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When styling a label (in [[Main page|label]]
), one can add the style code inside or outside the brackets:
[[Main page|''ABC'']]
→
ABC[[Main page|<span style="background: pink">DEF</span>]]
→
DEF'''[[Main page|GHK]]'''
→
GHK<span style="background: pink">[[Main page|LMN]]</span>
→
LMNBoth options work as expecteed, and no WP:LINTER errors reported. Special:ExpandTemplates does not alter them. My question is: is there a preferred convention in this? DePiep ( talk) 14:33, 26 February 2023 (UTC)
[[Main page|OPQ<sub>2</sub>]]
or [[Main page|RS''T'']]
, the formatting must be inside the label. Therefore if one wanted to have a preference, it might be a good idea to prefer the version that always works, rather than preferring the version that only works if the link label gets the same formatting throughout.[[Main page|RS''T'']]
reason given above, but only if it's what VE does. If VE puts the markup outside by default, then all bets are off and we just have to throw up our hands. —
SMcCandlish
☏
¢ 😼 02:33, 14 June 2023 (UTC)
[[This|''That'']]
and on the outside if for a simple link: ''[[This]]''
.
WhatamIdoing (
talk) 02:45, 14 June 2023 (UTC)The link in the edit summary for this edit should have been to wp:FIXTHEPROBLEM. Sorry about that. - Butwhatdoiknow ( talk) 20:07, 25 June 2023 (UTC)
Hi. An editor keeps on doing this, across the project. I've discussed this with him, and pointed him to wp:overlink. To no avail. Suggestions? 2603:7000:2101:AA00:ACA0:80D5:F00F:2AA1 ( talk) 03:36, 18 July 2023 (UTC)
genuine New York City topics can certainly link New York City.As to what constitutes a "genuine New York City topic", I agree that this does not include people born there and a vast array of adjunct topics, but I think something like an academic institution, a municipal election, a neighbourhood, a museum, a transit system, and so on— these should be allowed to link the city in which they're situated, regardless of which city it is. At least in the infobox. Probably not the prose. The fact that people know what New York City is doesn't mean they'll never have reason to navigate to its article, especially if they've just been reading one about a related topic. Folly Mox ( talk) 05:39, 9 August 2023 (UTC)
— Bagumba ( talk) 10:59, 9 August 2023 (UTC)The names of subjects with which most readers will be at least somewhat familiar. This generally includes major examples of...locations (e.g., New Delhi; New York City, or just New York if the city context is already clear; London, if the context rules out London, Ontario; Southeast Asia)
The assertion that some articles should never be linked to is ridiculous. Articles are not meant to be orphans with no incoming links and readers are not supposed to navigate Wikipedia solely by searching for articles. ElKevbo ( talk) 12:50, 9 August 2023 (UTC)
The first sentence should provide links to the broader or more elementary topics that are important to the article's topic or place it into the context where it is notable.
For example, an article about a building or location should include a link to the broader geographical area of which it is a part.
https://en.wikipedia.org/?title=R_Praggnanandhaa&diff=1171848036&oldid=1171845836
Is Rejoy2003's interpretation of MOS:GEOLINK correct? Khiikiat ( talk) 15:03, 23 August 2023 (UTC)
When linking to sections, but not piping the link(such as in see also sections or disambiguation pages), is Article § section preferred over Article#section? I ask this because there was a concern raised at my talk page. Ca talk to me! 07:20, 16 September 2023 (UTC)
Gioachino Rossini | |
---|---|
Born |
Pesaro, Italy | 29 February 1792
Died | 13 November 1868
Passy, Paris, France | (aged 76)
Works | List of compositions |
Two days ago, I opened a discussion at
Talk:Gioachino Rossini to debate the addition of an infobox. For those who may be unaware, WikiProject Composers has an age-old policy guideline that disallows infoboxes in composer biographies, but this has been changed in recent years. This question isn't about that; rather, this is about the inclusion of something within a possible Rossini infobox.
To the right is the infobox I proposed, similar in style to Mozart, Beethoven, Chopin, Shostakovich, Prokofiev, etc. The inclusion of the article link to "List of compositions" in the works parameter has been the subject of debate. @ Gerda Arendt and I state that the inclusion is justified because the link shows that Rossini was notable for composing and this is the standard on many other composer articles. @ Nikkimaria countered that MOS:FORCELINK, which is part of Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Linking, disallows these kinds of links per the words, "The text needs to make sense to readers who cannot follow links. Users may print articles or read offline, and Wikipedia content may be encountered in republished form, often without links." I argued that the very bullet point Nikki quoted also says, "Use a link when appropriate, but as far as possible do not force a reader to use that link to understand the sentence." (emphasis added) Infoboxes are certainly not sentences, but Nikki found this to still apply, since it "mak[es] it so readers could only understand the oeuvre of the article subject by following a link, which is what NOFORCELINK exists to combat".
So, now I am here. I understand the point Nikki is making and understand how it may apply to the infobox, but I want the input of people who frequent the MoS and deduce the sometime vague phrasing. Is the inclusion of the "List of compositions" link under the works parameter a violation of the MoS? MyCatIsAChonk ( talk) ( not me) ( also not me) ( still no) 00:18, 4 October 2023 (UTC)
|list_of_works=
)) and set the data row class in the infobox code to class="noprint"
. From what I understand from the noprint
class it will remove that piece of text from pinted versions.
Template:Infobox television episode does it with its episode list link.
Gonnym (
talk) 12:09, 9 November 2023 (UTC)
Use a link when appropriate, but as far as possible do not force a reader to use that link to understand the sentence. The text needs to make sense to readers who cannot follow links. Users may print articles or read offline, and Wikipedia content may be encountered in republished form, often without links.? If so, that is a guideline, not a policy. Also, it says
as far as possible, well, having the noprint class fixes most of the usage and that checks the "as far as possible" requirement. Unless you are referring to a different policy I missed in this discussion, there is no need for a RfC, unless you wish to start one. Gonnym ( talk) 12:54, 9 November 2023 (UTC)
gained fame for his 39 operas, so we already know he's notable for composing. And of course the link to List of compositions by Gioachino Rossini is already in the article, under "Music" in a {{ see also}}, so it's not something you'd have to hunt to find.
"gained fame for his 39 operas", that's what I'd expect to be linked in the infobox if a link is included in this parameter. If he's notable for the rest of his compositions similarly to his notability from operas, we could link both the articles and update the lead sentence to reflect that. Folly Mox ( talk) 15:26, 4 October 2023 (UTC)
Gioachino Rossini | |
---|---|
Born |
Pesaro, Italy | 29 February 1792
Died | 13 November 1868
Passy, Paris, France | (aged 76)
Works |
@ Folly Mox, I was completely unaware of the list of operas, how silly of me. To the right is proposal two, with a similar format to Taylor Swift- thoughts? MyCatIsAChonk ( talk) ( not me) ( also not me) ( still no) 20:53, 4 October 2023 (UTC)
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
The MOS currently advises If quoting hypertext, add an editorial note, [link in original] or [link added], as appropriate.
In practice, though, I almost never see this, as these parentheticals would generally cost more in terms of interrupting the reading flow than they'd provide in clarity benefit. Could we reconsider this advice? Perhaps not note "link added" and only note "link in original" when it's deemed significant to the quote's point? Or perhaps consider advising a footnote or some other less-intrusive means of providing the disclaimer? {{u|
Sdkb}}
talk 07:50, 4 October 2023 (UTC)
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
Editors in the taxonomy space use redlinks across entire lists
like this. Is this acceptable? The taxonomy folks in the WikipProject Tree of Life seem to prefer it this way, but from a non-expert reader's point of view, it seems a bit ugly and seems to violate the MOS guideline here: In lists, overlinking red links can occur when every item on a list is a red link. If the list is uniform, where each item is obviously qualified for an article, a single red link (or blue link) could indicate that.
Pyrrho the Skipper (
talk) 14:50, 9 October 2023 (UTC)
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
In many articles, the first sentence is more blue than black. Example: Z-transform. If that's indeed what we want, we should mention it here. ◅ Sebastian Helm 🗨 10:06, 23 October 2023 (UTC)
If that's indeed what we want...You'll need to be more specific about the "that" principles to which you are referring to. For reference, MOS:LEADLINK reads:
— Bagumba ( talk) 23:17, 23 October 2023 (UTC)Too many links can make the lead hard to read. In technical articles that use uncommon terms, a higher-than-usual link density in the lead section may be necessary.
What generally should not be linked is written from an absolute point of view: It stipulates a selection of links that is the same for every article, by using only such criteria as “everyday words” and “countries”. But does that really make sense for an article about a specialized topic? Example: The article Z-transform currently links such articles as multiplication, real number and numerator. What is the use case for these? In other words: Do we really think such a specialized article will be read by people who will need to look these up? ◅ Sebastian Helm 🗨 10:32, 23 October 2023 (UTC)
If we want an absolute statement here, how about giving a proportion that works well in our experience, such as: “If an article contains more than one link for every 400 bytes (as can be seen from its latest history entry), it may be overlinked, if less than one for every 1200 bytes, it may be underlinked”? ◅ Sebastian Helm 🗨 10:54, 23 October 2023 (UTC)
Greetings and felicitations. This topic isn't mentioned in the project page, and a brief search of this talk page's archives (not including the those in the sidebar) did not turn up anything relevant. In my opinion it is best to start with Wikimedia project links, followed by official links (edit: and then everything else), but is there any consensus on this? — DocWatson42 ( talk) 06:27, 6 November 2023 (UTC)
When adding the first citation of Mohammed Dajani Daoudi [1], first using Virtual Editor and then source editor, I tried to make a direct link from Fathom Journal/fathomjournal to the Fathom journal section of Britain Israel Communications and Research Centre based on the examples of Template:Section link but either the article and section titles were italicised or error notices appeared. In the end I left it as a link to Fathom Journal which redirects to the Centre. Should it be possible to make a direct link from the citation to the section? Mcljlm ( talk) 22:17, 14 November 2023 (UTC)
References
The redirect MOS: LINK has been listed at redirects for discussion to determine whether its use and function meets the redirect guidelines. Readers of this page are welcome to comment on this redirect at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2023 December 5 § MOS: LINK until a consensus is reached. Utopes ( talk / cont) 04:03, 5 December 2023 (UTC)
The redirect MOS: NOPIPE has been listed at redirects for discussion to determine whether its use and function meets the redirect guidelines. Readers of this page are welcome to comment on this redirect at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2023 December 5 § MOS: NOPIPE until a consensus is reached. Utopes ( talk / cont) 04:04, 5 December 2023 (UTC)
The redirect MOS: OL has been listed at redirects for discussion to determine whether its use and function meets the redirect guidelines. Readers of this page are welcome to comment on this redirect at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2023 December 5 § MOS: OL until a consensus is reached. Utopes ( talk / cont) 04:04, 5 December 2023 (UTC)
After the Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Linking/Archive_21#DL,_sections,_and_mobile_readers RFC, which demonstrated overwhelming consensus in support of relaxing the "once per article" rule for links to "once per section", RFC closer Mike Christie made a perfectly reasonable edit-of-least-disruption to the page, altering the introduction of MOS:DUPLINK like so:
Generally, a link should appear only once in an article, but it may be repeated if helpful for readers, such as in infoboxes, tables, image captions, footnotes, hatnotes, and at the first occurrence
after the leadin a section.
Reasonable, sure. Least-disruptive, sure. But... accurate?
