Wikipedia:Graphics Lab/Resources/Research and Development

International Harmonization of GLabs' Recommendations, IMPORTANT :

The several now active Graphic Labs are meeting difficulties which lead each graphic lab to set up graphic recommendations/standards. This section note how we should work for the moment to avoid wast of time and energy. :

1. The English GLab is encourage to follow and copy the French choices and standards/recommandations, to avoid recommandations splits which may produce huge waste of time. ;
2. a recommendation is composed by series of optimized rules (names' conventions, encouraged colors) and series of tools (list of icons to uses, links towards sources)
3. feel free to create new recommandations/standard/legends, this is helpful ! but make them as proposal which may be merge into the current french recommandations (you can apply them for creation, but keep in mind that new global standard will come) ;
4. when you think one proposal is optimized, propose it to fr:User talk:Sting for maps (icons, colors, etc), and fr:User talk:Walké or :fr:Séhmur for other conventions.
5. This because these skilled graphists are currently listing all maps and graphic recommandations in the aim to produce by mid 2008 (?) some new Wikimedia graphic's (maps/diagrams) uniformized, optimized, and strongly encouraged recommandations/standards.
6. Afterwhat, all maps (and many diagrams) on Wikipedia will have to be edit according to these recommandations. A global work probably on more than 5.000 images is planned for 2008-2009-2010 (Yes... huge project...), where all graphic Labs will have to collaborate.

The last thing, is that I encourage you to now (that you are really active ;] ) create your own Wikipedia:Graphic Lab/Research and development for your own development and to overview the tutorials, the various news pages you create + have a graphist mediator always aware of new development on the French Graphic lab (fr). This again to avoid waste of time.

Your /Research and development may be first based on this post, and then expand by your teams.

Good Luck into your grow ! Your team still have lot to do, but I'am happy to see that the English GLab is now moving to a pretty good success and development. Muahaha ! Let's Roll !

Yug 06:31, 10 January 2008 (UTC)PS: for the next year I will just make about 5 edits a month. I will just come to post you some summaries such this one. Sorry to don't be able to help more.

Comments:

This looks like a very sensible proposal, and I support it wholeheartedly. Unfortunately, my French is not good, so I will only be of limited assistance in translating recommendations. --Slashme (talk) 11:09, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

We need a regular interpreter (English<->French G. Labs) :

We need a regular interpreter (English<->German G. Labs) :

Summary: we need users to keep a coordination between our Graphic Labs and graphic standards, this to avoid huge waste of time.

Current Proposal

Here is a draft proposal, listing the mains parameters of this kind of charts, and giving my opinion about each of them.

Semi-circle and circle system : I don't really like semi-circle or circle. Why ? Because despite to be really clear, they have to show roughly two informations : the right number of deputy by color + the area of each color (in % of the circle). And I think that this last points is difficult to edit on a SVG, difficult to check, and so may be falsified (i.e. a pro-republican may display the republican area bigger than is true %).

refused. Not convenient untill we don't have an easy way to make and check that each color area is conform to it's pourcentage.

One deputy/One colored point system: I like more this system. Because : 1/ editable by every SVG newbie, 2/ quickly checkable by everyone, 3/ easily expandable, 4/ the % can perfectly be remove to the Image:page.svg and in the article.

Y proposition supported : seems to me to be the best way to be easily makable, clear, and checkable.

Displaying the Assembly shape system : seem useless. That's more difficult to provide/draw, is different for every countries, and make then like that will ask us lot of work without comparative gain in the message.

refused.

3D view VS 2D view (circle pie charts) : don't seems interesting. It look like one more difficulty adding to already existing difficulties link to 2D pie chart.

refused.

Colors ? : I prefer soft colors such display in the 1st and 4th images. An SVG displaying the list of the 12 (?) recommended soft colors should be create.

Y proposition valided : don't seems controversial. Stay to create an SVG listing the 12 (?) soft colors recommended, please wait the first attempt.

