Cleaning up SL.

DrStraw · #1

Occasionally, while I am waiting for other things to finish on my computer, I will go to SL and hit the random page button. I have two pet peeves about this and wondered how to propose a change.

1. Pages which say nothing more than "Hi, I'm Joe and I hope to be pro one day" and have not been updated in 10 years. Surely these can be purged.

2. Randomly landing on an answer page instead of the problem page. Surely the random feature can be modified to exclude these, or to go to the problem page if a solution page is randomly selected.

Bill Spight · #2

DrStraw wrote:

Occasionally, while I am waiting for other things to finish on my computer, I will go to SL and hit the random page button. I have two pet peeves about this and wondered how to propose a change.

1. Pages which say nothing more than "Hi, I'm Joe and I hope to be pro one day" and have not been updated in 10 years. Surely these can be purged.

2. Randomly landing on an answer page instead of the problem page. Surely the random feature can be modified to exclude these, or to go to the problem page if a solution page is randomly selected.

About point #2: Arguably the answer page is more random than the problem page.

skydyr · #3

As to the first page, it might help if there were a way to mark pages as personal pages, but I don't see any purpose to removing them.

As to the random button, there are really two use cases for it that I can think of:

The first is as drstraw suggests, the "I'm bored, show me something interesting" use. For this use, it may make sense to limit the pages that are returned, as to questions rather than answers, and maybe even within certain types, like "don't show me personal pages that haven't been updated in years" or "don't show me pages on pros or history, I want positions, games, etc".

The other use is as a developer or editor looking at the site to make random spot checks that pages are functioning properly, or just to access pages that aren't necessarily looked at frequently and check that links are still working, etc. For this purpose, limiting the pages that are returned is counterproductive.

It may make sense to split these two into separate functions, but there is still a reason for the current function to work as it does.

happysocks · #4

Never tried this feature. Pretty cool. Btw my first random selection just now was an answer page for the Gokyo Shumyo tsumego series. :lol:

hyperpape · #5

There have been discussions on senseis about this topic: http://senseis.xmp.net/?CoffeeMachine

tapir · #6

DrStraw wrote:

Occasionally, while I am waiting for other things to finish on my computer, I will go to SL and hit the random page button. I have two pet peeves about this and wondered how to propose a change.

1. Pages which say nothing more than "Hi, I'm Joe and I hope to be pro one day" and have not been updated in 10 years. Surely these can be purged.

2. Randomly landing on an answer page instead of the problem page. Surely the random feature can be modified to exclude these, or to go to the problem page if a solution page is randomly selected.

Random page isn't a Go oracle giving you deep meaningful answers. (Although excluding subpages and homepages may be a good idea.)

L19 isn't a SL feature/policy discussion, there are several pages feat. discussions on the topic. I am proposing sth. like this for ages, if feedback is staying outside SL it will hardly matter.

Quote:

(tapir in 2012): What I am looking for is a way to reduce the amount of homepages of long forgotten KGS accounts, jokes nobody is laughing at anymore etc. without impeding the openness to all kinds of stuff, for which I love SL and without anyone actually going around and deciding what humour page to keep or delete, which only would produce bad blood (one shouldn't police jokes imho). I already initiated sth. similar for complaints pages, see Day of Amnes(t)y - to keep SL open for people complaining while reducing the heaps of old complaints about KGS admins... I would love to get feedback on the general (sketchy) idea - it is nowhere close to happening now.

Homepages are already marked as homepages. It is possible to customize random pages (when logged into SL with your account).

DrStraw · #7

tapir wrote:

Random page isn't a Go oracle giving you deep meaningful answers. (Although excluding subpages and homepages may be a good idea.)

Did I claim it was? But it is kind of fun when you only have 30 seconds or so between tasks.

Quote:

L19 isn't a SL feature/policy discussion, there are several pages feat. discussions on the topic. I am proposing sth. like this for ages, if feedback is staying outside SL it will hardly matter.[/qoute]

Not sure what you are trying to say, but if you read my post you will see that I was asking for information because I could not find it myself. No one has yet answered my question.

Quote:

Homepages are already marked as homepages. It is possible to customize random pages (when logged into SL with your account).

Many homepages are interesting. It is those which are one line long have have not been updated for years which are not.

Uberdude · #8

But if random page doesn't return the short homepages, how else will you find them to clean them up? ;-)

Bantari · #9

Uberdude wrote:

But if random page doesn't return the short homepages, how else will you find them to clean them up? ;-)

So you are saying that the only way they have to fish out the 10-year-old-one-liner-pages is to hit RandomPage time and time again until you get them all???? Amazing!

gowan · **#10**

Uberdude wrote:

But if random page doesn't return the short homepages, how else will you find them to clean them up? ;-)

The "advanced findpage" page: http://senseis.xmp.net/?AdvancedFindPage has enough features to find home pages like those Dr Dtraw wants to purge.

