Disambiguation articles

[ka3jjz]

I know, the first thing you're going to say is

Huh?

Good question - allow me to explain.

In the database, it appears there are counties with trunked systems whose name can be found in several states. Montgomery county is a very good example. We need a tool that will allow the user to distinguish between which 'Montgomery county' is desired when viewing that page.

The WikiPedia site uses disambiguation to clear up non-specific references to items in its database (yes, the wiki can be thought of as a database, as it's built on a MySQL engine). The same will be used for us - but with a catch.

At least so far, it appears that while the conventional entries in the database have a state abbreviation next to the county name, sometimes the trunked systems don't. And therein lies the problem.

So unless we find out otherwise, please devote the disambiguation category to cataloging only trunked systems whose county names can be found in more than one state. What will happen here is that someone comes to a trunked system in the database, hits the 'Collaborate' link, then the wiki link. This immediately brings up the disambiguation article - very much like the main WikiPedia site would do. By the way, that's why it's written up like this in the Guidelines document.

See the Montgomery county PA TRS for a simple example

Thanks for reading this - it's an extra step, I know, but one that looks like is being forced upon us by the RRDB structure.

73 Mike

[qlajlu]

...please devote the disambiguation category to cataloging only trunked systems whose county names can be found in more than one state.

Mike, what you are asking makes all the sense in the world, but with 50 states, how do you know if another state has a county with the same name as a county in your own state? I'm certainly not traveled enough to know.

[ka3jjz]

That's what Wikipedia is for, hi.

There's a very easy test - if you go to the Collaborate link in a trunked system, click on the wiki link at the bottom, and come up with a wiki page that doesn't belong to your state, you know you have a disambiguation issue. I totally agree that it's sloppy, but as we go further and further with removing all the links in the trunked system lists, there's a pretty fair chance that at least in some cases, we're going to run into this again.

Also remember that not every county in the Union has a trunked system that serves it - so I'm hoping that this category won't be needed too often. However, given that trunked systems are steadily growing, the chances that a disambiguation issue will come up will likely grow as time goes by. Might as well bite the bullet now, while the number of systems is reasonably low.

Click on the link I gave above - follow it to the collaborate page, then click on the wiki link - and you can clearly see what needs to happen.

73 Mike

[DaveNF2G]

There are several county names that are quite popular:

Orange, Washington (or any other past president or Founder), Lee (or any other military commander or major historical figure), etc.

[DickH]

Originally Posted by ka3jjz

I know, the first thing you're going to say is
Huh?
Good question - allow me to explain. ...
73 Mike

And after all that, I don't see why there is a problem.
If I'm looking for a trunked system I certainly know what state I'm looking in. If I don't I'm in big trouble - or stoned.