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Archives

Archive 1 Archive 2

More Info

This is most useful! However some (to me) critical details are currently missing:

• download file size
• is installation necessary
• which versions of win will it run on (out of the box)

If I could answer the above I would... but as yet I cant. Tabby 10:12, 2 November 2007 (UTC)

How about adding new features in the list

• Spell checking
• Incremental finding
• history/chat-log
• Auto updatesMabdul (talk) 13:44, 9 May 2008 (UTC)
• DCC file send supports router port forwarding--Ubercoder (talk) 04:06, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

More IRC Clients

clients which need to be add and have already an article:

• Ayttm
• Centericq
• eMule
• ERC
• fire
• Instantbird
• jIRC
• Microsoft Comic Chat
• Morpheus
• naim (chat program)
• Orion
• Pork client
• Qnext
• Quiet Internet Pager
• Shareaza
• Babbel —Preceding unsigned comment added by 12.109.229.8 (talk) 17:55, 5 May 2009 (UTC)

every other client should be on the to-do list on the project page mabdul 0=* 08:59, 31 March 2009 (UTC)

I added the rest of the red links that are currently in the Comparison of Internet Relay Chat clients tables to the Misplaced Pages:WikiProject IRC/To Do List. There may be others in the clients table that could be added to to the comparison tables here. There may also be others in Category:Internet Relay Chat clients. If you find any existing client articles not in the category, please add the categories and add wikilinks to the WikiProject IRC article index. Tothwolf (talk) 21:27, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

ok; new features in the comparison want to get values! ;) mabdul 08:28, 28 April 2009 (UTC)

The Multi-IM instant messenger clients that have IRC support in the list above really do not belong in these tables since there is already a Comparison of instant messaging clients article that does a much better job covering those. Some of the above links are for actual IRC clients however and those should be added. --Tothwolf (talk) 09:09, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

Klient

One of the lines regarding "Klient" no longer servicing keys was incorrect. As recently I myself just purchased a key, while the wait was somewhat long, key's and replacement keys are still sent.Ykram (talk) 05:22, 16 May 2009 (UTC)

Clients missing from comparison tables

This is a list of clients that are missing from the comparison tables, there are more not in this list that could also be added but these either already have articles or are on the WikiProject's todo list and won't be red linked after the large merge and redirect project is finished.

• BenderIRC
• Bottler (IRC client)
• CGI:IRC
• Chatbox
• Chatspace
• Conversation (software)
• DigiChat
• dIRC (IRC client)
• DSOrganize
• ERC (IRC client) (partially added)
• Grapevine (IRC client)
• HIRC
• Homer (IRC client)
• IRC (DOS IRC client)
• irchat
• iRC (IRC client)
• JChatIRC
• jIRC
• jIRCii
• Jpirc
• KoolChat
• libIRC
• Liece
• Microsoft Comic Chat
• Minerva IRC
• MomosIRC
• Peekko
• pork client
• Quassel —Preceding unsigned comment added by 79.214.63.254 (talk) 22:50, 4 November 2010 (UTC)
• qwebirc
• rcirc
• Rhapsody (IRC client)
• Riece
• roxIRC
• SmIRC
• StunTour
• TalkSoup
• TinyIRC
• Vision (IRC client)
• WebIRC
• Xaric
• Zenirc
• Zircon (chat client)

--Tothwolf (talk) 09:19, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

Formatting

May I request that the color for clients no longer in active development be changed to something other than light purple? There isn't enough contrast between gray (the default background color) and light purple; it is very hard to see the difference on some monitors & in some light situations.

AEnw (talk) 20:15, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

I agree with you about the contrast but I'm not really sure what else we could use. It currently uses the standard {{rh}} and {{rh2}} rowheader templates which are widely used for these purposes in these type of comparison tables. It may be worth considering changing the {{rh2}} template itself. --Tothwolf (talk) 22:35, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

Trillian

You know the IM software Trillian? It is also an IRC client. By default Trillian 3.1 and Astra carry a IRC add-on built in. :) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 173.169.215.79 (talk) 11:41, 25 August 2009 (UTC)

Trillian is an instant messaging client and is covered in Comparison of instant messaging clients. It used to have an entry here as well but if we were to cover all IM clients that offer IRC support in Comparison of Internet Relay Chat clients this article would become unmanageable (and it was getting to that point when I removed the IM clients that were already included). I suppose we could have a Comparison of instant messaging clients with Internet Relay Chat support, but I think it would be far better to update and restructure Comparison of instant messaging clients to better cover these if needed. --Tothwolf (talk) 21:56, 25 August 2009 (UTC)

Pidgin

Pidgin (http://pidgin.im/) isn't on the list, but it isn't just an irc client, it handles most protocols. Should it be there? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 130.102.79.49 (talk • contribs) 02:43, 17 September 2009 (UTC)

See #Trillian above. I've added hatnote templates which will hopefully help with this. --Tothwolf (talk) 16:28, 17 September 2009 (UTC)

Templates for deletion nomination of Template:Latest stable software release/rxIRC

Editors who work on this article may be interested in the discussion here regarding Template:Latest stable software release/rxIRC, which is one of the templates currently used in this article. --RL0919 (talk) 22:52, 27 September 2009 (UTC)

Version History chart

Version numbers and release dates are entirely arbitrary and not part of the comparison role of this article. Is there any reason to keep this section? Miami33139 (talk) 05:40, 1 October 2009 (UTC)

Well, since I've been working on improving these tables I'll try to answer.
Many people come here to check the version and release dates of various clients. It actually does play a role in the comparison, although I think the sortable tables in the operating system and features sections may also be fairly popular. Could you elaborate as to how it might not be useful to readers? Currently the date fields are far from complete (due to a lack of time more than anything else) and we still need to apply templates to those dates to make those fields sortable within that table. Currently this article currently gets around 450-500 hits per day so within this category of articles, it is one of the more popular, which is why we've primarily focused on it and the other meta-articles before taking on some of the smaller ones. --Tothwolf (talk) 06:09, 1 October 2009 (UTC)

Platform column

The platform column is pretty useless at the moment. It just lists the processor architecture not the actual platform. "Platform" means a combination of processor architecture, underlying OS, and vendor. Things like Android, Solaris, AmigaOS, Ubuntu etc. need to be added.

If you listed *that* information, the web page might be useful to me. I came here to find an IRC client for a foreign platform that I didn't know anything about (something called Windows). Instead I ended up downloading Opera as I know that it has a built-in IRC client. 87.194.208.119 (talk) 10:36, 14 January 2010 (UTC)

he? solaris is in, amigaos also, android is a Linux, ubuntu also: so why not looking in these columns? these table/comparison is more cluttered that every other comparison i saw in wikipedia! mabdul 23:12, 14 January 2010 (UTC)

Somebody please consider removing the platform column: A quick search on Debian's Package site will reveal most clients are for all the supported Platforms. The chart about OS support is much more useful in this case. --99.41.104.240 Thu Jan 20 00:09:13 UTC 2011 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.41.104.240 (talk) 00:09, 20 January 2011 (UTC)

How is this list discriminate?

I feel that this list is arguably indiscriminate, beyond being an IRC client. What criteria must an IRC client meet in order to be included in this list? I am curious. JBsupreme (talk) 22:16, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

As explained to me

1. The client has to exist. We have to be able to verify that the client actually exists and isn't a made-up hoax entry. This is standard practice for comparison articles.
2. The entry has to be more than just a name and link. It takes a good bit of time to research and fill out details so this raises the bar and tends to discourage drive-by additions of someone's no-name home-brew Visual Basic based client
3. Only standalone clients, browser plug-in type clients, or web server or browser based Java applet type clients should normally be included.
4. Multi-IM type clients that support other instant messaging protocols should go into the comparison article that covers Instant Messaging clients. This is for article size and maintenance reasons since many IM clients now offer basic IRC support.
5. Clients for mobile / handheld devices go into their own comparison article. This is also for article size reasons and because mobile devices have completely different operating system requirements than normal clients.

