Wikipedia talk:Disambiguation/Archive 10

This is an archive of past discussions. 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.

There is a poll at

--William Allen Simpson 13:21, 2 January 2006 (UTC)

I've now moved this to a subpage, see

--William Allen Simpson 15:30, 15 January 2006 (UTC)

There is a poll at

--William Allen Simpson 14:23, 2 January 2006 (UTC)

I've now moved this to a subpage, see

Several different types are already required to be maintained as lists to prevent "orphan" pages. These lists are currently:

• Wikipedia:Links to disambiguating pages,
• Wikipedia:Links to (disambiguation) pages,
• Wikipedia:Multiple-place names, and
• Wikipedia:Non-unique personal name.

Presumably more lists will be added to comply with the separate poll results for {{TLAdisambig}}. There are already:

• List of all two-letter combinations
• List of TLAs

--William Allen Simpson 15:30, 15 January 2006 (UTC)

Some terms relate to a primary topic that most editors agree is the primary meaning for the term (

Rome, Italy rather than Rome, for example). The ambiguous meaning might redirect

to the unambiguous meaning, or vice versa.

--William Allen Simpson 08:41, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

• I cannot find anywhere that says anybody should "fix" redirects by eliminating them. The only links that need fixing are those that point to disambiguation pages (and I doubt a bot can figure out the context). Redirects are incredibly helpful in determining when to split pages, and which links should go to the new article! --William Allen Simpson 10:10, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

A link going straight to the target is preferred over a link relying on a redirect. See

WP:MOS-L. That doesn't say anyone should "fix" redirects, but I've certainly observed many editors go on such cleaning missions, and there are tools to help them. For instance, Popups has a one-click way to fix such links. I think I've even seen bots do the same for targeted cases, such as after a page move, but I could be mistaken. --TreyHarris

16:57, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

• Wow, Table has become a mess, too! "Table (information)" links to "tables" which redirects to "table", which is "table (disambiguation)". Yech! --William Allen Simpson 10:19, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

Um... I know it's not your fault, but this business of the policy page describing a status quo exactly 180° from what actually exists in the Wikipedia (Table, Rome (disambiguation)) is ridiculous.

Look, I think the problem here is that some folks (I'm referring to many editors, on this page and elsewhere) are trying to effect change in the Wikipedia by first making changes in the policy pages, and then pointing to those policy changes as the rationale for widespread and unpopular changes in the Wikipedia. This may be

bold

, but it's entirely ass-backwards as to how policy decisions have been usually made in the past. There's a customary procedure for settling wide-ranging policy disputes: go on notice boards, discussion pages, the Village Pump, etc., and say "there's a lot of confusion about how XXX should be handled in the Wikipedia, I'm starting a discussion [[here]]" and then make a proposal, let it get hacked to death, let consensus emerge, vote if necessary, etc. Then you can make the change in the policy and legitimately point to it as rationale for the change.

Until that happens, a policy page should document the state that actually pertains in the Wikipedia, even if that state is "no consensus, so editor's choice", like Amer./Brit. English. --TreyHarris 16:57, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

Hang on — wait — since when was a generic topic page a redirect to Foo (disambiguation)? We decided against that ages ago, in /Archive 7#Primary topic disambiguation.

Links that are intended to go to the dab page (which should be rare) should go to

Foo

are ambiguous.

From what I've seen, almost all generic topic pages are at the original name. Can the generic topic section be corrected? Neonumbers 11:02, 7 January 2006 (UTC)

If there are no objections before 23:02, 8 January 2006 (UTC), then I will change the "generic topic" section to advise that dab pages should be created at

Foo. This is a quick deadline for comment, but this is a change-back, not a change-to. Neonumbers

07:40, 8 January 2006 (UTC)

Woah, Nelly! I've just read your reference, and it looks like the text conforms to that! Wahoofive explicitly objected to having the "reverse process" and it looks to me like you were the odd man out....

