Categories Without Editors

Is it possible to know when pages in certain categories were last updated?

I am interested in various categories most if not all of which have not seemed to have a dedicated editor for at least two years if not more. I appreciate editors can do some work in a category that they are not listed as editors for so I was just wondering if I could tell if the categories are moving at all.

Thanks.

The bottom of each category has a 'Last updated' link, but that is not all-indicitive of if work is being done there.
And yes you are correct regarding categories without named editors. Many editors have directory wide permissions and can edit there as well as any editor higher up the category branch.

Hope that helps.

This FAQ item should prove useful

Thanks,

Both answers were helpful thank you. I see that most of the categories haven't been touched much in a while as they have no editors and obviously the meta editors have enough to do with so many categories to look after. The categories I am interested in can be quite a huge area with many smaller areas.

I applied a couple of times to help with editing but unfortunately was unsuccessful which is not a problem as I obviously didn't make the grade. can I just "suggest" changes for meta editors to look at. I am not trying to be smart but I can see bits (and sites) that could do with being changed to come into line with todays world. I don't want to be seen as a smarty pants by editors. An example maybe of what I mean:

http://www.dmoz.org/Regional/Europe/United_Kingdom/Scotland/

This category has a lot of kind of regional subcategories. These are old style regions which have not existed for a while. The Scottish Executive changed the regionality into bigger chunks which would probably serve DMOZ better. Aberdeen & Grampian, Angus & Dundee etc etc.

I started a directory of my own for the area concerned. Not one to make money (doesn't take money for links or have featured links and I input most of the sites myself with a few that get suggested being accepted (sound familiar ) people just don't read the submission guidelines ) but a genuine attempt to represent my area. Will this preclude me from ever becoming an editor on DMOZ? Obviously I would declare it.

Thanks for your time I appreciate as volunteers this is precious enough than having to answer posts like mine but I am genuinely interested.

The categories I am interested in can be quite a huge area with many smaller areas.

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That may be a problem if you are applying to edit them, we suggest new editors look for categories with total listed sites (including sub categories) in the 50 - 100 site range.

can I just "suggest" changes for meta editors to look at

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Not really. You can ask to have someone correct an obvious problem (site gone/changed content/description innacuracies) in the quality control thread http://www.resource-zone.com/forum/showthread.php?p=238897#post238897 . but general issues are more likely to need discussion in the internal forums.

These are old style regions which have not existed for a while. The Scottish Executive changed the regionality into bigger chunks which would probably serve DMOZ better. Aberdeen & Grampian, Angus & Dundee etc etc.

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According to the executive site http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Topics/Government/local-government

There are 32 directly elected local authorities in Scotland which provide local services and receive a large part of their funding from the Executive.

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which would line up with the existing 32 sub categories by my reckoning

I started a directory of my own ... Will this preclude me from ever becoming an editor on DMOZ?

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No.

Thanks for your reply

gimmster said:

According to the executive site http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Topics/Government/local-government which would line up with the existing 32 sub categories by my reckoning
No.

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I actually telephoned the executive when I was setting up my directory and asked about the regionality within Scotland. Yes what you have pointed to is the council areas which is fine but they are "subcategories" if you like of larger regions that have been set by the executive. The regions that have been adopted by the executive are:

Aberdeen & Grampian, Angus & Dundee, Argyll & Stirling & The Trossachs, Ayrshire & Arran, Dumfries & Galloway, Edinburgh & The Lothians, Greater Glasgow & Clyde Valley, Highlands & Skye, Kingdom of Fife, Orkney, Outer Hebridies, Perthshire, Scottish Borders, Shetland.

Not disagreeing with you but this is what the executive told me.

I had applied to this category for editing:

http://www.dmoz.org/Shopping/Clothing/Ethnic_and_Regional/European/Celtic/Tartan/Kilts/

Would you say in your opinion that this was too big a category for a new editor?

The regions that have been adopted by the executive are:
Aberdeen & Grampian, Angus & Dundee, Argyll & Stirling & The Trossachs, Ayrshire & Arran, Dumfries & Galloway, Edinburgh & The Lothians, Greater Glasgow & Clyde Valley, Highlands & Skye, Kingdom of Fife, Orkney, Outer Hebridies, Perthshire, Scottish Borders, Shetland.

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You will notice though that we don't call them Regions. In general, we use the government structure in the Regional branch to create our directory structure, in this case it appears to align to the electoral areas. Our structure documentation is at http://www.dmoz.org/guidelines/regional/taxonomy.html

Would you say in your opinion that this was too big a category for a new editor?

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As someone who cannot process applications, I can only profer a guess, that it is not too small or large.

That said Shopping has very specific listing criteria and reading http://www.dmoz.org/Shopping/faq.html may help with any future application you might make.

gimmster said:

You will notice though that we don't call them Regions. In general, we use the government structure in the Regional branch to create our directory structure, in this case it appears to align to the electoral areas. Our structure documentation is at http://www.dmoz.org/guidelines/regional/taxonomy.html


As someone who cannot process applications, I can only profer a guess, that it is not too small or large.

That said Shopping has very specific listing criteria and reading http://www.dmoz.org/Shopping/faq.html may help with any future application you might make.

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thanks for all your advice gimmster. Not arguing with you I was just wondering. Everyday is a school day.

Thanks for the info on the FAQ. Very interesting. I will have a good look at that if I think about applying again.

So are these Scottish regions and the relationship to the local authorities, similar to the English Regions and their relationship with the English counties? Do they have any signficance in the real world -- or to be more exact, do they have a reasonable number of sites for region-wide entities that we could list in them if we had categories for them?

BTW: You seem to have an interest in Scotland. If you live there, or have local knowledge, you could also think about applying to edit a local village or small town (or a sub-category of a larger town or city)...

No, the Scottish 'regions' aren't equivalent to the English regions.

As part of the Balkanisation of the UK, the European Community required that it be broken up into regions. These are the 9 English regions, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.

There is scope for each region to have some measure of autonomy but, so far, only Scotland, Wales, NI (sometimes) and London (partly) have gone the route of having their own elected assemblies. The NE Region had a referendum on the issue a while ago and rejected the idea. The rest of us have to put up with unelected quangos to formulate and implement regional strategies.

As part of the Balkanisation of the UK, the European Community required that it be broken up into regions.

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When do they assign the French names?

[mode=gritted teeth]Don't you just love the EU.[/mode]