Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Disambiguation/Archive 35

This is an archive of past discussions about Wikipedia:WikiProject Disambiguation. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Archive 30

←

Archive 33

→

Missing links: thoughts about a project

I've got a theory that perhaps about 2% of all articles in the encyclopedia have titles with bracketed disambiguators ("Basename (something)") but are not linked from their base name title (either by a hatnote, a dab page entry at "Basename", or a longer pathway) and are thus not as easy to find as they should be.

I've just taken 3 samples of 100 random entries using AWB, filtered out those not containing "(", and looked at the answers. 12 or 14 of each group of 100 had a bracket, and I needed to add a hatnote or dab page entry, or move a disambiguated entry to its unused basename, in 2 cases in each batch. There were also a few edge cases, one case where what was in brackets wasn't a disambiguator but a division (and was correctly linked from the base name), one case which went via a non-dab page at a different title (find Palacio de los Deportes (Heredia) from Palacio de los Deportes). But it looks as if about 2% of the articles need a link they haven't got: either as a hatnote at the basename article (or the article to which the basename redirects), or a dab page entry (at Basename, or "Basename (disambiguation)", or some other dab page to which "Basename" redirects). My notes are here.

I think it ought to be possible for a bot to do something on the lines of:

Consider an article.
Does this article title include an opening bracket? If not, then stop (ie go to next article).
Does it include a closing bracket, later? If not, then categorise as Category:Articles with possible unmatched brackets in title, and stop.
Consider the part of the title before the opening bracket, and call it "Basename" from now on. Is there anything at all at the title "Basename"? If not, then categorise as Category:Articles which might be unnecessarily disambiguated and stop.
Is there a redirect to this article from "Basename"? If so, then categorise as Category:Articles which might be unnecessarily disambiguated but have a redirect, and stop.
Is there a link to this article from an article at title "Basename" (it'll usually be a hatnote, or a dab page entry; just occasionally something more complicated and suboptimal as for Lucius Julius Caesar (consul 90 BC), but I don't think we need worry)? If so, then stop. (This should be the most common situation, of course: all is well.)
Is there a link to this article from an article at title "Basename (disambiguation)"? If so, Is there a link from "Basename" to "Basename (disambiguation)"? If so, then stop (all is well); if not, then add the disambiguation page to Category:Disambiguation pages which may not be linked from their basename, and stop. (Not sure there'll be many, or any, of this last lot, but we might as well check)
Is there any chain of links or redirects which lead from Basename to this article? If so, then add Category:Articles which have complex links from basename, to be checked for possible improvement and stop. (MIght be worth checking some day as a low priority)
For the remaining articles: Add category Category:Disambiguated articles which appear not to be linked from basename, and stop. (As a refinement, we could get the bot to classify articles into subcategories where possible: People, Places, Books, Music, Films, Science, ... on the basis of existing categories, to help editors pick an interesting area to work with). This is the lot we need to work on.

Clarification added later: That final category should be something like Category:Disambiguated articles which appear not to be linked from the existing article/dab at basename. OK, too long, but that's the gist of it: there is something at the basename, and it doesn't offer a pathway through to this article. Those are the ones I worry about - like Red or Dead (novel) before there was a hatnote at Red or Dead. PamD 17:37, 24 December 2013 (UTC)

We then end up with several categories for maintenance work, and the potential for improving the findability of articles: to the benefit of readers, and also to help editors avoid creating duplicate articles by making the existing one easier to find.

Any thoughts?

I've spent far too much of today on Wikipedia, and need to get on with some Real Life, so perhaps won't be commenting on comments very soon. Seasons Greetings to all Disambiguators! PamD 16:42, 20 December 2013 (UTC)

Great idea. I occasionally check User:Theo's Little Bot/unnecessary dab for this, but it is painfully slow loading, at least for me. Categorization sounds like a great idea. -- JHunterJ (talk) 17:41, 20 December 2013 (UTC)

Thanks, that's a really interesting list, although his 10k only gets as far as "E". (And browsing gives scope for some helpful dab creation - various pairs or groups of rivers etc). I think it's the category I've listed in step 4 above. It reminds me of a couple of other cases to think about: sets of articles which have been created with a standardised disambiguation (constituencies, metro stations... what's the policy on these ones, for the cases which don't "need" disambiguation?), and films/songs/books where there's a bracketed phrase within the title (eg 'Round and 'Round (Merry Go 'Round of Love)). (No harm in creating unnecessary redirects for these, as their number is trivial in encyclopedia terms, and it would save a future bot run fretting about them: or we stick them into another category:Category:Articles with title including non-disambiguating brackets or whatever.) Couldn't keep away. Must go. PamD 18:50, 20 December 2013 (UTC)

The policy for these ones, for the cases which don't "need" disambiguation, is WP:PRECISION: move them to the unqualified base name if there's no ambiguity, or move them to a correct unqualified name; that's the broader consensus. See also User:Mackensen/Naming conventions (US stations) and User:JHunterJ#Local consensus vs. precision. Agreed on redirects for the titled works where the title has a parenthetical -- readers should be able to get from 'Round and 'Round to 'Round and 'Round (Merry Go 'Round of Love) easily. -- JHunterJ (talk) 20:21, 20 December 2013 (UTC)

I also completely agree with this. bd2412 T 20:28, 20 December 2013 (UTC)

But I suspect that the people at Wikipedia:WikiProject_UK_Parliament_constituencies don't agree: see their styleguide. All current constituencies have disambiguator "(United Kingdom Parliamentary constituency)", whether or not their basename exists with other functions (eg Leeds North West). It does have the huge advantage that when writing about someone who represented various different constituencies, you know exactly what the Wikipedia article title will be for each one: the consistency here is really useful. Could be a battleground. PamD 00:27, 21 December 2013 (UTC)