• When I sectionalized, I ran back through a lot of guideline edit history to ensure that I didn't make any semantic changes.
• Right now, there are a mix, some pages at Foo, some at Bar (disambiguation), but the discussion of the time (and the actual text of the guideline) was clearly against the proposal.
• AFAICT, at the time written, Rome and Table conformed to the guidelines. The changes to those pages has occurred afterwards.
• If we're going to change these relatively clear guidelines, we better have a serious discussion!
• Therefore, I'll start a couple of new talk sections explicitly on the topic (per TreyHarris).

--William Allen Simpson 11:29, 8 January 2006 (UTC)

I'm sorry, I don't fully get that summary.

The idea of "Table" redirecting to "Table (disambiguation)", as far as this page and its discussion was concerned, began on 17 May 2005, with an addition that was not discussed on this page. It first appeared in this version; you can compare these two adjacent versions. It stayed there for a short while before I brought the matter to the talk page. It was removed on 20 July 2005 in this version, with the re-write.

(Before this page got involved, there was a small group of users already carrying out that process, see User:Jnc/Disambiguation for details.)

This version of 3 January 2006 says that "In other cases, where there is no such consensus, disambiguation pages are named after the topic itself (Table, for example)." There was nothing about a redirect.

I'd also like to point out that in both the 3 January 2006 version and the current (9 January) version, it says "If you must link to a disambiguation page (instead of a specific meaning), link to a redirect to the disambiguation page that includes the text "(disambiguation)", e.g. America (disambiguation)."

(I'm also gonna have a look at the sections below.) Neonumbers 07:37, 9 January 2006 (UTC)

Which is a better disambiguation page? Appleton where it is divided into people, places and things? Here the places are subcategories of the countries. or do you prefer: Franklin where the subtopics have been distinguished by two *s (**) and there is no clear Table of Contents (TOC) distinction between people and places and things? User:Richard Arthur Norton (1958- )

• I prefer Appleton the subsection headers, because they show in the ToC. I'd put the people first (alphabetized), though. --William Allen Simpson 08:25, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

I am glad you agree, I have been having a difficult time finding the information from the asterik versions. Do you think the order should always be People, Places, Things (PPT)? I have been creating pages in PPT format, and only recently noticed most pages are in an older format. Should there be a PPT Template created? That way it can be standardized. --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) 08:37, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

Hi, you should only split dab pages into people, places, things (or, for that matter, any grouping) where it is really long. Appleton should just be one list — remember that using section headers, whether using headings or extra lead lines, lengthens the page, and so should only be used when necessary (about twenty ( or maybe fifteen) entries for leading lines, and thirty entries for headings is a good indicator). In fact, Franklin is a good example where section headers would work really well (it looks as if, done properly, that page would be two pages long!).

Sectioning is one of those things where you really have to look at each page and decide each case individually. Hence, I don't think a template's such a good idea.

I'm gonna jump in and do Franklin, because it looks like fun — hope you don't mind. permalink to version of "Franklin" refered to here Neonumbers 10:51, 7 January 2006 (UTC)

I agree with Neo that there's no reason to have a policy on this; it should be decided on a case-by-case basis. In fact, the order of entries in general for dab pages is deliberately not mandated in this guideline. —Wahoofive (talk) 20:06, 7 January 2006 (UTC)

I concur, although Neo and I have very different ideas of fun. (Good work.)

--William Allen Simpson 21:13, 7 January 2006 (UTC)

In many articles that have

Ensure that the disambiguation page links back to an unambiguous page name (that is, link to

Rome, Italy rather than Rome). The unambiguous page name should redirect

to the primary topic page.

--William Allen Simpson 11:41, 8 January 2006 (UTC)

• Are there actual processes that need to have an unambiguous link? If there aren't, then I'd be happy to change my default defense of the existing text. There should be enough knowledge and experience around here by now to know whether it really matters.

--William Allen Simpson 06:54, 10 January 2006 (UTC)

Should a revised guideline be adopted to eliminate the unambiguous redirects, or should the current guideline be maintained?

