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I think that the rule that an article is ovelinked if it has more links than lines (in the section Overlinking) is not very useful as the length of a line can vary depending on the browser, browsersettings and the resolution of the screen. I think it should be deleted or changed. -- Galadh 13:23, 3 September 2006 (UTC)
Just because you don't know of anyone using this provision in a dispute does not mean it is not a bad provision. Every one of the last 4 articles featured on the main page have more links than lines in the introductions. It is an arbitrary, wrongful provision; why is it justified and what is wrong with the reasoning above in this section? — Centrx→ talk • 21:36, 7 October 2006 (UTC)
In addition, e.g., when all " ant" in an article are linked by [[]], it is easiest for ordinary readers to distinguish the word(s) automatically in an article. -- by PTNFromm 16:05, 10 May 2007 (UTC), 17:09, 10 May 2007 (UTC)
On a related note, what about items in tables? I've come across tables of lists of TV episodes, with their respective writer or director listed. Many writers/directors appear multiple times in a table, and the editors have painstakingly ensured that each writer is only linked for their first episode, and no subsequent ones. Or indeed not linked at all, if that person is mentioned elsewhere in some previous body text. I believe this to be a waste of effort on their part, and positively unhelpful for the reader. Having found the entry in the table I'm interested in, and seeing the writer unlinked, I'm then left to do a search of the page to find a functioning link for that writer. Can I suggest a recommendation that all such entries in tables should be linked, even if repeated, due to the "random-access" nature of tables? -- KJBracey 14:33, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
The paragraph which instructs to use the most precise target uses an example which doesn't make sense to me: " V8 engine" rather than " V8 engine" while V8 redirects to V8 engine. This example seems to address an evident case that you don't label a link foo if the article is named foo bar and you refer to foo bar as foo bar in your text. In that case, foo bar is not more precise, it's just the canonical name. I tried to fix that, but was reverted by User:Centrx. Is there anyone else that thinks like me, or am I missing something?-- Chealer 22:24, 12 September 2006 (UTC)
There is a problem with multiple links on a page. It makes maintenance of the page difficult if the links change (as the link count is only given once in the what links here), which is why multiple links to the same page has been discouraged in the past. Revision as of 05:28, 16 June 2006 Nscheffey ← Older edit, Revision as of 22:34, 6 July 2006 Centrx -- Philip Baird Shearer 12:44, 18 September 2006 (UTC)
I'd like to see guidance on redlinks here. - Stephanie Daugherty (Triona) - Talk - Comment - 07:58, 24 September 2006 (UTC)
An increasing number of articles are using automatically numbered footnotes to cite references. This practice is apparently being encouraged, because it is especially prevalent in
Featured articles. In my opinion, inline numbered external links (such as [http://www.blahblah.org]
, which displays inline as
[1]) should not be used in an article with footnotes. Having two overlapping number series (inline footnote calls numbered 1–x and inline external links numbered 1–y) is confusing and also ugly. In my opinion, the better practice in an article with footnotes is to put external links in footnotes with a descriptive title, such as: <ref>[http://www.blahblan.org Blather]</ref>
, which displays inline as
[1] and in the Notes section as shown below. What do others think?
Finell
(Talk) 06:02, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
I'm seeing more and more links of a new type. Instead of having the link reflect the name of the article, it's a verb phrase or something. For instance, the article Atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki has the link: considered very inefficient' which is just horrible and could be replaced by: considered to have a low efficiency (or something similar). This links to the same section on weapon efficiency. I think too much was put into the talk archive, as this page is really small now. I still stand by my comments about multiple, directly adjacent links. They're real ugly and clumsy because you don't know what you're getting, if it's one link or many, by simply reading an article without moving the mouse over every link. It spoils all multiple-word links that way. Usually this form is unnecessary and one of the links amounts to a sort of dictionary-definition link. It's a scourge on the whole enterprise if you ask me. -- Howdybob 14:25, 1 October 2006 (UTC)
I am not sure about the form for suggesting this so I am posting it here. I have been working away at fixing the links in filmographies and award pages over the last few months and I would like to recommend that we try to teach wiki editors to check and make sure that the link that they create goes to the wikipage that they mean it to go to (I would have typed this in all caps but I know that that is considered rude).
I suggest that we recommend to editors that are creating links that:
All of the things that need to be typed in like (film) or (1935 film) or (TV series) or changing the link to avoid redirects can be done right then and there. Now I am not trying to get out of the work that I am currently enjoying (more on that below), but, Wikipedia is a powerful and fun learning tool. That power is diminished when links lead to areas that have nothing to do with the subject at hand. Much of what I have mentioned also applies to creating external links but I have found very few of these that went somewhere unintended.
This was my main topic but I do have a further suggestion for anyone that is fixing links the way that I have been. I have found that opening two windows to a page that is being worked on makes this job much easier.
In this example it was still important to click on the 'Show preview' and check that my corrections went where I wanted them to.
Again my apologies if these are in the wrong place. To anyone who might read these I hope that they are useful suggestions. Also, if I have posted them in the wrong place please feel free to move them to where they might to some good for other editors. MarnetteD | Talk 02:03, 13 October 2006 (UTC)
The protocols are listed at Meta:URI schemes#Current settings. Peahaps this link should be given in the article? Secondly, what is the reason to restrict the protocols; that is, why not just to convert everything in square braces into external link? I was looking on how to insert ed2k links. -- Javalenok 19:08, 4 November 2006 (UTC)
I've been editing using the Template:Infobox Writer and a user changed the Website field from the way I had it (example) Official website to [2] citing WP:MOS. I personally think it looks better as official site especially since being in a template, or heck even www.catherinecoulter.com would do but the WP:MOS-L only says However, you should add a descriptive title when an external link is offered in the References, Further reading, or External links section. Is there any policy on this someplace that I'm not seeing? The template itself says nothing about the prefered style of choice. I bring this up here because I don't see it elsewhere and since that's the case perhaps it should also be on here, plus I don't want to get into an edit war. All other authors that I see using the Website field either have Official website or www.catherinecoulter.com so perhaps clarification for templates is needed? Anyway any answers are appreciated. Thanks. -- ImmortalGoddezz 01:12, 10 November 2006 (UTC)
Policy proposal: Link technical terms once per article section. Another editor ( AySz88 \ ^-^) and I have been discussing the proper number of links for the same technical term in a technical article. For example, how many times to link invariant mass in a longish article on mass in special relativity? His suggestion is that every time is too many, and I think just ONCE at the beginning is not enough (since it can be missed and have to be searched for). A good compromise seems ONCE per article section. That won't please everyone, but this is an issue where you can't please everyone. Linking EVERY time a phrase appears drives some people bananas with multiple colors per line, and yet I still say that for some articles, once isn't enough. So the logical number is just do it in the first paragraph of any section (or first use of it), so that it's unlikely that anyone reading it the second time won't have run over it the first time, and have it at hand. Again, I'm only suggesting this as a general guideline for technical terms in longish technical articles which use them more than few times. What say you all? S B H arris 01:16, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
I was searching this page for naming conventions for external links but found very little. In my opinion, if your article is, say, "Foo History Museum of Foo County", then if you have an official link to the museum, you can put that as the first link and simply call it "Foo History Museum of Foo County". I find it redundant to say "FHMoFC website", or even "Official website of FHMoFC", because I think "official" is overused and sometimes used to legitimize links that are anything but official. When Wikignoming articles I generally change the official link's title to the title of the entity or organization in question, but if at some point someone sees fit to change it back, I leave it that way since it seems to only be my opinion and not codified anywhere. Does anyone know if this has been discussed somewhere? Any thoughts? Thanks! Katr67 18:09, 26 November 2006 (UTC)
One thing not mentioned is where the 's goes when the possessive is not part of the name itself. I think the 's belongs outside the link. Compare:
I think the first one is much better, because the 's has nothing to do with the article linked to. On the other hand, Macy's definitely needs the 's on the inside, because the 's is part of the name (as the MoS currently says). - furrykef ( Talk at me) 02:06, 12 February 2007 (UTC)
Would it be good to change:
"The use of links to other Wikipedia articles, for example, [[Ant]]
, is encouraged."
into
"The use of links to other Wikipedia articles, for example, [[Ant]]
(resulting in
Ant), is encouraged."
Or something to that extent.
Or would this only add to the confusion?
kabbelen 04:25, 26 February 2007 (UTC)
What's the deal with links being underlined without rollover? I'm not sure where this is/was discussed, but it's really annoying. Sure, there's some merit to the change, and it's a bit more "proper," but it looks like shit on pages with many links (i.e. the home page). Compare the elegant rollover underlines on the menu panel. Anyone know why this was done? Max 15:38, 9 March 2007 (UTC)
Please, can anyone tell me the proper format to create a link within another link? (Or, is this even possible?) For example, let's say that I want the text to read exactly: Arnold (The Governator) Schwarzenegger. What is the proper linking format that would create this exact text so that it links to both the "Arnold Schwarzenegger" article and the "The Governator" article? Please help. Thanks a lot! ( JosephASpadaro 05:21, 13 March 2007 (UTC))
Policy in a nutshell: A red link is not an emergency and it is not a promise. (It's not a baby that has stopped breathing, and it's not an engagement ring). (This is a proposed policy page, to be summarized in shorter form, as a subsection under "linking") Terms which are given link parentheses, but do not presently link to a wiki, appear in the default user settings, in red. This may have been an unfortunate choice of color, since red to many people signals danger, or something not working, or which needs immediate fixing. This is not necessarily the case with non-working internal (red) links, however! A non-working link does *not* mean that something is wrong in Wikipedia, and despite the color, it actually is NOT begging to be immediately fixed, either by removing the brackets, or by creating a page which expands upon it. These things may be done later. Nature and the Heavens will not cry out if these things are not done immediately. In fact, a good healthy wiki article will probably have a certain amount of nonworking links, so long as wikipedia grows properly. Nonworking links may be perfectly normal things, like twig buds on a plant. They are markers for places where an editor has essentially commented, using brackets, that he or she would like to see a Wiki on this topic, but found that it didn't exist. That's okay. If the editor didn't have the immediate time or knowledge to expand upon a term, the mere marking of interest may stimulate another editor with more time or knowledge or initiative, to begin work on the article at some later date. This is a good thing. In the meantime, it's best if the non-working link is left alone. There is nothing wrong with such links. Editors who are offended by the violent RED color are encouraged to go back to their user settings page and change it for their own reader, so that they themselves can read articles in more peace, and thus leave these variety of links in peace. They are important, (which is to say, in the direction of writing articles on terms-of-interest which don't have them). Editors may notice that some nonworking internal links really are pathological. For example, they may link to words that don't need links because they aren't likely to ever be the topics of Wikipedia articles. But note that links in the preceding sentence-- this is not always easy to figure out. In such cases, though, it's perfectly fine to remove the brackets. Also, editors may notice that a link is not working because somebody has mistakenly included the plural s inside the bracket, or the word is misspelled, or some obvious problem of this sort. Again, these can and should be fixed. Finally, an editor who knows enough about a nonworking link to write a stub on it, can click on it, and start the page by doing it. This is always preferable to removing the brackets on a non-working link, if the link is to a word which will EVER be worth a Wiki. Probably the best of all solutions involves figuring out that the non-working link is actually a variant of a term which already has a wiki, so that the link can either be changed to the existing wiki, or a redirect page can be created (creating a redirect is the better option if the non-working term is a very common but not technically correct one, for example transistor radio battery vs. PP3 battery) What a nonworking internal link is NOT, is a promise, or a deadline. So it need not be treated as an engagement ring, or a notice from the IRS. The person who made it is under no moral obligation to come back and expand it into a stub or article, even if they once intended to. And you, the editor, are under no obligation to watch a non-working link for some period of time, to make sure that somebody eventually "attends" to it, as though it were a parking ticket. Nonworking internal links are not wet babies; unless the nonworking link is a pathological link (see above) there's no particular hurry for anybody to attend to it. And if the color of it is bothering you, again you know what you can do about it. But leave the link itself ALONE. It's serving a purpose and function, like a bud, and what it needs most from you the editor, if you're not going to create the article, is not to be bothered by you, until somebody else can do the job. S B H arris 21:50, 21 March 2007 (UTC)
I have read a number of articles where placenames are referenced with separate links to the city and state/province. e.g. John Smith was born in [[White Plains, New York|White Plains]], [[New York]]. This construction seems bulky and quite unwikily to me. Is this some sort of standard I don't know about? Am I out of line if I edit these links to [[White Plains, New York]]? Surely readers who want to read about New York state can find a link to it or enter it in the search box. I find myself somewhat of a deletionist with regard to links, particularly those which result in bulky wikitext. MKoltnow 21:24, 6 April 2007 (UTC)
I came here to check the advice about overlinking in order to explain things to another editor, only to find that it had disappeared. The History showed that it had been commented out because of lack of consensus, but I can see no recent (or any) discussion here about most of it, and no indication that there's lack of consensus. I've uncommented it (aside from anything else, it's really irritating to continue editing in line with the MoS, referring to it in editing disputes, and then to find that it's suddenly been radically changed).
