Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Computer science.html

The following discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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This project is a subset of the parent project WP:COMPUTING.This project articles contains both {{WikiProject Computer science}} and {{WikiProject Computing}} and possibly other descendant wikiproject banners also.

I am proposing the use of the integrated banner of {{WikiProject Computing}} , if there is a consensus among our project members...

Example :

{{WikiProject Computing|class=start|importance=Mid|science=yes|science-importance=low}}

will produce...

	This article is within the scope of Computing WikiProject, an attempt to build a comprehensive and detailed guide to computers and computing. If you would like to participate, you can edit the article attached to this page, or visit the project page, where you can join the project and/or contribute to the discussion.
Start	This article has been rated as start-Class on the quality scale
Mid	This article has been rated as Mid-importance on the importance scale
	This article is supported by the WikiProject Computer science, which aims to create a comprehensive computer science reference for Wikipedia..
Low	This article has been rated as low-importance for the WikiProject Computer science.

• This project and its autonomy will remain the same...
• No pages have to be moved as a task force.

The advantages of this are :-

• Intergated banner which takes up less space and avoid clutter of different Computer related WikiProjects.
• Greater co-operation and co-ordination among computer related wikiProjects.
• Each WikiProject doesnt have to maintain an assessment department...Since the standards for WP 1.0 Assessment is same for all WikiProjects, single assessment is only required for all the computer related WikiProjects. This means more time for individual computer wikiprojects to help and improve the articles in their scope..
• Seperate stats for quality and importance for both parent and descendant projects ( as before)
• Catergory intersection of quality and importance available like Category:Amiga articles by quality and importance for WP:Amiga

Possible Actions:

• Replace {{WikiProject Computer science}} with {{WikiProject Computing}} and our project parameters in the article talk pages .
• Copy the importance in existing {{WikiProject Computer science}} to |science-importance= in {{WikiProject Computing}} banner.

Thoughts ?? -- Tinu Cherian - 04:29, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

Oppose - I don't believe that every computer science article should also be a computing article, and furthermore I find these integrated banners highly cluttered. I would prefer the banners remain separate. Adam McCormick (talk) 20:39, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

Still Oppose - Computer science is not a subfield of computing. Computing really shouldn't cover topics such as Artificial intelligence, machine learning, data mining, algorithms or computational complexity. These topics are the meat of computer science but don't even require the use of a computer. By integrating the banners, you would force many topics that have nothing to do with computers, or information technology to be grouped there. This is not acceptable. CS is not a subfield of computing, Programming is, maybe, a subfield, but the meat of CS is not and grouping them is not correct. Adam McCormick (talk) 15:49, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

Oh? I'm curious to know what approach would you use to do Artificial intelligence, machine learning, data mining, algorithms or computational complexity without computers (other than study them and never put them into practice) ;-) Diego (talk) 16:39, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

There are good examples in the area of, say ... Turing undecidability, which are mathematical proofs, and not something you'd implement as an algorithm. -- Or oracle machines, which are computers that could never be built, (at least, not as Turing machines .. perhaps quantum computers?) but the theory is still interesting. Please note that oracle machines are not arcane, they're commonly covered in undergrad texts on computing theory. I've been reading Barendregt's book on lambda calculus, and while its technically comp sci, 99.999999% of it will never ever be implemented as a computer program or hardware or anything -- its a math book, for all intents and purposes. linas (talk) 17:35, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

Oppose - For same reasons as Adam McCormick --Cybercobra (talk) 21:53, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

Still oppose --Cybercobra (talk) 05:19, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

Oppose - per Adam McCormick — Johnl1479 22:11, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

After reading the extending explaination by the 'nominator' below, I would like to change my vote to Support. Computing != Computer Science, but project Computer_Science extends Computing — Johnl1479 04:38, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

Yes, that's true, but the argument below is that Computing extends Computer science or for those C++ folks, class Computing : public ComputerScience which is not a valid assumption. Adam McCormick (talk) 15:54, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

I'm also reading it like class ComputerScience: public Computing, which is mostly true in a practical way (the exceptions that I listed below would be friend class DiscreteMathematics; ) although it's not strictly true in an ivory tower sense. The wp:wikiprojects are not an ontology. Diego (talk) 16:20, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

Java ftl... :-P. Anyway, now I'm confused. Is he saying 1) Computer Science is a child of Computing, or that 2) Computing is a child of Computer Science? 'Cause that is what is all depends on. — Johnl1479 02:02, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

Ah, to hell with it, I still oppose — Johnl1479 02:04, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

Oppose - computing != computer science. ␄ –Iknowyourider (t c) 01:19, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

May I know what exactly are the concerns in the integrated banner ?

