Category talk:Users by language spoken

How to do the language user groups?
I have been trying to clean up the language categories, make sure everything can be reached through the category hierarchy etc, but I am not sure what would be the best way. As I gather, many users are already used to the Category:Users/Language/en-N format, and this is also the way the Babel user boxes auto generate categories. However, this category format is not in line with the other User categories on this Wiki. I have "kinda" solved it by making a hierarchy in line with the other user groups, but keeping the "bottom" categories in the old style. Is this acceptable, or do we want some other style? There really is only three options; Either have the "old, non GW WIKI" style throughout, or recode the Babel templates to fit with the user categories we have elsewhere (ie. "Users who speak English at a native level" etc). Or keep the "compromise" User groups that we have currently. Also, I have made categories based on languages. Is this something we want, or do we want a similar solution as the old Wiki, where all categories are just in one big list? Any thoughts?--Lensor 22:10, 8 June 2007 (UTC)
 * For me, the current solution looks good. The bottom level language categories start out with "User", so changing that would not be a priority for me. --Xeeron 16:32, 12 June 2007 (UTC)
 * I think I would be fine with however you organise it. I just have issues with the name. This particular category should be renamed Category:Users by language spoken. Each of the subcategories in here would be for one language group (eg. English), not a multi-language group (eg. English + French), so technically, it should only be singular. I also honestly do not like the categories that the Babel boxes produce. I find them ugly and inelegant, which is why I created the earlier set of "Users who ..." type of categories. It's also more readable and consistent with the mainspace categories. I think a big list might solve this nicely. Kinda like having a Category:Users who speak/understand/contribute English and then using the Babel boxes to add the appropriate sort key, so each of the language subcategories would be divided into en-N, en-4, en-3, en-2, and en-1. Just my 2. -- ab.er. rant [[Image:User Ab.er.rant Sig.png|sig]] 08:21, 13 June 2007 (UTC)
 * The reason I put in the (s) was that practically noone is present in only one category. But I agree that it may look ugly and a simplification of the name may be in order. What about "Users by language", short and simple? I also really dont like the Babel box categories, but I was not going to embark on recoding the templates if not "needed" (guess they were imported as is from wherever), as I am afraid they go a bit over my current understading of template code and I dont want to mess anything up. I dont really understand what you mean about the categories though. If I understand you correctly, you propose a system where each language has no subcategories (as they do today), but rather that users are directly sorted under "N", "1", "2", "3" and "4" in the different language categories? That might work, although I am not sure how to sort according to numbers. (I dont think sorting according to "en-1" etc would work, as then everyone would just be under "e", but maybe there is a way?). Another thing, should not the Babel boxes be saved in the User template namespace (they are presently in Template:Babel/Box)?--Lensor 09:21, 13 June 2007 (UTC)
 * I also think splitting the grades 1-N into extra subcategories is not that nice. Would prefer that all german users are added to Users German, having either their grade behind their name (e.g. MSorglos (de-N)) or grouped into these categories without having them as sub-categories (or having them as subcategories but including them into main category). But I don't know how to realize such behavior, perhaps I can do some tests after my diploma presentation. - MSorglos (talk|contrib) 09:57, 14 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Perhaps my Sandboxing could be one possibility: will sort users by level, inside of level sort by name. Don't know wether this will be unmanageable. Don't know wether section "3 A" could be generated. - MSorglos (talk|contrib) 10:11, 14 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Yea, I meant sorting by "N", "1", "2", "3", or "4" as necessary. Or maybe "Native" rather than "N". Category:Users by language is fine too. The Babel boxes probably came from GuildWiki. But I can help you change them when you've settled on what category names to change them to. -- ab.er. rant [[Image:User Ab.er.rant Sig.png|sig]] 10:46, 14 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Ye, but sorted under "Native" will still show up under "N", right? The old Wiki has every language proficiency as a separate subcategory, they are just all in one big list. I prefer to divide by language, as not everyone know what each abbreviation stands for, but then I agree that the addition of proficieny subcategories becomes a little "heavy". To me, the perfect would be:
 * Users by language
 * Users who can contribute in English
 * no subcategories, but users sorted clearly under N, 4, 3, 2, 1, alternativly "Native, Near- native, Advanced, Intermediate, Basic".
 * Users who can contribute in German (Deutch)
 * and so on. Sounds like MSorgos is having a good sorting mechanism in the works. --Lensor ( talk ) 11:20, 14 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Looks good. Implement? This looks stalled. -- ab.er. rant [[Image:User Ab.er.rant Sig.png|sig]] 09:49, 17 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Yes... forgot this discussion... I should go to my watchlist more often ;-). Let's give it a try. - MSorglos (talk|contrib) 07:13, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

(reset indent) I gave this a thought and I was wondering whether we should also rename the Babel templates into a more appropriate naming convention: "BabelMsg" -> "Babel userbox"; "Babel/1" -> "Babel level 1", "Babel/N" -> "Babel level N", etc., and then create templates like for users to use. Categorisation sorting would be based on 1, 2, 3, 4, and N (explanation on their meaning needed on each language category). And no categorisation for 0. -- ab.er. rant  06:19, 30 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Sounds good... that template babel box renamings are something for GWW:BOTS I think. - MSorglos (talk|contrib) 20:01, 30 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Nah shouldn't be too hard. I'd say the tedious one is in creating those language boxes and then updating the user pages of so many users. -- ab.er. rant [[Image:User Ab.er.rant Sig.png|sig]] 10:23, 31 July 2007 (UTC)