Talk:Index of Hawaii-related articles

Is this article needed?

Is there any reason to have this list? Seems like Category:Hawaii would do a better job. - Marshman 17:28, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)

This article is an ordered list of topics related to Hawaiʻi, rather than a list of articles about Hawaiʻi. This article is one of 57 lists of topics related to the United States. --Buaidh (talk) 13:56, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

I do not follow this. The title has now been changed to "articles", even though the above comment says it should be "topics", and most of the entries are "categories" or lists. Which is it? And some of them do not make sense, like, say "area codes of Hawaii" since there is only one. W Nowicki (talk) 23:05, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

And now we have Outline of Hawaii. Someone, somewhere, will arrive to explain it all. Viriditas (talk) 09:57, 2 May 2009 (UTC)

Hi.  :) Most of it is explained on Portal:Contents, WP:CLN, and WP:LISTS. The Transhumanist 20:45, 8 May 2009 (UTC)

Nowicki, a topic that isn't an article is a planned article. That is, a redlink. Lists can include such "topics", while categories cannot, making any list with a redlink in it a "topic list". But we still refer to them as article lists, because the redlinks always turn blue eventually, in part because they are red and attract attention to themselves. It's like they are saying "click on me and give me life". The Transhumanist 20:46, 8 May 2009 (UTC)

Marshman, yes, there are many reasons for having lists in addition to categories on the same subject(s). WP:CLN covers the relationship between lists, categories, and navigation templates, and quite clearly states that one type should not be deleted just because another type exists. Each has advantages that the others lack. And they are synergistic, playing an eternal game of leapfrog (lists are useful for updating categories and templates, and vice versa). See also WP:LISTS.

Advantages of lists include:

• Lists support scrolling much better. Scrolling is faster than clicking - many levels can be represented on a single list page, flattened (as with indexes) or not, which provides the benefit of scrolling to browse the material. This is not the case with categories. Scrolling is generally faster because there are fewer interruptions due to intermittent page downloads from clicking, especially if you need to scroll up and down a subject - categories are chopped up into many pages, at every level (they display only 200 entries at a time) and as subcategories, requiring frequent clicks to navigate. And every click is subject to download delay.
• Lists can include redlinks (categories can't). Therefore lists serve simultaneously as article lists and topic lists. But we call them all "article lists" these days, since a topic that isn't an article yet is a planned article. Redlinks are awesome, as they allow editors to click on them to create new articles on the spot.
• Lists can be used to watch for changes in at least 3 different ways:
  • As watchlists for an entire subject via Related changes (it would take many operations to use categories in this way to cover a whole subject)
  • As watchlists for page deletions - when an article is deleted, its link on a list turns red which alerts editors that there's a problem, but from the category it simply disappears and you may never notice it is gone)
  • As a watchlist for removals from itself - like all other articles, lists have edit histories which are useful for checking diffs. If a link is removed, the event is recorded locally. Categories can't be diffed and so removals of links from it aren't easily spotted.
• Lists can show up in search results (category entries never do)
• Lists can be contextually integrated into articles better via internal links (while categories are generally tacked onto the end)
• Lists can be embellished with parenthetical notes and annotations and pictures throughout (categories can't)
• Lists support references (category entries can't)
• Lists support see also sections and external links sections (categories generally don't, as they push the categorical list further down the page)
• Lists are centralized and are a lot easier and faster to build and edit than categories. A list of an entire subject can be built in a small fraction of the time it takes to build a category tree for the same subject.
• You can add entries to a list even before they are articles (including link dumps, and on categories you can't)
• On lists you can customize the formatting (formatting is always the same for the link section of category pages)
• You can process lists off-line with power applications (word-processors, outliners, etc.)
• Lists are easy to rename (to move a category requires editing all the pages it links to)
• Because category entries are activated from the pages that a category lists, categories suffer from the page ownership problem. Each article in a category may have different maintainers, who often edit their respective articles every day, and it is they who decide what categories "their" page belongs to (because if they change or remove categories, you are not likely to notice by looking at the category page (remember, the links just disappear). This problem causes many categories to have holes in them.
• And lists are more intuitive and beginner friendly (just click "edit this page")

And you have list builders, like me, who hardly ever work on categories. Every time you delete a list a dedicated list builder has created, you waste the time he or she took to build it, forcing him or her to start over and find a way to get around the deletion (we usually do). You also punch holes in the sets of lists we build, creating gaps in coverage in the navigation systems we are working on. AfDs of lists also waste a lot of time, and are generally unsuccessful, since WP:CLN renders the "redundant with category" rationale invalid. The Transhumanist 20:48, 8 May 2009 (UTC)

Is there a way to get a flattened alphabetical list of a category? Otherwise we would need to go and add another category to them all. Or perhaps just a list of articles under the [Project] could be used to get the same thing? W Nowicki (talk) 00:45, 5 May 2009 (UTC)

Adding another category to them all runs counter to WP:CAT#Duplicate categorization rule. The way to get a flattened alphabetical list is as an article page. That is, a list! And we can prepare such lists (from categories) with the list making feature of WP:AWB (which includes a recursion feature to scan subcategories). The Transhumanist 12:38, 8 May 2009 (UTC)