Wikipedia:Featured article review/Apollo 8/archive1

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The following is an archived discussion of a featured article review. Please do not modify it. Further comments should be made on the article's talk page or at Wikipedia talk:Featured article review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was kept 13:20, 18 February 2008.

Apollo 8[edit]

User:Abebenjoe,‎ User:Reubenbarton‎, User:Evil Monkey and Wikipedia:WikiProject Space notified.

This is quite an old FA, which I think needs a lot of work to bring it up to modern high standards. A few issues I have noticed:

  • 1(a)/1(b): Too list heavy - this makes it tiresome to read. For example, the "Crew" section gives no information about the main crew apart from their names. I'm sure there's lots of good information that could be added here.
    • Done - The Crew and Mission Parameters have been converted to prose. I need to add additional language, but the lists have been removed. I also added inline citations and additional sources. UltraExactZZ Claims ~ Evidence 16:21, 28 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • 1(c)/2(c): Quite poorly referenced. There are only 7 inline references and 16 more uncited. Many sections have no inline references at all.
    • I've added references to the article, both from what was uncited and other sources. I'm working on sourcing what's there before doing major rewrites, though I'm starting to think that we may be able to keep more than I had initially believed. UltraExactZZ Claims ~ Evidence 15:38, 29 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    • I'm continuing to add references - I'm using four primary sources with additional citations throughout the article. Still making progress. UltraExactZZ Claims ~ Evidence 19:26, 1 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    • Almost done. I need a citation for the documentary films, and I need to pull specific citations out of the Saturn V flight manual for background on the Saturn V section - but everything else has citations and additional references. At your convenience, please check my work. I'll start copyediting once I've got these last refs in place. UltraExactZZ Claims ~ Evidence 21:41, 4 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    • Done - All sections have been thoroughly referenced, with over 40 inline citations now documenting every section of the article. I've left the non-inline citations for now, as I did not use some of them as inlines, and might wish to during copyediting. I've also left external links alone, as that will be edited to fit the final version of the article (during this review, anyway). Now that that's done, could someone check me for any sections I may have missed? Thanks. UltraExactZZ Claims ~ Evidence 04:48, 5 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • 1(a): Needs a thorough copyedit. This is too general a requirement to give an exhaustive list of examples. It applies to just about all the sections. We can look at specifics once the article has been thoroughly cleaned up.
    • I've totally rewritten several sections, most notably the Saturn V section. I'll start to look through the other sections, but are there additional examples of problems to fix? Some of the language isn't that bad, actually, and might be worth keeping. This being my first FAR, I'd welcome any guidance. Thank you. UltraExactZZ Claims ~ Evidence 04:48, 5 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • 1(a)/2(b): I have marked several section stubs that need to be expanded, removed or merged with other sections.
  • 3: Non-free Time magazine cover is marked for speedy deletion as there is no fair use rationale.
    • Image was deleted as a fair use violation

