Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Redirect/Archive 4

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Adding the shell template to new redirects during a bot task

If a bot task makes a bunch of new redirects (with varying rcats), can it add the shell template without anything inside? It's difficult to automatically determine which rcats are appropriate for a given page. This question arose in the discussion at WP:BOTREQ#Redirect talk pages with only banners (permalink), which is a follow-up from the proposal to redirect talk pages with only banners. Enterprisey (talk!) 16:25, 31 July 2017 (UTC)

Adding the empty {{Redirect category shell}} template should, in my opinion, continue to be manual only. The single purpose of adding the empty Rcat shell to a redirect, which populates the manifold sort category, is to help editors who are new to the redirect categorization process. To use a bot to add the empty Rcat shell to redirects will quickly fill the category and make it virtually impossible for me and other editors to help inexperienced editors with redirect categorization.  Paine Ellsworth  put'r there  23:14, 1 August 2017 (UTC)

Genuine curiosity regarding editing practices

I know that redirects are CHEAP, but does it make sense to have a redirect for every artist on a remix album or multiple versions of every song on an album? A recent discussion makes it sound like these redirs are being created "to help people find the album" but searching for a track name (even if the page doesn't exist) will still show up something related to the album itself.

I'm mostly concerned about the redundancy (see the "multiple versions" link), but there seems to be enough concern from other parties regarding the mass creation of redirects that I figured I'd mention it.

For what it's worth, I'm using one specific editor's creations purely because I have the diffs available, but I've seen other editors doing similar actions, so I really would like to approach this from a "best practice" standpoint rather than a "I don't like what this editor is doing" standpoint. I've also looped in WP:ALBUM for their thoughts on the matter. Primefac (talk) 19:10, 5 September 2017 (UTC)

The search function here is good enough to make the creation of redirects redundant. Having a few editors selecting their favourite albums for this treatment could be considered advertising and totally against the spirit of WP. Furthermore, there may be other songs with the same name, and to create a redirect for only one of them is misleading. Please, let's stop the creation of redirects for album tracks (and I note some are also creating redirects for every alternative title variant, ie SONG (song), SONG, SONG (XXX song), some go as far as potential misspellings). --Richhoncho (talk) 19:39, 5 September 2017 (UTC)
I guess my problem with these redirects are what if one of them remixes a second song? That would be a very thin assertion of notability but you can't redirect a page to two targets. So what would happen? ―Justin (koavf)TCM 19:43, 5 September 2017 (UTC)

These two categories are populated by {{Infobox journal}} based on their |abbreviation= / |bluebook= parameters. If you're interested in created those

Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 17:25, 30 August 2017 (UTC)

Bot(s?) to set [un]printworthy categories

Thanks to a brief chat with Koavf yesterday, I have an idea for a bot for categorizing redirects by printworthiness (based on the advice at WP:RE/SG). This bot would crawl main-namespace redirects for several tasks:

  1. If a redirect is not a member of either Category:Printworthy redirects or Category:Unprintworthy redirects, it would add some new maintenance category, Category:Redirects of undetermined printworthiness, possibly by adding a new template {{R printworthiness undetermined}} (as examples). Interested editors could review members of that tracking category and assign its members to either of the printworthy categories.
  2. If a redirect is a member of both categories (it happens) the bot would also assign it to a maintenance category, maybe the same one as task 1.
  3. If a redirect has a printworthiness category added directly (with e.g. [[Category:Printworthy redirects]] inserted), it will replace the category link with the proper rcat template.
  4. If a redirect doesn't have any additional text at all other than the redirect code, it will add an empty {{redirect category shell}} to add it to Category:Miscellaneous redirects. The misc category would be made a child of the undetermined printworthiness category (not part of the task).

Some of the rcats already assign one of the printworthiness categories so the bot would skip them, but not all do. Redirects that have no categorization at all or aren't a member of either of the categories are probably in the tens of thousands (an extremely wild guess). As the bot works it would make a lot of things to do, none of which are urgent (so "creating unnecessary work" isn't really an issue), it's just a list of things that some editors can work on if they feel so inclined, but at least there would be a centralized maintenance category to work from. I also considered whether this should just be code added to {{redirect category shell}} to sort the categories if they're not already sorted, but that would exclude all of the redirects which don't have that template either (hence task 4).

Anyway, I'm not a bot coder, just interested in the project's thoughts on this. Cheers. Ivanvector (Talk/Edits) 13:29, 13 September 2017 (UTC)

  • I don't dabble much in redirect categorisation, so I'm simply sharing some airy thoughts. My impression was that most rcat templates already categorise the redirects they're on into the printworthiness categories. It turns out this isn't the case: for instance {{R from alternative name}} doesn't, although I'd imagine all redirects from alternative names are by default printworthy. I think as much as possible of the printworthiness should be handled by the rcats. As for the bot I see two potential issues: one is that a large number of redirects have only a single edit in their editing history (and so most editors can move the target over the redirect), but the bot's going to change that, so many page moves will become off limits for ordinary editors. My second concern is with the "creating unnecessary work" bit: of course no-one is going to force editors to work on these low-priority tasks, but my experience with wikipedia so far has left me with the impression that whenever a task is created users will step up to work on it, no matter how inconsequential it might be. – Uanfala 14:04, 13 September 2017 (UTC)
We could have a discussion about whether each of those rcats should add the category to either of the printworthiness cats, and some of the templates give guidance. For example, I would assume {{R from alternative name}} would be printworthy, with its unprintworthy analogue being {{R from incorrect name}} or {{R from misspelling}}. Some of the others allow a printworthy= switch to override the default. So, yes, a lot of it can be done by proper use of existing rcats. The problems I attempt to address with the bot are when an rcatted page doesn't have one of the rcats which set printworthiness, or has rcats which set conflicting printworthiness, which there is currently no way to track. Maybe {{redirect category shell}} can be modified to detect it in which case tasks 1 and 2 are unnecessary, but I'm not sure. As for edit history, you make a good point. I think bot edits do not prevent moving over a redirect (c.f. the bots that fix double redirects), but I'm not sure about this either. Ivanvector (Talk/Edits) 14:22, 13 September 2017 (UTC)
Bot edits DO prevent moving over redirects. There are almost 8 million redirects, and I'd guess the majority don't have any categories; it's certainly more than tens of thousands uncategorized. Plantdrew (talk) 16:40, 13 September 2017 (UTC)
@Uanfala: Josef Stalin redirects to Joseph Stalin but there's no reason for that to be printworthy. It's easy to think of lots of alternative names that would be a terrible idea to put into print (e.g. "For Billy Wilson, see Bill Wilson"--those would be immediately next to one another in print). ―Justin (koavf)TCM 17:50, 13 September 2017 (UTC)
But this then brings the question: what do we use printworthiness for? Enabling the compilation of a decent print index is a noble but nowadays arcane goal, and I can't imagine it being worth the effort. On the other hand, it can be used among others for ranking search results or the drop-down suggestions, and that's probably more relevant. But then maybe a simple print–unprintworthy distinction might not be the best tool, and again if anything more fine grained is used it had better take advantage of the information inherent in the rcats already applied to redirects. – Uanfala 21:45, 13 September 2017 (UTC)
@Uanfala: "what do we use printworthiness for?" I'm sorry but maybe I'm not understanding why you asked this, since you answered it in the next sentence. There are and have been print editions of Wikipedia (I have a volume myself). I can't speak to SEO but that's not at all why it's tagged as (un)printworthy. We certainly could have a similar (un)searchworthy but we don't. ―Justin (koavf)TCM 07:14, 14 September 2017 (UTC)
@Uanfala and Kaovf: Redirects tagged as unprintworthy are not shown as search suggestions in the drop-down list, e.g. G-class and G is for gumshoe will not appear when you start typing those strings. Thryduulf (talk) 13:23, 15 September 2017 (UTC)