Now more than ever, the actual rules we've settled on contradict the statement, "Generally, a link should appear only once in an article". Whether or not that was even accurate before (given the long list of exceptions), in the wake of the RFC it certainly doesn't seem right anymore.
Generally, the community expressed broad consensus for generally eliminating that restriction, and links are now permitted once per section, generally. So, why are we still opening with a statement of the policy as it (generally) maybe used to be?
IMHO we should bite the bullet, embrace the change, and open with something like:
Generally, a term should be linked at most once in each section of an article, the first time it's mentioned in that section. Subsequent repetitions should not be linked. (Note that this is a maximum link frequency; if it's relevant to link a term in one section, but not relevant in another, the term is not required to be linked in both. Common sense should always prevail.)
Outside of the body text, additional mentions of the same term may be linked if helpful for readers, such as in infoboxes, tables, image captions, footnotes, and hatnotes.
FeRDNYC ( talk) 15:47, 21 December 2023 (UTC)
That appears to get the same messages across in much less wording. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼 01:52, 18 January 2024 (UTC)Link a term at most once per section, at first occurrence. Common sense applies; do not re-link in other sections if not contextually important there. Other mentions may be linked if helpful, such as in infoboxes, tables, image captions, footnotes, and hatnotes.
Very belatedly (see below) implemented the re-wording provided by SMcCandlish, who sure do use them words all purty-like. ...With the word "major" shoe-horned in before "section", because in the interim someone had taken the time to shoe-horn it into the old wording as well, and even stuffed an unnecessarily verbose explanation of the precisely-imprecise contextual meaning of "major" into a footnote (also preserved) to accompany it.
What was the holdup, ya bum?
|
---|
(In my defense, back in October my left thumb went "offline", requiring surgery early February which resulted in my left hand being in a cast for weeks afterwards. Any activity involving typing has been neglected of late, on my part.)
|
Anyway, Done FeRDNYC ( talk) 08:51, 22 March 2024 (UTC)
someone ... even stuffed an unnecessarily verbose explanation of the precisely-imprecise contextual meaning of "major" into a footnoteHeh, turns out that was also SMcCandlish's doing! FeRDNYC ( talk) 08:56, 22 March 2024 (UTC)
I've proposed updating Template:Infobox company's documentation to avoid a potential MOS:EGG issue. Please give your thoughts in that discussion. Ed [talk] [OMT] 01:24, 12 January 2024 (UTC)
add
− | + | {{pp-semi-indef|small=yes}} |
103.253.27.33 ( talk) 22:32, 14 January 2024 (UTC)
Currently NOFORCELINK says Use a link when appropriate, but as far as possible do not force a reader to use that link to understand the sentence. The text needs to make sense to readers who cannot follow links. Users may print articles or read offline, and Wikipedia content may be encountered in republished form, often without links.
. The literal interpretation of this My interpretation of this is that it requires that every word that could be considered specialist ("
turboprop", "
action platformer", "
Laplace transform", "
endpaper", ...) be explained in the text. I believe this is impossible and would be bad writing if it were possible. This
has come up before, so I'll ping in everyone who was in that conversation, but what prompted me to post here was seeing a request from
Gog the Mild in
a current FAC (nominated by
Aoba47) to clarify "action platformer". I think Gog's request is in sync with what NOFORCELINK actually says, but I don't think the change they are requesting is desirable.
In the discussion from last year, linked above, I wrote if knowledgeable readers feel that the flow is being broken up too much by inline explanations, non-knowledgeable readers should accept that, and be willing to accept links instead, or, if absolutely necessary, an explanatory note
, and
NebY was kind enough to say they thought this was a guiding principle. I won't repeat the examples from the linked discussion, but I recommend reading it as there are good arguments made on both sides.
I propose we insert into NOFORCELINK a form of words that codifies the "guiding principle" quoted. I think this is going to be difficult to do because we can't explicitly give a local discussion at a WikiProject authority over other editors -- this is the WP:LOCALCONSENSUS point that SMcCandlish often argues, and he's quite right. I think it's worth trying to do because as it stands NOFORCELINK has no get-out clause for an editor who argues that "bench-clearing brawl" requires an in-text explanation in an article about a baseball game. NebY's example in the prior discussion parodies what such an article would look like, and is a better argument than anything I could come up with.
If we can't add something like this, at least we should weaken the guidance to make it clear there are exceptions. Maths is the most obvious exception, to me, but the wording should make it clearer what the limits of "as far as possible" are, and to weaken or remove "The text needs to make sense to readers who cannot follow links."
Pinging from previous discussion and the current FAC: J Milburn, Lee Vilenski, Bagumba, Uanfala. Mike Christie ( talk - contribs - library) 22:52, 17 January 2024 (UTC)
A prime number (or a prime) is a natural number greater than 1 that is not a product of two smaller natural numbers.Here the terms "natural number" and "product" are linked, but not explained, because if you do not know how to count and multiply, you are not ready to learn about prime numbers. "Greater than" is not linked but in the same boat. This is not so much an issue of accessibility as of making our articles self-contained to those who can benefit from reading them. — David Eppstein ( talk) 00:40, 18 January 2024 (UTC)
Do not unnecessarily make a reader chase links: if a highly technical term can be simply explained with very few words, do so.Hawkeye7 (discuss) 00:50, 18 January 2024 (UTC)
There is a separate question of where to put explanations when they are needed. I generally put them in footnotes, not inline, because the explanations are distracting and break the flow of the text.
Jo-Jo Eumerus ( talk) 09:33, 18 January 2024 (UTC)John Higgins made a century break of 104.- a century break is a phrase that under the current wording would have to be explained in every snooker article as "a series of shots which gives a score of over 100 in one turn", which is overkill except in the article in which we link. However, you can easily move on from this sentence if you dont know what a century break is, it's enough to know that he did a thing.
the event was played as a double-elimination tournament.I think most readers would have difficulty understanding this, and even if you do know what this is, you wouldn't worry too much about a later sentence saying
players who lost one match would be moved to the "loser's side" of the bracket and be eliminated after a second loss.for example. The last thing we should do is be explaining every link inline. Imagine if we had to explain what a goal, a battle or a table is. Lee Vilenski ( talk • contribs) 10:00, 18 January 2024 (UTC)
as far as possible. Articles are not limited to experts, but it shouldn't be bogged down for people with a bit of familiarity. WP:ONEDOWN is mentioned by some below.— Bagumba ( talk) 09:54, 19 January 2024 (UTC)
Users may print articles or read offline, and Wikipedia content may be encountered in republished form, often without linksis an obsolete concept. Wiki says
A wiki ... is a form of online hypertext publicationRight there in the lead sentence it emphasizes "online" as well as "hypertext". These are fundamental attributes of what we are.
Gog's point that a change to NOFORCELINK would mostly affect FAC seems plausible to me, so I searched the promoted FAC pages for uses of NOFORCELINK and FORCELINK. That only finds the few reviewers who use this shortcut rather than simply requesting further explanations without linking to the MoS; there are certainly other reviewers who make the same points. With that caveat, here are some of the results. Some of these seem clearly legitimate requests and are why we have NOFORCELINK; others seem to me to be requesting more than is needed. I tried searching for "gloss" but in many of the results I found the comment was "since there's no link for this specialist term we need a gloss instead"; those are not relevant as the reviewer is clearly saying that just a link is enough.
In a couple of cases below I've given the outcome, just to reinforce the point that many of these are perfectly legitimate applications of NOFORCELINK.
member of the Société Honoraire de Françaisfrom the FAC for Lisa Nowak. Nominators Neopeius and Hawkeye7; reviewer requesting the explanation The Rambling Man. Current wording in the article:
member of the Société Honoraire de Français, which required students to maintain an A average in French and a B average in all other subjects. I think a link would have sufficed here.
possibly because of Jacobite sympathiesfrom the FAC for Thomas Hardy (Royal Navy officer, died 1732). Nominator Pickersgill-Cunliffe; reviewer requesting the explanation Gog the Mild. Current wording in the article:
possibly because, as a Tory, he continued to support the deposed House of Stuart after the succession of the House of Hanover. Particularly given that this is in the lead I think the expansion was the right call.
137 breakfrom the FAC for 2022 World Snooker Championship. Nominator Lee Vilenski; reviewer Gog the Mild. I think this is the one that led to the last NOFORCELINK discussion.
frigatein the FAC for HMS Aigle (1801). Nominator Ykraps; reviewer Gog the Mild.
"a metal cast plaque in champlevé (carved) enamelin the FAC for Clonmacnoise Crozier. Nominator Ceoil; reviewer Gog the Mild. Current wording in the article is simplified rather than expanded:
in champlevé enamel.
"Tribal Hidage"in the FAC for Benty Grange hanging bowl. Nominator Usernameunique; reviewer UndercoverClassicist.
hero pulpand
weird menacein the FAC for The Spider (magazine). Nominator Mike Christie; reviewer UndercoverClassicist.
Chagatai literaturein the FAC for Fuzuli (poet). Nominator Golden; reviewer UndercoverClassicist.
David suggested that WP:ONEDOWN is the principle that should be used to determine whether more than a link is required. I like that idea in theory but would like to see that it would be helpful in resolving the above examples. For example, in the FAC for The Spider, UC requested glosses for "weird menace" and "hero pulp". Is the ONEDOWN level a reader who knows about pulp magazines but not about this one? If so no gloss is needed. Or is the ONEDOWN level a reader who knows about the magazine industry but not pulps? In which case a gloss is likely to be helpful. Mike Christie ( talk - contribs - library) 13:40, 18 January 2024 (UTC)
Over the years, FAC reviewers pushed me to avoid more and more technical terms. In hindsight, I am pretty happy about that, as I want people to understand these articles. I am still surprised how much is possible here that really makes a difference to the reader. Providing in-text explanations is only one possible solution. Sometimes, a little hint is sufficient (e.g., writing " Late Cretaceous epoch" instead of just "Late Cretaceous"). Often, it is possible to replace the term with a more widely understood one without sacrificing too much precision, or even replacing the term with an explanation. But I first had to learn this the hard way, which was not easy, and I was quite reluctant to stop using terms that, for me, are part of every-day language. So I think that having a guideline that pushes authors towards this direction is not necessarily a bad thing!
But we always have to remember: It is not our goal to strictly abide to guidelines. Our goal is to write the best-possible articles. Guidelines can only help us with that, but they can never be the goal themselves. When we start optimizing our articles to comply with a guideline, article quality tends to improve – but there inevitably comes a point where we over-optimize and article quality decreases sharply. Therefore, a reviewer should not make the mistake to blindly check an article against a particular guideline and oppose because of non-compliance, possibly without even reading the article. Instead, a reviewer should always have our primary goal in mind (to improve the article), and apply common sense with respect to the article in question, asking "could this article be improved by more closely abiding to that guideline"? -- Jens Lallensack ( talk) 16:12, 18 January 2024 (UTC)
Hyperlinking allows us to provide our readers a higher level of service than is possible in print media. We shouldn't try to emulate that high level by also adding inline explanations that are disruptive for most readers, even those who aren't online.
Print readers know very well that if we see unfamiliar terms, we may have to look elsewhere for definitions. Sometimes we make a good guess, sometimes we keep going because we're not trying to understand everything, sometimes we'll find a glossary in the back, grab a dictionary or primer, or look on Wikipedia. Print writers and publishers know they'll lose their target audience if they keep interrupting their reading, and WP editors should learn from them if we really are writing for those who print our pages (an ever-shrinking proportion of readers in this digital age, plus some publishers of expensive print-on-demand collections of our articles).
