Wikipedia:MOSGEO proposal

DRAFT

Geographic articles are one of the most common category of articles, and while uniformity in presentation is likely neither desirable nor possible, some commonalities of form adds a sense of coherence to the mass of articles making up the encyclopedia. Also, differences of opinion are frequently a source of conflict among editors, and having a style guide written in advance can often direct the conflict to an outcome that is both speedy and enhances the end product - the articles in question, and the encyclopedia as a whole.

Several specific topics have already been discussed in other fora and the results where not in conflict with the betterment of the encyclopedia will be adopted verbatim; discussion of these policies and practices should occur on the cited pages, discussion of them here should be limited to their applicability vel non to geographic articles in particular.

Titles

Unless an exception applies, follow the general policy. Certain geographic WikiProjects have set guidelines for places that are disputed, or their names are disputed, or where conflict among editors has occurred in the past. When more specific policies or guidelines are provided follow them.

For example, the general format of a place name for a populated (or formerly populated) place in the United States is Place Name, State. To disambiguate several places of the same name, the form Place Name, County, State. The names of census-designated places are defined by the Census Bureau, even if popular usage differs. Redirects should be used from all reasonable alternative or historical names (e.g., both Hangtown and Hangtown, California redirect to Placerville, California).

Disambiguation

Generally, follow the guidelines at WP:MOSDAB, but with a few caveats, including the last section of that guideline.

Consistent with the WP:FIVEPILLARS, one of which being a comprehensive gazetteer, disambiguation pages with one bluelink and multiple redlinks should not be redirected to the bluelink unless it is certain that all the places indicated by redlinks either don't exist or cannot be notable. Users should know that there are multiple places with the ambiguous name and not be shunted unexpectedly to whichever place happens to have been the first one to have something been written about it. Similarly, redlinks, even without inbound links, should also not be removed unless it is certain that the place doesn't exist or cannot be notable.

Redirects

Create redirects liberally. This helps users find their way from titles which, for them, may be more familiar. This is particularly important when a subject has had a recent name change. It also helps other editors, as they realize that there is another use for the name being redirected and can create an article with a WP:hatnote, or turn the redirect into a disambiguation page, without losing the linkage between the alternate name and the title.

Examples:

Redirect from official name in the local language:

München → Munich

Redirect from names without diacritics:

Besancon → Besançon

Redirect from alternate spellings or transliterations:

Teheran → Tehran

Redirect from alternate (or former) names:

Saigon → Ho Chi Minh City

Redirect from alternate naming conventions:

Detroit, Michigan → Detroit

Use templates

One of the primary way of helping quickly display pertinent facts about the subject of an article and to enhance visual coherence among articles is the use of templates. Some of the more relevant and highly used ones are:

{{Country geography}} usable in "Geography of (Country)" articles, see Category:Geography by country.
{{Infobox islands}} for islands
{{Infobox mountain}} for mountains
{{Infobox lake}} for lakes
{{Infobox river}} for rivers
{{Infobox crater}} for craters
{{Infobox settlement}} for settlement

Learn how to use them; make them work for you. Look at how they are used in existing articles before adding them to your article. Certain templates perform calculations based on data entered. For example, by {{Infobox settlement}} will calculate population per square mile and per square kilometer if the population_total and area_total_km2 (or area_total_sq_mi) are filled in and population_density_km2 (or population_density_sq_mi) is set to "auto". Note: if you use either km or mi based data, it will convert to the other.

Enter as much sourced information as available into the template, whether or not you intend to write it out in the text. There are plenty of places to enter footnotes for sources. For more information look at the documentation of each template.

Most template data should also be written out in text in the article as well. Different people process tabular data more efficiently than textual, and others vice versa. Templates may also be used to display visual cues for those who key off them, such as flags (see below), or icons for ease of reference. Also, the text can permit the addition of further information that is not part of the template; for example, the amount of land and water area for a place can be put in {{Infobox settlement}}, the text can add that most of the water area is Lake Such-and-Such.

Flags

See generally WP:MOSFLAG.

Human geographic articles - for example settlements and administrative subdivisions - may have flags of the country and first-level administrative subdivision in infoboxes; however, physical geographic articles - for example, mountains, valleys, rivers, lakes, and swamps - should not. Where a single article covers both human and physical geographic subjects (e.g. Manhattan), the consensus of editors at that article will determine whether flag use in the infobox is preferred or not.

However, human geographic articles for some countries, such as Kosovo or Abkhazia, which are subject to political disputes over territory and are particularly sensitive regions, it is usually advisable to avoid use of flags to avoid potential article disputes and where the usage of them may be seen as affecting the neutrality of the article because an entity is not universally recognized as a nation. In some cases, flags themselves are not officially or universally recognized, so caution must be exercised in such areas.

