17:14, 12 March 2022 (UTC)

Proposed deletion of Cheiracanthium cuniculum

Notice

The article Cheiracanthium cuniculum has been proposed for deletion because of the following concern:

This is an orphan article because reliable sources, such as the World Spider Catalog here, regard it as a "nomen dubium" (dubious name), i.e. it's likely that the name does not actually refer to a species of spider. Hence it's not even linked from the genus article, Cheiracanthium.

While all constructive contributions to Wikipedia are appreciated, pages may be deleted for any of several reasons.

You may prevent the proposed deletion by removing the {{proposed deletion/dated}} notice, but please explain why in your edit summary or on the article's talk page. Peter coxhead (talk) 17:05, 13 March 2022 (UTC)

Trichonephila clavata

Trichonephila clavata needs to have some fiddling done here and on Wikidata, Commons, and Wikispecies. There are two Wikidata entries: Trichonephila clavata and Nephila clavata. There are two Commons categories: Trichonephila clavata and Nephila clavata. There is one Wikispecies article: Nephila clavata. There may be other things I haven't noticed yet, too. Somehow, these all need to be merged appropriately so there's less confusion about it since Trichonephila clavata and Nephila clavata are the same thing. How should we do this to cause the least disruption possible? I'm happy to help out, but since this is in an area in which I am less familiar, I wanted input on how to proceed. Please {{ping}} me in any response. ···日本穣 · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe · Join WP Japan! 16:33, 25 March 2022 (UTC)

It looks like the World Spider Catalog moved it from Nephila clavata to Trichonephila clavata in 2019. ···日本穣 · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe · Join WP Japan! 18:31, 25 March 2022 (UTC)
@Nihonjoe: Wikidata should have two items, since so-called taxon items are actually instances of taxon names. There can be items for many synonyms of the same taxon.
The Commons categories do need to be merged. Peter coxhead (talk) 14:02, 26 March 2022 (UTC)
@Nihonjoe: After some false starts, I think I have managed to restore the Wikidata items. Each taxon name should have links to the entry for that taxon name in any taxonomic database that includes that name, whether as an accepted name or a synonym. Then the taxonbar in the article lists all Wikidata items that are synonyms for that taxon. See, as just one example, the taxonbar at Acmispon decumbens. All of the articles in Category:Taxonbars with multiple manual Wikidata items have multiple Wikidata items for synonyms of the taxon linked from the taxonbar. Do not merge Wikidata items for synonyms: there's a taxon synonym property to link synonyms together, and a basionym property. Peter coxhead (talk) 16:35, 26 March 2022 (UTC)
@Peter coxhead: Thanks for sorting through all of that. ···日本穣 · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe · Join WP Japan! 16:53, 28 March 2022 (UTC)
@Nihonjoe: no problem. The use of the term "taxon" in Wikidata consistently misleads editors new to Wikidata's taxonomy, in my experience. Some of us have tried in the past to replace the term by "taxon name" (which is what it is), but weren't successful. Sigh... Peter coxhead (talk) 16:57, 28 March 2022 (UTC)
I consolidated the two Wikimedia Commons categories at commons:Category:Nephila clavata, at least for now, since most of the files were in this category, and the file names mostly use "Nephila". It's always difficult to know what to do at Commons; there are a lot of categories under obsolete scientific names. It may not matter too much if there's a category redirect. Peter coxhead (talk) 17:06, 28 March 2022 (UTC)

Redirect Talk Pages

More than a few of the more recent publications include new monotypic genera. Manual of style is in agreement that information for both should exist on the higher taxon, and the lower one should redirect. However, I don't think we've discussed talk pages for these redirects. In general, I've been leaving talk pages empty for new redirects because I don't think it's useful, with a few exceptions such as the main page was converted to a redirect and the talk page already has contents, or something like that. The MOS for redirects is... confusing. I'm still not sure what is considered a "hard redirect" and what is a "soft redirect". However, other bio-projects are leaving them blank ex. (Dugong dugon, Eucheira socialis, Monodon monoceros) They all have different styles of page contents, which is fine, but none of these monotypic redirects have contents for the talk pages. I don't know what the general consensus is for this project- or if we have one- but I'm going to keep leaving them blank for newly created pages, if only to keep the new articles homogenized. Sesamehoneytart 11:33, 8 April 2022 (UTC)

