Category talk:Birds of the Gambia

The current diffusion of this category into subcategories based on species and subspecies by Atamari is challenged by Charlesjsharp. Srittau closed the ANU discussions and suggested to open a discussion here. So the status-quo is that "Keep both until a consensus is achieved. Do not remove the species category and species+location categories until a consensus is achieved." Pinging all involved parties: Ikan Kekek, AFBorchert, Steinsplitter, Takeaway, Odysseus1479, Archaeodontosaurus. Jee 04:27, 7 February 2017 (UTC)

I strongly oppose shunting photos into this kind of category and thereby removing them from the parent category of the species, genus, etc. I would countenance this category only if every photo in it is also in the category for its subspecies/species - a category that has no geographic limitation. -- Ikan Kekek (talk) 05:08, 7 February 2017 (UTC)

Naturalists are very attached to the distribution of specimens. Even if our boundaries are arbitrary is a useful way of sorting. This category is therefore, for science perfectly legitimate. It must be preserved. --Archaeodontosaurus (talk) 06:22, 7 February 2017 (UTC)

I have no problem with the category - only if any photo is only in this category and not also the category for their subspecies/species. -- Ikan Kekek (talk) 11:03, 7 February 2017 (UTC)

Very well I did not understand this point. You are perfectly right. --Archaeodontosaurus (talk) 11:11, 7 February 2017 (UTC)

I will use the image File:Pied kingfisher (Ceryle rudis rudis) diving composite.jpg to illustrate how this argument started. I uploaded this image with two categories Category:Ceryle rudis rudis and Category:Birds of Gambia. User Atamari changed these two categories to Category:Ceryle rudis in Gambia and Category:2016 photographs of Gambia. If Gambia was a larger country, I would use sub-categories of districts, and would be happy if someone creates them and moves my images. For my UK photos, where the number of images uploaded is huge, I use categories like Category:Birds of Oxfordshire. This category sits under Category:Birds of England by county which sits under Category:Birds of England under Category:Birds of the United Kingdom Category:Birds of Oxfordshire has itself sub-categories like Category:Birds in Cotswold Wildlife Park
I have checked images by some of Commons most prolific and competent photographers of wildlife. They would all put an image into Category:Ceryle rudis unless Category:Ceryle rudis rudis existed when they would use that if they knew the sub species, but not into a category like Category:Ceryle rudis rudis in Gambia.
Species/sub-species (without location) is one tree of categories universal across Commons; LOocation of class, order or clade, not species or sub-species, is another category tree. Most wildlife images have one of each As an example, on a recent FPC File:Orthetrum luzonicum-Kadavoor-2016-10-15-002.jpg, Jee used categories Category:Orthetrum luzonicum and Category:Odonata of Kadavoor. Jee recommends: "species and location categories kept separately". He says "There is not a single rule on how to split a meta category though there is a preference not to mix topics (like location and subject) if possible. But if there is no more narrow information available in a single topic (location here), then the next option is to mix topics.'
In Gambia there is no need to mix topics. Already we have Category:Birds of Gambia by location with one sub category Category:Birds of Bijilo Forest Park. Any user could create disctrict categories if they so wish like Category:Birds in Kombo South I don't think the community will be able to mandate any specific category structure except keeping species and location as two types of category. Depending on the country and volume of images: state, region, county, district, National Park, City etc. could all be appropriate. Let us not forget museum specimens where the location is inappropriate; nor endangered species where location must often be kept vague.
The Commons project Valued images project relies on species and sub-species categories subspecies like Category:Ceryle rudis rudis to define the scope of a VIC. Geography is irrelevant in VI scope, although all VICs have to have geolocation. Those of us who voted on VIC have to be able to find all the relevant images before promoting the most valuable. That is not possible with mixed species/location categories.
Please also don't forget the 'Good pictures' icon that appears of a category page. I assume we all know that FP, VI and QI images appear (including those from sub-categories) when the category structure is sound. Charles (talk) 12:38, 7 February 2017 (UTC)

@Frank Schulenburg: @Olivier LPB: @Ikan Kekek: @Archaeodontosaurus: @MartyRus: @Smihael: @Scotch Mist: @Palauenc05: @Berthold Werner: @Moheen Reeyad: @Jacek Halicki: @Famberhorst: @PIERRE ANDRE LECLERCQ: @Lucasbosch: @Llez: @Masum-al-hasan: @Jebulon: @Moroder: @DeFacto: @Alvesgaspar: @Bgag: @Halavar: @JLPC: Pinging those currently involved in Valued Images Project. Charles (talk) 15:07, 7 February 2017 (UTC)

The system of hierarical categories and their subcategories is an established rated system on commons. A lot of objects are subdivided into subcategories, especially where the amount of the images has become too large. There is even a serious warning in the form of a template. template:CatDiffuse and template:Categorize are these building blocks that require the user to keep order and move media in the appropriate subcategories.