Happily, many of our articles, even FAs, don't explain inline and often don't even link (century break, to take one of Lee's examples above, top of the fourth, right field foul pole and the others I mentioned before, or second yellow card, edging a delivery, or false flat). They're still good articles. Wikipedia editors shouldn't be told to degrade them to cater for print readers in ways that print publishers can't and don't. NebY ( talk) 18:13, 18 January 2024 (UTC)
If the term can be explained in two or three words, an inline description might be appropriate. If not, then I'm of the opinion that a link on its own is the better option. After all, isn't that the great advantage of a digital encyclopaedia. I certainly wouldn't fail a FAC because of NOFORCELINK but might insist on a footnote where no link is available. -- Ykraps ( talk) 18:56, 18 January 2024 (UTC)
There's enough support above for something based on ONEDOWN to try to formulate something here. Currently NOFORCELINK says:
Use a link when appropriate, but as far as possible do not force a reader to use that link to understand the sentence. The text needs to make sense to readers who cannot follow links. Users may print articles or read offline, and Wikipedia content may be encountered in republished form, often without links.
and ONEDOWN says:
A general technique for increasing accessibility is to consider the typical level where the topic is studied (for example, secondary, undergraduate, or postgraduate) and write the article for readers who are at the previous level. Thus articles on undergraduate topics can be aimed at a reader with a secondary school background, and articles on postgraduate topics can be aimed at readers with some undergraduate background. The lead section should be particularly understandable, but the advice to write one level down can be applied to the entire article, increasing the overall accessibility. Writing one level down also supports our goal to provide a tertiary source on the topic, which readers can use before they begin to read other sources about it.
ONEDOWN is an essay so rather than refer to it I think we have to rephrase it and summarize it. How about these extra sentences?
The text needs to make sense to readers who are at or one step below a level of study that would familiarize them with the material. For example, in an article on spinal medical issues, it would suffice to link facetectomy without an inline explanation; if the term were used in an article about general medical treatment it might need a footnoted explanation, and in an article not about medicine at all, the meaning of the term would have to be explained inline.
This is just a way to get the wording discussion started; please criticize or suggest changes or improvements. Mike Christie ( talk - contribs - library) 15:05, 19 January 2024 (UTC)
It is recommended to provide inline explanations for terms that are crucial for the understanding of the text or might be unfamiliar to the target readership. However, the article should find a balance between the number and length of inline explanations and the overall conciseness and readability of the article.Jens Lallensack ( talk) 17:00, 19 January 2024 (UTC)
It is recommended to provide inline explanations for the most difficult terms of an article, so that the widest possible audience can directly understand the article in general terms without having to follow wiki-links.This still retains some element of ONEDOWN as it is restricted to the "most difficult terms" ("most difficult" relative to the overall technicality of the article in question). But yes, this would mean that even the baseball article should provide such explanations to a reasonable extent (and I think, why not?). Jens Lallensack ( talk) 23:40, 19 January 2024 (UTC)
Do not unnecessarily make a reader chase links: if a highly technical term can be simply explained with very few words, do so.– which seems to cover our baseline quite well already. We also have the WP:MTAU guideline stating
Wikipedia articles should be written for the widest possible general audience, which points out many different possible ways to make an article understandable, and ONEDOWN is already covered there. If, in a FAC, an article is too technical in our opinion, we can still push for better comprehensibility by pointing at those guidelines. -- Jens Lallensack ( talk) 12:15, 20 January 2024 (UTC)
Do not unnecessarily make a reader chase links: if a highly technical term can be simply explained with very few words, do sofrom the MoS? It strikes me that everyone here is in agreement with that principle: it then creates a discussion around the word unnecessarily, which is where the nuance of each individual situation can come in.
Use a link when appropriate, but as far as possible do not force a reader to use that link to understand the sentence. The text needs to make sense to readers who cannot follow links. Users may print articles or read offline, and Wikipedia content may be encountered in republished form, often without links. I fear now that this is just not helpful. Does it mean that every important term should be explained in-line (which is arguably "possible")? We would keep
Do not unnecessarily make a reader chase links: if a highly technical term can be simply explained with very few words, do so.We could formulate this one a bit more strictly if needed. But my argument is now that this sentence is enough, and that the alternative wordings suggested above by Mike and me are basically redundant to this and the WP:MTAU guideline. Jens Lallensack ( talk) 13:28, 20 January 2024 (UTC)
Do not unnecessarily make a reader chase links: if a term that is highly technical, given the likely readership of the article, can be simply explained with very few words, do so? Mike Christie ( talk - contribs - library) 14:20, 20 January 2024 (UTC)
Use a link when appropriate, but as far as possible do not force a reader to use that link to understand the sentenceis sound: if we think that all readers will understand the term without following the link, there's no need to explain it: conversely, as far as possible gives a way out if an explanation is felt to be impractical. '' UndercoverClassicist T· C 14:28, 20 January 2024 (UTC)
if a highly technical term(formatting mine) -- which suggests that we generally don't explain, unless the term is highly technical -- and
as far as possible do not force a reader to use that link to understand the sentence, which errs on the side of explanation. There are plenty of terms that may not be highly technical but which many of our readers, through reasons of age, first language, education, interest etc ( WP:POPE), will not understand -- I think we should generally expect editors to explain them, at least when prodded to do so at FAC, unless there's a good reason to do otherwise. UndercoverClassicist T· C 14:51, 20 January 2024 (UTC)
At the start of a sentence, use a capital letter. You should use a capital letter for proper nouns.
Unjustified changes from one acceptable, consistently-applied style in an article to a different style may generally be reverted.
A title should be a recognizable name or description of the topic that is natural, sufficiently precise, concise, and consistent with those of related articles. If these criteria are in conflict, they should be balanced against one another.
Normally use nouns or noun phrases: Early life, not In early life
In rare cases, a hyphen can improve clarity if a rewritten alternative is awkward, but rewording is usually preferable
I'll just point out that explanations of 'technical' language don't always have to be inline. Footnotes are also a good way of allowing the text in the body to flow naturally for those who understand the topic while providing an on-the-page explanation for those who don't catch every nuance of every word or term. My personal preference is to keep the body's language understandable enough for as wide a selection of an English speaking audience as we can, but sometimes that's not always easy without dumbing down and annoying a large proportion of readers, so some flexibility in the MOS, the writing and the readers is required, although it's doubtful you'll ever manage to please anything but one of those groups at any point. - SchroCat ( talk) 15:44, 20 January 2024 (UTC)
if knowledgeable readers feel that the flow is being broken up too much by inline explanations, non-knowledgeable readers should accept that, and be willing to accept links instead, or, if absolutely necessary, an explanatory note. Ideally the test would be to always have a neutral and knowledgeable reviewer who can assess if the article could be expressed more simply. If we don't have that reviewer available I don't think we should be insisting that the article be fully understandable without following links to whoever is the most knowledgeable reviewer who shows up, no matter how far from knowledgeable they may be in practice. (This is part of the broader problem at FAC of lack of subject-matter expert reviews.) Mike Christie ( talk - contribs - library) 16:30, 20 January 2024 (UTC)
Do not unnecessarily make a reader chase links. If a technical term can be explained without disrupting the flow of the article for a knowledgeable reader, do so? Mike Christie ( talk - contribs - library) 16:49, 20 January 2024 (UTC)
Do not unnecessarily make a reader chase links. If a technical term can be explained without disrupting the flow of the article, do so. Inline explanation or footnotes can be especially helpful when a technical term is likely to be unknown to many readers and unlikely to be intuited in context; must be understood to understand the sentence in general terms; or is difficult to understand in the context of the sentence by consulting the wiki-linked article.(Wording partly based on what NebY posted above). I am not sure if that second part is needed, but let me know what you think. Jens Lallensack ( talk) 20:06, 20 January 2024 (UTC)
Do not unnecessarily make a reader chase links. If a technical term can be explained without disrupting the flow of the article for a knowledgeable reader, do so. My hope is that including the point about "the flow of the article for the knowledgeable reader" covers the baseball case but "do so" doesn't prevent us from expanding and explaining as much as possible. It's an attempt to say the same thing as ONEDOWN without requiring the levels implied by ONEDOWN to be defined. Mike Christie ( talk - contribs - library) 20:10, 20 January 2024 (UTC)
There's the beginnings of a consensus above on a proposed wording, so I am pulling it out to make a clear proposed change. I've changed the first sentence of the version discussed above to match NOFORCELINK's existing phrasing, both to make this a minimal change and because the compressed version isn't as clear.
I propose we change NOFORCELINK from
Do not unnecessarily make a reader chase links: if a highly technical term can be simply explained with very few words, do so. Use a link when appropriate, but as far as possible do not force a reader to use that link to understand the sentence. The text needs to make sense to readers who cannot follow links. Users may print articles or read offline, and Wikipedia content may be encountered in republished form, often without links.
to
Use a link when appropriate, but as far as possible do not force a reader to use that link to understand the sentence. If a technical term can be explained without unduly disrupting the flow of the article for a knowledgeable reader, do so.
This is not a formal RfC but if anyone thinks it necessary I can make it one. In any case I'd rather wait to do that until we see if this form of words does have significant support. Mike Christie ( talk - contribs - library) 23:03, 20 January 2024 (UTC)
Do not unnecessarily make a reader chase links: if a highly technical term can be simply explained with very few words, do so.in addition, or is this going to be replaced, too? Jens Lallensack ( talk) 23:24, 20 January 2024 (UTC)
No objections so far, and (counting Jens and Hawkeye7 above) four supports for this version. If there are no objections in the next week or so I will make the change. Mike Christie ( talk - contribs - library) 11:41, 22 January 2024 (UTC)
I like
Jens Lallensack's earlier suggestion at
#Working proposals (above) to add unduly: If a technical term can be explained without unduly disrupting the flow of the article for a knowledgeable reader, do so.
It hopefully conveys that some knowledgeable readers might be somewhat disrupted by a "dumbed down" version, but it's for the common goal of making the article more widely accessible.—
Bagumba (
talk) 16:02, 22 January 2024 (UTC)
I'm concerned that this is the sort of thing that is very subjective, and may be applied inconsistently at FAC, which as has been pointed out, is the only place it really matters. At the very least, I'd like to see some examples given. Wehwalt ( talk) 19:15, 22 January 2024 (UTC)
I'm also more sympathetic to Gog's view above - I'd prefer to privilege the non-expert reader. Nikkimaria ( talk) 03:14, 23 January 2024 (UTC)
After Brooklyn was retired in order in the top of the third inning, Oeschger doubled to center field to lead off the home half of the inning, and Powell sacrificed him to third base, from a recently promoted FA, can't be usefully explained to a non-expert reader without ruining the reading experience for a baseball aficionado. The current version of NOFORCELINK, in my view, makes no allowance for this limitation, and the revised wording is intended to address that -- to promote inline explanations (with the "do so" at the end of the revised wording) but acknowledge that this simplification has to be limited to avoid making the article unfit for expert readers.
