User talk:Auntof6/Archives/2017

Category:Historical images of Italy by photographer

Hi Auntof6. Can you stop please to change all what I do? I work hard on cats about old photographs of Italy, by author, by location, by monument; you follow me and nullify a lot what I've done laboriously. You know that I make a big work on historical images of Italy since years, so please, if you want to make big changes, please discuss first with me. Thank you. Best regards, --DenghiùComm (talk) 04:27, 3 February 2017 (UTC)

@DenghiùComm: Can you be more specific? Today I renamed some categories to have the correct names on metacategories. Was there something else? --Auntof6 (talk) 04:41, 3 February 2017 (UTC)

OK, I just saw the issue with the text on the category saying what you were going to work on next. That kind of thing doesn't belong on the category. You could put it either on the category's talk page or in your own userspace. --Auntof6 (talk) 04:46, 3 February 2017 (UTC)

Of course I have nothing to say about the changing of category names that are incorrect or have a mistake. I have a basic level of English. BTW categories that are uncorrect named have to be deleted, not made a redirect. About the little text saying what I am going to work on next, could be a kindness towards me to leave it, since I work on category and not you. But this is nothing of importance. What really you had not to do was to remove the "Category:Historical images of Italy by photographer" by a lot of photographs categories of different photographers showing historical images of Italy. And you removed them only because the category names were not the same of the upper cat. Is this reasonable? It would have been better to look before the content of those categories. --DenghiùComm (talk) 08:22, 3 February 2017 (UTC)

D.C. / states

Nyttend's removal of D.C. from a "by state" category: I'd be interested in your opinion on this, since it's an area in which I know you've worked a bit. - Jmabel ! talk 15:41, 9 February 2017 (UTC)

I approve of the edit. As you can see from Commons:Categories for discussion/2015/08/Category:Washington, D.C., I don't think DC should be categorized as a state. Although it can be considered a first-level subdivision of the US because it's not part of any other subdivision (the same is true of the territories), there are many differences between DC and a state. I'll let you read the discussion if you'd like more of my opinion. --Auntof6 (talk) 16:49, 9 February 2017 (UTC)

Category:Jewish cemeteries in Bavaria

Please, before reverting blindly. Take a closer look at the category which has categories for each governement district. So it is clearly a metacat, because all entries belong to one district. I just try to categorize the entries so yout edit is not very helpful because at the end it will be a metacat anyway. Andy king50 (talk) 16:40, 12 February 2017 (UTC)

@Andy king50: To be a metacat, the category name would have to include words like "by government district" or "by district". It is not enough that it contains categories for each district, the category name must specify what the subcats are grouped by. If you look at the categories for the other states, you will see that they are not metacategories, either. --Auntof6 (talk) 17:00, 12 February 2017 (UTC)

"in Bavaria" is de facto the same and cannot by missunderstood. It ist absolutely common for german categories to have Metacategories "xyz in governement district". Please show evidence, that Metacategories must contain phrases "by government district" or "by district" - else it would be only your own view. Andy king50 (talk) 17:04, 12 February 2017 (UTC)

I'm not sure I understand you. I see other "in Bavaria" categories that specify "by district", for example Category:Hotels in Bavaria by district, and those are metacats because they say "by district". If the category name doesn't say what the grouping is, then it's not a metacat. This naming is explained at Commons:Meta category. You could use the {{Categorise}} template if you want, which says that files should be in subcategories, but doesn't require it. --Auntof6 (talk) 17:19, 12 February 2017 (UTC)

Galleries in category of categories

I see that you removed a gallery that we (from Commons:WikiProject Nature and conservation in India) had put in one of the sub-categories of the super-category that we have: Category:WikiProject Nature and conservation in India. This is a bit problematic for us because we've been holding several Wiki-workshops and events where we have gotten contributors motivated to contribute to this project showing them that such categories could be created to organise galleries of photos contributed by particular conservation/research organisations. For e.g., you seem to have removed Category:Media contributed by NCF from several tens/hundreds of images. If I understand right, your concern is that images were being directly placed under a category of categories. Is this really a problem? Could you please point me to guidance which says this? Secondly, if such is the case, how do we (from the Wikiproject) ensure that people are able to see galleries of photos in particular sub-categories? Let me know as this step is interfering with public messages that we have given to several new contributors and may discourage future contributions. Thanks! I ask this on behalf of User:Shankar Raman & myself and other members of Commons:WikiProject Nature and conservation in India. Prashanthns (talk) 05:29, 20 February 2017 (UTC)

@Prashanthns: I'm sorry if I caused you problems. If I understand you correctly, you are mentioning two issues here.