There are several local consensuses, but they don't get to override the broader consensus at WP:PRECISION. I fix them as I encounter them. -- JHunterJ (talk) 12:21, 21 December 2013 (UTC)

But I hope we can avoid getting bogged down in old discussions about constituencies and stations. The most important problem is articles like Red or Dead (novel). Until yesterday there was no link from Red or Dead. That's too common a situation. PamD 05:43, 21 December 2013 (UTC)

Agreed. -- JHunterJ (talk) 12:21, 21 December 2013 (UTC)

Interesting though Theo's list is - and I can see a lot of useful dab pages which could be created by reading through it looking for duplicates like 104th Brigade, 168th Street, Bastasi, Battle of Bornos or Beica River, (as a few examples of the kinds of topics which seem to crop up a lot) - it omits the most important missing links. That's the articles at "Basename (foo)" where there is an article at "Basename" but no link from there to "Basename (foo)". eg, until the other day, you could find Red or Dead and have no indication of the existence of Red or Dead (novel). Sometimes "Basename" is a simple article needing a hatnote (as in that example); sometimes it's a dab page needing an entry; sometimes it has a hatnote directing to the dab page at "Basename (disambiguation)", which needs an entry. (And there are more complicated scenarios - eg the dab page being at "Base Name (disambiguation)").

If there's no article at "Basename" (as in all of Theo's list), then someone looking for that topic will end up on a search page and probably be offered the article on "Basename (foo)" within the options. But if they get straight to an article on a different topic, which doesn't have a hatnote pointing elsewhere, or if they get straight to a dab page none of whose entries are what they want, they won't find our article and will probably assume there is no such article. They'll go away from the encyclopedia with their question unanswered, or they might create a duplicate article at "Basename (foo2)".

Has anyone else got thoughts on this. (I wish I hadn't mentioned UK constituencies, as I see trouble brewing there now!) PamD 17:19, 24 December 2013 (UTC)

I wouldn't worry about the UK constituency thing. That trouble has been brewing since 2005, and has boiled over a few times. It would be nice to get it resolved, which means getting it out in front of the broader community. Another bit I've found in working Theo's list: sometimes the problem is "Several Words in Title (qualifier)" exists while "Several Words in Title" doesn't but "Several words in title" does. So the base name does "lead" somewhere by itself from the Search box (since the software will go automatically to another title that differs only by case if the case-as-input doesn't exist). I've created several {{R from alternate capitalisation}} redirects for those. -- JHunterJ (talk) 17:41, 24 December 2013 (UTC)

Meat market

This is halfway between being a disambiguation page and an I-don't-know-what. It has article-like text and references that should be merged into meet market, and there is a separate Meat Market page that I would propose should be merged here. bd2412 T 18:11, 24 December 2013 (UTC)

I would say the page should be split into a DAB page and a "marketplace where meat is sold" stub. Meat Market is the wrong name for a dab page, though. Put the two entries at the capital-lettered page, along with the DAB-y stuff from the lower-case-lettered page, plus Meat Market (film), at Meat market (disambiguation), which is currently a redirect. Then the capital-lettered pages should redirect, probably to the DAB page, since the film and the book (but not the marketplace) use capital letters. Cnilep (talk) 01:54, 25 December 2013 (UTC)

Not bad, provided that "marketplace where meat is sold" provides enough substance to form an article. bd2412 T 04:09, 25 December 2013 (UTC)

Another tool

I'm the creator of yet another automated tool for repairing incoming links to disambiguation pages, DisamAssist. Maybe it can be useful for someone. Qwertyytrewqqwerty (talk) 14:14, 27 December 2013 (UTC)

BK

Is Burger King so important? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.120.175.135 (talk) 17:53, 4 January 2014 (UTC)

@76.120.175.135 If you want to propose that the disambiguation page BK (disambiguation) should be at BK (instead of the current situation where "BK" redirects to Burger King), the thing to do is to propose that move: go to Talk:BK (disambiguation) and add {{subst:RMtalk|BK|Reason for move.}}, replacing "Reason for move" with your arguments as to why it should be moved. See WP:RM. There seems to have been some discussion 9 years ago but nothing since. PamD 19:08, 4 January 2014 (UTC)

disambiguation page or list?

Is state legislature a disambiguation page or a list? I'm inclined to mark it as a disambiguation page, but I wanted a 2nd opinion :) Kaldari (talk) 23:38, 6 January 2014 (UTC)

It looks to me like a stub or possibly the dreaded 'dictionary definition'. Although there might be items in need of disambiguation (this page, State Legislature (film), and State legislature (United States)), this page doesn't seem intended to direct readers to those articles. Cnilep (talk) 03:05, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

NB: I've added hatnotes to State Legislature (film) and State legislature (United States). Cnilep (talk) 03:10, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

More thoughts on Theo's list

Thanks to JHJ's link above to User:Theo's_Little_Bot/unnecessary_dab. Fascinating: presumably a straight search for "Basename (foo)" where there's no article "Basename". I commented earlier that this 10k only gets as far as "E", but "A" only starts at no. 2780. There's a huge number of numerical entries, a lot of which are military units: Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Military history includes: In cases where a unit's name can reasonably be expected to be used by multiple armed forces—particularly in the case of numerical unit designations—the units should generally be preemptively disambiguated when the article is created, without waiting for the appearance of a second article on an identically-named unit. If this is done, the non-disambiguated version of the unit name should be created as a disambiguation page (or a redirect to the disambiguated version).. So pre-emptive disambiguation is here explicitly allowed, but there should always be a link from the undisambiguated form - and these instances in Theo's list show the cases where it isn't present.

I might spend some time pottering down the list sorting out missing dab pages (starting at A as I'm particularly uninterested in the military units and sports info which dominate the numerical section).

Another common grouping seems to be capitalisation problems: APUS (computer) is included in Apus (disambiguation), linked from Apus, but APUS is a redlink.

