Portal talk:Northern Ireland

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	This article is a former featured portal candidate. Please see the links under Article milestones below for its original nomination page and why the nomination failed.
Portal milestones Date Process Result June 20, 2006 Featured portal candidate Not promoted July 14, 2006 Featured portal candidate Not promoted Current Status: Former featured portal candidate

This talk page is for the Portal about Northern Ireland. Ensure this portal's details are listed in the Portal directory. Discussion should centre on improving the Portal. Content disputes should take place on the appropriate article's talk page. For discussion about Portals generally, please see the WikiProject on Portals.

Contents 1 Selected article 2 'Edit' in main box 3 Nice 4 Featured bio candidates 5 Selected x 6 Garish 7 POV Flag

[edit] Selected article

I've made a right hash of this. Having a lot of trouble understanding how to limit the widths of different boxes. Help! Stu ^{’Bout ye!} 14:37, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

I think I fixed it up didn't I? The closing div was left out after the picture (and pic comment). The widths for either side or column of boxes seems to be 60% and 39%.. presumably the other 1% is for the gap in between. --Mal 17:35, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] 'Edit' in main box

Anyone know why the word edit on the top bar of the main portal box hangs halfway outside the title bar? --Mal 07:34, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

I've now fixed this problem. --Mal 07:40, 23 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Nice

Nice portal. Hopefully i'll contribute something when I can think of what to do! --al 22 March 2006

Thanks Al. Check out the Northern Irish Wikipedians' notice board too if you've got the time. --Mal 07:41, 23 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Featured bio candidates

I think its time to change the featured bio. I've already changed the featured article from Van Morrison to Giant's Causeway.

Please list your nominations here, and vote for each one using the hash key and signature. Bear in mind though that any bio article nominated should be of reasonably good standard. --Mal 17:29, 23 April 2006 (UTC)

• Kenneth Branagh --Mal 18:39, 23 April 2006 (UTC)

1. The article on Branagh needs a bit more work I think, but it might be good enough to include as a featured bio, considering the overall states of articles relating to Northern Ireland currently seem to be of a lower standard generally. --Mal 18:39, 23 April 2006 (UTC)

• C. S. Lewis --Martin 15:09, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

1. There's a bit of a hoo-ha going on at the minute about a section relating to his supposed S&M fantasies, but that should be sorted out soon. IMHO, this article is generally of a high standard. Martin 15:09, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

As there were only two nominations, and no votes, I've decided to go with the nom that wasn't offered by me. I'm going to change this now. Cheers Martin. --Mal 08:25, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Selected x

I noticed that the Selected x tables don't seem to change very often - perhaps they should change to 'Selected x of the week/fortnight' with I don't know - nominees to fill their spots/voting/occasional favoured NI pasttime (riots), etc. --Dom0803 14:15, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

Attention!

Sorry, but now that i have your attention. Is one able to nominate their own photo's for featured portal images? I must say I am quite fond of this photo I took of H&W directions, if you can't see the 350 feet cranes. And let's face it, no one else seems to be nominating anything, and I'm sick and tired of looking at my own country from space every time I visit! --Dom0803 21:03, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Sorry Dom - I took a wee break from Wikipedia a while ago, and left the Portal as was and forgot all about it really. Feel free to change the featured image (or featured bio or featured article) any time after a month perhaps, if no new suggestions have been made. Remember to record previously-featured pics or articles on the relevant pages though, so that we have both a record of articles and pictures that have been considered good is built up, and also so that we have a reservior of things to pick from.

If you don't make the change(s) in the next couple of days, I'll make them. I think previously nominated articles should probably have precedence over newly-nominated ones (unless there an article is part of a collaboration or nominated as Featured Article or whatever).