I suspect in a lot of areas, the matter under discussion is just not capable of being explained in a few words to those who know nothing about dinosaurs, or baseball, or mathematics: I see the frustration of having to respond to comments that we feel are unwise or ill-judged, but would it be so much of a hardship to write something like "yes, this bit's a little specialist, but there isn't really a good way to explain all of this without disrupting the flow (see MOS:NOFORCELINK), and the details are only really of interest to people who already know the basics"? It strikes me that the proposed wording, by having the word unduly, gives a very clear route to explain why an inline explanation has not been offered in a specific case. I'd hope that reviewers would consider their own sense of how disruptive an explanation would be before offering such a comment -- therefore, that if they did ask for an explanation, they would do so believing that it could be done without causing a major problem. UndercoverClassicist T· C 13:21, 23 January 2024 (UTC)
Use a link when appropriate, but if a technical term can be explained without unduly disrupting the flow of the article for a knowledgeable reader, do so. Try not to force a reader to use the link to understand the sentence."Try not to" may be too weak but a bald "Avoid" might be too strong; is there something suitable in between? NebY ( talk) 14:00, 23 January 2024 (UTC)
Use a link when appropriate. If it is possible to explain technical terms inline, do so, but use editorial judgement as to whether this can be done without unduly disrupting the flow of the article.. I think Wehwalt made a judgement call (for the baseball article) that almost any inline explanations would be disruptive, and I agree. I don't see how the current wording of NOFORCELINK permits that and I think that should be fixed. Mike Christie ( talk - contribs - library) 08:11, 25 January 2024 (UTC)
undulyis, by definition, a matter of judging what is
[due]. How would one assess that if not by
us[ing] editorial judgement? UndercoverClassicist T· C 08:53, 25 January 2024 (UTC)
appropriate,
unduly-- that already call for judgement, but I can see the value in explicitly invoking it. However, I can see the value in reinforcing the point that this is a particularly subjective "rule". UndercoverClassicist T· C 10:07, 25 January 2024 (UTC)
Use a link when appropriate. If it is possible to explain technical terms inline, do so, but use editorial judgement as to whether this can be done without unduly disrupting the flow of the article? Mike Christie ( talk - contribs - library) 13:31, 25 January 2024 (UTC)
I'm going to stop trying to find a form of words that can get general support. I still think the existing wording does not reflect actual practice, and it would be better to find wording that reflects what we really do: we do try to improve readability for non-experts, but the reasons we don't or can't always move very far in that direction are not acknowledged in the current wording. However, the MoS is a guideline, not policy, and at FAC a nominator can always say they think the application of a MoS rule doesn't make sense for a given article. Mike Christie ( talk - contribs - library) 06:47, 26 January 2024 (UTC)
I'm reviewing Beulé Gate by UndercoverClassicist right now. The following sentence reminded me of this discussion:
The area above the central doorway is decorated in the Doric order, and consists of an architrave in Pentelic marble, topped with marble metopes and triglyphs and made from a variety of limestone known as poros stone. Above the metopes and triglyphs is a geison with mutules, itself topped with an attic
There's nine different linked terms there and I don't konw what any of them means. Yet, the sentence makes complete sense and I know how to click to get more detail on any of them if I want. If this sentence was rewritten with parenthetical explanations for each of those terms, it would be crazy complicated and distinctly less readable. — Preceding unsigned comment added by RoySmith ( talk • contribs) 00:22, 30 January 2024 (UTC)
Use a link when appropriate, but if a technical term can be explained without unduly disrupting the flow of the article for a knowledgeable reader, do so., I'd give this as precisely the reason unduly is included: we're talking about architectural minutiae, so the details here are pretty immaterial to most readers: the value of the inline explanations is outweighed by the cost of doing so. Incidentally: thank you for raising this here -- it's helped me spot a couple of mistakes! UndercoverClassicist T· C 07:27, 30 January 2024 (UTC)
Editors interested in MOS:NOPIPE, and the use, creation, and modification of piped links in Visual Editor may be interested in the discussion going on at WP:VPT#Piped links with VisualEditor. Thanks, Mathglot ( talk) 23:40, 3 February 2024 (UTC)
Since we've changed the duplink policy to be links may or may not be suitable for the first time in a section, I've had users change this for all section headers (so even for level four headers, they have a new link). Can I confirm that when we say the first usage per section, we mean the first use per level 2 header? Lee Vilenski ( talk • contribs) 15:39, 4 February 2024 (UTC)
It's normal and expected for editorial consensus to be reached on an per-article basis; we treat all of MoS this way with regard to a guideline line-item that has interpretational wiggle-room, and this is by design. (Remember that MoS is not a policy, and is intended to produce consistent and useful content for readers, and secondarily to settle inter-editor disputes about style, broadly defined.) While wikiprojects coming to a "local consensus" on such a matter across a category of articles can sometimes be problematic per WP:CONLEVEL policy (namely, when those editors' preference is against a site-wide consensus, or conflicts with equally principled preferences of editors who are not part of that in-crowd; see, e.g., WP:ARBINFOBOX), in a case like this there is no issue, because all the articles in the affected group are structurally the same, so a page-by-page re-discussion of the same question would be a redundant waste of editorial time. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼 19:05, 26 February 2024 (UTC)
There is currently a discussion about MOS:FORCELINK's application in infoboxes. Any feedback from knowledgeable editors would be greatly appreciated. Thanks! Nemov ( talk) 21:21, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
In articles about CJK (Chinese, Japanese, and Korean) cultures, tons of Wiktionary links have been added to non-English terms (they usually use Template:Linktext). Is this overlinking or not? I started to think that they are overlinking, but it does not seem that MOS:OVERLINK directly says something about this. 172.56.232.211 ( talk) 05:56, 6 March 2024 (UTC)
The essay Wikipedia:Writing better articles § Use other languages sparingly says:Non-English terms should be used sparingly.
Foreign words that are not that common in English, when used, should have a MOS:SIMPLEGLOSS.— Bagumba ( talk) 07:21, 6 March 2024 (UTC)It is fine to include foreign terms as extra information, but avoid writing articles that can only be understood if the reader understands the foreign terms.
This topic is about whether it is ever preferable to use a redirect link in a pipe.
Joy and I are in a minor editorial dispute over my post-move activities after the close of an RM resulting in the move of Bojana (river) to Buna (Adriatic Sea). I have made various edits to articles that link to the resulting "Bojana (river)" redirect, and have been cleaning up the piped links when encountering the following typical scenarios:
Irrespective of whether the term after the pipe is Buna or Bojana, I have been changing the link (before the pipe) to "Buna (Adriatic Sea)" with the rationale that the link in a piped link should always be the direct link, producing:
Joy on the other hand has suggested on my talk page that if the term presented to the reader is "Bojana", the piped link markup should remain as follows:
... and that changing the piped link in this case to [[Buna (Adriatic Sea)|Bojana]] is a "pointless activity" that should not be done and is worthy of being reverted.
It appears that she has not contested changing [[Bojana (river)|Buna]] to [[Buna (Adriatic Sea)|Buna]].
I am of the opinion that in no case do we maintain piping through redirects as a good practice, and that it is completely irrelevant whether the term after the pipe is "Buna" or "Bojana"; the term before the pipe should always be the direct link, not a redirect link. This is because we don't want to introduce the reader to the name of the redirect which they hadn't previously seen, because it's hidden in the piped link markup, and it's preferable to link directly whenever possible, and not through a redirect. Joy, on the other hand suggests that piping through a redirect that is similar to the term visible to the reader, which produces the redirection notification at the destination article, is useful.
Should the MOS be clearer that piped links and redirect links are different techniques that should not be mixed, and that only direct links should be used before the pipe, and not redirect links?
MOS:DABPIPE says that Piping and redirects are two different mechanisms
and
WP:PIPE says Do not confuse piped links and redirects
. But should
MOS:PIPE also say something about this? Something like:
When piping, the reader should be led to the destination article directly, and not through a redirect.
— Alalch E. 23:53, 5 April 2024 (UTC)
[[Bojana (river)|]]
(with nothing after the pipe). On storing the page, our software autoconverts such links to [[Bojana (river)|Bojana]]
. Such autogenerated piped links are fine, very common (in fact the most frequent kind of piped link, I would suspect) and thanks to our redirect mechanism, they'll continue to work as before if a page was moved. So why should you change the invisible URL to use "Buna" if you leave the visible word ("Bojana") intact? There is really no reason to so do.
Gawaon (
talk) 06:35, 6 April 2024 (UTC)MOS:GEOLINK gives two examples: Sydney, Australia; and Buffalo, New York, United States. This creates an ambiguity, which Pi.1415926535 and I agreed to raise here after it came up in a GAN: Is the point of the two examples that the link should span all words except the country name, or do they describe two alternate approaches, meaning that one can equally write " Buffalo, New York, United States"? For that matter, could one write " Sydney, Australia"?
I think clarity on this would be helpful. I don't hugely care about what answer is settled on, although as I've said at the GAN, I do think that there's a moderate accessibility benefit to the linked text spanning only the city name: I have difficulty distinguishing black from blue in small quantities, and, if I hadn't modified my common.css to address that, " Buffalo, New York" and " Buffalo, New York" would look almost identical to me, making it unclear, when I click on "New York" there, where I'm going to be taken. -- Tamzin[ cetacean needed ( they|xe) 03:42, 18 April 2024 (UTC)
[[Buffalo, New York|Buffalo]], New York
would just be needlessly convoluted.
Gawaon (
talk) 15:30, 18 April 2024 (UTC)
[[Buffalo, New York|Buffalo]], New York
I encounter in an article I edit to [[Buffalo, New York]]
without any pang of bad conscience. (Though I would be too lazy to chase it through articles I don't otherwise edit.)
Gawaon (
talk) 17:42, 18 April 2024 (UTC)
Niagara Falls is a smaller city than Toronto so it's not particularly surprising← Is that intuitive to readers, though? It just looks unbalanced. If I saw that as a lay reader I would think, why does one link only the city and one link also the next level? I don't necessarily think the approach you advocate should be forbidden, but it seems reasonable to allow either as long as it's consistent within an article. -- Tamzin[ cetacean needed ( they|xe) 17:46, 18 April 2024 (UTC)
generally do not link the larger unit; I'd be sorry to see it changed to blue, comma, blue. NebY ( talk) 17:57, 18 April 2024 (UTC)
Further to that, what’s the rule if there are three entities, progressively larger? For example: Hrubieszów, Lublin Voivodeship, Poland. Is that how we should do it? — Biruitorul Talk 21:13, 18 April 2024 (UTC)
The redirect MOS: OVERLINKING has been listed at redirects for discussion to determine whether its use and function meets the redirect guidelines. Readers of this page are welcome to comment on this redirect at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2024 April 25 § MOS: OVERLINKING until a consensus is reached. Utopes ( talk / cont) 22:15, 25 April 2024 (UTC)
I'm not sure how much of an appetite there is for addressing accessibility issues that aren't related to vision, but one thing that came up in a recent discussion of a densely linked DYK hook is that our MOS doesn't seem to say much about how multiple links in one section of text can actually impede navigation for people with dexterity/coordination challenges. Because inline links are exceptions to minimum tap target settings, navigating a bunch of links in close proximity on a touchscreen can be kind of a nightmare. Rather than boldly pissing people off by editing directly, I thought I'd propose adding something like the following to the end of the overlink section:
Links may be excessive even if they are informative. For example, because inline links present relatively small tap targets on touchscreen devices, placing several separate inline links close together within a section of text can make navigation more difficult for readers with limited dexterity or coordination. Editors should balance considerations of readability, information, and accessibility when adding multiple links in one section of text.