Is there any opposition to the section in principle, or to any of the specific parts of it? -- Mel Etitis ( Talk) 11:59, 21 May 2007 (UTC)
I added a clause mentioning that non English sites are acceptable if they provide an authoritative information. I'm thinking, for instance, of legal matters: if we discuss a law of country X, then we should always have a link to the original version of the law in the language of that country, for there is usually no authoritative translation. David.Monniaux 06:49, 31 May 2007 (UTC)
Perhaps it should be explicitly mentioned that primary links to resources should not be avoided because of concerns about overlinking. With primary links I mean for example the main link to an album in an artist's discography, or the primary link to a track in an album track listing, even if those resources have been linked earlier in the article. This is being discussed at WT:ALBUM#Linking track names in track listing
Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Albums/Archive 16#Linking track names in track listing. My interpretation of this guideline is that linking them is fine, as long as the links are in a separate section, which they will most often be, but it might be worth making this explicit. Opinions?--
PEJL 18:27, 10 June 2007 (UTC)
I'd like to propose a guideline that, in situations where it is felt necessary to put multiple links in proximity, editors take care to avoid making adjacent words part of different links. As an example, these two alternative forms of the same fragment contain the same text and links, but the second is clearer:
SheffieldSteel 17:25, 3 July 2007 (UTC)
In re-organising the structure of MOSNUM, there's a proposal to move the information about the linking of chronological items to here. Does anyone have an opinion on this? Tony 04:31, 25 July 2007 (UTC)
| Guild of Copy Editors | |||
|
Couldn't find anything to change ! thisisace 01:01, 5 August 2007 (UTC)
In HTML, the #-prefix of an INTRA-page link is suppressed. See the (rendered) TOC for example. It seems that in Wiki-markup, this is not so, as the 5th example under Wikipedia:How to edit a page#Links and URLs shows:
[[#Links and URLs]] is a link to another section on the current page.
#Links and URLs is a link to another section on the current page.
Should articles really be speckled with stray #'s before certain words and phrases (that link to matching headings) ?, or should we all work together to manually suppress them with pipes (by duplicating the word or entire phrase, thereafter) ?
Any thoughts?
4.232.54.35 06:58, 15 August 2007 (UTC)
Would editors be able to clarify the guidance regarding the linking of lone years. And debate between myself and another editor (see my TalkPage for details, under "Dates of birth etc"). I think the MoS is quite clear that lone years are not linked. User:BrownHairedGirl argues that the MoS does not say this. She believes that when in sentence saying Ruth Dalton's husband was given a life peerage in 1960, it is relevant to link 1960 to 1960 in the United Kingdom, because 1960 is two years after the Life Peerages Act 1958 creating life peerages. That to me is linking for the sake of it. There are other examples on Ruth Dalton's page where BrownHairedGirl has done this, linking other lone years (and she only did this after I removed all the links in the first place and pointed out the MoS). I believe that this totally unnecessary over-linking which the MoS clearly forbides. Could other editors settle this. Much appreciated. -- UpDown 17:44, 16 August 2007 (UTC)
I am editing the entire page because the edit link on the section above goes to the no such section problem page. Is anyone else having problems? Septentrionalis PMAnderson 16:48, 26 August 2007 (UTC)
Fixed. SandyGeorgia ( Talk) 23:15, 28 August 2007 (UTC)
Former text:
I strongly object to the absolute prohibition of links in quotations, while agreeing that we should be very careful. The following quote seems perfectly harmless:
This is encouragement of bad writing, like some other provisions of the MOS; by the same reasoning, we would not be able to add italics, even when helpful to the reader and clearly indicated. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 16:48, 26 August 2007 (UTC)
Oppose change. Original guideline has long-standing acceptance because the reasoning behind it, as stated in the guideline, is sound. Terms in quotation can always be linked adding a sentence below the quotation that uses them; if a link would help the reader, an explanation would help even more. Finell (Talk) 08:28, 1 September 2007 (UTC)
MOS says:
- Linking
- Unless there is a good reason to do so, Wikipedia avoids linking from within quotes, which may clutter the quotation, violate the principle of leaving quotations unchanged, and mislead or confuse the reader.
There seems to be no good reason that the text here should be different. This submanual and MOS should not be inconsistent. Tony 10:43, 6 September 2007 (UTC)
Wikilinks are not stable, nor are Wikieditors; Wiki is a dynamic environment and is not a reliable source. Because of its dynamic nature, many Wiki articles are factually inaccurate. Article X that editor Y links to today can change to Article Z long after editor Y who inserted the link has left Wiki and ceased watching the article, and the context of a quote can be affected and misinterpreted. And even if Editor Y thinks Article X provides the correct context even when linking, the Wiki article can still be wrong in ways that cause the quote to be mischaracterized. It is not up to Editor Y to interpret context of a direct quote via a link. Because Wiki is dynamic, editors change, and Wiki is not a reliable source, I continue to be opposed to changing a long-standing guideline against wikilinks in quotes. We need to let direct quotes speak for themselves, independently of dynamic Wiki article possible misinterpretation of what the original author intended. Linking within quotes borders on original research. SandyGeorgia ( Talk) 13:07, 6 September 2007 (UTC)
I like it. Why? Because it helps the encyclopedia. Why? Because it potentially helps the reader. How? By providing context they might need to understand a quote. Why else? Because, in the spirit of ignoring all rules, it eliminates a "never" prohibition, and replaces it with a "use extreme caution" guideline. Does it violate the policy against original research? No, that policy remains in effect, and can be used on a case-by-case basis, rather than using it as a tool to bludgen this proposed change. Does it loosen restrictions on editing? Obviously (yes this is a good thing). Can an individual linked quotation be disputed? Obviously (this too is a good thing). Are we all discerning enough not to link if it means original research? Perhaps not. Is this okay? Yes, this is a wiki. Things can be altered (or disputed) by the next editor to come along. It's not the end of the world. I support this change. Mahalo. -- Ali'i 15:42, 7 September 2007 (UTC)
I've added a version of Greathouse's text, since he thinks it a stronger warning; I would consent to detag this. Let's see what happens. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 18:22, 12 September 2007 (UTC)
... who wrote in 1890, "Whether a little farmer from South Carolina named Tillman is going to rule the Democrat Party in America - yet it is this, and not output, on which the proximate value of silver depends." The term was used by Herbert Hoover in 1932, referring to the US politician Ben Tillman (1859–1914) ....
Or something like that. You just can't mess with the original source. Still opposing. Tony 01:13, 17 September 2007 (UTC)
I picked a paragraph from George W. Bush that has links within quotations:
In the televised Republican presidential debate held in Des Moines, Iowa on December 13 1999, all of the participating candidates were asked "What political philosopher or thinker do you most identify with and why?" Unlike most of the other candidates, who cited former presidents and other political figures, Bush responded, " Christ, because he changed my heart". Bush's appeal to religious values seems to have aided him in the general election. In a Gallup poll those who said they "attend church weekly" gave him 56% of their vote in 2000, and 63% of their vote in 2004. During the election cycle, Bush labeled himself a " compassionate conservative", and his political campaign promised to "restore honor and dignity to the White House," a reference to the scandals and impeachment of his predecessor. (references removed)
I don't necessarily doubt your abilities, but I know I would have a tricky time writing this paragraph using the context outside of the quotations. Perhaps de-link philosopher? But what about Christ, compassionate conservative, and White House? You already know that I support linking withing quotations, but this is a serious question (especially for the "compassionate conservative" label). There are just some times when a link makes more sense than trying to write complex sentences (where the reader might lose focus of the subject and point). Mahalo, Tony. -- Ali'i 15:56, 19 September 2007 (UTC)
Here's an example of an article ever so slowly inching its way through FAR: United States Congress#Enumerated powers. Opinions on whether historical concepts in these quotes relate to the current concepts they are linked to; some of them seem problematic and demonstrate the problem with linking in quotes. A lot of those links may confer POV or may not be reflect original language intended. SandyGeorgia ( Talk) 17:15, 19 September 2007 (UTC)
I added a section called "Intuitiveness" as a sub-section of "Internal links". What do you think about it? A.Z. 20:46, 28 October 2007 (UTC)
The box style of link is a bad idea, and should not be encouraged here. First, the idea of using a box is apparently promotional, and serves to encourage open wikis over other sites. I see no reason why (for example) {{ Databank}} should be any different than {{ Wookieepedia box}}. Secondly, the primary use (and the name of CSS style it uses) is for sister sites run by the Wikimedia Foundation. Using this box gives the false impression that external wikis are approved by or affiliated with Wikimedia. Superficial changes such as color don't make it clear that this is an external link. There is the idea that Wikipedia should encourage free content, and it does that by example, not with something resembling a banner ad. -- Phirazo 06:07, 21 December 2007 (UTC)
IMDb links are often in infoboxes, as well as other such links. Usefulness and the nature of a link does have a factor in how we display links. Something to think about. -- Ned Scott 17:26, 22 December 2007 (UTC)
There's also many ways we can work with this kind of box. For example, this box that I made just now in my sandbox shows how a single box could be used for all wikis (that pass WP:EL) could be used, taking up less space when there is more than one. It also helps to imply that the box is simply noting both wikis that are not related to Wikipedia, as well as making them seem less "important" and more a matter of organization. -- Ned Scott 17:33, 22 December 2007 (UTC)
I'm looking strictly at the issue of consensus here. To be frank, I'm not particularly exercised about whether the Memory Alpha links look one way or another, although the box format does have more of an advertising feel to it, which is (to me) a problem.
I don't think that the fact that some or all of these boxes have survived TfD necessarily demonstrates consensus to add text to this guideline, especially considering that the addition has been reverted by multiple editors. I think the issue needs to be resolved here first. Would an RFC or third opinion be useful? -- SSB ohio 17:03, 21 December 2007 (UTC)
<scratches head> On this page, I can't find the MOS guidance/convention which states that links of key importance should be bold, even though the page uses that convention itself, nota bene!
I grepped the talk page archives for the word "bold", but couldn't find a relevant discussion on inclusion or removal. Where did that go, and/or what happened and/or where should I be looking?
-- Kim Bruning ( talk) 20:30, 15 January 2008 (UTC)
It has been stated that this is the best practice. But it doesn't help with fact checking like for links in citations. If the external page goes down, then Internet Archive can be used to find the most recent version regardless of what the date retrieved is. – Pomte 02:03, 27 January 2008 (UTC)
Dear fellow editors—The idea is to centralise debate and consensus-gathering when there are inconsistencies between the pages.
The most straightforward way is to have MOS-central prevail, and to involve expertise from sub-pages on the talk page there, rather than the fragmentary discourse—more usually the absence of discourse and the continuing inconsistency—that characterises WP's style guideline resources now. If consensus has it that MOS-central should bend to the wording of a sub-page, so be it. But until that occurs in each case that might occasionally arise, there needs to be certainty for WPians, especially in the Featured Article process, where nominators and reviewers are sometimes confused by a left- and right-hand that say different things.
