This article is about a small dinosaur which became quite important to the study of dinosaur evolution upon its discovery. It is notable for its eponymous teeth and primitive features, and for being the basis of a family of dinosaurs. We have covered most of the scientific literature about the animal, the article has been copy-edited, and is a GA. Luckily, an article covering its family was published in a CC journal, which has provided most of our free images. FunkMonk (talk) 11:11, 2 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]
If you're using American English, it might be best to use imperial units rather than the metric system
I think we originally wrote this in British English, but the copy-editor changed it to American for some reason. How do you feel about this, Jens Lallensack? Most of the papers about this dinosaur are in BE. FunkMonk (talk) 23:08, 7 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Before we started editing, the article was in American English, as far as I can see. So we might have to stick with it. Regarding the papers, its often not the authors who decide whether to choose AM or BE; this is often predetermined by the journal they are publishing in. Therefore I'm not sure if this would be a good argument to switch to BE for this article. But regardless what we choose, I'm clearly against abandoning the metric system in a scientific article like this. The metric system is the standard in other dinosaur FAs, including the American dinosaurs. --Jens Lallensack (talk) 23:29, 7 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]
The editors who improve the article can decide what to write it in, the only other determining factor is whether the article's subject has some sort of connection to a spelling.[2] In this case, being South African, AE at least doesn't seem logical. Also Charig was British, and I guess SA English is closer to BE... But in any case, both measurements should always be included, I think Dunkleosteus means which one that should be displayed first? FunkMonk (talk) 23:53, 7 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]
If you're using American English, add the template {{American English}} to the top of the article's talk page, and use imperial units. If you're using British English, add the template {{British English}} to the article's talk page and use metric system (use the metric if you're using any dialect of English other than American). Just use the template {{<insert dialect> English}} at the talk page to avoid future confusion and make sure to stay consistent with dialect and measuring system (and of course use {{convert}}). I personally think that since the dinosaur is from South Africa you should use South African English and the metric system. User:Dunkleosteus77 |push to talk02:51, 9 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]
By "using" a system, do you mean that the one that fits the dialect is showed first, and the conversion is shown in parenthesis? To be honest, I think it would be cool to use South African English... Not sure what that entails though, but I think it's almost identical to British English, so I think BE is the best compromise. This page states they simply use BE in SA.[3] This indicates the difference is mainly in pronunciation and having some extra borrowed words, not in spelling.[4] I can make the change quickly if we agree. FunkMonk (talk) 06:24, 9 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]
@FunkMonk: I have no objections to change it to British English. Please go ahead.
@Dunkleosteus77: I had a quick look at the Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Dates and numbers#Units of measurement, and it seems to state the opposite: Only non-scientific articles relating to the United States are to use imperial units. This article is not related to the United States (no matter if its in American English or British English), and its not non-scientific. So we have to use the metric system here (or rather, have to show it first with the imperial units in parenthesis) according to the rules, even if we keep it in American English. Do I miss something? --Jens Lallensack (talk) 08:20, 9 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]
You could remove one of the "heterodontid/ae" links from the lead. I recommend the "heterodontid" in the first sentence as you can't explain it there and there are alot of bluelinks and big words already...
'Heterodontosaurus was a comparatively small dinosaur. - "comparatively" redundant here I think.
do any of the sources compare it in size to a living animal..."dog/cat/cow/etc.." to help a layreader visualise the size?
The skull of Heterodontosaurus was relatively small but robustly built. --> "The skull of Heterodontosaurus was small but robustly built." ?
differentiation of the teeth - could just say "different-shaped teeth" - more accessible
Done all but one, but none of the technical literature seems to compare the size to any extant animals. I have an older popular book[5] that compares the size to that of a turkey, but I'm not sure if the source is "authoritative" enough? FunkMonk (talk) 17:36, 23 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Support on comprehensiveness and prose. Only slight dilemma for me is whether we need "heterodontid" in first sentence or just link further down - but can see the point of having it there too. Not a deal-breaker anyway. Cas Liber (talk·contribs) 19:38, 24 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]
File:Heterodontosaurus AMNH 24000.jpg had a CC 2.5 license instead of a CC 3.0 license as indicated by the source copyright, I've fixed that. Otherwise images look good.
It appears all sources meet FA criteria for reliability and reputation.
For the purposes of verification I'd prefer to see scientific papers cited by page numbers, instead of linking the entire paper (ex. current ref 2, Galton, is cited repeatedly and a 44-page range is given for citation.) This might necessitate a switch to Harvard citation style with another reference section to reduce clutter, but for WP:V purposes I think it's important.
