User:Yboy83/Records in swimming project

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This page details a project to attempt to create a uniform format for presentation of records in swimming articles.

Introduction and current styles[edit]

There is a growing number of XXXX records in swimming articles now on WikiPedia with general main formatting styles being used.

Project area 1: Sections/sub-sections[edit]

The major differences in styles as I see them are in the sections/subsection headings

  • Styles A and C have sections/sub-sections for men's LC, women's LC, men's SC and women's SC
  • Style B lists sections of men and women, with LC and SC side-by-side within each section

Questions:

  • Which style is preferred - is one more readable than others?
  • Should bgcolors be used?
  • What order should the sections be in: men before women?; LC before SC?

Project area 2: Fields displayed[edit]

Whilst all of the fields used in the articles are the same vital information for each record, there are a number of other fields which occur in a number of the articles. A standard list of fields to be included should be decided upon, split into those required, and those optional.

Fields currently in use are: (italic: infrequently used)

  • Event
  • Time/Result
  • Name
  • Nationality (sometimes combined with Name)
  • Date
  • Location
  • References/Notes
  • Championship / meet / games
  • Heat / semifinal / final / relay lead-off leg
  • Club

Project area 3: Event naming, higher level record notations, time and date formats[edit]

I propose to standardise these small formatting issues across the articles:

  • Event naming:
    • {distance}&nbsp;{unit}<space>{stroke}
    • Stroke should be in lower-case lettering as they are not proper nouns
    • Relays should be 4×{distance}... not 4x{distance}...
  • Higher level record notations:
    • A decision to be discussed and made on how to recognise higher level records
  • Time format:
    • All times should be in the format: m:ss.00
    • Decision to be made on whether leading minute should be included for events lasting less than one minute - what is the Wikipedia standard
  • Date format:
    • The project should investigate the standard format for dates within Wikipedia

Project area 4: Referencing[edit]

All records should be referenced, however work on completing this should come after preparing the standard formatting for the articles.

Plan[edit]

Before making major changes to the formatting of articles, we should discuss the above project areas, before coming to a consensus, then allocating tasks to individual editors.