Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Lists of works/Archive 1

Order

In which order should the list be presented? Earliest to latest or vice versa? violet/riga (t) 09:15, 18 July 2005 (UTC)

• I prefer earliest to latest. Maurreen 13:02, 19 July 2005 (UTC)
• So do I, in general. DES 19:50, 20 July 2005 (UTC)
• Yes, earliest at the top, latest at the bottom --Fritz Saalfeld 17:47, August 4, 2005 (UTC)
• I disagree, latest should go on top, in my opinion. If someone is looking up an actor then I would think it's more than likely because they just saw them in something. Therefore, whatever they just saw would be at the top of the list. Also, this is how it's done, and the way people are used to seeing it, on the Internet Movie Database. I also disagree with changing the order around on articles that are currently already written since we haven't decided on anything yet. I like the Keira Knightley example best with the table. Dismas 20:28, 6 August 2005 (UTC)
• That may be a common form for a filmography and work ok there. it is not good form, nor common, for a bibliography, nor a list of wtiten works in a series or by an author. In those cases, do earliest to latest, or gorup in som topical way, and do earliest to latest within groups. For a fictional series, eiother publication order or internal chronological order may be appropriate. DES ^(talk) 22:57, 6 August 2005 (UTC)
  • So are you saying that you agree with me about films but agree with Maurreen and Fritz Saalfeld about other media like books, and such? I was speaking specifically about movies/films, though I guess I wasn't all that clear about that point. Dismas 23:52, 6 August 2005 (UTC)
    • Actually i am saying i have no strong views one way or other other about films, bu think books should generally be listed oldest to newest, with the possible exceptions I mentioned above. About films I have a mild preference for oldest to newest, but not a strong one. More importantly i think we neeed to recognize that the prefered styles might well be different for the different sorts of works. DES ^(talk) 23:57, 6 August 2005 (UTC)
• I strongly prefer earliest at top to latest at end, for all 3. Chronological ordering is logical and standard, and i feel it is important for all 3 to have consistent ordering. IMDB is different, and that is ok. --Quiddity 21:32, 7 November 2005 (UTC)
• general wikiconsensus is earliest at top, latest at bottom, for ALL lists of works. imdb is a commercial venture so needs to highlight current/latest works; not the case at wikipedia. Zzzzz 22:26, 3 April 2006 (UTC)

See Wikipedia talk:Filmographies for discussion on ordering of filmographies. I don't really care if it takes place here or there, but the discussion needs to be in one place and I picked the other. Cburnett 04:13, 6 April 2006 (UTC)

Grouping

When there are different types of releases (such as singles and albums) should they all be grouped together (stating on each what type they are) or placed in separate lists? violet/riga (t) 09:15, 18 July 2005 (UTC)

• IMO that depends on the details of the article involved. Grouping should be an option, depending on the number of itmes involved. Other possible groups might be fiction vs non-fiction; series works vs non-series, etc. DES 19:52, 20 July 2005 (UTC)

• Concerning discographies: I think that singles/albums/compliations should be seperated. Some artists may have 4 singles per album which would cause some confusion while reading (assuming they are sorted chronologically). However, for the purpose of relating singles to repsective albums (or eras), maybe there should be sub-headings in the singles section. Tastywheat 18:15, 30 November 2005 (UTC)

Other issues

It seems to me that Wikipedia:WikiProject Fictional series should be consulted on bibliographies for authors of fiction. It also seems to me that much of the above is oriented to music, and that books have soemwhat different considerations. DES 19:53, 20 July 2005 (UTC)

Indeed, what if a person has a filmography, discography, and bibliography associated with them (sadly, Eminem is the first person that comes to mind). Furthermore, the template on Wikipedia:WikiProject_Biography#Structure focuses only on "Works" which implies bibliography only. How can we integrate this MoS improvement with the Biography WikiProject? --J. J. 20:45, 2005 August 24 (UTC)

Filmographies

Hmmm. I hadn't seen this before I started Wikipedia:Filmographies, but I had expected this to eventually be a natural extension of that. Perhaps my tests could be used in some way. RADICALBENDER★ 18:36, August 15, 2005 (UTC)