So, not a hard and fast rule or anything, just some language making people aware that links are things that people touch, not just read. I didn't see much discussion of this in the archives for this page, but if you have institutional knowledge about prior discussion that would be particularly welcome. Or maybe it's already handled elsewhere. But I thought I'd raise the issue. Indignant Flamingo ( talk) 22:15, 23 May 2024 (UTC)
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When styling a label (in [[Main page|label]]
), one can add the style code inside or outside the brackets:
[[Main page|''ABC'']]
→
ABC[[Main page|<span style="background: pink">DEF</span>]]
→
DEF'''[[Main page|GHK]]'''
→
GHK<span style="background: pink">[[Main page|LMN]]</span>
→
LMNBoth options work as expecteed, and no WP:LINTER errors reported. Special:ExpandTemplates does not alter them. My question is: is there a preferred convention in this? DePiep ( talk) 14:33, 26 February 2023 (UTC)
[[Main page|OPQ<sub>2</sub>]]
or [[Main page|RS''T'']]
, the formatting must be inside the label. Therefore if one wanted to have a preference, it might be a good idea to prefer the version that always works, rather than preferring the version that only works if the link label gets the same formatting throughout.[[Main page|RS''T'']]
reason given above, but only if it's what VE does. If VE puts the markup outside by default, then all bets are off and we just have to throw up our hands. —
SMcCandlish
☏
¢ 😼 02:33, 14 June 2023 (UTC)
[[This|''That'']]
and on the outside if for a simple link: ''[[This]]''
.
WhatamIdoing (
talk) 02:45, 14 June 2023 (UTC)The link in the edit summary for this edit should have been to wp:FIXTHEPROBLEM. Sorry about that. - Butwhatdoiknow ( talk) 20:07, 25 June 2023 (UTC)
Hi. An editor keeps on doing this, across the project. I've discussed this with him, and pointed him to wp:overlink. To no avail. Suggestions? 2603:7000:2101:AA00:ACA0:80D5:F00F:2AA1 ( talk) 03:36, 18 July 2023 (UTC)
genuine New York City topics can certainly link New York City.As to what constitutes a "genuine New York City topic", I agree that this does not include people born there and a vast array of adjunct topics, but I think something like an academic institution, a municipal election, a neighbourhood, a museum, a transit system, and so on— these should be allowed to link the city in which they're situated, regardless of which city it is. At least in the infobox. Probably not the prose. The fact that people know what New York City is doesn't mean they'll never have reason to navigate to its article, especially if they've just been reading one about a related topic. Folly Mox ( talk) 05:39, 9 August 2023 (UTC)
— Bagumba ( talk) 10:59, 9 August 2023 (UTC)The names of subjects with which most readers will be at least somewhat familiar. This generally includes major examples of...locations (e.g., New Delhi; New York City, or just New York if the city context is already clear; London, if the context rules out London, Ontario; Southeast Asia)
The assertion that some articles should never be linked to is ridiculous. Articles are not meant to be orphans with no incoming links and readers are not supposed to navigate Wikipedia solely by searching for articles. ElKevbo ( talk) 12:50, 9 August 2023 (UTC)
The first sentence should provide links to the broader or more elementary topics that are important to the article's topic or place it into the context where it is notable.
For example, an article about a building or location should include a link to the broader geographical area of which it is a part.
https://en.wikipedia.org/?title=R_Praggnanandhaa&diff=1171848036&oldid=1171845836
Is Rejoy2003's interpretation of MOS:GEOLINK correct? Khiikiat ( talk) 15:03, 23 August 2023 (UTC)
When linking to sections, but not piping the link(such as in see also sections or disambiguation pages), is Article § section preferred over Article#section? I ask this because there was a concern raised at my talk page. Ca talk to me! 07:20, 16 September 2023 (UTC)
Gioachino Rossini | |
---|---|
Born |
Pesaro, Italy | 29 February 1792
Died | 13 November 1868
Passy, Paris, France | (aged 76)
Works | List of compositions |
Two days ago, I opened a discussion at
Talk:Gioachino Rossini to debate the addition of an infobox. For those who may be unaware, WikiProject Composers has an age-old policy guideline that disallows infoboxes in composer biographies, but this has been changed in recent years. This question isn't about that; rather, this is about the inclusion of something within a possible Rossini infobox.
To the right is the infobox I proposed, similar in style to Mozart, Beethoven, Chopin, Shostakovich, Prokofiev, etc. The inclusion of the article link to "List of compositions" in the works parameter has been the subject of debate. @ Gerda Arendt and I state that the inclusion is justified because the link shows that Rossini was notable for composing and this is the standard on many other composer articles. @ Nikkimaria countered that MOS:FORCELINK, which is part of Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Linking, disallows these kinds of links per the words, "The text needs to make sense to readers who cannot follow links. Users may print articles or read offline, and Wikipedia content may be encountered in republished form, often without links." I argued that the very bullet point Nikki quoted also says, "Use a link when appropriate, but as far as possible do not force a reader to use that link to understand the sentence." (emphasis added) Infoboxes are certainly not sentences, but Nikki found this to still apply, since it "mak[es] it so readers could only understand the oeuvre of the article subject by following a link, which is what NOFORCELINK exists to combat".
So, now I am here. I understand the point Nikki is making and understand how it may apply to the infobox, but I want the input of people who frequent the MoS and deduce the sometime vague phrasing. Is the inclusion of the "List of compositions" link under the works parameter a violation of the MoS? MyCatIsAChonk ( talk) ( not me) ( also not me) ( still no) 00:18, 4 October 2023 (UTC)
|list_of_works=
)) and set the data row class in the infobox code to class="noprint"
. From what I understand from the noprint
class it will remove that piece of text from pinted versions.
Template:Infobox television episode does it with its episode list link.
Gonnym (
talk) 12:09, 9 November 2023 (UTC)
Use a link when appropriate, but as far as possible do not force a reader to use that link to understand the sentence. The text needs to make sense to readers who cannot follow links. Users may print articles or read offline, and Wikipedia content may be encountered in republished form, often without links.? If so, that is a guideline, not a policy. Also, it says
as far as possible, well, having the noprint class fixes most of the usage and that checks the "as far as possible" requirement. Unless you are referring to a different policy I missed in this discussion, there is no need for a RfC, unless you wish to start one. Gonnym ( talk) 12:54, 9 November 2023 (UTC)
gained fame for his 39 operas, so we already know he's notable for composing. And of course the link to List of compositions by Gioachino Rossini is already in the article, under "Music" in a {{ see also}}, so it's not something you'd have to hunt to find.
"gained fame for his 39 operas", that's what I'd expect to be linked in the infobox if a link is included in this parameter. If he's notable for the rest of his compositions similarly to his notability from operas, we could link both the articles and update the lead sentence to reflect that. Folly Mox ( talk) 15:26, 4 October 2023 (UTC)
Gioachino Rossini | |
---|---|
Born |
Pesaro, Italy | 29 February 1792
Died | 13 November 1868
Passy, Paris, France | (aged 76)
Works |
@ Folly Mox, I was completely unaware of the list of operas, how silly of me. To the right is proposal two, with a similar format to Taylor Swift- thoughts? MyCatIsAChonk ( talk) ( not me) ( also not me) ( still no) 20:53, 4 October 2023 (UTC)
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
The MOS currently advises If quoting hypertext, add an editorial note, [link in original] or [link added], as appropriate.
In practice, though, I almost never see this, as these parentheticals would generally cost more in terms of interrupting the reading flow than they'd provide in clarity benefit. Could we reconsider this advice? Perhaps not note "link added" and only note "link in original" when it's deemed significant to the quote's point? Or perhaps consider advising a footnote or some other less-intrusive means of providing the disclaimer? {{u|
Sdkb}}
talk 07:50, 4 October 2023 (UTC)
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
Editors in the taxonomy space use redlinks across entire lists
like this. Is this acceptable? The taxonomy folks in the WikipProject Tree of Life seem to prefer it this way, but from a non-expert reader's point of view, it seems a bit ugly and seems to violate the MOS guideline here: In lists, overlinking red links can occur when every item on a list is a red link. If the list is uniform, where each item is obviously qualified for an article, a single red link (or blue link) could indicate that.
Pyrrho the Skipper (
talk) 14:50, 9 October 2023 (UTC)
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
In many articles, the first sentence is more blue than black. Example: Z-transform. If that's indeed what we want, we should mention it here. ◅ Sebastian Helm 🗨 10:06, 23 October 2023 (UTC)
If that's indeed what we want...You'll need to be more specific about the "that" principles to which you are referring to. For reference, MOS:LEADLINK reads:
— Bagumba ( talk) 23:17, 23 October 2023 (UTC)Too many links can make the lead hard to read. In technical articles that use uncommon terms, a higher-than-usual link density in the lead section may be necessary.
What generally should not be linked is written from an absolute point of view: It stipulates a selection of links that is the same for every article, by using only such criteria as “everyday words” and “countries”. But does that really make sense for an article about a specialized topic? Example: The article Z-transform currently links such articles as multiplication, real number and numerator. What is the use case for these? In other words: Do we really think such a specialized article will be read by people who will need to look these up? ◅ Sebastian Helm 🗨 10:32, 23 October 2023 (UTC)
If we want an absolute statement here, how about giving a proportion that works well in our experience, such as: “If an article contains more than one link for every 400 bytes (as can be seen from its latest history entry), it may be overlinked, if less than one for every 1200 bytes, it may be underlinked”? ◅ Sebastian Helm 🗨 10:54, 23 October 2023 (UTC)
Greetings and felicitations. This topic isn't mentioned in the project page, and a brief search of this talk page's archives (not including the those in the sidebar) did not turn up anything relevant. In my opinion it is best to start with Wikimedia project links, followed by official links (edit: and then everything else), but is there any consensus on this? — DocWatson42 ( talk) 06:27, 6 November 2023 (UTC)
When adding the first citation of Mohammed Dajani Daoudi [1], first using Virtual Editor and then source editor, I tried to make a direct link from Fathom Journal/fathomjournal to the Fathom journal section of Britain Israel Communications and Research Centre based on the examples of Template:Section link but either the article and section titles were italicised or error notices appeared. In the end I left it as a link to Fathom Journal which redirects to the Centre. Should it be possible to make a direct link from the citation to the section? Mcljlm ( talk) 22:17, 14 November 2023 (UTC)
References
The redirect MOS: LINK has been listed at redirects for discussion to determine whether its use and function meets the redirect guidelines. Readers of this page are welcome to comment on this redirect at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2023 December 5 § MOS: LINK until a consensus is reached. Utopes ( talk / cont) 04:03, 5 December 2023 (UTC)
The redirect MOS: NOPIPE has been listed at redirects for discussion to determine whether its use and function meets the redirect guidelines. Readers of this page are welcome to comment on this redirect at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2023 December 5 § MOS: NOPIPE until a consensus is reached. Utopes ( talk / cont) 04:04, 5 December 2023 (UTC)
The redirect MOS: OL has been listed at redirects for discussion to determine whether its use and function meets the redirect guidelines. Readers of this page are welcome to comment on this redirect at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2023 December 5 § MOS: OL until a consensus is reached. Utopes ( talk / cont) 04:04, 5 December 2023 (UTC)
After the Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Linking/Archive_21#DL,_sections,_and_mobile_readers RFC, which demonstrated overwhelming consensus in support of relaxing the "once per article" rule for links to "once per section", RFC closer Mike Christie made a perfectly reasonable edit-of-least-disruption to the page, altering the introduction of MOS:DUPLINK like so:
Generally, a link should appear only once in an article, but it may be repeated if helpful for readers, such as in infoboxes, tables, image captions, footnotes, hatnotes, and at the first occurrence
after the leadin a section.
Reasonable, sure. Least-disruptive, sure. But... accurate?