Any more comments would be appreciated. Papa November (talk) 19:01, 5 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comment - This looks like it's been here for a while, but I just noticed it. I know there are sources out there that could be added, and I have a plan for expanding the crew section (with additional notes and commentary from additional sources). I plan to work through the copyediting (these spaceflight articles can get wordy), but would like a couple examples of the most egregious examples of bad copy, to get the ball rolling. If it doesn't delay things too badly, I'd like a few days to work through some of these issues. Thanks, UltraExactZZ Claims ~ Evidence 04:28, 27 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Some non-exhaustive examples from the first two paragraphs of the lead section only are...
  • "...voyage to another celestial body" (Compared with what? No manned mission had visited a celestial body before. Also, voyage may imply that the mission landed on the celestial body - better to explicitly say that it was a near pass.
  • "...became the first humans to escape Earth's gravity and the first humans to see the..." (unnecessary repetition)
  • "It was also the first manned launch of the Saturn V rocket." (Apollo 8 was a complete mission - more than just a launch. Better to say it involved the first launch...)
  • "To beat the Soviet Union to the moon, in August 1968 NASA changed Apollo 8's mission from the planned low-earth orbit Lunar Module/Command Module test to a lunar orbital flight." (complex phrasing and a lot of information to take in here)
  • Why was it important to beat the Soviets to the moon? What Soviet action inspired the sudden change in US mission objective? Better to briefly mention the background of the Space Race and the Soviet advances before this sentence.
  • It takes some thought to work out the order of events here. Why not mention the initial plan first and then talk about how it changed?
  • Relevant technical phrases such as "celestial body" and "gravity" should be wikilinked to build context.
  • Try to avoid varying lengths of sentences and paragraphs too much. For example, the first paragraph contains a long, complex sentence sandwiched between two short simple sentences. This exaggerates the complexity of the middle sentence, while giving the illusion that the content of the short ones is trivial.
  • "Uncharacteristically very short" ("very" is redundant)
  • "Adding to the sense of urgency" (Was there really a sense of urgency? All that has been mentioned is the short timeframe. This could have been the result of new manufacturing technology for example, rather than urgency, so a reference or clarification would be nice here. Were the Soviet advances actually the primary cause of the urgency, rather than just an addition?)
  • "...than the Americans' that December." (We've just mentioned December, maybe this is redundant?)
The whole article needs a good tidy, aiming to reduce redundancy, clarify complex sentences etc. I hope that helps! Papa November (talk) 23:53, 27 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I agree, there's some cleaning to do. I've combined the small sections you marked, deleted the capsule location section (redundant to a clearer mention under recovery), and moved the mission insignia to the Crew (since it describes them, and was their creation). I'll work on the rest starting tomorrow. Unless you object, I'll annotate your concerns above with checkmarks when I've addressed them, for clarity's sake. Thanks, UltraExactZZ Claims ~ Evidence 03:21, 28 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Please don't add graphics to the page; it slows down load time. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 22:30, 6 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I left this up in the review section because it seemed to be moving along. What's the status? Marskell (talk) 10:21, 6 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]

  • User:Ultraexactzz is doing a great job addressing the concerns I listed, but I think there's a huge amount of work still to do before the prose meets current FA standards. It would be good to get another couple of opinions here. Papa November (talk) 10:37, 6 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • At this point, Copyediting is the biggest task. The only existing section I've managed is the Saturn V section, which I re-wrote to fit the references I found. The Crew section is entirely new, having been converted from a list - the same with Mission Parameters, at the end. If these look OK, then I'll tackle the other sections in similar fashion. The article needs to be clear and linear, but it's almost like a memoir in a few spots. The cites will help, and I added them first specifically to frame the copyediting. I have a checklist here of what I've done so far, and, if there are no objections, I'll continue to work through the article over the course of the next week or so. UltraExactZZ Claims ~ Evidence 14:22, 6 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Agreed - I've made the change. I also (temporarily) pulled the references to fears about the Soviet Zond program, as I can't find a source that explicitly cites that as a reason to move the Lunar Orbital mission forward. Everything I'm finding cites the LM delay as a main reason. UltraExactZZ Claims ~ Evidence 15:19, 6 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Fixes needed:

  • Why is Apollo 8 sometimes italicized, sometimes not?
  • WP:NBSP, non-breaking hard spaces or {{nowrap}} needed to prevent line wrap between Apollo and 8 (and any other item that is numerical and non-numerial element). For example, I'm getting line wrap on Gemini 7 in the first section.
  • I see several uses of "the" in section headings, see WP:MSH.
  • Capitalization of Support? "During the mission, backup crew members would serve as members of the Support crew.[4]"
  • Single-sentence sections, example: "Flight directors".
  • Incorrect use of WP:MOSBOLD, The Saturn V rocket used by Apollo 8 was designated SA-503, or the 03rd model of the Saturn 5 (V) Rocket to be used in the Saturn-Apollo program.
  • Incorrect use of WP:HYPHENs instead of WP:DASHes: during flight - two failed engines ... the article uses three different types of dashes/hyphens for punctuation, hyphen (-), endash (–) and emdash (—). See WP:DASH and use consistently either an unspaced emdash or spaced endash.
  • Acronyms (like NASA) need to be fully defined on first occurrence.
  • Loads of missing WP:NBSPs in "Launch and trans-lunar injection" and a whole lot of uncited hard data there.
  • WP:OVERLINKing: I noticed vomit and television, for example. Words commonly known to English speakers need not be linked, but technical and less common terms need to be linked on first occurrence (I didn't see NASA linked on first use, for example).
  • WP:MSH#Captions, punctuation on full sentences vs. sentence fragments.
  • Uncited direct quotes.
  • Lots of incorrect use of WP:MOSBOLD in Mission parameters.
  • Items mentioned within the article should not be in See also, and See also should be minimized. See WP:GTL. Example, NASA is in See also.
  • Missing publishers on citations, example: Courtney G Brooks, James M. Grimwood, Loyd S. Swenson (1979). "Chapter 11 Part 6", Chariots for Apollo: A History of Manned Lunar Spacecraft. Retrieved on January 29, 2008. And many more. Here's another one: NSSDC Master Catalog Display. Retrieved on September 15, 2007.
  • Double punctuation on citation: Genesis: The Story of Apollo 8.. Four Wall
  • Unformatted ciations. ^ "The Effects of Long-Duration Space Flight on Eye, Head, and Trunk Coordination During Locomotion (9307191)", NASA, http://lsda.jsc.nasa.gov/scripts/experiment/exper.cfm?exp_index=747

