Wikipedia talk:Redirect/Archive 2019

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WP:AFC/R

Currently, only the § See also section has a link to WP:AFC/R. I suggest adding it in the § How to make a redirect section. Note that the latter already has the text "Non-autoconfirmed users can request creation of redirects at Wikipedia:Articles for creation/Redirects." but it's commented out. WP:AFC/R deserves more attention than merely being buried away in a list of more than a dozen see also links. --77.173.90.33 (talk) 13:56, 13 January 2019 (UTC)

RFD as cleanup

I've seen a lot of RFDs whose rationale amounts to nominating a relevant sub-topic or alternate name for deletion because it is not mentioned in the current version of the article. We wouldn't accept this at AFD, because Wikipedia:Deletion is not cleanup, and anyone could fix this situation through normal editing. I wonder whether it would be desirable to add, to the list of invalid reasons, something like "Relevant redirect that is not mentioned in the current version of the article: This should be fixed through normal editing." WhatamIdoing (talk) 09:20, 1 January 2019 (UTC)

• RfD isn't just a deletion forum, it's for redirects to be discussed. It's a big difference from what occurs at AfD, so that anology doesn't work. Discussing whether or not a subject can be mentioned is therefore perfectly acceptable. Most of the time the nominator either thinks it shouldn't be mentioned or is unable to do so for whatever reason. If someone then comes in and adds some information on the subject, the redirect is then kept, preserving a cromulent redirect and improving the encyclopedia in the process. We don't want to prevent this from occurring. -- Tavix ^(talk) 15:23, 1 January 2019 (UTC)
  • Do you think that discussions about article content should happen at RFD instead of the talk page? (That seems to be what you're proposing as a desirable model.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 11:12, 2 January 2019 (UTC)
    • Well, if it's a question of whether some subtopic should be mentioned in the article or not, then of course, the article's talk page is the best place to discuss it. But I've only rarely seen RfD nominations that could have been better placed there, as it often turns out the issue is not confined to the given article: there might be some other place that mentions the term, or the term might prove ambiguous with multiple possible targets (that may or may not currently mention it). Generally, I think these questions involve two fields of expertise: one is the focussed, subject-specific one possessed by the contributors to the given article (these are the people who would participate in a talk page discussion); the other field involves knowing how redirects work and how readers search on the encyclopedia (and this is better represented among the RfD regulars). A talk page discussion might miss alternative uses or not take into account reader behaviour, whereas participants in an RfD discussion can make suboptimal assumptions about the subject matter, so ideally, we would want to get editors from both fields involved. There are some ways in which this happens (for example, RfDs show up in the article alerts for the projects that the target article is tagged for), but there definitely is room for improvement. For example, maybe it will be good to have an automated means of posting a notice to the talk page of an article if one of its redirects is at RfD? – Uanfala (talk) 12:09, 2 January 2019 (UTC)
      • Maybe we should be transcluding the RFDs on the target's talk page, to get somewhat greater participation.
        But I wonder whether you've looked at the recent examples of this? Someone's nominated a pile of "____ in HIV", which redirect to HIV, solely on the grounds that the target word isn't currently mentioned; Tavix (I discovered later) recently nominated a pile of redirects from unincorporated communities that redirect to the next larger legally recognized area; another "not mentioned" is redirected there as a result of an AFD, and it's only not mentioned because an IP blanked the merged section.
        I have to agree with you about the lack of subject-matter knowledge. I just ran across a notification (to one of our many "Vanished user nnnn" editors) from an RFD six months ago that ended up deleting a redirect from an official ICD-10 term for a boil in the ear canal, which was quite reasonably redirected to boil, only nobody involved appeared to have any idea what the technical terms meant or why ICD terminology matters.
        I wonder whether it would be valuable to encourage nominators to specify the outcome that they'd like to see. "Not mentioned, and I think it should be" suggests a very different (and non-admin) response than "Not mentioned, so obviously it should be deleted". WhatamIdoing (talk) 08:05, 3 January 2019 (UTC)
        • If the target's talk page is well-used, I think it's a good idea to advertise the RfD there. It can be as easy as adding {{RFDNote}} to the page. (I would be opposed to transcluding RfDs on a talk page for several reasons, but I won't get into that now.) If I was looking for "____ in HIV", and I was redirected to an article on HIV in general that does nothing to explain ___, that isn't helpful. That can be resolved by: 1) adding a mention of ____ somewhere in the HIV page, 2) retarget the redirect somewhere else that explains "___ in HIV", or 3) delete the redirect, which shows that Wikipedia does not have any information on "___ in HIV". If an HIV expert comes back later and adds that information, a redirect could easily be recreated at that time. Either way, a discussion at RfD is a good way to get that hashed out. As far as participation, I see that the HIV redirects are listed at Wikipedia:WikiProject Medicine/Tools#Article Alerts, which editors who care about medical pages can and should subscribe to. Additionally, a notice at WT:MED wouldn't hurt. I nominated the redirects to Gallatin County, Montana (most of which aren't unincorporated communities, but I digress) per WP:REDLINK because they ought to be articles in their own right, not redirects to a place where there is no information about the geographical feature (which is why I casually said that they aren't mentioned). When I nominate a redirect solely on "not mentioned" grounds, I am usually not sure whether or not it should be mentioned. Put another way, I would be fine with a mention, but I either don't know how to mention it or cannot find the required souring to mention it. If someone else comes by later and adds the information the the article, the RfD is then almost always resolved and Wikipedia is benefited by having information on that topic. -- Tavix ^(talk) 15:26, 3 January 2019 (UTC)
          • Trying to push someone else into adding information to the article is exactly what's discouraged by WP:NOTCLEANUP. If you're not sure whether something's worth mentioning, then why not ask on the talk page? Isn't the talk page of the article the place where you would expect to find someone who actually knows something about the subject? WhatamIdoing (talk) 06:54, 13 February 2019 (UTC)
        • For future reference, it would be helpful to have links to the discussions mentioned: HIV redirects, Redirects without mention to Gallatin County, Montana, Furunculosis of external auditory canal. -- Tavix ^(talk) 15:34, 3 January 2019 (UTC)