The scope of Computing WikiProject is defined here...Wikipedia:WikiProject_Computing > Scope and Goals. On a broader view, it can said that the scope of Computing WikiProject is articles related to areas or subjects relating to computers , computing and information technology. Please note that WP:COMPUTERS was merged to WP:COMPUTING long time back. "computing" means using computers and other computing machines. It includes their operation and usage, the electrical processes carried out within the computing hardware itself, and the theoretical concepts governing them (computer science).

Isnt single banner better than the article being tagged separately by say WP:COMPUTING and WP:Comp Sc, WP:software etc...I feel that it avoids the clutter of banners better-- Tinu Cherian - 02:09, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

Perhaps the kind of people who are interested in computer science are not interested in other aspects of computing, and v.v. ? Perhaps your proposal is similar to trying to merge WP:Linux and WP:Windows into, for example WP:Computer Users -- it might not be something that everyone would agree to. linas (talk) 03:21, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

Oppose - per Adam. --Chet B. Long^Talk/_ARK 02:20, 4 August 2008 (UTC)Support - after reading the new definition and clarification by Tinucherian. --Chet B. Long^Talk/_ARK 18:17, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

let me explain further. This is NOT_A_MERGER_PROPOSAL between WP:COMPUTING and WP:CompSc..... WP:COMPUTING is like a parent project ( call it umberalla project) to all computer related aspects and wikiprojects similar to WP:Christianity. People are welcome to work in any of the descendant projects like WP:Anglicanism or WP:CATHOLIC or even work with WP:Christianity as a whole. Similarly people are free to work in either WP:Linux or WP:Windows or both or even WP:COMPUTING depending on their interest.The autonomy of individual WikiProject remains the same ( see WP:Amiga or WP:Websites ). This effort is just a initiative to work in greater collabration between the computer related WikiProjects.

The seperate importance for each WikiProject helps to identify the importance of the article for each project seperately. Howover the |class= parameter which defines the quality of the article is same for all projects which is in accordance with the WP 1.0 Assessment standards.

Think of these advantages :

• Only one assessment rating is needed , whether it is computing, networking , comp sc. etc ,which gives the WikiProject members more time in article improvement and less overhead for administrative activities.
• A article may be a tagged by different computer related WikiProjects say WP:Computing, WP:Comp Sc. , WP:Databases ? Which is better ? Having a single banner which supports all or different banners which takes up too much space on the talk page.

Having said that, there is no clear line separating the two projects of WP:Computing and WP:Comp Sc.. All articles in WP:Comp Sc is within the scope of WP:Computing but not viceversa. The scope of WP:Computing is boarder and Comp Sc related articles account for a major portion of the articles. This calls for better interaction and co-operation of these WikiProjects -- Tinu Cherian - 04:38, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

For - I believe Computer Science is extended arm of Computing and there is no harm in having integrated banner for sister projects or parent-child projects, infact it makes tagging easy. Where ever there may be requirement a specific note may be left that explaining standing of article e.g. Bio-Informatics may come under Computing, Computer-Science, Databse, etc. as bio-informatics is related with them all(in field of Computation). There is very good example of same pattern being follwed by WikiProject India where articles fall under scope of different projects but we use integrated banner there listing different projects under umbrella of WP India. To conclude, I think it is great to integrate different inter-related projects in one banner. --Sayed Mohammad Faiz Haider Rizvi (talk) 04:21, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

still for --Sayed Mohammad Faiz Haider Rizvi (talk) 09:01, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

for - WP is otherwise cluttered with too many banner templates - a unified one is much better than two separate. Said: Rursus ☻ 06:41, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

