Commons talk:Categories/Archive 5

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Abbreviations

Is there some kind of rule for when it is OK or not to abbreviate something when creating a category, for instance "Company" versus "Co."? Thanks. --Adamant1 (talk) 00:10, 3 February 2022 (UTC)[reply]

@Adamant1: It is strongly preferred to avoid abbreviations in category names. However, this is not an absolute rule. For certain proper names where the abbreviation is almost always the normal usage of the name for the subject (e.g. Category:IBM), it can be okay. This is a high bar though, and abbreviations that are merely 'very common', but where the spelled out version is reasonably common to see as well, are probably better in spelled-out form (e.g. Category:United States). Since this is a gray zone, borderline cases should be discussed in a CfD before changes are made. If you are making a new category, feel free to use your best judgement but be okay with discussing it later should another user raise a CfD on it. Happy categorization! Josh (talk) 09:51, 31 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Many plural category names not matching the policies

Hello, I think the policies for Category names should be updated because it is not matching anymore with the common practice on the commons. Or we need a widespread renovation of the commons.

A discussion is started here → Commons : Village pump # Many plural category names not matching the policies.

W like wiki good to know 21:21, 8 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Metacategories

Is the concept of a metacategory fleshed out somewhere else? I'm not at all sure this page is the place to add any of this, but I do think it belongs somewhere. At the very least we presumably want to say something like the following.

As already noted, metacategories contain only other categories, not individual images. Typically, a metacategory contains categories that all have the same relation to its parent category. Good examples of metacategories are:

A metacategory may also contain other metacategories, and (as with members of regular categories) these do not necessarily have a parallel relation to the parent metacategory. For example Category:Art by genre contains:

Jmabel ! talk 21:19, 12 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]

@Jmabel: There's Commons:Meta category. There are some differently-named metacats, though, such ask Category:Centuries in Sikhism and other centuries-in subcats of Category:Religion by century. I also think I've seen some other alternate naming of metacats, but I don't remember exactly what they were right now.
I do think we need to be careful not to say that any category that has "by <something>" in the name is a metacat. There are several types of such categories that are not metacats. Examples are:
There may be other exceptions, but these are the kind I remember seeing a lot. -- Auntof6 (talk) 21:39, 12 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]
@Jmabel: A further thought: I have seen some categories whose contents look like the content of a metacat, but whose titles do not indicate any sort criterion. In some cases I removed the metacat template, and in some of those cases I got pushback about it. I can't think of a specific one right now, but I think some of them were taxon-related. To me, the name of a metacat should indicate the sort criterion. -- Auntof6 (talk) 21:43, 12 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]
@Auntof6: One tricky case I've seen is when an image really is about the topic of a metacat: e.g. Category:Coal industry by country (quite underpoplulated) would be the obvious home for a map showing the amount of coal produced in each country of the world in a particular year. Do we enforce the "metacategory" concept against including those? - Jmabel ! talk 22:50, 12 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]
@Jmabel: That is a tricky one. I think I've handled those in different ways in the past. You could leave it in the metacat, but I don't think that's what metacats are for. You could put it in the category/ies for each country shown. You could also put it in the parent category, or a category for statistics (in this case, coal industry statistics) if there is one. -- Auntof6 (talk) 00:24, 13 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]

"Not the primary subject"

Is that a valid reason to remove categories from image? Most categories people add to files aren't about a single subject found on pictures. Enhancing999 (talk) 07:33, 17 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]