@Sesamehoneytart: they should have WP talk templates, so the redirects get maintained together and nothing falls through the cracks. Many editors do not do so, so the cracks are large. --awkwafaba (📥) 11:46, 8 April 2022 (UTC)
@Awkwafaba: The redirects can all be found in Category:Redirects to monotypic taxa of spiders, a category created by the {{R to monotypic taxon}} template on the main page. Their respective talk pages generally don't have more than a project banner. It seems like unnecessary duplicate information, but also I think any information on a redirect talk page should instead be on the talk page of the article it is being redirected to. Additionally, {{Talk page of redirect}} implies that not only should empty/nonexistent talk pages for redirects be left alone, but that unnecessary talk pages qualify for G6 speedy deletion. What needs to be maintained that can't be done via Category:Redirects to monotypic taxa of spiders? Sesamehoneytart 16:52, 8 April 2022 (UTC)
I do see the argument that Category:Redirects to monotypic taxa of spiders implies that the redirect falls within the oversight of this project, but equally I also see the value of making the oversight explicit. Also, without the template on the talk page, the redirect row in the table at WP:WikiProject_Spiders#Articles isn't correct. I will certainly continue to complete the redirect talk page. Peter coxhead (talk) 19:44, 8 April 2022 (UTC)
I rarely add WikiProject banners to redirects, but do add redirect categories (to/from monotypic taxon, alternative scientific name, to/from scientific name). Redirect categories can facilitate finding redirects which should have a WikiProject banner added if that is desired. What benefit does the banner itself have? There are a few tools and reports that depend on WikiProject banners being present. They are:
1. Hot articles; shows pages with the most recent edits. Unlikely that any redirect would ever make the list
2. Cleanup listing; shows pages with various maintenance tags. I've never seen a redirect with any maintenance tags, I'm not sure that any would ever apply
3. Dab solver; shows articles with links to disambiguation pages. The backlog of links to dab pages has been conquered, and this tool doesn't pick up redirects wrongly targeted to dab pages anyway
4. Article alerts; shows pages up for discussions (move request, deletion, etc.); for several years now it picks up redirects based on the WikiProject banners of their target, so no need to tag redirects for this report to work
5. Popular pages; most viewed pages in past month. It is somewhat interesting to see what redirects might end up there
6. Assessment log; shows changes to quality/importance assessment. Will also show page moves and conversion of a redirect to an article (but only if "class=redirect" isn't set). The act itself of tagging a redirect shows up in the assessment log
7. Project based watchlists; it's possible to see changes to all articles tagged for a project. There's usually too much activity for any reasonably large project to be able to monitor changes effectively. It's also possible just to see changes to talk pages, which is potentially more useful (e.g. seeing issues raised on talk pages that don't have any active Wikipedians watching them), however the act of tagging redirects is noise for this purpose
8. The assessment table; shows the number of redirects that have been tagged for a project
I'm not opposed to tagging redirects for WikiProjects, but the benefits of doing so don't seem high enough for me to want to spend my time doing so (if I ever run out of more important tasks, I can always go back through the redirects I've categorized and search for the ones missing WikiProject banners). I lost the little enthusiasm I had for redirect tagging once article alerts started picking up redirects by their targets. Plantdrew (talk) 21:17, 8 April 2022 (UTC)
I think we can all agree that it's not worth spending time searching for nonexistent redirect talk pages and tagging them when there are many more productive things to do. But I do still think that when you create or modify a redirect, it's worth creating the talk page. Peter coxhead (talk) 12:58, 9 April 2022 (UTC)
I'm realizing tagging all spider redirects is a much smaller task than it would be for many of the other organism projects. Very few spiders are at a vernacular name title and most don't have a vernacular name at all, and as far as I'm aware, there haven't been very redirects created for synonyms. Redirects to/from monotypic taxa account for a bigger share of spider redirects than most other organism projects. In contrast, birds have a minimum of two redirects for every species article (scientific name, and vernacular name following IOC capitalization standards). Plants are mostly at scientific name titles, but there are a lot of vernacular name redirects, and there have been some editors who've been very prolific creating redirects for plant synonyms (one editor created more than 20,000 plant synonym redirects). Plantdrew (talk) 19:23, 9 April 2022 (UTC)

