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This is the talk page for discussing improvements to the Overcategorization page.
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Arbytrarycat exception example

Can we add Category:19th-century politicians to WP:ARBITRARYCAT? It apparently is the example that it indicates at the end of the subsection. It has 3 subcategories and 33 pages. Regards, Thinker78 (talk) 00:55, 25 June 2023 (UTC)
@Jc37 Thinker78 (talk) 23:43, 5 July 2023 (UTC)
It's not arbitrary, because it's part of this tree: Category:Politicians by century. - jc37 23:48, 5 July 2023 (UTC)
@Jc37 The example refers to exceptions to ArbytraryCat. This is my proposal:
"Categorization by year, decade, century, or other well-defined time period (such as historical era), as a means of subdividing a large category, is an exception to this.
Examples: Category:19th-century politicians, Category:1970s assassinated politicians"
Thinker78 (talk) 00:03, 6 July 2023 (UTC)
Ok. Well, when doing examples, we tend to try to use different things. So the first category should work. And if you wanted a second example, you could go look in a completely different topic (and not by years). The goal of the examples being that they are clear to the reader and aid in understanding of the text. - jc37 00:07, 6 July 2023 (UTC)
@Jc37 Can I add then the example like this? "Categorization by year, decade, century, or other well-defined time period (such as historical era), as a means of subdividing a large category, is an exception to this.
Example: Category:19th-century politicians". Regards, Thinker78 (talk) 00:51, 6 July 2023 (UTC)
My apologies, I should have been clearer. The examples at the top of each section are to WP:CFD discussions, not merely to a specific category. I had thought you were referring to a CfD discussion about that category. - jc37 18:36, 15 July 2023 (UTC)

Should we create a Definingness article?

We have an article for the other 2 important tests on Misplaced Pages, Notability and Verifiability. N.B. Other important Misplaced Pages tests put into the comment section would be greatly appreciated, and please also discuss the Misplaced Pages:Defining article, as that contains the section Misplaced Pages:Defining § From Misplaced Pages:Overcategorization § Non-defining characteristics which transcludes text from the aforementioned Non-defining characteristics section of this article, including the text describing the two article tests and the test about “definingness” used specifically for categories. SNOCMDE (talk) 01:26, 23 June 2023 (UTC)

Definitions of WP:SMALLCAT, potential for growth, and unpopulated categories

Since there's been a lot of discussion on the exact meaning of WP:SMALL at WP:CFD recently, I would like to propose some changes to the current text of the WP:SMALLCAT guideline. If there's need for it, I'll make a formal RfC, but I'd like to get feedback and discuss things informally here first.

The current text is as follows:

Avoid categories that, by their very definition, will never have more than a few members, unless such categories are part of a large overall accepted sub-categorization scheme, such as subdividing songs in Category:Songs by artist or flags in Category:Flags by country.

Note also that this criterion does not preclude all small categories; a category which does have realistic potential for growth, such as a category for holders of a notable political office, may be kept even if only a small number of its articles actually exist at the present time. Also, subcategories of Category:Works by creator may be created even if they include only one page.

The proposed text, with non-trivial changes in bold:

In general, avoid categories that will never have more than five members.

Exceptions:

  • Set categories that are part of a larger sub-categorization scheme of the form Category:Foo by X, such as members of Category:Songs by artist within the larger scheme Category:Works by creator, may be created even if they include only one page.
  • A category which does have realistic potential for growth, such as a category for holders of a notable political office, may be created even if an insufficient number of articles exist at the present time.

Summary of non-trivial changes (as marked in bold above and below), with justification:

  • An exact number definition - Five appears to be a number that comes up often in discussion. If a category is brought up for discussion, this will make it unambiguous when a category has crossed the acceptable size threshold. This also provides a clear benchmark to potentially check for first when creating new categories.
  • Rephrased the subcategorization scheme exception - the prior phrasing is ambiguous and it's unlikely someone consulting a policy page for reference will know what is "overall accepted". I've replaced this with a more general statement that seems to encompass existing guidelines here.
  • Removed "By their very definition" from the first sentence - the definition of the category itself is not a priori what typically restricts its size, but other information about it. Further clarification seems unneeded in the text, however.

Questions

  1. Is five a good upper bound for WP:SMALLCAT, or should it be higher?
  2. Are there other factors that should influence what the number should be?
  3. Should Category:People by occupation and nationality, or other categories of the format "Category:Foo by X and Y" be considered an exception to WP:SMALLCAT?
  4. Are the other proposed emendations to the text helpful, including those grammar and style ones not outlined above?

- car chasm (talk) 19:07, 12 July 2023 (UTC)

1.I have heard 5-10 is the consensus. So 5 sounds fine.
2.I think that question is addressed by the flexibility provided by the phrasing of "in general". But specifically, the concerns I heard are category clutter (which should be a non-issue if there was a better categorization system) and navigation.
3.I think the wording of your proposal in the exceptions should be modified to remove the limit you added, "of the form Category:Foo by X". Instead it should read like, "Set categories that are part of a larger sub-categorization scheme, such as subdividing songs in Category:Songs by artist or Category:Works by creator. They may be created and retained, even if they include only one page." The key words "such as" provides proper guidance that there may be other categories as well that are not mentioned.
4.Something I have pondered is when a series is ok by its size. For example if a category tree has 10 categories and 6 of them have less than 5 pages.
Sincerely, Thinker78 (talk) 05:15, 13 July 2023 (UTC)
Category: