Wikiversity talk:Categories

I'm not really part of the Category Cleanup Taskforce, but I plan to totally restructure the categorical heirarchy of the History category and subcategories, and then move onto Language related category tasks. The goal is to get them all interfacing smoothly and powerfully with the Browse function. The Jade Knight 09:17, 3 September 2008 (UTC)

The content at Help:Categorization was merged with Wikipedia:FAQ/Categorization, so I removed the redundant link. CuriousOne (talk) 22:31, 28 October 2012 (UTC)

Redundant Special Categories
The section "MediaWiki category tools" includes both "Special:Uncategorizedimages" and "Special:UncategorizedImages". Both link to "Special:UncategorizedFiles", yet "Special:UncategorizedImages" is NOT in the list of "MediaWiki category tools". It looks to me like "Special:Uncategorizedimages" should be deleted and "Special:UncategorizedFiles" should be added to this list. However, I don't know what all that might impact, so I'd prefer to report it here, hoping that someone more qualified than I would fix it. Thanks, DavidMCEddy (discuss • contribs) 03:04, 19 February 2013 (UTC)

Category Structure
Wikiversity top-level categories have been structured / restructured according to the following approach. Initially I reviewed Library of Congress Classification. This seemed like a good approach, and helped for a time, but there are some LCC top-level categories that don't seem to be top-level relevant here.

The next step was to look at Main Page, which lists only eight top-level portals (Arts, Biography, Geography, History, Mathematics, Science, Society, Technology). Much of this was useful when replaced with academic names. This led to top-level categories of Humanities, Interdisciplinary Studies, Mathematics, Medicine, Science, Social Sciences, Technology. A review of Outline of academic disciplines supports a similar approach, although that split the sciences up a bit.

Once top-level categories were defined, subcategories were then identified using Outline of the humanities,  Outline of mathematics,  Outline of health sciences,  Outline of natural science, and  Outline of technology.

There are certainly other ways to structure categories, but this seems to be a minimal starting point to work from. Please provide suggestions and rationale for any changes you would recommend. For example, we could list Computing and/or Engineering as top-level categories based on viewership, or we can leave them as is under Technology. Singling out top-viewed categories might provide a more responsive user experience, or it might complicate the interface and self-perpetuate the the popularity of top categories.

Suggestions welcome. -- Dave Braunschweig (discuss • contribs) 04:47, 17 February 2016 (UTC)


 * I've never looked much at the overall category hierarchy here before... it's rather confusing isn't it? :) Thank you for fixing it. I just tweaked the page (it was in a category, which created a circular category path). It also linked to Help:Category, which redirects to FAQ/Categorization... what is the difference in purpose between that page and Categories?
 * As far as actual top-level categories go, I think your set of {Humanities, Interdisciplinary Studies, Mathematics, Medicine, Science, Social Sciences, Technology} sounds good — and an additional 'meta' category for Wikiversity-internal pages also. Where in that would fine arts go?
 * &mdash; Sam Wilson ( Talk &bull; Contribs ) &hellip; 05:59, 17 February 2016 (UTC)


 * I presume the intent was that Categories explains the concept, and FAQ/Categorization explains how to apply the concept, but perhaps they should be merged so that there is one source of reference.


 * According to Outline of the humanities, humanities includes both visual and performing arts. There are many institutions that define this area as "arts and humanities", suggesting that there are those in arts and humanities don't see the term "humanities" by itself as covering the arts. I'm fine with either having Arts separate or having Arts included under humanities. In fact, I created a really nice (personal opinion) Arts portal before discovering that arts was included in humanities. The deciding factor for me was not finding "arts" in the top 1,000 pages. But there is interest in music and dance indicated in the top pages. I'll check with people in the arts at my institution and try to enhance my perspective. -- Dave Braunschweig (discuss • contribs) 14:07, 17 February 2016 (UTC)


 * A visual artist responded and said she would look for Arts first, separate from Humanities. She would only look for humanities if there were no arts or fine arts links available. I'll add Arts back in as a top-level category and portal. -- Dave Braunschweig (discuss • contribs) 22:33, 17 February 2016 (UTC)