Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Macintosh

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Contents 1 Macintosh categories 1.1 proposal for discussion 2 Question about joining this project 3 Apple vs Microsoft & Hewlett Packard Confusion 4 Stablepedia 5 MacHeist 6 Wikipedia Day Awards 7 Rogue Amoeba 8 MacAddict and Mac|Life 9 Proposal: Logo change 10 Mac-stub recatting 11 Considering a PROD for Overture (notation software) 12 Mac Color Classic image 13 Control Panels (up to Mac OS 9) 14 Computer specs 15 Percent completed section

[edit] Macintosh categories

User:ChristTrekker is taking it upon himself to recategorize the Macintosh articles into arbitrary categories based on CPU type. I completely disagree with this idea. S/he has nominated Category:PowerBook for deletion, because they feel that splitting this into Category:PowerBook (PPC) and Category:PowerBook (68k) makes the most sense. Why? People who don't know what "PPC" and "68k" are, which is the vast majority of the planet, aren't going to understand this kind of jargon in a category name. Additionally, they're trying to get away with stating that the iMac, eMac, PowerBook etc. are "Power Macintosh" computers. Apple has never marketed these machines as Category:Power Macintosh, and aside from the fact that they contain PowerPC chips. This category should contain articles such as Power Macintosh 7100 and Power Mac G5... you know, articles with "Power Mac" in the name. Oh, and there's Category:Intel Macintosh computers. Say whaaa? Intel doesn't sell Macintosh computers. -/- Warren 22:10, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

• 1) Category:PowerBook wasn't nominated for deletion because of the more-specific Category:PowerBook (PPC) and Category:PowerBook (68k), but because of the more-general Category:Macintosh laptops. (Category:PowerBook would exclude x86-based models: the MacBook and MacBook Pro.) 2) Personally, I feel that multiple categorization methods is good. If you want to look at Macs by product line/family, good. If you want to look at them by form factor, good. If you want to look at them by processor, good. Why can't we support all of them? I believe the categorization I had put in place addressed all three methods. If you want to do "Macintosh computers by CPU/form-factor/family" categories at a top level so that readers explicitly see how they're being organized, we can certainly do that. 3) Category:Power Macintosh seemed to encompass all PPC-based Macs, so it seemed a natural fit for use when group by CPU. If you want to deem that the "product family" category instead of the "processor family" category, I'm can accept that. I can use Category:PPC Macintosh computers instead. 4) I concur with your comment on my talk page. Category:x86 Macintosh computers (or similar) would probably be a better name than "Intel". ⇔ ChristTrekker 23:01, 10 November 2006 (UTC)
  • Warren is right. WAY too many categories, ChristTekker. Please stop! — Wackymacs 23:23, 10 November 2006 (UTC)
    • I fail to see how. Warren implies that categories for product line are OK. Distinguishing laptops from others seems like a no-brainer as well. So I'm only adding a CPU-type classification, with only three categories. Three extra somehow puts it over the top? Three mutually-exclusive systems, most Mac model articles having at most one from each system - that's three categories per model, which is not all that many compared to lots of articles I've seen. All three systems are based on a salient attribute of the topic - it's not like CPU type is something obscure and irrelevant like "Macs primarily manufactured in Singapore" or something. ⇔ ChristTrekker 16:54, 11 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] proposal for discussion

Here is my proposed categorization system, laid out graphically.

Macintosh computers
by CPU family			by case type						by product line (think I got them all)
68k	PPC	x86	desktops			laptops	towers	rack	original	II	Centris	Quadra	LC	Performa	PowerBook	Power Mac	‡
			all-in-ones
			compacts

This is a small departure from what I'd previously set up, in that it's more systematic. It doesn't try to fit product lines into CPU families, even though that's often what Apple did.

To reiterate, an particular model article would be in one subcategory of the each of the bolded categories, e.g. Centris 650 ⇒ 68k, desktop, Centris. The five exceptions I can think of are the main articles for the LC, Performa, PowerBook, Mini, and iMac because those lines spanned CPUs. I don't think this system is needlessly complex, but instead is helpful and informative. Categorizing by meaningful attributes obviously has precedent on Wikipedia, such as People by political orientation and People by nationality. Sometimes you even get those divisions intersecting again, such as American conservatives. This is what influenced the creation of PowerBook (68k) and PowerBook (PPC) - but Warren is probably correct in implying that we don't need to go to that level for the small number of articles each of those categories would have. Still, categorizing on three primary attributes (CPU, shape, line) would be beneficial.

