[WikiEN-l] Slipping quality as Wikipedia gets bigger (formerlyCan you trust Wikipedia?)

[Magnus Manske]

Neil Harris wrote:

>
> Perhaps the rating code could be turned on only for admins, or users
> with usernames beginning with 'E' to 'J', or only during non-busy
> hours... or automatically turned off if load rises over a pre-set limit?
>
> Or perhaps just turned on for a few hours one weekend, to see what the
> effect on load really is?

Jimbo's plan calls for everyone being able to rate, including
not-logged-in users. This will be for test purposes only; the ratings
from the test phase will be deleted again, once the statistics people
got their hands on it and can hopefully tell us how to fine-tune the
rating process.

The "performance hog myth" dates back to the very first version. I have
worked on the problematic parts and IMHO they should be good. I can't be
certain without real testing, though. However, I doubt it will degrade
performance in the initial phase; if there's a problem, it will most
likely show once there are at least a few hundred thousand ratings.
There will be many write/delete queries on the table, which might lead
to table locks; this might be countered with low priority queries, though.

Magnus