Include in the Image : country name or province name, years of vote ; total number of seats ; number of seat for each group/color ; % of each group (this is it really need here ?), exact day when the data was pick up such as "YYYY/MM/DD" (where to put this) . Do do not include (not forget) : groups' names (need on the image ? may be display on the legend using {{legend}}), explanations (should clearly be in the article)

Y proposition valided : seems to me the best optimization. To see clearly where put what, please wait the first attempt.

Exclude from the Image, include in the article : Legend explaining what means each color using the template {{legend}} : {{legend|#0000ff|Republican}} =

  Republicans (127 seats; 43%)

, with the number of seats and % of each groups.

Y proposition valided : seems to me the best optimization.

Naming convention : the name should contain all the following data : Country name, election name, year, language code (? not need if we agree to always produce free-of-text charts), and round number.
A proposition of recommendation, underlining the Country :
Countryenglishname_YYYY's_ElectionName -languagecode.svg , i.e. : Japan_2007's_House of Councilors election_1st-en.svg.
If you have a doubt for these names just check Wikipedia's article, i.e. Wikipedia use fluent names such as "French legislative election, 2007". But this should be put into basic english such as : France 2007's legislative election 1st-fr.svg (Taiwanese -> Taiwan ; Kenyanese ? Kenyan ? -> Kenya 2007's ...).

? proposition : seems to me the best optimization for international use -> validated, except if this name seems really ugly to native english speakers' ears (then -> French legislative election, 2007 1st-fr.svg, based on article's name.).

For standard creation, we have to keep in mind: that the image should be perfectly clear, able to say quickly and clearly the facts. In Wikipedia : the illustration will be accompanied by a legend, an article, etc , but the image will also be print by high school students, and so the image file need to bring the basis to be a good start point of a presentation. 1/ the filename provide the context Japan 2007 House of Councilors election-en.svg , 2/ the image provide the data : year ; total number of seat ; seats by group ; % by group , 3/ yes, we expect from our "high school student" to be able to read file name and to remember the topic of his speech... 4/ but what provide the groups names ? I think we should also expect from our high school student to remember the image's legend and articles comments.

Yug 13:19, 12 January 2008 (UTC)

Comments

Pie chart, or list of colored dot ?

This current proposal finally encourage to avoid pie charts. Despite their good looking, they don't offer enough guarantees of accuracy to be raise to the level of a recommendation. I'm myself a little disapointed by this conclusion, but I had to make a choice between "Good looking" and "Easy to do, to check", I chosen the second one. If you know a way to color disk on Inkscape into pie charts by seting the % of each part, they please tell it. Yug. 17:55, 12 January 2008 (UTC)

Could I ask why some were arbitrarily marked "rejected" and how this is "90%" done? I think 3 people (Myself, you and User:Sagredo) have commented on this: far to few to be able to arbitrarily declare a standard and certainly not enough to "reject" proposals out of hand which obvious have some merit (They're being used in at least one articel). 68.39.174.238 (talk) 21:26, 12 January 2008 (UTC)

How to set up an optimized recommendation ?:

This text have been move to Wikipedia talk:Graphic Lab/Research and Development#How to set up an optimized recommendation ?

Yug 09:34, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

I'm not (for obvious reasons) really involved with the means of consensus here, but I think that's a French system and not a universal one. The rough and ready blanket-primary-of-systems we have here seems to be working (Especially since this doesn't involve major wiki politics like pagemoving, etc.). Once a standard is adopted, it should be fairly easy for everyone (here) to follow it. 68.39.174.238 (talk) 16:27, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

1. It's certainly time to start the page Editing Wikipedia:Graphic Lab/Research and Development and move this there. Perhaps put a note on the appropriate German and French pages, even if it's in English and on the images to improve page, everyone should be welcomed to make comments on the English page any language. I think English will prove to be the most universal, but with any luck we'll get translators as well. Perhaps we'll end up with a trilingual page.
2. Slashme is a chemical engineer, and he has/knows about software which will generate all sorts of charts from raw data. Fvasconcellos may very well will know something as well. I left notes on their talk pages.
3. About all I can put in is the layman's point of view. And that just for the U. S. I think the public is very used to circular pie charts for things like budgets. Seating charts for things like legislatures. I really don't have the technical knowlege to keep up with this. I did study engineering, but that, too was a while back. Sagredo^{⊙☿♀♁♂♃♄} 23:53, 12 January 2008 (UTC)

