Wikipedia:WikiProject Ships/DANFS conversions

This is a list of points to consider when converting an entry from the Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships to a Wikipedia article. (These are guidelines, not strict rules, but they will help you improve the article.)

1. Follow Wikipedia:Naming conventions (ships). Italicize ship names, and ship class names where appropriate. Wikilink the first occurrence of each ship mentioned. Do not display hull numbers in the text unless they are directly relevant.
2. Follow Wikipedia:Manual of Style (dates and numbers). Times should be on a 24-hour clock with a separator (thus 17:42, not 1742 hours). Give metric conversions of measures in US customary units. Indicate what kind of tons the displacement is measured in: short tons, long tons, or metric tons?
3. Expand abbreviations on first mention. TF → Task Force; Lt. Cdr. → Lieutenant Commander, etc. See [1] for DANFS's list of abbreviations.
4. Improve the grammar, and wikilink military jargon or rephrase to omit it. Most of DANFS is written in a very terse style; we aim for flowing prose and accessible language.
5. Give the full name of people when first mentioned. The DANFS might just say "Admiral Nimitz"; change this to "Admiral Chester Nimitz" the first time he is mentioned. Never include someone's rank in the link: write "Admiral Thomas C. Kinkaid", not "Admiral Kinkaid".
6. Disambiguate and link to ships and ship classes mentioned in the text, even if Wikipedia doesn't yet have an article on them. For example, the DANFS might say, "On 1 May 1942, HMS King George V collided with a "Tribal"-class destroyer. HMS Punjabi, cut in two, sank quickly directly in the path of the oncoming Washington". Here you need to link to the disambiguated pages HMS King George V (1939), Tribal class destroyer (1936), HMS Punjabi (F21) and USS Washington (BB-56). Link to disambiguation pages like HMS King George V and Tribal class destroyer only as a last resort if you can't figure out how to disambiguate.
   1. A helpful tool for usage in disambiguation and italicization is to use the templates {{Warship}}, {{Sclass}}, {{USS}}, etc.
7. Name and link to foreign ships even if not named in the article. The DANFS might say "At the end of the first circle a Japanese battleship, illuminated by nearby burning ships and flares, was taken under fire by Portland’s forward turrets. Then again at 0630, still circling, Portland opened fire on an enemy destroyer". The battleship in question was Hiei, and the destroyer Yudachi, so name them.
8. Link to each battle the ship was involved in, even if not named by the DANFS. For example, the DANFS text might say something like "On the night of 5 to 6 March, she heavily bombarded Vila on Kolombangara in the Solomons, and helped sink an enemy destroyer." That night's engagement was the battle of Blackett Strait and two destroyers, Murasame and Minegumo were sunk. So rewrite the sentence appropriately. Having linked to a battle you can cut details of that battle that aren't relevant to the ship. Not every ship involved in the Battle of Leyte Gulf needs an explanation of Oldendorf's manoeuvres at Surigao Strait: only those ships actually involved in the manoeuvres need it.
9. Tone down the POV. Particular things to watch out for are anti-Communist statements dating from the Cold War, and expressions such as "unfortunate sinking" (consider that to the Japanese side in WWII, the loss of an American ship was a good thing, not a bad thing). Some statements may need qualification and/or further research, such as references to US interventions - phrases such as "protection of American lives and property" are often official explanations of complicated political situations that should have a dedicated article.
10. Add subheadings for significant periods of service (e.g., World War II, Korean War) or even individual battles if merited by the detail of the description.
11. Doublecheck against independent sources if possible. Some DANFS entries are nearly 50 years old now, and there is newer research available, in some cases because material has been declassified since DANFS entries were written. Enemy ship identifications are usually suspect (check against records of movement for the ships in question), and identifications and claims for sinkings made by submarines are particularly suspect. Here are some example mistakes, to give some you an idea of what to watch for:
    1. As of 11 November 2004, the DANFS entry for USS Minneapolis (CA-36) [2] contains the passage "At 2305 the next night she spotted six Japanese ships, and the Battle of Tassafaronga was opened by her 8-inch fire. Within 2 minutes, she had sunk an enemy transport; and her second group of four salvos, with those of another cruiser, sank a second enemy ship." But only one Japanese ship was sunk at Tassafaronga. The DANFS entry may have been written from the ship's log, without cross-checking with other accounts.
    2. As of 12 December 2004, the DANFS entry for USS Redfish (SS-395) [3] refers to the "Japanese aircraft carrier Hayataka". This is a mistake due to a misreading of the characters in the ship's name, possibly by a prisoner of war captured after the battle of Midway [4]. The ship is properly named Junyō.
    3. An old version of the DANFS entry for USS Nautilus (SS-168) — used as the source for that article — claimed that Nautilus torpedoed the damaged Japanese aircraft carrier Sōryū at the battle of Midway. This was based on Nautilus own report, but Japanese sources indicate that the carrier was actually Kaga and that the torpedo failed to explode. The error is now corrected in the DANFS [5].
    4. As of 17 August 2005, the DANFS biography for Jacob Jones says, "After the outbreak of war with England, Wasp captured brig Dolphin 13 October 1812" [6]. This must result from some misunderstanding as there were no Royal Navy brigs of that name in service at that date — Dolphin was an American privateer (she was captured by the British but not until April 1813). This error is corrected in the entry for Wasp [7].