Wikipedia:Peer review/Dowding system/archive1

Dowding system

This peer review discussion has been closed.
I don't use PR much because I generally don't promote articles past DYK, and then move on. However, in this case the article seems to be historically important enough that I'd like to get it as close to perfect as we might manage.

I think that my articles are generally B-quality out of the gate content wise, with a balance of detail without being overwhelming. But at the same time, I'm perfectly aware that I forget to explain some items, get drawn off into technical minutiae, and use some rather odd phrasing. I also have a rather aggressive spell checker that sometimes replaces one word for another, things I never notice.

Slings and arrows gratefully accepted! (really? that's how you spell gratefully?!)

Thanks, Maury Markowitz (talk) 14:11, 29 January 2014 (UTC)

Comments. Hi Maury, I recommend running this through MilHist's A-class review when you're done here. Here are a few copyediting comments: - Dank (push to talk)

• "prior to": Copyeditors (BrEng, AmEng, all flavors of Eng) deprecate this phrase these days in favor of "before" (usually). I could give you my guess why that is, but it would just be a guess. In this case, substitute "before" for "prior to the opening of".
• "Chain Home": Most readers will have to either click through or read ahead to know that you're talking about radar stations. I'd go with "the Chain Home (CH) radar stations"
• "a single unified map": a unified map
• "to produce a single unified map of the battlespace, and then relayed that information out to the various defensive weapons like interceptor aircraft and anti-aircraft artillery.": Tighter would be: to provide a unified map of the battlespace to interceptor aircraft and anti-aircraft artillery.
• "The Dowding system evolved": The word "evolve" didn't start off as simply a synonym of "develop" (though it seems to be headed that way); it still properly connotes an uncontrolled or chaotic process. It's sometimes misused to give an impression that no one was pulling any strings, that a process was allowed to proceed without any interference ... but this is rarely true where militaries are involved.
• "early radar": If you take my advice to include "radar" above, then don't link it here. - Dank (push to talk) 19:38, 29 January 2014 (UTC)

This is excellent stuff Dank, just the sort of thing I was looking for! Maury Markowitz (talk) 13:29, 30 January 2014 (UTC)

Happy to help, I'll sit back and wait for other comments. Btw, you can do WP:GAN before A-class if you like. - Dank (push to talk) 14:12, 30 January 2014 (UTC)