Wikipedia talk:Templates for discussion/Archive 21

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TfDs which list a large number of "redundant" templates, when some are and some aren't

Recently, there have been some cases where editors have listed a large number of templates in a single nomination, on the grounds that they're all redundant. When this has happened, normally some users have opined "delete all", some have opined "keep all" due to believing that they're all useful, some have opined "merge" (sometimes but not always listing the sets of templates they want merged), and some have opined "keep" generically, "keep" for one template, or "keep all", because they think that one particular template from the set is not redundant to the others.

The result is that the TfDs are basically impossible to close satisfactorily. There are likely going to be some solutions that have consensus, but the form of the TfD doesn't make it possible to determine what they are. As a result, the TfD sometimes gets closed as "no consensus" (which has lead to rows over at DRV recently), and often doesn't get closed at all.

I think we need a new type of TfD resolution for this sort of TfD. In particular, the fix I'd recommend would be to close the TfD with no result, but that:

permits speedy renomination of smaller sets of the templates (as "redirect", "merge", "delete"); and
permits bold merges and redirections of the templates in question, so long as those merges/redirections have only a minor impact on pages currently transcluding the template; and
has no prejudice against nominating the names of templates that were boldly merged or redirected at RfD, if the change appears to have consensus (either on the templates' talk pages or, passively due to no objections within a reasonable time limit).

This would mean that there'd be an option for closing the nominations in question, to help to find a consensus where one exists. (There may well be a consensus to keep a particular template, keep a particular template name, merge two templates, delete one of the templates, or delete one of the template names after merging its functionality. That's five different cases for each template, and people rarely say what they mean at that level of detail in this sort of TfD. So we need a process that helps people to distinguish which of the cases they mean.)

The contrast would be with the current situation, some people are jumping straight from "some of these templates are redundant" to proposing the deletion of all the redundant templates and their names, all in one go. Perhaps that's actually going to be correct for some, or even all, of the templates. But in the case where consensus is less drastic than that, our current process makes it really hard to find where the consensus is.

Do people think this sort of TfD close is appropriate? Should it have a name? --ais523 17:00, 9 October 2015 (U T C)

I certainly agree that such things can get convoluted. TFD doesn't explicitly have a BUNDLE clause like at AFD; maybe we should consider adding it to the main TFD page. Otherwise, I agree that some sort of NPASR could be used more often in no consensus situations, but that's less of a policy and more of a decision made by the closer. Primefac (talk) 17:09, 9 October 2015 (UTC)

There is no need at all for "a new type of TfD resolution"; it is already possible for a closer to reach such a finding. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 17:50, 9 October 2015 (UTC)

I'm not convinced. There's a TfD I have my eyes on that's massively overdue for closing, and that I'm uninvolved in, and feel should be closed like that. If I did the close, though, I suspect I'd be facing down a DRV. (Partly that's because I'm not currently an admin, but TfD has reached the stage at which pretty much all the admins who work on closing it end up involved in the discussions and so can't close.) Getting consensus that this sort of close is sometimes/often appropriate (in general) first would help, thus this post. --ais523 18:27, 9 October 2015 (U T C)

I presume the closing admin can always delete whichever templates received a consensus to delete, as keep those they see fit to keep, or merge, or no consensus, or whatever, as appropriate. That is "KEEP these because-of-this, DELETE those because-of-that, [and so on], NO CONSENSUS for the remaining". Certainly any that fell under a no consensus can be nomitaed soon after, and if bundling them didn't work the first time, the average nominator will consider trying something different, that is, to nominate in smaller groups - Nabla (talk) 23:37, 9 October 2015 (UTC)

This section is somewhat unneeded. There is a simpler solution to the issue. I think such nominations should be closed summarily, and the nominating editor advised, that they should relist the templates individually. Unless, of course, there is a clear connection between the templates (apart from that they are all perceived as redundant by the nominator), in which case they are likely to be treated as a group of templates rather than individual templates. Debresser (talk) 09:33, 15 October 2015 (UTC)

Confused

What do I do to get the unused Template:OuedEdDahabLagouira-geo-stub deleted? TfD says not to list stub templates or candidates for speedy deletion there, so I went to CfD which says to tag it for speedy deletion per CSD C1, but an admin reverted me when I tried to do that. What am I missing? Cobblet (talk) 04:14, 13 October 2015 (UTC)

