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Wikipedia:Templates for discussion/Log/2021 May 14

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May 14

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Template:Deprecated source

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The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the template(s) or module(s) below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the template's talk page or in a deletion review).

The result of the discussion was redirect to Template:Deprecated inline. Izno (talk) 22:47, 18 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Propose merging Template:Deprecated source with Template:Deprecated inline.
Obvious duplication of functionality, with both in active use. I don't think there's any point maintaining two minor variants of an inline template for tagging depreciated sources. 192.76.8.91 (talk) 14:38, 7 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Izno (talk) 20:52, 14 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Redirect. You can't even call this a merge because {{Deprecated inline}} has all the functionality that {{Deprecated source}} has. I think that simply turning {{Deprecated source}} into a redirect would suffice. ―JochemvanHees (talk) 22:42, 14 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Redirect per JochemvanHees it's redundant, but people might still try to use {{Deprecated source}} so just redirect, could probably have been done boldly to save time. 31.41.45.190 (talk) 17:27, 15 May 2021 (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 template's talk page or in a deletion review).

Template:Commonwealth English and Template:Use Commonwealth English

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The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the template(s) or module(s) below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the template's talk page or in a deletion review).

The result of the discussion was delete. Plastikspork ―Œ(talk) 14:36, 22 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

These two templates are fundamentally flawed. In the first place, there is no one written standard of 'Commonwealth English'. There is a reason we don't have an article on the subject (Commonwealth English presently links to English in the Commonwealth of Nations, which offers no evidence for the existence of a Commonwealth standard of English). There is no Commonwealth style guide, nor any real consistency within the Commonwealth that can be established through examination of reliable sources. Canadian spelling is fundamentally different from standard British spelling, some British writers use Oxford spelling, and some countries, like Ireland, are outside the Commonwealth but use British spelling.
Therefore the claim by the template that 'Commonwealth English' uses 'realise' (Oxford spelling -ize is also possible) or 'artefact' (Canadian spelling 'artifact' is also possible) contradicts the list of countries it purports to include. Furthermore, simply presuming that other countries of Commonwealth without clear standards of English use the prescriptions listed here is not acceptable. At the moment, these two templates are basically like a form of WP:OR, as outside the Wikipedia space, there is no such thing called 'Commonwealth English'. Therefore, I am proposing these templates for deletion, as it is not clear what purpose they are serving. If an article uses British English spelling, or any other variant, it can be tagged as such. Wikipedia should not be conjuring up 'variants of English' out of thin air without reliable sources to back up the idea of their existence. RGloucester — ☎ 16:41, 14 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]
@Largoplazo, ProcrastinatingReader, Hawkeye7, and Enervation: Pinging users who previously commented on the subject of these templates at their respective talk pages. RGloucester — ☎ 16:50, 14 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]
For the record, I would like to state that I am opposed to redirection, as a clear target does not exist. As stated above, we cannot simply equate some 'Commonwealth English' with 'British English with -ise spelling', as there is no evidence that this is actually representative of English as written in the Commonwealth (and in fact, there is evidence to the contrary, i.e. Oxford spelling and Canadian spelling). RGloucester — ☎ 18:56, 14 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete and replace in pages that transclude them or Redirect to the corresponding British English templates. As I'd written earlier,

While taking note of the circumstances that motivated the creation of this template, this solution doesn't make any sense. If, for example, a Malaysia-related article bears this template, it's telling me I mustn't use U.S. English—but it's OK if I use vocabulary and grammar peculiar to Ghana or Guyana, because those countries belong to the Commonwealth. There is no such thing as Commonwealth English (in contrast, say, to "Euro English"), so "use Commonwealth English" is no guideline at all.

The template documentation, which observes explicitly that there's no distinction between British and Commonwealth English, explains:

This template exists for use in articles with strong national ties to Commonwealth of Nations countries and other former British territory, and to forestall the creation of numerous nationalistic templates for dialects (...) that do not have distinct, codified formal forms with their own style guides.