This idea about printworthiness-by-bot is a great one for the most part. A couple of thoughts:

  1. Since tagging redirects with R printworthy/R unprintworthy has never been a huge priority, there might be thousands, even hundreds of thousands of redirects that are not yet so tagged,
  2. For a similar reason, it would probably be better if we don't use a bot to tag redirects with the empty Rcat shell template. That will inundate the Misc. redirects category, which is there solely to help editors who are new to redirect categorization learn how to do so. Add the empty Rcat shell with a bot and again, thousands, perhaps hundreds of thousands of redirects would quickly be categorized to the misc. category.  Paine Ellsworth  put'r there  07:36, 15 September 2017 (UTC)
See also: #Adding the shell template to new redirects during a bot task above
Where redirects are in both printworthy and unprintworthy categories, and one is set explicitly and the other implicitly a bot should be able to assume that the one set explicitly is correct and it should make whatever edit is required to suppress the one set implicitly. I don't know how many redirects are like this, but I have vague memories of doing this myself on at least one occasion several years ago.
As for redirects that are in neither category, I suspect a good proportion of these are the automatically generated {{R from move}} redirects. If we want to track redirects that have undetermined printworthiness it would be good to get this applied automatically to future moves rather than make unnecessary bot edits. Thryduulf (talk) 13:23, 15 September 2017 (UTC)
That should be no more complicated than editing the {{R from move}} template to add the category unless a switch is set, and then it would capture all existing page move redirects as well. We certainly can't say that all page move titles are printworthy or not. Ivanvector (Talk/Edits) 13:36, 15 September 2017 (UTC)
  • The more I read feedback on this and consider it, the more I think this should be handled by the shell template programmatically, rather than by a bot. Can the shell be programmed to detect if printworthiness is set, and set a category if it is not? It already sets the misc category if no other categories are present. I agree that bots shouldn't be running around making edits to redirects and making it so that they can't be overwritten by non-pagemovers; fixing double redirects is a good reason why we should do that, but fixing printworthiness is really not. Ivanvector (Talk/Edits) 13:39, 15 September 2017 (UTC)

Discussion related to double redirect-fixing bots

There is a discussion at Wikipedia talk:Double redirects#The bots should operate with a delay that users interested in redirects are invited to participate in. Note that the section contains multiple ideas (not just the one in the section title), but not yet any firm proposals. Thryduulf (talk) 16:46, 9 October 2017 (UTC)

Beseeching insight and clue?

A relisted discussion begs the esteemed members of this project to bring their insight and clue into the discussion. It can only profit by the increased understanding and clarity that this group could bring. I hope that many of you will. Thank you.--John Cline (talk) 07:36, 24 October 2017 (UTC)

New R-from template

It occured to me that there wasn't a specific tag for redirects from individually-unnotable sporting teams to their parent (notable) leagues. So, I created one: {{R from team}}. If this duplicates something that already exists, then by all means merge and if I broke something please feel free to fix! - The Bushranger One ping only 22:42, 8 November 2017 (UTC)

Bot for single character modifications

I believe a bot could be used to create/sort redirects from simple single character modifications, for example {{R to ligature}}: Aethelred the UnreadyÆthelred the Unready. Other similar rcats are {{R to ASCII-only}}, {{R from plural}} and {{R from CamelCase}}. Most of these rcats are automatically marked as unprintworthy so that is also useful. umbolo 22:28, 14 November 2017 (UTC)

Please come and help...

Should MoS shortcut redirects be sorted to certain specific maintenance categories? An Rfc has been opened on this talk page to answer that question. Your sentiments would be appreciated!  Paine Ellsworth  put'r there  16:43, 14 December 2017 (UTC)

This is presently is just a template redirect to {{R from modification}}, but should probably be its own template that subcategorises into a Category:Redirects from incorrect hyphenation, under both Category:Redirects from misspellings and Category:Redirects from modifications (which is where {{R from modification}} categorises, with {{R from other hyphenation}} being a redir to that template). This would be consistent with {{R from miscapitalisation}} and Category:Redirects from miscapitalisations (which is a subcat of both Category:Redirects from misspellings and Category:Redirects from other capitalisations, a subcat. of Category:Redirects from modifications). While we have no particular maintenance need (that I know of) to distinguish alternative hyphenations from other kinds of potentially printworthy redirs, it will help cleanup efforts to distinguish the rather full Category:Redirects from misspellings (and its parent Category:Redirects from incorrect names) into different sorts of errors, as we're already doing with incorrect capitalisation.  — SMcCandlish ¢ >ʌⱷ҅ʌ<  08:27, 23 December 2017 (UTC)

R from archaic name?

Currently {{R from archaic name}} redirects to {{R from former name}}, which has the descriptive text "This is a redirect from a former name or working title of the target topic to the new name that resulted from a name change.". This...doesn't really work for archaic names; for instance, the seabird petrel didn't have its name changed from peterel, the spelling simply shifted as Old English became our current verbiage. R-from-archaic-name should probably be its own, seperate template, I think, because of that. - The Bushranger One ping only 07:21, 26 December 2017 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Redirect listed at Requested moves

A requested move discussion has been initiated for Wikipedia:Redirect to be moved to Wikipedia:Redirects. This page is of interest to this WikiProject and interested members may want to participate in the discussion here. —RMCD bot 13:59, 7 June 2018 (UTC)

To opt out of RM notifications on this page, transclude {{bots|deny=RMCD bot}}, or set up Article alerts for this WikiProject.

Deletion principles for unexplained redirects of alternative terms

There is a discussion at Wikipedia talk:Redirects for discussion#Deletion principles for unexplained redirects of alternative terms, arising from the nomination at WP:RfD of Hadamard-Gutzwiller model at a time when the target page was in this state. Members of this project (which I confess I'd forgotten about!) might like to contribute to that discussion. PamD 08:23, 25 June 2018 (UTC)

@Jess Riedel: for info. PamD 08:34, 25 June 2018 (UTC)

Mass creation of Twitter username redirects

See here. Not sure if this sort of thing is appropriate or inappropriate but I noticed it so I thought I would point it out. — Godsy (TALKCONT) 08:42, 23 June 2018 (UTC)

@Steel1943 and Paine Ellsworth: Curious what those involved with {{r from twitter username}} think about this matter. — Godsy (TALKCONT) 18:18, 23 June 2018 (UTC)
Hi Godsy – was wondering when an editor would undertake this task. My only question is why R64Q sees the need to add the hard category to each page when the rcat does that automatically? Other than that it appears to be a good job of redirect creation, categorizing and sorting. Do you have any other specific misgivings?  Paine Ellsworth  put'r there  18:33, 23 June 2018 (UTC)
(edit conflict) @Paine Ellsworth: Honestly, I am unsure how I feel. Part of me says they are good for navigation while the other part senses possible undue promotion of twitter. — Godsy (TALKCONT) 19:28, 23 June 2018 (UTC)
I'm attempting to locate the WP:RFD discussion that led me to create this Rcat/category due to similar redirects being nominated at WP:RFD then kept, but I cannot find it at the moment, possibly considering that it happened almost 5 years ago. However, in regards to the most recently created redirects, I just had to fix a DEFAULTSORT issue, so I'm sure there are more, probably most redirects to biographical articles/subjects. Steel1943 (talk) 19:19, 23 June 2018 (UTC)
...Speaking of which, Paine Ellsworth, I don't agree with the following text in {{R from Twitter username}}: "...but instead that it is sorted by either the first letter following the at sign or by the surname of the subject – the preferred sort key for human names". I'll start a discussion about it on Template talk:R from Twitter username and ping you. Steel1943 (talk) 19:24, 23 June 2018 (UTC)
I vaguely remember seeing some of these pop up at rfd but I don't remember the details. — Godsy (TALKCONT) 19:31, 23 June 2018 (UTC)
@Godsy: Found it, I think: Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2013 October 23#@ladygaga. Steel1943 (talk) 20:26, 23 June 2018 (UTC)

