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I think this article is good enough now to be a FA. I have taken the liberty of nominating Velociraptor at [[Wikipedia:Featured article candidates]]. I hope you'll come & support it. [[User:Spawn Man|Spawn Man]] 00:10, 22 June 2006 (UTC) |
I think this article is good enough now to be a FA. I have taken the liberty of nominating Velociraptor at [[Wikipedia:Featured article candidates]]. I hope you'll come & support it. [[User:Spawn Man|Spawn Man]] 00:10, 22 June 2006 (UTC) |
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::I believe we are supposed to wait, per FA nomination guidelines, for the last one to finish up before we do a new one. However, I have to admire your enthusiasm.--<font color="#999fff">[[User:Firsfron|Firsfron of Ronchester]]</font> 00:16, 22 June 2006 (UTC) |
Revision as of 00:16, 22 June 2006
Archives
- Archive #1 - Opening discussions, reactivating the Project & disputes about stubs.
- Archive #2 - Discussions about categories, classification, free journal articles, nomina dubia, and images.
- Archive #3 - Discussions about nomenclature, outside collaborations, and the Pal(a)eosaurus mess.
Species of Psittacosaurus
Hello Project,
I am currently in the midst of rewriting the Psittacosaurus article, which is getting quite long as there is a lot known about this dinosaur. The main part that is taking up space is the listing (and description) of all 15 or so species (of which maybe 9 are valid). To cut down on the article size I have split that section off into a separate page (Species of Psittacosaurus), with a link to be provided on the main article when I finish it. This is not usual practice, I understand, but I think Psittacosaurus is a special case as it has the most valid species of any known dinosaur, by far. Please leave comments and/or criticism here or on the talk page of either article. Thank you! Sheep81 22:20, 22 May 2006 (UTC)
- Hmmm... You were definitely "thinking outside the box"... One major problem i see is that Psittacosaurus is one of the dinosaurs slated for the Wikipedia CD. If the page is split up, that will end up meaning most of the article is no longer on the CD.
- My suggestion is to either:
- a) delete the info on Hongshanosaurus (which already has its own article anyway), and just provide a link to that page, or
- b) start a page on the Psittacosauridae, where the Hongshanosaurus stuff can be moved, along with all of the general info on Psittacosaururidae "(Morphology)".
- Either of these options would clear up a fair amount of space for Psittacosaurus, and there would be no need to split the article up at all.
- The new info looks really great, but I worry it won't really even be seen on a seperate page like that. And moving out Hongshano only makes sense... JMO.--Firsfron 22:45, 22 May 2006 (UTC)
- I wrote the Hongshanosaurus article last night. I am still(!) writing the Psittacosaurus article currently... in fact I just updated it. Hongshanosaurus is no longer even mentioned (although it will be, briefly). I still need to add sections on classification, provenance and paleoecology, and add external links and more references, which will make the article quite long as it is. The species list I wrote on the separate page will almost definitely be longer than the rest of the article put together though. The main article has an abbreviated species list in the text of the article and the taxobox, which would probably be sufficient for the CD, I think. The separate article is now linked from the main article so it shouldn't be hard for people to get to it if they are so inclined. Does this address your concerns? If not, please elaborate so that I can either a) explain, or b) see your point and merge the two articles. Sheep81 22:58, 22 May 2006 (UTC)
- P.S. - I updated the main article even though I had not finished it to prevent the possible merging of my species article (the link on the main article should make the situation more clear). I checked before updating to make sure I was not removing any information in the meantime. Sorry if this ruffles feathers. Back to work! Sheep81 23:01, 22 May 2006 (UTC)
- I'm not sure whose feathers you'd be ruffling, since I think it's mostly just the three of us these days. I've nominated the article for Featured.--Firsfron 03:15, 23 May 2006 (UTC)
- Whoa. See what happens, I guess! BTW, there are more than 3 of us editing, it's just that you, me, and Dinoguy are the only three blabbing on this talk page on a regular basis. Sheep81 03:18, 23 May 2006 (UTC)
- I've seen a feweditors... I've got about 800 dinosaur pages on my watchlist, and aside from a few vandals, I can count the serious dinosaur editors on one hand. We do babble a lot here, but with GreyGirl and Agentsoo recently silent, there are not many others around.--Firsfron 03:26, 23 May 2006 (UTC)
- Whoa. See what happens, I guess! BTW, there are more than 3 of us editing, it's just that you, me, and Dinoguy are the only three blabbing on this talk page on a regular basis. Sheep81 03:18, 23 May 2006 (UTC)
- I'm not sure whose feathers you'd be ruffling, since I think it's mostly just the three of us these days. I've nominated the article for Featured.--Firsfron 03:15, 23 May 2006 (UTC)
- I don't see any real problem with a lengthy article for Psittacosaurus, as long as it's well written, good info, etc. etc. I think it's great that we're having this discussion in the first place... how many dinosaur articles can you say might be getting too long? I think we're just too used to stub-length entries. That said... now that I actually look at the species article, this might be the right way to go. Maybe a bit of elaboration for some of the most well-known species or most notable specimens could be copied onto the main page. In fact, as some of those species have as much info as your average genus article, we could make an exception and have a few separate species pages for these guys.Dinoguy2 23:11, 22 May 2006 (UTC)
- Well I finished the Psittacosaurus article (finally). Go look how long it is and why I thought it was necessary to move the species descriptions out (still up for debate, of course). If someone wants to add more information about the species on the main article, be my guest. Perhaps someone can rig up a chart like at Capra (genus) even. Look at the ridiculous References section... nobody will ever say I don't cite my sources. Heh. Sheep81 02:47, 23 May 2006 (UTC)
- I don't see any real problem with a lengthy article for Psittacosaurus, as long as it's well written, good info, etc. etc. I think it's great that we're having this discussion in the first place... how many dinosaur articles can you say might be getting too long? I think we're just too used to stub-length entries. That said... now that I actually look at the species article, this might be the right way to go. Maybe a bit of elaboration for some of the most well-known species or most notable specimens could be copied onto the main page. In fact, as some of those species have as much info as your average genus article, we could make an exception and have a few separate species pages for these guys.Dinoguy2 23:11, 22 May 2006 (UTC)
Well, even though there are only two objects so far, I think we are pretty close. Looks like we'll be converting the article to footnotes if we want to achieve the consensus we need, I'll work on that. Otherwise there doesn't appear to be any major complaints about the article itself, at least not so far. Sheep81 07:41, 23 May 2006 (UTC)
- We shall see. I apologise, I suppose: I should probably have warned you before nominating. It's possible some of these constructive criticisms will be pretty scathing... A little late now, I realize. Just gird yourself for anything, Sheep: useful stuff or really baffling comments... Try to not take any comment personally. --Firsfron 07:52, 23 May 2006 (UTC)
- No prob. My policy for this (and for the Ankylosaurus peer review) is just to say thank you every time, no matter what they say. The footnotes may actually be better for the average reader who might not be familiar with Harvard referencing (which I personally prefer). I just need to figure out how to do it. Sheep81 09:26, 23 May 2006 (UTC)
- We shall see. I apologise, I suppose: I should probably have warned you before nominating. It's possible some of these constructive criticisms will be pretty scathing... A little late now, I realize. Just gird yourself for anything, Sheep: useful stuff or really baffling comments... Try to not take any comment personally. --Firsfron 07:52, 23 May 2006 (UTC)
- I'm not sure what was wrong with the Harvard refs, as they're acceptable per WP policy, but whatever. If you look at the List of Dinosaurs page, under Tenchisaurus, you'll see a footnote ref. You can use this as a basis.--Firsfron 15:00, 23 May 2006 (UTC)
- The notes and refs section on Dinosaur also uses footnotes. It's an FA, so I assume this format would be a good template for Psittacosaurus.Dinoguy2 15:35, 23 May 2006 (UTC)
- The comments on the article have been really contructive so far, and if you read the article now, it is already so much better than it was even 24 hours ago. I still plan on converting to footnotes some time over the next few hours, although I have to go right now. Someone else can do it if they have the initiative, otherwise I will get it when I return. Sheep81 01:41, 24 May 2006 (UTC)
Hi (to Sheep et al) – latecomer on this one – I apologise as I’ve been watching other bits of Wikipedia more closely and had not realised the extent of work being put in on this excellent article. Rather than making edits, as it’s reached such a mature stage, I thought I’d propose my edits here, for agreement. Judging from the activity level of this correspondence, I doubt my proposed contribution will be overlooked! Pardon the length of this message, as it includes both original text and proposed text.
- Firstly, I would be concerned ref. the picture – I have no suitable substitute but I feel that this one, in present form, is not an asset to the article. The head (very important feature) is not at all clear, on my screen at least, and the creature was supposed to be bipedal (at least for the most part). [Sheep says: I have the same thoughts about the picture and I hope to get another one soon. But for now it is the only one available. However, the artist does have other pictures (there is one linked in the "External Links" section). If someone wanted to help out, you could email the artist and ask if we can use that one instead, as it is more clear.]
- I would change the enormous Triceratops. to: the 5.5 tonne Triceratops. to be more 'encyclopaedic' in language (however, does it need to have any size info/comment here – does it help?). [Sheep: I don't know that "enormous" is that un-encyclop(a)edic, but if you have a better (perhaps less sensational) word, feel free to change it. I don't know if adding a specific stat would be good as there are no other statistics in the lead paragraphs and it would be odd if the first one we added was for a different animal.]
- I then get into ‘comma pedantry’: Psittacosaurus is not as familiar to the general public as its distant relative, Triceratops, but it is one of the most completely known dinosaur genera. Change to: Psittacosaurus is not as familiar to the general public as its distant relative, Triceratops but it is one of the most completely known dinosaur genera.
- I would change: The generic name is composed of the Greek words ψιττακος (psittakos; "parrot") and σαυρος (sauros; "lizard"), suggested by the superficially parrot-like beak of these animals. to The generic name is composed of the Greek words ψιττακος (psittakos; "parrot"), suggested by the superficially parrot-like beak of these animals and σαυρος (sauros; "lizard"). [Sheep: Hmmm... in my opinion it looks better if the Greek words are closer together, but you are right, it may not be as clear as it could be. I think I will add something like "and their reptilian nature" to the end of the sentence maybe.]
- With a very high sample size, the diversity of Psittacosaurus can be analyzed more completely than most dinosaur genera, to With a very high sample size, the diversity of Psittacosaurus can be analyzed more completely than that of most dinosaur genera, [Sheep: Right, I should have added that in the first place.]
- Would 'digit(s)' be preferable to 'finger(s)' wherever the reference to fingers occurs? [Sheep: As long as it is clear which foot we are talking about (fore or hind), you are probably right.
- an opening in the skull between the eyes socket and nostril, was lost during the evolution of Psittacosauridae, but is still found in most other ceratopsians, and in fact most other archosaurs. to an opening in the skull between the eye socket and nostril, was lost during the evolution of Psittacosauridae but is still found in most other ceratopsians and in fact most other archosaurs. (i.e. remove two commas and 'eyes' to 'eye').
- More comma pedantry: While Psittacosaurus is known from dozens of fossil specimens, most other dinosaur species are known from far fewer, and many are represented by only a single specimen. to While Psittacosaurus is known from dozens of fossil specimens, most other dinosaur species are known from far fewer and many are represented by only a single specimen.
- The integument, or body covering, of Psittacosaurus is known from a Chinese specimen which most likely comes from the Yixian Formation of Liaoning. to The integument, or body covering, of Psittacosaurus is known from a Chinese specimen, which most likely comes from the Yixian Formation of Liaoning. (comma).
- was illegally exported from China, in violation of Chinese law, but was purchased by a German museum and arrangements are being made to was illegally exported from China, in violation of Chinese law but was purchased by a German museum and arrangements are being made (comma again).
- I would suggest a more specific technical word here: ...long, were also preserved, arranged in a row down the upper surface of the tail to ... long, were also preserved, arranged in a row down the dorsal surface of the tail. [Sheep: I would prefer to use "dorsal" too, as that is the correct word for it, and I actually had that word in their first, but I wondered if most people reading the article wiould immediately understand that, and articles are not supposed to use jargon without explaining it first. I could provide a link to the dorsal article, maybe something like "the dorsal (upper) surface"... good thought.]
- As the structures are only found in a single row on the tail, it is unlikely that they were used for thermoregulation, but they may have been useful for communication through some sort of display to As the structures are only found in a single row on the tail, it is unlikely that they were used for thermoregulation but they may have been useful for communication through some sort of display (comma).
