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Forums: Helping Hand > DefaultSort...a golem's work.

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I'd like to commend Artemaz for his DEFAULTSORT work lately, going through the thousands of pages that need it. However I was wondering if we could put our resident Stone Golem or Unseen Servant to the task instead, I would save Artemaz a lot of work. If this is something that can only be done by hand then I will lend my hand to task as well, when able.
--Eli the Tanner (talk) 20:36, June 17, 2015 (UTC)


It would also not clog up the recent edits... BadCat? - Darkwynters (talk) 21:28, June 17, 2015 (UTC)
- Darkwynters (talk) 21:28, June 17, 2015 (UTC)


Is this something a bot could do?
- Darkwynters (talk) 21:23, June 18, 2015 (UTC)


I don't think so. A bot will not likely ever be smart enough to recognize how to parse the article title of persons with first and last names, much less distinguish titles, definite articles, patronyms, or disambiguation words if any are present.
~ Lhynard (talk) 16:07, June 19, 2015 (UTC)


Thanks for the commendation! If a bot could do it that would be great, if not then I'm fine chiseling away at it a bit at a time. It does clog up the recent edits page so I'm at least trying to find other things to edit on these pages as I go such as categories, past tense, grammar, etc.
Artemas (talk) 16:32, June 19, 2015 (UTC)


Time to respond at last.

When I noticed Artemaz and others doing it, I thought about using the bot. Unfortunately, in AutoWikiBrowser, there's no option to simply move a section of text from one part of a page to another. (Unless maybe I need much more coding knowhow.) I can delete a {{DEFAULTSORT:}} line and I can prepend or append one, but I can't re-insert the sorting information. I could do it semi-automatically, finding and loading the pages in the program and making the changes manually, which is quicker than doing it through a browser, though still time-consuming. I've started doing it, but there's currently over 3600 to check.

A technical fix for the problem, so that {tl
class table
uses defaultsort for the generated categories rather than pagename or sortkey, would be preferable, to save this ever being an issue again. But I understand if that's not possible.

Perhaps, rather than shifting defaultsort, we encourage the use of sortkey in the class tables. Not all characters have classes or multiple names, so the sorting problem shouldn't arise for them. It's only those making use of the class table with editions and levels that need updating. That's a much shorter list of pages to find, check, and update via the bot, though still not something that can be done automatically.

Regardless, who is actually in favour of using a "Family Name, Given Name" sorting order? I know I argued for it in the past (at Forum:Sort categories for individuals), and I introduced the use of {{DEFAULTSORT:}} at this wiki (when I arrived, no page used it, and every category had its own sortkey or none at all). It kind of flourished without a consensus being reached. But, given the increasingly technical nature of our categories (which we didn't have in 2012), I'm beginning to wonder if the difficulties outweigh its usefulness. "Given Name, Family Name" would be much easier across the board.

There's actually a setting-based directive for this: Forgotten Realms Adventures, page 72, under "Human Names in the Realms", says "Not all humans of Faerun have surnames. Many are known only by a single name, plus a nickname to distinguish them from neighbors or colleagues who share that same name. As a result, the alphabetical lists of characters here are arranged by first name, simply because everyone has at least a first name." The FRCS 3e index sorts characters this way too. So, there's precedent and that's a good and easy model to follow. I prefer the convention of sorting by family name, but prefer ease of use more. I can use the bot to eradicate the defaultsorts and sortkey parameters if we're all in favour. |— BadCatMan (talk) 03:57, June 20, 2015 (UTC)}}

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