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Talk:Touhou Wiki/Subpage structure

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How we are subpaging articles

We should outline exactly how we are subpaging articles and any criteria used to determine the structure.

For instance, I have a Spell Card article. I have articles for each spell card in each stage. I would then toss them all under the the Spell Card article because it is a logical grouping. That is because the Spell Card article would explain what Spell Cards are (in the context of the specific game) and then allow readers to look at specific details.

Even though it may be intuitive, defining standards for the purpose of reference and "we wrote it down, you just didn't read it" is, IMO, necessary. It would also reduce possible conflicts in the future when someone doesn't agree with how I'm subpaging things and we suddenly have move and re-direct wars --Tsukihime 16:58, 17 January 2011 (UTC)

Right now the Music section for UFO is filed under translation; should that be moved to be consistent with the guidelines below then? Pufferfish101 21:19, 17 January 2011 (UTC)
These are just a proposal. Since I don't look at translations too much I'm not sure where would be the best place to put it. --Tsukihime
The music comments are part of the translation effort for a game as a whole. I've already linked it from the main Translation page, but I do think that's where it should go.
Also, I disagree that we should subpage character articles under the games, as there are quite a few characters that have been in more than one game. There's also no real reason to subpage the things in Bestiary, Items, or Misc(which shouldn't exist anyway) under the game articles.
However, I would see benefit in doing something like /wiki/Characters/Reimu_Hakurei or /wiki/Bestiary/Hakutaku. I was constructing this page a while back, and as of right now it contains only links to categories for certain things. If we were to have, say, a Bestiary page that would list everything in there, and subpage those pages to Bestiary, that would be cool.
I'm personally just concentrating on getting a format down using only the UFO-related pages, so. Darkslime 23:25, 18 January 2011 (UTC)
The subpaging criteria is only for specific articles, and not all articles in general. You're right, I wouldn't place Sanae or Reimu under /wiki/character either, nor would I place any music albums under /wiki/doujin/circles/circle_name/albums/; it's just unnecessary and rather silly lol. I guess the best criteria to determine whether something should be subpaged or not is whether there is a *Prefix* or not. Most of the prefixes I've come across have been rather useless and are only used for disambiguation purposes (otherwise, how would you be able to distinguish between EoSD spell cards and UFO spell cards?). We will not create any additional branches and ideally looking to have at most 3-level deep tree structures. Otherwise it becomes as useless as prefixes (if not more useless)! --Tsukihime 14:52, 19 January 2011 (UTC)
Yeah, that's probably the rule we should follow for the moment. Darkslime 20:41, 19 January 2011 (UTC)
For games that have separate pages for English patches, where should they go? Or should we just get rid of the pages with patches and link them directly? - Kiefmaster99 04:40, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

Subpaging music lyrics

I had planned to move all lyrics as subpages for their respective albums, but WGH mentioned on IRC that some songs appear in multiple albums by the same group (demo CD's, compilation CD's, re-used tracks). This would most likely lead to duplicate pages if we're not careful, and even if we were, the subpage navigation wouldn't work well. Suggestions? --Tsukihime 17:58, 20 January 2011 (UTC)

Subpaging Criteria

Each type of work generally exhibit particular patterns. Games always have Gameplay articles and articles detailing the various objects available in the game. Music articles always have lyrics associated with them. Print work usually have chapters, references, and covers.

As this is the Touhou wiki, all articles will most likely be related to Touhou. Hence, there would be no need to specify that is it indeed a Touhou article. There is also no need to specify whether it is a Game or Music or Print Work, as that is unnecessary on a wiki.

All articles under wiki/ should be independent of each other. For instance, it would be logical to have

  1. an article for Sanae Kochiya, as she is a character in the franchise
  2. an article for Curiosities_of_Lotus_Asia, as it is a print work in the franchise
  3. an article for each album, as they are separate works from each other.

One can argue that an album should be filed under the particular circle that produced it, and can also argue that all circles should be filed under /wiki/Doujin/, but that is unnecessary. There are 1000+ doujin circles that are only related by the fact that they're doujin circles. It is not necessary to state that they are doujin circles in the article name (we have categories for that).

So then why are we putting Chapter 1 and Chapter 2 of Curiosities of Lotus Asia as a subpage? Why not just use a category like with separate doujin circles? From what I just said, we can easily say it's unnecessary, otherwise I'm simply playing favorites and picking and choosing when to follow guidelines or not.

