[Wikimedia-in-en] GA master class - Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi #2

[Ashwin Baindur]

In #1 we saw how to reconnoitre and plan for a campaign to take an article
and make it GA. A few years ago this process was easy but now unconsciously
standards have risen and a fart of GAs are being derecognised, one of the
important reasons for which is content and referencing issues. Gandhi,
despite having been a former GA, will require serious amount of work to be
restored to that status.

Our article "Gandhi" requires a major rewrite and is not the most suitable
action to plunge editors new to the review process in.

Rather than that, let us take up the issue of Referencing, which is part
cleanup and partly related to content and which can be tackled without too
much of our work being undone in the rewrite.

Referencing involves a number of things.


   1. Each fact needing reference should either have a reference or a
   {{cn}} tag placed.
   2. Each reference needs to be checked against [[WP:RS]] (reliable
   sources) and if necessary deleted or replaced with better. If no ref can be
   found a {{cn}} tag be placed. Ultimately taged facts where references could
   not be found need to be deleted.
   3. The content on the article pertaining to the reference needs to be
   checked -
      1. Material written in the article is actually in the cited reference.
      2. The material written in the article is an NPOV representation of
      the cited material in the reference.
   4. Each reference needs to be converted to a complete cite templated
   reference with adequate details available in the reference.

Some preliminary reading is recommended and definitely required for newbies
or those who have not read the page before:

   - [[WP:REFBEGIN]]
   - [[WP:CITE]]
   - [[WP:RS]]

After this, we need to learn about cite templates. These are fill in the
blank forms for use. I keep them in a text file and copy them for use and
fill in. Preformatted as references, they are:

<ref name="">{{cite book |title= |last= |first= |authorlink= |coauthors=
|year= |publisher= |location= |isbn= |page= |pages= |url= |accessdate=9
January 2012}}</ref>

<ref name="">{{cite web |url= |title= |author= |date= |work= |publisher=
|accessdate=9 January 2012}}</ref>

<ref name="">{{cite journal |last1= |first1= |last2= |first2= |year=
|title= |journal= |publisher= |volume= |issue= |pages= |url= |doi=
|accessdate=9 January 2012}}</ref>

<ref name="">{{cite news |title= |author= |url= |newspaper= |date=
|accessdate=9 January 2012}}</ref>

Ideally look in Google Books for a citation especially one with
preview/full view. Once found, the url of the Google Book url can be loaded
into RefTag (url:http://reftag.appspot.com/) & lo & behold it will create a
preformatted citation for you. Its that simple.

For example, if we wanted to act a fact on Gandhi's assassination, to show
culpability of Nehru and his fellow politicians in creating the
circumstances leading to it, the follwing would be a very good link:

http://books.google.co.in/books?id=30e_maQ2vYQC&pg=PA58&dq=gandhi%27s+assassination&hl=en&sa=X&ei=hoIMT4bsLM6srAeUhuHKBA&ved=0CFoQuwUwBw#v=onepage&q=gandhi%27s%20assassination&f=false

If I load this url into the Google Books URL box for RefTag, I get the
following url:

http://reftag.appspot.com/?book_url=http%3A%2F%2Fbooks.google.co.in%2Fbooks%3Fid%3D30e_maQ2vYQC%26pg%3DPA58%26dq%3Dgandhi%2527s%2Bassassination%26hl%3Den%26sa%3DX%26ei%3DhoIMT4bsLM6srAeUhuHKBA%26ved%3D0CFoQuwUwBw%23v%3Donepage%26q%3Dgandhi%2527s%2520assassination%26f%3Dfalse&dateformat=dmy

which gives me the following Wikicode for a citation:

<ref name="Markovits2006">{{cite book|author=Claude
Markovits|title=Un-Gandhian Gandhi|url=
http://books.google.com/books?id=30e_maQ2vYQC&pg=PA58|accessdate=10 January
2012|date=1 January 2006|publisher=Permanent
Black|isbn=978-81-7824-155-5|pages=58–}}</ref>

which, when used in an article, will result in the following citation:

*^<http://reftag.appspot.com/?book_url=http%3A%2F%2Fbooks.google.co.in%2Fbooks%3Fid%3D30e_maQ2vYQC%26pg%3DPA58%26dq%3Dgandhi%2527s%2Bassassination%26hl%3Den%26sa%3DX%26ei%3DhoIMT4bsLM6srAeUhuHKBA%26ved%3D0CFoQuwUwBw%23v%3Donepage%26q%3Dgandhi%2527s%2520assassination%26f%3Dfalse&dateformat=dmy#cite_ref-Markovits2006_0-0>
* Claude Markovits (1 January 2006). *Un-Gandhian
Gandhi*<http://books.google.com/books?id=30e_maQ2vYQC&pg=PA58>.
Permanent Black. pp. 58–.
ISBN<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Standard_Book_Number>
 978-81-7824-155-5<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:BookSources/978-81-7824-155-5>.
Retrieved 10 January 2012.

COMBINED TASK for us all - To check each citation carefully and expand
it/delete it/correct it as required.

Warm regards,

Ashwin Baindur
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