User talk:Rschen7754

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Did you get a notification about this message? LilianaUwU ^{(talk / contributions)} 01:26, 20 June 2023 (EDT)

Sask Highway 204

Hello! I saw that most of the articles were copied from Wikipedia. So I copied Saskatchewan Highway 204 from the Wikipedia page then noticed on other pages that the talk page has an attribution template. I'm not sure how that works. Could you have a look when you get time? (Sorry to bother you with this). Masterhatch (talk) 13:43, 9 September 2023 (EDT)

Hi, since you were the only author it should be okay this time. But in general, most articles that are imported need to be requested at AARoads:Cleanup so that proper attribution can take place. --Rschen7754 13:48, 9 September 2023 (EDT)

Thanks Masterhatch (talk) 14:01, 9 September 2023 (EDT)

Welcome!

Welcome to the AARoads Wiki!

This wiki is a specialist encyclopedia of roads articles written by your fellow roadgeeks, and we're glad you've decided to join us!

Now that you're here, we have a few important things to tell you about. Our main discussion page is The Interchange. This is where we make decisions about how this wiki functions. We have a Discord as well that you might want to join.

We have a cleanup page where you can learn more how we're improving the collection of imported articles for our use. You can also report technical errors related to the article import process on that page.

The rules of the road are really simple. In short, follow the golden rule and you'll be fine; we wouldn't want you to be cited for a moving violation. While contributing, please keep in mind that we currently focus our articles on highways in the United States and Canada, including state or provincial highways and major county roads. (To express interest in adding other countries, see AARoads:International). We have the Annex here for additional content, like the list of longest state highways in the United States.

Once again, welcome to the AARoads Wiki! We hope you enjoy it here!. Just to make it official, Imzadi 1979 → 22:40, 29 September 2023 (EDT)

SABRE

You seem to have conflated SABRE and the UK Roads Wikipedia editors (there is a little overlap between editors, but the SABRE establishment mostly dislikes wikipedia and has done from the early days of WP), misunderstood the point about SABRE meaning we don't need to prioritise the UK WP articles, and got needlessly ranty about SABRE. The point about SABRE has nothing to with the acrimony on Wikipedia between editors, beyond that completely different issue creating a problem that the existence of the far superior SABRE wiki makes moot.

It's to totally miss the point to think it's some courtesy to them to not have UK articles here - SABRE would not give a monkeys whether we imported British and Irish wikipedia articles or not. <Don Draper in the lift meme>. The point behind the importation of British/Irish Wikipedia articles to here being low priority because SABRE has a wiki is not for SABRE's sake, but for ours. There seems to be a can of worms with importing the UK, especially if their editors come over and the acrimony seen there restarts. The point about SABRE is that there's no rush to save the UK WP articles - we can take the time to consider how to deal with that can of worms and not worry about the deletion issue, because WP isn't the go to roads encyclopedia for that country (ditto France with WikiSARA, Netherlands with Wegenwiki, etc) and so the articles there are not essential to preserve to keep the knowledge.

SABRE having a couple of basic articles on the USA not meant to be treading on the toes of a wiki (created well over decade later) as you imply it is - there was no courtesy to extend back (nor is it a courtesy they would want). SABRE's thin coverage of the USA is little more than giving a basic overview, and even points them to the AA Roads family of sites to get a better look (something that isn't the case with similar-style European articles). It, like all the other foreign countries, is mostly a place where member's holiday photos are kept and not seen as a priority for improvement because elsewhere covers it better and time is better spent on the core of the project. Si404 (talk) 08:08, 29 April 2024 (EDT)

There are a few things that I would like to clarify. My post wasn't directed at what you said, but at some talking points that have been raised on the Discord (which you are welcome to join!) by other editors as to why they would prefer not to import the UK right away, or even at all. I wanted to refute those talking points. However - ultimately I think it is best to delay importing the UK for similar reasons that India and Malaysia are likely to be delayed: those articles on the English Wikipedia are a mess and will take significant effort to cleanup - effort that could be better spent, at this stage of the project, on importing countries that don't require as much work.

I also certainly don't mean to imply that every member of SABRE is acrimonious or difficult to work with; however, past members of SABRE leadership are among the "UK Roads Wikipedia editors" that have caused a lot of difficulty on English Wikipedia (and, not just in the roads subject area). I'm hesitant to call out names unnecessarily on a public website. I certainly don't get that impression of you, I'm somewhat familiar with your work at TM. I honestly don't think that most of the UKRD editors would be interested in coming over and that the UK will have to be done by new editors - but if the imports do result in some of the problematic editors coming over, it will be dealt with then.

Even though AARoads (not even the wiki, just the static site itself) is one of the leading road sites in the US, it is not the only one, and I believe multiple sites can exist. Nobody has ever really attempted to create such a comprehensive guide to roads worldwide - TravelMapping and the English Wikipedia (and maybe OSM) are the closest. Plus, there was a lot of work invested to develop content and collaboration on the English Wikipedia that would be lost. So in a sense, that is my view on why we are doing international, even though there are numerous challenges. --Rschen7754 14:30, 29 April 2024 (EDT)

Those talking points of others sound exactly like what I've said previously on the subject - that there are apparently problems with importing the UK pages and that SABRE's comprehensiveness gives us space to put off importing them until later (if at all - we can always make our own pages that won't have the problems you talk about!). That you think that their points aren't also my points suggests that you still don't quite understand the point being made here. But it seems like you are getting there.

I know exactly who you mean - I said there was 'a little overlap' for a reason! But that's a UKRD problem, not a SABRE problem. My issue with your comment was that it made SABRE out to be the problem - SABRE is nothing more than the passive solution to the problem, which is to do with UKRD Wikipedia.

You've missed off Wegenwiki from your comprehensive guides - it literally is an attempt to create a comprehensive guide to roads worldwide (albeit as an expansion of a Wiki for roads in the Netherlands). OK, it's not as fleshed out as here for the USA (it's far far more threadbare for the UK) - but that seems to be more a desire to focus on the more obscure parts of the world which aren't covered elsewhere and seeing as a lower priority that which is covered elsewhere. When making more obscure systems for TM, EN Wiki failed me a lot, local language (or Dutch or German) WP was useful sometimes, OSM was very useful but often wasn't up to date with road numbering in the way wegenwiki was. It quickly became my go-to start point when looking at a new country.

I definitely don't see any problem in duplication of stuff that's elsewhere. But I also don't see it a priority for the highly laudable AARW International project to save stuff that duplicates stuff elsewhere, especially if its of a lower standard - the priority is to seek to save what's unique to EN Wikipedia before it gets lost! Si404 (talk) 05:09, 30 April 2024 (EDT)

It's not so much SABRE as not wanting to import a mess that has to be cleaned up. We did take backups of all HWY in 2023, though having to use them would not be ideal for several reasons.

For all of the reasons behind our forking such as w:WP:NODEADLINE, we do care about accuracy and writing good content. We are aware of Wegenwiki, however with Dutch not being as big of a language as English, it isn't as universal. --Rschen7754 11:01, 30 April 2024 (EDT)

I know its about not wanting the mess - the point about SABRE is that not wanting the mess isn't as much of a problem as it would otherwise be because it's not preserving a unique resource (Australia, on the other hand would have this problem).

The point about wegenwiki was directly in relation to "Nobody has ever really attempted to create such a comprehensive guide to roads worldwide" - that is just not true, because they are doing so. I agree that Dutch isn't universal, but that's a different thing than 'comprehensive' (available to all vs covering all).

Anyway, 95% of this is semantics, so I'll shut up now! Si404 (talk) 11:56, 30 April 2024 (EDT)