Which still sounds indiscriminate as only the first two are inclusion critera. The last three are simple sorting. The inclusion criteria is proof of existence and someone spending five minutes to fill in the chart. Bullet 2 is just a burden, but apparently anyone who documents their feature set - even if they have no users - is allowed an entry in this list. Miami33139 (talk) 16:53, 19 January 2010 (UTC)

this criteria seems a bit arbitrary. is it backed by policy? what ever happened to reliable sources or notability? i support the removal of non notable clients i.e. if there isn't an article about it, or significant RS coverage, then it should be removed from the list. Theserialcomma (talk) 18:05, 19 January 2010 (UTC)

I will leave this thread open for a few more weeks. I feel that the "speedy keep" closure was inappropriate in this case and will renominate it if no argument can be made that this list is discriminate. JBsupreme (talk) 06:40, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

Probably better off to tighten the criteria. Miami33139 (talk) 11:47, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

I will be renominating this for deletion next week if no argument can be made that this list is in any way discriminatory. JBsupreme (talk) 00:40, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Generally the critieria I see on these kinds of list insist on notable IRC clients. Which means any thing that is a red link or no link be removed. All of the URLs at the end make it seem promotional in nature.--Crossmr (talk) 01:35, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

I agree that red linked items should be removed, especially if they once linked to articles which have been deleted as a result of an AFD discussion. Does anyone disagree? If so, why? JBsupreme (talk) 01:57, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

I've cleaned up the first one as an example (but ran into a table problem there is a double line on the end, maybe someone can fix that).But there is a mass amount of charts here that seems overly extensive to be honest.--Crossmr (talk) 02:03, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

Keep on it. Miami33139 (talk) 02:21, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

Unfortunately I need to go out shortly. Anyone can jump in and carry on with the other tables. There are several there. How about everyone picks one and does it?--Crossmr (talk) 02:26, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

Yes, I disagree here. The value of an article such as this comes from it's ability to draw comparisons between different products. The more you limit the ability to draw those comparisons, the less useful it becomes. Given that there is no reason to limit this to notable software, limiting it on any other basis than verifiability and scope (IRC clients) is going to damage the article as a whole. - Bilby (talk) 04:32, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

There is a reason. Because wikipedia isn't a discriminate list, it isn't for promotion, and it isn't for advertisements. Which is what these become. Drive bys for people to advertise their new non-notable project on.--Crossmr (talk) 06:00, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

I'm hard pressed to see how having a intrinsically neutral list of IRC clients and basic information about the specifications can be seen as advertising. Perhaps there's a case for having extra criteria, but I'm not convinced that notability is the criteria we need, as that limits this list too much for it to have any real value. - Bilby (talk) 06:18, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

Because it included links to the sites. That makes it a directory and promotional. It isn't neutral if you're putting some random irc client that someone just whipped up in their spare time that no one has heard about on the same footing as notable projects. Neutrality is not giving the same attention to everything. It is given attention to things based on how reliable sources have covered it, and projects which aren't notable haven't been covered in reliable sources. These are even less than trivial viewpoints. So if you'd like to talk about neutrality, they have no place here.--Crossmr (talk) 14:10, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

Crossmr, perhaps not your intent, but I hope you do realise thay you are basically saying that the major contributors to this article such as Mabdul, Pyro3d, myself, and quite a number of others are "spammers" who are "drive by advertising". --Tothwolf (talk) 11:44, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

Perhaps its not your intention but you're coming across as someone desperately searching for a personal attack to be made against you or someone else instead of actually contributing to this discussion by trying to put words in my mouth. This is the second time you've done this and you're dangerously close to assuming bad faith.--Crossmr (talk) 14:10, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

We actually have policy that addresses this: Misplaced Pages:NOT#DIR which is linked from WP:LIST Of course, there is nothing wrong with having lists if their entries are famous because they are associated with or significantly contribute to the list topic. Entries on lists or comparison articles are required to be "famous" which in wikipedia terms means notable. If they don't have an article they don't belong on the list.--Crossmr (talk) 02:21, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

Actually, no. It says, as you quoted, "there is nothing wrong with having lists if their entries are famous" - it does not say "entries can only be included if they are famous ..." That's a rather odd interpretation you seem to be making. - Bilby (talk) 04:32, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

if their entries are famous it doesn't say "if some entries are famous" it says if the entries are famous. Its a perfectly reasonable interpretation. If you have a list without famous entries, you're violating the policy which is what is going on here. The requirement is that the entries are famous.--Crossmr (talk) 05:44, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

This remains a very curious interpretation. The full piece is:

Lists or repositories of loosely associated topics such as (but not limited to) quotations, aphorisms, or persons (real or fictional). If you want to enter lists of quotations, put them into our sister project Wikiquote. Of course, there is nothing wrong with having lists if their entries are famous because they are associated with or significantly contribute to the list topic (for example, Nixon's Enemies List). Misplaced Pages also includes reference tables and tabular information for quick reference. Merged groups of small articles based on a core topic are certainly permitted.

First, whatever this list may be, it is not a "list or repositories of loosely associated topics", so the whole section doesn't apply. Second, if it did apply, NOT#DIR says we can add items which are famous for being connected to a given topic, it's true, but not that fame = notability, nor that the only criteria for a list is that it must contain famous things. It's a sufficient, but not a necessary, condition. As mentioned elsewhere, Misplaced Pages practice has been specifically to allow lists of non-notable topics, as a decent thing to do with content once the article has been deleted - it may not be notable enough to stand on its own, but it is reasonable to group them into a list. - Bilby (talk) 06:18, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

Things are sometimes merged into articles, not lists. You can see List of social networking sites for an example where this isn't the case. Non-notable entries are always removed. The only way we have to measure fame on wikipedia is through notability. Anything that would indicate a client is famous would also indicate it is notable and qualify for an article.--Crossmr (talk) 14:15, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

Sorry, but no - obviously, Lists of episodes and characters are both lists, and common. And fame is a really bad measure - notability simply doesn't relate to fame. With respect, I'd be hard pressed to believe that any IRC client is famous. And if you made a case that one was, it would be very much an exception, and based on more than significant coverage in a couple of secondary sources. - Bilby (talk) 19:52, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

You're right. You probably wouldn't find any IRC client that is famous, hence why the lower threshold of at least notability is acceptable. Beyond that you are giving attention to things which haven't earned any attention themselves. It is not wikipedia's place to create that attention. Even though this has been made into a comparison, it is still a list. There is a page that addresses that and per naming conventions it should still be called "list of..." per Misplaced Pages:Lists_(stand-alone_lists)#Naming_conventions--Crossmr (talk) 01:58, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

Also per Misplaced Pages:NOT#DIR #5, wikipedia isn't to be used as a price guide. We may list items as either, "free, shareware, or commercial" but listing specific prices is against policy.--Crossmr (talk) 02:31, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

I agree there. - Bilby (talk) 04:32, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

At the current state of the article , every entry in the table has a seperate article. Useful inclusion criteria could only be something in between "every existing verifyable IRC client" and "only IRC clients with a seperate article", IMHO. Therefore I don't see the need to limit the article any further. I'd still disagree with "only clients with an article", because there's on ongoing effort to delete those articles: . Those would be deleted from the table if we agreed on "seperate article" as inclusion criteria, just because the article was deleted and I won't agree with that. There's no policy limiting the content of this list type article to clients with their own article (the wikilink could just be removed instead of the whole line). FWIW, JBsupreme and Miami33139 both think Irssi wasn't notable in this field , and it obviously should be in this comparison. I'd like to see a proposal that avoids the vague word "notable" for that reason. --thommey (talk) 13:56, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

Notability isn't vague. it is a well established threshold for inclusion on wikipedia.--Crossmr (talk) 14:15, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

WP:N is a criterion for having separate articles. See WP:NNC, and proposal below. Pcap ping 14:37, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

To quote WP:NNC: " Various content policies govern article content, with the amount of coverage given to topics within articles decided by its appropriate weight." -- As of right now this article is unbalanced (and something to the tune of almost 100KB) because there is no criteria limiting what can or cannot be added. Listing only the clients which are notable as defined by WP:N would be a positive step in the right direction, IMHO. JBsupreme (talk) 20:44, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

NNC is over-ridden by WP:NOT. Not directly addresses this kind of page and states that entries must be famous.--Crossmr (talk) 01:58, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

As mentioned above, (it seems we've moved away from the central point), sorry, but no, fame is not a requirement for inclusion in a list. You're applying the wrong aspect of NOT#DIR - this is not a list or repository of loosely associated topics, so the exception that entries can be included if they are famous for that association simply doesn't apply here. None of the seven "nots" under NOT#DIR are really applicable, to be honest. - Bilby (talk) 08:48, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