Of course, no one owns MOS-central, and we're all just as important to its running as other editors. I ask for your support and feedback HERE. Tony (talk) 12:19, 5 February 2008 (UTC)
Requesting comments for a new style proposal for wikis listed in the EL section is at Wikipedia:Linking to other wikis. Everyone is encouraged to leave feedback. -- Ned Scott 05:38, 10 February 2008 (UTC)
Should abbreviated units be linked or not within an infobox. CorleoneSerpicoMontana ( talk) 08:53, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
Is there anything in the MoS or in WP in regards to a wikiling that directs readers to another section of the same article? Butterfly0fdoom ( talk) 05:54, 24 February 2008 (UTC)
I have taken the liberty of moving this topic to Wikipedia_talk:Manual_of_Style_(dates_and_numbers)#Intuitiveness_and_year_by_subject_pages because of the cross-over with discussions there and that is the more active of the two pages. I hope nobody minds. Lightmouse ( talk) 23:07, 4 July 2008 (UTC)
I was working on the Ian Stewart article and was surprised by the external link regarding his work on coupled oscillators in the Biography section. I had a feeling that external links were usually inserted as references, and only links within Wikipedia are inserted as inline text (perhaps because the few articles I have been focusing on seem to do that). Is that the convention? If not, are external links distinguished from internal ones in any recommended way, or is it standard style not to distinguish them? DiderotWasRight ( talk) 22:42, 25 March 2008 (UTC)
Is it possible to add a bracket ] inside a link name (so it does not close the link)? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Knakts ( talk • contribs) 17:54, 29 March 2008 (UTC)
I haven't seen any comments about which is preferred for a "See also" section—using a piped link to hide the Category namespace name, or not:
I think the second item looks cleaner, but it hides the fact that the link is to a category and not a list article as one might think. Is there any MOS guideline for this situation? — Andrwsc ( talk · contribs) 18:00, 1 April 2008 (UTC)
user:Beeblbrox has proposed to get rid of all red links as a matter of policy. That is directly contrary to Wikipedia policies and the whole spirit of Wikipedia. I was quite shocked to find someone unaware of this. Getting rid of good red links is destructive. Please help this user: user talk:Beeblbrox. Michael Hardy ( talk) 04:38, 2 April 2008 (UTC)
Do language icons such as {{en icon}} have to be before the link or after? The section does not talk about where it needs to be placed. -- staka ( T ・ C) 00:32, 16 April 2008 (UTC)
What level of wikifying is expected for a great article. If an article contains a word that is very rare would you expect the article to wikify the word so the reader could understand what it means? If further more the rare word had no article on wikipedia to explain it, what should happen? Should it be redlinked, left without being wikified or something else? SunCreator ( talk) 16:58, 16 April 2008 (UTC)
Should text within articles have links to non-articles? An example of what I'm asking about is in Hiroshima#Transportation: "... two are still in operation as of July 2006 ([[:Image:Hiroden-hibakudensya PICT2443.JPG|Hiroden Numbers 651 and 652]])." In the article, the text "Hiroden Numbers 651 and 652" is a link to the image file. The brief discussion at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (links)#Links to categories shows an example of a link to a category, not in running text but in a "See also" section. Does anyone have opinions about when and where links from articles to non-articles are appropriate, or what sorts or purposes are good or bad? Fg2 ( talk) 02:37, 24 May 2008 (UTC)
What's the rationale behind thoroughly WL every date that appears in an article? I understand why, for example, it would be good to WL Einstein's birth and death dates but I don't know what purpose is served by WL every date that appears in the article about him. The "what links here" feature is almost unusable with indiscriminate linking of dates, more helpful WL become lost articles where every word is a wl, and I find it difficult to believe anybody ever really clicks them. I don't go to an article on Einstein and find myself suddenly curious what events happened to fall on the same day that he visited New York for the first time or his divorce papers became final. We're even wl "retrieved on" dates for external links in article references. This obsessive date linking mystifies me. Professor marginalia ( talk) 20:29, 16 June 2008 (UTC)
I'm not sure if this is already part of the policy or a guideline, but I'd like to suggest that, while normally only the first occurance of a term should be wikilinked, sometimes it makes a great deal of sense to subsequently link; and there are a couple of situations where it is common.
One is when you have, for example, a film or TV show. The header might say "Title is a 1928 movie starring Actor and Actress", with the two names wikilinked. However, it seems obvious that it is ideal to also wikilink the actors names in a listing or table of cast, or a subsection on cast, so that links to all of the cast are together. Similarly, an article about a music album might mention specific songs in the lead or history section, but should still include a link in the track list/table. Basically, I would say that it should be noted that even when a term is linked in an article, it should be re-linked when included in a list or table within the article. I give media examples, but it can occur anywhere (a list of cabinet ministers in an article about a state leader, for example).
The second example that I see when there is an article that, in a way, discusses more than one subject (for example, if there is a TV series article that covers more than one revival or version of the show, it makes sense to re-link in the section on the second version/revival, as people may start reading about that section and not realize that the people involved have already been mentioned as associated with the first version (or might start reading only about the 2nd version). TheHYPO ( talk) 04:46, 20 August 2008 (UTC)
I haven't seen a MOS guideline that either permits or discourages interwiki links. I'm specifically thinking of instances where the native language name of something is linked to the article in that language's wiki. For example:
Should there be a note about interwiki links like that from the main article prose or table text? — Andrwsc ( talk · contribs) 04:27, 26 August 2008 (UTC)
Speaking of which, is linking to wiktionary acceptable? Something like portmanteau. I'm guessing that like the links to commons and wikisource, links to wiktionary should mostly be through "sister project" templates at the bottom (or top) of an article, not in the main text. Is that right, or can you link to wiktionary in the main text of an article to help explain terms? Carcharoth ( talk) 23:19, 7 October 2008 (UTC)
In the manual of style, I found this:
We have discussed such things before ( here and here), but I disagree with this solution. It makes things inconsistent. As before, I argue that allowing links such as " William Shatner's toupee" causes a visual ambiguity: are we talking about a person named William Shatner, or a place, like a café, called William Shatner's? Of course, the context resolves the ambiguity, but my eyes still parse " William Shatner's" such that the 's is a part of the noun, which is jarring. I know that before it has been argued that it's similar to how links like [[banana]]s shows up the same as [[bananas]], but in that case the effect of leaving the S outside the link would be more jarring since there is no punctuation to break it up, so I don't think the analogy really works. Considering that, on top of all this, my way is also the easiest one to write in code, I think we should just stick to this rule. If consensus disagrees, we should probably stick to the other rule, because otherwise whether or not the 's appears in the link is significant or not becomes essentially random, which I think is silly.
Also, I remember at one point Wikipedia's software enforced the other rule, such that [[William Shatner]]'s still put the 's inside the link, but this was quickly undone. What was the deal with that? Was there a software problem, or did somebody think it was just a bad idea? - furrykef ( Talk at me) 16:18, 10 September 2008 (UTC)
I've commented out some text in the "Overlinking" section regarding "commonly known" nations, etc:
"The names of geographical locations that are likely to be well-known to English-speakers should generally not be linked where, in the context, they are unlikely to be confused with other locations of the same name, and the linked article would not specifically add to readers' understanding of the topic at hand—this includes the names of: countries such as United States, UK, Australia, Canada, Ireland, New Zealand, India, Russia, China, Germany, France and Italy, and the associated demonyms; major cities such as New York City, London, Moscow and Paris; the continents and the major oceans and seas; commonly known languages, particularly English; large-scale historical events ( World War II); familiar astronomical objects ( Earth, Moon, Sun); as well as common "dictionary" words."
It was added back in July, and is being used as justification for the removal of said links, but I see no discussion of it here. I've also seen some opposition to the removal of these links from articles, so... thoughts? -- Ckatz chat spy 23:49, 10 September 2008 (UTC)
to:"Geographic place names, since many places have similar names, and many readers may be from a distant place."
Again, after that change, the text from MoS (links) was copied to CONTEXT's "What generally should not be linked" section. I don't see a consensus here or there for what is, effectively, a reversal of that part of the guideline; if there is, apologies, but it isn't apparent. -- Ckatz chat spy 07:12, 11 September 2008 (UTC)"Geographic place names that are unlikely to be well-known to English-speakers"
I intend to add two points (not this exact wording):
Links should use the most precise target that arises in the context, even where the target is a simple redirect to a less specific page. Do not use a piped link to avoid otherwise legitimate redirect targets that fit well within the scope of the text. This assists in determining when a significant number of references to redirected links warrant more detailed articles.
Links should use the most precise target that arises in the context, even where the target is a simple redirect to a less specific page. Do not use a piped link to avoid otherwise legitimate redirect targets that fit well within the scope of the text. This also applies when the redirect leads to a section of the article. This assists in determining when a significant number of references to redirected links warrant more detailed articles. In fact, the creation of such redirects is encouraged.
And why, again, is CONTEXT separate from this page? You might ask why this shouldn't be discussed there; I rest my case. Tony (talk) 12:42, 22 September 2008 (UTC)
In chemistry articles sometimes I see links such as "tetra chloride". An article is mentioning a tetrachloride, but since we don't have an article called tetrachloride people link to chloride instead. Sounds reasonable in principle, but I think it looks hideous to have a word that is half black and half blue. Are there any guidelines for this? An alternative would be to pipe the link or create a redirect, as in tetrachloride ([[chloride|tetrachloride]]), but it could be considered misleading because the target article doesn't say anything specific about tetrachlorides (usually there's not much to say about these words that are composed using a multiplicative prefix). -- Itub ( talk) 12:01, 22 September 2008 (UTC)
I frequently come upon consecutive linked words, most often where the first term is to the far more directly relevant term while the second one goes to a parent article. The most recent example and the reason I'm finally posting here was from Gamma Cassiopeiae, where the consecutive words Cassiopeia constellation were linked to Cassiopeia (constellation) and constellation, respectively. I changed the link, as I sometimes do when I come across examples like this to one unified piped link to [[Cassiopeia (constellation)|Cassiopeia constellation]].
Personally, I regard such consecutive word links to be highly confusing, especially for non-editors who may not even realise that there are two different links. I also know that sometimes, linking from consecutive words can hardly be avoided. But imho the MOS should state that such links should be avoided wherever possible. Everyme 23:48, 28 September 2008 (UTC)
As recently discussed at Wikipedia:Village_pump_(policy)/Archive_55#Redundant guidelines, there are 4 different pages giving 4 different sets of advice on what to link: Wikipedia:Build the web, Wikipedia:Only make links that are relevant to the context, Wikipedia:Wikipedia doesn't use Allwiki and Wikipedia:Manual of Style (links). I remember Aervanath was working on this a while ago, and I'm glad to see that some progress has been made: User:Mr.Z-man recently demoted WP:ALLWIKI. But we're not home yet; I see that WP:BUILD still has sentences like this one: "George Washington should be linked to from President of the United States". It is very uncommon for a page on a particular public office to link to all the individuals who have been holders of that office. The style guidelines have ignored WP:BUILD and WP:ALLWIKI for a long time, and it looks like further work and negotiation is going to have to happen if we want to start linking to WP:BUILD. Better yet, it's probably time to get rid of at least one of the 3 remaining pages, and maybe 2 of them. - Dan Dank55 ( send/receive) 23:07, 1 October 2008 (UTC)
I'm looking at Wikipedia:MOSLINK#Overlinking_and_underlinking, but there is nothing in that section on underlinking or how to avoid it. Should there be? No mention of what underlinking is on the whole page. Carcharoth ( talk) 00:03, 3 October 2008 (UTC)
No one has convinced me one iota that underlinking, as Aerdavath claims, is rife. When I ask for examples, I get lists of shambolic stubs. Tony (talk) 05:58, 9 October 2008 (UTC)
Would there be any interest in noting on this page that one way to add links of secondary interest is to move "editorial aside" comments to a footnote and link to the articles there. i.e. instead of putting an aside in brackets, put it in a note at the bottom of the article instead. See here for the original post. Carcharoth ( talk) 00:04, 3 October 2008 (UTC)
For anyone who hasn't yet seen it so far, there's an RFC currently open at WT:MOSNUM on whether dates of birth and death in the first sentence of a biography article should be linked or not.
This is an issue that has recently come to a head, with the new deprecation of date auto-formatting, and recent bot-driven de-linking sprees. Jheald ( talk) 19:39, 3 October 2008 (UTC)
Hi, in MOS:LINK under the "Internal links" section, it states: "Do not link items in the title or headings.". Does this apply to Templates such as Template:Anglican Cathedrals in the British_Isles as well, or only to article titles and headings. Thank you. -- HighKing ( talk) 16:05, 7 October 2008 (UTC)
(outdent)Any other opinions on this? Or put another way - is there an actual policy that explicitly deals with links in template headings? I perhaps misunderstood the MOS:LINK policy and assumed... -- HighKing ( talk) 16:48, 8 October 2008 (UTC)
← Having had a look at the template in question and
its talk page boldness has been tried. Also note that my opinion doesn't reflect current practice: Looking only through the templates of the same category I found {{
ECUSA Provinces}}, {{
Anglican hierarchy in the United Kingdom and Ireland}} and {{
Province of New Zealand}} which link several items in the navbox title.
We have, BTW, the essay at
WP:NAVBOX, but I don't think it says anything about it at the moment.