- This indicates relatively rapid growth compared to most reptiles and marsupial mammals, but slower than modern birds and placental mammals to This indicates relatively rapid growth compared to most reptiles and marsupial mammals but slower than modern birds and placental mammals (comma again).
Apologies for the comma pedantry – I have observed the principle here that commas do not usually precede a conjunction (e.g. ‘and’ or ‘but’). I’m sure that could be overruled if the majority prefer. Sorry not to have offered help before! [Sheep: I was always taught that you use a comma before a conjunction if the second phrase could be a stand-alone sentence. In fact that is what it says at comma (punctuation)] If you want to include any or all of these alterations, do you want me to make them or will you? Great article! - :-) Ballista 04:16, 24 May 2006 (UTC)
- I think you've got some worthwhile suggestions there, Ballista. I'm not sure which ones Sheep will want to incorporate (the "digit" one seems a must IMO), but he did say earlier he didn't care if anyone updated the article: it is WP, after all. That said, I won't touch it myself, since I did nominate it for Featured, and the overviewers do tend to frown on self-noms... BTW, welcome to the discussion board! :) --Firsfron 05:09, 24 May 2006 (UTC)
- I responded to your suggestions above. Thank you! Except I messed up the numbering, grrr... fixed. Sheep81 06:50, 24 May 2006 (UTC)
- As far as the commas go... Sheep's got most of them in the right places, as far as I can tell. No problems there.--Firsfron 17:06, 24 May 2006 (UTC)
About the image: I'll e-mail the artist. Which one should I request? There's a lovely head-shot here, showing 5 species' heads, plus Hongshano's. But I guess that would actually be better on the species page, now that it's seperate...? Or I could request the family portrait. Comments? (adding my sig:)--Firsfron 19:47, 24 May 2006 (UTC)
- I'd definitely go with the head-shot pic. Far more encyclopedic and informative. Mgiganteus1 19:28, 24 May 2006 (UTC)
- I think you're right, Mgig.--Firsfron 19:47, 24 May 2006 (UTC)
- I'd love to be able to show the headshot comparison. Ask him if we can crop one head out so you can actually see it in the taxobox though. Sheep81 19:31, 24 May 2006 (UTC)
- Good idea. I'm on it.--Firsfron 19:47, 24 May 2006 (UTC)
- I like the alterations - commas are still a thing of mine but I am a pedant! I tend to think if a part of a sentence could stand alone, it should be preceded by a full stop (period) or a semicolon. No matter, tho' - great article and thanks for not being annoyed by my suggestions. Ballista 21:18, 24 May 2006 (UTC)
- Look, all three of the reviewers now support the nomination. That's awesome, but we will probably need more than three votes of support. If you know anyone outside of the Project that is familiar with the rules for FAs, you might want to consider asking them to review the article and provide constructive criticism (please don't ask them to support it, obviously... let them read it and decide on their own). Almost there! Sheep81 01:33, 25 May 2006 (UTC)
- Anyone see the fantastic new skull image one of the reviewers got for us? PERFECT for the taxobox. Sheep81 08:04, 25 May 2006 (UTC)
- Say, Ballista, you've offered some good suggestions here on Psittacosaurus. I wonder if you don't mind looking over some of the Dinosaur articles nominated for the Wikipedia CD. You could leave your comments here, or just edit. These are going on the CD, so it's important someone takes a look at them before they're etched forever into plastic...--Firsfron 01:42, 25 May 2006 (UTC)
I never heard back from Dinosauromorpha. I have been having some problems getting e-mails the past few days, though, so I don't know if they never got the e-mail, they got it and responded, or never responded.--Firsfron 01:43, 27 May 2006 (UTC)
- Got the permission! Whew! Here, in part, is the response:
Hello!
Yes, It's ok, use it. But be warned - it is not complete, meaning there are some more species also known from skulls. The detail head "B" is of an adult Hongshanosaurus
- --Firsfron 23:47, 27 May 2006 (UTC)
- I've uploaded the image, which is now at Image:Psittacosauridae.JPG
- Nice work, Mgig!--Firsfron 02:36, 28 May 2006 (UTC)
- This is a great step forward, thanks to all involved. I don't want to whinge or upset anyone but I still feel that the original drawing (that used to be in the box) does more to confuse than to inform, mostly because of the head. Is there anyone among us who can draw? - Ballista 03:40, 28 May 2006 (UTC)
- I'm an occasional artist, and I'm quite proficient with Photoshop. It might be possible for me to work on a new image, however I do rather like the new taxbox image, and these new head shots really are lovely. If it's decided we need more images for Psittaco, I could possibly work on something. --Firsfron 04:07, 28 May 2006 (UTC)
- Honestly, I like the old txbx drawing (not for the taxobox, but for the page in general). It's not the same old flat-on lateral view, it's got a little dynamic gesturing going on. It seems like whenever a dinosaur is depicted in anything but a lateral running pose, people get all confused (cf. Conway's Deinonychus...), which doesn't say much for paleoart. For what it's worth, I have this drawing of Psittacosaurus [1], but it's a few years old and not as good from a technical standpoint.Dinoguy2 04:18, 28 May 2006 (UTC)
- The problem with that drawing, Dinoguy, is that the quills were actually on the proximal tail, not the distal tail as in that piece of art. Other than that it is quite serviceable. As for the pic in the article, I actually like the position of the head cause you can see the expanded jugals when the head is viewed from the front. But the way it is drawn is slightly confusing, yes. I still like it though. Sheep81 10:26, 30 May 2006 (UTC)
- Honestly, I like the old txbx drawing (not for the taxobox, but for the page in general). It's not the same old flat-on lateral view, it's got a little dynamic gesturing going on. It seems like whenever a dinosaur is depicted in anything but a lateral running pose, people get all confused (cf. Conway's Deinonychus...), which doesn't say much for paleoart. For what it's worth, I have this drawing of Psittacosaurus [1], but it's a few years old and not as good from a technical standpoint.Dinoguy2 04:18, 28 May 2006 (UTC)
- I'm an occasional artist, and I'm quite proficient with Photoshop. It might be possible for me to work on a new image, however I do rather like the new taxbox image, and these new head shots really are lovely. If it's decided we need more images for Psittaco, I could possibly work on something. --Firsfron 04:07, 28 May 2006 (UTC)
- This is a great step forward, thanks to all involved. I don't want to whinge or upset anyone but I still feel that the original drawing (that used to be in the box) does more to confuse than to inform, mostly because of the head. Is there anyone among us who can draw? - Ballista 03:40, 28 May 2006 (UTC)
- Nice work, Mgig!--Firsfron 02:36, 28 May 2006 (UTC)
- I've uploaded the image, which is now at Image:Psittacosauridae.JPG
Ah yes, no objection whatever to 'dinoart' and, in that respect, nothing against said pic. However, in an encyclopaedic context, I feel something a little more illustrative of the consensus view of likely appearance is more useful to the reader (one of our reasons for what we do). I think the one you have just shown is better, from that point of view. :-) - Ballista 04:50, 28 May 2006 (UTC)
Got another vote of support on FAC. That's four (five if you count the nominator's vote, heh). I've been trolling the FAC page to see who's active and then making review requests on those users' talk pages. He's the only one to respond so far though. Sheep81 10:18, 30 May 2006 (UTC)
- Looks like your hard work paid off, Sheep. Psittaco is Featured! Congrats! :)--Firsfron 04:53, 31 May 2006 (UTC)
- Hi - just visited 'Featured articles' and seen it there - heartiest congratulations, Sheep, on inspirational drive and energy. - Ballista 06:53, 31 May 2006 (UTC)
So, we got our star now - good work! - Ballista 05:09, 1 June 2006 (UTC)
Dinosaur CD
Thanks Firsfron - I've taken a look at Alamosaurus and done a two-stage edit - kindly review and feedback and I'll do some more if you think the work is appropriate. Interestingly, it took me down a route of starting a new article, to clear one of the red links. Ballista 04:06, 25 May 2006 (UTC) - P.S.: I've just done another 'comma job' on Allosaurus - please review that too.
- Great! One thing to remember: If you see a red wikilink to a dinosaur genus, it's probably a typo. We've only got two missing dinosaurs on our list of missing dinosaurs now, and I expect those last two will be created shortly. One of the last sentences in the Allosaurus article still needs work, IMO: This skeleton was initially discovered by a Swiss team, led by Kirby Siber, which later excavated a second Allosaurus, "Big Al Two", which is the best preserved skeleton of its kind to date. Seems to run on, and is fragmented. Thanks again for your assistance. :) --Firsfron 04:46, 25 May 2006 (UTC)
You're welcome - I've got that sentence - sorry to miss it first time around - still took me two edits! Red link wasn't to a dinosaur genus. It was a geological formation link and led me down a whole series of edits/creations. Yes, I was well aware of your excellent work in gathering up/marshalling dinosaur articles; you persuaded me to do four of them. Great stuff :-) Ballista 05:26, 25 May 2006 (UTC)
- Nice job on the Alamosaurus article there, Ballista. I bet if we tried we could get that one up to featured, or at least "good" status as well. Sheep81 08:03, 25 May 2006 (UTC)
- Hee! One article at a time, maybe? Although I'm surprised at how quickly all those changes were made to Psittaco...--Firsfron 08:05, 25 May 2006 (UTC)
So far had a 'sweep' through all the 'A' dinosaurs on the CD list - Ballista 06:23, 27 May 2006 (UTC)
- Nice, Ballista! I'll check them out... And thanks! --Firsfron 06:34, 27 May 2006 (UTC)
Just finished dusting off the 'B' dinos on the CD list. Please let me know if you want me to be doing anything more radical than what I am doing. Do I need to revisit previously done ones (since more edits are bound to have come in)?
- If the articles are on your watchlist, your watchlist will tell you when they've been updated. If Elmo12456 has edited them, definitely do check them! He appears to be a young grade school student, and he does edit articles. The results are often not so great.
- As far as other things for the dinosaurs on the CD: most of these well-known dinosaurs have junior synonyms. If you wanted to (it's sort of a pain), you could check out their 'what links here' page, find any pages that redirect to them, and explain on the page why the reader has been directed to that article (since they won't know): "Samplesaurus was also known as Eusamplesaurus, until 2002, when Dr John Doe of Sample University proved in his paper that Eusamplesaurus is the same animal as Samplesaurus. Since the two are the same, Samplesaurus, as the older of the two names, is the only valid genus." (Or something like that).
- It is sort of a pain, but you did ask... ;) --Firsfron 06:37, 28 May 2006 (UTC)
You're right, I did - thanks for the tidy-up of Brachiosaurus - great improvement - I'll see if I'm up to the latest challenge you've offered (new departure!). - Ballista 06:57, 28 May 2006 (UTC)
- Bit of the 'usual' housewirk on the 'C' & 'D' dinosaurs. - Ballista 07:20, 29 May 2006 (UTC)
- Now up to Hypsilophodon (i.e. No 19 on the list). - Ballista 03:32, 30 May 2006 (UTC)
- Nice work. You're fast, Ballista. :)--Firsfron 04:17, 30 May 2006 (UTC)
- Just finished up to (& incl.) Lesothosaurus - I'll take a deep breath before diving into the 'M' dinos....... - Ballista 05:22, 30 May 2006 (UTC)
- That's the 'S's, now, ready for review as you do. - Ballista 05:16, 2 June 2006 (UTC)
Just the two 'biggies', T. rex & Velociraptor to go, now. Also, I had already done a lot of work on Dimetrodon, Ichthyosaur, Plesiosaur, and Pterosaur, a while back - are they going on the dino CD? I also added Pliosaur, a few days ago. However, if they're to go on the dino CD, I'll revisit them. - Ballista 15:11, 2 June 2006 (UTC)
- Oh, it's not really a dinosaur CD: it's a Wikipedia CD which will have dinosaur articles, among many others, on it. The team that is making the CD chose a few dinosaurs, and asked for a few others. I chose a few that I thought would best represent Dinosauria, trying to get well-known members from most major families, since the original listing was a little saurischian-centric (it was almost all theropods and sauropods).
- I've taken a look at your edits, and am really happy with almost all of them. You've done a nice job, inclding some major work on Scelidosaurus and a few others. Thanks Ballista.--Firsfron 19:54, 2 June 2006 (UTC)
- Thanks for encouraging comment, Firsfron - I've been thru' Tyrannosaurus and Velociraptor, now. That's the whole list, unless I've accidentally missed any. (I should have known that it was a WP CD, not a 'dino' CD - I think I did, when I first followed your link then I kind of drifted off into my own concept!). - Ballista 04:52, 3 June 2006 (UTC)
Journal Illustrations: Copyright Status?
