How to clear a backlog

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Re: [WikiEN-l] How to clear a...

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theProject

11 Dec 2006 11 Dec '06

1:55 a.m.

I've spent the last week or two observing and trying to help out with the backlog on [[Category:Articles to be merged]]. Unfortunately, it looks like the backlog is rapidly spinning out of control -- I haven't actually kept track, but I have a sneaking suspicion that there are many more merge requests added than are serviced every day. Right now the backlog is a little under 10,000 articles, and I would like to see if we can't brainstorm a new way to deal with backlogs, because our current methods aren't dealing with our worst backlogs. (Our worst backlogs, ironically but expectedly, are the ones users are least likely to start tackling.) I was just thinking about the math, however: if 100 Wikipedians volunteered to service one merge request per day, or 50 Wikipedians volunteered to service an average of two per day, etc., we might make significant headway into the backlog in three month's time. Of course, there would be new articles to be merged, but ... ... anyway, it might not even involve actually performing the merge. A lot of old merge requests are merges that have not gained consensus and should just be removed. Also, since a merge request typically entails two merge templates, it's likely we have "only" somewhere on the order of 6000~7000 actual requests. So if 100 Wikipedians, every day for a few months: 1) evaluate one merge request 2) check if the merge has consensus (or use their own discretions) 3) perform the merge Maybe we'll make some progress clearing the backlog. (In fact, item #3 might be as simple as copy and pasting and slapping {{cleanup}} on it to have it checked over for redundancy and style, but of course, we'd have an even bigger cleanup backlog then. :-) ) Any thoughts? -- theProject

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Steve Bennett

11 Dec 11 Dec

3:34 a.m.

On 12/11/06, theProject <wp.theproject(a)gmail.com> wrote:

...

... anyway, it might not even involve actually performing the merge. A lot of old merge requests are merges that have not gained consensus and should just be removed. Also, since a merge request typically entails two merge templates, it's likely we have "only" somewhere on the order of 6000~7000 actual requests. So if 100 Wikipedians, every day for a few months:

It's a problem that the same template (merge, mergefrom, mergeto, mergewith...) is used to mean: a) Maybe these articles should be merged? What do you think? b) I think these articles should be merged. If no one objects, I'm going to do it. c) We all think these articles should be merged. Does anyone have time to do it? Maybe explicit "merge-todo" templates would be useful, to indicate that the work should be done, by anyone who feels up to it. Or alternatively, using "merge-proposal" templates to indicate that a discussion needs to be had. IMHO, a big merge backlog is not necessarily a huge problem. At least contributors will be aware of the existence of the other article and will hopefully not be adding duplicate information, even if they have to fairly arbitrarily decide which article to contribute to. Steve

Angela

4:41 a.m.

On 12/11/06, Steve Bennett <stevagewp(a)gmail.com> wrote:

...

a) Maybe these articles should be merged? What do you think? b) I think these articles should be merged. If no one objects, I'm going to do it. c) We all think these articles should be merged. Does anyone have time to do it?

d) I don't see any reason for a merge but "merge and redirect" was the outcome of an AfD so I'd better chuck a {{merge}} template on it. Articles listed for reason (d) are rather likely to stay in the backlog since they're on articles no one cares about which only narrowly survived deletion. Before those templates existed, people could [[WP:BB]] and redirect the page, but now it seems more common to use a template than to "fix" the problem. I don't know if this is a policy/guideline issue with people being obligated to add {{merge}} before doing so or just a cultural change where many editors no longer feel confident to "be bold in updating pages". http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Be_bold_in_updating_pages says "If in doubt, fix it", not "If in doubt, chuck on a template." Angela

Ilmari Karonen

3:20 p.m.

Angela wrote:

...

More likely just laziness and/or lack of time on behalf of the closing admins. Some merges can be non-trivial, and determining whether a given merge is trivial or not can itself take time. If you're already busy clearing a backlog of AfD closures, the temptation to just slap a merge tag on it and move on can be great. The positive side here is that, since it's mostly an issue with admin behavior rather than that of random editors, it can be solved by coming up with a new recommended procedure and communicating it the admins doing the closures (via [[WP:AN]], this list, personal talk pages etc). The negative side is that any viable solution needs to ensure it doesn't just turn the merge backlog into an even bigger AfD closure backlog. Some possible solutions I can think of off the top of my head include: a) Advise admins to always perform the merge when closing, if at all possible. This could mean just cut-and-pasting the text and slapping a cleanup tag on it, but at least the merge itself would get done. b) Suggest that busy admins just redirect the page to be merged and put a notice on the talk page of the target page with a link to the text to be merged. We could even make a special template for this. This will only take care of one half of "merge and redirect", but half done is better than nothing at all. c) Make a new "afdmerge" template (or templates), for use in cases where the decision to merge has already been reached on AfD. This template would state that consensus has already been reached and would strongly recommend that anyone having the time to carry out the merge go ahead and do it. None of these are, of course, mutually exclusive. If anyone can suggest other possible approaches, please do. -- Ilmari Karonen

Guettarda

5:48 p.m.