• Issue 1: Removal of a gallery Can you tell me what gallery page you're referring to? Or were you referring to the files in a category as a gallery?
• Issue 2: Removing files from Category:Media contributed by NCF I did that in line with the policy at COM:OVERCAT. The files I removed were already in subcategories of Category:Media contributed by NCF, so that policy says they shouldn't be in the higher-level category. After removing the files, the three remaining subcategories seemed to cover all possible files, so I then added the {{Catcat}} template: that template was not there before I removed the files, so being a category of categories was not the reason I removed the files.

All that being said, it seems to me that the policy I mentioned above is more important for other types of categories than for this type, and I didn't take that into account at the time. Therefore, let me know if you would like me to put the files back in Category:Media contributed by NCF. If I need to get the information from my edit history, I can, but it would take me a while to do that and I won't have time for a day or two. If the files needed are all the files at all levels under that category, I could do that sooner and more easily. Let me know, and I apologize again for the problems. --Auntof6 (talk) 06:34, 20 February 2017 (UTC)

Thanks User:Auntof6 for your detailed response. Much appreciated. No big problem as such. We also realised that we had not put these project categories as "Hidden categories", as alerted to us by User:Shyamal. We will do that too right away. Meanwhile, we would like to reinstate the Media contributed by NCF category to several images (User:Shankar Raman has volunteered to do that), so you won't have to undo anything. We will once again review the categories guidance and make all our project-based categories hidden. Hopefully, that should be ok with you? Thanks again for your patience! Prashanthns (talk) 05:30, 21 February 2017 (UTC)

@Prashanthns: Yes, that would be OK with me, and I apologize again for causing you problems. --Auntof6 (talk) 05:55, 21 February 2017 (UTC)

@Prashanthns, Auntof6, and Shyamal: Thanks all. I have made the changes and responded on the project talk page. Cheers. Shankar Raman (talk) 15:33, 21 February 2017 (UTC)

Disambiguation CFDs

I know we disagree on the point regarding topics like Canterbury or Seattle, but I'm concerned that the process being followed isn't going to get a worthwhile outcome. Identifying problem cats (presumably by finding a bunch of bad panoramio batch uploads) and then starting individual CFDs in turn, reduces the likelihood of meaningful discussions and increases the risk of inconsistent outcomes. That is if CFD ever returns any results at all (as its an effectively moribund process). I think it would be better to consolidate these into a single discussion at a higher profile location (such as the VP) and thrash out a coherent Commons guideline on these things. This would then give us the local equivalent of w:WP:PRIMARYTOPIC (By the way, I don't like using the term "primary topic" as that is loaded with the connotations of the WP guidance on that term). Some obvious non-options are "disambiguate everything", "follow en.wp exactly", or "only disambiguate when problems arise". My own personal belief is the end-result on Commons should be broadly similar to the WP concept, but in a way that the bar is considerably before an ambiguous topic takes the base name.

The individual CFDs can then be about more technical issues, like should the AP stylebook be a factor, or how to sort out conflicts like I've highlighted for Canterbury.--Nilfanion (talk) 01:49, 22 February 2017 (UTC)

gloubi-goulba

salut ! désolée je parle pas l'anglais ! juste pour te dire : c'est bizarre tout de même de commencer par vider une catégorie puis de la faire supprimer au motif qu'elle est vide au lieu de la remplir ! ah ! mais je vois que le classement par compositeur a aussi subi le même sort ! les oeuvres pour basson par genre et par forme : sonates concertos quintets traits de symphonie par exemple et par compositeur : fauré rimski beethoven saint-saens villa-lobos etc vont donc toutes rester dans cet infâme gloubi-goulba :( ? ben alors à quoi ça sert que mandariine se décarcasse ? si j'ai fait le cadre c'est pour qu'il soit rempli ! pas pour qu'il soit vidé ! s'il est pas encore rempli ça veut pas dire qu'y a rien à y mettre la preuve ça veut dire que personne s'y est encore collé ! et si personne s'y est encore collé ça veut dire qu'il a autre chose à faire et qu'y a qu'à attendre que des bonnes volontés veuillent bien s'y mettre ! ça viendra ! sauf si on supprime le cadre ! on restera alors avec le gloubi-goulba ! c'est pas un cadeau mais bof ! voili voilou ! --Mandariine (talk) 08:00, 26 February 2017 (UTC) pour info à user:Taivo