Ship names are another large category, where WP:SHIPNAME says For an article about a modern-day ship, include the ship's hull number (US Navy hull classification symbol) or pennant numbers (Royal Navy, and many European and Commonwealth navies), if it is available, sufficiently unique, and well known. Here again I'd have thought it useful to include a link from the version without the hull number, but Theo's list shows it hasn't always been done.

Interesting stuff. Must go and get on with Real Life. PamD 18:15, 24 December 2013 (UTC)

The (gens) issue is also something that we have discussed here before. I notice that there are some titles for which there are multiple possibilities (for example Bahna River, for which I have made a disambiguation page). Some of these are missing an article, like Ekushey Padak Awards. bd2412 T 19:02, 24 December 2013 (UTC)

I've created APUS as a redirect to Apus (disambiguation). I've noticed a lot of churches on the list; it seems that many should be created as a redirect since there are many variations (St, St., Saint, 's, Church of XX or XX Church, etc.). TimBentley (talk) 14:44, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

Why Harald III becomes a redirect?

@Victor falk: @R'n'B: Why English page is so special (on this particular page) than everyone else? Simply because Hadrada is more famous? And I checked "what links here" of it, there wasn't a significant talk about this; neither do I see any discussion on Talk:Harald_III.

I really want to restore the disambig nature of Harald III, but before I do it, let's talk on this. Thank you. :) SzMithrandir (talk) 05:30, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

This version seems appropriate to me. Like SzMithrandir, I don't know why Harald Hardrada is considered the primary topic. See also the 2011 move discussion, Talk:Harald Hardrada#"Harald III" is not the most common name. Cnilep (talk) 08:27, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

I agree that it should be reverted to a disambiguation page. --R'n'B (call me Russ) 08:38, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

OK, anyways, victor falk is not showing up, let's revert it. Done.SzMithrandir (talk) 06:08, 9 January 2014 (UTC)

Tri-Cities

This is barely recognizable as a disambiguation page. Any interest in converting to something else (such as a list article or a broad-concept)? older ≠ wiser 13:43, 9 January 2014 (UTC)

Tri-City also. I would merge these to a list article at Tri-City, with any truly ambiguous uses moved to Tri-City (disambiguation). There isn't really a broad concept involved beyond there sometimes being three "cities" grouped close together. bd2412 T 13:56, 9 January 2014 (UTC)

I wouldn't do anything drastic yet - First, I'd go through Tri-Cities and deleted every entry that can't be sources as using that name. Once you do that, a disambiguation might be all you need. Ego White Tray (talk) 01:54, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

End of history

I have begun a draft at Draft:End of history, as a primary topic article to replace the current disambiguation page. Any help would be welcome. Cheers! bd2412 T 16:54, 17 December 2013 (UTC)

Note: This has since been moved to mainspace, supplanting the disambiguation page as the primary topic of End of history. Cheers! bd2412 T 19:32, 15 January 2014 (UTC)

Lake Josephine

The original Lake Josephine was about a lake in Montana and was moved to Lake Josephine (Montana). I changed Lake Josephine into a disambiguation page after researching the ramifications of making this change. The reason was I created Lake Josephine (Florida) and found the 'Lake Josephine' designation refers to at least five entities in Wikipedia. The only problem so far that has puzzlied me is that the talk page for the old article now is somewhat in limbo, although I think I can fix this. If anyone finds unintentional broken links, etc., I caused, please tell me. I hope the talk page was the only problem I encountered. Bill Pollard (talk) 07:16, 16 January 2014 (UTC)

I fixed the talk page on the disambiguation page to show that the original article was moved. Bill Pollard (talk) 07:25, 16 January 2014 (UTC)

Need a bit of help/advice

A new user has created Brehal (surname). Besides the fact that the page says it's a French surname and it's in an English surname category, it actually includes a place name as well, Bréhal - which is also the correct spelling of the surname. I'm not sure how to word the first line given that it's a place name as well. The article title is wrong also if it's going to include a place name, right? Thanks. Dougweller (talk) 18:57, 15 January 2014 (UTC)

Since there are only two surnames noted, I think that it should be a disambiguation page, and the title should be changed to Bréhal (disambiguation). bd2412 T 19:30, 15 January 2014 (UTC)

Thanks. Still learning about dab pages after many years. Dougweller (talk) 19:50, 15 January 2014 (UTC)

I don't like how this is currently set up. Bréhal is functioning as the primary topic, so the only other ambiguous term is the surname. This should be achieved with a hatnote pointing to Bréhal (surname), which would then list the two surname-holders. There's no need for a disambiguation page at all. —Xezbeth (talk) 09:16, 19 January 2014 (UTC)

Retardation

has a reference — Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.120.175.135 (talk) 18:46, 19 January 2014 (UTC)

Fixed. SchreiberBike talk 19:38, 19 January 2014 (UTC)

puzzle

crudo is Spanish for "raw", crudos is plural
crudo is Italian for "raw", crudos is plural — Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.120.175.135 (talk) 21:37, 22 January 2014 (UTC)

The former article treats a Chilean dish, the latter an Italian dish. Each mentions the word raw, but neither is about a word as such. Both contain hatnotes pointing to the other. I don't see an issue here related to disambiguation (though both articles need improvement). Cnilep (talk) 00:48, 23 January 2014 (UTC)

Requested move of Silesian language

There is a request at Talk:Silesian language#Requested move2 to move the article from 'Silesian language' to 'Silesian dialect'. Disambiguation is relevant, since most of the participants in the discussion seem to agree on the 'Silesian' part of the name, but not on its status as a language or a dialect. There is a suggestion to move 'Silesian language' to Silesian, and to move the dab page to Silesian (disambiguation) (currently a redirect). Cnilep (talk) 00:59, 23 January 2014 (UTC)