To prevent a discussion fork, suggest we continue this at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents#Twitter accounts as redirects.  Paine Ellsworth  put'r there  20:37, 23 June 2018 (UTC)

Proposal to stop twitter and other social media handle redirects

Twitter handles and other social media handles (instagram, facebook etc) are not valid or useful redirects except in extraordinary circumstances. We should remove them all. The Template:R from Twitter username should be deleted to discourage such creations. Policy be updated to reflect the conclusion of this thread.

that would be an extraordinary circumstance where the twitter account has it's own page because it is notable. Legacypac (talk) 21:48, 23 June 2018 (UTC)
* e.g. capitalization
  • (edit conflict × 2) I believe that all the existing redirects should be kept for cheapness reasons. However, I don't believe any more of these should be created. If the community agrees with me to keep the existing redirects, the template's language can be updated there to say that consensus holds these redirects should not be created anymore and that the template exists solely to track the already existing ones, which did not reach consensus to be deleted. Of course, if we do delete all 1000 of these redirects, the Rcat template should go too. Compassionate727 (T·C) 22:10, 23 June 2018 (UTC)

--Administrator note -- This is where the original {{abot}} was placed. Primefac (talk) 22:28, 23 June 2018 (UTC)

You boldly closed a discussion to delete all the redirects - which would have made the template redundent. Proposing to delete the template does not address the thrust of this proposal. Legacypac (talk) 22:22, 23 June 2018 (UTC)

  • @Legacypac: Then feel free to nominate the lot of them through their proper venue: WP:RFD. Creating discussions on non-XfD forums for deletions of pages is distracting, and causes the pages to have to be nominated (and thus be subject to another 7-day discussion cycle) anyways, and thus cause a possible waste of the community's time. Steel1943 (talk) 22:24, 23 June 2018 (UTC)
    • I have voided the closure, as I concur with Legacy. Text of the original close is as follows:

    I am boldly closing this discussion since I have now nominated the respective template at Wikipedia:Templates for discussion/Log/2018 June 23#Template:R from Twitter username to prevent further discussion forks such as this one. Steel1943 (talk) 22:12, 23 June 2018 (UTC)

    Granted, this is not an RFC and is nowhere near binding, but it could lead to an RFC that would result in such a mass deletion. The discussion regarding the template itself is only a small part of this. Primefac (talk) 22:27, 23 June 2018 (UTC)
    • @Primefac: I will gladly revert your revert of my close once I finish my mass nomination myself. Thanks for ... umm, making this more complicated and time-consuming than it has to be. Steel1943 (talk) 22:29, 23 June 2018 (UTC)
    • I would ask that you not do that, and let someone uninvolved do so. It is very possible that after you make your mass-nomination that no one else even feels the need to comment here. In other words, there is no need to prematurely close the discussion. Primefac (talk) 22:31, 23 June 2018 (UTC)
      • @Primefac: So, you support having a discussion to delete redirects on a forum other than WP:RFD, then after utilizing community time with your opinion on how this should go, then have to go ahead and post these on WP:RFD anyways? Well, unless you plan on propose on creating WP:CSD#X3 in regards to this, that plan is a rather large waste of community time, but okay. You have an editor who is willing to go the extra mile so that this discussion happens the way that it should and can guarantee that it will get resolved properly via WP:RFD, but yet, you have shot me out. Again, okey dokey. Steel1943 (talk) 22:33, 23 June 2018 (UTC)
    I have zero opinions on this matter; I simply saw a discussion that I felt was closed without addressing the concern of the proposer. This discussion could end in nothing more than "I've nominated all these redirects for deletion", or it could spin out into a RFC about banning their creation entirely. The thread has been here all of a few hours and is not grossly improper. You are welcome to do whatever you feel is best regarding these redirects, and please do not take this un-closure as an indication that you should stop all subsequent activities of what you feel is necessary. Primefac (talk) 22:39, 23 June 2018 (UTC)

I'm not convinced that running 1000 similar recently created implausible redirects through RFD is a good idea. If there is consensus to remove them in a ANi discussion we don't even need to individually CSD them as some Admins can just act. We sure did not run all the Neelix redirects through RFD we agreed at ANi to CSD them after review. In this case if @AmericanAirlines should be deleted so should @Starbucks so its even simplier. Legacypac (talk) 22:38, 23 June 2018 (UTC)

  • Support, for the most part. There are some celebrities who are notably active on Twitter, who have Twitter handles that differ from their actual names. For example, Ron Perlman is @perlmutations, and Russell Brand is @rustyrockets. bd2412 T 03:47, 24 June 2018 (UTC)
    • I was searching through some of R64Q's contributions earlier and noticed that there are a few like this. Agreed that distinctly different handles should be kept. Someone wanting to know (and read about) the handle's operator might search the handle. Compassionate727 (T·C) 04:14, 24 June 2018 (UTC)
  • Oppose. These redirects are good search terms, and if more are needed, then they should be created. And yes, if people know about Twitter usernames then they know to type the @ sign into the search field. I find it interesting that editors would think people would not type in the @ sign. I think editors might consider the new user who created all these redirects as erring because they've only been registered for a few months; however, the fact is that this has been on my to-do list for awhile now. I wonder how many would have questioned it if a more experienced editor had created the redirects?  Paine Ellsworth  put'r there  03:51, 24 June 2018 (UTC)
    • I consider 5,000 edits to be experienced. But then again, I didn't question it at the time so, so perhaps it still demonstrates your point. Compassionate727 (T·C) 04:14, 24 June 2018 (UTC)
  • Oppose. At least some of these redirects are good, so there should be no prohibition on their creation, nor should they deleted simply because of their class. Any that are individually not useful can and should be dealt with individually. Thryduulf (talk) 11:02, 24 June 2018 (UTC)
  • Note I've speedy-closed the TFD, because nobody's argued that the template has any problems doing what it's intended to do, or that we shouldn't be using a template for this purpose; the deletion arguments (e.g. I personally don't see the point in these as anyone would just search for the persons name as opposed to @Name, by Davey2010) all focused on the idea of collecting the redirects or having them in the first place, and those are arguments for deleting the category or its contents, not for deleting the template itself. Please see Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2018 June 25 for a deletion discussion for the category, and please remember to comment only on the idea of having a category for these redirects, since comments about the redirects themselves are irrelevant. Nyttend (talk) 04:09, 25 June 2018 (UTC)
  • Oppose it seems to me a small number of redirects are useful, notably when there is sufficient mention of that Twitter account in some article. I'm not sure if a redirect is useful when there is barely any mention although I would likely not support their deletion provided it doesn't get out of hand. I am always opposed to, and would therefore support the deletion and disallowing of any redirect which functions as a confusing easter egg i.e. there is no mention at all of the redirect term (twitter handle in this case) in the target article so people may be legitimately confused why they ended up at the target page. Nil Einne (talk) 11:42, 26 June 2018 (UTC)
  • Comment I create a lot of articles on foreign-language films, and always create the redirects for the film's title in French, German, Spanish, or whatever language it is. I see this along the same lines, that it's possible for a reader of WP to search for the Twitter handle of the subject they're looking for. The only issue I would have if someone was setting up lots of attack redirects (@moron -> Donald Trump, for example), but that can be handled like an other bad-faith/BLP/attack issues, if it happens. Lugnuts Fire Walk with Me 12:01, 29 June 2018 (UTC)