A way forward

Clearly restricting this to wiki-notable instead of notable—in the plain English sense of the word—software is counter-productive. The purpose of a page like this is to be more comprehensive about this kind of software, but still not indiscriminate. The distinction between these notions is in the depth of coverage in WP:SECONDARY sources. This is acceptable per WP:LSC: "exception is for list articles that are created explicitly because the listed items do not warrant independent articles". I propose the following criteria, in line with WP:V, WP:NNC, WP:DUE, WP:LSC:

Typical examples of WP:SECONDARY WP:RS would be book mentions, e.g. , , . Thoughts? Pcap ping 14:36, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

I would agree that notability is not an appropriate metric for list inclusion; the guideline explicitly states this in WP:NNC with the exception of lists of people. I would propose that such lists require an RS that either compares a good portion of the proposed items (i.e. a comparison of 10 word processing programs from 2008 in PC Pro would be a justification for a 2010 WP list that compared those two and added a half a dozen newer programs backed up by other reliable sources). Just restricting it to anything reliably sourced means that there is no guidance as to what sorts of topics are appropriate for lists; any trivial collection of reliably-sourced data could be assembled. See Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/Comparison of Star Trek and Star Wars for inspiration.  Skomorokh  15:28, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

That's basically what I proposed. You wrote "require an RS that either compares a good portion of the proposed items"; that's usually called a "round-up review" (we have no article on this, but a google search finds plenty). I'm not sure what exactly you're worried about with "any trivial collection of reliably-sourced data could be assembled". Clearly only IRC clients need apply here. I suppose you're worried about the comparison criteria, which seems to be the issue in the Star Trek vs Star Wars AfD. I agree that those topics (normally the columns in this article) need to be reliably sourced valid comparison criteria. An example of I found to be a bad criteria is . But, most of the debate on this page was how to select the software, not how to select the criteria used to compare it. Pcap ping 16:23, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

I completely disagree. NCC is a guideline. While Misplaced Pages:NOT#DIR is a policy. It specifically governs what can be in a list, and this is a list per Misplaced Pages:Lists_(stand-alone_lists)#Naming_conventions. NCC doesn't remotely apply on this page.--Crossmr (talk) 02:04, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

I don't have a problem with this as a general principle. The only problem is it is going to keep in software that hasn't been updated for 10 years, and got a mention or three when it was new, while denying good software that was released more recently when there's less discussion about IRC, and thus is less likely to be compared. However, as some criteria beyond "it's a client" is required, it is probably worth taking this path rather than having no criteria or, alternatively, an overly strict option. - Bilby (talk) 19:59, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

Further to the above: I've seen no evidence of a policy that restricts the content of lists to only notable entries, except for people, so whether or not this list is thus restricted is a decision for this talk, not something which relies on policy. While I've yet to see a convincing argument that we need to restrict this to "notable" software, (in WP's sense), if we did we would needlessly restrict the comprehensiveness and usefulness of this article. Notability does not mean the same thing as "widely used" or important: it just refers to the extent and type of coverage. A client can be notable without being used, current, or of value to the vast majority of readers, while a client that is important, widely used, and of value may not meet our notability requirements for a stand-alone article. I think a further restriction beyond "any stand alone verifiable client" is certainly needed, but restricting it to "only notable clients" will damage the article to the point where it will be of little value. - Bilby (talk) 23:32, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

Right now I guess I feel as if this list is broken beyond repair (hence the current deletion discussion) but if we were to instill some sort of discriminate criteria then I could be swayed to believe otherwise. I don't see how or why restricting this list to products with articles is counter-productive, but am open to hear why it would be. JBsupreme (talk) 20:28, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

Completely disagree. You're giving the same attention to something which is trivially mentioned vs something which qualifies for an article on wikipedia and putting them on equal footing. This is a violation of WP:UNDUE and Misplaced Pages:NOT#DIR. Simply put, it is not wikipedia's place to promote subjects which haven't first received the coverage in reliable sources and a trivial mention in a massive open source round-up isn't sufficient.--Crossmr (talk) 02:04, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

This is a WP:LIST, not an article. So you cannot expect coverage strictly mirroring coverage in WP:RS. What are we supposed to do, make the font size proportional with how many review a software had? Application of WP:DUE means including only the software that one and preferably more WP:RS include in similar lists. That's not a violation of WP:NOT#DIR either: "Merged groups of small articles based on a core topic are certainly permitted. (See Misplaced Pages:Stand-alone lists#Appropriate topics for lists for clarification.)" Pcap ping 23:51, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

This is too wide. Personally, I would start by removing any products that that is not notable to have its own article. Skomorokh's proposal can be used to limit further the amount of products. --Enric Naval (talk) 22:09, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

I'd like to have more discussion about what a WP:RS is in the software world. Few scholarly sources will cover software. Online sources, including personal blogs, have taken over some of the print magazine market (which is hard to search anyhow). Does anyone want to help create someMisplaced Pages:Reliable_source_examples for software? Jodi.a.schneider (talk) 22:15, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

I see some like "KoolChat", which are so non-notable that they don't even have blog entries talking about them. --Enric Naval (talk) 00:20, 7 February 2010 (UTC)

Change title of article to "Comparison of notable Internet Relay Chat clients"?  :) This article is a mess and will remain a mess once all the clients which the elite deem to be non-notable have been removed.

Is anyone going to tidy up this article? If not delete it. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.175.47.130 (talk) 20:32, 20 February 2010 (UTC)

• Agree with Pcap. No reason to force the comparison only to notable software; all we need is a RS mentioning the software capabilities for each entry. --Cyclopia 18:42, 28 February 2010 (UTC)

...which were previously in the article and later removed (which has also yet again screwed up the tables). I wouldn't mind spending the dozens of hours required to go back and fix this stuff again but I have no intentions of edit warring with the three individuals who targeted me for harassment either. Per WP:NNC notability wasn't an issue here, although as seen in the section above, things such as the notability guideline and WP:NOT were clearly being used as a weapons to attack others (including myself) who had previously spent a good deal of time actually improving this article. My original concern was making sure the information this article contains was verifiable and balanced.
Quite frankly it was highly inappropriate for those three individuals to do this sort of stuff as well as and even this before trying this after months of this sort of stuff
...especially when not one of these three individuals has ever made a single positive contribution to an article in this subject area and are clearly not here to build Misplaced Pages (I never really was able to find anything constructive in these three contribution histories). Based solely on their contribution histories, these three individuals clearly much prefer to attack others (not just myself) and bulk remove content instead of improving Misplaced Pages. cf. WP:OWB #41, #13, #3 and WP:SPADE/WP:DUCK.
To help show just how much the cleanup, verification and expansion efforts of those of us who were working on this article (starting back before about June-July 2009 ) had helped, the average monthly hits increased from around ~150 (200905) up to around ~450-500 (200907) which have since unfortunately been dropping (200912 201001) largely due to the harassment/disruption and mass removal attempts linked above.
(...and yes, I'm still backing up what I'm saying with diffs.) --Tothwolf (talk) 21:10, 28 February 2010 (UTC)

Moving ahead

Since we can all agree (I hope) that this is not an indiscriminate list, I will be removing items from this list that are not supported by reliable third party sources. I am being careful not to describe these as "notable" in any sense of the word, Misplaced Pages or otherwise, but strictly an adherence to WP:SECONDARY WP:RS policy. JBsupreme (talk) 07:23, 4 March 2010 (UTC)

Requested move revert

The following discussion is an archived discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: page moved. Just closing the discussion since the page has been moved. Vegaswikian (talk) 22:21, 2 February 2010 (UTC)

List of Internet Relay Chat clients → Comparison of Internet Relay Chat clients — This move was done the other way round today by JBsupreme (). I see no reason for it and unfortunately none was provided either. I think it's clearly a comparison, not a list. —thommey (talk) 02:57, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Its a list with a table embedded. JBsupreme (talk) 22:29, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

It has more than just one table. It's not a list, that's obvious. It's a comparison article like all the ones on Category:Software comparisons (except for those called List* of course). If you suggest renaming them all, please do so or request it somewhere. Don't do it one by one, it's difficult to establish consensus this way. --thommey (talk) 01:09, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

Egad, that is a lot of comparative lists. JBsupreme (talk) 01:11, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