Without commenting on the need for or desirability of such forestalling, it's a mystery to me how templates with "Commonwealth" in place of "British" are expected to be more effective at it. All they do is replace a meaningful dictum with a meaningless one.
FWIW, at the moment the "What links here" for the two templates yield 160 of one and 251 of the other.
I'd prefer the delete and replace solution because, while it's more arduous to implement, it would eliminate even the suggestion, to someone unaware of discussions that came before, that Commonwealth English is a thing, one distinct from British English. It's just plain misleading. Largoplazo (talk) 18:32, 14 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete and replace per nom. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 20:18, 14 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete and replace I totally agree with deleting and replacing this. Its actually something I've been bugged about a while now but didn't have the time or motivation to deal with. I'm glad to sew it being dealt with now. Adamant1 (talk) 22:32, 14 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete - There is no such thing as commonwealth dialect and this seems to be redundant considering that other nation-specific templates exist. AXONOV (talk) ⚑ 16:13, 15 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment though there does seem to be a Commonwealth English [1][2][3] [4][5][6][7] which seems atleast, different from North American Englishes (AmE and en-CA, etc), and missing various weird forms found in British English (anachronisms, etc). -- 67.70.27.105 (talk) 02:31, 16 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep There are general standards across Commonwealth countries that don't vary that greatly, and where they do (e.g. Canada) saying "Commonwealth" standards does imply a particular set of spelling which is consistent with the rest (labour over labor). Assigning these articles to a particular national variety of spelling (which are effectively the same) is unnecessary. To address an earlier point, there's a difference between saying you should use local dialectical words and peculiarities and saying to prefer English with WP:COMMONALITY across these varieties. Shadowssettle Need a word? 10:02, 16 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete and replace per nom. Even though I personally agree that there is a great deal of commonality in English as spoken in the Commonwealth (and enough to distinguish it from U.S. English), this form of "Commonwealth English" does seem to be original research. Yes there are general standards across Commonwealth countries, but there are also commonalities between U.S. and Canadian English which are not found in British English. Should we have a "Use North American English" template then? Equally, there are commonalities between British and Canadian English which are not found in Indian English, even though they are all Commonwealth countries. The differences may appear minute or pedantic to an outsider, and there may be variations within each (as OP mentions, -ize is the preferred Oxford spelling and used in academic subjects, despite most British people using/preferring -ise), but they are all valid varieties of English. Yes, local dialectical words should be avoided − MOS:COMMONALITY advises users of Indian English to say "ten million" instead of "one crore", for example − but this applies to American and British English differences too ("glasses" instead of "eyeglasses" [American English] or "spectacles" [British English]). Implying that there is a singular "Commonwealth English" seems to basically be implying that British English is the standard form for the whole Commonwealth, which is not true. "Football" in the UK isn't the same as "football" in the U.S., and both are different to "football" in Australia. --Bangalamania (talk) 13:35, 16 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete and replace The point of the "use" template is to set a standard, and it's confusing if there isn't one, as in this case. I think it will be more helpful to just say use British English or use Canadian English, or have no template at all. Mvolz (talk) 15:16, 19 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]
  • Lean delete, with major concerns (replace existing transclusions with Template:Use British English unless there is a specifically better candidate). I think this is a good idea on the whole for reasons others have clarified. I will note that Template:Use Commonwealth English links to only 181 pages, many of which should actually just be replaced with Template:Use Indian English. The other major category of pages where it is actually used are about the Commonwealth (eg 2010 Commonwealth Games medal table or List of viceregal representatives of Elizabeth II) where replacement with Template:Use British English might be contentious, as the UK is not the exactly the "head" of the Commonwealth. I'm also concerned about some articles (eg ones about Kashmir) where strict identification of either "Indian English" or "Pakistani English" instead of this more general form may cause issues.
There are also some related policies and talkspaces that deleting these templates would implicate. For example, Wikipedia:Manual of Style#National varieties of English specifically instructs editors to use general "Commonwealth English" when needed, so removing this template may also require some re-working of that particular MOS section. There's also the related Category:Use_Commonwealth_English, which claims it is the appropriate category for any non-American articles that are not specifically categorized otherwise. I guess what I'm saying is that changing this as a facet of Wikipedia policy might require a larger discussion. Also, has anybody pinged folks over at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Commonwealth? Seems they may have a different opinion. - - mathmitch7 (talk/contribs) 19:57, 21 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]
You are replicating the exact sort of thinking that this template promotes, and I think that's very problematic. The idea that it would be contentious to mark an article as written in British English when, demonstrably, it is written in British English, is basically the product of a strange form of nationalist thinking, which is not actually representative of how people write. British English isn't only used in Britain (and nor is American English only used in America), and tagging an article as such should not be indicative of any kind of WP:OWNERSHIP, but rather of the mere technical fact that an article uses a certain form of spelling. In any case, I will tell you how we can resolve this problem: these templates are simply not needed in the vast majority of cases, and can be removed if they themselves are likely to cause some kind of problem.
As for your second point, the relevant phrasing was unilaterally added to the MoS by the creator of these templates in 2018, and he wrote in his edit summary that he viewed British and the supposed 'Commonwealth' as equivalent, so the solution to this problem is quite clear. If you're looking for a category for articles that are not specifically categorised as using a national variety, but are clearly not written in American English, then you are looking for the long-standing Category:EngvarB, which servers this purpose without the problem of an invented 'Commonwealth English'. Indeed, the category you mention was an unnecessary duplication of this long-standing one, and that is most likely the reason why it is empty. RGloucester — ☎ 20:26, 21 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Re articles that are about the Commonwealth: that the term for the English used in those articles would need to be neutralized would lead to the need for other templates like Use Organization of American States English and the laughable Use Mercosur English. Further, just as would be the case for those examples, since there is no such thing as "Commonwealth English", and since the template is an instruction to use Commonwealth English, how is the average editor opening up the article for editing supposed to react to it? It would send them running to ask "What the hell is Commonwealth English"—and any helpful response would unavoidably say something to the effect of "Well, it's basically British English". There's just no circumventing the association with Britain. Largoplazo (talk) 22:14, 21 May 2021 (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 template's talk page or in a deletion review).