‡ There is no need for mini, eMac, iMac, iBook, MacBook, MacBook Pro, or Mac Pro categories since they would only have one entry under the current precedent. If revisions are ever split out to their own pages (e.g. iMac (G4) and iMac (G5)), a category (iMac) could be created at that point. ⇔ ChristTrekker 23:25, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

As no one has had any comment for a month, I assume this is satisfactory, so am moving ahead. ⇔ ChristTrekker 18:38, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Question about joining this project

How would one go about "joining" this project? I have to edit a Wikipedia article as a school project. I have been assigned to edit the stub Macintosh Quadra 900. I would like to also help a bit more with this project when possible. --zlhappyone 22:06, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

You can add you're name to the list, but the project is pretty dead, I'm sorry to say. You'll want to look at the Guide to writing better articles and Simplified Ruleset. Do some research, don't mess with copyright or bias, and cite your sources. Use common sense and you'll get along fine. As for the writing itself, you can try some of the links on this page, but Google's probably a better bet.--HereToHelp 22:35, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Apple vs Microsoft & Hewlett Packard Confusion

I've run across three mentions of this in different Apple-related articles, and there seems to be two conflicting accounts. Notable litigation of Apple Computer page states that "Apple's claims against Microsoft were dismissed, primarily due to a license John Sculley had negotiated with Bill Gates for Windows 1.0." Apple Computer, Inc. v. Microsoft Corp. agrees but cites no sources. In the "Beginnings of Microsoft" section on the History of Apple Computer it claims that Apple and Microsoft settled out of court in an agreement that gave Microsoft unlimited use to the Macintosh GUI. I don't know enough about the situation to be able to clear it up one way or the other, but it needs to be cleared up.

Both are true. Apple lost in court on the copyright issue, but there were some remaining claims. (Patent I think.) Both companies agreed to cross licensing when Microsoft invested $150m in Apple in 1997. [1] --agr 12:17, 26 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Stablepedia

Beginning cross-post.

See Wikipedia talk:Version 1.0 Editorial Team#Stablepedia. If you wish to comment, please comment there. ★TWO YEARS OF MESSEDROCKER★ 03:45, 26 November 2006 (UTC)

End cross-post. Please do not comment more in this section.

[edit] MacHeist

The MacHeist article is up for deletion. From the Mac community perspective, what is your advice regarding this? --Rschen7754 (talk - contribs) 03:33, 21 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Wikipedia Day Awards

Hello, all. It was initially my hope to try to have this done as part of Esperanza's proposal for an appreciation week to end on Wikipedia Day, January 15. However, several people have once again proposed the entirety of Esperanza for deletion, so that might not work. It was the intention of the Appreciation Week proposal to set aside a given time when the various individuals who have made significant, valuable contributions to the encyclopedia would be recognized and honored. I believe that, with some effort, this could still be done. My proposal is to, with luck, try to organize the various WikiProjects and other entities of wikipedia to take part in a larger celebrartion of its contributors to take place in January, probably beginning January 15, 2007. I have created yet another new subpage for myself (a weakness of mine, I'm afraid) at User talk:Badbilltucker/Appreciation Week where I would greatly appreciate any indications from the members of this project as to whether and how they might be willing and/or able to assist in recognizing the contributions of our editors. Thank you for your attention. Badbilltucker 17:47, 30 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Rogue Amoeba

The Rogue Amoeba article was recently nominated for deletion due to reading like an advert and not having enough sources. It survived on the condition that it be cleaned up and sourced better. As that article falls under the scope of this project, I thought I'd post a note here for interested editors. Thanks! ···日本穣^{? · Talk to Nihonjoe} 03:20, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] MacAddict and Mac|Life

Has anyone given some thought about what to do about MacAddict changing its name to Mac|Life? The way I see it, we could either move the article to MacLife (or some other variation; I suspect going with the magazine's exact title Mac|Life might cause issues since MediaWiki considers the pipe a special character) and keep it about both, or have a separate article for the new magazine. If it helps in considering the issue, the February 2007 issue of Mac|Life is numbered as Issue #1. I've put a requested move template on the Talk:MacAddict page. -- Hawaiian717 07:07, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

Maybe MaclLife? That's a lower case "L", by the way.--HereToHelp 17:41, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

