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User:WendlingCrusader

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  • I am a long-time user of wikipedia, who only became an editor in January 2024.
  • My username comes from the USAAF 392nd Bombardment Group, who flew Consolidated B-24 Liberators. http://www.b24.net/
  • As a young boy, my father took me around the country collecting aircraft registrations, both civil & military. I am just old enough to remember when Heathrow actually welcomed people who came to look at the pretty planes. And when the police did turn up to move you along, they kindly gave you two minutes to finish taking your photograph first.
  • These days it is the USAF at RAF Lakenheath that roll out the red carpet for aircraft enthusiasts. How ironic!

Useful links for editing

Personal projects (mostly started by accident)

MOS:Infobox The purpose of an infobox is to summarize, but not supplant, the key facts that appear in an article. An article should remain complete with its infobox ignored. The less information that an infobox contains, the more effectively it serves its purpose, allowing readers to identify key facts at a glance. Information should be presented in a short format, wherever possible, and exclude unnecessary content.

A disinfobox offers a competitive counter-article, stripped of nuance, making it a poor substitute for accuracy and complexity. If the infobox contains only information found in the lead, it is a disinfobox. If the infobox is longer than a third of the article's body, it is a disinfobox. If a biographical infobox contains only a photo, a person's occupation, and date and place of birth/death, it is a disinfobox. If the infobox contains multiple entries within any identifying field, it is probably a disinfobox. (note; there are also counter-arguments to these ideas)

(An essay) - RAF Squadrons / Infoboxes - an editors journey

[edit]

I don't really know how this came about; I seem to recollect that my first impressions were that everything was ok, and there was nothing left that I could possibly add to this vast encyclopedia of RAF units. As time passed, I learned more about Wikipedia, and started to see the cracks. Except there was this nagging doubt, again and again; if element 'X' is so wrong, why has no-one else corrected it over the past 10-15 years since the article was created? Initially I concluded that it must be me that was mistaken. After all if you search through Wikipedia MOS for long enough, you are almost certain to find one piece of guidance that says this, in complete contrast to another MOS that states that. Plus a third that says 'you don't have to follow the rules'!

Hence, slowly and deliberately, I ventured some small edits, waiting for the thunder-from-above. None came. So I became bolder, noticing that other (more experienced) editors were following my edits with either small tweaks (i.e. incorrect date format) or completely unrelated edits. But no thunder. So it wasn't that I was getting away with something because nobody had noticed. I still wonder sometimes if I am doing the right thing, but I guess that is just me; other editors don't seem to give a shush.. er, hoot.

INFOBOXES - Some examples: Time and again overly full of trivia, badly arranged, so that the Infobox extends halfway down the article. Why is this a problem?

  1. this is not the purpose of an Infobox
  2. any image is forced either towards the bottom of the article (below the Infobox), or is positioned incorrectly i.e. on the left, sandwiching the text. There is MOS guidance against that. I occasionally let it pass if there is no better option.

But for any squadron that saw service in both WWI and WWII, this often means that the image of a Sopwith Camel ends up halfway through the section describing various marks of Spitfire that were flown.

  1. specific examples of Infobox abuse include -
    • full dates, requiring two lines of text if one or both include a 'long' month e.g. February, September, November, December
    if we limited it to years, we might even be able to eliminate all those ridiculous instances where 99 Squadron was disbanded on a Tuesday, and reformed somewhere else a week later. Unfortunately, this seems to be a recurring theme. It just about qualifies in the main text, but is it really important enough to feature in the Infobox? Particularly when publicity material often claims that they were formed over 100 years ago! i.e. ignoring all these small continuity breaks.
    • Flags; for RAF units it should say 'United Kingdom' - the flag is mere decoration.
    • RAF roundel; very pretty, but not what an Infobox is designed for
    • Service streamers; as above, and even more inappropriate when applied to an 'airdrome' in France during WWI. Ok, so Malta (the island) was awarded the George Cross after WWII, but that was exceptional. Do air bases, barracks, garrisons, usually receive honours? Even if they did, the Infobox is not the place to show it!
    • A long list of aircraft flown, sometimes dating back to 1914. For comparison, the airline Infobox limits itself to current number in fleet. For a military unit that is still extant, this could equate to the type of aircraft currently flown. In fact, the template advises;
    equipment – optional – For units strongly associated with specific equipment or vehicles, such as tanks, artillery, or aircraft, a brief list of the notable types used by the unit; if the number of entries is large, it is recommended that this field not be used, and that the full list be given in the article text instead.
    • A long list of campaign awards. The military unit Infobox template states;
    battles – optional – Any notable engagements in which the unit participated. The decision of what constitutes a notable engagement is left to the editors of the specific article. Except what we actually get is every theater of operations listed, even if the unit was 200 miles behind the front-line, and only involved in a support capacity. A complete list of everywhere they have served belongs in the main article, not the Infobox.

I'm stopping this for now, in case it sounds like a rant. Ok, it probably is, but the fact remains that Infoboxes are being abused all over the place. Either that, or I am sorely mistaken and should find something else to do.

If it is worth anything at all, whilst I am ripping into various Infoboxes, I also try to cast an eye over the whole article and see if I can somehow add something even more beneficial, otherwise I might just appear as the Grim Reaper. The problem that arises from that is I often end up following tangential links and end up somewhere else entirely. <laughs> (edited December 2024, after 11 months editing & ca.1500 edits)


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This user is a participant in WikiProject Aviation.
This user is a member of the Military aviation task force
of WikiProject Military history.
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