[FEAT] browse by composer nationality?

[KGill]

We have composer name, work genre, and composer time period, but couldn't it also be useful to create categories for different composer nationalities? Wikipedia has them, after all. If anyone agrees, I can help work on it.
(N.B.: If a composer is considered to have multiple nationalities [e.g. Handel or Stravinsky], s/he could easily be included in more than one category.)

[Lyle Neff]

Would that be nationality according to today's borders, or nationality according to the time when the composer was living?

[KGill]

That's a really good question...probably mostly by today's borders. Polish/Ukrainian/etc. would be separate from Russian, Prussian would likewise be regrouped. Although it might be better to put composers in disputed territories in both categories (i.e. a Polish composer born in the 1860s would be classified as both Polish and Russian- maybe).
Wikipedia seems to classify some composers rather oddly- for instance, Szymanowski is listed as Polish even though he was born in the Ukraine.

[Davydov]

Wikipedia seems to classify some composers rather oddly- for instance, Szymanowski is listed as Polish even though he was born in the Ukraine.

Szymanowski's family were Polish, but at the time of his birth they were living in the Ukraine, which was then part of the Russia Empire (and the country of Poland didn't even exist at the time!). Birthplace isn't the only factor in determining nationaity, so it's always a good idea to check the standard reference sources to make sure. But it would be very useful to be able to browse by composer nationality.

[KGill]

Do you think I should start on it? (Any disputes could easily be resolved by, as you say, checking standard resources.)

[KGill]

Well, I started it anyway: http://imslp.org/wiki/Category:Composers_by_nationality. It's just a skeleton at present. Hope no one minds...

[Davydov]

Looks good to me! I've had a little dabble as well, hope you don't mind...

[imslp]

I just want to say that, before the next time something like this is implemented, please ask for a technical solution before adding anything outside of the template. Both the composer pages and work pages should have no text or wiki markup outside of the template. Fixing this is always much harder than preventing this in the first place, especially since technical implementation is so trivial.

I'm deadly afraid that, because there is wikitext outside of the template, people start adding all sorts of stuff outside of the template. This fundamentally breaks the system, requiring a huge effort to fix it (and not with 100% success as previous attempts tell us). Please, please, if you are going to change the system in a huge and systematic matter, make sure that a technical solution on the part of the template is impossible before you go ahead and add stuff outside the template. Templates are much more flexible than the most well intentioned addition outside of the template. We can make the template process the information in many many ways, but not general wikitext.

It is especially so in this case because all that is needed is one extra line of code in MediaWiki:FTE:composer. The only thing you have to know is that variable substitution is the same in FTE as in normal templates ({{{variablename}}}). To prevent empty variables, simply do: {{~ifexist:variablename<>[[Category:{{{variablename}}}]]~}}, and you can use the variable in the template (ex. |Nationality=French |Nationality2=Dutch). Ask Leonard or me for assistance if you don't know how to do something in FTE, but don't go with a suboptimal solution unless it cannot be helped.

I'm not intending this post to be directed against Davydov, and I'm sorry if I offended. But I am extremely afraid that if we do not control template-external wiki markup, we will have a huge problem on our hands later down the road, especially since we are going to stick around for a while. New users already have an urge to break the template system; I do not want seasoned users to lead the way. This is why I made a fuss about templates regarding the WP link issue on work pages.

[Davydov]

Feldmahler, I can only say that no-one mentioned a 'template solution' when KGill first came up with the idea, or asked if he could go ahead, or even when he started last night. Thinking this was an excellent idea, and with some time on my hands today, I joined in enthusiastically, to find that I'm now in your bad books

You obviously has a clear idea of how you would like the site to develop, using templates, etc., but this isn't necessarily clear to the rest of us, who may be more used to the usual Wikipedian ways of doing things. That's not a criticism, but just a request for better communication.

How would you suggest we proceed from here?

[Davydov]

If someone who understands these things can edit the composer FTE template to include the field for nationality, then I'll convert all the pages I edited earlier today to use the new template, and a team of us (hopefully) can get to work on the rest. Note that there are some composers who changed nationalities during their lifetime, so this new field will need to cope with multiple values.

[imslp]

I'll segment this post since there are several things I want to make clear.

1. Regarding my previous post

I think you mistake me a bit.

I absolutely was not blaming you. I understand perfectly well that you did what you did out of enthusiasm, and out of the best of intentions. This is precisely why I did not attempt to abruptly stop you in the middle of what you were doing. I was essentially content for this to be an anomaly until I come around to fix it with a bot. This is why I said "before the next time."

But it is also my job to make sure that everything is as efficient as possible, so that all contributions have the maximum value possible, which is why I posted that rant above (I will explain this in the sections below).

I would be crazy indeed if I put people in my bad book when all they did was out of enthusiasm and good intentions. I was absolutely not criticizing you for what you did. I actually said this in the previous post, but I'm not sure it came across correctly amongst the other things in the rant.

2. Why templates are good

The reason I used such strong language and bold font in my previous post is this: previously, I've observed silently some (well intentioned, but more limited in scope) breakage of the template system, and I was convinced this time that time is ripe to act, and to make clear what I as a technical person see clearly and have a duty to discuss.