Template:Infobox Colorado Legislation

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The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the template(s) or module(s) below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the template's talk page or in a deletion review).

The result of the discussion was delete. Izno (talk) 15:57, 21 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

As raised on WP:COIN (see the discussion about Colorado legislature COI violations), this template is unusual in that it is only used on the pages of Colorado politicians (highlighting legislation they sponsored), and in many cases has been added by the IP users listed on the COI Noticeboard. Other similar legislation infoboxes tend to be about individual pieces of legislation, not all pieces of legislation sponsored by a particular individual. Because of this, the template seems to violate WP:PROMOTION, at least in its use. It's tricky since I actually appreciate the content currently covered in these templates, but I think the content would be more neutrally covered in articles like 68th Colorado General Assembly (currently, the only article of its kind) as a general discussion of legislation proposed during a given session.

The two main counter-arguments as I see it is (1) if we think (to pick a random example) that a politician like Kevin Lundberg is more important than the 68th Colorado General Assembly, and so discussion of the legislation that he sponsored is more important than a general discussion of legislation in that session. I don't particularly agree with this perspective, but I could understand if somebody felt that way. (2) There is no deadline, and keeping the template until a more appropriate venue for the information appears outweighs its potential for abuse at this time.

In case we do delete the template, I saved the "What links here" page and outlinks to the internet archive [8] as a resource for moving the information to other pages if necessary. - - mathmitch7 (talk/contribs) 12:52, 14 May 2021 (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 template's talk page or in a deletion review).

Template:Track gauge/metric

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The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the template(s) or module(s) below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the template's talk page or in a deletion review).

The result of the discussion was delete. Izno (talk) 15:56, 21 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

{{Track gauge}} was converted to a module and these sub-templates were superseded 7 years ago. Only several talk page instances which can be either subst or converted to the current setting. Gonnym (talk) 00:39, 14 May 2021 (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 template's talk page or in a deletion review).
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