• William Allen Simpson 11:41, 8 January 2006 (UTC) -- single level redirects are useful, and the current guideline should be strengthed.
• Get rid of this sentence entirely; this topic belongs on the
  MOSDAB. —Wahoofive (talk
  ) 04:16, 10 January 2006 (UTC)
  • This is a page name and structural (redirect) issue. It certainly doesn't belong in
    MOS:DP
    (unless everything here is merged), as this page is for the structure and naming aspects, and MOS:DP is for the form of the content.

--William Allen Simpson 06:54, 10 January 2006 (UTC)

The current text says:

In other cases, where there is no such consensus, then there is no primary topic page. The generic term or phrase should redirect to the actual disambiguation page. (For example, Table should redirect to Table (disambiguation).)

• This reflected actual practice at the time. Table (disambiguation) has since been changed to link to Table (actually with a problematic copy and paste some months ago that had to be fixed by administrators recently).

• All Primary topic disambiguation pages must be (by definition) at Topic (disambiguation).

• The current guideline has the Generic topic consistent with the Primary topic, avoiding confusion.

• Unfortunately, there is a lack of consistency throughout the *pedia as to where the disambiguation page is located: some pages at Topic, some at Topic (disambiguation).

--William Allen Simpson 12:03, 8 January 2006 (UTC)

I selected a quick sample of 1000 pages from Category:Disambiguation (5 pages of 200 entries, starting at "Me Without You", "Khadafy", "Black (disambiguation)", "Yegorov", "Sea Bright"). 179, or 17.9%, had "(disambiguation)" in their title.

Flaws in that quick sampling:

• I didn't check which one of the (disambiguation) pages was actually a generic topic page. The actual percentage statistic ideally should be found by finding (179−n)/(1000−n), where n is the number of primary topics in the sample. Note that (179−n)/(1000−n) → 0 as n → 179;
• There were also 18 pages with titles such as "King's (electoral district)", that is, double disambiguations;
• I didn't check pages individually to ensure they were what I thought they were.

Nevertheless, I think my sample would have been representative of the general trend that can be found. I would suspect the majority of those 179 pages are primary topic dabs, but even if that's not so, we're still looking at a minimum 82.1% at "Thing".

Furthermore, it would make sense to have something at each article "Thing". To have a disambiguation page at "Thing" makes it abundantly clear that we don't know what you're after. To force a redirect to "Thing (disambiguation)" means there's nothing at "Thing", which is confusing — it would be much easier to just tell them at "Thing", is this what you're after. I don't see a need to make generics consistent with primaries when generics make up 80% of dab pages anyway. The more common method is not only simpler but keeps pages at their rightful original titles, thereby avoiding confusion. Neonumbers 10:15, 9 January 2006 (UTC)

• That's really interesting. So the "reverse" method won out in practice despite the objections.
  • BTW, I checked the first page of 189, admittedly not as good a sample, and there were 19 "(disambiguation)" of which only 9 actually had primary topics. So that makes 180/189 (95%) as Generic, with 5.9% needed to be moved from "()" form. Not too hard to finish.
  • Also, having the disambiguation page without "()" would make it easy to distinguish in the category whether it's a Generic topic visually. Only the Primary topics would have the label.

--William Allen Simpson 07:32, 10 January 2006 (UTC)

Should a revised guideline be adopted to "reverse" generic topic disambiguation pages, or should the current guideline be maintained?

• Change. This sentence was the subject of a prolonged edit war at one point; one very vocal editor favored mandating the (disambiguation) suffix. I guess I didn't realize that the dark side won. —Wahoofive (talk) 04:15, 10 January 2006 (UTC)
• Change. Excuse my obscenity, but holy shit, when did this happen? I've been following the prior policy of keeping the disambiguation page at the main topic page, and I think this approach is just fine. Its only disadvantage is that some disambiguation pages have the suffix and some don't, but so what? That's no reason to make a major structural change with huge impact, especially when the status quo makes just as much sense. Deco 07:09, 10 January 2006 (UTC)
• Change. See many paragraphs above, I read your (Wahoofive) historic comments to be against the reverse method. Now you call it the dark side. Well, I'm agnostic, but it's better to go with the 95% for consistency. It would be insanely difficult to move all the existing pages. Apparently there's not actually a technical reason after all. I've changed my position here. --William Allen Simpson 07:32, 10 January 2006 (UTC)
  • A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds —Wahoofive (talk) 22:26, 10 January 2006 (UTC)