Quick question i can't seem to find in a cursory search: What's the copyright status of illustrations/figures from scientific journals? I'd like to upload some of Reichel's Archaeopteryx illustrations from 1941 [2], if possible.Dinoguy2 14:40, 25 May 2006 (UTC)
- Protected. Can't use 'em without express permission. Otherwise we'd have like 8 million pictures per article by now, I'd have filled them all. You can freely use pictures (or anything else for that matter) published before January 1, 1923 though (I just found that out... damn that Osborn publishing Psittacosaurus IN 1923... I could kill him! Except... well, you know.) Sheep81 16:08, 25 May 2006 (UTC)
- Here's a link:
- Similarly, though scientific data are usually exempt from copyright, the specific figures and styles of presentation used to present that data will in most cases merit copyright protection. Also, in some cases facts that are exempt from copyright may still be protected as a result of patent law.
- Sheep81 16:12, 25 May 2006 (UTC)
All genera complete
We've got a stub for every dinosaur listed on the list of dinosaurs page and the Wikipedia:WikiProject Dinosaurs/missing page. Well done, guys!
Now that we're done with the first stage, the rest can slowly be implimented. I saw Dinoguy working on a lot of taxoboxes, but there are still a lot of non-nomen nudem left without taxoboxes. For me, the easiest way has been to just go into the category page, and mass add them to each valid genus.
On some articles, we're still missing the three cats we wanted to use on each article. I plan to use CatScan to rectify this. CatScan's data is about six days behind, and does give some bad data, but it's still a lot better than clicking on every single dinosaur to see if they have all the proper cats.
Now that we've finished the stubs, I guess now would be a good time to make mention of the articles which redirect to them. Other thoughts...?--Firsfron 17:05, 25 May 2006 (UTC)
Classification of birds
In many articles, including Dinosaur, Class Aves has been placed within Superorder Dinosauria. To me, this does not make sense, since Class is a higher level rank than Superorder. Am I missing something here? Mgiganteus1 17:18, 25 May 2006 (UTC) Likewise, in the taxobox on the Bird page, Class Aves is placed within Archosauria, which is unranked, but below Infraclass.
- This is somethingthat probably should be standardized across all entries to avoid confusion. Ideally, in my opinion at least, the taxonomy section on each entry should include two sections--classification and phylogeny. In the ranked classificaton section, groups which are traditionally paraphyletic shouldn't be indented beneath their ancestor groups, rather, the ancestor groups should be marked as paraphyletic (see the taxobox on Synapsid). The phylogeny section should present a family ree style, unranked cladogram, showing evolutionary relationships rather than categorizations like class and Superorder. The page on Avicephala uss this system. What do you guys think?Dinoguy2 18:58, 25 May 2006 (UTC)
Pronunciation Presentation
I'm not too keen on the rather unencyclopedic pronounciation presentations (a-LOK-o-don) one sees in several articles so I was wondering if one could follow the International Phonetic Alphabet for that. I've seen it in such disparate articles as Pterosaur and Algarve, so it's common use and another way of improving the articles Dracontes 16:45, 26 May 2006 (UTC)
- Good point, Dracontes. Technically according to WP policy, we should be using IPA, but I'm not really familiar with it, so I haven't been adding any pronunciations (either IPA or traditional pronunciation schemes) to any of the articles.--Firsfron 17:51, 26 May 2006 (UTC)
- Same here.Dinoguy2 20:37, 26 May 2006 (UTC)
- I'm not familiar with it also but I intend to be so in the next weeks. One only has to ask the dreadful question: what pronunciation scheme should one follow? "Anglicized", "church Latin" or "strict Latin"? The obvious diferences are the syllabic stress and the interpretation of certain letters' correspondance to certain sounds. Few links to get you acquainted with the problem (I solved it for myself but I'm not sure my solution would suit everyone.):
- In my opinion, which, may be far from the mark and the original languanges, each letter should correspond to only one sound and one should keep it simple. Maybe we can start a trend and get this problem over with. (Which means Centrosaurus would perhaps have to renamed again to Eucentrosaurus ::-/ ) Dracontes 09:25, 29 May 2006 (UTC)
- Good point, Dracontes. Technically according to WP policy, we should be using IPA, but I'm not really familiar with it, so I haven't been adding any pronunciations (either IPA or traditional pronunciation schemes) to any of the articles.--Firsfron 17:51, 26 May 2006 (UTC)
- Why does Centrosaurus have to be renamed Eucentrosaurus??--Firsfron 16:47, 29 May 2006 (UTC)
- This came up many years ago... Centrosaurus and Kentrosaurus have the same derivation and pronunciation, which I think is Dracontes' point. However, the names are okay under the newest ICZN rules, and even if they weren't, it would be Kentrosaurus that would have to change beccause it was named 11 years later (btw, that is why someone made up the name Kentrurosaurus). The name Eucentrosaurus arose because Centrosaurus was thought to be preoccupied by a lizard named in 1843. The ICZN ruled that the original usage was invalid and so the name Centrosaurus remains.
- Also, if we are going to use a pronunciuation guide, I suggest http://www.dinosauria.com/dml/names/dinosi.htm .
- Sheep81 20:01, 29 May 2006 (UTC)
- Oh, so that's how it went :-] Though we'd still have to transcribe that pronunciation guide into IPA.
- I got myself thinking a bit more into this and realized that this pronunciation issue will be the source of some controversy and perhaps detracting of more important things.
- Not that it doesn't have its merit. Scientific nomenclature was supposedly, or came to be regarded as, a normalized way to vehicule biological information among languages, although something is always lost in terms of intelligibility due to the vocal habits of everyone who utters the names (not to mention speaking sientific names may be the prime source of mistypes and misprints).
- So I'm a bit at loss here: should one just drop the pronunciation guide altogether? Actually no one uses it for any other taxa as far as I've seen here in Wikipedia. At least it's a safe bet we can use it in derived english terms (tyrannosaur, chasmosaurine, &c).
- Anyway, I'll be all too happy to remove the existent pronunciation aids in the pertinent articles if you agree with such an action.
- Dracontes 10:07, 30 May 2006 (UTC)
- Well the guy who produced that pronunciation guide (Ben Creisler) is a linguist who specializes in biological nomenclature, especially dinosaurs, so I would trust his pronunciations and I don't think it would be too hard to convert them to IPA. But I definitely won't cry if someone removes all the pronunciations (I don't get anything out of them myself). Sheep81 10:18, 30 May 2006 (UTC)
- If any of these articles ever reach featured status, they will probably need the IPA pronunciations per WP guidelines.--Firsfron 00:39, 31 May 2006 (UTC)
- If pronunciation is displayed at all, then yes, it should be in IPA format, but I don't think it has to be there at all (I can't find it in the vast majority of featured articles). Sheep81 11:16, 31 May 2006 (UTC)
- Why does Centrosaurus have to be renamed Eucentrosaurus??--Firsfron 16:47, 29 May 2006 (UTC)
I'm with Sheep on this - not much of a turn-on for me either but OK to have a standardised system, if anyone feels they help the articles or the readers. - Ballista 20:51, 30 May 2006 (UTC)
It's on the main page, guys! Congrats, Dinoguy! :)--Firsfron 01:20, 27 May 2006 (UTC)
- Thanks but... the fact is wrong! Or does somebody have a cite that Dracorex was named after that specific dragon in Harry Potter? Bakker's explaination for the name is different, just that some kid told him it looked like "a dragon".Dinoguy2 16:07, 27 May 2006 (UTC)
Paleontology
Why are stubs and links from cynodonts redirecting to this project? This is a project on dinosaurs, not paleontology in general. Cynodonts are synapsids, not diapsids, let alone dinosaurs. Did I miss something when I read through the project description? Moonsword 03:18, 27 May 2006 (UTC)
- What stubs and links are you talking about, Moonsword? I know of no redirects which go to this project, since this is supposed to be a 'backpage', any redirect from an article to here would be in error. If you are asking why a talk page might direct someone here, it might be because the animal in question was at one time considered a dinosaur, as shown on the list of dinosaurs page. But without knowing what you're specifically talking about, I cannot answer you further.--Firsfron 04:10, 27 May 2006 (UTC)
- I went to Cynodont to see and it has a link: "You can help the WikiProject Dinosaurs by expanding it" I haven't checked things like Plesiosaur, Pterosaur etc., just yet, although I have contributed to them some time back. It is certainly not consistent with a dinosaur project - on the other hand it's sort of 'inclusive' and friendly and may pull more editors into WP Dinosaurs. It may be sensible to have a different template to put on 'wannabe dinosaur' articles, so no-one thinks we're confused about the defininition of dinosaurs, which should remain very explicit. I seem to remember spending quite a time editing the definition bit. May be time to formulate a policy on this. I don't have enough familiarity with the inner workings of Wikipedia but am assuming one can trace or locate all such templates that are on the Wikipedia, to check their appropriateness? Ballista 04:53, 27 May 2006 (UTC)
- Just checked and it's not on Dimetrodon, Plesiosaur, Ichthyosaur, Mosasaur, Pterosaur, Pterodactyl. Dimorphodon has a WP Reptiles message. It would seem that Moonsword has highlighted an inconsistency here. Ballista 05:06, 27 May 2006 (UTC)
- No, these are mostly on some of the various articles about synapsids, including the cynodonts. I haven't seen them anywhere else. There weren't any redirects that pointed here.
- Some of these are probably there in error. I'd double check with list of dinosaurs to make sure the animal in question hasn't been thought of as a dinosaur at some point, and if not, remove the tag. If it's a stub tag, use WP:Paleontology.Dinoguy2 16:09, 27 May 2006 (UTC)
- OH, wait, i see the problem. The paleo-stub template includes a link to WP:Dinosaurs. Is there a WP:Paleo...? Either way, the template needs to be changed.Dinoguy2 16:11, 27 May 2006 (UTC)
- Yes, you're right, Dinoguy. I've reverted the template back to its original form, taking out the link to WP:Dinosaurs and removing Eoraptor's image.
- As far as tracing templates and pages, Ballista, yes, that's easy to do. The 'what links here' link on the <---sidebar can be used. CatScan also works for categories, although its data is about a week behind "real time".--Firsfron 17:24, 27 May 2006 (UTC)
- Thanks. I wasn't sure exactly what was going on. Moonsword 19:20, 27 May 2006 (UTC)
- No, these are mostly on some of the various articles about synapsids, including the cynodonts. I haven't seen them anywhere else. There weren't any redirects that pointed here.