Misplaced Pages naming conventions indicate that his move was proper Misplaced Pages:Lists_(stand-alone_lists)#Naming_conventions. If (as is often the case), the list has multiple columns and so is in table form, the name or title List of _ _ is still preferable to Table of _ _ or Comparison of _ _. It should be moved back.--Crossmr (talk) 02:06, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

The header of Misplaced Pages:Lists_(stand-alone_lists)#Naming_conventions also states "It is a generally accepted standard that editors should attempt to follow, though it is best treated with common sense, and occasional exceptions may apply", and "preferable" isn't policy. There're a lot of "Comparison of" articles on wikipedia . That indicates there's consensus to use those names. The format chosen for software comparison is mostly a set of tables because it fits best, that doesn't necessarily make it a list, IMHO (Category:Software comparisons). Crossmr, are you suggesting to rename them all? --thommey (talk) 13:34, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

I am (suggesting that). JBsupreme (talk) 04:29, 1 February 2010 (UTC)

I don't think there is any consensus to have comparison articles, in fact a search of Misplaced Pages shows a lot of dissatisfaction with comparison articles as being OR. Certainly there seems a consensus that any comparisons drawn in any article need to be sourced to a reliable source actually making the comparisons. is an example of a long dispute which looks as though it is going to result in a retitling of the article to make it clear it is about 'comparison studies', ie sources that make the comparison. Dougweller (talk) 10:12, 1 February 2010 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

Entries without articles

I realise this discussion has been held before, many times, but most software lists comply with WP:WTAF. Having endless lists of mostly red links is messy, and an inconvenience for the reader, the primary purpose behind writing this encyclopedia. Entries that are not notable do not belong here. Greenman (talk) 12:31, 20 March 2010 (UTC)

Yes, it does seem to have been discussed many times. But I agree, in that we don't need red links, especially for subjects that are unlikely to be notable enough for articles in the foreseeable future. Of course, WP:WTAF is simply about adding red links - whether or not software that is not sufficiently notable for an article is mentioned here is a different issue. - Bilby (talk) 03:15, 24 March 2010 (UTC)

WP:WTAF is an essay, not a guideline. While some essays are so common sense to be readily treated as a guideline (or sometimes even policy), WP:WTAF is simply not one of them. We previously had many entries were which were mergered here from stub articles which were in turn redirected here. Removing those entries made no sense and when time permits, I will restore those entries and the sources which were also removed. --Tothwolf (talk) 01:00, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

See WP:NNC (notability guideline), which sends you to WP:LSC (content guideline). If you want to add redlinks, then add them with a source that shows that a) they are notable in the field for some reason or b) they have a reasonable chance of an article in the future. --Enric Naval (talk) 06:54, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

I think we're confusing redlinks - as in links that don't go anywhere - with mentioning software that doesn't have an article. The latter is a problem, so we should remove the link, but we don't necessarily need to remove mention of the software in the list. That's an issue for the article's individual inclusion standards. - Bilby (talk) 06:59, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

Right, but the non-redlinked entry should have a third-party independent source, showing that it's notable for this topic, or relevant enough, or worth including for some completion purposes (like, for example, listing the first client for system X even if it doesn't have an article, because it influenced later clients). --Enric Naval (talk) 07:08, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

I don't think it needs to show it's notable, as such, but yes - I've no problem with needing a source for WP:V. :) - Bilby (talk) 07:19, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

No, not to verify that it actually exists, but to verify that it's notable or relevant enough to include. --Enric Naval (talk) 07:46, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

(edit conflict! woooho!) How about adding annotations and references for every feature/option for every client? I know this needs really much work and some clients have a bad documentation, but after a time this could be working. mabdul 07:48, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

Enric, It's WP:BRD as in "BOLD, revert, discuss"; not "BBRD" or "BOLD, revert, revert, discuss": No, there has never been any consensus on the issue of "red links" or "non-links" in "comparison of" articles, as previously shown above, and I ask that you self-revert your removal of that entry.

This is also not a "list of" article, for which the WP:LSC guideline was intended (and I personally happen to agree with). With a "list of" article it would make no sense whatsoever to create a list of nothing more than red linked entries without articles, especially if it is unlikely that those red links would ever link to articles. For a "comparison of" article on the other hand, it can make a lot of sense to cover material which may not necessarily have its own article purely for the purposes of comparison.

Misplaced Pages:Stand-alone lists (which WP:LSC is a subsection of) specifically states: "Stand-alone lists and "lists of links" are articles that primarily consist of a list or a group of lists, linking to articles or lists in a particular subject area, such as a timeline of events or people and places. The titles of these articles usually begin with "list of" or "timeline of"." Most "comparison of" articles are clearly much more than a list of links to articles, so just going by the guideline's own criteria, most "comparison of" articles should not be considered a "stand alone list".

WP:NNC also clearly states: "The notability guidelines are only used to determine whether a topic can have its own separate article on Misplaced Pages and do not govern article content. The question of content coverage within a given page is governed by the principle of due weight and other content policies." (Note that while the current wording is slightly different from how it was worded in the past, the meaning is still the same.) Put simply, WP:N absolutely does not prevent us from comparing the features and functionality of software programs which may not (and might never) have their own standalone article.

Now, as far as sources go, I happen to agree with Bilby in that we need sources. We used to have sources here and they still need to be restored. That said, it is generally more reliable to use a program's own documentation per WP:SELFPUB when it comes to the features and functionality of a particular software program. Ask yourself, which would you trust more, a software program's own current documentation shipped with the software or on its website, an outdated book published years earlier, or a third party website which "reviewed" a software program say 3 years prior. It should be obvious in this case that the software's own documentation or website is going to be far more reliable for simple features and functionality, which again is perfectly fine per WP:SELFPUB. In addition, when it comes to open source software, one can even cite the software's own source code as a reference if the documentation is lacking (and this will be the most reliable of them all as the source code makes up the actual instructions for how the software program operates). Per WP:RSUE however, it is much preferable to use an English source vs source code which is a foreign language to the majority of the people who will be reading articles on Misplaced Pages. All that said, it would not be proper to use a software program's own documentation where it might hypothetically claim "this program is better than program x due to y" in order to show that "program x is better than y" as that would run afoul of WP:NPOV. It would of course still be perfectly acceptable to quote that documentation or website with attribution so long as it is clear who is making the claim.

Enric, I also do not see where you've ever contributed to this article or the talk page discussion until today. You claim in your edit summary that there was consensus for your removal of material here, yet you don't seem to have ever contributed to this article or interacted with those who've put quite a lot of work into it. How exactly was it you came to be involved here? Removing an entire entry the manner in which you did violates WP:BITE as it takes a considerable amount of time to actually add an entry to a "comparison of" article such as this (if you don't believe that, you try doing the research involved to properly add an entry sometime). --Tothwolf (talk) 09:00, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

Please check WP:LISTNAME, "comparison of X in table format" is still a list article. And it doesn't make sense to compare non-notable products to notable ones, when from the start we were only supposed to cover the non-notable ones (again, we can make exceptions for products that are relevant for comparison, but they still need a source to show the relevancy).

Once the product has been included via independent sources, its features can be sourced from the product's website (secondary sources are better, of course, and they could be used to source some notable comparison). --Enric Naval (talk) 12:48, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

P.D.:this article is in my watchlist because I commented in the 2nd AfD. I don't remember how I found the AfD. --Enric Naval (talk) 12:53, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

Enric, I'm quite familiar with the naming conventions for stand-alone lists (WP:LISTNAME). That section of text is unfortunately not entirely in-sync with the way things are currently done or have been done for quite some time, and was written before Misplaced Pages grew to what it is today. It should be updated, but that hasn't yet happened.

