Template talk:Infobox ship begin/Archive 4

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Two Infobox Ship Characteristics

Can we put two Infobox Ship Characteristics into an article of an ocean liner which was refitted into a warships or an aircraft carrier such as MS Augustus or SS Roma (1926) and her speed and displacement were changed? —Aquitania (talk) 05:37, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

There "characteristics" (and "career" on military vessels) boxes can be repeated. In cases such as these where the information is notably different this is probably the best course of action. — Kjet (talk · contribs) 15:34, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

IMO number

I am new in this group, most of my work is on Commons. I am trying to bring the complete seagoing Commons fleet under IMO number and invites every uploader of ship-files to give the IMO number together with the file. And if you are working on an item, please add the IMO number(s) to the pictures. It seems to me very usefull to find all pictures of a ship by IMO number in Commons, by name is difficult. Names change often with a new owner, the IMO number not. I wonder if it is possible to split the Infobox in two parts: the part that doesn't change, headed by the IMO number, and a part by name (in many cases under a new flag), starting with the MMSI number and Callsign. I didn't find an IMO number in the present Infobox. Is it possible to add it. Regards --stunteltje@hccnet.nl (talk) 09:21, 31 December 2008 (UTC)

Tagging all images with an IMO number is certainly something I can get behind. Have you thought about posting your request on the discussion page of WikiProject Ships? I'm sure it will meet with acceptance.

As far as a specific field for the IMO number in this template, I believe at the time the template was conceived, the thought was to not have umpteen different fields for this type of number or that type of number, but to have a single "Identification" field that could be used for any of them. Since, as I understand it, IMO numbers did not start to be used until the 1960s and are not assigned to warships, for example, a single "Identification" field provides consistency among ships of many types and from many eras. — Bellhalla (talk) 13:47, 31 December 2008 (UTC)

I didn't post my request on the discussion page, as I was not aware of the existance.

You are correct in your statement that not all ships have IMO numbers, but most new sea-going ships will have. It was not my intention to transfer Commons in a database for ship details, but to give details and pictures of ships during their lifetime in just one file - up to now in a category. --stunteltje@hccnet.nl (talk) 16:08, 31 December 2008 (UTC)

Have seen the discussion on the discussion page. Forget it, problem solved. --Stunteltje (talk) 23:06, 31 December 2008 (UTC)

Lawhill

The infobox in this article contains a lot of highly specific information about the ship, most of which doesn't fit into any field. Is all of this information needed, or is there some way to accommodate it? Thanks in advance. AP1787 (talk) 21:39, 28 January 2009 (UTC)

I attempted to update it to use this template. I believe that I captured all of the key data ... how does that look? --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 22:19, 28 January 2009 (UTC)

Looks great, thanks for the help! AP1787 (talk) 01:32, 29 January 2009 (UTC)

Add/Remove/Replace request

Simple requests for field updates.Nuttyrave (talk) 10:38, 28 February 2009 (UTC) + others updated 4 October 2009

ADD

naval architect
Ship registration number (we have Ship registry ie where it is registered Lloyd's Register etc but shold have it number )
Ship official number (may be the same or different from the Ship identification)
Ship built (we have who built the Ship but not where it was built)
burgee (if the boat belongs to a yacht club)
build / construction(is the boat hull made of wood, steel, epoxy, carbon fibre, etc... and is it composite built, molded, steel rivetted, wood-planked, clinker-built, etc...)
Length-On-Deck
Load-Waterline-Length
Ship primary use (what the vessels primary role was eg transport, passanger, warship etc)
Ship industry (general cargo, bulk coal etc)
Ship passenger capacity (similar to crew but passanger capacity)

REMOVE

are EN-GB Vs EN-US redundancies needed? (draft + draught, honors + honours, armor + armour)

REPLACE

Length with Length-Over-All

Some comments on your suggestions:

If there is a consensus to add these fields we can, but until/unless that happens, the Ship notes field is a good place for many of these things.
Assuming that a yacht burgee graphic would be usable (copyrights and all), the Ship flag field might be suitable in some cases.
As far as "build" information, Ship type is an appropriate place. Using something like "wooden-hulled yacht" or "steel-hulled cargo ship" is what was intended there.
Many ship's lengths are reported as only one measure, like length between perpendiculars. Having a generic "length" (rather than many similar fields) lets editors leave it ambiguous if the source does not specify which length measure is used. It also avoids the problem of editors putting the wrong measure in the wrong field (as often happens with the Ship displacement and Ship tonnage figures). It also lets editors note specifically which measure(s) is/are being used, by putting an abbreviation such as (lpp) or (oa) after measures given. Also, more than one measure can be (and often is) given in the Ship length field.
Yes, the US/International English distinctions are necessary and so should remain. If we were to redesign these infobox templates from scratch, it would make sense to have an Engvar field to control all the alternate spellings. Although changing the template code for this is straightforward, given the wide use of these templates, it would be a long and arduous task to convert all uses of the infoboxes to take advantage of this, and get it right on all articles, all for little-to-no net gain for the readers of the encyclopedia. — Bellhalla (talk) 13:09, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