So I guess further opinions are still welcome. --
Amalthea
Talk 10:24, 9 October 2008 (UTC)
It's strange that there's no lead. This is an initial draft. Does anyone have ideas on how it can be improved?
Wikilinking is one of the most important features of Wikipedia. It binds the project together into an interconnected whole, and it suggests closely related and useful pathways between locations both within the project and to external destinations. The four basic types of link—internal and external, piped and unpiped—are explained on this page in terms of their mechanical aspects and the contexts in which they are used.
Tony (talk) 15:07, 12 October 2008 (UTC)
The sequential points were very strange at one point (save, then fix?). Very messy, unexplained, makes assumptions I can't understand, so our newbies will be totally confused. Does this para refer to piped "Year-in-X" links? If so, they need to be introduced properly in their own subsection. It's strangely informal at the end—"we did a little research and came up with useful info for you" is the implication. I've removed it because it's misleading and confusing. External links are treated under their own section further down. Why here fleetingly??
All of the things that need to be typed in like (film) or (1935 film) or (TV series) or changing the link to avoid redirects can be done right then and there. Wikipedia's charm is diminished when links lead to areas that have nothing to do with the subject at hand. Much of what we have mentioned also applies to creating external links (
[ ]
), but we have found very few of these that went somewhere unintended.
Tony (talk) 15:07, 12 October 2008 (UTC)
This statement can't possibly be what is intended:
These links should be included where it is most likely that readers might want to use them; for example, in article leads, the beginnings of new sections, table cells, and image captions.
The implication could be that these are the only places one should link in. Another implication might be that you should probably link in captions and table cells. I think it probably needs to be replaced with something less ambiguous and more helpful. Unsure as yet what to write. Tony (talk) 15:07, 12 October 2008 (UTC)
I'm perplexed as to what this following paragraph means. It's kind of like a little "how to" guide, but I don't see how it would help anyone. It repeats what was in the "How to create links" section above, badly.
Link a word or phrase to the proper page. Use Preview to check a link, and follow it by opening the page to which the link directs. If that page does not seem to exist, do a quick search to find out whether the article may have a differently worded title or if the subject is included in a section of another article.
I've removed it. Tony (talk) 14:14, 12 October 2008 (UTC)
Can someone explain what this means?
Automated processes should not replace or pipe links to redirects. Instead, the link should always be examined in context.
It needs to be spelt out for newbies. Tony (talk) 15:18, 12 October 2008 (UTC)
Goodness. I just found (via WP:Red link), the following: Wikipedia:Interlanguage#Inline interlanguage links. It seems there is a school of thought that favours inline interwikilinks. I think the presumption is that people follow the link, see a foreign language, and are inspired to translate it. I think a better approach would be to leave it as a redlink, but have some way of saying to people "X number of articles on this exist in other language: link, link , links" (maybe in a footnote), and to say "please translate one of them for us. Or maybe not. The other point is that some people use a large number of existing redlinks to work out which articles are most "in demand" and to write (or translate) them. Use "what links here on a redlink to see what I mean: e.g. this allowed me to find out that William Henry Lang won the Linnean Medal and worked with Isabel Clifton Cookson. There is a William Lang (US football team coach). An examination of "what links here" for that William Lang shows us that someone has linked a William Lang in John Struthers (poet) - this one is a 19th century printer (could be notable, don't know. As a side point, Tony, what links here for William Lang is polluted with overlinking from a template. Namely, Template:Maryland Terrapins football coach navbox. Use of templates like that is responsible for huge amounts of overlinking. But I've gone way off-topic again. What should be done about inline interlanguage links? Carcharoth ( talk) 22:19, 13 October 2008 (UTC)
Currently, MOSLINK says:
There is no rule as to whether "See also Train" or "See also train", but consistency is required for multiple links. Linking never forces the use of an initial capital letter, so you can leave the initial letter lower case if you so desire, in the interest of readability.
Um ... I've always corrected examples of the former, since wikilinking was made to be flexible enough to take either upper- or lower-case initial, and it seems wrong not to integrate links into the grammar of their context.
Is there any objection to changing this to encourage editors to use upper or lower case according to which fits the grammar of the context in which the link is used? Tony (talk) 14:44, 14 October 2008 (UTC)
Earlier this month, Avearneth added a statement that "many articles suffer from underlinking" (proceeding to balance this by adding "overlinking" to the sentence). I've now made the prose neater and removed the negative "suffer". Apart from this, I've asked for justification of this assertion about underlinking, as has another editor above. I really haven't received a proper answer to this query. Can we have better examples than the list that was previously provided, to support this quite recent addition to the text? Tony (talk) 15:16, 14 October 2008 (UTC)
Tony, in fairness, you have yet to provide sufficient proof of overlinking. If you could please do so, that would be great, so that we could get a complete picture of the over/underlinking environment on Wikipedia. Not only is there Category:Articles that need to be wikified, but also Category:Dead-end pages (which, yes, does have some articles which are not actual nonsense), Wikipedia:Dead-end pages, and most importantly (in my view) Category:Orphaned articles, which has 58,257 members (and counting). All of these, in my opinion, point to a certain issue with underlinking.-- Aervanath lives in the Orphanage 16:30, 14 October 2008 (UTC)
I've also left a note one the WP:OVERLINK talk page. There has been much argument on this, but having read OVERLINK, I find it's almost entirely about over-AND-underlinking, and it's all valuable, but too long to be all crammed into MOSLINK. Thus, it serves as a valuable main article for just the section on over and underlinking in MOSLINK. So I've listed it that way. There are a few bits in OVERLINK to move, but really, that classifies all this info nicely, now. What say you all? S B H arris 18:17, 14 October 2008 (UTC)
I've removed "suffer", but I haven't yet touched the use of the rather negative terms "overlink" and "underlink" in the title. This area of the MoS is splintered between MOSLINK and CONTEXT, and is a prime reason for rationalisation (specifically, the merging of the latter into the former). What I propose is that this be done without affecting the current substantive balance between over/under taking both pages as a whole. I hope this will avoid political disputes. But the merger needs to involve a rationalisation of the text.
In particular, I wonder why a Manual of Style has to cast aspersions on articles by starting with this:
Many articles are underlinked or overlinked. An article is likely to be considered underlinked if subjects are not linked that are necessary to the understanding of the article. An article may be overlinked if any of the following is true:
"Many" is impossible to define, and there are unanswered queries here in relation to the existence of underlinking as a "problem". I note that this angle has only been recently added to MOSLINK by Averneath, and that when asked to justify it, he responds by asking me to provide other evidence.
I think the paragraph above is unnecessary and fails to assist editors. It would be better to simply state what generally should be linked and what generally should not be linked, as CONTEXT does. Tony (talk) 05:01, 15 October 2008 (UTC)
I notice that the shortcut WP:EGG is no longer working. It used to link to the "Intuitiveness" section of this MOS, but I see that section header is gone as it has been merged with other topics. Would someone mind addressing this, either by restoring the header or changing the shortcut redirect? I often use WP:EGG to point other editors towards the consensus on linkn intuitiveness, and I'm sure others do too. -- IllaZilla ( talk) 23:29, 21 October 2008 (UTC)
I'm currently working on a Featured List, (List of ISS spacewalks) and the only issue remaining is that the list does overlink, because every astronaut's name is linked to their page, even if they have been mentioned before. On the suggestion of a reviewer, I am posting here to get input. The issue is that most astronauts have made repeated spacewalks, some were done over a span of years. Most readers looking at this list would be looking for a specific mission where something was done, (and not reading it through from start to finish) and if the names are not linked, because the astronauts had previously done an EVA and had a link far up in the table, the readers would have to scroll or search the list to find that name, to be able to go to their article.
The same can be said for the links (and the acronyms) for modules, components, laboratories, and other parts of the station, which in the first mention, are spelled out, and linked, but not linked after that. (For instance, the Solar Alpha Rotary Joint (SARJ), which is linked and fully spelled out on first mention, but then years later, causes some major issues and multiple EVAs are done to evaluate and inspect it, and it is simply referred to as SARJ.) It seems that the overlinking guideline, in this case at least, is not the ideal. I would think that linking each mention of the components (or at the very least, once per mission) would be much more helpful to an average reader who may not know what the acronyms mean, or components do.
As for the astronaut names, it seems that linking them all gives the list a "consistent" look to it, if some were blue, and some black, it would be visually distracting (in my opinion), and that's why I went with linking all names. The compromise would be to link the first mention of each person per mission, so that the most someone would have to scroll would be 5 entries to find the link. I'd appreciate any input, thoughts, or suggestions. Thanks! Ariel ♥ Gold 22:02, 24 October 2008 (UTC)
I remember reading somewhere that this was bad form to like part of a word and have the rest unlinked rather than piping it. FE: [[car]]
s instead of [[car|cars]]
. However, I can't seem to find that anymore so I don't know if there was a change. I had figured it would be in this article, but I couldn't find anything. The issue comes up because someone recently editing a link I piped like that.
Jinnai (
talk) 03:35, 26 October 2008 (UTC)
Could some of the people watching this page give their opinions on the linking done in the 'award citation' quotes at List of Nobel Laureates in Chemistry? It is currently a featured list candidate (see here - submitted by someone else, not me), and I pointed out there that links in quotes were only rarely allowed, though I think the links are helpful, and I've said before that the carefully chosen language of the Nobel Foundation is a good example of quotes where links are both: (a) helpful to explain technical stuff; and (b) rife with pitfalls for the unwary who don't realise what the citation is talking about and what the key links should be (simple plain linking without piping is usually very unhelpful). I suggested a separate column called "further reading" from which to add relevant links (my preferred solution, as this makes clearer that the links are from Wikipedia editors, and not us 'speaking for the Nobel Foundation' by suggesting what they meant in their quotes), but that 'separate column' approach doesn't seem like it will catch on anytime soon. So I'm asking here whether the piping of links and the 'easter egg' appearance of some of the links at List of Nobel laureates in Chemistry is helpful or not (despite the easter egg-nature of some of the links). Please, please, before taking a "never link in quotes" or "they are easter eggs" stance, take the time to browse down the list and see whether the links actually work for you and if you learn more about the Nobel Laureates and their work from where the links take you. There is a subsidiary issue of linking to sections vs linking to articles, so if that is a problem please say something. A permalink, in case the article changes drastically, is here. The list before the changes (so people can see what the standard of linking was before my changes) is here. I'll wait a bit for some responses, and then ping two people I recently discussed linking issues with to get their opinion (I'm hoping they watch this page). So, in short, the options for such lists with highly-technical 'citation quotes' seem to be: (a) no links; (b) piped links; (c) links in a separate column; (d) links in footnotes. Any verdict here on which is best, or does it depend on context? Carcharoth ( talk) 20:58, 26 October 2008 (UTC)
There is supposed to be a dispute or proposal or something about the wording of the section on dates. It is alleged to be at WT:MOSNUM, but I can't find it. Please can the editor who insists on having a tag here direct people to the discussion. (I'll alter the tag to point here - please indicate further where people should go to find it. Or else start it here if you want.)-- Kotniski ( talk) 08:56, 17 November 2008 (UTC)
I have started an RFC for a centralized discussion of the issue of linking units in articles. I arbitrarily chose the talk page of WP:MOSNUM, but I am also leaving notices on as many relevent talk pages as possible to attract centralized attention to this. See Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (dates and numbers)#Centralized discussion for linking of units of measurement. Please carry on all further discussion at that location. Thanks. -- Jayron32. talk. contribs 21:22, 31 December 2008 (UTC)
I've hacked out a merged version of WP:MOSLINK, WP:OVERLINK (aka WP:CONTEXT) and WP:BUILD, as we agreed was desirable. It's at WP:Manual of Style (links)/merged. Please comment on that talk page. I know it still needs brushing up, but let me know if I've left out anything major. If there are no objections, I'm planning on substituting it for the current version of this page.-- Kotniski ( talk) 19:55, 9 January 2009 (UTC)
Please discuss the proposal below.-- Kotniski ( talk) 20:01, 9 January 2009 (UTC)
nice work, Kotniski - thanks! one suggestion for the date link section: it's rather contradictory to say multiple year-in-X links are unnecessary and then to suggest aliasing those links "in the main prose of articles in which such links are used heavily". a revision of this was discussed briefly on some talk page or other - i'll see if i can find it, but meanwhile it would make more sense to leave it at "However, piped links may be useful in places where compact presentation is important, such as tables, infoboxes and lists." thanks again for this work. Sssoul ( talk) 20:13, 9 January 2009 (UTC)
![]() | This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
Archive 1 | Archive 2 | Archive 3 | Archive 4 | Archive 5 | → | Archive 10 |
I think that the rule that an article is ovelinked if it has more links than lines (in the section Overlinking) is not very useful as the length of a line can vary depending on the browser, browsersettings and the resolution of the screen. I think it should be deleted or changed. -- Galadh 13:23, 3 September 2006 (UTC)
Just because you don't know of anyone using this provision in a dispute does not mean it is not a bad provision. Every one of the last 4 articles featured on the main page have more links than lines in the introductions. It is an arbitrary, wrongful provision; why is it justified and what is wrong with the reasoning above in this section? — Centrx→ talk • 21:36, 7 October 2006 (UTC)
In addition, e.g., when all " ant" in an article are linked by [[]], it is easiest for ordinary readers to distinguish the word(s) automatically in an article. -- by PTNFromm 16:05, 10 May 2007 (UTC), 17:09, 10 May 2007 (UTC)
On a related note, what about items in tables? I've come across tables of lists of TV episodes, with their respective writer or director listed. Many writers/directors appear multiple times in a table, and the editors have painstakingly ensured that each writer is only linked for their first episode, and no subsequent ones. Or indeed not linked at all, if that person is mentioned elsewhere in some previous body text. I believe this to be a waste of effort on their part, and positively unhelpful for the reader. Having found the entry in the table I'm interested in, and seeing the writer unlinked, I'm then left to do a search of the page to find a functioning link for that writer. Can I suggest a recommendation that all such entries in tables should be linked, even if repeated, due to the "random-access" nature of tables? -- KJBracey 14:33, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
The paragraph which instructs to use the most precise target uses an example which doesn't make sense to me: " V8 engine" rather than " V8 engine" while V8 redirects to V8 engine. This example seems to address an evident case that you don't label a link foo if the article is named foo bar and you refer to foo bar as foo bar in your text. In that case, foo bar is not more precise, it's just the canonical name. I tried to fix that, but was reverted by User:Centrx. Is there anyone else that thinks like me, or am I missing something?-- Chealer 22:24, 12 September 2006 (UTC)
There is a problem with multiple links on a page. It makes maintenance of the page difficult if the links change (as the link count is only given once in the what links here), which is why multiple links to the same page has been discouraged in the past. Revision as of 05:28, 16 June 2006 Nscheffey ← Older edit, Revision as of 22:34, 6 July 2006 Centrx -- Philip Baird Shearer 12:44, 18 September 2006 (UTC)
I'd like to see guidance on redlinks here. - Stephanie Daugherty (Triona) - Talk - Comment - 07:58, 24 September 2006 (UTC)
An increasing number of articles are using automatically numbered footnotes to cite references. This practice is apparently being encouraged, because it is especially prevalent in
Featured articles. In my opinion, inline numbered external links (such as [http://www.blahblah.org]
, which displays inline as
[1]) should not be used in an article with footnotes. Having two overlapping number series (inline footnote calls numbered 1–x and inline external links numbered 1–y) is confusing and also ugly. In my opinion, the better practice in an article with footnotes is to put external links in footnotes with a descriptive title, such as: <ref>[http://www.blahblan.org Blather]</ref>
, which displays inline as
[1] and in the Notes section as shown below. What do others think?
