Commons:Categories for discussion/2019/11/Category:Metal bridges
Unclear purpose, scope, definition and contents.
See Category talk:Iron_bridges. We have a long-term issue where naming and meaning are confused for bridges, particularly iron vs steel. This category is part of that, although also the least useful.
We have Category:Bridges by material, which is clearly an important high-level category for the description of bridges. It should include, as direct children, all of the major material-based types. Even where that is contradicted by COM:OVERCAT (hiding major groups beneath arbitrary sub-categories is unhelpful). This category is a worst-case example of that.
"Metal" bridges mean either iron or steel. There are a vanishingly small group of bridges in aluminium, maybe even something obscure in another metal (but examples escape me at present). "Iron" is also sub-divided importantly into wrought iron and cast iron. This is such an important distinction (they have contradictory properties, thus are used in quite different structural types) that we should treat those two materials as distinct and place them directly under "by materials", i.e. a three way split between cast iron, wrought iron and steel.
The content of this category does not represent any rational grouping:
"Footbridges" would seem to be inevitable here as a valid and defining group, but it tells us little otherwise. Like this category, "metal" just doesn't work as a grouping.
"Riveted" bridges is again, a valid and defining group in itself (both iron and steel were frequently riveted, concrete is not). But again, it plays no useful part in any navigational pattern. "Riveted steel" bridges would be firstly bridges by structural type (arch, girder, truss etc.), secondly by steel as a material and in a far third place, by riveting. "Riveting" alone as a supercategory, encompassing the three materials in all their forms, is of very little use.
"Iron" and "steel", as such broad terms, have all the problems already described.
The files included here are such a random collection as to be meaningless.
A more rational structure here would include deleting this category. Probably iron bridges and metal footbridges too. Andy Dingley (talk) 16:20, 10 November 2019 (UTC)
- I'm not sure I understand the problem. I accept that all bridges should eventually be placed in the correct iron or steel bridges category - ultimately, it should have no images - but if someone doesn't know whether a bridge is made of iron or steel, it's better to have it in Category:Metal bridges, no? And if we're going to have Category:Metal structures, it doesn't seem outlandish that we might have Category:Metal bridges as a subcategory. Sorry if I've failed to grasp something important from your comments above. - Themightyquill (talk) 12:27, 11 November 2019 (UTC)
- Is this category permanent or temporary? If it's temporary, is that really temporary (i.e. files are expected to be moved out of it), or is it actually permanent, as a group for "We can't identify this and have given up trying"?
- It's named here, and populated, as if it's permanent i.e. a useful sub-layer of grouping between "materials" and either "iron" or "steel". But it doesn't work for that, as discussed. It's just not a useful grouping to identify bridges as "metal", but no more than that. We need to either go deeper, or we might as well not bother to identify their material.
- If really temporary, it should be named as "Unidentified bridges of either wrought iron or steel", and cast-iron should be excluded (as they're identifiable from their shape).
- We can place both "steel bridges", "iron bridges" et al. directly into "metal structures" just as well, without a superfluous extra layer. Andy Dingley (talk) 13:38, 11 November 2019 (UTC)
- Holger1959, who created the cat is no longer active on Wikipedia and Commons (though his work lives on since many german wikipedians still work heavily with his lists and scripts). I am ambivalent about the cat in questions - decide on best judgement. --Ordercrazy (talk) 13:57, 11 November 2019 (UTC)
- @Andy Dingley and Themightyquill: This appears to be a valid category. We have an established tree of Category:Metal objects as a parent to objects made of metal, so it makes sense to have Category:Metal bridges for all bridges made of metal regardless of type, with subcategories for specific metals as appropriate. This is not a 'temporary' category, though it would be good for as many contents as possible to be sorted by specific metal as research permits, but both new and old content which has yet to be identified need a home and so I suggest we keep this category as is. Josh (talk) 21:43, 2 January 2020 (UTC)
Keep useful and valid category. I agree with Josh. -- Triple C 85 | User talk | 20:37, 9 June 2024 (UTC)- Keep It's useful to have the general category, such as to fit under other metal-related categories that might not be limited to iron or steel. I do think that the various "iron or steel" categories could be replaced with general "metal" categories because combining different things, even if similar, is not a good practice.
- If people are concerned about specifying which metal is involved, we can add a {{Categorise}} template. -- Auntof6 (talk) 06:51, 10 June 2024 (UTC)