I'm a little confused too. As I understood it, the intended process is to file the template, and any categories that it (and no other template) populates, at CfD, but CfD doesn't seem to have filing instructions for that. The template that you'd use for the purpose used to be {{sfd-t}}, but that template seems to have been blanked (although a TfD a while back found that it was still useful?). If there's a category that you could file, I recommend filing that at CFD (CFD is good at deleting categories) and mentioning that you also want to delete the template populating it. If not, we'll probably have to wait for someone else to explain what happened process-wise when WP:SFD was merged into WP:CFD. --ais523 05:04, 13 October 2015 (U T C)

Liz (talk · contribs) is right: WP:CSD#C1 is only for category pages, not templates. I don't see what part of WP:CSD says to tag it for speedy deletion (C1 or otherwise). But if you consider that it warrants speedy deletion (as opposed to discussed deletion), are any of the G criteria or T criteria applicable? If not, then a discussion is necessary, and being a stub template, that would take place at WP:CSD. It doesn't have its own stub cat (it's upmerged to Category:Morocco geography stubs and Category:Western Sahara stubs), so nominate as if it was an existing stub category, but don't name a category on the nom, just name the stub template. --Redrose64 (talk) 08:24, 13 October 2015 (UTC)

The way this is done is by nominating the category, and mention that there is a template connected to it. The admin will delete both the category and the template, if the discussion is closed as a delete. This has been the instruction and procedure for as long as I know. Debresser (talk) 09:36, 15 October 2015 (UTC)

@Debresser: No, this concerns {{OuedEdDahabLagouira-geo-stub}} which does not have a single category, it is upmerged to two separate categories, Category:Morocco geography stubs and Category:Western Sahara stubs. If those were to be nominated for deletion, that would imply that twelve other stub templates (such as {{Morocco-geo-stub}} and {{WesternSahara-stub}} that we definitely do want to keep) should be deleted with those two cats. --Redrose64 (talk) 11:32, 15 October 2015 (UTC)

Stub templates that do not have their own category should be nominated at Tfd like al other templates. The reason is simple: the rule is that all templates should be nominated at Tfd, with the exception of those templates that exist mostly to add a category (simply put), like stub templates. In the case that stub templates don't have a category, there is no reason for the exception, and we stay with the general rule: Tfd. Debresser (talk) 19:01, 15 October 2015 (UTC)

I think this makes a fair bit of sense, so I boldly updated the main TfD instructions. — Earwig ^talk 20:58, 17 October 2015 (UTC)

Thanks. I added a few words to your edit by way of explanation. Debresser (talk) 11:46, 18 October 2015 (UTC)

Source for some work

I have a list of templates (99.9% of them are infoboxes), that has small number of transclusions, that maybe are worth of taking to discussion here. For example, this one, which only transclusion is in the template itself. The list. --Edgars2007 (talk/contribs) 08:55, 14 December 2015 (UTC)

Question about relisting

In the last few days I've seen a few discussions be closed as "relisted", where the closing editor blanks the entire discussion and moves it to the new date. Per WP:RELIST this would appear to be the policy, but given that it's only one editor I guess I'm wondering if a) everyone else is just doing it wrong/being lazy/etc, or b) TfD can be considered an exception to that policy? Should I be blanking the old discussion when I relist? Primefac (talk) 05:14, 25 December 2015 (UTC)

the advantage of blanking/moving is that it reduces the amount of transcluded text, which can help with expansion size limits. I, personally, like the method where the heading is left, but the discussion content is moved, just in case there are links to the old discussion page. Frietjes (talk) 14:31, 30 December 2015 (UTC)

What is the reason behind the need to delete templates

Barbara (WVS) (talk) 12:31, 18 January 2016 (UTC)

Barbara (WVS), there are a few reasons to delete templates, as listed at WP:TFD#REASONS. Basically, if a template does not meet the guidelines or is completely unused (and will never be) then it should be deleted. It's like getting rid of the DVDs from the back of the stack that never get watched (or were terrible). There is no "need" to do so other than making Wikipedia more tidy. Primefac (talk) 01:01, 20 January 2016 (UTC)