A 3–5 page paper isn't a major burden, and anything that's covered in the abstract itself (as were some of the spot-checks I did below) isn't particularly pressing, but for the longer articles I would say so. Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs(talk)19:04, 11 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Just my two cents: In other articles (both in the English and German Wikipedia) I've tried many different approaches allowing for citing specific page numbers. The problem is that a good and standardized technical implementation in MediaWiki is still missing. Regardless what I tried, there were always people pointing out the many disadvantages of the respective approach, asking me to switch to another approach. I'm really tired of this. For example, the implementation in Carnotaurus has recently been criticized as being to complicating, making it difficult for other editors to change something. I certainly agree here, but I have no solution. You are completely right that page numbers would be a benefit, but since most other dinosaur FAs do not have them, I would suggest we wait until an acceptable software implementation exists instead of using one of the rarely used, sub-optimal and non-standardized approaches. Having said this, including page numbers would mean a few hours of work, but should be doable as we have digitized all cited sources. --Jens Lallensack (talk) 22:05, 14 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Jens Lallensack: Harvard citations are really not that complicated, and are pretty widely used across a variety of disciplines; if you need to you can create anchor links and wikilink to reference to the footnote, although I don't think that's strictly needed. Carnotaurus probably rightfully got flack because you are using syntax I've never seen in any reference work and then combining that with citation templates in a non-standard way with common usage, both in the body and the refs. It frankly is a mess and unnecessarily complicated, but I'm not asking you to do something like that, I'm just asking for actual page numbers for verification. Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs(talk)14:56, 15 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
@David Fuchs: Do you mean we should use in-text citations, having info like "Norman et al., 2004, p. 134" directly embedded in the text? I don't think that's the way to go, as it will be very different to other articles, and many people are concerned as it might disrupt the reading experience. @FunkMonk: I think yours is the best option. Although it is imho still not very convincing: We need to separate lists, only because some refs need page numbers, and others do not, which makes the whole think more complicated. The reader might think that one of the lists is more important than the other (i.e., they confuse it with a "further reading" section), which is not the case. When we cite a long paper only once, we still need to have it in both lists, as we can't use the "pages=" attribute in the cite-journal template to specify page numbers; if we would do that, the reader would not be able to distinguish between page ranges for the whole article and page ranges for the information we cited. But still, I don't see a better option. --Jens Lallensack (talk) 09:51, 17 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
I've now split Sereno 2012 in the manner I proposed. Any thoughts, David Fuchs and Jens Lallensack? Of the remaining citations I think only Norman et al. 2011, Galton 2014, and Santa Luca 1980 are long enough to warrant such detailed splitting. FunkMonk (talk) 18:19, 19 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Hmmm, but such page-ranges have been enough for practically all other FAs I've worked on. Is there any guideline that states how short page-ranges should be? FunkMonk (talk) 15:41, 22 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
I don't see any explicit statements or recommendations on length; WP:V says The cited source must clearly support the material as presented in the article. Cite the source clearly and precisely (specifying page, section, or such divisions as may be appropriate) and WP:CSSpecify the page number or range of page numbers. Page numbers are not required for a reference to the book or article as a whole. But in practical terms how are you helping either me as a reviewer or a reader with accurately verifying information if you just tell them "it's all in here somewhere"? Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs(talk)16:01, 22 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
I'd say it's way more specific than that. For example, one page range covers the part of the paper related to diet, because this article's diet section contains a summary of that entire section. So if you want to verify something from the diet section here, the page range tells you exactly where to look. There may be pages of figures in between that makes it seem like there are more pages in the range, but these should be easy to skip. A range consisting of fifteen pages may include several pages of just images. FunkMonk (talk) 16:10, 22 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Spotchecked statements attributed to refs 4, 7, 12, 31, and 34. Did not spot any issues with close paraphrasing or incorrect/incomplete/synth sourcing.
At first glance, this article appears to be of featured article quality; upon closer scrutiny, it still holds up. In order to get an even better idea of this article's overall quality, I checked it against both the featured article criteria (as is standard) and other paleontology-related articles (e.g. Tyrannosaurus) which have already passed to FA quality. Here are my observations:
This article's prose is of featured quality, as it is grammatically correct, stylistically appropriate, and overall of professional quality. I did discover one minor issue:
From the first paragraph, the sentence
"The genus name means "different toothed lizard", in reference to its unusual, heterodont dentition, and the specific name honors G. C. Tuck, who supported the discoverers."
may be better off in terms of grammar as:
"The genus name means "different toothed lizard", in reference to its unusual, heterodont dentition; the specific name honors G. C. Tuck, who supported the discoverers."
This article's lead is engaging and sufficiently summarizes the main points of the article.
This article is comprehensive; every topic that is dealt with is discussed in appropriate depth without bogging down the article with useless information. However, depending on what information is available (and its importance), you may consider adding information about the following aspects of the subject:
Neurology and Senses (e.g. Brain structure, Reliance on sight/smell, etc...)
Depiction in popular culture (though there may not be enough concerning this particular creature)
Though it is a fairly well-known genus, which appears in most popular dinosaur books, it has never appeared in any films or those animated dinosaur "documentaries" to my knowledge... FunkMonk (talk) 12:39, 15 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
These are just rough suggestions; I'm not sure how much literature there is out there concerning these aspects of the creature. If reliable content is found, its addition may help improve the article.
Other than this, the article covers all areas of the topic well.
This article's structure is appropriate, and it closely follows the structure of other FA's; the organization is both logical and convenient.
This article follows and fulfills WP:STYLE. It does not appear sloppy, contains numerous links to other articles, and lists measurement conversions. All images are appropriate and legal, and the videos are a nice touch.
This article is stable, with mostly non-IP edits and no edit warring.
This article is reliably sourced.
In conclusion, this article goes appropriately in-depth to its subject in all the necessary categories. While it could be expanded, such expansion is by no means necessary; this article is, in my opinion, a featured article as-is: I support promotion. Any additions would only make it better. Good work, good luck, and farewell. Colonel Wilhelm Klink (Complaints|Mistakes) 23:13, 13 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
I suppose that if there's no major coverage of those topics from third party sources, it can't be included in the article. Thanks for checking though. Additionally, while looking in the "Locomotion and Metabolism" section, which I somehow inexplicably overlooked before, I found a minor typo and corrected it myself:
"Even at moderate running speeds, Heterodontosaurus would had exceeded the maximum aerobic capabilities possible for an ectotherm (cold-blooded) animal, indicating endothermy in this genus."
was changed to
"Even at moderate running speeds, Heterodontosaurus would have exceeded the maximum aerobic capabilities possible for an ectotherm (cold-blooded) animal, indicating endothermy in this genus."