Now more than ever, the actual rules we've settled on contradict the statement, "Generally, a link should appear only once in an article". Whether or not that was even accurate before (given the long list of exceptions), in the wake of the RFC it certainly doesn't seem right anymore.
Generally, the community expressed broad consensus for generally eliminating that restriction, and links are now permitted once per section, generally. So, why are we still opening with a statement of the policy as it (generally) maybe used to be?
IMHO we should bite the bullet, embrace the change, and open with something like:
Generally, a term should be linked at most once in each section of an article, the first time it's mentioned in that section. Subsequent repetitions should not be linked. (Note that this is a maximum link frequency; if it's relevant to link a term in one section, but not relevant in another, the term is not required to be linked in both. Common sense should always prevail.)
Outside of the body text, additional mentions of the same term may be linked if helpful for readers, such as in infoboxes, tables, image captions, footnotes, and hatnotes.
FeRDNYC ( talk) 15:47, 21 December 2023 (UTC)
That appears to get the same messages across in much less wording. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼 01:52, 18 January 2024 (UTC)Link a term at most once per section, at first occurrence. Common sense applies; do not re-link in other sections if not contextually important there. Other mentions may be linked if helpful, such as in infoboxes, tables, image captions, footnotes, and hatnotes.
Very belatedly (see below) implemented the re-wording provided by SMcCandlish, who sure do use them words all purty-like. ...With the word "major" shoe-horned in before "section", because in the interim someone had taken the time to shoe-horn it into the old wording as well, and even stuffed an unnecessarily verbose explanation of the precisely-imprecise contextual meaning of "major" into a footnote (also preserved) to accompany it.
What was the holdup, ya bum?
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(In my defense, back in October my left thumb went "offline", requiring surgery early February which resulted in my left hand being in a cast for weeks afterwards. Any activity involving typing has been neglected of late, on my part.)
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Anyway, Done FeRDNYC ( talk) 08:51, 22 March 2024 (UTC)
someone ... even stuffed an unnecessarily verbose explanation of the precisely-imprecise contextual meaning of "major" into a footnoteHeh, turns out that was also SMcCandlish's doing! FeRDNYC ( talk) 08:56, 22 March 2024 (UTC)
I've proposed updating Template:Infobox company's documentation to avoid a potential MOS:EGG issue. Please give your thoughts in that discussion. Ed [talk] [OMT] 01:24, 12 January 2024 (UTC)
add
− | + | {{pp-semi-indef|small=yes}} |
103.253.27.33 ( talk) 22:32, 14 January 2024 (UTC)
Currently NOFORCELINK says Use a link when appropriate, but as far as possible do not force a reader to use that link to understand the sentence. The text needs to make sense to readers who cannot follow links. Users may print articles or read offline, and Wikipedia content may be encountered in republished form, often without links.
. The literal interpretation of this My interpretation of this is that it requires that every word that could be considered specialist ("
turboprop", "
action platformer", "
Laplace transform", "
endpaper", ...) be explained in the text. I believe this is impossible and would be bad writing if it were possible. This
has come up before, so I'll ping in everyone who was in that conversation, but what prompted me to post here was seeing a request from
Gog the Mild in
a current FAC (nominated by
Aoba47) to clarify "action platformer". I think Gog's request is in sync with what NOFORCELINK actually says, but I don't think the change they are requesting is desirable.
In the discussion from last year, linked above, I wrote if knowledgeable readers feel that the flow is being broken up too much by inline explanations, non-knowledgeable readers should accept that, and be willing to accept links instead, or, if absolutely necessary, an explanatory note
, and
NebY was kind enough to say they thought this was a guiding principle. I won't repeat the examples from the linked discussion, but I recommend reading it as there are good arguments made on both sides.
I propose we insert into NOFORCELINK a form of words that codifies the "guiding principle" quoted. I think this is going to be difficult to do because we can't explicitly give a local discussion at a WikiProject authority over other editors -- this is the WP:LOCALCONSENSUS point that SMcCandlish often argues, and he's quite right. I think it's worth trying to do because as it stands NOFORCELINK has no get-out clause for an editor who argues that "bench-clearing brawl" requires an in-text explanation in an article about a baseball game. NebY's example in the prior discussion parodies what such an article would look like, and is a better argument than anything I could come up with.
If we can't add something like this, at least we should weaken the guidance to make it clear there are exceptions. Maths is the most obvious exception, to me, but the wording should make it clearer what the limits of "as far as possible" are, and to weaken or remove "The text needs to make sense to readers who cannot follow links."
Pinging from previous discussion and the current FAC: J Milburn, Lee Vilenski, Bagumba, Uanfala. Mike Christie ( talk - contribs - library) 22:52, 17 January 2024 (UTC)
A prime number (or a prime) is a natural number greater than 1 that is not a product of two smaller natural numbers.Here the terms "natural number" and "product" are linked, but not explained, because if you do not know how to count and multiply, you are not ready to learn about prime numbers. "Greater than" is not linked but in the same boat. This is not so much an issue of accessibility as of making our articles self-contained to those who can benefit from reading them. — David Eppstein ( talk) 00:40, 18 January 2024 (UTC)
Do not unnecessarily make a reader chase links: if a highly technical term can be simply explained with very few words, do so.Hawkeye7 (discuss) 00:50, 18 January 2024 (UTC)
There is a separate question of where to put explanations when they are needed. I generally put them in footnotes, not inline, because the explanations are distracting and break the flow of the text.
Jo-Jo Eumerus ( talk) 09:33, 18 January 2024 (UTC)John Higgins made a century break of 104.- a century break is a phrase that under the current wording would have to be explained in every snooker article as "a series of shots which gives a score of over 100 in one turn", which is overkill except in the article in which we link. However, you can easily move on from this sentence if you dont know what a century break is, it's enough to know that he did a thing.
the event was played as a double-elimination tournament.I think most readers would have difficulty understanding this, and even if you do know what this is, you wouldn't worry too much about a later sentence saying
players who lost one match would be moved to the "loser's side" of the bracket and be eliminated after a second loss.for example. The last thing we should do is be explaining every link inline. Imagine if we had to explain what a goal, a battle or a table is. Lee Vilenski ( talk • contribs) 10:00, 18 January 2024 (UTC)
as far as possible. Articles are not limited to experts, but it shouldn't be bogged down for people with a bit of familiarity. WP:ONEDOWN is mentioned by some below.— Bagumba ( talk) 09:54, 19 January 2024 (UTC)
Users may print articles or read offline, and Wikipedia content may be encountered in republished form, often without linksis an obsolete concept. Wiki says
A wiki ... is a form of online hypertext publicationRight there in the lead sentence it emphasizes "online" as well as "hypertext". These are fundamental attributes of what we are.
Gog's point that a change to NOFORCELINK would mostly affect FAC seems plausible to me, so I searched the promoted FAC pages for uses of NOFORCELINK and FORCELINK. That only finds the few reviewers who use this shortcut rather than simply requesting further explanations without linking to the MoS; there are certainly other reviewers who make the same points. With that caveat, here are some of the results. Some of these seem clearly legitimate requests and are why we have NOFORCELINK; others seem to me to be requesting more than is needed. I tried searching for "gloss" but in many of the results I found the comment was "since there's no link for this specialist term we need a gloss instead"; those are not relevant as the reviewer is clearly saying that just a link is enough.
In a couple of cases below I've given the outcome, just to reinforce the point that many of these are perfectly legitimate applications of NOFORCELINK.
member of the Société Honoraire de Françaisfrom the FAC for Lisa Nowak. Nominators Neopeius and Hawkeye7; reviewer requesting the explanation The Rambling Man. Current wording in the article:
member of the Société Honoraire de Français, which required students to maintain an A average in French and a B average in all other subjects. I think a link would have sufficed here.
possibly because of Jacobite sympathiesfrom the FAC for Thomas Hardy (Royal Navy officer, died 1732). Nominator Pickersgill-Cunliffe; reviewer requesting the explanation Gog the Mild. Current wording in the article:
possibly because, as a Tory, he continued to support the deposed House of Stuart after the succession of the House of Hanover. Particularly given that this is in the lead I think the expansion was the right call.
137 breakfrom the FAC for 2022 World Snooker Championship. Nominator Lee Vilenski; reviewer Gog the Mild. I think this is the one that led to the last NOFORCELINK discussion.
frigatein the FAC for HMS Aigle (1801). Nominator Ykraps; reviewer Gog the Mild.
"a metal cast plaque in champlevé (carved) enamelin the FAC for Clonmacnoise Crozier. Nominator Ceoil; reviewer Gog the Mild. Current wording in the article is simplified rather than expanded:
in champlevé enamel.
"Tribal Hidage"in the FAC for Benty Grange hanging bowl. Nominator Usernameunique; reviewer UndercoverClassicist.
hero pulpand
weird menacein the FAC for The Spider (magazine). Nominator Mike Christie; reviewer UndercoverClassicist.
Chagatai literaturein the FAC for Fuzuli (poet). Nominator Golden; reviewer UndercoverClassicist.
David suggested that WP:ONEDOWN is the principle that should be used to determine whether more than a link is required. I like that idea in theory but would like to see that it would be helpful in resolving the above examples. For example, in the FAC for The Spider, UC requested glosses for "weird menace" and "hero pulp". Is the ONEDOWN level a reader who knows about pulp magazines but not about this one? If so no gloss is needed. Or is the ONEDOWN level a reader who knows about the magazine industry but not pulps? In which case a gloss is likely to be helpful. Mike Christie ( talk - contribs - library) 13:40, 18 January 2024 (UTC)
Over the years, FAC reviewers pushed me to avoid more and more technical terms. In hindsight, I am pretty happy about that, as I want people to understand these articles. I am still surprised how much is possible here that really makes a difference to the reader. Providing in-text explanations is only one possible solution. Sometimes, a little hint is sufficient (e.g., writing " Late Cretaceous epoch" instead of just "Late Cretaceous"). Often, it is possible to replace the term with a more widely understood one without sacrificing too much precision, or even replacing the term with an explanation. But I first had to learn this the hard way, which was not easy, and I was quite reluctant to stop using terms that, for me, are part of every-day language. So I think that having a guideline that pushes authors towards this direction is not necessarily a bad thing!
But we always have to remember: It is not our goal to strictly abide to guidelines. Our goal is to write the best-possible articles. Guidelines can only help us with that, but they can never be the goal themselves. When we start optimizing our articles to comply with a guideline, article quality tends to improve – but there inevitably comes a point where we over-optimize and article quality decreases sharply. Therefore, a reviewer should not make the mistake to blindly check an article against a particular guideline and oppose because of non-compliance, possibly without even reading the article. Instead, a reviewer should always have our primary goal in mind (to improve the article), and apply common sense with respect to the article in question, asking "could this article be improved by more closely abiding to that guideline"? -- Jens Lallensack ( talk) 16:12, 18 January 2024 (UTC)
Hyperlinking allows us to provide our readers a higher level of service than is possible in print media. We shouldn't try to emulate that high level by also adding inline explanations that are disruptive for most readers, even those who aren't online.
Print readers know very well that if we see unfamiliar terms, we may have to look elsewhere for definitions. Sometimes we make a good guess, sometimes we keep going because we're not trying to understand everything, sometimes we'll find a glossary in the back, grab a dictionary or primer, or look on Wikipedia. Print writers and publishers know they'll lose their target audience if they keep interrupting their reading, and WP editors should learn from them if we really are writing for those who print our pages (an ever-shrinking proportion of readers in this digital age, plus some publishers of expensive print-on-demand collections of our articles).