"Badge" as a term for USN ship's arms/crests/seals

Where this template is transcluded to USN ships, the term "badge" is used in reference to ship's coats of arms/crests/seals. While these latter three terms are often used interchangeably, the term "badge" is never used. The term "badge" refers to an element of the USN uniform (see Badges of the United States Navy). The correct term is coat of arms, or seal. "Crest" is inaccurate as the crest is part of the arms/seal. Similarly, "shield" is part of the arms/seal. For reference, see [1], [2] and [3]. The most commonly accepted term is "coat of arms".

I wanted to modify {{Infobox Ship Characteristics}} to add some code to make this change. Rather than having to make hundreds or even thousands of edits to correct the term "badge" across all USN ships, I thought it would be easiest to check to see if the page title began with "USS ". But, mw:Extension:StringFunctions has not been implemented yet and I could find no alternative way to parse out "USS " from the title. mw:Help:Extension:ParserFunctions gets somewhat close with titleparts, but it's insufficient.

So, alternatively, I'm going to make the change:

}}{{#if:{{{Ship coat of arms|}}}|<tr valign=top><td>Coat of arms:</td><td>
{{{Ship coat of arms|}}}</td></tr>

and then set about finding someone talented with regex to make the changes to "USS " articles where this template is transcluded. --Hammersoft (talk) 15:41, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

Another option could be to add a field for "Ship badge label =" ... if left blank, then in the infobox defaults to using "Badge:" for the label on the field in the infobox; but if another value is provided (such as on USN ships), it could show the alternate text such as "Crest:" or some other value. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 19:23, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

After asking at the help desk, I found {{Str left}} which does the trick. If used (I tested this) on an article such as USS Nimitz (CVN-68), a la {{Str left|{{pagename}}|3}} it returns "USS". You can use other expressions to compare that against "USS", and from there is a match replace "badge" with "coat of arms". That's a lot easier than editing the several hundred articles where this is transcluded. Thoughts? --Hammersoft (talk) 19:27, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

That seems to be the ideal solution, provided the terminology "coat of arms" holds true for all USN ships. I'm not familiar with the correct terminology myself, so I'll let you and others discuss that part. One question, these are per ship, correct? Are there counterparts for the ship class articles that we would need to also find a solution on? --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 19:45, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

These are per ship, yes. On the ship class articles, I'd be very surprised if any invoke badge/crest/seal/coat of arms, as there are no such things for the specific classes, just the ships within them. Ticonderoga class cruiser doesn't. Arleigh Burke class destroyer doesn't. Oliver Hazard Perry class frigate doesn't. Etc. --Hammersoft (talk) 19:59, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

Page protection removed

I requested page protection be removed from these templates and it was granted. See rationale at [4]. --Hammersoft (talk) 15:41, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

The rationale for page protection is that it is used to prevent changes to the template that have not been discussed and agreed on; not for fear of vandalism. About 20,000 articles have this template in place which certainly warrants edit protection from potential vandalism. This template was constructed to allow uniformity to all ship articles and allowing changes that have not been discussed leads to a cluttered template with redundant entries. --Brad (talk) 21:31, 18 April 2009 (UTC)

test depth

I personally didn't know what "test depth" was, although I am familiar with the term "crush depth" and something like "maximum depth" is obvious from the wording. Might I suggest that in the template, test depth be linked to Submarine depth ratings? I'd do it myself, but it's been a really long time since I worked on templates, and I don't want to cock it up. Thanks – I think it would be helpful for readers. ... aa:talk 21:05, 18 April 2009 (UTC)

Additions

I was wondering whether the infobox should include MMSI and callsign? --jmb (talk) 19:56, 26 June 2009 (UTC)

Both should be placed in the |Ship identification= field. — Kjet (talk · contribs) 09:25, 27 June 2009 (UTC)

Minor fix

Could someone lowercase the word "Registry" for the port of registry parameter? – Zntrip 06:47, 13 August 2009 (UTC)

Fixed — Kralizec! (talk) 15:54, 13 August 2009 (UTC)

Thanks. – Zntrip 21:48, 13 August 2009 (UTC)

Range

Does "range" refer to "operating range" (round-trip) or "transit range" (one way) ? Alexpl (talk) 08:27, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

