User:Dweller/Coaching

Dweller

Ready for the 3rd-degree? Okay, here goes...

• What's your favorite aspect of Wikipedia (the thing you like to work on the most)?

This changes, from day to day, hour to hour. It's also changed as I've gained experience here. If you don't mind, I'll meld in the Why to this section, because I'm going to be awkward and give more than one answer.

Currently, I very much enjoy putting in quality spadework to get articles promoted to FA. I've done 2 and a third is close to FA status. I've worked in collaboration with some cricket WikiProject editors but my greatest partner in crime has been the indefatiguable Rambling Man, who (let's be fair about this) has done most of the work on the 3rd article.

From these activities, I derive considerable enjoyment. FA is the highest level of approval available in Wikipedia for an article's quality, as opposed to the merit of its topic.

I like to counter-point this (sometimes wearing) work with a mix of RC patrolling/Vandal bashing/Welcoming newbies/Conflict resolution and what I think of as "librarianship" at some of the ref desks. The first three are usually fairly easy to "get through" with a modicum of time invested, in other words, they're the exact opposite of the FA work - small investment for a small improvement here. Conflict resolution is something I find deeply satisfying. I like to do this from time to time. It takes a lot of time and effort and I try hard to be smart, so as not to antagonise situations further. My style is to be unilateral and make an effort to come out of left field. There are plenty of formal systems for this and currently, I'm not too interested in joining them. I hope I'm making a difference. Finally, the much-maligned Ref Desks. I think these are great. I dip in and out and make use of my own general (and specialist) knowledge and my Googling/WP-searching abilities. I spice it with a modicum of humour. I've learned not to make the first answer to a well-intentioned question too jokey.

I hope that just about covers What and why. Feel free to query me and point out where I'm outta line.

• Why?

See above.

• What tools do you use?

Ah. I'm rather low-tech. I've been using pop-ups for a while. I find it pretty useful, but it has some rather irritating aspects during editing, particularly when trying to cut and paste text that includes wikilinks. I had a comment from Glen that I should subst my warning messages. The ensuing debate (my atttidue here is slightly cocky, but I stand by it) led to him trying to boost my wikielbow by giving me "non admin tools". My monobook looked fabulous, the tools seemed brilliant... for the 0.3 seconds I could access Wikipedia before my humble laptop crashed. Again and again. Sadly, I've reverted back to simple pop-ups and I'm frankly reluctant to try out too much with my monobook. I am tempted to try downloading Firefox and give that a spin, but as I only own one of the machines I access WP from, I'll only tinker with that one. I occasionally make use of an edit counter (I placed a shortcut on my user page). I find this moderately interesting in an admittedly slightly self-absorbed manner, but I'm hardly obsessed with edit count etc. Mostly, I it's because at heart I'm a bit of a geek who likes stats. Recognise the cricket fan in me?

Glen's intervention was hugely welcome and disappointingly abortive. I recognise from pop-ups weedy abilities the utility of some of the tools that are out there, but I'm a little afraid of pushing my creaking kit too hard.

• What areas do you think you need the most improvement in?

Policy, policy, policy. In answer to the next question, yes, I've read them, but reading em and absorbing em is two different fish. I recently was rightly upbraided for speedy tagging repost on a reposted article that hadn't been to AfD. I wasn't aware of the issue, though I've read the speedy criteria umpteen times... I must have just missed the detail, which is worrying. Interestingly, I then found it interesting that an admin can salt an article that's being reposted without having been to AfD. I find that contradictory. Ho hum. Anyway, my main point is that I was shocked to have made such a basic mistake.

I've been participating in XfD to hone my antennae. My modus operandi has been to find debates where I'm the first opinion, or at least an early one, so I'm unaffected by others' opinions, other than the nom. When I first came to Wikipedia, I was definitely inclusionist, but I now find myself more of an appropriatenessist.

Other than that, I think I'm pretty good on civility. I have had a very occasional aberration. I am very keen to reduce those to a nil level as an ongoing platform. Whether it's my fault or not, I pride myself on apologising for even an accusation of incivility and doing my best to redress the situation. In my opinion, if I've upset someone, my intentions at the time are irrelevant and at the least I'm guilty of clumsiness. This of course applies to good faith editors. I'm polite to vandals (I try to encourage them if I detect a chance of redemption... I quite like the {{silly}} tag, as it is less confrontational than others...

• Have you read all of the policies?

Interesting question. No. Many are not relevant to me. For example, I will never run a Bot and rarely participate in Bot related interaction.