Because that text is outdated, I believe you are confused as to what WP:LISTNAME was referring to when it mentions Comparison of. Just because an article uses the "Comparison of" (or even "List of" or "Timeline of") naming scheme does not simply make it a stand-alone list. To help illustrate this, let's look at some real-world examples. Take for example Comparison of Windows Vista and Windows XP, Comparison of Unicode encodings, and Comparison of ADO and ADO.NET (three of many such examples from Category:Software comparisons). None of these are "list of" stand-alone lists even though they are named "Comparison of". Contrast those with say Comparison of BPEL engines or Comparison of scorewriters, which I would argue are just barely no longer "list of" stand-alone lists or say Comparison of open source and closed source, Comparison of Windows and Linux, Comparison of video codecs, or Comparison of ADO and ADO.NET which are absolutely not "list of" stand-alone lists. Furthermore, it is extremely common for us to have entries in "comparison of" articles which are either red-links or non-links. Take for example Comparison of x86 DOS operating systems, Comparison of graphics file formats, Comparison of raster to vector conversion software, Comparison of MUD clients, Comparison of disk encryption software, or even have a lengthy browse over Category:Software comparisons. If you spend some time comparing Category:Lists of software and Category:Software comparisons, I think the differences between "comparison" articles and stand-alone lists will be quite obvious. In all fairness, we did use to have quite a few "list of" stand-alone lists which were named "comparison of". The majority of those have long since been renamed "list of". In addition, we have numerous "list of" stand-alone lists which include red-links such as say List of Computer Viruses (All) where it makes perfect sense to include entries as red-links or non-links.

I think the best way to draw the defining line between a standalone list and a comparison article is if the article is merely a list in a table format without actually including comparable elements (features, functionality, etc) then it is a "list" and not a "comparison". If the article includes actual comparable elements (not just a version number and/or a release date), then the article is a comparison and not simply a list of internal wikilinks.

Neither WP:LISTNAME nor WP:LSC are hard and fast rules and trying to apply them as such (particularly when trying to apply them to something which they were not intended for) is both disruptive and damaging to Misplaced Pages. The very beginning of Misplaced Pages:Five pillars states: "Misplaced Pages is an online encyclopedia. It incorporates elements of general and specialized encyclopedias, almanacs, and gazetteers." and the very last section states: "Misplaced Pages does not have firm rules. Rules on Misplaced Pages are not fixed in stone, and the spirit of the rule trumps the letter of the rule."

I think the best way to sum up everything I'm trying to get across here is: Misplaced Pages exists for our readers, not the editors. If readers find the inclusion of specific material helpful to them while making use of Misplaced Pages, then it should be included. If the material would not be helpful to a reader, then it should be excluded. Comparison of articles are among some of our more popular articles (see WP:COMP/PP). It would be a huge disservice to our readers if we go against WP:NNC ("The notability guidelines are only used to determine whether a topic can have its own separate article on Misplaced Pages and do not govern article content.") and attempt to cut down all "comparison of" articles to material which would only meet the guidelines for a stand-alone article, as this would then remove a huge amount of material which our readers actually wish to know more about. --Tothwolf (talk) 04:43, 10 October 2010 (UTC)

See WP:OTHERSTUFF. We are not serving the reader by indiscriminately listing lots of non-notable stuff. If those policies are outdated then go to their talk pages and ask that they are updated to reflect current practice. --Enric Naval (talk) 11:58, 10 October 2010 (UTC)

WP:OTHERSTUFF is a subsection of an essay titled Misplaced Pages:Arguments to avoid in deletion discussions. It does not apply to this discussion and your attempt to use it here amounts to nothing more than wikilawyering. You would also do well to read WP:NOTPOLICY and Misplaced Pages:Somebody Else's Problem. --Tothwolf (talk) 14:23, 10 October 2010 (UTC)

Toth, I invoked OTHERSTUFF because you can always find articles in bad state, and use them as examples. What if all those articles violate WP:LSC, and most of those red-links in those articles should be removed? Do we need to change the article that complies with WP:LSC, to fit the articles that don't? (also, you give articles that are not comparable to this one, like Comparison of Windows Vista and Windows XP) --Enric Naval (talk) 17:09, 10 October 2010 (UTC)

Enric, I specifically mentioned articles such as Comparison of Windows Vista and Windows XP because you attempted to invoke the misleading wording at WP:LISTNAME as "comparison of X in table format" is still a list article." Articles such as this are a firm rejection of your argument that all articles named "comparison of" are somehow "stand-alone lists". Those articles are also not all in a "bad state", although many do need improvement and additional citations (but don't most articles?) A lengthy browse over Category:Software comparisons and the handful I picked at random from that category make it quite clear that your argument of "comparison of" articles are all "stand-alone lists" and therefore subject to Misplaced Pages:Stand-alone lists is invalid.

You attempted to invoke WP:OTHERSTUFF because you had already made up your mind regarding WP:LSC and didn't care to consider my points.

Ultimately, what your arguments are clarifying here is that we desperately need to improve the wording at Misplaced Pages:Stand-alone lists as it misleads individuals such as yourself into believing that all articles which include tables of information or which are named "comparison of", "timeline of", etc are without exception "stand-alone lists", which is clearly not the case and directly conflicts with WP:NNC. Misplaced Pages:Stand-alone lists and WP:NNC apply to lists which consist of wikilinks, not articles that include tables of information which might also include wikilinks. --Tothwolf (talk) 01:53, 11 October 2010 (UTC)

Enric, to revisit your specific removal of KVIrc since you have been arguing notability, did you actually check to see how "notable" KVIrc actually is? It has been covered in quite a number of published works of which Google Books still only indexes a fraction thereof. Considering what I covered in some of the links I brought up when confronting User:Cameron Scott over his bulk removal of material from this article (which I previously had gone through, expanded, and added references for), you might just find that the {{prod}} of KVIrc by one of the parties involved in that disruption was improper and in violation of both the Proposed deletion policy and Deletion policy (similar was done with Ircle , see a pattern?). This was the same individual who added {{notability}} to ircII, which was the second IRC client ever written (the first of course being the bare bones 'irc' command/client which shipped with the original ircd software up to around version 2.6 or 2.7).

Enric, now, will you self-revert, or do we need to take this to a noticeboard? --Tothwolf (talk) 04:47, 10 October 2010 (UTC)

WP:DRV is thataway. Alternatively, consider working in User:Pragma2/Sandbox. (I looked at the google books link, and I see lists of IRC clients. Not really worth for notability, IMHO). --Enric Naval (talk) 11:58, 10 October 2010 (UTC)

While you were certainly entitled to voice your opinion you are in the minority view per the other comments in the second AfD and WP:NNC is quite explicit on this issue. No one other than yourself (or the three individuals previously mentioned who engaged in harassment and wikistalking behaviours) argued the deletion angle and per the above discussions, there was not consensus for your removal of "KVIrc" from the comparison tables. Additionally, WP:REFUND is the correct place to deal with {{prod}}, not Deletion review. You've been present on Misplaced Pages long enough to know that.

Per your definitions and criteria, we can't include the entry for the original IRC client called "irc" which shipped with the early IRCd software as it hasn't been covered in a book and about the only mention of it that you will find today is the original documentation and source code for the early IRCd software itself. The thing you might not realise due to your unfamiliarity with this topic is that Internet Relay Chat itself was created in August 1988 and predated the World Wide Web (~August 1991), Deja News (March 1995), Google (January 1996) and Google Books (~December 2004). Neither the "web" nor Google are magic oracles and are not going to contain everything. You might do well to have a read over the essay Misplaced Pages:Make articles useful for readers.

Enric, if you won't self-revert your removal of KVIrc from the tables, then perhaps we do need to take your actions to a noticeboard? From the looks of things, you have a history of this sort of thing and it genuinely doesn't seem to be worthwhile or very effective in trying to reason with you. You know, it really is a shame too as this particular article was extremely low drama before the disruption and wikistalking/AfDs by one of the parties previously mentioned began. --Tothwolf (talk) 14:26, 10 October 2010 (UTC)

Yeah, well, get a source explaining how KVIrc is notable, and then we speak about that. WP:LISTNAME and WP:LSC still apply, you can convince the other editors in the page that a certain client is worth including even if there are no sources, I suggest that your efforts aren't going to give much fruit until you can findd a compelling argument for including KVIrc.... (WP:REFUND? wow, it's been there since April 2009, and I had never heard of it. I had no idea that PRODs were sent there). Yes, please, bring my actions to whatever noticeboard you think appropriate. --Enric Naval (talk) 17:09, 10 October 2010 (UTC)

Enric, I never said we had "no sources" so don't try to twist my words. You've continued to ignore and/or gloss over the larger points ("yeah, well, ...") that I've made while refuting your arguments regarding WP:LISTNAME and WP:LSC. You just don't like the points I've made even though you are indirectly acknowledging that they may indeed have merit. --Tothwolf (talk) 01:55, 11 October 2010 (UTC)

I have worked a bit on the KVIrc article adding sources of verifiability and notability. Many of them are simply shared with other IRC clients that are in the list, as explained here. I vote for readmitting KVIrc to the list and restoring the article. Which are the thoughts about it? Pragma2 (talk) 02:40, 16 October 2010 (UTC)

Naw, I can't agree with this, you could add any old shit if you simply went off SPS such as documentation. I still think we stick to the broad idea that if nobody else is writing (independently) about something, then why are we? --Cameron Scott (talk) 09:05, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

States the individual who took it upon himself to bulk remove merged/redirected entries going against the prior discussions? --Tothwolf (talk) 09:20, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

For example, Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/NexIRC, amongst others. --Tothwolf (talk) 09:34, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

I wasn't involved in any prior discussion so let's get that clear, so don't make it appear that I want against a consensus that I was aware of. Are you clear about that? Aren't you the guy who emailed me pleading not to remove the stuff because it would help you get another editor banned? --Cameron Scott (talk) 09:50, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

You were aware of some of the past discussions so don't give me that bullshit. And just so we are crystal clear, I never emailed you about getting another editor banned. I did email you and asked you not to blank the article further and gave you a link to the ArbCom matter. In fact, here is the exact email I sent you:

"Just a heads up...the first table in Comparison of Internet Relay Chat clients was largely blanked by someone who was being disruptive. I've not yet pulled a clean version from the history and re-integrated edits since, but blanking more sections is counterproductive. Right now the larger issue of the individual involved is being examined by ArbCom."

...and here are some links for anyone who actually gives a shit (compare the names therein with some of the individuals who were pushing for large scale removals from this article in several of the above sections): So what does the material in those links boil down to? tag teaming, meatpuppetry, harassment, specifically wikistalking, and off-wiki harassment of myself, friends, and co-workers, including phone calls to my place of work. --Tothwolf (talk) 11:53, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

You were aware of some of the past discussions so don't give me that bullshit. I have absolutely no recollection of being involved in such discussions - please provide a link. --Cameron Scott (talk) 12:04, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

Don't try to put words into my mouth. I said you were aware of the discussions, not that you participated in them. I emailed you on Friday, August 20th, 2010, which according to the timestamps, was after your first 6 edits removing content from 11:39-11:52 UTC and you then resumed removing content at 16:55, 21 August 2010. I have nothing further I wish to discuss with you on this matter. You were aware of things you now seem to be claiming ignorance on. --Tothwolf (talk) 12:37, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

So that's a no, I wasn't involved in such discussions, I thought as much. --Cameron Scott (talk) 13:44, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

Browser-based IRC clients/services

There isn't any information about browser-based client/services section. Something like irc2go.com :( —Preceding unsigned comment added by 61.17.77.32 (talk) 14:38, 23 May 2010 (UTC)

we don't have any information what theses services suppot. mabdul 13:29, 18 November 2010 (UTC)

We do have Mibbit in the comparison tables. CGI:IRC and PJIRC should be added though. While working on both of these, I found quite a number of books which give coverage to some other web and browser-based clients which we don't yet cover on Misplaced Pages. --Tothwolf (talk) 14:02, 18 November 2010 (UTC)

Requested move (2)

The following discussion is an archived discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: no consensus to move Kotniski (talk) 14:07, 12 December 2010 (UTC)

Comparison of Internet Relay Chat clients → List_of_Internet_Relay_Chat_clients — From WP:LISTNAME, "If (as is often the case), the list has multiple columns and so is in table form, the name or title List of Xs is still preferable to Table of Xs or Comparison of Xs". This article has no comparisons, sourced or unsourced, just a list in form of table.

The above discussion already had consensus and arguments to move to "List of". It was closed just because someone had moved the page at mid-discussion. Enric Naval (talk) 10:17, 18 November 2010 (UTC)

Also Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Software/Archive_3#renaming_all_.22comparison_of....22_to_.22list_of....22, to see if we can end with this situation where some lists in table format are called comparisons. --Enric Naval (talk) 10:34, 18 November 2010 (UTC)

• Opposed Comparison of Internet Relay Chat clients (and other articles within Category:Software comparisons) contain clearly definable comparative elements and are not simple lists of wikilinks intended to be used for navigation. The text at WP:LSC which you repeatedly referred to above was intended to keep navigational lists from growing out of hand with red-links and was never intended to conflict with the WP:NNC section of the notability guideline.

  You previously made repeated attempts to invoke the WP:LSC section of Misplaced Pages:Stand-alone lists as a content guideline when it was clearly a Manual of Style page. When those arguments ultimately failed, you slightly change tactics and now attempt to invoke WP:LISTNAME to have the page renamed "List of x" so you can justify removing material from the article... Enric, that tactic is considered POV pushing (cf. Misplaced Pages:Civil POV pushing) and is inappropriate.

  Renaming "Comparison of x" articles to "List of x" articles is also a perennial proposal which has in the past been brought up on many "Comparison of x" talk pages and has ultimately been soundly rejected by the community.

  In addition, Enric, you did not make a post to WT:SOFTWARE You made a comment on the talk page archive for WT:SOFTWARE. You also knew quite well WP:SOFTWARE doesn't get too much activity, which is why you chose it over a more active WikiProject such as Misplaced Pages:WikiProject Computing.

  Enric, please observe WP:STICK. I don't have the time to argue this with you again, but others can review #Entries without articles above to see your past arguments. --Tothwolf (talk) 12:41, 18 November 2010 (UTC)

  • ...and just so we can further clarify the key difference between "List of x" and "Comparison of x", two examples of lists which use a "table layout" are List of HTML editors (bulleted multi-column) and List of GNU packages (wikitable). Neither of these make any sort of comparisons between the entries, nor are they sortable on a per element basis. See Category:Lists of software for more such examples.

    As I've said previously regarding WP:LISTNAME, that section of text has not been maintained and is unfortunately not entirely in-sync with the way things are currently done or have been done for quite some time. It was written before Misplaced Pages grew to what it is today and should be updated, but that hasn't yet happened.

    This is precisely why WP:GUIDES states: "Guidelines are sets of best practices that are supported by consensus. Editors should attempt to follow guidelines, though they are best treated with common sense, and occasional exceptions may apply." which is also echoed in template messages such as {{MoS-guideline}} and {{Guideline}}, which respectively state: "This guideline is a part of the English Misplaced Pages's Manual of Style. Use common sense in applying it; it will have occasional exceptions." and "This page documents an English Misplaced Pages guideline. It is a generally accepted standard that editors should follow, though it should be treated with common sense, and occasional exceptions may apply."

    (Oddly enough, note that Misplaced Pages:Template messages itself is such a navigational list, where it wouldn't make much sense to include red-links.) --Tothwolf (talk) 13:26, 18 November 2010 (UTC)

• Opposed per Tothwolf: it is quiet common to have a seperate list to the comparison. biggest internet related example may be the comparison of web browser: in this comparison aren't integrated all browsers that are on the list. (often because it is only a new shell based on the same engine, the browsers are discontinued, but that can't be the only reasons!) mabdul 13:28, 18 November 2010 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

Orion (IRC client)

Notability not established, and inappropriately redirected to this article. I've found no reliable, independent, notable sources, discussing this IRC client in news, magazines, journals, or books. The blue link to ] is a redirect to this very article, which cites no sources about this client. The WP:GNG General Notability Guideline, yes, applies to articles, but the Orion IRC Client lacks sufficient WP:RS to possess its own article. For comparison, see the rather well-sourced Chatzilla article which cites, yes, the developer and Mozilla sites, but also includes magazine articles, reviews, and books. Please help by locating and listing WP:RS which can be used to create an article for Orion, and any other non-article-yet-possibly-notable clients. IMHO, "notable enough for this list" should mean "has its own article in which notability is established." Otherwise, this comparison's entries will always be vulnerable to summary deletion, one by one, by deletionists, or even quite reasonable "no source? delete" editors. --Lexein (talk) 18:49, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

http://tellini.info/software/orion/ I can't figure out how to add that correctly to references. Also, can you please fix the formatting/links on the first table's Orion entry? I was trying to make the tables consistent.