@Enhancing999: Sort of. Really depends on context. E.g. I wouldn't remove Category:1993 in Chicago on that basis, but I might remove (and certainly would have no problem with someone else removing) Category:Stop signs from an urban scene that very incidentally has a stop sign in it. - Jmabel ! talk 14:48, 17 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Is there an explanation on this page that would justify that users delete anything but categories about a primary subject? Enhancing999 (talk) 17:17, 17 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Do you have specific examples of users doing so in mind? -- Infrogmation of New Orleans (talk) 17:26, 17 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]
I do, but they don't really matter, as the opposite seems fairly common. It's a general question about this page. Enhancing999 (talk) 17:33, 17 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]
If the categories are redundant (what the main page calls "overcategorization" but is actual redundant categorization, eg including a general category in addition to the more specific subcategory), then I'd say the removal is appropriate. If they are removing significant secondary topics, like my example below, I'd say the removal was not appropriate. If the categories are for minor details that are not shown in a manner that would reasonably be useful to reusers or researches, I'd say the removal was appropriate. No doubt there can be cases somewhere between the second and third where things might be more a matter of personal judgement or up for discussion. -- Infrogmation of New Orleans (talk) 17:46, 17 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]
If the page currently doesn't cover the point, we should add something.
Otherwise it may not be clear to users that what they are doing isn't helpful. Enhancing999 (talk) 17:54, 17 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]
I'd say the focus should be if the categories show a potentially useful example of something to someone interested in the topic. IMO properly categorized secondary subjects can be very useful in research and historic topics, and sometimes an unexpected delight. Hypothetically, say there were a photo of US President Harry Truman in Chicago in 1950. The photo clearly shows he is seated in an automobile (which someone familiar with old cars can identify as a particular model of 1950 Chevrolet) and is wearing a straw boater style hat; the background streetscape can be seen to be Michigan Avenue. While President Harry Truman would be the "primary subject" of the photo, categories for the other things mentioned can be useful to reusers or researchers, and should not be removed. Certainly there can be overcategorization when things only slightly visible or so common that adding categories for them is not useful. Again, I'd say the criteria should be "if someone is interested in a topic, is this an example that they could reasonably find useful?" If the answer is yes, I'd say there is nothing wrong with categorizing accordingly. -- Infrogmation of New Orleans (talk) 17:25, 17 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]
  • Any suggestions of rewording of policies per discussion above? I'm not the first to note that the attention given to what is called "overcategorization" is actually *redundant* categorization, although that may not be clear to newer users. I'd say the usefulness of in many cases including more than a single category for some media has been well demonstrated in practice for more than a dozen years on Commons, and should not be confused with what the policy page calls "overcategorization". - Infrogmation of New Orleans (talk) 00:07, 18 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]
    • I'm not sure, though the guidance does mention what or whom does the file show? What is the main subject? What are the noteworthy features of the image? So it is concentrating on the main subject, and other noteworthy features as you mention. So I guess the current guidance is more "noteworthy features", not necessarily "primary subject". There are of course other possible categories for location, time, author, and other aspects. I'm in general agreement with your guidance above, that not every little thing which happens to appear in the image needs a category -- particularly if common, or blurry or otherwise not a very good representation of the subject. A bad or partial picture of a particularly rare subject may be still be fine, though. "Noteworthy features" seems a pretty good way to put it, but your example of would re-users or researchers find the image useful to the category's topic might be a way to expand on that. Carl Lindberg (talk) 00:54, 18 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I concur completely with what Infrogmation and (especially) Carl have said here. - Jmabel ! talk 02:01, 18 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Cannot remove category from image - why?

File:Sign at Guatemala Mexico border.svg is in Category:Guatemala - unneeded, since it is more specific subcategory. However Category:Guatemala does not display when I try to edit the image page, and I see no way to remove the category. What's happening here? -- Infrogmation of New Orleans (talk) 22:34, 12 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Permission to add "(disambiguation)" to DAB categories to help preventing them to be used

I would like to be able to rename some disambiguation categories (DAB categories), adding "(disambiguation)" to the category name, even when there is no category with the same name that is a primary topic. As I understand, Commons does not have a policy regarding "(disambiguation)" in category names, but uptill now follows W:WP:DABNAME (according to Crouch, Swale on Commons:Categories for discussion/2022/06/Category:Decoration).

  • The problem: DAB categories are not recognizable as such when you add a file or another category to one. And you do not get a notification in all cases when you add a file or category to a DAB. (See Commons:Village pump/Archive/2022/10#How to make a structural solution for not empty disambigious pages?, item 2, for the discussion about this problem.)
  • One of the proposed solutions is to allow "(disambiguation)" in the category name, even when there is no category with the same name that is the primary topic. Then at least people will see that the chosen category is not the right one. The original category should be deleted to avoid misunderstanding.

So my question is: Would it be allowed to rename DAB categories, adding "(disambiguation)" to the category name, even when there is no category with the same name that is a primary topic? JopkeB (talk) 05:58, 21 October 2022 (UTC)[reply]

