Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Layout

Should "See Also" sections be discouraged for Featured Articles?

I've seen a few editors say that "a FA-quality article shouldn't have a See Also section". I understand that a top-quality article will have in-depth coverage, and that 99% of all relevant links will be included in the body. But to jump from that to stating that See Also sections are indicative of an unfinished article doesn't seem logical. Here are two concrete examples of "finished" articles which follow the FA convention and thus not have a See Also section - these articles are missing an important, relevant link that could be in a See Also section:

• American Livestock Breeds Conservancy - Has no link to heirloom plants
• Birth control movement in the United States - Has no link to Timeline of reproductive rights legislation

It appears that editors preparing articles for FA status are forced to choose between omitting the link altogether, or contriving some prose in the body that makes a reference to the other article. It seems more reasonable that we instead acknowledge that See Also sections are appropriate and acceptable even for FA-quality articles. Thoughts? --Noleander (talk) 04:00, 6 December 2011 (UTC)

Discouraged doesn't mean forbidden. SchmuckyTheCat (talk)

True. The WP:SEEALSO text is rather permissive on this. It says:

A reasonable number of relevant links that would be in the body of a hypothetical perfect article are suitable to add to the "See also" appendix of a less developed one…. Indeed, a good article might not require a "See also" section at all.

which seems like good guidance. My impression of "forbidden" comes more from the FAC discussions, but maybe I'm just reading too much into some stray comments. --Noleander (talk) 04:09, 6 December 2011 (UTC)

Many smaller communities, and I imagine FAC is one, develop their own practices that may deviate stricter from general guidelines. If that is so, the problem is there, not here. SchmuckyTheCat (talk)

Yeah, the more I read WP:SEEALSO, the more I see that it is consistent with my opinion that See Also sections can be downright beneficial for FA articles. So I guess I have no changes to propose to to WP:SEEALSO. I'm just ruminating. --Noleander (talk) 04:17, 6 December 2011 (UTC)

Simplify wording of WP:SEEALSO?

The wording in WP:SEEALSO is a bit verbose and convoluted. Perhaps it could be made clearer as follows (red text replaced with green text). Original text:

Contents: A bulleted list, preferably alphabetized, of internal links (wikilinks) to related Wikipedia articles. Editors should provide a brief annotation when a link's relevance is not immediately apparent, when the meaning of the term may not be generally known, or when the term is ambiguous. For example:

• Related person – made a similar achievement on April 4, 2005
• Ischemia – restriction in blood supply

A reasonable number of relevant links that would be in the body of a hypothetical perfect article are suitable to add to the "See also" appendix of a less developed one. Links already integrated into the body of the text are generally not repeated in a "See also" section, and navigation boxes at the bottom of articles may substitute for many links (see the bottom of Pathology for example). However, whether a link belongs in the "See also" section is ultimately a matter of editorial judgment and common sense. Indeed, a good article might not require a "See also" section at all. Thus, although some links may not naturally fit into the body of text they may be excluded from the "See also" section due to article size constraints. Links that would be included in the article were it not kept relatively short for other reasons may thus be appropriate, though should be used in moderation, as always. Links included in the "See also" section may be useful for readers seeking to read as much about a topic as possible, including subjects only peripherally related to the one in question. The "See also" section should not link to pages that do not exist (red links) or disambiguation pages. {{Portal}} and {{Wikipedia-Books}} links are usually placed in this section.

Proposed wording:

Contents: A bulleted list, preferably alphabetized, of internal links (wikilinks) to related Wikipedia articles. Editors should provide a brief annotation when a link's relevance is not immediately apparent, when the meaning of the term may not be generally known, or when the term is ambiguous. For example:

• Related person – made a similar achievement on April 4, 2005
• Ischemia – restriction in blood supply

The See Also section generally should not repeat links which appear in the article's body or its navigation boxes. The number of links in the See Also section should be limited to a reasonable quantity. Many good articles do not have a See Also section, because all relevant links are contained in the article body or in navigation boxes.

The links in the See Also section do not have to be directly related to the topic of the article, because one purpose of the See Also links is to enable readers to explore topics that are only peripherally relevant. The "See also" section should not link to pages that do not exist (red links) or disambiguation pages. {{Portal}} and {{Wikipedia-Books}} links are usually placed in this section.