Hatnotes in redirects?

 Note: Wikipedia:Help_desk#WP:R#PLA. (For the sake of clarity / transparency, please comment there.)--Hildeoc (talk) 19:50, 15 February 2019 (UTC)

"fix" template redirects?

Template:Start date and years ago redirects to Template:Start date and age. Is this something that should be fixed in articles, or is it Not Broken? (And if it should be fixed, it is bot-worthy?)Naraht (talk) 13:40, 17 June 2019 (UTC)

Leave it alone. What difficulties are found with the redirected form? --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 20:04, 17 June 2019 (UTC)

Redrose64 The instructions for Template:Infobox Fraternity say that Template:Start date and age should be used for the founded parameter. I'm trying to make sure that all active groups use the template and I'm having to add the "Years ago" version as well in eliminating ones that I need to look at.Naraht (talk) 14:05, 19 June 2019 (UTC)

Yes, the instructions say that. But that does not mean that it is wrong to use any of these seven instead. What it is saying is not to use a bare date. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 18:22, 19 June 2019 (UTC)

Redirects in navigation templates

I'm obviously aware that the practice of removing redirects from nav templates per WP:NAVNOREDIRECT has at least one exception: where a redirect represents a distinct sub-topic within a larger article and is not merely a variant name. However, Template:A Song of Ice and Fire has just become a hot mess of redirects; entire sections like Houses and locations are all redirects (to lists that are included in the template), and other sections like Novellas are heavy with redirects. I think this is an abuse of the exception, and there is no reason to provide a redirect to every location in this fictional world when the list they redirect to, World of A Song of Ice and Fire, is right there. I don't think Psantora's assertion that "Each link points to a specific section in the article" is enough to justify this.— TAnthony^Talk 22:19, 20 June 2019 (UTC)

guidelines seem to contradict one another

Rule F9 here and clarified here seems to directly contradict MOS:DYKPIPE? --valereee (talk) 19:58, 29 June 2019 (UTC)

Yup, I wrote F9, and years later it's no longer true, in part because I changed this guideline just to make it consistent. So I'll remove F9 myself. Art LaPella (talk) 20:10, 29 June 2019 (UTC)

Removing pipes

I seem to be at loggerheads with The Rambling Man over my edits at Kevin Beattie. I removed several pipes, explained the benefits of using redirects instead of pipes, linked to this guideline, and got reverted without any counter-argument or explanation. I apologize if I missed something more substantial, but the issue with my edits appears to be that I "deliberately introduce redirects". So the question is - is it really disruptive to remove pipes (i.e. replace pipes with redirects)? And what to do in cases like this? Surtsicna (talk) 21:36, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

• Piped article titles are preferable to redirects because the former give hovertext that accurately give the page to be downloaded. —SmokeyJoe (talk) 21:48, 17 September 2019 (UTC

"Centre-half" certainly shouldn't have been piped to two different places; Defender (association football) and Association football positions#Centre-back, and the fact that it was is a prime illustration of why piped links were a bad idea in this case. If a separate article is ever written for "centre-halfs" an unpiped link will lead to the new article. If the redirect target of "centre-half" is changed, a direct link to the redirect would not need to be updated, while a piped link would be. Plantdrew (talk) 22:00, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

Just my only contribution here. We constructed the FA Kevin Beattie with a huge community effort. Many redirects were avoided at the point of article creation. Nobody beyond Surtscina has ever had a problem with this. Not one single reader has ever complained about these pipes. Not one single editor has ever complained about these redirects. You can delve into the minutiae of the piped links and find individual examples you personally prefer not to be redirected, but frankly this is a complete 100% waste of time. Surtscina edit-warred to actively and repeatedly introduce redirects, contrary to not just me, but another editor in good standing. The behaviour is reprehensible and should stop immediately. There are more than six million articles which could be approached in this way, why pick the one that was on that main page to impose such a edit war? The Rambling Man (Staying alive since 2005!) 22:30, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

I am a reader who complained about the pipes. And then I removed them and replaced them with redirects, citing two guidelines and explaining why in great detail. I have explained that redirects are useful to other editors and I have explained how. You have never bothered to explain why you are opposed to these minor tweaks that can be of great help to others and you evidently do not intend to. That is bewilderingly unreasonable. Surtsicna (talk) 23:45, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

delete redirect in advance of an article creation?

