Template talk:Infobox ship begin/Archive 8

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Archive 7

Archive 8

Notable commanders?

Is there any reason why we couldn't add a field for notable commanders? Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 03:37, 20 April 2020 (UTC)

I'd oppose such a field. The anti-infobox people have a point in that there's a lot of redundancy between infoboxes and ledes, especially for biographies. Much less so for ships and units, but Template:Infobox service record can be used to add this sort of information if needs be. Honestly, any prominent commanders and campaign participation can be added to the lede and I'd actually support deletion of service record as redundant. Especially since people tend towards completeness which greatly lengthens the infobox. They're forgetting that infoboxes are supposed to be summaries of the material in the main body, not complete records of all specifications/campaign participation/commanders, etc.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 16:06, 20 April 2020 (UTC)

Seems to me that army and air force unit infoboxes have such a field, and it is useful information. Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 05:03, 21 April 2020 (UTC)

Sure, but I tend to be a minimalist as I've gotten complaints by readers of overly-long ship infoboxes. Let me give you an example of what I'd prefer not to happen. I know the names of almost every commander for the WWII-era Japanese battleships, almost all of whom reached flag rank, thus giving them the presumption of notability. The Japanese seem to have changed commanders more frequently than other navies, roughly at 16-18 month intervals so there are a lot of these guys over the 20- or 30-year careers of the older ships. So that'd be roughly 20 names for the oldest ships, of which 80-90% would be notable. So we'd have arguments over which ones were the most notable and should be included in the infobox, aside from the completionists who'd want to put everybody there. No, far better to put them in the main body where they can be put in context.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 12:49, 21 April 2020 (UTC)

I agree with Sturmvogel. Our infoboxes are already too complex. If commanders of vessels is notable, that can be mentioned in their articles, or in the text of the ship articles if important to the narrative. Kablammo (talk) 16:04, 21 April 2020 (UTC)

I see your point. Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 01:36, 22 April 2020 (UTC)

Parameter names

Per Manual of Style on infobox formatting, parameter names should not be capitalised: Parameter names should use lower-case unless they are proper nouns. Please convert. Thank you. --Goldsztajn (talk) 15:32, 23 April 2020 (UTC)

 Not done for now: please establish a consensus for this alteration before using the {{edit protected}} template.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 15:40, 23 April 2020 (UTC)

This template is, at the time I write this, transcluded into 35645 articles. The ship infobox templates:

• {{Infobox ship begin}} – uses lowercase parameter names
• {{Infobox ship image}} – supports both lowercase parameter names and sentence case parameter names; but, different case, different name: |image= is an alias of |Ship image= (why is that?)
• {{Infobox ship career}} – uses sentence case parameter names
• {{Infobox ship characteristics}} – uses sentence case parameter names

So, to do it right, all of these except {{Infobox ship begin}} require modification to create lowercase aliases of the sentence case parameter names. All template documentation needs to be rewritten to use the lowercase parameter names. A bot might be created to troll through the list of transclusions to set the parameter names to lowercase though such a bot might (likely would) run afoul of WP:COSMETICBOT.

Is it WP:BROKE?

—Trappist the monk (talk) 17:51, 23 April 2020 (UTC)

Trappist the monk: Thank you for replying. No, it's not WP:BROKE and you've helped me understand the complexity here. There's also one template you left out {{Infobox ship class overview}}), which only makes your point stronger: 3.5 million (give or take) changes to the transclusions is not realistic in this case. Regards, --Goldsztajn (talk) 19:24, 23 April 2020 (UTC)

Umm, what? 3.5 million (give or take)? Where does that number come from? Even adding up the independent transclusions for the whole suite of the ship infobox templates (a nonsensical exercise) gives a result that is far smaller than 3.5 million (142096).