What you've done there is excellent, and could well be merged in here and form some basic guidelines for all types of lists of works. violet/riga (t) 20:11, 16 August 2005 (UTC)

i heartily agree. would it be premature to add a Merge vote/template to this and the Filmographies pages, to draw other's attention? --Quiddity 20:50, 30 October 2005 (UTC) i withdraw that proposal. i prefer the simple lists already in use. --Quiddity 20:47, 6 November 2005 (UTC)

Basic information, and ordering thereof

I'd like to suggest that we add guides just above the examples in each section, showing the basic 'best case' use. eg for bibliographies:

* (year) ‘‘Title: subtitle’’ (isbn #) - notes

and then we need someone to verify/clarify policy on ordering of year/title info, and whether the year and isbn# get brackets or not. i've seen all variations in use, and weakly prefer year first, as it looks cleaner.

• title year - William S. Burroughs
• year title - Michael Crichton

(It should be noted on the page, that the years should NOT be linked by default (see Wikipedia:Manual of Style (dates and numbers) and Wikipedia:Make only links relevant to the context).) --Quiddity 21:09, 6 November 2005 (UTC) (added to WP:Rfc/Style)

Personally for books at least I prefer:

* Title:subtitle by Author (Publisher, year) (ISBN #) Other info. 

See examples at Timothy Zahn (The "by author" is ommited when it is a list of works of a single author, of course) DES ^(talk) 01:18, 8 November 2005 (UTC)

I'm against including publisher information, as it is only slightly useful for finding a book, which the isbn should suffice for. (publishers for any given book often vary by country/edition). Including it just adds clutter. Just as we wouldnt include the distributor/publisher in a filmography or discography. --Quiddity 20:16, 12 November 2005 (UTC)

Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (lists of works)/examples i made some example lists. add your own variants there, and discuss here. --Quiddity 21:11, 12 November 2005 (UTC)

Concerning discographies: I borrowed from different citation styles (APA style and The MLA style manual) and I like the way this looks (underlines used to look like links).

* Year - Title of Work (Record Label) extra notes

The only necessary information here is year and title, other small details can be included on a specific album page. However, I think that adding the record label makes the listing less bare. If you want to put the parenthesis around the year and a dash for the label instead that would be okay. Obviously, I'm also in favor of a non-tabular listing for albums. Tastywheat 19:02, 30 November 2005 (UTC)

For books, what do you think of using the standard cite book template? I've started it on the Du Bois Books section (my edit), for example. It looks a little clunky, but I like that it standardizes the format. In response to Tastywheat, I agree that year and title are all that are needed, although ISBN is often helpful (see comment above about using the most currently available title available). If the title has its own page, further details and additional ISBNs can be listed. I'll see if I can find similar templates for filmographies and discographies. --J. J. 20:55, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

All works or some ?

I understand that this project is about "presentation" of a person's works rather than the content. With regards to content, I've started a discussion at Wikipedia_talk:Filmographies#All_films_or_some_.3F as to whether a filmography should include all the works of the person or only the notable ones, in case the list of works is long (like 100+). Jay 19:56, 12 February 2006 (UTC)

Table or list

Should some form of simple table format be used or should it be a simple list? Should there be numbering to denote, for example, the 7th album release? violet/riga (t) 09:15, 18 July 2005 (UTC)

First of all, thanks for this MoS proposal; Wikipedia's bibliographies are getting out of hand! In terms of the format, I think lists and tables are equally acceptable depending on the detail of the content. Also, I think it's a good idea to at least have the year, title, and (earliest possible) ISBN of each work. Furthermore, I wanted to mention that some biography pages include a bibliographical template, like the one on John_Grisham#Novels. I guess that's acceptable? --J. J. 20:08, 2005 August 24 (UTC)

I have a strong preference for lists. Jkelly 00:09, 6 November 2005 (UTC)

Lists are easier to add, and to read at a glance, especially if they follow a consistent format. whereas tables are only useful if there are subclasses within the content that need to be tracked, as with the discworld example you used. --Quiddity 20:59, 6 November 2005 (UTC)

re: which ISBN numbers, i found/asked this at Wikipedia talk:ISBN#ISBN. the conclusion was - on pages about a book, list as many as feasible. but with lists of books, give the ISBN most likely to be available ie "current paperback". --Quiddity 21:18, 6 November 2005 (UTC)