The future of IMSLP depends on the template system. Not only has the template system made possible various redesigns of the site, but it is also enabling possible complex searches. For example, maybe someone wants to find all English composers born between 1800-1900. The only way to do this is by processing the information from templates. Obviously this has not yet been implemented, but I would say that it is almost 100% certain it will be at some point down the road. Templates are way way more efficient than wikitext itself.

I understand perfectly that a normal person would not think of potential uses in the (perhaps far) future. This is why I worded my previous post strongly, to make sure that people notice it for a relatively major issue. This is not because I like shouting at people (I don't), but because I believe it is my job to guide IMSLP along the most efficient and forward-looking way possible.

3. Regarding what to do now with the categories

Please do not fix them into the template if you do not want to. I have absolutely no interest in "punishing" people (especially since nobody did anything wrong) or making people do stuff that bots can do (it is horribly inefficient, because people should be doing other things rather than mechanical transformation). As I said before, it is most possible that I will simply run the bot over the wiki at some undefined point in time and fix them in a batch.

My greatest fear is that, because new contributors see "random" categories on composer pages, that they will add more "random" categories. If this happens, we may need to either (1) alert the new contributor that he/she should not be breaking the category system like that, or (2) fix the nationality categories such that they are in the template, and thus prevent new contributors from assuming that adding categories is a free-for-all.

Unfortunately, I'm horribly and extremely busy at the moment, so the bot will most likely have to wait until Christmas at the earliest.

In the meanwhile, I've already added |Nationality= and |Nationality2= into the code. Not only that, but the composers will be sorted correctly if their names contain accent marks. Technical solutions always have some nice little perks

And since the template has thus been fixed, please feel free to resume adding nationality to composers if you want. I think what is lost in all of this is that I actually think adding nationality is a very good idea; just that I disagreed with the way it was implemented.

The next time, you can bug Leonard or me (or both of us) if you want some simple change to the template like this. Alternatively, you can even try to change the template yourself. I greatly encourage trial and error as long as the error is not hard to fix, as is the case for all minor changes to the FTE template. Major changes should probably be left to Leonard unless you are confident, because the templates do have a little bit of voodoo magic (mostly intuitive however). But I will certainly not blame you for trying to modify the templates in good faith and with reasonable caution, whatever the result of that modification may be.

4. Regarding implementing novel ideas on IMSLP in general

I've always said that if you think of something that can be done on IMSLP, do it. I still stick to my word. You do not need my permission for every project you want to do on IMSLP. However, I will occasionally rant about it and tell you not to do it again, just because that is my job as the technical staff of IMSLP. So here is the statement for this case:

If you want to add a category or some other systemic change to IMSLP, please make sure that it is supported by the template. This is even more so if the change involves every page (as it does in this case).

Again, generally you do not need my permission to do something on IMSLP. Even if you end up doing something wrong, I will not accuse you. However, if (1) you are trying to do this to almost every page (i.e. systematic change), and (2) the technical measures do not provide for what you want to do, it is probably a good idea to contact me first via my talk page, so that I can check if it is technically sound. At the very least it will prevent me from posting badly-worded rants on the forums

-- Feldmahler

[Davydov]

Thanks, Feldmahler, that's very clear and helpful.

I've just tested the new template entries for nationality, which works very well. As it's a relatively quick cut and paste job to modify the pages where the categories have already been added, I'd prefer to do this so that people don't pick up any 'bad habits' Notnd is also helping with this, and hopefully others will join in as well...

[KGill]

@Feldmahler: Your support and logic is much appreciated. I (rudely) haven't gotten around to saying anything about this for almost two months, but make no mistake, I am very grateful to you for being around to correct my screwup.
@Davydov: Again, I boorishly haven't mentioned anything about this project to you so far. In addition to completing letters D through K (just about all of which are enormously long), you filled out the Russian and Soviet categories, provided much better wording for the category pages, new sources of information (VIAF- well, it was new to me at least), corrections for some pages on which I made bad decisions, and continue to keep up with new composers. Not only that, but you corrected the original bad entries I made in the system (i.e. outside the template). Your help was invaluable, and I cannot thank you enough for the work you have done on this project.
I would also like to thank Notnd for generally filling the system out, and for doing most of W and Z.

Other reasons I have for posting are to give a status update, and to ask where to go next. Every letter of the alphabet has been checked through; almost all composers have been classified. I have added a new category to the composer template (Perlnerd was the one who actually created the page) for composers who have not been classified in this system. (On a slightly related note, it still hasn't updated to include anything more than new pages, although I know it works for all pages.) Even though not every single composer on the site has been (or will ever, most likely) classified, should this be added to the sidebar and main page as another browsing method alongside name, time period, and work genre?

Again, thank you all for your excellent work.

[Davydov]

I'd have liked to have done more, but I've been really tied up with my day job the last few weeks. But congratulations to you on starting the project and seeing it through, and it will be really helpful for our users!

I don't suppose you fancy sorting out the genres next?

[KGill]

If a system were to be finalized, then yes, I would love to help the reclassification effort. I'm not sure where it stands now, though; no one seems to have pursued it after your system was withdrawn...

I repeat my question: are there any objections to nationality being added to the sidebar and main page as another browsing method? Also, should some of the categories sorted under '0' (e.g. German folk music) be classified according to nationality?