Finell
(Talk) 06:02, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
I'm seeing more and more links of a new type. Instead of having the link reflect the name of the article, it's a verb phrase or something. For instance, the article Atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki has the link: considered very inefficient' which is just horrible and could be replaced by: considered to have a low efficiency (or something similar). This links to the same section on weapon efficiency. I think too much was put into the talk archive, as this page is really small now. I still stand by my comments about multiple, directly adjacent links. They're real ugly and clumsy because you don't know what you're getting, if it's one link or many, by simply reading an article without moving the mouse over every link. It spoils all multiple-word links that way. Usually this form is unnecessary and one of the links amounts to a sort of dictionary-definition link. It's a scourge on the whole enterprise if you ask me. -- Howdybob 14:25, 1 October 2006 (UTC)
I am not sure about the form for suggesting this so I am posting it here. I have been working away at fixing the links in filmographies and award pages over the last few months and I would like to recommend that we try to teach wiki editors to check and make sure that the link that they create goes to the wikipage that they mean it to go to (I would have typed this in all caps but I know that that is considered rude).
I suggest that we recommend to editors that are creating links that:
All of the things that need to be typed in like (film) or (1935 film) or (TV series) or changing the link to avoid redirects can be done right then and there. Now I am not trying to get out of the work that I am currently enjoying (more on that below), but, Wikipedia is a powerful and fun learning tool. That power is diminished when links lead to areas that have nothing to do with the subject at hand. Much of what I have mentioned also applies to creating external links but I have found very few of these that went somewhere unintended.
This was my main topic but I do have a further suggestion for anyone that is fixing links the way that I have been. I have found that opening two windows to a page that is being worked on makes this job much easier.
In this example it was still important to click on the 'Show preview' and check that my corrections went where I wanted them to.
Again my apologies if these are in the wrong place. To anyone who might read these I hope that they are useful suggestions. Also, if I have posted them in the wrong place please feel free to move them to where they might to some good for other editors. MarnetteD | Talk 02:03, 13 October 2006 (UTC)
The protocols are listed at Meta:URI schemes#Current settings. Peahaps this link should be given in the article? Secondly, what is the reason to restrict the protocols; that is, why not just to convert everything in square braces into external link? I was looking on how to insert ed2k links. -- Javalenok 19:08, 4 November 2006 (UTC)
I've been editing using the Template:Infobox Writer and a user changed the Website field from the way I had it (example) Official website to [2] citing WP:MOS. I personally think it looks better as official site especially since being in a template, or heck even www.catherinecoulter.com would do but the WP:MOS-L only says However, you should add a descriptive title when an external link is offered in the References, Further reading, or External links section. Is there any policy on this someplace that I'm not seeing? The template itself says nothing about the prefered style of choice. I bring this up here because I don't see it elsewhere and since that's the case perhaps it should also be on here, plus I don't want to get into an edit war. All other authors that I see using the Website field either have Official website or www.catherinecoulter.com so perhaps clarification for templates is needed? Anyway any answers are appreciated. Thanks. -- ImmortalGoddezz 01:12, 10 November 2006 (UTC)
Policy proposal: Link technical terms once per article section. Another editor ( AySz88 \ ^-^) and I have been discussing the proper number of links for the same technical term in a technical article. For example, how many times to link invariant mass in a longish article on mass in special relativity? His suggestion is that every time is too many, and I think just ONCE at the beginning is not enough (since it can be missed and have to be searched for). A good compromise seems ONCE per article section. That won't please everyone, but this is an issue where you can't please everyone. Linking EVERY time a phrase appears drives some people bananas with multiple colors per line, and yet I still say that for some articles, once isn't enough. So the logical number is just do it in the first paragraph of any section (or first use of it), so that it's unlikely that anyone reading it the second time won't have run over it the first time, and have it at hand. Again, I'm only suggesting this as a general guideline for technical terms in longish technical articles which use them more than few times. What say you all? S B H arris 01:16, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
I was searching this page for naming conventions for external links but found very little. In my opinion, if your article is, say, "Foo History Museum of Foo County", then if you have an official link to the museum, you can put that as the first link and simply call it "Foo History Museum of Foo County". I find it redundant to say "FHMoFC website", or even "Official website of FHMoFC", because I think "official" is overused and sometimes used to legitimize links that are anything but official. When Wikignoming articles I generally change the official link's title to the title of the entity or organization in question, but if at some point someone sees fit to change it back, I leave it that way since it seems to only be my opinion and not codified anywhere. Does anyone know if this has been discussed somewhere? Any thoughts? Thanks! Katr67 18:09, 26 November 2006 (UTC)
One thing not mentioned is where the 's goes when the possessive is not part of the name itself. I think the 's belongs outside the link. Compare:
I think the first one is much better, because the 's has nothing to do with the article linked to. On the other hand, Macy's definitely needs the 's on the inside, because the 's is part of the name (as the MoS currently says). - furrykef ( Talk at me) 02:06, 12 February 2007 (UTC)
Would it be good to change:
"The use of links to other Wikipedia articles, for example, [[Ant]]
, is encouraged."
into
"The use of links to other Wikipedia articles, for example, [[Ant]]
(resulting in
Ant), is encouraged."
Or something to that extent.
Or would this only add to the confusion?
kabbelen 04:25, 26 February 2007 (UTC)
What's the deal with links being underlined without rollover? I'm not sure where this is/was discussed, but it's really annoying. Sure, there's some merit to the change, and it's a bit more "proper," but it looks like shit on pages with many links (i.e. the home page). Compare the elegant rollover underlines on the menu panel. Anyone know why this was done? Max 15:38, 9 March 2007 (UTC)
Please, can anyone tell me the proper format to create a link within another link? (Or, is this even possible?) For example, let's say that I want the text to read exactly: Arnold (The Governator) Schwarzenegger. What is the proper linking format that would create this exact text so that it links to both the "Arnold Schwarzenegger" article and the "The Governator" article? Please help. Thanks a lot! ( JosephASpadaro 05:21, 13 March 2007 (UTC))
Policy in a nutshell: A red link is not an emergency and it is not a promise. (It's not a baby that has stopped breathing, and it's not an engagement ring). (This is a proposed policy page, to be summarized in shorter form, as a subsection under "linking") Terms which are given link parentheses, but do not presently link to a wiki, appear in the default user settings, in red. This may have been an unfortunate choice of color, since red to many people signals danger, or something not working, or which needs immediate fixing. This is not necessarily the case with non-working internal (red) links, however! A non-working link does *not* mean that something is wrong in Wikipedia, and despite the color, it actually is NOT begging to be immediately fixed, either by removing the brackets, or by creating a page which expands upon it. These things may be done later. Nature and the Heavens will not cry out if these things are not done immediately. In fact, a good healthy wiki article will probably have a certain amount of nonworking links, so long as wikipedia grows properly. Nonworking links may be perfectly normal things, like twig buds on a plant. They are markers for places where an editor has essentially commented, using brackets, that he or she would like to see a Wiki on this topic, but found that it didn't exist. That's okay. If the editor didn't have the immediate time or knowledge to expand upon a term, the mere marking of interest may stimulate another editor with more time or knowledge or initiative, to begin work on the article at some later date. This is a good thing. In the meantime, it's best if the non-working link is left alone. There is nothing wrong with such links. Editors who are offended by the violent RED color are encouraged to go back to their user settings page and change it for their own reader, so that they themselves can read articles in more peace, and thus leave these variety of links in peace. They are important, (which is to say, in the direction of writing articles on terms-of-interest which don't have them). Editors may notice that some nonworking internal links really are pathological. For example, they may link to words that don't need links because they aren't likely to ever be the topics of Wikipedia articles. But note that links in the preceding sentence-- this is not always easy to figure out. In such cases, though, it's perfectly fine to remove the brackets. Also, editors may notice that a link is not working because somebody has mistakenly included the plural s inside the bracket, or the word is misspelled, or some obvious problem of this sort. Again, these can and should be fixed. Finally, an editor who knows enough about a nonworking link to write a stub on it, can click on it, and start the page by doing it. This is always preferable to removing the brackets on a non-working link, if the link is to a word which will EVER be worth a Wiki. Probably the best of all solutions involves figuring out that the non-working link is actually a variant of a term which already has a wiki, so that the link can either be changed to the existing wiki, or a redirect page can be created (creating a redirect is the better option if the non-working term is a very common but not technically correct one, for example transistor radio battery vs. PP3 battery) What a nonworking internal link is NOT, is a promise, or a deadline. So it need not be treated as an engagement ring, or a notice from the IRS. The person who made it is under no moral obligation to come back and expand it into a stub or article, even if they once intended to. And you, the editor, are under no obligation to watch a non-working link for some period of time, to make sure that somebody eventually "attends" to it, as though it were a parking ticket. Nonworking internal links are not wet babies; unless the nonworking link is a pathological link (see above) there's no particular hurry for anybody to attend to it. And if the color of it is bothering you, again you know what you can do about it. But leave the link itself ALONE. It's serving a purpose and function, like a bud, and what it needs most from you the editor, if you're not going to create the article, is not to be bothered by you, until somebody else can do the job. S B H arris 21:50, 21 March 2007 (UTC)
I have read a number of articles where placenames are referenced with separate links to the city and state/province. e.g. John Smith was born in [[White Plains, New York|White Plains]], [[New York]]. This construction seems bulky and quite unwikily to me. Is this some sort of standard I don't know about? Am I out of line if I edit these links to [[White Plains, New York]]? Surely readers who want to read about New York state can find a link to it or enter it in the search box. I find myself somewhat of a deletionist with regard to links, particularly those which result in bulky wikitext. MKoltnow 21:24, 6 April 2007 (UTC)
I came here to check the advice about overlinking in order to explain things to another editor, only to find that it had disappeared. The History showed that it had been commented out because of lack of consensus, but I can see no recent (or any) discussion here about most of it, and no indication that there's lack of consensus. I've uncommented it (aside from anything else, it's really irritating to continue editing in line with the MoS, referring to it in editing disputes, and then to find that it's suddenly been radically changed).