I have had a look at the alternatives, and I strongly support the one-representative one-dot system. It gives more information at a glance than the pie chart: The pie chart shows you the balance of representation, but the dot-chart also shows you which parties only have one rep or two reps in sitting. The seating plan is cute, but I agree that it's not worth the added effort, and is inefficient in terms of pixels used per amount of information presented. --Slashme (talk) 06:52, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

Ok, I also made this choice because it's the most efficient. It stay to find a way to be nice and efficient in the same time : delete space between square ? use dot ? etc. Yug 15:09, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

NO. If you run all of the squares together, then you have to guess at the true number. With a separation, you can just multiply the rows by columns and add any extras. 68.39.174.238 (talk)

I like circles for this. Then you don't have to worry about the thickness of the lines in between the rows and columns.--Slashme (talk) 10:50, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

As for the soft colours, nice idea to keep a standard SVG for this purpose. --Slashme (talk) 06:52, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

Ok. Yug 15:09, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

I suggest using the locally (EG. Within the legislature's jurisdiction) understood symbols.

Talks about Slashme's script solution

See also : Slashme's current script and the associated talk page

How about giving the option of making it an HTML table (wikitable?) or an SVG at the user's discretion? It could in principle look exactly the same, and has some technical advantages when you have a grid, and might be easier to fix for people without graphic design experience or software when a by-election changes one seat. --Slashme (talk) 06:52, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

I'll look into methods of automatically generating the SVG of the table. I'm sure it can't be too hard, in fact it might be possible to do by template! --Slashme (talk) 06:52, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

Interesting idea, we are here to test new ways... so go ahead if you think that can produce a gain. Yug 15:09, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

Summary: 1/ 8.39.174.238's proposat to organize the page "research and development" between "Standard" VS "New" ; 2/ 8.39.174.238's proposal to use the symbolic colors use by the parties themselves into our output SVG.

I'm busy writing my script to generate an SVG given a list of parties and their representation levels. I'm going to implement it as a cgi script and make the code available for improvement. As soon as I have a working copy, I will give the web address and post examples. Doing it in the evenings makes progress a bit slow, but it will probably be ready by Monday. --Slashme (talk) 10:38, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

I've now got a python script which draws a nice-looking array of squares, each "party" being represented by its own (random at the moment) colour. I'm still going to:

• Fix the scaling (at the moment it just draws the squares 50x50 with 10 space in between and doesn't worry about page size, so I'll make those lengths multiples of the page size, easy to do)
• Set a standard list of colours: Where do I get the list? Someone please mail me or drop a note on my talk page in case I miss any responses.
• Make it draw a legend at the bottom (will be easy)
• Give the option of circles as well as rectangles so that we can decide what looks better (really easy).
• Implement it as a CGI script on my freeshell account (not hard to do)

I have karate and Go this evening, but sometime this weekend I should have a working script for you all to test.--Slashme (talk) 10:06, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Thus far I've discovered Political colour, {{Party name with colour}} and Category:Political parties colours templates. 68.39.174.238 (talk) 15:55, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Well, the Stellenbosch Go Club only starts meeting next week, so I got the script into a state where it writes OK pictures, but I'm not quite done yet: Please see User_talk:Slashme/parliament.py.

• Need to make circles as well
• Inkscape seems to mess up the file when I save as "plain svg"
• Need to convert to CGI and host on freeshell.org
• Need to check out the standard colours

You can check out the source code at User:Slashme/parliament.py. Sorry, no comments yet!!

