Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Categories/uncategorized

This is the talk page for discussing improvements to the WikiProject Categories/uncategorized page.

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Categories This page is within the scope of WikiProject Categories, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of categories on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.

WikiProject Categories was featured in a WikiProject Report in the Signpost on 6 September 2010.

Archives

Feb 2007 – Current

Undated articles need category no longer needed

since all articles are now dated when needing a category, it is no longer usefull to have an undated section. Mephiston999 (talk) 12:44, 29 August 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Not all articles are dated when needing a category. If a user tags an article by adding only {{Uncategorized}} to it, it will put it in the undated category Category:Category needed until a bot or user dates the tag or removes it. I often see a few articles in the undated category. Also, it is a parent category with a lot of useful information, so it shouldn't be removed even if it didn't contain any articles directly. --Mysdaao ^talk 16:09, 30 August 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I see that a bot always adds a date after not long so maybe it would be best if this process was automatic. Mephiston999 (talk) 11:27, 2 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

This task force is a waste of everyone's time

I have wasted half an hour this morning cleaning up the mess that one of your members left in Category:Sports and I suggest that this "task force" is a waste of time and space.

For example, what possible good are you doing by dumping List of FC Vaslui statistics and records into Category:Lists, Category:Romania and Category:Sports? Do you honestly think this helps the people who are maintaining those categories to help the readers navigate the site? With only a few seconds effort, you could have found Category:Romanian football clubs which is obviously an appropriate category for that article.

Categories are there to organise articles efficiently to enable the readers to navigate the site, not as dumping grounds to be used by people who cannot be bothered to find the right sub-category. In any event, experience shows that most uncategorised items are the sort of "article" that should be deleted, so may I suggest that in addition to improving your navigation skills you also learn about prod and AfD? ----Jack | ^talk page 05:30, 4 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

• Gosh, someone made a mistake. Better scrap the project! Seriously, Jack, try to be civil. You've been around long enough to know not to drop petulant messages like that. --JaGa^talk 09:05, 4 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]
• Come on Jack. Tell that editor why his work was counterproductive but don't shoot this project down to ease your frustration. Yes, there has been a recurrent problem with editors more interested in quantity than quality but I and others have tried to spot them and ask them to adjust. This is also why the project page provides a guideline and overall this task force has been a success. The example you give is pretty bad although the net result is that the task of categorizing this article will go to editors who clean broad categories like Romania or Sports. In the end, the work did get done though not by the person who first got there. Pichpich (talk) 21:14, 4 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Well done

Reducing the backlog from four digits to one is certainly something to be proud of! Well done, everybody. Fishal (talk) 21:49, 29 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Uncategorized Task Force in the Signpost

"WikiProject Report" would like to focus on the Categorized Patrol/Task Force for a Signpost article to be published next month. This is an excellent opportunity to draw attention to your efforts and attract new members to the project. Would you be willing to participate in an interview? If so, here are the questions for the interview. Just add your response below each question and feel free to skip any questions that you don't feel comfortable answering. Also, if you know anyone else who would like to participate in the interview, please share this with them. Have a great day. -Mabeenot (talk) 16:09, 21 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Backlog update

After much hard work, the entire backlog of 42,000 uncategorized articles listed at the Untagged Uncategorized Articles list has been cleared as of early this week; every article that was on that list has now at least been tagged with {{uncat}}, {{morecat}} or {{uncategorized stub}}. Going forward, however, I would like to suggest that we make some effort to ensure that the backlog never gets that large again.

Although the entire old list has been cleared, typically somewhere between 100 and 200 new titles appear on the list each day. These aren't always all newly created articles, of course, as all of the standard ways in which a formerly categorized article can become uncategorized come into play as well. But it's important that we make monitoring and clearing that list a priority task for this project — somebody (I'd prefer that it not always be me) needs to check that list and do a "tag, categorize, repair or revert" run through it every day. Ideally, there should never again be a single day when that list isn't cleared back down to zero before midnight. If it's done promptly each day, it's really quite a simple and easy task that shouldn't generally take more than 15 to 20 minutes to complete — it really only becomes a daunting burden if we let it pile up for days or weeks at a time.