This is interesting. Here is my question then: does tidying up a template result in more 'space' in WP's presumably huge servers? It seems to me that leaving an unused template 'un-discussed' and undeleted takes up less space and time than the discussions that accompany such a deletion and then the eternal storage of such deletion discussions. Deleting templates seems like a waste of time. If they are never used then their storage space is much smaller than all the discussions and storage of discussions. Maybe I am looking at this wrong...Best Regards, Barbara (WVS) (talk) 11:02, 20 January 2016 (UTC)

No space is released: when an admin "deletes" a page, what they are actually doing is flipping a switch that make it appear that the page no longer exists (any links to it will show in red instead of blue, for example). It's still there, demonstrated by the fact that an admin can view the "deleted" page, and perhaps restore it later on. To truly expunge a page from the database (something normally only done for legal reasons), special rights are needed. --Redrose64 (talk) 11:22, 20 January 2016 (UTC)

Bot cleanup help

Is there a bot that can do template cleanup like change {{Quotation}} to {{Quote frame}} where it occurs on talk pages and is not inside certain elements like {{source}}, <pre>...</pre>, etc.? — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼ 23:44, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

Just to be clear, the idea here is to only execute the change on talk pages, and not in articles. --Tryptofish (talk) 23:51, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

"Weird text"

When my edit at Wikipedia talk:Templates for discussion/Header was reverted, I was asked[1] (well, that is putting it more politely than the request itself) to come here (redirected from Wikipedia talk:Templates for discussion/Header). Is it just me seeing:

Enter '"`UNIQ--nowiki-00000001-QINU`"' to find a d

in the archive search box at WP:TFD? It seems to me from WP:VPT#Strip marker problems with nowiki tags that it it is a general problem being worked on. Anyway, none of the other WP:XFD search boxes has a search hint such as this and looking back here the hint looked wrong anyway. Thincat (talk) 12:52, 15 March 2016 (UTC)

Yes, it's the same problem. In essence, the behaviour of <nowiki>...</nowiki> inside MediaWiki extensions (in this case, <inputbox>...</inputbox>) has changed, and can no longer be relied on. So, until they restore the previous behaviour, other methods need to be found; and these other methods must continue working if and when the previous behaviour is restored. Fortunately, numeric character references meet those requirements, so I did this. --Redrose64 (talk) 14:45, 15 March 2016 (UTC)

Thank you for your help. Thincat (talk) 15:22, 15 March 2016 (UTC)

Categories associated with a template

Resolved

The template {{Steam app}} was deleted on 2016 January 27. That template populated the following categories:

which are now permanently empty I suppose. These categories were populated in the template by the code

{{#if:{{{id|{{{1|}}}}}}|{{WikidataCheck|property=P1733|value={{{id|{{{1|}}}}}}|category=Steam ID}}}}

See {{WikidataCheck}}. TfD closers should pay extra attention to the code in the templates to identify such category inclusions and prevent "dangling" categories. This is not an easy burden since it is non-obvious what the previous code does unless one slows down to think about it. There was also a container category for those categories:

Category:Steam ID Wikidata tracking categories

Quick question: do closers at TfD usually just delete such "template-attached" categories when deleting a template without going through the CfD process? These categories don't meet the speedy deletion criteria (not even WP:C1) but it seems kind of silly to go through the CfD process in this case. I'm tempted to just delete them myself but I want to know what the standard practice is. Jason Quinn (talk) 09:42, 21 March 2016 (UTC)

They meet the general speedy criterion WP:G8, whose examples include "categories populated by deleted or retargeted templates". SiBr₄ (talk) 09:49, 21 March 2016 (UTC)

Thank you. Jason Quinn (talk) 12:04, 21 March 2016 (UTC)

Past consensus on single use transclusions of article content?

