Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Linking

Repeated links

'Repeated links' now says "where the links are in a table or in a list, as each row should stand on its own" seemingly justifying an indefinite number of repeats arranged in lines down the page. Can we make a common sense amendment to this sentence? I propose:

'"where the links are in a table, the table should stand on its own, relinking words that may have already appeared in body text."

Any comments? --Kleinzach 01:59, 19 April 2011 (UTC)

Good suggestion. Tables tend to be grossly overlinked, because this guideline seemingly allows it. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 02:04, 19 April 2011 (UTC)

I support this. I had the same issue above, as a user was readding links to every row even when you can see all of the rows within a standard resolution screen.  BIGNOLE  (Contact me) 04:11, 19 April 2011 (UTC)

I support anything that stops (or discourages) a link being repeated in nearby rows in a table. The trouble is that I'm not getting that sense from the suggested wording. "...relinking words that may have already appeared in the body text" doesn't seem to achieve what we are all thinking here; or does it, and I'm not understanding it? Doesn't that wording still give a green light to anyone wanting to repeat the same link in every row?  GFHandel.   04:33, 19 April 2011 (UTC)

• I think there is a critical difference between a table standing on its own as opposed to each row of a table standing on its own. I am unsure as to what "relinking words that may have already appeared in body text" means, but would guess that is an exemption to link words that have already been linked to in the preceding text. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 04:40, 19 April 2011 (UTC)

• Sorry, my wording was less than ideal. I did mean "an exemption to link words that have already been linked to in the preceding text". Perhaps I should quote the whole text with (my suggested) part in bold:

"In general, link only the first occurrence of an item. There are exceptions to this guideline, including these:

• where the later occurrence is a long way from the first.
• where the first link is in an infobox, navbox or similar meta-content.
• where the links are in a table or in a list, as each table or list should stand on its own with its own independent set of links.

How about that? --Kleinzach 06:54, 19 April 2011 (UTC)

IIRC, the reasoning for the current wording, giving the exception as line-by-line, not the table as a whole, is that in sortable tables one cannot ensure which line is going to appear first, and so each line being fully self-contained ensures the reader doesn't have to hunt through the entire table to find the relevant link. For short tables, it's not that big a deal, but some tables are quite long, and the links actually serve the reader. I think we should keep the current wording; it exists for a reason. oknazevad (talk) 18:13, 19 April 2011 (UTC)

what about incliuding mention that the exception is for sortable tables, and not non-sortable tables?  BIGNOLE  (Contact me) 18:53, 19 April 2011 (UTC)

"...it exists for a reason" seems like a reason why nothing would ever get debated/changed, so instead: have a look at this table. The Venue column is sortable, however it was long ago decided not to repeat the links to Queen's Theatre, King's Theatre, etc. in every row. (and there has never been a localized problem with that decision). Tables don't retain a user-preference of sort order, so the table is always initially in a sort order that makes the decision to link the first occurrence sensible. The idea being that when the user clicks a different sort order (e.g. Libretto in the example table), then all bets are off, and the user shouldn't be too shocked that the links are no longer in the original order—and it is expected that someone using that table would be knowledgeable enough to restore the original sort order (with the HWV column) if required. Please remember that there is no perfect solution for repeated links in tables, but I feel that linking only the first occurrence (even in a sortable table) is generally more desirable than the dilution of more valuable links that happens when every occurrence is linked.  GFHandel.   23:09, 19 April 2011 (UTC)

The table that prompted me to start this is here: List of operas by Auber. As you will see Opéra-Comique and Eugène Scribe are each linked 30 or 40 times in this table. This also illustrates GFHandel's point. I don't think the reader of these (relatively complex) tables is so naive that he or she doesn't realize that links are also moved by resorting. Most readers will not re-sort. Those that do, will be doing so for a purpose. --Kleinzach 00:38, 20 April 2011 (UTC)

My 2c. While I object to repeated links in text, I don't have a problem with repeated links in tables, or, indeed, plain lists. Period. Wwwhatsup (talk) 03:29, 20 April 2011 (UTC)

 Done I've made the change as we have a reasonable consensus for change. Please say if the phrasing needs further tweaking. Best. --Kleinzach 07:19, 21 April 2011 (UTC)

I've just added rfc tag, as I don't think this was debated widely enough. --Rob Sinden (talk) 09:15, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

I have added a fourth exception - where two references map onto the same article via a redirect - see my changes to Zara Phillips. Martinvl (talk) 09:08, 14 June 2011 (UTC)

I cannot parse what you added; your example above also seems inconsistent with what you did at Zara Phillips. I'm reverting for now pending further clarification. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 10:30, 14 June 2011 (UTC)

The current text for three consecutive paragraphs in the lede for Zara Phillips now contains:

... her niece Savannah Phillips in 2010, she is ....

...[paragraph not relevant]...

She has an older brother, Peter Phillips, ...

The original link to Savannah Phillips had been redirected to her father, Peter Phillips. This morning somebody removed the link from Savannah's name. I reinstated the link even though both end up at the same page on grounds that the reader would not automatically connect Savannah Phillips to Peter Phillips. Does this clarify things? Martinvl (talk) 12:09, 14 June 2011 (UTC)

• I'm not stupid, but I still don't get it. How will other people understand this addition? At the very least, could you write out here something a bit easier to understand, as a draft for your addition? Tony (talk) 13:12, 14 June 2011 (UTC)

How about the following text to describe a permitted repeated link:

• "If two articles that are apparently unrelated have been merged into a single article using WP:REDIRECT (for example the biography of a young child has been merged into the biography of its parent) and both articles are referenced from a third article, then both articles should be Wikilinked in that article, especially if the context does not indicate a connection."

Martinvl (talk) 14:15, 14 June 2011 (UTC)

Needs clarification

At Wikipedia:Manual of Style (linking)#What generally should not be linked it says in part "Avoid linking the names of major geographic features and locations,". What is meant by major in this case? Is it used to indicate importance or size? CambridgeBayWeather (talk) 23:40, 30 May 2011 (UTC)

If the only choices are importance or size, importance is clearly better because the Earth's mantle has much more size than London. But we don't have more specific rules on that issue. Art LaPella (talk) 04:06, 31 May 2011 (UTC)

I would take it to mean the terms "mountain" or "ocean" or "doctor" are not linked. A normal English reader should understand the term. But I wouldn't have excluded Mount Everest, England, Islam, nor Arabic, even though all are well known. I would think we would want them linked the first time in an article like everything else. Student7 (talk) 02:02, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

I think "Avoid linking the names of major geographic features and locations, religions, languages, and common professions" pretty clearly includes at least England, Islam and Arabic if it includes anything, so does that mean you want to change the guideline? Art LaPella (talk) 03:06, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

I think I would favor that change, yes. I think the guideline went a bit far. "Geographic features" and "common professions" makes a lot of sense. I think specifically named places, religions, and languages are not down to that level IMO. Even IF considered "common" by many of us. There are some people for who this is not common. Others who would appreciate a link to the topic. Student7 (talk) 14:17, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

It is well-established on en.WP that the names of commonly known countries and cities are not linked, particularly English-speaking ones. There are almost always more important links to preserve in the vicinity without the dilutionary effect of such overlinking. We have had this discussion many times, most recently at WT:MOS last week; please let's not revisit it. Tony (talk) 16:41, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

@Student7, I never really considered it referring to things like mountain, ocean or doctor. @Tony1, I'm not looking to change the guideline but for clarity. If the word major is used for size then editors would not link Victoria Island (Canada) but they would link Cyprus. If on the other hand major means importance or commonly known the reverse of the previous sentence would be true. The whole sentence should be cleared up by rewording it. One possible suggestion is "Avoid linking the names of common or well known geographic features and locations, religions, languages, and professions". CambridgeBayWeather (talk) 15:22, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

• That wording is according to my interpretation of the guideline, and would have no problem with it. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 16:51, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

• Yeah, seems ok. Could you make it "well-known"? Tony (talk) 03:16, 5 June 2011 (UTC)

You mean as in "Avoid linking the names of well known geographic features and locations, religions, languages, and professions"? CambridgeBayWeather (talk) 10:07, 5 June 2011 (UTC)

He means the hyphen: well-known not well known, see WP:HYPHEN. (I would have changed that as a typo, anyway.) Art LaPella (talk) 16:17, 5 June 2011 (UTC)

I assume that this solves one problem that satisfies everyone.

As for the other part, Proper Names that are commonly known to US residents and sometimes Europeans, are not always recognizable to someone whose first language is not English or who does not have a European background. These are not uneducated readers; they just haven't taken American Geography or watch American television. This is why I prefer to link place-names when first encountered. I am not pushing for a change here since I have really had no problem with that, except with myself when I first noticed rather recently, a proscription not to link stuff in the lead, when avoidable. (I have found it hard to avoid, to tell the truth). Student7 (talk) 18:20, 8 June 2011 (UTC)

What Student7 say. Cardiff might be well known in the UK but I think a sizeable fraction of Texas couldn't tell where it is off the top of their head, and vice versa for Austin. On the other hand, the names a few really major cities such as London or Paris are actually quite unlikely to be unfamiliar to a reader, wherever they are from. Maybe “well known geographic features ... and professions” should be replaces by “geographic features ... and professions which are well known worldwide”? ― A. di M.​_plé​^dréachtaí 22:44, 30 July 2011 (UTC)

RFC: restructuring of the Manual of Style

Editors may be interested in this RFC, along with the discussion of its implementation:

Should all subsidiary pages of the Manual of Style be made subpages of WP:MOS?

It's big; and it promises huge improvements. Great if everyone can be involved. Noetica^Tea? 00:43, 25 June 2011 (UTC)

Overlinking of magazines or publishers

An IP-hopping editor has made a habit of linking The New York Times and Time (magazine) (not [[Time (magazine)}|]]), and professional organizations, such as the American Geophysical Union, when it appears in a citation template in a reference. Other editors find it a distracting sea of blue. Any comments? I, personally, think the links unnecessary, but not distracting. Any comments whether something needs to be done, and how to phrase it in WP:OVERLINK? — Arthur Rubin (talk) 15:13, 7 July 2011 (UTC)

• If there is a specific element within the source document that is cited/quoted directly (such as a quote from an editorial, as opposed to a third party spokesman), the journal's name would appear in the running text of the article; it will most likely be linked at its first appearance. In most other cases, sources are fungible (ie it wouldn't make much difference if we substituted another source) and do not merit linking. Names of publishers are rarely necessary in everyday news sources; I would expect the reader to know about 'publishers' such as BBC, CBC, and for readers to look them up separately only if they were curious. Many other 'works' themselves are often better-known than their publishers. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 15:20, 7 July 2011 (UTC)

Good question. I have linked lesser-known publications so that interested editors may check out the source to determine reliability. For a large article, I can appreciate that overlinking happens for the better-known sources. I do not expect that everyone reading these articles has heard of sources that many of the rest of us are familiar with.

I am more annoyed with someone sticking in a source that "sounds like" a reputable organization but merely has a well-chosen name for what is essentially and unedited blog (and no article in Wikipedia). Student7 (talk) 18:35, 9 July 2011 (UTC)

A similar case in January 2010 inspired the lengthy thread Wikipedia talk:Citing sources/Archive 27#Links within citation. There was no consensus on whether these links are a good thing. Adrian J. Hunter^{(talk•contribs)} 07:35, 29 July 2011 (UTC)

Avoid linking plain English words

This is ambiguous because it doesn't specify 'link to' or 'link from'. A link from a common word such as "nun" may be linking to an uncommon word such as "Dorothy Kazel". QuentinUK (talk) 13:43, 28 July 2011 (UTC)

Ah, that would be piping from a common word to what one hopes is a high-value link. This is called "Easter egg" linking, and we try to minimise it; occasionally, it's inescapable. Tony (talk) 14:30, 28 July 2011 (UTC)

Sometimes I signal that by including the grammatical article in the link caption: The equation describing the ... is named after him, where it's clear I'm not linking to equation because in that case I'd keep the The out of the link. But don't do that unless it's obvious from the context where the link goes. (@Tony: Can you give an example of when “it's inescapable”? When all else fails you can recur to parentheses, as in a nun (Dorothy Kazel).) ― A. di M.​_plé​^dréachtaí 22:14, 30 July 2011 (UTC)

Linking to an image page

The article has a section on "Links to Wikipedia's categories" that explains prefixing the link with a colon so that the Cat will appear as a link and not get interpreted as a command to add a Cat to the bottom of the page. I noticed that something similar happens with links to images. If one places a wl to an image, it gets interpreted as a command to display the image. On the other hand, if one wishes to include a link to the image – say, as part of a Talk page discussion – then the colon does that. I think the article should make this clear (unless it does and I missed it). Either rename the section "Links to Wikipedia's categories and images" or create a new section "Links to Wikipedia's images" with instructions like in the "categories" section.—Biosketch (talk) 08:27, 31 July 2011 (UTC)

nbsp in wikilinks

Hi

I have seen a recent trend to include &nbsp in wikilinks - e.g. [[The link to number 7]]

Is a Wikilink inherently protected from breaking on a line, in other words is an nbsp necessary?

These introductions are causing a problem when editing or viewing diffs as it prevents correct linking and results in a "Bad title" error page. Chaosdruid (talk) 18:26, 2 August 2011 (UTC)

This is explained at MOS:NUM#Non-breaking spaces and the footnote it points to. It isn't just a recent trend; I've been doing it since the April 2010 discussion that footnote links to. A wikilink is not inherently protected from breaking on a line. You can experiment with this example of [[World War II]]: World War II by un-maximizing your window (that is, click the square by the red X in the upper right corner), and adjust the window size until "World" shows on one line and "War II" shows on another line. I just repeated that experiment to make sure. I'm unaware of any problems, but of course if you're the first to tell me about something happening everywhere, then I got the wrong advice and we need to stop, and remove the nbsps from the links we have.

So what "problem when editing"? When editing you see the nbsp, which causes a problem if you don't know what it means, but that problem isn't restricted to links. I suppose it might also cause a problem among people who think it won't work in links, even though it does, but the worst they could do is remove it. "When viewing diffs, as it prevents correct linking"? I don't get it; links don't work when viewing diffs anyway. In normal reading mode, the links do work; click my World War II link above. "a 'Bad title' error page"? What is that? How do you get it? Can you show us an example? Art LaPella (talk) 21:42, 2 August 2011 (UTC)

It's not clear to me what user Chaosdruid means. The wikisoftware now seems to convert all spaces, nonbreaking or not, into underscores in the link. That should work, and I have not seen any problems. --Robert.Allen (talk) 22:34, 2 August 2011 (UTC)

The problem is that when editing, or viewing diffs, if I click on one of the links with nbsp in it, I get the error page instead of the target article - Links do work when viewing diffs, at least they do for me (you do know about holding ctrl then clicking to open them in a new tab?).

Example: click edit for this section, then hold ctrl and click on your World War II example. Doing that opens a special page "Bad title".

"How to resize your browser 101" was a little beneath my knowledge lol :¬) Chaosdruid (talk) 00:42, 3 August 2011 (UTC)

"click edit for this section, then hold ctrl and click on your World War II example" is a little above my knowledge. I have never heard of such a procedure, and when I tried it nothing happened, neither when I clicked World War II nor when I held ctrl and clicked this example. In edit mode, of course, it looks like [[World War II]] and [[example]]. Is that what you want me to click while holding down the "ctrl" key? Firefox 5.0, Windows XP Professional, Service Pack 3. Anyway, it looks as if others will need to decide if this is a significant enough problem to warrant removing nbsps from wikilinks. Art LaPella (talk) 04:11, 3 August 2011 (UTC)

Having a nbsp inside a wikilink is a great inconvenience in edit mode - it never displays properly. When I select a wikilink in edit mode and mouseover, a menu pops up taking me to the relevant article; a nbsp screws that up. For that reason, I have always eschewed that method, even in my dates script (except for images). Thanks to the above, I find that the nbsp inside wikilinks works as it is meant to in display mode. I still intend to avoid using the nbsp inside links. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 04:50, 3 August 2011 (UTC)

Links should be tested using Preview. --Robert.Allen (talk) 05:56, 3 August 2011 (UTC)

• I'm sorry. Links should be tested by whatever means is most convenient/effective. The most important constraint for most people is time, so whatever we do is usually driven by that principle. The edit screen is difficult to navigate and is sometimes difficult not to preview, and use of Popups (with its mouseover feature for wikilinks) is a great tool to make life easier. Being forced to use preview for a minor check because someone has inserted nbsp is a real productivity sump. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 06:26, 3 August 2011 (UTC)

(ec)

@Art - edit mode and click this - if you do not hold ctrl while clicking it will try and open it in this tab.

If it doesn't do anything, it may be that you do not have some of the extras enabled in your Wiki preferences that I have - though I think it is possibly something else. I also am running FF5, though with Vista 64 bit (which should not really affect it).

The main gripe for me is when checking that links point to the correct place, that the main articles contain the material summarised in the one I am editing/comparing changes via diffs. If this was to become a widespread thing I really think that Wikilinks should have some sort of non-breaking protection added as that would prevent any problems. At present nbsps only work in the preview window or in reading mode.

@Robert.Allen - we are talking about the links in edit mode and as diffs, why would we have to preview every time we want to check a link or diff, or why have to go to the actual document when we have the facility to hover over them? For example, looking at the diffs for this page [1], when I hover over Arts addition of "[[World War&nbsp ;II]]" I do not get a preview of the start of the World War II article, I get "/* cache key: enwiki:resourceloader:filter:minify-css:5:f2a9127573a22335c2a9102b208c73e7 */" Chaosdruid (talk) 06:31, 3 August 2011 (UTC)

I clicked "edit" and found [[World War II|click this]]. That made me choose between clicking "World War II" and "click this". So I tried it both ways. I tried both ways without the ctrl key. I tried both ways with the ctrl key. I tried both ways with the other ctrl key. Nothing. Oh well. I haven't installed "Popups" as Ohconfucius has, so maybe there's something else I didn't install. Art LaPella (talk) 06:48, 3 August 2011 (UTC)

The link user Chaosdruid provided was for a History version comparison. In any case, when one scrolls down to the link it is certainly possible to open it in either a new window or a new tab without errors. If these users have special software installed to customize their edit windows which produce popups, then this certainly applies to a only few editors. If that's the case, the problem is probably with this customization software, and not relevant to most editors. --Robert.Allen (talk) 08:40, 3 August 2011 (UTC)

I don't use popups, but sometimes I highlight links and use the middle mouse button to call up a Google search on the highlighted text. Any nbsp needs to be edited out of the search box and a new search done. That's no big deal to me, but if it bothers many people, a way to avoid it is, instead of
[[World War II]], use a pipe:
[[World War II|World War II]].
--Stfg (talk) 09:49, 3 August 2011 (UTC)

@Art - what happens if you do the same process with this one? - click edit and click on this link World War II (with and without holding the ctrl key)

@Robert - how exactly is it "certainly possible", in other words what process did you have to go through to make it possible, as that implies that it does not do it on its own without some sort of intervention by the editor? Also I cannot see how you have determined your numbers on how many editors use pop-ups or not, can you please tell me how you did that?

@All - perhaps it would be simple to gain consensus for a recommendation that the nbsp is only used in piped links, and as part of the pipe, not the actual link? After all, surely we are here to make progress, not limit us to what works when we disable everything. Chaosdruid (talk) 18:58, 3 August 2011 (UTC)

• Popups is an EXTREMELY widely used tool, so it should not be dismissed as a 'minority'. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 01:40, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

Still nothing. Assuming a left click. Hovering over the link in the green rectangle on the history page doesn't do anything either. Art LaPella (talk) 00:23, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

• @Chaosdruid: I use the Safari browser. To open a link I generally use one two methods: hold down the command key and click the link to open it in a new tab in the same window OR hold down the control key and click to reveal a popup contextual menu from which one can choose to open the link in a new tab or a new window. Both of these methods work fine with these links that contain nobreak spaces without piping.
• @Ohconfucius: after checking your link I must agree, "Navigation popups" are used by a lot of editors, and if they are a minority, they are probably a very important minority.
• @All: it still seems possible that the problem can be fixed in the Navigation popup Javascript. I'm not sure how long it has been since support for nobreak spaces in wikilinks was added to the wikisoftware, but I only noticed it and started taking advantage of it recently. I suspect it may be easier to get the Navigation popup Javascript modified than to get all editors to pipe these links. (If Chaosdruid is not using the Navigation popup Javascript, then I can't imagine where his problem lies.) --Robert.Allen (talk) 02:04, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

@Art - I guess then, that you have not ticked the option to "open links in a new tab" (in your "My preferences" page "Gadgets" under the Browsing section), or that your "Editing" page does not have some of those other functions enabled (under "Advanced options"). Apologies for asking you to try that so many ways and times, it must be a little frustrating :¬)

I assumed (I know, ass out of u and me *blushes*) that everyone with Firefox had this functionality - see [2] and [3]

@Robert - This post was originally made about issue which did not include popups (see original post at the very top of this section), this is when simply editing a page and clicking, or looking at diffs and clicking. Pop-ups are an entirely different thing, I was just giving the result pop-ups gives when the link is hovered over. Chaosdruid (talk) 02:11, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

Correct. Despite 39,377 edits since 2004, clicking "Gadgets" shows (if a techie can actually believe this) nothing but EMPTY BOXES. Art LaPella (talk) 05:01, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

I only see an option for opening external links, not wikilinks. I think I'm still in the dark on this. Sorry. --Robert.Allen (talk) 07:33, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

Since popups is being used as a way of checking links while editing, didn't they ought to behave in the same way as links in ordinary windows? Otherwise, the check seems unreliable. So perhaps this should be considered a bug in popups? --Stfg (talk) 08:39, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

Popups while editing? I do not get pop-ups in the edit window while editing, I use left-clicking the link and holding ctrl to open in a new tab. (the same as when looking at diffs) Chaosdruid (talk) 13:30, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

Sorry if I used the wrong term, but that functionality is not available until you enable something. I thought that something was being referred to as "popups" in this thread. Whatever it is that has made it possible you to do that in the edit window and in diffs, if you want it to give you a reliable check of a link, then it needs to behave in the same was as the software behaves when you click a blue link in the read window. Otherwise the check is unreliable. That's all I meant. --Stfg (talk) 15:14, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

No problem, I mentioned it earlier, but it might have been lost in all those @s: "I assumed (I know, ass out of u and me *blushes*) that everyone with Firefox had this functionality [ctrl + left-click] - see [4] and [5]"

It is a basic default functionality of Firefox, and I believe of IE. If Art cannot get it to work, then maybe something is different in Art's FF or Java setups (xe might have turned it off), rather than it being a Wiki software thing. Chaosdruid (talk) 17:57, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

@Chaosdruid: Are you using or have you tried wikEd by any chance? Apparently it shows links in the Edit window. (I just tried wikEd, and I got the error you are talking about when I tried to open a wikilink in the Edit window which contained an nbsp.) --Robert.Allen (talk) 18:08, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

I imagine that the standard version of the edit window also shows links :¬) It does not allow them to be opened whilst editing - how would one open links from there? preview, scroll, find it, ctrl+click (shudders) all those extra movements just to open a link seem a little wasteful to me. That is one of the reasons I use WikiEd (used by around 2,000 editors) and mainly because the standard editor is not that good at anything apart from editing.

That would not explain the diffs view links not working though, nor the pop-ups problem. Chaosdruid (talk) 19:22, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

It seems to me that all these add-on editing aids just need to be updated so they keep up with the improvements in the wikisoftware. I think you will find it difficult to roll back the change, since it was probably implemented in response to requests from other editors. It was interesting to learn about the add-ons however. Thanks! --Robert.Allen (talk) 19:02, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

I tend to use {{nowraplinks}} --Trevj (talk) 05:10, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

Multiple links in a table?

For a table of Fraternity Conventions, if out of say 50 conventions, 3 were held in Chicago, would all three Chicago entries be linked? This is a sortable table.Naraht (talk) 11:03, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

Normally yes, the link should be repeated (particularly as a sortable table), but I do ask to consider if you need to link the very well-known geographic city of Chicago in a non-geographic article. --MASEM (t) 11:50, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

So you would support removing the links to cities in both fraternity convention tables and fraternity chapter lists that includes cities?Naraht (talk) 13:47, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

Big cities. Art LaPella (talk) 17:25, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

So if they've had two conventions in Chicago, Illinois and two in Shreveport, Louisiana out of the 80 conventions they've had, should it be 0, 1 or 2 links for Chicago and 0, 1 or 2 links for Shreveport? Naraht (talk) 22:20, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

WP:OVERLINK doesn't define "likely to be already known by almost all readers", but I would say 0 for Chicago and 2 for Shreveport. Art LaPella (talk) 23:10, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

That just looks really wierd in a table, to have some cities linked and some not. Both links are of equal importance to *that* article, aren't they?Naraht (talk) 00:30, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

Not if the reader recognizes Chicago but not Shreveport. If you want to change the guideline, I generally leave that to others. Art LaPella (talk) 01:07, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

Well, this of course flags up the regularly raised - and never-answered - point of how you can ever define what is or is not "well known" or what, for example, is a "big city" in the context of a global encyclopedia like WP; or where any consensus on the practical details of these points has ever been agreed (which is a separate point from any suggestions of changing the guidelines). Even if that were possible and had been done, it ignores the fact that links are about enabling navigation to detailed encyclopedia pages - and should not necessarily be excluded simply because some, or even most, people might know that Chicago is "a city in the US, somewhere in the middle north".

Equally, in terms of tables and lists as opposed to main article text, surely we have to be a bit more liberal in how we apply what is, after all, only a guideline anyway - as Naraht says, and many others have observed in the past, it looks odd to have some terms linked and not others, as well as, per the first point, being somewhat arbitary. N-HH talk/edits 13:07, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

Its understandable that not every possible WP reader will understand what "Chicago" is. But more than a slim majority would - likely closer to 80-90%. We can probably say the same for most world capitals (at least, those in NA, Europe, Asia, and Oceania) and 10M+ population cities like NYC, LA, Houston, etc. And if all we are doing is linking the name of the city in a non-geographic article to help people ID what that city is, then its absolutely not necessary to link those cities that are likely to be well known to WP readers. On the other hand, if this was an article about, say, lakes or some other geographic feature, I could see the city being linked to provide that geographic reference. This is not that type of case, however. --MASEM (t) 14:29, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

• Well, actually, no. Let's not throw out years of more intelligent, selective, useful wikilinking because someone has turned up after six months' absence to start lobbying for maximal linking. Tony (talk) 14:18, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

Tony. Where am I lobbying for maximal linking? Someone came here asking a question, and I gave my take on it. Why do you need to fall back into cheap sarcasm and strawmanning (after six months)? And do you have anything constructive to say? N-HH talk/edits 14:48, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

Masem: thanks, but I still maintain that it is hard to see where we draw the line, or how we can even try to work out where. Plus, as noted, I think there's a difference when we're talking about lists and tables; and, it's not about ID-ing as such, it's about navigability as well - and of course, in a way, the more well known a place is, the more likely people are to want to go to the page (I'm pretty sure pageview stats bear this out, eg that the US page is one of the most popular here). N-HH talk/edits 14:48, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

In this specific case I find it hard to believe the city names are there for navigation as opposed to simply providing a wikilink to an unfamiliar proper name. I'm not saying the location column of the table is unnecessary, but it does offer much context compared to the rest of the details given. Therefore, it is unlikely that someone is going to land on that article and use the location links because they want to learn more about that location; eg they aren't very germane to the subject matter. But, as they are proper names, we should be linking the uncommon ones for those to learn what the city is. This is obviously not true for every table, but in this case, I would argue that the links are only there for uncommon proper name aid, nothing more. And hence why Chicago shouldn't be linked city it is a reasonably well-known city. --MASEM (t) 15:18, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

I'd have to wonder how many people look at most lists and tables anyway tbh, let alone navigate from them. But, leaving that to one side, and pushing the Chicago point a bit further - I know where Chicago is; I know what state it's in; I've been there twice, which surely puts me in a <1% minority of English-speaking people. But even then I don't know how many people live there, when it was founded, how many colleges there are in the city, where its convention centres are etc. Nor (until just now) have I looked at the WP page on Chicago, but might well choose to out of curiosity if I came across a link to it on another page. Sure, some of those considerations probably fall short of giving it a "relevant/germane" qualification in the case being cited here, but not all do, and it just seems it's a little inflexible and limited - on several levels - to simply say "it's well known, so don't link, even in a table" and leave it at that.

Anyway, I think we may agree to disagree on this. But I do think it's important that people who ask a question about this kind of thing know there are differing views and interpretations of the style guideline. Also, I can't help but noticing (when I just went to look for it) that since I was last here, that bit of the guideline that said "Think before removing a link—it may be useful to other readers" has gone AWOL. Was it agreed somewhere to remove that? N-HH talk/edits 16:17, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

Answering my own question .. no, it was not agreed - it got slipped away with this edit towards the end of last year. Some of changes unilaterally made by that edit were later put right, by the two edits on this diff, but that deletion seems to have escaped restoration - by omission rather than because there was any discussion/agreement about it specifically. (Here's the general discussion. I, for one, missed it back then). N-HH talk/edits 16:27, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

Underlinking - places, languages and geographic features

I've noticed that wp:overlink is being enforced over zealously of late. I've even found myself being interested (however tangentially) in something mentioned in an article but being forced to copy and paste the text into the search bar because no link was provided. Either that or one is forced to scroll up or down several screenfulls to find the link.

While common word and expressions should only be linked when relevant to the topic, I don't think this rule should apply to proper nouns. If a place, language or geographic feature are relevant enough to be mentioned in an article they should be linked. We should avoid making judgements over what the reader is likely to be familiar or what might interest them. — Blue-Haired Lawyer ^t 13:41, 25 August 2011 (UTC)

"United States" is the most commonly used example of something that shouldn't usually be linked. The María Guinand article, for instance, briefly mentions "the Oregon Bach Festival held in Eugene, Oregon, USA". Simply mentioning the USA in that context is unlikely to make someone want to read all about it. Linking "USA" is more likely to distract them from useful links than to be useful in itself. Readers came to that article to read about María Guinand, so they are unlikely to want to read all about the US instead. Not 100.000% certain, just 99.999% unlikely. Of course we should make judgments of what might interest the reader; you would surely object if I copied the New York telephone book onto your user page. If you think "United States" should always be linked (and not just in places like the California article) then why is there any word you don't think should be linked? Art LaPella (talk) 17:10, 25 August 2011 (UTC)

To BHL - I agree with you, up to a point. As wp:overlink itself says, I think common geographic etc terms (however exactly those are to be defined anyway) do need to be "relevant" to be worth linking, rather than mentioned simply in passing. However, most delinking edits, done by script or otherwise, go way beyond even this, often leaving obvious links bare and random inconsistencies as to what is left linked and what is not (eg "XX is a city on the border between France and Belgium"). Also, on the grounds of navigability, I think the balance should be to retain a link rather than strike it; plus, as you say, it is impossible to make a sensible judgment about which reader knows what when they come here, and what links they might want or even "ought" to be using when they do get here. Anyway, I won't repeat in any details all the arguments I've made ad nauseam about this in the last six months since I first noticed the scripts and other edits running through pages on my watchlist (see archives). Be prepared as well for other familiar faces here to come in from the other side, insisting that this is all correct and proper, and that they are "improving the encyclopedia" (implying you are not, or do not wish to), as they usually do when the latest outsider pops in here querying edits of this sort ..

To Art, the US page is one of the most-visited pages here. People want to go to that page. Why make it harder? Yes, it is probably overlinked, as a whole, but I think it's hard to say we should pretty much never link it, especially in geographic articles about places in the US. And I really don't see the comparison between providing a link (which simply makes a word on a shared page turn blue and provides easier navigation) and dumping 1000s of pages of text onto someone's user page. Apologies, but that's a very odd point to make. Also, BHL I think is pretty clear about the broad principles under which they think things should be linked - and not linked. Please let's not go down the road of suggesting that everyone who simply queries, however casually, the extent of some of the current delinking of places, languages etc is somehow demanding links to "the" and "suitcase" in every article in which they appear.N-HH talk/edits 17:29, 25 August 2011 (UTC)

The US page is one of the most-visited, probably because we have so many irrelevant links to it, not because people reading about María Guinand suddenly want to read all about the US. If we linked every occurrence of "the", that article would be among the most-visited. "geographic articles" – sometimes, which is why I mentioned California. Depending on how you define it, only about 1% of United States links are from "articles about places in the US" (using a random sample of "What links here"), so let's not miss the forest for the trees. Dumping 1000s of pages is relevant to the actual quote I was rebutting: "We should avoid making judgements over what the reader is likely to be familiar or what might interest them", and a similar point applies to overlinking. I didn't suggest Blue-Haired Lawyer wants to link "the", which he has already denied – I asked why not, considering that he always wants to link the US. For other editors, the oft-damned sea of blue argument is a very relevant counter-argument whenever they advocate linking anything the reader might possibly want to read, not what he more likely wants to read. Art LaPella (talk) 20:35, 25 August 2011 (UTC)

I hadn't the common American habit of giving the address of a place after it's name to mind when I wrote my proposal. Mentioning the USA in the sentence "the Oregon Bach Festival held in Eugene, Oregon, USA" seems a bit superfluous to me, it's not like there's an Oregon anywhere else?! (I just checked, there are but they're all in the US too.) But I don't really think the USA is mentioned, no more that the definite article is mentioned, even though the words USA and the appear in the example. Eugene is mentioned and appropriately linked to, even though it's by no means obvious that readers of an article about María Guinand would be interested in a small town in Oregon. The problem is that on my reading of the policy it shouldn't be linked to, as the town is not "particularly relevant" to the article on María Guinand.

