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Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Disambiguation pages/Archive 30

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Latest comment: 17 years ago by Smack in topic Songs without articles
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Films, albums and songs

Latest comment: 17 years ago18 comments3 people in discussion

I would like to open a discussion on a suggested format for films, albums and songs. I've encountered a good few of these, and I think that it would be appropriate to suggest a format for them in the same way that we have suggested formats for people and places.

I've tended to format them as follows:

  • Happy Feet (film), a 2006 [animated] film directed by George Miller
  • Happy Feet (2006 film), a[n animated] film directed by George Miller
  • Stadium Arcadium (album), a 2006 rock album by the Red Hot Chili Peppers
  • Stadium Arcadium (Red Hot Chili Peppers album), a 2006 rock album
  • "Irreplaceable" (song), a 2006 R&B song by Beyoncé Knowles [from her album B'Day]
  • "Irreplaceable" (Beyoncé song), a 2006 R&B song [from her album B'Day]

where everything in [square brackets] is a sort of "maybe" inclusion.

I have also seen this around sometimes:

  • Stadium Arcadium (album), the ninth studio album from the Red Hot Chili Peppers

I don't really know what the format should be, but I think we should standardise the format for these entries. Any comments? Neonumbers 00:45, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

I don't think we need to standardize the format. Only put in the information needed to help users disambiguate the items and that depends to a great extent on what else is on the page.
If you are trying to understand how to determine the article title, look at WP:TITLE. If there is only one Happy Feet article, you don't need the (film), if there is only one film, you don't need the 2006. I leave out the disambiguating information that is in the title (the parenthetic stuff) from the following text unless it is gramatically necessary:
  • Happy Feet (film), a 2006 animated film
I personally would leave out the "directed by George Miller" as that wouldn't help most people understand which "Happy Feet" they are looking for. (John User:Jwy talk) 01:02, 8 January 2007 (UTC)
We could give guidelines, I guess, but it seems like for the most part, common sense allows people to appropriate describe the entries. If there are multiple movies by the same name, people will list the year. If they happen to be in the same year, chances are they will list the director. Perhaps I give "people" too much credit, but I like to think we're all vaguely competent people. If we do feel it's necessary, perhaps we can say something along the lines of "if there is confusion, descriptions should be able to be distinguished from similar articles from one another", or something of the like. -- Natalya 01:48, 8 January 2007 (UTC)
I'm certainly not questioning the judgement of editors — I see this as one of those situations where many ways are as good as each other, but if it's always done the same way, it makes life a bit easier. I draw a comparison to people — a standardised format for that makes life easier, even if there are various ways (all of common sense) of doing it.
(By the way, those examples were all made up, and the article name determines the dab entry, not the vice versa, which is why I listed both (film) and (2006 film) to demonstrate. For obvious reasons, information already contained in the clarifier is omitted in the description unless grammatically necessary.)
Because what we know about albums/films/songs (and what there is to know about albums/films/songs) tends to be the same from album to album, I think this is feasible. It would beat (the made up):
  • Songs and Mayhem (Invisibles album), a 2006 alternative rock album
  • Songs and Mayhem (Justin Timberlake album), a pop album released in 1997
  • Songs and Mayhem (Blue Riders album), released in 2004
  • Songs and Mayhem (DP7 album), the eighth studio album by DP7 released in 1989
  • Songs and Mayhem (Happy People album), the band Happy People's fourth album
  • Songs and Mayhem (John Musicson album), the first country album by singer John Musicson
many of which contain roughly similar information — just in different ways; and all of which I would consider to be common sense descriptions (albeit some more than others), and none of which I would consider to be extraneous. This is what I mean by "format". Neonumbers 03:52, 8 January 2007 (UTC)
I guess that's where I would disagree. Much of this information is extraneous. Most people would be able to tell by the artists name which one they are looking for. In some cases, the date or music style would be useful, _depending on what else is on the page!_. But its extremely unlikely that the fact that it is the 8th album by the artist won't help in the disambiguation. If that's the information they are looking for, they would (IMHO) have to click through to the article. The balancing advantage being a "less busy" dab page. (John User:Jwy talk) 16:39, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

Okay—that's exactly the type of comment I was hoping to get from someone. From what I've seen, the six formats above are often used, sometimes on the same page, and that's why I'd like there to be a guideline on this matter. As you suggest, the guideline would be wise to avoid againsed "the eighth studio album". I could take the director of a film as being extraneous as well.