Is there any reason I shouldn't delete a redirect at the request of an editor who has written that article and would like to move it to article space to retain his edit history? Redirect is Raúl Hernández Barrón, it doesn't have a history other than its creation and nothing links there. --valereee (talk) 12:07, 19 September 2019 (UTC)

• I think #9 of WP:R#DELETE applies. The redirect in question has only one edit, while the I made draft that is intended to replace the redirect has many and will be more useful for readers. Cheers, MX (✉ • ✎) 12:15, 19 September 2019 (UTC)

Now that I read the rule I realize I could have requested a speedy deletion... MX (✉ • ✎) 12:44, 19 September 2019 (UTC)

MX, I think you're right...I've deleted it. --valereee (talk) 13:01, 19 September 2019 (UTC)

Did you know

MOS:DYKPIPE makes "Did you know" an exception to WP:NOTBROKEN. That contradiction could be resolved by adding "Did you know" to the list of exceptions here. Also, why is "Did you know" different from the rest of the Main Page, where fixing redirects has been controversial for years? Art LaPella (talk) 18:08, 21 January 2019 (UTC)

No response, so I made it "Links on the Main Page" as another exception. At least it's consistent. Art LaPella (talk) 19:32, 27 March 2019 (UTC)

I've reversed this, as you acknowledge above that it's been controversial for years, so should not be changed without consensus. We always bypass piped redirects, but not direct ones. Needs a proper RFC to determine what the correct guideline should be for this. Cheers  — Amakuru (talk) 06:46, 22 September 2019 (UTC)

Please see Wikipedia:Main Page/Errors for my explanation of why this is not a mere style issue. —David Levy 08:33, 22 September 2019 (UTC)

Questions on NOTBROKEN

Part of NOTBROKEN states : It is almost never helpful to replace [[redirect]] with [[target|redirect]].

What about replacing [[redirect|target]] with [[target]]?

This replacement seems to be in keeping with WP:NOPIPE, but possibly in contravention of NOTBROKEN. I've seen this crop up most often when a page has been moved from [[redirect]] to [[target]].

There are also BOTREQs to change [[redirect|displayed text]] to [[target|displayed text]] following a page move, and editors quote NOTBROKEN as a reason not to do it: is this a valid reason? Some occurrences of "displayed text" happen to be the new article name, which is what I noticed and led me to raise this. Spike 'em (talk) 09:23, 19 June 2019 (UTC)

Changing [[redirect|target]] with [[target]] should be OK, particularly if you are making other valid changes to the article. I would not send in a bot to do it though. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 10:41, 19 June 2019 (UTC)

Ah, I've just seen Wikipedia:Bot requests/Archive 79#New election article name format - in which case WP:MULTI applies. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 10:44, 19 June 2019 (UTC)

Thanks: I'm not trying to venue-shop, just thought here would be a better place to ask the general question. I'm not that bothered about the specific BOTREQ mentioned there, though I have had a discussion about making similar edits due to some AWBing I did a while back (following a page move involving Lord's). Spike 'em (talk) 13:13, 19 June 2019 (UTC)

I'm very much a WP:NOTBROKEN enforcer, in cases where the redirect is a distinct topic rather than an alternative name to the target. However, I tend to fix modifications and incorrect/unnecessary disambiguations to sort of "retire" incorrect redirects. So, I would leave redirects with possibilities like Mon Mothma, but I would change cases of Dune (upcoming film) to the correct Dune (2020 film).— TAnthony^Talk 22:08, 20 June 2019 (UTC)

It's a little tangential to the question, but can anyone tell me how widespread the discussion and consensus on this guideline was? I personally think any like which requires a redirect is, by definition, broken. So the guideline is not only misnamed, but I think people should be encouraged to replace [[redirect]] with [[target|redirect]]. None of the justifications for this guideline make sense to me, and I don't understand why the whole [[target|redirect]] mechanism would exist if we aren't supposed to use it. Fcrary (talk) 09:59, 20 September 2019 (UTC)

The last question is easy. Help:Link gives the example [[train station|station]], to be used in a sentence like "The train arrives at the station at noon." It would need disambiguation without the pipe. Or "We all know [[Wikipedia:Civility|why you can't call me names like that]] ..." You wouldn't fix either of those with a permanent redirect. Art LaPella (talk) 14:19, 20 September 2019 (UTC)

For your main question, besides the explanation here you dismissed, there's more at Wikipedia:Tools/Navigation popups/About fixing redirects and some discussion at its talk page. The fact that NOTBROKEN has survived since January 2006 gives some evidence of unspoken consensus. Art LaPella (talk) 15:49, 20 September 2019 (UTC)

You're referencing a reason not to use popups to fix a redirect. That's particular method. Personally, I edit the raw ascii, so that doesn't really apply. In any case, it does describe the edit as fixing a redirect, which implies something is broken. The argument that a more relevant article might be added later (and the automatic redirect is more easily be modified) doesn't really convince me, since the opposite is also true. A change could as easily send the redirect to a new, less relevant article. And, finally, saying it's been a guideline since 2006 means nothing; lots of things have changed since then and consensus can change.