Thoughts? --Noleander (talk) 18:17, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

The new language is certainly clearer, but it is also more restrictive. Is that your intent? Butwhatdoiknow (talk) 18:55, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

No, my intention was simply to clarify the existing guidance, not to change it. Can you point out the wording that looks more restrictive? I'll try to fix it (or you can just jump in and re-word it yourself). --Noleander (talk) 19:05, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

To give one example, "Links already integrated into the body of the text are generally not repeated in a "See also" section" has turned into "The See Also section should not repeat links which appear in the article's body". Your wording will (unfortunately, but predictably) be interpreted as "must never-ever-ever repeat links" rather than as a statement that we don't normally do this, but that sometimes we find it beneficial. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:23, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

Okay, I changed it to ".. generally should not repeat ...". Is that okay? Any other inadvertent changes of meaning? --Noleander (talk) 19:38, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

Accepting your invitation to edit your draft, I will do so in stages. Step one: create two paragraphs containing related content. Butwhatdoiknow (talk) 13:35, 10 December 2011 (UTC)

[edit conflict]Seeing no more comments, I've put that proposed text into the guideline. Again, the purpose of the change is to clarify the wording, not to alter the guidance. If anyone sees a way to tweak the text, go right ahead, or revert, and continue the discussion here. --Noleander (talk) 13:38, 10 December 2011 (UTC)

@Butwhatdoiknow: No problem. I just put the text in the guideline, so you may want to edit it there ... or revert and do it here. Either way. --Noleander (talk) 13:39, 10 December 2011 (UTC)

I put Butwhatdoiknow's "split into 2 paragraph" improvement into the guideline. --Noleander (talk) 14:01, 10 December 2011 (UTC)

@ButWhat: When you split that paragr into two, was the intention that the first paragr contain "exclusions" and the second contain "inclusions"? If so, the sentence "the "See also" section should not link to pages that do not exist (red links) or disambiguation pages" should be moved from second paragraph, to first, true? --Noleander (talk) 15:22, 10 December 2011 (UTC)

Thank you for assuming that I engage in rational thought. What I had in mind was that the first paragraph spoke to quantity (number of cites) and the second to quality (type of cites). Butwhatdoiknow (talk) 19:16, 10 December 2011 (UTC)

Okay, as long as there is some reason to the rhyme. --Noleander (talk) 19:30, 10 December 2011 (UTC)

@Nikkimaria: I see you re-inserted the sentence "A reasonable number of relevant links that would be in the body of a hypothetical perfect article are suitable to add to the "See also" appendix of a less developed one." I find that sentence hard to comprehend. Its intention may be good guidance, but could you supply (here) a plainer version of what it is trying to say? For example, say a novice editor were trying to decide whether to add a given link into a See Also section: is there a simpler phrasing for that sentence that the novice would be able to understand? --Noleander (talk) 22:41, 12 December 2011 (UTC)

I could try, but I'm not sure what you're having trouble with? Nikkimaria (talk) 22:46, 12 December 2011 (UTC)

The sentence seems very hard to understand, especially for novices that are most likely to be in need of guidance from the MOS. Specifically, the sentence is rather hard to parse; "less developed" doesn't mean much to a novice; how is "relevant" determined?; how would a novice know what a perfect article is? Is the novice expected to conjure up the perfect article, fully formed in their mind, before they can use this sentence as guidance? If you don't mind, could you try re-phrasing the sentence (what are its essential points of guidance?) into really simple wording that a novice could grasp? Thanks. --Noleander (talk) 22:57, 12 December 2011 (UTC)

"The number of links in the See Also section should be relevant, limited to a reasonable quantity, and should reflect the links that would be present in an ideal article"? Given that your proposed rephrasing also contains "relevant" and "good article" (which I understand as something other than GA - correct?), I'm not sure what you're looking for in rephrasing those points. Nikkimaria (talk) 23:06, 12 December 2011 (UTC)

Nikki: Thanks for that alternate phrasing - it is definitely better than the "...hypothetical perfect article..." wording. Could you elaborate more on the "... should reflect the links that would be present in an ideal article" part? Does that refer only to the body of the ideal article, or also to it's NavBoxes? How does the "ideal article" guidance differ from the "relevant" guidance (I can see how they might be interpreted to mean the same thing)? Does the "ideal article" guidance tell the reader that (1) if the link were in the ideal article, then it should be in the SeeAlso; or (2) if the link were not in the ideal article it should not be in the SeeAlso; or (3) both? (i.e. Necessary and sufficient condition). Thanks in advance for your replies. I'm not trying to be pedantic: I'm genuinely trying to improve the wording of WP:SEEALSO so it is more useful for novices. My intention is not to change the essence of WP:SEEALSO's guidance, but rather to clarify the wording. --Noleander (talk) 01:27, 13 December 2011 (UTC)