I would argue that the date (and maybe genre), however, would be useful. There are many songs/album for which I know the title but not the artist (in fact, that might be why I'd be looking up the song/album), but it's normally easy to recall some indication of the release date — even if it's nothing more than "recent", "about five years ago", or "decades ago". Genre, same thing goes. I still stand by genre and release date, and in the case of albums/songs, artist.

My point in the six bullet points I posted above what to demonstrate how the same information could be presented in different ways, and how it would work better (like people entries) if we had one standard way of doing it. The standard way could even be, "if it's necessary, to put in the year, write '2006 album' instead of 'released in 2006'" or "write 'rock album' instead of 'album with rock songs'", without prescribing what content. Compare just the first three bullets to see what I mean.

By "what else is on the page", do you mean what other albums/films/songs, whether there are other albums/films/songs, or what's there that's not an album/film/song? I don't see how the other content would affect this in most instances (though of course there are always exceptional cases). Neonumbers 23:56, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

"if it's necessary, to put in the year, write '2006 album' instead of 'released in 2006'" or "write 'rock album' instead of 'album with rock songs'" -- To me, this feels like unnecessary micromanaging. Is there really an issue with not having each description for an entry standardized? There are already many guidelines for disambiguation pages, and an overage of them will likely turn more people away from editing them. "If it ain't broke, don't fix it"? I see why guidelines would be helpful, but I feel like they might do more harm than help. -- Natalya 00:04, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

(had an edit conflict with Natalya, but I tend to agree. . .) The goal of the page is NOT to provide information about the items, it is to guide the user to the appropriate page, so if there is just one album/film/song, then an entry

would be enough for me. But I don't mind what is actually there:

Both tell me which article I am looking for without cluttering up the page with too much stuff. I'm not sure what a guideline beyond that gives us. . . (John User:Jwy talk) 00:08, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

My concern lies primarily with the volume of album entries on Wikipedia. Having a normal way of writing entries of this type would, in my opinion, facilitate the ease of navigation in disambiguation pages. Unlike most categories of entries, albums, films and songs are (comparatively and generally) not situation-dependant.
Naturally, a guideline like this would concern primarily pages of muliple album/film/song entries.
Likewise, for people we have a normal way of: name, date of birth/death, and short description of what he did. Providing an example (just like the one Jwy posted in the last post) would be sufficient (in fact, almost perfect).
If, in your view, the volume of album/film/songs entries is insignificant, then I see where you're coming from: the reason I think this is worthwhile is because there are enough of these types of entries in Wikipedia for inconsistency to look like clutter (as in the above example). Is it the volume of entries that's insignificant? Neonumbers 00:20, 9 January 2007 (UTC)
I'm not sure what problem you are trying to solve. Either one of my Revolver examples works. I don't know why we have to enforce one over the other. If there are many albums on one page, the information that best disambiguates them depends on the albums, not on the "volume" of them. (John User:Jwy talk) 01:20, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

Consistency. The main Manual of Style once said that "one way is often as good as another, but if everyone does things the same way, Wikipedia will be easier to read, write and edit". I don't know why it's not there anymore, but see that principle as applying here. There's nothing much else to it, which is why I say that the greater the volume of a type of entry, the more justification there is in making all those entries consistent. Many (if not most) manual of style guidelines exist for the sole purpose of making things consistent. It could be argued that this is not a resolution of a problem, but an attempt to improve through consistency.

The former Revolver example would not work for a page with multiple entries on it. (Please at least try to understand what I'm saying! Natalya seems to be able to...) If you want a good example, consider this extract from Evolution (disambiguation):

and compare it to:

Which is faster to scan? Does the second format help? But is the first format wrong? All I've done is I've applied a consistent format. Nothing else, really. Now, say I knew that I was after an album called "Evolution", but I didn't know its band, but I knew it was old. Or if I knew its title, but not its band, and I knew that it wasn't pop/rock/similar genre (like R&B), and that it's not a Chinese album. Then what would I do? What if there the follow-up descriptions weren't there?

Of course, you might be of the opinion that the second version is no better than the first. If that's the case, then say so. Would common sense lead everyone to exactly the same format? There are multiple ways of succeeding, but being consistent would help navigation. There'd have to be a sufficient volume of these types of entries (in all of Wikipedia, not per page) to make it worth it, though, but I think there are, and that's what I'm asking.