I know this must exist, but I'm struggling to find it. I was under the impression there was consensus in the past that addressed how article content should not be stored in single-use transclusion templates. This has come up in discussions at Wikipedia:Templates for discussion/Log/2016 March 20. If anyone is aware of past large-scale discussions along these lines, would you mind linking one of them for me? Thanks. ~ Rob^Talk 23:18, 20 March 2016 (UTC)

There's this short RfC about the wording of Wikipedia:Template namespace. There's probably also some related discussion in the archives of Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Elements, because the project uses things like {{Infobox hydrogen}}. There's been a few experiments with synchronizing articles by transcluding bits of text, and those generally haven't taken off, but there's more flexibility with tables and infoboxes and other data-dense things.

To be honest I think this "article content in templates" idea is more of a religious belief than a well-thought-out piece of practical guidance. The usual argument seems to be that it confuses newbies, but so do great big globs of indigestible wikicode. It's like claiming that all of the code for every piece of software should be in a single ginormous file, because how else will anyone find anything? Opabinia regalis (talk) 06:39, 21 March 2016 (UTC)

@Opabinia regalis: Personally, I object to the article content outside in templates because newbies likely don't know how to navigate to the template namespace. Not only does it confuse them, but it makes the content entirely inaccessible. I'd rather they be able to access the content and be confused with a chance to learn via trial and error than not be able to access the content whatsoever and have no learning opportunity. ~ Rob^Talk 14:07, 21 March 2016 (UTC)

I dunno, I've never seen a newbie who was competent enough to edit something like {{Infobox hydrogen}} but too incompetent to find the template namespace. And in some of these cases, "less accessible" is part of the point, because the high data density means any given change is very likely to be a negative one. I think we're overall doing new editors a favor by abstracting away the fiddly bits of table code and long lists of data, links to outside databases, etc. so they have a chance to look at the actual article content. Opabinia regalis (talk) 00:28, 22 March 2016 (UTC)

Please help

I've never worked with merging templates and need some help. After trying to get discussion, I merged Template:Chinese dictionaries into Template:Dictionaries of Chinese and deleted the transclusions, as described here. Did I make a mistake? Do I need to request deleting the former template? Keahapana (talk) 22:32, 1 April 2016 (UTC)

Keahapana, {{Chinese dictionaries}} is a plausible alternate name to {{Dictionaries of Chinese}}, so I have simply made it into a redirect. This way either title can be used, and it will show the same template. Thanks for your hard work! Primefac (talk) 03:42, 21 April 2016 (UTC)

Primefac, many thanks for the perfect(ly simple) solution. From what I learned about template format, I created parallel ones for Japanese dictionaries. Best wishes, Keahapana (talk) 22:15, 21 April 2016 (UTC)

RFCs about TFDs

Is it acceptable practice to start an WP:RFC about an ongoing WP:TFD? Please see this TfD also this RfC, and respond at Template talk:Government misconduct accusations#RfC: Is this template about Government misconduct accusations legit? --Redrose64 (talk) 14:50, 9 June 2016 (UTC)

No, obviously. All discussion should be kept in one place. If an editor wants a TfD publicized, just place a neutral notification on relevant project pages. As a side note, that template is borderline eligible for speedy deletion as per WP:T2. ~ Rob^Talk 15:05, 9 June 2016 (UTC)
@BU Rob13: all discussion should indeed be kept in one place, that is why I asked you to respond at Template talk:Government misconduct accusations#RfC: Is this template about Government misconduct accusations legit? --Redrose64 (talk) 15:18, 9 June 2016 (UTC)

RE: Andre de Toth

André de Toth → Andre de Toth (not by me), so how to change name of eponymous template?? {{André de Toth}} for consistency's sake (see discussion here). Thanks, Quis separabit? 23:52, 8 June 2016 (UTC)

Done by Roman Spinner. Primefac (talk) 03:46, 9 June 2016 (UTC)

@Primefac: Thanks but shouldn't template ({{André de Toth}}) match page name? Yours, Quis separabit? 02:37, 13 June 2016 (UTC)

Rms125a@hotmail.com, {{André de Toth}} is a redirect to {{Andre DeToth}}, in exactly the same way that André de Toth is a redirect to Andre DeToth. I'm not sure what else you're wanting. Primefac (talk) 02:42, 13 June 2016 (UTC)

@Primefac: OK, got it. Sorry, my bad. Thanks. Quis separabit? 02:44, 13 June 2016 (UTC)