{{R from alternative language}} and diacritics

Hi, I have an issue with categorising two redirects (Uniwersytet Jagiellonski and Uniwersytet Jagielloński). They are both {{R from alternative language}} to an English name, but one is without a diacritic and the other has a diacritic. I would welcome guidance on whether they should be tagged with {{R from diacritic}} or {{R to diacritic}} or some other Rcat. The language of the templates is "To the same page name", and I don't think that names in different languages are the same. Also, is any of them printworthy? (I think Uniwersytet Jagielloński is, as it is a correct name in Polish, while Uniwersytet Jagiellonski is not) —Biexx 🤔talk 14:30, 30 June 2018 (UTC)

Biexx, in a way you've answered your own question - the diacritic sorting is only for the same name. Both redirects are (at the time I'm writing this) accurately categorized. Primefac (talk) 17:16, 30 June 2018 (UTC)
Primefac, thank you. I was asking because I tried looking at other redirects, but I've seen it done both ways. So, for example, Allée is categorised incorrectly? —Biexx 🤔talk 17:22, 30 June 2018 (UTC)
Correct, and  Fixed. Primefac (talk) 19:03, 30 June 2018 (UTC)

New maintenance subcategories

There are new sheriffs in town. They come in the form of new subcategories that bd2412 created to make Category:Redirects from sort names and Category:Redirects from ambiguous sort names much easier to manage. At present, those two parent categories will act as container cats (just subcategories, no actual entries) and will be monitored in case editors haven't gotten wind of this improvement. To start you off, please see Template:R from sort name#Parameters, where it's explained that two new parameters are needed on sort-name redirects to populate the correct subcategories. The same info can be found at Template:R from ambiguous sort name#Parameters. Have a great day and Happy Publishing!  Paine Ellsworth  put'r there  19:19, 19 July 2018 (UTC)

Do redirects belong in categories?

When an unsourced stub for a novel was at AfD I proposed that it should be redirected to the author's article but that the categories (eg Category:1911 novels) should be preserved, and I've added them to the redirect. Is this standard practice or not? I can see two arguments:

(a) it's useful to the reader who is using the category to look for 1911 novels to know that this one exists and is mentioned in an article, even if only in a list of the author's publications
(b) it's a hindrance to the reader to offer them a redirect to the author's article, given that the novel has failed at AfD.

I think I've seen plenty of redirects within category listings, but is there any guidance on this? @Joe Roe: as the AfD closer. PamD 16:09, 28 July 2018 (UTC)

@Uanfala: Thanks. I should have looked at WP:Redirect which has a brief section on categorisation and links to that page. For some reason I came straight to this project page, where the only mention of categorisation is, understandably, about the redirect-specific categories. PamD 16:39, 28 July 2018 (UTC)

First, yes, all redirects should be in at least one category, to describe what kind of redirect it is - an alternative spelling? A plural? A sortname? The name of a work by an author or artist? The name of a song on an album? Substantive categories are also permissible where the redirect title would be one that falls within the substantive category if it were an article. Second, in light of that, can someone please generate a list of uncategorized redirects? bd2412 T 17:15, 28 July 2018 (UTC)

Redirect template request

Which template should be used on redirects from villages or former municipalities to the current municipality in which they are covered? Example: Glavacioc? We have a template from person to an article covering it, but we ought to have - or I couldn't find - one from settlement to an article covering it. If I've missed it, I apologize, but if someone could set me right, I'd appreciate the help. Carlossuarez46 (talk) 18:40, 2 August 2018 (UTC)

It seems like {{R from historic name}} would cover that case. --{{u|Mark viking}} {Talk} 19:04, 2 August 2018 (UTC)
  • But it's a part of a larger, as Glavacioc is a village in its target municipality, for example. Carlossuarez46 (talk) 19:14, 2 August 2018 (UTC)

R from AfD Discussion

Sorry if this is a perennial suggestion but is there a reason there's not an R from an AfD discussion template? Obviously this can be noted on a talk page but seems like it might be useful on the page itself. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 12:58, 23 August 2018 (UTC)

Not sure if it's perennial necessarily, but I asked the same question a couple years ago and the answer was "because there's usually a talk page notice as to why it's redirected" (which I mostly agree with). Primefac (talk) 17:31, 23 August 2018 (UTC)

Hi, I've just came across {{R from cover song}}, which is used on only 5 redirects. It hadn't even got a doc subpage until I created it a few minutes ago and added some categories. I feel like there are many redirects that could use this template, but I have no idea how to encourage editors to use it. It'd be great if someone could create an actual documentation for the template. — bieχχ (talk) 21:17, 25 August 2018 (UTC)

I apologize for this oversight and will resolve the discrepancy of the missing documentation within the coming days.--John Cline (talk) 22:25, 15 September 2018 (UTC)

Redirects from reverse name order

Is there a template available for redirects such as Abe Shinzō? I have seen several instances of articles on two different people at the Western and Eastern name order for the same name. A template and a push to create the missing ones should help prevent this from happening. Though if one needs to be created then I'm not sure what the best name would be. —Xezbeth (talk) 19:57, 15 September 2018 (UTC)

  • {{R from sort name}} is the closest in Category:Templates for redirects relating to human names. This is indended for redirects like Einstein, Albert so I'm not sure if it's suitable or not (my gut feeling is no). Paine Ellsworth is probably the most knowledgeable editor when it comes to redirect categorisation templates. Thryduulf (talk) 20:09, 15 September 2018 (UTC)
  • I would personally use {{r mod}} because why not? {{r from sort name}} is for redirects from commas. wumbolo ^^^ 20:33, 15 September 2018 (UTC)
  • As can be seen at Surname, and at Shinzō Abe, a surname is also a family name, and "Abe" is the Japanese family name. This means that {{R from sort name}} is appropriate for the Abe Shinzō redirect. Use of the comma is common for Western names like Einstein's; however, the comma is seldom used in Eastern names.  Paine Ellsworth  put'r there  20:56, 15 September 2018 (UTC)
    • It's not a sort name though, it's their actual name. There are also instances where the article will be at the Eastern name order. A Western name order redirect to that can't be considered a sort name, surely. —Xezbeth (talk) 21:00, 15 September 2018 (UTC)
      • Yes, the article is default-sorted to "Abe, Shinzo", although with today's Wikimarkup it could also be sorted to the name with the diacritical mark, "Abe Shinzō" or "Abe, Shinzō". Most of this type of article I've seen are titled with the family name first, and there is no need for a sort-name redirect. If the article title is to retain its Western configuration (WP:COMMONNAME?), then the sort name redirect is needed and should be categorized as such.
      • And no, if the title is moved to the Eastern configuration, the Western-order redirect that results would definitely not be {{R from sort name}}.  Paine Ellsworth  put'r there  21:22, 15 September 2018 (UTC)
        • I shouldn't have have used a name with a long vowel as an example since that confuses matters. Using Yamashita Miyuki as an example instead, I do not consider that a sort name and would not be willing to pollute those categories with tens of thousands of redirects like this. —Xezbeth (talk) 04:34, 16 September 2018 (UTC)
          • I think creating new templates template:R from eastern name order and template:R to eastern name order (and the associated categories) would probably be the best way to go here. They aren't the same as sort names, and shouldn't be conflated with them. Thryduulf (talk) 11:00, 16 September 2018 (UTC)
            • Not sure I understand this reasoning. The first example article, Shinzō Abe, sets the DEFAULTSORT to "Abe, Shinzo", so if we use the Japanese family name (surname) as the default sort in an article, why would that be different for redirects? In the second example, Miyuki Yamashita, the DEFAULTSORT is set to "Yamashita, Miyuki", which indicates that "Yamashita" is the subject's family name. So again, I don't understand – why should we treat redirects different from articles? I would like to hear from bd2412 on this issue.  Paine Ellsworth  put'r there  14:56, 16 September 2018 (UTC)