@Mandariine: Je vais essayer de vous répondre, avec l'aide de Google Translate, mais mon français n'est pas assez bon pour comprendre tout ce que vous avez dit.
Category:Ogg files of music for bassoon by composer et d'autres catégories que j'ai vidées étaient des métacategories. Les métacatégories ne devraient contenir que d'autres catégories, et non des fichiers ("files"). Pour cette raison, j'ai déplacé les fichiers à d'autres catégories. Après les avoir déplacés, les catégories étaient vides et j'ai demandé qu'ils soient supprimés. Si cela ne répond pas à votre question, peut-être pouvons-nous trouver quelqu'un pour traduire pour nous afin que je puisse mieux comprendre ce que vous avez dit. --Auntof6 (talk) 09:04, 26 February 2017 (UTC)

bonjour auntof6 ! non non c'est bon on va arriver à se comprendre ! nous sommes bien d'accord Category:Ogg files of music for bassoon by composer et Category:Ogg files of music for bassoon by genre and or form sont des méta-catégories ! si elles contiennent des fichiers il ne faut pas les vider mais affiner ces méta-catégories avec des sous-catégories comme ici par exemple : Category:Ogg files of music for cello où le travail de classement a commencé avec les suites pour violoncelle de bach ! pour le basson on aura par exemple des sous-catégories par sonates concertos quintets traits de symphonie pour basson ou musique pour basson de fauré rimski beethoven saint-saens villa-lobos dans lesquelles placer ces fichiers ! on peut retrouver toutes les catégories par genre et par compositeur à créer dans ce cadre ici ! je sais c'est du boulot ! mais si on enlève le cadre ce sera moins facile à faire et on trouvera moins de bonnes volontés pour s'en charger ! --Mandariine (talk) 09:23, 26 February 2017 (UTC) mon anglais est lamentable et ton français est parfait : autant continuer en français ;-)

US states

Hi,

I just re-visited the Cleveland discussion, and that got me thinking about the situation with states. Many of them are ambiguous to some extent, there are the same potential issues with states as with cities. For example, a bot could upload an image of Florida, MA, to Category:Florida, just as easily as it could upload Miami, OH, to Category:Miami. Therefore a case could be made for disambiguation, maybe even to a consistent "XX (U.S. state)" scheme.

Of course, I'm fine with the status quo with the majority. However, I do think New York and Georgia are problematic and need discussion. I'll probably start a couple CFDs later, any thoughts?--Nilfanion (talk) 11:11, 13 March 2017 (UTC)

Started CFDs for Georgia and New York. Comments appreciated.. :)--Nilfanion (talk) 02:37, 15 March 2017 (UTC)

Thanks Nilfanion, I was myself considering nominating those, Mississippi is probably another example. Disambiguating everying would be pointless, as you have pointed out, we don't disambiguate a major topic if 99% of people want it just because of a slight risk though (like Florida). Crouch, Swale (talk) 11:06, 15 March 2017 (UTC)

@Crouch, Swale: Why do you think Mississippi needs to be qualified? Because of the river and the state? We usually refer to the river as the Mississippi (or the Mississippi River), never without either the word "the" or the word "River". The state is referred to as just "Mississippi". --Auntof6 (talk) 20:55, 15 March 2017 (UTC)

Auntof6, to be fair to Crouch here it is very rare to include the "the" category (or article) titles (ie Category:Sun or Category:Netherlands). Its only standard to include it in prose. With rivers there are numerous categories like Category:Danube, Category:Nile, Category:Rhine, Category:Thames and Category:Volga... For all 5 of those rivers, either "the" or "river" would be added in normal English usage, exactly the same as the Mississippi.

The difference is that, unlike those, the Mississippi shares its name with another highly important subject. If the river is often called "the Mississippi", then "Mississippi" is ambiguous and unsurprisingly errors can, and do happen--Nilfanion (talk) 23:13, 15 March 2017 (UTC)

That's a good point. --Auntof6 (talk) 23:50, 15 March 2017 (UTC)

As Nilfanion pointed out "Mississippi" is a DAB page on several Wikipedias, in addition some Wikipedias have the river disambuiguated in brackets on at the base name (eg RM). I agree with you, Auntof6 than in English it is refereed to as such but that doesn't appear to be so in other languages. Crouch, Swale (talk) 11:00, 18 March 2017 (UTC)

Road sign categories

Hi Auntof6. You're very active at COM:CFD, so I thought I'd give you an FYI. If you see any strange or duplicated road sign categories, these are created by our most prolific sockmaster Jermboy27. He's easy to spot since he only uses IPs that register to New Zealand. He likes to create some good categories and others that duplicate existing categories. This is a way of socking here and creating messes that he's been doing for roughly 10 years/1 million edits. Don't hesitate to empty his categories and tag them for speedy deletion. My RFA nominator, INeverCry, has told me about Jermboy, who is globally locked, so I'll be watching out for him. Have a good day. Daphne Lantier 08:00, 2 April 2017 (UTC)