Change done. --William Allen Simpson 07:44, 10 January 2006 (UTC)

Forgive me — the part about Wikipedia:Links to disambiguating pages — I beg to differ there. Well, maybe not so much "differ" as "discuss".

1. A quick flick through the LtDP pages shows me that just about all of the links there are just your usual generic-topic-name, like English. (Primary-topic-dab pages aren't here because they don't need to be — the purpose of the pages is to give orphan pages a friend.)
2. With regard to the link sorting thing, I think an exception can be made for this; it is readily apparent that the link is intentional (given, after all, its purpose) and I'm sure dab-link fixers will be aware of that.
3. Aside from that, a reason to link to a generic topic dab page is very, very, very rare — there are many thousand disambiguation pages on Wikipedia and I'd be surprised if so much as five hundred had a purposeful deliberate (non-LtDP) link to it. Neonumbers 03:33, 11 January 2006 (UTC)

(added numbers for response)

1. Sorry, linked to wrong page. Fixed Wikipedia:Links to (disambiguation) pages. (Also friend to orphans.) I don't know how often somebody runs the update script, so I just added my new entries manually.
2. I'm just trying to maintain continuity with the old text, presumably the existing practice. I really don't think it's too much effort to link to an unambiguous page, and it's one less thing for fixers to check. I know I'd prefer less work!
3. Yep, fairly rare. The page is supposed to exist anyhow, and be listed, and redirect pages are cheap in the database. So, what's the problem?

-William Allen Simpson 09:10, 11 January 2006 (UTC)

I posted a question over at the Wikipedia:WikiProject Television that grew out of a list TV shows that I'm currently working on. Since the project is not very active I haven't gotten many other comments but I think that it is important enough to ask for outside opinions. Any input would be appreciated because there are many naming variants such as (TV), (sitcom), (TV series) (television), (TV show), (game show) that should be standardized on the project page. Please leave comments here. --Reflex Reaction (talk)• 15:25, 11 January 2006 (UTC)

Which is the prefered disambiguation - (TV series) or (television)? I've seen both used or similar variants but (TV series) seems to be more popular. Thanks! --Reflex Reaction (talk)• 18:50, 9 January 2006 (UTC)

For series, let's use (TV Series). Lvr 10:07, 10 January 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for replying, but what constitutes a series? A sitcom, a drama, a miniseries, a cartoon? Are they all series? What about game shows or news programs. I'm not clear which is which.

Also does adding "series" make it an unnecessary disambiguation, shouldn't "TV" or television be sufficient unless there are two similarly name shows or shows that have coverage in two separate countries like Blind date (disambiguation) which has the UK and the US version. Or something like TV show name (sitcom) TV show name (game show). I would really like some help and other opinions on this. --Reflex Reaction (talk)• 20:41, 10 January 2006 (UTC)

I don't think we need thousands of disambiguation for television programs. Series, sitcoms, a drama, a miniseries, a cartoon, "normal" series use (TV Series). We can use (TV games) for games, ... (TV) for other ones. Lvr 15:59, 11 January 2006 (UTC)

I personally think that simple disambiguation should be used (TV or television, preferably television) for almost all disambiguation and series, show, or sitcom should only be used when further disambiguation is needed. Shows can be disambiguated by country if necessary (UK television or UK TV). TV movies are a little more complicated, but I think at heart they are movies, not a television show and should be under the film umbrella. I am ambivalent about the naming of miniseries.