Web decoration

Hi. I've written on the talk page of "Web decoration" but nobody answered. I suggested to move the pages to right title (Stabilimentum), but i need a mover to complete the process. Can somebody help me? Thanks. --Lorenzo Longo (talk) 17:09, 10 April 2022 (UTC)

 Done It seemed uncontroversial to me. Peter coxhead (talk) 09:00, 12 April 2022 (UTC)

Wikispecies discussing revamping spider classification

See species:Village_Pump#The_tragedy_of_Wikispecies'_spider_taxonomy. Wikispecies spider classification is apparently biased on a bad source compiled by an amateur. There is discussion to revamp it, with en.wiki as an (interim) source. @Peter coxhead:, you probably have the best awareness of the state of spider classification here (what's been checked against WSC and how recently), and may want to comment on the Wikispecies thread. Plantdrew (talk) 18:59, 12 April 2022 (UTC)

It has like that for as long as I can remember; I don't even know how they'd approach such a large problem/organize fixing it. I haven't even bothered to touch wikispecies- I mostly work with wp/media/data at family/genus level, but a problem I've seen that isn't brought up in that post is that many of these clades and subfamilies are still being decided. I just went through a source yesterday from 2018 and one from 2019 sorting out Pholcidae based on molecular phylogeny. I read through one a few weeks ago done even more recently for Salticidae. Trying to fix it now might be a little like trying to shovel snow while it's still snowing. I'm not sure if this is related, but Wikimedia in particular has its own unique problem where image names are permanent, but the subject it is a picture of can move around, so categories won't necessarily correspond with the image name. Even if they're re-categorized, occasionally someone will come along and move it back because of the permanent image name. Sesamehoneytart 08:43, 13 April 2022 (UTC)
I have commented at Wikispecies. trying to shovel snow while it's still snowing is a good analogy! The other problem is that even when there are reasonably good recent phylogenies, these often don't map to useful ranks or even clades, and certainly rarely match the 'traditional' subfamilies, superfamilies, etc.
Zacmh has also been very active lately in updating species lists for genera and genera lists for families, and may be able to comment. I haven't been working on spiders as much. Peter coxhead (talk) 09:01, 13 April 2022 (UTC)

User script to detect unreliable sources

Main page: User:Headbomb/unreliable

I have (with the help of others) made a small user script to detect and highlight various links to unreliable sources and predatory journals. Some of you may already be familiar with it, given it is currently the 39th most imported script on Wikipedia. The idea is that it takes something like

  • John Smith "Article of things" Deprecated.com. Accessed 2020-02-14. (John Smith "[https://www.deprecated.com/article Article of things]" ''Deprecated.com''. Accessed 2020-02-14.)

and turns it into something like

It will work on a variety of links, including those from {{cite web}}, {{cite journal}} and {{doi}}.

The script is mostly based on WP:RSPSOURCES, WP:NPPSG and WP:CITEWATCH and a good dose of common sense. I'm always expanding coverage and tweaking the script's logic, so general feedback and suggestions to expand coverage to other unreliable sources are always welcomed.

Do note that this is not a script to be mindlessly used, and several caveats apply. Details and instructions are available at User:Headbomb/unreliable. Questions, comments and requests can be made at User talk:Headbomb/unreliable.

- Headbomb {t · c · p · b}

This is a one time notice and can't be unsubscribed from. Delivered by: MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 16:02, 29 April 2022 (UTC)

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