I'd also point out that some further user education needs to take place as well. In the process of working on the backlog, I ran into quite a bit of flak from people who insisted that an article was properly categorized if it had (a) a stub category, (b) a list of unwikified keywords arranged under the unwikified heading "Categories:", or five or six keywords comma-spliced into a single category link, (c) a topic template, regardless of whether that template actually transcluded a content category or not, or (d) any category tag whatsoever, even if the category in question didn't actually exist. There were also a number of cases where people simply removed the tag without providing any reason whatsoever — as well as a bot that would invariably untag articles that had hidden maintenance categories like Category:Articles incorporating DNB text without Wikisource reference but no visible content categories, while frequently missing articles that actually did have real categories added to them without the uncat template getting removed.

Ultimately, if possible I'd also still like to see a way for articles to be automatically tagged as uncats the moment they're saved without a category declaration on them in the first place, though that's obviously a longer-term goal. But in the meantime, I would like to suggest that we work on some ways to make managing that list — both by getting articles tagged promptly and by attempting to reduce the number of articles that show up there in the first place — much more of a priority task. Bearcat (talk) 21:26, 1 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Backlog back

This has always been one of the shortest backlogs - everyone gone to help the other backlogs? Rich Farmbrough, 04:15, 24th day of January in the year 2011 (UTC).

Excessively broad categories

While stub-sorting I'm finding a lot of articles which a particular editor is putting into categories like Category:Places, Category:Magazines, Category:Books. I've suggested that this is unhelpful as it means that the article won't come to the attention of someone prepared to put effort into finding more appropriate categories such as Category:Upazilas of Gazipur District, and , and , but she disagrees: "I also think that having a category that isn't that specific is definitely better than being uncategorised, especially as the people who patrol those broad categories are likely to have more knowledge of how to write, format and categorise articles on that type of topic.". I doubt if anyone patrols "Places" (though I've just cleared out the 3 she put there ... and will now fix Santosh (place) which she's just added!).

(P.S. Yes, moved it to a better title and found Category:Populated places in the Dhaka Division for it.)

It might be helpful if these ultra-broad categories had a large message saying "Please do not put items in this category unless it is impossible to allocate them to a narrower category". Beyond that, I don't know what I can do about this experienced editor who seems determined to remove the {{uncategorised}} tag even if she can't find a usefully precise category to add, so adds these unhelpful high level categories. Any thoughts?

I do note that the project page says "Take your time: it is more important to ensure a useful, precise categorization of articles than to clear the backlog at high speed.", but I don't know how to get that message across! PamD (talk) 14:11, 5 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Pam, you have got your point across perfectly clearly, that doesn't mean I have to completely agree with you! I'd rather discussions specifically about me as an individual were not posted here, it seems unfriendly to say the least.

As for broad categories, if there is consensus for certain categories to be 'parent' categories and not used themselves, then I think adding a note to the category - or even deleting the category as has been done on very broad categories - is a good idea. It would have to be looked at on a case-by-case basis though, I'd have thought. As you're aware, with the articles I added to 'Category:Places' (only 4, I think), I removed the uncat tag and added 'catimprove' instead, so there was still marked as being a problem with categorisation. This seems to me a good way to do it - of course, we all have our own opinions on that, but while categories exist, and don't have any kind of 'warning' on them, I don't think editors should be particularly criticised for using them, especially when a catimprove tag is left on. Boleyn (talk) 14:31, 5 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Picking up a couple of points (after edit conflict): The broad categories like Category:Places can't be deleted because they are needed as parent categories. But perhaps they do need a flag saying that they shouldn't be used. On the other hand, Category:Villages in India already has a note saying "It should list very few, if any, article pages directly and should mainly contain appropriately categorized subcategories." but you have still been using it (much better than either "Places" or "Villages", though: thanks.) When an article says it's about a village in such and such a state, why not just find the right category straight off? PamD (talk) 14:57, 5 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not here to take sides in a conflict between the two of you so I won't comment on specifics. But Pam is basically right and in fact I would argue that placing an article in an overly broad category and tagging it with catimprove is worse than doing nothing. Nobody actively patrols the catimprove backlog and categories that should be diffused are not typically cleaned up regularly. The categorization of uncategorized pages has to be done with precision because it's very often a one-time opportunity to fix the problem. Pichpich (talk) 14:53, 5 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks, Pichpich: I came here to find experts on the issue of "categorization of uncategorized pages", and you seem to be one! PamD (talk) 15:01, 5 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Great work guys