It could be either, or both. Just identify whatever you have sourced in the field—like, "500 nautical miles (930 km) (operating range)"—to let readers know. — Bellhalla (talk) 11:20, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

US Flag for infobox

See question at Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Ships#US_Flag_for_infobox. — MrDolomite • Talk 20:03, 31 August 2009 (UTC)

ships cost

OK, so where do we put the building cost of a ship? Sandpiper (talk) 19:35, 27 September 2009 (UTC)

|Ship original cost= --Brad (talk) 19:52, 27 September 2009 (UTC)

yes i came across a mention of that. unfortunately I couldn't find any mention of it in any ship template documentation and couldn't make it work adding it to any of the infobox lists. Where does it go and are you sure it is enabled? Sandpiper (talk) 18:48, 28 September 2009 (UTC)

An example of the field in-use can be found on the MS Oasis of the Seas article. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 19:00, 28 September 2009 (UTC)

And for a military example, at USS Texas (BB-35). -MBK₀₀₄ 19:05, 28 September 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for the examples. Now, I have successfully inserted a cost into the HMS Warrior article here [5] but when I did what seemed to be the same thing to HMS Monarch, [6] it does not show up. I have deleted the monarch figure again because it is incorrect, just did it for a trial. But this seems to be the problem I had to begin with. Sandpiper (talk) 22:23, 28 September 2009 (UTC)

In the HMS Monarch edit, the field was listed twice - first with the amount you added, then with no amount showing. I believe the template kept the last value it was provided (when reading top-to-bottom), which was blank, so the field didn't show in the infobox. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 22:38, 28 September 2009 (UTC)

Thanks again, that may be the problem, that I didn't spot it. That does however bring me back to where I started trying to solve this puzzle: where is there a list of parameters for these boxes? I could not find one in the text of template:infobox ship career. The talk page is redirected to here, so then when you pointed out the correct phrasing I still didn't know which template it belonged in. Sandpiper (talk) 23:14, 28 September 2009 (UTC)

On Template:Infobox Ship Begin/doc, there is a section for "Usage". There are then five groups of sample code, press "show" for the one that you want to look at the details. The groups are: the most common fields for warships, the most common fields for submarines, the most common fields for sailing ships, the most common fields for commercial vessels, then the full list of all available fields (there's then a second list of five usage fields - the same pattern, but for ship class instead of individual ships). --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 23:47, 28 September 2009 (UTC)

I looked at it and read the instructions (which seem to be copied onto each of the template pages identically?) before ever posting here. The word 'cost' appears nowhere on the page, I searched for it. I have now tried editing the page and searching the edit, but previously did not realise this complex procedure was needed to reference the documentation! Perhaps you need to explain that someone needs to do this, or explicitly fill in all the parameters so they appear in the documentation. code which I think it invites you to copy (by clicking a link to show it) does not include 'cost' in the version for warships, nor submarines, though it does for 'age of sail', 'commercial vessels' and 'none of the above'. The wording at the top of the page seems to imply that the examples given are incomplete and the reader needs to look elsewhere to find the full set of options. Sandpiper (talk) 06:39, 29 September 2009 (UTC)

"Namesake"

"Namesake" just means someone or something the same name. I assume the intent of this field is to identify the person or thing that the ship's name commemorates. Wouldn't it be better, then, if it read "Named for" or "Named after"? --208.76.104.133 (talk) 05:51, 29 September 2009 (UTC)

Namesake means the person or thing the subject was named after. My nephew carries my first name so therefore he is my namesake. --Brad (talk) 19:40, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

Need alt image support

Images need alt text as per WP:ALT. Please expand the template with a new Ship alt argument. WilliamKF (talk) 00:18, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't it already exist: [[File:No Photo Available.svg|300px|AlternateTextHere]] is the default code in the |ship image= field. (Admittedly most editors seem to leave it blank). — Kjet (talk · contribs) 13:01, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

For Alt text you need [[File:No Photo Available.svg|300px|Alt=Bla Bla|caption description]] Which can be added but currently the template is not recognizing it. To test this, turn off images in your browser and load the page in question. You will see the other pics with descriptive alt text in place except for the infobox area. --Brad (talk) 19:40, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

Seems to be working correctly now, as seen in: Washington Irving (sidewheeler). WilliamKF (talk) 00:54, 11 October 2009 (UTC)

I misunderstood what the problem was. There is no need for a |ship alt= parameter. Alt text should be placed inline with |Ship image=[[File:No Photo Available.svg|300px|Alt=Bla Bla]]. --Brad (talk) 06:53, 11 October 2009 (UTC)