For that reason, I would point out the use of prefixes. Before subpages were enabled across the mainspace, every chapter for that novel was prefixed "Curiosities of Lotus Asia:". When you had to refer to another chapter, you had to type the full article name. There is no relative link between the two at all; no connection. By filing them under the main print work article, we have now established a relation between the novel "Curiosities of Lotus Asia" and all of its chapters. As an added bonus, if the novel suddenly change names, we can easily change all articles under it without having to rename the one by one (and, of course, update the links accordingly).

There are still many articles out there with prefixes. You can see them here. We should not see any articles that duplicate a prefix without being subpaged (most of them use a colon after the prefix)

One may argue that in a wiki, there is no need for such a structured hierarchy, but at the very least, I would like to remove meaningless prefixes. --Tsukihime 14:47, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

tl;dr

  • Subpaging shows the relationship between the parent article and the subarticle
  • The subarticle is dependent on the parent article and usually means very little if it is its own independent article
  • Prefixes generally indicate that the article is dependent on some other article, however that is not always the case

Drafted Guidelines

Games

Generally speaking, the details for a particular game would mean very little anywhere else as it is game-dependent. It would make sense to subpage them.

  • Gameplay
  • Translation
    • Maybe characters, if all that is required is background information translation
    • Documentation
    • Dialog in the game
  • Music (translations and such)
  • Characters (that appear in the particular game)
    • Profiles for each character (if there are a lot of details for them)
  • Skills)
    • Subarticles for skills (ie: different class of skills perhaps)
  • Bestiary
    • Profiles for each monster
  • Items
  • Equipment (this may be placed under items IF there are no subarticles. Usually, it is separated)
  • Miscellaneous (Uncategorized topics that are not big enough for their own article)

Note: Some games have the OST (official soundtrack) released as an album. This should be its own article.

Music

Subpages will not be used here unless the following issues have been resolved:

  • A song may appear in multiple albums.

Songs themselves can be considered independent objects that just happen to be grouped together in an album, so they are not necessarily dependent on the album itself.

Print Work

  • Main article
    • Chapters

(other types you can think of)

Reference

This is what I imagine a tree to look like

  • "Concept" (this is the most abstract template that all "ideas" are based on
    • Entertainment <-- category
      • Games <-- category
        • Touhou <-- category
          • ... <-- stuff in the Touhou category

Since we are the touhou wiki, we don't need to attach "Touhou" category to every article because it is implied. Here is one possible structure that it may be ordered in.

In fact, you can choose many different structuring schemes, but clearly some categories will exist indefinitely. They, of course, will use categories and not subpaging! --Tsukihime 16:58, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

And what if subpages are evil?

Sorry about reverting Touhou Hisoutensoku/Music/OST move without discussing it with anyone. I just felt that OST really deserves its own page.

Anyway, I think "subpage everyting possible" decision was rash. Wikipedia doesn't use subpages for a reason. We have one extra reason to not use it: doing things like they're done on wikipedia would make life easier for both editors and readers. Anyway, here is the page from Wikipedia: Wikipedia:Do not use subpages. "Related topics" section at the bottom of that page provides even more discussion about subpages. To make it short, subpages don't provide anything really useful while restricting the structure. Wikipedia use hatnotes for navigation between related subjects. They are not any worse than header generated for subpages, besides a bit of manual work. --WGH 22:44, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