Precedent for this naming conventions has been established by the

Personnaly, I have no preference about that. However, I would object to you comparison to albums and films, that television is far broader realm than albums and films. A (TV series) or a (Television Fiction) are the not the equivalent (Cop film). (TV Cop Series) would instead be this equivalent. I think that this latter form is indeed not suitable, because too precise for the simple purpose of a disambiguation. For me (television), (television series) are good levels.

I will not fight for any one of these ;-) Lvr 17:08, 11 January 2006 (UTC)

I agree that the comparison is not 100% but the principle is there, don't add disambiguation unless necessary. I guess what I don't understand is the need for the word "series". Compare Friends (television) vs. Friends (television series). "Television" is sufficient to disambiguate the television show from other similarly named ideas. "Series" does nothing to disambiguate Friends from anything else it is not necessary and shouldn't be included. "Series" would only be necessary if there was a television game show called Friends, i.e. Friends (television game show). It is confusing to have shows named Friends (sitcom) or Friends (sit-com) or Friends (show) or Friends (TV show) or Friends (TV series) when television is sufficient to disambiguate >99% of the shows. --Reflex Reaction (talk)• 17:36, 11 January 2006 (UTC)

I have proposed a new naming convention comments are welcome. --Reflex Reaction (talk)• 21:14, 11 January 2006 (UTC)

Great; I'll peruse shortly. You might also want to address individual TV episodes; see below for an example. E Pluribus Anthony | talk | 21:19, 11 January 2006 (UTC)

Using the noun "television" to disambiguate programs is the wrong standard.

The West Wing is not a type of television, it is a series made for television, or a "TV series" in the most commonly-used way to phrase it. As such (TV series) is more presentable. Think of it this way, we disambiguate movies/films with (film)... not (theatre) or (DVD), which are the mechanisms by which the product is seen. My last edit to Wikipedia:Naming conventions (television) (perm link) page reflects exactly my views on disambiguating TV programs. (P.S. We really should move this thread to the appropriate talk page.) -- Netoholic @

21:59, 11 January 2006 (UTC)

Not all disambiguations are "examples of..." there are just as many disambiguators which are clarifiers. For example,

Judge (policy debate). There is no confusion that Uranus is a type of mythology, or that school is a type of discipline. Using "television" is an appropriate way to disambiguate without adding unneeded complexity of differentiating things produced on television that are not series. --Reflex Reaction (talk

)• 22:39, 11 January 2006 (UTC)

Additionally, the naming convention for comics uses a single word (a noun) to disambiguate comic books, graphic novels, comic strips, comics creators and comics characters, despite their varied background and meaning. This convention make it so there is only only Wolverine (comics) not Wolverine (comic book character) or Wolverine (comic book series). --Reflex Reaction (talk)• 03:00, 12 January 2006 (UTC)

I prefer (television). With a year added if necessary, ie. Cinderella (1957 television). Mackerm 00:48, 12 January 2006 (UTC) Television would serve as a similar

I'm still opposed to using (television) by itself as the disambiguator for a TV program. The main article on TV shows and series is

Why not NAME (TV series), to perhaps distinguish between NAME (TV movie) (or NAME (TV series, YEAR) if needed), or the like? And given the abundance of discussion regarding this (and also that the above locale indicated by Netoholic is listed as inactive/invalid), I'm unsure where to place this comment. :) E Pluribus Anthony | talk | 08:11, 12 January 2006 (UTC)

What about this compromise: NAME (TV programme) ? We have a single disambiguation, and we have the "in sort of" meaning ? Lvr 10:16, 12 January 2006 (UTC)

Hmmm. I suggested the two above since there may be TV movies/specials that are dissimilar from series; TV is quite explicit in and of itself. And I'm sure someone would take exception to variant spellings of 'program/programme' no matter which was used. E Pluribus Anthony | talk | 11:21, 12 January 2006 (UTC)

I agree with E Pluribus on this point. Just looking at the first paragraph of

Television program shows four different naming conventions (program|programme|show), (series|season), (episode|show), (show|special), these different conventions can all be satisfied with (television). --Reflex Reaction (talk

)• 14:26, 12 January 2006 (UTC)