Number/new field

For a ship's IMO number, a specific field "IMO=" could be useful. Currently other fields are used for this and it's not necessarily easy to find there. I'd like to suggest its addition to the template. -- 签名 _sig at 00:53, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

This has been discussed several times. Thus far the concensus has been that the IMO number (and any other comparable identifiers) should go in the |ship identification= field, to avoid cluttering the template any more than it already is. — Kjet (talk · contribs) 13:07, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

I looked into the values in the ship_identification field and it does look really cluttered. Many other probably less important elements have their own field, so there isn't really a benefit in keeping this amalgamated with other information. -- 签名 _sig at 13:21, 20 October 2009 (UTC)

height="30pt"

re: {{Infobox ship career}}

Please change:

height="30pt"

to

height="30"

as html height attributes to not take 'point' units. This is in the 'Career' header-row and the plain "30"-form is already being used in the "General characteristics" row implemented in {{Infobox ship characteristics}} (it was wrong, fixed here).

Also, attributes should be quoted and there are a bunch of:

valign=top

what would be better

valign="top"

MediaWiki is addding the quotes to the generated page, but relying on this is poor form. I just did this to the characteristics template.

Cheers, Jack Merridew 12:02, 7 December 2009 (UTC)

Done. PS. why is the height for those headers 30px, when the flags used in those headers use a height of 35px ? —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 15:14, 7 December 2009 (UTC)

No idea; had not even noticed. That sort of thing is best done with line-height on the content, anyway; have not looked, padding or margin, depending on the elements and ambient css (which would be an even better spot). Cheers, Jack Merridew 15:17, 7 December 2009 (UTC)

Ship image

Anyone know why the infobox ship image now defaults to displaying the No Image Available banner when no image is specified. IMO this is ugly and unnecessary. Infobox looks much better without it. Mjroots (talk) 20:48, 8 December 2009 (UTC)

Removed - "no photo" seems ridiculous on a 1784 ship. Rich Farmbrough, 18:19, 15 December 2009 (UTC).

Does not well cover sailing ships

Need sailplan type (e.g. [[Barque\\), a reference to the article Sailplan, number of masts, heights of up to five masts, total sail area, etc. See Schulschiff Deutschland and the German wikipedia article de:Schulschiff_Deutschland (the later is hand coded without a template reference).

Masthöhe über Wasser: (Mast heigth over water)

Anzahl der Segel: (Number of sales)

Segelfläche: (Sail area)

Need also Sailplan:

- Thanks, Leonard G. (talk) 22:32, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

There is a fundamental problem with the templates that apparently grew out of the one naval application. If starting from scratch and engineering the things I'd recommend a base template with what every ship has in common: builder/launch information, dimensions and tonnage (several standards on each too so care is needed there), power (engines or sail rig) and such. Then a series of specialized add on template for flags/ownership (a lot of vessels go through quite a series), naval, commercial, research and major specializations. Detailed sail plan, all the naval concentration on commissioning and in service details, guns, scientific equipment and shuch should then be subset additions to the base. Whether it is worth a retrofit I don't know since I've no clue how much these ship pages are actually of use. Any real researcher will go directly to the sources and the casual public probably does not care. Palmeira (talk) 16:56, 1 January 2010 (UTC)

Leonard G. you should look at the infobox for USS Constitution and that will show you how to lay out the specifications. --Brad (talk) 18:19, 1 January 2010 (UTC)

Repeat career section

MV Glen Sannox was for 32 years a Clyde and Hebridean ferry and then had a brief career as a Red Sea ferry. I feel each should have a separate career section. This has been challenged. Is there any consensus for merchantmen? Finavon (talk) 12:12, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

The concensus has, as far as I'm aware, been that as far as mechant ships go the career box should not be repeated, as this can lead to hugely bloated infoboxes. The concensus has also been that the |Ship country= and |Ship flag= fields should not be used on merchant ships' infoboxes, as this needlessly emphasises the registry country which is usually chosen on the economic grounds and has little to no relevance to the owner's home country or the traffic area (as indeed exemplified by the Glen Sannox's Red Sea service). Instead the flags should go in the |Ship registry field next to the homeport (see for instance MS SNAV Toscana). — Kjet (talk · contribs) 17:29, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

In my opinion your MS SNAV Toscana example has several advantages even for naval vessels. It is clean and simple on various ownership/flagging phases, including the "as built" with "modifications" following. As I noted elsewhere here there are some basic characteristics every ship has in common such as a builder and launch date. Even an almost total rebuild is a "modification" that could be handled as in the example. Naval ships in particular often get heavily modified over a service life with entire classes getting major block upgrades and new systems. The ships are then stripped of much specialized equipment before going to another navy if that is the case. As for merchant vessel flags? Well you are right on that! At one time the largest fleet in the world was said to be actually "held" in a building in Reston, Virginia where a number of the flag of convenience states contracted a company to manage the registries and records. Palmeira (talk) 18:05, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Thanks. Finavon (talk) 18:25, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Collapsible sections?