Category:Stream beds

Shall we not also discuss how we intend to write the following categories: Stream beds/Streambeds or River beds/Riverbeds and also think about if we'd like to differentiate between them or not where possible (eg. rivers -> riverbeds resp. streams -> streambeds)? So that we have a homogeneous form.Reykholt (talk) 15:30, 7 April 2017 (UTC)

sundial

Hi, Auntof6,

Thanks for helping me finding the right categories. Could you please explain why a sundial isn't an instrument (eq tool). And second, why I shouldn't use category '16th century'? --MHV GAC (talk) 07:44, 10 April 2017 (UTC)

Can you remind me which page this was? I remember making the change, but I'd like to look at it again before I answer. --Auntof6 (talk) 07:47, 10 April 2017 (UTC)

https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=File:Pocket_sundial_from_the_16th_-_early_17th_century.jpg&diff=next&oldid=239828797

MHV GAC (talk) 07:56, 10 April 2017 (UTC)

Thanks. The file name says it's "from the 16th - early 17th century", so it can't be said to be from a specific century. Therefore, I removed both categories that indicated century. The file is now in an instruments category, because I added Category:Portable sundials, and its grandparent Category:Sundials is under Category:Historical astronomical instruments. --Auntof6 (talk) 08:09, 10 April 2017 (UTC)

Ok. Thanks. MHV GAC (talk) 08:41, 10 April 2017 (UTC)

Category:Big_Bird_(muppet)

Big Bird (muppet) has been listed at Commons:Categories for discussion so that the community can discuss ways in which it should be changed. We would appreciate it if you could go to voice your opinion about this at its entry. If you created this category, please note that the fact that it has been proposed for discussion does not necessarily mean that we do not value your kind contribution. It simply means that one person believes that there is some specific problem with it. If the category is up for deletion because it has been superseded, consider the notion that although the category may be deleted, your hard work (which we all greatly appreciate) lives on in the new category. In all cases, please do not take the category discussion personally. It is never intended as such. Thank you!

Closeapple (talk) 01:20, 30 May 2017 (UTC)

Category:Close-up photographs of shells

Category:Close-up photographs of shells has been listed at Commons:Deletion requests so that the community can discuss whether it should be kept or not. We would appreciate it if you could go to voice your opinion about this at its entry. If you created this category, please note that the fact that it has been proposed for deletion does not necessarily mean that we do not value your kind contribution. It simply means that one person believes that there is some specific problem with it. Please remember to respond to and – if appropriate – contradict the arguments supporting deletion. Arguments which focus on the nominator will not affect the result of the nomination. Thank you!

Hello, I nominated it for deletion. Snek01 (talk) 21:50, 6 June 2017 (UTC)

@Snek01: Thank you for the notification. However, you included the request in the wrong place. Discussions about deleting categories go under categories for discussion, not under requests for deletion. --Auntof6 (talk) 22:23, 6 June 2017 (UTC)

The Category Barnstar awarded

		The Category Barnstar
		The Category Barnstar is awarded to especially tireless Wikimedians who make significant edits to media files that accurately and precisely categorize them.  Senator2029 ➔ “Talk”  21:52, 28 June 2017 (UTC)

@Senator2029: Thank you! --Auntof6 (talk) 23:15, 28 June 2017 (UTC)

Metacats

Hello! May you better explain me this edit? I'm a bit confused, because that category (along with Category:People by name, also removed by you) is exactly the example of metacat shown in Commons:Meta category. Thanks, --Horcrux92 (talk) 10:31, 2 July 2017 (UTC)

Also, is this edit of mine correct? --Horcrux92 (talk) 10:33, 2 July 2017 (UTC)

Finally (sorry for bother): how to manage the case Category:Districts of cities by country, since there are edits like this?

Move the category to Category:Districts by city by country and all the subcategories to "Category:Districts in CountryName by city" should be more standard but could have less sense, because the districts belong to the city and not to the country.

Despite the absence of " by " in the title, the subcategories seems to be meta categories to all effects. --Horcrux92 (talk) 10:40, 2 July 2017 (UTC)

Hi, Horcrux92, thanks for your questions. The "by name" categories can be confusing because some of them are metacats but some aren't. For a "by name" category to be a metacat, its subcats need to be grouped by things with the same name. An example is Category:Hotels by name: the subcats there are not for individual named hotels (as Category:People by name is for individual named people), but for hotels with the same name. The confusion comes from the fact that Commons uses the shorthand "by <criterion>" to mean " grouped by <criterion>", but "by name" is also a phrase in English to mean you're talking about something by mentioning its name and some categories are named according to that usage. This issue also comes up with some other criteria, such as registration numbers (used for aircraft, for example).