• {{Infobox ship begin}} – 35645
• {{Infobox ship image}} – 35151
• {{Infobox ship career}} – 32333
• {{Infobox ship characteristics}} – 35544
• {{Infobox ship class overview}} –3423

—Trappist the monk (talk) 19:46, 23 April 2020 (UTC)

If {{Infobox ship image}} is transcluded 35,151 times and each transclusion contains 3 parameters that need changing then that would require 105,453 changes across all the transclusions (assuming all parameters present). {{Infobox ship class overview}} contains 21, so 71,883. Characteristics 39 x 35,544 = 1,386,216 changes...etc... Or have I misunderstood something? My number (3.5 million) was the total transclusion number you cited multiplied by the total number of parameters (around 100) I rough counted. --Goldsztajn (talk) 22:40, 23 April 2020 (UTC)

Adding lowercase parameters to the templates can (in theory) be done with one edit per template – in practice, two or three edits because getting it right the first time isn't always as easy as it seems. If a bot is written to convert sentence-case parameters, for each article that uses the ship infoboxen, the bot will replace all of the sentence-case parameter names with lower case parameter names with a single edit per article (presuming that the bot author did it right and didn't miss any parameters). So really, 35k-ish bot edits.

But, WP:COSMETICBOT, so converting all of those parameters in all of those templates where the only change to the article is the case of the first letter of a handful of parameter names, is highly unlikely. A human doing the same thing is just as bad because editors don't like to have their watchlists filled with such inconsequential edits. At least with a bot doing those kinds of edits, editors can hide bot edits until the storm of changes is done (a couple of days).

Is it WP:BROKE?

—Trappist the monk (talk) 23:48, 23 April 2020 (UTC)

I was only replying to your question about the number, not trying to convince you otherwise from your initial response. Am in heated agreement, nothing's BROKE. Regards, --Goldsztajn (talk) 07:08, 24 April 2020 (UTC)

There's no reason to change all the templates in every existing ship article, many of these templates are missing parameters where editors have mistakenly deleted code because they were not used. As an example I often have to add in the 'Ship image' parameter. The only time this change would be required is when the article is first created. The idea has some merit; at least, it will minimize interventions from and having to deal with the OCD troll that plays in this area. I'm still put out that the project insists on this ridiculous changing of accepted usage in the English language, which capitalises titles as a norm. Broichmore (talk) 19:17, 24 April 2020 (UTC)

I'm still put out that the project insists on this ridiculous changing of accepted usage in the English language, which capitalises titles as a norm. I don't know what you mean by that.

I'm all in favor of standardizing the parameter names to lowercase but, doing that will, as you note, draw the attention of the various trolls who will change the casing merely for the sake of changing the casing. That could be overcome by establishing lowercase as the standard and then running a bot that converts all of the extant parameter names to lowercase. Once the bot is finished, the templates are modified a last time to remove sentence-case parameter names. I do not foresee this happening because WP:COSMETICBOT unless, perhaps, this project hosts an WP:RFC to get an exception (stranger things have happened).

—Trappist the monk (talk) 19:30, 24 April 2020 (UTC)

I would say that the obvious solution is to update the template to accept lowercase versions of the parameters, update the documentation to reflect, but still continue to accept the current parameter names to avoid having to change them all. — Martin (MSGJ · talk) 12:29, 11 May 2020 (UTC)

Struck vs stricken

When was the |Ship stricken field changed to |Ship struck? Regardless of any grammar issues, the former term is far more often seen in my sources and I've got a ton of infoboxes in which that info no longer appears.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 00:53, 13 July 2020 (UTC)

I can find no evidence that |Ship stricken= has ever been the parameter used by {{infobox ship career}}. I believe that stricken is the correct term (at least so says Wiktionary:stricken § Adjective). We could change the label rendered for this parameter to 'Stricken:'.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 10:57, 13 July 2020 (UTC)

Now that I think about it, I believe that you're correct, Trappist, 'cause I get people trying to change the struck date for the Arizona to 7 December rather than the '42 date she was formally stricken.

I'd prefer that we use stricken as that's the proper term, and I like the idea of leaving the field alone so as not to orphan anything, but changing how it displays. But let's see if anyone else has preferences.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 14:58, 13 July 2020 (UTC)

Simple enough to do; we could even preferentially support |Ship stricken=:

{{#if:{{{Ship stricken|{{{Ship struck|}}}}}}|<tr style="vertical-align:top;"><td>Stricken:</td><td>
{{#invoke:WPSHIPS utilities|unbulleted_list|{{{Ship stricken|{{{Ship struck|}}}}}}</td></tr>

—Trappist the monk (talk) 15:05, 13 July 2020 (UTC)

