Talk:Endomorphism

Ph.D. thesis and software laboratory

I made some changes to this article which were backed out by another editor. I tried to discuss this but received no reply. Here's the exchange so far:

Howdy, I backed out your recent change to Endomorphism because it violated a few guidelines for wikipedia, WP:EXT and WP:COI. Roughly speaking, you should avoid adding links to external sites and avoid adding information about yourself or your friends.

Definitely do not link to external sites related to you personally, WP:EXT#Advertising and conflicts of interest. JackSchmidt (talk) 03:30, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the pointers to the guidelines on external links and conflict of interest. I'm learning quite a bit about becoming a Wikipedia editor and appreciate your help. I've reviewed these two guideline documents and, although the guidelines are clearly stated, there appears to be a fair amount of room for interpretation and case-by-case judgement. In my opinion the edits I made to the Endomorphism page do not violate the external links guidelines. Both the links to my Ph.D. dissertation and the Endo software laboratory download seem to satisfy section 3.1 "What should be linked" and do not satisfy the criteria in section 4 "Links normally to be avoided".

However, the link to my personal website for the on-line version of the Ph.D. dissertation does seem to violate the guidelines on conflict of interest in the external links document:

"You should avoid linking to a website that you own, maintain or represent, even if the guidelines otherwise imply that it should be linked. If the link is to a relevant and informative site that should otherwise be included, please consider mentioning it on the talk page and let neutral and independent Wikipedia editors decide whether to add it"

The download and manual pages links I provided for the Endo software laboratory do not seem to violate either the external links or conflict of interest guidelines as the external links are not to my personal website but to an extensive download area of open source software packages. Further, the endo software and mathrec package is released under an open source license and freely redistributable so I do not profit in any way thereby avoiding the conflict of interest in the "Financial" section. Further, the conflict of interest guidelines state: "Editing in an area in which you have professional or academic expertise is not, in itself, a conflict of interest. Using material you yourself have written or published is allowed within reason, but only if it is notable and conforms to the content policies"

So, the only real problem I see is the link to my Ph.D. dissertation which happens to reside on my personal website. I could reference the copy archived at the University of California at Santa Cruz library but the on-line version is quite a bit more convenient than physically travelling to Santa Cruz.

I am quite willing to abide by community consensus and standards on these issues. I really don't care if people visit my website, I'd just like to make the research software and dissertation research available to others. So, what would you suggest ? Should I present this discussion on the Endomorphism discussion page or somehow involve others ?

Again, thanks and sorry for the long-winded post. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Doctorfree (talk • contribs) 23:42, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

Is anyone interested in picking up this discussion? Is a link to a Ph.D. dissertation on Endomorphisms and accompanying open source software laboratory relevant and appropriate for this article? Ronald Joe Record (talk) 00:42, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

If it is good, then yes. Good material doesn't comes from heaven ... 84.16.123.194 (talk) 22:55, 27 May 2009 (UTC)