Your edit to Category:Army Combat Uniform by year was correct: the subcats there are for different files grouped by year.

For Category:Districts of cities in Russia, if that needs to be a metacat, I would name it "Districts of Russia by city". That cat is being used as a metacat, but the current name would allow for an individual district to be included directly.

I hope this helps. --Auntof6 (talk) 15:16, 2 July 2017 (UTC)

Thank you so much, you've been very clear. So, shouldn't these indications be edited? And according to what you said I guess this should be renamed in Category:Spain by month or something like that. Am I right? --Horcrux92 (talk) 21:49, 2 July 2017 (UTC)

Well, you've found one of the cases where some metacats don't have the word "by" in their names. There are some metacats named "<place> by month" (like Category:Hesse by month) and others named "months in <place>" like the one you're asking about. I don't know if that was deliberate or just happened. I'd prefer to see them all say "by month", but I wouldn't rename them without discussing because people are probably used to the way they are. As far as editing the category naming documentation, yes, the issues with "by name" could be mentioned (probably also after discussion), although technically it's covered by saying that a metacat has subcats that are grouped by a criterion. --Auntof6 (talk) 22:36, 2 July 2017 (UTC)

I understand. I opened a new topic here. Thank you again, --Horcrux92 (talk) 15:22, 4 July 2017 (UTC)

P.S. Please, in future ping me or answer in my talk page.

"Buildings and structures" on the National Register of Historic Places

Hi. I just noticed that you've been converting category names from "Category:Buildings and structures on the National Register of Historic Places in state" to "Category:Structures on the National Register of Historic Places in state" (example).

I don't believe this is an appropriate change. Both "buildings" and "structures" are defined terms in the official National Register program; every NRHP property is categorized in one of five property types: building, structure, site, object, or district. Thus, in the NRHP context, "buildings and structures" and "structures" are not equivalent formulations. Moreover, the large majority of NRHP properties are categorized as "building", so that converting the categories to "Structures in..." creates a larger problem than converting it to "Buildings in..." would.

I have for a while thought about setting up a category structure where each of the 5 NRHP property types has its own categories, but that would be a mammoth manual task given the tools I (don't) have access to, and would still be huge even with tools. But meanwhile, I'm not sure the changes you've made are an improvement. — Ipoellet (talk) 12:25, 9 July 2017 (UTC)

@Ipoellet: Thanks for your message. In case you weren't aware, I renamed all "buildings and structures" categories, not just the NRHP ones, and not just the NRHP "by state" ones. This was pursuant to a discussion at the Village pump. I can see that my intended edit summary for the related category moves got truncated, so here is a link to the discussion. (My favorite comment in that discussion was that "buildings and structures" makes as much sense as "carrots and vegetables".)

I know about NRHP's 5 types. In the NRHP context I would agree with your comments. However, these categories are set up according to Commons conventions, not NRHP's types. You can see that if you look at Category:National Register of Historic Places: there are subcats there for more than 5 types of things (although some of them could probably go under structures). From a Commons viewpoint, "buildings and structures" is equivalent to "structures", so I renamed the categories to "structures". In the Commons scheme, renaming them to "buildings" would be incorrect because, while all buildings are structures, not all structures are buildings, and these categories contain both. There's no reason not to also have building categories under the structures categories if we want.

I also thought about categorizing in line with NRHP's defined types, but was daunted for the same reason as you. If you ever decide to pursue that, I'd be willing to help.

Anyway, thanks for your message, and let me know what concerns you still have. --Auntof6 (talk) 13:25, 9 July 2017 (UTC)

Bridges to nowhere

[1]: really? Doesn't seem at all analogous to the other subcategories there. I won't revert unilaterally, but I think you might want to reconsider this. - Jmabel ! talk 07:43, 12 August 2017 (UTC)

@Jmabel: I see your point. I did that because the parent "to nowhere" categories are also in "by condition" categories. I suppose you could think of "ending abruptly" or "having an unusable end" as being a condition. If you have a better idea of how to categorize the bridges to nowhere, I'd have no objection. --Auntof6 (talk) 08:42, 12 August 2017 (UTC)

I'd just leave it directly under bridges. I don't think anyone looking for it would ever think to check "by condition." - Jmabel ! talk 17:38, 12 August 2017 (UTC)

Category:Relations of ...