But I'll give my own example now. None of the countries mentioned in the lead of the euro article are linked to but shouldn't they be? They all use the euro as their currency, isn't that enough relevance? — Blue-Haired Lawyer ^t 23:19, 25 August 2011 (UTC)

I think I would have linked those countries. Wikipedia has plenty of wiki-warriors who enjoy such issues. ("Oregon, USA" is arguably an example of Wikipedia's overreaction against "US-centrism".) What gets me relatively excited is to click United States, click "What links here", and look at typical examples in that list, with United States links that are very unlikely to be used. The existing WP:OVERLINK guideline already acknowledges "particularly relevant" exceptions, and I would call Euro such an exception. My reading of the OVERLINK guideline differs from yours on Eugene, because Eugene isn't "likely to be already known by almost all readers" including Europeans. Art LaPella (talk) 23:56, 25 August 2011 (UTC)

• Linking a whole row of euro countries in the first sentence: aside from the wash of blue at the opening and the assumption that a reader will want to divert immediately to another article rather than to read about the euro, linking to whole country articles is to assume the reader doesn't know:

  (1) where those countries are (fair enough, but a narrow-based question that should be answered in a continental map), and

  (2) that they want to read a full article about every aspect of the country they click on.

  This is why whole-country article-links are often below the line of utility.

  The "eurozone" and "European Union" are linked in the first sentence, which both give a description of the countries in the super-state in more focused context. But people just don't read articles to divert to link-targets five seconds after starting. And if they don't know where or what those countries are, would they spend a long time clicking on each link in succession? Would they click just on "Germany"? Or would they actually read the subject article on the subject of the euro first, given that they've gone there explicitly in the first place to read about it.

  Much more focused links in the context of the euro are provided in the first table—to the original currency of each country. And the map below, strangely, names the countries that aren't in the zone, not those that are. That could be fixed, rather than resorting to the multiple link diversions to huge, mostly irrelevant articles that almost no readers will follow through. (BTW, either WP's map or the map at Ref 2 at the end of the sentence is wrong in one respect: Slovakia—is it in or out?) Remember that WP articles are not "reliable sources"; the ref presumably is, and should stand in preference to unfocused internal links). Then we have a map of the Eurozone, to show the geography of the whole zone (if not that of each individual country).

  If links to individual country articles were provided, they should be to either or both the economy section of the country article or to a daughter article on the economy of that country (like Austria#Economy, which has a section on currency, or even better, Economy_of_Austria). Second-best would be to deceptively pipe these to the country-names alone right at the top, just where readers are getting into the topic of the euro, and are least likely to divert, especially when the pipe will indicate an over-broad target (better that WP had not damaged wikilinking in the past by soaking it in deceptive links). First choice would be to link the "Economy of" articles explicitly in a "See also" section. That would be a plainer, better positioned, more sophisticated use of wikilinking.

  Now, I'm not prepared to engage in an extended debate yet again about this matter, which has been discussed before; so you won't hear much more from me. In summary, we need to uphold the smart use of wikilinking, and not to rely on generalised carpet linking in place of fixing maps and presenting readers with explicit and focused links that are not deceptively piped—which has only one advantage: it's quick and easy for editors to do). Many editors are willing to actively optimise the use of wikilinking, and very few object. Tony (talk) 01:47, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

The reason to link to the countries in the Euro article would be to study their economies, so "Economy of Austria" etc. would be ideal if it were the Main Page featured article. Since it isn't, AWB could process around 50 United States "What links here" articles in the time it takes to research an "Economy of Austria" solution. Editor time is finite. Art LaPella (talk) 13:50, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

Wouldn't it be more appropriate to link to the equivalent "Economies of X" articles instead of the country itself in such a case? Also, arguably, when a group of highly-related topic are present, such as what I'd consider "Economies of (European Country)" articles, this would justify a upfront navigation box to allow editors to jump between them quickly (in addition to a end-of-page nav box). --MASEM (t) 13:59, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

Yup, if it can fit in at the top without trouble. Otherwise, the "See also"; and it's sometimes possible to put in parentheses a short note prominently in the lead, like "(articles on the economies of each country are linked in "See also"). You might have a neater wording, or the navbox might work. Either will be much more useful for readers, Masem. Tony (talk) 14:24, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

Overlinking vs. overpolicing

Wow, I just read this page after probably not looking at it for a few years, and I can't believe some of the suggestions given here. In particular:

• "Avoid linking the names of major geographic features and locations, nations, languages, religions, and common professions."

Really?? So we shouldn't link to the Nile or Germany, or English anymore, just because they're well known things? I'm sorry, that's just plain stupid. This is an encyclopedia. We should link to topics we have articles on that the reader might want to find out more about. That should be the overriding concern. (Of course, if this guideline was just discouraging links to, say, the actual words river or nation, or language, that would be different.)

• "Too many links can make the lead hard to read."

Again, really? All that blue is really that distracting? How long have people been using the web now? Yes, overlinking is a real phenomenon, but articles are not disambiguation pages, and should not be pared down to "only the most relevant links". As has been pointed out above, underlinking is a real problem, since a reader who wants more info about an unlinked term must then search for it separately (perhaps even having to first open up another window/tab so they can easily continue reading the article — I have to do this kind of thing all the time when I copyedit/wikify articles).

• "Overlinking should be avoided, because it makes it difficult for the reader to identify and follow links that are likely to be of value."

The source cited in a footnote to this sentence is talking about linking between different web sites in general, not links between articles in an encyclopedia. It's almost not even relevant, if you look at the examples the author is talking about. But to address the guideline itself: In contrast to the "having to search" problem I mentioned above, this "too hard to read" issue seems to me to be a mostly made-up problem. I can say with some confidence that I, personally, have never read an article with lots of links in it and thought, "Wow, this is hard to read." I have thought, "Wow, this article is overlinked," but only because it linked to things like "regular English words" or lots of "insignificant" dates.

This reminds me of the old inclusionist/exclusionist schism, which (ISTM) was largely resolved in favor of inclusionism in most areas. (If you want to know what I'm referring to, you'll have to go search for it yourself. ;)

So, anyway.... to narrow this down to a specific case, here's what actually brought me here in the first place. Recently I wikified the lead section of the University of Houston article from this (I've taken out the links to references):

The University of Houston is a public research university located in Houston, Texas. Founded in 1927, it is the flagship institution of the University of Houston System. The third-largest university in Texas, UH has over 38,750 students on its 667-acre campus in southeast Houston. It was known as University of Houston–University Park from 1983 to 1991. The Carnegie Foundation classifies UH as a top-tier research university. The institution ranks among the Top 50 American Research Universities, and is in the Top 300 Academic Ranking of World Universities.

The university offers over 300 degree programs through its 12 academic colleges on campus—including programs leading to professional degrees in law, optometry, and pharmacy. The institution conducts nearly $120 million annually in research, and it operates more than 40 research centers and institutes on campus. Interdisciplinary research includes superconductivity, space commercialization and exploration, biomedical sciences and engineering, energy and natural resources, and artificial intelligence. Awarding more than 7,200 degrees annually, UH's alumni base exceeds 250,000. The economic impact of the university contributes over $3.1 billion annually to the Houston economy while generating about 24,000 jobs.

The University of Houston hosts a variety of theatrical performances, concerts, lectures, and events. It has over 400 student organizations and 16 intercollegiate sports teams. Annual UH's events and traditions include The Cat's Back, Homecoming, and Frontier Fiesta. The university's varsity athletic teams—known as the Houston Cougars—are members of Conference USA and compete in the NCAA's Division I in all sports. The football team regularly makes bowl game appearances, and the men's basketball team has made 19 appearances in the NCAA Division I Tournament—including five Final Four appearances. The men's golf team has won 16 national championships—the second-most of any NCAA golf program.

To this:

The University of Houston (abbreviated UH or UofH) is a public research university located in Houston, Texas. Founded in 1927, it is the flagship institution of the University of Houston System. The third-largest university in Texas, UH has over 38,750 students on its 667-acre campus in southeast Houston, as of fall 2010. It was known as University of Houston–University Park from 1983 to 1991. The Carnegie Foundation classifies UH as a top-tier research university. The institution ranks among the Top 50 American Research Universities, and is in the Top 300 Academic Ranking of World Universities.

The university offers over 300 degree programs through its 12 academic colleges on campus—including programs leading to professional degrees in law, optometry, and pharmacy. The institution conducts nearly $120 million annually in research, and it operates more than 40 research centers and institutes on campus. Interdisciplinary research includes superconductivity, space commercialization and exploration, biomedical sciences and engineering, energy and natural resources, and artificial intelligence. Awarding more than 7,200 degrees annually, UH's alumni base exceeds 250,000. The economic impact of the university contributes over $3.1 billion annually to the Houston economy while generating about 24,000 jobs.

The University of Houston hosts a variety of theatrical performances, concerts, lectures, and events. It has over 400 student organizations and 16 intercollegiate sports teams. Annual UH events and traditions include The Cat's Back, Homecoming, and Frontier Fiesta. The university's varsity athletic teams, known as the Houston Cougars, are members of Conference USA and compete in the NCAA's Division I in all sports. The football team regularly makes bowl game appearances, and the men's basketball team has made 19 appearances in the NCAA Division I Tournament—including five Final Four appearances. The men's golf team has won 16 national championships—the second-most of any NCAA golf program.

(I'm not just linking to the diff because my insertion of newlines before the "ref" close-tags to improve "skimmability" of the source makes the diff almost useless to see the actual changes.) Another editor reverted all of my changes, citing this page as his justification when challenged. Is the latter version really overlinked? Really? (Be sure to "mouse-over" the links to see what articles they link to.) I mean, OK, maybe you could quibble about, say, golf or law... but to not link research university or Houston in the opening sentence? That just seems crazy to me. And to not link terms like superconductivity? Seriously?

My point is this: if editors are citing this guideline to limit links to this extent, things have gone too far. We need to clearly state that the overriding concern is to link to terms that people might "reasonably" want to know more about, not to limit links to only topics directly related to the topic of the given article. - dcljr (talk) 09:51, 31 August 2011 (UTC)

That delinking looks extreme to me. We don't usually link to words like "Germany" (with exceptions like the Denmark article) because, as you put it, "We should link to topics we have articles on that the reader might want to find out more about." If an article mentions Germany only because (for instance) a meteorite happened to land in Hesse and people might not know where that is, then someone reading about meteorites is unlikely to suddenly want to read a Germany article that doesn't even mention meteorites. But "superconductivity"? Many readers would have no idea what that is, and would want to read the article or at least the introduction. Art LaPella (talk) 21:28, 31 August 2011 (UTC)

• '[[Public university#United States|public]]' and '[[research university]]' are bunched/chained, as are 'Houston' and 'Texas'. The bunching can be reduced by separating the words, or by removing the less important link. Ordinarily, I wouldn't link Houston, but as the subject is based there, it is arguably germane. Here, I would say unlink 'public' and 'Texas'. 'Law', 'pharmacy', and golf are common enough so they would not miss being unlinked, as would '[[college football|football]] and [[college basketball|basketball]] – which college doesn't have a football and basketball team? --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 01:22, 1 September 2011 (UTC)

I agree with Art LaPella that the unlinking went too far. Some items are obviously undesirable as links ("Texas", which is linked to prominently in "Houston", and bunches; and "engineering" and some of the other topic/profession items is starting to treat wikilinking like a dictionary (Pillar: "Wikipedia is not a dictionary"). "Public" is a deceptive link that hardly any reader would ever click on, and it bunches with "research university", itself a pretty self-explanatory term. Common country-names: please no. Tony (talk) 01:46, 1 September 2011 (UTC)

I guess I have a very different idea of what kind of links are desirable than the people interested in maintaining this policy. For example, I see no problem at all with linking both Houston and Texas. Why not? Some people might want to look at the Houston article, some at Texas. Why prevent one group from getting to their destination in just one click? I don't buy the whole notion that "more links confuse people" — in fact, I don't even think that "bunched" links are much of a problem: after all, don't most browsers allow the reader to see (/hear?) the target of the link before they follow it? (And BTW, it seems somewhat disingenuous to claim that the links to Houston and Texas are "bunched": they're separated by a comma in a standard way that "everyone" knows is referring to geographical/political entities. This can't possibly be considered confusing in any way.) The real justification for the public link (the reason I did it, anyway) is that the terms "public" and "private" can be used in opposite senses in different countries, so the link can clarify the sense for those who are concerned about that. So I would just warn people to keep in mind that just because they might not see the reason someone would want to follow a link doesn't necessarily mean there isn't a good reason (that's why I warned people to actually look at where my links went — not that I chose the best targets in all cases, but some links might seem more relevant once you see where they go). I completely disagree with the idea that major countries, languages, etc., should not be linked when only mentioned "in passing". This seems to me to be a horrible, horrible, horrible idea. Did I mention I think it's a horrible idea? In fact, I would go so far as to say that it's probably the worst guideline I think I've ever read on Wikipedia (among those that had some kind of consensus, I mean). No, really. Think about how you actually use Wikipedia: Do you only follow links that are significantly related to the article's subject? I know I don't. I go wherever looks interesting, and that depends on my mood/goal at the time. Even if I'm looking for more specific information than a link will provide, sometimes I think, "Maybe something relevant will turn up in that article's 'See also' links, or even in the categories." Why prevent that kind of "browsing" for no good reason? (I haven't seen a good reason presented yet, anyway.) - dcljr (talk) 22:53, 1 September 2011 (UTC)

Note: Apparently what I said above about public/private is not true about universities—which I guess I would have discovered if I'd actually read the article I linked to! [g] My confusion, ironically, serves to prove my point: that linking to an explanation of the term might be a good idea. - dcljr (talk) 02:08, 2 September 2011 (UTC)

no irony. The usage 'Public school" is but an English quirk. It's not usual to expect that terminology would carry the opposite meaning. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 02:30, 2 September 2011 (UTC)

Does your mood lead you to reread the Germany article, when mentioned only in passing in a completely unrelated article, more often than it would lead you to read about almost any other word? Art LaPella (talk) 03:16, 2 September 2011 (UTC)

Just to reiterate for your benefit, Dcljr, that not everyone here takes such a rigid view on linking and delinking. Indeed, I've always asserted ever since I first came across this problem that most disinterested editors and readers would probably err on the side of retaining more links (a glance at the succession of threads opened by people previously unknown to this talk page querying what's going on suggests that is correct). In addition, it is worth noting what the guideline actually says in more detail - eg that common terms are fine to link if "relevant". Also, until it was quietly edited away with a slightly misleading edit summary, the page used to say "Think before removing a link—it may be useful to other readers". The guideline itself is not as strict in what it says as you fear and as some would like to believe. In addition, it is, after all, only a guideline written by a small sub-group of editors - not a policy.

As for the Houston points being discussed here, I'm sorry, but removing links to "Texas" and even, arguably, to "US" is a clear breach of the guidelines. It's hard to argue that Texas is well known enough to be excluded, and, even if it were, it still falls within the "relevant" exception. Equally, removing the link to "Houston" from the University of Houston page lead, is pretty unwarranted (removing "flagship" I can more than happily live with). I can't see in what way that is helpful or indeed in line with the guideline here. Dcljr's bid to retain them seems wholly correct, by any standard.

And finally (@Art .. and others). Please, please, please stop with the "link every word" digs. I don't know how many more times I can ask this, or why you might think it's still appropriate or relevant to do it. N-HH talk/edits 08:58, 3 September 2011 (UTC)

"Every word" digs are relevant as long as arguments are presented for linking that could be applied to every word, even though the "every word" conclusion of such arguments is explicitly rejected. Repeated pained objections from several people frankly look like evasion of that point. In this case, why would your mood be more likely to make you click Germany than any other word? Art LaPella (talk) 18:04, 3 September 2011 (UTC)

Because Germany, even when linked in passing, is (almost always) referring to a geographical entity that is itself worthy of an encyclopedia article (and not only worthy, its inclusion is positively de rigueur). Words like more or often, or than, OTOH, refer to ideas that are themselves not typically subjects of encyclopedia articles — and if an encyclopedia were to have articles about them for some reason (e.g., some kind of "encyclopedic dictionary"), they would be talking about the words as words in the English language, not as signifiers of other encyclopedic topics. BTW, this might be a good place to explain why I linked the word "flagship", even though it is a "regular English word": My thinking is that it is a somewhat obscure term that is likely to not be understood by a significant precentage of readers (e.g., younger ones, and especially non-English natives), so I decided to link it to assist those who needed an explanation of the term (exactly the same reason I linked de rigueur just above). I was not slavishly following a rule that "Thou Shalt Not link regular English words", nor did I avoid linking it because "then I'd also have to link words like 'the'" (an objection that brings to mind Emerson's famous "hobgoblin" quote). No, instead I used my own judgment, based on years of experience reading and editing Wikipedia, as to what links readers might benefit from. Clearly I have a "more expansive" view than others on this point, but not quite as expansive as your ridiculous straw-man characterization. - dcljr (talk) 10:03, 7 September 2011 (UTC)

You clearly have not read - or at least understood, or thought through the conclusions of - anything I have said then. I do not know what more I can do to help you with that. N-HH talk/edits 19:00, 4 September 2011 (UTC)

Just to clarify, to avoid any confusion, since you seem a little confused (this is more polite than accusing you and others of wilful misrepresentation) - my personal view is that in a page that opens, for example, "The University of Houston is a university in Houston, Texas, USA, that offers a variety of courses and admits students from various disciplines ...", "is" should not be linked; "a" should not be linked; "university" should possibly be linked; "in" should not be linked; "Houston" should definitely be linked; "Texas" and "US" should possibly be linked; "that" should not be linked; "offers" should not be linked; "a" should not be linked; "variety" should not be linked; "of" should not be linked; "courses" should probably not be linked; "and" should not be linked; "admits" should not be linked etc. Quite why I should have to point this out, Lord only knows, but there you are. There are words that pretty obviously no one is ever going to demand are linked, words where there will probably be broad agreement that they should be and words that are more open to debate one way or the other. If you and others could stick to discussing the last of those three - which probably amount to 0.1% of all the words that appear in any given article - that would be marvellous. Thank you. N-HH talk/edits 19:32, 4 September 2011 (UTC)

Then apparently you can't help me understand why "USA" or "Germany" should be linked, but not the unmentionable words. Oh well. Art LaPella (talk) 20:49, 4 September 2011 (UTC)

I can - I hope - at least get you to focus on that question, and on the key issues of relevance and related information and context, rather than make daft "jokes" about things that no one is asking for, not least because pages don't even exist for a lot of those words to link to. You and Tony and others have used this for a long time as an excuse to derail any serious discussion and to taint those of us who might disagree with you as being in favour of a "sea of blue". Re-read the above thread - you bring up an absurd and irrelevant point; I ask you not to drag that irrelevant point out again; you then insist it is a relevant point; I explain in detail why it is not; and you then accuse me of not being willing to debate the substantive point because I have focused, temporarily, on the irrelevant point that you dragged up. Sorry, that's just stupidity or trolling, take your pick. As for "unmentionable words" I have absolutely no idea what you are talking about. Or Germany for that matter, in the example under discussion. N-HH talk/edits 21:22, 4 September 2011 (UTC)

Well no, that isn't what happened. But if you don't want me to mention the Voldemort words again, here's how: "I think 'USA' should possibly be linked because [fill in a reason here, a reason that wouldn't apply to every word in the dictionary as well]". Not a reason that convinces me; I'm no style expert by the standards of this page. Just a reason. Art LaPella (talk) 21:59, 4 September 2011 (UTC)

I wasn't under the impression that Wikipedia must necessarily develop out of rigorous adherance to previously defined rules. I thought we were just trying to make something that would be useful as an encyclopedia. To answer your request, see one possible reason in my other comment above (with the same timestamp as this comment). If that doesn't do it for you, then I don't know what to tell you. - dcljr (talk) 10:03, 7 September 2011 (UTC)

If Dcljr and N-HH are the same person, then thank you for answering the question. Of course if the consensus is to link "Germany" just because it's a typical encyclopedia article, then we might as well reverse the rule, and recommend a link to such countries from every possible article, because the same reason will apply. I suppose we could get the same effect by listing the most frequently read articles on the left side of every page, relevant or irrelevant, just in case someone wants to click them. Art LaPella (talk) 00:15, 8 September 2011 (UTC)

Of course we are not (I'll assume that was a joke of sorts rather than a serious suggestion of sockpuppetry). Although I do agree with their comment higher up on the page that of course no one is ever going to link every word, not least because most verbs, prepositions etc are not encyclopedic topics anyway. Anyway, I ducked out here because it seemed a bit pointless for me to say much more, and I can also only handle one debate/argument at a time here. As for Germany/US or whatever, I am on record many times as saying I do not think countries and other such terms should always be linked. However, I do think, for example, that all countries should be linked, at least somewhere on a page (even if only the infobox), when we are on geographic or place articles (eg "Bremen is a town in Germany"; "The US is a north American country neighbouring Canada and Mexico" etc). It's all about context, and whether they are mentioned in passing or are more specifically "relevant" - as the guidelines say - to the main topic/sub-topic at hand. That's quite a clear and rational criteria and it should be obvious to see why that might be one reasonable option, and where it might - and might not - lead. I'm not sure why you're pushing so hard for me to explain something I've already explained, or for me to explain at length why it will not have alleged consequences that it very clearly will not.

Someone came here and asked for opinions on a specific point - I gave mine, as I have previously on the broader questions. I'm broadly sympathetic to what they were saying, and knew they'd get a bit of heat for suggesting it. It may be they want more linking overall than I might prefer, just as many regulars seem to want far less linking than seems reasonable and sensible to me - but guess what, that's fine. There's far too much rigidity in (de)linking and an assumption that there's a provable "right" way to link and unlink. And that isn't coming from me and any alleged bid of mine to "link every thing, every country, always"; if anything it's coming from those script-based delinkings that remove, for example, every link to France, World War II etc from thousands of articles, regardless of context. N-HH talk/edits 19:16, 8 September 2011 (UTC)

I'll just limit myself to denying an accusation of sockpuppetry (I did wonder if you were the same person, but I wouldn't have said that if I had realized it amounted to accusing you of a Wikicrime.) And this section has me on record as considering a specific delinking to be "extreme". Art LaPella (talk) 20:53, 8 September 2011 (UTC)

[back to left margin, since this is not just a response to the previous comment]

Just a few final (??) comments from me in this thread:

1. To those who felt that the "delinking" of the University of Houston lead section shown above went too far (which, by my reading of the comments, is actually everyone who has participated in this thread), please note that two subsequent attempts to add fewer and fewer additional links to that article's lead were both unsuccessful, being reverted away by the same editor as before. I can't help but see this as an inappropriate attempt by User:RJN to eschew collaboration and "own" the article in question. Perhaps someone more "sympathetic" to RJN's viewpoint can convince him/her to at least link to Houston somewhere in the University of Houston article! Currently there are none that I can see. This is clearly an unacceptable situation.
2. BTW, for comparison sake I checked the articles for 10 "arbitrarily chosen" U.S. universities named after states or cities (just the first 10 that came to mind), and in 9 of those cases, the state or city was linked in the first sentence. The only case where this wasn't true, University of Texas, had been edited recently by RJN to remove those links! This says to me that RJN is, at the very least, swimming against the tide of what the majority of WP editors want linked in a lead section, at least in this kind of article.
3. Art: While I did find your comment about N-HH and I being the same person a bit disconcerting, I realized you only said that because I was replying to a question you posed to him/her. I chose to reply because N-HH had not yet done so, and he/she seemed to be making the same general argument here as I was. Also, you had already used a word that I had used ("mood") in a reply to one of N-HH's comments, so I figured it was sort of "open season" as far as replying to things, regardless of whom they were directed towards.

OK, go on about your lives... - dcljr (talk) 18:18, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

(long break)

For the record, because subsequent comments left on RJN's talk page about the University of Houston (UH) article have gone nowhere, I've raised the issue on the article's talk page. Now, I'm hoping that RJN and other UH-interested parties can talk about this, so I would humbly request that discussants here not go over there and rehash the same arguments they've given here. I'd recommend holding off—perhaps watchlist or bookmark that page—and only join in after some actual discussion has started over there. Thanks. - dcljr (talk) 22:22, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

Moved

My summary seemed to get lost, perhaps it was too long, but the raionale for the move of this page can be found at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Archive 123#RFC: Should all subsidiary pages of the Manual of Style be made subpages of WP:MOS?. — Martin (MSGJ · talk) 11:47, 1 September 2011 (UTC)

That discussion says that renaming everything makes information easier to find, but doesn't explain how. So I hope the rest of you know something I don't. Art LaPella (talk) 03:59, 2 September 2011 (UTC)

Yes, all subsidiary pages of the MoS (involving parentheses in their titles) should be moved to subpages (with a solidus or slash). Tony (talk) 04:39, 2 September 2011 (UTC)

Current consensus on links in quotations?

I see this archive entry which seems to say "It depends." In a BLP the subject is quoted as using the expression "floating signifier" which used to link to empty signifier which explained what it meant, which most people wouldn't know. (I didn't til looked it up myself.) An editor removed it writing: "as a general rule, in my opinion, we should avoid piped links in direct quotations." But it seems this would be an exception to the not very explicit rule. If I'm wrong, do tell, before I revert it. (Note other editors on page aren't too friendly towards subject and prefer he seem as obscure as possible, including in sentence where this is used, so need NPOV opinion.) Thanks. CarolMooreDC (talk) 11:50, 1 September 2011 (UTC)

Sometimes links within quotations seem pretty safe, but sometimes they don't. If there's doubt, you might consider footnoting it and putting the link in the footnote with a brief explanation. Tony (talk) 04:41, 2 September 2011 (UTC)

That had occurred to me. I assume on the word itself? CarolMooreDC (talk) 12:28, 2 September 2011 (UTC)

Propose restoration of removed material

I would like to "formally propose" restoring the following bullet point that was removed with no explanation (none specific to the removal, I mean) back on 12 December 2010:

• Think before removing a link—it may be useful to other readers.

This is essentially what I've been saying here for the past week.... - dcljr (talk) 10:39, 7 September 2011 (UTC)

• Support. It's hardly controversial, surely. In fact, it should go back in now really without any further discussion here, as there was no consensus - or even any discussion - about removing it. Those who wish to see it gone can then make that proposal. N-HH talk/edits 19:19, 8 September 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose—we could add "think before doing X" in hundreds of places in style guides. This is just clutter, and style guides need to be as succinct as possible. Equally, we could say "Think before linking an item"—yet more clutter. Tony (talk) 09:29, 9 September 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose – per Tony. We should be careful everywhere, not particularly here. This is just noise. Dicklyon (talk) 23:08, 9 September 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose – "Think before you link" seems like a more useful reminder to have in the guideline, judging from the rather systematic overlinking that exists across Wkipedia. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 00:27, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

I agree that calling on people to think before doing either would be sensible advice, as well as that, equally, to have both would be rather stating the obvious and somewhat redundant. The point here is that the guidelines very specifically (by design or accident) used to ask people to be more cautious before delinking, and that injunction was removed without any discussion. A few editors delink certain terms en masse by script; nobody links or relinks in the same way. Hence, the issue is slightly different - whether one believes WP is as a whole over- or underlinked, the focus here is as much on the action as the aims behind it. N-HH talk/edits 13:14, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

Propose another addition

Under What generally should be linked, I believe we need another bullet point — something like:

• articles that provide necessary context for the current article, especially in the lead section.

Now, I guess this might be "controversial" given the above discussion, but the way I see it, this is entirely consistent with WP:LEAD#Contextual links (and is apparently necessary to remind people of that other guideline). - dcljr (talk) 10:57, 7 September 2011 (UTC)

• Weak support: broadly agree, although it's possibly too vague, such that anyone can take anything from it (or maybe that's a good thing in a guideline?). But having said that, if it's in wp:lead, it's odd that it's not here. N-HH talk/edits 19:26, 8 September 2011 (UTC)
• Unsure why the lead should be treated differently from other parts of an article. It's case by case: often a more specific link is possible under the lead, avoiding the so-called Easter-egg links that are piped with general items the readers are very unlikely to click on. Tony (talk) 09:27, 9 September 2011 (UTC)

Because the lead is where context is established. - dcljr (talk) 18:41, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

• Nah: the lede is among the most densely linked real estate. Context for an article, where judged necessary, is nearly always provided within the background section – the first section after the lead. Merely planting a link in the lede to provide that context is just plain lazy and is of no service to the reader. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 09:50, 9 September 2011 (UTC)

Indeed there's no need to go out of your way to add text just to plant a link. The suggestion, though, is that the main contextual information should link to the articles that cover it in more detail. This information normally occurs in the lead naturally, especially the first sentence. We might be intending something different by the word "context". As I am using the word, the topic's definition sets the context for the rest of the article, by placing the topic in the broader context where it's meaningful and important. For example:

The Court of Chancery was a court of equity in England and Wales that followed a set of loose rules to avoid the slow pace of change and possible harshness (or "inequity") of the common law.

The links lead to information about the terms needed to explicitly delimit the topic. These express the most basic facts about the topic: what kind of thing it is, and how it most significantly differs from others of that kind. The rest of the article provides details that fill in the context set by the definition, with links to contextual information relevant to various subtopics. The links in the definition lead to contextual information for the article as a whole. —Ben Kovitz (talk) 20:31, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

• Nah2 – ledes with overlinking as an alternative to actual context are annoying. Don't encourage it. Dicklyon (talk) 23:09, 9 September 2011 (UTC)

Well, we arguably have clashing guidelines if we don't do something with this guideline (or with that one). I agree that leads are often overlinked - to the extent that that matters really - but I'm not quite sure we should be pushing "valid" links further down in article simply to keep the lead clearer of blue or to avoid something being a bit "annoying" to some readers/editors. That just seems to reduce functionality and navigability, especially to those people who never get much further than the lead, to no particular benefit. N-HH talk/edits 13:20, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

Ohconfucius & Dicklyon: I don't understand your objections. The context is presumably already there, we would just be encouraging the linking of it to relevant articles. For example, instead of saying, "Acid rain is a rain or any other form of precipitation that is unusually acidic" (which is the unlinked version of the actual opening text of acid rain), it should be (assuming the same [awkward] wording): "Acid rain is a rain or any other form of precipitation that is unusually acidic". That is, if you're presenting right at the outset the defining characteristics of something (what it is, where it is, etc.), you should provide links to relevant articles so that people can look up more information about those things. (And again, before anyone says it: this is not an argument to "link everything you can in the first sentence"!) I mean, in this particular example (which I found through Special:Random), without the links the first sentence is not helpful at all. "Acid rain is acidic rain." Oh, yeah, thanks. But with the links there, it makes some kind of sense to start this way (not saying it couldn't be phrased better, mind you and note that the sentence does actually continue beyond what I've quoted). Regardless, I'm not arguing about wording, just the linking. - dcljr (talk) 18:41, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

Hmm. Okay, maybe I should provide a better example now that I have a little time to do so. Here's a few different examples (also found through "Random article") of what I'm talking about. The particular "contextual links" I'm alluding to are underlined. The rest of the links are not important for this particular thread. (I've linked the bold terms because those are the articles these examples came from. As in the earlier thread, I've removed things like <ref>erences, pronunciations, etc. And sometimes I've made minor grammatical changes to the article text so as not to distract from the main issue being discussed.)

1. Vallipuram was an ancient capital of the Northern Kingdoms of Sri Lanka. Point Pedro is the nearest town. Vallipuram is a part of Thunnalai.

   (actually, I would have linked "Northern Kingdoms of Sri Lanka", but I wasn't sure what the best target would be)

2. XtratuM is an open source hypervisor specially designed for embedded real-time systems available for x86, PowerPC, recently for LEON2 (SPARC v8) processors.

   (I guess "open source" is debatable; "open source software" would probably be a better target to provide the necessary context)

3. Matthew 5:19 is the nineteenth verse of the fifth chapter of the Gospel of Matthew in the New Testament, and is part of the Sermon on the Mount.
4. In economics, Benefitive Treasury Measure (BTM) is an economic indicator that attempts to correlate a relationship between immigration and government tax receipts or government spending; put more simply, it is cost-benefit analysis of immigration on a macroeconomic scale.

