Posting this under the heading it deserves: Splitting an overlong document into two Everything below is what sits behind that.
Trying to work out what would count as evidence on splitting an overlong document, before collecting any. This is the part I usually skip and it is the part that makes the rest useful.
If two explanations predict the same observation, observing it does not help. So: what observation would separate them?
Splitting an overlong document came up in a thread eighteen months ago and was answered well. I cannot find it, which is itself the problem, so here is the reconstruction.
Confirming the opening post from a second method, which matters more than confirming it from a second person.
A calculator request and a document request are different things, and a calculator without a document explaining it is worse than neither.
I had written a reply contradicting post #2 and deleted it. Here is what survived.
The honest answer on splitting an overlong document is that it depends, and the useful part is the list of what it depends on. Four items, in rough order of how much they matter.
Most people get the first two right and then argue about the fourth.
Cross-referencing: if you notice two pages that should reference each other but do not, suggest the cross-reference.
That is all the detail I have. Someone else will have more.
A note on how splitting an overlong document gets discussed rather than on splitting an overlong document itself: the confident posts get the replies and the careful ones get ignored, and the careful ones have been right more often.
Worth separating two things that post #6 runs together.
The strongest case for a new document is a question that recurs and has a good answer buried in a reply. That is the promotion criterion as written.
Adding a null result on splitting an overlong document. I looked, carefully, and found nothing, and null results deserve posting precisely because they never are.
Narrowing post #10, because the general version has more than one answer.
Splitting an overlong document would be much easier to settle if anyone reported the denominator. Almost nobody reports the denominator.
Staff rationale: Hidden by community flags. The substance was fine; the framing attributed motive rather than error, which is R1.
Where an existing document nearly covers it, extending that one is usually better than starting a new one. Two overlapping pages drift apart.
The corresponding entry is in the public moderation log. Hidden posts are never deleted.
A note on scope: what I am saying about splitting an overlong document applies to the case in the first post and I would not extend it further without checking.
Suggesting content for a page: if you know a maintained page is missing something important, post a suggestion with specific content you think should be added.
A request is more likely to succeed with a proposed outline attached. "Somebody should write about X" rarely moves; a structure and two sections does.
Post #18 answers the question as asked. The question underneath it is different.
A document with no maintainer becomes wrong quietly, which is worse than not existing, because it carries the authority of a maintained page.
That is my reading. Someone else read the same page differently and was reasonable.
What would change my mind on splitting an overlong document is a second dataset collected by someone with no stake in the first. Until then I hold it loosely and I would rather say so than pretend to more.
Same experience here, different supplier, so it is at least not unique to one of them.
Narrowing post #22, because the general version has more than one answer.
Format suggestions: if you think a maintained page could be clearer in its presentation (different section structure, different examples, added graphics) suggest the change.
If the premise is wrong, everything after it is decoration.
Everything in post #25 holds. The case it does not cover is the one I have.
Source for the splitting an overlong document figure, since it was asked for. It is in the discussion rather than the abstract, which is why the version circulating is stronger than the paper is.
Reading the surrounding paragraph is worth the two minutes. The authors are more careful than their summarisers.
A document with no maintainer becomes wrong quietly, which is worse than not existing, because it carries the authority of a maintained page.
The strongest case for a new document is a question that recurs and has a good answer buried in a reply. That is the promotion criterion as written.
Documents that are mostly a worked example age better than documents that are mostly a summary, because the arithmetic does not change.
Answering the question post #28 raises rather than the one it answers.
Where the splitting an overlong document reasoning breaks down for me is the step from the group result to the individual case. That step is almost never argued for.