Great; I think TV (vis a vis television) should be used: it's common enough yet descriptive. Medium first, then type, then year/timeframe; so, how about something like this:

• NAME (TV xxxx):

• NAME (TV show) (general)
• NAME (TV series)
• NAME (TV mini-series)
• NAME (TV movie)
• etc.

or (time-indicative, if needed):

• NAME (TV xxxx, YEAR)

Any or all of these could include comics and other variants, or be tweaked to. Thoughts? E Pluribus Anthony | talk | 14:39, 12 January 2006 (UTC)

I just want to be clear, does (TV xxxx) mean that only (TV or television) is being used and when needed (xxxx) is used or would (TV xxxx) be the standard? Also in my opinion a movie is just that, a movie. If you look through some of the older comments (TV movie) is a U.S. phenomenon and breaks with the (film) convention. I don't think (TV movie) should be used unless absolutely needed for disambiguation. --Reflex Reaction (talk)• 14:56, 12 January 2006 (UTC)

In response to the first question: it depends. I believe it should only be used when clarity is required (i.e., otherwise defaulting to the common naming convention), but NAME (TV show), etc. could equally apply and be used as a standard if a consensus agreed to doing so. (I'd prefer any of the above to merely NAME (TV) or NAME (television), since those can be reckoned as adjectives and would undoubtedly be screaming for nouns!)

I disagree with the movie blurb: just because it's a US phenomenon (many things are), that doesn't obviate it. (Remember The Day After?) Movies are dually made for the box office and specifically for TV, and the convention should accommodate for that. E Pluribus Anthony | talk | 15:06, 12 January 2006 (UTC)

Because it doesn't look like I have been able to get a consensus on the naming convention, perhaps I can get a consensus on a poll (if there are no objections). There have been previous polls [1], [2], [3], but I would like to keep this one simple as possible using the preferred options from previous polls and current comments. If one of the options is chosen, then the prefix (TV or television) can be chosen. Insert other options if you feel there is an option missing. Proposed options for the poll

• (TV) or (television) with further disambiguation when needed, see draft naming convention
• (TV xxxx) or (television xxxx) where xxxx is the show type, typically series, movie or miniseries, see draft naming convention
• (TV show) or (television show) for most series and program(mes)
• (TV program)me or (television program)me for most series, program(mes) and shows

Support poll options

1. --Reflex Reaction (talk)• 16:54, 12 January 2006 (UTC)
2. I've no general objection to polls: instead, IMO, a poll should be mounted on the options themselves, not on whether or not we should poll on the options.
   (Continue to) Be bold! E Pluribus Anthony | talk
   | 20:15, 12 January 2006 (UTC)
3. Lvr 21:21, 12 January 2006 (UTC)

Oppose poll options

Star Trek series/naming conventions

Relatedly, this was a topic of some discussion regarding the various

I hope this is helpful; please let me know if you've any questions. E Pluribus Anthony | talk | 17:19, 11 January 2006 (UTC)

The proposed naming convention for television episodes is excellent and I'm sure helps to people get to the information that they are looking for rather than an episode for which they are not familiar. This suggestion may be applicable for other shows like the The Simpsons where individual episodes guides are available. Unfortunately it may not be appropriate disambiguating the individual television shows themselves where someone may be looking for the television rather than an episode. --Reflex Reaction (talk)• 21:32, 11 January 2006 (UTC)

Thanks; I understand. I suggest it only as a guide – maybe even a precedent – for the possible treatment and disambiguation of ep articles for series within other genres that share similar roots/names or have many incarnations (e.g., Law & Order, CSI, Survivor, et al.). Within the Star Trek guidelines indicated above, there are also clear conventions for naming of the discrete series, movies, and other items (largely harking of the common naming convention). While few other genres have the breadth of material in the Star Trek franchise, reflected in the ongoing creation/maintenance of articles for individual episodes/items, I'm sure a similar phenomenon may occur with other genres in time ... if not already. E Pluribus Anthony | talk | 21:47, 11 January 2006 (UTC)