Technical help needed for Template:California topic

Orange County Sheriff's Department has incoming links through Template:California topic. In fact, a glance at Template:California topic/testcases indicates that this template will tend to generate disambiguation links to a number of topics, since it links ambiguously named cities and counties such as Lake County and Pasadena. Either the template needs to be fixed to avoid generating erroneous links, or it should be deleted, as we should not have templates that create errors. bd2412 T 13:39, 24 January 2014 (UTC)

Should raise this at Template talk:California topic. -- JHunterJ (talk) 14:57, 24 January 2014 (UTC)

I left a note on the template author's talk page a week ago. bd2412 T 16:41, 24 January 2014 (UTC)

And now it should be raised at the template talk. -- JHunterJ (talk) 18:00, 24 January 2014 (UTC)

Tentamen

Would someone like to have a look at Tentamen, where there is a minor edit war - see talk page. PamD 12:38, 25 January 2014 (UTC)

overturn

if this (compare overturning) were a dab page, what would you put — Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.120.175.135 (talk) 21:42, 27 January 2014 (UTC)

Invitation to User Study

Would you be interested in participating in a user study? We are a team at University of Washington studying methods for finding collaborators within a Wikipedia community. We are looking for volunteers to evaluate a new visualization tool. All you need to do is to prepare for your laptop/desktop, web camera, and speaker for video communication with Google Hangout. We will provide you with a Amazon gift card in appreciation of your time and participation. For more information about this study, please visit our wiki page (http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Research:Finding_a_Collaborator). If you would like to participate in our user study, please send me a message at Wkmaster (talk) 12:17, 30 January 2014 (UTC).

To the Guardians of Wikipedia (whoever they may be)

I put this comment in on the 'talk page' for Ai (disambiguation), but maybe it needs more exposure than just that.

Okay, I get it: Some high school in Delaware, Alexis I. duPont High School (whose initials should be AID anyway, it seems to me) – that qualifies as being listed in 'Ai (disambiguation)'; but the Appraisal Institute (to which I belong), the leading American organization in the field of real estate appraisal – which shows on their website that they have copyrighted "AI" (see http://www.appraisalinstitute.org/ ) – they do not. The second time I added the organization, I pointed that out; and someone still took them out of the list. What is the deal anyway? It is bad enough that I have to fight for 'notability' on albums and rock bands and artists that I have written entire articles on; but now, we have to keep the disambiguation lists short? When I first started writing in Wikipedia, it was a lot of fun; and I really felt like I was contributing. I am no big deal, but I am closing in on 3,000 edits and have written over 100 original articles. Now almost every time I put something in, somebody reverts it immediately – and just to rub it in, I get a message saying that this has happened. If you people are trying to run me off, it is working. Shocking Blue (talk) 17:56, 30 January 2014 (UTC)

Can you provide the diff where Appraisal Institute was removed from the page? It may have been removed because there is no indication in the article that the organization is known by its initials (see WP:DABACRO). The thing to do in that case would be to find a source that refers to the Appraisal Institute as "AI", add that source to the article, and then add it back to the disambig page. bd2412 T 18:14, 30 January 2014 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Ai (disambiguation) is a redirect to Ai. Please give a diff to the addition or removal you refer to. I couldn't find it in your contributions or any of the page histories.[1][2] Are you sure your edits were saved? I'm also unable to find a message you received about it, but maybe you only refer to messages about other edits. PrimeHunter (talk) 18:18, 30 January 2014 (UTC)

I didn't look back far enough. I see your additions were in 2008 [3] and 2009 [4]. The first was reverted right away [5] and the second in March 2013 [6] as part of a big cleanup. In both cases the edit summary correctly explained that the article does not mention "AI". You cannot expect your 2009 edit summary to be read before somebody makes an edit in 2013. As the edit summaries and BD2412 indicate, the solution is to mention "AI" in Appraisal Institute before adding the article to the disambiguation page. PrimeHunter (talk) 18:31, 30 January 2014 (UTC)

I have made the AI mention in the article [7] and added it to the disambiguation page.[8] PrimeHunter (talk) 18:44, 30 January 2014 (UTC)

WP:DABCONCEPT taskforce

I would like to establish a WP:DABCONCEPT taskforce within this WikiProject, to identify pages that are really broad concept article topics stuffed into a badly fitting disambiguation framework, and to create the articles that are missing for these topics. I would also like to have a place where drafts for this purpose are made available to be worked on and brought up to article quality, so they can be moved into article space and either replace or displace the disambiguation pages currently at those titles. So far, I have completed one transition through this process (End of history), and I have begun five more articles in draft space:

Would anyone else be interested in joining such a taskforce? I don't mind doing this work, but frankly sometimes I feel like I'm all alone out here building DABCONCEPT articles (though, admittedly, without a central base of discussion for these, I can't really see what other editors are doing in this area). Cheers! bd2412 T 21:14, 30 January 2014 (UTC)

Proposed naming convention (UK Parliament constituencies)

Advertising the proposed Wikipedia:Naming conventions (UK Parliament constituencies) here, as specified in Wikipedia:Article_titles#Proposed_naming_conventions_and_guidelines JHunterJ (talk) 14:44, 17 February 2014 (UTC)

In choosing which umpteen pages to advertise it on, I considered this one but as the Wikiproject's scope is defined as "disambiguation pages" and this proposal relates to article naming, I decided against it. PamD 15:45, 17 February 2014 (UTC)

"Nevermind"

Currently Nevermind is a redirect to Nevermind (album). Shouldn't that be the other way 'round? I mean, if (as Nevermind (disambiguation) suggested, and I left it in cleaning up the page) the album is the main topic, then the article should be at the non-disambiguated title, right? If the album is not the main topic, then the DAB page should be at the bare title. Cnilep (talk) 00:16, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Looks like there was a recent undiscussed move. I have moved the page back. older ≠ wiser 00:42, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Adding categories

