User:Chris Day/sandbox1

The is a work in progress. Feel free to edit it on this page.

Proposal for Subgroups

Subgroups can represent a subset of editors from a workgroup with a niche interest, be a vehicle for collaboration between different workgroups or both of these concepts.

The breadth of some workgroups is huge, so it makes sense to break them down into more natural subgroups. Within biology and engineering alone whole academic departments can be based on a subset of those workgroups disciplines, i.e. Botany and Chemical Engineering. There is also an interdisciplinary need for subgroups. Take a hypothetical subgroup called Biochemistry Subgroup, it should involve editors and authors from at least three different workgroups, Health Sciences, Biology and the Chemistry Workgroup.

Article clusters of interest to a Subgroup will be tagged with a subgroup category. I have initiated this idea within the {{subpages}} template and used the Chemical engineering article as a guinea pig. The metadata fields of sub1, sub2 and sub3 are available to denote the affiliation of any cluster; up to three different subgroups can be added per cluster. So, currently the chemical engineering article is also designated as being in the Chemical Engineering Subgroup.

Bottom up rather than top down organisation

Authors and editors can initiate any subgroup idea but it will be up to each workgroups editors to recognise their respective "affiliated" subgroups. This is preferable to having to go as high as the editorial council, as with requests for new workgroups. Subgroups may well come and go in a Darwinian manner depending on the various interests of editors and authors. Thus, workgroups are a collection of topic areas in citizendium that rarely change whereas the number and names of various subgroups can be more fluid within the limitations that one cluster can only be in up to three different subgroups (this will limit the narrowness of subgroups).

Structure of a Subgroup:

The home for each subgroup will be at 'CZ:NAME subgroup' and there will be a 'Category:NAME subgroup' page that lists all the articles within the subgroup, where NAME is the desired subgroup name.

How to start a Subgroup

1) Create a template titled Template:NAME Subgroup.

2) Add the following to the template: {{Subgroup|NAME|A|B|C|D}} A-D are four optional parameters that can be added by editors to affiliate their Workgroup with the subgroup.

Thus, Template:Chemical Engineering Subgroup has {{Subgroup|Chemical Engineering|Engineering|Chemistry}} in the body of the template.

3) The template {{NAME Subgroup}} should be placed at the top of the CZ home page for the subgroup and its talk page as well as each category in the subgroup. For example, our model subgroup currently has the following pages:

CZ:Chemical Engineering Subgroup

CZ talk:Chemical Engineering Subgroup

Category:Chemical Engineering Subgroup

Category:Chemical Engineering Approved

Category:Chemical Engineering Editors

Category:Chemical Engineering Authors

Category:Chemical Engineering tag

Any categories at the foot of a page and/or descriptive text for each page are automatically added based on the parameters A-D.

How to navigate the Subgroups pages

The navigation bar at the top will lead one to all the relevant pages using standard hyperlinks.

Each affiliated Workgroup will be hyperlinked in the navigation header and each Workgroups Subgroup category will be placed at the foot of the subgroups home page (See Category:Engineering Subgroups). This category will be used to track all the subgroups that affiliate with, in this case, the Engineering Workgroup.

How to cutomize a Subgroup header

Each subgroup will have a grey coloured navigation bar by default. See the genetics example here. It is possible, however, to have a jazzy workgroup banner at the top IF there is an image at the location "Image:NAME banner.jpg" where NAME refers to the subgroup name. I have made one for Chemical Engineering as a trial run, see the header banner at the home page for the subgroup. Also see below:

Example of a Subgroup specific banner.

Recognition of Subgroups

Editors can decide which subgroups are required and add them to their workgroup (see using the A-D parameters above). If editors from other workgroups feel there is an interdisciplinary connection they too might consider adding their workgroup to the subgroup template.

We need a mechanism, however, to prevent redundancy. i.e. we may not want two similar subgroups such as Protein Structure Subgroup and Macromolecule Structure Subgroup. At present this would probably be an informal process but could require a more formal process as the citizendium community grows.

How to invite your colleagues to join

Authors and Editors can be added to a Subgroup by adding the appropriate category tags to their user page (either {{Category:NAME Editor}} or {{Category:NAME Author}}, where NAME refers to the subgroup name). Anyone can add themselves as an author, of course.

It should be noted that the editor label does not give special editorial rights outside their designated workgroup! It is merely to identify members of the subgroup that are editors in one or more workgroups. Note: there may well be clusters tagged in the Subgroups collection that a "subgroup editor" cannot recommend for approval.

To do and change prior to submission:

Have sugroup tags now so can do recent changes for each subgroup. Consequently can replace the Subgroup Draft category (for workgroups too) and replaced with an “approved” category instead (placed at the base of talk page for each subgroup listed).

Activate the Category:Engineering Subgroups type portal for the workgroups. Need the subgroup template to place the appropriate categories