Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Guild of Copy Editors/Backlog elimination drives/May 2019

Found problems in Abdul Khaliq (athlete). What should I do?

I was copyediting Abdul Khaliq (athlete). About halfway in, I noticed that the competition section was getting overly detailed, and stopped immediately. I inserted a horizontal rule where it was, and added the template {{Overly detailed}}. (I also added {{Peacock}}.) Should I:

1. Abort the copyedit
2. Finish the copyedit
3. Do something else entirely?

Let me know your thoughts below. – Ben79487 02:56, 10 May 2019 (UTC)

Hi Ben, yes that's a horribly structured article! If you want to continue, some of the sub-sub-sections could be merged to form paragraphs, unreferenced text could be removed (note the subject is dead so BLP doesn't apply) ; I doubt we need every race of his career. If you want to abandon it, you could add {{Refimprove}} and/or {{missing information}}. It could also be sent to Cleanup using {{Cleanup}}. Cheers, Baffle☿gab 05:00, 10 May 2019 (UTC)

@Ben79487: I agree, that article looks like it needs a lot more cleanup than copyedit. {{Example farm}} might also apply. There's nothing wrong with walking away from it; though if you really wanted the challenge, you could try to summarize some of the lengthy awards sections with prose. – Reidgreg (talk) 10:13, 11 May 2019 (UTC)

How to calculate word count for a section?

I am working on the article Abdul Hamid II. The Page Size script suggests word count as 5196 words but only the section on Marriages and Descendants needs a copy edit. How to estimate word count and record the same? RajkGuj (talk) 14:16, 20 May 2019 (UTC)

The script does not work for me on that section, because it is mostly bullets. You'll have to copy it to a text editor or word processing program and count the words there. – Jonesey95 (talk) 16:49, 20 May 2019 (UTC)

@RajkGuj: Those long hereditary/genealogy lists represent a bit of work by someone, but I'm not sure they should be there. It looks like there are about 20 wives and/or descendants who have their own articles, and could be briefly listed. The rest of them just hide the more notable ones, and don't really add anything to the reader's understanding of the article's subject. So I'd be hesitant to count a lot of those lists, as I'd probably just remove them from the article. Or actually, it might be better to replace the copy edit tag with {{example farm|section}} and let someone else sort out the notable from the non-notable. – Reidgreg (talk) 18:37, 20 May 2019 (UTC)

Great Reidreg. I agree with your suggestion and have just replaced the copy edit tag. RajkGuj (talk) 08:33, 21 May 2019 (UTC)

January 2019

As of 21/5 only four articles remain to be edited from December 2018. Is it time to add January 2019 articles to the drive? Twofingered Typist (talk) 12:16, 21 May 2019 (UTC)

When the December backlog is cleared, we'll add January; otherwise I get stuck doing the last few really old articles, and I suffer enough :-). All the best, Miniapolis 13:10, 21 May 2019 (UTC)

Gotcha! I did the last November article—I know what you mean. CheersTwofingered Typist (talk) 17:24, 21 May 2019 (UTC)

The last non-claimed December 2018 article (Provisional Government of the Republic of Korea) is actively undergoing copy edit outside of the drive (the tag is still extant). So it's probably safe to add January to the old articles now. – Reidgreg (talk) 23:05, 21 May 2019 (UTC)

Sounds good, and I've amended the drive page to include January articles for the bonus. I'll be happy to delete the December category page when it's empty :-). Many thanks for the help and all the best, Miniapolis 00:43, 22 May 2019 (UTC)