Editor2020 and I have a disagreement on whether it is appropriate to add Category:Lists of people by nickname to Magician. See the prior discussion at User talk:Editor2020#Category goes poof from Magician. Could we get some other opinions please? Clarityfiend (talk) 20:53, 23 February 2014 (UTC)

I am not terribly averse to having the category. It would be better suited to a List of people nicknamed "Magician", but that list would be redundant to the disambiguation page anyway. If you are a reader searching by categories for nicknames shared by multiple people, this is the best place to find people nicknamed "Magician". I note also that there are 15 disambiguation pages already in that category, and I am not aware of any objection having been raised with respect to any of those. bd2412 T 21:06, 23 February 2014 (UTC)

If you look, I think that you will find that in many of them were the category was added by User:Clarityfiend. At least, in the first tow I checked, that was the case. Editor2020 (talk) 23:07, 23 February 2014 (UTC)

Human name DAB plus surname in a larger DAB page

How is this normally handled? There is a DAB page called William Say (disambiguation). There is also a section at DAB page Say#People that includes all four Williams. Should 'Say' just link to 'William Say (disambiguation)', or should all four be included on both pages? I can think of arguments in favor of either solution, so I'm happy to abide by consensus or tradition. I didn't see this mentioned at MOS:DAB. Cnilep (talk) 05:28, 24 February 2014 (UTC)

I've been linking to the more specific dab page whenever there are more than two people with the same name to avoid too much duplication. Clarityfiend (talk) 11:49, 24 February 2014 (UTC)

primary plus non-primary in combined dab page

Any thoughts about how to format Scramble? It's a dab page including both "Scramble" and "Scrambling", and while theres no primary topic for "Scramble" there is one for Scrambling. I can't just think how to format the preamble of the dab page to reflect this. PamD 08:33, 24 February 2014 (UTC)

The simplest solution would be to split them up into two dab pages. Also, the scrambler entry should be deleted, since there's a separate page for that. Clarityfiend (talk) 11:52, 24 February 2014 (UTC)

And per the discussion below, I'd leave the "scrambler" entry there, even though there's a separate dab page for "Scrambler (disambiguation)", if the topic at scrambler is ambiguous with both "scrambler" and "scramble/scrambling". There's no goal of putting each topic on no more than one dab page. -- JHunterJ (talk) 13:32, 24 February 2014 (UTC)

(ec) Usually the dab page observes only the primary topic for the dab page's actual title. On rare occasions, drama leads to the inclusion of a second meaning as primary as well (for example, previous version of HP (disambiguation), but if the terms differ by more than capitalization and it's important that each be "recognized" as primary, I'd say that the pages should be split (so there would be a Scrambling (disambiguation) page) to note the primary topic-ness of "Scrambling" for that title. In general, though, spelling variations, caps variations, etc., are just included in the list and not included in the preamble. -- JHunterJ (talk) 12:00, 24 February 2014 (UTC)

We do need to be careful not to make things overly complicated for readers, especially with verb forms where the title of the article (for whatever reason) might have one form of title, while in context the activity or associated results may often be referred to in a different form. Most all of the things with "scrambling" titles may also be described as "scramble(s)" in some contexts. older ≠ wiser 12:56, 24 February 2014 (UTC)

Right. The default here would be to leave the list combined, with no primary topic for "Scramble". Second choice, move the list to Scrambling (disambiguation) and rework the preamble for the primary topic Scrambling. Third choice, split the dab to Scramble and Scrambling (disambiguation). -- JHunterJ (talk) 13:30, 24 February 2014 (UTC)

Thanks for comments. I think the reader is best served if we just leave it as is: the reader wanting the primary topic "Scrambling" will have got there directly, and everyone else can choose from the assorted senses of "Scramble/ing" on offer here - noun and verb forms often having similar meanings (that mountain route is a scramble / it involves scrambling, etc), so a combined page is helpful. PamD 16:39, 24 February 2014 (UTC)

Coil (disambiguation)

There is a current discussion at Talk:Coil (disambiguation) and two affecting RM discussions at Talk:Coil#Requested move and Talk:Coil (electromagnetism). Imho the Coil (disambiguation) needs a cleanup/tweak. Looking forward for your expertise :) --Trofobi (talk) 16:42, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

I tagged it with {{disambiguation cleanup}} -- that's what it's there for. Cheers! -- JHunterJ (talk) 17:04, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

Apparently the above was not a request for cleanup of the dab after all.[9] -- JHunterJ (talk) 18:42, 25 February 2014 (UTC)

Corpus separatum and Index

If anyone would like to take a whack at fixing the incoming links to the last two outstanding pages for the February disambiguation contest, Corpus separatum and Index, please have at it. bd2412 T 19:07, 25 February 2014 (UTC)

Thor (film) and Thor 1

Should Thor (film) sport a hatnote to indicate the satellite "Thor 1" located at Thor (satellite) ? Thor 1 redirects to the film article. I've been reverted when I tried to add that. -- 70.50.151.11 (talk) 21:17, 2 March 2014 (UTC)

People looking for the satellite could easily search for Thor 1, so I think a good case can be made for it. I'd suggest discussing it at Talk:Thor (film). SchreiberBike talk

I just added it back in, with a little language tweak to re-emphasize that it's "Thor 1" and not "Thor" being handled by the hatnote. If that comes off, I'd just make Thor 1 a disambiguation page. Reader navigation has to be enabled. -- JHunterJ (talk) 22:27, 2 March 2014 (UTC)

User:Darkwarriorblake removed the hatnote shortly after JHunterJ placed it. I have turned Thor 1 into a DAB page. There is also an ultralight aircraft called Thor 1-A. Cnilep (talk) 00:07, 3 March 2014 (UTC)