Copied from WT:SHIPS
In some cases, the infobox can get quite long. Would it be better if the Career and General characteristics sections were normally collapsed, or normally open with an option to collapse? Mjroots (talk) 09:18, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

The option to have collapsible infoboxes (or more specifically, infobox sections) could also be of use in ship class articles for variants. What I'm thinking of is for articles like Lerici class minehunter or Oberon class submarine, where several variants or subclasses, each with slightly differnt characteristics... the top infobox contains all the characteristics for the main example of the class, while each subtype section has an infobox showing the stats that change. These latter ones could be collapsed to avoid large tracts of whitespace.

I'd personally be against having the infobox sections automatically collapse on all occasions...it would probably be best decided on an article-by-article basis, or by some criteria (i.e. "If the infobox repeats a subsection..."), as opposed to a blanket implementation. My template-fu is weak, but I imagine this could be done via a field input parameter (like the current option to show or hide headers), with the blank/default set to open. -- saberwyn 05:43, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

It is certainly possible to have collapsible groups, see {{Dutch Windmills}} where all groups are collapsed. I'm not sure that it will be necessary to collapse the image section though. Mjroots (talk) 13:14, 5 January 2010 (UTC)

Definitely not the image section. -- saberwyn 20:50, 5 January 2010 (UTC)

I would oppose collapsible infoboxes. Certainly I would oppose infoboxes being collapsed by default. I think infoboxes add visual appeal and a professional-looking finish to articles as well as adding useful summary information, and they are advantages worth retaining. Gatoclass (talk) 17:59, 5 January 2010 (UTC)

Then what is your solution to the problem of very long infoboxes? It is a genuine issue. - BilCat (talk) 18:54, 5 January 2010 (UTC)

How about shortening them? Gatoclass (talk) 19:04, 5 January 2010 (UTC)

How can they be shortened without losing info or introducing poor aesthetics? Hence my original suggestion. Mjroots (talk) 21:01, 5 January 2010 (UTC)

There has been another proposal made about infoboxes for research ships. I think this particular issue should be discussed on the template talk page along with the other proposal. --Brad (talk) 00:27, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

Let the discussion continue here, per Brad101's suggestion. Mjroots (talk) 05:38, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

Continued

Well, some users have more space-intensive methods of formatting information in infoboxes than others. But personally, I think in general that there is too much info being crammed into ship infoboxes, the main problem is that some people try to add every detail of a ship's entire career and infoboxes can get very long as a result. Gatoclass (talk) 07:15, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

Where the infobox has an entry for an item of information, and that item is not constant, then it is logical for all relevant entries to be placed in the infobox, whether it be the name, owner, operator, port of registry, identification etc. The same applies where the characteristics change over time. IMO, this is not cramming stuff in, but using the infobox for its intended purpose. Mjroots (talk) 09:57, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

I think collapsing as an option might be ok but only for the characteristics section of the box. The infobox in general supplies a large amount of structure to an article and removing that structure is a bad idea. I'm aware that in many articles the infobox is 3 times the length of the text and certainly detracts from an appearance of the article. --Brad (talk) 20:41, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

I can't see much point in that Brad. The "characteristics" section is usually pretty short. The problem is the career section (or multiple sections) of ships which have had many different owners and so on. Characteristics are important in any case and in my opinion that section should always be visible. Gatoclass (talk) 01:36, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

Generally, the characteristics section does not get over long due to changes. It's the career section which presents length problems in some instances. Maybe an option to collapse this section where it is long, but maintain the normal infobox without this option as standard - i.e. you'd actually have to add the code separately, on a case by case basis. Mjroots (talk) 07:15, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

Research vessel characteristics

After looking at the USN and commercial templates neither really fit the research vessels well. For those vessels certain capabilities are essentially the "armament" and there are standards for terminology. I could help with the fields but am not experienced with templates. For just one ship example see R/V Knorr Specifications and R/V Knorr Scientific Equipment where each heading drills down to detail. A selected subset of such detail with general worldwide application might be useful. Is it worth the effort to create such a specialized template, preferably applying world wide to both research and survey vessels? Palmeira (talk) 19:25, 28 December 2009 (UTC)

Can you be more specific as to what you would want to see included? A lot of the time a little bit of ingenuity can make use of the current template parameters. There might not be a strong enough reason to include more minor specifications to the infobox; but rather explain them in the body of the article. --Brad (talk) 18:39, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