Is there any opposition to the section in principle, or to any of the specific parts of it? -- Mel Etitis ( Talk) 11:59, 21 May 2007 (UTC)
I added a clause mentioning that non English sites are acceptable if they provide an authoritative information. I'm thinking, for instance, of legal matters: if we discuss a law of country X, then we should always have a link to the original version of the law in the language of that country, for there is usually no authoritative translation. David.Monniaux 06:49, 31 May 2007 (UTC)
Perhaps it should be explicitly mentioned that primary links to resources should not be avoided because of concerns about overlinking. With primary links I mean for example the main link to an album in an artist's discography, or the primary link to a track in an album track listing, even if those resources have been linked earlier in the article. This is being discussed at WT:ALBUM#Linking track names in track listing
Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Albums/Archive 16#Linking track names in track listing. My interpretation of this guideline is that linking them is fine, as long as the links are in a separate section, which they will most often be, but it might be worth making this explicit. Opinions?--
PEJL 18:27, 10 June 2007 (UTC)
I'd like to propose a guideline that, in situations where it is felt necessary to put multiple links in proximity, editors take care to avoid making adjacent words part of different links. As an example, these two alternative forms of the same fragment contain the same text and links, but the second is clearer:
SheffieldSteel 17:25, 3 July 2007 (UTC)
In re-organising the structure of MOSNUM, there's a proposal to move the information about the linking of chronological items to here. Does anyone have an opinion on this? Tony 04:31, 25 July 2007 (UTC)
| Guild of Copy Editors | |||
|
Couldn't find anything to change ! thisisace 01:01, 5 August 2007 (UTC)
In HTML, the #-prefix of an INTRA-page link is suppressed. See the (rendered) TOC for example. It seems that in Wiki-markup, this is not so, as the 5th example under Wikipedia:How to edit a page#Links and URLs shows:
[[#Links and URLs]] is a link to another section on the current page.
#Links and URLs is a link to another section on the current page.
Should articles really be speckled with stray #'s before certain words and phrases (that link to matching headings) ?, or should we all work together to manually suppress them with pipes (by duplicating the word or entire phrase, thereafter) ?
Any thoughts?
4.232.54.35 06:58, 15 August 2007 (UTC)
Would editors be able to clarify the guidance regarding the linking of lone years. And debate between myself and another editor (see my TalkPage for details, under "Dates of birth etc"). I think the MoS is quite clear that lone years are not linked. User:BrownHairedGirl argues that the MoS does not say this. She believes that when in sentence saying Ruth Dalton's husband was given a life peerage in 1960, it is relevant to link 1960 to 1960 in the United Kingdom, because 1960 is two years after the Life Peerages Act 1958 creating life peerages. That to me is linking for the sake of it. There are other examples on Ruth Dalton's page where BrownHairedGirl has done this, linking other lone years (and she only did this after I removed all the links in the first place and pointed out the MoS). I believe that this totally unnecessary over-linking which the MoS clearly forbides. Could other editors settle this. Much appreciated. -- UpDown 17:44, 16 August 2007 (UTC)
I am editing the entire page because the edit link on the section above goes to the no such section problem page. Is anyone else having problems? Septentrionalis PMAnderson 16:48, 26 August 2007 (UTC)
Fixed. SandyGeorgia ( Talk) 23:15, 28 August 2007 (UTC)
Former text:
I strongly object to the absolute prohibition of links in quotations, while agreeing that we should be very careful. The following quote seems perfectly harmless:
This is encouragement of bad writing, like some other provisions of the MOS; by the same reasoning, we would not be able to add italics, even when helpful to the reader and clearly indicated. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 16:48, 26 August 2007 (UTC)
Oppose change. Original guideline has long-standing acceptance because the reasoning behind it, as stated in the guideline, is sound. Terms in quotation can always be linked adding a sentence below the quotation that uses them; if a link would help the reader, an explanation would help even more. Finell (Talk) 08:28, 1 September 2007 (UTC)
MOS says:
- Linking
- Unless there is a good reason to do so, Wikipedia avoids linking from within quotes, which may clutter the quotation, violate the principle of leaving quotations unchanged, and mislead or confuse the reader.
There seems to be no good reason that the text here should be different. This submanual and MOS should not be inconsistent. Tony 10:43, 6 September 2007 (UTC)
Wikilinks are not stable, nor are Wikieditors; Wiki is a dynamic environment and is not a reliable source. Because of its dynamic nature, many Wiki articles are factually inaccurate. Article X that editor Y links to today can change to Article Z long after editor Y who inserted the link has left Wiki and ceased watching the article, and the context of a quote can be affected and misinterpreted. And even if Editor Y thinks Article X provides the correct context even when linking, the Wiki article can still be wrong in ways that cause the quote to be mischaracterized. It is not up to Editor Y to interpret context of a direct quote via a link. Because Wiki is dynamic, editors change, and Wiki is not a reliable source, I continue to be opposed to changing a long-standing guideline against wikilinks in quotes. We need to let direct quotes speak for themselves, independently of dynamic Wiki article possible misinterpretation of what the original author intended. Linking within quotes borders on original research. SandyGeorgia ( Talk) 13:07, 6 September 2007 (UTC)
I like it. Why? Because it helps the encyclopedia. Why? Because it potentially helps the reader. How? By providing context they might need to understand a quote. Why else? Because, in the spirit of ignoring all rules, it eliminates a "never" prohibition, and replaces it with a "use extreme caution" guideline. Does it violate the policy against original research? No, that policy remains in effect, and can be used on a case-by-case basis, rather than using it as a tool to bludgen this proposed change. Does it loosen restrictions on editing? Obviously (yes this is a good thing). Can an individual linked quotation be disputed? Obviously (this too is a good thing). Are we all discerning enough not to link if it means original research? Perhaps not. Is this okay? Yes, this is a wiki. Things can be altered (or disputed) by the next editor to come along. It's not the end of the world. I support this change. Mahalo. -- Ali'i 15:42, 7 September 2007 (UTC)
I've added a version of Greathouse's text, since he thinks it a stronger warning; I would consent to detag this. Let's see what happens. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 18:22, 12 September 2007 (UTC)
... who wrote in 1890, "Whether a little farmer from South Carolina named Tillman is going to rule the Democrat Party in America - yet it is this, and not output, on which the proximate value of silver depends." The term was used by Herbert Hoover in 1932, referring to the US politician Ben Tillman (1859–1914) ....
Or something like that. You just can't mess with the original source. Still opposing. Tony 01:13, 17 September 2007 (UTC)
I picked a paragraph from George W. Bush that has links within quotations:
In the televised Republican presidential debate held in Des Moines, Iowa on December 13 1999, all of the participating candidates were asked "What political philosopher or thinker do you most identify with and why?" Unlike most of the other candidates, who cited former presidents and other political figures, Bush responded, " Christ, because he changed my heart". Bush's appeal to religious values seems to have aided him in the general election. In a Gallup poll those who said they "attend church weekly" gave him 56% of their vote in 2000, and 63% of their vote in 2004. During the election cycle, Bush labeled himself a " compassionate conservative", and his political campaign promised to "restore honor and dignity to the White House," a reference to the scandals and impeachment of his predecessor. (references removed)
I don't necessarily doubt your abilities, but I know I would have a tricky time writing this paragraph using the context outside of the quotations. Perhaps de-link philosopher? But what about Christ, compassionate conservative, and White House? You already know that I support linking withing quotations, but this is a serious question (especially for the "compassionate conservative" label). There are just some times when a link makes more sense than trying to write complex sentences (where the reader might lose focus of the subject and point). Mahalo, Tony. -- Ali'i 15:56, 19 September 2007 (UTC)
Here's an example of an article ever so slowly inching its way through FAR: United States Congress#Enumerated powers. Opinions on whether historical concepts in these quotes relate to the current concepts they are linked to; some of them seem problematic and demonstrate the problem with linking in quotes. A lot of those links may confer POV or may not be reflect original language intended. SandyGeorgia ( Talk) 17:15, 19 September 2007 (UTC)
I added a section called "Intuitiveness" as a sub-section of "Internal links". What do you think about it? A.Z. 20:46, 28 October 2007 (UTC)
The box style of link is a bad idea, and should not be encouraged here. First, the idea of using a box is apparently promotional, and serves to encourage open wikis over other sites. I see no reason why (for example) {{ Databank}} should be any different than {{ Wookieepedia box}}. Secondly, the primary use (and the name of CSS style it uses) is for sister sites run by the Wikimedia Foundation. Using this box gives the false impression that external wikis are approved by or affiliated with Wikimedia. Superficial changes such as color don't make it clear that this is an external link. There is the idea that Wikipedia should encourage free content, and it does that by example, not with something resembling a banner ad. -- Phirazo 06:07, 21 December 2007 (UTC)
IMDb links are often in infoboxes, as well as other such links. Usefulness and the nature of a link does have a factor in how we display links. Something to think about. -- Ned Scott 17:26, 22 December 2007 (UTC)
There's also many ways we can work with this kind of box. For example, this box that I made just now in my sandbox shows how a single box could be used for all wikis (that pass WP:EL) could be used, taking up less space when there is more than one. It also helps to imply that the box is simply noting both wikis that are not related to Wikipedia, as well as making them seem less "important" and more a matter of organization. -- Ned Scott 17:33, 22 December 2007 (UTC)
I'm looking strictly at the issue of consensus here. To be frank, I'm not particularly exercised about whether the Memory Alpha links look one way or another, although the box format does have more of an advertising feel to it, which is (to me) a problem.
I don't think that the fact that some or all of these boxes have survived TfD necessarily demonstrates consensus to add text to this guideline, especially considering that the addition has been reverted by multiple editors. I think the issue needs to be resolved here first. Would an RFC or third opinion be useful? -- SSB ohio 17:03, 21 December 2007 (UTC)
<scratches head> On this page, I can't find the MOS guidance/convention which states that links of key importance should be bold, even though the page uses that convention itself, nota bene!
I grepped the talk page archives for the word "bold", but couldn't find a relevant discussion on inclusion or removal. Where did that go, and/or what happened and/or where should I be looking?
-- Kim Bruning ( talk) 20:30, 15 January 2008 (UTC)
It has been stated that this is the best practice. But it doesn't help with fact checking like for links in citations. If the external page goes down, then Internet Archive can be used to find the most recent version regardless of what the date retrieved is. – Pomte 02:03, 27 January 2008 (UTC)
Dear fellow editors—The idea is to centralise debate and consensus-gathering when there are inconsistencies between the pages.
The most straightforward way is to have MOS-central prevail, and to involve expertise from sub-pages on the talk page there, rather than the fragmentary discourse—more usually the absence of discourse and the continuing inconsistency—that characterises WP's style guideline resources now. If consensus has it that MOS-central should bend to the wording of a sub-page, so be it. But until that occurs in each case that might occasionally arise, there needs to be certainty for WPians, especially in the Featured Article process, where nominators and reviewers are sometimes confused by a left- and right-hand that say different things.
