Operator: Ponor ( talk · contribs · SUL · edit count · logs · page moves · block log · rights log · ANI search)

Time filed: 23:36, Saturday, July 20, 2024 ( UTC)

Function overview: WP:MASSCREATE the remaining 3200 out of 6700 Croatian naseljes (settlements), which are the third level division of the country. The bot can create stubs like Dubrava, Split-Dalmatia County. Update the existing articles with ZIP codes (new official source), and historical population data graphs (where possible, under full supervision).

Automatic, Supervised, or Manual: Automatic creation. Supervised or manual updates.

Programming language(s): Python @ PAWS

Source code available: possible

Links to relevant discussions (where appropriate): Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Croatia/Archive 5#Croatian settlement articles mass creation

Edit period(s): one time run

Estimated number of pages affected: 3200 (+2500 or so)

Namespace(s): Articles

Exclusion compliant (Yes/No): irrelevant

Function details:

1. Create some 3200 articles from the list Wikipedia:WikiProject Croatia/To Do List/Missing settlements, link them with Wikidata.
2. Update existing Croatian settlement articles with ZIP codes and historical population data graphs, where possible (time permitting). The same job has been completed on hrwiki for all 6700 settlements.

Needs wider discussion. The discussion you link was between you and only one other person. Please seek consensus at WP:Village pump (proposals) or a similar venue where we can be sure many people have seen it. Anomie ⚔ 01:11, 21 July 2024 (UTC) reply

Hm... Thanks, though I'm not sure I wanna go through anything like Wikipedia:Village pump (proposals)/Archive 207 again. I thought the 2000+ existing Croatian settlement stubs would prove the current consensus. A few hundred stubs created by the two users I mentioned in the linked WikiProject:Croatia discussion definitely contain less information than my bot can add, and were all kept. Let me ping @ Joy to see if he can help push this through... somewhere. I don't have time for endless opinionated discussions myself, I'm afraid. Ponor ( talk) 01:49, 21 July 2024 (UTC) reply

You linked to a failed proposal to tighten the notability guideline, but it has little relevance to this proposal, because if all these new articles look like Dubrava, Split-Dalmatia County there's no way anyone's going to propose their deletion. These are not gas pumps masquerading as villages.

Even if we wanted to upmerge that information into list articles, those historical population graphs would just seem to be unwieldy, it would be pointless shoehorning.

@ Primefac had previously allowed Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/PonoRoboT and I don't remember seeing any problems, it seemed to be a nice, straightforward improvement to the encyclopedia.

@ Anomie, is there a real difference here? IOW why would this change to these 3k settlement articles need more discussion when the previous change to analogous 3k settlement articles didn't?

The fact that one group of 3k Croatian places has articles while another group of them doesn't is a historical fluke. If we need a discussion on making this situation consistent, the previously existing group needs to be discussed as well. But we already know they all qualify under WP:5P1 etc, so I don't quite see why this would be frowned upon according to standard processes ( WP:BOLD, WP:NOTBURO). -- Joy ( talk) 06:32, 21 July 2024 (UTC) reply

I was only reminding everyone what our notability discussions end up looking like. Since there were recent MEAT creations of these stubs, I'm thinking creating them by hand would be a waste of anyone's precious time if I can do the same thing, or better, by my bot.

I see that, for example, Serbia has all of their 3rd level two-sentence geo stubs created since 2010 or so. That says WP:EDITCON is there, no? Ponor ( talk) 10:01, 21 July 2024 (UTC) reply

The real difference between Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/PonoRoboT and this is that this is about creations, and the community has for many years now wanted to vet bot creations of articles before they happen. And that's regardless of whether the proposed creations would pass WP:N (part of it is that the community wants independent evaluation of that before the creations happen) or whether other articles on the topic or related topics already exist.

If you want to refer to policy, WP:MASSCREATION says (emphasis added) It is also strongly encouraged (and may be required by BAG) that community input be solicited at WP:Village pump (proposals) and the talk pages of any relevant WikiProjects. Unless you can get another BAGger to proceed without, this is me requiring. Anomie ⚔ 11:17, 21 July 2024 (UTC) reply

I concur with Anomie on this one; we have an editor who, while other factors were involved, wanted to do a similar thing for 300 pages and is restricted to only making one per month. Creating ten times as many one-paragraph sub-stubs in a fraction of the time will need consensus. Yes, they aren't just gas stations, but other than "Town X has a population Y" there appears to be no more information readily available, so I would like to see a reasonable consensus to create these (and not just two editors agreeing it would be a good idea). As Anomie said, your first approved task was updating information, not creating new pages. Primefac ( talk) 12:07, 21 July 2024 (UTC) reply

It's a clerical difference, it's just because some editor mass-created tens of thousands of these two decades ago and happened to miss half of the Croatian settlements. But okay, let's go through the motions, I'll file a proposal when I have the time (and if no one beats me to it). -- Joy ( talk) 18:57, 21 July 2024 (UTC) reply

@ Ponor the best way to substantiate this proposal would be to make sure we show some external references on e.g. the Bureau of Statistics doing proper work (documenting existing human habitation as opposed to something weird), and illustrate the body of scholarly and other work out there on the topic of these settlements. If you have something to this effect already, please share. -- Joy ( talk) 19:05, 21 July 2024 (UTC) reply

Sure, I'll help with everything I know, but can't take the burden of convincing everyone on the project alone atm. I'd start with the first four refs in Dubrava, Split-Dalmatia County: there are laws, one agency takes care of the division(s), the bureau uses their data. Every town and municipality have their web page listing these settlements. Most settlements have a church, school, etc. Let's continue at WikiProject Croatia, huh? Ponor ( talk) 19:20, 21 July 2024 (UTC) reply