I think I have uncovered why there is so much confusion about the issue of Japanese names. For most (not all) modern living and recently deceased Japanese names, people break with tradition and use the Western order, <given name> <family name> ("family name" is synonymous with "surname" here). 2008 is the year given for this change in this article. And this editing guideline uses the year 1885 as the date when the traditional Eastern order changes to the Western order. So the "period of confusion" would appear to be 1885–2008. I think it is important to note that these are two separate and distinct issues. The article deals with how Japanese people order their names, and the guideline deals with how those names should be sorted to Wikipedia categories. Before 1885, Japanese names are sorted the same as Chinese names, for example, Mao Zedong is sorted as "Mao, Zedong", the family name "Mao" coming first. After 1885, the sort changes and Japanese names are sorted by their given names, not their family names. At least, that is one way to interpret the guideline. The exact wording of WP:NAMESORT is as follows:

Sort by surname
If the article is titled "Forename Surname", the category should be added to the article as [[Category:Type X people|Surname, Forename]] (or: {{DEFAULTSORT:Surname, Forename}}) so that it will be sorted by surname (surname and family name are used interchangeably in this article). However, there are exceptions depending on customs, where a person lives and when they lived. If the country is not listed, try consulting with Names of persons : national usages for entry in catalogue in the bibliography section. It is a resource for how librarians and institutions inside their respective country sorts names. However, the sort value may be inappropriate outside their country.

(several countries listed, and then:)
  • Japanese names for people born after 1885 follow Western order. For people born before 1885, names followed the same practice as Chinese names.
    • There are exceptions. Sumo wrestlers, Geishas, Kabuki actors and practitioners of traditional crafts and arts may take professional names. These names follow the same practice as Chinese names. Sumo wrestler Toyohibiki Ryūta's sort value is {{DEFAULTSORT:Toyohibiki, Ryuta}}.

So it appears that sorting Japanese names of people born after 1885 should normally follow the

  • {{DEFAULTSORT:<given name (forename)>, <family name (surname)>}} order.

It would be interesting to hear how other editors interpret the sorting guideline.  Paine Ellsworth  put'r there  15:33, 17 September 2018 (UTC)

  • They're always sorted by surname. I assume you can't read Japanese, but look at any random category such as ja:Category:日本の男優 and you should be able to infer that every biography is sorted by surname. But I don't really care about sort names, an Eastern name order redirect isn't a sort name, it's just their name. Which is why I want a separate template and category for them. —Xezbeth (talk) 19:38, 17 September 2018 (UTC)
  • I think of it like this: let's say that tradition in the West has always been to order names <surname> <given name>, like Einstein Albert or Bond James. What's happened in Japan is that they've broken with tradition. If the West were to break with tradition in this scenario, then we would start ordering our names <given name> <surname>, like Albert Einstein or James Bond. The given names and surnames have not changed, just their order in the new modern era. So what you're saying is that "Bond James", which now in this scenario redirects to James Bond, and "Einstein Albert" which redirects to Albert Einstein, should not be sort names because "Bond James" and "Einstein Albert" are "just their names". So an Eastern name order redirect is just as much a sort name as it would be if it were the title of an article. If it is the title of an article, like Mao Zedong, then the sortkey is "Mao, Zedong". If it is the title of a redirect, like Abe Shinzō, then the sortkey is "Abe, Shinzō", and the redirect is an {{R from sort name}}. It would seem to cause a lot of extra work for little gain to monitor and maintain two new categories and two new rcats, as suggested by Thryduulf above when, in my humble opinion, we're still talking about sort-name redirects.  Paine Ellsworth  put'r there  23:56, 17 September 2018 (UTC)

Responding to Paine Ellsworth's request for comment on my part, the kind of last-name-first redirects that we generally have are sortname redirects, which are generally useful for organizing articles by their sorting name, and because there is a long history of paper encyclopedias listing individuals by surname, for which readers familiar with those sources might instinctively search. My opinion on names where the surname leads, like Mao Zedong, is that it is still useful to have a redirect from "Mao, Zedong" and from "Zedong, Mao" because people unfamiliar with other naming conventions can easily make the mistake of thinking that "Mao" is a given name and "Zedong" is a family name, and may search for such an entry that way. We don't have a rule on these, in particular, and I seem to recall that there was an RfD or two that went the other way on those. As it stands, the only redirects we definitely create are sortname redirects for persons with a conventional Western given name, surname order. bd2412 T 03:33, 18 September 2018 (UTC)

  • So in the case of Miyuki Yamashita, Yamashita, Miyuki would be the sort name redirect, which I don't particularly care about at the moment, while Yamashita Miyuki would be a different type of redirect that currently has no corresponding template? I'm not sure how many Japanese, Korean, Chinese and Hungarian biographies there actually are, but I don't want to make a huge amount of these redirects only to have to go back and change the template on them all. —Xezbeth (talk) 04:54, 18 September 2018 (UTC)
  • I am so sorry, Xezbeth, but I am still not clear on the difference you appear to see. "Yamashita Miyuki" begins with a surname and ends with a given name, so it will be correctly sorted to categories whether or not there is a comma, even whether or not there is a DEFAULTSORT: sortkey. If that is not a redirect from a sort name, then what is?  Paine Ellsworth  put'r there  10:05, 18 September 2018 (UTC)
Thank you, bd2412, and to add a little to the "people unfamiliar with other naming conventions" thought, by adding a DEFAULTSORT: sortkey such as "Mao Zedong" or "Mao, Zedong" to an article (or redirect) that is titled the same or almost the same, such as the Mao Zedong article or the Yamashita Miyuki redirect, we help to ensure that an uninformed editor doesn't come along and, in good faith, add an incorrect sortkey to the article or redirect. Thanks again!  Paine Ellsworth  put'r there  11:10, 18 September 2018 (UTC)

RfD template

There are two questions about possible additional functionality at Template talk:Rfd that have gone unanswered - one from 11 September this year and one from January last year. Please could one or more technically-competent users take a look and maybe add the page to their watchlist. Thryduulf (talk) 00:00, 20 September 2018 (UTC)

R to renamed or deleted section

A common problem in my experience is mainspace redirects to article sections that have been renamed or deleted. See here for my latest fix of one of these.

Is there any way of detecting such problems? I have found quite a few over the years, but only ever by accident.

Typically, I Wikilink from an article, but when I check the destination of the link it makes little sense, being to an article on a related but quite different topic. Investigating, I find that the redir is to a deleted or renamed section. This may have been done for many legitimate reasons, such as (but by no means only) an article split.