The problem is that in this case too many people still choose "Category:Mercury" instead of one of the others. I do not want a redirect from "Category:Mercury" to "Category:Mercury (disambiguation)" because that indeed would cause a lot of trouble. I'd rather have "Category:Mercury" be deleted. --JopkeB (talk) 09:53, 21 October 2022 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose. I don't know if it would be allowed, but it would be a bad idea. My viewpoint is that here on Commons no dab categories should have "(disambiguation)" on them, and we shouldn't be looking at anything here as being a primary topic. A primary topic situation works for Wikipedia, because they are text-based and their dab pages are in article space; you can tell by reading an article whether it's about the thing you're interested in.
On Commons, where things are media-based and our dab pages are in category space (except for some gallery dabs that I think serve no purpose), it's different. You can't always tell which thing a file belongs to by looking at it (or watching, listening to, etc.). Let's say someone is uploading an image of something nondescript in Paris, Texas. It could be a generic street scene, an image of children playing, or whatever. Different things could go wrong:
  • An automated process categorizes based on individual keywords it sees in the file description. It sees "Paris" and puts it in Category:Paris, which is for the French city.
  • A person who doesn't understand how to categorize here uses HotCat to categorize the file. They enter "Paris" and choose the first category suggested which, again, is the one for the French city.
  • The file is now incorrectly categorized. How will anyone notice that? With many images, there's nothing to indicate what continent it's in, much less what country or city. Many pages have been renamed to avoid the unqualified title being for a "primary topic" because so many incorrect things got categorized there. (One I can think of is Category:Choir, Mongolia, but I know there have been others.)
And that's only taking into account use of only English when categorizing. Not everyone knows that category names here are supposed to be in English, so we get wrong things categorized under English terms that have other meanings in other languages. An example of this is Category:Lagos. Because we don't use that for a primary topic, when people put images of lakes in it (because lagos means lakes in Spanish), we can recognize that and fix it. If that category were for, say, the city in Nigeria, how would someone looking at the category know that those lakes weren't in that city? --Auntof6 (talk) 09:25, 21 October 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Dear Auntof6, Your viewpoint is that no dab categories should have "(disambiguation)" on them. What do you think would be a solution for the problems you describe after your viewpoint? How could it be prevented that files for Paris, Texas end up wrongly in Category:Paris (capital of France)? Or files about Spanish lakes end up in the DAB Category:Lagos? --JopkeB (talk) 09:53, 21 October 2022 (UTC)[reply]
@JopkeB: The solution would be for categories like Category:Paris to be dab categories, and for the category for the French city to be qualified -- Category:Paris, France or Category:Paris (France) or some such. This has been discussed before, sometimes rather heatedly.
As for the lakes, the best way to prevent that wrong categorization is to make sure people and processes that assign categories understand how to categorize correctly. However, that's probably not 100% feasible, especially in the case of automated processes, and the second best solution is what we currently have: the "Lagos" category is a dab cat. And it's not only Spanish lakes that show up in the Lagos category; it's potentially any file for any lake when being categorized by a Spanish-speaking person. -- Auntof6 (talk) 10:14, 21 October 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Why may a category not have "(disambiguation)" in the name, why is this a bad idea? What would go wrong? Uptill now I see no valid arguments, only opinions. --JopkeB (talk) 02:31, 23 October 2022 (UTC)[reply]

It could be worth a try. The problem would be clear to all users. Unless we redirect existing disambiguation categories, people may reuse them and the problem starts all over. Enhancing999 (talk) 10:57, 23 October 2022 (UTC)[reply]
This has been discussed many times on Wikipedia but the problems I mentioned above would be an additional reason not to. Commons categories just like Wikipedia articles should generally use just the page's name rather than add additional information to the title and the same applies to disambiguation categories for example we use Category:Hagmore Green not Category:Hagmore Green, Suffolk. One user namely User:SmokeyJoe has advocated this on Wikipedia over the years but has never gained consensus and I doubt it would here for the additional reasons I mentioned. See also the essay at w:User:Born2cycle/Unnecessary disambiguation. Crouch, Swale (talk) 14:09, 23 October 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Perhaps there is a misunderstanding. With a "disambiguation category" I mean a referral page. In my opinion such a category is not a real category, but it gives a list of categories whith a similar name. See for instance Category:Cars (disambiguation) (which has, by the way, "(disambiguation)" in the name, which is what I here propose for other problematic disambiguation categories/referral pages to make possible). It is not my intention at all to rename existing normal categories that do not offer such a list. JopkeB (talk) 14:26, 23 October 2022 (UTC)[reply]
(English) Wikipedia may have other uses, likely not directly relevant to Commons image categorization. Commons categorization is done on every upload, by all users, multiple times for thousands of new images per day.
As an example: I'm fine with using Category:York (disambiguation) as the list of categories with a redirect from Category:York. Enhancing999 (talk) 14:48, 23 October 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks, Enhancing999, your example is exactly what I mean. My proposal would be to reactivate categories like Category:York (disambiguation) or make new ones for problematic ones if they do not exist yet, and remove Category:York and the like.
And yes, I learned many times on Commons that Commons is not (EN-)Wikipedia, here we have and make our own rules. And for this subject Commons differs very much from a Wikipedia, as you pointed out. JopkeB (talk) 05:34, 24 October 2022 (UTC)[reply]
@JopkeB: Removing categories like Category:York would not stop things from being categorized there. It should at least be a redirect so that anything there gets moved to the disambiguation category. I know you're trying to avoid having anything in dab cats, but I don't think having things categorized in non-existent categories is better. -- Auntof6 (talk) 05:39, 24 October 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, perhaps you are right, I indeed am trying to avoid having anything in dab cats, at least as little as possible; and perhaps that is not realistic. But if we keep categories like Category:York with a redirect to a dab category, then it is useless to have categories like Category:York (disambiguation); then the situation might stay just as well as it is now. JopkeB (talk) 04:42, 25 October 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks Crouch, Swale, Auntof6, Enhancing999, for your contributions to this discussion. --JopkeB (talk) 10:28, 12 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Conclusions about "(disambiguation)"

