Project of the Week

[Horatio252]

Time for straight talk about the Archive and GoArch. The Archive is not in bad shape. We are not missing crucial articles nor are their pages suffering from glaring errors. So what is there for potential and current guild members to do? Well we have the guild projects page. The only thing there that might ever be urgent is FCAL if it gets going again. Everything else can be put off until we "feel like doing it" which of course means it won't get done. Adding to the problem is the fact that most of the things on the projects page are massive in scope (redo all people pages, redo all citations, redo all kings journals).

So, here is my idea. We set small weekly goals and invite anyone to help (with a dose of guilt and pressure on anyone who calls themselves an Archivist). I am thinking of calling for a focus on only 4-6 articles at a time. Hopefully this will help people see what needs to be done, give them an achievable goal, and give them a time frame for doing it. For example I think week one should be the Ages of Yeesha's Journey (Gahreesen, Teledahn, Kadish Tolesa, Eder Gira, Eder Kemo) with the goal of updating them if need be and implementing the new guidelines for Age articles.

The potential problems with this idea are that we might attracting people who won't follow the guidelines in their edits, and we might get too many cooks in the kitchen working at the same time on the same article and possibly also fighting with each other about details instead of working together. Still, those are risks that, compared with the current situation, I am willing to take.

So, is this a good idea? Do I need to change it in any way?

[Alahmnat]

I actually think this is a great idea, since it really gives us a way to generate interest and participation on a suitably narrow field of entries in the Archive, because I agree with you that the general scale of the Archive as it stands now is a bit daunting to just jump into and start editing.

That said, I'd like to hold off on bigger overhauls like getting the sidebars built into articles until after the site upgrade (which is still coming much sooner than late now, I really promise! Really!), as I may be able to do something clever with those that will make it easier to standardize their look in the new system.

[Horatio252]

Okay then, sounds like we should put this on hold until after the site upgrade. I will keep waiting, lurking and hoping