So I suspect that there may be a great many of these broken redirs. Is there any easy way to find out? Andrewa (talk) 19:00, 27 September 2018 (UTC)

@Andrewa: User:SoledadKabocha/badAnchorWarning.js. wumbolo ^^^ 19:02, 27 September 2018 (UTC)
Best practice when redirecting to a section is to use {{anchor}} (and {{anchor comment}}) at the destination section to avoid breaking the redirect if the section is renamed. This doesn't solve cases where the article is split (although it might provide a clue the redirect exists) or deleted, but actual usage is low - and all this is about prevention rather than cure. Thryduulf (talk) 23:47, 27 September 2018 (UTC)
Thanks, is this documented anywhere? Andrewa (talk) 01:11, 28 September 2018 (UTC)
The use of the anchor template (and other methods) with redirects is described at WP:TARGET. I've not come across {{anchor comment}} before. olderwiser 01:42, 28 September 2018 (UTC)
I think I learned about {{anchor comment}} from the documentation at {{anchor}}, but maybe I saw it in the wild before then. Thryduulf (talk) 10:23, 28 September 2018 (UTC)
Per the instructions, {{anchor comment}} is supposed to be subst: -- which means spotting it in the wild would be un-subst instances. Now that I see what the template does, I'm sure I've seen the results before -- I only assumed the comments had been manually entered. olderwiser 10:47, 28 September 2018 (UTC)
The last part of the comment is "This template is {{subst:Anchor comment}}" which is how I'd have found it from the wild (if that's what I did). Thryduulf (talk) 12:23, 28 September 2018 (UTC)

There is a phrasing dispute at Wikipedia:Double redirects that would benefit from additional input. Please see Wikipedia talk:Double redirects#Within a couple (of) days of creation. Thryduulf (talk) 12:45, 2 October 2018 (UTC)

What is the name of this redirect template?

I seem to recall that there is a template and category for people who have a certain vocation, who perform some action, or maybe even who profess a belief, as in:

Does such a template exist? I'm talking about something more specific than {{R from noun}}. —Ringbang (talk) 23:08, 12 October 2018 (UTC)

Template:R template index is where all the templates should be listed, but I can't see anything along the lines of {{R from occupation}} or {{R to vocation}} or similar. Paine Ellsworth is the guru for R cat templates though. Thryduulf (talk) 09:58, 13 October 2018 (UTC)
To editors Ringbang and Thryduulf: I know of no specific vocational or belief professing rcats for the examples noted above. The tags for redirects like the above examples are {{R from related word}} (usually), {{R to related topic}} (sometimes), {{R with possibilities}} (when appropriate) and {{R printworthy}} or {{R unprintworthy}}. Any other appropriate rcats can be used as needed; however, {{R from common noun}} is generally limited to noun redirects that target other parts of speech... verbs, adjectives, etc. Feel free to browse the complete index at Wikipedia:Template messages/Redirect pages#Alphanumeric listing to see if you can find more rcats that may apply to the above examples and to other similar redirects.  Paine Ellsworth  put'r there  11:32, 14 October 2018 (UTC)

Redirect with (qualifier)

It there any history or discussion of redirects of the type "FOO (qualifier)". There is frequent comment at the DAB talk pages that disambiguating terms this way is a unnatural, awkard, WP-only convention that should be avoided if possible. I ran across the redirect Chidori (weapon) and wonder if it has any use. How likely is it that anyone searching for info on this sword would type in that peculiar syntax (and for that matter, with "weapon" instead of "sword")? Searching on Chidori, which is much more natural, goes straight to a disambiguation page. I don't see this type of redirect listed in WP:POFR. Asking here instead of taking this to RFD to get a generic answer if possible. MB 02:07, 25 October 2018 (UTC)

Here is another example, Andreas Konstantinou (singer). This has nothing to do with a dab page. It is a "disambiguated" title on a redirect which doesn't need disambiguation. MB 02:51, 25 October 2018 (UTC)

@MB: There are literally thousands of these - see Category:Redirects from unnecessary disambiguation, which has 17,666 members plus subcats. Category:Redirects from other disambiguation has another 7.539, Category:Redirects from incorrect disambiguation‎ another 1008 and Category:Redirects from incomplete disambiguations‎ 25,616.
Redirects from unnecessary disambiguation are useful because it guarantees that you will reach the article you are looking for whether it is the primary topic or not (and there is no guarantee that what is the primary topic today will always remain so). Because of how extensive parenthetical disambiguation is on Wikipedia people have become familiar with it. The second redirect you mention is actually ambiguous as Andreas Konstantinou is a Greek actor while Andreas Konstantinou (singer) is a Cypriot singer. Thryduulf (talk) 12:00, 25 October 2018 (UTC)

Template for hook line redirects

Is there a template for redirects such as With Our Lanterns On?

I Can't Get No Satisfaction should probably be similarly tagged but there are other issues. I'm sure there are other, better examples. Andrewa (talk) 20:05, 27 October 2018 (UTC)

{{R from catchphrase}} is the closest one among the ones I know of. But not quite there. – Uanfala (talk) 22:19, 27 October 2018 (UTC)
{{R from modification}} would also work for I Can't Get No Satisfaction, but the best general one I know of (that isn't listed at template:R template index for some reason) is {{R from search term}} [edit: that's because it's a redirect to {{R from related word}}]. I can certainly see the value in a {{R from lyric}} template though - we already have {{R from quotation}}, {{R from phrase}} and {{R from slogan}} which are similar. Paine Ellsworth any thoughts? Thryduulf (talk) 23:53, 27 October 2018 (UTC)
I think {{R from hook line}} might even be justified, see hook line, but {{R from search term}} is definitely applicable and will do for now! Hook lines are a subset of likely search terms. Thank you! Andrewa (talk) 02:52, 28 October 2018 (UTC)
It looks like we're in agreement to use {{R from search term}} and in the second case, {{R from modification}} "for now". I've added the former to both the functional and alphanumeric index listings – good catch, Thryduulf! Because of all the work it entails to create an rcat and category, and then monitor the category, it's probably best at this point to get community input on future creations. "Hook line" does not appear to be in the common vernacular and I'm glad you provided a link to it, Andrewa. I'd never heard the term before, except when used with "and sinker".  Paine Ellsworth  put'r there  18:02, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

Episode redirects

Hey, I would like to get your projects opinion on this matter, as I couldn't find this specific kind of redirect mentioned in a previous discussion. Are television episode redirects an accepted type of redirect? Category:Redirected episode articles lists over 13k redirects and redirected episodes have their own redirect template. The reason I'm asking, is I was adding some missing episode redirects to a television season article and decided to see if I can get a bot request approved to add episode redirects to other shows that miss them, but since this creates many redirects, policy mandates I get a consensus first. So before I do that, I wanted to see what this project thinks. --Gonnym (talk) 18:02, 24 October 2018 (UTC)