• Also concerning discographies - I wanted to bring attention to a table I have been using to arrange discographies, and (hopefully) it is clear and clean enough so that it won't need too much overhaul from other Wikipedia members. I've attempted to present the information in chronological order, with albums and singles separated. I haven't been separating out compilation albums for the most part, although if it is already arranged in that manner on the page, I'll keep them that way. I also have a tendency to place EPs in with albums, although I'm neither here nor there in terms of my preference on that. I've been using an "additional information" column in album tables to distiguish any special characteristics of the release, and editors who have modified after me have added to any notes I had. In addition, I like to use an extra column in singles tables to indicate the album from which the song is pulled. Seems to clear up any confusion. In my experience here I've noticed that people like to add chart postitions and RIAA certifications and sales info into discographies and after a while it starts to look very cluttered. I have been taking the formatting "look" from a recent discussion regarding "singles" articles (Wikipedia:WikiProject Music/Tables for charts), i.e. centering numbers in columns, avoiding the # symbol, not boldfacing number-ones, placing the artist's home-country column first. Some examples of what I've done are Morrissey, Eurythmics, The Cure, Stevie Nicks, Erasure and Depeche Mode. A look at any of those articles' histories can document how things looked before I edited. Any feedback people could provide would really help out, hopefully this is a table that can be used to make things more uniform throughout the Wikipedia and (of course) accurate. Sorry to ramble on.  :-) -- eo 22:53, 30 November 2005 (UTC)
  • Maybe before we decide the style for a listing we should decide what exactly should be included in the listing. Technically speaking, it's only necessary to create a link to the album/song page and leave all other details off the main artist page. So if the listing is going to contain at least a moderate amount of information then a table would look better. If the listing is a simple year and title, a table would be overkill. I think that the actual album listing should be minimal. Most information should be kept on the relevant album page or included in a special section (ex. put chart information under an "Acheivments" section). --Tastywheat 08:33, 5 December 2005 (UTC)
    • I do agree with you in theory, and I think that a very basic list makes sense if, say, the artist has released a small handful of material. My main reason for using the table I mentioned above was to clean up a lot of the information that is already on artist pages. I don't think it would be a successful venture to tell editors "album title and year only." Editor A comes along and adds chart positions for the US, Editor B comes along and adds UK chart positions, then Editor C adds RIAA certifications and Editor D adds more album details... etc., etc., etc.... eventually the discography looks like a mess. I think it also has to do with many albums and singles just not having their own article. Chart fanatics (and I am one of them), like to glance at an artist's success on the music charts in one place, rather than having to go to all the individual album pages to find out chart placings. As of right now I've seen no less than five different templates/tables being used by various people - some have boldfaced numbers, some have the "#" symbol, some have "weeks at number one" notations.... you see where I'm going. Some discography tables look a lot better than others. With the discussion at Wikipedia:WikiProject Music/Tables for charts I thought it was a safe bet to incorporate the basic structure of that table and implement it on artist pages without too much outrage from editors. -- eo 17:20, 5 December 2005 (UTC)
      • Duly noted. So we probably agree that the year and title are essential to a discography listing. I don't completly disagree with including chart information with the listing (or table), but I still stress that certain information can be more appropriate elsewhere. If you include chart information for the UK and US then it's only fair to add chart information for CAN, FRA, GER, ITA, JPN or wherever else the artist is charted. If we went with a tabular form, this would cause many empty cells or variable width tables. I still think that chart information is just as convenient and probably more appropriate in a seperate section. -- Tastywheat 19:12, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

Lists vs tables

Hmm.. I'm specifically talking about music discographies here, but I guess it can be lightly applied to books and films... Anyway, I'm surprised there is no standard for lists of works. I'm very much against the use of tables to show a discography - mainly in terms of accessibility for disabled users, I mean they're a total waste of time for those users, but also because they contain mainly redundant data; generally the chart position. It's not really important in terms of an album release, I don't think. Anyway... somethink similar to...