In any case, you did not actually answer my main question: "can anyone tell me how widespread the discussion and consensus on this guideline was?" I don't know of any way (without great effort) to look up that sort of information, but I'd hope it exists somewhere. Fcrary (talk) 07:28, 21 September 2019 (UTC)

Yes those could happen. If the redirect is more specific, then it is possible that someone will come along and write the more specific page. Using the redirect, in addition to simplifying the change, reminds some people of the possibility of a new page. Gah4 (talk) 08:50, 21 September 2019 (UTC)

One that might be more likely is fixing red links with a redirect. I believe it is worth doing, but maybe not always. You have to consider each individual case, and guess how likely it is to go either way. Gah4 (talk) 08:50, 21 September 2019 (UTC)

I found that NOTBROKEN existed first with popups before it came here, so that's the best discussion I found. Clicking "Search archives" above gives more results like this and this. Art LaPella (talk) 16:53, 21 September 2019 (UTC)

And while an established guideline is obviously some evidence of consensus, I'm not personally expressing an opinion on removing, keeping, or changing NOTBROKEN. Just keep the popups article consistent with any changes. Art LaPella (talk) 18:17, 21 September 2019 (UTC)

NOTBROKEN necessarily follows from the very nature of the project: there isn't a 1:1 mapping between topics (which we link to) and articles (where the links go), new articles get written, old articles get renamed, and topic structures get reorganised. – Uanfala (talk) 14:28, 23 September 2019 (UTC)

Replacing [[redirect|target]] with [[target]] is most often a good idea, but you can imagine rare situations where it's not. For example, when Redirect is a subtopic of Target (for which a separate article will at some point exist) and the context around the link requires the word used to be target rather than redirect. – Uanfala (talk) 14:28, 23 September 2019 (UTC)

RfC on introducing redirects

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

---

Is it disruptive or beneficial to introduce redirects into articles, i.e. to replace pipes with redirects? E.g. is it beneficial or disruptive to replace [[Season (sports)#Off-season|off-season]] with [[off-season]], [[Defender (association football)|centre-half]] with [[centre-half]], etc? More examples can be found here. After the RfC is concluded, this should ideally be clarified in the guideline itself. 11:40, 26 September 2019 (UTC)

