Wikipedia:Featured portal candidates/Portal:Music/archive2

Portal:Music

I am proposing the Music Portal as a featured portal because it is well-maintained, ergonomically and aesthetically pleasing, and useful, since it provides a wide coverage of all the music-related articles on Wikipedia. Madder 11:29, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

• Support. Very informative portal, set up well and easy to navigate. Cricket02 13:19, 24 July 2007 (UTC)
• Comment - I can't help but notice that Christian music isn't listed. There is a Christian music portal that should be listed as a subportal rather than some of the individual band portals (which really should come under their genre rather than directly under music). The genre list should probably include hymn and gospel or possibly the generic Religious music. --B 21:30, 26 July 2007 (UTC)
  • I added Christian music and moved the band portals as you suggested. The genre list is taken from M:List of articles every Wikipedia should have, so you should ask there about adding religious music/hymn/gospel. Λυδαcιτγ 05:01, 27 July 2007 (UTC)
    • Very nice. One other minor point - the "Connections" area looks a little ragged. The transcluded templates have different fonts/colors/formatting and just look out of place. Maybe the "points of interest" navbox could be moved down to the bottom and {{Music portal}} could be either removed, have its contents copied, or be modified to use parser functions that make the border not show up in portal space. I don't know ... that section just doesn't look crisp. --B 22:22, 27 July 2007 (UTC)
      • Good suggestion! Fixed. Λυδαcιτγ 02:56, 28 July 2007 (UTC)
• Oppose Comment Support: The lower section of the potal looks totally messed-up with boxes overlapping each other. Is it my browser, that's playing the trick? Arman Aziz 07:53, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

• I don't know - it looks fine to me. Can you post a screenshot and tell us what browser you are using? Λυδαcιτγ 18:43, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

• The screenshot is here. It's how I see the body of the portal when I maximize the screen. The view changes when the screen is not maximized - probably some of the boxes are moving around with the screen while some others are not. I'm using Internet Explorer version 6.0 along with Windows 2000 Professional and my screen resolution is 1024 X 768. - Arman Aziz 03:32, 9 August 2007 (UTC)

• I have no idea what's causing the problem. I would try to debug, but I can't reproduce the symptoms. How about fooling around with the code in my sandbox to see if you can figure out how to solve this? Λυδαcιτγ 05:56, 9 August 2007 (UTC)

I tried the sandbox but couldn't solve. By the way, I tried the portal from another pc but I still have the same problem. Arman Aziz 09:49, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

I have just tried viewing Portal:Music in Internet Explorer 6. There is no problem whatsoever with Portal:Music being viewed in Internet Explorer 6. Please see: this image for a screenshot of Portal:Music displaying absolutely fine in Internet Explorer 6. Madder 01:25, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

The lowest part of the page as shot by User:Madder also looks fine from my PC. But the problem is in the middle section of the page. Here's a new screenshot. I am having the same view from my office and home pc. Arman Aziz 02:17, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

Here's another screenshot of Portal:Music in IE6, this time the middle section: Image:Musicportal-ie6-screenshot2.jpg. As you can see, it displays absolutely fine. I'm looking at your screenshot of Internet Explorer 6 and clearly some changes have been made. For example, in the status bar at the bottom, the letters "ms.ms.ms" have been appended to "Internet". You should check your settings in IE, it looks as if you may have set it to apply another stylesheet to each page in the accessibility settings. Or perhaps you have an addon that is causing the problem. All I can say is that Portal:Music works fine in an unmodified Internet Explorer 6. It works fine on my computer, and unless you have changed some settings in your browser, should work fine on your computer too. Madder 18:11, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

I have tried the portal from a FireFox browser and it looks fine. I'm still having the problem with IE from both my office and my home PC. However, since it appears to be a browser - specific problem, I'm changing my position from oppose to comment. Arman Aziz 04:21, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

• Displays fine in IE7. Λυδαcιτγ 05:16, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

Today I tried the portal from a cyber cafe using Netscape. It still looks all messed up. I don't know why I am only having this problem. Arman Aziz 06:23, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

I have just tried viewing Wikipedia in Netscape - see: Image:Wikipedia-netscape4.jpg. In fact Wikipedia in its entirety does not display correctly in Netscape. I'm therefore surprised that you've singled out specifically the Music Portal as looking "messed up" in Netscape - when in fact the whole of Wikipedia doesn't display correctly in Netscape.