For - but with reservation. Computer Science is the top level (i.e. parent class) of the academic field. As such things like databases, AI, and even Software Engineering all really belong as a sub class of computer science. The only example I can think of that is computing but not computer science would be an article on the computer industry - and even then some may disagree. All that said, an integrated approach sounds good, and if computing has been chosen as the parent... so be it. Oboler (talk) 10:55, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

For - per Sayed Mohammad Faiz Haider Rizvi. There may be some very abstract mathematical non-computing results that are of interest for Computer-Science and not for Computing (e.g. general articles in topology, order theory or formal systems), but having them enclosed by the former would give enough hint of this, and they should be the exception more than the rule. Also articles about particular tools or platforms (Windows, Oracle, Logitech...) are of interest for Computing but not really for Computer-Science, so the second is mostly a subset of the first. Diego (talk) 12:58, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

Still For - this fusion is not about defining the fields of Computer Science and computing, is about joining forces in a practical way. Adding CS as a subsidiary project of Computing would allow for greater visibility to a more diverse audience, and would do nothing to change the platonic definition of both disciplines. Diego (talk) 16:47, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

Oppose - the kinds of article qualities that might make for a good article on databases are in general quite different than the kinds of qualities that would make for a good article on comp-sci. I think it's healther to evaluate an article from several perspectives, driven by specialists, rather than some vague general one-size-fits-all, lowest-common-denominator evaluation. linas (talk) 17:25, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

Comment - I think the integrated banner approach is very interesting. See for example Talk:Deep Impact (space mission). WP:WikiProject Space has a very broad scope, similar to this project, but they were able to organize the child projects appropriately. I think if there is a combined WikiProject for both Computing and CS, then the integrated banner makes more sense (you can incorporate software engineering, crypto, etc). --Jiuguang (talk) 18:30, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

For - I've not been very active, but I think that might give me a slightly more objective view. The argument of what is and what isn't Computing or Computer Science, is not in dispute here, from what I can tell? The banner is only displayed on the Talk page anyway, correct? Everyone opposing: your arguments would be valid if it were suggested that all Categories should be changed so that everything came under Computing, instead of Computer Science. The only thing I can see proposed here is the unification of administration of the projects, where appropriate, which I can only see being a good idea. Some review instead of no review, regardless of how generic or one-size-fits-all has to be an improvement (rather a Computing Project person than some unqualified random with too much time on their hands), and anyone can step in and dispute that review at a later time, or claim ownership by the Computer Science project specifically. Maybe there needs to be further discussion about what the joint banner means. I assume from the current format there is another version that says it has X importance to WikiProject Computing? Although I am "For" I don't really see why this is important, or really that great a help. If we spent this amount of time and energy on some collaborative editing of Computing/Computer Science articles instead of bureaucracy we wouldn't need to worry about administration ;D That last statement is under the assumption everyone edits for fun in their free time and gets enough TPS at work? MattOates (Ulti) (talk) 18:45, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

• Weak Support - I can easily see both sides of the argument here. In short, not repeating the arguments above, I think the advantages of integrating a banner outweigh the disadvantages. --ZeWrestler ^Talk 00:29, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

Comments: Altough there is a better support for the integrated banner use, I dont wish to proceed without addressing the concerns of those who oppose. To be fair, I had dropped a note regarding this discussion to the talk page of ALL the members.
Let me go through some of the concerns expressed by some of the project members :

• Computer Sc is a subset of Computing ?
  • Ans : Probably not, but WikiProject Computer Sc is a subset of WikiProject Computing. I would have definitely opposed to idea of Categorization of Comp Sc articles under Computing. And here lies the difference. Dont be mislead by the name WP:Computing. The scope of WP:Computing is 'anything related to computers and computing' in simpler terms ( including the science of it ) . Please note that WP:Computers was merged to WP:Computing long back for remove redundant project infrastructure.
• Will WP:Comp Sc lose its autonomy and independancy ?
  • Ans : No ! This initiative is to reduce the Bureaucracy and administrative overhead on computer related WikiProjects and enhance greater collabration and cooperation.Since the scope of these projects are loosely overlapped ,many members are already members of both the projects. As I had said earlier , this is NOT a merger proposal of WP:Comp. Sc and WP: Computing. Think of the advantage of ONLY one single quality assessment to be done for every article unlike each WikiProject member manually assessing the quality of the article for each project banner. Still each project will get seperate stats for quality and their own importance scale. The importance of a particular article for WP:Computing may of Mid-importance but for WP:Comp Sc, it may be Top-importance. This facility is available in the intergated banner. Tell me which is better ? a clutter of computer related banners on the talk page or an integrated banner which servers all purposes! Frnd, we are making the the changes only on the talk pages not the articles. The result : you have more time to work on the articles of your interest. Having said the above , we are extending this initiative to all computer related wikiprojects.