• Links to article section titles are better and should not be replaced with redirects. One reason is the auto hovertext that tells the reader what page that wikilink will download. In this respect, redirects are misleading. —SmokeyJoe (talk) 11:42, 26 September 2019 (UTC)
  • That contradicts this guideline, which says (among other things) that "shortcuts or redirects to embedded anchors or sections of articles or of Wikipedia's advice pages should never be bypassed, as the anchors or section headings on the page may change over time. Updating one redirect is far more efficient than updating dozens of piped links." Surtsicna (talk) 11:57, 26 September 2019 (UTC)
    • If there are many incoming links, it means it is a mature article. In mature articles, section titles tend to be stable. —SmokeyJoe (talk) 12:33, 26 September 2019 (UTC)
      • Neither of those premises is necessarily correct. And as Uanfala explained, the hovertext is not misleading when a redirect is used. It is misleading when the pipe is used instead of the redirect, because a reader seeing "Defender (association football)" when hovering their mouse over "centre-half" might conclude that those two are the same thing. Surtsicna (talk) 13:14, 26 September 2019 (UTC)
• Beneficial, as there is nothing wrong with redirects and this guideline lists several persuasive reasons why redirects are preferable to pipes: indicating future articles, reducing unnecessary invisible text, making better use of the "what links here" feature, etc. Surtsicna (talk) 11:57, 26 September 2019 (UTC)
• Disruptive as articles are (and should be) written for the benefit of the readers. Deliberately introducing redirects after the event is of no benefit to our readers at all, including the annoying "Redirected from:" which is seen at the top every page a redirect takes our readers to. I also note your RFC doesn't specify to whom this is beneficial or disruptive (a different case for readers [of which there are millions] or editors [of which there are perhaps a dozen main editors for any given article]). Also, I note your examples are quite specific, and don't involve other such issues your disruptive edits introduced, including introducing redirects to football team names only when required thus leaving less experienced editors somewhat confused as to the methodology being applied. The Rambling Man (Staying alive since 2005!) 12:03, 26 September 2019 (UTC)
  • • I have to say that the edits in question were not disruptive, but in line with guidelines and in at least some cases were clearly helpful. Take centre-half for example: this is a well-defined term, and the link with a redirect takes you directly to the article section that defines it. On the other hand, something like [[Defender (association football)|centre-half]] is at the very least less convenient for readers (they'll have to scroll down to the relevant section), but also potentially misleading: a reader who hovers their mouse over the link and sees Defender (association football) might drawn the conclusion that a centre-half is the same thing as a defender. – Uanfala (talk) 12:37, 26 September 2019 (UTC)
  • The RfC should obviously take into account both readers and editors. Examples are inherently specific. If "Redirected from:" is annoying or in any way negative, the guideline should address that. If it's not (and I do not see how it could possibly be), using redirects instead of pipes does not affect readers at all. Being of no consequence to readers yet very helpful to editors does not make a practice disruptive but beneficial. Surtsicna (talk) 12:30, 26 September 2019 (UTC)
    • Quite the opposite. I see not one single editor anywhere around the article you edit-warred over unable to update it because of piped links. In contrast, as a reader, I find the "Redirected from" tag each time I click on an unnecessary unpiped redirect to be very offputting and indicative of a sub-par project. The Rambling Man (Staying alive since 2005!) 12:42, 26 September 2019 (UTC)
      • This is not about one article. It is about a general practice. This guideline explains in great detail how redirects help editors of other articles (and the project as a whole) and underlines that there is "usually nothing wrong with linking to redirects to articles". If you believe redirects to be detrimental to the project, you should explain how the supposed unsightliness of the "Redirected from" tag outweighs all the benefits of redirects listed at WP:NOTBROKEN. If it does, then the guideline should be rewritten. Surtsicna (talk) 13:10, 26 September 2019 (UTC)
• Moot. There already are pretty solid guidelines here: mainly MOS:NOPIPE, but also to some extent MOS:SECTLINK and MOS:REDIR. If used with common sense, there will be no need to come up with such overgeneralised black-and-white rules. – Uanfala (talk) 12:37, 26 September 2019 (UTC)
  • Yes, I agree that there are solid guidelines here, which point to this being a beneficial practice. The proposal is that this guideline, after an RfC consensus, should make it explicit whether actively simplifying links (replacing pipes with redirects) is beneficial or detrimental. The guideline currently does not address this. Surtsicna (talk) 13:10, 26 September 2019 (UTC)
• Potentially Disruptive. One of your examples, [[Season (sports)#Off-season|off-season]] versus [[off-season]] is a case where a pipe should be used. "Off season" can apply to many things, for example, tourism and low hotel rates outside the busy times of year. The pipe clearly links the use to the specific meaning. The redirect would become misdirected if someone wrote an article on a non-sports meaning of off-season. Guidelines are supposed to be open to common sense and how their justifications apply to specific cases. We don't need to add more and more specific and restrictive guidelines. (Also, the way you phrased the request for comment, it isn't clear exactly what a reply of support, oppose, disruptive or beneficial means.) Fcrary (talk) 15:29, 26 September 2019 (UTC)
  • That's a fair point; we have a problem with off-season redirecting to Season (sports)#Off-season and it's not a good example. I am merely asking whether replacing a pipe with a redirect (one that leads to the correct page) is helpful or unhelpful. Surtsicna (talk) 16:48, 26 September 2019 (UTC)
• Moot. WP:NOTBROKEN is explicit regarding when redirects are more appropriate than piped links, and I restore redirects from piped links all the time (citing the policy) without challenge. I'm hesitant to add an unnecessary restriction to the guideline (even one I agree with). Have you been challenged recently on these types of changes? Fcrary makes a good point about off-season, though I would actually consider this overlinking of a common word.— TAnthony^Talk 16:07, 26 September 2019 (UTC)
  • Yes, TAnthony, I have been challenged recently on these types of changes. Please see Talk:Kevin Beattie#Pipes and redirects. There is such a strong opposition to replacing pipes with redirects that it left me wondering whether the guideline should be changed or clarified if my edit really was disruptive. Surtsicna (talk) 16:48, 26 September 2019 (UTC)
    • I guess this depends on what you think a guideline (as opposed to a policy) is, and to be honest, I've yet to find any clear statement of the distinction. Personally, I don't think you should always (or habitually) remove pipes. I see a guideline as advice (guidance). It doesn't mean there is a right or a wrong answer, it means you need to think about it and decide if it applies to the particular case in question. It serves to document what the consensus usually is when the subject comes up and explains why. (If it's rule we should always follow unless there is a very good reason not to, I'd call that a policy.) So, in the case of a pre-existing pipe, I'd assume someone did it that way for a reason and that, at least at one time, there was a consensus not to apply the guideline. I wouldn't change it to a redirect without at least knowing why someone felt a pipe was more appropriate. Of course, if the pipe is a recent edit, then changing it would be part of defining the consensus. Fcrary (talk) 18:00, 26 September 2019 (UTC)
      • The reason some people consider pipes more appropriate is that they think redirects are broken, hence WP:NOTBROKEN. In the case of Kevin Beattie, the pipes are there because the major contributor feels that the "Redirected from" tag seen on top of articles is annoying. Does this (or any other aesthetic objection) outweigh the pros of redirects listed in this guideline? If so, what is the point of the guideline? I do not see anything in the Kevin Beattie pipes that would not apply to pipes in general. Surtsicna (talk) 18:23, 26 September 2019 (UTC)
        • No. Some people may think a redirect is inherently broken. There are also people who simply hate pipes (hence the prejudicial name for WP:NOTBROKEN. But there are good, legitimate reasons to use a pipe rather than a redirect. When replacing a pipe with a redirect, I think you need to consider why it was written as a pipe and whether or not that logic makes sense. And that could apply to a broad subset of pipes, not just the one in question. I don't think you should assume the pipe is there because an editor just didn't know what he was doing.

