Category talk:Dams in the Netherlands

About the template

@Joshbaumgartner: Dams in the Netherlands are for flood protection, they are not about reservoirs and water supply. Can those parent categories be removed? And what happened to Category:Dams in Europe by country? And should Category:Barriers in the Netherlands not be a parent (and similar categories for the other Dams categories)? I have added the removed ones again manually. JopkeB (talk) 04:39, 6 December 2023 (UTC)

@JopkeB: All good questions. Let me address each in turn:

1. Dams (on Commons) are any barrier which serves to retain a reservoir of water, regardless of whether it also serves a water supply, power generation, irrigation, flood protection, or other purpose. It doesn't matter what country they are in. If "dams in the Netherlands" are something else, then they should not be under Category:Dams, but instead under whatever Commons topic covers their actual nature, and should be re-named in accordance with that topic. However, that doesn't seem the case here. Of course the Netherlands has some unique and wonderful dams and use them often in innovative ways (one reason we bother sorting by country...to see this diversity), but I think they can be handled consistently with the main category Dams.
2. Dams in Europe by country is a 'by country' category, and 'country' on Commons is for sovereign states. Currently, 'the Netherlands' is merely a constituent country, not a sovereign state, and thus it goes under 'Kingdom of the Netherlands', the sovereign state it is a subject of. Thus the hierarchy is: Dams in Europe by country (index) -> Dams in the Kingdom of the Netherlands (sovereign country) -> Dams in the Netherlands (constituent country). Having Dams in the Netherlands parallel to Dams in the Kingdom of the Netherlands under Dams in Europe by country is an overcat violation that doesn't make much sense.
3. Flood protection is not a parent category of Dams, as dams are defined by being a barrier for retention of fluid, with no specific purpose needed. Sub-categories of dams can reflect dams used for specific purposes, and I would think that most dams of any sort serve a flood control role in some manner, but that is not automatically inherent to being a dam. However, I think in this case, flood control is pretty close to being a pervasive feature of the vast majority of dams (maybe not their primary function, but still an element), much as water supply may not be a specific purpose, but it is hard to have a dam not feature in some level of water supply. Thus I am not against adding Flood protection as a parent to Dams (and making the relevant update to the data template).
4. Barriers seems to be a valid parent of Dams (and thus that applies to in the Netherlands as well). I think it should be added to the main category first, and then to the data template. Then it will automatically be implemented for every country consistently in accordance with the Universality Principle.

I've implemented the changes on #3 and #4 above, so those categories should automatically be added to all places using the topic in country template. I think the inclusion of those two is a good enhancement of the main cat, so I'm happy that these were highlighted so they could be addressed.

Additionally, I've added 'dikes' as a seealso in the data template, so it will be automatically added with {{Cat see also}} to any instance where both 'dams in' and 'dikes in' exist for a country.

I've left your inclusion of Dams in Europe by country for now, as I have a CfD open which could impact the statements above depending on how it goes.

Josh (talk) 23:16, 6 December 2023 (UTC)

• @1 OK.
• @2 I agree, the overcat should be solved. I think we should discuss a solution on Commons:Categories for discussion/2023/12/Category:Kingdom of Denmark; we are still working on a reaction to your questions there.
• @3 "but it is hard to have a dam not feature in some level of water supply": as far as I know there are no dams in the Netherlands that have a feature in some level of water supply, they were all constructed to protect the land from the sea; in recent years the IJsselmeer (dammed by the Afsluitdijk in 1932, not a dike as the name suggests, but a dam) might have that function in dry summers due to climate change, but it was not its purpose in 1932. Moreover, the Oosterschelde (dammed by the Oosterscheldekering) has salt seawater, so is not even usable for drinking water.
• @4 OK

 Question Is it one size fits all? If there is a template for a category, then you may not deviate from the main category and add other parents? Or may you never deviate from the main category? If that is true, then my objection is that there may be country categories with one or more red parents, while there might be grandparents that fit; I usually would rather add a grandparent than make a category for the red one. And it is not always required to make a real category of a red link, for instance when there would be only one subcategory, namely this country category. So if my suspicion is correct: was this discussed? Otherwise I think it should be discussed. JopkeB (talk) 08:25, 7 December 2023 (UTC)