Oh, and please try not think anything on this manual as "enforcement", just guidance... applied with elasticity and so on... Neonumbers 04:08, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

The second example is certianly more streamlined, but I feel like many people will skip right to the descriptions of the links, and not read the band names in the parenthetical clarifiers the links themselves. (Though it could just be me) Even the guidelines for links involving people are very free: "For people, include their birth and death years (when known), and only enough descriptive information that the reader can distinguish between different people with the same name." That really seems sufficient for any example, and there certainly are lots of entries for people on Wikipedia. -- Natalya 04:12, 9 January 2007 (UTC)
As it happens, we originally designed this manual in the assumption that people wouldn't skip right to the descriptions (in fact, that the clarifiers might be all they need, and the descriptions are there as a courtesy for those that need a bit more info to make their selection)... that was the idea, anyway (lol ^^)
Strangely, I feel that people guideline to be reasonably strict... well, the examples (in my mind, anyway) show how to include the birth/death dates and the descriptive information (it's a bit subjective but it shows clearly what should be done)... could be just how I see it, but yeah.
In line with that, I was thinking something like, "For films, albums and songs, include their release dates, genres, and in the case of music, artists (if not already in the clarifier)." followed by examples (one of each will do).
I think that this would work for almost all cases (but that's mainly because I've yet to see a case where it doesn't work, i.e. more info for whatever reason should be there). In the case of single entries, I don't see how it causes a hindrance. Same point with consistency applies; and that most descriptions I've encountered have been longer than "a 2006 animated film". Neonumbers 10:31, 10 January 2007 (UTC)
Sorry, I don't mean to be frustrating. I do understand what you are saying, I think I just poorly expressed myself in response. My Revolver examples assumed they were the only album on the page - they would have to be expanded if someone had the audacity to re-use the name for another album. I think the question is down to how important conststency is. For the functional purposes of article finding, in your Evolution example _just the links_ would work for me without ANY descriptions. I dislike the first example as it does have too much non-ambiguating material. I like to make sure we don't lose the main focus of "article finding." In many cases, what you are suggesting IS useful disambiguating information, maybe unnecessary. But in some cases there might be better criteria ("featured in the film Butch Cassidy and the Sundannce Kid") might be good for. . . that bike riding song, where it ambiguous.
That said, I'm one that goes in and puts birth/death dates on dab pages even when they are not "necessary." So I have to fess up to being a bit ambiguous about this concept. I just don't like rules for rules sake. If the guideline suggestion is for concise and pertinent information, I wouldn't complain. I would suggest if there is to be guidlines for film, we keep it to, e.g. "A 2006 comedy film," and only suggest further information if it truly helps dabbing. For example, Hitchcock films probably could use "a 1960 horror film directed by Alfred Hitchcock" Again, sorry for seeming and/or being obtuse. (John User:Jwy talk) 11:35, 10 January 2007 (UTC)
I think you've hit what's been bothing me about this, Jwy; "rules for rules sake". Neonumbers, your suggested guideline (in your most recent post) is fine, I just don't think it's necessary, because it's already being done. That being said, I'm sure it won't be harmful if it is put up. -- Natalya 15:40, 10 January 2007 (UTC)
Ah — I thought there must've been some case where additional information might be useful for this case (there's always exceptions), I just couldn't think of any... In the event that there are guidelines for films/albums/songs, I pretty much agree wtih what Jwy suggested. And apology accepted. My view is that it's not already being done (most descriptions are overdone) — but that could well be just because I've only ever encountered cases where it isn't (which is entirely possible).
Anyway, we all seem to understand each other now — I'm going to let it sit for a month or two while I have a look at some more dab pages (in my normal course of editing on Wikipedia) and think about it some more. Thanks for your comments, Jwy and Natalya. Neonumbers 22:53, 10 January 2007 (UTC)
Cool. I hope you don't feel like we shot your idea down or anything; there's been some good discussion. Thanks, -- Natalya 02:21, 11 January 2007 (UTC)
Yes, thanks for a civil discussion. I see from your user page that consistency is an important issue with you. I'm glad you are reasonable with those of us that don't share that passion, but share your passion for making this a good encyclopedia. (John User:Jwy talk) 02:33, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

First name dab pages

Latest comment: 17 years ago7 comments5 people in discussion

What exactly is the thinking about disambiguation pages for first names? A while back I created a disambiguation page at Edwina, mainly because I didn't think that the M*A*S*H episode "Edwina" quite merited being placed there. Now someone has added a paragraph about the meaning and history of the name. Is this kosher? (By the way, I realize that the "People with the given name Edwina" should be divided between real and fictional, and the real ones should have dates — I'll take care of that after I know whether the "history of the name" section should go.) —Josiah Rowe (talk • contribs) 01:51, 4 February 2007 (UTC)