No, the majority of the reactions say: it is not a good idea and not allowed to rename DAB categories (= referral pages) adding "(disambiguation)" to the category name, because then:

  • people may still add Category:X (if it still exists) via Hotcat to files, and that would redirect to Category:X (Disambiguation), so the problem would not have been solved at all
  • automated processes still would add wrong categories to files
  • we do not easily see that files have wrong categories with a similar name, while now we can recognize that in the DAB category and fix it.

Auntof6 thinks it is better to keep DAB categories as they are and correct the files (and subcategories) that wrongly are put in those categories.
--JopkeB (talk) 10:28, 12 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

An additional advantage of using "(disambiguation)" could be that it could fit as a parent category to anything listed there. Enhancing999 (talk) 09:36, 22 January 2023 (UTC)[reply]
You mean like categorizing Category:Mercury (planet) under Category:Mercury? We should definitely not do that. The disambiguation categories should be empty as much as possible, containing only things that we don't know which item they belong in. -- Auntof6 (talk) 10:42, 22 January 2023 (UTC)[reply]
No, Category:Mercury (planet) under Category:Mercury (disambiguation). There would still be no files. Enhancing999 (talk) 10:45, 22 January 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I was using the current name of the disambiguation category, but whichever name it ends up with, it should not contain the disambiguating entries. A disambiguation category should normally be empty. It would have text listing the possible things it refers to, but it should have no files and no subcategories. -- Auntof6 (talk) 11:15, 22 January 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I got that, but without "(disambiguation)", it seems to me it would be rather confusing.
What downside do you see, except that "it should [not]"? Enhancing999 (talk) 11:19, 22 January 2023 (UTC)[reply]
That's just it: Disambiguation categories are for things that are confusing (that is, words/phrases that have multiple possible meanings).
As for the downsides I see, I explained them above. Some users (and probably all automated processes) that assign categories don't do so correctly. Things will get categorized in the categories with unqualified names, whether they are disambiguation categories or not. It's better for those categories to be disambiguation cats so that things that get categorized there don't get lost in incorrect categories. -- Auntof6 (talk) 12:43, 22 January 2023 (UTC)[reply]
These seem to arguments about the use of "(disambiguation)" in general, not specific to my suggestion above. Enhancing999 (talk) 12:47, 22 January 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Edits to "guidance by topic"

i integrated rather outdated guides from special:permalink/703743320, and rewrote it to cover any kinds of structures instead of only bridges: special:diff/707887756. RZuo (talk) 13:11, 19 November 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Category scheme for people

In 2010, a reference was added from this page to Commons:Suggested category scheme for people which is stated to be "under construction" and not formally a policy. I don't know if here or VP is best but I think we should have a discussion if any of the suggested scheme should be policy because I don't think it's policy to refer to not-even guidelines. Ricky81682 (talk) 08:56, 22 January 2023 (UTC)[reply]

There is some good material here, and some problematic material. I think some of these ideas may be ready to discuss porting them over to actual COM:CAT policy, but probably not that document as a whole. Josh (talk) 03:58, 8 February 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Adding a caption makes page unfit to add categories until refresh

Fill in the Caption box of a file. Now at the top, add some categories with the "+". Result: warning that you are editing an old version. Must remember to manually refresh the page in the browser first. Or, first add the category, then the caption. Jidanni (talk) 01:11, 27 February 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Add idea sender link

The "Categories (++):" tool should have in its corner, a link to where to send ideas. Jidanni (talk) 06:40, 27 February 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Moving tens of thousands of files en masse

Tudor Collins was a photographer. We have about 21,460 of his photos at Category:Tudor Washington Collins. We also have a cat for his photos, at Category:Photographs by Tudor Washington Collins, but it contains only a dozen. I think we should move all the files in Category:Tudor Washington Collins to Category:Photographs by Tudor Washington Collins. Then we can manually move or copy the tiny percentage of them that have Collins as a subject back to Category:Tudor Washington Collins. I know I can move 200 files at a time with Cat-a-lot. Is there a way to move the thousands at once? Thanks. Nurg (talk) 07:57, 26 February 2023 (UTC)[reply]