71.214.52.97 (talk) 14:23, 6 February 2011 (UTC)

Bah nevermind - just read the *sshattery above. I guess they'll do a bulk fix, anyways when the article is repaired. Wow, mass deletes of sourced materials FTL!71.214.52.97 (talk) 14:36, 6 February 2011 (UTC)

Thanks. However, Tellini is the author, a primary source not a reliable (nonblog, nonforum, nonwiki) independent (completely unrelated to Tellini), notable (established, published) 3rd-party source. The Orion client has not been reviewed or even mentioned in any magazines or related blog, journals or related blog, newsletters, or books. One such review will be good, two would be better; then I'd call it sourced. At the moment, it should be removed from all this article's tables, IMHO. All new software suffers from this sourcing and notability battle. At the moment, I'm not bothered that Orion doesn't have an article - it's definitely not WP:GNG generally notable enough for that - I'm just looking for any kind of WP:RS. I hope you understand that I have the same problem with any entry in this list which lacks an article and any WP:RS. --Lexein (talk) 02:22, 7 February 2011 (UTC)

Good grief... Why is this argument still turning up here again? This stuff has been discussed to death above. The notability guideline does not limit what can or cannot be written about in an article. The WP:NNC section of the notability guideline is quite explicit on this and trying to limit article content based with the WP:GNG was not a view supported by one of the recent RFCs.

As long as we have verifiability there is nothing preventing us from discussing a particular software program in relation to others. For basic features and functionality of a software program, a primary source is sufficient. As long as we don't attempt to draw our own conclusions from a primary source (e.g. program "A" is better than program "B" because...) there is nothing wrong with using a primary source to verify that program "X" supports feature "Y". See WP:SELFPUB and Misplaced Pages:Identifying reliable sources#Self-published and questionable sources as sources on themselves for more on this. A program's own documentation, website, source code, etc will also almost always be more authoritative in documenting a program's current features and functionality than a 3rd party book which covers a software program because software evolves much at a much faster rate than books can be published.

Keep in mind, however, that the verifiability policy does not state that every single fact needs an inline citation. It would be quite silly and even disruptive to the reading of an article to require an inline citation for every single fact contained within an article. Anything controversial, suspect, or otherwise likely to be challenged by the average reader should however have a citation.

"... and inappropriately redirected to this article"? The Alternatives to deletion section of the deletion policy states among other relevant things: "Articles that are short and unlikely to be expanded could be merged into larger articles or lists."

71.214.52.97, I think *sshattery is a good way to describe it. The good news I suppose is the original individual responsible for harassing me online for roughly 18 months (who took an interest in harming articles such as this and others where I had previously done significant amounts of editing) is now indef blocked here on Misplaced Pages (although most likely back again editing under a new account). The two accounts which were "helping" him (including repeatedly mass-nominating this and many other articles which I had contributed to for deletion, mass-MFDing draft articles in my userspace, etc) were finally sanctioned after yet another lengthy ANI discussion and ArbCom amendment, after which both accounts were apparently "abandoned".

There are a number of highly skilled editors who work on comparison articles within WP:COMP's scope, so if I don't get to this one soon enough, eventually another editor will likely begin working on it. Comparison articles can be quite difficult to work on because of the complex markup and the sheer volume of information which has to be verified. I would estimate that cleaning the mess up here will likely take at least 20-30 hours of work, based on past experience. --Tothwolf (talk) 10:51, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

For this discussion to stop coming up repeatedly, just state the inclusion criteria somewhere like the top of the article and/or in hidden comments as recommended in, say WP:LIST#Lead section or paragraph or similar. This article certainly looked to me like most of the entries have a) an article and/or b) reliable secondary sources, for example, Chatzilla. Orion has neither. Your fight's not with me, and I'm not a deletionist, nor a campaigner against lists, comparisons, or you. If you reread what I wrote carefully, Orion doesn't have an article because it doesn't have RS. I can see GNG per se being tough for software to meet, but getting one or two secondary RS just isn't that high of a burden to meet. All I wanted was one or two RS mentioning Orion, to go forward with its inclusion here. Without RS, it really shouldn't, since nearly every other item in this comparison has RS. (Also note that I didn't delete it, just commented it out, because I respect the work involved in adding entries). Was I wrong to infer inclusion criteria based on extant entries? --Lexein (talk) 14:39, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

Example proposed inclusion criteria for this comparison:

1. Inclusion: One notable independent secondary reliable source: a review, or a two-sentence mention. Examples: Wired or Wired blog, Linux Journal, New York Times or NYT blog, or "industry" blogs which have been republished in or cited in notable publications. If the software author(s) is/are notable (established previously in sources like (1), example: JWZ), then the software has inherited notability.
2. Features/details: The primary source (software author's website) is good enough for the detailed software features. Detailed features do not require secondary RS for purpose of listing here. (In my opinion, writing about the detailed features does require secondary RS, because Misplaced Pages's "voice" is the voice of the sources not the editors.)

At the moment, criteria #1 is a barrier to Orion, but that barrier lifts as soon as it's noticed and written about. Misplaced Pages has always been about what secondary sources, say about the article subject.

--Lexein (talk) 01:42, 11 February 2011 (UTC)

Per WP:SELFPUB a self-published primary source can be a reliable source for non-controversial facts about the subject itself. As I mentioned above, a primary source can be used to show that "program X" supports "feature Y", and this is an acceptable use of a primary source here on Misplaced Pages. It is very common to cite a program's own site and documentation for verification of the release date/version and for features/functionality of the software itself. As I mentioned above, we can't use primary sources for other purposes such as "Program A is better than Program B because it supports feature X" because that would fall afoul of WP:NOR.

The notability argument for inclusion of content however has no place within a comparison article. Per WP:NNC we do not limit article content based on the notability guideline. The notability guideline covers whether or not a topic meets the inclusion criteria for a stand-alone article. What came out of our last RFC on notability and lists also extends this to the subject of a list, e.g. the subject (but not the title) of "University of X alumni who Y" would itself need to be considered notable as a group in order to have a "List of University of X alumni who Y" standalone list. As I've previously stated above, this seems to make perfect sense when it comes to such lists. What came out of the RFC still does not cover embedded lists, nor does it cover other forms of lists or articles.

Now, with this specific article, my argument is not that we should include every single IRC client ever written... While there are a finite number of "IRC clients" out there, I don't feel that we should include every pet project someone has ever written in Visual Basic (I often found that many of these were written in Visual Basic, however there have been popular software programs written in Visual Basic in the past too). We should however mention the features and functionality of popular or better known clients (as known by users of IRC) even when a client does not have a standalone article, regardless of whether or not it meets the requirements of the notability guideline for the purposes of a standalone article. E.g. XiRCON (see the AfD for that one and take particular note of who the nom was).

It isn't just here that this "discussion" keeps coming up. I've see these same notability arguments brought up on many comparison article talk pages and even when challenged and eventually struck down by others, they end up popping up again elsewhere. If we were to attempt to artificially limit comparison articles such as this solely to Misplaced Pages-notable items, we end up presenting a very skewed view of the overall subject. Comparison articles, especially software comparisons are among some of our most popular articles here on Misplaced Pages. See WP:COMP/PP for many such examples. While Misplaced Pages shouldn't be used for promotion of "software X", if a particular software program is or has previously been well known and/or popular with users of that genre of software, then we should still include it in such comparison articles.

The main issue I see looking at the larger view is that we currently do not have a Manual of Style page which covers the various forms of comparison articles. This leads to many people not having a fundamental understanding of how and why they are structured the way they are, why they include what they include, etc. Editors who work on these forms of articles tend to learn this stuff hands-on, but at some point we still really need to write a MoS page which covers these forms of articles. --Tothwolf (talk) 10:38, 11 February 2011 (UTC)

I had to WP:DISENGAGE for a while before responding to this.