Appreciate the work you do - because having good categories on articles really helps me with bot things. One question however occurs to me as I'm new to doing New Page Patrol. Is it worth me or anyone adding {{uncategorised}} to pages? In light that Uncategorized pages can be found at Special:UncategorizedPages? Regards, SunCreator ^(talk) 22:40, 16 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Articles needing additional categories

We have a problem with the Category:Articles needing additional categories queue, and I wanted to generate some discussion about how best to deal with it.

The problem, put simply, is that although I've taken on a little bit of management in the past couple of weeks, nobody else ever deals with it at all and I'm not willing or able to deal with it all by myself. There's a backlog of over 2,700 articles, dating at this point all the way back to November 2010 — and it isn't a queue that we can or should dismiss as a low priority, because for a variety of reasons, some of the articles in that queue are actually true uncats and some others just don't belong there at all. For one thing, User:SoxBot frequently removes the uncat tag from articles which have "categories" but fails to distinguish properly between true content categories and hidden maintenance categories that don't count as real categorization, with the result that I've frequently been forced to use the catimprove tag on articles that were more properly tagged as uncats just to keep the bot from inappropriately detagging them again — and for another, some other users who do manual tagging just incorrectly apply the catimprove tag to practically every article they touch regardless of whether it actually needs more categories or not.

So, put simply, we have to start really dealing with that queue. So my question is, how do we actually want to do that?

1. Leave everything exactly as it is, but commit to start actually dealing with the Category:Articles needing additional categories queue. The thing about this option is that it only works if we actually follow through on that commitment; if we continue to let it just stagnate as a backlog that nobody ever actually deals with, then we haven't solved the problem.
2. Collapse the "uncategorized articles", "uncategorized stubs" and "articles needing additional categories" queues into a single "articles that aren't sufficiently categorized" queue. This would have the benefit of keeping all of the project's work in one spot instead of dividing it up into three different piles. I know that traditionally they've been viewed as being three different priority levels, but frankly that's bullpuckey — for one thing, as I've already noted, a significant number of the articles in the "additional categories" queue are actually full uncats. And for another, there isn't actually any discernible or legitimate difference in priority between an article with no categories on it at all, one with a stub template but no content categories and one whose only content category is Category:Living people; they're all equal in priority.
3. Set a target whereby any backlogged monthly "additional categories" queue older than X number of months gets culled, such that any existing categories would be removed so that the page can be swapped back into the uncats queue. This would certainly not be my preference, because it verges on being disruptive, but I'm certainly willing to consider doing it anyway if the backlog doesn't start getting dealt with through more productive means.

The bottom line, however, is that we cannot ignore the queue or deem it to be a low priority; one way or another, it needs to be dealt with. Bearcat (talk) 04:04, 20 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Bot for tagging uncategorized articles

Hello! A BRFA has been filed for having a bot automate this task. Essentially, a bot will scan for Untagged Uncategorized Articles, and add {{Uncategorized|date={{subst:CURRENTMONTHNAME}} {{subst:CURRENTYEAR}}}} to them. Your comments are appreciated here. ^Avic_ennasis @ 18:51, 18 Av 5771 / 18:51, 18 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Fix redlink Category:Better category needed?

Category:Better category needed on the project page is a redlink; can we either fix or remove this redlink? MatthewVanitas (talk) 18:08, 18 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

User:Addbot

Hi All! Just a quick note to say that Addbots tasks involving the Uncat tag are now running again, Hence why this morning you had 750 articles to look at but now have 1500 and counting! The bot will add tags to pages without cats as well as remove tags from pages with cats! Enjoy! ·Add§hore· ^Talk To Me! 16:17, 8 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Redirects

Hello,

I'm working on Category:Uncategorized from August 2015 and there are a lot of redirects there. I was just a little thrown because the main categorization problem I've seen with redirects is too many categories: they are often placed in the same category as the target article, creating double listings. What is the project goal with redirects; to put them all in Category:Wikipedia redirects? RevelationDirect (talk) 05:14, 17 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]