@Nurg Commons:Bots/Work requests. RZuo (talk) 08:38, 26 February 2023 (UTC)[reply]
  • That's easy enough (done now, although any to move back still need doing)
As a side issue, a lot of these seem to be duplicates? The negative (glass plate?) seems to have been scanned twice and we have one positive image, correct way round, but also a negative that's horizontally flipped. Should we delete those? Put them somewhere else? Andy Dingley (talk) 11:55, 26 February 2023 (UTC)[reply]
@Andy thanks very much. Your question about the negatives was the next question looming large in my mind. I wondered whether there is any standard Commons practice with regards to negatives for which we also have the positive. I am not very familiar with Commons deletion policy & practice. Personally I can't think of any use for these negatives, and at present I'm leaning towards deleting them. Separating them out is the other option, as you suggest, if there is a reason to not delete them. I certainly think we should do something with them, to declutter the main cats. Nurg (talk) 20:58, 26 February 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Also we should think about any useful ways to sub-categorise these by subject. 20k files is too unwieldy to be much use for anything. Andy Dingley (talk) 13:23, 26 February 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Category chooser wizard should appear even on categories that don't exists yet

Visit e.g., Category:Some category that doesn't exist yet. Well, there we can put another category's name in the box below. But wouldn't it be great if the same "+" "-" category chooser appeared near the top of this not-yet existing category too, to help us along? Jidanni (talk) 23:44, 26 February 2023 (UTC)[reply]

@Jidanni There's a work-around for that: The link to Category:Some category that doesn't exist yet will actually lead you to https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Category:Some_category_that_doesn%27t_exist_yet&action=edit&redlink=1 - which is the page in edit mode. Go to your browser's address bar, delete the &action=edit&redlink=1 at the end of the URL and hit Enter. HotCat will be there. El Grafo (talk) 12:47, 13 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Don't offer redirects in match list

The Categories (++) tool should not offer redirects in its lists of matches. Jidanni (talk) 06:41, 27 February 2023 (UTC)[reply]

@Jidanni You mean HotCat? What exactly is the problem with redirects there? I think it's doing a pretty good job at resolving them automatically ... --El Grafo (talk) 12:37, 13 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Delete "Universality Principle"

I propose to delete this section.

It was added, undiscussed, by one single editor in a massive change of policies here. That seems to have been to try and justify some specific category discussions here: Category talk:Navigation consoles of watercraft (and others) that were being resisted by a number of editors. It has been cited again here: Commons:Categories for_discussion/2021/11/Category:Tracht. A massive change involving it came up more recently here: Commons:Categories for discussion/2020/01/Category:Gray and as that was (unsurprisingly) such a surprise, it then generated pushback here: User talk:JopkeB#Grey or gray?

There are two problems with this section. They are fundamental and cannot be addressed simply by editing the wording.

  • It is contrary to all other WP policy and practice.
  • It seems only to be used to introduce neologisms. Which are themselves against WP policy and practice, and they also reduce usability for readers by phrasing things with invented terms that are equally unfamiliar to all.

Commons is not Wikipedia and does not inherit Wikipedia's policies. Few have been explicitly copied across, most were thought to not be necessary. However it's still worth looking at them, and especially at the backstory for how they came to be. In particular en:WP:ENGVAR: because language differences are inevitable, and editor loyalties will lie with their own tradition, then there is no hope of ever finding a "best" solution. In the interim though, we need to avoid concrete problems, such as edit-warring and needless churn between versions. If a narrow use of a term does have an evident national link (such as Category:Grey road vehicles in London), and where the alternative with "gray" would be a wiki-invented aberrance, then of course it can be tied to that.

There is no reason at all why MediaWiki categories need to have consistent naming across their children. I am tired of people claiming this as some justification for this "Universality". MediaWiki works by tagging both "Grey vehicles in London" and "Gray aliens in Area 51" and "Things that are an iridescent rainbow and aren't monochromatic at all" with membership in the Gray category, then they're done. The parent category just doesn't care what the children are called. Nor do our readers: the names themselves, in relation to their content, is much more important than a false and contrived consistency imposed between them.

Neologisms are a real problem on both Wikipedia and Commons, but Wikipedia has policies that they mustn't be invented, Commons (this policy) says that they must! We should resist this. No-one is well-served by inventing nonsensical names for things, even if that makes them "consistent". We do not need any more attempts to invent Category:Driving stands of watercraft.