Article lead

Follow the general style guide. The lead should contain the name of the place in bold, used in a short but readable exposition of what the article is (a town, a former county town, a mountain, an island, etc.), where it is (in Warwickshire, in the Black Sea, etc.), its major claim to fame (if any), and often a sense of how big it is (area, or population). Use common sense, and multiple options are encompassed within this Manual of Style.

Some examples:

Munich (German: München, pronounced [ˈmʏnçən] ; Bavarian: Minga) is the capital city of Bavaria, Germany. It is located on the River Isar north of the Bavarian Alps. Munich is the third largest city in Germany, behind Berlin and Hamburg. About 1.35 million people live within the city limits. Munich hosted the 1972 Summer Olympics.

Vista is a city in north San Diego County, California. It was incorporated January 28, 1963 and became a charter city on June 13, 2007. Located just seven miles inland from the Pacific Ocean in northern San Diego County, the City of Vista has a Mediterranean climate. The population was 93,834 at the 2010 census.

General wording

The official name of a place (often used in templates and text), isn't necessarily Wikipedia's name for a place. The official name of Munich is München. The official name of Vista, California is Vista or City of Vista.

Avoid trite phrases, "total population" (how does that differ from "population")? Also seriously consider whether the subjective adjectives "small", "large", etc. convey any information or even the proper connotation. Is a small town, one that is small in area or in population, and is there an objective measurement that separates "small" from not "small" from "large"? Also, in some jurisdictions, "town", "township", "city", "village", "district", etc. have specific definitions and care should be taken to not use the wrong terminology.

Abbreviations

Follow the general style guide. First uses of most abbreviations need to be spelled out, both in the article and the head template (if one is being used). Remember, most people do not know what a CDP (census-designated place) is; spell it out the first time it is used.

Use consistent English

An article about a place in the United States of America should use American English - including American spelling (e.g., center not centre), plurals, and dates in Month Day, Year (July 4, 1776) format. Similarly, an article about a place in England should use British English, with British spelling, plurals, and dates in Day Month Year format (21 April 1926). See WP:TIES. For articles on places without a local variety of English, typically American English is used for articles for places in the New World, Japan, and Korea; British English for articles in the remainder of the Old World, but use common sense.

Units

Articles about places in the United States should use traditional units of measure (with SI units parenthetical); articles about places everywhere else should use SI units (and traditional units parenthetical).

Names

Place names

Adopted directly from Wikipedia:Manual of Style (proper names)#Place names; only conforming changes should be made

Geographical or place names are the nouns we use to refer to specific places and geographic features. These names most often give rise to conflict, because the same places are called different things by different peoples speaking different languages.

This is an English-language encyclopedia, so established English names are preferred if they exist, and spellings in non-English alphabets should always be transcribed into the extended Roman alphabet. In general, other articles should refer to places by the names which are used in the articles on those places, according to the rules described at Wikipedia:Naming conventions (geographic names). If a different name is appropriate in a given historical or other context, then that may be used instead, although it is normal to follow the first occurrence of such a name with the standard modern name in parentheses.

At the start of an article, provide notable equivalent names from other languages, including transcriptions where necessary:

Cologne (German: Köln, IPA: [kœln]) is the …

Mount Fuji (富士山 Fuji-san, IPA: [ɸuʥisaɴ]) is the …

The article on Luxembourg provides an extended example of presenting place names in more than one language. The official state names are given in the languages of the country in the lead, and at the top of the text box on the right side.

Names in languages with no particular present-day or historical ties to the place in question (English excepted, of course) should not be listed as alternatives.

Many place names have a historical context that should be preserved, but common sense should prevail. There can be few places that have not been parts of more than one culture or have had only one name. An article about Junipero Serra should say he lived in Alta Mexico not the U.S. state of California because the latter entity did not exist at the time of Junipero Serra. The Romans invaded Gaul, not France, and Thabo Mbeki was the president of the Republic of South Africa, not of the Cape Colony. To be clear, you may sometimes need to mention the current name of the area (for example "what is now France"), especially if no English name exists for that area in the relevant historical period.

Diacritics

Adopted directly from Wikipedia:Manual of Style (proper names)#Diacritics; only conforming changes should be made

Foreign proper names written in languages which use the Latin alphabet often include characters with diacritics, ligatures and others that are not commonly used in modern English. Wikipedia normally retains these special characters, except where there is a well-established English spelling that replaces them with English standard letters. For example, the name of the article on Hungarian mathematician Paul Erdős is spelt with the double acute accent, and the alternative spellings Paul Erdös and Paul Erdos redirect to that article. Similarly the name of the article on the Nordic god Ægir is so spelt, with redirects from the Anglicised form Aegir and the Swedish spelling Ägir. However, the article on the Spanish region of Aragón is titled Aragon, without the accent, as this is the established English name.