I'd like to hear what others have to say about this as well. John (and others) used to have similar info. I cleaned up the page and split out the etymology to John (name). That was the best thing I could think of doing. - grubber 02:13, 4 February 2007 (UTC)
It seems clear to me ... "Edwina" the name should have its own article and be just one line on the dab page; dab pages are not the place for explanations simpy a method for redirection. I will edit Edwina accordingly, see what you think Abtract 18:58, 4 February 2007 (UTC)
In my opinion, the "People" section should be on the Edwina (name) page, not on the dab page. CarolGray 21:03, 4 February 2007 (UTC)
I disagree, Edwina (name) is about the name itself not people with that name. Abtract 21:10, 4 February 2007 (UTC)

Thanks, folks: I'll try to bring Edwina into keeping with the MoS. —Josiah Rowe (talk • contribs) 21:17, 4 February 2007 (UTC)

Just a note, I moved Edwina (name) from the toplink to the main part of the disambiguation page, since it is not the primary topic. -- Natalya 00:24, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

Let's clarify with the various CC templates once and for all

Latest comment: 17 years ago42 comments11 people in discussion

Hello my disambiguating friends,

We've all been through the many discussions about the various "CC" templates: {{2CC}}, {{3CC}}, {{4CC}}, {{5CC}}. The situation has been clarified much more than it used to, but somehow it still seems to be somewhat cloudy. I feel that we should, as a whole, decide if/how these templates should be use, and make it really clear, so that it's easy for everyone working with disambiguation pages.

The clearest usage of the templates that we have is at Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style_(disambiguation_pages)#The_disambig_notice. It's not too bad. The question we have to answer is Do we really need to use these templates? I know there has been much debate about it in the past, and in theory, there isn't much wrong with the templates; they've been modified to be similar to the {{disambig}} notice, and all pages which use any of the "CC" templates are listed under Category:Disambiguation. The problem I've seen lately is that pages that include many entries that are acronyms, but are not soley devoted to acronyms, may be incorrectly tagged with one of the CC templates. XXX reminded me of this, and is the most recent occurance, but it has also happened in the past. Of course it's not a big deal, and can be easily changed back, but is there any reason to have that confusion in the first place? The differences between the CC templates at {{disambig}} are rather subtle, and with so many things of the CC templates already being nearly the same as {{disambig}}, is now the appropriate time to cease using the CC templates? Since we are the ones who do a large part of the work with disambiguation pages, we should figure it out.

And if we decide to keep using them, that's totally fine too. Whatever is best for us is great. What we should do then is then clarify when they are to be used (ie, when all the entries are acronyms), and make sure that it is the same throughout all disambiguation pages. Let's just figure it out once and for all.

For anyone who is curous, a (rather large!) number of discussions on this topic can be found in the first section of the manual of style index of archives.

Thanks, everyone! It will be good for us to clarify this, to make working with disambiguation pages easier for everyone. -- Natalya 00:55, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

I vote to retire the CC templates. Josh Parris 02:15, 6 February 2007 (UTC)
So do I. --Smack (talk) 04:10, 6 February 2007 (UTC)
So do I. CarolGray 08:11, 6 February 2007 (UTC)
For what its worth I also agree ... and while you are about it, why do we need {{Geodis}}, {{Hndis}} and {{Numberdis}}? They add very little except the potential for confusion. Abtract 09:28, 6 February 2007 (UTC)
True. They seem to fall under the same category; let's consider them all together, then. -- Natalya 15:09, 6 February 2007 (UTC)
Retire them all. Any common characteristic (if there is one) can be handled in the intro sentence: "Page title refers to various places in the United States:" or "Page Title is an acronym that may stand for:", etc. Maintaining all these templates and making sure they get used "properly" in dab pages seems like a lot of work for no benefit. - grubber 16:40, 6 February 2007 (UTC)
I'd be in favor of retiring the CC templates; they are inconsistently used at best, and it's hard to imagine a need for the distinction between short words and short acronyms. The extremely occasional need for such distinction can probably be attained from articles like List of all two-letter combinations.
I'd be more hesitant to retire the other templates. They seem much more cleanly defined and thus less prone to wasting time over whether items belong there. Also, I can see the Wikipedia of 2017 having subtly different behavior with such pages. For instance, links to a {{shipindex}} page could automatically prompt italicizing the ship's name. Slightly more implausibly, all geodis pages might have automatically generated maps a la the Congo disambig page to make it clear which place is which (an enhancement for the far future!). While I probably wouldn't argue to implement geodis today, I can't say that it's so clearly useless that we should delete it, either. You never know, and the work has already been done. That said, numberdis seems pretty loosely defined, and could lead to wasted effort- while it's fairly obvious when hndisambig is proper (it's all names!), numberdis is a bit more subtle, so it may not be worth the effort to maintain that one. SnowFire 04:17, 7 February 2007 (UTC)
That's a good point, but given the current state of the software, I would like them to act identically. Would it be worth our while to maintain several identical-looking templates? Or can we redirect the specialized templates to {{disambig}}? --Smack (talk) 06:17, 7 February 2007 (UTC)
If we do consider keeping any of the templates, it seems like {{Geodis}} and {{Hndis}} would be the ones that are most valid. In usage, I would imagine they lead to the least confusion. I'm still not sure if they're worthwile to keep, but I can see why they might have advantages sometime in the future. Still, there could be some confusion in their use (albiet much less than with the CC templates and {{Numberdis}}). Although it is tagged correctly, Middlesex (disambiguation) deals almost solely with locations, but also has a couple of non-location entries; I could see there being confusion similiar to pages that are mostly, but not all, CC templates. Perhaps that would occur, perhaps it wouldn't. There are currently geographical disambiguation pages simply using the disambig tag (New Boston was the first example I came across), so it doesn't seem like there is too much consistancy. Whichever we decide, however, we should just be sure to make it clear when those tags should be used. I guess we have to weigh the possible future benefits against the current confusion. -- Natalya 12:37, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