Why not? I think it was a common thing to place those bilateral locator map images in "Category:Relations of X and Y".[2][3] That anonymous just kept doing the same. Perhaps only some of those "Military relations" categories are inappropriate. XXN, 16:58, 13 August 2017 (UTC)

I was trying to clean up what that IP editor did. Instead, I have asked the admins (at Commons:Administrators' noticeboard/User problems) to help without needing many individual requests. We'll see what they say. --Auntof6 (talk) 17:05, 13 August 2017 (UTC)

Ambiguous categories

Although I think we shouldn't disambiguate everything (like Category:Science, Category:Pennsylvania and Category:England), as appears to be consensus currently. I think we should maybe disambiguate these categories. Category:Bury because of the verb. Category:Nancy becuase of Category:Nancy (given name). Category:Memphis because on the city in Tennessee and Category:Mamshit which is unrelated. Category:Mansfield because there are some like Mansfield, Ohio that have a greater administrative importance and some (like Mansfield, Texas) were named independently. Category:Bolton because there are many with this name that are unrelated and Category:Boston because the English town is the original and other US cities Category:Denver (less ambiguous) and Category:Virginia Beach, Virginia and Category:Colorado Springs (not ambiguous) include the state. Probably using the {{Move}} or CFD would be the best approach, any thoughts? Crouch, Swale (talk) 11:50, 19 August 2017 (UTC)

With regards to Virginia Beach, if naming convention says include the state, then include the state. The fact that it includes the state name in its category title is not a bad thing. How about Kansas City? That includes the state name doesn't it? So we don't need to include it? Oh wait... Don't break with WP conventions unless there is a good reason to.--Nilfanion (talk) 13:03, 19 August 2017 (UTC)

I was pointing out that "Virginia Beach" isn't really ambiguous at all but still includes the state unlike Boston which is ambigous. Also that "Virginia Beach, Virginia" is an unnatural title while "Boston, Massachusetts" is natural which maybe points to the exception! Crouch, Swale (talk) 13:08, 19 August 2017 (UTC)

Virginia Beach, Virginia is perfectly natural in the US context as its <city name>, <state name>. The repetition isn't a problem.--Nilfanion (talk) 13:22, 19 August 2017 (UTC)

I agree that "Virginia Beach, Virginia" is perfectly fine. --Auntof6 (talk) 16:16, 19 August 2017 (UTC)

Auntof6, I'm concerned we already have far too many open discussions covering the same themes, and I'm sure you are as tired as me at re-hashing it over and over. Any ideas on how to get some positive involvement and get a proper resolution?--Nilfanion (talk) 13:03, 19 August 2017 (UTC)

Yes, I would welcome a higher-level discussion. Possible places for such a discussion:

• Commons:Village pump/Proposals
• Category talk:Populated places
• Commons talk:Categories, for possible inclusion at Commons:Categories#How to categorize: guidance by topic or in the list at Commons:Categories#Category names

Wherever it is, it could be included in Template:Centralized discussion. — Preceding unsigned comment added by ‎ Auntof6 (talk • contribs) 16:16, 19 August 2017 (UTC)

Agreed, it needs as wide an audience as possible. I'll try get a brief and neutral summary together here. I'd appreciate if you could link any CFDs you think are relevant. IMO the end goal is adding a sentence or two to the guidance.

While it is clearly not my preference, and extreme but easy to express option would be to say that we always add the relevant higher-level unit to all location categories, regardless of their importance or ambiguity. That leads to needlessly complex titles like Llanfairpwllgwyngyll, Anglesey, but if it means more stable titles and less arguments in the long run is that a bad thing?--Nilfanion (talk) 21:31, 19 August 2017 (UTC)

Sure, I'll link the ones I'm currently watching -- all those are still open -- and see what relevant closed ones I can find. --Auntof6 (talk) 22:09, 19 August 2017 (UTC)

Thanks. I've added a couple more and made an attempt at providing facts neutrally.--Nilfanion (talk) 12:49, 20 August 2017 (UTC)

@Nilfanion: I tweaked one of your list items to point out that ambiguity can involve place names plus other things. Shall we put further discussion at User talk:Nilfanion/Disambiguation of places? --Auntof6 (talk) 17:02, 20 August 2017 (UTC)

Yep, makes sense to me (I'm extremely busy in real life at present, so may not be able to deal with this promptly).--Nilfanion (talk) 13:05, 22 August 2017 (UTC)

Like Llanfairpwllgwyngyll we could add (and continue to add) more delail to every category like Category:Llanfairpwllgwyngyll, Anglesey, Wales, Category:Llanfairpwllgwyngyll (village), Anglesey, Wales, Earth, the Universe etc. There is an essay here. That could also mean Category:Oprah Winfrey (media proprietor). Crouch, Swale (talk) 18:02, 30 August 2017 (UTC)

Commons Conference project

Hello Auntof6,

I'm writing you as one of the most active Commons users right now. Since a while now, the idea of a dedicated Commons conference has been floating around. But since the last Wikimania concrete steps have been taken to actually make it happen next year. If you're interested in participation or maybe willing to help organize the first ever Commons Conference, I invite you to check out the project page and leave your comments; or just show your support for the idea, by signing up.