   (targets of linking and inclusion/exclusion of "government" in linked text is debatable, but beside the point: something should be linked to explain these terms)

I hope that my point is clear: in every lead section, there are terms that are so germane to understanding "what this thing is" that they really should be linked to appropriate articles to provide the proper context for what's being discussed — whether "most people" will follow the links or just a few. It just seems to me to be a matter a good style to provide such links (not to mention [again] that this is actually what the majority of WP articles currently do). Which terms are covered by this guideline and what the targets of the links should be is entirely context dependent, and I see no good reason to try to create a list of what kinds of things should always or never be linked (or linked to). (Examples, yes: to elucidate the guideline, and these obviously can be debated here. But not checklists.) And I'm out of time again.... - dcljr (talk) 21:01, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

So... no more comments about this? Even though the two "negative" comments above seem to have been based on misunderstandings? (Ohconfucius: The opening sentences of an article pretty much always try to establish context. Dicklyon: I'm not talking about links as substitutes to good prose. And while I'm at it, Tony: Like I said, the lead is where the context is first introduced; apart from that, I'm not actually trying to treat the lead any differently. Those who would push the linking farther down the page are the ones who would be treating the lead differently from the rest of the article.) So, by my (admittedly biased) reading, this leaves a "weak support", another whole guideline that this is consistent with, and no other particularly relevant objections (other than the allusion to link density). Does anyone have anything new to say in response to my above attempt at clarification? Or, even better, a possible rewording of the original bullet point? - dcljr (talk) 10:15, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

"Immigration"? It's far too general an article to be worth linking in this opening context; it's a dictionary term. The first pillar of WP says "Wikipedia is not a dictionary". "Immigration" is even too general/common to bother linking in the See also section. "Economic indicator" ... well, maybe, but anyone who goes to Benefitive treasury measure is going to understand enough about the world to know what "government spending" is. Again, the lead is the worst place to blue-carpet the text—you want the reader to keep going with the article, don't you? Not to click away from it straight away an an aimless chase. These things can be linked below in the article text, once, or in the See also section. Otherwise, it's a disservice to our linking system. Tony (talk) 03:38, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

Regarding "immigration": the problem with your analysis, ISTM, is that immigration is one of the two (or three, depending on how you count) things being correlated by this economic indicator. It is therefore one of the fundamental parts of the definition of this thing. Without that word (or something equivalent to it), you can't define what this thing is. Given that fact, I'm saying that it's a prime candidate for linking simply for that reason. If you have a more specific article than Immigration to link the term to, that probably just means that the actual wording of the sentence could be improved. And, BTW, the word "immigration" is in the dictionary; the contents of the "Immigration" article is not. Please don't confuse the two. Regarding "government spending": the link to that article is not merely to a dictionary definition either. So it doesn't matter if most people will "know what 'government spending' is"; it only matters whether they will want to know more. Anyway, these examples were primarily meant to illustrate the concept of "contextual links" as I understand the term, not lead to a debate about which specific terms should be linked to which specific articles in these specific examples. As for your question, "you want the reader to keep going with the article, don't you?, my answer is, "Of course not!" I want them to do whatever they want to do with respect to the article. They can keep reading if they want; they can follow a link out of the article and never come back; they can even close their browser and walk away. I don't care. But for those who want to keep reading I want to provide them well written, interesting, informative text (not try to prevent their escape from the article by providing "no way out"). For those who want to follow a link to more information about something, I want to provide them that link. Since I cannot predict with certainty what kind of information they might be looking for—unlike you, I don't have such a highly developed sense of what links people will and won't need to follow, and why—I can only go by rough heuristics like "relevance", "relatedness", "context", "unusualness", and the like, with a dose of "reasonableness" thrown in for good measure. And finally: "Not to click away from it straight away an an aimless chase." What kind of idiots do you take our readers for? - dcljr (talk) 09:53, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

The problem is that Tony and the other delinkers think that the readers are complete idiots who can't handle the choice of following a link or not. -- cheers, Michael C. Price ^talk 10:02, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

• Support and link to WP:CONTEXTLINK: The most salient facts about the topic are in the lead. They are usually the most appropriate for a link. Links mainly lead to context for the topic, and the lead lays down the most fundamental elements of that context. Also, the lead appears first and usually starts with a definition. A reader who needs the most basic information about the topic may well find that definition confusing; linking from the definition to its main elements is especially valuable. —Ben Kovitz (talk) 15:40, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

• " The most salient facts about the topic are in the lead. They are usually the most appropriate for a link."—And the lead is usually the least likely place a reader will want to give up the article and divert somewhere else, almost always to a more general topic. An argument could be made that it's better to link to the first occurrence of an item in the body of an article, not in the lead, but I won't push that. Or in the "See also" section, if there are no other occurrences. The lead should normally have links, but only carefully selected ones, or the boat will be capsized by the blue carpet effect and by bunching, which is discouraged by the guideline (rightly so). Tony (talk) 03:31, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

Tony, I share your loathing of "blue carpets", where meaningful emphasis is lost because too much is emphasized, or even reversed because the few non-linked words stand out against the blue. I don't think that linking to the most salient elements of context produces anything like that sort of mess, though. It does occasionally produce two consecutive links, but I think that's a flaw to weigh against the flaw of failing to link when it's called for. I especially share your sentiment that links should be "carefully selected", whether in the lead or elsewhere. Tonight I will gather my thoughts and try to write something that explains the whole of why I think contextual links are important, and why I think they serve rather than harm readability, at least when thoughtfully selected. Arguing little points one at a time might be creating an illusion of disagreement. In an edit summary, you mentioned your concern about "disservice to the linking system". That also sounds like one of my leading concerns.

On another subject, are you sure that the lead is the least likely place for a reader to click away? Speaking for myself, when I am just starting to browse, I often find myself clicking links in leads, quickly running through related articles, sometimes to get the lay of the land, sometimes because I don't know quite what I'm looking for until I've found it, often because I don't understand the definition and I need to back up to read something more elementary. I treat the leads as mini-versions of the article and quickly read and navigate those and then settle down and read for detail if necessary. I don't have any data about how common this is, but I can't believe it's unusual. In any event, I'm wary of sacrificing the link structure's faithfulness to the material in favor of how we think readers ought to or even in fact usually do use Wikipedia. —Ben Kovitz (talk) 06:23, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

Manual of Style/Links

Manual of style pages have the following titles:

Abbreviations Accessibility Anime- and manga-related articles Article message boxes Biographies British Isles-related articles Canada-related articles Capital letters Captions Chemistry Comics Command-line examples Computing Cue sports Dates and numbers Disambiguation pages Embedded lists Film France & French-related Glossaries Hawaii-related articles Icons Images/Draft India-related articles Infoboxes Iran-related articles Ireland-related articles Islam-related articles Japan-related articles Kosovo-related articles Latter Day Saints Layout Lead section Legal Linking Lists Lists of works Malaysia-related articles Mathematics Medicine-related articles Military history Music Music samples Novels Philippine-related articles Philosophy Poland-related articles Pronunciation Proper names proposal Record charts Road junction lists Self-references to avoid Singapore-related articles Snooker Spelling Stand-alone lists Stringed instrument tunings Tables Television Text formatting Thailand-related articles/Draft Titles Trademarks Trivia sections Visual arts Words to watch Writing about fiction Writing about fiction/Draft revision

It seems to me that this page would be more consistent with those if it were "Manual of Style/Links". Thoughts? Lightmouse (talk) 23:34, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

linking countries in tables

I'm probably treading over old ground with this question, but I think it needs clarifying. As far as I'm concerned the current guidelines are ambiguous when it comes to whether you are allowed to link countries in tables. On the one hand we have a guideline that states that countries that should not be linked, yet another that states that links in tables should be allowed to stand on their own. I would like clarification as to whether, countries should be linked in tables or not, and if possible a guideline that specifically states whether they are allowed or not, to end the issue once and for all. NapHit (talk) 18:51, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

"Allowed [or not]" is probably slightly strong terminology, since we are talking about a guideline. Also, the guideline does not say countries "should not be linked" - it only says "major" nations (whatever they are, as ever) should not be linked "unless particularly relevant to the topic of the article", ie when they are simply mentioned in passing. So, in fact, "major" nations should be linked if related to the topic and "minor" nations should be more liberally. Anyway, the comment that tables should stand on their own is, as far as I can see, more an exception to the guidelines on repeated links, which are usually deprecated. The point is: don't avoid linking a term in a table simply because it has already been linked in text. In principle, beyond that, the general rules on linking apply the same to tables as they do to text.

In reality tables are often much more heavily linked - correctly in my view - since the "aesthetic" and "distraction" arguments against overlinking (which are contested anyway) do not really apply outside of narrative prose and because tables are seen by some as having a navigation function. I always find it odd when you see tables that are part linked and part unlinked (eg where "Belgium" is linked but "France" not). It seems wholly arbitrary, needlessly reduces utility and navigability for the the broad range of readers, and in fact is somewhat uglier than having most terms in the table blue and hyperlinked. Anyway, as ever, there are no compulsory rules here, and others will disagree with at least the second half of the above. Does that help? N-HH talk/edits 17:21, 8 October 2011 (UTC)

Yes and no. Yes for the fact that what you say confirms my view that countries should be linked in tables. No because as you say other will disagree, but I suppose that is part and parcel of the project. Hopefully there will be a few more views on the matter, but I agree with what your saying. Personally, I would just like a guideline stating the above, but I'm sure that would be hard to achieve. NapHit (talk) 23:17, 8 October 2011 (UTC)

Counties, US states, ethnic groups etc

And beyond any issues about nations/countries ("well known" or "major", or otherwise), see above ad nauseam, I've noticed that we now seem to be reaching a point where even English counties, ethnic groups (by seemingly random selection) etc are being delinked. I note on that editor's talk page that several others have chipped in on these points from a sceptical viewpoint. I appreciate that the county point is based on the "avoid linking of consecutive terms" principle rather than the "well known" argument, but it surely is going too far to argue that on a page about a town/city we should not have an early and accessible link to the county it is part of or found in. Sure, bunched-up linking may be best avoided where possible, but it is not outlawed. It also seems a little odd to suggest that readers are incapable of working out when the individual items in a string of words might be linking to different pages, given that it becomes obvious as soon as the mouse places the cursor over it. Equally, there is absolutely no rational or guideline-based justification for delinking Italian-American while retaining Swedish-American, or similar edits. N-HH talk/edits 18:13, 9 October 2011 (UTC)

No links in the lead?

And then we have this edit. Not surprisingly (in light of my comments above), I've reverted it and invited the editor to talk about it here. - dcljr (talk) 09:05, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

I agree - again, perhaps unsurprisingly - that that would be a step way too far. I think most people would too, although you never know. It seems to have been done in good faith, by an editor unaware of the wrangling that goes on in this obscure backwater; but as a general point, people really need to get consensus before making changes to this or related pages, even if certain changes or "tweaks" seem obviously beneficial to them. N-HH talk/edits 12:09, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

The suggestion was: "Try writing the lead without any links at all; then link below where the lead is expanded." I actually think writing first without links is good advice, though it applies equally to any prose text on Wikipedia. You're in a better position to tell which facts have the most salient connections to other topics after you've got some facts down. It would be nice to mention this somewhere in the page, though not in an especially prominent spot. If the suggestion is really to leave the lead bare of links and link only from the body, I think that's a very bad idea. To start with, it violates the lead's ability to stand on its own as a concise version of the article (WP:MOSINTRO). —Ben Kovitz (talk) 20:50, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

removed overlinking in image captions edit

I have removed an edit made by Ssilvers [6] that promoted repeating links into image captions:

1. The edit was made deceptively ("ce" as summary).

2. Change was made without discussion. (and previous version was stable for at least 2 years, I checked).

3. Image captions are not a type of metacontent like a navbox or table.

4. Image captions are one of the WORST places to put formatted text. That is some of the most high gain text in an article.

5. It really doesn't make sense to REPEAT a link into a caption (of course if you need it, fine, but not REPEAT it). I mean if I have an article on the Battle of Waterloo and Napolean was linked at the beginning of the article, do I really need to wikilink the term in a painting of him?)

6. It really doesn't make sense if you have repeated images of a subject (let's say there are two paintings of Napolean, would I wikilink in both image captions? Or is there some parallel and separate train of linking just for the captions?)

96.238.184.111 (talk) 18:44, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

• I would observe that infoboxes and image captions seem to live in a cocoon of their own by some sort of historical consensus. Linking practices within these are usually abominable, but to open up a battle front where there is litle hope of winning is just too stressful. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 02:28, 15 October 2011 (UTC)
• I don't think the second half of Ssilvers' edit encourages wikilinks in captions. It encourages wikilinks when the only previous link was in a caption. For instance, in the Waterloo example, suppose the reader wants to know what else Napoleon did before Waterloo, so he is looking for a link to the Napoleon article. Do we expect the reader to find that link in a caption at the top of the Waterloo article? Or as Ssilvers would prefer, do we also link the first mention of Napoleon in the main text, regardless of captions? Art LaPella (talk) 06:23, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

I also read the Ssilvers edit as pointing out exceptions to the guideline to link only from the first occurrence of a term. Image captions are perceived as a separate thread from the main text, so a link from a caption shouldn't count as preceding a link from the same term in the text. This and the other suggestion (in a long article, the body is perceived as a separate thread from the lead) are already common practice, so I'd favor restoring the edit. (It was indeed not a mere copyedit, though.) On the idea of never linking from captions, that's a whole separate topic. —Ben Kovitz (talk) 21:00, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

Salient relations

I'm surprised that the article doesn't already include more about "salient relations between topics". I understand this to be the main principle explaining why wikilinks in the text are important and for distinguishing between good, over-, and under-linking. The article currently contains a tidbit about the "knowledge tree", but not much else. Here's an attempt to explain the missing concept. Apologies for the length. If I had more time, I'd write something shorter.

The link structure is itself part of WP's summary of all recorded knowledge. The links tell which topics have some salient relation to any given topic. Salient here means standing out from all other topics' relations to the target topic due to playing a distinctive or important role—standing out relative to the great majority of relations that do not stand out.

Nearly any statement of facts about one topic must be expressed in terms of other topics. For example, from an article about a gardener:

Robinson began his garden work at an early age, as a garden boy for the Marquess of Waterford at Curggaghmore. From there, he went to the estate of an Irish baronet in Ballykilcannan, Sir Hunt Johnson-Walsh, and was put in charge of a large number of greenhouses at the age of 21. According to one account, as the result of a bitter quarrel, one cold winter night in 1861 he let the fires go out, killing many valuable plants.

WP has articles about many topics mentioned here: garden, work, age, the Marquess of Waterford, estate, Ireland, baronet, greenhouse, testimony, dispute, winter, and more. Almost none of these play a distinctive or important role in describing Robinson. In fact, Robinson is notable because he revolted against highly artificial gardens such as require plants grown in greenhouses. That's why this story was included in the source.

So, the topics with a salient connection from Robinson are simply garden, greenhouse, and Sir Hunt Johnson-Walsh. Robinson plays no particularly distinctive or important role in relation to the others. For example, this story is not a special or outstanding fact about boys or boyhood in general. But Robinson did play a distinctive role in relation to gardening, greenhouses, and the life of Sir Hunt Johnson-Walsh. (Marquess of Waterford is actually a title, which many people have held, and the fact given is rather vague, so it only has borderline salience in relation to Robinson.)

To make those relations explicit, the Robinson article should contain links to those three topics, and none of the others.

Abstractly: If you need topic B to state a fact about topic A, then B is somehow relevant to A. But normally the relation is salient only if A is somehow distinctive or outstanding in its relation to B. To put that another way, link from A to B only if the existence of the link means something to B. If that seems weird, notice that it's normally true automatically if B is essential for saying something important about A. So, you can get the same effect just by linking from the most important terms needed to say the most salient facts about A. That's the easier way to think about it.

There can be other reasons for linking, of course. This is simply the main one. And of course, linking just from the first occurrence of a term is enough to do the job. There's no need to spoil readability by turning half the page blue.

Generally, we do not link simply in order to make it easier to navigate to other topics. If we wanted to make it as easy as possible to get to other topics, we would just make MediaWiki link every word or phrase to the article about it, without highlighting some links in a distinctive color. Just click anything and you're on it. Our actual policy, though, gives links a visual salience that represents their logical salience. The differing ease of navigation, where only the saliently related topics are easy to navigate to and the rest are not, might be the greatest benefit that the link structure provides readers. The easiest, most natural way to browse Wikipedia is to click along the links in the text. A reader traveling along the links effortlessly finds a path shaped by a combination of the relations that exist within the source materials and the reader's particular focus.

Nor do we link simply because we think most readers don't know what a word means (WP:DICT). A reader can consult a dictionary or type an unfamiliar word into the search bar. A link leads to further information; a definition is part of that, but an article contains much more information than a definition (including further links from the linked-to article). The presence or absence of a link derives from the relations within the source material, not from an attempt to second-guess the reader. That is why the links are so valuable—to readers. Readers can use the information contained in the links any way they like. Our job as editors is simply to make the links provide that information.

Some less-common ways of using links: Links that express salient relations between topics make the "What links here" link in the nav bar provide meaningful information. (It sure could be improved, though.) Robinson might not be mentioned in Sir Hunt Johnson-Walsh, but the fact that he links there is significant; maybe he should be mentioned there. Data-mining software can crawl and analyze the link structure. If wikilinks are pictured as arrows between topics, natural "families" of topics should appear as clusters in the picture, something like maps of scientific fields derived from citations in journal articles.

Overlinking damages the link structure because it corrupts the information it contains. It's actually slightly worse than indiscriminately adding facts to an article, because too many gratuitous links spoil the kinds of things you can do when you look at "What links here". For example, Ward Cunningham doesn't show up for a long time on Special:WhatLinksHere/Wiki. He's drowned out by topics like Mick Fleetwood, who links to Wiki because an external link about him goes to a wiki, and someone gratuitously pointed that out and linked to Wiki even though there is nothing important to say about Mick Fleetwood in connection with wikis. Maybe the editor thought "wiki" would be an unfamiliar term to many readers, and tried to be helpful.

Even with the current high level of overlinking, though, "What links here" searches often turn up interesting facts about less-central topics. For example, every notable virologist shows up automatically at Special:WhatLinksHere/Virology. There are lots of kinds of searches you could do, most of which probably haven't even been thought of yet, all because the link structure faithfully reflects important relations within the source material. What links here is only a convenient illustration. The main benefits are the way logically salient relations are made visually salient and help shape the path of a reader's browsing.

Hopefully that persuades someone to share my opposition to most guidelines that make the kind of topic the criterion for linking or not linking to it (such as "link to jargon terms, don't link to common terms"), rather than the kind of relation that one topic has to another. This is also why I think the relation of "critical to defining the topic" nearly always does merit a link. Salient relations (standing out) can only be held by a small minority of topics, by definition. So, I think linking only along salient relations means that relatively few words will be linked from, and when there is a link, it will mean something.

Would anyone object if I add something about salient relations to the article, in a prominent place?

—Ben Kovitz (talk) 10:25, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

Of course they will. [wink] I agree with much of what you're saying here, but I'm not prepared to go quite as far as you in the area of "selectivity". One small thing: you say, "Nor do we link simply because we think most readers don't know what a word means (WP:DICT)", but isn't that exactly what Wiktionary is there for? WP:DICT stresses that we shouldn't have dictionary definitions for articles, not that we shouldn't link from WP articles to WT entries (indeed, it even says in the lead, "the two often link to each other"). If I'm mistaken, please point to the part that says that. Oh, and to answer your final question more directly: You probably should post it here before you try it out in the article. - dcljr (talk) 10:14, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

I don't disagree with everything Ben says, and I do agree with Dcljr's post. Ben, I think you're taking one dimension of the wikilinking system—the navigational—to an extreme, without accounting for its other dimensions. To raise one point that's been done to death on this talk page, wikilinking needs to be rather selective if it's to aid the readers. We could link every single word via a system that didn't colour the linked items (like my online Encarta dictionary—works well for that), but that would remove our significant service to readers in isolating what, in our knowledge of the topic and the catogory, we judge is the most useful, the most focused on the topic. Relatedness per se is only one criterion. Tony (talk) 10:27, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

Tony, it sounds like we agree: the thoughtful selectivity is what makes the links especially valuable. And, I wouldn't say that navigation should crowd out all other concerns. There can be other reasons for linking, too. I think we all know that our topic—everything—is filled with so many irregularities that no rule nor single principle can cover them all. —Ben Kovitz (talk) 10:59, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

Yes, Tony, please reread Ben's post and yours. Is that really what you wanted to say? You didn't get Ben and me confused, did you? - dcljr (talk) 06:52, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

Dcljr, can you tell me what "selectivity" you think goes too far? It's likely that I was unclear; the above was "typing out loud" to find out what's been bothering me about the delinking campaign. One clarification I can make right now: the above is only about links between articles in Wikipedia, not links to Wiktionary. Regarding WP:DICT, I meant that we don't link (within WP) in order to define a word we think the reader doesn't know, we link in order to lead to further information about a related topic. Doing the latter often happens to accomplish the former, of course. —Ben Kovitz (talk) 10:50, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

Ah, I see that I completely misread your meaning in the line I quoted. Mea culpa. Although... that being said, I wouldn't necessarily rule out linking a somewhat obscure term for those who need to find out simply what it means (as I have done with the link above). I mean, obviously this will often be an indication that the article text needs improving (if you find yourself linking for the purpose of dictdefs), so no one has to take up arms in opposition to what I've just said. I'm not pushing it as a guideline... Sorry if I seemed somewhat dismissive with my short response; I didn't have a lot of time to devote to it, plus I figured others would comment, anyway, so...

Let's see... the statements that I would take issue with in various ways (and to varying degrees) include:

• "To make those relations explicit, the Robinson article should contain links to those three topics, and none of the others." Without getting bogged down in which specific terms you recommended be linked and which you didn't, the criterion that lead you to those choices is only one of many that could be used, so it's not necessarily true that only those terms should be linked. This is more or less what I was alluding to with my "selectivity" remark. (Interestingly, this sounds very much like Tony's comment, except the way I read it, he got it exactly backwards and ended up restating your points as if he were disagreeing with you. [?!] Talk about "violent agreement".....)
• "link A to B only if the existence of the link means something to B" This is interesting advice, but I think too restrictive. Change "only if" to "if" and I'll agree with you. IOW, I suspect that this criterion works better to encourage good links than it would for discouraging (only) bad ones.
• "There can be other reasons for linking, of course. This is simply the main one." Again, those "other reasons" are not necessarily of lesser importance. It depends...
• "The differing ease of navigation, where only the saliently related topics are easy to navigate to and the rest are not, might be the greatest benefit that the link structure provides readers." Hmm. I don't entirely buy this because... (see next item)
• "A reader traveling along the links effortlessly finds a path shaped by a combination of the relations that exist within the source materials and the reader's particular focus." Not if you haven't provided a link that they would have wanted to follow. In that case, it's not as effortless, and might even be downright frustrating for them.
• "too many gratuitous links spoil the kinds of things you can do when you look at 'What links here'". Frankly, unless some revolutionary advance in usability is made (selecting namespaces is a good start, but not sufficient), WhatLinksHere is going to remain almost useless (to human readers) for all but the least linked-to articles. This is decidedly not an argument to reduce the number of links in our articles. It's a technological problem that requires a technological solution.

- dcljr (talk) 06:50, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

About not providing a link that the reader wanted to follow: As terrible as this sounds, I think making certain browsing paths frustrating is actually a good thing. The ease of access to closely related articles (through links, especially in the lead) provides a set of "paths of least resistance" that the user explores while quickly browsing. The links reflect the most important close relationships within the source material, so you tend to view a natural cluster of topics as you browse. Your exact browsing path, however, follows only a small subset of the links, reflecting your purpose for browsing that day, your interests, the exact background knowledge that you have and that you lack. This happens automatically, without us trying to anticipate any of these things about the reader.

This is really pretty amazing, if you think about it. I regularly bring myself up to speed on new subjects by taking little tours suggested by the links (though not consciously). For example, a biologist friend told me that a certain kind of gene is relevant to something I'm doing. The first couple articles about genes I looked at were way out of my depth, but I skimmed and browsed a bit, and in maybe half an hour, I found myself getting a basic overview of a certain mechanism in developmental biology, which I did not even know I was looking for but which was the reason my friend thought the gene was relevant. A little tour of genetics, starting in some highly technical place I'd never heard of before, customized to my one-of-a-kind reason for being interested! The point I was trying to make above is that such tours reflect both the logical connections within the subject and each reader's unique interest and background.

On the other hand, if a reader wants to do something "against the grain of the links," like visit every Greek-derived word in the article, that should feel like going against the grain if Greek-derived words play no special importance in the subject matter. But, if, for some weird reason, most of the Greek-derived words do have links, that should reflect something peculiar, interesting, and real about the subject, like way early botanists drew heavily on Greek. (Or is this not a good example of what you meant? If not, can you tell a better example of a reader finding a path frustrating?)

My main point above is that we as editors shouldn't try to anticipate any of this. Our job is to write prose that's faithful to each topic and to make links that are faithful to the logical relations with other topics. That's what makes the magic happen.

On the other hand, pushing a single factor to the exclusion of all others is unrealistic and silly, and I wouldn't want that. Sometimes, sure, link to a peculiar word not so much because there's a salient relation, but because there's no real doubt that most readers need the word explained. That injects a flaw into the link structure, but sometimes usability has to trump "salient relations" or whatever we want to call it. My long "typing out loud" above was an attempt to understand something important but not much covered about links, not an attempt to cover every factor to consider (well beyond my expertise, anyway). I guess I didn't make that clear.

About the difference between "links to" and "links from": "if" rather than "only if" is fine with me. My point there is that it's OK if A links to B but B doesn't say anything about A or shed any obvious light on A. The fact that B is needed to state a particularly important fact about A means that A is outstanding in some way in relation to B. That's the right kind of relevance, and it should be included in the "path of least resistance". (That sort of link made a big difference on my "customized, peculiarly focused tour of genetics". I had to jump "up" in the topics a lot.)

About the current lameness of "Wikipedia:What links here": This is not nearly as important as "paths of least resistance" and visual salience reflecting logical salience, but there are possibilities for automated use of the link structure that no one has thought up yet. Actually, if you google, you'll find a bunch of creative uses of the link structure. Obvious ideas that occur to me now are simply systematic ways of paring down the list of "Wikipedia:What links here" in custom queries: leave out user pages, include only links from people, include only pages that also link to X, etc. It should be easy to make a query to find all people with some important connection, say, to Greenhouse, or all mathematics articles with some connection to Enrico Fermi (not a mathematician per se, but I've heard he had amazing skill at mentally restructing a calculation to quickly get an order-of-magnitude estimate, and I'm curious about that). So you say, "Show me all articles that link to both Mathematics and Enrico Fermi."

The main thing is: don't try to anticipate any of this! Don't skew the link structure to reflect your own theories about what's more and what's less useful. Users decide what's useful; editors decide what's salient. Don't make rules based on the kind of topic or word being linked to; phrase the linking guidelines to focus on relationships between topics. Modulo the inevitable exceptions and competing concerns, of course.

—Ben Kovitz (talk) 11:51, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

That is a take on salience and overlinking that I can largely agree with. If only that's how most articles are linked. The problem is that en.WP is chock-full of links that one or another editor think some others may think useful, thereby using it as 'navigational' or to provide a dictionary definition. I have catalogued a substantial number of words that are seemingly linked as a matter of course, often without any thought. It is the practice which is detrimental. Such links can be removed advantageously in >90% of cases; for some of the more common terms, that percentage rises to 99.9%. For every hundred links to a common term, there are perhaps 5 that could be advantageously rendered salient to the subject. Therein lies the challenge. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 07:16, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

• Ben, should wikilinking shoulder the entire navigational burden? WP has navboxes and categories too. And a "See also" section at the bottom of each article. Tony (talk) 12:07, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

Of course not! That would be crazy. Is there any disagreement about this? —Ben Kovitz (talk) 12:16, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

Well actually, pace Ohconfucius, I think the bigger problem is that a small group of editors have taken it upon themselves to remove a large number of links - often by automated scripts that remove links to certain terms wherever they appear, regardless of the context on that page - because they assert, definitively, that they are "not useful", or even, somehow, "detrimental"; as well as on the basis of the now comprehensively rebutted "dictionary" issue. Personally, I see a lot of articles that I think are overlinked, but I think the technique for dealing with that primarily needs to be through manual copyediting; the principles under which that is done should be as per the existing guidelines, which stress relevance and navigation as being relevant criteria for linking, and which very specifically do *not* mandate removal of so-called "dictionary" links or the blanket removal of so-called "common" or "well known" terms; and especially not the arbitrary and selective removal of totally random terms as often happens on the basis of some tortuous reasoning.

As for the "salient" option, I can kind of see the value of that. But equally, I think we're slightly dancing on semantics to some degree when we start comparing salient, germane and relevant etc (the latter of which is already accounted for in the guideline). I think the example of dog offers a good example, which I think I have used before - the guidelines as written, common sense, the expectation of most readers and editors surely, and any additional/alternative requirement of germaneness or salience would all allow, or even require, a link to the "dog" article in the lead of the Doberman article. However, that part of an article that recounted the occasion when something happened to them as a famous pianist took their dog for a walk would not link to dog. The problem for me is that some seem to be arguing against the first point.

Finally, as to navigation, I agree we shouldn't be looking to simply navigate everywhere at every opportunity, but I can't see the problem with offering a considerable amount of flexibility and options to readers (falling some way short of "link everything!", which is never going to happen anyway, even if anyone really wanted that, not least because pages don't exist for most words, WP not being, er a dictionary). Those readers are all different of course, coming here with different levels of interest and knowledge and for different reasons, and with different online reading styles and habits etc etc. I don't get how some editors can assert the right to decide what people - supposedly as an undifferentiated whole - are looking for or, worse, what they ought to be looking for in terms of links to other articles. I neither accept that as a principle nor do I see how you could assess how that should actually work in practice and in the context of individual articles. Focusing more on the relevance (or even salience) requirement - which, as noted, currently exists in the guideline - offers a clear, fairly objective standard as to how to link between topics. Individual editors making their own judgments about what is "common/well known" or "useful to the reader" - whether this is done in an extremely reductive fashion, as some do currently, or in a more maximalist and generous way - very definitely does not. N-HH talk/edits 14:23, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

I didn't read all of that, but IMO the main consideration in deciding whether a paragraph of Article A should link to Article B should be:

• the conditional probability that someone will want to read (not necessarily straight away, remember about tabbed browsing) the lead of Article B (or, for section links, the linked section) given that they have just read said paragraph of Article A.

Other considerations should be:

• the principle of least astonishment (hence, do not write Glasgow, Leeds, Liverpool, Manchester and Sheffield unless it's obvious why some are linked and some aren't);
• a roughly consistent link density (though if by following the first two principles you'd still end up with a paragraph with more than 3 [less than 0.3] links per hundred characters, odds are that it is too terse [too vacuous] and you'd better explain the stuff more explicitly [cut fluff out]).

All the rest can only be rules of thumb about how to best satisfy these desiderata. ― A. di M.​  20:47, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

My post or the whole thread? Anyway, apologies for the length of what I said at least, but the conversation here rarely moves forward, so one finds oneself constantly having to repeat - and explain in ever greater detail - what should be rather simple and readily acknowledged first principles, and rebuttals of claims about what the guidelines say, whether I and others want to "link everything", where consensus may or may not be and why wp:dictionary has nothing immediately to do with linking issues etc etc.

Anyway, I mostly agree with what you say, but, on the first point, I'm always wary when we start trying to assess too analytically how people might want - or even ought, as some put it - to navigate between pages. As I said in the last few sentences of my essay, I just don't think it's possible to do that in any satisfactory way with such a varied readership; nor can it lead to consistent principles for linking, since every editor will have their own views on what others supposedly might want - the criteria need a strong objective focus as well. There's a risk of each case falling down to "well someone might be interested in that other article, hence we'll link" vs "well who would really, how many of them? Let's delink". As, of course, happens currently. N-HH talk/edits 15:02, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

Germane –> "relevant and appropriate"

There's been a slight tussle by two editors over whether this long-standing term germane—approved at a massive RfC more than two years ago and inserted officially by Ryan Postlethwaite, an ArbCom clerk—should be changed. I'm uneasy that it hasn't been put to this forum, let alone gained significant support. But the editor pushing this does have a point, that germane does mean relevant and appropriate in the dictionary, and is a less-well-known word. It's neither here not there in terms of the meaning, but might be plainer English. If other editors here don't object to the change, perhaps it might be acceptable. At the moment, it's at WP:BRD status, as far I can see. Tony (talk) 07:49, 20 October 2011 (UTC)

I see some problems with the edits made:

• The previous version with the explanation ("relevant and appropriate") in parentheses made it clear (in my opinion) that the explanation also applied to subsequent uses of "germane". This is lost if "germane" is replaced by "relevant and appropriate" in one instance.
• The current version omits the explanation completely. This also removes the emphatic "and"; so the implication "not only relevant but also appropriate" is lost.