If we did deprecate/delete {{2CC}} et al, what would happen to Category:Lists_of_two-character_combinations? Are we arguing that this category is also not useful? - grubber 15:59, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

Not particularly? That's just my thought, though. Pages can have multiple categories that encompass their contents, and the doesn't really seem to be a point of confusion. However, if the category goes along with the CC tags, we might have to manually readd them if we delete/redirect the templates to {{disambig}}. That might get ugly. -- Natalya 16:30, 7 February 2007 (UTC)
Well here's my concern: I personally dont think {{2CC}} is useful. I think the category could be considered useful (I've never been a fan of categories as it is, but that's a different matter). Here's some possibilities and their problems:
  1. Delete {{2CC}}, replace with {{disambig}}, but keep the category. Well, we'd have to add the pages to the category somehow, so we would need to add the [[Category:...]] to the page. But, then that would something a template could do cleanly and nicely. But we just deleted the template that does that.
  2. Keeping {{2CC}} but changing it so that it redirects to/matches/etc {{disambig}}. The wording has changed, but the problem most of us seem to have with the template is its consistent use and its maintenance burden.
  3. Delete {{2CC}}, replace with {{disambig}}, and delete the category. Are we losing something useful?
I'm not sure what else we could do. None of these 3 options sounds any better than what we have now. Any ideas? - grubber 17:02, 7 February 2007 (UTC)
What if we got a bot to manually add the appropriate categories to the pages currently using the CC templates? (Providing we continue to agree that the CC templates are not useful). If we can get a bot to do that, and I know there are some disambig bots floating around (hopefully the coding wouldn't be too hard), it would make the manual labor much less challenging. I bet that if the CC templates got deleted, a bot could even replace all the pages that use them with the disambig tag. -- Natalya 17:12, 7 February 2007 (UTC)
If the template was deleted but the category was kept for some reason, that could actually quite easily be done. Just change 3CC, etc. to look something like in this diff then order a bot to subst' them. It'll leave the disambig template and the category. SnowFire 17:37, 7 February 2007 (UTC)
Good to know that it should not be so hard to do; the technical aspects of it are someone beyond me (or perhaps just require more thinking), but regardless, good! -- Natalya 19:38, 7 February 2007 (UTC)
It seems that still classifying pages into 2-CC-type categories is just shifting the burden from using templates to using categories. Although we're not reducing work-load, I suppose this would match the way ordinary pages work -- pages about math dont use a template to include the math category, but rather use explicit category tags. Sounds reasonable to me! - grubber 20:19, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

Look here for the danger of having subject specific DABs. Whatever you decide on categories, surely all but the main DAB template must go? Abtract 17:18, 8 February 2007 (UTC)

I've swapped the templated already (for all those interested, it was using {{hndis}}, but certainly not only about human names.)
It seems like there is consensus to stop using the CC templates (though we should certainly leave this discussion going for a bit before replacing anything). Somewhat less certain are the hndis, geodis, and numberdis? How can we address those ones?
Additionally, if we stop using the CC templates, do we want to delete them and replace them with {{disambig}}, or do we just want to redirect them? Redirecting them would certainly be faster, but it seems like having them on the pages would still be kind of confusing, though perhaps it's just me. -- Natalya 19:02, 8 February 2007 (UTC)

Nuke all the CC's. They're template-cruft at best. -- RoySmith (talk) 19:36, 8 February 2007 (UTC)

