Forum:Stars and star systems

This is the revival of an old Ten Forward discussion from three years ago that I can not find otherwise archived. --Alan del Beccio 06:16, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

Ten Forward: Stars and Star systems
What is the actual added value of all those stub-sized ___ system articles? Take for example Regulus and Regulan system. I was looking at Regulus, and to get to Regulus III, I first have to click on Regulan system, which has zero information and just links to the planets. I expected to find these links on the article on the star Regulus.

Then there is the information on the Battle of Andoria, which is only linked in Regulus, not in Regulan system, leading to more confusion and discussion.

Why not simply combine these two typed of articles? Neither of these articles are ever going to be very long. Even Sol, likely the biggest star/star system article we'll ever have, are just two small articles at the moment. -- Harry 23:34, 6 Jan 2005 (CET)


 * The original idea was to separate the "star" from the "system", I think - about a year ago, we started adding all those bits of real astronomical information to articles about stars, and at that point it seemed like a good idea (at least to me) to have a separate article about those "brand name" stars. In these cases, I still think that "star articles" are a good idea. At the same time, we needed the "X system" articles, both because these article titles often were terms used in the episodes and because we simply didn't know (or could only assume) the names of the respective stars. While I still believe that this (having the possibility of both the "star" and "star system" articles) is necessary and a good idea, I agree that this system got out of control somewhat. The best example of this is the list of stars and stellar bodies which is more than just a little messy in my opinion. In short, any form of cleanup would be nice, but we can't simply remove either all "star" articles or all "star system" articles. -- Cid Highwind 23:59, 2005 Jan 6 (CET)


 * Some of them could do without.. i'd still say that every star X that has a system should have an 'X system' redirect should there not be a necessity for a system article. -- Captain Mike K. Bartel

I think we need to narrow down the policy, and only allow 'X system' articles for references for which we don't know the name of the primary (like Goren system, which could strictly speaking also be a planetary system or even a starcluster, judging by the sometimes confusing language). But confirmed stars should not have a separate 'X system' article, and we should use a redirect in these cases. To summarize:
 * 1) If we have no further information on a system, and the primary of the system is not a known object, put the article at __ system.
 * 2) Otherwise, if the primary is known, link to that article or use a __ system redirect.

Articles like Devron system are good examples of #1, but cases like Regulus and Alpha Centauri need cleaning up. -- Harry 14:32, 7 Jan 2005 (CET)


 * I think the rule of thumb is that any system where the system name and the star name are identical should go under the star article. This works well, for example, that Altair is the main article and Altair system simply redirects back to it. The only separate "system" articles that could and should remain in this case are those where the name of the star is unknown or unlisted, or when the system has a separate name from the star. The last system article possible under the new rule would be a tiered system: the Alpha Centauri system has three stars, each with its own separate system (a subsystem?). -- Captain Mike K. Bartel 21:10, 9 Jan 2005 (CET)


 * User:EtaPiscium is concerned (Talk:Vico system) about the number of redirects this will create. -- Captain Mike K. Bartel 21:12, 10 Jan 2005 (CET)


 * What I propose instead is that only star systems where the star is known and is the same as the system name should be combined with the star systems. That means star systems around real stars (i.e. "Acamar system") would be under "Acamar", as would systems where the star is known (i.e. "Monac"/"Monac system") For systems whose parent stars have never been mentioned (i.e. "Volon system"), I recommend the article stay under "Volon system" because there is no possibility that another article will ever link to just "Volon". That will cut down on the number of redirects enormously, since we know of many systems only through their planets (i.e. "Narendra IV"/"Narendra system") and through them the star ("Narendra"), and there's no need to have a redirect when any conceivable reference to the system will linked to "Narendra system" and not "Narendra". -- EtaPiscium 21:24, 10 Jan 2005 (CET)