Happily, many of our articles, even FAs, don't explain inline and often don't even link (century break, to take one of Lee's examples above, top of the fourth, right field foul pole and the others I mentioned before, or second yellow card, edging a delivery, or false flat). They're still good articles. Wikipedia editors shouldn't be told to degrade them to cater for print readers in ways that print publishers can't and don't. NebY ( talk) 18:13, 18 January 2024 (UTC)
If the term can be explained in two or three words, an inline description might be appropriate. If not, then I'm of the opinion that a link on its own is the better option. After all, isn't that the great advantage of a digital encyclopaedia. I certainly wouldn't fail a FAC because of NOFORCELINK but might insist on a footnote where no link is available. -- Ykraps ( talk) 18:56, 18 January 2024 (UTC)
There's enough support above for something based on ONEDOWN to try to formulate something here. Currently NOFORCELINK says:
Use a link when appropriate, but as far as possible do not force a reader to use that link to understand the sentence. The text needs to make sense to readers who cannot follow links. Users may print articles or read offline, and Wikipedia content may be encountered in republished form, often without links.
and ONEDOWN says:
A general technique for increasing accessibility is to consider the typical level where the topic is studied (for example, secondary, undergraduate, or postgraduate) and write the article for readers who are at the previous level. Thus articles on undergraduate topics can be aimed at a reader with a secondary school background, and articles on postgraduate topics can be aimed at readers with some undergraduate background. The lead section should be particularly understandable, but the advice to write one level down can be applied to the entire article, increasing the overall accessibility. Writing one level down also supports our goal to provide a tertiary source on the topic, which readers can use before they begin to read other sources about it.
ONEDOWN is an essay so rather than refer to it I think we have to rephrase it and summarize it. How about these extra sentences?
The text needs to make sense to readers who are at or one step below a level of study that would familiarize them with the material. For example, in an article on spinal medical issues, it would suffice to link facetectomy without an inline explanation; if the term were used in an article about general medical treatment it might need a footnoted explanation, and in an article not about medicine at all, the meaning of the term would have to be explained inline.
This is just a way to get the wording discussion started; please criticize or suggest changes or improvements. Mike Christie ( talk - contribs - library) 15:05, 19 January 2024 (UTC)
It is recommended to provide inline explanations for terms that are crucial for the understanding of the text or might be unfamiliar to the target readership. However, the article should find a balance between the number and length of inline explanations and the overall conciseness and readability of the article.Jens Lallensack ( talk) 17:00, 19 January 2024 (UTC)
It is recommended to provide inline explanations for the most difficult terms of an article, so that the widest possible audience can directly understand the article in general terms without having to follow wiki-links.This still retains some element of ONEDOWN as it is restricted to the "most difficult terms" ("most difficult" relative to the overall technicality of the article in question). But yes, this would mean that even the baseball article should provide such explanations to a reasonable extent (and I think, why not?). Jens Lallensack ( talk) 23:40, 19 January 2024 (UTC)
Do not unnecessarily make a reader chase links: if a highly technical term can be simply explained with very few words, do so.– which seems to cover our baseline quite well already. We also have the WP:MTAU guideline stating
Wikipedia articles should be written for the widest possible general audience, which points out many different possible ways to make an article understandable, and ONEDOWN is already covered there. If, in a FAC, an article is too technical in our opinion, we can still push for better comprehensibility by pointing at those guidelines. -- Jens Lallensack ( talk) 12:15, 20 January 2024 (UTC)
Do not unnecessarily make a reader chase links: if a highly technical term can be simply explained with very few words, do sofrom the MoS? It strikes me that everyone here is in agreement with that principle: it then creates a discussion around the word unnecessarily, which is where the nuance of each individual situation can come in.
Use a link when appropriate, but as far as possible do not force a reader to use that link to understand the sentence. The text needs to make sense to readers who cannot follow links. Users may print articles or read offline, and Wikipedia content may be encountered in republished form, often without links. I fear now that this is just not helpful. Does it mean that every important term should be explained in-line (which is arguably "possible")? We would keep
Do not unnecessarily make a reader chase links: if a highly technical term can be simply explained with very few words, do so.We could formulate this one a bit more strictly if needed. But my argument is now that this sentence is enough, and that the alternative wordings suggested above by Mike and me are basically redundant to this and the WP:MTAU guideline. Jens Lallensack ( talk) 13:28, 20 January 2024 (UTC)
Do not unnecessarily make a reader chase links: if a term that is highly technical, given the likely readership of the article, can be simply explained with very few words, do so? Mike Christie ( talk - contribs - library) 14:20, 20 January 2024 (UTC)
Use a link when appropriate, but as far as possible do not force a reader to use that link to understand the sentenceis sound: if we think that all readers will understand the term without following the link, there's no need to explain it: conversely, as far as possible gives a way out if an explanation is felt to be impractical. '' UndercoverClassicist T· C 14:28, 20 January 2024 (UTC)
if a highly technical term(formatting mine) -- which suggests that we generally don't explain, unless the term is highly technical -- and
as far as possible do not force a reader to use that link to understand the sentence, which errs on the side of explanation. There are plenty of terms that may not be highly technical but which many of our readers, through reasons of age, first language, education, interest etc ( WP:POPE), will not understand -- I think we should generally expect editors to explain them, at least when prodded to do so at FAC, unless there's a good reason to do otherwise. UndercoverClassicist T· C 14:51, 20 January 2024 (UTC)
At the start of a sentence, use a capital letter. You should use a capital letter for proper nouns.
Unjustified changes from one acceptable, consistently-applied style in an article to a different style may generally be reverted.
A title should be a recognizable name or description of the topic that is natural, sufficiently precise, concise, and consistent with those of related articles. If these criteria are in conflict, they should be balanced against one another.
Normally use nouns or noun phrases: Early life, not In early life
In rare cases, a hyphen can improve clarity if a rewritten alternative is awkward, but rewording is usually preferable
I'll just point out that explanations of 'technical' language don't always have to be inline. Footnotes are also a good way of allowing the text in the body to flow naturally for those who understand the topic while providing an on-the-page explanation for those who don't catch every nuance of every word or term. My personal preference is to keep the body's language understandable enough for as wide a selection of an English speaking audience as we can, but sometimes that's not always easy without dumbing down and annoying a large proportion of readers, so some flexibility in the MOS, the writing and the readers is required, although it's doubtful you'll ever manage to please anything but one of those groups at any point. - SchroCat ( talk) 15:44, 20 January 2024 (UTC)
if knowledgeable readers feel that the flow is being broken up too much by inline explanations, non-knowledgeable readers should accept that, and be willing to accept links instead, or, if absolutely necessary, an explanatory note. Ideally the test would be to always have a neutral and knowledgeable reviewer who can assess if the article could be expressed more simply. If we don't have that reviewer available I don't think we should be insisting that the article be fully understandable without following links to whoever is the most knowledgeable reviewer who shows up, no matter how far from knowledgeable they may be in practice. (This is part of the broader problem at FAC of lack of subject-matter expert reviews.) Mike Christie ( talk - contribs - library) 16:30, 20 January 2024 (UTC)
Do not unnecessarily make a reader chase links. If a technical term can be explained without disrupting the flow of the article for a knowledgeable reader, do so? Mike Christie ( talk - contribs - library) 16:49, 20 January 2024 (UTC)
Do not unnecessarily make a reader chase links. If a technical term can be explained without disrupting the flow of the article, do so. Inline explanation or footnotes can be especially helpful when a technical term is likely to be unknown to many readers and unlikely to be intuited in context; must be understood to understand the sentence in general terms; or is difficult to understand in the context of the sentence by consulting the wiki-linked article.(Wording partly based on what NebY posted above). I am not sure if that second part is needed, but let me know what you think. Jens Lallensack ( talk) 20:06, 20 January 2024 (UTC)
Do not unnecessarily make a reader chase links. If a technical term can be explained without disrupting the flow of the article for a knowledgeable reader, do so. My hope is that including the point about "the flow of the article for the knowledgeable reader" covers the baseball case but "do so" doesn't prevent us from expanding and explaining as much as possible. It's an attempt to say the same thing as ONEDOWN without requiring the levels implied by ONEDOWN to be defined. Mike Christie ( talk - contribs - library) 20:10, 20 January 2024 (UTC)
There's the beginnings of a consensus above on a proposed wording, so I am pulling it out to make a clear proposed change. I've changed the first sentence of the version discussed above to match NOFORCELINK's existing phrasing, both to make this a minimal change and because the compressed version isn't as clear.
I propose we change NOFORCELINK from
Do not unnecessarily make a reader chase links: if a highly technical term can be simply explained with very few words, do so. Use a link when appropriate, but as far as possible do not force a reader to use that link to understand the sentence. The text needs to make sense to readers who cannot follow links. Users may print articles or read offline, and Wikipedia content may be encountered in republished form, often without links.
to
Use a link when appropriate, but as far as possible do not force a reader to use that link to understand the sentence. If a technical term can be explained without unduly disrupting the flow of the article for a knowledgeable reader, do so.
This is not a formal RfC but if anyone thinks it necessary I can make it one. In any case I'd rather wait to do that until we see if this form of words does have significant support. Mike Christie ( talk - contribs - library) 23:03, 20 January 2024 (UTC)
Do not unnecessarily make a reader chase links: if a highly technical term can be simply explained with very few words, do so.in addition, or is this going to be replaced, too? Jens Lallensack ( talk) 23:24, 20 January 2024 (UTC)
No objections so far, and (counting Jens and Hawkeye7 above) four supports for this version. If there are no objections in the next week or so I will make the change. Mike Christie ( talk - contribs - library) 11:41, 22 January 2024 (UTC)
I like
Jens Lallensack's earlier suggestion at
#Working proposals (above) to add unduly: If a technical term can be explained without unduly disrupting the flow of the article for a knowledgeable reader, do so.
It hopefully conveys that some knowledgeable readers might be somewhat disrupted by a "dumbed down" version, but it's for the common goal of making the article more widely accessible.—
Bagumba (
talk) 16:02, 22 January 2024 (UTC)
I'm concerned that this is the sort of thing that is very subjective, and may be applied inconsistently at FAC, which as has been pointed out, is the only place it really matters. At the very least, I'd like to see some examples given. Wehwalt ( talk) 19:15, 22 January 2024 (UTC)
I'm also more sympathetic to Gog's view above - I'd prefer to privilege the non-expert reader. Nikkimaria ( talk) 03:14, 23 January 2024 (UTC)
After Brooklyn was retired in order in the top of the third inning, Oeschger doubled to center field to lead off the home half of the inning, and Powell sacrificed him to third base, from a recently promoted FA, can't be usefully explained to a non-expert reader without ruining the reading experience for a baseball aficionado. The current version of NOFORCELINK, in my view, makes no allowance for this limitation, and the revised wording is intended to address that -- to promote inline explanations (with the "do so" at the end of the revised wording) but acknowledge that this simplification has to be limited to avoid making the article unfit for expert readers.