One of your project's articles has been featured

Hello,
Please note that Prehistoric Asia, which is within this project's scope, has been selected as one of Today's articles for improvement. The article was scheduled to appear on Wikipedia's Community portal in the "Today's articles for improvement" section for one week, beginning today. Everyone is encouraged to collaborate to improve the article. Thanks, and happy editing!
_{Delivered by Theo's Little Bot at 01:00, 3 March 2014 (UTC) on behalf of the TAFI team}

Fish net

Currently Fish net redirects to Fishing net, while Fishnet treats the stockings. There is also at least one disambiguated title, Fishnet (song). I've added a hatnote at Fishing net. I wonder whether there should be a DAB page, and if so, would either 'Fish(ing) net' or 'Fishnet' be considered the main topic? It seems slightly arbitrary to choose one or the other of those, but problematic to choose both. Cnilep (talk) 06:15, 3 March 2014 (UTC)

"Fishnet" could have one primary topic while "Fish net" has another, yes. I would put the dab at Fishnet (disambiguation), with the stockings as the primary topic for that title, and list all three under "Fishnet or fish net may also refer to:". -- JHunterJ (talk) 12:01, 3 March 2014 (UTC)

Done. Cnilep (talk) 23:54, 6 March 2014 (UTC)

Rotation group (disambiguation)

More opinions sought at Talk:Rotation group (disambiguation). Widefox; talk 10:57, 9 March 2014 (UTC)

Disambiguation expert needed

There is great confusion about the naming and disambiguation of a bunch of U.S. Navy aviation squadrons. (See the lengthy and wide-ranging discussion HERE.) We need someone who is very well-versed in disambiguation to work out a few test cases, so we can figure out how to take care of the rest. I have two test cases in mind — one fairly simple and one fairly complex — if a well-qualified volunteer steps forward, I will provide all the details. (I am a skilled editor myself, and knowledgeable about these squadrons and their articles, but a total newbie with disambiguation). Reply here if interested. Lou Sander (talk) 20:28, 6 March 2014 (UTC)

Please don't be scared off by the lengthy and wide-ranging discussion referred to up above. We really need some help. One of our recurring problems is that, for example, we want to give an article a name that is already in use as a redirect page to another article. We don't quite know how to do that. (We DO know how to handle the disambiguation links once our article is in its proper place.) Lou Sander (talk) 19:08, 8 March 2014 (UTC)

I had a quick look, and the few redirects that I checked — VA-36, VA-45, VA-55 and VA-123 — already were disambiguation pages originally, but were redirected to the State Roads several years ago as the attack squadron articles were all redlinks. I can't imagine that anyone would have a problem with them all being turned back into dabs. —Xezbeth (talk) 19:30, 8 March 2014 (UTC)

@Xezbeth: I've been on a mission of giving Wikipedia coverage to U.S. Navy aircraft squadrons. About 90 of these squadrons are named "VA-nn". Alhough there are other, usually cumbersome, ways of referring to them, their legitimate, widely-used names are of that format. There is a large number of articles about Virginia highways, typically named "Virginia State Route nn", with redirect pages from "VA-nn" to the article with its full name. VA-38 is one I have focused on as a typical simple example. Because of the large number of cases like this, when I recently created 76 articles about squadrons named "VA-nn", I named them all "VA-nn (U.S. Navy)", just to avoid confusion and make for uniformity, and hoping to later rename them to what is, IMHO, their legitimate "VA-nn" form. There were about 12 pre-existing squadron articles, which I boldly renamed into the "VA-nn (U.S. Navy)" format, also for the sake of uniformity and later cleanup.

Now, I am hoping to rename the "VA-nn (U.S. Navy)" articles to the "VA-nn" format. The impediment to that is the existing redirects to Virginia highways. I certainly don't want to rob people of the ability to find their highways by entering "VA-nn", but I think that the main "VA-nn" articles should be about the squadrons, and shouldn't have to have the "(U.S. Navy)" disambiguator. I don't know enough about redirects, disambiguation pages, hat notes, etc. to be able to handle this situation skillfully myself. I agree that Virginia highway people probably won't be upset if they enter "VA-nn" and get to a disambiguation page or a squadron page with a hatnote.

My fond hope is that this can be worked out for VA-38. Once the pattern is set, I can use it on the rest of the articles. (I'm prepared to do the work, but I need to have a proper pattern.) Any help with the pattern will be VERY much appreciated. Lou Sander (talk) 15:01, 10 March 2014 (UTC)

In that case a move request for VA-38 (U.S. Navy) to be moved to VA-38 might be the way to go. All of them would require an admin to perform the move and I'm not comfortable with unilaterally moving 90 or so articles myself without getting consensus for one of them first. A hatnote should be able to deal with any further ambiguity on all of these so it's just a question of whether the attack squadron articles are primary topics for these terms or not. —Xezbeth (talk) 15:52, 10 March 2014 (UTC)

@Xezbeth: It seems obvious to me that the attack squadron articles are the primary topics, but I want to get some consensus on that before taking any action. I definitely want to do only one attack squadron article first. When it is properly done, unambiguously successful, etc., I will move on to the rest. Actually, once it's done, there are some more complicated cases that I need to figure out. For example, VA-95 leads to a disambiguation page one item on which leads to another disambiguation page. Also there are two VA-95 squadrons with similar names, and one red link to a former squadron name that is very non-standard and that IMHO no knowledgeable person would use. Sheesh! I've figured out how to deal with the two different squadron names, but the disambiguation is a different matter. Lou Sander (talk) 01:13, 11 March 2014 (UTC)

notice of bulk RMs affecting many dab pages

There is a bulk RM discussion at Talk:Chipewyan people#Requested move which concerns disambiguation in various ways, including the erstwhile creation of two/three-item dab pages created invoking a passage in the language naming conventions authored in advance by the same editor who created those; that guideline ignored the "no small dab pages" in this project's guidelines and also bypasses PRIMARYTOPIC, as the people are invariably the primary topic; and also the changing of various "FOO" dab pages into "FOO" disambiguation so that the "FOO" title can be used for the eponymous indigenous group. Discussion is centralized at the Chipewyan talkpage but there are, for now, three other bulk RMs on the same premise, and will be more once I get to the rest of the US state categories. Lists of articles not on the Chipewyan talkpage are on Talk:Yupik peoples#Requested move, Talk:Yaquina people#Requested move, and Talk:Cayuga people#Requested move.Skookum1 (talk) 05:46, 14 March 2014 (UTC)