Obviously, I've read the most relevant policies (3RR, Vandalism etc) which apply to work I do. But what I've found is that I read the policies as I uncover a need to use them. For example, I've recently discovered WP:RFCN and before I began interacting there (nice debating chamber) I read WP:U, as you'd hope (and expect!).

More to the point, if I might redirect the gist of your question, I find myself querying whether I really understand the policies and can apply them correctly. As I've already indicated, I have cause to question myself with these big questions. My best options, all of which I've undertaken, are:

1. Keep re-reading the policies
2. Interact vigorously and using justification (few "per nom" comments from me) at places like XfD, WP:AIV, WP:ANI and WP:RFCN
3. Occasionally drop in to respected admin's talk pages and suggest what I think an appropriate course of action would be and check they agree (and if not, why not)
4. Editor review
5. Erm... admin coaching. <Grins>

Fortunately, I would modestly say that I respond well to constructive criticism and indeed welcome it (I seek it out - see 3, 4 and 5 above). I have learned tons since my first tentative steps here (check this for an embarrassing early edit, although in good faith of course) and I fully expect to continue learning, possibly by making mistakes and possibly after any successful RfA. I have heard that admins are human and occasionally get things wrong... --Dweller 11:19, 12 March 2007 (UTC)

Okay, that's a start. More questions to come after you've answered those. The Transhumanist 05:23, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

Hi. Thanks for this. I'm raring to go and hope to learn lots, so please find my weaknesses! I'll be kicking this off, most likely, tomorrow (Monday). --Dweller 10:16, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

Glad to have you here. I hope you have fun. You can post your answers above, indented under each question. And more questions will be coming! The Transhumanist 17:16, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

Email activated. Good. The Transhumanist 21:48, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

Some comments on the answers you posted above...

Understanding of policies lies in their context. Some ways to understand policies better are to:

• Read a policy's talk page and talk page archive. The archive may provide the initial discussion and reasoning for why the policy was created (though you might have to search further afield to find them). But what you will find for sure are endless debates over each policy's purpose and the justifications and criticisms of it and its various clauses. I.e., a policy's context.
  • Yes, you're right (of course). I'd worked this one out, but I've been too lazy. Some of the policies and guidelines have masses of back history. I've had some interaction at WT:N (can't remember the detail) - it's a hotbed of antagonism between the inclusionists and deletists in particular! (10 pages of archive). If you don't mind, this will be one option I'll be leaving till later in the process, though I definitely appreciate the rationale, which is clear and sound.
• To be exposed to policy context in general - and the attitudes, principles and philosophies that underlie policies - you could regularly read and participate in Wikipedia:Village pump (policy).
  • Great idea. I'll make a point of doing that. I've added it to my watchlist.
• Another very good place for learning policy context is to see how they are actively applied and enforced at Wikipedia:Administrators' notice board.
  • Yes. Until pretty recently, I was deterred by its name and <blushes> thought non-admins shouldn't post there. I know, I know. Funny, because I have plenty of edits to AIV and ANI. Perhaps because they're more task-focused. (Actually, on reflection, I was very nervous when first posting to ANI).
• Content-related policies are discussed a lot in Wikipedia:Deletion debates and at Wikipedia:Deletion review.
  • I'm increasingly interested in these. I stepped up my contribution to XfD a couple of months ago and that has naturally led to interest in those areas. The Transhumanist 18:56, 12 March 2007 (UTC)

To track down the cause of your laptop crashes, add one tool at a time to your monobook.js, and use it for awhile before adding the next one.

Yup. I tried that in reverse (see the history) but might try it forwards too. I also cleaned up my hard drive a fair bit, so may get a better result.

Some more questions for you:

• When you need to find a particular word in the edit window of a long article, how do you do it?
  • Control F
    • You mean that finds them in an open edit window (after you've clicked "edit this page")? Wow! what browser do you use? The Transhumanist 00:49, 13 March 2007 (UTC)
      • I thought for a moment that I'd written something stupid, but I just "Control F"d to find the word "Control" in order to respond :-) I'm using IE version 6.0 on this particular machine. --Dweller 09:16, 13 March 2007 (UTC)
• What methods do you use for searching and relacing?
  • Yes, you asked me that on my talk page. Do you mean within text? I don't do an awful lot of that. I'd use Control F. I don't run AWB or any automated tools if that's what you're asking.
• Do you spellcheck the articles you read, edit, and create?
  • Yes. I'm quite pedantic about typos and glitches.
• How?
  • Well, I don't use the Preview option as much as I should, although a recent decision to try to remember to do so is paying dividends! I have a certain amount of, shall we say, "expertise" at proofing. I'm surprised when someone else needs to pick up on a typo of mine, though always pleased it's been corrected. (So long as it's not a fallacious correction!)
• What methods do you use for finding what you are looking for on Wikipedia?
  • Gosh, that's a broad one. Well, the search box is quite useful <grins> but I supplement that with using list articles, Categories and links within relevant articles. I also resort to Googling sometimes.
• What browser(s) do you use?
  • IE v6.0
• What browser extensions do you apply to studying and working on Wikipedia?
  • Just Pop-Ups at the moment, for reasons I've already documented :-( --Dweller 09:56, 13 March 2007 (UTC)
    • What I meant was browser "plug-ins". (Firefox calls them "extensions").
      • Sorry, that's my lack of tech skills. None, I think. --Dweller 09:59, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

The Transhumanist 19:32, 12 March 2007 (UTC)

Question from Luckyluke:

• Hello, I'm one of the newer students that Transhumanist has taken on. A policy-related question for you, as an admin, should you choose to, you will have to close AfD discussions. You have mentioned above that you wish to become more involved in XfD's to better understand policies. Since my time on Wikipedia, October 2004, I have seen a growth in articles about educational institutions (public high schools, private schools, private universities, public universities, etc.), what are you views on the notability of schools given that the formerly proposed notability guidelines for schools were not adopted? Luke! 05:47, 14 March 2007 (UTC)
  • Hi. That's a really good question. When I first started coming across these (very early in my time here - indeed, my first ever edit was to a school article) I found it quite easy to apply WP:N and WP:ORG criteria. It's blatantly apparent that there are highly notable schools. It's equally clear to me that the nursery school round the corner from my gaff isn't notable.
  • I saw WP:SCHOOL and it's talk page and found myself inclining with those who disagreed for the need for the guideline. If anything, all that was needed was a gloss to WP:RS, but I'm not even sure of the need there. Any school that's notable will have been the subject of comment in a reliable source or two.
  • Claims of notability are of course more controversial and I'd be looking for clear consensus at AfD if the only claim was something like "<notable person> attended <this school>." (but I think that'd be enough for me to disallow a speedy) if that were the sole claim for notability. In essence, distilling my ramblings, speedy keep/delete options would be reserved for the clearer, less contentious issues where there is consensus (Shimeru's summary here is handy).
  • I'd make no distinction between the notability requirements for private and government-funded schools.
  • In terms of colleges and universities, I believe that properly accredited colleges and universities (which should almost certainly carry heavyweight WP:V anyway) are pretty much automatically notable. The difficulty comes with the proliferation of "send a cheque and your PhD is in the post" institutions. These are a minefield and I'd handle with extreme care. Indeed, I'd rather not touch 'em. I've come across these before in RL and they're slippery eels. However, heavyweight RS won't be verifying them. In short, I'd not close any speedy or AfD for a university unless it was a Keep based on heavyweight RS. For Delete, I'd avoid speedying but would consider an AfD WP:SNOW close... but it'd have to be a veritable blizzard. Admins should know their shortcomings.
  • Thanks for the excellent question. --Dweller 10:35, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

Questions for Dweller, round 2

Please provide the links to your FAs so we can learn from your activities and progress there. -TT

Hi there. Sure... I'm proud of them. All three (to-date) have been collaborations with User:The Rambling Man. Here they are, with some comments:

1. West Indian cricket team in England in 1988. Our first effort. An article I began shortly after arriving at WP, which got on the main page as a WP:DYK, something I'd found immensely satisfying. We had a little help from the Cricket WikiProject.
2. Paul Collingwood. We responded to an "advert" by User:Blnguyen (yes, it's a redlink), asking for help getting some cricket bios to FA in time for the impending World Cup. This was the first of two that we did. Blnguyen helpfully pointed to a bunch of bios with decent usable photos - one of the biggest problems to overcome. TRMan chose "Shep". There was considerable help from the Cricket WikiProject, in the enthusiasm garnered by Blnguyen's ad. Incidentally, TRMan and my posts at the WikiProject page stimulated the creation of a WikiProject "collaboration of the month".
3. Adam Gilchrist. In all fairness, TRMan did most of the work on that one, with me chipping in. We had much less help from Cricket WikiProject members.