Of course, no one owns MOS-central, and we're all just as important to its running as other editors. I ask for your support and feedback HERE. Tony (talk) 12:19, 5 February 2008 (UTC)
Requesting comments for a new style proposal for wikis listed in the EL section is at Wikipedia:Linking to other wikis. Everyone is encouraged to leave feedback. -- Ned Scott 05:38, 10 February 2008 (UTC)
Should abbreviated units be linked or not within an infobox. CorleoneSerpicoMontana ( talk) 08:53, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
Is there anything in the MoS or in WP in regards to a wikiling that directs readers to another section of the same article? Butterfly0fdoom ( talk) 05:54, 24 February 2008 (UTC)
I have taken the liberty of moving this topic to Wikipedia_talk:Manual_of_Style_(dates_and_numbers)#Intuitiveness_and_year_by_subject_pages because of the cross-over with discussions there and that is the more active of the two pages. I hope nobody minds. Lightmouse ( talk) 23:07, 4 July 2008 (UTC)
I was working on the Ian Stewart article and was surprised by the external link regarding his work on coupled oscillators in the Biography section. I had a feeling that external links were usually inserted as references, and only links within Wikipedia are inserted as inline text (perhaps because the few articles I have been focusing on seem to do that). Is that the convention? If not, are external links distinguished from internal ones in any recommended way, or is it standard style not to distinguish them? DiderotWasRight ( talk) 22:42, 25 March 2008 (UTC)
Is it possible to add a bracket ] inside a link name (so it does not close the link)? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Knakts ( talk • contribs) 17:54, 29 March 2008 (UTC)
I haven't seen any comments about which is preferred for a "See also" section—using a piped link to hide the Category namespace name, or not:
I think the second item looks cleaner, but it hides the fact that the link is to a category and not a list article as one might think. Is there any MOS guideline for this situation? — Andrwsc ( talk · contribs) 18:00, 1 April 2008 (UTC)
user:Beeblbrox has proposed to get rid of all red links as a matter of policy. That is directly contrary to Wikipedia policies and the whole spirit of Wikipedia. I was quite shocked to find someone unaware of this. Getting rid of good red links is destructive. Please help this user: user talk:Beeblbrox. Michael Hardy ( talk) 04:38, 2 April 2008 (UTC)
Do language icons such as {{en icon}} have to be before the link or after? The section does not talk about where it needs to be placed. -- staka ( T ・ C) 00:32, 16 April 2008 (UTC)
What level of wikifying is expected for a great article. If an article contains a word that is very rare would you expect the article to wikify the word so the reader could understand what it means? If further more the rare word had no article on wikipedia to explain it, what should happen? Should it be redlinked, left without being wikified or something else? SunCreator ( talk) 16:58, 16 April 2008 (UTC)
Should text within articles have links to non-articles? An example of what I'm asking about is in Hiroshima#Transportation: "... two are still in operation as of July 2006 ([[:Image:Hiroden-hibakudensya PICT2443.JPG|Hiroden Numbers 651 and 652]])." In the article, the text "Hiroden Numbers 651 and 652" is a link to the image file. The brief discussion at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (links)#Links to categories shows an example of a link to a category, not in running text but in a "See also" section. Does anyone have opinions about when and where links from articles to non-articles are appropriate, or what sorts or purposes are good or bad? Fg2 ( talk) 02:37, 24 May 2008 (UTC)
What's the rationale behind thoroughly WL every date that appears in an article? I understand why, for example, it would be good to WL Einstein's birth and death dates but I don't know what purpose is served by WL every date that appears in the article about him. The "what links here" feature is almost unusable with indiscriminate linking of dates, more helpful WL become lost articles where every word is a wl, and I find it difficult to believe anybody ever really clicks them. I don't go to an article on Einstein and find myself suddenly curious what events happened to fall on the same day that he visited New York for the first time or his divorce papers became final. We're even wl "retrieved on" dates for external links in article references. This obsessive date linking mystifies me. Professor marginalia ( talk) 20:29, 16 June 2008 (UTC)
I'm not sure if this is already part of the policy or a guideline, but I'd like to suggest that, while normally only the first occurance of a term should be wikilinked, sometimes it makes a great deal of sense to subsequently link; and there are a couple of situations where it is common.
One is when you have, for example, a film or TV show. The header might say "Title is a 1928 movie starring Actor and Actress", with the two names wikilinked. However, it seems obvious that it is ideal to also wikilink the actors names in a listing or table of cast, or a subsection on cast, so that links to all of the cast are together. Similarly, an article about a music album might mention specific songs in the lead or history section, but should still include a link in the track list/table. Basically, I would say that it should be noted that even when a term is linked in an article, it should be re-linked when included in a list or table within the article. I give media examples, but it can occur anywhere (a list of cabinet ministers in an article about a state leader, for example).
The second example that I see when there is an article that, in a way, discusses more than one subject (for example, if there is a TV series article that covers more than one revival or version of the show, it makes sense to re-link in the section on the second version/revival, as people may start reading about that section and not realize that the people involved have already been mentioned as associated with the first version (or might start reading only about the 2nd version). TheHYPO ( talk) 04:46, 20 August 2008 (UTC)
I haven't seen a MOS guideline that either permits or discourages interwiki links. I'm specifically thinking of instances where the native language name of something is linked to the article in that language's wiki. For example:
Should there be a note about interwiki links like that from the main article prose or table text? — Andrwsc ( talk · contribs) 04:27, 26 August 2008 (UTC)
Speaking of which, is linking to wiktionary acceptable? Something like portmanteau. I'm guessing that like the links to commons and wikisource, links to wiktionary should mostly be through "sister project" templates at the bottom (or top) of an article, not in the main text. Is that right, or can you link to wiktionary in the main text of an article to help explain terms? Carcharoth ( talk) 23:19, 7 October 2008 (UTC)
In the manual of style, I found this:
We have discussed such things before ( here and here), but I disagree with this solution. It makes things inconsistent. As before, I argue that allowing links such as " William Shatner's toupee" causes a visual ambiguity: are we talking about a person named William Shatner, or a place, like a café, called William Shatner's? Of course, the context resolves the ambiguity, but my eyes still parse " William Shatner's" such that the 's is a part of the noun, which is jarring. I know that before it has been argued that it's similar to how links like [[banana]]s shows up the same as [[bananas]], but in that case the effect of leaving the S outside the link would be more jarring since there is no punctuation to break it up, so I don't think the analogy really works. Considering that, on top of all this, my way is also the easiest one to write in code, I think we should just stick to this rule. If consensus disagrees, we should probably stick to the other rule, because otherwise whether or not the 's appears in the link is significant or not becomes essentially random, which I think is silly.
Also, I remember at one point Wikipedia's software enforced the other rule, such that [[William Shatner]]'s still put the 's inside the link, but this was quickly undone. What was the deal with that? Was there a software problem, or did somebody think it was just a bad idea? - furrykef ( Talk at me) 16:18, 10 September 2008 (UTC)
I've commented out some text in the "Overlinking" section regarding "commonly known" nations, etc:
"The names of geographical locations that are likely to be well-known to English-speakers should generally not be linked where, in the context, they are unlikely to be confused with other locations of the same name, and the linked article would not specifically add to readers' understanding of the topic at hand—this includes the names of: countries such as United States, UK, Australia, Canada, Ireland, New Zealand, India, Russia, China, Germany, France and Italy, and the associated demonyms; major cities such as New York City, London, Moscow and Paris; the continents and the major oceans and seas; commonly known languages, particularly English; large-scale historical events ( World War II); familiar astronomical objects ( Earth, Moon, Sun); as well as common "dictionary" words."
It was added back in July, and is being used as justification for the removal of said links, but I see no discussion of it here. I've also seen some opposition to the removal of these links from articles, so... thoughts? -- Ckatz chat spy 23:49, 10 September 2008 (UTC)
to:"Geographic place names, since many places have similar names, and many readers may be from a distant place."
Again, after that change, the text from MoS (links) was copied to CONTEXT's "What generally should not be linked" section. I don't see a consensus here or there for what is, effectively, a reversal of that part of the guideline; if there is, apologies, but it isn't apparent. -- Ckatz chat spy 07:12, 11 September 2008 (UTC)"Geographic place names that are unlikely to be well-known to English-speakers"
I intend to add two points (not this exact wording):
Links should use the most precise target that arises in the context, even where the target is a simple redirect to a less specific page. Do not use a piped link to avoid otherwise legitimate redirect targets that fit well within the scope of the text. This assists in determining when a significant number of references to redirected links warrant more detailed articles.
Links should use the most precise target that arises in the context, even where the target is a simple redirect to a less specific page. Do not use a piped link to avoid otherwise legitimate redirect targets that fit well within the scope of the text. This also applies when the redirect leads to a section of the article. This assists in determining when a significant number of references to redirected links warrant more detailed articles. In fact, the creation of such redirects is encouraged.
And why, again, is CONTEXT separate from this page? You might ask why this shouldn't be discussed there; I rest my case. Tony (talk) 12:42, 22 September 2008 (UTC)
In chemistry articles sometimes I see links such as "tetra chloride". An article is mentioning a tetrachloride, but since we don't have an article called tetrachloride people link to chloride instead. Sounds reasonable in principle, but I think it looks hideous to have a word that is half black and half blue. Are there any guidelines for this? An alternative would be to pipe the link or create a redirect, as in tetrachloride ([[chloride|tetrachloride]]), but it could be considered misleading because the target article doesn't say anything specific about tetrachlorides (usually there's not much to say about these words that are composed using a multiplicative prefix). -- Itub ( talk) 12:01, 22 September 2008 (UTC)
I frequently come upon consecutive linked words, most often where the first term is to the far more directly relevant term while the second one goes to a parent article. The most recent example and the reason I'm finally posting here was from Gamma Cassiopeiae, where the consecutive words Cassiopeia constellation were linked to Cassiopeia (constellation) and constellation, respectively. I changed the link, as I sometimes do when I come across examples like this to one unified piped link to [[Cassiopeia (constellation)|Cassiopeia constellation]].
Personally, I regard such consecutive word links to be highly confusing, especially for non-editors who may not even realise that there are two different links. I also know that sometimes, linking from consecutive words can hardly be avoided. But imho the MOS should state that such links should be avoided wherever possible. Everyme 23:48, 28 September 2008 (UTC)
As recently discussed at Wikipedia:Village_pump_(policy)/Archive_55#Redundant guidelines, there are 4 different pages giving 4 different sets of advice on what to link: Wikipedia:Build the web, Wikipedia:Only make links that are relevant to the context, Wikipedia:Wikipedia doesn't use Allwiki and Wikipedia:Manual of Style (links). I remember Aervanath was working on this a while ago, and I'm glad to see that some progress has been made: User:Mr.Z-man recently demoted WP:ALLWIKI. But we're not home yet; I see that WP:BUILD still has sentences like this one: "George Washington should be linked to from President of the United States". It is very uncommon for a page on a particular public office to link to all the individuals who have been holders of that office. The style guidelines have ignored WP:BUILD and WP:ALLWIKI for a long time, and it looks like further work and negotiation is going to have to happen if we want to start linking to WP:BUILD. Better yet, it's probably time to get rid of at least one of the 3 remaining pages, and maybe 2 of them. - Dan Dank55 ( send/receive) 23:07, 1 October 2008 (UTC)
I'm looking at Wikipedia:MOSLINK#Overlinking_and_underlinking, but there is nothing in that section on underlinking or how to avoid it. Should there be? No mention of what underlinking is on the whole page. Carcharoth ( talk) 00:03, 3 October 2008 (UTC)
No one has convinced me one iota that underlinking, as Aerdavath claims, is rife. When I ask for examples, I get lists of shambolic stubs. Tony (talk) 05:58, 9 October 2008 (UTC)
Would there be any interest in noting on this page that one way to add links of secondary interest is to move "editorial aside" comments to a footnote and link to the articles there. i.e. instead of putting an aside in brackets, put it in a note at the bottom of the article instead. See here for the original post. Carcharoth ( talk) 00:04, 3 October 2008 (UTC)
For anyone who hasn't yet seen it so far, there's an RFC currently open at WT:MOSNUM on whether dates of birth and death in the first sentence of a biography article should be linked or not.
This is an issue that has recently come to a head, with the new deprecation of date auto-formatting, and recent bot-driven de-linking sprees. Jheald ( talk) 19:39, 3 October 2008 (UTC)
Hi, in MOS:LINK under the "Internal links" section, it states: "Do not link items in the title or headings.". Does this apply to Templates such as Template:Anglican Cathedrals in the British_Isles as well, or only to article titles and headings. Thank you. -- HighKing ( talk) 16:05, 7 October 2008 (UTC)
(outdent)Any other opinions on this? Or put another way - is there an actual policy that explicitly deals with links in template headings? I perhaps misunderstood the MOS:LINK policy and assumed... -- HighKing ( talk) 16:48, 8 October 2008 (UTC)
← Having had a look at the template in question and
its talk page boldness has been tried. Also note that my opinion doesn't reflect current practice: Looking only through the templates of the same category I found {{
ECUSA Provinces}}, {{
Anglican hierarchy in the United Kingdom and Ireland}} and {{
Province of New Zealand}} which link several items in the navbox title.
We have, BTW, the essay at
WP:NAVBOX, but I don't think it says anything about it at the moment.