Disambig or SIA

The article at Crowned Crane, which should be at "Crowned crane" or "Crowned crane (disambiguation)", has alternated between a Disambig and SIA. Help on the correct template (DAB or SIA) to use on the listing page and formatting the list will be helpful. Help with setting the WP banner on the talk page also needed. Snowman (talk) 21:52, 20 March 2014 (UTC)

It can either be a non-dab set index article or a non-article disambiguation page. Currently, it is a non-dab SIA. SIAs are not part of the dab project. -- JHunterJ (talk) 10:34, 21 March 2014 (UTC)

I think that it's an SIA if it is possible to refer to the term as a class of things (i.e. all "crowned cranes" makes sense, while "all Mercurys or "all John Adams's" doesn't). bd2412 T 11:52, 21 March 2014 (UTC)

Disambiguator "(British coin)"

See Talk:Double florin (British coin)#Requested move. --Rob Sinden (talk) 11:55, 21 March 2014 (UTC)

David Hernandez disambiguation needed

~~David Hernandez can move to David Hernandez (singer). Sportfan5000 (talk) 00:37, 11 March 2014 (UTC)~~ [WP:Ban 02:03, 25 March 2014 (UTC)]

Chosen

In the lede of Chosen, the second main bullet point

Chosen people or Joseon people, a term for Korean people

had no links at all.

I linked Joseon, which is about the history of the kingdom. Then I looked at Korea, but that article is mostly about the geography, history, and politics, not about the people. There is an entry Korean people, which redirects to Koreans, quite a sizeable page; but the guidelines, as quoted on the "Editing…" page, say

Generally only one navigable link (blue link) belongs in each bulleted entry.

ISTM that the connection of "Chosen/Joseon people" with "Koreans" is not very obvious here and is too important to be left implicit. Accordingly, I am boldly linking "Korean people" on the dab page to Koreans, shortcutting the redirect. --Thnidu (talk) 07:51, 26 March 2014 (UTC)

There's no mention of "Chosen" on the Korean people page. I cleaned the dab and changed that entry to describe the kingdom, which does mention Cho-sen. -- JHunterJ (talk) 12:55, 26 March 2014 (UTC)

Three-way

should try to fix or not worth it — Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.120.175.135 (talk) 20:23, 23 March 2014 (UTC)

should detail or not understand

Or rather: I'm sorry, I don't take your meaning. Three-way currently redirects to Threesome, an article about sexual activity involving three people. That page, in turn, has hatnotes directing to Threesome (disambiguation) and 3-way (disambiguation). It's not obvious to me that anything needs to be fixed. Cnilep (talk) 04:12, 27 March 2014 (UTC)

After editing a disambiguation page

I edited the disambiguation page for 'Space Cadet' (https://wiki.riteme.site/wiki/Talk:Space_Cadet_%28disambiguation%29). I was the first to do so, so do I need to do anything else to draw attention to it? I am asking from pure motives - wondering whether there is a specific thing I'm supposed to do - rather than just trying to draw attention to it by asking if I need to draw attention to it! Bluest Teddy (talk) 11:25, 27 March 2014 (UTC)

Verny

Interesting dab page, my cleanup has just been reverted. Anyone like to have a look? PamD 12:02, 27 March 2014 (UTC)

Done -- JHunterJ (talk) 12:49, 27 March 2014 (UTC)

Russian feminine and neuter forms are normally included with the masculine, but here, of course, this is primarily a root of French origin, with the only applicable Russian neuter form being Vernoye in Amur Oblast and with the Vernaya article (the title of which is the same as the Russian feminine form) having nothing to do with any Verny on the disambiguation page. I have thus no objections to the cleanup (and pledge to first drink my coffee before diving into editing next time :)). Thank you both.—Ëzhiki (Igels Hérissonovich Ïzhakoff-Amursky) • (yo?); March 27, 2014; 13:16 (UTC)

Other forms (plural, singular, masculine, feminine, neuter, nominative, etc.) are only included if the disambiguation page is disambiguating topics known by those alternatives. -- JHunterJ (talk) 13:27, 27 March 2014 (UTC)

...which in case of Russian adjectives, they always are. With nouns, you are completely right—the alternative forms of those need to be looked at on case-by-case basis.—Ëzhiki (Igels Hérissonovich Ïzhakoff-Amursky) • (yo?); March 27, 2014; 13:46 (UTC)

Right. Adjectives-as-topics are very unusual on Wikipedia. WP:Article titles#Use nouns -- JHunterJ (talk) 14:27, 27 March 2014 (UTC)

True, but a good bulk of Russian toponyms and proper names of organizations, facilities, etc. are adjectives, with no acceptable noun alternative to be used instead. Those nearly always retain their gender in transliteration of their nominative form, yet their forms in different genders are routinely encountered in sources depending on context.—Ëzhiki (Igels Hérissonovich Ïzhakoff-Amursky) • (yo?); March 27, 2014; 15:08 (UTC)

I see. If they are referred to by other names (different genders of their root adjective), that should be captured in the topics, but isn't necessarily required for disambiguation; that is, it doesn't appear to be needed to help the reader easily navigate to the sought topic. -- JHunterJ (talk) 15:32, 27 March 2014 (UTC)