* Year - Title of Work (Record Label)

...would be best I think. I really think there should be some sort of standard decided for this, but I guess it will be quite difficult for everyone to agree. I'm not sure what I'm talking about to be honest but hopefully this starts the ball rolling. SaltyWater 23:51, 29 March 2006 (UTC)

If no one is going to comment I'm going to change the project page myself... SaltyWater 10:49, 5 April 2006 (UTC)

I'll comment... I don't see a problem with formatting discographies in tables. They look cleaner and they're able to hold more information than a bulletpoint or plain text list. How exactly does a table make it difficult for disabled users? If there is a serious problem with accessibility then obviously something will have to change, but at this point there are literally hundreds of articles in Wikipedia that utilize table formatting. Most pages with tables were created because they previously had text lists which became very messy due to artists' long list of albums and singles. Changing things back to non-table lists will not prevent people from adding comments, chart positions, countries, albums, remixes and various other bits. Many discography tables also include album artwork. You're the first person (at least that I have seen) to mention a problem with accessibility to the information so I'm interested to know how tables make things difficult. If disabled people are having issues with tables then something should definitely be done about it, but I don't think the immediate response should be to remove tables. -- eo 12:00, 5 April 2006 (UTC)

My ultimate position to use tables instead of lists is that when you have more than two items you really need to tabulate the data. Tabulated data with justification between items is much easier to read, IMO. if the list is beyond "YEAR: TITLE" format then the total lack of justification makes it harder to read.

If there's a concern of edittability then look me up. I have no problem editting tables. Cburnett 04:18, 6 April 2006 (UTC)

I believe tables can be beneficial, but generally only when wielded by an experienced editor. That is why i recommend lists for the guideline, but am happy for tables to be mentioned as an alternative method. --Quiddity 04:22, 6 April 2006 (UTC)

Here's the scenario I don't want to happen. A filmography is a plain list. I make it a table; add roles and notes. Then someone comes along and says "nope, page X says lists is the way to go" and reverts my changes. If we can work something out so that doesn't happen, then sign me up and let me go on my merry way making pretty tables. :) Cburnett 05:05, 7 April 2006 (UTC)

Understood and completely agreed. Good stuff :) -Quiddity 05:15, 7 April 2006 (UTC)

Discography example has changed

The discography for Keane, used as an example of a 'list' discography style, has changed. It is now more like the Oasis example: a list with cover thumbnails. I'm trying to think of an artist that has a thorough discography in the text-only list style, but thus far I can't find one that has all of the elements suggested (separate singles and albums sections; includes date, label, chart position). GentlemanGhost 17:37, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

Complete overhaul

I've attempted to work most of the discussion above into an overhaul of the proposal. (previously). Tell me what you think, or just overhaul my overhaul if you can improve it :)

I've tried to give it some solid statements to argue/ratify, and some broad leeway to encompass all the still-evolving standard-methods we have.

The only thing I foresee as being potentially contentious is the chronological ordering of filmographies, but I suspect (hope) a supermajority will quickly emerge, once put to wider discussion, favouring both consistency and traditional listing standards.

I've posted requests for comment at various related WikiProject and Styleguide talkpages, and at Village pump (proposals) and (policy), and various user talkpages, and RfC/Policies, in order to get further feedback. -- Quiddity 02:37, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

I'd add that using tables enables the year to be rowspaned and thus only linked once (it's what I tend to do anyway). I can live with ordering earliest first (I prefer newest first though). I also change filmographies, etc. to tables whenever I edit them for numerous reasons that I don't think need to be iterated right here. Suffice it to say that so long as tables are just as acceptable as lists (with reduction from tables to a list being frowned upon) then I'm also fine. Cburnett 21:22, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

I'm stepping in a bit late on this, but as for chronological order, that might present a problem with series. For example, Orson Scott Card has a list of works, but his Ender's Game series stretches out over 20 years; meanwhile, he's written many books in between. -Patstuart^{(talk)(contribs)} 02:05, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