So, on balance, I would prefer restoration of the original, including the parenthetical explanation that clarifies the precise meaning of germane that is intended (which is, apparently, more than the Wiktionary definition "related to the topic being discussed or considered"). --Boson (talk) 10:05, 20 October 2011 (UTC)

I thought my edit was well-thought and explained. I was a tad miffed that it was undone without so much as a word of explanation, and even more miffed at the condescending tone in which it was suggested I "look up" a word I obviously understand. I saw no point to using the word "germane" when an explanation of the word was given immediately after it. I was entirely unaware of the "massive RfC", and if editors feel "germane (revelant and appropriate)" is ideal, I certainly have no objection. I do object to "germane and topical", and don't understand the grounds on which that change was made. Joefromrandb (talk) 17:34, 20 October 2011 (UTC)

Is there any objection to changing from "germane and topical" to the original "germane (revelant and appropriate)"? Joefromrandb (talk) 11:36, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

Fine by me. I just objected to removal of the word 'germane'. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 12:03, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

Joe, I'm confused: you removed and reinstated a number of times. Please don't remove "topical" unless there's consensus. I've reverted to the long-standing. Tony (talk) 13:58, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

Reverting to the long-standing version was what I meant to do. Sorry. Joefromrandb (talk) 15:15, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

Linking United States

WP:OVERLINK provides: "Avoid linking the names of major geographic features and locations, languages, religions, and common professions." I interpret this to mean we should not be linking to United States (a major geographic location) in the body of articles. I made a series of edits today delinking the term in a number of articles by an editor (User:Jweiss11) who regularly links the location. An example of my delinking is found at this diff. The editor in question has objected to my delinking the "United States." I will hold off on delinking for now, but would appreciate input from the experts here. Should the "United States" be delinked in examples such as the diff above? Cbl62 (talk) 06:55, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

It should definitely be unlinked in those contexts; and in rare cases where a link might be appropriate, it should generally be to a section or a daughter article. Tony (talk) 07:14, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

It might be helpful to readers if there was information on where the subject originates from. Such would allow a focussed link without resorting to an article where the relationship is not of the first order of separation. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 07:28, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

I'm curious why then today's feature article, Rudolph Cartier, sports a link to Austria in the lead. Jweiss11 (talk) 19:26, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

Not sure whether that link is so vital, but at least, unlike in the Joe Reilly case, none of the other articles linked by that paragraph is Austria-related but more specific. (And I don't think screenwriter should be linked when Nigel Kneale is, or George Orwell when Nineteen Eighty-Four is, so I'm gonna remove those.) ― A. di M.​  20:14, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

On Joe Reilly, the link to Boston College obviates the need for United States to be linked? Jweiss11 (talk) 22:59, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

I'm not sure if I would link Austria either, but I would surely link Suriname for instance; not a major geographic location. Austria has 8 million people and 80,000 km², so readers might be hazy about where it is. The United States has 312 million people, 10 million km², and speaks the language of English Wikipedia. It's very unlikely that someone reading about Joe Reilly would suddenly want to read a general article about the United States that doesn't mention Mr. Reilly at all. Art LaPella (talk) 00:40, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

Indeed. Let's not be lulled into thinking that readers routinely click on links: they don't, yet editors seem to plaster them all over the place in the hope that they will. Judicious linking that avoids those that overlap in topic (Orwell and 1984, for example) should not be doubled up unless there's a compelling reason. Usually, the more specific link should be retained. Tony (talk) 02:30, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

FWIW, Guyana speaks the language of the English Wikipedia, too. ― A. di M.​  09:38, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

I'm old enough to think of Guyana and Suriname as new names for British and Dutch Guiana, but I don't get the point. Art LaPella (talk) 23:21, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

It surely depends on the context of the article and text in question. Let's not forget that the actual, more complete - and qualified - wording of that part of the guideline is "Unless they are particularly relevant to the topic of the article ... avoid linking the names of major geographic features and locations" (my emphasis). However, there no clear definition of what constitutes a "major" geographic location - arguably the US if anything falls within that for most people, but where is the line - France? Belgium? Nigeria? Iran? I can't see how doing maths about population numbers is really going to help make that sort of judgment; nor is the question anyway about whether people might know or not know "where" a specific country is. The links to country articles do not simply lead to geolocation co-ordinates or a one-line dictionary definition, eg "country in Europe" or whatever. Regardless of that, even for "major" locations, however defined, there is no blanket bar, given the qualification about relevance that precedes the suggestion to avoid (and note "avoid", not "do not, ever").

More specifically, there is no agreement or consensus among editors at large, or among the "experts" on this page, as to whether any and every link enabling navigation to the lengthy and detailed Wikipedia entry on the US - which I believe is one of the site's most visited pages - from genuinely relevant and related pages, should be universally struck out. With personal biogs, as in the example cited above, one could probably argue the toss either way for relevance and hence retention when it comes to countries of birth, although this should be consistent and considered regardless of the actual country in question (personally I'm kind of indifferent); but when it comes to geo-political articles, such as, say those on US states or neighbouring countries, the case for having and/or retaining a link to "US" seems much, much stronger. Almost insurmountable, in fact. N-HH talk/edits 14:36, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

Of course there's no line; I thought the point was that the previous practice of automatically linking all countries is discouraged. Just being a country doesn't automatically make a word more linkable than any other word. And I thought that for all the noise over this issue, there was consensus even from you that most randomly chosen "What links here" links to the U.S. should be unlinked, and those on U.S. states and neighboring countries should be linked. Art LaPella (talk) 23:21, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

A di M, Guyana might list English as its official language, but that doesn't mean that any great proportion of the population are native anglophones, nor that many of them speak standard English. Are you suggesting that Guyana-related articles shouldn't be copy-edited to standard English of a chosen variety, even if written by Guyanans? And I've never seen an India-related article where editors have objected to the harmonisation of the language with one of the major varieties (and not Indian English)—and India has a lot of native anglophones in its middle class. No one has ever suggested that en.WP's rules on ENGVAR, on date formatting, and other related matters are anything but racist, favouring ancestral native-speakers of English over native speakers of currently outlying varieties (Indian English is just one, Guyanan another), and over second-language speakers. But when I've brought this up at the MoS as a matter of interest, there's always an embarrassed silence. I recently saw a film located in Liberia, a so-called anglophone country in Africa (where returnees from the US have ruled the roost, often unfairly, for a long time). You needed subtitles, although repeated listenings to a line of dialogue would have enabled you, often, to work it out. (Such places have an acrolect, mesolect, and basilect.) But on the other hand, I suppose it's natural that the ancestrals might rule the roost at the WP they believe they own, and it's often a matter of developing rules that will keep the peace among them (i.e., US vs UK practice—who cares what date format or spelling they use in Guyana).

On the linking of country-names, it's more than that: it's the reality that almost everyone in the world has a basic familiarity with English-language culture and its knowledge-base, at least enough to think carefully about whether linking these country-names anywhere is useful enough to outweigh the dilutionary and visually disruptive effects. Tony (talk) 03:05, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

My mention of Guyana was in reply to The United States ... speaks the language of English Wikipedia as it that mattered at all when deciding whether to link a country. (Maybe the Isle of Man would be a better example?) But since you mentioned it: India has one billion people, a quarter million of whom are native English speakers, so there's no way it has “a lot of native anglophones in its middle class”, for any reasonable definition of a lot and middle class. And some Guyanese might speak a creole in informal situations, but still English is the only (or main) language they're literate in and so the English Wikipedia is the first one they'll go to; I still think articles about Guyana should be written in standard Guyanese English (essentially British English, as far as writing is concerned). (And I've heard of native English speakers having trouble understanding certain scenes about Trainspotting without subtitles, too, but that doesn't mean Scotland shouldn't count as English-speaking, does it?) I still have trouble with this “ancestral” thing: a minority of Irish or American people have English ancestry; in most cases, their (great-)grandparents had to learn English as a second language to avoid corporal punishment by school teachers or marginalization). As for “almost everyone in the world has a basic familiarity with English-language culture and its knowledge-base”, after the n-th time I told someone I was going to/had been to Dublin and they asked me “That's in Germany, right?”, I'm no longer sure of that. *sigh* ― A. di M.​  10:58, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Repeated links okay: lead and first occurence?

I notice that many FA-quality articles repeat links twice: once at the first occurrence in the lead, and again at the first occurrence after the lead. I'm looking in WP:LINKS and I dont see mention of that. If it is a recommended practice, I would expect to see that rule stated either in the Lead section or the Repeated Links section of this page. Am I missing something? --Noleander (talk) 15:42, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

WP:REPEATLINK doesn't exactly apply, but I didn't find anything that comes closer: "exceptions ... where the later occurrence is a long way from the first". Art LaPella (talk) 22:36, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Yes, I saw that exception. But I looked at the last three FA articles on the WP home page, and all three repeated links, even when they were very close, for instance in the first section immediately after the lead. For example in todays featured WP article, Lester Brain, the lead has links for New South Wales and Royal Australian Air Force, yet those links are repeated about ten sentences later, in the first section following the lead. I don't have an opinion for/against this "repeat the link at first occurrence after the lead" convention, but if the black-belts at FA are using it as a standard practice, I suggest that WP:LINKS mention that as a "best practice" or "commonly used in good articles" or something like that (but doesnt suggest that it is mandatory). --Noleander (talk) 22:45, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

(I guess I should mention where this came from: I recently submitted an article for GA review, and the reviewer asked me to repeat the lead links, and I complied, based on what I saw at FA. But I was surprised this convention was not mentioned in WP:LINKS). --Noleander (talk) 22:55, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

That's because WP:LINKS and the MOS generally mirror the views of a dogmatic clique of delinkers, and reflect neither good practice nor reality nor commonsense which says that repeat links are desirable. -- cheers, Michael C. Price ^talk 23:07, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

I take it, then, that you support changing LINKS to include mention of the convention found in many FA articles.  :-) Let me go ahead and make a formal proposal: I propose to amend WP:LINKS, in the WP:REPEATLINK section, to say something like, "it is acceptable to repeat links at the first occurrence after the lead". --Noleander (talk) 23:50, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Sure, go ahead. -- cheers, Michael C. Price ^talk 06:27, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

• No, there is no consensus for doing this. Please do not change MOSLINK without proper debate. Tony (talk) 08:10, 30 October 2011 (UTC)
  • Doesn't GA and FA practice constitute a consensus? -- cheers, Michael C. Price ^talk 08:39, 30 October 2011 (UTC)
    • No. GAs and FAs are full of errors and breaches of the styleguides. Consensus is not generated by what one user claims is a pattern in a class of articles. Tony (talk) 08:56, 30 October 2011 (UTC)
      • And yet if the reviewers advice conflicts with MOSLINKS then that suggest that the so-called delinking "consensus" is not a consensus. -- cheers, Michael C. Price ^talk 09:00, 30 October 2011 (UTC)
        • As you well know, consensus is arrived at (or not) after a measured debate at the appropriate forum, not on the basis of what some reviewer says at GA or an FAC page. Tony (talk) 09:20, 30 October 2011 (UTC)
          • And as you well know, there has never been measured debate here; dissenters are ridiculed, points ignored, active threads archived mid-discussion etc. -- cheers, Michael C. Price ^talk 09:32, 30 October 2011 (UTC)
• I've been ridiculed. Please, I'm under time-stress in RL, so this thread has eaten up my time budget right now. Tony (talk) 10:43, 30 October 2011 (UTC)
  • The way some people do that is an art form. Don't be baited, Tony. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 11:11, 30 October 2011 (UTC)
    • How convenient. And how convenient that it stopped you responding to A di M's point in the previous section. -- cheers, Michael C. Price ^talk 11:14, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Perhaps we could initiate an RfC to get input from additional editors? --Noleander (talk) 14:20, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

RfC: Can links be repeated after Lead section?

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.

Closing Rationale: The support argument has the numerical majority with 16 to 6. However more weighty in my reasoning is the fact that several of the opposers argue that the change would be an addition to the policy and as such perhaps a case of WP:INSTRUCTIONCREEP - I think this argument is compatible with the support argument - IF the proposed change is implemented in a way that gets rid of the rule and the list of exceptions, by substituting the use of commonsense in achieving a balance between overlinking and helpfully guiding readers towards articles of interest. In short the change should not stipulate any preferences for particular way of repeating links or not other than a general admonition to avoid overlinking, it should not introduce any new requirements or suggestions - only simplify existing ones. In my eyes this is therefore one of the rare chances we have to simplify a policy rather than complicate it - and I hope that when framed this way some of the opposers will look favorably on the closure as: "support simplifying rules for link repetition". Now I leave it up to you all to decide whether deleting the section altogether, merging it into another section (e.g. the one on Leads) or merely simplifying it is the preferred solution.·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 00:54, 26 November 2011 (UTC)

---

Many FA-quality articles repeat links twice: once at the first occurrence in the lead, and again at the first occurrence after the lead. For example in Lester Brain, the lead has links for New South Wales and Royal Australian Air Force, yet those links are repeated about ten sentences later, in the first section following the lead. More than half of recent FA articles follow this convention. Yet this is contrary to the advice in WP:LINKS, which suggests that only the first occurrence should be linked. Question: Should WP:LINKS be modified (probably in the WP:REPEATLINK section) to acknowledge this as a permissible (but not necessarily recommended) practice? --Noleander (talk) 14:28, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

• Comment - I have no strong opinion one way or another. But something needs to change: either this MOS should acknowledge this as an acceptable convention (presenting it simply as an option, not a recommendation), or else the FA reviewers should be asked to change their habits, because it is contrary the MOS and confuses editors that are looking at FA articles as exemplars. --Noleander (talk) 14:29, 30 October 2011 (UTC)
• Support - WP:REPEATLINK should allow editors the option of repeating links more often so that readers have the choice of using them.
  1. We shouldn't require articles to be read linearly.
  2. We shouldn't require readers to have perfect memories.
  3. We shouldn't require readers to know whether they might need/desire information later on in an article the first time they meet a link.
  4. We shouldn't think that we know the profile of readers; they're a varied bunch, in interests and knowledge; more links cater for this by providing more choice.
  5. Policy here should reflect commonsense and actual practice, not the anally-retentive views of a bunch of control freaks.

-- cheers, Michael C. Price ^talk 16:33, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

• Support - The lead is meant to be a summarizing section and as such many who are interested in more in-depth knowledge will skip over it once they knew they are reading the right article. I have always assumed this is a WP:COMMONSENSE exception to not posting links more than once/article in the prose.∞陣内Jinnai 16:43, 30 October 2011 (UTC)
• Comment I was always under the impression that it was acceptable to repeat links, in separate sections, as each section tends to stand on its own. Sometimes I am only interested in reading a particular section of an article, and I shouldn't have to scan back several sections in order to find a link.--JOJ ^Hutton 17:25, 30 October 2011 (UTC)
  • I think it also depended upon how close the terms linked were. If the previous section ended with a link and the next section started with that same link it would probably be considered too close together.∞陣内Jinnai 18:14, 30 October 2011 (UTC)
    • Probably a bit of common sense should be used on that, but I do agree, that there are some people out there who try and enforce WP:Overlink without really understanding how it should be applied.--JOJ ^Hutton 18:18, 30 October 2011 (UTC)
      • The MOS used to explicitly allow links repeated across sections, but that was removed a few years ago when common sense went out the window. -- cheers, Michael C. Price ^talk 18:57, 30 October 2011 (UTC)
• Sometimes. It is possible that someone reading a section of an article has not read the sections before it, so it makes sense to repeat some (not all) links. On the other hand, we can assume everyone reads the lead unless they've come to the article through a section link (or a section redirect). In any event, what the guideline says should match what the best current practice is; there's very little point in deprecating a practice if not even most featured articles avoid it. ― A. di M.​  19:41, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

  The RfC question is: Should WP:REPEATLINK be amended to acknowledge the convention seen in many FA articles? Which is a Yes/No question. So I take it that your "Sometimes" comment means "Yes, it should be amended, but the new wording should indicate that the repetitions are optional and should be considered in light of the article as a whole, etc". --Noleander (talk) 19:54, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

  Exactly. ― A. di M.​  22:18, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

• Comment It seemed a bit strange to have this discussion without letting the FA people know. So I notified them. CambridgeBayWeather (talk) 21:18, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Thanks. I had already notified them also at Wikipedia_talk:Featured_article_candidates#Question_about_repeat_links ... on the FAC page, which seems to have more activity. --Noleander (talk) 23:25, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

• Support, many readers do not read articles linearly, but rather read the first sentence/paragraph, skip to the table of contents and go to their section of interest. In addition to the guideline allowing an additional link "where the later occurrence is a long way from the first" it should allow additional links when they are in different section from the first to accommodate the fragmented way our articles are often read.AerobicFox (talk) 01:56, 31 October 2011 (UTC)
• Support there's a bot being written to check the lead and body separately for overlinking, so the bot will be working on that basis too. I've adopted this practice myself in my last few FAs Jimfbleak - talk to me? 06:42, 31 October 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose. [Although opposing is irrelevant, since the current guidelines allow for this, using common sense. Tony (talk) 09:50, 31 October 2011 (UTC)] "For example in Lester Brain, the lead has links for New South Wales and Royal Australian Air Force, yet those links are repeated about ten sentences later, in the first section following the lead." This sounds like a really bad use of our wikilinking system. You mean, shove it in their faces if they didn't get 20 seconds beforehand? Readers are not fools. Tony (talk) 07:28, 31 October 2011 (UTC)
  • Wow, and you call that "shoving it in their faces"? -- cheers, Michael C. Price ^talk 07:37, 31 October 2011 (UTC)
    • This RfC is meaningless unless the wording is proposed. The difficulty is that the current "Repeated links" section doesn't specifically disallow the repetition of a link that first appears in the lead. It was deliberately cast that way for flexibility; but we rely on editors to use common sense. Just what is being proposed?Tony (talk)
      • And yet the inflexible and dogmatic implementation by Tony et al shows a lack of common sense (which is what people are complaining about), which is why such flexibility needs to be explicit in MOS. -- cheers, Michael C. Price ^talk 08:20, 31 October 2011 (UTC)
      • @Tony: I understand what you are saying, but when I read WP:LINKS, it says "In general, link only the first occurrence of an item" which, to me, means the FA practice is non-compliant. I agree with you that WP:LINKS should permit the kind of flexibility that we are seing in the FA articles. This RfC is simply asking that WP:LINKS wording be improved so editors, like myself, don't misunderstand it, and think the double-linking is prohibited. --Noleander (talk) 13:20, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

... also, Tony asked about what specific wording change is proposed. I deliberately left that out of the RfC description, because a particular wording might narrow the discussion down too far. One option is a new bullet in WP:REPEATLINKS, as in: "* When a link is in the lead, the first occurrence following the lead may also be linked." But that kind of detail can wait until if/when this RfC consensus turns out to be "Support". --Noleander (talk) 14:12, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

• Support as a natural and appropriate use of the linking system, as editors can and will exercise appropriate discretion as they do with other aspects of the style guidelines. This should be left to the discretion of the editors of a page in accordance with what works best there. --Ckatz^chat_spy 07:47, 31 October 2011 (UTC)
• This (specifically "Policy here should reflect commonsense and actual practice, not the anally-retentive views of a bunch of control freaks") doesn't seem to be at all a civil way to participate in an RfC. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 08:42, 31 October 2011 (UTC)
  • It's hard to know how else to describe the extreme delinking you advocate and implement, while ignoring the constant complaints that your activities attract. (Why do you archive active talk page threads, for example?) -- cheers, Michael C. Price ^talk 08:51, 31 October 2011 (UTC)
    • Oh, so it's directed at me... so it now graduates into a 'personal attack'. ;-) --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 09:05, 31 October 2011 (UTC)
      • Just answer the question. -- cheers, Michael C. Price ^talk 09:07, 31 October 2011 (UTC)
• Michael, can we tone down the rhetoric and depersonalise, please? You've now issued personalised attacks on OC and me. It's unnecessary; let's keep to the issue. Tony (talk) 09:10, 31 October 2011 (UTC)
  • Characterisation of activities is a not personal attack. Just address the issues raised, instead of using this as a smokescreen to evade answering. -- cheers, Michael C. Price ^talk 09:16, 31 October 2011 (UTC)
    • Characterisation of people's views as "anally retentive" do, however, cross that line. Are you perchance qualified to make such a diagnosis? --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 09:31, 31 October 2011 (UTC)
      • So why do you find it necessary to archive active threads? Do you find dissenting views make you uncomfortable? Please answer in a new section to avoid cluttering up the RFC. -- cheers, Michael C. Price ^talk 09:40, 31 October 2011 (UTC)
        • So why do you find it necessary to keep abusing deceased equines that have nothing to do with this RfC ? And Why TF did you accuse me of being "anally retentive" – a clear breach of WP:NPA?
• Support following WP:IAR. Its policy that we use some common sense when linking, yes it can be helpful sometimes to use a link twice, and again linking can be overdone. I've wasted quite a bit of time searching backwards through articles looking for the first use of a term.--Salix (talk): 09:41, 31 October 2011 (UTC)
• Support a more explicit expansion or relaxation of the "rules"/assumptions - per most of the arguments above - even though, as noted, the current guideline is not in fact perhaps as restrictive as some might hope/fear. It currently allows repeat links when the second occurrence is a "long way" - pieces of string, anyone? - from the first, or when one comes in a table or infobox etc. That should almost certainly be extended to cover where a key term turns up, say, both in the lead and the section of the page focused on that issue, even if that is the section directly following (ie not necessarily a "long" way, however defined); also from section to subsequent section, if the term is relevant to both. N-HH talk/edits 13:53, 31 October 2011 (UTC)
  • Problem with that is that many articles may have that appear in most of its sections.∞陣内Jinnai 15:57, 31 October 2011 (UTC)
    • Ah, I'm not saying that it should be compulsory to link a word over and over so that we have one such link in each section, just that it should be allowed, or, at least, not barred. As ever, individual editors can - and should - apply judgment and common sense in each case, eg by looking at how long it has been since a previous link to that term, how relevant/pertinent the term is to the specific section at hand, etc, rather than having restrictive rules about what "can never" or even "must always" be linked. N-HH talk/edits 16:25, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

• Oppose changing the guideline, which already gives plenty of leeway in saying "There are exceptions to this guideline, including these:..." Dicklyon (talk) 16:58, 31 October 2011 (UTC)
  • The only real leeway states "a long way from the first" which is being interpreted as once per article, and is excluding links after the header - which, as we have seen, is contrary to practice and guidance elsewhere. Obviously the leeway is far from enough. -- cheers, Michael C. Price ^talk 17:04, 31 October 2011 (UTC)
  • @Dicklyon: I'm not sure the existing wording you cite is very helpful. I submitted an article for GA review, and the reviewer said I had to repeat all the lead links when first found after the lead. I replied, pointing out that WP:LINKS says links should not be repeated unless real far away. The GA reviewer then pointed me to dozens of recent FA articles that repeat the links even when close. This sort of confusion shouldn't be happening. Clearly "repeat links at first occurrence after the lead" is a convention that many top-quality editors are following, so WP:LINKS should at least acknowledge it. --Noleander (talk) 17:23, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

• I was always under the impression that the repeat links section meant for links within the article body. What I have seen widely practiced is that the lead has a link and so does the first occurence in the body, and then links are not repeated unless they are far away from each other. I very rarely read leads, so it does not make sense to me to have the links only in that section. Karanacs (talk) 19:04, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Do you support the RfC proposal to enhance WP:LINKS to include a mention of this "widely practiced" convention? --Noleander (talk) 19:19, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

• Support - Linking once per lead and once per main text (plus eventually one more way down in very long articles) sounds logical and is a very easy to follow guideline - even scripts to check links automatically can use this guideline. However i would not oppose an article with other valid consistant linking methods (see common sense) - except of course for heavy overlinking. GermanJoe (talk) 21:36, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

• Oppose - multiple links are allowed, there are already five to seven levels of "permission" given
• # WP:Ignore all rules
• # This is a guidelineUse common sense in applying it; it will have occasional exceptions."
• # In general, link only the first occurrence of an item
• # There are exceptions to this guideline, including these:
• # Specific examples

  We really don't need to make this guideline longer, no-once objects to sensible linking, and in fact I wonder if we really need the section at all, per WP:COMMONSENSE. Rich Farmbrough, 23:37, 31 October 2011 (UTC).
  

Sure, the FA linking convention could be construed as consistent with WP:LINKS, as currently written. But only by squeaking past the "avoid repeating links" rule. Look at it this way: WP's top-notch editors at FA have been utilizing particular MOS conventions. Shouldn't the MOS tell novice editors what those FA conventions are? Not as a mandate, but just informational? Shouldn't editors who are nominating articles for GA or FA status be able to go to the MOS and get a clear description of the conventions that are commonly used in FAs? --Noleander (talk) 23:48, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

• Rich: no-one objects to sensible linking Hah! Reading the last 2-3 years of the talk page should disabuse you of that. And no is suggesting that the guideline should be longer, just replace "once per article" with "one per section". -- cheers, Michael C. Price ^talk 00:20, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

• Oppose per Rich. It's allowed at present, and it would not be desirable to turn this into anything stronger, such as a suggestion, recommendation or obligation to link, especially if the word is in the opening of the next section. (But note that I don't unlink such occurrences as a rule, except when there are multiples – 5 or more). --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 01:45, 1 November 2011 (UTC)
  • Perhaps people see this as point-scoring, since the RfC is vague and superseded by the existing text. Michael, one link of the same item in every section is way over the top, even if you might interpret this as "sensible". It would be the ruination of our wikilinking system, and I'm going to stand up for its selective use, which is critical if it's to remain a service to the readers and the project. I have no more time today to engage in this kind of link-in-every-section conversation. Tony (talk) 08:53, 1 November 2011 (UTC)
    • After 2-3 years for some (less than 12 months for me), could we finally get an explanation though of exactly how reducing the number of links available to readers amounts to improving the linking service? That is, unless we assume readers are not capable of exercising their critical functions and making rational choices that are appropriate to their own interests/knowledge levels? I write as someone who is aware of issues around the tyranny of choice and also accepts there is genuine overlinking in a lot of articles. More specifically on point, I personally am opposed to an assumption to link in every section - but equally, this RfC is not redundant, because this guideline does need something more generous, and also clearer, than "it's OK to link again if the second occurrence is a 'long way' off", especially when it comes to lead vs body. N-HH talk/edits 14:38, 1 November 2011 (UTC)
      • N-HH, the usual mantra is the much vaunted "link dilution" - but this concept is invalid, since it is based on commerical click-thru metrics that fail to adjust for the lower likelihood of the text and link near the end of an article being read in the first place (which is correct for calculating click-revenues, but not for assessing readability). I.e. the delinkers here use raw probability instead of the more correct conditional probability. I don't know whether they've ever understand this point, since they never respond to the issue when addressed. -- cheers, Michael C. Price ^talk 06:57, 2 November 2011 (UTC)
        • As far as my own actions are concerned, a term stands pretty much equal chance of being unlinked whether it is at the beginning of an article or at the end. On the other hand, I am aware there seems to be a greater propensity to link at the beginning of the article, probably due to the repeatlink part of the guideline. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 07:58, 2 November 2011 (UTC)
          • OC, just as the usual practice, everywhere, is to provide the expanded form of an abbreviation on only the first occurrence in a text, you'd expect the same principle to operate for linking. Michael, you vest me with far greater technical insight that I deserve. I draw on only common sense, not data, for supporting the community standards for selective linking. Tony (talk) 10:22, 2 November 2011 (UTC)
            • That's a convenient memory you have, Tony. No matter, I take it that that's your way of conceding that the oft vaunted data doesn't support your position, despite your many claims in the past that it did. -- cheers, Michael C. Price ^talk 11:15, 2 November 2011 (UTC)
• Support Clearly to acknowledge this as an acceptable standard practice and to avoid new editors that read policy too much as a legal framework to take it on themselves to remove such links. Asking for one line or two to be added for this clarity far outweighs the purported issues of CREEP and "it already allows for it". --MASEM (t) 12:40, 2 November 2011 (UTC)
• Support - I've scrutinized some more FA-quality articles, and the "repeat link at first occurrence after lead" rule is a very common convention. But WP:LINKS, as written now, seems to discourage that: it suggests that links should only be repeated when far apart, yet many FA-quality articles include "near" repetitions, e.g. in the first section following the lead (for one of many FA examples, see Lester Brain). Novice editors, when reading WP:LINKS, should be informed of this convention. I suggest that a bullet be added to WP:REPEATLINKS saying something like "a link may appear at the first occurrence following the lead, even if already linked in the lead" or "when a link is in the lead, the first occurrence following the lead may also be linked". The wording should be crafted to ensure it is merely an option, not a mandate. --Noleander (talk) 15:30, 2 November 2011 (UTC)
• Support - the current "link only the first occurrence of an item" is not an adequate description of widely accepted good practice, and the MoS should follow usage rather than the other way around. Something a little less prescriptive than "the first occurrence after the lead" might be worthwhile, given the wide support here for a once-per-section (or once-per-large-chunk-of-article) approach. Shimgray | talk | 18:04, 2 November 2011 (UTC)
• Support. Two arguments in favor of this, from my perspective: (1) If the lead section is intended to be a summary (in some sense) of the entire article, then it can stand alone, independent of the rest of the article. Conversely, the rest of the article might be seen as standing alone, separate from the lead (this is not a strict rule, of course, but is a possible side-effect in reader's minds once they start getting the idea that the lead section merely introduces the topic, and then the rest of the article covers much of the same material in more depth). To the extent that this is true, issues such as linking and footnoting should be treated independently in the lead and the rest of the article. This is, more or less, my view on things. (2) Many readers will not be reading an article from beginning to the end—especially if they are looking for a particular piece of information (which the present article may or may not provide). Such readers might benefit from links further down in the article, even if the same terms are linked higher up. So, yes, the same terms can be linked in the lead and then again later in the article, if editors feel that it is helpful to do so. OTOH, linking "once per section" is almost surely too much; "once per large chunk" (per Shimgray) is better, but, of course, harder to describe in an elegant way... - dcljr (talk) 04:25, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

"If the lead section is intended to be a summary (in some sense) of the entire article, then it can stand alone, independent of the rest of the article. ... the rest of the article might be seen as standing alone".—Put them on separate pages, then; they clearly don't belong on the same page. Tony (talk) 09:14, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

re/ "large chunk", many years ago I picked up "once per screen of text" from somewhere, but while that's a good rule of thumb, it's not one that can be put into a guideline very easily :-) Shimgray | talk | 13:13, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Tony, please, that just sounds petulant. People do not have to read a whole article if they do not wish or need to. These constant assumptions and even implicit instructions to people as to how they should be reading WP articles, or be able to move around between them via well judged and relevant (as I and most others agree, not indiscriminate) links, are becoming a little much. Readers will often only look at specific sections (many links from other pages link to a section, rather than the whole page); even more commonly, people will often only look at the lead, as a concise - and yes, hopefully standalone - summary of the wider content. With many pages, it's often painful to read much more. And it is, in fact, a long-establised principle that the lead should stand on its own.

Anyway, I think the consensus here is becoming pretty clear on double links in the lead and then a later section, which, as a minimum, can easily be implemented by simply adding "the lead" to the short list at bullet point 2 at wp:repeatlink; there even seems to be some support for more leeway when it comes to repeat links from one section to another, which could be achieved by changing bullet point 1 to say "where the later occurrence is some way from the first, or where it occurs again in a later section in which it has specific relevance or application". N-HH talk/edits 15:09, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

N-HH, you have just called me "petulant". I'm not easily offended, but I urge you not to personalise. My point is that there seemed to be case made that articles should be viewed as a collection of segments. This has no basis in consensus. It would be equally untenable to argue that abbreviations be spelled out at the start of every section. Now, no wording has been proposed, and this RfC is just a collection of rather chaotic views, poorly advertised. No one has given a good reason why an item should be linked again after a short lead, right at the start of the next section: sometimes this will be within five or ten seconds of reading. This is a very poor use of wikilinking. And the current wording allows editorial discretion, anyway. This is indeed an argument for adding bloat. Tony (talk) 13:45, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

No, I said that your specific comment about putting the lead on another page sounded, or came across as, petulant. I'm not being pedantic when I say that not only did I not describe you, personally, as being petulant, but that I was implicitly acknowledging that it probably was not even your intention to sound that way. I just assumed you were not serious about the substantive point, but were just engaging in a bit of hyperbole. Yes, some people read a whole page; others don't. Nor do they have to.