Body, and 3. I don't know that the body vs navbox distinction would be clear to a novice, anyways. Nikkimaria (talk) 01:51, 13 December 2011 (UTC)

Okay, that makes sense. How about this for a wording to replace the "...hypothetical perfect article..." sentence: "The links in the See Also section should be relevant, should reflect the links that would be present in a comprehensive article on the topic, and should be limited to a reasonable quantity." Does that sound okay? --Noleander (talk) 03:59, 13 December 2011 (UTC)

I went ahead and made that replacement. Feel free to revert, or change, if you think it can be improved. --Noleander (talk) 04:12, 13 December 2011 (UTC)

"Good article" != GA

@ButWhatDoIKnow: I removed the link from "good article" phrase to WP:GA. I think that text is trying to indicate high-quality articles in general, and not GA articles specifically. That "good article" wording has been in WP:SEEAlSO for a long time (see the red text above). I changed it to "excellent articles" just now so the GA confusion wouldn't happen again, but Im not sure "excellent article" is ideal. Maybe "high quality article"? "top quality article"? "good quality article"? "well written article"? --Noleander (talk) 01:25, 13 December 2011 (UTC)

My inclination would be "high-quality article", and I would note that well-written does not (necessarily) equate with comprehensive (a la WP:WIAFA), which I think would make more sense in this context. Nikkimaria (talk) 01:51, 13 December 2011 (UTC)

Sounds good. I changed it from "excellent" to "high-quality, comprehensive". Feel free to change to "high quality" alone, if you feel that is better. --Noleander (talk) 04:09, 13 December 2011 (UTC)

It's all good to me. Butwhatdoiknow (talk) 13:22, 13 December 2011 (UTC)

Editorial judgment in See also

The sentence "whether a link belongs in the "See also" section is ultimately a matter of editorial judgment and common sense" seems to add nothing of value. That sentence could be inserted into any section in any WP guideline: "whether [to do something] is ultimately a matter of editorial judgment and common sense". If there is some specific, concrete point that sentence is trying to make, then it should be made explicit; otherwise it should be deleted. --Noleander (talk) 15:57, 10 December 2011 (UTC)

WhatamI can, perhaps, give a more authoritative history on this. But my understanding is that See also had been the source of an unusual amount of wikilawyering. So the section now includes a specific reminder that its guidance is not rigid. Butwhatdoiknow (talk) 19:10, 10 December 2011 (UTC)

There are hundreds of individual guidelines throughout WP that are subject to controversy, but they dont each contain a stern reminder to use common sense. Every WP guideline is "ultimately a matter of editorial judgment and common sense". Was there some specific aspect of the See Also guideline that was the target of controversy? If so, what was the aspect? Perhaps we can come up with some wording that clarifies that particular aspect, if it exists. --Noleander (talk) 19:38, 10 December 2011 (UTC)

There is a conversation in the archives that explains this compromise wording. Like all things on WP it is subject to improvement. SchmuckyTheCat (talk)

Looks like it took place in early 2008: Wikipedia_talk:Manual_of_Style/Layout/Archive_2#Proposed_change_to_.27See_also.27_guideline. Butwhatdoiknow (talk) 21:42, 10 December 2011 (UTC)

Schmucky: thanks for pointing me to the archives. I see four discussions there:

• Feb 2008
• Dec 2008
• Feb 2010
• April 2011

The most important one is the earliest, Feb 2008, when that sentence was first introduced. It looks like 3/4 of that discussion focused on the issue of repeating links in the See Also section (which were already in the body), but the discussion also touched on red links in the See Also, obvious/trivial links, and excessive quantity of links. A big part of the discussion was whether or not repeated links could be outlawed, or made discretionary. The latter prevailed, of course. It looks like the See Also guideline was in its infancy, and getting fleshed-out at that point. The See Also guideline has been enhanced since then to prohibit red links, and to make it clear that excessive linking is discouraged; and the guidance on repeating links is clearly discretionary. I think the sentence served a purpose 3 years ago, but is no longer useful. After reading the discussions, I would still recommend removing the sentence. --Noleander (talk) 21:47, 10 December 2011 (UTC)