To editor Gonnym: it's good that you do that, because it seems everytime an editor begins to create redirects en masse, they find themselves deluged with requests to stop it, at least for the time being, until others can assess the need for all those redirects. To answer your question, {{R to TV episode list entry}} is an rcat that tags and categorizes TV episode redirects that target a list article. These usually include {{R to embedded anchor}} or {{R to section}}, and {{R printworthy}} or {{R unprintworthy}} as well, all enclosed in the {{Rcat shell}}. To my knowledge, those are the only TV episode redirects that are being categorized and monitored at this time. Best to you!  Paine Ellsworth  put'r there  21:30, 30 October 2018 (UTC)
Those are the ones I was adding. So, are those valid redirects? --Gonnym (talk) 21:33, 30 October 2018 (UTC)
Yes, I believe they are because readers may search for those episode titles.  Paine Ellsworth  put'r there  21:42, 30 October 2018 (UTC)
That was my thoughts also. Well I guess then I'll just have to put in an official request at Wikipedia:VPPROP as instructed to get consensus for it. Thanks for the answers! --Gonnym (talk) 21:49, 30 October 2018 (UTC)

If anyone wants to join in the discussion, I've created an official request here. --Gonnym (talk) 12:57, 9 November 2018 (UTC)

Fiction redirects

As I trawl through Category:Redirects from fictional characters I'm noticing a lot of redirects for fictional teams, groups, vehicles (the non-sentient variety) and titles. Do they all belong in Category:Redirects from fictional elements instead? —Xezbeth (talk) 13:09, 15 November 2018 (UTC)

Redirects from unnecessary disambiguation where the disambiguator-less term is also a redirect

What's the best practice in the following situation that occurs all the time: Mr. Satan is a Dragonball character that resides in a list article. There is a redirect, Mr. Satan, pointing to its list entry. There are also Mr. Satan (Dragon Ball Z) and Mr. Satan (Dragon Ball), among others. Should they be in Category:Redirects from unnecessary disambiguation? And if they are, should they not be in Category:Redirects from fictional characters? That's what I intend to do but I don't want to unilaterally make thousands of edits only for someone to object at a later date. —Xezbeth (talk) 13:16, 24 November 2018 (UTC)

I'd say they should be in Category:Redirects from unnecessary disambiguation and Category:Avoided double redirects ({{R avoided double redirect}}). Whether they should be in the fictional character category is ultimately for the maintainers of that category to determine, but as long as one of the two is I wouldn't change the status quo without explicit consensus. Thryduulf (talk) 19:09, 25 November 2018 (UTC)

Redirecting of Tolly Carr

Tolly Carr has been redirecting to WXII-TV since 2009 and for a time Carr was actually mentioned by name as a former staff in that article; sometime in 2011 or 2012, however, most of the content was heavily trimmed and the mention of Carr was one of things taken out. So, basically, the name now redirects to an article where there is no mention of the person at all. I've discussed this with the editor who created the redirect and RfD was suggested. That's fine, but I'm wondering if there are any other alternatives. FWIW, the content about Carr was particularly negative in nature; it would probably be fine in a stand-alone article (if one existed) written about Carr, but really seem out of place (and maybe even a WP:BLPCRIME problem) in a list of former staff members in a TV station article; so, I'm not sure if trying to re-add that content to the article is going to fly. Anyway, just trying to find out what some others think. -- Marchjuly (talk) 06:24, 30 November 2018 (UTC)

I'd nominate it - the D in RfD is for "Discussion" not "Deletion" so people will consider any alternatives. Thryduulf (talk) 12:46, 30 November 2018 (UTC)
I created the redirect, and I also advocate nominating it for RfD. I won't express an opinion at RfD though. - Richard Cavell (talk) 13:28, 30 November 2018 (UTC)
There's no point having a redirect which doesn't give the reader any information. Take it to RfD and if I'm there (which I'm not often) I'll vote to delete it as an unhelpful redirect. Better for the reader to find out straight off that this is a person about whom the encyclopedia has no information. The only other mention of him was an entry in the dab page Tolly, which I've now deleted. PamD 13:39, 30 November 2018 (UTC)
Sorry for not getting back to this sooner, but thanks to everyone who responded. I've started a RfD at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2018 December 6#Tolly Carr about this as suggested above. -- Marchjuly (talk) 02:48, 6 December 2018 (UTC)

New CSD criterion - R4

Just as a note, this RFC (permalink) split the file redirect criteria from WP:G6 and made it into WP:R4. The template to use is {{Db-r4}}. Primefac (talk) 21:08, 6 December 2018 (UTC)

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Category question

It seems that Category:Wikipedia redirects and Category:All redirect categories‎ are redundant, and I was going to propose they be merged. Before I do, am I missing something? UnitedStatesian (talk) 14:44, 7 January 2019 (UTC)

A question about best practice for talk pages of draftspace redirects

Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Articles for creation#Best practice with draftspace redirect talk pages --PrussianOwl (talk) 01:32, 12 January 2019 (UTC)

Unicode / emoji redirects?

I came across this set of page creations today, and I'm honestly wondering if these are worthwhile redirects to have on the project. Courtesy ping to the page creator. Primefac (talk) 16:05, 13 February 2019 (UTC)

They come up from time to time at WP:RFD, enough where there is a "common outcome" section on them, see WP:EMOJI. -- Tavix (talk) 16:20, 13 February 2019 (UTC)
Most (or almost all) emoji characters on Wiki already currently redirect to pages explaining their meaning, if generally uncontroversial; the pages I've been creating are for those that have recently been approved for this year (per WP:OTHER, I guess). RAVENPVFF | talk ~ 23:05, 13 February 2019 (UTC)

A new newsletter directory is out!

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R to section vs R to list entry

If there's a redirect pointing to a list entry that also happens to be its own section, which template is preferred? Both? —Xezbeth (talk) 06:25, 6 May 2019 (UTC)

@Paine Ellsworth: is the person I ask questions like this. Thryduulf (talk) 12:53, 6 May 2019 (UTC)
To editors Xezbeth and Thryduulf: Thank you for this question and referral! According to the documentation at {{R to list entry}}, "For a redirect to an article section about the subject use the {{R to section}} rcat instead." The R to list entry rcat is usually to an anchored entry (separate and distinct from a "section anchor"). Hope this helps. Paine Ellsworth, ed.  put'r there  14:57, 6 May 2019 (UTC)
Wish I'd asked before deciding to change a few hundred of them. Thanks, at least it saves me a job in future since most of the redirects I'm dealing with already use the correct one. —Xezbeth (talk) 15:57, 6 May 2019 (UTC)
Sorry you caught this after much work, and thank you beyond words for your edits concerning redirects! Paine Ellsworth, ed.  put'r there  18:05, 6 May 2019 (UTC)

A new newsletter directory is out!

A new Newsletter directory has been created to replace the old, out-of-date one. If your WikiProject and its taskforces have newsletters (even inactive ones), or if you know of a missing newsletter (including from sister projects like WikiSpecies), please include it in the directory! The template can be a bit tricky, so if you need help, just post the newsletter on the template's talk page and someone will add it for you.

– Sent on behalf of Headbomb. 03:11, 11 April 2019 (UTC)

R to section vs R to list entry

If there's a redirect pointing to a list entry that also happens to be its own section, which template is preferred? Both? —Xezbeth (talk) 06:25, 6 May 2019 (UTC)

@Paine Ellsworth: is the person I ask questions like this. Thryduulf (talk) 12:53, 6 May 2019 (UTC)
To editors Xezbeth and Thryduulf: Thank you for this question and referral! According to the documentation at {{R to list entry}}, "For a redirect to an article section about the subject use the {{R to section}} rcat instead." The R to list entry rcat is usually to an anchored entry (separate and distinct from a "section anchor"). Hope this helps. Paine Ellsworth, ed.  put'r there  14:57, 6 May 2019 (UTC)
Wish I'd asked before deciding to change a few hundred of them. Thanks, at least it saves me a job in future since most of the redirects I'm dealing with already use the correct one. —Xezbeth (talk) 15:57, 6 May 2019 (UTC)
Sorry you caught this after much work, and thank you beyond words for your edits concerning redirects! Paine Ellsworth, ed.  put'r there  18:05, 6 May 2019 (UTC)

R from (in)definite article

Hello,

I wonder how to categorize redirects from a title with a definite or indefinite article to the correct title which avoids the article, according to WP:DEFINITE and WP:THE. An example is from The Pornocracy to Pornocracy. The closest I could find is {{R from stylization}}, but this covers stylization which is different. Of course many of these redirects could be deleted, but there's plenty of them and some may be eligible. Note that the other way around exists too, such as Beatles, redirected to The Beatles, currently using {{R from incomplete name}}.