I've tested the Music Portal in the following browsers and found them all to display it absolutely fine:

• Internet Explorer 5.5, Internet Explorer 6, Internet Explorer 7
• Firefox (uses Gecko rendering engine, as do Netscape 6, Netscape 7, Netscape 8, Netscape 9)
• Links (Text-based Browser)

I think that's pretty good coverage, especially considering that Wikipedia:Browser notes states: "There is no perfect browser for viewing Wikipedia." Madder 22:26, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

• Comment. I've tried viewing this in IE 6 (Windows XP) and it's a nightmare -- all the boxes overlap, the graphics are scattered randomly (seas of stars). It's completely unusable. I've never had a problem with any Wikipedia content before, and in particular all portals I've ever looked at display just fine. Espresso Addict 21:23, 19 August 2007 (UTC)

Could you upload a screenshot? Λυδαcιτγ 03:19, 20 August 2007 (UTC)

I've tweaked with the portal's layout code a bit. I'd be grateful if you could try viewing it again in IE6 and see if it now works for you. As ever it displays fine for me in IE6. All the best, Madder 20:01, 20 August 2007 (UTC)

Excellent -- it now works fine, and looks great! Espresso Addict 22:40, 20 August 2007 (UTC)

Now, it works for me, too! I have changed my position to support. Thanks to Madder for at last taking the comments seriously and fixing it. Great fix indeed. Arman Aziz 01:32, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

• Comment. A few nitpicks now that I can read the thing at all...
  • The word edit protrudes from the box on the full width boxes (this might be another IE 6.0 problem).
  • The DYK image uses 'thumb' which I believe is not recommended.
  • In the Explore... box, the list of musical instruments seems short compared with other lists. 'More musical instruments' could probably be split over two lines to reduce the column width.
  • There is bias towards content of a particular type in a few places. The DYKs should probably attempt to mix up the genres a bit more; the current set all seem to be broadly speaking 'pop'. The same goes for 'Recently featured' in the Explore... box, perhaps some older featured content in other genres could be retained? Also today's birthdays, although that might just be fluke. On the other hand, the 'Composers and musicians' in that box seems a little classically biased.
  • Otherwise I really like it: informative, interesting, well laid out and pleasing to the eye. Espresso Addict 10:26, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the suggestions. I'll go through each point:

• 'Edit' link - I've made more changes to the layout code, it no longer seems to protrude. However, I'm worried the changes might also have reverted the previous layout changes - although it still displays fine for me in IE6, could you check it's still OK in yours?
  • Fixed for me, and the rest is still fine. Espresso Addict 13:46, 22 August 2007 (UTC)
• I will sort out the DYK stuff later today, unless someone else does first
• The Explore... box is derived from the 'list of articles every Wikipedia should have' - see [1] . This is so that people can't randomly add their favourite article to the Explore... box. Instead it has to go through a consensus and be added to this list. Also, it's an attempt to prevent any bias.
• I guess this leads on to your last suggestion. Perhaps we could have a different process for deciding what goes in the Explore... box - I don't know what other users think - but the current list on Wikimedia seems pretty good. As for the 'recently featured', the problem with retaining older featured content is it then stops being 'recent'. I disagree with the point on today's birthdays though, the list is very very thorough, with composers and musicians spanning centuries. However, if there's a way of implementing any changes to make the portal even better, that's great :-) Madder 13:34, 22 August 2007 (UTC)
  • The list you link doesn't look very balanced to me, though I agree you need some way of stopping everyone adding their favourite composer etc. Also for composers/musicians you seem to have left out a few (eg Hendrix, Madonna), which I think may have led to an increase in the classical bias. The birthdays thing may well naturally bias towards modern people whose birth date will be known, as opposed to historical people where it's sometimes not. Espresso Addict 13:46, 22 August 2007 (UTC)
    • Thanks for pointing this out - it seems the list has changed, so it will have to be synchronised again. As for the birthdays, historical people are there as well, but only people who are alive are shown on the main portal page, because before there was a real problem because the list was far far too long. To see all birthdays, you can click on 'More birthdays...' Madder 13:53, 22 August 2007 (UTC)
      • List synchronized. Espresso addict, I think the bias towards classical and pop is a reflection of the bias of Wikipedia articles - those two genres have more developed articles than do other genres. Λυδαcιτγ 06:18, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

• I switched the DYK to use borders instead of thumbs. Λυδαcιτγ 05:43, 23 August 2007 (UTC)