As I re-read the 2008 archive, it appears that the sentence was created to address the question of determining the relevancy of a link. If so, its message could be useful, but its wording should be improved to something like "Determining whether a link belongs in the See Also section involves weighing several factors, including relevancy to the article, utility to the reader, risk of confusion, and the quantity of links in the section.". Does that sound like an improvement? --Noleander (talk) 22:22, 10 December 2011 (UTC)

In reply to a comment above, I'll be kind and say that rather than wikilawyering, we've had two problems. The more common problem has been slowly evolving standards, which resulted in different experienced editors believing that significantly different practices are normative. The other is a problem with people wanting very exact guidance, so that there was always a single, obvious One True™ answer about whether a given pages should be linked. This is similar to the occasional plaintive cries for "Can't you just tell me the name of every single reliable source, so I won't get it wrong?", and the fact is that it can't be done.

What to link depends not just on the points that Noleander suggests in the prior comment, but also on things like whether or not a well-developed navbox is included (you probably wouldn't want to repeat links that are in the navbox, although you might if it was an important related page and the navbox link was buried in the middle of a lot of collapsed navboxes) and the length of the article (you might want to repeat a link that was last seen four screenfuls ago in a very long article, but never one that is clearly visible immediately above in a two-sentence stub). WhatamIdoing (talk) 03:51, 11 December 2011 (UTC)

Yes, the SeeAlso guideline shares that tension (desire for concreteness vs. the desire for flexibility) with many WP guidelines. Yet each guideline should avoid generic motherhood pronouncements ("use common sense") and instead tailor its guidance to its unique requirements. How about this for a replacement of the above sentence: "Determining whether a link belongs in the See Also section involves weighing several factors, including relevancy to the article, the quantity of See Also links, the size of the article, the presence of the link in the article's body or navigation boxes, utility to the reader, and risk of confusion." If we want to mention "proximity to the (other) link to the See Also section" we can, but that probably deserves its own sentence. --Noleander (talk) 13:32, 11 December 2011 (UTC)

Proximity shouldn't matter. SchmuckyTheCat (talk)

That's fine. I only mentioned proximity based on the above comment by WhatamIdoing where he said "you might want to repeat a link that was last seen four screenfuls ago in a very long article, but never one that is clearly visible immediately above in a two-sentence stub". For now, the proposal is simply to replace the generic "common sense" sentence with the "Determining whether ..." sentence which is tailored to SeeAlso. --Noleander (talk) 19:14, 11 December 2011 (UTC)

Any more suggestions on how to improve the wording of the generic "common sense" sentence to tailor it to SeeAlso? --Noleander (talk) 01:19, 13 December 2011 (UTC)

Candidly, I believe that the generic motherhood-and-commonsense statement is preferable. It is impossible to produce a comprehensive list of specific considerations, and even when the considerations are known (length of the article, for example), they are often difficult to explain concisely. For example, I'm sure that Schmucky would agree with me that duplicating a link that is less than an inch away from the ==See also== section is silly, but that under certain limited circumstances, duplicating a particularly relevant link that was last seen four screenfuls ago might be desirable. WhatamIdoing (talk) 03:06, 13 December 2011 (UTC)

The "use commonsense" dictum applies to every single of the hundreds of WP guidelines, but the most useful guidelines do not rely on such generalities. Consider, for example, WP:UNDERLINK and WP:OVERLINK: they are very similar to WP:SEEALSO in that a line must be drawn: not too much, not too little Yet those guidelines do not punt and say "just use common sense". No, they list very specific factors to consider, and yet they make it clear they are just suggestions, and exceptions can be made. That is the way a good guideline should read: the accumulated wisdom of the sages. Why should the SeeAlso guideline withhold those specific factors that veteran editors have identified as useful to determine whether a link belongs or not? --Noleander (talk) 04:06, 13 December 2011 (UTC)

IMHO duplication is OK

I apologize if I've jumped in without extensive studying of the "historical" background of this discussion. This is just my 0.02. I am concerned about being helpful to the reader.

In my opinion, a "See also" section can be helpful in "speeding up" browsing for a casual reader who may not be familiar with the subject, and/or who may not have spent much time reading "all" of (or a large "percentage" of) the article that contains the "See also" section.