Here are some example images:

• Demonstrating the balance of power in Wikipedia :-)
  Demonstrating the balance of power in Wikipedia :-)
• 
  Demonstrating that the script works OK with unicode (on Linux, anyway)

--Slashme (talk) 20:29, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

HeHe, I'm unfortunately an RDer, despite the fact I'm such an absentee there. Makes me wonder what the upper house would look like; WP:AC, WP:ANI and WP:DEL?

Well, you will notice that my parliament was slightly biased, but yes, I think you have the House of Lords pretty well pegged X*D --Slashme (talk) 06:49, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Anyway, I suggest making the different blocs go from side to side and not top down.

Good point. I'll do that.--Slashme (talk) 06:49, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

If you can, can you add the majority lines bit (EG. By asking "What majorities should be indicated?" and allowing people to enter fractions or #s of seats (Whichever is the easiest to implement in code))?

The majority lines are a good idea, but note that they will not be straight lines in general. But yes, not a big headache to code. Maybe this weekend. As for fractional seats, I think that will be easier to do by hand, but I'm open to convincing. What do you mean by #s? or was that a typo for %s?--Slashme (talk) 06:49, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

I was just suggesting having the code ask what the majorities were, so when it generates the seats, it can then draw lines at, say 1/2 and 3/4 (Assuming those mean anything) to show which parties (If any) have the majority required to pass legislation and amend the constitution (or override a veto, or 'peach the president, or overthrow the government, etc, etc.). What I meant was possibly allowing people to enter "0.5" as well as 141 (seats) and having both be recognized, however it might be best to just pick the safest one to implement and add explainitory text to the question. 68.39.174.238 (talk) 16:52, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Oh, OK, now I understand. I'm not quite sure how the lines should work. There are at least two obvious possibilities – a step and a slice:

• 
  33% slice of the US Senate
• 
  33% step of the US senate

but only the step will work in general, because the slice depends on having a complete rectangle, which becomes difficult when you have (for example) 239 seats in your legislature. It seems pretty easy to code, except for collision avoidance, which I'll leave up to the user, so I'll do it some time in the next two weeks. --Slashme (talk) 14:06, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Why does the "slice" say that 30 is 1/3 of 100?! I do see what you're saying though, about the two methods, only why is the line divide the seats in fractions? 68.39.174.238 (talk) 18:08, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Well, the "slice" doesn't cut at 30, it cuts 1/3 of the way through the 31-40 column, giving 33 1/3. As for dividing the seats into fractions, how else would you represent 33 1/3? --Slashme (talk) 05:15, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

I've had another think about this. For a majority vote threshold you need a certain number of votes. For example in a legislature with 100 seats, you need 67 votes to pass a 2/3 majority motion. I won't be coding this weekend due to having a busy social calendar, but when I get around to it, I intend to allow specification of:

• Fractions (e.g. "2/3" or "1/2") or
• Number of seats (e.g. "67" or "50")

I don't intend allowing percentages, because then too many people will type "66%" when they mean "67%".

Comments please? --Slashme (talk) 08:38, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

I would prefer fractions, since that's how they are usually constitutionally specified, EG. "Two-thirds of both Houses concurring", not "67 here and 290 there", however allowing specific numbers may be useful for showing, EG. "Two-thirds were needed (One line), but only 117 voted for it". Also, do you think we should have specific colors for the lines for different purposes (EG. One color for a simple majority, another color set to mean "Majority to change the constitution", "majority to override vetoes", "Majority to impeach the executive", etc)? 68.39.174.238 (talk) 19:44, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

OK, I think you have a point here; I'll stick to fractions and numbers for flexibility, though. I don't think different colours of lines are really necessary: This is not likely to become a standard, as there are so many possible variations on the theme. What I suggest is that I allow the user to specify a list of fractions and numbers, and I'll put a line in at each fraction or number given, with the label of the line being the fraction or number as given. If the user asks for too many lines, the diagram will look stupid, and they'll hopefully notice that. If the user wants different colours, that's really easy to do in inkscape (or even a text editor) afterwards. I suggest that I round all fractions upwards to the nearest integer, as that's the most logical sense to be made from the diagram. --Slashme (talk) 05:54, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Just remember to round up. 68.39.174.238 (talk) 17:54, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

Also, why circles?