We're also close to taking Ipswich Town F.C. to WP:FAC. It's currently at peer review. We're waiting for a copyedit, as we dislike taking material to FAC until we're confident it's close to "approvable". Finally, we've just started work on our latest project, Norwich City F.C. --Dweller 11:31, 21 March 2007 (UTC)

What have you learned about getting articles through FA, that isn't covered in the instructions? -TT

Gosh. Lots. I'll try to distill it all. Some of this is in the instructions, but is worth picking out.

1. Don't take an article to FAC until it's really, really good. A bunch of serious opposes begin to fill the page and make it look like a bad nomination. A good long time at Peer Review is best.
2. Work on detailed responses to detailed objects/comments at the article talk page, for the same reasons as 1.
3. Get the photos assessed by a photos specialist before going to FAC, to make sure all aspects of their licensing are OK. The shenanigans over the recent Main Page article Cricket World Cup losing all of its images on the very day it was featured was a horrible embarrassment to the cricket WikiProject and Wikipedia itself, IMHO.
4. Deal with every comment and criticism without rancour. Remember that the purpose is to get the best possible article, not to bulldoze an almost-ready piece through. For that reason, thank your critics - they're doing you a favour.
5. Number 4 does not mean that you need agree with every criticism. But have a very good reason for disagreeing. And don't do it often.
6. Respond promptly to comments/criticisms, even with a placeholder "Good point - I'll look into it"#
7. Be prepared to delete things (or comment them out) if they're POV or unsourcable. Even if they're (to your mind) important or really good bits of prose
8. Be persistent. You'll get there.
9. Ask expert editors on the topic to come and comment. Also, ask total novice editors on the topic. A cricket article must be satisfying to cricket lovers and half way understandable for everyone else. A brilliant recent Main Page FA that I (surprisingly) really enjoyed was 0.999.... I don't "get" maths, yet the article was challengingly digestible.
10. Images help make an FA, but they can be hard to find, with the right licenses. Charts and other graphics, on the other hand, are much easier and if you can't do them yourself, ask for help from someone who's made one on another article.
11. Start the process by adding {{cn}} tags to every single claim in the article. Then go back and replace them with proper inline citations - the "citeweb" methodology is preferred, it would seem. Position your references at the end of sentences/parags, after the full-stop.
12. You need to read and understand WP:DASH. It's a bore, but you'll get opposed otherwise.
13. Similarly for WP:MOS and WP:LEAD

Might add more, as I think of it. --Dweller 11:48, 21 March 2007 (UTC)

Looks like the perfect start for a lesson. Want to convert it into one? "Dweller, on Featured Article Development". Just say the word, and I'll transfer the above to a subpage, where you and our copy-editors can work on it. That reminds me! I've got to post the new lesson.  :-) The Transhumanist 22:37, 21 March 2007 (UTC)

Excellent idea. I'd be honoured. I'd guess that TRMan would have an opinion or two! :-) --Dweller 17:27, 22 March 2007 (UTC)

Questions for Dweller, round 3

Question from Luckyluke:

Given that we are all aspiring to be adminstrators and that you have participated in RfA discussions a fair bit, do you have a general criteria of what constitutes a successful RfA? This may sound like a stupid question given that if we all knew the criteria we wouldn't be here coaching each other. However, you are well experienced and I am interested in your views. I am most interested in the criteria you use to judge other editors - what do you look for, what pleases you, what doesn't, etc. Are there any special instances where an RfA can proceed successfully beyond the normal conventions (ex. would it be possible for a low edit count user to successfully pass an RfA, etc.)? Luke! 23:38, 28 March 2007 (UTC)

Hi Luckyluke. This question coincided with my last Wikibreak, which is why it's withered here waiting forlornly for a reply. Apologies for this. I'm going to work on a reply. --Dweller 11:50, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

Dweller's answer

This is a complex question and certain aspects are highly subjective. I'm going to break it down into the parts I perceive:

What criteria do I judge when assessing an RfA?

The following factors are a rough hierarchy. The higher up I've placed it, the more likely I am to oppose, if the candidate falls foul of it.

1. Civility. Particularly if recent / repeated / unapologetic.
2. Answers to questions. Some of the questions are easy to bluff, just by looking at old RfAs, so it's amazing how frequently people give duff answers.
3. Inexperience, particularly in Wikipedia ("Project") space. This is not a popular response and can be derided as "editcountitis". Frankly, I think it's pertinent. I'm not interested in an edit count of a certain level, but I am interested in involvement in/with the kind of processes and issues that adminship involves.

What differences exist between those and my assessment of the generalised chances of any RfA succeeding?

As I mentioned above, my third option is sometimes derided. However, a significant number of editors will usually oppose an inexperienced editor.