I have been in this situation (maybe we should call it the "clueless newbie" situation) before; -- and the fact that an infobox (for example), or a template or "navigation" box of some kind, -- or maybe even a "See also" section! -- may contain the link[s] I am looking for, has sometimes saved me some time. When that happens, I am thankful, and it has given me a certain perspective (maybe the "clueless newbie" perspective?) on whether such "duplication" is OK.

Apparently it is already considered OK (allowable) for an infobox (for example), to offer the reader a given hyper-link (or cross-reference), even if that exact same hyper-link already exists somewhere else in the same article! Good! I have seen this many times, and -- (in my opinion) -- the "duplication" was not just OK, it was super OK. The duplication did not bother me. On the contrary, it may have saved me some time. It sometimes means that I do not have to read the entire article. Reading an entire article could be a waste of time -- (or, an inefficient use of time) -- if what I am really looking for is a hyper-link (or cross-reference) to some other article.

The hyper-link I am looking for (and delighted to find!) (quickly and easily) might be an "internal" link, that points to some article here on Wikipedia; or it might point to [say] a footnote, with perhaps a reference to an external web site, or an "ink-on-paper only" source, such as a book or magazine. It doesn't matter. In my opinion, helping the reader is what is important. I do not see a big advantage in "requiring" the reader to have to spend more time reading, because the hyper-link they are looking for only occurs one place -- or a small number of places! -- in the article. ...I mean, if we were short on disk space, or bandwidth, or something, that would be a different story. I don't think we are short on disk space, or bandwidth -- ...at least not so much that it should be a deciding factor in making a rule against allowing a long "See also" section -- even [a rule against] allowing a "See also" section that contains hyper-links or cross-references that also occur elsewhere in the same Wikipedia article.

I am more concerned about the drudgery (or, the "waste of time") involved, when a reader has to read all of (or, most of) some article, in order to find something, like, a cross-reference that was not duplicated -- or is not duplicated "very much" -- so that it only occurs one place -- or a small number of places! -- in the article.

In my opinion, that potential drudgery (or, "waste of time") could be significant, and it could justify duplicating cross-references, if such duplicating might save time for some readers.

I am NOT very concerned about the "waste of time" involved, if any, when a reader has to endure the possible 'inconvenience' of having to "skip over" a "See also" section -- (even a very long "See also" section!), -- if he or she does not "need" the "See also" section, or does not "like" to read "See also" sections, or something. In fact, that 'inconvenience' is so minor, that I would put it in the "chicken feed" category.

I noticed that, at Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style/Layout#See_also_section it says, in part,

Whether a link belongs in the "See also" section is ultimately a matter of editorial judgment and common sense. The links in the "See also" section should be relevant, should reflect the links that would be present in a comprehensive article on the topic, and should be limited to a reasonable quantity. As a general rule the "See also" section should not repeat links which appear in the article's body or its navigation boxes. Thus, many high-quality, comprehensive articles do not have a "See also" section.

I think we should have less emphasis on having "rules" that sound good, or rules that are politically correct in some way, or rules that meet some other kind of goals other than practical and realistic goals. I think we should have more emphasis on choosing recommendations that will result in organizing an article in such a way that -- bottom line! -- we help the reader to save time, and to find the desired links quickly and easily. ...and if that means repeating links that may already appear elsewhere, then that would be OK with me.

Just my 0.02. (This sub-section [my comments today] might also be an example of some writing that is tiresome for a reader to [have to] "read all of" -- and/or an example of some writing that has a lot of duplication. Happy to be of service, in that regard! ["if applicable"] :-)

--Mike Schwartz (talk) 19:43, 29 February 2012 (UTC)

Links to templates in See also sections

An article I watch has a link to a template in its See also section (specifically, Derbyshire#See_also has had a link to Template:Derbyshire Places of interest). This feels at best unorthodox, but linking to templates doesn't appear to be formally discouraged in WP:SEEALSO. Should it be? Dave.Dunford (talk) 15:28, 24 January 2012 (UTC)

If I ruled the world navboxes would appear in the See also section. Alas, that boat has sailed. So the practice of putting a navbox link in See also probably runs contrary to the spirit of wp:APPENDIX. The question then becomes whether to add an explicit proscription to Layout. My thought is that this practice is so infrequent that we don't need to add complexity to Layout to deal with it. Butwhatdoiknow (talk) 14:28, 27 January 2012 (UTC)

Notes and references

I would like to state my very strong objection to using "Notes" for exclusively reference citations. While it may be commonly used in some sources, it's ambiguous. Our same MOS recommends against using "citations" and "sources" on those same grounds. When I'm looking for references in an article, I will be looking for "References" or "Citations." "Notes" I would automatically assume to be a section of explanatory footnotes. (Or endnotes, if we're going to be nitpicky about terminology.)

