CZ:Approval Process

Overview

Here, in broad strokes, is how the approval process goes:

1. An editor decides that an article is ready to approve, or nearly so. If the editor has worked on it herself, she asks another editor to approve it; or, if there are several editors all doing significant work on the article, then at least three of them can agree to approve it.
2. So then (one of) the approving editor(s) places a {{ToApprove}} template on the article's talk page. That approval template will be marked with a date, usually several days to a week from the date that it is placed. This acts as an announcement -- if the approval template remains there, approval will occur on that date. Meanwhile, the template could be removed by another editor if the discussion on the talk page is one that brings up important objections. The list of articles nominated for approval can be found at Category:Articles to Approve.
3. Unless the template is removed, on the designated date, a sysop (a person with "sysop" administrative rights on the wiki) then freezes the approved version of the article on the main article page under an {{Approved}} template. At that freeze, a draft form of the article is generated. The draft is not frozen.
4. When a user calls up the article, the approved (frozen) version appears. At the top of the article is a notice to users who would prefer to write or edit, redirecting them to the Draft page. Work on the article continues on that "Draft" page. Discussion about the article in progress is made on the Talk:Draft Page, and eventually it may be nominated to replace the approved version. Then the procedure repeats.

The provisional nature of this process

This process is provisional and probably temporary in this form. The use of templates, in particular, may be regarded as a temporary stopgap measure. Eventually, we will want to integrate certain procedures into the software itself. But it is actually desirable to test out the process first "by hand" before stabilizing it in code.

Who may approve

For any given topic, only editors who may be considered experts on that topic may approve an article on that topic.

Expert editors may approve articles in either of two configurations: individually or as part of a group.

Individual approval. Editors working individually may approve articles if they have not contributed significantly to the article. In this way, there is a kind of peer review. No single editor may approve an article to which that editor has contributed significantly. In other words, no editor may approve her own work singlehandedly. If the article has already undergone an approval and is being re-approved with only minor typographic corrections such a spelling erors and spacing adjustments to an approved version (that is, a 'bug fix' which commonly occurs with version 1.1), one-editor approval is acceptable.

Group approval. If there are three editors, all of whom are expert in the topic of an article, and all of which have been at work on an article, then any one of them may approve of an article with the concurrence of the other two.

An author may trigger the approval process simply by writing a note to several relevant editors, drawing attention to the page.

When and how to use the {{ToApprove}} template

An approving editor (or "approver") should be of the considered opinion that the article satisfies the Citizendium article approval standards.

The act of approval consists of placing a {{ToApprove}} template at the top of the talk page of an article. (You may wish to consult the Wikimedia page about templates for background. We haven't yet written our own help page for templates.)

Here is an example of the template as it appears on the talk page:

Nancy Sculerati MD has nominated this version of this article for approval. Other editors may also sign to support approval. The Biology Workgroup is overseeing this approval. Unless this notice is removed, the article will be approved on December 14, 2006.

Here is the code that produces that template:

{{ToApprove|editor=Nancy Sculerati MD|url=http://en.citizendium.org/wiki?title=Biology/Draft&oldid=100012889|group=Biology|date=December 14, 2006}}

Or, more generalized:

{{ToApprove|editor=APPROVER USERNAME|url=URL OF VERSION TO APPROVE|group=WORKGROUP|date=DATE TO APPROVE}}

To prepare the template, simply copy the above code and make the following replacements:

• For APPROVER USERNAME, put the username of the approver. This is your username without the [[ ]] brackets and without the usual User: prefix.

• For URL OF VERSION TO APPROVE, you need to look in the relevant page history:
  • If this the first time the article has been approved, then look under the "history" tab. Find the specific version, in the history, that you want to approve. It may or may not be the most recent version. Please don't simply list the URL of the main article; so, you would not mark down simply http://en.citizendium.org/wiki/Biology as the URL to approve. It should be something like http://en.citizendium.org/wiki?title=Biology&oldid=100024148
  • If this article has been approved before, then look under the "history" tab of the /Draft article, for example, the "history" tab you find on the Biology/Draft page. This is where the "working (draft) version" of the article is.

• For WORKGROUP, place the name of the overseeing workgroup, without the word "Workgroup", e.g. "Biology" not "Biology Workgroup", or "Philosophy" not "Philosophy Workgroup".

• For DATE TO APPROVE, write down the day after tomorrow, or perhaps even a few days after that to allow time for completion of last minute copyedits. You must give others at least 24 full hours to examine the article after you have flagged it with the {{ToApprove}} template.

If you have made all the correct replacements, then all the links in the template should appear blue. None should appear red.

Updating the {{ToApprove}} template after revision

It is all right if the article undergoes significant revision in the days following the initial placement of the {{ToApprove}} template. If after such revision the approver is still willing to approve the article in its revised state, she should update the URL in the template to point at the most recent satisfactory version of the article, found under the "history" tab. At any given moment it might or might not be the most recent version.

If an article is undergoing group approval, it must be the sense of at least two other editors, in addition to the approver, that the newly-revised version is also worthy of approval.

Involving other editors from a workgroup

• Discuss your impending approval on the forum for the relevant workgroup(s). This isn't required but it's a good idea.

Involving copyeditors (informally)

• Post a note to the Copyedit Board on the forums. Not required, but an excellent idea.

