[Wikipedia-l] Enhanced search for local language clusters? (Was:: Request ...

[Olve Utne]

Hello,
A user on no: (I don't know whether he is active here on wikipedia-l or 
not, since he is only known through his pseudonym) has pointed out two main 
problems with starting to use nb: rather than no: for the mainly nb (i.e., 
Norsk Bokmål/Riksmål(/samnorsk)) wikipedia:

1) The interwiki links to articles on no: might not work anymore.
2) The search engine hits through Google and Yahoo might not work anymore.

Both Andre's and Mark's suggestions seem to take care of this problem.

I have another question, though:

Is it -- as yet -- possible to configure a Wiipedia in such a way that one 
can use the general search box so search in more than one language version? 
In other words: Could the parameters for the Scandinavian wikipedias 
(no-nn-sv-da) be set so that hits from all four wikipedias show up when 
clicking the "search" link? And, even better, can this be done for the 
"Search" function only, thus giving only a local hit when searching for a 
term using the "Go" button IF there is a local page with that name?

Hypothetical examples:

1) In da:, you enter "København" and click "Gå til" (Go). You get the 
Danish page "København".
2) In da:, you enter "København" and click "Søg" (Search). You get a list 
of hits, with the da: and no: articles and the Swedish København redirect 
to Köpenhamn. You do not yet get a nn: hit, since that article is not yet 
created. Alternatively (or additionally), you get the Swedish "Köpenhamn" 
page directly because of the interwiki links to "da:København" and 
"no:København".
3) In da:, you enter "Gamvik" in the search box and hit "Søg" (Search). You 
get, hypothetically, the no: and the nn: hit, since there is no da: page 
with this name.
4) In nn: you enter "København" and click "Gå" (Go). Since there is no page 
with that name yet in this still quite new Wikipedia, it defaults to a 
Scandinavian search and comes up with the no:, da: and sv: pages on top of 
the search result page. You also, obviously, get the usual question whether 
you want to create a "København" page in Nynorsk.

This option should probably be set as default. It should also be possible 
for logged-in users to unselect this option.

This would be a great enhancement; it would be a way of for all four (as 
yet) Scandinavian-language wikipedias to effectively provide more 
comprehensive contents, for the benefit of all its users; — and it 
would be a great incitement for each of the four groups to write lots of 
articles to make sure that there is an article for a direct hit in their 
own language as often as possible.

Other similar language clusters, like Serbian/Croatian/Bosnian (with some 
tweaking of the Alphabet issue), Czech/Slovak, 
Bulgarian/Macedonian(/Serbian), Finnish/Estonian, German/Plattdüütsch/etc., 
and maybe Faeroese/Icelandic (or the latter could join the Scandinavian 
cluster for this purpose if they so desire), may also benefit from such a 
solution.

Regardless of whether no: stays or moves to / gets joined by nb:, I think 
this would be a solution to consider for the best of all four Scandinavian 
language groups.

Best regards,

Olve


___________________

Olve Utne
http://utne.nvg.org