Just an alternative that was suggested above.--Slashme (talk) 06:49, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Anyway, thanx; this'll be the best thing ever when refined: we can create SVGs by the THOUSANDS... for EVERY LEGISLATURE... EVER. :DDDDD 68.39.174.238 (talk) 00:40, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the support! much appreciated. Everyone, please put bug reports and feature requests on User_talk:Slashme/parliament.py. --Slashme (talk) 06:49, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Coalitions

A new idea: For legislatures where parties form superparties or blocks (Think Taiwan & their two coalitions), what would we do? I suggest having the parties in a block have their representatives squares bordered by the color of their coalition (EG. In the current Alaska Senate, we would have blue squares (Democrats), but the squares borders would be purple (Coalition). The uninvolved Republicans could be just red squares. 68.39.174.238 (talk) 21:18, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

This is a good suggestion. I will add it to the "wishlist" section of User_talk:Slashme/parliament.py. --Slashme (talk) 12:49, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Majortarian indications

Summary: Suggestion to add lines to indicated various majorities: 1/3 1/2 and 2/3 proposed. It was noted that these would have to be specified by the image creator as different legislatures have different working majorities.

Special sections

Another idea, which may or may not be useful: What about indicating separately special seats? Many countries have legislatures with a certain %age of seats allocated specifically for certain groups, EG. the new Montenegro Assembly has 5 seats for Albanians. Is there an easy and logical way to indicate these? Should we care (etc.)? 68.39.174.238 (talk) 04:17, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

Very good point! In general, I assume there could be some parties which have seats in the reserved and non-reserved sections. How about allowing numbers in the form of "aRb" (e.g. 12R3) meaning that there are 12 seats of which three are reserved, and then all reserved seats are shown as circles in the party colour instead of squares? I will only be working on the script again after 14 Feb, as I have to prepare a talk on my M.Sc. work, so please discuss other suggestions in the meantime. --Slashme (talk) 06:45, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

It depends: in some cases, the seats are competed for by totally different parties (EG. The ethnic ones), in others (EG. The ones requiring a certain % or number to be women), that may be fought over by all the parties. The last one though, makes be think of states in a federal affair: We would be drawing hundreds of lines to show the individuals state representation (EG. MA is all blue, but NJ has 7 and 8)! 68.39.174.238 (talk) 19:19, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

Well, I guess we could leave the details to the user, maybe having different classes of seat be represented by different symbols. For example, the user could type:

Barking Mad Party:35,3(Women),2(Youth):#FFAAAA;Monster Raving Loony Party:0,3(Sith),4(Women):#d768c5;Very Silly Party:11,3(Jedi):#AAAAFF

and get a diagram with the Barking Mad Party having 35 pink squares, 3 pink circles and 2 mauve triangles, the Monster Raving Loony Party with 3 mauve pentagons and 4 mauve circles and the Very Silly Party with 11 powder-blue squares and 3 powder-blue crosses. The key would then show the parties each with a square in its colour, and also have a list with the symbols just given as transparent shapes with black outlines. If the list becomes unwieldy due to its length, I might have to code it as a few text boxes for each party with a button to add a party. This would be much more user-friendly. --Slashme (talk) 09:19, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

I like the idea of a new UI (If possible). Feeding it a long string is probably the easiest way to parse, but it will get really unwieldy with things like Papua New Guinea. 68.39.174.238 (talk) 04:31, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

Script unavailable

I see I have to upgrade my membership at freeshell to get continued use of the cgi facilities. This isn't very expensive, but I will only get around to it in a few days. Until then, the script is unavailable. Sorry!! --Slashme (talk) 05:28, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

OK, now the script is again available: See User:Slashme#Parliament_diagram_tool. There are now two scripts, one for semicircular diagrams, one for rectangles. --Slashme (talk) 09:04, 29 May 2010 (UTC)