[Wikipedia-l] Re: [Wikitech-l] Software Assisted Context Resolution

Mon Mar 31 12:09:37 UTC 2003

At Mon, 31 Mar 2003 12:40:12 +0100, 
tarquin (tarquin at planetunreal.com) wrote:
> 
> 
> Gary Curtis wrote:
> 
> >I propose a number of changes to the Wikipedia software to 
> >enable "software assisted context resolution", or if you 
> >prefer "software assisted disambiguation". The primary purpose 
> >of these changes is to allow users to more easily resolve 
> >ambiguous links at the time they are created, or if necessary, 
> >at some later stage. I stress that this is not "automatic" 
> >link resolution, although the process will be invoked 
> >automatically in many cases.
> >
> 
> Well we sort of already have this...
> Maintenance page -> disambiguation pages with links
> 
> :-)
> 
> The other mechanism we have for this is Plain Old Brainpower -- if 
> you 
> write in a certain area of the Wikipedia for some time, you come 
> to know 
> which pages are disambiguation and which aren't.

Frankly, this proposed mod is not for users of the skill level
of tarquin (or say mav or zoe). They don't need "software
assistance", but would probably use it ;-). 

It is for Jack or Jill Average, who adds a link to [[mercury]]
with little thought that there are so many mercury's. I want
the software to "protect" the database from this user's well-
intentioned edit. Not that the user is going to do any real
damage here, but if the user resolves the link then someone
doesn't have to do it later.

Gaz

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