Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Mastering Jenkins

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was delete. joe decker ^talk 17:05, 6 November 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Mastering Jenkins

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Self-published e-book. No indication that the subject satisfies WP:NBOOKS or WP:GNG. Super Mario Man ( talk ) 19:51, 29 October 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Small correction as a print version does exist. Super Mario Man ( talk ) 22:13, 29 October 2015 (UTC)[reply]

This book is not self published. This book is published through an international publisher Packt. Its in Paperback format not only in ebook. Please consider not deleting this page as it matches in structure similar pages from other tech books on wikipedia and provides an equal value. Furthermore based on wikipedias rules:

Failure to satisfy the criteria outlined in this guideline (or any other notability guideline) is not a criterion for speedy deletion. Additionally the article states: Academic and technical books serve a very different function and come to be published through very different processes than do books intended for the general public. They are often highly specialized, have small printing runs, and may only be available in specialized libraries and bookstores. For these reasons, most of the standards for mainstream books are inapplicable to the academic field because they would be too restrictive and would exclude articles on books that are worthy of notice. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jmcallister80 (talk • contribs) 21:04, 29 October 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Literature-related deletion discussions. Human3015^TALK 22:11, 29 October 2015 (UTC)[reply]

@Jmcallister80: Our article on Packt describes it as a "print-on-demand publishing company". Print on demand can be considered a form of self-publishing. The actual deletion argument, however, relates to notability as indicated by significant coverage in reliable, independent sources – something that neither this article, nor anything that I have seen elsewhere, demonstrates. A Google search for "Mastering Jenkins" + the author's name turns up only 16 hits, and I have yet to find any detailed discussion of the book anywhere online.

You correctly point out that the notability guideline for books contains a few caveats regarding academic and technical works, but what of the specialised indicators for notability suggested in the second half of that paragraph? Has anyone cited this book? Is it considered influential?

Am I correct in assuming, based on your username, that you are the author of this book? Super Mario Man ( talk ) 22:13, 29 October 2015 (UTC)[reply]

@SuperMarioMan: The provisions outlined within the Wikipedia guidelines provide special provisions for technical and academic works. These works do not need to necessarily meet the notability guidelines indicated for traditional literature. The important section of these guidelines is indicated below:

"For these reasons, most of the standards for mainstream books are inapplicable to the academic field because they would be too restrictive and would exclude articles on books that are worthy of notice. Again, common sense should prevail." The key word above is 'notice' not necessarily the same as 'notable'. If we are to begin limiting academic and scientific literature from wikipedias database the essence and original intent of the wikipedia concept "The sum of all human knowledge" would be null and void. This would make wikipedia no better than a common user-forum. In addition to this argument there are hundreds of technical books listed within Wikipedia that match the same basic concept as this one. Do we begin wholesale deleting those pages as well? Where is the line drawn? What is the specific criteria…. ? How can a book gain notoriety without being noticed first? This argument seems much like the chicken and the egg.

EOM.

You're quoting WP:TEXTBOOKS and the general basis of that is to look at who has published the book, how widely used the book is, how many printings it's been through, and so on. The guideline there basically argues that a textbook will be notable if it has been through at least 5-6 printings, is widely used at colleges throughout at least one country (if not multiple countries), and is published by a well-known and well-respected academic publisher. Just being an academic work in and of itself does not mean that something will pass guidelines and the unsaid thing about this guideline is that an academic text that would pass this guideline would be very likely to have some sort of footprint in reliable sources, even if it's just that the book is widely cited as a reliable source in footnotes. It's extremely unlikely that a book would pass these guidelines without some sort of coverage in reliable sources independent of the book, author(s), or publisher.

As far as gaining notice, the problem is that while it's difficult for independent and/or self-published books to gain coverage, they must still have received coverage in some sort of reliable source, enough to pass guidelines. Frustrating? Yes. I'll openly say that I've been frustrated with Wikipedia's guidelines in the past, but these guidelines have evolved over the years because there has been a lot of abuse of the system. Because of this, notability must be established prior to the article being written. This is unlikely to change any time soon. Tokyogirl79 (｡◕‿◕｡) 07:55, 2 November 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Delete. This very, very newly published book (October 27, 2015) doesn't seem to have gained any sort of coverage in independent and reliable sources that Wikipedia would consider reliable, like newspaper articles, academic journal reviews, or the like. For that matter, I also cannot see where the book is widely used in classrooms at this point in time. Same goes for citations in academic works, although that's an obvious given. This might change over time, given that this book released about a week ago, but we have to judge notability in the here and now. Just existing as a book is not enough, regardless of whether or not it's a mainstream, academic, or technical work, and all articles must assert notability in some form or fashion. As far as self-publishing or publishing on demand goes, that isn't a reason for deletion and I don't think that the nom meant it like that, but it is usually a sign that sourcing will be difficult to find, if it exists. Tokyogirl79 (｡◕‿◕｡) 08:23, 2 November 2015 (UTC)[reply]

My argument on this matter is that there is no reasonable way to have notoriety without getting noticed first. This is a chicken and the egg type conundrum. If the position of the wikipedia community is that books should not be included (even though pertaining to an academic subject) based on a lack of not being heard of we are in the end simply stifling innovation and forward thinking thought. This rule should also then apply to the hundreds of other books which have wikipedia pages. To the point of the book being self published. The book was not actually self published. PoD (print on demand) simply means that when a buyer purchases it it is printed fresh each time instead of in large runs. In addition the book is actually a part of the 'Mastering' series which is well known within Packt Publishing. The book itself was peer-reviewed, had a technical editor, and had copywrighters who all follow the same publishing process as say books from Orielly. I still however fail to see how say this particular argument of notoriety applies to academic books. The wikipedias guidelines are just that 'guidelines'. They even admit that this would be too restrictive for academic publications. Why can't common sense prevail here? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 173.174.108.42 (talk) 22:08, 2 November 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Delete yet again (I was the admin who deleted this as spam first time around and have seen nothing to change my mind). Wikipedia isn't an advertising platform, and it's not our job to help you "get noticed". As a tertiary source, we only reproduce material which has already been published by reliable sources; if no sources on a topic exist, then we don't cover that topic. This is one of our most fundamental core principles, and unfortunately you're not going to get that changed; if you can't point to reviews that show that other people consider it important, then we can't consider it important regardless of whether we want to. ‑ iridescent 00:14, 3 November 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Delete For a topic to have an article on Wikipedia it must pass WP:GNG or in this case, Wikipedia:Notability (books). There is no evidence presented that the subject of this article passes either of these. Blue Rasberry (talk) 18:21, 4 November 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Comment, re "This rule should also then apply to the hundreds of other books which have wikipedia pages." Sorry but the WP:WHATABOUTX is irrelevant to afds. oh, also Delete as it does not meet WP:GNG, may be a case of WP:TOOSOON? Coolabahapple (talk) 18:26, 5 November 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Delete - nothing in search engines shows that it passes either WP:GNG or WP:NBOOKS. Onel5969 ^{TT me} 13:47, 6 November 2015 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.