@RevelationDirect: You're right: Copying categories from the target article is counterproductive. In fact, redirects should not be put into article categories, except in a few special cases. Instead, redirects have their own categories and categorisation guidelines. Redirects are primarily categorised using these message templates. When adding more than one redirect category template, it's nice if you enclose them in Template:Redirect category shell. —Ringbang (talk) 22:04, 14 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Category:No-Category Version 0.7 articles

Category:No-Category Version 0.7 articles, which is within the scope of this WikiProject, has been nominated for deletion. If you would like to participate in the discussion, you are invited to add your comments at the category's entry on the Categories for discussion page. Thank you. RevelationDirect (talk) 01:30, 18 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Uncategorized German images

Would any Germans with commons accounts be willing to give categories to all the images uploaded by Panoramio-bot named "Altstadt, ***** Halle (Saale), Germany?" If anybody knows this area better it's 1)A German, and 2)Somebody familiar with the Halle (Saale) region. ---------User:DanTD (talk) 23:08, 13 February 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Amma Makkal Munnetra Kazhagam

Help me in adding references Aayush anuj (talk) 16:25, 6 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Uncategorized categories

I've been working on the categorisation of companies, and I've come across several uncategorized categories, such as Category:Pioneer Corporation and Category:Creative Technology Limited but none of them appear on Wikipedia:Database reports/Uncategorized categories. is there an explanation for that?Rathfelder (talk) 21:13, 23 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]

• Another: Category:Allis-Chalmers Manufacturing CompanyRathfelder (talk) 11:02, 26 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • The list was maintained by BernsteinBot, but the bot hasn't edited for about a month. You could ask at User talk:BernsteinBot. --Mysdaao ^talk 11:46, 27 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]
    • I've left a note at User talk:BernsteinBot#Bot appears not to be creating uncategorized categories report referencing this inquiry. Thanks for making the observation. --User:Ceyockey (talk to me) 01:20, 12 July 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I did it!

There are no uncategorized pages on Wikipedia! 🐔 Chicdat  ^Bawk to me! 11:52, 12 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Oh really? I see three... (they just keep on coming! but keep up the great work!) ~EdGl talk 18:21, 12 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

adding uncat template to relevant pages

Hello,

I know it's a old discussion already talked about (a marronier as we say in French) but I'm (relatively) new here in English Wiki, and in the maintenances team

I see there are a lot of articles listed in the toolsever app, and that's are not marked by the template in category (the main cat). I know that the special page exits, but it's not always actualised. So, I made some search and I've found that a bot is working on it via AWB, so I would know if it's possible to ask him to perform some actions, especially if we have the list of articles to tag, as we can found it here. Or is there another person we can do that?

I think it's more simple to have a simple webpage where all the must-do articles are listed, in opposite of having to find from the three sources. Plus, we can have the right stats of uncat articles on the main maintenance cat.

Thanks for your answers, Anas1712 (talk) 18:32, 20 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Good question. I don't know what the answer is, but we need a bot to go through and add that template to all uncategorized articles. ~EdGl talk 00:03, 21 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

In the meantime, I added the link above to the main cat (All Uncat Pages) so people can also check when having corrected all the links.Anas1712 (talk) 20:41, 4 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Added request to AWB. Anas1712 (talk) 21:05, 11 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Sunday Lecture Society

Anyone know what category this should be added to? - Aussie Article Writer (talk) 19:41, 5 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Aussie Article Writer, I think Category:Learned societies of the United Kingdom is relatively accurate. Pichpich (talk) 20:43, 5 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Also, Special:Uncategorizedpages seems to be way behind... - Aussie Article Writer (talk) 19:45, 5 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Aussie Article Writer, If you want to work on uncategorized pages, the best place to find them is through Category:Uncategorized pages. Pichpich (talk) 20:47, 5 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

@Pichpich: thanks! I generally try to avoid categories, it can be a scary place :-) thank you for the category addition, I appreciate it. - Aussie Article Writer (talk) 21:02, 5 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]