Anyway, I was no more personalising anything than you are when you say people here have not given a "good" reason for any change. Plenty of people have a) supported a change/amendment; and b) have explained clearly why, with perfectly sensible arguments. You disagree, fine, but the actual consensus is quite clear at this RfC (as opposed to the oft-asserted but never-evidenced "consensus" about linking cited by some). As I noted, all it needs is to add one word "lead" to the list at bullet point 2. Surely that will simply add clarity? And it is no more "bloat" than adding one or two links to an article is "linking to the hilt" or a "poor use of wikilinking". N-HH talk/edits 16:54, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

• Support. I do not believe that we can ever assume that an article is read in its entirety or in a linear fashion. Not when the table of contents allows a reader to easily jump to the section of greatest interest or relevance to what information they seek, and especially when direct section links are not only deployed but becoming even more common as more editors find their specificity the most relevant form of linking. oknazevad (talk) 16:48, 3 November 2011 (UTC)
• I think that the existing advice is adequate (it is covered by the first bulleted exception), and I oppose any suggestion that the first post-introduction use is the best second link. For example, if the name of a place appears in the lead, is mentioned in passing in the first section after the lead, and is discussed extensively halfway through the article in a section primarily about the place, then the best second link is at the start of that big section, not the first post-lead appearance. But on the general point, more than one link (always in separate sections) is acceptable, exactly like this guideline has always said. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:32, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

What if a section with a significant use of the term in question is directly after, or comes relatively close to, the lead? Per the strict wording we have now, that would be barred from having a link. In any event, I'm not sure the broad proposal here - or any of the more specific wordings that have been suggested - is mandating that the first post-lead mention has to then be linked as well, especially when it might be just a passing mention; simply that it would be OK to do so (when appropriate in terms of significance, relevance etc), and that a link in the lead does not preclude a link in the main body - whether a long way or not. The point is that the first bullet point doesn't currently deal with the "or not" scenario of course; and hence, per common practice, the guideline does need that additional clarity, surely? N-HH talk/edits 18:50, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

• Support. The lead and the article should be capable of standing separately. Hawkeye7 (talk) 20:20, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

• Gosh, I wonder if we could rationalise a change in FAC, and instead have 'Featured Sections' on the basis that nobody reads articles in a linear fashion and that every section is therefore independent. ;-) --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 22:50, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

Well exactly: the article, not the section, is the fundamental unit. Sections cannot be the basis for expanding abbreviations and linking unless we change WP so that each section is at a different page. I don't think there's any enthusiasm for that. This discussion is wasting time. Tony (talk) 02:59, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

Indeed, I decide what is and what cannot be, know what is right, and can interpret consensus; as well as drawing absurd conclusions about how what everyone else wants means that every section must be on a different page. More importantly, time is being wasted disagreeing with what a small minority of self-appointed experts - none of whom are presumably actually professionally employed as editors or writers, given the amount of time they spend here - think. Now, sarcasm aside, do we have consensus here to ignore said "experts" and insert one word into the guideline to deal with the lead/repeat issue? N-HH talk/edits 00:06, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

Do it, and hurry before we come to our senses. What ever were we thinking, wasting our time editing here? I could have been wasting my time watching useless TV shows. Dang it. Repent, repent, repent.--JOJ ^Hutton 00:43, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

• Oppose the proposed change. The wording we have now is adequate. Generally the lede introduces and links any terms that may be necessary for the understanding of the body of the article. People may indeed read articles in a non-linear fashion, but they will skim the lede first to confirm they have the right article and to get a quick summary, before navigating to some specific section via the contents list. It's wrong to think of the lede as merely a sort of executive summary; it's actually a precursor to the body. That's why we shouldn't normally relink terms from the lede in the body. Colonies Chris (talk) 11:00, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

You might want to open an RfC on changing the opening sentences of wp:lead then ... "The lead serves as an introduction to the article and a summary of its most important aspects. The lead should be able to stand alone as a concise overview". By contrast, I'm not sure where the suggestion that the lead should [only?] link terms necessary to understand the body comes from (however we would define those anyway), in guidelines or common sense and practice. And, while I don't presume to speak for how everyone else might or might not read articles, I can tell you for a fact that I very frequently look at the lead and only the lead; or often only one section, without the lead. We do presumably allow readers to do this; and should, in turn, allow - note not compel - editors to insert a second link subsequent to the lead. N-HH talk/edits 13:09, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

You seem to completely misunderstand or misrepresent everything I wrote. I'm not going to waste my time pointing that out in detail. Try reading my comments again, then retract your own irrelevant response. Colonies Chris (talk) 16:26, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

I completely understood everything you wrote - other than where I clearly signposted one aspect with a question mark - and am not going to waste time pointing out in detail how each part of my response was aimed at each part of what you said (that should be fairly obvious, anyway). Nor, obviously, am I going to retract any part of my comment unless it is precisely explained what I have got "wrong" and why. Whether what you wrote was not what you meant is an issue for you to address, not me. N-HH talk/edits 16:54, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

• Oppose. I think excessive and reflex use of linking is getting out of hand. We should resist the idea that if a capability exists, it's to be used at every opportunity. I am reminded of the reflex use of centred headings, in amateurish wordprocessing. Novices learn how to do it, and then seem to consider the new trick an automatic source of merit and kudos. Never mind readability. Linking is like that. It is too often a substitute for thoughtful exposition in the present text. I oppose any shift from the status quo that would encourage this excess. I strongly favour a clean text that stands up on its own. One well-placed link is better than three duplicates that are thrown in "just in case". As the discussion above shows, there is already enough flexibility to cover any special need that might arise. Leave it alone. Noetica^Tea? 12:58, 12 November 2011 (UTC) Note: I did not come to this RFC to have my opinion misread and misinterpreted, or to endure the abuse of those who take a view different from my own. I have spoken of "novices" here; so have others. I have not been disrespectful to any participant here, and I do not expect to be treated with disrespect myself. This is my last involvement in the discussion until I see retraction and apologies. The RFC is tainted by such abuse; accordingly no consensus for change can be properly established. Noetica^Tea? 14:16, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

Have you read the above discussion and taken on board what the issues are? The status quo - in terms of practice and FAC - is precisely to encourage a second link that puts a link to a relevant term in the body as well as the lead. The point is to make this guideline reflect that. The point is very much not to change the status quo, to promote the insertion of hundreds of links or even necessarily to compel the introduction of a second link in the body. It is to be explicit in saying that the option exists, and that editors can use, you know, their judgment in how and when to exercise it. Also, this patronising tone - "novices", "reflex", "[supposed] kudos", "amateurish" etc - comes across as a bid to set some up as "experts" and others as ignorant about how to link properly. Can we see your certificate of expertness? N-HH talk/edits 13:09, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

@Noetica - The fact is that most FA-quality articles do repeat the link at the first occurrence after the lead (including today's article Tumbler Ridge, British Columbia). The point of this RfC is to help novice editors reconcile what they see in FA articles (repeating links) with what this MOS says (don't repeat). Right now, novices see two contradictory practices. Don't you think we should clarify that apparent contradiction (without mandating one way or another) for editors? --Noleander (talk) 13:38, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

I think I have seen enough. At the opening, there was some berating of "anally-retentive views of a bunch of control freaks"[7]. Then we have "small minority of self-appointed experts"[8]. Now, we have what appears to be some persistent riposting[9]. So much for the alleged intolerance (or whatever the exact word used was) of the "small minority of self-appointed experts [sic]". Notwithstanding arguments about non-linearity, NHH and the other supporters failed to demonstrate how subsequent links are deterred by the current guideline that they need to make such explicit, but have also abjectly failed to indicate exactly how such 'permission' they seek will not translate into systematic linking of the first occurrence of a 'contextually relevant' word in each section. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 13:40, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

As Noleander says, this is a no-brainer. We add one word to the guideline, and we get clarity and consistency. We have clear consensus for that, even if one or two editors - who are indeed "self-appointed experts"; if you don't want to be referred to as such, don't act that way by arguing other people don't know what they are doing or haven't "proved" something or other - disagree. That is your right. However, there is, contrary to some suggestions, no "right" or "wrong" way to link, or to advise on linking, which those experts can divine for the rest of us and impose on the community. That is what I have kicked against ever since I came across the broader linking issue. In reality, all we have at the end of the day is the individual preference and guesswork of thousands of readers and editors, expressed and mediated through practice and consensus. Btw I'm not sure why I or anyone else needs to show either of the two things you mention, even if it were possible to do so. So our supposed abject failure is neither here nor there. N-HH talk/edits 13:55, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

If you don't want to be referred to be described as an "anally-retentive bunch of control freaks" (sorry a "small minority of self-appointed experts") then stop behaving like one – Very droll indeed. "We add one word to the guideline, and we get clarity and consistency." Pray, what is that one word? Oh, and by "consistency", presumably you are talking about repeat linking the 'relevant' word(s) in each and every section? --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 14:34, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

Sorry, there's no consensus for any specific wording. I made that point some time ago. All we have is a set of mostly loose comments, only to be expected when an RfC is framed so loosely. Tony (talk) 14:53, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

I don't think anyone has said that there is, yet. The RfC question is as follows - "Should WP:LINKS be modified (probably in the WP:REPEATLINK section) to acknowledge this as a permissible (but not necessarily recommended) practice?" So, no it does not ask for approval for a specific wording, but the RfC proposer did respond to that point, also some time ago - "I deliberately left that out of the RfC description, because a particular wording might narrow the discussion down too far ... that kind of detail can wait until if/when this RfC consensus turns out to be 'Support'". That seems reasonable enough to me, and we now clearly have consensus - if not unanimity - in favour of that general proposition. Hence, we can now move to working out what wording satisfies that consensus; and if there's a simple tweak to the guidelines that uncontroversially implements the consensus, we don't even need to waste more time wrangling over the precise wording. As for my primary suggestion, it was - "simply adding 'the lead' to the short list at bullet point 2 at wp:repeatlink". So, apologies, it was two words, including the definite article; and "consistency", btw, refers to what would then be the consistency between editor and FAC practice, and the guideline here. Anyway, that's certainly one option, and seems to be the simplest and quickest. I also detect the rumblings of a bid to discredit this RfC from those who disagree with its conclusions (see also Noetica's post above). I hope that's just me being paranoid; I can't see the benefit to anyone in going down that road. N-HH talk/edits 16:02, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

Sadly, N-HH, I don't think you're being paranoid. 2 delinkers have indicated their intention of ignoring the consensus that has emerged. The consensus is clearly to specifically permit duplicate linking immediately following the lead. As some others have pointed out the only question is how much to relax the guidelines in general. My own proposal would be to allow linking in sections, regardless of linking elsewhere, simply because readers can be navigated directly to sections from elsewhere. -- cheers, Michael C. Price ^talk 16:37, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

"Duplicate linking immediately following the lead" is very different from "once per section" which you suggested was the proposed outcome in response to my comment above. I suspect that the RFC would have had a better chance of achieving clarity if it had said change to wording to "links may be repeated one per section" or "links may be duplicated immediately following the lead". I also think that neither is what is wanted. You may have better luck digging through history to see if there was a version that said something about links not being repeated "close together" - that may stand a good chance of getting more uniform support at least for the idea, if not for an explicit change. Rich Farmbrough, 01:08, 13 November 2011 (UTC).

Yes, Rich, I know the two suggestions are different, which is why I said "my own proposal". As for clarity, the RFC clearly indicates linking immediately after the lead is permissable and that the MOS guide needs amending - if the results were not clear then we would not have the declared intention of two delinkers to ignore the RFC consensus. As for the history, there was a stable version that said that links should not be repeated within a section; stable, that is, until the present delinking clique started their crusade, declared their views consensus and ignored all other opinions. And engaged in tactics such as archiving active talk threads. -- cheers, Michael C. Price ^talk 08:58, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

The current guidelines allow editors to judge if a duplicate is useful to the reader. No one here has explicitly agreed to a situation where an item is linked in a one- or two-sentence lead (most WP are stubs or not much bigger), then straight away linked again, within five seconds of reading. With an infobox link (explicitly permitted), that makes three links at the top of an article. This RfC is a mess, I'm afraid, and provides no endorsement of one person's wording, invented after the fact. Tony (talk) 12:45, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

And not to mention that it got very personal just as the ball on this started rolling. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 13:04, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

• Question to the opposers: I think the status quo situation, in which the guideline and the actual practice in a s***load of articles (including many featured ones) disagree with each other, is dysfunctional; hence, I hope that the people who support the current text of the guideline would be willing to roll up their sleeves and fix all those articles, removing links to articles already linked to in the lead unless there's a good reason to keep a particular duplicate link, rather than hoping that a guideline that hasn't been followed thus far will somehow magically be followed in the foreseeable future. Amirite? ― A. di M.​  18:57, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

Oh god, don't go putting ideas like that into people's heads; I'm sure there are several that would leap at the chance to do exactly that. Although, were they to, they would of course be in clear breach of the consensus established here, as well as the consensus already set by common practice. There's quite enough mass delinking going on currently (and the fact that there's no consensus in favour of much of it - despite assertions, never evidenced, that there is - or that it takes a lot of time to put into effect has been no bar to that). N-HH talk/edits 20:00, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

A di M, what would be FAR more logical would be to remove the link in the lead and put it (or retain it) in the opening section. Twice is silly; and the lead is the very last place a reader would want to divert to another article, isn't it? We're not here to cater for this ten-second browser kind of notional (I'd say fictional) reader, who wants to skip from one article to the next after reading the opening sentence. The lead looks down into its article. Tony (talk) 02:28, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

Ah, this “divert to” thing again, as if tabbed browsing hadn't been supported by pretty much all major browsers for several years now. Plus, it's nearly obvious that in most cases more people read the lead than a section below it. (A principle I once read somewhere, though I can't find it right now, is that an encyclopaedia made up by the leads of Wikipedia articles should make sense; and the point of the ToC is that someone can read the lead and Section 2 without reading Section 1, so if a term is repeated in all three, linking it only in the lead caters such readers, whereas linking it only in Section 1 doesn't.) And isn't the fact that you can use articles as stepping stones the very reason we don't like ‘chained’ links in the same sentence? If the top screenful of Boston doesn't link to Massachusetts, saying “There's no point in linking both Boston and Massachusetts in the first sentence because blah blah blah” isn't a valid argument.

That said, there are some cases where the best place to link to an article is not the first mention, but they are a minority. ― A. di M.​  11:45, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

I already do that when I come across instances of links repeated several times in the lede – they are surprisingly common. It doesn't surprise me to find the same word(s) linked many more times in the body. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 02:39, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

• Support. I like blue links. (Blue is my favorite Wikipedia color.) They should at minimum be repeated when they are far enough apart that the repeated link doesn't appear on the screen at the same time as the previous one. (Of course that varies with the individual's screen, so editors could reasonably differ on this.) Red links should only appear once in an article, and should not be repeated. (I definitely do not like red links! Somebody should either write an article to make them a beautiful blue, or if it's not notable, delete the red link!) --Robert.Allen (talk) 08:51, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

• Admittedly, blue is a much less traumatic colour than red: Blue is the colour of cool, calming water, red is the colour of molten engulfing lava. I also like seeing blue on the screen, but only small blotches of it suffice to give that calming effect. The reality is, red links are more useful than blue links, and although people seem to have an aversion to them to the extent of liberally removing them on sight, they remind us of the job at hand, which is really to "Build the Web". Red is what motivates me here on WP. Ironically, the parts already built don't need so much attention drawn to them. They need only to be linked once. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 11:07, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

• Comment - I posted a request at WP:AN asking for an admin to read this RfC, see if there was consensus, and close it. Over a week has gone by with no new activity. However, the full 30 day period recommended for RfCs has not elapsed, so if anyone wants to let it run another few days, that is fine also. --Noleander (talk) 15:40, 25 November 2011 (UTC)

I remind editors that this RfC was poorly conceived if the intention was to change the wording of the guideline. It has proposed no new wording, and the wording itself needs to be the subject of consensus if it's to be changed. The responses of editors here, instead, cover a range of opinions. I suggest another RfC proposing actual wording be held if anyone is thinking of changing the guideline. Tony (talk) 15:45, 25 November 2011 (UTC)

Sure, the change could proceed in two steps. The thrust of this RfC was "Should the guideline be improved to acknowledge the practices often used in FA articles?". If the closing admin finds that the above discussion resulted in the answer "Yes", we can then start a discussion of the precise wording, either with an RfC or just an ordinary discussion on this Talk page. --Noleander (talk) 15:49, 25 November 2011 (UTC)

• Support per Michael C. Price. Long overdue, and actually not going far enough. As usual, when we got rid of the bizarre overlinking of dates etc. the pendulum swung too far in the opposite direction. Hans Adler 16:02, 25 November 2011 (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.

Table of non-obscure units

I don't feel that the exact choice of which units to list has been discussed enough for such a table to be shown. For now, I'd just remove the table. (Also, what happened to the point about conversions? The degree Fahrenheit is very obscure outside the US but not obscure at all inside it, and vice versa for the degree Celsius, so you want to link degrees Celsius if used alone, and degrees Fahrenheit if used alone, but you don't want to link them if used together for the same temperature, as in 20 °C (68 °F) or 68 °F (20 °C).) ― A. di M.​  21:20, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Agree with removal. The whole idea that some units are well-known universally ignores the multiculturalism of the Anglophone world. -- cheers, Michael C. Price ^talk 05:16, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Well, a few units are known pretty much universally: year is one of the most commons nouns in English. :-) ― A. di M.​  16:53, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

True, perhaps the table does have too much information (particularly if not discussed in this Talk page before it was created). Rather than deleting the whole thing, perhaps just replace it with some prose that gives a few examples. That section already has the sentence; "... the troy ounce or bushel, the candela or mho might be considered obscure." Perhaps add a second sentence like "units that are relatively common and generally don't need to be linked include watt, volt, hertz, bit, byte, hour, minute, and second." And maybe a third sentence: "Other units may be obscure in some countries, but well-known in others (such as metric system units, which are not well known in the US) and so linking them may be useful." Or something like that. --Noleander (talk) 13:25, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Wouldn't it be better to discuss each item, point by point, here, before throwing it out? I'm keen that exceptions to general rules be listed in a table or appendix at MOSNUM: there is actually chaos out there WRT some units, and a few edit-wars and fights about them, I believe. This is what our style guides are meant to minimise. A di M, the anglophone world is about as multicultural as plasma. English seeps into everything like a kind of mould, and as you know, has come to dominate the world. Tony (talk) 13:36, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

I think it makes more sense to discuss each item, point by point, before adding it. I don't perfectly remember the details of the story, but the whole table was introduced after a hurried discussion at WT:MOSNUM which AFAICT wasn't even advertised here. (And I like Noleander's idea of a few examples on which everyone would agree, but adding “unless a conversion is present” at the end.) ― A. di M.​  16:43, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

As for “the anglophone world is about as multicultural as plasma. English seeps into everything like a kind of mould, and as you know, has come to dominate the world”, I completely agree, but what the hell does that have to do with this, exactly? ― A. di M.​  16:46, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

It means that we shouldn't make assumptions about the background of our readers - so leave the links in. -- cheers, Michael C. Price ^talk 16:48, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Knowing Tony, that's likely not what he meant. ― A. di M.​  16:53, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Yes, no doubt he has a rationalisation about why anglophone multiculturalism means we should remove links. -- cheers, Michael C. Price ^talk 16:57, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

I thought this table was a bit ropey, that's why I amended it a little, and added some text. Maybe it could be spun off into a sub-page, to avoid cluttering, and extended appropriately. Rich Farmbrough, 01:14, 13 November 2011 (UTC).

Links in quotations

The MOS says the following:

Items within quotations should not generally be linked; instead, consider placing the relevant links in the surrounding text or in the "See also" section of the article.

It's not immediately obvious why this would be deemed good practice, rather than bad practice. Furthermore, following this rubric - especially the end of it - isn't helpful to the reader. I'm fairly sure the question "why?" is an FAQ here (though I can't see a list of FAQs) - but why do we have this instruction?

Assuming there is a good reason, perhaps it could be included in brief in the actual MOS text. --Dweller (talk) 16:09, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

Perhaps the reason for that guidance is that a link within a quote give an erroneous impression to the reader, such as (1) the blue color may imply some emphasis (by the original speaker) on that particular word/phrase; (2) there could be OR issues if the editor chooses a target article that is not 100% identical to the quoted word (e.g if the quoted word is "foo" but the target article is foobar); (3) if there are a few articles with similar names (disambig) there is some OR if the editor picks one of several for the target. But that is all just speculation on my part. Personally, I see no big problem with including links within quotes. --Noleander (talk) 17:17, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

I see no reason why links can't be included within quotes either. -- cheers, Michael C. Price ^talk 07:16, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

Yes this is slightly dodgy. Advice to take special care linking items in quotes for the type of reason Noleander outlines would make more sense. Rich Farmbrough, 01:16, 13 November 2011 (UTC).

The reasons for not linking within quotations are well-founded, and should be obvious — but a few additional words could be added to the first part of the sentence to firmly explain why. We editors are already burdened with taking special care to not misquote, or quote out of context, and we don't need to be given additional special license to perform mindreading on the person we quote, as well. A quoted persons words are immutable, whereas the Wikipedia articles to which we link are not. Even when an editor links to an 'identical' quoted word, there is no guarantee that our Wikipedia article conveys the same meaning as that intended by the quoted speaker. There is further no guarantee that the meaning conveyed by our article won't change two days from now. When we quote, we are to convey what the source says, not what we personally think the source means; we have crossed that line when we start Wiki-linking the words and phrases within a quote. Xenophrenic (talk) 17:55, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

Why is it a sin to link "a far-away country" in Chamberlain's speech? It provides context. Of course judgement should be used, and care taken, but an outright ban is silly. -- cheers, Michael C. Price ^talk 18:06, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

WP:EGG. Much better is “a far-away country [Czechslovakia]”. ― A. di M.​  18:47, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

I agree with the guideline, but I also agree that it should state its rationale. ― A. di M.​  18:51, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

I strongly support this sentence. The only problem I see with it is that it is not strong enough. Some editors consider following it completely optional, so they are free to insert original research and POV statements into quotations. Any literal quotation that comes with a link that is not due to the original author is a misrepresentation of what the author actually said. By doing so we always put the words into a new context which is not the original. Sometimes it comes close enough to the context intended by the original author, but much more often it does not. Editors with poor judgement or a poor sense for linguistic nuances have trouble understanding this and then insist they can simply ignore this sentence. This problem needs fixing. Hans Adler 16:07, 25 November 2011 (UTC)

Yes, context can always be stated in other ways, as suggested. Having been a former long-time editor fo Falun Gong articles, support the current wording. I am well aware of how this device has been used in situations to give an emphasis where it was certainly, in my opinion, undue. Of course, the risk of introduction of original research is ever present if this practice is allowed. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 00:43, 26 November 2011 (UTC)

I agree with Rich Farmborough. We went from a complete ban on linking within quotations to a slightly looser guideline several years ago, which seemed fair enough. But don't you all think it's wise to flag to editors that a little more caution than usual is required in the judgement of whether to link an item in someone else's text, as opposed to WP's narrative? Among the issues are that the "owner" of the text didn't link to a particular article in their text, that it introduces another variable given that a quotation-linked item can change over time to represent an angle or view incompatible with the original writer's/speaker's intended meaning. I'm not for a total ban, but editors should be reminded of these matters, I think. Tony (talk) 08:37, 26 November 2011 (UTC)

I can see that, but would still like more clarity and more leniency. Yes, linking can imply things that the quoted party would not have implied (this is a WP:NOR problem, already covered by a policy), and can be manipulated to seem like improper emphasis (already covered by WP:NPOV). The main problem with not linking in quotations when linking would be helpful is that the passage is either not as encyclopedically useful as it should be (maybe even confusing), or it must be followed with explanatory verbiage which is redundant and tedious, and worse yet is often even more prone to WP:NOR and WP:NPOV problems than the simple links would have been. — SMcCandlish Talk⇒ ʕ(^Õل^ō)ˀ Contribs. 19:45, 7 January 2012 (UTC)

Arthur's edit

Arthur and I have discussed his recent edit concerning timeline articles. I've reverted his change to the guideline pending discussion here of just what was decided at the big RfC on dates. At the very least, a link to the RfC is required; and I distinctly remember that Arthur conceded to Colonies Chris early this year that timeline articles are not part of the "exemption" granted to articles on years, months, days, etc. Input would be appreciated. Tony (talk) 08:27, 26 November 2011 (UTC)

The quote you found referred to such articles as November 2008 in sports; I withdrew the complaint after looking closely at the article and found no standard of whether dates should be linked within the article. That does not apply to articles written to a standard, such as 2011 in the United States. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 09:21, 26 November 2011 (UTC)

Timeline

There is clear consensus that the chronological linking guidelines do not apply to day-of-year, year, decade, century, millennium, and some other articles. I thought it was all timeline articles, but I may have been wrong. However, some indication of that consensus should be here, regardless. Specifically, 2011 in the United States has been linked until recently, so there needs to be some discussion before it is unlinked. I believe 2000s in sports has also been linked, and not just to 2000 in baseball, etc. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 08:37, 26 November 2011 (UTC)

Actually, there is no consensus at all. The community spoke loudly and clearly at that turning-point RfC in 2009. I see no reason its voice should be nullified right now. Tony (talk) 09:44, 26 November 2011 (UTC)

Actually, you're quite wrong. The community spoke loudly, and clearly indicated that there were exceptions for types of articles, and did not identify the exceptions. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 09:56, 26 November 2011 (UTC)

According to my recollection, "and some other articles" was deliberately vague because there was never any agreement how to properly define it. If Arthur thinks that timeline articles was to be included, he should demonstrate that the consensus existed for it then, or that it exists now, before he goes about changing the guideline. Thanks. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 12:41, 26 November 2011 (UTC)

The guideline already says, “Intrinsically chronological articles (1789, January, and 1940s) may themselves contain linked chronological items.” BTW, is there any reason for this section and the one before to be separate? ― A. di M.​  11:19, 26 November 2011 (UTC)

Arthur, as Colonies Chris said to you just before you bullied him with threats of blocking: "Please explain to me why you think a reader who's interested to find out about events expected to happen in 2015 would benefit from a link to the events of, say, March 20, in some random set of completely different years. The only date link that's even arguably relevant, albeit remotely, is '21st century': the month-day links are of no value whatever." The same might be said of linking 3 March in a timeline article. I suppose this is why the community was so dismissive of the idea. Tony (talk) 13:17, 26 November 2011 (UTC)

That is not the consensus. "Intrinsically chronological articles" are exempt, and there has never been any consensus that 2011 in the United States is not "intrinsically chronological". I can't agree with the anon that there should be articles January 1 in the United States/1 January in the United Kingdom, but, if there were, keeping the date links in place would be the easiest way to adjust them later. As it stands, I do not have a bot that links only dates in line headers, and I doubt that should a bot could easily be written; yet another reason for retaining the date links if there is any doubt.

Finally, if you are going to accuse me of bullying, it would be appropriate to note that this entire episode is a good example of the big lie; certain editors asserted, without evidence, that consensus was against date linking. Sometime later, after a number of RfCs which could not possibly have produced a result which would not be interpreted as consensus against date linking, one was finally produced which could not possibly have a produced a result (other than no consensus) other than being against date linking. I agree it did result in a consensus against date linking, but, if you want to revisit the exceptions, I would propose an RfC which could produce a different result. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 16:36, 26 November 2011 (UTC)

Arthur, the principle is clear: Month-and-day articles (February 24 and 10 July) should not be linked unless their content is germane (relevant and appropriate) to the subject.

Please read that above principle again; three times if necessary to fully appreciate what it is driving at.

Timelines and anything else you want to write about are no exception to this principle. If a reader is in our Timeline of antibiotics article, which begins:

• 1910 - Arsphenamine
• 1912 - Neosalvarsan
• 1935 - Prontosil

…all we do is confuse readers, waste their time following extraneous links, and make them fear even clicking on links when we leave time-wasting blue land mines that are totally irrelevant. If the article is directed to a general-interest readership that came to read up on antibiotics, precious few readers will be impressed when they get to 1910 where they will find mind-boggling jewels like “July 4 – African-American boxer Jack Johnson defeats American boxer James J. Jeffries in a heavyweight boxing match, sparking race riots across the United States.” In fact, the 1910 article doesn’t even contain the word antibiotic.

I remember the first time I clicked one of these trivia links. I was interested in scientific fiascos and our article on it had something like The 1967 announcement of polywater. I thought, “Wow, I can go to a detailed account of that announcement!” All I learned was “Don’t click those fucking links.” It was clear that Wikipedia had fallen victim to a legacy of its early days when there were far fewer articles and wikipedians hyperlinked any and everything. Now…

We’ve been through all this this before. Once readers are reading one of the intrinsically chronological articles (which are lists of unrelated trivia) such as 1910, then it is OK for those articles to themselves contain still more chronological links such as July 4.

There is one notable exception to this “chronological trivia can lead to more chronological trivia” rule. I am pleased to announce that our Trivia article is, IMHO, completely compliant with our principles on linking. It has this:

On September 13, 1965, four Columbia students appeared on the TV quiz show I've Got a Secret and competed in a trivia contest with the show's regular panelists.

Boy, oh boy, are our visiting readers who are interested in trivia in for a treat. Greg L (talk) 19:48, 26 November 2011 (UTC)

Wrong, as usual. As even you must be aware, "inherently intrinsically chronological articles" are exempt from unlinking. The only question is whether 2011 in the United States is "inherently chronological" (arguable, but there is not a clear consensus, except by the regular editors of the article), and whether the regular editors want the links there (not arguable; the answer is yes). — Arthur Rubin (talk) 00:40, 27 November 2011 (UTC)

Awe, you are so charming when you’re at your best. Juvenile responses like that do not help your case. If your position is now clear, that’s fine, but your addition (…these guidelines do not apply to timeline articles…) (∆ edit here) was incorrect policy if interpreted as it was written and was incorrect if you meant something other than what you wrote. Our Timeline of antibiotics article is an example of a timeline article. Please exercise more care when unilaterally changing Wikipedia’s guidelines; writing one thing and meaning another happens to us all, but getting all pissy and attacking others when they revert your mess is another. Is this response something even you can understand? ;-) Greg L (talk) 00:55, 27 November 2011 (UTC)

That was partially my mistake. I didn't (and apparently, neither did the unlinkers) see the note that the guideline does not apply to "intrinsically chronological articles". I don't think that applies to timeline of antibiotics, but it does seem to apply to 2011 in the United States or 20th century in antibiotics (if such an article existed). — Arthur Rubin (talk) 01:13, 27 November 2011 (UTC)

I consider myself an “agnostic” with regard to those date links in 2011 in the United States. If it was 2011 in baseball, its very targeted subject matter (baseball) makes it inappropriate, IMO, to have links to trivia that is nearly 100% unrelated to baseball. And, after writing that baseball-related article title in brackets and seeing it is a real article—and reading it—I see that the dates in it are not linked. That’s all good and well and proper, IMO.

But I can also see why many would argue that 2011 in the United States is so sufficiently broad (the U.S.), that readers might be interested in following links to see what else was happening in the world at that time. I would have to see persuasive, rational, thoughtful arguments both ways to come down one way or another for articles like 2011 in the United States. All those links there now don’t exactly shock my wiki-conscience.

But having linked dates in, say, 20th century in antibiotics would be inappropriate, IMO, because of its targeted focus on a very specific (narrow) subject (antibiotics).

Having written all that, I would propose something like this for debate: For “[Time period] in [subject]” articles such as 2011 in the United States, where the subject matter (United States) is very broad and and is not highly specific (such as Timeline of antibiotics or 2011 in baseball), chronological items (dates, months, and years) may be linked. The underlying principle behind this guideline is that many readers of articles covering very broad subject matter would be interested in following links to see what else was happening in the world at that time. I could support this, which has the virtue of reflecting the current reality. We could benefit from having the current reality memorialized in our guidelines so we don’t have further editwarring over it.

This proposed guideline would also cement an important principle on the flip side of this issue; an article like 20th century in antibiotics would not properly have linked dates, and the reason has nothing to do with the fact that it has “20th century” in it, but is because readers of such highly focused subject matter would typically have no interest in going to trivia articles totally unrelated to the subject at hand. Greg L (talk) 02:20, 27 November 2011 (UTC)

Actually, that seems reasonable, with the additional notes that, for example, 2011 in baseball could rationally link to [[1932 in baseball|1932]] or, rarely, [[2011 in football|football]], when referring to an athlete known for more than one sport; and some discussion related to where the breakdown is between 2011 in the United States and 2011 in Tuvalu (where we might agree that the one potential entry shouldn't have links). It may need work, and possibly another <censored> RfC. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 02:48, 27 November 2011 (UTC)

I’m pleased that you see that as a potentially acceptable proposal to work on. There is no point letting details get in the way of things, but I’ve long thought that aliasing a link to the point that it is at great risk of appearing to be something it is not or which makes it ambiguous, such as this code:

Willie Mays won the [[Negro League World Series]] in [[1948 in baseball|1948]]

to produce this:

Willie Mays won the Negro League World Series in 1948…

…does our readers—and even our wikipedians—a disservice. Our readers are accustomed to something that reads “1948” as taking them to the trivia article with that exact title. Why would any wikipedian want to write informative, useful text that masquerades as something that isn’t nearly as useful? Were it me, I’d write it this way:

In 1948, Willie Mays won the Negro League World Series (see 1948 in baseball ).