Part of the reason subpages were introduced without much opposition was because it was replacing something that doesn't exist(?) in Wikipedia - Title: Subheading. This is especially prevalent in game pages where there are a bunch of articles under the main game (script, music, etc.), whereas in Wikipedia this isn't as prevalent. I suppose the whole '/' in titles was overlooked too.
There are few cases where hatnotes are used here, but they do exist (see Rin), though I can't think of any examples where this would be relevant with regards to subpages.
There are places where subpaging has not taken effect yet, such as music lyrics (Lyrics: Name). Whether we could just use a system of redirects is up to debate.
With regards to your example, this is where hierarchy would have to be discussed. I can see where you're going, and I am inclined to support your reversion. The whole subpages thing should start (if not already) at independent products. If the OST and game are sold separately, then the OST should have its own page. Beyond this, the OST could be mentioned in the main article or put in a Navbox. Categories could be used too. - Kiefmaster99 23:44, 2 February 2011 (UTC)
Many of the problems with subpages are specific to an encyclopedia, and subpages may work perfectly for other wikis.
subpaging requires new users to learn arbitrary, idiosyncratic hierarchies, which could in many cases be avoided without subpages. To use the same example, bass guitar is easy to guess; guitar/bass is not. Violin is easy to guess; string instrument/violin is not.
On the whole, the subpage move was for existing categorizations/heirarchy being switched to using 'main/secondary' instead of 'main: secondary'. It looks like the Hisoutensoku OST was an exception to this, but at least for the pages where the heirarchy already exists (I assume this to be most), the subpages are definitely an improvement. -- Qazmlpok 23:59, 2 February 2011 (UTC)
I've looked at the arguments on that page, and many of them don't really apply to this wiki. For one, many of the pages that are being subpaged were already hierarchically organized, only with the ":" construction instead of the "/" construction. The difference is merely functional, and the main reason subpages in mainspace caught on was because backlinks can be then used instead of "Return to", which Wikipedia does not use either. That said, I don't think anyone is trying to "subpage everything." So far there's only really been major subpaging of articles which have already been organized in a hierarchical fashion. Pufferfish101 06:05, 3 February 2011 (UTC)
Wikipedia actually use some sort of "Return to": hatnotes and "See also" sections. There are also a lot of examples on Wikipedia where subpages could work. E.g. wikipedia:2011_Egyptian_protests_timeline vs. wikipedia:2011_Egyptian_protests/Timeline. And so on. I believe that most arguments actually do apply to this wiki. Both "X/Y" and "Y of X" are arbitrary conventions. For example, Undefined_Fantastic_Object/Spell_Cards/Stage_1 vs. Undefined_Fantastic_Object_Spell_Cards. Why not? What's the problem with putting all spellcards in one page? It's easier to find a spell card when you have its number. --WGH 14:15, 3 February 2011 (UTC)
Wikipedia does use hatnotes (but not "Return to", they prefer somehow getting a link to the main article in the lead paragraph) and see also, but the usage of those is different from how subpages are being used on this wiki. There are indeed many pages on Wikipedia that could be subpaged, but that is not really the issue. The issue is that we have a lot of very specific and niche articles on this wiki - articles that, if on Wikipedia, would be deleted on sight. Sure, we could move a lot of pages to "Characters in XXX" or "Gameplay of XXX." But how would you deal with something like, say, The Genius of Sappheiros/Walkthrough or Labyrinth of Touhou/Special Disk or Labyrinth of Touhou/Troubleshooting or Touhou Pocket Wars EVO/Music? "Walkthrough for", "Special Disk for", "Troubleshooting for", "Music of"? Unwieldy and provides no real useful or new information, not to mention rather pointless for organizational purposes. Or do we go back to using ":"? I really like having backlinks at the top of articles. It makes navigation significantly easier, especially since not all the articles on this wiki have enough content to justify a lead paragraph linking to the main article. And a hatnote at the top pointing to the main article is hardly better. And on Wikipedia, if you look at "Timeline of the 2011 Egyptian protests," there's currently no easy way to get back to the main article...
As for the spellcards, I believe they're only organized that way because that's the way they were originally created and formed. Do people really search for spell cards by number though? I look for them by stage (a.k.a. boss), and for some people with wooden connections, loading too many images on one page may not be convenient. Pufferfish101 19:06, 3 February 2011 (UTC)
I believe Subpaging is not a bad idea. However, I do believe that there are some instances in which it hasn't been properly implemented. For example, Scarlet Weather Rhapsody's Spell cards. The Structure as it currently stands is: "Game Page/Spell Cards/(Player|Story|Skill|System Spell Cards/Character Player Spell Cards". That's FOUR levels. I don't see why the information in each of the "______ Spell Cards" page cannot be included in the "Spell Cards" page, thus bringing the number of subpages to 3.
Also, I don't think it's bad to use it in the Literature section. On the other hand, the Music section won't need it much, particularly in the Lyrics pages, as one song may appear in multiple records.
On the subject of Spell Cards: I agree with Pufferfish. More often than not, if you're looking for a Spell Card you don't look for the number, you look for the game in which it appears and the character who uses it. Having all the Spell Cards in one page isn't such a bad idea either, but in some cases it can create pages that are just plain huge. Scarlet Weather Rhapsody or Imperishable Night (222 Spell Cards!!) come to mind. The current standard avoids having huge pages by mere categorization according to widely-known, well, categories. If no one can make a compelling-enough argument against this, I think Subpaging should stay, even if we have to further define when to use it. Anatole serial 20:01, 3 February 2011 (UTC)
OK, I've got it. As a conclusion: let subpages be here, but be sure to not over-use them. Use them only where they're really necessary. --WGH 21:56, 3 February 2011 (UTC)