Been working to beef up this article, so any input/copyediting, clarification, etc would be most welcome. I only have three PDFs on this beast, and I won't be able to dig up my paper copy of the description until tomorrow, so if anybody can add info from other papers, that would be cool. Two things I really need help with: IPA pronucniation (I'm clueless), and pictures. The DigiMorph image is good, but it's only the upper portion of the skull, we should at least have the whole thing for the taxobox. This is one of the most unique-looking and often-illustrated dinosaurs out there (when it was Oviraptor at least), it would be a shame if we didn't have any good images here. Though, I'd bet my life it was fully-feathered, as would 99.99% of paleontologists, which might make getting accurate life restoartions tougher.Dinoguy2 04:36, 28 May 2006 (UTC)
ceratopsian images
hey all, anyone have an email contact for Peter Dodson? I fiugred he'd be a good person to ask about ceratopsian images. From his book the old exhibition of all the Protoceratops skulls sounded pretty funky, and he had b/w photos in his book (Horned Dinosaurs) Cas Liber 06:22, 29 May 2006 (UTC)
- Is it possible he's on one of the dinosaur mailing lists, Cas? We do need some good images, outside of the few well-known genera. --Firsfron 21:09, 29 May 2006 (UTC)
Yippee! First cab off the rank. I rang Peter Trusler tonight and he agreed for the use of a Leptoceratops he depicted on the page, and sent me a digital image Cas Liber 13:32, 9 June 2006 (UTC)
Achievements
A (still rather brief) list of this project's achievements can now be found at Wikipedia:WikiProject Dinosaurs/Achievements. They're all all I know of; if anyone knows of others, say, before I joined the project, feel free to add them! Also: I'm hoping we can add Psittacosaurus soon!--Firsfron 21:09, 29 May 2006 (UTC)
Proposed move
I'd like to propose Wikipedia:WikiProject Dinosaurs/missing be moved to Wikipedia:WikiProject Dinosaurs/shortest articles. The list as it is now will probably only ever contain a few animals, and as such has IMO lived out its usefulness. It would be more useful to this group as a list of the shortest articles, so that the shortest stubs can be built up over time. Any missing articles can certainly be included as well, since they are by definition also very short. CatScan can be used to pull up the size (in kb) of all the articles, and the data can be updated on a weekly (or so) basis. I figured I'd ask here first before any such change was made. --Firsfron 21:56, 29 May 2006 (UTC)
- fine with me Sheep81 01:28, 30 May 2006 (UTC)
- Sound plan. - Ballista 01:34, 30 May 2006 (UTC)
- Good ideaDinoguy2 02:02, 30 May 2006 (UTC)
- Thanks guys. It's done.--Firsfron 04:09, 30 May 2006 (UTC)
- Quick work - good list - we should 'get cracking'. One question from the ignorant and great unwashed: are Calamospondylus and Aristosuchus one and the same? If so, I'll have a go at expanding one and disbanding (or rather putting a small reference) the other - Ballista 04:38, 30 May 2006 (UTC)
- According to the Thescelosaurus! page, which I use often, "Often confused with Calamospondylus, Aristosuchus appears to be a valid compsognathid based on the structure of its pubis." --Firsfron 04:56, 30 May 2006 (UTC)
- Good-oh - thanks for the enlightenment - it's so difficult to keep up with all opinions etc. I'll get on with it, but not today. - Ballista 05:25, 30 May 2006 (UTC)
- I have a book with nearly an entire chapter about these guys. If you like I can write the article(s). Sheep81 09:48, 30 May 2006 (UTC)
- Then what's Ballista going to work on?--Firsfron 10:05, 30 May 2006 (UTC)
- No probs to me if it gets done by Sheep81 - in fact that's great! - it'll be better with fuller info, as they're a bit thin at present; no offence to me whatever - I'll press on trolling thru' the CD list, for now & perhaps pick up on one or two of the other thinnest stubs as I go. Too late for me tonight, I'll do something in the morning. - Ballista 20:48, 30 May 2006 (UTC)
- I have a book with nearly an entire chapter about these guys. If you like I can write the article(s). Sheep81 09:48, 30 May 2006 (UTC)
I hope no-one minds (esp. Sheep, who will, I hope add yet more to it) - I've messed about with Aristosuchus (and Apatodon). - Ballista 15:40, 4 June 2006 (UTC) (in fact, first four on the list have had a tinkering but it's not going to be easy to bring fictitious creatures up to more than 1 kb) :-) - Ballista 16:31, 4 June 2006 (UTC)
- Expanded Atlantosaurus & Avipes. - Ballista 04:43, 5 June 2006 (UTC)
- I was wondering who was working on those! 'Cause I hadn't touched them, and they were much bigger than when last I checked.--Firsfron of Ronchester 04:16, 6 June 2006 (UTC)
- I've had a go at three more: Aachenosaurus Acanthopholis & Aepisaurus - Ballista 04:45, 7 June 2006 (UTC)
Most of the 'A' dinos given basic expansion and Cetiosaurus - however, Asiatosaurus doesn't seem to register changes, acc. to 'popups'. - Ballista 05:16, 10 June 2006 (UTC)
- Excellent! Oh, on pop-ups, sometimes you have to wait for the database to update, because it might show outdated article sizes, but usually if you just hit 'reload', that'll fix it. We're really going thru the top of the list! Makes me feel a little sorry for Zizhongosaurus. ;) --Firsfron of Ronchester 06:10, 10 June 2006 (UTC)
- Feel sorry for him no longer - and a few others from all over the list - Ballista 04:54, 12 June 2006 (UTC)
Image review?
(See my initial comments on Talk:Deinonychus) Scorpionman's recent, well inentioned addition of images which violate the guidelines made me think that maybe we should have some kind of image review forum or image sub-page for this project. That way, we could discuss the appropriateness of images before they're added to articles. Not sure how practical it would end up being vs. just reverting but, thought i'd throw it out there for discussion.Dinoguy2 17:20, 30 May 2006 (UTC)
- You have my whole hearted agreement as this would stave off edit wars and such drama... from the articles. Besides I'd like to feature some of my own art here and I rather be told off the bat if a drawing of a particular dinosaur has too much leeway put into it. Dracontes 17:56, 30 May 2006 (UTC)
- We really are in need of drawings, so if you can, feel free! We can always veto them on Dinoguy's proposed image sub-page. I'm in favor of both ideas.--Firsfron 00:42, 31 May 2006 (UTC)
- Yep - I'm up for the idea of an image sub-page - just creating the page could well start attracting some piccies and it would be a very practical way of discussing pros & cons of any proposed pics before they're hung up on the public washing line. - Ballista 04:43, 1 June 2006 (UTC)
- Done! I've put there a picture you might find interesting to consider. Dracontes 10:14, 1 June 2006 (UTC)
I think the most reliable images are those of skeletons. I am kicking myself I didn't take better pix when I was in Belgium (at the museum filled with all the Iguanadon skeletons). I got a Kentrosaurus photo in Berlin though :) Cas Liber 12:20, 1 June 2006 (UTC)
Archive #3
Our talk page was 91KB long, so I archived over 49KB of that, which still leaves over 41KB out here. I did not archive any active discussions. Sheep81 06:21, 31 May 2006 (UTC)
Featured Dinosaur Campaign
Well, now that we have gotten Psittacosaurus featured, I say we do it again. In fact, look at WikiProject_Tropical_cyclones. Not only do they get a hurricane featured every month, it is actually their ONLY stated goal to get ALL tropical-cyclone-related articles featured. Now I am not suggesting that we get every single dinosaur-related article featured, as there are clearly many dinosaurs that don't have enough known about them. But I bet that if we wanted, we could get a dinosaur featured every month.
My suggestion is this: At the beginning of every month we get together and decide on an article, either one that is fairly complete now or one that we write from scratch, get it peer reveiwed in the first half of the month, then once it seems to pass that, get it on the FAC page in the second half. We could even get several articles peer reviewed and then pick the best one to be our FAC. After awhile it will start to become second nature to write articles in a way that will get them featured. I don't think we should settle for anything less. Sheep81 06:21, 31 May 2006 (UTC)
- With the writing talent and scientific minds assembled here, there's no reason we can't do it. I'm all for it.--Firsfron 06:31, 31 May 2006 (UTC)
- What it is to be slow - I never saw anything happen with the Psittacosaurus article - you mean it made the grade? Well done! However, it still has no 'star' on the heading, as per the 'Tropical cyclone' featured articles do. Yes, I'm up for helping in this endeavour, however, I have periods in which I don't open the computer, so am not 100% reliable for ongoing projects. - Ballista 06:44, 31 May 2006 (UTC)
- No one added the star to Psittaco, but it's featured: check its talk page. As for working on getting articles featured... you mean you don't want to single-handedly get Aachenosaurus featured? Well then, how about Albisaurus? ;)
- I kid, of course. Any ideas on the next candidate?--Firsfron 15:08, 31 May 2006 (UTC)
- This is a great idea. In fact, why could just go through The Big 20 list one by one, or pick from that based on the current status of the articles there. I worked on Velociraptor a bit yesterday, and it really needs a lot of work, especially for such a popular dinosaur. My vote would probably be for Velociraptor if we wanted a challange, or maybe Tyrannosaurus, which already has a peer review and is a one-time FAC.Dinoguy2 15:09, 31 May 2006 (UTC)
- I have lots of ideas. But I am biased towards ones I have written (Albertosaurus, Ankylosaurus). We could also pick one of the "Big 20" like Dinoguy said.
- By the way, I think we ought to have a separate page for this so we don't chew up space on this talk page. I made a preliminary version here: User:Sheep81/FeaturedDinoInitiative. Feel free to make comments, suggestions, or criticisms (including whether the page is necessary in the first place). If nobody objects, I'll make a real page out of it. Sheep81 15:15, 31 May 2006 (UTC)
- You've got be bloody kidding me right? I suggest making a collaboration & everyone rejects it. Now Sheepy makes a page based on the tropical cyclone COLLABORATION (!!!), & everyone accepts it!!!!???? We have the "Big 20", whos goal is to get those articles featured, & nobody accepted it at first. I don't know whats going on here but I don't like this project very much any more..... Spawn Man 02:25, 1 June 2006 (UTC)
- I cannot speak for anyone else, Spawn Man, but the reason why I had decided against volunteering for the 'Big 20' was because I wanted to focus on some of the smaller articles that no one wants to write. I felt there were many people focusing on the big-name 'celebrity' dinosaurs, and I really wanted to focus on lesser-known ones, since no one was writing about most of them. I didn't think it was the best idea to focus "all of our attention" (as you put it) on just 2% of the articles. It had nothing to do with your idea, and more about what I wanted to accomplish.--Firsfron 05:38, 1 June 2006 (UTC)
- You've got be bloody kidding me right? I suggest making a collaboration & everyone rejects it. Now Sheepy makes a page based on the tropical cyclone COLLABORATION (!!!), & everyone accepts it!!!!???? We have the "Big 20", whos goal is to get those articles featured, & nobody accepted it at first. I don't know whats going on here but I don't like this project very much any more..... Spawn Man 02:25, 1 June 2006 (UTC)
- For the last time guys, I'm not talking about the big 20!!!! I'm talking about the collaboration (now quietly forgotten in archive 2 or 3), which I proposed before my absense caused by my mother being hospitalized. So that would be under 2 months ago. Apart from me, Jayant supported it. Happy Camper commented on it. Now that Sheep asks for pratically the exact same thing, everyone accepts it. And just incase anyone asks again, I'm not 15!!!! One guy said that ages ago & cause I didn't see the comment everyone thought that I accepted them. Im not 15! Spawn Man 22:51, 1 June 2006 (UTC)
Hi - I'm writing this AFTER my response to the below issue, so please assume the same vein in this response. I like the idea of a special sub-page, to co-ordinate the initiative - if not, it will be less easy to focus - is it unwise and imprudent (or even impudent) to propose that we revisit the issue of a basic fixed format as a 'skeleton' for all articles, so that they are easier to edit/expand without omitting or muddling topic areas? We don't currently have consistency of headings or batting order, within articles, which may be helpful (or would you feel that it would be too restrictive or stifling?). Heated debate aside, this project has really woken up! Thanks to ALL you guys, for all the ideas and sweat that have gone into everything so far. - Ballista 04:30, 1 June 2006 (UTC)
Fine. Hey everyone, it was Spawn's idea! Shout it from the rooftops: fantastic idea, Spawn! Okay, now that that's out of the way, how bout we actually start working on this? Remember nobody is committing anyone to work on any article and if you would like to send your own article to peer review or to FAC, you are of course welcome to do whatever you like and someone will most likely support you. But Dinoguy has nominated Velociraptor to be our next Featured Dinosaur, which will need collaboration to improve (very doable). I would also like to nominate Albertosaurus, which I just rewrote (again), but could probably use a bit of copy-editing or other work (dive right in). Any other nominations?
I would also personally like to hear more opinions on whether a separate sub-page for the Featured Dinosaur Initiative is necessary (or if the Initiative itself is necessary). I think we have already heard from me, Firsfron, Dinoguy, and Ballista, and maybe Spawn Man (?), but there are many other members of the Project besides us (Dracontes? Jayant? Soo? Mgig?). BTW I will be out of town until Sunday. I may possibly be able to check in but I don't see myself doing a ton of editing while I'm gone. Sheep81 02:56, 2 June 2006 (UTC)
- Get f#@ked you loathesome little man. Why do we have to have a dinosaur initiative? Why not just call it a collaboration & put it on the collaboration section on community portal? The idea of this whole "nominating it for FAC & then nominating it here & then editing it there & then if it fails it still can stay there" thing isn't very simple nor is it easy to maintain or understand. Collaboration = Nominate (any article you wish). Vote. Fix article. Go yay...
