Open Directory Editor Tools Primer


Do you wonder what editor tools are? Or do you know what they are and wonder what they're used for? Or, maybe just how to use them? If so, you're in luck, because this month's column goes into excruciatingly painful detail (well, not exactly..) about those things that make editing life a little easier. Where to begin... There are two excellent places to begin your quest for the holy grail: http://dmoz.org/tools/ A useful redirect to the Editor Tools category, buried way under Computers/Internet/... Dmoz ODP Navigator A conglomeration of the most useful editor tools in a framed interface. At either of these locations you'll find all the editor tools you can shake a virtual stick at. I'll be discussing the Top 10 Editor Tools, and how to use them. And now, the Top 10 Editor Tools, and how to use them. Ta-da! 1. dmozed.org e-mail aliases This thing is the cat's pajamas. If you need an address to use when contacting submitters (so you don't have to give out your actual address), or if you just want an easy-to-remember and cool-sounding address, this is where to go. Editor huggi has graciously donated his service to the DMOZ community. Simply go to the page and fill out the very short form, and soon you'll have your editor@dmozed.org e-mail alias. This service dates back to March 1999. 2. CatAlert Nurey has supplied this extremely helpful tool. You tell it what categories to watch, and every day it will check those categories. If their unreviewed percentage is over a certain threshold (1% by default), it will send you a friendly e-mail notice. To use it, visit the page, type your editor name in the box, and press Enter. From there, type or paste category paths into the form and press Add. You can also set the threshold to something other than 1%. For instance, my threshold for Arts: Music: Bands and Artists: N: Nirvana is set higher than Recreation: Autos: Enthusiasts: Station Wagons because Nirvana has a co-editor and tends to get over 1% unreviewed every day. Try it out; you'll like it. :-) This tool was created in March 2000. 3. Bookmarklets Far too many cool ones to name them all! These little JavaScript programs can simplify just about every aspect of editing. The most notable and bookmarkable bookmarklets for me include: "Title Case Title & Format Description" basically walks the dog on bad descriptions. It will change a submitted title to Title Case, and will format the description in several ways. "View summary" and "View edits" are invaluable to a meta. Easy access to the work done by any editor. Very cool. "Search ODP" is a quick and easy way to search the directory from anywhere. You do need Javascript to make these things work, so make sure you've got that option turned on in your browser. 4. CGI Multiple Editor Feedback and Javascript Multiple Editor Feedback The CGI version was based on the Javascript version. These tools are very useful for communicating with a group of editors for just about anything. The CGI version is prone to timeouts after sending approximately 25 feedbacks. The Javascript version won't time out, but also won't tell you if a feedback fails or not. To use them, fill out the forms just like using standard editor feedback. The additional field is the editors to whom you are sending the mail. These tools have been around since early 1999. 5. Editors' Search and Editors' Search and Destroy These are basically the same tool, but with distinct differences. The Editors' Search will conduct a search on dmoz.org, but instead of returning search results for you to browse sites, it returns search results with [EDIT] links next to them, similar to the edit page of a category. Search and Destroy will do the same thing, but you'll get a page with all the sites' edit information in form fields, so you can edit them all at once, like with the Multi-Links Editor. These are pretty self-explanatory and easy to use. 6. Multi-Links Editor and Multi-Links Adder [dmoz prototype] Created by former editor gruban, these tools make filling up or emptying a category a breeze. The Multi-Links Editor will edit, unreview, or delete an entire category of links at your discretion. The Multi-Links Adder will take a page of links and let you make touch-up changes to each one, then add them all in one fell swoop. Staff engineer cptginyu is currently working to add these tools to dmoz.org. A prototype of the Multi-Links Adder can be access via http://dmoz.org/editors/multilink.cgi?cat=. Just add the path of the category where you want the links to be added and the tool will work magic. Both of these tools are designed for good use but have the capability of being used for evil (that is, manual catmvs.. just don't do it!), so please use sensibly. 7. ViewUnrev Another fantastic creation by Nurey, this tool is best for non-editalls. It will show you the unreviewed in a given category, even one you don't edit. Perhaps you're thinking of applying for Sports/Lacrosse? Use this tool to find out what the unreviewed is like. There is even an associated bookmarklet. 8. @linking Bigger_Region/Topic to Littler_Region/Topic and @linking Place/Topic to Place/Another_Topic @linking Bigger_Region/Topic to Littler_Region/Topic and back with a related cat, where the regions can be localities, counties, metro areas, states, and whatnot. It does it for every topic that exists in the bigger region, and at least one littler region. It also does related categories from Littler_Region to Bigger_Region. @linking Place/Topic to Place/Another_Topic in a template fashion, e.g. Creating @links from Arts_and_Entertainment to B&E/Restaurants_and_Bars. There are a whole range of standard template topics to choose from. These links go to forum threads where rpfuller graciously offers to keep track of the nightmare of sorting out @linking in Regional. 9. The DeMozulator Feed this monster a category and it'll go through the links, one by one, telling you if the links are good or not. It's like Robozilla's little brother. This tool was created by editor trebor back in early 1999. (Before most of y'all were even around... back in MY day, sonny, we didn't have all this fancy schmancy stuff. We edited on a 386 and we LIKED it! We LOVED it! Oh, sorry. Got carried away.) This tool will tell you if the page is OK, or if the host times out, or if the page is gone (404)... one of the ones you can't live without. 10. #ODP IRC Chat OK, so this isn't exactly an editor tool. Well, it could be. This is a Java interface to an IRC chat channel where dmoz editors can go to relax or talk about dmoz, or both! It's also accessible through a standard IRC client like xchat, mIRC, or pIRCh. Just use the server newwave.primeline.com and channel #ODP. OK, so that was actually more than 10. It's just so hard to pick 10 favorites. But at least I didn't mention this one ;-) In fact, there are plenty more tools I haven't even mentioned, one that might be your new favorite. So do yourself a favor and check out the Editor Tools category. You'll be glad you did.