In the case of someone not liking the "redirect from" tag, I'd personally consider that a weak reason. But I also think some of the WP:NOTBROKEN reasons for avoiding pipes are pretty weak. Regardless, consensus can change. If a large number of editors said "redirect from" was annoying and should be avoided, and that was more important than the Not Broken justifications, then I'd have to say that was the new consensus.

In a way, the idea that guidelines are rules that must be followed is an obstacle to changing consensus and allowing guidelines to evolve. If I suggested changing NOTBROKEN (which I'd like to do), the first thing I'd hear was how it reflects how articles are written and how editors write them. Therefore the guideline is simply documenting a consensus and needs no changes. But how much of that current usage is either people following the guideline because they feel like they have to follow the rules (even if they disagree with them) or because someone goes through and actively enforces it? That keeps guidelines from evolving by creating the impression of a consensus when there may not be one. (Yes, I know that's getting a bit philosophical...) Fcrary (talk) 21:58, 26 September 2019 (UTC)

• I'll also add that I think some of the reasoning in WP:NOTBROKEN needs work. For example, the business about pipes adding invisible text and invisible text making page source hard to read. I agree about invisible text, and this might have made sense in over a decade ago. But honestly, today and in the articles I edit, pipes are an almost trivial contributor to invisible text. Most of what I see comes from citations, where the invisible text is often longer than the main text making the citation. Does this invisible text argument against pipes really make sense anymore? Fcrary (talk) 18:00, 26 September 2019 (UTC)

• Wrong question. A link should be as useful as practicable to both readers and editors. For readers, taking you to the best and most directly relevant available information relevant to the linked phrase is best. This is often a section link. For editors, links which allow for reasonably predictable changes are best. This is often a redirect with possibilities. When the redirect with possibilities sends you to the best currently available relevant information everybody wins. This may well be a redirect to a section, which some day will be split out into a full article at the redirect. The "redirected from" notice is informative and useful to both the reader and the editor. It tells you that you have in fact arrived where the link was intended to bring you, but which has a different title, and not accidentally at some random place. It would be even more useful if it worked with section links, but we can live with it at the top of the article if it cannot be displayed where it would be most useful – the top of the page as opened, at the section header. A redirect is not "inherently broken", it is a useful tool when used correctly, as are piped links, which bypass the need to use exactly the same terminology as the target title. I have no doubt that sub-optimal usage of all these things exists, but they all have their uses. Sometimes a piped link is best, sometimes a redirect is best. What is definitely not useful is to substitute an ambiguous or potentially ambiguous redirect for an unambiguous piped link · · · Peter Southwood ^(talk): 08:21, 27 September 2019 (UTC)

I think another important consideration is what those reasonable, predictable changes would do. The fact that a broken link can be fixed a redirect with one change, as opposed to needing separate changes for each and every pipe, is frequently mentioned. But I think a pipe is more robust. If someone writes a more specific or appropriate article about the subject, it would be nice if the link just went there. A redirect does that. But if the new article is about something different (e.g. the "off season" example, discussed above), the redirect would send readers to a irrelevant page or a disambiguation page. I'd consider that badly broken, and it would take changing each and every redirect to fix. If it's done with a pipe, then the link would no longer point to the most relevant and appropriate article, but it would still point to something reasonably relevant (the preexisting, more general article.) That's not ideal, but it isn't what I'd call badly broken. And, with luck, the linked article would itself have a link to the new one. Fcrary (talk) 23:03, 27 September 2019 (UTC)