- Why not even open up a collaboration & a featured dinosaur taskforce (instead of ungodly name FeaturedDinoInitiative, which sounds more like a university torture system rather than a vote created to get dinosaurs featured every month). I think it's very doable that we open both collaborations. I like the idea of both being open at once, one designed to attract editors & to get smaller articles up & running & the other to get FAC to actually be featured. Thoughts? Spawn Man 12:25, 2 June 2006 (UTC)
- You know Spawn, nobody is ever going to back your projects ever again if you resort to these immature outburts and insult other editors like this. You want people to quit calling you a 15 year old? Stop acting like one.Dinoguy2 13:56, 2 June 2006 (UTC)
- I agree.--Firsfron 20:01, 2 June 2006 (UTC)
- Good idea. Somebody should start an official Collaboration page (basically the same thing as what I was proposing, like Spawn said). I think once there is an actual page set up it will encourage more participation than just throwing ideas around here on the talk page. If nobody gets around to it, I'll do it when I get back. We can definitely have more than one article up at once too (we should limit it though, so that there can actually be a focus). Sheep81 22:11, 2 June 2006 (UTC)
- You know Spawn, nobody is ever going to back your projects ever again if you resort to these immature outburts and insult other editors like this. You want people to quit calling you a 15 year old? Stop acting like one.Dinoguy2 13:56, 2 June 2006 (UTC)
- Have a good trip and weekend! - Ballista 05:19, 2 June 2006 (UTC)
New look for Project page
I also spent part of last night redesigning the Project page to give it a snazzier look and organize it better. I didn't want to change anything official without asking though. My concept is located here: User:Sheep81/WPDinopage. This is totally experimental, I just want to see if there is any support out there for such a change. Sheep81 15:31, 31 May 2006 (UTC)
- That looks pretty cool. I like how the colors sort of distinguish it from standard article pages. One thing I'd fix is the big gap after Parentage, but otherwise, it gets my vote.Dinoguy2 15:37, 31 May 2006 (UTC)
- Big gap? Sheep81 15:39, 31 May 2006 (UTC)
- Maybe it's my browser, but I'm getting a decent sized gap in the text between the Patentage heading and the start of the bullet list. Could be due to the image or sidebar or something.Dinoguy2 15:45, 31 May 2006 (UTC)
- Not me. Move the picture around and see if it helps. Sheep81 15:56, 31 May 2006 (UTC)
- Maybe it's my browser, but I'm getting a decent sized gap in the text between the Patentage heading and the start of the bullet list. Could be due to the image or sidebar or something.Dinoguy2 15:45, 31 May 2006 (UTC)
- This is excellent. I agree that the colors help distinguish it from out other pages. This will be a great Main Project page. I also wonder if the talk page could be done in the same manner. Also, I see no gap.--Firsfron 19:34, 31 May 2006 (UTC)
- Big gap? Sheep81 15:39, 31 May 2006 (UTC)
- Quite honestly people, I think it is a shite idea. Good intentioned, but by no means good. 100% of other wikiprojects are non-colourful. The colours simply distract you from the actual project. The tasks are all mixed up. It will be much harder to maintain, with all the colours & what not. Believe me, something always goes wrong with colour schemes, & I've been around on here enough to know that they take long times to fix. This is no frilly adolesant girl club, it's a place to discuss & plan article improvements. I've spent enough time starting this project up to not see this travesty go through. The main page was bad enough, but now our project pages?! People, this is a bad idea. I STRONGLY OPPOSE THIS INHUMANE TRAVESTY TO THE VERY BOWELS OF MOTHER NATURE HERSELF!!!.... *sigh*... Spawn Man 02:18, 1 June 2006 (UTC)
- In my personal opinion, whether we use colors and pictures or not, the Project page needs to be reorganized and cleaned up as it is currently very difficult to navigate through and some parts are difficult to understand. I like the color and it is not without precedent (see: Wikipedia:WikiProject_Tropical_cyclones), nor is the picture (see: Wikipedia:WikiProject_Evolutionary_biology). However, the color is not the most important thing for me. The cleaning up is. Sheep81 02:28, 1 June 2006 (UTC)
Clean away. I don't agree with the big 20 being below all the minor tasks. The tropical cyclones page is grey at best, hardly the montage of colours you have. I don't care about the picture, only the colours. Leave it white, with pic, with big 20 above other tasks & clean up what ever else & you have my support.... Spawn Man 02:39, 1 June 2006 (UTC)
- I wouldn't exactly call that color gray. In fact, I'd say the border is a nice shade of aqua, with a light blue background. --Firsfron 03:53, 1 June 2006 (UTC)
Hi - sorry to be late in on all this stuff - time incompatibility or something - I like the proposed re-organisation of the Project page - as far as order and lay-out is concerned, that can evolve as it goes. I'm keeping out of the to-colour-or-not-to-colour debate - we don't want to create any sort of confrontational situation - as Bertrand Russell said: "War does not determine who is right - only who is left." Same goes for the debate over the collaboration deal. I am guilty of not having revisited the Project page much at all, which is bad of me, as it is our public front - I'm now itching to have a 'bit of an edit' at it! Can we have a definitive page, so we can do that? I'm NOT going to interfere with content or order of appearance. Sheep's proposed page appearance is nice (and tasteful, not garish - but it's not the only option we have) but I cannot comment on the predicted difficulties of maintenance, etc. as I have no experience of such work. Anyway, we mustn't be distracted from our goal, if we're to be emitting the next featured article (which is not even chosen yet! -:) - is it blindfold dart time?) so I'm for running with the new proposed page, unless the 'maintenance' point is a decider. "Assume good faith" and "onwards and upwards"! - Ballista 04:22, 1 June 2006 (UTC)
- I'm not sure what there is to maintain. You stick in some color coding and that's... it. I agree we don't want a confrontational environment over a dash of color to a page. At the same time, it's just a proposal, and should be taken as such. It's not like the page was changed suddenly without consultation. Also: I don't think you're late, Ballista. We just started talking about this a few hours ago.--Firsfron 04:36, 1 June 2006 (UTC)
- I don't like to be pushy, esp. when everyone's putting so much work & effort into stuff, so please consider this as a straight question, not as an implication that things should be done more quickly or even decided more quickly - please can we have an idea when the Project page can be edited by the great unwashed? It seems wrong to try to edit it right now, when there's a new proposed page with a whole lot of alterations in the pipeline. For a start, I wanted to add my name to one or two of the 'open tasks'. - Ballista 02:55, 2 June 2006 (UTC)
- Edit away. Spawn has given his blessing to clean it up above, so if you feel there is something to do that needs to be done, do it. You can use my version as a guide if you like, or do something completely different. As long as it's better organized than the current one. Any text that is there can be added into the colorful frame if we ever decide to actually use that, so don't worry about stepping on anyone's toes. Sheep81 03:42, 2 June 2006 (UTC)
- Is it tactless to ask if the idea of smartening up our Project page is now officially 'dead' or 'alive'? - Ballista 04:00, 9 June 2006 (UTC)
Formations
Also, Firsfron has done some great work on creating lists for various tasks. They act as a great focus. I haven't applied my mind to how to do this, on Wikipedia. Can anyone produce a list of rock formations needing creating or tell me how to do it? I see Greygirlbeast & General Eisenhower have been working on this and I wonder how much more is to be done. I have added a few rock formations but had not noticed, until a couple of days ago, that there was a listed task for this work. - Ballista 02:55, 2 June 2006 (UTC)
- Here is a very partial list of formations if you like: User:Sheep81/List_of_formations. I only made it through the early Cretaceous. There are a LOT more in the LK but I have to go now. If you want to move this onto an official Project subpage, be my guest. Sheep81 04:28, 2 June 2006 (UTC)
- BTW, a very useful tool for United States formations is GEOLEX. Sheep81 04:31, 2 June 2006 (UTC)
Hey, thanks - very useful lists. There's plenty to work on, there. I'll work on some of the British/European ones first. I'd still like to know how to pull out 'red links' from WP (or even those formations mentioned in articles but without wikilinks), tho', so that we can be sure to tidy up existing dino articles. May be it's just a question of wading through each article in turn? - Ballista 05:25, 2 June 2006 (UTC)
- There is definitely no need for wading thru hundreds of articles, Ballista. Here is what I do:
- TO CREATE A RED (MISSING LINKS) LIST
- . Create a page for your list to go on. This can either be a new project page, or one of your own sub-pages.
- . Find a good, mostly complete list from some reputable web-site. Copy and paste it (you're only using it for comparison, and the items on it will be disapearing anyway).
- . Paste it into a program such as notepad. If the list items have a bit of space around them, use the Edit>Replace tool to automatically add * and square brackets to the beginning of each list-item (works well for hundreds or thousands of items). Use Edit>Replace to automatically add square brackets to the end of the items (that way you don't have to add them all in manually).
- . Paste the list into Excel and sort alphabetically (optional).
- . Paste the alphabetized list into your new page and hit save page.
- . Open a second browser page and set them so you can see both of them at the same time. "Deblue" the list by removing any blue links, comparing your edit page with the other page. Then hit save. You'll end up with a perfectly red list of missing links.
- Voila! Six easy steps to preparing a missing links list!
There are many other tools you can use for other editing needs, but this procedure works really well for red lists. Hope this helps! :)--Firsfron 06:15, 2 June 2006 (UTC)
- Thanks Firsfron, that looks really great and is very obvious, when you think about it (which I obviously hadn't)! Sheep's already given a pretty good list, from the Cretaceous, which is a good start. Any good ideas for finding formations in articles, where editors haven't put the wikilink brackets? Or is that the "wading thru'" job that I was suggesting? If so, I suppose it's 'first things first' and just get on with 'red-link' ones, relying on each & all of us to flag up any others, as we trip over them while editing. In retrospect, I know I've missed a few in my latest editing tranches (laziness at the time). - Ballista 06:28, 2 June 2006 (UTC)
- There is never any need for 'wading'. With 1,000 genera articles, that's just not efficient. You can do 100 articles in the time it takes to wade thru 10. What I would do to find missing wikilinks to formation articles is either: use Google-within-Wiki searches, or use AWB. --Firsfron 06:46, 2 June 2006 (UTC)
- Also: there are a number of tools linked on my user page. The majority (gray ones) don't work too well (they give some funky results after a database change on April 12th, but they're still better than wading thru thousands of pages: I highly recommend CatScan), but the blue ones work perfectly.
- You can also download AutoWikiBrowser, if you get on the authorization list and your comp meets all the requirements. You could also consider getting a tool called popups: nice for comparing stub sizes. You can do Google searches within Wikipedia (there are several ways), and you can use the 'what links here' tool on the left-hand side of every page: it's great for making comparison lists! There are tons of tools that work really well with Wiki software. I'm sure there are others I'm not mentioning.--Firsfron 06:28, 2 June 2006 (UTC)
- Thanks Firsfron, that looks really great and is very obvious, when you think about it (which I obviously hadn't)! Sheep's already given a pretty good list, from the Cretaceous, which is a good start. Any good ideas for finding formations in articles, where editors haven't put the wikilink brackets? Or is that the "wading thru'" job that I was suggesting? If so, I suppose it's 'first things first' and just get on with 'red-link' ones, relying on each & all of us to flag up any others, as we trip over them while editing. In retrospect, I know I've missed a few in my latest editing tranches (laziness at the time). - Ballista 06:28, 2 June 2006 (UTC)
Thanks for all that - I might get around to experimenting with that this w/e. I do have AWB & popups.but I'm a bit of a greenhorn with both, so I'll need to play awhile. - Ballista 11:19, 2 June 2006 (UTC)
- MEANWHILE, everyone, I've posted Sheep's list up on a new Project sub-page, as he said I could, so if anyone has a burning need to create articles on rock formations, there they are - I'll happily tackle the British ones, for starters.