Never too late - constant growth :) Yeah, an explanation of special circumstances needs to be added to that section, allowing variants for series works. That's a perfect example too. I've added a short paragraph dealing with it, but feel free to rewrite/tweak. :) --Quiddity 21:01, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

Alphabetical lists

When listing things alphabetically, should one put numbers at the top of the list, before A, or within the list? As a random example, if you were listing Stanley Kubrick films alphabetically, would 2001 come at the top, or would it be listed under T? Cardinal Wurzel 21:32, 3 December 2006 (UTC)

Numbers first, per Template:CompactTOC. -Quiddity 00:22, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

Filmographies

Can we change the filmography guidline? We need one that takes into account individual TV episodes, now that we have a lot of pages for single episodes? I think we should just copy IMDB's styling; is this a copy vio? For example, check out Rachelle Lefevre. - Peregrinefisher 20:14, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

I don't care if we list them new to old or old to new, but there are a lot of things that the current guidline doesn't capture. The example is very simple and doesn't address more complex issues. Do we do subsections for writer, director, actor if they have credits in various fields? Do we append (writer) or something? I see lots of dates linked to 200X in film instead of 200X, we should mention this in the guidline. I see Partial filmography, Selected filmography, and Filmography section headers, we should decide on one. What if an actor had more than 100 (or 200) credits? Do we spin this off into its own page? What should that page be name? List of actor_name credits, actor_name filmography, etc.? - Peregrinefisher 20:25, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

I've replied to the RfC questions with my opinions. As for what to do with large lists, yeah they can get split off into pages like Clint Eastwood filmography, or columnized like Dustin Hoffman#Filmography. —Quiddity 22:34, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

I'd also suggest that you could create/draft a long-supplementary page at Wikipedia:Filmographies for detailed variations and instructions. You can either Delete/merge/update what is currently there. —Quiddity 03:38, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

Cool. I didn't know about that page. - Peregrinefisher 03:52, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

Filmography RFC

I've created an RFC to work out the details involved in making useful filmography sections. Check it out at Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Filmography. - Peregrinefisher 21:31, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

Years and parentheses

I'm still not completely happy with the format/style/order suggested. Alternative suggestions welcome (add to the list). A few options:

1. Title (year) - notes
2. (year) Title - notes
3. year - Title - notes

Comments

I slightly prefer option #3, myself, as the cleanest and most orderly (year and title are well-aligned in columns). See a few more examples at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (lists of works)/examples.

I simply used the most common format I'd seen, for this guideline-page (option #1). Thoughts? —Quiddity 22:16, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

I guess I like Title (year) - notes most, but year - Title - notes is also good. I notice Hugh_Jackman#Selected_filmography now has a table. We have Template:ActingFilmography, but I don't like its look (example). I think a table with no background and no seperating lines could organize it without looking like a table. Maybe. I'd like it to be able to handle shows and individual episodes though, like Claire Coffee would need. - Peregrinefisher 23:18, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

Re: Hugh Jackman - Yeah, that's why I linked diffs instead of pages in the guideline :)

I dislike Template:ActingFilmography too. And also the navbar style used at Gene Hackman#Filmography. —Quiddity 03:38, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

I like the table used for Hugh Jackman, but the format for that table looks very intimidating to use. Otherwise, I prefer format #3, year - title - notesFistful of Questions 00:54, 21 January 2007 (UTC)

i'm opposed to the last change (putting year before title). dont mind people doing it like that but it shouldnt become part of this guideline. most lists are title (year) so the change doesnt reflect consensus. cheers. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 82.13.43.180 (talk)

Just spent a good amount of time and effort revising Charlton Heston's filmography from format #1 to format #3. Fistful of Questions 01:17, 21 January 2007 (UTC)

There doesn't appear to be consensus either way yet. I'll add a note asking for comments in a few places. In the meantime, there is so little consistency within these sections in Wikipedia (what this guideline attempts to address), that editors can use either method until we decide something formally. Let's leave the guideline as it was originally, until we have strong consensus for change. :) --Quiddity 21:32, 24 January 2007 (UTC)