Numbers

Follow the general provisions, unless clarity requires or common sense dictates otherwise. However, in measuring lengths of rivers, borders and coastlines, use appropriately sourced data of you may run into the coastline paradox.

Sources

Always use reliable sources. Sometimes reliable sources conflict. Without trying to resolve which of several (seemingly) reliable sources is correct, follow the general guidelines, but keep these in mind.

Oftentimes, the country in whose territory the subject of the article lies is the best source for data (official data) such as the location, elevation, population, depth, or area (etc.) of the subject. However, that is not always the case. If the official data is dated, suspect, or in general conflict with the weight of independent sources, consider using unofficial sources, such as data generated by a third county (the US, UK, UN, and others have English-language accessible databases of worldwide geographic information). The United Nations publishes geographic data on a regular basis, but be aware of the intended use of the information because that may affect either how it was compiled or how it is presented. Also, when judging the reliability of various sources, remember to look at the date at which the data were compiled. Some data (such as the elevation of a mountain) may not change from year to year or decade to decade; other data, such as population and the area of various municipalities or national parks may.

Population/Demographic data

In countries where regular censuses are established, the article should report the population at the most recent census. If there are more recent reliable estimates of population, the most recent should also be reported, not as a substitute for census data, but an addition to it. If the population is changing significantly over time, there are templates (for example, {{USCensusPop}}) to capture historic populations. Unless specifically related to an article, no more than the most reliable current estimate, the most recent census, and the immediately prior census data should be reported, other than in tabular form.

Demographic data (such as race, ethnicity, language use, tribal or religious affiliation, marital status, birth/death rates) should be sourced as above. Much of this data is self-reported without verification by the agency soliciting the self-reports. Be aware that many people may not consider themselves affiliated with groups that outsiders consider them affiliated with (see, for example Race and ethnicity in Brazil). Where this is a significant issue or makes the data untrustworthy, consider whether its inclusion adds clarity and information or not. Also, various sources may use (or construct) data for purposes other than unbiased reporting, such as nationalism or irredentism.

Precision

With computers it is easy to calculate any data to innumerable precision. However, few people can discern a difference in the second or third decimal place in ratios such as people per square kilometer, or the percentage of the inhabitants who are Fooian. Moreover, since much of the data used for making the calculations is not accurate to such detail, the result as one moves out further than the first decimal place is more likely to be random (based on rounding or inaccuracy of a source value) rather than informative. Use of figures in templates that do calculations to any degree of accuracy is fine, provided that what is displayed does not imply an undue assertion of accuracy. For display to the user, unless there is a compelling reason to do so, avoid use of figures with more than one decimal place.

Geographic coordinates

A minute of latitude is constant worldwide and definitionally equals one nautical mile (1,852 meters (6,076.1 ft)).^[1] A second of latitude is 1/60 of this value (approximately 61.7 meters (202.4 ft)). Rarely does the geographic location of a city, town, or even village or hamlet require precision beyond one second of latitude. Often, a large city should be rounded to the minutes of latitudes. Countries, large national subdivisions, and other large areas, often can be rounded to degrees of latitude with greater clarity.

Geographic coordinates should be displayed in DDD°MM′SS″(N/S) DDD°MM′SS″(E/W) format - to the appropriate level of accuracy above - both in the template and in the title. They need not be repeated in the body of the article, unless they accompany further explanation (e.g., Greenwich). Degrees should not have leading zeros, minutes and seconds should have both leading zeros or "00" where the number is zero. If the source data contains no seconds, do not add "00", for that introduces a false precision beyond what the original source purports. Examples:

Source: 36°00′20″N
Correct: 36°00′20″N
Incorrect: 036°00′20″N; 36°20″N; 36°0′20″N

Source: 115°06′W
Correct: 115°06′W
Incorrect: 115°6′W; 115°06′00″W; -115.1°

Notes

^ A minute of longitude is approximately one nautical mile at the equator and decreases as it approaches the poles; by mid-latitudes (45 degrees N or S), a minute of longitude is closer to 0.7 nautical miles.

[1] A minute of longitude is approximately one nautical mile at the equator and decreases as it approaches the poles; by mid-latitudes (45 degrees N or S), a minute of longitude is closer to 0.7 nautical miles.

[1]