Wikipedia:WikiProject Dinosaurs/formations - Ballista 11:21, 2 June 2006 (UTC)
Ceratopsia and Ceratopsidae pages - species lists
had an idea - on these pages are lists of species. In Dodson's book I liked how there is a list which has when they were discovered. Also, may be good if, next to each genus, there was a 2 item locality (eg. Xinjiang,China or Alberta, Canada, or whatever). Does anyone have strong opinions on whether the lists should be: 1. species only (neat but a little dry) 2. very brief geographical entry (like above) 3. date and name of publisher
thoughts fellow dinophiles? Cas Liber 11:58, 1 June 2006 (UTC)
- I don't have a problem with it per se, but that information would be rendundant with info presented on the specific pages for each dinosaur.Dinoguy2 15:32, 1 June 2006 (UTC)
- True, I guess, but I thought the geography may be good to get an overall gestalt 'feel' where all the taxa were (it is getting more interesting now more are coming from unusual places). I guess the issue with Leptoceratopsidae. I may put a little entry on that family somewhere.Cas Liber 19:39, 1 June 2006 (UTC)
- cute. I like it. With dinosaurs it would only be dots though Cas Liber 01:48, 2 June 2006 (UTC)
- I like the idea of range maps. I even have a good source or two for that. If we create them, I think we should use maps that show the geography at the time the dinosaur was alive, rather than maps of modern Earth.--Firsfron 07:31, 2 June 2006 (UTC)
- Not a bad idea with the maps, or maybe to elaborate the list a little further. I like the idea of adding the location next to the names on the list. Sheep81 02:09, 2 June 2006 (UTC)
- cute. I like it. With dinosaurs it would only be dots though Cas Liber 01:48, 2 June 2006 (UTC)
OK - brief geographical addendum would look like this: Cas Liber 04:05, 8 June 2006 (UTC) INFRAORDER CERATOPSIA
Yinlong (Xinjiang, Western China)
Family Chaoyangsauridae
Chaoyangsaurus (Liaoning, Northeastern China)
Family Psittacosauridae
Psittacosaurus (China, Mongolia)
Hongshanosaurus (Liaoning, Northeastern China)
Liaoceratops (Liaoning, Northeastern China)
Family Archaeoceratopsidae
Archaeoceratops (North Central China)
Auroraceratops (Gansu, NW China)
Family Protoceratopsidae
Bagaceratops (Mongolia)
Breviceratops (Mongolia)
Graciliceratops (Mongolia)
Lamaceratops (Mongolia)
Magnirostris (Inner Mongolia, China)
Platyceratops (Mongolia)
Protoceratops (Mongolia)
Family Leptoceratopsidae
Bainoceratops (Mongolia)
Leptoceratops (Montana, USA)
Montanoceratops (Montana, USA)
Prenoceratops (Montana, USA)
Udanoceratops (Mongolia)
Superfamily Ceratopsoidea
Family Zuniceratopsidae
Zuniceratops (New Mexico, USA)
Family Ceratopsidae
- The geographical additions are fine to list after the different genera, however, please leave the species list as it is currently organized (in accordance with most recent phylogenies). Sheep81 04:10, 8 June 2006 (UTC)
- Um, OK, I agree it looks awkward at the beginning with Liaoceratops/Auroraceratops/Archaeoceratops as to what is in where familywise. However with Zuniceratops it was placed in its own family and essentially everything needs to belong to some family. But I won't stick it in if no-one else agrees. Pity Zuniceratops can't go on the Ceratopsidae page as it has more in common with them really.. Thanks for the feedback :) Cas Liber 01:37, 9 June 2006 (UTC)
- No, everything does not need to belong to some family. Thanks for adding the geographic info though! Sheep81 06:56, 10 June 2006 (UTC)
PS: So everyone else is OK with the geog. addenda above? cheers Cas Liber 01:43, 9 June 2006 (UTC)
- Looks good to me, just make sure you don't refer anything to a family it has not been referred to in print. I lean towards "the more things in families the better" since it's less confusibng that way for most people, but we shuoldn't pigeonhole them unless its generally accepted by phylogeny or at least published classifications.Dinoguy2 15:35, 10 June 2006 (UTC)
Chasmosaurinae vs Ceratopsinae
Also - ICZN has something on this I note about popualr use. Chasmosaurinae was coined by Lambe in 1915 and is in Dodson's book. Was there an official ruling, what does it say in the Dinosauria book? (anyone have it to peek in?) cheers Cas Liber 12:00, 1 June 2006 (UTC)
- The official rulnig is that, for family level names, earliest published has priority, just like genus names. Unfortunately, this is not often followed in practice (as was recently discussed here). Ceratopsinae has priority and is starting to be used more by scientists.Dinoguy2 15:32, 1 June 2006 (UTC)
Ichnites
I've started an article on Ichnites. However, I'm getting cold feet (pardon the pun) about the exact meaning. Help! 'Trace fossils' include footprints. My question is: Are ichnites specifically 'fossilised footprints' (as I believe) or might the word refer to the more general term 'trace fossils'? I don't want an error 'written in stone' (oh dear another pun). Either way, I feel we should have a record of the most important/famous finds of dino footprints, somewhere under the Project's umbrella. - Ballista 06:23, 3 June 2006 (UTC)
- I guess I missed this message until now. Sorry for the delayed response. We'd discussed earlier the possibility of making a list of ichnotaxa (the animals that make ichnites). I'd started one, but only got down to letter C. There were a lot, and Dinoguy and Sheep both indicated they felt Ichnotaxa were more pseudoscientific, or at least should be kept seperate from the list of "real" dinosaurs (the ones with actual fossils). That said, Elmo's recent creation of Grallator means we'll maybe have to start a cat for ichnotaxa. Other ideas?--Firsfron of Ronchester 14:47, 4 June 2006 (UTC)
- I'd suggest an article just with some major finds (with some illustrations if poss), just to show the world a glimpse of what has been found (i.e. for interest & education). - Ballista 16:35, 4 June 2006 (UTC) P.S.: Could just be expanded version of Ichnite article? - Ballista 17:33, 4 June 2006 (UTC)
Classification of Quilmesaurus
At the moment, the Quilmesaurus article categorizes it as a ceratosaur. However, Coria et Salgado (2005), state "owing to the lack of fusion of the proximal tarsals, it was not recognized as a ceratosaur and is considered related to basal tetanurans because of a notch on the distal articular surface of the tibia." So, where then should we place it, category-wise? I haven't changed the category, but it's clearly considered by Coria and Salgado to be non-ceratosaurian.--Nar'eth 14:38, 4 June 2006 (UTC)
- We don't currently have a 'Tetanurans' category. We also have many unclassified misc. theropods. Is it time for a new cat? What do you all think? Should one be made? Will we have enough to make it a decently-populated cat? Could we come up with 15 members?--Firsfron of Ronchester 14:52, 4 June 2006 (UTC)
- P.S. Since Tetanurae are (Unranked), I guess this proposal will not be acceptable, but have we any other ideas?--Firsfron of Ronchester 14:55, 4 June 2006 (UTC)
- The Tetanurae article gives a few prospective 'members'. On the basis of the criteria, could Utahraptor, Deinonychus, Aristosuchus be added? - Ballista 16:49, 4 June 2006 (UTC)
- I'm really not certain, under the present system, how to best solve the cat. problem posed by taxa like Quilmesaurus. A 'Tetanurans' category would be awfully inclusive. A "basal tetanurans" cat. might work better. We're back to the issue of formal Linnaean ranks vs. unranked phylogenetic clades. Regardless, I don't think that Quilmesaurus should be categorized as a ceratosaur.--Nar'eth 20:21, 4 June 2006 (UTC)
- It should not be in the Ceratosaur category. At the moment, all basal tetanurans, like basal theropods, are simply in the category Theropods. Don't see too much of a problem with this. Changing to cat system into a real cladogram, rahter than a cladogram-like system, would make it pretty hard to use. Cats should be for major groups, in my opinion, not "wastebaskets" for dinosaurs that don't fit into a major group.Dinoguy2 20:29, 4 June 2006 (UTC)
- Well, personally I think that "major", in this case, is sort of subjective, and I do tend to favour phylogeny over taxonomy...but, yes, I agree that we should have an internally consistent system which is intuitive and easy to navigate. I've placed Quilmesaurus in the cat. "theropods."--Nar'eth 20:51, 4 June 2006 (UTC)
- Well, now we have 75 dinosaurs in the generic cat for Theropods. I agree with both of you that the system should be easy to navigate, and I agree that we don't want to turn categories into "wastebaskets". At the same time, are there any categories we could create that might break these basal theropods into smaller chunks? Coelophysoids, perhaps? Or...?--Firsfron of Ronchester 21:18, 4 June 2006 (UTC)
- Well, in this particular instance, the case of Quilmesaurus, the problem arises from the fact that the paleontologist who described the taxon referred it only as far as Theropoda, and then speculates that it appears to belong within the basal Tetanurae. We can't get more specific here, because the author of the taxon, working with diagnostic but fragmentary material, was unable himself to get more specific. I don't think we should create categories just to make the cat. Theropoda smaller. A little ambiguity isn't so bad.--Nar'eth 21:28, 4 June 2006 (UTC)
- I think there are enough articles to fill up cats for Coelophysoids and Megalosauroids. Other than those, there aren't any basal theropods or tetanurans that belong to anything more than monotypic groups. Mainly, I think, because there are quite a few basal tetanurans are incertae sedis.
- Well, in this particular instance, the case of Quilmesaurus, the problem arises from the fact that the paleontologist who described the taxon referred it only as far as Theropoda, and then speculates that it appears to belong within the basal Tetanurae. We can't get more specific here, because the author of the taxon, working with diagnostic but fragmentary material, was unable himself to get more specific. I don't think we should create categories just to make the cat. Theropoda smaller. A little ambiguity isn't so bad.--Nar'eth 21:28, 4 June 2006 (UTC)
- Well, now we have 75 dinosaurs in the generic cat for Theropods. I agree with both of you that the system should be easy to navigate, and I agree that we don't want to turn categories into "wastebaskets". At the same time, are there any categories we could create that might break these basal theropods into smaller chunks? Coelophysoids, perhaps? Or...?--Firsfron of Ronchester 21:18, 4 June 2006 (UTC)
- Well, personally I think that "major", in this case, is sort of subjective, and I do tend to favour phylogeny over taxonomy...but, yes, I agree that we should have an internally consistent system which is intuitive and easy to navigate. I've placed Quilmesaurus in the cat. "theropods."--Nar'eth 20:51, 4 June 2006 (UTC)
- It should not be in the Ceratosaur category. At the moment, all basal tetanurans, like basal theropods, are simply in the category Theropods. Don't see too much of a problem with this. Changing to cat system into a real cladogram, rahter than a cladogram-like system, would make it pretty hard to use. Cats should be for major groups, in my opinion, not "wastebaskets" for dinosaurs that don't fit into a major group.Dinoguy2 20:29, 4 June 2006 (UTC)
- I'm really not certain, under the present system, how to best solve the cat. problem posed by taxa like Quilmesaurus. A 'Tetanurans' category would be awfully inclusive. A "basal tetanurans" cat. might work better. We're back to the issue of formal Linnaean ranks vs. unranked phylogenetic clades. Regardless, I don't think that Quilmesaurus should be categorized as a ceratosaur.--Nar'eth 20:21, 4 June 2006 (UTC)
- We don't currently have a 'Tetanurans' category. We also have many unclassified misc. theropods. Is it time for a new cat? What do you all think? Should one be made? Will we have enough to make it a decently-populated cat? Could we come up with 15 members?--Firsfron of Ronchester 14:52, 4 June 2006 (UTC)
Alright, so if I'm reading this aright, we've got one vote for no new theropod cats, two votes for adding Coelophysoid and Megalosauroid cats, and no one else yet voting...? I assume Sheep will be back tomorrow, and I assume he will want a word, either way... Anyone else...?--Firsfron of Ronchester 05:06, 5 June 2006 (UTC)
Looks okay to me. I just don't want little tiny categories for like subfamilies and junk. Sheep81 06:54, 5 June 2006 (UTC)
Taxobox content
Hey guys. I think I'd mentioned this somewhere before, but maybe we should discuss and possibly codify this on the main page. In my opinion, the taxoboxes shouldn't be comprehensive. For example, check out the taxobox on my user page. That's supposed to be a joke, demonstrating why the taxonomy in these things needs to be short and sweet. I bring it up because user Jerkov has been adding subclassis, infraclassis, etc. to many taxoboxes. Now, all Saurischians are diapsids, archosauromorphs, etc, so including these taxa in the boxes for genus-level taxa seems like its overdoing it. I think sub- infra- and (unranked) taxa should be included only when they denote a subjectively "major" group. Of course this is a judgement call, but adding (unranked) Oviraptorosauria to the taxobox on Ceanagnathus is probably more helpful than adding Subclass diapsida or even Infraorder Coelurosauria. Knowing that an animal is an oviraptorosaur or ceratopsian, etc, instantly gives you a general idea of what the animal looked like and some of its close relatives. Knowing that an animal is a Diapsid is almost meaningless, unless that's the most specific taxa you can get (i.e., Euparkeria, as a basal archosauromorph, so listing Archosauromorpha is a good idea, it helps position the genus). But if you know an animal is a dinosaur, any ranks greater than that are pointless, since all dinosaurs are Diapsids, Archosauromorphs, etc, so leave it at only the most basic linnean ranks (Kingdom, Class). My opinion--save extraneous supra-familial taxa for the pages discussing supra-generic taxa, and use sparingly even then.Dinoguy2 03:52, 5 June 2006 (UTC)
- I agree taxoboxes could get ridiculous if editors expand them overly much. I really like his paleoboxes, and I personally don't mind if he adds in a few extra ranks, but you're right, we should keep this streamlined. Have you talked with Jerkov? Because he's nearly as prolific as you, Dinoguy, so if we'd prefer not to have so many ranks in the taxobox, we'll have to act fast.--Firsfron of Ronchester 04:58, 5 June 2006 (UTC)
- I would like to standardize everything above Order.