1. Are you saying that Orion should be included in this comparison, even though nobody anywhere has written about it? No independent sources needed? That any joker in a garage can write whatever they want on their publicity brochure, website, blog, forum, and wiki, and you'd include it in this article, comparing its unverified (and UNVERIFIABLE) claims against other clients for which RS have established verifiability? That's a remarkably low threshold of inclusion, with which I disagree, and I'm an inclusionist. Keep in mind, there's not one shred of independent reliable evidence which supports the existence of Orion as an IRC client. By what Misplaced Pages policy/guideline/essay do you really think Orion's inclusion should stand? Ignore all rules - is this IRC client worth invoking that?
2. Linking Orion (blue link) elevates its apparent stature to "as mentioned on Misplaced Pages", purporting to link to an article with reliable, independent sources supporting Orion. Linking Orion to this very article is disingenuous, because this article cites no such sources about Orion. This constitutes a use of WP as PROMO, and should not be encouraged at all.
3. Notability is important as a concept, even though we're not talking about "article level" notability. We can't just make stuff up, or quote primary sources with zero independent verification. Comparison article or not, verifiability, WP:TRUTH, and WP:RS.
4. In case anyone wonders, I have nothing against Orion or its author. It has become the lightning rod, unfortunately, in this discussion, because it completely lacks any support in independent reliable sources, and therefore fails WP:RS, a bedrock policy at WP.
5. And again, to put a button on it, if you don't want discussions such as this to keep recurring, state the actual inclusion criteria concisely, at least at the top of the Talk page. Don't bother yelling at or insulting me, due to your failure to clearly state whatever consensus your prior discussions have reached. --Lexein (talk) 16:38, 5 March 2011 (UTC)

Addendum - Tothwolf, you state you only want to include popular IRC clients. Is there any RS way to measure popularity in terms of downloads or usage? Yes, Google shows there are over 17,000 "hits", but it's only mentioned as an echo of Tellini's own description of the software (using the word "comfortable"). I don't recommend relying on Softonic's download popularity rating (3rd of 19 IRC clients at 1000+ downloads), with Yahoo India's IM client is #1 at 143,000. BTW ChatZilla is at over 5,000,000+ downloads. Are there any usage-based server statistics reported in WP:RS which will indicate how many people are using which client? If not, how can we, as Misplaced Pages editors, decide download or usage popularity at all? We can't. We have to rely on WP:RS, because we can't just make stuff up. I say, in the absence of popularity reports in WP:RS, we have to abandon the notion of popularity in toto, and rely only on WP:RS verification of the existence, and hence, relative notability (not GNG article-grade notability), of the client.

Reminders: I didn't delete Orion, just commented it out until it has one WP:RS, ffs. I do respect the work. (Nobody's attacking anybody here except for you and an anonymous IP calling me an asshat. I politely request that you strikethrough or delete your rant against "attackers" - it has no place in a discussion of this article's improvement. As soon as you do that, I'll do the same for this. As for XIRCON, the deletion discussion was damnably short, and its undeletion request was denied but did you, really, make an effort to find RS to justify the article? There are some decently citable sources about XIRCON - I found them in 3 seconds. If you felt that strongly about XIRCON, why did you request to delete its userfied version at User:Tothwolf/XIRCON? If you don't care enough to maintain it for improvement in your userspace (dooming its invested work forever), you can't claim to care enough to bring it up here as an example of an "attack" on you or this article. Anyways, I'm now mindful of your experience at the hands of other editors, so I'll try to be less abrasive. But dude, knock off the victim/attack paranoia - it's just not happening here.)

Anybody else? Opinion about requiring one cloth-eared reliable source for inclusion? --Lexein (talk) 08:01, 9 March 2011 (UTC)

Lexein, you appear to be misinterpreting what 71.214.52.97 and myself were referring to as "asshattery", which were some of the "discussions" much further up on this talk page.

What I said above is Misplaced Pages-notability is not a valid metric for article content inclusion/exclusion. This is made clear in the notability guideline itself and I further explained why attempting to use Misplaced Pages's notability guideline to artificially limit article content ends up presenting a topic such as this to the reader in a biased "Misplaced Pages-notable" manner.

To further expand on what I said above, both primary and self-published sources can be used on Misplaced Pages and can be reliable; it depends on the source and how it is used. While blogs, email lists, etc are generally not considered "reliable" (especially for the purposes of a BLP article), per WP:SELFPUB and longstanding common practice within WP:COMP's scope, we can and do use primary and self-published sources in the manner I described above. Take for example the Linux kernel. Emails, usenet posts, and blog posts made by Linus Torvalds and other Linux kernel developers are considered reliable for the purposes of citing "The Linux kernel supports feature "X"" and "The next version of the Linux kernel will include support for "Y"". While we certainly can't use them to say "The Linux kernel is better than because ..." (since that would be considered original research), if a developer made such a statement on his blog, we could still include his statement as a direct quote.

As for Orion, the software program's own site for example is reliable for the purposes of showing that the client is released under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike license. The source code and included documentation (Changes.txt, Readme.txt, etc) would also be reliable for the purposes of showing that the software supports features "X", "Y", and "Z". While English sources are much preferable (see WP:RSUE), if we don't have an English source which states that open source software program "X" supports feature "Y", the source code of the program itself can be cited as it is a reliable self-published source and is acceptable for the purposes of verifiability when it comes to the software program's features and functionality.

As far as defining popular IRC clients, yes, there are metrics we can use, although two of the better online ones such as the "Top IRC clients" from irc.netsplit.de and another from Alexa are no longer available. This really isn't surprising either, given the slow decline in popularity of IRC with the introduction of some of the newer web-based social networking technologies.

Yes, the XiRCON AfD was very much flawed, but it is just one example of many which were part of a much larger pattern. The reason I CSD'd all drafts within my userspace is detailed in the AN/I report I made here. After I made this report, one if the individuals involved attempted to initiate an ArbCom amendment request in revenge (which Plaxico'd quite badly). Two of the three individuals involved abandoned their accounts when they were finally sanctioned and placed under edit restrictions. The third individual was later indef blocked for continuing to make personal attacks. For more background, see User talk:Tothwolf/Archive 4#On the subject of COI. These three individuals were the ones involved in the discussions above which 71.214.52.97 and I referred to.

Another example is Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/AmIRC. Here are two dead-tree sources for it:
Charalabidis, Alex (1999-12-15). "Odds and Ends: IRC for Other Platforms: Amiga". The Book of IRC: The Ultimate Guide to Internet Relay Chat (1st ed.). San Francisco, California: No Starch Press. p. 249. ISBN 1-886411-29-8. AmIRC is probably the most popular client for the Amiga. It supports all the basics, emphasizing well-developed standard features rather than modern toys, and provides a stable and secure chat environment.
Jeacle, Karl (1996). "Running the Best Software: Internet Relay Chat: AmIRC". First Steps Amiga Surfin'. Bedford, Bedfordshire: Bookmark Publishing. p. 76. ISBN 1-85550-007-8. AmIRC is the aforementioned competition to Grapevine. As with the other "Am" applications, it is the Amiga Technologies choice for inclusion in the A1200 Surfer pack. {{cite book}}: Unknown parameter |month= ignored (help)

Another example is Grapevine, and while I can't see that we've ever had an article for it on Misplaced Pages (and it would seem to meet the requirements of the GNG for the purposes of a standalone article), coverage of this client certainly should be included in this article.
Charalabidis, Alex (1999-12-15). "Odds and Ends: IRC for Other Platforms: Amiga". The Book of IRC: The Ultimate Guide to Internet Relay Chat (1st ed.). San Francisco, California: No Starch Press. pp. 249–250. ISBN 1-886411-29-8.
Jeacle, Karl (1996). "Running the Best Software: Internet Relay Chat: Grapevine". First Steps Amiga Surfin'. Bedford, Bedfordshire: Bookmark Publishing. p. 75. ISBN 1-85550-007-8. Grapevine has been called "The best IRC client on any platform" by a number of experienced Amiga Internet users. it was one of the first major Internet applications available for the Amiga and it did such a good job of being an IRC client that until recently there was no competition whatsoever. {{cite book}}: Unknown parameter |month= ignored (help)

I could cite dozens and dozens of these but I think you probably get the idea. Note that The Book of IRC like many books is not indexed (either full or in part) and text-searchable with Google, so a simple Google Books search is not going to turn it up as a source for the great many IRC-related subtopics it covers. (cf. FUTON bias, Misplaced Pages:Reliable sources/Cost, and Misplaced Pages:Perennial proposals#Require or prefer free, online sources) --Tothwolf (talk) 10:23, 9 March 2011 (UTC)

LimeChat

There are two different IRC clients named LimeChat. One is the one mentioned in this article, the other one is a Windows client by the same author. See here: http://limechat.net/ . It's currently at version 2.39, and seems to be available in Japanese only. It's, however, the most used IRC client in Japan, or at least as far as I remember, all Japanese people I've seen or known, use it. There's also a third one, for iOS. - 94.140.73.150 (talk) 11:43, 1 March 2011 (UTC)

Please provide reliable sources to show it is the most used in Japan. IRWolfie- (talk) 16:40, 3 March 2011 (UTC)

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