Cheers,

--MB-one (talk) 19:49, 6 September 2017 (UTC)

New categories

Actually the new categories are not really empty. They're populated with sub-categories that are operated by templates, and unfortunately the templates take a little while to update themselves. If you wait a few days, the templates should all have updated, and from then onwards, the new categories will then be automatically populated, in some cases with quite a lot of sub-categories. Bahnfrend (talk) 13:43, 17 September 2017 (UTC)

overcategorization

Unless for technical limitations there is no such thing. Either a statement about an object is true or not. Its impratical (impossible) to gather (capture) all true statements about an object, so naturally we deal with a subset of them on commons. The purpose is to organize (and at the same time describe) media available. There is plenty of subjects to deal with and work on, so you may find your own. I welcome review of my work when done with some timely distance to the edits made. Jamming edits while things are in flux grabs my attention, yes, but not in a helpful way.

When dealing with a multi-dimensional (by a, by b, by c, -criteria e.g. makes three dimensions) categorization tree, leaves need to have more than one parent. E.g. if a green road bridge called grerobri is the only bridge that exists, a single category will suffice. To tell more bridges apart, one level of indirection might do (but more are not wrong):

• bridges by color: green bridges{ .. }
• bridges by function: road bridges{ .. }
• bridges by name: grerobri

The sets in subcats to by color and by function partition the set given in by name.

For a second (and on..) level of indirection, to deal with even more bridges (as is done on commons..) it continues like this:

• bridges by color: green bridges{ green bridges by name: grerobri, green bridges by function: green road bridges{ .. } }, red bridges{ .. }, ..
• bridges by function: road bridges{ road bridges by name: grerobri, road bridges by color: green road bridges{ .. } }, tube bridges{ .. }, ..
• bridges by name: grerobri

The partitioned sets get smaller with every (added) level of indirection: This is the one and only desired effect for the purpose of organizing large sets. For the describing aspect however, indirection may (in extreme cases) even continue if the size of the set has reached a single instance. This does not contradict or falsify the traditional concept of categories, see en:Categorization.

Inexperienced people on commons often claim that a category should not (let alone cannot) appear twice or more below its main category, neglecting the fact that most categories indeed have more than one main category: grerobri being a bridge is one point of view (one main cat), but another main cat is "colored objects" (there is no need to identify grerobri as a bridge to correctly categorize it to "green objects"). "Named things" can also serve as a main category, because grerobri may be assigned to completely different objects as well.

"Named things" for example, is silently assumed on commons for most categories that directly include instance names, albeit without the usage of a by name metacat. In the example with two indirections above

• green bridges by name
• road bridges by name
• bridges by name

metacats are used. If we did not focus on bridges for a moment, we can easily see that a main cat for the first may also be named colored objects, for the second named infrastructure objects, which in general ripples up to named things and not things being a bridge.

If by name metacat is wiped, it is harder to see that instance naming is simply one aspect (one dimension) of statements about an entity:

• bridges by color: green bridges{ grerobri, .. }, red bridges{ .. }, ..
• bridges by function: road bridges{ grerobri, .. }, tube bridges{ .. }, ..
• grerobri

.. and if some more metacat keys are wiped:

• green bridges{ grerobri, .. }
• red bridges{ .. }, ..
• road bridges{ grerobri, .. }
• tube bridges{ .. }, ..
• grerobri

OK, let's remove grerobri from the "main cat". Now its clear that grerobri is not a bridge name in its own right, correct? It's only so for green bridges or road bridges. What if I am colorblind and have never seen a car drive across grerobri? .. In this case I will neither navigate to green bridges nor road bridges (among tons of other cats). However, I've heard that the bridge is called grerobri. So what I'm looking for is a by name category (which is strictly assumed the top-level main cat if it does not exist).