Old TfD waiting to be closed

Hi there. Not sure if it's entirely appropriate to post this kind of comment here, but would someone with the ability to close down a TfD be able to take a look at Wikipedia:Templates_for_discussion/Log/2016_July_8#Excess_Gospel_of_John.E2.80.93related_templates? There's a pretty clear consensus (IMHO) and non-closure is holding up improvements to an article. Thanks either way. Jujutsuan (Please notify with {{re}} talk | contribs) 19:04, 20 July 2016 (UTC)

Jujutsuan, please be patient. There are a lot of old TFDs waiting to be closed, and (I'm guessing) since it's summer time we're a little short on TFD staff. It will be looked at in due time.

As a slightly OTHERSTUFF point, having a two-week old TFD is relatively minor, compared to the months-old discussions we had a while ago... Primefac (talk) 22:48, 20 July 2016 (UTC)

On the bright side, it appears we recently doubled our TfD staff with the return of another editor who closed TfDs in the past and has returned to doing so every once in a while. On the not-so-bright side, that was doubling from one to two. We're always short-staffed. In any event, I'll take a look. ~ Rob₁₃^Talk 23:45, 20 July 2016 (UTC)

@Jujutsuan: Do you mind if I delete User:Jujutsuan/Content of John COPY? There are attribution issues with such a copy-paste move. I can userfy the template if the consensus is to delete it (which I'm still assessing). ~ Rob₁₃^Talk 23:47, 20 July 2016 (UTC)

@BU Rob13: Thanks, Rob. I hope I didn't come across as too impatient. Sure, please delete and userfy (the right way). (Is "userfication" something a non-admin can do properly on their own?) Jujutsuan (Please notify with {{re}} talk | contribs) 23:50, 20 July 2016 (UTC)

@Jujutsuan: Userfication is something anyone can do so long as they're autoconfirmed, but you really shouldn't do it outside of a XfD outcome. It's more-or-less equivalent to deleting something from one of the "outward-facing" namespaces, which should have consensus. I wound up not userfying this due to attribution requirements; see my close for an explanation of how the template should be handled given the requirements for attribution. Let me know if you have any questions. ~ Rob₁₃^Talk 00:01, 21 July 2016 (UTC)

@BU Rob13: I've made a preliminary merge of the template's content into the Gospel of John article, and redirected the template to the page with a {{r with history}} tag. If you see any issues with the way I did this, please let me know. Thanks again. Jujutsuan (Please notify with {{re}} talk | contribs) 01:33, 21 July 2016 (UTC)

Closure script

Are there any scripts to semi-automate the closure process? Like User:Mr.Z-man/closeAFD2.js instead of User:Doug/closetfd.js (which only works when editing a single section?) The backlog's not too bad right now, but having such a tool would help czar 19:11, 22 July 2016 (UTC)

Czar, in one word, no. The Earwig is working on one, but it's been stalled for a while, so Doug's script is about as good as it gets at the moment. I try not to bug 'em too much about it, but I know what you mean with potential backlogs (closed 30 identical TFDs the other day... not fun). Primefac (talk) 19:20, 22 July 2016 (UTC)

I've recently made a script to close FFD discussions, so I thought I'd take a look at making one for TFD. After reviewing the WP:TFDAI instructions, I think it will be possible to code the following options into a script:

Extended content

Single template discussions:

