Project grants/Writing about Portsmouth

Basic information

Project Title

Writing about Portsmouth

Proposed by

User:Jaguar

Are you currently a member of Wikimedia UK?

Yes

Project description

Briefly describe the issue or problem that motivates this application. What needs are you meeting?

I am attempting to bring the article on Portsmouth to Good Article status on the English Wikipedia. Purchasing books related to the topic will help ensure the content is high-quality and well sourced.

Describe project activities. What will you use the funding to do?

I will use the following books to improve the article on Portsmouth to Good Articles status:

• A Portsmouth Miscellany (£5.78 used inc P&P)
• The History of Portsmouth (£9.86 used inc P&P or £9.99 new inc P&P)

Describe your plan for evaluating this project. How will you measure success? What types of things will you measure (e.g. content, participants)?

Each project will be a success once an article has been promoted to GA status. I will consider nominating an article to FA status depending on how much information I can find on the subject.

Identify key people involved in this project. How will or could the wider Wikimedian community be involved?

It will be myself who will be writing the content, however any small outside assistance is welcome.

Discussion

@Richard Nevell (WMUK): and @Karla Marte(WMUK): I endorse this grant request and would like to see it approved as soon as possible. I've given Portsmouth a heavy review and think it would really benefit from some further history research before I pass it. What the article really needs is some decent book research I think. Jaguar is an experienced editor and a friend, so I think he'll put the sources to some use.Dr. Blofeld (talk) 09:37, 8 September 2016 (BST)

Thank you Dr. Blofeld your thoughts on this are very useful. I've just emailed Jaguar about this to follow up our discussion from last week. Richard Nevell (WMUK) (talk) 13:46, 8 September 2016 (BST)

Approval

The budget holder has approved this grant.

Richard Nevell (WMUK) (talk) 14:24, 9 September 2016 (BST)

Progress

I hope that this is the right place to leave updates on my progress. The second book, A Portsmouth Miscellany, arrived today and it's been brilliant! I've spent most of the day ploughing through Portsmouth's history section, basically rewriting it and replacing the choppier sentences from low quality online sources. Both of the books are great, the first book (The History of Portsmouth) covers a lot of detail from the middle ages to 1800. It was released in 1817 and unfortunately doesn't cover anything from 19th century, but the second book does. I'm up to the Stuart to Georgian section at the moment. The prose already reads a lot better as I'm taking out content from higher quality sources. If all goes well then I should finish the history section by the end of the week. Both books cover different aspects of the city, so I won't stop there! Jaguar (talk) 20:51, 14 September 2016 (BST)

Good news and bad news; I've just literally got my internet access back this afternoon, which explains why I wasn't able to edit over the past few days. It's a shame as I reckon I could have got everything done at the rate I was going a few days earlier. Anyway, I'm back editing the article now at full speed. Just wanted to check in just in case you thought I went AWOL! Jaguar (talk) 17:48, 19 September 2016 (BST)

@Jaguar: Sounds good, thanks for the update! Richard Nevell (WMUK) (talk) 15:09, 22 September 2016 (BST)

Portsmouth has passed its review and is now a GA! I definitely couldn't have done it without the books. Both were vital; with History of Portsmouth being more in depth and A Portsmouth Miscellany covering a far wider range of topics which allowed me to fill in a lot of gaps. I could have probably got it promoted last week if it wasn't for computer issues, so apologies for the delays. I think that getting an important city is not only a good achievement for me, but it's a significant milestone for both the Hampshire and UK WikiProjects. I'd like to bring it up to FA standard, although I haven't delved deep enough into that idea yet as it's just literally been promoted. I think to reach the FA criteria it would need some copyediting and perhaps a little more info on some aspects like transport and economy, which were the only topics not covered in the books. Jaguar (talk) 20:56, 30 September 2016 (BST)

Well done Jaguar, I'm sure Richard and Karla are delighted too!Dr. Blofeld (talk) 11:37, 1 October 2016 (BST)

Congratulations Jaguar! Karla Marte(WMUK) (talk) 13:10, 3 October 2016 (BST)

Thanks both! I'd like to close the grant now if that's OK and I'll send the books back ASAP. Karla told me to make a closing report so I'll get on that now. Around all I think I spent over 48 hours writing, researching, reading and editing Portsmouth from when I started in July to finishing in late September, which accumulated in a total of 1100 edits to the article. I remember spending at least an hour every evening working on it, so the figure could be under 48 hours or over. I could not have got Portsmouth to GA status without the books for sure. The first book, The History of Portsmouth, covered the history of the city into great detail and I was thus able to expand the history section greatly from it. The second book (A Portsmouth Miscellany) was very useful as it covered almost every topic from the ships, history, and people to politics, detectives and ghosts! The second book was by far the most used one, though the first book made me produce the most content. I initially wanted to get Portsmouth to FA status afterwards, but felt discouraged due to a lack of participation from other editors, and was unsure what direction to take the article into to make it FA-ready. I also wasn't sure if I possibly needed more books (and if so, which ones) to cover more topics, and I was also worried if the FAC itself wouldn't gain momentum. With all that out of the way, I am extremely pleased that I got it to GA status, and of course the possibility of a FA nomination is still open for the future. I would like to thank the grant holders for letting me do this, and Dr. Blofeld for encouraging me and giving an excellent review! Jaguar (talk) 19:18, 2 November 2016 (GMT)

Thank you for completing the project, Jaguar. It's great to hear that the article made it to GA. Articles about settlements require a lot of work, and you've done a really good job of it. Richard Nevell (WMUK) (talk) 13:20, 3 November 2016 (GMT)