This example transfers imho to a lot of other cases where an entity is not found at the expected metacat or combinations thereof. A road bridge is also a bridge in its own right; whether people know its being used as such or not does not really matter. --Cmuelle8 (talk) 00:37, 8 October 2017 (UTC)

Beechcraft aircraft by facing

Thanks for your alertness to retain the Template:MetaCat for this cat. Just so you know, on categories using Template:Mfr aircraft by facing, just simply use parameter 2 as 'meta' and it will include it automatically, so no need for a separate MetaCat inclusion. Josh (talk) 16:51, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

@Joshbaumgartner: Sounds good. Two questions:

• Why is there stray code showing on Category:Beechcraft aircraft by facing?
• Category:Beechcraft aircraft by facing has the (redlinked) category Category:Aircraft facing by manufacturer. It seems to me that "Aircraft facing by manufacturer" should contain cats like "Right-facing aircraft of <manufacturer name>", not "<manufacturer name> aircraft by facing". What do you think?

--Auntof6 (talk) 19:24, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

I've been doing a lot of tweaking on the template in question, and it seems one of my errors escaped. It's been since fixed. The category should show up cleanly now for you. Josh (talk) 19:32, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

@Joshbaumgartner: Category:Aermacchi aircraft facing right is showing up as a metacat, but it's not one. Could you take a look and see what's wrong? --Auntof6 (talk) 05:18, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

The template was working correctly, but on the category, needed to say 'face=r' instead of 'face=m'. Fixed. Josh (talk) 05:31, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

Category:Images by User:Christian Ferrer

It is a user category, mine, it groups photographs taken by me therefore it has his place inside Category:Photographs by Wikimedia Commons users, maybe the name is not the best however it is a user category and I chose the name I want. Please stop doing that, I'm not going to play this game a long time therefore it is the first and last warning. Christian Ferrer ^(talk) 17:20, 6 November 2017 (UTC)

Category:Old maps of county towns in England

I was surprised by this diff.

My intention with the {{CatCat}} template was that if a map image comes in of a county town which does not already have a category listed here, then a new category should be created for that town and the image put in it. The number of county towns is limited. Almost all already now have categories; so the number of further categories that will be needed (if any) is likely to be very limited.

In my view there should be no images left in this category itself. My understanding was that the template {{CatCat}} signals this. I'm therefore not clear why you removed it. Jheald (talk) 16:11, 15 November 2017 (UTC)

@Jheald: I removed it because the category is not named in a way that prohibits individual files. Cases like this are usually handled in one of the following ways:

• Instead if {{Catcat}}, use {{Categorise}}.
• Rename the category to something like "Old maps of England by county town" or "Old maps of county towns in England by name". Either of those would use {{Metacat}} but with different parameters.

By the way, I requested deletion of the two categories that are empty. It's not the practice to keep empty categories, even when they're part if a set like this. --Auntof6 (talk) 16:46, 15 November 2017 (UTC)

I am prepping an upload of 5000 maps and plans of England at all scales - see Work in progress page, and project development page. I would appreciate it if target categories were not deleted. Jheald (talk) 17:14, 15 November 2017 (UTC)

Then maybe you could either put one or two files in the empty categories so that they're not empty, or put a note on the categories saying when you expect them to be populated. --Auntof6 (talk) 17:18, 15 November 2017 (UTC)

Changed cat keys under Trams by setting

Before these edits of yours, these four subcats were neatly listed under the same heading (🛤) at Category:Trams by setting:

• Category:Trams on segregated tram tracks
• Category:Trams on ties-and-ballast rail tracks
• Category:Trams on dedicated lanes
• Category:Trams off track

This was done to keep these four subcats, which share a common topic, together for better use; the creation of an intermediate category, something like Category:Trams by setting concerning the type of track, was deemed needlessly cumbersome.

Now, after your change of the sorting keys, these four are scattered all over the place, interspersed among not specifically related subcats — helping nobody’s dissimination or browsing needs, accomplishing nothing but irrelevant alphasorting.

-- Tuválkin ✉ ✇ 00:50, 16 November 2017 (UTC)

I don't think we should be using images as sort keys. I don't see a problem with a subcat for these, but another option is another sort key such as an asterisk. --Auntof6 (talk) 01:37, 16 November 2017 (UTC)

• Thanks for your prompt reply. Two points:

• This "🛤" is as much as a character as this "*". If it is rendering in your browser as an image (as it is in mine, too) and you find it annoying (like I do), then fix your browser (as I’m trying to fix mine — I’ll let you know how it went). The difference is that "🛤" means "track" in its semantics (and not just in its glyph, like "#" or "⨳"), while an asterisk means a lot of stuff but none of it is "track". That’s why I chose it.
• There is an advantage in an intermediate category, though, as it can be categorized as a sibling of similar cats for other types of rail vehicles.

-- Tuválkin ✉ ✇ 03:54, 16 November 2017 (UTC)