So I guess further opinions are still welcome. --
Amalthea
Talk 10:24, 9 October 2008 (UTC)
It's strange that there's no lead. This is an initial draft. Does anyone have ideas on how it can be improved?
Wikilinking is one of the most important features of Wikipedia. It binds the project together into an interconnected whole, and it suggests closely related and useful pathways between locations both within the project and to external destinations. The four basic types of link—internal and external, piped and unpiped—are explained on this page in terms of their mechanical aspects and the contexts in which they are used.
Tony (talk) 15:07, 12 October 2008 (UTC)
The sequential points were very strange at one point (save, then fix?). Very messy, unexplained, makes assumptions I can't understand, so our newbies will be totally confused. Does this para refer to piped "Year-in-X" links? If so, they need to be introduced properly in their own subsection. It's strangely informal at the end—"we did a little research and came up with useful info for you" is the implication. I've removed it because it's misleading and confusing. External links are treated under their own section further down. Why here fleetingly??
All of the things that need to be typed in like (film) or (1935 film) or (TV series) or changing the link to avoid redirects can be done right then and there. Wikipedia's charm is diminished when links lead to areas that have nothing to do with the subject at hand. Much of what we have mentioned also applies to creating external links (
[ ]
), but we have found very few of these that went somewhere unintended.
Tony (talk) 15:07, 12 October 2008 (UTC)
This statement can't possibly be what is intended:
These links should be included where it is most likely that readers might want to use them; for example, in article leads, the beginnings of new sections, table cells, and image captions.
The implication could be that these are the only places one should link in. Another implication might be that you should probably link in captions and table cells. I think it probably needs to be replaced with something less ambiguous and more helpful. Unsure as yet what to write. Tony (talk) 15:07, 12 October 2008 (UTC)
I'm perplexed as to what this following paragraph means. It's kind of like a little "how to" guide, but I don't see how it would help anyone. It repeats what was in the "How to create links" section above, badly.
Link a word or phrase to the proper page. Use Preview to check a link, and follow it by opening the page to which the link directs. If that page does not seem to exist, do a quick search to find out whether the article may have a differently worded title or if the subject is included in a section of another article.
I've removed it. Tony (talk) 14:14, 12 October 2008 (UTC)
Can someone explain what this means?
Automated processes should not replace or pipe links to redirects. Instead, the link should always be examined in context.
It needs to be spelt out for newbies. Tony (talk) 15:18, 12 October 2008 (UTC)
Goodness. I just found (via WP:Red link), the following: Wikipedia:Interlanguage#Inline interlanguage links. It seems there is a school of thought that favours inline interwikilinks. I think the presumption is that people follow the link, see a foreign language, and are inspired to translate it. I think a better approach would be to leave it as a redlink, but have some way of saying to people "X number of articles on this exist in other language: link, link , links" (maybe in a footnote), and to say "please translate one of them for us. Or maybe not. The other point is that some people use a large number of existing redlinks to work out which articles are most "in demand" and to write (or translate) them. Use "what links here on a redlink to see what I mean: e.g. this allowed me to find out that William Henry Lang won the Linnean Medal and worked with Isabel Clifton Cookson. There is a William Lang (US football team coach). An examination of "what links here" for that William Lang shows us that someone has linked a William Lang in John Struthers (poet) - this one is a 19th century printer (could be notable, don't know. As a side point, Tony, what links here for William Lang is polluted with overlinking from a template. Namely, Template:Maryland Terrapins football coach navbox. Use of templates like that is responsible for huge amounts of overlinking. But I've gone way off-topic again. What should be done about inline interlanguage links? Carcharoth ( talk) 22:19, 13 October 2008 (UTC)
Currently, MOSLINK says:
There is no rule as to whether "See also Train" or "See also train", but consistency is required for multiple links. Linking never forces the use of an initial capital letter, so you can leave the initial letter lower case if you so desire, in the interest of readability.
Um ... I've always corrected examples of the former, since wikilinking was made to be flexible enough to take either upper- or lower-case initial, and it seems wrong not to integrate links into the grammar of their context.
Is there any objection to changing this to encourage editors to use upper or lower case according to which fits the grammar of the context in which the link is used? Tony (talk) 14:44, 14 October 2008 (UTC)
Earlier this month, Avearneth added a statement that "many articles suffer from underlinking" (proceeding to balance this by adding "overlinking" to the sentence). I've now made the prose neater and removed the negative "suffer". Apart from this, I've asked for justification of this assertion about underlinking, as has another editor above. I really haven't received a proper answer to this query. Can we have better examples than the list that was previously provided, to support this quite recent addition to the text? Tony (talk) 15:16, 14 October 2008 (UTC)
Tony, in fairness, you have yet to provide sufficient proof of overlinking. If you could please do so, that would be great, so that we could get a complete picture of the over/underlinking environment on Wikipedia. Not only is there Category:Articles that need to be wikified, but also Category:Dead-end pages (which, yes, does have some articles which are not actual nonsense), Wikipedia:Dead-end pages, and most importantly (in my view) Category:Orphaned articles, which has 58,257 members (and counting). All of these, in my opinion, point to a certain issue with underlinking.-- Aervanath lives in the Orphanage 16:30, 14 October 2008 (UTC)
I've also left a note one the WP:OVERLINK talk page. There has been much argument on this, but having read OVERLINK, I find it's almost entirely about over-AND-underlinking, and it's all valuable, but too long to be all crammed into MOSLINK. Thus, it serves as a valuable main article for just the section on over and underlinking in MOSLINK. So I've listed it that way. There are a few bits in OVERLINK to move, but really, that classifies all this info nicely, now. What say you all? S B H arris 18:17, 14 October 2008 (UTC)
I've removed "suffer", but I haven't yet touched the use of the rather negative terms "overlink" and "underlink" in the title. This area of the MoS is splintered between MOSLINK and CONTEXT, and is a prime reason for rationalisation (specifically, the merging of the latter into the former). What I propose is that this be done without affecting the current substantive balance between over/under taking both pages as a whole. I hope this will avoid political disputes. But the merger needs to involve a rationalisation of the text.
In particular, I wonder why a Manual of Style has to cast aspersions on articles by starting with this:
Many articles are underlinked or overlinked. An article is likely to be considered underlinked if subjects are not linked that are necessary to the understanding of the article. An article may be overlinked if any of the following is true:
"Many" is impossible to define, and there are unanswered queries here in relation to the existence of underlinking as a "problem". I note that this angle has only been recently added to MOSLINK by Averneath, and that when asked to justify it, he responds by asking me to provide other evidence.
I think the paragraph above is unnecessary and fails to assist editors. It would be better to simply state what generally should be linked and what generally should not be linked, as CONTEXT does. Tony (talk) 05:01, 15 October 2008 (UTC)
I notice that the shortcut WP:EGG is no longer working. It used to link to the "Intuitiveness" section of this MOS, but I see that section header is gone as it has been merged with other topics. Would someone mind addressing this, either by restoring the header or changing the shortcut redirect? I often use WP:EGG to point other editors towards the consensus on linkn intuitiveness, and I'm sure others do too. -- IllaZilla ( talk) 23:29, 21 October 2008 (UTC)
I'm currently working on a Featured List, (List of ISS spacewalks) and the only issue remaining is that the list does overlink, because every astronaut's name is linked to their page, even if they have been mentioned before. On the suggestion of a reviewer, I am posting here to get input. The issue is that most astronauts have made repeated spacewalks, some were done over a span of years. Most readers looking at this list would be looking for a specific mission where something was done, (and not reading it through from start to finish) and if the names are not linked, because the astronauts had previously done an EVA and had a link far up in the table, the readers would have to scroll or search the list to find that name, to be able to go to their article.
The same can be said for the links (and the acronyms) for modules, components, laboratories, and other parts of the station, which in the first mention, are spelled out, and linked, but not linked after that. (For instance, the Solar Alpha Rotary Joint (SARJ), which is linked and fully spelled out on first mention, but then years later, causes some major issues and multiple EVAs are done to evaluate and inspect it, and it is simply referred to as SARJ.) It seems that the overlinking guideline, in this case at least, is not the ideal. I would think that linking each mention of the components (or at the very least, once per mission) would be much more helpful to an average reader who may not know what the acronyms mean, or components do.
As for the astronaut names, it seems that linking them all gives the list a "consistent" look to it, if some were blue, and some black, it would be visually distracting (in my opinion), and that's why I went with linking all names. The compromise would be to link the first mention of each person per mission, so that the most someone would have to scroll would be 5 entries to find the link. I'd appreciate any input, thoughts, or suggestions. Thanks! Ariel ♥ Gold 22:02, 24 October 2008 (UTC)
I remember reading somewhere that this was bad form to like part of a word and have the rest unlinked rather than piping it. FE: [[car]]
s instead of [[car|cars]]
. However, I can't seem to find that anymore so I don't know if there was a change. I had figured it would be in this article, but I couldn't find anything. The issue comes up because someone recently editing a link I piped like that.
Jinnai (
talk) 03:35, 26 October 2008 (UTC)
Could some of the people watching this page give their opinions on the linking done in the 'award citation' quotes at List of Nobel Laureates in Chemistry? It is currently a featured list candidate (see here - submitted by someone else, not me), and I pointed out there that links in quotes were only rarely allowed, though I think the links are helpful, and I've said before that the carefully chosen language of the Nobel Foundation is a good example of quotes where links are both: (a) helpful to explain technical stuff; and (b) rife with pitfalls for the unwary who don't realise what the citation is talking about and what the key links should be (simple plain linking without piping is usually very unhelpful). I suggested a separate column called "further reading" from which to add relevant links (my preferred solution, as this makes clearer that the links are from Wikipedia editors, and not us 'speaking for the Nobel Foundation' by suggesting what they meant in their quotes), but that 'separate column' approach doesn't seem like it will catch on anytime soon. So I'm asking here whether the piping of links and the 'easter egg' appearance of some of the links at List of Nobel laureates in Chemistry is helpful or not (despite the easter egg-nature of some of the links). Please, please, before taking a "never link in quotes" or "they are easter eggs" stance, take the time to browse down the list and see whether the links actually work for you and if you learn more about the Nobel Laureates and their work from where the links take you. There is a subsidiary issue of linking to sections vs linking to articles, so if that is a problem please say something. A permalink, in case the article changes drastically, is here. The list before the changes (so people can see what the standard of linking was before my changes) is here. I'll wait a bit for some responses, and then ping two people I recently discussed linking issues with to get their opinion (I'm hoping they watch this page). So, in short, the options for such lists with highly-technical 'citation quotes' seem to be: (a) no links; (b) piped links; (c) links in a separate column; (d) links in footnotes. Any verdict here on which is best, or does it depend on context? Carcharoth ( talk) 20:58, 26 October 2008 (UTC)
There is supposed to be a dispute or proposal or something about the wording of the section on dates. It is alleged to be at WT:MOSNUM, but I can't find it. Please can the editor who insists on having a tag here direct people to the discussion. (I'll alter the tag to point here - please indicate further where people should go to find it. Or else start it here if you want.)-- Kotniski ( talk) 08:56, 17 November 2008 (UTC)
I have started an RFC for a centralized discussion of the issue of linking units in articles. I arbitrarily chose the talk page of WP:MOSNUM, but I am also leaving notices on as many relevent talk pages as possible to attract centralized attention to this. See Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (dates and numbers)#Centralized discussion for linking of units of measurement. Please carry on all further discussion at that location. Thanks. -- Jayron32. talk. contribs 21:22, 31 December 2008 (UTC)
I've hacked out a merged version of WP:MOSLINK, WP:OVERLINK (aka WP:CONTEXT) and WP:BUILD, as we agreed was desirable. It's at WP:Manual of Style (links)/merged. Please comment on that talk page. I know it still needs brushing up, but let me know if I've left out anything major. If there are no objections, I'm planning on substituting it for the current version of this page.-- Kotniski ( talk) 19:55, 9 January 2009 (UTC)
Please discuss the proposal below.-- Kotniski ( talk) 20:01, 9 January 2009 (UTC)
nice work, Kotniski - thanks! one suggestion for the date link section: it's rather contradictory to say multiple year-in-X links are unnecessary and then to suggest aliasing those links "in the main prose of articles in which such links are used heavily". a revision of this was discussed briefly on some talk page or other - i'll see if i can find it, but meanwhile it would make more sense to leave it at "However, piped links may be useful in places where compact presentation is important, such as tables, infoboxes and lists." thanks again for this work. Sssoul ( talk) 20:13, 9 January 2009 (UTC)