There having been no further discussion, I have made the above change.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 23:26, 22 July 2020 (UTC)

Adding prefixes for Iranian warships

Hi. Iranian warships use "IRIS" (standing for 'Islamic Republic of Iran Ship') prefix–IIS ('Imperial Iranian Ship') was used before 1979. Can someone please add these two to the template so that the title of Iranian warships get automatically stylized? I had this problem with . Pahlevun (talk) 16:14, 28 July 2020 (UTC)

G'day, what are the reliable sources for this prefix? Thanks, Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 03:53, 30 July 2020 (UTC)

@Peacemaker67: IIS is cited by Jane's Fighting Ships published in 1979 (page 253). I found defpost.com, Oneindia and The Daily Mirror (Sri Lanka) for IRIS. There are also a couple of images available from writings on Iranian ships: IRIS Damavand IRIS Alborz, IRIS Bayandor. Pahlevun (talk) 16:37, 1 August 2020 (UTC)

If this is a valid ship prefix (I'm not yet convinced, but am open to the idea), do we need to create {{IRIS}} as a variant of {{Ship}}? Mjroots (talk) 19:17, 1 August 2020 (UTC)

@Mjroots: That would be a good idea, but Template:Iris is already taken. I guess you need more sources for IRIS, right? Are you convinced that IIS was a legit prefix for pre-1979 warships? Pahlevun (talk) 19:32, 1 August 2020 (UTC)

I found other sources for IRIS:

• Official website of Indian Navy mentions 'Iranian Naval Ship IRIS Alvand' [1]
• Southern Africa Shipping News
• shipspotting.com
• Daily News and Analysis mentions 'IRIS Alvand of Iran' [2]
• Polish website Nowa Strategia mentions IRIS Alvand (71) and IRIS Bushehr (422) [3]

–Pahlevun (talk) 19:42, 1 August 2020 (UTC)

Pahlevun and I have had several discussions about WP:COMMONNAME, him wondering whether 'Iranian Army' refers to land forces or all armed forces. In a similar manner, I must strongly stress that Jane's Fighting Ships is the absolute "gold standard" for WP:RELIABLESOURCES for warships, though clearly with its ex-Royal Navy editors it is biased towards the West. Thus "IIS" is unassailable, unless there are unimpeachable ex-IIN things saying otherwise. Actually as Mjroots is saying, we would like to see more official sources, in Farsi saying that the IRIS prefix is used in official communications. Kind regards Buckshot06 (talk) 03:57, 2 August 2020 (UTC)

Unfortunately, the official website of Islamic Republic of Iran Army and its service branches [4] is only available in Persian/Farsi, but official website of Sri Lanka Navy, official website of Indonesian Navy and official website of Indian Navy all have mentioned names of Iranian warships with the prefix 'IRIS'. Unlike English language, naval prefixes in Persian/Farsi are not abbreviations and they are in use as a full phrase: 'ناو جمهوری اسلامی ایران' (lit. 'Islamic Republic of Iran Warship'). Examples are ناو جمهوری اسلامی ایران "دماوند" or ناو جمهوري اسلامي ايران (خارك). Pahlevun (talk) 13:15, 3 August 2020 (UTC)

@Buckshot06: Eureka! I found a recent news entry from janes.com that mentions both 'IRIS Alborz (72)' and 'IRIS Sahand (74)'. Pahlevun (talk) 13:16, 3 August 2020 (UTC)

In spite of the point that Jane's may be sufficient, I also found 'The Iranian Sea-Air-Missile Threat to Gulf Shipping' by Anthony H. Cordesman which mentions the prefix IRIS for a Bayandor-class corvette (page 114). Pahlevun (talk) 13:21, 3 August 2020 (UTC)

Great!! If it is "IRIW [Shipname]" in Farsi, even if not abbreviated, I think we can go with IRIS. Buckshot06 (talk) 22:49, 3 August 2020 (UTC)

This seems conclusive. Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 01:23, 7 August 2020 (UTC)

Spaces in parameter names

This has to be the first template I've come across which doesn't use underscores in parameter names. Took me a while to figure out why it wasn't accepting a parameter I added. Opencooper (talk) 21:29, 29 December 2020 (UTC)