I don't know what would be good form to distinguish between mixed sections and explanatory footnote-only sections, but at the least we could avoid muddling things by including "notes" as an option for reference-only sections. For a long time (as recently as this revision) the MOS merely noted that it might be inappropriate in mixed sections, without suggesting also using it for notes. "References" being already the most commonly used name for such sections on Wikipedia, if we're going to change away from them for mixed sections, it makes sense to advise to make the change when it's a mixture of explanatory footnotes and citations, and against it when it's reference citations only. --Quintucket (talk) 13:48, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

The use of Notes is based on practice, that is, what editors are actually using. It is used at Help:Footnotes, Help:Shortened footnotes and elsewhere. I will check style guides later. ---— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk 15:32, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

I'm sure there are sections that use "citations" and "sources" too, just as "references" is used for mixed references and endnotes. If we discourage those, I think that we ought to discourage the use of "notes" for citation-only references too. --Quintucket (talk) 16:36, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

Location of Media sections?

Several articles have Media sections, e.g. World War I. In that article, I've moved Media to a subsection of See also (since the links in it are to files on Wikipedia per se, rather than to any sister project), but is there a proper place to put it?—DocWatson42 (talk) 08:57, 6 February 2012 (UTC)

It would presumably fall under the image gallery rules. WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:43, 25 February 2012 (UTC)

Location of {{coord}} or {{coord missing}}

This is not specified at present, and while stub-sorting I usually add {{coord missing}} when appropriate and would like to know the best place for it. I raised the question at Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Geographical_coordinates#Placement_of_.7B.7Bcoord_missing.7D.7D, and it was pointed out that The Anomebot2 puts the {{coord missing}} immediately above the categories and defaultsort, and that this was "just following the conventional lead of many editors".

So I would like to propose: that in "Order of sections" we add "Geographical coordinates" after "Persondata" and before "Defaultsort". I'm not sure whether it would be more useful to link it to MOS:COORDS for the MOS or to WP:GEO for the Project. PamD 09:36, 6 February 2012 (UTC)

Putting proposal on pause: Have just consulted Anomebot to find out whether the bot puts it before or after PERSONDATA. The two will rarely co-occur, but presumably the bot is following a rule and, for want of other input, we might as well follow its established precedent. So I will return with a proposal which specifies whether before, or after, PERSONDATA. Anomebot does not have a view on this, as it will not assign {{coord missing}} to an article about a person. Fair enough. PamD 18:59, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

Revised proposal after that consultation": So I would like to propose: that in "Order of sections" we add "Geographical coordinates" after "Navigation templates" and before "Persondata". There's a logic in having it following the navboxes, which are for display in the article, as the coords are also displayed in the article (albeit not at the point where the template appears), unlike the persondata and other later elements (except {{stub}}) which are not. I'm not sure whether it would be more useful to link it to MOS:COORDS for the MOS or to WP:GEO for the Project.

I'll add it if no-one objects in the next week or so. PamD 18:59, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

I have now made that change to Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style/Layout#Order_of_sections, as no-one has objected. PamD 09:32, 23 February 2012 (UTC)

Noted. ^_^—DocWatson42 (talk) 07:41, 25 February 2012 (UTC)

Etymology

Recently I've been adding the etymology of various words in the lead after the title (see this or this). Sometimes though, if the etymology requires detailed it is given a section of its own.

I'm wondering if etymology should always be mentioned later on, after the lead, or if its short enough can it be mentioned in the first sentence?VR _talk 06:24, 11 February 2012 (UTC)

I think this depends on the WikiProject and their guidelines for page layout... if they have it. – VisionHolder « talk » 20:05, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

Given that Wikipedia is not a dictionary, the etymology frequently should not be mentioned at all. Having said that, as a general rule of thumb, your "length-based" approach sounds okay to me. WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:45, 25 February 2012 (UTC)