Both research and survey vessels "main armament" so to speak will be the navigation suite, sonar arrays, computers with the research vessels then getting into a fairly standard suite of winches/trawls. cranes, "U" frames and such. The multipurpose R/Vs can get specialized beyond template reason but all will tend to have a number of ship provided in common. These are all in addition to the ship's actual navigation equipment used by the crew. For example, the crew would never normally use Knorr's Seabeam for ship navigation. The existing templates truly do not provide for even the standard survey/research except with a monster note. The casual audience here no more needs extreme detail than non-naval professionals need to know every publicly released sensor and weapons detail about a naval vessel. The info box format does give an opportunity to present a general picture of what research vessels capabilities are just as does the weapon information in naval info boxes. If that seems useful I will find time to put together a draft list. I may need help in turning that into a compatible template to go with ship info already in templates. Palmeira (talk) 00:57, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

Just put a draft list, very quick and unsorted, on my talk page. Right now it is more an example than a proposed template list. Palmeira (talk) 15:20, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

Have a look at {{Infobox Ship Wreck Location}} which is an add on box for shipwrecks. I think something similar to that is what would be needed to cover research vessels. --Brad (talk) 23:16, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

I don't see the connection. Maybe we are in a disconnect. I am not talking about research vessel "discoveries" at all and would not recommend any attempt at an extensive listing of those even in the body. What I am talking about is the equivalent of "armament" in naval vessels. Every research vessel has specialized scientific/survey equipment separate from the ship's navigational suite. A complete template would be a monster and not needed. I would recommend a basic one covering echosounding, winches, frames and cranes, base computer systems and such. A limit of half a dozen and a "Notes" section should do, enough to give the general public an idea. Those should be repeatable as the systems change. Most of the survey ships I "rode" got significant upgrades several time over two decades. Palmeira (talk) 13:18, 8 January 2010 (UTC)

And I'm pointing out a box that adds onto the current infobox which is what I believe you are wanting to have. The shipwreck box is an example of what a research vessel box may look and act like. With that in mind why not lay out the parameters you would like to see? --Brad (talk) 17:44, 9 January 2010 (UTC)

Multiple renamings

Is there anyway to get the ship renamed= field to allow for multiple renamings? I have a couple of cases where the name was changed during building and then renamed during its career more than once.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 19:47, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

Two ways you can do this:

Renamed	list error: <br /> list (help) Goofy 1925 Mickey 1934 Sturmvogel 1977

Or:

Renamed	Goofy 1925
Renamed	Mickey 1934
Renamed	Sturmvogel 1977

--Brad (talk) 20:05, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

Slap to the forehead!, thanks, Brad101.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 20:23, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

It's better to see a slap to the forehead than to see demands for changes just to fit one particular article. --Brad (talk) 21:43, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

“no photo available”

Why are we using an image in place of plain text? I would change the default to these three words except I′m concerned about the tautology they present. So better: do we need such a message at all? Discussion welcome. ―AoV² 09:58, 28 March 2010 (UTC)

Perhaps replacing it with a template that automatically adds it to Category:Wikipedia requested photographs of ships maybe more helpful, then when replaced with an image the user wouldn't have to go do a second separate edit to the talk page to remove the template as well... JonEastham (talk) 12:19, 15 April 2010 (UTC)

That′s a good idea. I wouldn′t mind moving the talk-page categories back to articles themselves now that article categories can be “hidden”. That is, except for the select few templates/categories which say something about the talk page, such as “archived by bot such-and-such”. ―AoV² 12:32, 15 April 2010 (UTC)

I've long thought that using "No photo available" seems to send the message that a photo has been searched for but couldn't be found which is not always the case. Keep in mind though that the image part of the infobox isn't required to be displayed; MV California Star (1945) is one example. In either case there is also File:Unknown ship no picture.svg which is an alternative default "no photo" image. --Brad (talk) 02:54, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

I agree ... there's no need for a place-holder for an image. A hidden category within the article would be better, as well as eliminating the need for secondary maintenance of talk-space project cleanup tags. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 18:30, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

As an observation, NerdyScienceDude (talk · contribs) appears to have embarked on a mass removal of the File:No Photo Available.svg placeholder. -- saberwyn 08:35, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

And I've asked him to stop and pointed out this conversation. --Brad (talk) 10:35, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

I didn't know about this discussion. I was removing the image from all articles it is being used in because that image isn't supposed to be used on any articles. ~NERDYSCIENCEDUDE (✉ message • changes) 13:14, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