Uberdude · **#11**

I was half joking, but also making the point that if 'junk' appears in a widely used feature such as random page it is more likely to be acted upon.

tchan001 · **#12**

Being inactive for years doesn't mean the person doesn't come back later on. As I recall, Dr. Straw was once also inactive from the community for a period of years.
I'd hate to be someone who comes back years later and thinking of updating his homepage on SL only to find it deleted by some random admin while I was inactive.

tapir · **#13**

DrStraw wrote:

Not sure what you are trying to say, but if you read my post you will see that I was asking for information because I could not find it myself. No one has yet answered my question.

The question was "how to propose a change", the answer is "start a discussion in SL" (Bug Report or forum of Deleting Pages or any of the Metadiscussion pages), unlike L19 you don't even have to login to do so.

What I am trying to say apart from that, I agree with your comment regarding homepages, but there is in my opinion a need for a policy that is permissive and unambiguous. Removal of certain old pages should not be misconstructed as a rule against 1 line homepages or bad jokes and nobody should be in a position to police homepages or humour pages for perceived quality. With relevancy and quality ruled out as a criterion, there only remains age. Maintenance in this spirit would have the distinct advantage to keep the fundamental wiki principle intact.

DrStraw · **#14**

tchan001 wrote:

Being inactive for years doesn't mean the person doesn't come back later on. As I recall, Dr. Straw was once also inactive from the community for a period of years.
I'd hate to be someone who comes back years later and thinking of updating his homepage on SL only to find it deleted by some random admin while I was inactive.

True, but the longest my page went without modification was a little over three years, and it had a lot of content plus several subpages. That is a lot different from a one-liner.

Splatted · **#15**

I think the intro pages are worthwhile and should be kept regardless of the creators' continued activity. Any info about who is posting the "facts" on sensei's seems important to me, so as long as a user's other contributions remain I don't see that a self introduction can ever become obsolete.

DrStraw · **#16**

Splatted wrote:

I think the intro pages are worthwhile and should be kept regardless of the creators' continued activity. Any info about who is posting the "facts" on sensei's seems important to me, so as long as a user's other contributions remain I don't see that a self introduction can ever become obsolete.

Absolutely. If someone has posted something else their page should remain.

Bantari · **#17**

Personally, I see nothing wrong with the RandomPage functionality.
It works exactly as advertised - it gives you a random page.
To expect anything else would be... uncivilized.

And there is also the advanced search to drill into the subject you want.

It seems to me that what DrStraw would like is something inbetween: not really random, but not needing the setup of advanced search form. Something like PressHereAndGetSomethingOfInterest(ToYouPersonally) button. Not sure if wiki comes with such functionality, and no clue how hard it is to build it in.

What I would like is a good indexing pages, something like an extended site map, links to all pages grouped by topic or whatever. But this is probably a different discussion.

Bonobo · **#18**

DrStraw wrote:

[..] If someone has posted something else their page should remain.

What exactly would be this “something else”, and who would decide how much of “something else” would qualify them to stay? And how would we know whether they are not just some of these “small” people who themselves don’t create any content but only correct some typos here and there?

I think “homepages” should be honoured as their creator’s place. As little as may be on somebody others page there, I think deleting such a page would show disrespect.

Greetings, Tom

DrStraw · **#19**

Bonobo wrote:

DrStraw wrote:

[..] If someone has posted something else their page should remain.

What exactly would be this “something else”, and who would decide how much of “something else” would qualify them to stay? And how would we know whether they are not just some of these “small” people who themselves don’t create any content but only correct some typos here and there?

I think “homepages” should be honoured as their creator’s place. As little as may be on somebody others page there, I think deleting such a page would show disrespect.

Greetings, Tom

I have to disagree. The page which prompted this thread was one created in 2005. I forget exactly what is said now, but the gist was that the owner had just discovered go (probably through HNG) and was going to be a pro in a couple of years. Nothing else was said, or has been since. That person probably quit playing a few months later when he realized it was not possible.

Bonobo · **#20**

DrStraw wrote:

[..] The page which prompted this thread was one created in 2005. I forget exactly what is said now, but the gist was that the owner had just discovered go (probably through HNG) and was going to be a pro in a couple of years. Nothing else was said, or has been since. That person probably quit playing a few months later when he realized it was not possible.

Well, you are countering the—perhaps false—assumptions of that person with your assumptions.

Nobody HAS TO read such pages. They are simply there. And maybe … they are examples of (false?) assumptions, and as such, IMHO, they should stay there, just as all those “1 Dan in two months” threads here.

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