- Kingdom: Animalia
- Phylum: Chordata
- Class: Sauropsida
- Superorder: Dinosauria
- ...is what I would choose.
- Sheep81 06:57, 5 June 2006 (UTC)
- I agree taxoboxes could get ridiculous if editors expand them overly much. I really like his paleoboxes, and I personally don't mind if he adds in a few extra ranks, but you're right, we should keep this streamlined. Have you talked with Jerkov? Because he's nearly as prolific as you, Dinoguy, so if we'd prefer not to have so many ranks in the taxobox, we'll have to act fast.--Firsfron of Ronchester 04:58, 5 June 2006 (UTC)
- Does this also apply for non-dinosaurs? I know it's WikiProject Dinosaurs but many pages for non-dinosaurs (such as Postosuchus) are also part of the Project. Other than that question I agree with this decision. Jerkov 20:43, 5 June 2006 (UTC)
- I don't know as much about most non-dinosaurs but I would think that something similar could be devised.Sheep81 21:30, 5 June 2006 (UTC)
- Kingdom/Phylum/Class/Superorder works for me.--Nar'eth 21:23, 5 June 2006 (UTC)
- As I mentioned above, the same should probably apply to non-dinosaurs unless they're very basal and don't have an order, family, etc anyway (same goes for basal members of any group, really. Plesions, if you will.)Dinoguy2 23:57, 5 June 2006 (UTC)
- Does this also apply for non-dinosaurs? I know it's WikiProject Dinosaurs but many pages for non-dinosaurs (such as Postosuchus) are also part of the Project. Other than that question I agree with this decision. Jerkov 20:43, 5 June 2006 (UTC)
WP:TX says:
- Taxoboxes should include all major ranks above the taxon described in the article, plus minor ranks that are important to understanding the classification of the taxon described in the article, or which are discussed in the article. Other minor ranks should be omitted.
Gdr 18:43, 6 June 2006 (UTC)
- Which I think is basically wha we've agreed on here. Superorder is fairly important for dinosaurs, since Dinosauria is a superorder, and there is often confusion in the general public about waht is/isn't a dinosaur. Things like Tetanurae are not important to understanding relationships unless some taxon is a basal Tetanuran (Cryolophosaurus or Megalosauroidea, for example, but not Allosaurus or Tyrannosauroidea).Dinoguy2 19:17, 6 June 2006 (UTC)
Official Collaboration page
Okay, since we seemed to get quite a lot of approval simultaneously above, I went ahead and made an official Collaboration page. Please feel free to edit it however you wish. I just went ahead and called it the Dinosaur collaboration since there seemed to be a little disagreement over what it should be called. What length of time should we be looking at between nominations? Whenever we kind of have it in working order we need to add it to the collaboration sidebar here to make it officially official. You'll notice I nominated Velociraptor for Dinoguy and also that I sent Albertosaurus to peer review.Sheep81 09:35, 5 June 2006 (UTC)
Paleobox content
User Sheep81 posted this message about paleoboxes on my talk page, and I think he's made some very good points. Maybe this is something we need to work out?
Hey, how's it going man. I see you have been adding a lot of taxoboxes to articles. Awesome, awesome work, they really needed it. But hey, I don't want to sound like I'm nagging you after some of the other little nitpicky discussions so far, but I really think the paleobox needs a lot of work before we start throwing it on every dinosaur page. My main objection is that it's just redundant info copied from the article and placed in box form for the benefit of people with short attention spans. On a lot of the less complete articles, this is a good thing as otherwise the information isn't in the article at all. But in more complete articles, especially ones with good lead sections, the same info is already summarized in the taxobox or at the very beginning of the article (see: Albertosaurus for an example). I just don't think it's necessary to regurgitate the information a third time. I also have problems with the format of the box (it just looks really 'rough' and thrown together), and the fact that it refers to itself at the bottom. It's strange having a huge bar on the right side of the page with some of the same information repeated twice, and often times the paleobox and taxobox are different widths, which looks silly and messes with spacing in the article. So I have a lot of problems with the current paleoboxes and I guarantee you an article with a paleobox in its current form will not ever become featured (and not because I don't like it, but because the reviewers will jump all over it). So basically I think I have got my point across that I don't think paleoboxes are appropriate additions, especially not to relatively complete articles, although they may be a useful addition to less complete articles and/or stubs (although the taxobox+paleobox will be much longer than the article itself, which is weird also). If you want to work on the paleobox template and improve it (or better yet, find a way to incorporate some of that info into the taxobox), that could be a welcome project too. Of course this is just my opinion and if you want to bring it up on the DinoProject talk page, it could be a very helpful discussion. Who knows, maybe the consensus will be to keep them and I will look like an idiot for rambling on like this. Jerkov 11:59, 7 June 2006 (UTC)
- I think Sheep hits on a good idea--reserve the paleoboxes only for stub pages. Once somebody comes along to expand the stub, all the paleobox info should be in the body of the text, and the paleobox can be removed. I agree, however, that at least a few items from the pbox should be incorporated into the txbx, such as etymology, distribution, and maybe size.Dinoguy2 16:57, 7 June 2006 (UTC)
Um, hadn't used any paleoboxes on any ceratopsian pages I have been tweaking. I tend to agree with Jerkov Cas Liber 06:28, 9 June 2006 (UTC)
Europasaurus
I've just begun work on an article for the new dwarf macronarian sauropod Europasaurus. It's just a stub at the moment, but I'm having the full paper from Nature sent over this afternoon and will be fleshing it out over the next couple of hours. --Nar'eth 20:08, 7 June 2006 (UTC)
- Good work! Just for whoever works on the article, it looks like there's some kind of petty squabbling going on with the authors, as a note in the appendix states that the name should not be attributed to Sander. So, the paper ref is Sander et al. 2006, the genus and species are Mateus, Laven, and Knötschke vide Sander et al. 2006.Dinoguy2 21:16, 7 June 2006 (UTC)
- Thanks for pointing out the problem with the binomen. I'd read the article through twice and not noticed that bit of fine print!--Nar'eth 21:20, 7 June 2006 (UTC)
- Cool stuff. I will be a bit surprised if the name is not already preoccupied though. Sheep81 00:42, 8 June 2006 (UTC)
- I've just added two images to the Europasaurus article, both of which were released to the press today. However, when uploading them, I noticed that there's no longer a "press release" option when choosing an appropriate license. What gives? Have the rules changed? Anyway, I assume these are okay. They're all over the web.--Nar'eth 04:47, 8 June 2006 (UTC)
- I've nominated this article for DYK.--Firsfron of Ronchester 01:42, 9 June 2006 (UTC)
- I've just added two images to the Europasaurus article, both of which were released to the press today. However, when uploading them, I noticed that there's no longer a "press release" option when choosing an appropriate license. What gives? Have the rules changed? Anyway, I assume these are okay. They're all over the web.--Nar'eth 04:47, 8 June 2006 (UTC)
Collaboration
I've tidied up the collaboration (would be nice if it was left that way, but I know it won't be so *sigh*). I've changed the nomination & voting procedure & shifted the participant's list to the talk page as discussed with Sheepy. The sections are now much less alike & the template thingy that Kirill fixed is beautiful. I hope you all like it. Spawn Man 01:35, 9 June 2006 (UTC). P.S. I've nominated Triceratops just so T rex can have competition....
- I like it! Also, having Triceratops go head-to-head with Tyrannosaurus? Inspired! :) --Firsfron of Ronchester 01:41, 9 June 2006 (UTC)
Polacanthidae (Ankylosaur classification debate again..)
I actually wanted to add this onto the archives page but anyway, I just got The Armored Dinosaurs by Ken Carpenter (cool book!) and he seems to present some pretty convincing evidence for Polacanthidae. Is there a link somewhere ti a convincing argument the other way?
Also, some genera like Acanthopholis are described as nomina dubia..interesting..Cas Liber 01:42, 9 June 2006 (UTC)
- He is actually one of the only ones who finds a Polacanthidae to exist. Vickaryous and others still only find the two historic families. Carpenter even crtitiques his own phylogeny later on in another paper. BTW, every paper Ken Carpenter has ever been an author of can be downloaded for free from his homepage (link is at the bottom of the Project page). Sheep81 07:52, 9 June 2006 (UTC)
Layout of articles - headings
Please forgive me if I am going over old ground but I only joined this project recently. Is it constructive to consider a more standardised list of headings for dinosaur articles and a more-or-less standard order of appearance? At the moment, we appear to be pretty haphazard. I don't know whether others would find this too confining/restrictive or whether helpful (esp. in expanding 'thinner' articles). Quite a bit of the editing I have done has been to reshuffle info, creating new headings, reducing repetition etc., which a more 'formal' order of compilation might help to avoid. We could for instance, have:
- Introduction (no heading - includes derivation of name, geological timescale & Taxobox);
- Discoveries or Finds or History of discovery;
- Taxonomy or Classification (latter term may be easier on the reader?);
- Anatomy;
- Behaviour/Biology;
- optional heading to include any other interesting info about any particular dinosaur (if any) with heading suitable to the circumstance;
- Species;
- In popular culture;
- References;
- External links;
- Categories
- No offence taken, if this propoosal were to be 'rubbished'. - Ballista 04:28, 9 June 2006 (UTC)
- somewhere along the line I picked up some of these but had 'Disocvery and Species' (as one heading as they are generally linked) and 'Classification' as the 2 headings after an introduction. have done a heap of ceratopsian pages Cas Liber 06:26, 9 June 2006 (UTC)
- I used to use standard headings but I got into the rut of just cutting and pasting so much that everything I wrote sounded alike. I still have that problem a little bit now actually, but I worry that all of our articles will sound formulaic. Minor concern though, if we just watch out for that, it won't be a problem. I don't mind having standardized headings, but the thing is that there technically isn't even supposed to be a heading at all unless that section is longer than one paragraph. For most of these dinosaurs, there just isn't enough to write about. I guess I could go either way on this one.Sheep81 08:16, 9 June 2006 (UTC)
All good points. However, I would only propose 'activating' a heading if there was sufficient material to warrant it. - Ballista 21:03, 9 June 2006 (UTC)
- As you'll see from earlier discussions on Sheep's page, I think it's a bad idea. Agreeing with Sheep, it will most certainly sound monotone & similar throughout all Dinosaur articles. When I write an article, I only pick out headings for sections that are too big to last on their own, for unique sections only available to that article & if I want to create an edit break in the page. For example, say a dinosaur has the largest head in the world, you'd put a heading about that etc etc. Or if the taxonomy section was pretty huge, you'd need to put a heading there. Or if the section under the heading "Extinction" was pretty huge, you'd put an edit break in there to slice it up, maybe using "Theories" or "Other theories for extinction". People seem to think that a heading is needed everywhere. This is not so. My vote goes towards using headings only in the circumstances above or we may risk a topic wide epidemic of boredom!! Spawn Man 21:44, 9 June 2006 (UTC)
Thanks for the feedback, folks. All nice points again. I suppose I only had the thought as a sort of internal tool, to try to avoid missing stuff. Perhaps we should just have a 'Heading check-list', for our own use when expanding/building articles? We certainly don't want 'boring'! - Ballista 04:26, 10 June 2006 (UTC)
Derivation question
Hi Project. A couple of days I put up a plea for help on Talk:Aepisaurus. I expect no-one has seen it. Any opinions? - Ballista 04:50, 9 June 2006 (UTC)
- Responded. A really good Web-based resource that I use a lot for Greek translations is here. I also find the Dinosaur Translation and Pronunciation Guide on [www.dinosauria.com Dinosauria Online] to be very reliable as it is maintained by an actual linguist.Sheep81 08:16, 9 June 2006 (UTC)
Sorted - thanks! My Greek was inadequate. (Talk:Aepisaurus & Aepisaurus). - Ballista 09:58, 9 June 2006 (UTC)
Repair needed?
