I do not intend to participate. However, it is of note that one reason given for deletion is the fact that the article, until very recently, had only one reference. This is ironic, as a main reference was deleted, on 5 May last year, by another editor, MrOllie, on the grounds that it was “apparent promotional mentions [sic] of a particular book”.
If deleted I would very much like you to consider moving the document to the Fortran Wiki. I find it interesting that no consideration is given to the fact that the article is referenced by subsequent works as a reference, which I think is a good argument for considering that the article itself is an reasonable entry for wikipedia to contain. I had not noticed before the animus towards tutorials and references; but that explains why I often cannot find any information in wikipedia for certain topics. Odd that many math topics are covered in depth on wikipedia to the extent is would obviously fit the definition of a reference, and that kind of description is OK for wikipedia to contain so I think it is a very blurred line. But it would definitely be a shame to lose this often-cited article and the Fortran Wiki or fortran.lang site would almost certainly welcome hosting the material. The Wikipedia Fortran article could then reference it at it’s new home, which would increase the reference count for the Fortran entry
We can also host it as a document at fortran-lang.org in the documentation section.
I always thought using Wikipedia as the main documentation for Fortran is problematic. If you search “Fortran”, this is what I see in Bing (the same with Google):
The Wikipedia articles are (or used to be!) very good, lots of good information. But it’s on somebody’s else platform and there is nothing that we can do to prevent them to delete it or destroy it. Now when we have a visible webpage for Fortran at fortran-lang.org, let’s host it there.
And ensure over time we have a comprehensive and current documentation for Fortran that is well maintained.
I see that there are Wikipedia entries for C99, C11, C17 and C23 (plus similar ones for C++), so maybe the issue is that the page shouldn’t focus on being a tutorial, but rather a description of features added by the 95 revision (like the “The new features of Fortran XXXX” papers that the Standard Committee publishes after each revision is completed).
The tutorial-like article, should be at fortran-lang.org instead.
Weird. Last week I started a new wikipedia article. The first new page I’ve started in years.
Very non-programming related, non-political, easily googled, etc. However some ‘editor’ threw it back into my lap as a draft, because I only cited a single source. So maybe they’ve been tightening their rules about such things.
As an aside, I’ve made a number of wikipedia edits lately on various programming-related pages fixing up their references to Fortran features. Especially in the areas of data types and structured programming constructs. Some statements were very dated - as if Fortran hadn’t advanced since the 1960s…
A copy of the source code of the Wikipedia’s article (English version, last edit by February 25, 2025) is fetched; locally, work to build a multipage booklet (similar to the ones e.g., about Fortran intrinsics or Bader’s OOP with Fortran) started.
The article seems indeed not-very-wikipedic. The preamble to the article for deletion page describes it as more like a tutorial or documentation. It also suggests transwiking the article to Wikibooks which might be a good idea.
But there are entries already for Fortran on Wikibooks.
In this one (Fortran Examples) I recognize some code examples I originally put in the Wikipedia’s Fortran page like 20 years ago. And there’s also this other one (Fortran 2003).
So, some effort might be required to unify the whole thing —the only problem is dealing with the “editors/moderators hierarchies” that seem to plague the Wikimedia endeavors .
By some mysterious process, a decision has been made to keep the article but, in the long term, it’s safer to have a version here (thanks nbehrnd).
In general, we’re confronted by a clash of cultures. On this site, users are encouraged to announce new products, tutorials, etc. On Wikipedia, this is not just frowned upon, but is a ClashOfInterest and strictly forbidden by the wikicops. I recommend rereading Kafka before taking them on.
and citations to your books have been (wrongly IMO) designated as self-promotion. The criticism could be addressed by making citations to the Fortran 95 standard instead, if someone volunteers the time to do so.
Many thanks for your kind words, and also for your own hard working promoting and supporting Fortran.
On the OUP website I found that MFE(2023) has been cited in research papers 3 times and MFE(2018) 13 times. The references are in the links below. Maybe there are some there that are not included in your extensive lists.
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