[keep/other]: Use for: Keep, or other close that will result in the template being kept (e.g. Redirect, No Consensus); Details: Prompts for result & rationale; closes discussion using that result & rationale (and {{NAC}} if non-admin); adds {{Old TfD}} to template talkpage; removes {{Template for discussion/dated}} or {{Tfm/dated}} from template
[quick-keep]: Use for: Keep, when no further rationale is required; Details: Same as [keep/other], but instead of prompting, just uses "Keep" as the result/rationale
[delete/other]: Use for: Delete, or other close that will result in the template being deleted (e.g. Review, Convert, Substitute); Details (admins): Prompts for result & rationale; closes discussion using that result & rationale; prompts for which holding cell section to use, or "delete now"; If a holding cell section is selected: adds {{tfdl}} to that holding cell section, and replaces {{Template for discussion/dated}} or {{Tfm/dated}} with {Being deleted} (<noinclude>'d); If "delete now" selected: performs delete action, using a link to the TFD discussion as the reason; Details (non-admins): Prompts for result & rationale; closes discussion using that result, rationale, and {{NAC}}; prompts for which holding cell section to use; adds {{tfdl}} to that holding cell section; replaces {{Template for discussion/dated}} or {{Tfm/dated}} with {{Being deleted}} (<noinclude>'d)
[quick-delete]: Use for: Delete, when no further rationale is required; Details: Same as [delete/other], but instead of prompting, just uses "Delete" as the result/rationale. Will still prompt for a holding cell section or (if admin) "delete now"
[relist]: Details: Prompts for optional relist comment; relists discussion on current day's TFD subpage; closes original discussion as "Relist" and collapses that discussion; updates {{Template for discussion/dated}} or {{Tfm/dated}} on template

Multiple template discussions:

[keep/other], [quick-keep]: Same as for single template discussion, iterating through each template and template talkpage
[delete/other], [quick-delete]: Same as for single template discussion, iterating through each template (but only makes a single edit to the holding cell for all the templates)
[other close]: Use for: Closes which require different actions for one or more of the templates listed at the discussion (e.g. Merge, Delete some but keep others); Details: Prompts for result & rationale; closes discussion using that result/rationale; opens each template so that further manual action can be undertaken.
[relist]: Same as for single-template discussion, iterating through each template

How does that sound? (Pinging @Czar and Primefac: ) - Evad37 [talk] 04:31, 26 July 2016 (UTC)

Yes! Thank you! The regulars will see your post and respond, but the better the tools → the more time spent on other jobs czar 06:15, 26 July 2016 (UTC)

@Czar and Primefac:, and other TFD closers: My new script is ready for testing! See documentation at User:Evad37/TFDcloser, and use User talk:Evad37/TFDcloser.js to report any unexpected occurrences or provide other feedback. - Evad37 [talk] 03:37, 31 July 2016 (UTC)

Crosspost of requested move

There is a move discussion in progress on Template talk:Tfm about expading the name of that template. Pppery (talk) 13:07, 9 August 2016 (UTC)

Requested move crosspost

I am posting here to notify you of a requested move I made regarding a bunch of deletion discussion templates. The discussion it at Template_talk:Cfd-notify#Requested move 21 August 2016 Pppery (talk) 23:26, 21 August 2016 (UTC)

Increasing participation

One recurring theme throughout previous discussions is the problem of low participation at TfD. There are probably several underlying causes for this state of affairs so there isn't going to be a one-shot solution, but I think one indication that we could see is that the current system for notifying possible participants is probably not working completely as intended. Can we use the current thread to brainstorm ideas about possible ways of improvement? Please feel free to add subthreads of your own. Uanfala (talk) 12:33, 24 August 2016 (UTC)

Project tags on templates. If the template is tagged for a WikiProject then it's almost twice as likely for the TfD to receive participation. I had a look yesterday at the TfDs from 16 and 18 August and there were 38 open ones. In 21 cases the template concerned (or at least one of the templates, if it was a multi-nomination), had a WikiProject tag on its talk page. The remaning 17 templates didn't have a project tag. Of the discussions for the tagged ones, 75% saw participation from editors other than the nominator. The corresponding percentage for untagged templates was almost half of that at 40%. That's a big difference. And although there are certainly other factors involved (for example, more widely used templates have higher chances of getting tagged and, independently of that, are also more likely to have more watchers and hence a larger pool of potential TfD participants.), I think we have a strong correlation. And given that a little over half of the templates I surveyed were tagged, there's something to be done on this front. Should we somehow incorporate tagging into the workflow? Uanfala (talk) 12:33, 24 August 2016 (UTC)
I've changed the listing instructions to make the relevance of project tags a bit clearer [2]. Uanfala (talk) 12:26, 1 September 2016 (UTC)
You'll get more participation if what you write is legible. Feel free to admonish me for re-factoring your comment, but please read MOS:FONTSIZE first - it's there for a reason. --RexxS (talk) 19:44, 4 September 2016 (UTC)
Notifying editors who use the template. That's probably far-fetched, but I'm wondering if there isn't a way of tracking down the editors who have used a given template, and then posting on the talk pages of a sample of them using some sort of RfC-style notification process. I imagine that tools like the article blamer could be harnessed to help with that, but I don't really know if ultimately this is going to be technically feasible. Uanfala (talk) 12:33, 24 August 2016 (UTC)
Improve discussion culture. It might be just me, but maybe TfD's participation problem wouldn't be so bad if the discussion culture was a bit more like that of most other parts of wikipedia, where participants do a bit more in terms of engaging with any issues raised or questions posed, and do a bit less in the way of circuitous restatement of initial assertions. Uanfala (talk) 20:50, 25 September 2016 (UTC)
Yep. TfD is waaay too confrontational; some serial nominators feel the need to shoot down anybody who dares !vote "Oppose" or "Keep". --Redrose64 (talk) 23:09, 25 September 2016 (UTC)
I concur. There's a fine line between "I think I can persuade you to change your mind" and "You're an idiot for thinking like that" (and there is no sarcasm in that statement). Primefac (talk) 23:21, 25 September 2016 (UTC)