The Category: Birds of Gambia is also such a category that contains many pictures. The benefit would be greater - if the set of images can be accessed by a system of the subcategory. In Gambia about 560 different species of birds are observed, we do not have a picture of the birds at the beginning of 2017. But there are more every year - which is also great. At the moment, there are almost 800 pictures, about 90 percent of which are accessed through subcategories. I think there will be more in ten years, so it makes sense to have a strong system of regulation right now and not to implement it later with lots of articles.

The subcategories are not uncommon in the field of living creatures, in the case of animals, this is found in plants ... and, of course, in the species of birds.

Samples are often found:

Https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Ardea_alba_in_Costa_Rica

Https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Corvus_corax_in_Ili

Https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Ciconia_ciconia_in_Romania

Https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Ardea_cinerea_in_Switzerland

Https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Gallinula_chloropus_in_the_United_Kingdom

Https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Cygnus_olor_of_the_United_Kingdom

Https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Passer_domesticus_in_Berlin

A system (type in geographic area) that is partially broken down to cities. As far as I would (mostly) not go, a categorization by state but I think is legitimate.

Category: Birds of Gambia to divide Gambian region or even district is little constructive since Gambia - as is often emphasized a small state. Except for the birds you can observe on the coast, many birds can be seen everywhere. In addition, most photographers neglect to indicate where their location was. It is estimated that 80 to 90 percent of the images reduce the recording location to the state of Gambia. This approach makes no order.

An argument was put forward that one can then see no QI / FI or VI more. This argument is incorrect. In the upper left, the Help: FastCCI tool is available in each category. This tool displays in seconds, all the graded images in the category and subcategories. A powerful tool that we will probably use more often in the coming years.

The fact that partly correctly specified images of a concrete subspecies in the categorie system were mixed with the species was an oversight. This is due to the categorization of others. Was corrected using Category: Ceryle rudis rudis in Gambia.

Either one makes only subcategories to species by state and a double classification with subspecies. Or consistently makes the subcategories also to subspecies by state. Here I have not yet concluded an opinion. For Gambia, I think that there is only one specified subspecies.

It is important for me that the existing system is used throughout the world, the system of subcategies by kind in state is a legitimate system of order. And that there will be no more Edit-War in the future, just because someone would like to place "his own" pictures prominently prominently. --Atamari (talk) 20:35, 7 February 2017 (UTC)

Stop personalizing this. This isn't about Charles. He happens to be a brilliant photographer of extremely useful pictures of birds and other wildlife, so his photos are very often best in scope and he should be thanked for that, rather than being the butt of snide remarks as if there's something wrong with his pictures being VIs, but he is in no way the only great or useful photographer of birds and other wildlife. I'm unaware of the FastCCI tool but would simply observe that when something isn't broken, it shouldn't be "fixed". "Subspecies/species/genus (etc.) in location" categories are fine but should never substitute for subspecies/species/genus categories not tied to location. Introducing confusion is a very bad use of your time. -- Ikan Kekek (talk) 21:27, 7 February 2017 (UTC)

There is no other statement, Charles is a very good photographer. His pictures are first class and very useful for the project. Just such good pictures are really not in the crowd of average pictures. The only thing I want to do is ... if someone creates a text for Gambia, the pictures are really from Gambia. It would be awkward to choose a good picture from Tanzania - just because the pictures are poorly sorted. --Atamari (talk) 23:36, 7 February 2017 (UTC)

We have no dispute whatsoever on that point. Wildlife photos should be classified by subspecies/species, and also when possible (Charles laid out exceptions) by geographic region/country. -- Ikan Kekek (talk) 23:39, 7 February 2017 (UTC)

Wikipedia is a collaborative work. One can take very good pictures, others can determine the right species in flora and fauna, other programming tools, others write articles and others are thinking about a working categorie system. Only together in the work we are a strong community. --Atamari (talk) 23:53, 7 February 2017 (UTC)

Are we on Wikipedia? :-) But seriously, yes, of course this is collaborative. I'm not suggesting that people who upload photos of birds without knowing what species they are should be attacked or something. The point is, don't change the taxonomic classifications given by experts like Charles and Jee. Go ahead and add geographic classifications as long as they're bottom-level (no overcategorization), but do not mess with the subspecies categories they give their photos. -- Ikan Kekek (talk) 01:39, 8 February 2017 (UTC)