Sysops make it official with the {{Approved}} template

Anyone with "Sysop" permissions on the wiki--that is, personnel administrators, constables, and technical staff--may go through the following steps when initially marking an article as approved. An important exception is that no person with "Sysop" permissions on the wiki who has done any significant work on the article, or who is an editor in any workgroup to which the article is assigned may "do the honors." That means that Editors at work on the article who are also Constables must call another Constable to "do the honors." We thus hold a hard line against appearances of conflict of interest. To ask a Constable to "make it official," simply send an e-mail to constables@citizendium.org. The following steps may be followed on or after the date (and time, if any) given by someone with "Sysop" permissions:

1. Examine the talk page. Make sure it's clear that there are three editors who are in agreement about the approvability of the article, or, if it seems there is an individual approval going on, make sure that the person approving the article has not worked much on the article. (For that, examine the article's history.)
2. Make the Draft page:
   • Copy the current version of the article (i.e., the one you see by simply clicking "edit"), and paste it into a new "Draft" page. If the article name is "XYZ" then the draft page name is "XYZ/Draft".
   • At the top of that page, make a link back to the approved version of the article:

     "Most recent approved version: [[XYZ]]"

   • Comment out the article's categories. To do this, simply surround the template code with

     <!-- [[Category:Foo]] ... -->

   • Create a category link to the workgroup for the Draft page by adding a category to the bottom of the Draft page:

     [[Category:{{{Group}}}_Workgroup_Draft]]

   • Save. You're done making the Draft page.
3. Protect the approved version of the main namespace copy of the article:
   • On the talk page of the article to be approved, where you find the article's {{ToApprove}} template, click through to the URL supplied by the approving editor. Copy the text there.
   • Edit the main namespace version of the article. Delete whatever is there, and replace it with what you copied from the approved page.
   • At the very top of the article, put in the {{approved}} template. This requires that you copy the exact editor username and group name. Here is the form:

     {{approved|editor=APPROVER USERNAME|group=GROUP NAME}}

     For example:

     {{approved|editor=Nancy Sculerati MD|group=Biology}}

     In some cases other fields, such as group2 and abc, will have to be used in the form:

     {{approved|editor=APPROVER USERNAME|group=GROUP NAME|group2=GROUP2 NAME|abc=ARTICLE NAME SORTED}}

     The group2 field should be used when a second workgroup has oversight.

     The abc field should be used for all biographies so they are sorted by last names. For example, the Barbara McClintock approval template is written as abc = McClintock, Barbara so the article is sorted under M rather than B. This field can be useful for non bigraphical articles too; a hypothetical example is 'List of Biologists' that that would use the abc field in the following formatt: abc = Biologists, List of.

   • Save.
   • Press the "protect" tab. Change both "Edit" and "Move" options to sysop only. Explain why you're protecting the page: "Article version approved." You're done making the Approved article copy.
4. Now, go to the article's Talk/Draft page, and "comment out"--do not delete--the template. To do this, simply surround the template code with

   <!-- [template code here] -->

   • Change the Article Checklist status to "0" for approved.
   • Leave a note saying that you've approved the article.
   • Insert this template at the bottom of the talk page to separate the before approval article discussion from the after approval discussion.

==APPROVED Version 1.0==

<div class="usermessage plainlinks">Discussion for [http://en.citizendium.org/wiki?title=PAGE ID Version 1.0] stopped here. Please continue further discussion under this break. </div>

Make sure to put the current version in the PAGE ID space. An example should look like this:

Discussion for Version 1.0 stopped here. Please continue further discussion under this break.

• Click on the XYZ talk page Move tab. Type in the new location of the new talk page [[Talk:XYZ/Draft]]. A redirect will automatically be made so that all discussion will remain together on the talk draft page.

Finished!

Approval and protection process for templates used in approved pages

Editors and sysops need to be aware that a protected approved page draws on templates which contain text. Consideration should be given to subjecting key subject-specific templates for banners, boxes and footers to protection and editorial approval in step with major pages.

Re-approving revisions to approved articles

Re-approval is the process of approving the replacement to an approved article. These replacements are called versions (XYZ version 1.1, 1.2 and so on) for clarity here.

The process of re-approving a revision to an an approved article is in its essentials the same as for the first version, but as two article pages (approved and draft page now exist), a mode of operation needs to be established to minimize confusion.

A suggested approach is to continue all edit discussions leading to re-approval on the XYZ/draft talk page, and provide a section at the top of that talk page for the approval templates of the sucessive versions, which can be referred to in the text of the talk page as V1.1, V1.2 etc.

e.g.

==Article re-approval and version record area== ====Reserved for a log of event re-approval of XYZ article and template records==== See [http://en.citizendium.org/wiki/CZ:Approval_Process#Re-approving_revisions_to_approved_articles here] for help. ====Version 1.1 approval events==== (Earlier details of V 1.1 commented out for clarity) <!--{{ToApprove|editor= BLAH BLAH BLAH--> (Approval V 1.1) confusing text commented out but log details retained. ====Version 1.2 approval events==== Approval V1.2 ----

which will look like this:

Article re-approval and version record area

Reserved for a log of event re-approval of XYZ article and template records

See here for help.

Version 1.1 approval events

(Earlier details of V 1.1 commented out for clarity)

(Approval V 1.1) confusing text commented out but log details retained.

Version 1.2 approval events

Approval V1.2

---

It will be necessary for a sysop to transfer markup text to the protected main page to create a new approved version ( i.e. V1.1) by code copy, paste and save, and at such time annotate such re-approval save events with the approval version (e.g. V1.2 ) and source of code ("permanent links to source code are at the top of XYZ/draft talk, commented out") descriptions to clarify the source of the text.

Again, as with initial approval, an important exception is that no person with "Sysop" permissions on the wiki who has done any significant work on the article, or who is an editor in any workgroup to which the article is assigned, must "do the honors." That means that Editors at work on the article, who are also Constables, must call another Constable to "do the honors." We thus hold a hard line against appearances of conflict of interest. To ask a Constable to "make it official," simply send an e-mail to constables@citizendium.org.