Please do not alter my text by introducing graphics or checkmarks; I will check the items when done. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 22:30, 6 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]

No problem. I've done some work tonight, and will attack the other tasks tomorrow (probably mid-afternoon). UltraExactZZ Claims ~ Evidence 04:52, 7 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I've completed the edits you specify above, as well as several similar edits in other areas of the article. Please have a look, at your convenience. Thanks, UltraExactZZ Claims ~ Evidence 16:12, 8 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Much improved, still a bit more to do. If you don't mind, pls review my edit summaries so I don't have to retype it all. Are you also working on the Saturn V FAR? If so, please ping me when the same sorts of issues have all been reviewed, and I'll have a look. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:42, 10 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I've attempted to address all of your concerns - and I copied down your edit summaries for future reference. I'm starting in on Saturn V today, though that article has much further to go than this one does (or did). I think it's salvageable, though. Thanks again for your assistance, UltraExactZZ Claims ~ Evidence 16:25, 11 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
You might want to ping Papa November to see if there are any outstanding issues. I'll look at Saturn V in a few days. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:54, 11 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]

← It's much better now - you've done a fantastic job. It would still be nice to hear some more views on this, but we can live without! The paragraph lengths may want some attention - for the sake of readability, it's not great to have too much variation there. Also, some of the text seems rather informally written. The "Mission" section in particular reads more like a story than an encyclopaedia article, with phrases like "somewhat strangely", and "Then they finally got their first glimpses of the Moon" being a bit too informal for an encyclopaedia. Papa November (talk) 22:41, 11 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]

  • Comment I can have a go at a general copyedit tomorrow. --Laser brain (talk) 04:16, 12 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I got through part of it today (Launch and trans-lunar injection heading) but need to pick it up again tomorrow. It is tedious work because I keep running into things I have to clarify with the sources (which are thankfully online). --Laser brain (talk) 06:14, 13 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • WP:UNITS problem throughout, miles is abbreviated to mi, main unit should be spelled out according to UNITS. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:52, 14 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I think I caught all of the miles, and all of the Kilometres are parenthetical, so I left them as km. There was one feet per second that I converted, but the subsequent instances were left as-is (as that abbreviation is both cumbersome and clearer in the ft/sec context, once explained). I also switched hz to hertz. I left g alone, because "g" refers directly to gravitational force (as a percentage of normal earth gravity, e.g. 0.25 g), and doesn't seem to stand for gravities or gravitons or anything similar to which I would expand the abbreviation to clarify the point. There was also a wikilink at "g" to g force, which explains the concept clearly. UltraExactZZ Claims ~ Evidence 04:26, 15 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Status check? How is the copyedit coming? Can this be kept without FARC? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 03:52, 17 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    It's certainly a lot better. I'm still a little concerned about the informal style of writing, but I don't think it's bad enough to go to FARC. Papa November (talk) 13:06, 17 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    Concur. It is on my radar and I will continue to copyedit. --Laser brain (talk) 02:45, 18 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    Agreed. I'll also keep this article on my short list for detail work, but I think we've addressed every other major concern. UltraExactZZ Claims ~ Evidence 05:44, 18 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.
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