Indeed, the system of "subcategories" by nature is good, because it is universal and comprehensible to all. No solution in the location of the subjects, I would agree, so that this nuance becomes optional, and made geographically, as far as possible, by region, country, department. ---Pierre André (talk) 17:13, 8 February 2017 (UTC)

[1]

What is the conclusion of the discussion? The dismantling of the meaningful categories continues. It is annoying again that work is destroyed. --Atamari (talk) 17:47, 17 February 2017 (UTC)

There has been no conclusion/no consensus and I posted the following on Srittau talk page but have had no reply:

Hi. You have taken charge of the discussion on changing categories etc. and moved the discussion to Category talk:Birds of Gambia. There has been no contribution to the debate for a week. There is no clear consensus one way or the other and therefore I request that you:
1. Allow me to revert edits made by Atamari to my images
2. Ask Atamari to leave my images categorized as I upload them, though of course he may a) add valid categories (such as year of photo); b) move any image to a 'species-only' or 'location-only' category.
Thank you. Charles (talk) 16:42, 15 February 2017 (UTC)

If there is any "dismantling of the meaningful categories", it is you who is doing it. All I am requesting is a return to the status quo. You and Srittau should also consider the categories of birds in Senegal. Senegal completetely encloses Gambia, there are no endemic species in Gambia, but you have ignored Senegal in your self-appointed quest to create your own Gambia-specific categories. The most=respected field guide to this area in titles Birds of Senegal and The Gambia. And by the way, the country is called The Gambia, not Gambia, so every one of the mixed species/location categories you created is wrong. Charles (talk) 11:06, 18 February 2017 (UTC)

Thank you for moderating the moderation, unfortunately she has fallen asleep.

Unfortunately the Edit-War continues ([2]) without a reasonable compromise was found. I think I have to report the Edit-War soon, because it does not go any further. --Atamari (talk) 11:11, 18 February 2017 (UTC)

• Just in case anyone thinks this last edit was me, it was not, and therefore is nothing to do with an Edit-war. The edit Atamari refers to was made by one of the most respected authorities on wildlife on Commons. Charles (talk) 19:31, 18 February 2017 (UTC)

@AFBorchert, Jkadavoor, and Srittau: --Atamari (talk) 11:11, 18 February 2017 (UTC)

• The category Birds of Gambia is useful and sufficient. It is totally useless to create categories with non-endemic species for countries. This way of making artificial and artificial categories must be fought. They have no scientific basis which is the very essence of all our projects. --Archaeodontosaurus (talk) 11:27, 18 February 2017 (UTC)

Probably you have not seen the many examples (see above #Samples are often found) above. The system is widely used. Either this is a personal feud against me or all such categories have to be dismantled (in Costa Rica, Switzerland, United_Kingdom and Germany for example) --Atamari (talk) 12:02, 18 February 2017 (UTC)

Your idea of dismantled these categories is good; In favor of another sorting system based on the elements provided by the caption. --Archaeodontosaurus (talk) 13:23, 18 February 2017 (UTC)

• @AFBorchert, Jkadavoor, Srittau, Archaeodontosaurus, PIERRE ANDRE LECLERCQ, Ikan Kekek, Steinsplitter, and Odysseus1479: @Ikan Kekek, Steinsplitter, and Odysseus1479: As an example of what I consider to be good practice, I have created sub categories for all the sub-species of Lagonosticta senegala. I have moved all the images where I can identify the location (and hence the sub-species) into the new categories, except for Atamari's images taken in Gambia. I have, however, re-categorised an image Atamari took in Ethiopia. I have then added some of the best images of each sub-species to the gallery page Lagonosticta senegala. I have indicated which images in the gallery page are QI or VI. There are no FP images. For anyone who doesn't understand the fundamentals of this argument, this should help explain things. For everyone's information, this process took me about and hour, so it is not something one can do so thoroughly for every species. Charles (talk) 11:23, 20 February 2017 (UTC)

• @Charlesjsharp: Your example is probably a good practice, and personally I also create new categories that I am to develop by adding subcategories. So it's a good idea, even if it takes time, and much attention. It remains to be seen if the elements provided in the legends are of good quality. I noticed that some definitions sometimes remain too vague, and especially imprecise in geolocalizations. Regards, --Pierre André (talk) 11:57, 20 February 2017 (UTC)

Yes, I like that too. But we can go back to the core of the discussion, the subcategories in category:Birds of Gambia. The goal should be that not 1000 different files are confused. For a good order - as in the other categories by state as well. --Atamari (talk) 15:55, 20 February 2017 (UTC)

If category:Birds of Gambia is crowded, a better dissemination would be to split into category:Birds of Gambia by location or Category:Birds of Gambia by order, See for example Category:Birds of India. Here the problem is a species level categorization is created like (Category:Birds of Gambia by species) which ended up with a few files in each categories. Moreover a jump from class to species is skipping of so many intermediate steps. It may be more interesting to know Category:Passeriformes in Gambia or Category:Estrildidae in Gambia than Category:Lonchura cucullata in Gambia . Jee 16:37, 20 February 2017 (UTC)

For categories of birds in India, there is no consensus Jee @Jkadavoor: . Under Category:Birds of India by location, there are many locations and I will categorise the images I take in November this year into those (I'm coming to Kerala too now!). I don't like mixed species/location categories. I'm very surprised you recommend Category:Passeriformes in Gambia. There are no similar categories Category:Passeriformes in India; Category:Passeriformes in Kerala; Category:Passeriformes in Kadavoor. Don't you have any!! We cannot demand one style of category tree. Charles (talk) 12:30, 21 February 2017 (UTC)

There is. BTW, I'm not recommitting any; just mention an option if Category:Birds of Gambia is crowded. (Welcome to Kerala!) Jee 13:07, 21 February 2017 (UTC)

One sees the categories by state are not unusual and widespread. --Atamari (talk) 20:41, 22 February 2017 (UTC)

@Atamari: re your quoted 'Samples are often found' above - there is a massive difference between those species, and the ones you have been creating categories for. Those you cite are all of abundant, usually quite tame, highly-photographed species in regions with many photographers. As a result, there are hundreds, often thousands (and for Cygnus olor, probably tens of thousands) of photos of the species, and subcategorisation within the species becomes necessary. For the species you have been dealing with, there are typically only a handful of photos in total, and creating subcategories of the species by country makes no sense at all. It will be many years, if ever, that these species have so many photos on Commons. I would very strongly agree with the suggestion by Jee and others above that you instead use subcategories of Family or Genus by country (e.g. create Category:Alcedinidae in Gambia for the Ceryle rudis example cited above, plus other Gambian kingfisher photos), or else Birds by region of Gambia, and so also retain the images in their respective species (or subspecies) categories so they are easy for other users to find. - MPF (talk) 14:56, 7 April 2017 (UTC)

Also further to this, bear in mind that there are over 500 species of birds in the Gambia: having 500 by-species subcategories sitting in Category:Birds of Gambia is equally not useful nor helpful. - MPF (talk) 15:00, 7 April 2017 (UTC)

As an example to show how it works, I've created, and populated (fully, for what I could find), Category:Charadriiformes of Gambia - MPF (talk) 16:24, 7 April 2017 (UTC)

just wrote on Commons:Administrators' noticeboard/User problems:

The best way is to use the hierarical system. It uses meaningful subcategories. That the recording point in a living being as a category is meaningful - is also undisputed and everywhere else with the categories except for the birds usual. I am really annoyed that here by several users to disturbances in the category system comes. An attempt to find a compromise was not rejected by me - on the contrary. I also pay close attention to the high performance of users working in the field of birds. The conditions of the species is a great work. Just how can one come to a good compromise that the category: Birds of Gambia category is not crowded and also allows a pleasant navigation?

A categorization by country based on the order (biology) is a first basis for a compromise. I've also seen that this level is widespread. Only it shifts the problem into the future, at some point the category according to order will also be very full. According to which criterion is it permissible or meaningful to go another level deeper? --Atamari (talk) 20:18, 7 April 2017 (UTC)

Yes, obviously, it moves things into the future, but it'll be several years, if not decades, away yet. When [Category:Charadriiformes of Gambia] is full (reaches 200 files), the first thing to do is create [Category:Laridae of Gambia]; that'll take out the gulls and terns (about half the files), and then later [Category:Charadriidae of Gambia] for the plovers & lapwings and [Category:Scolopacidae of Gambia], etc. And when they reach 200 files each, divide them into Genera - but that's a long, long way into the future, and easily done when the need eventually arises. Setting up a category tree relevant to the expectations of year 2200 isn't a great deal of help in 2017, though! - MPF (talk) 20:54, 7 April 2017 (UTC)

+1. Species (or subspecies) is supposed to be the lowest level in phylogenetic classification. Splitting it any further may produce awkward results. Jee 02:54, 8 April 2017 (UTC)