Greg L (talk) 03:39, 27 November 2011 (UTC)

I see 2011 in baseball does not have any year links of any sort, but, for instance, in the deaths section, it would not be unreasonable to have, in deaths:

• February 30 – Famous Player, had league doubles record in [[1960 in baseball|1960]] for the (insert team name here) (b. [[1939 in baseball|1939]])

I can't say I'd recommend it, but it shouldn't be banned. That's not related to this guideline, so let's let it go. We still need some guidelines for "sufficiently broad". (And I still think an RfC might be needed to avoid trouble; if we can agree on the wording, there should be few who would object that the wording is unfair.) — Arthur Rubin (talk) 03:55, 27 November 2011 (UTC)

I can’t agree with you, Arthur, about linking “February 30" in such an article. Your example squarely flouts the basic principle of Month-and-day articles (February 24 and 10 July) should not be linked unless their content is germane (relevant and appropriate) to the subject. Too few readers interested in baseball are going to find value in being taken to articles that have nothing whatsoever to do with baseball. Your example link (linking “February 30”) is a treatise with such information as how the Soviet calendar treats “Feb. 30” differently than the Swedish calendar. That sort of tangent is not *germane* to baseball and excessively stretches the Chain Of Discovery®™© (Baseball → Famous Player → Player died → Date of death is mentioned [apply philosophy of “hyperlink early and often” here] → Soviet Calendar treats “Feb 30” differently than Swedish calendar). Greg L (talk) 23:25, 27 November 2011 (UTC)

On the other hand, lots of readers on seeing “February 30” will assume it's a typo, and on following the link they will realize that maybe it is not. ― A. di M.​  23:45, 27 November 2011 (UTC)

Wow… Sad, but true. It could be one of those Mystery Easter Eggs where something useful masquerads as something to avoid like the plague (is it [[1948 in baseball|1948]] or is it [[1948]]??). It elicits a reaction of “Did wikipedians accidentally screw up or accidentally-on-purpose screw up?” Greg L (talk) 00:27, 28 November 2011 (UTC)

• What, pray tell, are the navboxes in these articles for? Washing blue over everything in each entry weakens the wikilinking system. I still don't understand why May 3 is relevant to a timeline of any sort. Tony (talk) 09:27, 27 November 2011 (UTC)
• Policy idea - Date linking is usually acceptable for articles that have a date/day/year in their title. It is only acceptable in other articles if the destination page is immediately relevant to the topic, but in most cases, this should be avoided. Is this where the discussion is going? D O N D E groovily Talk to me 03:12, 1 December 2011 (UTC)

  I'd be OK with that, but I don't think the unlinking WP:CABAL would go along. I also don't think it was exactly what I was proposing. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 09:19, 1 December 2011 (UTC)

  The ArbCom clerk in charge of that enormous RfC back in 2009 inserted these clauses into MOSNUM as a direct result of the community's very significant consensus. It was a direct reflection of consensus, and I see no reason to detract from that. This is why I repeated the question that was asked at that RfC, thus far unanswered at this page. Let's not waste time on this. BTW, in case you think I have some inherent bias against year, century, date articles (i.e., the intrinsic ones), note that I've added my clear support in a number of venues to the continued presence of On this day at the main page. OTD contains I don't know how many year and day-and-month links, every day, exposed to millions of views. One should not tempt providence: OTD scored rather poor support at the RfC a few months ago on what to keep on the main page and what to dump. Tony (talk) 11:54, 1 December 2011 (UTC)

  @Dondegroovily: That's way too broad. I can see no good reason why a date should be more likely to be linked in (say) 2009 L'Aquila earthquake than in (say) Ultra-high-energy cosmic ray just because the former contains 2009 in its title. ― A. di M.​  18:44, 1 December 2011 (UTC)

  Good point. We would need to exclude articles that use dates only as disambiguation (like disaster and elections articles). That makes things more complicated. D O N D E groovily Talk to me 01:55, 2 December 2011 (UTC)

  And there's no in-principle difference between "History of X" and "Timeline of X". We don't allow year or day-and-month linking in the first without very good reason; nor should we in the second. Tony (talk) 14:23, 2 December 2011 (UTC)

Knowing that we shouldn't be linking years without good reason, it would seem to me that if you have a History of X or Timeline of X article, presented in a non-prose format (table, list, whatever), and there exists a series of "YYYY in Z" (doesn't necessarily have to be years, could be decades, whatever, if it is a longer-term subject) where Z is the immediately obvious parent topic of X, then having links from the years give to the specific "YYYY in Z" article makes sense for tracking the influence of topic X on and by the larger field Z. But this has to be an obvious, intuitive relationship. In no case would I link to a bare year article (barring unless we're talking a pure calender-based discussion), and, for example, if we're talking a development in medicine that just happened to occur on US soil, there would be no point in linking that to the year article in US history - neither are non-obvious connections. But linking year dates from within History of antibotics to the appropriate YYYY in Medicine is exactly the type of application where these links make the most sense. --MASEM (t) 14:47, 2 December 2011 (UTC)

• I agree with A. di M.’s 18:44, 1 December 2011 post.​ Just because a Supernova 1987A contains a date doesn’t take the pure trivia found in our 1987 article and magically make it “germane” to “supernovas”. There is too much wikilawyering going on here by a few editors that seems to amount to nothing more than efforts to probe for logical wiki‑loopholes. The most modest application of WP:COMMONSENSE is all we need here; in no dictionary will one find “profoundly irrelevant” as a definition of “germane”. The colossal effort put into the 2009 RfC and its abundantly clear consensus is in no need of being turned on its head. Greg L (talk) 02:09, 4 December 2011 (UTC)

Month-and-day

A. di M.: Why didn't I think of that as an alternative to month–day? Tony (talk) 13:20, 26 November 2011 (UTC)

(I had considered day-of-the-year too, but that sounded a bit too clunky.) ― A. di M.​  16:12, 26 November 2011 (UTC)

Thanks. I wish I had thought of that. Now, on to WP:DOY.... — Arthur Rubin (talk) 00:41, 27 November 2011 (UTC)

Wording for Repeat links ... not so prescriptive

SSilver: you just changed WP:REPEATLINK to read: "the same word or phrase should be linked only once in the lead and once in the body ...". I believe that is not consistent with the RfC above in this Talk page, which concluded that such double-linking was optional, and that this guideline should not recommend (nor discourage) such double linking. I think the wording that was there before ("... it may be useful ...") shows the optional nature of the double links. There are probably lots of ways to word it, but "should be linked .." is not consistent the the RfC outcome. --Noleander (talk) 22:40, 29 November 2011 (UTC)

I've changed the wording to "... but if helpful for readers, links may be repeated...", which I believe is more consistent with the RfC consensus. Feel free to improve the wording further. --Noleander (talk) 04:06, 30 November 2011 (UTC)

WP:OVERLINK

Does it specify that only major religions and languages should not be linked, or that religions and languages should never be linked? Joyson Prabhu ^{Holla at me!} 09:11, 16 December 2011 (UTC)

Not linked formulaicly ... that is, every time Christian or Jewish comes up. But clearly in List of religious leaders you'd link the religions once or twice. And probably religions that are less well-known to readers of en.WP should be linked more readily. It's sometimes a grey area. Tony (talk) 09:41, 16 December 2011 (UTC)

As with the whole of the overlink section, there is an explicit exception for "major geographic features and locations, languages, religions, and common professions" when said terms "are particularly relevant to the topic of the article". As noted, that leaves grey areas and a degree of subjectivity in respect of what constitutes relevance (as well as what constitutes a "major" religion or language anyway), but it certainly does not mean they should not be linked, "major" or otherwise.
Personally, I'd avoid linking passing references in article text where it would be hard to argue any direct relevance; perhaps with a slightly lower threshold for linking "minor" religions, on the basis that people are less likely to be familiar with them. As ever it's about context, navigability and utility. And don't forget that the articles on those religions do not simply and briefly explain what they are, which we might expect people to know already - WP is not simply a dictionary after all - but are lengthy and detailed entries that may well include useful or interesting information for someone reading the prior topic. N-HH talk/edits 17:16, 16 December 2011 (UTC)

I agree with the answers above. I think it can be expressed more simply, though: Just ask yourself: "How many of my readers will really be grateful for the additional link, as opposed to being distracted?" Rules are only needed because for many editors it's hard to put themselves into other's shoes, particularly so for topics that define identity, such as religion, nationality, and language. — Sebastian 20:55, 16 December 2011 (UTC)

Although that does rather simply move us on to the next question - how many would be enough; or, in the case of distraction, too many? I would add that I'm rather sceptical of the distraction argument anyway - how would we define distraction as opposed to interesting - and relevant - but maybe tangential connection? Are people really distracted as such by links anyway, even as far as their being somehow deceived or forced into clicking on them? And, at the lower end of that scale, what business is it of anyone else's even if they are?

To be more specific, I think an article on the Pope or Saudi Arabia that failed to link Catholicism or Islam respectively would be seriously underlinked; equally, where the article on Iran lists the various religions found there, I think it would be odd to link Zoroastrianism but not Islam, on any claimed basis that the latter was "well known" or "major". It remains a relevant and significant term - perhaps the more relevant of the two, given the numbers involved in each - and it would be inconsistent to link one but not the other. Beyond that, as acknowledged, it gets more tricky. With language, for example, even English language should surely be linked - even on the English wikipedia - in an article or article section about languages, eg Frisian languages; but not when mentioned in passing, eg "the Bible was first translated into English in the year ..". In fact, in that case, a good piped link is used (see towards the end of that section). N-HH talk/edits 15:20, 17 December 2011 (UTC)

Possibly. But always try to find a more specific link. In Saudia Arabia, for example, if there is an article on "Islam in Saudi Arabia", or a section on it, that would be preferable as a primary link. Better still, linked to Wahabi Islam (is that the spelling?), the particular brand of Islam of the Saudi establishment. It could still be piped to Islam, depending on the localised grammatical context. Tony (talk) 15:28, 17 December 2011 (UTC)

Replacing red links with blue links to urls

This [10] just seems wrong to me. When I click on a blue link I expect to go to an article, not an outside web page. It also defeats the purpose of red links which is to encourage article-building. Is there any specific guidance on this (I imagine there is and I've just missed it). Thanks. Dougweller (talk) 07:59, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

• Yes, I think this is covered by WP:EL, which discourages such links in the text body. I can understand the general reticence to allow red links to exist/remain, but they are indeed useful as you said. The user clearly doesn't understand the difference between a ref and an external link masquerading as a wikilink. I remove such links on sight as 'linkspam'. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 08:40, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

Thanks very much, and for fixing it. I'll remember that in the future. Dougweller (talk) 11:38, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

I'd keep the red links unless I thought the topic is not notable enough to ever have its own en.wiki article, in which case I'd have the external links. ― A. di M.​  14:06, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

Of course, we should not make a red link dedicated for a topic not notable enough for an article, but the correct solution depends on where and how is it short of notability. More precisely, may it be considered as a part of some other Wikipedia article – if it may, then a link to such article (blue or red), a link through redirect or a link to section are more appropriate than short descriptions and external links spread possibly by several articles. Incnis Mrsi (talk) 20:33, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

Repeat linking in reference sections

It's not unusual to see multiple linking of works/publishers in the reference section of articles. Take Fight Club for instance, which is a featured article, and there are multiple links to publishers such as Box Office Mojo and Variety in the references. It's not unsual to see this, but I recently saw a review where an editor was asked to remove repeated links from the references section. WP:OVERLINK states:

Generally, a link should appear only once in an article, but if helpful for readers, links may be repeated in infoboxes, tables, image captions, and at the first occurrence after the lead.

At first glance, it seems to indicate that links in the reference section should only be linked the once. However, the guideline also seems to contradict itself, or at least muddle itself by also stating links may be repeated ... at the first occurrence after the lead. Now, here's the thing, because of the citation system, pretty much any citation can be the "first occurrence" of the word after the lead, as in terms of the likelihood of being encountered by the reader. Nobody apart from a reviewer is going to read through the references in order, so there is no more logic to linking a term in the first citation than there is in the last.

So I'm basically after some clarification. Are references exemopt from the overlinking guideline, or are we still limited to linking just one occurrence of each term. Fight Club has 100+ references, so if you click on a citation that takes you to a reference, is the reader really expected to go trawling through the other references looking for one with the linked term? Either way, I think this should be made explicitly clear in the guidelines. Betty Logan (talk) 20:14, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

There was a recent thread on this here [11] but with no conclusion.

My opinion is that due to two aspects: a ref list being nearly like a list or table (where we do want duplicate links to be consistent) and that ref order can change on a whim when a new reference or reused references is added, that if one is linking reference any publication/work sources (you don't have to) then all sources that aren't redlinked should be linked, even if duplicates are found. Alternatively, no ref publication or work could be linked. --MASEM (t) 20:30, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

I think the spirit of WP:OVERLINK is more geared to prose; lots of linked terms can be intrusive to the reader, but we process tables, lists and the references in a different way. The point of having references is simply so a reader can confirm a piece of information in the article, and part of that process is being able to ascertain the quality and type of source, so being able to link to publishers/newspapers etc certainly has a role. We don't really read a references section, so I don't think we should accommodate the aesthetics of the section at the expense of its function. If there is no consensus on this issue, can we at the very least stipulate that in the guideline so it is left to the discretion of editors? Betty Logan (talk) 20:52, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

I'm not sure it's possible to come to a clear conclusion based simply on the guidelines as currently written; although, as you say, generally wp:overlink is more focused on prose. Either way, I would say that it seems rather pointless and obsessive to insist on the removal of multiple links in reference notes of all places. N-HH talk/edits 11:25, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

Agreed; completely obsessive and pointless. -- cheers, Michael C. Price ^talk 11:56, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

The goal of WP:OVERLINK is to avoid a wall of blue text. Too much blue is annoying and distracting. Thus, if a source, such as Variety, is mentioned several times within the citations, the spirit of OVERLINK suggests that should only be blue once, in the first footnote. OVERLINK also suggests that if Variety is also linked in the prose, it is okay to also link it (once) in the Footnotes. --Noleander (talk) 14:00, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

... also, the same situation arises with links to an author's name in the References section. Let's say there are four works listed by noted author Smith. The spirit of OVERLINK suggests that only the first reference to Smith should be linked. --Noleander (talk) 14:03, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

But again, as noted by several past discussions, a wall of blue text distracts from reading prose (a completely fair, accurate statement), but references are not prose. You aren't "reading" the references, and because you can click on a footnote in prose and jump to the appropriate reference, if it is not linked but only the first instance is, you'd have to go back to find it. Thus it makes no sense to apply OVERLINK to the source or author name in the reflist: it should be consistent, either by not linking any source works, or by linking all that can be linked. --MASEM (t) 14:29, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

Agree with Masem. And if a reader is dedicated enough to check a reference (as some are) they are hardly going to be distracted by blue links in other references. -- cheers, Michael C. Price ^talk 14:31, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

The alleged correlation between "dedication" and "absence of distraction" cannot be proven. There is no cause and effect, and I would argue that they are wholly unrelated to each other. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 15:19, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

The alleged correlation between the number of links and "distraction" cannot be proven either, but it seems to be regularly appealed to. It's safe to say though that people do not read footnotes as such, surely, which leads us to the same conclusion anyway - ie that it does not matter if there are multiple links; and, also, as pointed out above, they may in fact be helpful. N-HH talk/edits 16:03, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

If you can't intuit the "interference" and "distraction" due to saturation linkage in refs sections compared to a utilitarian linked scenario, you and I are clearly from different planets ;-) --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 01:36, 7 January 2012 (UTC)

Me neither. (Or, people from this planet are much more unlike one another than you believe.) Personally, I find the insistence on using archived copies and having full dates with fully spelled-out month names for publication, retrieval and archiving dates much more distracting (what's the point of having the retrieval date if you have the archival date as well, and what would be wrong with “Nov” instead of “November”, and are such pages so likely to change to make the archive thing necessary in the first place?), as well as the tiny font for quotations. As for the version with the links, the distraction of seeing a few more blue words is minor compared to the utility of instantly knowing that (say) Hiroko Tabuchi and Ben Protess are notable enough for a Wikipedia article and the convenience of being one link away to find out more about them. (BTW, why do you use bullets for single comments?)[Screw it, I'm fixing that myself] ― A. di M.​  12:35, 7 January 2012 (UTC)14:00, 7 January 2012 (UTC)

Personally, I find the insistence on using archived copies and having full dates with fully spelled-out month names for publication, retrieval and archiving dates much more distracting. I agree. but that seems to be the current convention to have all those dates and not in abbreviated form, and I would remove the retrieval dates. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 13:51, 7 January 2012 (UTC)

No, wait: those links actually go to journalist, which I agree is crazy, but as far as I can tell nobody is advocating that, so that's a gross straw man. ― A. di M.​  12:36, 7 January 2012 (UTC)

No, wait: those links actually go to journalist, which I agree is crazy put there to illustrate how it would look where the authors were all linked. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 13:51, 7 January 2012 (UTC)

Which is not what people are advocating. ― A. di M.​  14:00, 7 January 2012 (UTC)

Sans blague? --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 14:06, 7 January 2012 (UTC)

It's probably about time to implement the spirit of the RfC, which was to remove most of the strictures against so-called "over"linking.-- cheers, Michael C. Price ^talk 16:18, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

Oh, Michael, you're such a tease! ;-) New consensus??? try pulling the other one! --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 01:34, 7 January 2012 (UTC)

Read the closing admin's comments, which suggests wholesale removal. -- cheers, Michael C. Price ^talk 13:10, 7 January 2012 (UTC)

• Treating ref lists as tables is not as damaging as undisciplined repeat links in running prose. I can cope with repeat links to journals and publishers in a ref list, since it's such a fragmentary layout anyway. But it should certainly not be mandatory. Tony (talk) 15:21, 7 January 2012 (UTC)
  • I think the key thing that we'd all agree on is consistency - its not mandatory article to article, but if you employ linking, then all bluelinked publishers should be linked or otherwise no publisher should be linked. You shouldn't employ partial linking. --MASEM (t) 23:57, 7 January 2012 (UTC)

Well... I propose adding “footnotes” to the last sentence of WP:REPEATLINK. Is that OK with everyone? ― A. di M.​  16:38, 7 January 2012 (UTC)

Sounds good to me. --Noleander (talk) 19:31, 7 January 2012 (UTC)

I support that; citations have more in common with tables and lists than they do with conventional prose in that they are "entry specific", so there is no reason to treat them any differently. Betty Logan (talk) 00:13, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

YEARLINK under discussion

Why does WP:YEARLINK have a tag saying it is currently under discussion? I’m not seeing a specific discussion thread here indicating there is an active discussion on that specific topic. Greg L (talk) 05:11, 16 January 2012 (UTC)

P.S. Never mind. Back on 2 December (#Timeline). I’ve deleted the tag. Greg L (talk) 05:14, 16 January 2012 (UTC)

Irish articles

WP:IMOS guidelines are not being followed when some removing of overlinks is done. They have been mentioned above and can be found in the link at the start of this paragraph. Including the section WP:IRE-IRL. I understand that removing overlinks is important but please refer to the local MOS when doing so. Murry1975 (talk) 13:38, 19 January 2012 (UTC)

Well, no. If there's a concern that these terms will be misconstrued in readers' minds, piping is a very bad way of conveying the correct term. Readers are highly unlikely to click on a linked "Ireland" to discover that it actually means something slightly (actually majorly) different from what the pipe might suggest. It is far better to spell it out in the first place. Tony (talk) 13:56, 19 January 2012 (UTC)

Please could you explain. The article for the state is at Republic of Ireland, yet island article is at Ireland, could you explain how you would get around this?Murry1975 (talk) 14:13, 19 January 2012 (UTC)

Well, a reference to Ireland can, depending on context, of course be about either the island or the state. Given that the island article - for better or worse - currently occupies the "Ireland" space, any linked reference to the state will have to piped. I don't see why that's a problem or why we should insist on it specifically spelling out "Republic of .." in text in order to avoid such piping. Equally, I have absolutely no idea why someone tried to remove the main link to Ireland from the article on Dublin anyway. N-HH talk/edits 23:37, 19 January 2012 (UTC)

IMHO there is far too much linking to Wiki article on countries from BLP articles. For example, in the Liam Neeson article we have the text "Neeson was born June 7, 1952, in Ballymena, County Antrim, Northern Ireland, and is the.." Here we link, Ballymena, Co. Antrim and NI. Why do we need to link all these names - if the reader is really interested in finding out more about Neeson's place of birth, surely a link to Ballymena is sufficient? This is the type of overlinking I object to in a Wiki article. --BwB (talk) 03:43, 20 January 2012 (UTC)

The chained country links are one large facet of the problem, and correct me if I'm wrong, but even those that often oppose the full extent of my unlinking efforts such as Nick (NHH above) accept it as a problem. County Antrim and Northern Ireland only have secondary and tertiary relevance to the subject, and are crying out for removal. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 04:24, 20 January 2012 (UTC)

The formulaic linking of the country-name is going to lead to misleading text; and Ireland as a nation, a culture, a people, is hard to mistake as the default meaning (if one is referring to the island itself, that would need to be marked, at least on first occurrence). In almost every case, a more specific link is required. Tony (talk) 05:49, 20 January 2012 (UTC)

I accept there's a case to be made in respect of articles about people and/or in terms of lengthy chain links (although I don't think it's necessarily clear-cut). However, neither really applies to the main case here, that of Dublin. The idea that the page needs remedial surgery for overlinking in its first sentence - "Dublin is is the capital and most populous city of Ireland" is pretty untenable. The link is there because "Ireland" is a manifestly relevant and related topic to "Dublin". The piping is necessary because the reference is to Ireland as a state, not the island. I'm not quite sure why you're suggesting/thinking that the purpose of the piped link is simply to explain what is meant by Ireland in this context Tony - which I think you might be. You see far too much through the idiosyncratic and narrow prism of seeing links as purely pedagogic rather than as also navigational (and, more brodaly, that also colours far too many of these debates). N-HH talk/edits 10:22, 20 January 2012 (UTC)

@Tony: The fact is that not everybody agrees that the culture and people of Ireland coincides with the Republic of Ireland (but not everybody agrees it coincides with the island of Ireland, either). Try telling a nationalist from NI that he's not Irish (or a unionist from NI that she's not British) and, well... in the best case, you'll find that's not a good idea. (Myself, I call them “Northern Irish” unless I know better about an individual.) BTW, I agree that the half-assed compromise whereby the sovereign state and the island are called “Ireland” and “island of Ireland” in article text but “Republic of Ireland” and “Ireland” in article titles, requiring all links (in contexts where the distinction matters) to be piped, combines the worst of both world, but that doesn't have a snowball's chance in hell of changing in the foreseeable future – it's about as likely to happen as for the six counties to become part of the Republic. :-) ― A. di M.​  10:45, 20 January 2012 (UTC)

I agree: it's weird. I don't think those guys agree among themselves about it, and it looks like a half-baked attempt one or two of them slapped up without thinking it through. They're good-faith editors, but the guideline does need some work. I've copy-edited a bit of it at the top. Tony (talk) 15:29, 20 January 2012 (UTC)

If I were you, I'd stay the hell away from there, given the years' worth of arbitration cases and other drama surrounding that issue. ― A. di M.​  18:18, 20 January 2012 (UTC)

Everything should be linked

I'm actually quite annoyed that such a concept as overlinking exists to be honest. This is an encyclopedia. I keep hearing over and over again "but nobody is going to want to click that", well, I would! I've found numerous times I am reading an article (usually an American one!) and, not being from America, I don't know where Houston, or Dallas, or other places are. When reading an article about the University of Houston, and not being from America, I should be able to get from that article to a page about Houston.

There is no real reason why there should be a limit to links. Overlinking is in my mind a pointless rule, because as an encyclopedia the goal should be to be as useful and interlinking as possible, not as consise and pretty.

Furthermore not only does "overlinking" create useful links between pages, but it also backs up the text with kind of references. If you're talking about a place in an article, then I should be able to click that place's name to verify what you're saying about that place, even if it's just to another wikipedia article.

I would also suggest that, barring common English words, a word's usefullness as a link is given by the fact it appears in the page at all - if it isn't important to the subject it wouldn't be on the page.

Don't assume that somebody "wouldn't want to visit x". It's hugely big headed to think nobody needs to know about the United States. This is an English language wiki not an American-only one.

95.175.136.29 (talk) 10:28, 26 January 2012 (UTC)

Many of us feel that way, but a small clique of determined delinkers refuse to allow any policy change here.-- cheers, Michael C. Price ^talk 11:05, 26 January 2012 (UTC)

Linking every single word (and I mean every, as my desktop Encarta dictionary definitions do) could work in some respects, if, like the Encarta system, linked items were not visually distinguished from their surroundings (except perhaps if one's cursor were hovered over a word). But what we'd lose is the ability to use our expertise, our familiarity with a topic and its sibling articles, to point readers to useful, relevant, and valuable targets through intelligent rationing, as we currently do. This would be a major loss of functionality. Tony (talk) 11:09, 26 January 2012 (UTC)

Links are not scarce and therefore do not require rationing. -- cheers, Michael C. Price ^talk 15:17, 26 January 2012 (UTC)#

This could work if there were "links" and "important links". Links would appear black, important links blue. 90.220.230.144 (talk) 17:19, 26 January 2012 (UTC)

See WP:PEREN#All words and phrases should be linked (though I agree that in the last few years that idea has been taken a bit too seriously and common words are unlinked no matter how relevant they are to the topic).― A. di M.​  14:09, 26 January 2012 (UTC)

There are of course two issues here - whether such a thing as overlinking exists at all; and, if so, where sensible boundaries lie. Unlike, it would seem, the OP here I accept the first premise - for example, I personally don't see the value in linking common English-language words unless very relevant to the page topic, or section of that page, at hand. Equally, while I would not bar repeating links, I think you can have excess repetition. On the first point, "A Labrador is a type of dog" is good; "while walking his dog, Einstein came up with the theory of relativity", no need, surely. The same applies for so-called "well known" countries, geographical places - eg "Guam is an island in the Pacific Ocean"; "Frankfurt is a town in Germany" etc seem sensible, logical and useful links. Fortunately, the actual wording of wp:overlink backs that interpretation, encouraging as it does "relevant" links. And wp:link as a whole stresses the role of links in binding the encyclopedia together. Unfortunately, a small number of editors have taken it upon themselves, despite what overlink actually says, to remove vast numbers of perfectly useful and valid links (including ones equivalent to those mentioned above), while citing it in support of their actions, and accusing everyone else of simply being "wrong" about the issue, rather than accepting that - shock! - people might differ in their views about what is "better" linking.

The problem seems to lie in the numerous assumptions they make - eg that certain things are "well known" to all readers; that such readers would not want to navigate to (and read) the detailed WP page on that thing even if the broad topic is familiar to them; that somehow people are duped into clicking onto links that they do not actually want to click on, and that we must remove said links to prevent that happening; that one or two self-appointed editors know better than every single potential reader of that page what other pages those readers will want to - or even should - navigate to; that people have to read a whole page and that if they only make it to one section, that's tough on them in terms of having relevant links there if it's already been linked elsewhere recently; that people can always use the search function if the thing they are interested in is not linked (sure they can - but why should they have to?). As for said editors' "expertise" and "familiarity with the topic" - the first is unsupported self-assertion; the second has no relevance of course to the familiarity that others might or might not have with the topic. N-HH talk/edits 17:23, 26 January 2012 (UTC)

City, state and country names

In my many years of dealing with music album articles, I've always linked US-based recording locations in this manner: Cotati, California; Easton, Pennsylvania; North Hollywood, Los Angeles, California; San Diego North County, California, etc. For locations outside the US, I've done it like this: Reading, Berkshire, England; Richmond, Victoria, Australia; Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Is this correct, or should the cities not be linked? I think they should, because whilst major countries like England and Canada should be obvious to native English readers, those specific cities, counties and provinces may not be. On the "Overlinking" section of this article, it states to "Avoid linking the names of major geographic features and locations", but what exactly constitutes a major location? Should, then, the province of Ontario not be linked? Again, I think it should, because not every reader will be well-versed in Canadian geography (certainly not here in the UK, where I'm sure some illiterate souls couldn't even point to Canada on an atlas!) All in all, I'm not getting much information from the quoted sentence above. It leaves too much room for ambiguity. Mac Dreamstate (talk) 15:03, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

Irregardless on the linking of the city to start, when you link the city, you don't need to link any larger states/providences/countries that it is in, as it is implicit that the city article will have these links. To be explicit, all 4 examples you lead off with are linked properly for this, but the Toronto Ontario example is wrong (it should be "Toronto, Ontario, Canada". As for what is a major city that shouldn't be linked, ask yourself if you'd expect the city to be known to anyone that is able to access Wikipedia. Also consider what importance that the location has to the actual album, since geographical location is rarely germane to the topic of the article, outside of the location of the recording studio. For your examples, I wouldn't at all link North Hollywood or Toronto, but the others are not quite as well obvious. --MASEM (t) 15:11, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

The part about relevance to the topic makes sense, and I've only recently started to consider not linking locations at all within album page infoboxes (having observed the various templates in more detail). I'm still on the fence about that, but most likely I'll add it to my list of things to start de-linking in my overlink cleanup sweeps. I try to do things by the book around here but sometimes I like to skip the pages a little bit, heh. Outside of album articles, though, are you saying that it comes down to a judgement call to link certain cities, rather than something set in (Wikipedia's) stone? Mac Dreamstate (talk) 15:27, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

Well, its basically "What are cities that you'd expect every Wikipedia to know?" I'm sure there's a short list where there's no disagreement such as New York City, London, Paris, Tokyo, etc. But there's a broader list that becomes a bit more iffy, and likely will have regional differences, like Portland (either Maine or Oregon), Manchester, Lyons, Osaka, etc. At that point I'd defer to how relevant the link is to the content. Note that if it is in an infobox or in a table as opposed to prose, it is generally okay to link even if it a large well known city , as long as that's part of the consistency for the infobox/table. The point of avoiding the links to well-known cities in prose is that they can be distracting when the term is obvious. ("Soandso traveled to New York City to record his latest album..."), but helpful if the term is unfamiliar otherwise. --MASEM (t) 17:11, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

The two key words in the guidelines are "well known" and "relevant". The limits of what is "well known" have never been defined (indeed, I'm not sure you ever could, although people seem to try pretty hard and enforce linking/delinking on the basis of what they happen to believe); and the relevance allowance overrides that anyway. In this case, I'm not sure how relevant you'd say cities/countries were to albums. Beyond that, chain-linking I guess is frowned on. But equally, the rules that attempt to cut back on "unnecessary" or "cluttering" links are obviously less of an issue in infoboxes, out of prose. And, finally, these are guidelines of course anyway, not rules of stone. N-HH talk/edits 20:51, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

So within the album infoboxes, linking to not-so-well-known locations isn't frowned upon after all? That's what I've been doing until now. Granted, there's still the issue of it not being relevant to a music article, but if it isn't necessarily such a wrong thing to do, then maybe I'll spare myself the task of going back and de-linking everything from album articles I've created/edited. Plus, I don't see why people wouldn't be interested in knowing more about a cool-sounding place like Växjö (as can be seen on the article for Heavy Machinery), heh. Mac Dreamstate (talk) 22:02, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

Links in infoboxes are generally fine even if is a large city; consistency should be sought after there. But the same idea of chain linking should be avoided (eg don't use Toronto Ontario but instead use Toronto, Ontario). --MASEM (t) 22:09, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

OK, one more thing: in the case of a more long-winded location such as Woodland Hills, Los Angeles, California, is that how it should be formatted or should California be left blank, as in Woodland Hills, Los Angeles, California? I'm not very keen on dropping the name of the state altogether because, again, for the sake of geographically challenged readers they might not even know where Los Angeles is. That, or abbreviating the state name to CA, as seems to be customary over there—not everyone will be aware of that system works. Mac Dreamstate (talk) 22:26, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

I would include the full geographic string in the link since being linked, if someone really didn't know what California was, they would easily find their way there following the first few links in the leads of the linked city articles. --MASEM (t) 23:55, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

I'd say if an English-speaker doesn't know where LA is, they should go back to infants' school. The whole string is unnecessary clutter. What's wrong with just Woodland Hills, Los Angeles? Easier to read and identify the link, yes? If there's some particular reason to link to it, this should be to a more specific section or daughter article of the city that is relevant to the topic. MOSLINK also says to avoid bunches of links. Tony (talk) 02:12, 3 February 2012 (UTC)

I'm not sure the focus on "where X is" and whether WP users might or might not know that already really helps much. WP articles on places don't simply offer a geolocation or one-line description and nothing else; and, again, it's impossible to say what individual WP users might know or not, or what they might be interested in reading more on, whether they know about the thing at a basic level already or not. Comments about "going back to infants' school" don't help much either. Anyway, when it comes to the specific questions, the guidelines aren't 100% prescriptive, and nor should they be. Equally, these responses are all just the opinions of random other editors. Some dislike chain linking that string-links to city, state/county, country; others, such as myself, aren't much fussed. None of us are experts any more than anyone else, and I'd just stick to what make sense to you, while applying a bit of common sense to the process n order to avoid both the extremes of needless cluttering with redundant links, especially in text, and of needless asceticism that limits reasonable navigability for the wide range of people who come to read WP articles, with all their diverse knowledge and interests. If that helps. N-HH talk/edits 09:53, 3 February 2012 (UTC)

We've already excluded chainlinking from this. It's one link containing three terms, linking to the most specific location. --MASEM (t) 13:16, 3 February 2012 (UTC)

Incoming links at India and Turkey

Currently there are a large number of incoming links pointing at India and Turkey. For India in particular, there are a lot of cases that the articles talk about people or events of pre-1947 partition India. For Turkey, there are articles that talk about the bird. Since neither is disambiguation page, is there any way that incoming links pointing at them can be monitored? 61.18.170.228 (talk) 17:18, 17 February 2012 (UTC)

If these incoming links cannot be monitored how can they be disambiguated and modified to point to the correct page (e.g. Turkey)? 61.18.170.76 (talk) 15:16, 18 February 2012 (UTC)

Bio intros being linked/delinked to countries and constituent countries

Hello, I need clarification for my gnome edits, concerning links to bio intros. Which are proper [United States|American], [Wales|Welsh], [Canada|Canadians] for examples or [Americans|American], [Welsh people|Welsh], [Canadians|Canadian] for examples? GoodDay (talk) 08:34, 18 February 2012 (UTC)

In principle, I'd favour the "people" articles rather than the country, although a lot of them are full of ethno-nationalist rubbish and linking to them might imply that the subject is more of an ethnic flag-waver than they really are. It can also spark pointless WP arguments - eg someone obecting to a Basque painter being linked as "Spanish". Linking them as coming from "Spain" is less controversial as a statement of fact of course.