What might help an RfA succeed if otherwise falling outside these criteria?

Bear in mind that this question is about the success of an RfA, not the likelihood of my support. Given that proviso...:

1. Time. Months of good behaviour passed since incivility (or even vandalism) may help.
2. Newbie v experienced. Behaviour that can be put down to having been a newbie at that stage that won't be repeated, will get an easier ride.
3. Attitude. A user perceived as responding well to making mistakes and learning from them will usually gain latitude.
4. Massive interaction. Someone who throws himself into WP and makes vast numbers of (manual) edits across the various types of space and demonstrates all the trustworthiness needed might be "excused" having a short period of experience.
5. Perception of admin need. It's my experience of watching RfA that at certain times candidates will easily pass, without significant opposition, who would have at least struggled at other times. This tends to be when the community perceives there's a need to recruit more admins due to backlogs etc.

Hope that covers your interesting questions. Thanks! --Dweller 13:39, 2 May 2007 (UTC)

Assignments for Dweller

Until you're comfortable with policy and confident in your application of it, I recommend that you spend roughly half of your Wikipedia time on the following:

• Join the Wikipedia:Association of Members' Advocates and take on mediations. You'll be forced to interpret policy every step of the way.
• Read and keep up with Wikipedia:Administrators notice board. It's a base camp from where policy is actively enforced. And don't be shy. You can participate in the discussions there too.
• Read/participate in Wikipedia:Village pump (policy) regularly.
• Read all of Wikipedia's policies, and their talk pages and talk page archives. (You'll find yourself looking things up a lot in relation to your activities above, but a straight read through of all of them is important as well).

The other half of your time should be spent in the encyclopedia itself. After all, encyclopedia articles are the entire point.

The Transhumanist 18:56, 12 March 2007 (UTC)

Indeed. I've kicked off a new FA hunt with The Rambling Man. We're working on Ipswich Town F.C.. Our third FA was passed overnight - Adam Gilchrist (though TRM did most of the work on that one). --Dweller 15:50, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

Update. I have now installed Firefox on one of the machines I use. I have installed a copy of your monobook and it's working (better than!) fine. I'm restricted to IE on other machines I use, so it remains to be seen if they'll tolerate the tools. Advice on "extensions" is welcomed. --Dweller 13:47, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

Yes, I have a couple of recommendations. The first, is a feature of Firefox itself, rather than an extension: tabbing. There's a section about it on my tools page. Tabs are like windows, but they're within Firefox. See Interiot's suggestions on using it in the interface section on this page, below.

The best tool I've found to enhance tabbing is Linky.

"Tab" is just another name for "window". Try the following: Select text with about 100 links in it, click your right mouse button, click Linky on the drop down menu, click "Load selected links into tabs", uncheck any links you don't want to open, click "Open selected links", and then switch to another window and do something else while those links are loading. Then come back and look at the first tab (each tab contains a seperate Wikipedia page). When you are done looking at or editing that page, press Ctrl-F4 and it instantly disappears, and the next tab is displayed. When you need to see what you are doing, tabs + Linky is faster than AWB. Tabs + Linky + a macro program is a powerful tool, and complements AWB.

Another extension I recommend is Translator. It is fantastic for viewing other-language Wikipedia's, which in turn serve as portals to the WWW pages in that each language. That is, the German Wikipedia is a great portal to the German Web.

And of course, ChatZilla. Enjoy. The Transhumanist 04:14, 17 March 2007 (UTC)

Some more assignments for you:

• You mentioned you joined the AMA. Good for you. If you'd like to see how I've been handling my first mediation assignment, see Paytakaran. I never actually joined AMA, instead I was tapped on the shoulder by an advocate who asked me to help. I was asked to participate here, I replied both here and here, and got started here.
  • I've reviewed the case. My goodness. I think you've done such an outstanding job, it's rather off-putting; I'm not sure if I'm as wise as you! But I'm keen to give it a shot. I'll dive in today. If you don't mind, I'll notify you here about it and ask you to keep an eye on what I get up to. Sound advice is always welcome. For that matter, I welcome it in any area of my contributions. --Dweller 12:27, 21 March 2007 (UTC)
• I recommend not setting up an AMA desk page, as it just splits up the discussion. Rather, I advise taking each case right to the talk page of the article at issue, and mediating right there.
  • Yes, seems sensible. Much like my experience of working on FAC articles. Totally agree. Will amend my AMA member details and nuke my desk. --Dweller 12:27, 21 March 2007 (UTC)