I agree, there should be only one template ... {{disambig}} ... the subject-specific ones should be deleted and replaced by it. Abtract 19:38, 8 February 2007 (UTC)
Before any are replaced in pages, we should make sure those pages get added to the approrpiate categories that those templates added before. Otherwise, we will lose information. - grubber 21:18, 8 February 2007 (UTC)
Yes, definitly. Just as a reference, the following would need to be added:
  • Pages using {{2CC}}: [[Category:Lists of two-character combinations|{{PAGENAME}}]]
  • Pages using {{3CC}}: [[Category:Lists of three-character combinations|{{PAGENAME}}]]
  • Pages using {{4CC}}: [[Category:Lists of four-character combinations|{{PAGENAME}}]]
  • Pages using {{5CC}}: [[Category:Lists of five-character combinations|{{PAGENAME}}]]
  • Pages using {{hndis}}: [[Category:Lists of ambiguous human names|<noinclude>*</noinclude>{{#if:{{{1|}}}|{{{1}}}|{{{name|{{PAGENAME}}}}}}}]]
I don't know all the extra tags are saying, but probably something about how it is listed in the category.
  • Pages using {{geodis}}: [[Category:Ambiguous place names]]
  • Pages using {{numberdis}}: [[Category:Lists of ambiguous numbers]]
Do we need "PAGENAME" for these last two? Do we even need it for the CC ones? I'm not super familiar with template usage.
When/if we go ahead with this, I imagine we'll have to put them all up for TFD to actually go through with it. It's good that we're gaining consensus and ironing out how this would go about. Does anyone have/know of a bot that would be able/willing to do the replacement of categories, and then replace all the templates that were deleted with {{disambig}}? There seem to be quite a few that do similar things at Wikipedia:Registered bots, but I don't know if we have to figure it out beforehand, or if it will automatically be taken care of if the TfD goes through. I imagine we could put all the parts together at the TfD, saying that first the categories will be put in, and then the templates replaced. -- Natalya 22:34, 8 February 2007 (UTC)

I don't especially care for the CC templates, but can see some justification for hndis and geodis. I wonder though, if we are going to keep the CC categories, then why not use the templates to automatically add the category rather than having to use a two-step process (1. add disambig and 2. add category). I think that was the genesis of the templates. And I think the main objections I"ve seen raised is in variations in language in the templates. Seems we could use a single message for all (or most of the templates) and transclude them in the specialized templates along with the categories. I mean, it seems as though we may be making more work and making things even more complicated if we keep the categories but do away with the templates.

Also, I don't think the hndis category can be easily substituted -- with articles of the form "Firstname Lastname", they are *supposed* to be sorted in the template as "Lastname, Firstname". older ≠ wiser 22:51, 8 February 2007 (UTC)

So just change the wording of the CC templates to match {{disambig}}? That would certainly be a lot less work, and would save the categories. What happens to future disambiguation pages, though? Would they continue to use the depricated CC templates just to get the cateogry? For some reason that seems kind of odd, but it might just be me. -- Natalya 13:29, 9 February 2007 (UTC)
Eh, not really. If the category is kept, then there'd actually be a mild reason to keep the CC templates for precisely that purpose, the ease of adding the category.
Anyway, I don't think that there's any need for a hurry on the non-CC templates. The CC change may bring other people out of the wordwork when they notice it happening to discuss the other templates. I'd propose that first we go to CFD and put the cats Category:Lists of two-character combinations, Category:Lists of three-character combinations, etc. up for deletion/merging. See if others think that those categories serve some usage. If the consensus is keep, then we just change the CC templates to be {{disambig}} copies with the category added a la the diff mentioned above. If the consensus is delete, then we can just wipe the now totally useless CC templates completely, and put them up for TFD. (Though "delete" should probably include a merge as well for the list entries in each category, like Wikipedia:TLAs from AA0 to DZ9 and so on to parent category Category:Lists of abbreviations. SnowFire 14:20, 9 February 2007 (UTC)
Adding a category explicitly is what is done on almost every page on wikipedia. If the article is about Widgets in Australia, then we add a [[Category:Widgets in Australia]] tag at the bottom of the page; we dont create a template for the specific purpose of including a page in a certain category. That's just one more layer of maintenance. The {{2CC}} et al should be completely deleted, regardless of what happens to the category. - grubber 15:46, 9 February 2007 (UTC)

I would prefer we Keep All. It's all very well to say a bot can quickly and easily replace all the short tags with the longer disambig-plus-category tags, but what about the added workload we place on everyone after that who's creating a new such page? There's also an increased chance of typo error or omission. Why make things harder? We use shortcuts for so many other things -- policies, guidelines, admin notice boards and other processes -- why disallow these handy shortcuts? They provide utility without a lot of upkeep, which seems to me like a great deal.