 * I simply think that I prefer the simpler names.. as you can see from Talk:Vico system. If an article's main home resides at the simpler name as a rule, it will be a lot easier to link to about three-quarters of the star / system articles on this site, by keeping them in one main name form, with the separate solar system names that exist only when absolutely necessary. I don't think it makes much of an issue if 10 articles link to a Vico system redirect and only 2 or so link to Vico (star) -- because they all end up at the same article. Wiki naming conventions suggest the simpler article name and support an infrastructure of useful redirects anyway, i'm saying we use it. -- Captain Mike K. Bartel 21:48, 10 Jan 2005 (CET)


 * The problem is that there will be no articles that link to "Vico (star)" because it's never been mentioned, nor is "Vico (star)" particularly convenient a link because of the qualifier attached to it. The simplest name is not always the best one; I think that the most logical name is best. In the case of Vico, when I'm writing about the Vico system because it's mentioned in the episode, the obvious thought is to link it to "Vico system", rather than having to make a jump to "Vico (star)", which somebody might not even think of because it's non-intuitive to link to the star when you're talking about the system. If all the systems we know of are instead switched to their stars, there'll be a bunch of broken links from people who're writing and believe that "X system" is the correct nomenclature, that'll either have to be fixed or changed to a redirect. I don't see why we have to implement a system that makes it more difficult for people to put in the correct links. -- EtaPiscium 00:12, 11 Jan 2005 (CET)

I agree with both of you. In the case of Vico, there's enough evidence that Vico is a star. In the case of Volon, there is not. I don't agree with the Narendra example. What's the point of the Narendra system page? There is only one planet, Narendra III, and we know absolutely nothing about the Narendra system apart from that. I suggest we don't make ___ system pages for every minor planet with Roman numerals. -- Harry 22:06, 10 Jan 2005 (CET)


 * Unfortunately there're already a bunch of them out there since a while ago I was looking at edits people made to my planet articles and I started assuming that was the protocol for all planets with Roman numerals. -- EtaPiscium 00:14, 11 Jan 2005 (CET)


 * This seems to become even more complicated than I feared... Some questions I asked myself when reading this discussion were:
 * Which pages are necessary? I think that each "object" that was mentioned deserves a page - even if it is a redirect page to another article (which makes sense in some cases, of course). Regarding the "Vico"-issue, this means that both "Vico _" (whatever numeral was used in this case) and "Vico system" deserve to exist, while "Vico" is just an assumed title - a good assumption, but still an assumption.
 * What is the simplest title? I agree that articles should exist at a "most simple" title, but what is or isn't "simple" depends on the context. If "Vico system" was mentioned in an episode and "Vico" was not, can the latter one really be the "simplest title"? If "Vico" even is a disambiguation page, does it really make sense to use "Vico (star)" instead of "Vico system"?
 * There are good arguments for both sides - what we will most probably end up with is a mess of both "star" and "star system" articles, with additional redirects to and from both. It simply isn't possible to create only star articles or only star system articles (although it would be nice, for example when trying to categorize all these). I don't have an easy solution, but I'm unsure if we should simply continue deleting some of the existing pages at the moment... -- Cid Highwind 01:16, 2005 Jan 11 (CET)
 * Additional note regarding categorization: Please keep in mind that it is not possible to categorize redirects. If we ever want to have a "Category:Stars" or a "Category:Star systems", it might be a good idea to not have a redirect at that article title. Perhaps the idea of having both articles (if both are known or can at least be reasonably assumed, of course) isn't that bad after all? Perhaps we should just update the relevant templates to avoid extraneous clicks (as described in the initial post) instead... -- Cid Highwind 11:50, 2005 Jan 11 (CET)

Talk:Vico system
I thought the decision from Memory Alpha:Ten Forward was to keep systems that didn't have established primary names at under "(name) system", so shouldn't this be under "Vico system" since we don't know that the star is called "Vico" too? -- EtaPiscium 20:31, 10 Jan 2005 (CET)


 * I was operating under the assumption that if there's is a system (Vico system) and a oplanet named with that same systemic notation (Vico V) that that is sufficient evidence that Vico system and Vico V are centered around Vico (star). I think wherever these to data points concur, its pretty conclusive. -- Captain Mike K. Bartel 20:34, 10 Jan 2005 (CET)

But I think it's unnecessarily complicated to have a redirect to the presumed star "Vico" (assuming it exists) when it was never actually referenced, since all the possible articles linking to it will be to "Vico system" and not "Vico (star)". I was assuming that only star systems where the name of the star is already known and is the same as the system name, would the system be put under the star's article.