Yes, they are often referred to by different genders of their root adjectives. This is reflected in (and can be sourced to), for example, the Russian State Registry of Geographic Objects, which lists any alternative names in addition to the official names for each and every inhabited locality in Russia. The alternatives included are the variants which at some point made it into official use and, consequently, into secondary and tertiary sources. A lot of those are historical names, simple typos, or similar spellings confused with other populated places nearby, but as far as the toponyms in adjective form go, the vast majority would have the forms in two other genders listed as alternatives as well. This alone shows the extent of the potential for confusion. And of course when these toponyms are transliterated for use in English-language texts, oftentimes neither the authors nor readers are familiar with how Russian grammatical genders work, thus exacerbating the problem for the Anglophone audience even more if a wrong variant is picked for transliteration. Add on top of that the fact that roughly two-thirds of Russian place names are not unique and you'll see how this becomes something worth worrying about.—Ëzhiki (Igels Hérissonovich Ïzhakoff-Amursky) • (yo?); March 27, 2014; 16:14 (UTC)

awkward: disambig for 1 article + 1 wiktionary page

What do we do when there's just 1 article + 1 wiktionary definition on a disamb page for an acronym? The Wiktionary box prescribed by the MOS seems confusing to me in this case. Possibly somebody could improve YGM. The list of internet slang it used to link to is now at wiktionary, so all I could figure to do was this edit Jodi.a.schneider (talk) 13:40, 28 March 2014 (UTC)

Done[10] -- JHunterJ (talk) 16:25, 28 March 2014 (UTC)

Invitation to Participate in a User Study - Final Reminder

Would you be interested in participating in a user study of a new tool to support editor involvement in WikiProjects? We are a team at the University of Washington studying methods for finding collaborators within WikiProjects, and we are looking for volunteers to evaluate a new visual exploration tool for Wikipedia. Given your interest in this Wikiproject, we would welcome your participation in our study. To participate, you will be given access to our new visualization tool and will interact with us via Google Hangout so that we can solicit your thoughts about the tool. To use Google Hangout, you will need a laptop/desktop, a web camera, and a speaker for video communication during the study. We will provide you with an Amazon gift card in appreciation of your time and participation. For more information about this study, please visit our wiki page (http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Research:Finding_a_Collaborator). If you would like to participate in our user study, please send me a message at Wkmaster (talk) 00:20, 6 April 2014 (UTC).

Help with hatnote on Depression (mood)?

Presently, at Depression (mood) we have:

"Despair" redirects here. For other uses of despair, see Despair (disambiguation). For the mood disorder, see Major depressive disorder.

I'd like to propose on the article's talk page that we change that to:

For the mood disorders sometimes called simply "depression", see Major depressive disorder and Dysthymic disorder. "Despair" redirects here; for other uses of "despair" see Despair (disambiguation).

What template/fields do I use to create that? --Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 08:01, 12 April 2014 (UTC)

I'd stack {{for}} and {{redirect}} -- JHunterJ (talk) 13:31, 12 April 2014 (UTC)

Category for abbreviations

There are categories and templates for {{Letter-Number Combination Disambiguation}} and {{numberdis}} but no category for DAB pages that contain abbreviations consisting of letters only. There are some DAB pages, such as AAA or LAPD (disambiguation) that consist primarily of initialisms, and other pages like Cats or Goa that include a section of acronyms or abbreviations. It seems like it would be possible to create a category similar to Category:Genus disambiguation pages as a parameter of the {{disambiguation}} template. I see in the archives this suggestion from 2005 that the scope of this WikiProject should "avoid abbreviations", but I didn't find anything else. Is it simply unneeded, or is there some reason in principle to avoid such a category? Cnilep (talk) 03:28, 13 April 2014 (UTC)

What's the reason to create such a category? It's certainly possible, but I don't see the benefit. (Then again, I don't understand the benefit of the letter-number combination disambiguation or numberdis categories either.) -- JHunterJ (talk) 10:53, 13 April 2014 (UTC)

There used to be one a long time ago, see Wikipedia:Categories for deletion/Log/2005 June 14#Category:TLAs. It doesn't strike me as something worth doing though. —Xezbeth (talk) 12:21, 13 April 2014 (UTC)

I don't know that there is a need for such a category (as I suggested, it could be "simply unneeded"); I just wondered about the lack of parallel with numbers and letter-number combinations. Sometimes useful things come of such idle curiosity, but sometimes... not. Thanks, Xezbeth, for the background. Cnilep (talk) 01:08, 14 April 2014 (UTC)

Clarify

Connaught Park & Talk:Connaught Park#Clarify: Do we really mean Connaught, Calgary? Peter Horn User talk 23:14, 16 April 2014 (UTC)

Proposed deletion of Washington Convention

The article Washington Convention has been proposed for deletion because of the following concern:

Only the CITES article uses the phrase "Washington Convention". The "International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes" article never uses this phrase; thus, there's no need for disambiguation.

While all constructive contributions to Wikipedia are appreciated, content or articles may be deleted for any of several reasons.

You may prevent the proposed deletion by removing the {{proposed deletion/dated}} notice, but please explain why in your edit summary or on the article's talk page.

Please consider improving the article to address the issues raised. Removing {{proposed deletion/dated}} will stop the proposed deletion process, but other deletion processes exist. In particular, the speedy deletion process can result in deletion without discussion, and articles for deletion allows discussion to reach consensus for deletion.
--LukasMatt (talk) 01:27, 21 April 2014 (UTC)

The article was redirected rather than deleted. Looks good.

--LukasMatt (talk) 03:23, 21 April 2014 (UTC)

This should remain as is (redirect). The full unexpurgated title of this treaty is Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora which, by any standard, is a bit of a mouthful. Generally, it is referred to as either CITES or, more commonly, as the Washington Convention. All those in the field understand and use all these names interchangeably and so all roads should lead to the same page.

Enquire (talk) 07:14, 21 April 2014 (UTC)