Does anyone else have acres of white space in Stegosaurus? - Ballista 17:31, 9 June 2006 (UTC)
- Nope, just adjacent to the table of contents as usual. Sheep81 17:34, 9 June 2006 (UTC)
Good news but I have white space for the full length of the area beside the paleobox. - Ballista 20:56, 9 June 2006 (UTC)
- Me too. The problem is the paleobox pushing the image halfway down the page, and the text moves with it. Removal of the paleobox, or alighning thei mage left, will fix the problem.Dinoguy2 21:40, 9 June 2006 (UTC)
Thanks for fixing it - I didn't want to interfere, without first checking with the Project. - Ballista 04:34, 10 June 2006 (UTC)
- Be bold! :)--Firsfron of Ronchester 05:03, 10 June 2006 (UTC)
Europasaurus on Main Page
Europasaurus is on the main page, everyone! It's in the DYK column! Cool, eh? :) --Firsfron of Ronchester 19:29, 10 June 2006 (UTC)
Stegosauria, Stegosauridae and Huayangosauridae on one page??
I have been starting to play with these a bit: Stegosauria, Stegosauridae and Huayangosauridae - and I feel the info may be pretty meagre to go over 3 pages (and involve a bit of repeating). Looking at the Ceratopsia page I feel a page with all 3 would do it justice and could be an informative one with overview and issues etc. 9also a place to stick mention of unplaced Stegosauria fragments from the UK and elsewhere. The infraorder Stegosauria is also what laypeople would recognise as Stegosaur-type dinosaurs (like we draw the line for natural group at Ceratopsia, rather than Coronosauria etc.
Ideas on one page guys? Cas Liber 21:07, 10 June 2006 (UTC)
- Sounds like a good idea. I'm more of a "lumper" when it comes to articles with redundant info like that.Dinoguy2 21:49, 10 June 2006 (UTC)
- Seconded. I didn't even know there was a Huayangosauridae page.Sheep81 23:03, 10 June 2006 (UTC)
OK, initial combination of pages to model on Ceratopsia done now. Kids are mucking up in the other room, gotta dash. Need to do redirects on old family pages....Cas Liber 01:11, 11 June 2006 (UTC)
Pedantrry with Greek derivations
Hi Project - I'm in the midst of a (long) process of rejigging the links in Greek derivations of Dino names. Manic obsessive or what? We currently have a wide variations of format, from no link to links to 'Classical Greek' (which redirects to 'Ancient Greek' anyway) or 'Greek language' (which refers to modern Greek!). What I am doing is Greek (visualise using popups or by putting into 'edit'), which is hopefully the most accurate. Please, assuming you all agree, do any new derivations with this link, to save future work in reformatting. Also, please change any you trip over, during your edits for other purposes. Great help, thanks :-) - Ballista 20:54, 11 June 2006 (UTC)
cool, I had noticed a couple of old links to 'Greek language' so I am glad you're getting stuck into it. I have been adding on greek characters so will cut and paste a standard one of 'Ancient Greek' above. cheers Cas Liber 21:32, 11 June 2006 (UTC)
- Yup, looks a bit better now. --Firsfron of Ronchester 04:10, 12 June 2006 (UTC)
Has anyone established an age for this dinosaur (not Giganotosaurus, BTW)? A google search pulls up just a couple of valid links, both of which say nothing more than it was a European sauropod that had some convoluted naming history that has since been sorted out. But nothing on the age. Links? --Firsfron of Ronchester 19:04, 12 June 2006 (UTC)
- DinoData says Kimmeridgian, and my old Dinosaur Society Encylcopedia (I knew that thing would still come in handy every now and then!) also lists Late Jurassic.Dinoguy2 20:38, 12 June 2006 (UTC)
- Appreciated.--Firsfron of Ronchester 23:52, 12 June 2006 (UTC)
The word 'dinosaur' in text.
Hello Project. This may be a very small point but it makes searching for dinosaur articles incomplete. I have found several dinosaur articles that do not have the word 'dinosaur' anywhere! Any dinosaur article you encounter or edit, may I suggest everyone looks for the word and adds it (with wikilink) if it's not there. OK, I'll sit down! - Ballista 18:26, 13 June 2006 (UTC)
- While we're at it, if we could only get "dinosaur" onto all the "bird" pages... :-) --Nar'eth 23:21, 13 June 2006 (UTC)
- For those of us who favor an apomorphy-based definition of Aves, can we get "bird" on all the maniraptor pages? ;) Dinoguy2 23:28, 13 June 2006 (UTC)
- Hee! Actually... what articles didn't have the word 'dinosaur' in them? Because all of them should have, by now, especially the genera ones which we agreed would be categorized by "Name of Period dinosaur", "Name of continent dinosaur", and "type of dinosaur". Puzzling. --Firsfron of Ronchester 23:27, 13 June 2006 (UTC)
- Sorry, can't remember - I'd have to troll all thru' my editing history to find it now, but it was one of the 'shortest articles' that I expanded. By the way, ref. that list, Sinosaurus, Sonorasaurus and Tylocephale are now expanded beyond 1kB. - Ballista 03:00, 17 June 2006 (UTC)
- That's great. I've been working on a few myself... we're up to 37% complete! :)--Firsfron of Ronchester 06:56, 17 June 2006 (UTC)
Basal Ornithomimosaurs
I expanded the Harpymimus stub into an article this morning, and I'll be getting to Pelecanimimus tomorrow. With luck, I'll even scrounge up some usable illos. for both. Thank, Dinoguy2 for helping out with the taxobox today.--Nar'eth 21:52, 18 June 2006 (UTC)
- Good work! 'Bout some attention was paid to the ornithomimes :) Dinoguy2 22:19, 18 June 2006 (UTC)
- I would also like to add my thanks to Dinoguy for fixing some of my taxoboxes. Also: Harpymimus is looking quite a bit better than yesterday... --Firsfron of Ronchester 22:23, 18 June 2006 (UTC)
coincidence! I was just doing Timimus...Cas Liber 03:52, 19 June 2006 (UTC) prob'ly good to tidy up Elaphrosaurus too with the latest on its close relationship or lack thereof with ornithomimosaurs Cas Liber 21:45, 19 June 2006 (UTC)
Allosaurus vs Allosaurid/ae vs Carnosaurs
Probably time to figure out what should go on each page. Been trimming a bit on Allosaurus - related genera stuff on this page could go on Allosaurid, or that could be ditched and redirected to carnosaurs. What do folks think? Cas Liber 11:13, 19 June 2006 (UTC)
- The problem with having a separate page for Allosauridae is that it's practically monotypic. I can't think of a single allosaurid that hasn't been referred to Allosaurus, though no all these referrals are universally accepted. I vote for keeping the Allosaurid page, and moving discussions of other allosaurid genera and their possible synonymy with Allosaurus there. Should be enough material for this to warrent its own page, and not just a section on Allosaurus.Dinoguy2 13:06, 19 June 2006 (UTC)
OK. if so, then the Allosaurid page is short and the possibility is that it wouldn't get much longer than it is now. In which case, maybe better to have discussions about it (i.e. subsume it) onto Carnosauria where the list of Carnosaurs (including Allosaurids) is now? Alternately, take the list of Allosaurids off Carnosauria (like Ceratopsidae off Ceratopsia) Cas Liber 21:29, 19 June 2006 (UTC)
Anatomy/Morphology articles
Something to think about as we edit and write dino pages: there are a lot of very basic anatomical terms that still lack even stubs. For example, today while writing Pelecanimimus, links to gular pouch and heterodont would have both been very helpful. Only, those articles didn't yet exist. I just created them this evening. I've been trying to do this as I go along, but many basic anatomical terms, espcially for "lower" vertebrates still do not even have stubs. So, grab a morphology textbook and lend a hand! :-) --Nar'eth 21:40, 19 June 2006 (UTC)
I know - I was musing on this. I did find mention and explanation of rhamphotheca on beak, so I made the word link to beak on the Stegosauria page. Rostral bone in ceratopsia is another story.. Cas Liber 21:43, 19 June 2006 (UTC)
- I also disambiguated ramphotheca to beak on Herpymimus. It would be a good idea to dab these scientific terms to a more general article that discusses them. For example, heterodont could easily be added as a sub-section or insersted somewhrere into tooth, then link to #heterodont for the dab, or something. But if there are no appropriate articles, new ones should certainly be created (like rostral bone). Maybe gular pouch could be added into a subsection of the newly created bird anatomy?Dinoguy2 00:08, 20 June 2006 (UTC)
- I think the problem with sinking them into more inclusive articles is that the wikilinks then cease to function as a quick reference, as the reader has to search through a lengthy article for the one bit they wish to clarify.--Nar'eth 04:57, 20 June 2006 (UTC)
- True, but if you created a sub-heading for the term and linked it via the # sign, it would take you right to the appropriate spot.Dinoguy2 15:55, 20 June 2006 (UTC)
- I think the problem with sinking them into more inclusive articles is that the wikilinks then cease to function as a quick reference, as the reader has to search through a lengthy article for the one bit they wish to clarify.--Nar'eth 04:57, 20 June 2006 (UTC)
If everyone thinks it's okay?
If everyone thinks it's okay, I would like to maintain the Dinosaur collaboration. I've done a good job so far & thought it would give me something to do. Is this cool with everyone? If nobody replies I'll suppose it is... Thanks, Spawn Man 01:40, 20 June 2006 (UTC)
<Kiwi> choice, bro!</Kiwi>
Sorry, couldn't help myself - seriously it is a good idea to encourage closer collaboration on a few pages Cas Liber 02:25, 20 June 2006 (UTC)
It's great by me but how about going steady on some of the (humorous) outbursts, in case someone takes offence? - Ballista 04:16, 20 June 2006 (UTC)
OK, sorry in advance Spawnman - feeling a bit decerebrate here. Got flu/kids up all night/sleep deprived/mum renovating and haivng to race around early in am to sort stuff out before builders...........Cas Liber 05:03, 20 June 2006 (UTC)
Sorry, Cas - I meant some of Spawn's more 'florid' language might be taken by some for an insult, perhaps - To all I say, assume goodwill and congeniality, anyway - :-) - great to 'know' you all. - Ballista 08:01, 20 June 2006 (UTC)
- Huh? What "florid" language? I've merely asked to be the maintainer. What's wrong with that? Huh? I'm confused... Spawn Man 08:16, 20 June 2006 (UTC)
- Support - Good job so far. Keep it up man. Sheep81 11:19, 20 June 2006 (UTC)
Sauropod mess
Actually - looking at all the pages of Sauropod groupings there is a bit of reduplification here too. Hands up who really likes sauropods.. PS: One of the biggies should make a good featured article but which one................Cas Liber 02:28, 20 June 2006 (UTC)
More dino shots
Hi all - Firsfron's been fiendishly 'doctoring' some of my dino shots - please take another look: User:Ballista/images/OUMNH Meanwhile, I took a few more shots, down in Dorset at the weekend (at the Charmouth Heritage Coast Centre) - he's been at them too, as he likes Scelidosaurus - please find on: User:Ballista/images/Charmouth Heritage Coast Centre June 2006 At some point, when we are all comfortable with which are to go up into articles, I'll start uploading. - Ballista 08:08, 20 June 2006 (UTC)
- Sorry everyone, I haven't been taking any part in the discussions for some time now. I am stuck in Kuwait and only yesterday I got internet access in my house. I'll check out the shots as soon as i can (I only have a dial-up connection). Cheers! Jayant,17 Years, India • contribs 09:10, 20 June 2006 (UTC)
- By the way, what happened to the Big 20 list on the project page? I think its on one of the discussions above, but i've missed a lot and can't find it, if its there. Jayant,17 Years, India • contribs 09:15, 20 June 2006 (UTC)
- Spawn deleted it because of the new Dino collaboration. Sheep81 11:19, 20 June 2006 (UTC)
- By the way, what happened to the Big 20 list on the project page? I think its on one of the discussions above, but i've missed a lot and can't find it, if its there. Jayant,17 Years, India • contribs 09:15, 20 June 2006 (UTC)
- I also have some pictures I took at the UC Museum of Paleontology a few weeks ago which I will upload if I ever have time (have been insanely busy lately). Sheep81 11:19, 20 June 2006 (UTC)
- That would be cool. Looking forward to seeing the pictures! :)--Firsfron of Ronchester 17:52, 20 June 2006 (UTC)
- Yeah - great! The more the merrier. - Ballista 00:28, 21 June 2006 (UTC)
I think this article is good enough now to be a FA. I have taken the liberty of nominating Velociraptor at Wikipedia:Featured article candidates. I hope you'll come & support it. Spawn Man 00:10, 22 June 2006 (UTC)
- I believe we are supposed to wait, per FA nomination guidelines, for the last one to finish up before we do a new one. However, I have to admire your enthusiasm.--Firsfron of Ronchester 00:16, 22 June 2006 (UTC)