"Universality" does not work as a naming principle here. WP recognises that and long abandoned it, in favour of accepting stability and recognising national ties. We should do the same on Commons. Andy Dingley (talk) 17:43, 10 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]

 Comment I do not know if an RfC has been made elsewhere on this matter, but if so, it should merely direct participation to this existing conversation, there is no need to forum shop. I do strongly encourage posts on VP and other relevant pages to solicit comment here.
 Oppose I strongly oppose simply deleting the Universality Principle. It is one of the key principles that have guided building and maintaining the Commons category structure. It is absolutely important to permit a standard approach to category management and ensure a consistent presentation of cateories to users. It helps to avoid provincialism and local kingdoms. Given that Commons is a multilingual resource, but lacks at this time a proper internationalization process for category names, it was decided that category names would be in English (other than proper names without a recognized English style) as a general rule. Universality is fundamental to implementing this basic principle.
While Commons has selected English as the language for category names, it does not favor UK, US, or any other flavor of English over the other. Back and forth battles over spelling differences are counter-productive to the mission of categorization. Whether the name of a category is spelled "colour" or "color", "gray" or "gray", etc., is not as important as it being named consistently through the topic tree.
Keep in mind that Commons category names are NOT Wikipedia article titles or any other such thing. They are not prescriptive. The name is not there to tell people how to spell, and not even to say 'things in this category are called 'name' '. Category names are just names for a category, not some attempt to define a name for things beyond the category itself.
Calling a category Butcher's shops in Mexico is not some attempt to say they are called 'butcher's shops' in Mexico, that would be silly, they are called carnicerias there, and renaming it Carnicerias en Mexico would be destructive to the categorization system. Go to Japanese topics and the problem would become even more acute. The Universality Principle is the key principle which encourages the former name instead of the regionally accurate name.
Another flaw with regional naming is that access to Commons media is international, not regional, and international users cannot be expected to learn all local varieties to access our files. Consistent category names are particularly helpful to non-English speakers as asking them to also have to understand regional English differences on top of working in a foreign language is just one more hurdle in the way of international, multilingual access.
Exceptions have been allowed from time to time for certain topics. This is true for many policies and guidelines...exceptions can be made when discussed, there is a good reason for them, and the consensus is to do so. Using that as the basis for flinging the flood gates open and encouraging a mess of category naming by simply removing a guideline without a suitable replacement to prevent unintended consequences is foolhardy, and I can't agree with it.
There are several further reasons why the Universality Principle has been a good thing, and why it should be kept, but here are a few of the key ones:
  1. Consistent names make it easier to maintain the hierarchical category system in accordance with the Hierarchical Principle.
  2. Encourages discussions to happen at the main category level with maximum broad participation in the naming discussion.
  3. Discourages fights over regional variations from continuing 'down the tree' to ever more local (usually lower-traffic) levels.
  4. Simplifies template design and implementation, thus improving consistent look and feel for users throughout the topic tree.
  5. Improves access for non-English speakers (the majority of the world).
Now I like others would love for an internationalization solution (such as WD's labels) to be implemented by Wikimedia, but until that elusive day, UP is key to keeping categories functioning as best possible. Encouraging provincialism and anti-standardization is going to be destructive and thus I strongly oppose simple deletion of the Universality Principle as proposed. Josh (talk) 23:09, 9 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
 Keep I agree with Josh. Most important for me is, that I can search easily for subcategories and parent categories: just type Category:XXX in YYY or Category:XXX by zzz in the search field and you usually get what you want, without having to try variants or to go all the way up or down the category tree. JopkeB (talk) 04:26, 10 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]

In, From, Of

The common English language words "In" "From" and "Of" have distinct meanings familiar to native and advanced speakers. Perhaps they are not clear to some second/third etc English language speakers. Possibly some users have chosen to deliberately disregarded the meanings in a quest for some sort of uniformity in category names. Whatever the case, we seem to have a number of examples where the terms are misused. "In" refers to location and time. The location where a photo is taken is "in" that place. "From" refers to origin, for example the place a person is native of, or where an object was manufactured. "Of" is more general, and can refer to either or both "in" and "of"; it states a general but significant connection. (For example, if a Nerf herder native to Tatooine moved to Alderaan and had their photo taken in Alderaan, the photo could accurately be categorized in "Nerf herders from Tatooine" and/or "Nerf herders in Alderaan", but it would be a falsehood to categorize it as "Nerf herders in Tatooine" or "Nerf herders from Alderaan".) Is there agreement that these three small words should be used accurately in Commons categorization - and if there is not, what is the counterargument? Wondering -- Infrogmation of New Orleans (talk) 18:58, 1 May 2023 (UTC)[reply]

