This is one of my favorite articles on the wiki, and I want to keep it as friendly as possible – or even aim it more at “common editing mistakes”
Would it be OK if I wordsmithed a little to make it shorter and snappier?
Usability, Simplicity, Retention.
Thanks so much! In principle I’m delighted for folks to improve it, and that is after all the idea of a wiki. I’m also aware that my writing is wordy. I can’t help it, it’s like I learned to write (poorly) in the mid 1800’s, though I often come back later and and see a zillion ways to tighten my prose.
My intent in this article diverges somewhat from a standard wiki approach that aggressively replaces text with links. I wanted this article to be a “one-stop shop” to a greater extent than the typical article. Many of the intended readers will arrive here not because they want to know something and are willing to keep following links until they understand it, but rather because someone told them they screwed up and they are reluctantly trying to find out how. So, I’d discourage tightening it in such a way that it requires readers to follow more links to get a satisfactory answer to that question.
Tell you what, why not pick what you consider to be the most worthwhile item to edit, have at it, and let me know when you’re done. If we’re on the same page (no pun intended) you’ll have my unqualified blessing, otherwise we can discuss which is the best way to go 
OK. I’ll start on the first point you just added. I’ll let you know when I’m done.
It takes a long time to write briefly.
And if we are on the same page – I will ask you if it is OK to make it “friendlier” because I see most of the content as perfect to hand to the first-time editor who has not made any mistakes yet.
In fact, as soon as I saw it, I wished I had read it before I had edited anything at all. Especially all those parking lots… and the odd bridge.
OK. I changed “misunderstood principals” to “understanding waze principals” and did a little to the first point. In rearranging things, you can see I have caused some change in emphasis. I’ve dropped “strongly discouraged” in favor of … sort of … “don’t” because this is beginner-level stuff. I made it less nuanced, I guess.
Thanks, this is useful. I can see your main concern appears to involve my tone, which can be a bit strong at times. I do want to keep readers awake and engaged, but more than that, I’m trying to disrupt habits of thought. A stronger tone can help accomplish that. This is also a departure from the Wikipedia approach, which aims for an even tone and neutral language, and rightly so for that application.
So I don’t mind making readers a little bit uncomfortable, but definitely not at the cost of making them feel unwelcome. Put another way, I want the article to be challenging, but never officious, pedantic or patronizing.
Tell you what, I’ll review the article and see what I can do. Our styles are different enough it may be better for me to look into this just for the sake of uniformity.
If you have any other specific or general concerns please feel free to bring them up!
I think you are correct that we are looking at this from very different points of view. I have a different purpose in mind.I can see now that the changes I made don’t match your purpose for the article.
If I were ever to try some editing here again, I would do it with your original purpose in mind.
Please revert my changes.
I really do like the content.
I am thinking of taking a copy and writing a different intro, to make it more of a “welcome to editing; here are some common newbie mistakes you can avoid”. If you like the idea, I can even set up a transcludable for the part that is used in more than one article.
Looking again at the proposed approach of changing the article, it looks like one of the primary goals is to change the “wrong” headings to “right” headings. For example, if the “Incorrect edits” article currently lists:
- Misplaced roundabouts
- Overlapping segments
- Corrupted turn restrictions
- Unnecessary road splitting
- etc.
The friendlier approach would list
- Correctly-placed roundabouts
- Proper use of adjacent segments
- Correct turn restrictions
- Appropriate road splitting
- etc.
Although I agree this is a friendlier approach, I feel pretty strongly that it sacrifices the clarity necessary for an article whose readers have arrived with one question: “tell me what I did wrong and why the editing community responded like it did”. The main point of this article is to answer that question. Headings that talk about doing things right are great and appropriate in other articles in the wiki, but this is the one place I believe it’s better to talk about doing things wrong.
It is fantastic that this could be a useful article for editors who haven’t yet been asked to read it! But they are not the primary target audience. So I would propose to retain the negative headings.
[EDIT: Oops, crossed posts! Thanks again for the suggestions and understanding!]
We agree perfectly
I even like all your “wrong this, wrong that” headings. I’ll give you a buzz when I make some progress on “my own” (even though I 'll mostly be stealing your material).
Thanks again!
hmmm… “Overlapping” may need a term thingy in the wiki???
Ummm…a term thingy?
I did a search and the only thing with overlapping is where it is contained. So we might need a glossary entry? or better search term with overlapping _______?
Possibly a glossary for editors?
overlap
split
bow tie
detour suppression
One way this might be done is via the SMW (semantic media wiki) extension. But I’m not certain on that.
:lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:
Now responding to the serious side of the point, we may need a disambiguation page on overlapping since there are at least 4 different pages that use that term is similar, but different ways.
Another editor recently added the following recommendation to the “incorrect edits” wiki article:
On the whole I lean in favor of this new addition. But, I believe I’ve heard some senior editors murmur that beginners (the target audience for this article) may in fact be slightly more dangerous when armed with scripts – even one as well done as Validator.
If anyone has concerns about this new addition please speak up. I’m inclined to leave the new language in place but would welcome perspectives.
With a caution that validator is no substitute for talking to experienced editors, I think it is OK to recommend validator to beginners. When validator finds things that seem to have been done intentionally by experienced editors, or even beginners working with the guidance of experienced editors, they need to ask rather than assuming it should be undone.
And, of course, validator doesn’t find incorrect turn arrows. Shift-Z helps with that.
but recommending “what to do” is not the same as cautioning against incorrect edits.
I would always be cautious giving a novice editor a script that editor might not understand the reasons for much the same way a math teacher would be reluctant to give a calculator to a student who hasn’t yet mastered basic arithmetic.
Perhaps I will move and modify the tip somewhat to suggest Validator only as one becomes more comfortable with WME. It feels like overload for a brand-new editor to be told to install optional third-party scripts from day one…
I am opposed to telling novice editors to use the validator script. I believe that an new editors should be taught to pick out incorrect edits on their own based on their knowledge of their streets rather than a script telling them that something may be wrong. I think of it like learning to multiply or divide before using a calculator. People use a calculator to save time, but they need to know the context and mechanics behind how the calculator is coming up with that answer, so they can understand it.
While the validator report gives a good idea of what is wrong with the segment and goes more in-depth with a link to a wiki page or the forum, I suspect that many people never run the report to see these links. I guess I would be somewhat assuaged if validator didn’t highlight in WME for L1s and instead required them to run a report to find errors. However, as a whole I am opposed to novice editors being told to download scripts. I believe we have a solid mentoring group and I think that we should start to use it more(maybe a group class?) rather than offloading our teaching to these scripts.
OK, based on responses, and on my own feelings on the matter, I have moved the recently-added paragraph on Validator to a new section at the very end of the Incorrect Edits wiki article. This new section deals with scripts in general. The new section reads:
I think too little importance is placed upon the value of WME Toolbox & Validator to new editors. These are tools every new editors should have, especially Validator since it explains whats wrong and how to fix the issue. WME Toolbox is just as important bc it now alerts the user they have a PM waiting for them if they are unable to be reached via chat (which could be useful if they are causing damage to the map).
I think we should convey to editors that map editors are not required to use these plugins but that it is HIGHLY recommended to do so. Especially for editors who plan on or already do edit regularly.