And {{lowercase}} won't even work (un-subst-ed, anyway), because it gives The correct title of this Life is Mac.--HereToHelp 17:44, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

I don't think it should be MaclLife. I have the magazine in front of me and they're definitely using the pipe character, not a lower case "L", when they refer to the magazine's name. You're seeing the problem with calling it Mac|Life, thus why I suggested using MacLife. -- Hawaiian717 18:58, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

Can we use Template:Pipe in title? ⇔ ChristTrekker 16:33, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Proposal: Logo change

I would like to propose that we change the logo of the Wikiproject. Currently, we use the 128k, which, at least to me, is unattractive and does not reflect the current style of Apple products. I propose that we change the logo to Image:Crystal Clear app mymac.png. I realize that this represents an iMac G4, and not the current generation of products, but I feel that it better reflects the modern Macintosh. Any comments? —W. Flake (talk) 22:13, 20 January 2007 (UTC)

I think that would be fine. IIRC, the previous logo was chosen because of the license terms of the alternative choices. ⇔ ChristTrekker 16:36, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Mac-stub recatting

I see that {{Mac-stub}} now feeds into Cat:Apple Inc. stubs, which is a bit confusing as it's left a mostly-empty Cat:Macintosh stubs category, a mismatch between the template name and the category, the Mac software type "parentless", and me scratching my head. (It's best to go via WP:SFD for stub type renamings and deletions.) So what's the plan: does WPJ want a "Mac" type, an "Apple" type, or one of each? Alai 07:29, 4 February 2007 (UTC)

I'm betting someone goofed during the Computer→Inc. mass-renaming. It appears to have been rectified, though. ⇔ ChristTrekker 22:47, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Considering a PROD for Overture (notation software)

I am considering a proposed article for deletion tag for Overture (notation software). How popular is this MIDI software among the Mac community? Please let me know. Guroadrunner 05:34, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

The article needs a little cleaning up, every section is deemed to be a stub rather than the entire article. But it does have some useful info. Why does it bother you so? Is it part of what Wikipedia isnt? Connectionfailure 13:34, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

When I Googled this software, I couldn't establish notability for Wikipedia. But, I don't know if it is popular in the Mac community (I'm on a PC) so I did not want to make a rash judgement on it. Guroadrunner 20:53, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Mac Color Classic image

I tried to fix Macintosh Color Classic so it shows the image Macintosh_Color_Classic.jpg‎ in the table. The image name had been spelled with spaces instead of underscores, but even with the image name spelled correctly it still doesn't work. What gives? --Eloil 13:27, 12 March 2007 (UTC)

The image appears to work correctly in my browser. Have you tried resetting your browser's cache? It might have an outdated version already stored. —W. Flake (talk) 16:05, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Control Panels (up to Mac OS 9)

Zillions of Control Panels having been released by third-party companies during the years of pre-OS X Macintosh, and I think it wouldn't be a bad idea to make - be it just very simple - a list of all the control panels that could be dug up and say what their use was, who were the developpers, and which system(s) it ran on. This way, a developper who is looking for fresh new ideas could come look at the list and propose the original developpers to transport these CP into today's OSes, Vista, OS X v.5, etc. It would also allow users who are looking for a transport of their once-beloved CPs to find it easily. Then maybe a page named "Third-Party Control Panels (Macintosh)" would need to be created. So far I couldn't find anything better than the page http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Mac_OS_APIs which is really miserable is that's all there is. (I am rating the OS X operating system below the previous ones and up to OS 9) Beforedecay 18:14, 19 March 2007 (UTC)

The only problem is most of the control panels would probably fail the notability guidelines for software. However, if you think that they can, it might potentially useful. —W. Flake (talk) 23:36, 20 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Computer specs

I think that the community should standardize which specs an article displays on a table, along with a picture (for example, the Apple I). My personal opinion is to have these specs:

• Manufacturer
• Type of media (personal computer, portable media player...etc.)
• Production date and discontinuation date
• Price
• CPU
• RAM
• OS
• Casing?
• Preceeding and succeeding version

That's what I can come up with from the top of my head. I leave this to the community. Sr13 (T|C) 08:30, 22 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Percent completed section

I left last August, and the percentages in the {{Project Macintosh}} are still the same as they were then. Shouldn't they have been updated since then? Macintosh User 22:48, 30 March 2007 (UTC)