I think people often use the first word that pops up their mind. Sometimes they choose the word according to their intention with the category, without realising that the limitation imposed by the choice would require a parallell category tree with mostly the same content. Often the only thing you know is "in", as your motif is in that place when you take the photo. For celebrities "of" makes more sense, as you usually know where the person lives, but not necessarily where they are from (and that may be irrelevant, cf "Presidents from France").
There is also a true problem: you might want to include both presidents and nurses in People in/from/of X by occupation. Do you need three such categories for each country (or city, or whatever)? If you settle for just one (as we normally do), you probably don't want visiting presidents included, so you should say "of" (you really don't want "from"). So to avoid the visiting presidents you choose "of", and still include Nurses in X, and thus also those in the country for Médecins Sans Frontières, or on a workplace retreat across the border.
–LPfi (talk) 20:13, 1 May 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Along which lines this recent move by User:Trade seems a bit odd. We can easily know these people are in the United States, but the change to of seems to raise questions about our knowledge of the particular people in each photo. - Jmabel ! talk 01:03, 2 May 2023 (UTC)[reply]
It makes no sense for one set of age groups to use "of" and another set of age groups to use "in". I choose the former as that seemed to be the norm with men, women, children, boys and girls. Trade (talk) 18:55, 2 May 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I assume none of them is served by using "of". It is probably inherited from "People of", which includes authors, politicians and other celebrities. The age group categories are mainly for random people who might not be locals – that's at least my impression – and should thus use "in". –LPfi (talk) 20:17, 2 May 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I have no strong opinion as to which construction is better in this particular case. I only note that the three words have different connotations, and movement of any media from one to the other should always be done with awareness for every single file, making sure no inaccuracies are introduced. I do feel very strongly that "consistency" should never be used as an excuse for falsehoods in categorization. -- Infrogmation of New Orleans (talk) 20:56, 2 May 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Of, from, in, and other prepositions should be used consistently, however in practice this needs some work. LPfi is correct that generally it seems people use what seems logical at the time of naming, or what sounds right to them. This is because while English speakers usually know what they mean when they use prepositions, there are also a lot of different relationships that can be defined by a given preposition and multiple prepositions that can be applied to some relationships. As an experienced English speaker, this may not pose much of a challenge to sort through most of the time based on context and such. However, for a less-experience English speaker, or especially one relying on translation tools to navigate English-named categories, this is more of a problem. Thus for Commons categories, there is a more simplified preposition employment that seems to work well while being relatively simple:
  • Of is the broadest preposition and thus can serve well in cases where only one relationship is categorized (as noted this is most topics). Alternatively, in cases where there are various prepositional relationships for the same two topics, 'of' works as the parent 'catch-all' with others as sub-categories. Essentially, an 'of' category means essentially "'Topic A' related to 'Topic B'".
  • In is more specific: "'Topic A' located within 'Topic B'". This is usually geographic, but can be other spatial situations, and is usually indexed in a 'by location' index.
  • From has to do with origin: "'Topic A' with an origin of 'Topic B'". Exactly what this means can differ based on the topics, but is usually indexed in a 'by origin' index.
  • With indicates setting or composition with other subjects: "'Topic A' depicted with 'Topic B'" or "'Topic A' with component 'Topic B'".
  • By is generally reserved in the topical tree to incdicate "sorted by" in indices where is it is "'Topic A' by 'sort criterion'" and in the media by source tree to indicate the creator of the topic: "'Topic A' created by 'Topic B'".
These are just the basics but cover the vast majority of actual use cases. Unfortunately, there are a lot of topics which use other interpretations of the above prepositions, so we are a long way from standardization across Commons. In any case where it might not be clear, more specific prepositional phrases can be used ('born in', 'in service with', etc.) as it makes sense. An example where several are used is Aircraft.
Applying the case above (Teenagers in the United States), "in" is the more specifically correct to indicate that the category is for pictures of teenagers actively located in the United States, regardless of origin or such. "Of" could include Canadian teenagers visiting the United States (they are 'in' the US), or Americans visiting Canada (they are 'from' the US). "Of" does have some connotations of ownership or belonging to, and so if indeed both of the listed cases exist and are deemed worthy of a category, the Canadian visiting the US should be in Teenagers in the United States and the American visiting Canada should be in Teenagers from the United States. Both of these categories can then be grouped in Teenagers of the United States. Josh (talk) 23:54, 9 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Museum exhibits and "November 2012 in Strasbourg"

See Category:November 2012 in Strasbourg and @Edelseider:

Should images be categorized to these narrow date/place categories solely on the basis that this is when a passing Commons photographer happened to press the shutter? I am thinking here (as this category is filled with) of museum exhibits which happen to be displayed in Strasbourg and were accessible on that date to be photographed, no more than that. The focus of the subject has no inherent link to either place or date.