TfD failure

When nominations like this, for a single-use external link template, with no other article-space links to the target site, have to be closed (through no fault of the closer) as "no consensus", then there is something seriously wrong with TfD. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 11:27, 9 September 2016 (UTC)

Well, if all the (three) participants in this discussion weren't convinced by the nominator's argument that a template should necessarily be deleted if it meets these two criteria, then I don't think I'm able to see any fault with TfD on account of that. Uanfala (talk) 13:04, 9 September 2016 (UTC)

Uanfala, I would argue that the first !vote was from someone who has a bias towards keeping all of these sorts of templates. The second !vote is an ILIKEIT, and your comment was pretty handily answered by Andy almost two weeks prior to you asking the question. Thus, a broken system, where one guy with a beef and a random user can stall what should be a policy- and consensus-driven discussion about the usage (in the here and now) of a template. Now, I won't say that people with biases towards a subject shouldn't comment on a discussion (it's their prerogative), but that they should stick around to refute any statements made by the nominator/other users. Drive-by !voting isn't a great idea... Primefac (talk) 02:41, 10 September 2016 (UTC)

My comment was answered by Andy? I take that to mean that the question of whether an external links template is likely to be used is summarily solved only by looking at the number of already existing links to that site. Is that the case? I don't think I would agree with that, especially if the resources on the site (like the resources of other major national archives) seem likely to be relevant for a high number of articles. Uanfala (talk) 06:32, 10 September 2016 (UTC)

@Uanfala: By "your comment was pretty handily answered" I believe that Primefac refers to the bullet beginning 'This supposed "high possibility for reuse" (my emphasis) has not been realised ...'. --Redrose64 (talk) 09:17, 10 September 2016 (UTC)

@Redrose64: Oh, I see. But then that's worse: that's deleting a template simply because so far it hasn't been used. Correct me if I'm wrong (I'm new to TfD), but aren't we meant to look at the potential for use? And something like This supposed "high possibility for reuse" has not been realised simply restates the fact that the template is unused and that brings us back to where we started. Uanfala (talk) 09:35, 10 September 2016 (UTC)

If there were several links to the Amicus website, in various articles, not using the template, then there would be potential for its use, by converting them (and I would have tagged it as such, rather than nominating it for deletion). As I pointed out, there are zero such links. And the template has found no use in seven years of existence. No evidence of any likelihood of the template being used in the future was presented. As I recently pointed out to you elsewhere, point 3 of the criteria for deletion at Tfd says "The template is not used... and has no likelihood of being used". Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 10:57, 10 September 2016 (UTC)

I approve also this last statement. In my opinion that Tfd template just causes more harm in an attempt to solve another unrelated problem: participation. We have other tools widely used to inform authors plus project pages for other people that may be intererested. But we should not break any template (notably widely used ones) just to advertize such proposals to everyone, by breaking all pages using them. It causes unnecessary load on the server as well and in fact if it should be used somewhere, it should even be in the doc pages or of templates proposed to deletion, or probably just in their tlak page (just to keep an history of discussions). Putting it in the main code just causes troubles (and this may explain why this method has in fact not been used since years: we have better ways to inform and discuss these proposals). verdy_p (talk) 18:24, 10 September 2016 (UTC)