On 12/11/06, Ilmari Karonen <nospam(a)vyznev.net> wrote:

...

<snip> a) Advise admins to always perform the merge when closing, if at all possible. This could mean just cut-and-pasting the text and slapping a cleanup tag on it, but at least the merge itself would get done.

No, this is unacceptable - a text dump, even from another article, is horrible, borderline vandalism. Have you ever seen the results of something like that? Article quality is more important than making AfD closings easy and mechanical. If anything, the onus should be on the people voting merge... the closing admin could drop a note to the people voting "merge" (after all, these people should know enough about the topic to carry out the merge). b) Suggest that busy admins just redirect the page to be merged and put

...

a notice on the talk page of the target page with a link to the text to be merged. We could even make a special template for this. This will only take care of one half of "merge and redirect", but half done is better than nothing at all. c) Make a new "afdmerge" template (or templates), for use in cases where the decision to merge has already been reached on AfD. This template would state that consensus has already been reached and would strongly recommend that anyone having the time to carry out the merge go ahead and do it. None of these are, of course, mutually exclusive. If anyone can suggest other possible approaches, please do. -- Ilmari Karonen _______________________________________________ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l(a)Wikipedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l

theProject

6 p.m.

On 12/11/06, Guettarda <guettarda(a)gmail.com> wrote:

...

On 12/11/06, Ilmari Karonen <nospam(a)vyznev.net> wrote:

_______________________________________________ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l(a)Wikipedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l

Well, I disagree that it's borderline vandalism, because it's at least half of a merge, even if merging does bring an article's quality down before bringing it back up. I see there are a lot of ideas for how to prevent future backlogs, but I was also hoping to encourage discussion as to how we can deal with the backlogs (all of the large ones) we've got right now. -- theProject

Guettarda

6:03 p.m.

On 12/11/06, theProject <wp.theproject(a)gmail.com> wrote:

...

On 12/11/06, Guettarda <guettarda(a)gmail.com> wrote:

On 12/11/06, Ilmari Karonen <nospam(a)vyznev.net> wrote: > > <snip> > a) Advise admins to always perform the merge when closing, if at all > possible. This could mean just cut-and-pasting the text and slapping

cleanup tag on it, but at least the merge itself would get done.

"merge"

(after all, these people should know enough about the topic to carry out the merge). b) Suggest that busy admins just redirect the page to be merged and put > a notice on the talk page of the target page with a link to the text

> be merged. We could even make a special template for this. This will > only take care of one half of "merge and redirect", but half done is > better than nothing at all. > > c) Make a new "afdmerge" template (or templates), for use in cases

where

> the decision to merge has already been reached on AfD. This template > would state that consensus has already been reached and would strongly > recommend that anyone having the time to carry out the merge go ahead > and do it. > > None of these are, of course, mutually exclusive. If anyone can

suggest

other possible approaches, please do. -- Ilmari Karonen _______________________________________________ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l(a)Wikipedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l

_______________________________________________ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l(a)Wikipedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l

Well, I disagree that it's borderline vandalism, because it's at least half of a merge, even if merging does bring an article's quality down before bringing it back up.

That's silly - blanking a page is half of a total re-write, but justblanking a page is still seen as vandalism (even if the person uses an edit summary saying "blanking to make way for a re-write" and then doesn't re-write the page) I see there are a lot of ideas for how to prevent future backlogs, but I was

...

also hoping to encourage discussion as to how we can deal with the backlogs (all of the large ones) we've got right now. -- theProject _______________________________________________ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l(a)Wikipedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l

Utkarshraj Atmaram

3:45 a.m.

On 12/11/06, theProject <wp.theproject(a)gmail.com> wrote:

...

Unlike wikification and other such tasks, in most cases, a merge is best done by somebody who has little knowledge about the subject. I do hunt out the articles to be merged that I know something about. Right now, many people who put the [[Template:Merge]] or [[Template:Mergeto]] don't use [[Template:Mergefrom]]. This is one of the main reasons behind the backlog. The article to be merged is usually an orphaned or little known about article. On the other hand, the article that is to receive the merged material is usually on many watchlists. If [[Template:Mergefrom]] is used, many editors will notice it and help with the merge. -- Utkarshraj Atmaram http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Utcursch

Tim Starling

4:32 a.m.

Utkarshraj Atmaram wrote:

...

