Forum:Item categories by series or movie/CS

I am copying this from something I said elsewhere in the memory alpha talk page; I was searching for an alcoholic drink shared by Tom and Torres (originally I was searching for an alcoholic drink Chakotay concealed from Neelix) when, after a long search, I realized I just could not find it... This is when I decided to join the page so I could forward this suggestion; It is about making subcategories for categories of items like beverages, alcoholic drinks, vehicles, weapons, etc. These subcategories would further break categories into movies and series so if you are searching for an alcoholic drink from Voyager you would only get alcoholic drinks from Voyager, and so on... anyone agrees with me? I even doubt the "beverage" category is full (I was trying to avoid repeating the same item by choosing only those that hadnot been marked and I went through every drink that had a name that made it obvious that it was alcoholic and I only found the Chakotay drink which was the Antarian cider)

To the previous I am adding that one does not always know in which episode the item one is searching for appeared (for instance I did not know the Antarian cider appeared in Shattered because I had already seen more episodes by the time I needed the data) and that while in which series or movie something appeared is not in-universe information it is also useful information... Don't you think?--The Tuvixean (talk) 18:37, September 13, 2012 (UTC)

PS: This is already done with races (for instance the article on betazoids has a list of episodes where betazoids appear, it does not say which betazoids appear there but it lists the episode where they appear, with the exception of such betazoids as Deanna Troi that are main characters)--The Tuvixean (talk) 18:46, September 13, 2012 (UTC)


 * You can't have an in-universe category to allow searching by series/movie, as we treat the Star Trek universe as a universe, not as a TV show. They don't divide up their reality by which TV show it was in, so we don't either.  Maybe there is some other way to do what you are trying to do- like a hidden out-of-universe category or some other method- but not in-universe, I think.
 * Each article should already list which episodes the article's subject appears in, either with inline references or in a list at the end. What you describe with the races is different than what you are proposing here. 31dot (talk) 20:37, September 13, 2012 (UTC)

I understand that, but unlike memory beta, memory alpha treats it as a series of tv shows and movies in the same continuity with canon and non-canon... References are given to the novels and comics and videogames but they are not treated as canon os it can be said that while Star Trek is treated like a universe it is treated as what it happens to be; a fictional universe (or better said, a fictional multiverse as universes like the one of the mirror mirror are regarded as real parts of this multiverse, only alternate timelines are treated as "once real but no longer real")...

As the original series has many preposterous elements (common to sci-fi of the era they were made in) I would dismiss them as non-canon if I could, but since I cannot I take them with a grain of salt, as if they were, more than non-canon, some in-between, the stories of the 23rd century in the voice of its protagonists and distorted over time (pretty much like Voyager's adventures got distorted in the mouth of 31st century kyrians)...

Yet I am not trying to dismiss TOS as less than canon, I am just trying to help point the fact that canon evolves with each series; at the time of TOS the Star Trek canon was ridiculous for the people of the 90s and afterwards, dispite braking many cliches that needed to be broken (thanks to Roddenberry's visionary nature)... TNG brought to the canon elements much more believable for the scientifically literate people of the 90s and afterwards (I believe scientific literacy among layman has increased much more since the late 80s onwards in comparison to previous years, thanks to sci-fi and with the rise of internet, thanks to internet); DS9 and Voyager did not enhance this canon but suplemented it, only failing in that Chakotay makes a poor excuse of an amerindian as this site explains in a link regarding the incosistencies of his origin, the prequel Entrepise which I will try watching soon is probably what bridges the canon of TOS to real events in actual history the best (I hope the series does something about the ridiculous notion of Khan Noonien Singh and his war of genetically enhanced people, but I dont have much faith in that because changing such aspects of canon stablished by such foundationary series as TOS, that probably makes the greatest portion of Star Trek fans, is a risque movement few authors would be willing to take and the only excuse for differences between reality and the Star Trek universe is that the fictional universe has a difference history and rate of development than ours)

I am not proposing to eliminate the categories where all items are grouped together (for instance when I wanted to search planets in the control of the Klingon Empire I found that a complete list not broken into such subcategories as the ones I was proposing was better), but I am asking that besides alphabetical subcategorization one could, at one's own choice, access a chronological categorization (the 24nd century and the 22nd century are where Star Trek events of the works of the 90s and afterwards take part, mostly, the 23rd century in the star Trek canon is the typical 70s sci-fi) and a out-of-universe categorization (with TNG, VOY and DS9 merely knowing the century is not enough), as for articles already pointing out the series the item appears in, yes, that is true, they do so, but how can you find the object if you know what the object is and what series it comes from and who interacts with it but you do not know which episode it appeared on? The search can be futile... For instance I was searching for a particular Betazoid, one that was for me the most devious Betazoid ever and probably the best example of how can the empathic nature of betazoids be turn to unscrupulous behaviour... I tried the list of episodes where betazoids had appeared (I knew he was from TNG) and could not find it because the list was defective (the episode was "The Price") so I added the list for future reference, if I ever forget his name again I can try that short list of episodes instead of trying the larger list of betazoids, the same applies when searching anything and I know other categories make reference to subcategories by series (not only those of races) I just cannot think of another such case because I am not remembering... maybe if lists were presented on tables, One column names the item, another column links the item in the same row to a date of availability, a third column links the item to a spatial source where it comes from and a fourth column mentions in what series, movies or otherwise the item has appeared, maybe even better, give each possibility their own column so each row will have a check or nothing depending on each case, and whoever wants to rearrange the list needs to click on an arrow next to each column header as many tables in wikipedia do... What ya say? I would do this myself if the idea were approved and I knew how to, but I do not know and it still needs approval...--The Tuvixean (talk) 23:12, September 13, 2012 (UTC)