-- Tinu Cherian - 06:06, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

Comment It is my opinion that WP:ComputerScience should not be a subset of WP:Computing. To answer the response to my last post above, graduate level CS courses in Machine Learning, Artificial Intelligence, Algorithms, Data Mining, and many other core CS topics do not rely on the use of computers. Most rely on advanced mathematics and bookwork, and may not even be implementable. Sure, many of the concepts are implemented on computers to show how they work, but they are not "Computing" concepts and are not specific to 'anything related to computers and computing'. They are no more a part of computing than Calculus is. Sure you use calculus to build computer programs but that should not put it under the Computing WikiProject.

I understand that you are not proposing that the two WikiProjects merge but you are forcing the improper assumption that WP:Computing should encompass all articles even tangentially relating to Computers which is not accurate and will only serve to inflate the size of that WikiProject and dilute its ability to improve its articles, not reduce any perceived bureaucracy. Adam McCormick (talk) 15:02, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

Comment I've been largely inactive for a long while, so I'm a bit out of touch on the whole banner thing. However, reviewing the comments above, it would seem that: some articles fall clearly into both Computing and Comp Sci; some articles seem to fall primarily or exclusively in Comp Sci; and some articles seem to fall primarily or exclusively in Computing. So perhaps instead of replacing the current two banners with a single integrated one, both banners could be modified to have an integrated option. Then, if an article is primarily Comp Sci, it can use the Comp Sci banner; if it has enough overlap into Computing, it can reference Computing with its integrated option. Likewise, if an article is primarily within Computing, it can use the Computing banner; if it has enough overlap into Comp Sci, it can reference Comp Sci with its integrated option. If a given article has overlap into both but is contentious enough that one of the two projects doesn't want to use the integrated banner, then just use both. In other words: implement and use the integrated banners where they make sense, but not where they don't. Then you get to reap the benefits of an integrated banner where you can, without losing the benefits of having separate banners where they'd be useful. Would that be an acceptable option? – Zawersh 19:48, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

I think that's an excellent suggestion. --Allan McInnes (talk) 22:49, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

I support that option too. Best of two worlds. Diego (talk) 08:08, 7 August 2008 (UTC)

This would be a reasonable alternative, IMHO. --Cybercobra (talk) 08:21, 7 August 2008 (UTC)

Very reasonable, but then let us decide the articles which doesnt need to use an intergated banner ? -- Tinu Cherian - 09:32, 7 August 2008 (UTC)

Why not just modify the template and let the wikiprojects work the rest out? Seems a lot of work to decide this now for every single article... --Cybercobra (talk) 10:17, 7 August 2008 (UTC)

Comment Two importance ratings is one too many. Can this banner possibly stick to one topic with one rating? (Thanks for the heads up on my talk page by the way and apologies if this has already been addressed.) -SusanLesch (talk) 19:18, 7 August 2008 (UTC)

The seperate importance ratings are important and has the following advantages :

• More flexibility for both parent and descendant projects. ( greater independance and autonomy , I would say)
• An article might be of say Mid importance for Computing Project, Top Importance for WP:Comp Sc and even may be Low importance for WP:Databases. This helps such situations.

Please note that this initative is extended and in discussion with all the computer related Wikiprojects and there is more or less unanimous support now.