Take a look at the following pages:

• Portal:Northern Ireland/Selected image archive
• Portal:Northern Ireland/Selected image/Vote
• Portal:Northern Ireland/Selected article archive
• Portal:Northern_Ireland/Selected article/Vote
• Portal:Northern_Ireland/Selected biography/Vote
• Portal:Northern_Ireland/Selected biography archive

--Mal 06:50, 13 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Garish

This portal is exceedingly garish, far too much to have any air of professionalism about it. Softer tones would be so very much better. This point was raised when the portal was up for Featured Portal status. It might be an idea to change the colours. --Bob 23:51, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

The Green and Red looks too... Italian, maybe! What about Green and Blue?. Those seem to be neutral NI-related colours. What do people think? NotMuchToSay 18:34, 17 August 2006 (UTC)

Personally I think the colours are too vibrant and very eyesoreish, but I'm easy going. I think however a change would be nice, and if so, it should be white, and the blue that is the colour of the Northern Ireland Assembly. --Dom0803 00:07, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Something needs to be done, but a consensus needs to be reached beforehand to avoid an edit war. I don't mind what colours be used, but something less garish than those used currently would be nice. --Bob 15:30, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

I don't see that it is either garish or unprofessional looking, but I suppose its a matter of personal preference. When I created the portal, I followed the design of the Scotland and UK portals. I think the England and Wales portals followed suit when they were developed later.. and so they were all similar and consistant. The colours were originally green and white I think, and then I changed it so that red could be added to reflect the colours of the flags (NI flag and Patrick saltire).

Perhaps you need to turn the brightness down on your monitor or something! lol Anyway, I see the NI template has been changed, following changes to other portal templates - not something I think that specifically makes it any more legible - but if the portal page is going to be changed, I think it should follow the design of that template. --Mal 06:58, 13 September 2006 (UTC)

Note: Ironically, the Welsh portal is now almost identical in layout and colouring, and the Scottish and English portals are very similar in layout. --Mal 07:06, 13 September 2006 (UTC)

The topics section has been changed - could we change the rest to follow suit? NotMuchToSay 21:04, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] POV Flag

Highly POV and unofficial flag... I see no good reasons for an unofficial, highly POV (and offensive) flag to be on this page just because it is describe in passing. Portals are not immune from meating a NPOV. SCVirus 05:51, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

I agree. I deleted the flag. There are plenty of other interesting images to illustrate the portal. --Hroðulf (or Hrothulf) (Talk) 14:02, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

I know that the main editor(s) of the portal put in a lot of work, and chose to display the flag. Portal:England, Portal:Scotland, Portal:Ireland and Portal:Wales display their flags prominently, and a couple describe them too. However, those are national flags; the one that was reverted is merely the flag of a former government. While it represents the identity of many in Northern Ireland, it is offensive to a large minority, and does not really represent 21st century Northern Ireland as a whole. I suggest we consider removing both the flag and its description out of Portal:Northern Ireland/Intro. I don't want to get into NPOV issues, but I do think it is distracting to readers and editors. It is easy to find, as it is in the infobox at Northern Ireland. --Hroðulf (or Hrothulf) (Talk) 17:14, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

No flag represents Northern Ireland (other than the Union Jack) in an official capacity. However, Northern Ireland is symbolised in many sporting events and by other national and international organisations, by the flag of Northern Ireland.

People who would be offended by the flag are likely to be those who don't actually 'recognise' the very existance of Northern Ireland itself. However, it does exist whether we like it or not, and the flag represents it in many aspects on a global scale.

I recommend that we change the flag and description at such time as comes to pass that Northern Ireland does have a new flag. I also suggest that the description includes, as a compromise, a link to an article on the flags used to represent Northern Ireland. The Northern Irish flag has been accepted by consensus on the Northern Ireland article, and I take that as a premise for its acceptance for this portal, which has existed now for some months without complaint. I intend to revert some of the changes made again to reflect the fact that Northern Ireland, as it exists, is represented by the Northern Ireland flag. --Mal 22:58, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

Strongly disagree. The Northern Ireland portal intro is much longer than those of neighbouring countries and regions, and the statue of Saint Patrick on Slieve Donard is a more suitable symbol. I will shorten the intro by removing the flags. A similar issue was heavily discussed at Talk:Northern Ireland/Archive03; no consensus except exhaustion was achieved; and I think a happier conclusion can be reached here. --Hroðulf (or Hrothulf) (Talk) 09:02, 3 October 2006 (UTC)