Beyond that, you'll find plenty of people on this page who think there often should not be a link there at all, especially for places like the US, on the rather odd grounds that "everyone knows what/where the US is". There are no hard rules though, and also a possible contradiction between WP:CONTEXTLINK section in wp:lead, which seems to encourage links (and did so even more before one of the regulars here went and quietly changed it); and WP:OVERLINK here, which looks to discourage them. Sorry, that's not really an answer, but I'm not sure there is one. N-HH talk/edits 11:29, 18 February 2012 (UTC)

I can't see the utility of these "people" pages. "Americans", for example, opens with, "People of the United States, also known as simply Americans or American people, are the citizens of the United States. The United States is home to people of different nationalities.". Gee. Profound. The whole point of the overlink guideline is that linking should be used carefully—rationed, as it were. There are a number of compelling reasons for doing this. GoodDay, can you provide examples of bio articles where such links are useful to readers? In addition, almost every such general link could be strengthened by making it more specific, to a daughter article or a section. I don't want to get into a debate about this with N-HH, who disagrees with the guideline on these matters. Tony (talk) 12:38, 18 February 2012 (UTC)

Well no Tony, I broadly agree with the guideline at overlink, which advises against linking things for the sake of it, but specifically and explicitly allows for links to supposedly "well known" terms (the threshold for which is never defined anyway) when relevant to the topic at hand. I just disagree with your and one or two other people's entirely subjective interpretation and implementation of it. You are well aware of, but constantly elide, that distinction. Please, finally, can you stop doing that? Here, as with all linking questions, surely the issue is one of relevance, context and navigation, not whether someone might or might not know what X is or are. Whether the links are "useful" or not is also kind of a meaningless question, because obviously any content or link should have utility; but that just begs for a definition of what we mean by that and who you define it in respect of - what is "useful" to one person is useless to another. As noted, I do agree on the point about the poor quality of the people articles. However, quoting the opening definition of one of them and pretending that is all the article says hardly goes to proves the complete pointlessness of that one, let alone of all of them; and, if they are really completely pointless, they should surely not exist at all. If the pages have any value at all, it logically follows that a link to them will be relevant in some cases. The question is when exactly. N-HH talk/edits 13:05, 18 February 2012 (UTC)

Well no, N-HH. "If the pages have any value at all, it logically follows that a link to them will be relevant in some cases." This is not logical. One or two other people ... do you have evidence for that assertion of low numbers? Please, finally, can you stop doing that? "because obviously any content or link should have utility" ... let's link every occurrence of "the", then. Tony (talk) 16:12, 18 February 2012 (UTC)

Foolishly perhaps, I will respond to your rather pithy and utterly childish - in terms of its repetition of my phrasing - comment. 1) Unless you are suggesting there are topics that stand in isolation from everything else in the world, it is fairly certain that there will be some cases where a link to the page on thing X from another page will be warranted. That's a rather unremarkable observation on my part. What is remarkable is that anyone should contest it. 2) Yes, I do have evidence. It is only you, OhConfucius and Colonies Chris and a couple of others who I see tearing through pages taking out not just admittedly repetitive, redundant or irrelevant links, but perfectly decent ones too. By contrast, I see people regularly querying that behaviour, on this page and on your talk pages; and, of course, you have persistently refused to ever point to where there was evidence of a wider consensus for this. You just assert it, while misrepresenting what the guidelines actually say, as you are doing here. 3) You were the one who insisted on links being "useful". My point about utility was agreeing with you on that. And you really let yourself down by throwing the "let's link 'the' shall we?" into the mix again. If you can't debate this seriously and can't - or won't - understand what people are saying, then don't bother. N-HH talk/edits 16:38, 18 February 2012 (UTC)

It would appear that de-linking from countries/constituent countries & people articles, would be best? GoodDay (talk) 15:30, 18 February 2012 (UTC)

Different editors will continue to disagree over how the guidelines should be interpreted. It seems to me that any changes made without a very clear and specific justification in each case may well become contentious, and are best avoided. Ghmyrtle (talk) 15:39, 18 February 2012 (UTC)

I think we can all agree that these particular pipelinks [Republic of Ireland|Irish], [Northern Ireland|Irish] & [Irish people|Irish], are certaintly best left alone. GoodDay (talk) 15:43, 18 February 2012 (UTC)

I'm not so sure about this. Ireland is very commonly known throughout the world, and especially among people who know enough English to be using this site. More importantly, piping in this way can sometimes slip up: there are historical, national, and geographical sensitivities we should not display incorrectly by mistake, by piping everything to Ireland and Irish. The first time in an article, if the meaning is Eire or the Republic of Ireland, and this matters in the context, it shouldn't be piped to Ireland or Irish, which can be ambiguous. Let's be careful. Certainly Northern Ireland is a risky pipe to Irish. Please judge on a case-by-case basis. Tony (talk) 16:08, 18 February 2012 (UTC)

It's best to skip the Irish stuff, IMHO. GoodDay (talk) 16:12, 18 February 2012 (UTC)

The way I think of these links - very common terms or names or the like but limited to the first or second sentence of the lead, typically in the immediately sentences "TOPIC is a X, Y Z" - are what I think of as taxonomic links, establishing where the specific topic falls into a large classification structure. Such links, only in those lead sentences are important to have, as long as consensus generally agrees that they apply to how we at WP organizing topics. Sometimes these will be repeated into the infobox, but not always. We should link these taxonomic terms when used like this, as to allow readers to jump to the immediately higher-up class in that heirarchial information structure. So, in the case of an Irish person, linking "Irish" to an article about people of Irish nationality makes sense, because by nationality is one way we classify people. Mind you, there's a lot of gotchas that I recognize here, but that's why its almost always what the first or second sentence of the lead where these phrases appear that linking makes sense; outside of that, the value of such links decreases dramatically. --MASEM (t) 16:40, 18 February 2012 (UTC)

Concerning constituent countries: I assume there'll be little (if any) complaints about changing links in corresponding bio articles from [England|English], [Wales|Welsh], [Scotland|Scottish] to [English people|English], [Welsh people|Welsh], [Scottish people|Scottish], however. GoodDay (talk) 16:46, 18 February 2012 (UTC)

Irregardless if they should be linked or not, yes, the nationality article should be linked, not the nation's article. --MASEM (t) 16:53, 18 February 2012 (UTC)

That's good enough for me. GoodDay (talk) 17:00, 18 February 2012 (UTC)

Ha! Wait until you get to someone from Cornwall. Are they English? Cornish? Both? And, just to clarify, since Tony seems to have taken it upon himself to completely misrepresent my views on this, in this thread and on the OP's own talk page, thus creating the very row he claimed he wanted to avoid. I am agnostic on the specific issue of nationality links in leads - whether they go to people or country articles - and genuinely don't have a view to offer beyond my original comments. And there is no firm right or wrong on the point, however expert individual editors might like to tell you they are on how to link "properly". However, on the broader point, it is flat-out wrong to suggest that either the guidelines or a separate consensus deprecates links to "well known" things full stop. There is a relevance exemption, explicitly in the guidelines. Equally, "WP is not a dictionary" actually works, if anything, against the do-not-link argument, precisely because the WP pages being linked to are not simply dictionary definitions (this point will sink in eventually for the one person who insist on repeatedly citing it). This also undercuts the "a 10 year old knows what American means" argument, which also has no relevance since the links are not necessarily there to simply define or explain what something is, but to provide context and enable navigation between pages on related or relevant topics. N-HH talk/edits 17:02, 18 February 2012 (UTC)

For info, WP:LEAD used to include a specific example of "American pianist", with a link to both US and pianist. That was taken out in a unilateral intervention a few months ago. Of the small number who then commented on the edit, the ensuing talk page discussion about this came down 4 to 2 (3 to 1 if you exclude me and Tony) against such a restricted interpretation of linking things like nationality and profession in the lead based on what every reader supposedly already knows. Not a big sample, but it's the only direct discussion on the specific question here that I've seen anywhere prior to this one. N-HH talk/edits 17:16, 18 February 2012 (UTC)

I'll just keep puttering along. Since different editors have different bio articles on their watchlists, they can always merely revert any of my changes. GoodDay (talk) 17:20, 18 February 2012 (UTC)

Linking inside titles

Looking for previous discussions or guidelines about linking inside titles, for example

The book Rose is My Wife was published in 1956

vs.

The book Rose is My Wife was published in 1956

Generally it's been my experience we don't wikilink words inside titles, rather add clarifications in parenthesis, like:

The book Rose is My Wife (about Rose McGowan) was published in 1956.

The reason being wikilinks insides titles will stop working once the title is red or blue linked; are confusing because the link breaks up the title into separate parts; and confusing to newbies who think clicking on a title should go to the book itself. Any help on previous consensus appreciated. Green Cardamom (talk) 20:03, 24 February 2012 (UTC)

I agree. It irked the hell out of me when the first link in Með suð í eyrum við spilum endalaust#Track listing went here rather than here. ― A. di M.​  20:24, 24 February 2012 (UTC)

Agreed - I can understand the need to link, but there's always a way to do it without placing the link in the title directly. --MASEM (t) 23:46, 24 February 2012 (UTC)

100 links to The Observer?

User:The Rambling Man believes that this Manual of Style recommends linking to "items every time in a sortable table". Now, common sense and what I understand as the spirit of this guideline seem to argue against repeating the same link to a major newspaper over 100 times, but maybe he is right. What do others think? --John (talk) 21:01, 29 March 2012 (UTC)

While this is becoming a bit forum shopping, I'm happy to contribute my perspective (for the third time for John's benefit) which is that OVERLINK allows us to be generous to our readers if useful within a table. Sortable tables enable our readers to focus on the categories of tables that they are most interested in. Now, if we link an item once and once only in a sortable table, and our reader sorts the table in a manner different to the default, the first instance of a given linkable item won't necessarily be linked. Indeed, it might be linked some way away from the only linked item in the table. Is that useful to our readers? I don't believe so. For many months (maybe years), featured lists have received community consensus with linkable items in sortable tables being linked every time. In this instance, User:John has used a semi-automated tool with an incorrect (in my opinion) rule set to remove those links. I believe his edit to be incorrect, unhelpful and therefore disagree with his approach. The Rambling Man (talk) 21:09, 29 March 2012 (UTC)

At the FLC of the article in question, I asked for these links to be added. At the time, REPEATLINK was more explicit about it than now. I'll look into when and why this changed. Goodraise 22:56, 29 March 2012 (UTC)

I would also question such repeat links. The Observer is a well-known journal, and over 100 repeats does seem rather over the top, but: 1)REPEATLINK seems to allow it, because it's in a table and 2)it's a large table. IMHO, the problem is not as irritating as if it was a table where 'USA' or 'Russia' was linked 100 times.--Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 23:06, 29 March 2012 (UTC)

Okay, I've traced the change to this edit and that discussion. Goodraise 23:13, 29 March 2012 (UTC)

On a sortable table - as long as the linking of one specific column of data makes sense for all elements in that dataset (excluding the obvious cases of redlinks), then yes, repeat links should be completely fine. There is the option that Ohconfucius suggests as a consideration is that if the terms in the data column are sufficiently common/well-known, then linking may not be needed (eg. depending on scenario, a link to a country column if the article is not directly related to geography, politics, or the like); however, if it is the case that there are not-well known elements that would be linked among well-known elements, then all elements that can be linked should be linked in this table to be consistent. --MASEM (t) 00:41, 30 March 2012 (UTC)

Vertical inconsistency can look a bit messy in a table. Tony (talk) 01:47, 30 March 2012 (UTC)

My two cents I wrote the article and the reason I linked it repeatedly is because it's a sortable table, as pointed out before. It seems more helpful to me for users to be able to find out what this publication is each time its mentioned rather than having to find the single instance where it's linked. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 02:01, 30 March 2012 (UTC)

As ever, the argument that this might be useful and offers substantive functionality seems to outweigh the argument that one or two people might not like the look of multiple blues in a table, which would seem to be of marginal relevance. FWIW I think more comprehensive linking is more aesthetically attractive in tables anyway, so the appearance argument cuts both ways, depending on who you ask, which makes it even less worth bothering with. Also, as a side-point, I'm not sure the Observer is that well known out of the UK (or even within in, if you look at circulation figures). N-HH talk/edits 14:40, 30 March 2012 (UTC)

That assertion seems to presuppose that only the paper's readers know a journal. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 15:41, 30 March 2012 (UTC)

Well they might know of it or know what it is, but I was assuming that people who don't read it don't know much about it. That may or may not always be true, but it's a reasonable guess (and, on even more of a side-point, since a lot of the more radical delinking of certain terms that goes on comes justified by the claim that "people know what X is", that's an important distinction btw, which often gets lost). N-HH talk/edits 16:47, 30 March 2012 (UTC)

OK, I'll admit it: what's the Observer? It sounds like some kind of newspaper or something. Art LaPella (talk) 20:37, 30 March 2012 (UTC)

If a genuine "observation" (irony) then fair play, but if an attempt at irony, poor (this is English Wikipedia, not British Wikipedia); why should someone (e.g. Randy) from somewhere in the midst of the US (e.g. Boise) know that The Observer is a weak Sunday pseudo-broadsheet in the UK with a circulation of around a quarter of a million? i.e. read by 1/240th of our populous? In the meantime, an Italian sports newspaper that most US citizens (the majority of our readers) will never have heard of gets a third of a million readers? What you may think is obvious is not obvious to every English-speaking reader, nor the rest of our global audience. The Rambling Man (talk) 21:21, 30 March 2012 (UTC)

No irony intended. I do in fact live 600 miles from Boise. Art LaPella (talk) 22:04, 30 March 2012 (UTC)

Aren't we getting a bit off topic here? Things like Russia, Africa, or Earth don't usually need to be linked, at all. That The Observer should be linked at least once, doesn't seem to be in question here. Whether the average reader will be familiar with The Observer is besides the point for links to it beyond the first. The question here is whether the utility of linking to it on every occurrence within a sortable table outweighs the distraction caused by the mass of blue it entails and the aesthetical displeasure it apparently causes to some of our editors. Personally, I think the distraction is much less an issue within a table than it is within a paragraph of prose, but maybe that's just me. Goodraise 21:41, 30 March 2012 (UTC)

Entirely so. The initial assertion by User:John that "we definitely do not need multiple links to the same target; one or two will suffice" is part of the origin of this debate. Of course, how to implement "one or two" links to the same Observer in this table would need to be discussed. Do you link the first and the 50th? The first and last? The 25th and 75th? I'm not sure how that would work. For me (and, it would seem, all recently promoted FLs), it's all or nothing. Sure, no need to link Earth but there seems to me to be a legitimate reason to link minority British publications in a global English-speaking encyclopaedia, and there seems a legitimate reason to do it every time in a sortable table where the first instance of the name of the publication may not appear first or near a reader's interest after a re-sort. Of course, for prose this is an entirely different discussion. The Rambling Man (talk) 21:57, 30 March 2012 (UTC)

It seems to me that the two arguments for linking every instance of a linkable term in sortable tables are aesthetic ("Vertical inconsistency can look a bit messy in a table") and utilitarian (Randy from Boise will not know what The Observer is, will not properly appreciate an article about Orwell's writings without being able to click to our article on the paper, and will not be able to find this link unless every single instance of the term is linked, because he may have resorted the table). The Rambling Man says it should be "all or nothing". I disagree; I am sure that Randy will be able to find one link somewhere in the table if it's so important to him. This is what I understand the guideline currently to recommend. The spirit of the guideline is that for the majority of our readers who are not Randy from Boise, the multiplicity of low-value links will distract from the fewer high-value ones, and I am still struggling to see a cogent argument to depart from this in sortable tables, any more than in prose. When I read prose I often do not start from the top; for example on biographies I often start at the end and work backwards. In doing this I would not try to enforce the practice of linking every instance of a link, just for my convenience in case I see an unlinked instance of The Observer before I see the link; why should this be any different? --John (talk) 23:26, 30 March 2012 (UTC)

So your suggestion on how/when to link is what exactly? Every fifth instance? Every ninth? What's your practical solution rather than your individual interpretation of the spirit of the guideline? The Rambling Man (talk) 09:37, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

I'd go with once, as I said above. --John (talk) 10:15, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

So the point of OVERLINK as a guide and an aid to our readers is what? The Rambling Man (talk) 10:28, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

the multiplicity of low-value links will distract from the fewer high-value ones, and I am still struggling to see a cogent argument to depart from this in sortable tables, any more than in prose. What's distracting for someone in prose might not be distracting for them in a table, and vice versa. (Plus, what's distracting for someone might not be distracting for someone else – people are not all alike.) ― A. di M.​  17:03, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

• I agree with N-HH here: to expand, aesthetically, either all blue (or none) in a table column seems to be better that the patchy effect. The sortability of a column can make it worse when inconsistently linked. A table doesn't present the problems of reading difficulty and dilution that we have from linking in running prose (here, N-HH doesn't agree, I know, and we'll have to accept these different positions). Is the item linked anywhere else in the text? If so, it may not be necessary to link every instance in the table. Tony (talk) 11:18, 31 March 2012 (UTC)
  • That's a great suggestion, Tony. It is the low-value nature of the link as much as the 100+ repetitions that offends this guideline. In a case like this it might suffice to have a sentence outside the table that says "Orwell published over 100 articles in The Observer" rather than linking every instance in the table. The guideline currently says "links may be repeated in ...tables..." (my emphasis) and not must. Certainly it doesn't recommend linking every occurrence. Do those who hold this view believe that we should insert something along the lines of "In sortable tables, every instance of every linkable word must be linked"? --John (talk) 11:37, 31 March 2012 (UTC)
    • No, The Observer wasn't linked beforehand, and per many of our readers who don't know what The Observer or The Adelphi is, these are very much not low-value in nature. The Rambling Man (talk) 13:20, 31 March 2012 (UTC)
    • There is the option that, say, a column in a long table only derives values from a set of 3-5 elements, of having a catch-all statement right before the table to explain that column and provide singular links there, avoiding linking in the table. (Any more than 5, and you've created a sea of blue in prose, so that's not a good option). As Tony says, internal consistency is the key guidance here, since we're not talking about well-known geographic terms. If the page editors feel The Observer needs linking in the table, that's fine, as long as all other items within the same column that can be linked are linked. --MASEM (t) 14:08, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

Appropriate way to mark dead links?

I ran across a dead link here (the last reference). I've seen a few links marked as dead but before I did so I thought I'd look around for the proper way of doing so. I've not be able to find anything, but this article looks like a natural place for that information. How should one mark dead links, and can this information be added to the maintenance section of this article? Garamond Lethe (talk) 22:13, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

Template:Dead link. ― A. di M.​  22:34, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

That's what I was looking for. Thanks! Garamond Lethe (talk) 23:39, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

Underscores

This seems never to have been discussed. Some editors have the habit of separating words in a link, not with spaces but with underscores. They probably do this because they're familiar with some software that requires underscores. But here on WP, they're not necessary. Plus, it looks terrible when the link isn't piped (e.g. President_of_the_United_States), and for those who spend any time attending to aesthetics, it means extra work for them to remove the damn underscores.

Can MOS mention this matter, please? My preference would be to BAN them. That's probably unrealistic, but can we at least say they're undesirable, unnecessary and unattractive? -- Jack of Oz ^{[your turn]} 22:05, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

A Bot like UsefulPixieBot could probably remove these on sight. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 12:53, 11 April 2012 (UTC)

Maybe, but that is not related to what I'm asking. Underscoring is surely a stylistic issue, and a MOS ought to have a position on it. -- ♬ Jack of Oz ♬ ^{[your turn]} 20:54, 11 April 2012 (UTC)

Modifying OVERLINK

I propose modifying WP:OVERLINK to make an exception to:

Avoid linking the names of major geographic features and locations, languages, religions, and common professions

for the first instances of such terms, in infoboxes. For example:

Birth place = Birmingham, England

Death place = Derby, England

Thoughts? Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 12:51, 11 April 2012 (UTC)

Well, first, you'd never link the first one like you did. You don't need run-on blue links for a city and its country, but instead simply use Birmingham, England for a single link, and the same for the second, since it's expected that the country would be linked in the city article. That said, if the place was still well known, like New York City, then linking the first time in an infobox would be reasonable. --MASEM (t) 13:20, 11 April 2012 (UTC)

First: on the contrary, I would, and I recommend that we codify that in the MoS. Your [[Birmingham|Birmingham, England]] example is particularly unhelpful and I would never do that; indeed, I'd remove such when I saw them, which is thankfully rare to the point of extinction. It's even more important to link less-well known places than the well known; but who's to say what a reader in other countries knows or does not know? Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 13:40, 11 April 2012 (UTC)

I think it's fine as is. We don't need to link to obvious things. It's just distracting. Even the Birmingham article doesn't link to England. There's always the search box for the person who wants to know what England is Bhny (talk) 13:56, 11 April 2012 (UTC)

But, as I always have to say when this comes up, linking isn't just about explaining what something is to people - it's about navigability to related/relevant topics, as the guidelines expressly allow for, even for "well known" terms. Plus of course, WP articles don't just provide dictionary-style definitions, they're detailed and lengthy profiles. I know what England is and am relatively well educated when it comes to history, but can guarantee you half of what is on the page would be news to me. It doesn't simply say "country in northern Europe, part of UK". Also, how do we decide where the bar falls? Do we have an ideal, average reader who we assume knows what England is but maybe not Belgium? What if 20% of people do know Belgium (and how would establish that anyway) - is that enough to not link Belgium? 50%? People come to WP from 1001 different backgrounds, including 10 year-olds from Papua New Guinea no doubt on occasion.
As for infoboxes specifically, I'm personally easy about more frequent linking there, to the point where they act as navboxes almost. Plus of course, having links there can justify culling the perhaps weaker related links from the main text, which should make it easier to come to agreement on that. N-HH talk/edits 14:16, 11 April 2012 (UTC)

ps: the fact that England is not linked in the main text of the Birmingham page btw strikes me as an omission. N-HH talk/edits 14:19, 11 April 2012 (UTC)

The point that I think has been determined from past consensus (I think, I'd have to search to double check) is that we avoid back-to-back links of the style [[Town]], [[Country]] in favor of [[Town|Town, Country]] when the reason for inclusion of the link to the town is germane, such as here indicating the place of birth or death. This is not trivializing the country link, but the fact that the country like is far less germane in most cases when the town is given immediately before as in this example, and there should be reasonable expectation that the country the town is in will be linked in the town's article. --MASEM (t) 15:10, 11 April 2012 (UTC)

The problem isn't necessarily that readers don't know where England is, or what's in the England article. As pointed out by Masem, this dreadful habit of carpet-linking of geographical topics to successively less germane articles is linking for its own sake. Navigational links are well and good, but links really ought to be germane (i.e. relevant in the first degree); the tendency of using wikilinks as some sort of dictionary function is not what we are about. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 15:30, 11 April 2012 (UTC)

"There's always the search box for the person who wants to know what England is " - Some should let Sir Tim Berners-Lee know how he's been barking up the wrong tree all these years. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 15:38, 11 April 2012 (UTC)

As I thought I had pointed out (above and separately ad nauseam previously; and as any cursory reading of any half-decent WP page would make obvious) Ohconfucius, the point is precisely that WP links do not simply provide dictionary definitions. The - entirely correct - "WP is not a dictionary" argument actually reinforces the point that links can be useful above and beyond simply explaining what something is in basic terms. It doesn't count against providing links where they are to terms that are sufficiently relevant - or even, more tightly, germane - and I still have absolutely no idea why people cite it as an argument against linking. "The golden retriever is a type of dog" should link to dog, "Marx met Engels while taking his dog for a walk" probably shouldn't. But the reason why in each case has nothing to do with whether people know what a dog is or not, or whether the dog page simply says "yapping thing with four legs". And I agree with Andy 100% about the old "people can use the search box" argument. Sure they can. But why make them when we don't have to? The internet has functions here that can help people that paper encyclopedias do not have. Why on earth would we be making things more difficult? And then, truly bizarrely, justifying it all by proclaiming that it was supposedly more useful for the reader (as we-who-know-best define that)? N-HH talk/edits 21:19, 11 April 2012 (UTC)

I'm going to step out of this one. I didn't realize how often it has been discussed. Others are more qualified here Bhny (talk) 22:26, 11 April 2012 (UTC)

Nick, we'll never achieve a confluence, I fear, because of a basic difference in angle about the reading experience. There are several disadvantages of linking that need to be weighed, in every instance, with the advantages. Tony (talk) 05:21, 12 April 2012 (UTC)

Well in fact of course one thing that gets obscured sometimes is that you and I do both agree on the benefits of cutting out the many redundant and repetitive links that end up getting plonked all over many articles - the difference lies in where we'd put the bar and what justifications we'd use for losing or retaining (eg I'm opposed to blanket removal of links to geographic or other so-called "common" terms - where they are proper nouns rather than ordinary English words - especially from articles where they are clearly relevant and directly related to the main topic, as are the guidelines themselves). More on point, as noted above, I'm certainly open to having more links in infoboxes, not least since this makes it easier to remove those same links from within the main prose text of articles, especially the lead, when they're of 50-50 significance or relevance. N-HH talk/edits 11:38, 12 April 2012 (UTC)

ps:@Bhny I don't see anyone really as being more qualified than anyone else. Some of us might be better able to bore on the topic, but we all have valid views as readers and editors on how to make this place work better - indeed, as an occasional editor, I came to the wider topic of linking as a reader first, a little confused as to why people were sweeping through articles removing all links to France even from articles specifically about French geography and/or things from France; and then being a little confused when I was told that some editors knew how to link better and that I should simply trust them on that. N-HH talk/edits 11:38, 12 April 2012 (UTC)

Easter egg guidance needed

I made this edit to avoid what I thought was a deceptive easter egg, but it was reverted by an administrator. The current piped link appears to go against the advice under Intuitiveness in the Piped links section and against Wikipedia:Writing better articles#Principle of least astonishment - but maybe the consensus has changed, or maybe Plot sections can be more relaxed? Could those more familiar with this issue please advise and possibly suggest clarifications in the MOS, as I still believe I made a reasonable edit, and that the current state still has BLP issues. -84user (talk) 19:24, 14 April 2012 (UTC)

That link is useless and shouldn't be there anyway. It makes you watch an ad then plays an unrevealing clip. I deleted it Bhny (talk) 20:48, 14 April 2012 (UTC)

I think they were talking about the [[Julian Assange|a blonde-haired rat]] internal link, not the external link. I agree such confusing piped link are Evil. ― A. di M.​  15:11, 16 April 2012 (UTC)

yes sorry, I missed that and you are correct. that piped link is confusing and should not be there Bhny (talk) 15:43, 16 April 2012 (UTC)

Names within names

I propose an addition to the section "What generally should not be linked": names within names. If there is a building, street, airport, park, other geographical entity, tool, or pretty much anything named after someone or something else, do not link to the name within the name. For example, all of the following links should be avoided: Hancock Airport; Wilshire Boulevard; Maimonides Medical Center; Mount Edith Cavell; Hoover High School; Mahatma Gandhi University; Humphrey–Hawkins Full Employment Act; Esquipulas Peace Agreement; Rio Conference; I Love Lucy; The Lion in Winter; The Pink Panther; Cascade Elementary School; Phillips screwdriver; Ferris wheel; Teddy bear. Whether the outer name would be a red link or blue link, the link should be to the outer name or not at all. I look forward to a constructive discussion here to generate consensus and refine the wording.—Anomalocaris (talk) 02:32, 19 April 2012 (UTC)

I would think this follows from a previous section about linking a specific word in a title of a work. There's nearly always a better way to organizing information to avoid this type of link - if the inner name is germaine to the article, explain that reasoning; if not, you can usually assume that the linked inner name will be on the page of the outer link. --MASEM (t) 04:02, 19 April 2012 (UTC)

Linking sense

This talk page and the Linking guidelines could drive one nuts. I recommend that we drop most of the strictures on formally functional linking. Leave it to good sense and the editor (and I don't mean cruising red-pencillers, but primary editors), except where there is some gross SNAFU such as self-reference.

• The objection that blue links break the flow of reading is valid only until the reader learns what the blue means. Pretty soon he doesn't even see blue until he thinks: "Uh. What the blip does that mean? Oh, there's a link; goody!"
• Granted gross overlinking is stupid and sets teeth on edge, but it is rare and otherwise essentially harmless, venial.
• Even slight underlinking is worse than gross overlinking and can be harmful and confusing for a number of reasons. Certainly at the very least, by the time one has scratched one's head and decided to type in a speculative search for the meaning of the term to see whether the text means what one thinks, the disruption is far worse than skipping over a few blue or even red links.
• Finding the intended sense of the reference where a link is omitted, is not as simple a matter as finding a word for which typing in a search finds an article. It might take several tries with different wording from what is in the text that had puzzled you. And then your search might have retrieved something that for obscure reasons is misleading. A properly formulated link would take you directly to the best (and in particular to the intended) article, often just by hovering over the link, if the lede is any good.
• I propose, much as foregoing texts have done, that for key words in long articles at least, there (usually) be one visible link per section (including lede) unless the sections are ridiculously short; and usually one link per visible page for important links at least. For one thing, suppose I have in fact remembered that there was a link on a previous page (not having skipped down to the fifth section) and I suddenly see this linked word (which I know fairly well) but I think: "Hm? What can he be thinking?" then being able to click or hover can often bring quick, smooth enlightenment.
• Red links certainly are disruptive, but they damwell should be disruptive. They point out work to be done and warn the reader of a gap in the material. Omit them and the work remains undone longer and more often.
• The fact that a link refers to a major item of common knowledge does not necessarily disqualify it. If I link to Latin in a trivial sense in passing, such as "many classical writers in Latin, Greek, Sanscrit, but not often in Arabic, used this form..." it is OK not to link (though not harmful as a rule), but if I am referring to a technical point concerning the link, or it might not be clear whether the reference is to one usage of the word or another, or the usage is not generally familiar, or if in doubt, then a link is certainly justified, and for Senor Redpencil to say: "Ah, Latin! I know what Latin is; I'll unlink it!" is not only arrogant, but destructive. And if the link is to Diptera, an entomologist saying: "Hell, everybody knows what the Diptera are, and the Nematocera, and the Nemestrinidae; I'll remove the links and avoid offending anybody or breaking the flow. Everybody knows where Cape Town is, right? And yet every second travel agent has fielded requests for tickets to Cape Town where the intention was Cape Cod (or vice versa). The "common knowledge" criterion should only be used with deep, deep reserve.
• I suggest that removal of links be tolerated only where they reflect obvious major error or nonsense. To hell with fussy concerns about redundancy.
• As for adding links to unfamiliar articles, where the original author omitted them, that is generally OK; the mere fact that it occurs to me that it might be helpful or necessary means that someone else is likely to need it. But it can be tricky if one does not realise that it was not the link appropriate to the intended sense; when in doubt when writing, link, and make sure that you have chosen the link that is appropriate to what you are writing.
• Another thing: using links for refs. Sure we cannot link to a WP article's text for WP's verifiability, but a lot of cruising editors simply don't understand that a link instead of a reference can be perfectly valid. Suppose I am writing about Hibernation. I deal with a point on thermodynamics. This is not the place to explain thermo, so I link to the thermo article. I don't have to include twenty of the refs in the thermo article in my hibernation article for verifiability; the thermo article should have its own refs, and for me to duplicate them (even if I am competent to do so) simply creates a major maintenance problem.

Probably I am overlooking half the important cases, but I am rapidly becoming less and less tolerant of link removal, red or otherwise. JonRichfield (talk) 09:19, 24 April 2012 (UTC)

I do not agree with "red-pencillers – primary editors" distinction. There are many users which create content in (some relatively few) articles, and act as "red-pencillers" in many other articles. The primary content just arrives in different qualities: somebody makes it MoS-compliant, but less MoS-aware user leaves a lot of room for red pencils. The task of MoS-es is to make more MoS-aware users, why is it not good?