I suspect in a lot of areas, the matter under discussion is just not capable of being explained in a few words to those who know nothing about dinosaurs, or baseball, or mathematics: I see the frustration of having to respond to comments that we feel are unwise or ill-judged, but would it be so much of a hardship to write something like "yes, this bit's a little specialist, but there isn't really a good way to explain all of this without disrupting the flow (see MOS:NOFORCELINK), and the details are only really of interest to people who already know the basics"? It strikes me that the proposed wording, by having the word unduly, gives a very clear route to explain why an inline explanation has not been offered in a specific case. I'd hope that reviewers would consider their own sense of how disruptive an explanation would be before offering such a comment -- therefore, that if they did ask for an explanation, they would do so believing that it could be done without causing a major problem. UndercoverClassicist T· C 13:21, 23 January 2024 (UTC)
Use a link when appropriate, but if a technical term can be explained without unduly disrupting the flow of the article for a knowledgeable reader, do so. Try not to force a reader to use the link to understand the sentence."Try not to" may be too weak but a bald "Avoid" might be too strong; is there something suitable in between? NebY ( talk) 14:00, 23 January 2024 (UTC)
Use a link when appropriate. If it is possible to explain technical terms inline, do so, but use editorial judgement as to whether this can be done without unduly disrupting the flow of the article.. I think Wehwalt made a judgement call (for the baseball article) that almost any inline explanations would be disruptive, and I agree. I don't see how the current wording of NOFORCELINK permits that and I think that should be fixed. Mike Christie ( talk - contribs - library) 08:11, 25 January 2024 (UTC)
undulyis, by definition, a matter of judging what is
[due]. How would one assess that if not by
us[ing] editorial judgement? UndercoverClassicist T· C 08:53, 25 January 2024 (UTC)
appropriate,
unduly-- that already call for judgement, but I can see the value in explicitly invoking it. However, I can see the value in reinforcing the point that this is a particularly subjective "rule". UndercoverClassicist T· C 10:07, 25 January 2024 (UTC)
Use a link when appropriate. If it is possible to explain technical terms inline, do so, but use editorial judgement as to whether this can be done without unduly disrupting the flow of the article? Mike Christie ( talk - contribs - library) 13:31, 25 January 2024 (UTC)
I'm going to stop trying to find a form of words that can get general support. I still think the existing wording does not reflect actual practice, and it would be better to find wording that reflects what we really do: we do try to improve readability for non-experts, but the reasons we don't or can't always move very far in that direction are not acknowledged in the current wording. However, the MoS is a guideline, not policy, and at FAC a nominator can always say they think the application of a MoS rule doesn't make sense for a given article. Mike Christie ( talk - contribs - library) 06:47, 26 January 2024 (UTC)
I'm reviewing Beulé Gate by UndercoverClassicist right now. The following sentence reminded me of this discussion:
The area above the central doorway is decorated in the Doric order, and consists of an architrave in Pentelic marble, topped with marble metopes and triglyphs and made from a variety of limestone known as poros stone. Above the metopes and triglyphs is a geison with mutules, itself topped with an attic
There's nine different linked terms there and I don't konw what any of them means. Yet, the sentence makes complete sense and I know how to click to get more detail on any of them if I want. If this sentence was rewritten with parenthetical explanations for each of those terms, it would be crazy complicated and distinctly less readable. — Preceding unsigned comment added by RoySmith ( talk • contribs) 00:22, 30 January 2024 (UTC)
Use a link when appropriate, but if a technical term can be explained without unduly disrupting the flow of the article for a knowledgeable reader, do so., I'd give this as precisely the reason unduly is included: we're talking about architectural minutiae, so the details here are pretty immaterial to most readers: the value of the inline explanations is outweighed by the cost of doing so. Incidentally: thank you for raising this here -- it's helped me spot a couple of mistakes! UndercoverClassicist T· C 07:27, 30 January 2024 (UTC)
Editors interested in MOS:NOPIPE, and the use, creation, and modification of piped links in Visual Editor may be interested in the discussion going on at WP:VPT#Piped links with VisualEditor. Thanks, Mathglot ( talk) 23:40, 3 February 2024 (UTC)
Since we've changed the duplink policy to be links may or may not be suitable for the first time in a section, I've had users change this for all section headers (so even for level four headers, they have a new link). Can I confirm that when we say the first usage per section, we mean the first use per level 2 header? Lee Vilenski ( talk • contribs) 15:39, 4 February 2024 (UTC)
It's normal and expected for editorial consensus to be reached on an per-article basis; we treat all of MoS this way with regard to a guideline line-item that has interpretational wiggle-room, and this is by design. (Remember that MoS is not a policy, and is intended to produce consistent and useful content for readers, and secondarily to settle inter-editor disputes about style, broadly defined.) While wikiprojects coming to a "local consensus" on such a matter across a category of articles can sometimes be problematic per WP:CONLEVEL policy (namely, when those editors' preference is against a site-wide consensus, or conflicts with equally principled preferences of editors who are not part of that in-crowd; see, e.g., WP:ARBINFOBOX), in a case like this there is no issue, because all the articles in the affected group are structurally the same, so a page-by-page re-discussion of the same question would be a redundant waste of editorial time. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼 19:05, 26 February 2024 (UTC)
There is currently a discussion about MOS:FORCELINK's application in infoboxes. Any feedback from knowledgeable editors would be greatly appreciated. Thanks! Nemov ( talk) 21:21, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
In articles about CJK (Chinese, Japanese, and Korean) cultures, tons of Wiktionary links have been added to non-English terms (they usually use Template:Linktext). Is this overlinking or not? I started to think that they are overlinking, but it does not seem that MOS:OVERLINK directly says something about this. 172.56.232.211 ( talk) 05:56, 6 March 2024 (UTC)
The essay Wikipedia:Writing better articles § Use other languages sparingly says:Non-English terms should be used sparingly.
Foreign words that are not that common in English, when used, should have a MOS:SIMPLEGLOSS.— Bagumba ( talk) 07:21, 6 March 2024 (UTC)It is fine to include foreign terms as extra information, but avoid writing articles that can only be understood if the reader understands the foreign terms.
This topic is about whether it is ever preferable to use a redirect link in a pipe.
Joy and I are in a minor editorial dispute over my post-move activities after the close of an RM resulting in the move of Bojana (river) to Buna (Adriatic Sea). I have made various edits to articles that link to the resulting "Bojana (river)" redirect, and have been cleaning up the piped links when encountering the following typical scenarios:
Irrespective of whether the term after the pipe is Buna or Bojana, I have been changing the link (before the pipe) to "Buna (Adriatic Sea)" with the rationale that the link in a piped link should always be the direct link, producing:
Joy on the other hand has suggested on my talk page that if the term presented to the reader is "Bojana", the piped link markup should remain as follows:
... and that changing the piped link in this case to [[Buna (Adriatic Sea)|Bojana]] is a "pointless activity" that should not be done and is worthy of being reverted.
It appears that she has not contested changing [[Bojana (river)|Buna]] to [[Buna (Adriatic Sea)|Buna]].
I am of the opinion that in no case do we maintain piping through redirects as a good practice, and that it is completely irrelevant whether the term after the pipe is "Buna" or "Bojana"; the term before the pipe should always be the direct link, not a redirect link. This is because we don't want to introduce the reader to the name of the redirect which they hadn't previously seen, because it's hidden in the piped link markup, and it's preferable to link directly whenever possible, and not through a redirect. Joy, on the other hand suggests that piping through a redirect that is similar to the term visible to the reader, which produces the redirection notification at the destination article, is useful.
Should the MOS be clearer that piped links and redirect links are different techniques that should not be mixed, and that only direct links should be used before the pipe, and not redirect links?
MOS:DABPIPE says that Piping and redirects are two different mechanisms
and
WP:PIPE says Do not confuse piped links and redirects
. But should
MOS:PIPE also say something about this? Something like:
When piping, the reader should be led to the destination article directly, and not through a redirect.
— Alalch E. 23:53, 5 April 2024 (UTC)
[[Bojana (river)|]]
(with nothing after the pipe). On storing the page, our software autoconverts such links to [[Bojana (river)|Bojana]]
. Such autogenerated piped links are fine, very common (in fact the most frequent kind of piped link, I would suspect) and thanks to our redirect mechanism, they'll continue to work as before if a page was moved. So why should you change the invisible URL to use "Buna" if you leave the visible word ("Bojana") intact? There is really no reason to so do.
Gawaon (
talk) 06:35, 6 April 2024 (UTC)MOS:GEOLINK gives two examples: Sydney, Australia; and Buffalo, New York, United States. This creates an ambiguity, which Pi.1415926535 and I agreed to raise here after it came up in a GAN: Is the point of the two examples that the link should span all words except the country name, or do they describe two alternate approaches, meaning that one can equally write " Buffalo, New York, United States"? For that matter, could one write " Sydney, Australia"?
I think clarity on this would be helpful. I don't hugely care about what answer is settled on, although as I've said at the GAN, I do think that there's a moderate accessibility benefit to the linked text spanning only the city name: I have difficulty distinguishing black from blue in small quantities, and, if I hadn't modified my common.css to address that, " Buffalo, New York" and " Buffalo, New York" would look almost identical to me, making it unclear, when I click on "New York" there, where I'm going to be taken. -- Tamzin[ cetacean needed ( they|xe) 03:42, 18 April 2024 (UTC)
[[Buffalo, New York|Buffalo]], New York
would just be needlessly convoluted.
Gawaon (
talk) 15:30, 18 April 2024 (UTC)
[[Buffalo, New York|Buffalo]], New York
I encounter in an article I edit to [[Buffalo, New York]]
without any pang of bad conscience. (Though I would be too lazy to chase it through articles I don't otherwise edit.)
Gawaon (
talk) 17:42, 18 April 2024 (UTC)
Niagara Falls is a smaller city than Toronto so it's not particularly surprising← Is that intuitive to readers, though? It just looks unbalanced. If I saw that as a lay reader I would think, why does one link only the city and one link also the next level? I don't necessarily think the approach you advocate should be forbidden, but it seems reasonable to allow either as long as it's consistent within an article. -- Tamzin[ cetacean needed ( they|xe) 17:46, 18 April 2024 (UTC)
generally do not link the larger unit; I'd be sorry to see it changed to blue, comma, blue. NebY ( talk) 17:57, 18 April 2024 (UTC)
Further to that, what’s the rule if there are three entities, progressively larger? For example: Hrubieszów, Lublin Voivodeship, Poland. Is that how we should do it? — Biruitorul Talk 21:13, 18 April 2024 (UTC)
The redirect MOS: OVERLINKING has been listed at redirects for discussion to determine whether its use and function meets the redirect guidelines. Readers of this page are welcome to comment on this redirect at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2024 April 25 § MOS: OVERLINKING until a consensus is reached. Utopes ( talk / cont) 22:15, 25 April 2024 (UTC)
I'm not sure how much of an appetite there is for addressing accessibility issues that aren't related to vision, but one thing that came up in a recent discussion of a densely linked DYK hook is that our MOS doesn't seem to say much about how multiple links in one section of text can actually impede navigation for people with dexterity/coordination challenges. Because inline links are exceptions to minimum tap target settings, navigating a bunch of links in close proximity on a touchscreen can be kind of a nightmare. Rather than boldly pissing people off by editing directly, I thought I'd propose adding something like the following to the end of the overlink section:
Links may be excessive even if they are informative. For example, because inline links present relatively small tap targets on touchscreen devices, placing several separate inline links close together within a section of text can make navigation more difficult for readers with limited dexterity or coordination. Editors should balance considerations of readability, information, and accessibility when adding multiple links in one section of text.
So, not a hard and fast rule or anything, just some language making people aware that links are things that people touch, not just read. I didn't see much discussion of this in the archives for this page, but if you have institutional knowledge about prior discussion that would be particularly welcome. Or maybe it's already handled elsewhere. But I thought I'd raise the issue. Indignant Flamingo ( talk) 22:15, 23 May 2024 (UTC)