Which led to three possibilities:

1) For the Aldebaran system, the star is known to be Aldebaran so the whole article is under "Aldebaran" 2) For the Volon system, we don't know that the star is called Volon so it's put under "Volon system" 3) For the Kolarin system, the star is called Kolarus Prime, so there are two articles, "Kolarus Prime" and "Kolarin system"

Is that not what was agreed to? -- EtaPiscium 20:40, 10 Jan 2005 (CET)


 * If it had been simply the "Vico system" i'd say that's true -- but the fact the Vico V lays in the Vico system changes the matter. Just like the combination of Aldebaran III and Aldebaran system leads us to the conclusion there is a star named Aldebaran as the parent. Certainly if we didn't see the planetary notation "Vico V," we'd be forced to agree the Vico system could orbit any star, but that notation usually means its the fifth planet from Vico (star). Certainly this remains true for other "system" articles like Xendi Sabu system --> there's no planetary notation to reference, so that is a case we must recognize that there might not be a star Xendi Sabu. -- Captain Mike K. Bartel

What about planets like Beta III, which isn't named for its parent star at all? -- EtaPiscium 20:50, 10 Jan 2005 (CET)


 * Beta III lacks half of that combination also -- we know the planetary notation is "Beta III" -- but there is no "Beta system" -- its clearly noted as being in the c-111 system. We'll have to look up relevant discussions relating to Alpha system for more, but unless we can find more instances of a planet having "false-positives" of the roman numeral notation (ie the planet looks like is Xth planet from Star Y, but the name is misleading, but i cant recall any other cases that would disprove that Beta III and Alpha III are anything but isolated cases, and also non-applicable because of their sole Greek letter names (remember, producers were careful to "obscure" simplistic names in later cases, like Theta VIII actually being Theta 116 VIII and Mira V becoming Mira Antliae V -- so I don't think we'll find any more ambiguity to support the case that the roman numeral notation system works any differently than it seems)-- Captain Mike K. Bartel 20:57, 10 Jan 2005 (CET)

Well, my main point is that its just simpler to have "Volon system" rather than "Volon", because the star has never been mentioned onscreen so there aren't any articles that link to it. There could potentially be a huge number of redirects if this policy is universally implemented. -- EtaPiscium 21:05, 10 Jan 2005 (CET)


 * Further discussion at Memory Alpha:Ten Forward please. -- Harry 21:57, 10 Jan 2005 (CET)

New Discussion
This topic has come up again at talk:Antede system, as has been the root for several deletions as well. It seems we need to review when and how to create these X system articles and follow through with removing all unnecessary ones from Category:Star systems (and perhaps Category:Stars) instead of revisiting this issue every few weeks on in our present, inefficient case-by-case manner. --Alan del Beccio 06:16, 20 September 2007 (UTC)


 * Without having read through all of the above again, there basically are three questions to consider:
 * If only one (star or star system name) is known, should we assume the other one?
 * If we have both (whether by assumption from question #1 or because both were mentioned), do we need separate articles?
 * If we have both, but only want to have one article, which title should be the article and which should be the redirect?
 * In my opinion: We shouldn't assume anything, and we might as well combine articles, especially if the "star" article only states that this actually is a star and links to the "system" article - which links back to the star and additionally to the only known planet in the system. Whether we should then prefer the star or the system article - I'm not sure of that, yet. -- Cid Highwind 13:16, 20 September 2007 (UTC)