As to simply dropping the categories themselves... there's a project to replace the various "Lists of Wikipedians who _____" with categories, precisely because the lists tend to fall out of date, while the categories are to some extent self-updating. The same reasoning should apply here. Yet this proposal seems to feature deleting the categories in favor of the lists, adding still more future workload. Why? -- Ben 22:08, 11 February 2007 (UTC)

The categories are up for deletion as well as the templates. Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2007 February 9#Character Combination lists To a point I agree with you, that if the categories are kept, it is counterproductive to delete the templates. But no one has really explained why those categories are needed. What is their use? If there isn't a good rationale for the categories' existence, then I see no reason they shouldn't all be deleted. older ≠ wiser 22:17, 11 February 2007 (UTC)
One of the common non-Wiki types of FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions) files on the Web and Usenet is the "Jargon" file, of which acronyms form a sizable part. People want to know what comments like "HTH" and "TINC" mean. These sets of 3CC, 4CC, etc., are a Wiki way to answer such questions. You and I and others here may not need such explanations; but new Wikipedians and Net-users arrive every day, and at some point will have questions like "This guy referred to "NIT"; is he referring to lice, calling me a nit-picker, or something else?" Soon after that comes "Cool; so what other acronyms are used?" These categories help answer that question. -- Ben 00:53, 12 February 2007 (UTC)
Doesn't the search function allow that to happen too? I would imagine people would be much more likely to search for a term than to look through a list to find it. -- Natalya 00:56, 12 February 2007 (UTC)
Searching for an acronym may show you hundreds of pages where it is used, among which (eventually) you find one where it is defined. But that may not even be the definition that applies, which is why there are disambiguation pages. So the _CC definition/disambiguation pages (and their categories) speed the process immensely. -- Ben 01:19, 12 February 2007 (UTC)
Exactly how do these categories assist a person who wants to find out what HTH or TINC mean? I mean, seriously, you type in the abbreviation/acronymn in the search box and you either get a topic or the disambiguation page. How do these categories help in such an activity? older ≠ wiser 02:09, 12 February 2007 (UTC)
The categories show you just the disambiguation pages, so you don't have to look through all the pages that use-but-don't-define or define-one-usage-but-not-all. As a result, the categories list explicitly multiple-meaning acronyms, flagging them as ambiguous (which is why they needed disambiguation), while a search may find so many hits on one usage that (unless you look at every topic page found) you may think that's the only usage out there. Since articles have not been created for all such usages (see the redlinks at CAMP and NIT for examples), even looking at every topic page found, for pages and pages of search hits, may not cover all the usages, so getting just the disambiguation pages straight away would be more helpful. -- Ben 12:02, 12 February 2007 (UTC)
I'm sorry, but I still don't see how these categories will help a person who wants to know what a particular abbreviation/acronymn means. Are you seriously suggesting that they would find it easier to browse the category than use the search box. That seems unlikely. older ≠ wiser 01:17, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

Counter-proposal

One problem with Category:Disambiguation is that it's so darn big. With other big categories, we use subcategories to break them down into more manageable sizes: novelists and poets are grouped by nationality, and each categorized in, for instance, "Russian poets" or "French poets" rather than the overall "Poets" category, so only the un-subcategorizable show up in the top category. Maybe, "to be consistent", the same organizing principle should apply here.

Rather than eliminate the 2CC, 3CC, etc., special-categories, perhaps we should subdivide the disambig category, to get that top category tag off most of the entries:

  • Disambiguation
    • Biographical disambiguation (personal names)
    • Geographical disambiguation (place names)
    • Acronym disambiguation (non-word strings)
      • 2-character combinations
      • 3-character combinations
      • 4-character combinations
      • 5-character combinations
      • 6-or-more-character combinations
    • (Other) Word disambiguation (including words that may also serve as acronyms) ...

