Talk:Sinclair Sovereign/GA1

GA Review

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Reviewer: Montanabw (talk · contribs) 19:35, 28 April 2014 (UTC)

I will do a review of this article. Montanabw^(talk) 19:35, 28 April 2014 (UTC)

Many thanks. James^x12345 21:26, 28 April 2014 (UTC)

OK, well, just for starters, it seems pretty short for a GA. While short articles CAN become GAs, this one seems to be a bit too sparse. The lead is only two sentences long, the history section begins rather abruptly and I'd like to see a little bit of expansion on the history and design. I took a look at related articles, such as Sinclair Executive and Sinclair Scientific, and compared to those, (Both GAs, I see) this article is choppier, shorter, a bit lighter on source material, and generally seems pulled together rather hastily. I'd like to see an expansion of the history section to provide a bit more context for this model in the context of the company and an expansion of the design section (I'm comparing to the Executive article, this one seems to be missing detail present in the other) and then add to the lede so it is a more thorough summary. There's not a whole lot to say about a pocket calculator model, but there should be more than what's here. Montanabw^(talk) 06:14, 29 April 2014 (UTC)

I've added quite a bit now on the background, as well as a further note on the battery life. Unlike the other two articles at GA, however, the electronics in this model are quite pedestrian, and as far as I can gather it was a fairly ordinary calculator in a nice case with an inflated price tag. In contrast, the two earlier models use quite remarkable shortcuts that are discussed at length in various sources. The article is also about 30% longer now, and the lead covers all the major aspects of the article. James^x12345 15:51, 29 April 2014 (UTC)

@Jamesx12345: It's definitely better. I'd say you are at least 80% there now. As a person old enough to remember using calculators with light-emitting diodes in school (and we weren't supposed to, except AFTER we'd learned to manually calculate square roots!), it is a fun article for me to review! Frankly, if your sources verify the "fairly ordinary calculator in a nice case with an inflated price tag" comment, I'd try to slip that in there, I was kind of wondering just that myself. As a random GA reviewer, I'm looking for why this topic is interesting and the article worth being read. So, perhaps explain a bit more for us non-techies that the various fancy looks but "pedestrian" features were just that. Maybe see if you can wikilink a few more of the tech concepts, also -- I think what is happening is that to you, with a lot of knowledge in this field, you are writing for others with some background. However, I am a non-expert and am reading this article as the first in the series, so from time to time I scratch my head, then click a wikilink to go read another article (such as the one on Sinclair Radionics), then go back and look at this article again. But even then, I feel like there are gaps. So instead of putting it all here, I am reading through it again and putting hidden text <--like this--> where my non-expert mind is going, "huh?" or "I'd like to know more about that." Doesn't mean you have to do what I suggest, but take it as a flag that a reader (me) was scratching her head at this point and maybe you could add a little there - if info exists, of course. Feel free to ignore any of it and toss the comments when you've read them, but perhaps in there you will find something useful that will expand the article. (I also sympathize with your situation, as with my horse articles, I know they get loaded with jargon and aficionado knowledge, it's tough to write both correctly and in a way understandable to the layperson!) Give it one more expansion whack, and I can probably sign off on it. Montanabw^(talk) 02:34, 30 April 2014 (UTC)

I've completely rearranged again the historical context to make it chronological, and clarified a few things as well. I couldn't find much by way of comment or comparison on the technical aspects, but I've added a bit more about the battery life. The closest a source comes to saying it is an ordinary calculator is the Register, which describes it as a "technological dead end," but I might be able to put two things together. There is also more info about the solid gold one now, which makes it a substantiated rumour. James^x12345 18:44, 30 April 2014 (UTC)

EXCELLENT WORK! I like it a lot better now. The lead was still bugging me, so again, instead of nitpicking here, I just did a small rewrite on it to give you a notion of what could be done to expand it. I'm not anchored to my prose and I may have inaccurately summarized something, so feel free to revert or redo anything I wrote - but you can see that I dug up stuff to expand it out more. (I hate doing leads on my own articles, I just can't seem to wrap my head around one last summary of what I've already written a zillion times...). I had two hidden questions also. I'd say touch bases on those comments, make sure I didn't totally screw up your article with my lead rewrite, see if you can not the "technological dead end" bit and you'll be good to go. Montanabw^(talk) 07:07, 1 May 2014 (UTC)

I've addressed those two points, and added a few more bits and pieces. I've been looking for this ad for some time, so it's nice to have a copy to work from, as it contains a few details such as "hand polished gold." Thanks for your copy-editing of the lede, and also the inline comments - they're really useful, and something I might do with other GARs in the future. James^x12345 17:38, 1 May 2014 (UTC)

Passing it now. Good work! Montanabw^(talk) 09:29, 2 May 2014 (UTC)