I think just the opposite, redirects are often much more robust than pipe links. In the automobile project we have summary articles like Toyota Camry which then links to the genrational articles like Toyota Camry (XV10), Toyota Camry (XV20), etc. However, Toyota Camry (XV70) has not yet been fleshed out, so it is a redirect to Toyota Camry#XV70. Now, other articles coudl do a pipe link to Toyota Camry#XV70 (possibly pipe linked as 'Camry XV70') becuase it is the final destination. But one day we will finally flesh out its article and Toyota Camry (XV70) will be the actual article instead of a redirect to Toyota Camry#XV70. How do we update all the articles that link to the XV70 info? We could go to Toyota Camry and see what links there. Oh joy - it's hundreds of articles. Many of these are from the timeline template added to the bottom of almost every Toyota article but the link is shown as being from the other article, not the template. Hands up who wants to check hundreds of articles for the handful of XV70 links! On the other hand, having articles link to Toyota Camry (XV70) (currently a redirect) means that when it is converted into a full article then there is no extra work to be done - the system works automatically.  Stepho  talk  01:45, 28 September 2019 (UTC)

I think that's a fine example of why we have to apply guidelines on a case-by-case basis, and every time think about if and why their rational applies to that particular case. In your case, I can't imagine someone writing an article titled "Toyota Camry (XV70)" which was about anything other than a particular model of car made by a major, Japanese corporation. Since the article doesn't exist but eventually will, then your example is a perfect match to the rational for using a redirect. But that's not always the case.

I mostly edit planetary science and spaceflight articles. What would you do with the sentence, "The Principal Investigator for Dragonfly is Elizabeth Turtle." I'd like to link to the article on the PI and the article on NASA's Dragonfly mission. Currently Zibi is the only Elizabeth Turtle with an article about her, so that isn't a problem. But it could, eventually be, since that's not an uncommon name and someone may add an article which makes it ambiguous. The right person isn't obvious enough for a redirect and a comment at the top, "For other uses, see..." I don't want to send people to a disambiguation page either. Should another article appear, I think a pipe would be the most sensible solution. Similarly, I don't want to put "Dragonfly (spacecraft)" in the visible text (and don't know how I'd make it work with Dragonfly italicized.) I don't want to create a redirect, since that would send people looking for the insect to an article about a spacecraft. So, again, and in this case, a pipe seems like the sensible choice to me. That's why I don't think guidelines should be strictly followed and enforced rules. Fcrary (talk) 18:58, 28 September 2019 (UTC)

If it isn't helpful to apply a rule without considering issues that may or may not occur to others in the same way, does that mean we would be better off without a guideline at all? Each rule removal helps the TLDR nature of the rest of the rules. Art LaPella (talk) 20:51, 28 September 2019 (UTC)

I'm not sure I'd go that far, although I do like the idea of reducing the number of guidelines overall. But I think it helps to have the issues which should be considered written down in one place (they might not be obvious to the editors involved.) It also gives you something to point to in a discussion. Otherwise, every time some issue came up, we'd be writing the same arguments over and over again. I'd rather just say, "I think items 1, 3 and 4 in the justification for NOTBROKEN apply because..." or something similar. Fcrary (talk) 21:39, 28 September 2019 (UTC)