The second point: how do you understand the problem of unlinking? Certainly, if a user unlinks some places as his primary task, without real improvements in articles, then it is bad. But in the course of an article's improvement a good editor can and should use his/her discretion about words which deserve a link, and words which do not. More precisely, there are many words and other possible sockets for a link. Some are more link-worthy, some are less, some may not have a link at all (such as punctuation marks). But each link marked by the browser distracts an attention. So, if one would link all link-worthy places in a certain article, then the article becomes less navigable (that means a reader sees too many links and makes his choice for the next jump difficultly). So, when I improve an article, I usually add links to more link-worthy items, but simultaneously remove links from less link-worthy places. Incnis Mrsi (talk) 20:24, 24 April 2012 (UTC)

Incnis Mrsi, you're not the problem, as what you describe involves approaching the concept of linking with common sense and appropriate thought and discretion. The problem lies in the (very small) group that is rigidly adapting and applying the linking guideline to endorse their methodically marching through the project using scripts to strip away links "just because" they don't see them as necessary. It is a troublesome mentality, one that has seen (as a recent example) the article on North America losing links to "continent", "South America", "Europe" and "Asia" among others. --Ckatz^chat_spy 21:43, 24 April 2012 (UTC)

While also leaving bizarre inconsistencies, such as leaving one language/country linked, the next not, on the basis of some arbitrary bar of what the average reader supposedly knows. Not that even that is a relevant consideration - as noted 1000 times, if relevant to the topic, as the guidelines explicitly say, such links should be there, regardless of how "common" or "well known" the term is. The purpose of linking is not simply to explain to some putative ideal reader of average education or intelligence what a word might mean (WP is indeed "not a dictionary"; and how the hell would you set that average standard anyway, even if that were the point?) or even necessarily just to provide context to the current page; but to enable and facilitate navigation to other encyclopedia articles on related topics. Still waiting as well, after two whole years roughly, for a pointer to where consensus was established for people to run these scripts or otherwise perform such extensive blanket delinking of the same terms across thousands of articles, regardless of context. As noted, common sense, editorial discretion and appreciation of context are the key to decluttering "overlinked" articles that need it; as well as a less rigid and formulaic idea of what linking is supposedly for within an online reference work in the first place. Not everyone is going to agree on exactly how to apply those principles in each case, but that's got to be the starting point, rather than "everybody knows what Europe/the English language/a dog is, hence I'm going to run a script to remove links to them or take them out automatically whenever I see them" - even, for example, from the articles about Italy, the Welsh language and labradors respectively. N-HH talk/edits 07:22, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

So far we are all four on the same side. I agree with all three. My major reservation is that one needs a positive reason (reason as in "reasoning", not just as in "excuse")to remove a link, whereas a reasonable doubt is an adequate justification for including or retaining a link. N-HH's example is very good. As you all demonstrate and urge, functional reasoning in either case is more important than passively following a formula. This principle applies to a lot more editing activities than linking, but the latter are a sorer point with me than some others at the moment. It would be nice if the article could emphasise that concept more strongly. Partly because I am not one of the policy-setting community and partly because I am too partisan to be dispassionate, I have recused myself from going further in than the talk page. JonRichfield (talk) 08:37, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

I don't see four, actually. I see you and the two regulars here who start a wave of complaint about every three months. It's always the same theme. But there's been a strong trend on en.WP over the past five years to take much more care in wikilinking. This has been highly successful in making the linking system work much better for our readers. I couldn't have put it better myself than Incnis Mrsi, above: "So, when I improve an article, I usually add links to more link-worthy items, but simultaneously remove links from less link-worthy places." It is widely accepted. Tony (talk) 09:09, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

Tony, you know there's far more than "two regulars" who have issues with this; and surely you noted that neither I nor Ckatz started this thread. And yes, I may complain occasionally - or back up the new faces who regularly come along to query what's going on - but I don't bulldoze my way through thousands of pages relinking things I'd prefer to see linked in the same way that you and one or two others do for delinking. I have the humility to accept that I have an opinion that not everyone might agree with - I do not believe that I am necessarily right and that my preferences should be imposed on everyone else. The real minority here in terms of numbers, and the one that really matters in terms of consequences, is the one that has set itself up as a quasi-official "expert" panel and makes substantive changes across the encyclopedia on its own say-so (as opposed to merely commenting on talk pages occasionally). You still haven't pointed to any consensus for what you and one or two others do, despite still claiming, even now, that it is "widely accepted"; plus I'll add to that ongoing request with a new one - any evidence for the rather bold assertion that what you do "has been highly successful in making the linking system work much better for our readers"? Not just a theoretical argument/claim about how reduced navigability is supposedly somehow more useful (which would be interesting enough), but real, hard evidence, assuming that's even possible? For once? N-HH talk/edits 11:37, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

Yes, it would be terribly useful to survey readers (not just editors) about how they use links, whether they'd prefer more or fewer of them, and so on. Otherwise all general discussions about linking are based on speculation and generalizing from one example i.e. ‘I like it this way therefore so do readers’. ― A. di M.​  11:54, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

Hi A di M. You have a good point and thanks for the reference to a good (and generally sound) read. It certainly is reasonable to consider the reader, or at least one of the readers. Or a lot more than one of them. Or as many as one usefully can. However, how cogent would a survey be? Which fraction of the audience should one write for? The largest? The cleverest? The least well-informed? All I can do is write to make the most of such quality, information and reason as I have at my command. As frequently happens, someone later materialises and improves on my efforts, and bless that one, say I. Occasionally someone makes a mess of the work and I revert or raise Cain. And sometimes there is a long-standing shouting match or a briefer discussion that settles down amicably. In writing the next article I still try to achieve a well-reasoned, readable, helpfully connected article, ignoring people who say it is too hard unless they follow the links and those who say it is too puerile because they don't think the links are necessary. By all means let anyone adjust this aspect of WP on the basis of surveys, but I am left in doubt about how we should predicate our work-a-day activities on the outcomes. Hamilton, Maxwell, Milton, Boltzmann, Gauss... I cannot see many of them radically adjusting their products in the light of the polled transient opinions of their public. Galileo maybe, but see what good that did him! But I am listening in case you have compelling counter-examples!  ;-) JonRichfield (talk) 12:53, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

The main job of Hamilton, Maxwell, Milton, Boltzmann, and Gauss was not communicating with the general public; that of Wikipedia is. See the tooltip text of http://xkcd.com/1028/. ― A. di M.​  13:46, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

Hi Tony, nice to meet you, I am sure. I don't know whether you are requesting help with your enumeration, but until you arrived there were just four of us (3+1 if you like) and I cannot include you as a fifth as yet. I am afraid you will have to earn your place. For a start please explain whether you disagree with any substantial point made so far. If you do not, then once your counting is up to scratch, welcome to the club. If you do, then please explain why you think that the current situation is tolerable in such a point of disagreement, let alone why you think there is a strong trend to take much more care in linking and making the system work much better etc. Most of what I have seen has been removal of redlinks, removal of "obvious" links on a basis of arbitrary opinion, and removal of "redundant" links because the same link occurred earlier in the article... like about two pages back in a different context. Not much for regulars to base quarterly complaints on, I grant, especially if they keep on complaining about the same things. How does it come that they do that, I wonder? Surely if the system had been amended or if the error of their views had been demonstrated, they would have stopped by now? Speaking strictly as a newbie among seasoned authorities I am of course limited to my own experience of the currently sophisticated and improved system, and commensurately constrained in expression of my opinions -- I accordingly beg your patience; could you please explain how you would correct my views on points about which I had written, and remarks as made by the other errr... two... three? A cogent word from you now might save us all a lot of time and repetitive complaint, not to mention leading to major improvements any articles that we respectively work on. Thank you in anticipation. JonRichfield (talk) 12:17, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

Delinking via scripts should never be performed, short of removing duplicate links in an article. It's one thing if it were dates where it is obvious what the content of the link is, but a computer script will never be able to judge context and value of word-based links. If there are editors using scripts in this manner, this behavior is highly frowned upon by both the community and ArbCom (see BetaCommand cases for such examples). (This is to make no judgement on the rest of the arguments, only the automatic nature of removal) --MASEM (t) 13:25, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

Now that I could resonate with! Mind you, I am not sure I accept simply removing duplicate links in an article either, automatically or otherwise; some of the foregoing examples explain why. Duplicate links in a section... maybe; or perhaps flag them. Duplicate links on a page... again, maybe. Raising a flag if a word is linked ten times in an article, maybe. And maybe never anything beyond raising a flag. But short of such examples there might be reasons for deliberate linking, and as long as there is room for disagreement, I don't see how any script can cut it. JonRichfield (talk) 13:50, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

Oh Masem, stop twisting things. Scripts involve human oversight, preferably skilled scrutiny of an automatically displayed diff—in that respect, they are very different from switching a bot on and going to bed, letting it run without oversight (that is what, I've heard, goes on ... I run a Mac, so have no knowledge of them). I'm surprised that you're making claims like this.

I see in JohRichfield that we have a link maximiser—someone, like N-HH and CKatz—who'd be happy for wikilinking to be boosted back to levels resembling the old days, when it was virtually "link what you like", without discipline. Ain't gonna happen. Linking is now recognised, thankfully, as something requiring skill, and the community has decided that linking needs to be rationed if it's to function well for readers. Linking "France" or "United States" at the top of every BLP on a French or American person is just the kind of loose approach that makes readers wonder what "that blue gunk" is. Dilution through careless linking for the sake of it is now frowned upon; and country-name links, for example, have often been lazily inserted in disregard of a more specific link.

I have a limited time-budget for this next wave of lobbying by the two main players, plus you. Someone else is missing, but I can't remember who. It's just not productive. We all want the same thing: an optimal linking system; we should be singing from the same song-sheet, not taking adversarial positions. Now I've taken time to explain some of the context to you because you're new. The others know this merry-go-round well. I'm not prepared to invest hours of my time yet again, unless there's suddenly something new on offer. Tony (talk) 15:04, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

Even in BetaCommand's case, where he claimed that he oversaw the changes made, the use of automated scripts to do cleanup tasks like this was frowned on to the point that he's been blocked from the project for a year. Yes, there was a second contributing factor, that being the inability to communicate well with users that disagreed with him; that's not 100% the case here but there's enough similarities between the two that the path between what we have now and what the situation was in Beta's case is there, we just need to avoid it. Some of the arguments presented, where on a page about a geographic feature where links to other geographic features are being removed via script, call into question whether these scripts are being closely monitored or not. --MASEM (t) 15:13, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

Tony, with regard to your comments above:

"I see in JohRichfield that we have a link maximiser—someone, like N-HH and CKatz—who'd be happy for wikilinking to be boosted back to levels resembling the old days, when it was virtually "link what you like", without discipline."

This approach - repeatedly making unsupported claims that have no connection to the poster's actual position, but which are designed to distract attention from the topic at hand - should be avoided in the interest of rational debate.

"Ain't gonna happen."

I've yet to see any consensus declaring you, Ohconfucius etc. as the ones who get to decide this. I was under the impression that this was a collaborative effort.

"Linking is now recognised, thankfully, as something requiring skill"

No-one's questioning that there is skill required for successful linking. The debate is actually about whether the arbitrary practice of wide-scale elimination of links you don't like is really supported by the community as a whole. I would like to hear some explanation from you as to how you can possibly justify the removal - for example - of links to continent and South America in the article about the continent of North America. It is clear that the scripts are not being applied with due care and attention, as evidenced by the rate at which articles are processed and the number of inappropriate removals that occur as a result of this haste. --Ckatz^chat_spy 16:37, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

“Scripts involve human oversight”... then you must be a damn fast reader, as I've seen you use scripts to edit a dozen articles within a couple minutes. <gd&r> ― A. di M.​  17:12, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

Relinking in an article (post lead, prose only and ignoring tables/lists/captions) is actually a bad practice. Through other parts of our MOS, we write pages to be read through as a single article at one time. For example, if discussion a notable building and the architect is named, we refer to the architect once by their full name, and then all subsequent references to that name are via a last name basis, even if the name is not rementioned until several virtual pages down the article body. For the same matter, relinking should be avoided in the same manner, simply because we start from the assumption the reader is reading through the article from top to bottom. Maybe if the article had some weird structure where something about A was talked about first, then completely disparate subtopic B, and then a return to A, may make sense to reintroduce links from the first A section into the second, but in such cases, I bet it is better to re-organize the article to put both A sections together and move B elsewhere. It's not a hard-fast rule, but it is one that the relinking of a term within prose is the rare exception, not the norm, to the point that bots can with that (though like all good bots, there should be opt-out features for editors). --MASEM (t) 15:23, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

When we pin people down, I think there is a consensus that North America should be linked in the South America article. Most links to articles like United States aren't like that; they are more likely to be people or events mentioned only in one paragraph or sentence who need to be identified as American. When we pin people down, I think there is a consensus that those links, which are the great majority of United States links, should be delinked. And the only practical way to approach that goal is with AWB, although some AWB users aren't previewing enough. I hope this reduces some of the arguments repeating for the hundredth time. Art LaPella (talk) 20:20, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

It is not specifically the tool as long as it requires human interaction to validate each change. An unattended bot that removes any link to continents, for example, would be bad. Using AWB or the equivalent itself isn't, but referring back to the Beta case and what's being reported here, when such changes are done in rapid fire manner, it suggests that the user is not review each change appropriately prior to making it. There are places where linking to "North America" on pages not about geography might be appropriate, for example.

Proper linking is a skill of art. It is not easily done. Because of that, short of patent nonsense/easter egg links, chain linking, and other easy-to-spot-and-remove link problems, linking trimming/adding is the type of thing best done under a consensus based approach such as when taking an article to GA, FA, or a peer review. An article that hasn't hit these points should be allowed to develop without trying to stymy its links at the early stage. --MASEM (t) 21:00, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

One out of 1127 articles is featured, and one out of 274 is "good". For the rest of Wikipedia, "easy-to-spot-and-remove link problems" are the overwhelming majority in real-world articles, though seldom mentioned in debates. Art LaPella (talk) 23:24, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

There is no deadline. Outside of the truly problematic link issues (repeated linking, easter eggs, serial links, etc.) that can significantly interfere with comprehension, there is no rush to add or remove links from articles. Yes, by all means, let's encourage editors to engage in smart, germane linking by providing sound advice when to add and when to remove such links, when they are creating and editing articles. But because the refinement of what is the best possible link is something that can only be done by multitude of editors working together, we might as well wait until we reach these points of quality control to actually evaluate the appropriateness and density of links. --MASEM (t) 23:30, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

There is indeed no deadline, because Wikipedia grows much faster than anything like featured articles. We will never feature everything, nor will we ever submit every word to a committee faster than new words can be written. Once again, some AWB users aren't previewing enough (based on what I've read here), but we shouldn't let the perfect be the enemy of the good. In most cases, the United States should be delinked, and overly trigger-happy AWB users should be dealt with as individuals rather than essentially give up on nearly all of our articles. Overlinking can be fixed in the future, but so can underlinking. Art LaPella (talk) 23:39, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

Again, it is not the tools that are the problem here, it is editor that use them with the appearance of automated behavior to add or remove links that are otherwise not immediately problematic and/or following a personal set of linking agenda that they know is contested. That is, using AWB in a rapid fire manner to remove easter-egg links: good. Using AWB in a rapid-fire manner to remove continent and country names from articles: not good. Until we have a casebook that describes specific consensus-agreed upon removals (and not just based on the concept of germane linking, but highly concrete guidance), no one outside of regular editors of the page in question should be manipulating links in that manner. As long as the page is still readable, there is no harm. That's why I do agree with removal of chain linking, easter egg links, and other known problems for comprehension, but when there's been a good faith effort for other types of links, one editor using a script-enabled tool should not be the judge jury and executioner of that, particularly in such a rapid-fire manner that is clearly raising questions. Note: this is nothing against the linking philosophy that Tony et al have about scarcity of links as I do agree with that approach; this is about using tools in rapid succession to impose that when I know it doesn't yet enjoy far-and-wide consensus. This is exactly where BetaCommand got ridiculed by the community, and if such actions continue, it will happen to those rapid-fire removing links for the same exact reasons. --MASEM (t) 12:57, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

<sigh> What do you mean by this emotive "rapid fire"? I certainly don't engage in it. Bear in mind that gnoming and its timing is more complicated that you're making out. For example, a few thousand article-stubs on Polish villages alone have been dumped on en.WP from the Polish Wikipedia (foreign dumping is becoming an increasingly common phenomenon—it is not an exaggeration to call it a waterfall, and other WPs have different standards of typography, date-rendering, and wikilinking, not to mention other issues); each Polish village article uses almost the same formula, including links to "village", "region", and "population"—well, that's what they do in most WPs, senselessly. Gnoming is multilayered, at least as I do it. To start with, working out which date format to harmonise to is a pain that requires the whole diff to be looked through. Then you have to check for the holes that might have been created when geographical names are listed inline (an infrequent issue, but nevertheless it has to be checked). Some articles are stubs; others are more substantial. Occasionally one fixes glaring prose issues.

This mantra of yours, "there is no deadline", has no place in Wikipedia: it is a cop-out, a call to go slow, the very opposite of what is needed at the moment. It ends up being very damaging, particularly when it's used to discourage hard-working editors who appreciate the massive task of article maintenance—a task we can never keep up with, but try to. And the mentality it pushes is getting the project into trouble when it comes to managing some of the serious problems we now face (buzz me and I'll enumerate them). The neglect of PR and company people who do the right thing by asking for changes to be made to an article (thus avoiding CoI edits) is just one current issue where "there is no deadline" comes up against the rigours of real life out there, where a powerful wiki can cause a lot of trouble when bias and factual errors go uncorrected. So please, re-examine the damaging potential of your mantra and avoid splashing it around: it harms a project that needs volunteers to embrace professional standards to survive. It's no longer 2004, when such statements might have been bandied about with less egregious effect. Tony (talk) 13:45, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

I strongly recommend you read the whole of Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Δ, including all archives, and Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Betacommand 3 including all case pages. My concern is not the philosophy of what should be linked, but the manner to enforce it. We are not where Beta was yet, but the conditions are ripe.

As to the deadline point, there's a huge difference between COI and patently false information being posted on articles about companies and people, and dealing with a sea of blue links. The former could get WP in trouble and needs to be dealt with post haste, but the latter is an annoyance but far from any legal ramifications for the foundation. The Foundation has made it clear there are three areas where there actually is a deadline: Bios of living people, non-free media, and copyright violations - all those feed back as potential harm to them. Anything else is style and content, and can be fixed as volunteers get to it. Hence, as long as we remain a volunteer project, there is no deadline to correct annoyances like over/mis-linking. And it is better to do it in a manner that has consensus than to heavy-hand it as proven by Beta above. --MASEM (t) 14:10, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

You've side-stepped my point, again, by sliding in a binary attitude now: oh, just three things are urgent, so the rest can be cast in your call to go slow, your "there is no deadline". It would be nice if the world were cast in simple binaries, but it's inevitably more nuanced and multilayered than that. So I take it you intend to persist with your "there is no deadline" ethic; it's very damaging, and I wish you'd rethink it. Tony (talk) 15:02, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

Sometimes Masem writes as if only "rapid fire" AWB use (like Betacommand) is his concern. Sometimes, as in "Until we have a casebook" (i.e., when pigs fly), he says there should be no AWB country delinking at all unless one WP:OWNs the article. It makes a difference. Art LaPella (talk) 14:22, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

The argument that there can never be a casebook is bogus; the problem is that those employing tools like AWB are following a casebook of their own desire and not one that has been determined by consensus (except among a select group). And I will stress again: I probably agree with most of the linking advice that is in those personal casebooks. I just find that the community does not accept the use of semi-automated tools to enforce something that does not have wide consensus, as is what is happening here.

There is a way to write the casebook, just like for NFC we've had to write a non-inclusive lists of acceptable and unacceptable uses. Take country names: I would agree that if we actually had a RFC to say "country names should not be linked except on articles dealing with geography or political issues" to make that a case, consensus would back in, and from there, AWB delinking of country names from every other type of article is fine. The problem is that doing the AWB steps before getting consensus on such cases is putting the cart before the horse, the same problem that Beta repeated came under. The community does not accept that type of logic - that's why bot operators have to get approval via consensus and usually undergo strict penalties should they do something intentionally outside their scope. Now, with automated tools like AWB , its a bit different, but the same logic and courtesy should be made to the community to make sure that the task that is being rapid-fired is what the community accepts. Delinking as been evidenced in this discussion so far, as best as I can tell, does not yet enjoy proven consensus. Set that up first via an RFC, and then you can delink as fast as AWB allows you to for those specific instances. --MASEM (t) 19:40, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

Even after an RFC, I would not countenance "rapid-fire" AWB; the decision-making is too contextually based, which is one reason A di M has said "pigs might fly" WRT your case-book proposal ... it's not easy to create a catch-all list, since there's always going to be a grey area, even though much of the matter is clear-cut. Who's using AWB???? How fast does AWB go? Tony (talk) 07:05, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

Art is the one that brought up AWB, but it can be any user-created script that is of concern if mis-used. AWB and these work as fast as generally the person running the script can hit accept and have en.wiki acknowledge the change. But, as per the Beta case, the problem is that when there is very little time between these script-enabled changes, the amount of human checking involved with these changes are raised into question. As an example, you today, around 06:30 on April 27, had about 8 edits over a small time window (<10 min) using some automated tool (based on the change message). Now, that rate of editing is completely possible by a human if they are making simple changes, but with the bulk of changes being put into place via these diffs, its hard to say for sure if you're double checking that each change is correct or if you're assuming your script is correct and just clicking off on the change. That itself is not bad - for comparison, Beta was one limited to an average of 40 edits in a ten minute block, which was considered the bare minimum for a human to check the results of an automatic script and accept it to en.wiki. You're nowhere close to that, obviously, but the same idea does apply: when you rapid-fire edit with an semi-automated tool of either your own design or like AWB, the human check of those results are called into question. The example given elsewhere in this thread where geographic terms were delinked from an article about geography is the example of human failure to catch this, and it was part of a rapid-fire block.

As to the casebook issue, you're just providing the counterargument for why links shouldn't be taken out by these semi-automated tools because their value is contextually-based. An semi-automated tool cannot figure that out. Now, again, if it is the case that a human reviews the suggestions of the tool, that's fine, but then the rapid-fire nature and whether there is truly human review of each link removal comes into play. If there was at least a case book that affirmed through consensus the types of articles where country names should be and shouldn't be linked, then this issue of rapid-fire changes becomes less an problem, since now that's acting upon a consensus-affirmed specific type of removal. Right now, the one line about what generally shouldn't be linked doesn't cut it. --MASEM (t) 13:46, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

There is community consensus for using AWB without needing approval for every edit. There is consensus (nobody has ever specifically asked me to get BAG approval), but paradoxically less consensus, for using AWB in compliance with the Manual of Style, even though the Manual is evidence of consensus. It's like a policeman who keeps threatening to arrest me for not breaking enough laws. I haven't used AWB much since last year, and maybe I shouldn't until everybody comes to a coherent understanding on this issue. Art LaPella (talk) 01:45, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

But it is expected that when you are using AWB for a large number of edits, those edits are the type that have wide consensus. The problem is that the type of links being removed are not spelled out as improper in the MOS. Do an RFC, set it as a casebook example, and then its not a problem. Until then, such edits via AWB or whatever scripted tool will be considered as against consensus and a problem, and as per Beta, dealt with appropriately. --MASEM (t) 04:33, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

"the type of links being removed are not spelled out as improper" implies that it is possible to use AWB to remove country links with your approval. But often you seem to say the opposite. Easily fixed: do you condemn all AWB country delinking, or some AWB country delinking? Art LaPella (talk) 05:34, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

Since there's nothing about country links in Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style/Linking#Specific_cases, they should not be removed by rapid-fire AWB edits or similar scripts since there's no established consensus to remove. This can be fixed by having an RFC to get consensus that country links shouldn't be linked outside of geography/political pages. --MASEM (t) 05:42, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

I wouldn't call my AWB edits "rapid-fire" (it handles a long list of Manual of Style issues, and I'm likely to pore over each article up to an hour), so let's ask it this way: do you condemn my AWB country delinking? Art LaPella (talk) 14:13, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

It is likely not a problem since yes, you appear to be spending time to assess the links. (Again, I agree generally countries shouldn't be linked in most articles). Its when others spend under a minute on a page to remove such links that brings into question if there's human review of the changes. Again, I urge reading of the Beta/Delta cases to understand the community's concern with rapid fire semi-automated editing. --MASEM (t) 15:35, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

• This latest pronouncement suggests that you're clinging to a deep fear of anything that moves at more than a snail's pace on en.WP: this is the only possible interpretation, I think, of the dictum you're clinging to, "there's no deadline". Now, there is consensus, as someone pointed out above, for avoiding the linking of major geographic locations—it's in the style guide, and the style guide is the outcome of a somewhat stormy rationalisation and set of compromises brokered by Kotniski in late 2009, I think it was. Like dates and months and centuries and days of the week, I've seen virtually no issue taken by the community over not linking "Australia", "United States", "Germany", "China", "Russia", "New York City", "Los Angeles", an so on. We do assume that our readers have a mental age of more than five. And let me say that a large proportion of country-name links are lazily inserted when a more specific link would be so much more helpful to readers. We cry wolf by being cavalier in linking; caution will earn the linking system a greater functionality. And also, WP is not a dictionary, as the first pillar says, so if you want to look those items up because you don't understand them in the context, Wiktionary is the place to go. Thanks. Tony (talk) 06:24, 27 April 2012 (UTC)
  • I am not disputing, and in fact agree, that links to major geographic names are useless on most pages. That's not in dispute. The dispute is when tools like AWB are being used in a rapid-fire pace to remove such links on pages where they are appropriate, such as topics about geographic features (and examples where that has occurred been identified in this discussion). That is careless, and that's why we should not be rushing this. Again, stressing this: it is not the issue about what actually are the best types of links to be made and when links are poorly made - it is about the fact that editors using rapid-fire tools seem to be following personal, non-consensus decisions on what should be linked to mass delink terms. If the advice to remove certain links are not present on the MOS page, that should not be done by mass edit tools in a careless fashion. Establish the concept of scarce links that are the most germane to the article (a concept I completely agree with) with specific examples and cases via an RFC, and then mass-edits to enforces those cases won't come under any scrutiny and can proceed as fast as you want. Right now, without hard specific advice, rapid-fire edits will be seen as harmful by the community, as evidenced by Beta's case. --MASEM (t) 07:00, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

Tony: we are a volunteer project. Since there are no time demand requirements by editors we cannot expect any time requirements for articles to become ship-shape. Ergo, "there is no deadline" has to be how en.wiki operates, except where the Foundation has identified potential legal problems for themselves. Alternatively, let's put it this way: okay, removing excess links is a necessary help for articles to become easy to read and comprehend without being lost in a sea of blue, which is a point I would agree with. But then why stop there? Why not copyedit the whole article, since that also helps? Why not fix all the references, find all the missing ones, fix the punctuation, order sections appropriate, assure that dates and US/UK spellings are consistent, etc. etc. all things that also help comprehension of an article? All the semi-automated scripts that I see removing links are doing some other mechanical things (like stripping unused params from templates - a good thing) but if we have a deadline, why stop there? We should be copyediting and improving articles every time we touch it with AWB scripting too, since obviously comprehension must be established. Of course, I hope you recognize that this is a bogus argument, but that is what you are basically saying when you say "WP:DEADLINE is harmful". It's not - it's how the wiki works - articles will get improved in time as fast as volunteers can do it. An article that is of poor quality - whether due to excess links, bad english, inconsistent formatting, or whatever - does appear to be a problem, but the Foundation is not going to be legally liable for any of those faults, and ergo, it is not a high priority to fix them. That's why DEADLINE is critical to keep in mind, and why rushing off to try to delink terms without seeking wide consensus is the problem here. --MASEM (t) 19:40, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

I only noticed this section since I posted below, but I admit that I stopped reading "Linking sense" after this point: "Granted gross overlinking is stupid and sets teeth on edge, but it is rare and otherwise essentially harmless, venial". It is not "essentially harmless" because gross over-linking dilutes the more valuable links that assist the reader in gaining a deeper understanding of the article. The fact that "it is rare" is because of the hard work that dedicated and experienced editors have put in over the past many years to reduce the scatter-gun approach to linking that used to be endemic at WP. I don't run scripts, but I do a lot of article work in which I reduce over-linking, and with the exception below (which is a delinking that I didn't instigate, but support), very rarely receive any resistance to delinking from local article editors.

If you want a taste of what happens when "we drop most of the strictures on formally functional linking" and "leave it to good sense...", have a look at the scatter-gun approach to linking that is now the norm on the French Wikipedia. Here's the link to today's FA there, which contains eight links in the first sentence—none of which help to deepen the understanding of the article's subject. Note how, besides his name and the word "américain", every word over three letters long has been linked? Also note the bizarre attempt to link "1958" to their "1958 in cinema" page—as if what happened in cinema in the year the article's subject was born is in any way going to help readers gain a deeper understanding of the subject. And that's one of their FA?

From the coalface ... please don't weaken the current policies because (in my experience) they have met with extremely wide acceptance, and have definitely helped to give our articles a more professional and reader-friendly appearance.

GFHandel ♬  01:26, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

Tony, I see you are still making comments like this after all this time, alleging that I and others want "maximal linking". Unless you strike or correct that, it is clear that you are either extremely thick, cannot read or are a liar. The fact that your post opens with an allegation directed at another editor that they are "twisting things" truly takes the biscuit, as the cliche has it. And the gall of someone who complains about a "merry-go-round" and wanting "something new", when it is they who for years now have charged through pages with their battering-ram script and refused to address points made to them is something else. You know, if you actually listened to people and made a substantive acknowledgement of their points instead of making up crap in response, you might not find them having to repeat themselves. You can blame it on the usual suspects in your head all you like if it makes you feel better, but doesn't the succession of new names coming here to query what you do raise any doubts in your mind? The regularity of names is far more obvious in the small number coming to defend this blanket delinking. And yes, I am still waiting for a) evidence of consensus mandating such wide script-based auto de-linking; and b) evidence for the claim, now also made by old friend GFHandel, for "extremely wide acceptance" of such actions post-facto. I could at least stop asking those questions, if you'd ever deign to answer them with anything other than assertion.

To clarify, for you (for the 406th time) and anyone else, I broadly support much tighter and more focused linking - including the removal of links that repeat in close succession, links to common English words and links to proper terms when those things are not directly relevant to the main topic at hand - and doing that as part of the normal copyediting process. There may or may not be consensus for that level of restriction of links; people will certainly have different opinions on it, different from mine as well as yours (as they would seem to in France, when it comes to FAs). However, I do not support blanket removal of links to specific terms from thousands of articles, regardless of context, on the basis that they are supposedly "well known" things by some unidentified standard. Nor is there explicit consensus for you, or anyone else to do that. Use a script, sure, but go back and reinstate relevant ones (you say you do this, but I rarely see it). I've lost count of the number of times I've seen scripts strip out perfectly useful and relevant links to supposedly "well known" terms from a page, while missing out and leaving far more useless, repetitive and redundant links sitting there. Manual and discretionary editing would have made a much better job of improving and focusing links, while at the same time offering decent and broad navigability for readers to related and often quite significant other articles in an online encyclopedia. N-HH talk/edits 07:15, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

@GFHandel, re the France example. FWIW, personally I am fairly open-minded about linking or not when it comes to a string of nationality/professional terms, eg "X is an American actor, singer, model ...", and am sympathetic to objections to it (the infobox to me has always seemed a better, alternative, place for such links). But I think that the fact that French WP appears happy with it, while not directly relevant to establishing consensus here, does of course indicate that there are a range of views - even if they are different to your own - as does the fact that many editors do commonly link in that fashion, even if they don't speak here (and btw, the fact that people rarely complain about delinking isn't evidence of consensus or approval - it's more likely to be evidence of "meh" or an erroneous assumption, especially with script delinking, of some quasi-official drive). Also, I'd take issue with your focus on links that "help the reader understand the topic". Sure that's one function/purpose of linking, but not the only one. As the guidelines say at the very start, links "bind the project together" - ie they provide navigability. The problem is that not only have the guidelines been chipped away over the years by people with pretty determined views (rather than being the definitive expression of specific consensus), but they still don't even say what many of those people want or believe them to say - navigation and connection remain criteria for linking; as does relevance, even for common terms. N-HH talk/edits 08:43, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

GFH, The coalface is a broad one, accommodating many workers and many kinds of work. Let no one claim it for his personal fief. I am such a worker on several kinds of work, and I do not doubt that you are one, nor that all the others contributing to this section are too. Whether the "current policies" have met with acceptance is not what defines their validity in all contexts, otherwise they would not be "current", but cast in concrete. "Weakening" the policy is not an issue, and not a consequence of rational discussion. I am nonplussed at your suggestion that it might be. Perhaps you would like to enlighten any readers who fail to follow you? I am objecting to difficulties arising from the attitudes of certain classes of editorial behaviour, and that is not a matter to be settled by tarring every proposal with the same brush just because we can instance a few horrible examples. For material reasons I insist that over-linking is worse than under-linking and ultimately "essentially harmless", and in fact the reasons include those that I instanced in the rest of the list at the start of this section. If you reject material reasons unread and out of context because you have in anticipation favoured what you fancy to be an opposing reason, that is up to you, but it hardly contributes to establishing a sound perspective on the matter. Over-linking is essentially harmless because it is a passing irritation, and one that can readily be fixed by the irritated person if s/he is an editor. If s/he is not, then it is unlikely to be a bother after the first few minutes, if that, because anyone intelligent enough to read and to consult WP should be able to work out pretty quickly what the blue text means and, after a few trials, what the red text means as well. Conversely, under-linked material can mean that one does not realise that there is a link to search for at all, or if one feels like going exploring, one does not realise what title it is available under. You might find it helpful to reflect that the same blue-tinted word in the same article can validly and helpfully link in different places to different explanatorily linked material. Precisely what you imagine "formally functional linking and good sense" might mean, puzzle me. You appear to imply that it doesn't matter how one links as long as it is only according to the principle of a single link at the first appearance of a highly obscure term in an article, and that the only alternative is a French mess. I haven't checked on your horrible example, not because I doubt your word that it is a horrible example, but because even if the editor had idiotically linked every single word in the article, it would not have been in the slightest relevant either to good sense or formally functional linking, because it would represent neither, and to the reader might well be irritating in passing. Nor would leaving out valuable links be any better, and it would let down the reader in need by causing greater disruption if he went searching for links, and very likely depriving him of necessary information if he did not, or searched unsuccessfully. Furthermore, the reason for a link in one place might differ from the reason for the same or a similar link in another place, in which case it might well be important to link both. Linking might or might not be red, in which case its presence would be important both to the reader and to the appropriate editor, as opposed to blue, in which case it would not generally attract attention from the editor, but would leave the reader free to choose. If you fail to agree that these are matters of good sense and formally functional linking design, then please explain as cogently as you can manage, just why they militate against the sensitive and practical placing of links where they are constructive and omitting them where they are not, and I promise that I shall read your views as carefully as you read mine. Or even more. JonRichfield (talk) 09:44, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

Anyone care to look at Gisele Bündchen?

Hi. Could someone experienced in matters about linking please see if I am on the right track here? I think it would also be nice if a MOS-compliance script could be run on the article. Thanks in advance for any assistance possible. GFHandel ♬  00:18, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

I think it should link to German Brazilians which in turn should link to Germans and to Brazil, but not directly to the latter two. ― A. di M.​  10:36, 26 April 2012 (UTC)