 * Is there any way you could slim down the above, because it is too much to read and I'm not really sure what your point is. Please also keep your indent consistent throughout this section. 31dot (talk) 23:15, September 13, 2012 (UTC)

Most of the above is argumentation but to slim things down, here is what I am proposing now;

I am asking that besides alphabetical subcategorization one could, at one's own choice, access a chronological categorization (the 24nd century and the 22nd century are where Star Trek events of the works of the 90s and afterwards take part, mostly, the 23rd century in the star Trek canon is the typical 70s sci-fi, as ridiculous as Buck Rogers in the 25th Century or The New Adventures of Flash Gordon) and a out-of-universe categorization (with TNG, VOY and DS9 merely knowing the century is not enough),

maybe if lists were presented on tables, One column names the item, another column links the item in the same row to a date of availability, a third column links the item to a spatial source where it comes from and a fourth column mentions in what series, movies or otherwise the item has appeared, maybe even better, give each possibility their own column so each row will have a check or nothing depending on each case, and whoever wants to rearrange the list needs to click on an arrow next to each column header as many tables in wikipedia do... What ya say? I would do this myself if the idea were approved and I knew how to, but I do not know and it still needs approval...--The Tuvixean (talk) 23:42, September 13, 2012 (UTC)

PS: I do not know what indent is, but if it is what I think it might be... I am using it as I have always seen it used in wikipedia's talk page...--The Tuvixean (talk) 23:51, September 13, 2012 (UTC)


 * "Indent" is the colons before your write your post; our convention here is to keep them the same throughout the section, to make it easier to tell posts apart. Since you started this section, you should have no colons in this section.
 * I don't believe category pages are structured in such a manner as to allow doing what you describe, at least with categories- though others might know better than I. It also seems to me to make things more complicated than they need to be, instead of making things easier. 31dot (talk) 23:58, September 13, 2012 (UTC)

Oh, ok, when in Rome do like the Romans... Wikipedia tends to use indents to start a conversation tree, anyway, back on trail;

Implementing what I describe might be difficult at first (it needs someone with memoristic knowledge of how to edit this wiki and memoristic knowledge of what goes where) but once implemented anyone can contribute to enhacing the system... Wikipedia applies it with great ease and it is an excellent wikia... As for the relative complication; I would say it does increase complication in editing, but it adds simplicity in accessing the final product, the information itself.--The Tuvixean (talk) 00:03, September 14, 2012 (UTC)


 * Can you link to an example of such a category on Wikipedia? I read it and I've never seen a category like that- not that they don't exist, but they don't seem common. 31dot (talk) 00:17, September 14, 2012 (UTC)

Ok, here are two examples I can think rihgt out of my mind: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cities_proper_by_population http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/School_shootings

the main item in the list of the first link are cities, the main item in the second link are shootings (with lists divided by country or subcontinent or region)... I have seen it in many wikipedia articles (I can add more examples if you want, but I am too lazy to add them right now)--The Tuvixean (talk) 00:25, September 14, 2012 (UTC)


 * Those are list articles, not categories. We do have some list articles here, and if you want to tableize them that can be discussed, but those aren't categories. 31dot (talk) 00:38, September 14, 2012 (UTC)

Forgive me for my lack of insight into the proper terminology, I do not derive my lexicon from a deep experience with software and wikis but from my broad and deep knowledge of philosophy and etymology... List articles are a kind of categorization or subcategorization from the perspective of "category theory" or "set theory" that is a field of mathematics but is also a field of logic and philosophy (as studied by Bertrand Russell)... So where is the proper place to discuss the possibility of making list articles for such item lists as "list of planets", "list of beverages", "list of alcoholic drinks" and so on?--The Tuvixean (talk) 00:44, September 14, 2012 (UTC)


 * Since you started a page at Ten Forward already, I'd suggest using that. 31dot (talk) 01:11, September 14, 2012 (UTC)

Ok, I am going there right now with the idea...--The Tuvixean (talk) 01:15, September 14, 2012 (UTC)