Most of these images have nothing to do with Strasbourg in 2012, except for the coincidence of their photography. They are not of Strasbourg as a subject, by an artist connected to Strasbourg, of a subject of that date or even part of a temporary exhibition on that date. All of those would be justifiable reasons to categorize them.

The metadata here is about the image, not anything to do with the subject. We also record that they were taken with a Nikon P900, but we wouldn't invent "Category:Photographs by a Nikon P900 in Strasbourg".

All this does is that it dilutes the content that really does depend on "November 2012 in Strasbourg". Even when that's a relatively broad link, such as "the 500 year old church in Strasbourg, with people of 2012 wearing the fashions of that era walking past". Such a link does still have some temporal relevance, but a museum gallery is deliberately timeless and isolated. Andy Dingley (talk) 09:32, 12 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]

@Andy Dingley: I can see your point, but you've missed the bigger picture. These November 2012 photographs happen to have been taken during an exhibition ([1]), which is a special occasion and a specific event in time. Most of the artworks were on loan from abroad, this photo for instance shows a painting usually displayed in the National Maritime Museum in London. --Edelseider (talk) 09:44, 12 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Also, artworks tend to change over time - they darken, cracks appear or become larger, or they are restored and suddenly look brighter and fresher. Commons is full of photographs of artworks in a state before restoration and a state after restoration. --Edelseider (talk) 09:48, 12 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
The exhibition aspect is far from clear though. If that's the case, then I'd suggest creating a category for that exhibition, placing the images into that, and placing that exhibition category into the place/time category. This would make it much more visible.
As an example, why is File:Loutherbourg-L'Abbaye de Tintern, sur la rivière Wye.jpg here? It's part of a well-known series of paintings connected with SW England / Wales and still in SW England. There's nothing here evident to connect it to Strasbourg, so the categorization is never more than confusing.
If the history of the artwork is so important (and almost never place related), then categorize that on the artwork. An obvious example is Rembrandt's Night Watch and the several restorations that has had. Andy Dingley (talk) 10:17, 12 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Short answer: a time in place category is always welcome. Slightly longer answer 1: the more we try to decide that this is relevant for some photos and not for others, the less likely people are to add them. I'd really like to have everyone add this as a near-reflex on uploading. Slightly longer answer 2: yes, a category for an exhibition is also great, but exhibitions are usually longer than a month, while our usual time in place categories for recent history of cities are a single month. - Jmabel ! talk 13:58, 12 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Why do we bother with categorization? It's not to give a definition of the content (and can't), it's navigational, in order that relevant content can be found by those searching for it.
An artwork categorized with time and place adds nothing, unless that association has meaning. What if I photograph the same artwork fifty times, and put it in a different cat each time, because it's been hanging on the same museum wall for years. That's of no use to anyone.
The exhibition context has value, but only if it's identifiable. The Tintern painting gains nothing from being in Strasbourg in 2012, because nothing else tells me that it was there for a specific event (and I know that normally it's not even in the country). If the exhibition has a category, then I'm fine if that's no more specific than 2012, because that's how I'll be looking for it (over-sliced Commons cats are also a problem from those who don't know SPARQL and have a working query endpoint). Andy Dingley (talk) 16:08, 12 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Very much agree, especially with dilutes the content that really does depend on [some category name like "November 2012 in Strasbourg"].
It not only dilutes but there are further issues such as not being relevant, not being what the user looks for there and being distracting. One of the reasons why I don't think the image that will come to your attention first at Category:Wooden ladders in Russia is appropriate in that specific category, albeit there are more problematic cases. Prototyperspective (talk) 17:03, 12 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Exey Panteleev is a problem all of their own Andy Dingley (talk) 11:10, 13 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
It's useful for someone who wants (years later) a sense of what was in that time and place. I wish I had clarity of like this on a ton of third-party images we have from Seattle over the course of more than a century. - Jmabel ! talk 17:30, 12 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Agree in principle. And partly precisely because of that (the usefulness and relevance you described), such images should not be in this cat.
...or at least only in a subcat of it to which a user likely navigates through other routes or means (cats are not only 'navigational') than via for example a cat "November 2012 in Strasbourg". Prototyperspective (talk) 22:55, 12 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
"a sense of what was in that time and place" Yes, very much so. So a photo of a group of people in mini skirts in the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam in 1970 shows us something of museum visitors of that era and place. But a simple reproduction of a Rembrandt on the wall there has been there much the same for a hundred years beforehand, and likely hundreds to come. The intersection of photographer / time alone is too trivial to record by category (we have the metadata otherwise).
But what's worse in this case is that there is some relevance, but that the blunt categorization to month rather than to exhibition doesn't show that. Andy Dingley (talk) 11:10, 13 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
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