I agree. This anonymouse IP address is only trying to enforce statusquoism rather than accept positive change. I see no problems with the new format suggestion, it looks much better and is more function than the ridiculous paranthesis. However, should the year and the film title be separated by a hyphen or just a space? Looking at Charlton Heston, I think it looks best without the hyphen. Pugno di dollari 21:34, 24 January 2007 (UTC)

I like: "title(year) - role (notes)", since it is ordered from the most to the least useful field in a clear and concise format. I don't like having years first because they make it harder to search the filmography for a particular film and because the typical search pattern of someone scanning a screen is an F(down the left side, then line by line). In addition, when scanning a filmography, the years seem to blur together if the years-first format is used. --PhantomS 23:22, 24 January 2007 (UTC)

Hmm, I like the third option. W3stfa11/^{Talk to me} 01:05, 8 February 2007 (UTC)

Just a quick note, IMDB uses Title (Year) notes W3stfa11/^{Talk to me} 20:15, 9 February 2007 (UTC)

A pretty standard (and neat) approach, which can be found in very many articles too, and has been adopted by various WikiProjects, is:

4. year: Title — notes

or

5. year: Title (notes)

This section of the MoS unfortunately conflicts with general usage and preferred usage for a number of Wikipeojects (as well as other sections of the MoS; the notion of Easter-egg linking of dates is usually described as controversial at best; it's disliked by many editors). --Mel Etitis (Μελ Ετητης) 12:54, 9 February 2007 (UTC)

after checking out the heston page, i definitely think that's the way to go. the fewer punctuations, em dashes, en dashes, dash-dashes, and diacriticals, the better. --emerson7 | Talk 20:36, 9 February 2007 (UTC)

Upside-down filmographies

If you spot a filmography, or a list of awards, that is in reverse-chronological order, please either correct it to chronological order as per WP:LOW, or tag it with the template {{MOSLOW}}. This template looks like this:

I don't understand how this ended up with a "MOSLOW" project aimed at filmographies given the utter lack of consensus regarding sort order (regardless of this edit, at the 'filmography'-specific Wikipedia talk:Filmographies#Chronological ordering. Seems like an organized attempt by the half of the people that wanted oldest first to override the objections to the other half of Wikipedians that prefer newest first. 76.22.4.86 04:32, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

Someone thinks this isn't disputed? Well it is. There's the consensus of a few users who frequent this page, and then there's the consensus of lots of users who create filmographies in newest to oldest. - Peregrine Fisher 04:41, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

you seem to be under a misunderstanding as to what constitutes "consensus". (as also evidenced by your edits to WP:WAF). the vast majority of articles on wikipedia are unverified and have no references. is the "consensus" of lots users, therefore, that all articles should be unverified and unreferenced? please note that MoS's express best practice in order to achieve high-quality articles in a standardized format. rgs. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 82.2.93.97 (talk) 09:52, 14 February 2007 (UTC).

You're summary mentions "revert to pre-dispute version." Doesn't that show you it's disputed, and that that should be mentioned? - Peregrine Fisher 09:57, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

The dispute is valid. I disagree with it (I prefer, and think it logical and consistent, to have all lists of works displayed in chronological order), but until most of the opponents are convinced, we don't have consensus, and the dispute ref should remain. (82.2.93.97 - please sign in, I'm presuming you are a regular editor due to your obvious MoS awareness, so I won't throw a welcome template at you.) --Quiddity 18:41, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

As mentioned here I thought there was an attempt to push a consensus , by placing MOSLOW tags , that doesn't exist and that I was suspicious of anon editors who seem to know a lot about wiki policy.

I prefer for living actors,artists etc that it should be newest first since that is the version of their work that you are likely to encounter first .Garda40 21:25, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

I second that. It may be my own personal opinion (and commonsense possibly) to have recent works listed at the top because there are several arguments in favour of that, Garda's included. I don't see why earliest-to-last chronology is a virtue and I am unfamiliar with the rationale for that.