• Comment my last entry here in this timesink, but it's fundamentally clear that the answer is "it depends" and edit-warring across stable (featured!) articles to deliberately introduce redirects is disruptive and a waste of the community's time and should be discouraged. The Rambling Man (Staying alive since 2005!) 22:27, 28 September 2019 (UTC)
  • No, it is absolutely not clear that deliberately introducing redirects is disruptive. If redirects are preferable to pipes, as this guideline suggests, then replacing pipes with redirects should be encouraged. It only turns into a time-wasting edit-war when one editor decides that he simply does not like redirects. Surtsicna (talk) 17:55, 18 October 2019 (UTC)
    • That is not really correct. There are good reasons for using a pipe instead of a redirect. Blindly, automatically replacing pipes with redirects is disruptive. If you know why the previous editors originally decided to use a pipe, and you disagree, that's a different matter. But someone should not go through and automatically replace every pipe they see, without thinking. That is disruptive. Fcrary (talk) 20:45, 19 October 2019 (UTC)
      • Agreed, doing almost anything blindly is just asking for trouble. Some people hate redirects with a passion and unless you have a real good reason with demonstrable benefits (eg: my car example above makes the links far more future proof) then they will revert it as a knee jerk reaction and an edit war and/or protracted, time wasting discussion starts.  Stepho  talk  00:24, 20 October 2019 (UTC)
      • Yes, of course there are situations when a pipe is preferable to a redirect. This guideline lists numerous "good reasons to bypass redirects". I know the original editor used a pipe because they "hate redirects with a passion", as Stepho-wrs put it, but merely hating redirects is not listed in this guideline as one of the "good reasons" to use pipes. Should it be? Surtsicna (talk) 10:22, 20 October 2019 (UTC)
        • Well, if you know, as an actual fact and not an assumption, that the original author just used a pipe because he hates redirects with a passion, then that's a fair reason to consider replacing it. I'm not sure how you could know that without having psychic powers, but whatever... On the other hand, if you're just assuming the original editor felt that way (because some people do) and not stopping to think whether there were good reasons for the pipe, that's terrible logic. In addition, the guideline is quite specific about the wording. It says "Good reasons to bypass redirects include" That's include, not limited to. The list is some of the many reasons to use a pipe. It's not an exclusive list. You can't treat it as a checklist, and once you've gone through it declare that there isn't a good reason for a particular pipe. Fcrary (talk) 21:37, 20 October 2019 (UTC)
          • I am not sure I follow, Fcrary. Why would I need psychic powers when we have talk page discussions to engage with other editors? In this case, the author has stated on this very talk page that he considers redirects "very offputting and indicative of a sub-par project" and has given no other explanation for opposing my "deliberate introduction of redirects" (as he tellingly calls it). Is the rejection of the entire feature one of the good reasons not mentioned in this guideline? Besides, I never said I saw that as a checklist. Surtsicna (talk) 22:21, 20 October 2019 (UTC)
            • I was thinking in general, not about your specific case. In that case, you have comments from the editor on the talk page, and that's certainly evidence of a bad reason for preferring a pipe over a redirect. But I've also seen people who just go through ever article they see and remove pipes, just because they like it better and think its a "rule" that must be followed. No discussion on the talk page, not consideration of which is more appropriate. And I've also seen people who, in a talk page discussion, do treat the list in the guideline as a checklist. Those people have said, in effect, "Well, none of the reasons on that list apply, therefore a pipe is inherently inappropriate." I think more thought and consideration is appropriate in those cases. In your case, it looks like that thought and consideration has already happened. Fcrary (talk) 22:39, 20 October 2019 (UTC)
              • Oh, so it was the impersonal you. That's a quirk of English grammar that I am yet to master! Thank you for explaining in more detail. Surtsicna (talk) 23:01, 20 October 2019 (UTC)
• Big ol' It depends. Even 'mature' articles get refactored occasionally, and we can't rely on section headers being permanent. In new prose, links to individual section headers should be redirects ideally. In existing prose, redlinks broken by changing a section header should be replaced with an appropriate redirect - This seems like an easily-automated bot task. If a link is blue and goes to the right place right now, it should be left alone. It's not that important. Pipe links should mostly be used to bypass a disambig page. -- a ^{they/them | argue | contribs} 12:36, 13 October 2019 (UTC)
• It depends. Redirects with possibilities should generally be linked to, redirects that will never be articles are generally less useful, WP:NOTBROKEN applies and it doesn't make a significant difference in most cases. It's just not possible to have a single rule that is relevant to every case. Thryduulf (talk) 00:46, 20 October 2019 (UTC)
• Potentially disruptive, in either direction when done en masse, both per WP:NOTBROKEN and as WP:MEATBOT behavior. Making trivial changes that don't help readers and which don't serve a technical/maintenance function, is discouraged, as it pings a zillion people's watchlists for no good reason. Redirects exist for a reason and so does piping. It's about evenly useful, but to different kinds of reader-editors, to have a link just be the expected word or to have it be clear about the exact link target. More experienced editors tend to favor the latter, and mostly-just-a-reader users tend to prefer the former, but neither is objectively better.  — AReaderOutThataway ^t/_c 07:56, 22 October 2019 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Is it possible to make targeted redirects show hover-previews of the targeted section?

I have done some reading (about 30 minutes) but can't find a way to do this: Many common anatomical terms such as anterior and caudal redirect to a specific section of the very general page anatomical terms of location. However, those links all unhelpfully show a page preview of the top of that page, rather than just showing the text of the definition (i.e. of 'anterior' or 'caudal', respectively). Is there a way that the redirect system can be used to show these short, specific previews without requiring the reader to actually click on the link? I couldn't find a way to do it, hence posted this new section here. 24.55.212.21 (talk) 14:15, 22 November 2019 (UTC)

This is a technical matter, you may find that WP:VPT is a better place for a question like this. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 08:14, 23 November 2019 (UTC)

Useless Draft Redirect

I came across the redirect Draft:Black Stane Examination when assessing Black stane and then considering its Orphan status. Does this Redirect ever have a use in the future? I learned that Redirects are not eligible for Speedy Deletion. After a Draft article has become a mainspace article for more than a year, why would any editor or reader ever have any use for the draft? Advice please. --Dthomsen8 (talk) 02:23, 8 December 2019 (UTC)

"Blank and redirect" and the suitability of the redirect

Currently, Wikipedia:Redirect#Redirects that replace previous articles has two paragraphs of text detailing the practice of blanking and redirecting (as an alternative to deletion). A crucial missing point is the suitability of the resulting redirect. What I often see is redirecting to some more general article, which however does not have any relevant content. For example, if an article about a village in province X is blanked and redirected, then the target of the redirect will often be the article about the province. The trouble is, the province article will never have any content about this village, and so the redirect will not be just useless, but a positive source of confusion and disappointment to any readers who follow it. If brought to WP:RFD, such redirects almost always get deleted.

Should we maybe add a sentence to the effect that editors should generally only use blank-and-redirect if the resultant redirect makes sense as a redirect? – Uanfala (talk) 02:10, 25 December 2019 (UTC)