Pages to disambig words that also serve as acronyms should have both the "single-word" tag and the appropriate "acronym"-or-subsubcategory tag, so they show up in both lists. Add other subcategories as needed to keep the top category to a reasonable size. Only those disambig pages outside all the subcategories would still have the "Category:Disambiguation" tag and show up individually in that top category. Sound feasible? -- Ben 15:54, 16 February 2007 (UTC)

I don't think there is a useful subdivision of that big category. The nature of the pages is the word in question has several meanings and therefore difficult to categorize via meaning. Sure, the number of letters in the word is a clearly defined category, but almost as useful as categorizing by the second letter of the word. I think we have to "live" with the big category and use the alphabectical index that it has. I don't see that as a problem, really. How would one USE these subcategories you describe? (John User:Jwy talk) 16:17, 16 February 2007 (UTC)
The same way one uses the subcategories of, say, Category:Novelists: most entries are in subsubcategories of subcategories like Category:Novelists by nationality; only those novelists whose nationality is unclear (e.g. through emigration while writing) or undisclosed are seen in the top category. As a result, Category:Novelists needs only one page for its entries instead of dozens. -- Ben 19:07, 16 February 2007 (UTC)

FYI, it's probably helpful to keep this discussion centralized, perhaps at Wikipedia:Templates_for_deletion/Log/2007_February_9#Counter-proposal so that everyone can see it. -- Natalya 17:43, 16 February 2007 (UTC)

Since both the TfD and the corresponding CfD, as well as this counterproposal, could affect how Category:Disambiguation works -- they all amount to reorganizing the category, one way or another -- Wikipedia_talk:Disambiguation should have been involved in this discussion from the beginning. -- Ben 19:15, 16 February 2007 (UTC)
All of the various disambiguation pages were alerted to the discussion here, as well as the corresponding TfD. I posted the recent messages because different people were responding to the proposal at different talk pages, which doesn't lend for a cohesive discussion. -- Natalya 20:20, 16 February 2007 (UTC)

TfD

I've officially nominated 2CC, 3CC, 4CC, and 5CC for deletion (see Wikipedia:Templates for deletion/Log/2007 February 9). There seems to be overwhelming consensus formed here to delete those, but I want to make sure the process wonks are kept happy. There seems to be a less solid consensus about the other ones at this point, so I left those out. -- RoySmith (talk) 18:41, 9 February 2007 (UTC)

Songs without articles

Latest comment: 17 years ago10 comments6 people in discussion

Songs on dab pages fall into four categories:

  1. Songs with articles
  2. Songs without articles, which appeared in albums that do have articles
  3. Songs without articles, from albums without articles, by musicians with articles
  4. Songs without articles, from albums without articles, by musicians without articles

The first category is straightforward: we just link to the song. The last category is also fairly clear: we delete those entries. But what should we do for the other two? --Smack (talk) 01:30, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

I usually link to the most specific thing available and leave the rest unlinked. Whether to delete the entry or not is more complicated. I agree with you about category 4, but the others I usually just leave unless there is a compelling reason to believe its not a useful entry to have. (John User:Jwy talk) 01:47, 22 February 2007 (UTC)
Ditto Jwy. older ≠ wiser 03:44, 22 February 2007 (UTC)
Ditto again. For category 2, on occasion I will link both the album and the musician if there is something relevant about the song in both articles. --Paul Erik 04:59, 22 February 2007 (UTC)
I don't do that - the song will have a link to the album, so I reduce the bluelinks. (John User:Jwy talk) 05:15, 22 February 2007 (UTC)
One blue link is usually good (and follows the MoS). As Jwy said, the album link usually has the song, so it's a good link to have. And if not, the artist can be linked to. -- Natalya 12:18, 22 February 2007 (UTC)
Don't know how many people agree, but I'd suspect that in the third category will often not be notable enough for a disambig link in the first place. For that matter, I'd be inclined to often agree for the second category as well, though that at least has a shot. Considering the sheer number of albums in existence, random two-bit bands out of Wisconsin that are only barely notable enough for their own page are unlikely to be notable enough to have all their songs link back to them, too.
Also, the uniqueness of the name comes into play as well. If a band of questionable notability has a song with an unusual title ("Hedgehogs are eating my brains" or the like), then, well, on the off chance there's a disambig page there rather than a redirect, go ahead and add it. If it's some kind of incredibly generic word or phrase that likely has a long disambiguation page, then the standards get a lot higher- it should be a reasonably famous song. SnowFire 18:27, 24 February 2007 (UTC)
Do we have enough of a consensus to officially put this into the MoS? These problematic entries occur very often, so I think we should address them specifically. See also this discussion. --Smack (talk) 19:26, 27 February 2007 (UTC)
Rather than specific rule about this case (songs), I would suggest adding to the "single blue link" item on the MOS something like:
When there is a choice of several items to bluelink for an entry, link the most specific item, for example (and then a few of our song entries). This would cover other things, like school, city, state, country or similar things. Don't want too many rules. (John User:Jwy talk) 23:15, 27 February 2007 (UTC)
I agree. Does anyone want to do this? It strikes me that I've never actually edited a policy page before, so I would be very nervous editing an MoS. --Smack (talk) 05:25, 28 February 2007 (UTC)
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