First, let me say that the idea of a printed version of Wikipedia is *GREAT*
I'd like to make a modest logistical proposal for the print edition. I think that each article, in addition to having an associated talk page, should have an associated "Wikipedia 1.0" page - a page containing a print-encyclopedia worthy summary. This is important, because a printed encyclopedia should contain no web links, or internal links, but we don't want to remove them from our articles either. Some longer articles need to be shortened for the print version as well. I think this is the most workable way to do it.
--Mark Pellegrini User: Raul654
mapellegrini@comcast.net wrote:
First, let me say that the idea of a printed version of Wikipedia is *GREAT*
I'd like to make a modest logistical proposal for the print edition. I think that each article, in addition to having an associated talk page, should have an associated "Wikipedia 1.0" page - a page containing a print-encyclopedia worthy summary. This is important, because a printed encyclopedia should contain no web links, or internal links, but we don't want to remove them from our articles either. Some longer articles need to be shortened for the print version as well. I think this is the most workable way to do it.
This is an important point I'd been meaning to bring up: if at all possible, it'd be nice if people would avoid doing things like non-obvious piped links, where knowledge of the fact that a particular word is linked is necessary for the sentence to make sense, as these translate very badly to print, and usually would have to be reworded. Plus it's actually easier to read on the internet too if you don't have to mouseover the link to find out what exactly is meant by an oddly-used term. Things like "more details are available [[Another article|elsewhere]]." are the most obvious cases (reword to "see ''[[another article]]'' for more details), but there are plenty of others as well.
-Mark
Delirium wrote:
This is an important point I'd been meaning to bring up: if at all possible, it'd be nice if people would avoid doing things like non-obvious piped links, where knowledge of the fact that a particular word is linked is necessary for the sentence to make sense, as these translate very badly to print, and usually would have to be reworded.
Oh whee! Makes me feel that I've done a useful contribution by removing those links and (in some cases) rewording the sentence. :-)
I call these things "surprise links" because a user clicking on X but being taken to Y will be surprised at first. Another kind of link is one whose link text is "this one" or "click here"; I haven't quite found a derogatory enough name for those ;-)
Timwi
mapellegrini@comcast.net wrote:
First, let me say that the idea of a printed version of Wikipedia is *GREAT*
I'd like to make a modest logistical proposal for the print edition. I think that each article, in addition to having an associated talk page, should have an associated "Wikipedia 1.0" page - a page containing a print-encyclopedia worthy summary. This is important, because a printed encyclopedia should contain no web links, or internal links, but we don't want to remove them from our articles either. Some longer articles need to be shortened for the print version as well. I think this is the most workable way to do it.
How about a "printable" (or "print") namespace? Or "brief"?
Important functions for this: * For the "print:" version, show number of (normal/minor) edits of the "big" article and the time passed since the last edit of the print version. This will help keeping the printable version up-to-date with information on the "real" page. * Some mechanism to lock the page when the deadline approaches. This could be a page protection after at least two approvals. * Links in "print:" should automagically link to the "print:" versions instead of the ":" namespace. That way, it would be easy to see what's missing (broken link).
A list of articles to include could start as a list of existing articles, sorted by "how many articles link here" (":" namespace only).
Magnus