You may need not consider this banner integration as an overhead as I will make sure the present importance rating for this project is properly carried over to the new banner parameters during the banner intergation . I will make sure there is no or minimal overhead to the descendant project members for this banner intergation ( TinucherianBot is a hardworking Bot :) ). Whether or not the you may need to add importance rating to newer articles is left to the descendant WikiProject members.. -- Tinu Cherian - 04:54, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

Oppose sorry, but because as said above "this is NOT a merger proposal of WP:Comp. Sc and WP: Computing". The idea of one or two WikiProjects breaking ranks to have their own special-cased conglomeration sounds confusing. And further confused if the suggestion above succeeded in making the banner flip back and forth from one WikiProject to another. Thanks for your suggestion but in my opinion it is probably better to conform to the model that is used by all of the projects. Regarding "Please note that this initative is extended and in discussion with all the computer related Wikiprojects and there is more or less unanimous support now", WikiProject Computing has no discussion at all. Maybe you can provide a better link. -SusanLesch (talk) 05:41, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

Please see below :

• Disussion for Intergated banner for the existing Task forces and absorption of Inactive Wikiprojects can found here.
• Discussion at WP:Websites can be found here.
• Discussion for WP:Computer networking can be found here
• Discussion for WP:Software can be found here.

-- Tinu Cherian - 06:01, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

Comment Can you please stop breaking up the threaded discussion? I for one have no problem with those other projects being brought under computing (Websites, software and Networks don't exist without computers), but just because there hasn't been any discussion from those projects (or at computing) does not create "Unanimous support". I for one think that there is not enough support shown ant any of those links to combine the templates. I do see that you are contributing the vast majority of the discussion which makes it difficult to follow at best. I don't see any consensus that this proposal go forward, and nothing you have said refutes the points made in opposition above. Adam McCormick (talk) 16:13, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

I second the sentiments with regard to the non-threaded responses being hard to follow. --Cybercobra (talk) 18:50, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

Perhaps it would be better if WP:CompSci was completely divorced from WP:Computing, and instead got married to WP:Math? That way we could use the "integrated" mathematics banner for the WP:CompSci articles. This would more closely mirror how these disciplines are actually related in the "real world", where CompSci is academic, whereas Computing is a commercial activity. If there are overlapping articles, they could have two banners: one from WP:Math, and one from WP:Computing. This would make for a very clear, clean-cut distinction. linas (talk) 16:55, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

Eh, IMHO, CompSci should be its own separate thing. Certainly parts are mathy e.g. algorithm articles, but other parts, e.g. programming language articles, definitely stray from mathematical subjects but are within the domain of CompSci. But this is all tangential to the discussion at hand, which is merely about merging banners. Cybercobra (talk) 18:50, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

linas, that is only true for a subset of computer science and for the way it is taught in some universities. Computer Science is usually: (a) It's own department (b) Part of the science department (c) part of the engineering department (d) part of the mathematics department. I don't want to be really geeky, but... I did gather raw data on this in 2001 by going through every department at every unversity teaching computer science in the US as well as Australia. It was for a survey an unfortunately I only have the results online for those that responded - Australia [1] , and USA [2]. Beware small samples! (the original data as I said was from every department and collected via inspection of their websites) Oboler (talk) 05:07, 11 August 2008 (UTC)

Totals as of 19-Aug-2008

7 Oppose
5 Support
1 Weak Support

— Johnl1479 16:54, 19 August 2008 (UTC)

Support/Opposes comments copied to below poll data.The user may shift to appropriate vote if I am wrong in reading your comments. -- Tinu Cherian - 07:22, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

Support

1. TinuCherian
2. Chet B. Long
3. Sayed Mohammad Faiz Haider Rizvi
4. Rursus
5. Zawersh
6. Oboler
7. Diego
8. Jiuguang
9. MattOates (Ulti)

Weak Support

1. ZeWrestler

Oppose

1. Adam McCormick
2. linas
3. Cybercobra
4. Johnl1479
5. Iknowyourider
6. SusanLesch

Closure of the Proposal : As the person who made this proposal , I am withdrawing this proposal for WP:COMP SC. Altough there is a greater support for the Intergated banner , I dont believe there is a consensus for the integrated banner migration for WP:Comp. Sc. Altough there is some pointy and ownership issues in some of the oppose reasons, I respect your valuable opinions. Having said that, we have done this integration successfully for other descendant projects like WP:SOFTWARE , WP:Comp Networking etc. Should anyone feel this proposal is still possible with consensus among the project members , this discussion may be opened anytime. Thanks for your time and valuable comments. -- Tinu Cherian - 11:59, 9 September 2008 (UTC)

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The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page, such as the current discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.