I'd also like to say how irritating it is that a fundamental part of Wikipedia (MOS) is disputed on grounds like this; how are editors supposed to get on with their work if advocates of one opinion edit articles accordingly, only to be followed by a rival group of editors (or genuine editors reverting what they perceive as wrong MOS) editing according to their view. I came here because of such edits to articles I am invovled with, so I'd like to just say to editors here to please resolve this dispute and come to a consensus first before attempting to edit articles according to a currently-disputed MOS. Ekantik ^talk 05:58, 17 February 2007 (UTC)

I agree with Garda40 because I have encountered Problem where an anon or a new user tries to add a new Movie to the listand in the process messes everything up for example Shah Rukh Khan in the Filmography section. Please for the sake of Newbies and Anons follow the rule which states that new movies should be added on top and older movies at the bottom..Thanx.--Cometstyles 16:22, 18 February 2007 (UTC)

Where have you found this rule and could you point me there please? I don't think we should change the manual of style because some new users don't check where the film fits in the ordered list. Also, if new users make mistakes it's the responsability of the more experienced users to fix things and help the new user understand what he did wrong. I've encountered problems where new users used 5 tildes to sign their comments or accidentally broke a link in an edit, but I don't think we should stop using signatures or links. Neither do I think we should order lists in an unlogical and unencyclopedic way to accomodate the tiny percentage of new users who will make an easily fixable mistake otherwise.theroachman^TC 02:04, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

I meant the IMDB format and Anywayz small mistakes by anons can easily be detected and fixed and to change the format of the Filmography section would require a lot of time BUT I always thought the Filmography section was created to list works of actors and future releases and not list from the top the names of the movie they had acted in long time ago and that would really be confusing for some and I think that this proposal Wikipedia:Filmographies should be looked into again and I went through the WP:LOW many times and I dint see where they actually tell you to list the Filmographies in Chronological order except for the Ordering section which doesnt emphasise that much on Chronological listing anyway but Whatever suits Best and I wont comment on this issue ever again...--Cometstyles 14:24, 20 February 2007 (UTC)

I hope I haven't deterred you from commenting on this subject, if I did it was certainly unintentional. It's just that it's important to form a consensus, disputed guidelines are never a good idea. It's less confusing for users if all filmographies are in the same order. That is why we're trying to develop a consensus about this guideline. The Filmography section is just that: a list of all works a particular person has collaborated on (as an actor, or a director, or some other occupation). It's not a list that is meant to find the latest rumors about movies set to be released in 2010 and who is going to feature in them. Though that information is probably welcome, it's not the main goal of a filmography. That also rebutes Garda40's point, as different list style (reverse chrono for living actors, chrono for dead actors) would confuse readers. theroachman^TC 00:59, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

Theroachman, thanks for making an illuminating point. Does this mean that editors are "within their rights" to remove forthcoming releases and such (even if they are referenced) from filmographies? I would think so, because such information may be suitable for inclusion in the main body of an article rather than in the filmography. But it strikes me that I filmography should be a list of works completed rather than include information about fortcoming works. I think that is when we invite danger by copying IMDb too much, although I personally do not credit IMDb as an infallible source due to discussions at WP:RS on the subject.

And if it is justifiable that "forthcoming releases" should be removed, it might be a nice idea to edit the project page accordingly so that editors are aware of that principle. Ekantik ^talk 01:12, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

It is similar to release dates for video games. People like to pick up rumors here and there and change the article. Often such edits are reverted because different sources say different things. In such cases a release date marked as To Be Announced is better until an official source (developer or publisher) confirms a date. But here we are discussing style of lists, the 'look' rather than the content. The reason I mentioned rumors is that Cometstyles' argumentation was based on his misunderstanding of the concept filmography. He thought the goal was to show people the newest or upcoming films with a particular actor. Actually, the goal is to make an encyclopedic list of all films with a particular actor. For what a filmography constitutes here on WP, a chronological order is most logical and useful. For what a filmography consitutes on IMDB, a reverse chronological order, with newer items on top, is most logical and useful. theroachman^TC 03:32, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

Comments on this subject are being looked for at this location http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment/Filmography#Newest_to_oldest .Garda40 19:53, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

Unreleased works

What is the recommended procedure for unreleased works (e.g. editors who add albums to a discography based on vague announcements in interviews; or books announced in publisher's catalogues)? Notinasnaid 17:01, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

WP:CRYSTAL —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 86.31.151.119 (talk)