I prefer not to have the "no photo available" image display. I think it looks ugly and unencyclopaedic. With the Empire ships such as California Star, there are photos available of many of them, but these are almost all subject to copyright. I occasionally use a copyright picture in an article on an individual ship, but I refuse to flood Wikipedia with hundreds of copyright photos, hence the external links to photos of the ships in many articles. Mjroots (talk) 18:17, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

Can you point out when, where and why the decision not to use the file took place? --Brad (talk) 03:43, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

That's not what I said. I expressed my preference, and I don't use the "no file available" image in articles I create. Others may use it if they wish. Mjroots (talk) 09:37, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

I think Brad may have been asking the question of NerdyScienceDude, not you. -- saberwyn 09:46, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

Yes, that's right. If I had replied to him it would have been indented like this one. --Brad (talk) 23:14, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

"Do not add this image to article pages. The proposal to add such images to articles has been rejected. The image is preserved for historical reasons, as it is frequently cited in the proposal debates."

This is the warning message in the file description page of File:No Photo Available.svg. There was discussion about the use of image placeholders at Wikipedia:Centralized discussion/Image placeholders. ~NERDYSCIENCEDUDE (✉ message • changes) 13:14, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

If you're going to remove this image from articles, you need to also mark them in some other way as needing images. I know {{infobox lake}} somehow automatically adds such articles to Category:Wikipedia infobox lake articles without image.

—WWoods (talk) 18:47, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

Yes it says "do not add to articles" but that doesn't justify a mass removal campaign. When we figure out what we're going to do regarding the image then a bot can easily remove them. --Brad (talk) 11:30, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

Proposed code change

It needs to be tested yet to verify the code is correct; but to automatically attach articles lacking an image to a category, I believe it's just a matter of editing Template:Infobox ship image to replace the code with this:

<noinclude>{{pp-template}}{{Documentation, template}}</noinclude><includeonly>| colspan="2" {{WPMILHIST Infobox style|image_box_plain}} | {{#if:{{{Ship image|}}}|{{{Ship image}}}{{#if:{{{Ship caption|}}}|<br>{{{Ship caption|}}}}}|[[Category:Wikipedia requested photographs of ships]]}}</includeonly>

The category would still need to be set as a hidden category - or an alternate category created for this purpose. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 19:03, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

Does consensus exist for this type of change? Are there any concerns or objections? --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 19:07, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

Support. However I think Category:Ship articles that need an image might be a better cat. - The Bushranger (talk) 20:46, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

I think this is the direction we want to go. It should be tested of course. --Brad (talk) 11:30, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

Support I've setup a test of Barek's code using Category:Ship articles without an image a defunct sub-userpage of mine User:JonEastham/Userpage Backup and the code is on my Sandbox. It seems to work ok, although the caption doesnt show unless there is an image in it as well. As such, I think we just need to decide upon what to call the category and then the ships infobox template can be updated. JonEastham (talk) 13:58, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

PS, the category was setup for this test as Category:Ship articles without an image JonEastham (talk) 14:01, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

Re: the caption; the existing code also only shows the caption if an image is provided, so I left that part of the existing code in my proposed change - although due to the placeholder image, that part of the existing code hasn't been clearly obvious in the past. If there's reason to show the caption even if no image is provided, the code can be tweaked to do that fairly easily. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 16:03, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

I like what I see but this leaves a problem if an editor doesn't include Template:Infobox ship image when they build the box. Any chance of getting around that problem? --Brad (talk) 23:22, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

Possibly; but it wouldn't be easy. If we did away with {{Infobox ship image}} and instead placed the image fields within {{Infobox ship career}}, that problem would be eliminated. But it would require modifying all existing uses of the templates to move the image from the current position over to the single template - so there would be a sizable cleanup effort involved. I can't think of any other straight forward solutions - if other methods exist to get around that issue, they're beyond my coding abilities. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 23:37, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

I support the change as is. The solution for those that don't use the image box seems to be far too complicated and time consuming for what would amount to little result. --Brad (talk) 05:59, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Support since the current placeholder image is not supposed to be used in articles. ~NerdyScienceDude (✉ message • changes) 23:25, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

Seems we just need to reach a consensus on what to call the Category then... if we were to follow the current setup of Category:Ship articles without infoboxes as a precedent to follow, then I would suggest either Category:Ship articles without images or Category:Ship articles without an image would go well to accompany it. JonEastham (talk) 10:50, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

Technically, it's possible that someone may have placed images in the body of an article but not in the infobox ... so I think a more accurate category name would be either Category:Ship infoboxes without images or Category:Ship infoboxes without an image. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 17:47, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

I would go with Category:Ship infoboxes without an image and you're correct that images could be placed in the body therefore this category is more specific to the problem. --Brad (talk) 18:25, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