On 12/11/06, theProject <wp.theproject(a)gmail.com> wrote:

You want to ugly up major articles with "merge from" templates for obscure orphans? Why? You won't get things done even by having todo templates fly across every article on the site in flashing red reindeer-shaped boxes. Merging does not need to be centralised, it's a simple task which can be done by any interested editor. Like every other editorial task, it can be organised from the wikiprojects, perhaps with a rotation of requests on a wiki-wide forum like the community portal. -- Tim Starling

theProject

4:53 a.m.

On 12/10/06, Tim Starling <tstarling(a)wikimedia.org> wrote:

...

Utkarshraj Atmaram wrote:

On 12/11/06, theProject <wp.theproject(a)gmail.com> wrote: > I've spent the last week or two observing and trying to help out with

the

> backlog on [[Category:Articles to be merged]]. Unfortunately, it looks

> the backlog is rapidly spinning out of control -- I haven't actually

kept

> track, but I have a sneaking suspicion that there are many more merge > requests added than are serviced every day. Right now the backlog is a > little under 10,000 articles, and I would like to see if we can't

brainstorm

> a new way to deal with backlogs, because our current methods aren't

dealing

> with our worst backlogs. (Our worst backlogs, ironically but

expectedly, are

the ones users are least likely to start tackling.)

Unlike wikification and other such tasks, in most cases, a merge is best

done by

somebody who has little knowledge about the subject. I do hunt out the

articles

to be merged that I know something about. Right now, many people who put the [[Template:Merge]] or

[[Template:Mergeto]]

don't use [[Template:Mergefrom]]. This is one of the main reasons behind

the

backlog. The article to be merged is usually an orphaned or little known about article. On the other hand, the article that is to receive the merged material is

usually on

many watchlists. If [[Template:Mergefrom]] is used, many editors will

notice

it and help with the merge.

That's what I'm suggesting, I suppose -- I'm just wondering if the idea would work. Err, did I suggest it in the wrong place? -- theProject

phoebe ayers

5:27 a.m.

On 12/10/06, Tim Starling <tstarling(a)wikimedia.org> wrote:

...

The merge category has kept track of how many articles have been in it over time, though the numbers aren't up to date. The last time there was a (recorded) maintenance collaboration of the week for merges, a year ago, the number of articles to be merged only fell by 160 or so. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category_talk:Articles_to_be_merged Hey, at that rate, it'll only take 62 weeks to clean up the category, assuming nothing else gets added to it of course. As Utkarshraj said, subject knowledge is helpful for merging (which shouldn't be a simple redirect, if there's anything of substance to the article), which makes this task slightly more difficult for an editor without that subject knowledge (this has less to do with the text itself, I've found, and more to do with questions of whether thing A is really the same as thing B, and does thing A deserve its own article. Merge tags often get placed on an article without any accompanying helpful commentary). Placing complimentary 'mergeto' tags on the major article in question simply means that more people who work in that subject are likely to see it & do something about it, which doesn't seem too problematic to me. Of course, merging is small potatoes compared to the backlogs in some other major cleanup categories, like factchecking and cleanup itself (not least because particularly poor articles tend to get placed in multiple categories). -- phoebe

Utkarshraj Atmaram

9:24 a.m.

On 12/11/06, Tim Starling <tstarling(a)wikimedia.org> wrote:

...

You want to ugly up major articles with "merge from" templates for obscure orphans?

Probably a better option would be to put the [[Template:Mergefrom]] on the talk pages. -- Utkarshraj Atmaram http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Utcursch

Ilmari Karonen

2:40 p.m.

Utkarshraj Atmaram wrote:

...

On 12/11/06, Tim Starling <tstarling(a)wikimedia.org> wrote:

You want to ugly up major articles with "merge from" templates for obscure orphans?

Probably a better option would be to put the [[Template:Mergefrom]] on the talk pages.

Yes, this would probably be the solution to this problem. The people we want to reach with that template will notice them on talk pages, but they won't annoy casual readers there. -- Ilmari Karonen

Alphax (Wikipedia email)

5:32 a.m.

Utkarshraj Atmaram wrote: <snip>

...

The article to be merged is usually an orphaned or little known about article. On the other hand, the article that is to receive the merged material is usually on many watchlists. If [[Template:Mergefrom]] is used, many editors will notice it and help with the merge.

You assume that people actually check their watchlists. This would be a whole lot easier if enotif was enabled... -- Alphax - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Alphax Contributor to Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia "We make the internet not suck" - Jimbo Wales Public key: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Alphax/OpenPGP

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13 comments

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participants (9)

Alphax (Wikipedia email)
Angela
Guettarda
Ilmari Karonen
phoebe ayers
Steve Bennett
theProject
Tim Starling
Utkarshraj Atmaram