Verdy p, your comment has seemingly nothing to do with this particular discussion (and you broke the section header). If it's in the wrong section, feel free to move it to the correct one (and remove my comments here). Otherwise... what's your point? Primefac (talk) 18:33, 10 September 2016 (UTC)

No, the section header is appropriate and my comment was about what Andy just wrote, that I approve too. verdy_p (talk) 22:47, 12 September 2016 (UTC)

TfD needs to be merged into MfD. That way, there will be more !voters, which means less "no consensus". KATMAKROFAN (talk) 14:10, 23 September 2016 (UTC)

Do you think this will increase participation? I don't think I'm the only one who gives up watching XfD pages or delsorts that see a lot of activity. Uanfala (talk) 14:14, 23 September 2016 (UTC)

And again at Wikipedia:Templates for discussion/Log/2016 September 21#Template:Infobox academic. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 15:38, 6 October 2016 (UTC)

And now Wikipedia:Templates for discussion/Log/2016 September 20#Template:Newbie-biting. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 20:34, 30 October 2016 (UTC)

Andy, I think it could also have to do with a potential reluctance to close as delete when it is "close". I've found myself often in the past few weeks !voting instead of closing because I completely agreed with the deletion rationale, found the keep rationale wishy-washy, but didn't want to get a load of flack thrown my way for making a supervote. I know the actual admins are likely to be a bit less reluctant, but then again I've seen BU Rob13 make similar actions. On the whole, though, I agree with the issue - I'm not convinced a template should be kept due to rationale of "charming" and "harmless", which in my book is comparable to "ILIKEIT". Primefac (talk) 21:43, 30 October 2016 (UTC)

I close based on strength of arguments (given the policies), not on vote count. I've closed in favor of deletion when the numbers favored keeping in the past, and I'll do it again in the future. I'll do the same for keeping. In the specific discussion quoted above, the arguments for deletion (which I favor very slightly, on a personal level) were not very well-made and had no clear connection with policy that would allow me to close on the basis of strength of arguments. ~ Rob₁₃^Talk 22:15, 30 October 2016 (UTC)

I'm wondering if it isn't time for a TfD-specific text similar to Wikipedia:Arguments to avoid in deletion discussions. Some time ago I started drafting User:Uanfala/Arguments to watch out for in TfD discussions. It's badly written but it can be a start. Given that so far it reflects my own personal view, you're all invited to add to it. – Uanfala (talk) 22:23, 30 October 2016 (UTC)

@Uanfala: I'd agree, except that all of those are perfectly valid reasons for deletion and are reflected by consensus since I started closing at TfD, and likely much earlier. There are maintenance costs to keeping unused templates. Indeed, I'd quite like a speedy deletion criteria targeted at them which allows them to be deleted without the administrative costs of TfD (subject to WP:REFUND, of course!). Hardcoded instances of a template are already eligible for speedy deletion (WP:T3). I'm much more sympathetic to your arguments there, and I frequently encourage application of WP:IAR in that area. Hell, I even use a hardcoded instance of a cite template for my own content creation. But we'd need to start with consensus to remove that speedy deletion criteria before actively discouraging people from nominating for it. ~ Rob₁₃^Talk 16:37, 1 November 2016 (UTC)

BU Rob13, I completely agree with you on the "unused" bit. T3 speedies sit for a week before they're deleted, so some sort of "unused" CSD tag could be similar (like a PROD) - use the template and the CSD is invalidated. It would also save the 30 October 2016 ridiculousness of having a thousand templates nominated for deletion and really hammering load times. RfC time? Primefac (talk) 17:13, 1 November 2016 (UTC)

There isn't a single policy based argument for keeping the template; and the single argument that is not "I like it" (i.e. that it points to a policy telling people not to bite newbies) is rendered null by the fact that the template duplicates another which does the job, does it better, and does so with far more widespread community uptake. however, if you read my first post in this section, you'll see that it's not my point to re-litigate the close; if it were, we'd be at deletion review. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 17:32, 1 November 2016 (UTC)