Support Category:Ship infoboxes without an image JonEastham (talk) 20:32, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

I've also made the change to the template. It will take some time for the code to process through all the ship article; but, any article using the place-holder image will not show within the new category - so, we should now be able to remove the place-holder image File:No Photo Available.svg (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs) from articles, as well as the existing {{imagereq}} tags from the talk pages as those are now redundant. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 20:50, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

As these are fairly straight-forward maintenance tasks, we could probably submit a WP:BOTREQ, or just hammer through these manually. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 20:58, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

Theres at least 2,000+ usages on ship articles of Image:No Photo Available.svg on ship articles so have submitted a WP:BOTREQ here -> Remove 'No Photo Available' from Ship Infoboxes otherwise it could take forever to remove them. JonEastham (talk) 12:27, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

NOTE: A request has been made to take this discussion to WT:SHIPS#Mass removal of placeholder images prior to proceeding further with this process. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 08:21, 24 April 2010 (UTC)

Coordinates, redux

The issue of having coordinates in the infobox remains unresolved. Andy Mabbett (User:Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 19:52, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

reads discussion I believe that in the case of ships that are sunk and/or permamently berthed (i.e. museum ships, derelicts, etc.), the coordinates are a good idea. Support. - The Bushranger (talk) 20:47, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

I think the previous conversation is still valid. Adding this feature would be a silly redundancy. --Brad (talk) 10:23, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

The previous conversation was inconclusive. How would infobox coordinates be any more redundant" [sic] than any other infobox field? Andy Mabbett (User:Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 10:26, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

There are two ways to implement this - one is to just use the "Coord" field, which could technically already be inserted into a field such as "ship status = {{coord|12.345678|-87.654321}}" (for a permanently positioned ship, it's status could be viewed to be its position). The other method would be to implement it using individual lat and long field, plus a locmapin field and then show an actual map within the infobox with a dot showing the location on the map.

With the first option, is there value in creating a new field when the "status" field could be utilized? For the second option, the coding is more complex but can be done by using other infoboxes as guidelines - but is there value and consensus on adding the clutter of an additional image?

From looking at the prior discussion, it appears that the first option above was the one proposed last time - but if so, why not use the existing field? --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 06:46, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

There is a third and fourth method: a separate parameter for "coordinates"; or for "latitude" & "longitude", bit without a map. Separate fields - an thus greater granularity - are beneficial in a number of ways, such as facilitating data reuse. Andy Mabbett (User:Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 06:58, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

I support adding "lat=" and "long=" to the infobox. - The Bushranger (talk) 16:49, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

To get better involvement, it may be beneficial to post notices on the talk pages of any related WikiProjects WT:SHIPS and WT:SHIPWRECK, as this infobox talk page may be on relatively few watchlists. I'll go ahead and post those notices now. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 17:00, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

WT:MILHIST might be interested as well...I'll do that. - The Bushranger (talk) 17:01, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Thanks, I was just about to edit my comment to add them, you got to it before I could. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 17:03, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Oppose - as it can already be done in so many ways within the existing infobox parameters, the addition of separate fields is pointless. If these were needed by the majority of articles then I could see a point for incorporation as individual elements. However I hazard that the majority of ships finished up in a breakers and those that sunk at some inaccessible and largely irrelevant position at the bottom of the sea. I would also note, that there is no room in the infobox for a useful map, so individual lat and long would be a point beyond pointless. GraemeLeggett (talk) 19:16, 2 May 2010 (UTC)
Oppose - What Graeme said. The current coord template works well enough, IMO.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 19:39, 2 May 2010 (UTC)
Oppose. If this parameter were added to the box there would then be three areas where coordinates can appear in an article: at the top right, the body and the infobox. This is a silly redundancy as I've already pointed out. And as I've already pointed out all over this talk page, the idea behind this version of infobox was to limit redundant parameters. --Brad (talk) 18:46, 3 May 2010 (UTC)
Oppose. The ship infoboxes already are too long and overshadow the text in shorter articles. They should convey basic information, not the vessel's entire history. More to the point, we do not need infobox fields or title coordinates pointing to empty pastches of ocean, or a pier where the ship once docked. If its final resting place on the bottom of the sea is useful, the coordinates could appear in the text, but then we need just coordinates, without the little globe icon, which is not encyclopedic. Kablammo (talk) 18:58, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

Tonnage

Is this field for gross tonnage or net tonnage?80.65.243.30 (talk) 23:18, 20 August 2010 (UTC)

I think it has been used for every type of tonnage: GRT, NRT, GT, NT, DWT. It was kept "flexible" by design. Haus^Talk 10:52, 21 August 2010 (UTC)