We currently have R templates for many other cases of Grammar, punctuation and spelling, should this be one of them or is there an existing template? Place Clichy (talk) 09:30, 21 February 2019 (UTC)

To editor Place Clichy: good question, and sorry to take so long to respond. In cases where a def. or indef. article is used in a redirect title, I always tag the redirect with {{R from unsuitable title}} in accord with WP:THE. Hope this helps! Paine Ellsworth, ed.  put'r there  16:03, 7 May 2019 (UTC)

Redirects from alternative capitalisations in Portal space

I've just created Portal:American Frontier as a redirect to Portal:American frontier and tagged it with {{R from alternative capitalisation}}. I was surprised to see it throw and error for not being in the main namespace. I can understand not wanting to conflate project pages with articles, but I'd have thought grouping portals with articles would make more sense than grouping them with project pages? Thryduulf (talk) 12:17, 22 March 2019 (UTC)

To editor Thryduulf: yes there are many rcats that only work in mainspace. When an issue exists such as you describe above, {{R from modification}}, and in some cases {{R from miscapitalization}} can be used to categorize. It would be interesting to find out what other editors think about your proposition to group portals with mainspace articles for this purpose. Paine Ellsworth, ed.  put'r there  16:08, 7 May 2019 (UTC)

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Template:R comics from alternative name

I've ran into an issue with Template:R comics from alternative name that another editor had already brought up at Template talk:R comics from alternative name#Alternative names in general fiction: split/move?, but since it probably not watched by a lot of editors, nothing came of it. This template should be made more general in language and category to allow non-comic book characters to be able to use it correctly. Arrowverse characters, while based on comics, are still fictional TV characters and not comics (and as the previous editor brought up, other TV fictional characters, which aren't based on comics, also can use this). It would also be a good idea to add an optional parameter for series name to group them up. --Gonnym (talk) 20:13, 21 January 2019 (UTC)

To editor Gonnym: good question, and sorry to take so long to answer it. A separate rcat might be needed (other than, say, {{R from fictional character}}, which is a broader subject); however, a new rcat requires a new category and a commitment to monitor the redirects in the category. When this is realized, R from fictional character might start looking better and better! Paine Ellsworth, ed.  put'r there  15:27, 7 May 2019 (UTC)
I personally am trying to take care of the Arrowverse redirects. For an example - Arsenal (Arrowverse) is the costumed identity of Roy Harper (Arrowverse). I've tagged it with {{R from fictional character}} as it leads to a fictional character to a [...] list of characters, but also to {{R comics from alternative name}} as it's also a title that is another name or identity, a pseudonym, a nickname, or a synonym of the comic book character detailed in the target article, which is the issue here, as the character isn't really a comic character but it also is an alt name of a "comic" related character. Would appreciate your guidance here. On a different but related issue - should R from fictional character be used only when redirecting to related work (so say, "Arrow" the TV series) or list of characters article or also for an article of a character which the name is an alternative comic name, like Green Arrow (Arrowverse)? I didn't tag it with that template as I wasn't sure, but that means that this redirect isn't categorized with all the other Arrowverse redirects. --Gonnym (talk) 16:34, 7 May 2019 (UTC)
To editor Gonnym: been reading up on all this. Find that "Arrowverse" appears to refer only to the TV series, so under that defining feature, no redirect with that qualifier should be tagged with any comics-related rcat. The Arsenal (DC Comics) redirect is correctly rcatted with {{R comics from alternative name}}; however apparently, no Arrowverse-type redirects should be so tagged. And again, a new rcat such as {{R TV series from alternative name}} would require a redirect category and a monitoring commitment. The other issue, "should 'R from fictional character' be used only when redirecting to related work (so say, 'Arrow' the TV series) or list of characters article or also for an article of a character which the name is an alternative comic name, like Green Arrow (Arrowverse)?" Looking over the rcat, I see where this issue arises because of the wording, "This is a redirect from a fictional character to a related fictional work or list of characters. The destination may be an article about a related fictional work that mentions this character, a subsection or a standalone list of characters." Evidently, something needs to be altered, because the categorization is always to either Category:(name) character redirects to lists or Category:Fictional character redirects to lists. So judging by the template code, there should be no using this rcat to tag anything other than redirects to lists. Please give me a little while to figure out the best way to take care of that. Paine Ellsworth, ed.  put'r there  22:10, 8 May 2019 (UTC)
Thanks for looking into this. Will wait until you figure out how best to deal with this. --Gonnym (talk) 08:18, 9 May 2019 (UTC)
@Paine Ellsworth:, any thoughts on how to handle this? --Gonnym (talk) 16:20, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
Workin' on it. Paine Ellsworth, ed.  put'r there  16:40, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
To editor Gonnym: looking at the beginnings of the {{R from fictional character}} rcat, from the first creation edit, the one just before this edit, the rcat was designed to populate a general category, Redirected fictional character articles, which now soft-redirects to Category:Redirects from fictional characters, in addition to a list category. So the wording of the rcat that evolved over time seems to be correct. These redirects are intended to occupy both a list category and a general category. For those redirects that target "a related fictional work that mentions this character" that is not specifically a list article, or even a formal listing of characters within a fictional work article, this rcat has always been appropriate to tag such redirects. I can only guess as to the creator's intention, and my guess would be that these character redirects, which are not notable enough for their own articles, would always target either a "formal" list article or listing of characters or an "informal" type listing with other characters also mentioned within the paragraph, section or article about a fictional work. So to answer your question, should R from fictional character be used only when redirecting to related work (so say, "Arrow" the TV series) or list of characters article or also for an article of a character which the name is an alternative comic name, like Green Arrow (Arrowverse)?, it should be correct to tag any and all fictional character redirects with {{R from fictional character}}. The documentation could use some updating, which I'll take care of, however I see no need to change anything else. Paine Ellsworth, ed.  put'r there  23:53, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
But if we're using the same rcat, isn't the category incorrect? If a an alt name redirect is tagged with this rcat and has the series parameter entered then it is added to Category:The Simpsons character redirects to lists, when it is not a list. --Gonnym (talk) 08:11, 29 May 2019 (UTC)
Yes, that puzzled me for a long time. Again, I can only guess that it wasn't much of an issue to the creator and first users of the rcat, probably because even if the target is not a formal list article or formal bulleted list, there are still other characters informally listed in the target article, since no character "lives" in a vacuum. What would you suggest to improve the situation? Paine Ellsworthed. put'r there  09:37, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
Well, we can either accept that it's not really fitting and use it anyways, or go the route the comic rcat did with Category:Comics redirects from alternative names and based on {{R from fictional character}} and Category:Fictional character redirects to lists create a template Template:R from fictional character alternative names (phrasing pending) with a category of Category:Fictional character redirects from alternative names. --Gonnym (talk) 09:49, 30 May 2019 (UTC)