Category talk:Redirects from initialisms

This category was nominated for Merging on 6 February 2011. The result of the discussion was Nomination withdrawn.

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Abbreviations and Initialisms

I propose that abbreviations and {{R from abbreviation}} be separated from this category and {{R from initialism}} as they are two separate things. A redirect such as "Neocon" etc. is an abbreviation, not an initialism, and should be in its own category, leaving this category strictly for capital letter initialism redirects (SPCA etc.). However, the term 'abbreviation' can include initialisms as well, so perhaps a better option would be to just move this category and {{R from initialism}} back to Category:Redirects from abbreviations and {{R from abbreviation}}, as that was the template and category's original name, and the redundant Category:Redirects from abbreviations (which was supposed to be a container category as I recall) currently contains a small smattering of both abbreviations and initialisms, and also, too many initialism redirects are already tagged with {{R from abbreviation}} to split them all manually from each other. -- œ^™ 19:41, 22 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Acronym should be subcat of initialism, which in turn is a subcat of of abbreviation, so that people can find it in the tree structure. This initialism category is so huge I'm wondering if we could design some other subcategories of it besides acronyms though. Perhaps on the basis of how many letters? Something like "redirects from 3-letter initialisms" for FBI/CIA or something? Ranze (talk) 20:36, 1 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Naw I don't think subcategorizing by letter count is necessary. Just separating the initialisms and acronyms from the abbreviations I think would be enough to reduce the size substantially. Currently everything is clumped together under the category of "Initialisms" which is just wrong. As you mentioned, we should have a top category of "Abbreviations" with a subcat of "Initialisms" and another subcat of "Acronyms". I think probably the best way to accomplish this would be with WP:AutoWikiBrowser however I've never used the tool, and am hoping someone more experienced with it can help us. -- œ^™ 20:59, 2 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

In fact I'd probably be satisfied with someone just doing a mass removal of all these blasted "..., μSA" redirects polluting this category! Here's a list of all of them, btw. -- œ^™ 03:18, 7 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Regarding the relatively few long-to-short redirects

FYI, Category:Redirects to abbreviations is now a pure container (no Pages) with one Subcat for acronyms (6) and one for initialisms (128). Without examining those subcats i daresay they are now used conservatively. The parent Redirects from long names is 30 times larger. --P64 (talk) 22:55, 7 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Upon examination I learned that {R to abbreviation} and {R to initials} were not used judiciously, given that they redirect to {R to initialism}. Instead they were used for many other redirects from longer to shorter page names. ...

But template {{R to abbreviation}} redirects to {{R to initialism}}, a problem. I addressed one consequence this hour by substituting {{Redr|long}} in numerous R to abbrev pages. --P64 (talk) 23:59, 7 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Miscellaneous redirects from longer to shorter names now use {{Redr|long}}. Redirects to acronyms and initialisms, almost all clear and difficult cases, now use one of {{R to acronym}} (count 14) and {{R to initialism}} (count 57) rather than either the abbreviation (3) or initials (0) redirects to the latter. ...

All that just made the job even harder to sort all this mess out. -- œ^™ 09:23, 10 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

It's strictly unrelated to this mess, although suggestive. See below (outdented).

Experience shows that {R to abbreviation} and {R to initials} will be used generally, as their names may suggest, not reliably used for acronyms or initialisms. They should be re-targeted to {{R from long name}} --which is now the target of both Template:R to abbreviated name and Template:R to abbreviated title. --P64 (talk) 01:50, 11 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Return to the many short-to-long redirects

Almost certainly {{R from abbreviation}} (count 9354) should be vacated --not by hand, of course, with about 10,000 rather than 40 transclusions-- and re-targeted to {{R from short name}}. And same for {{R from initials}} (count 266).

{R from short name} is now the target of all these near synonyms, wisely:

R abbreviation, R from abbreviated name, R from abbreviated title, Redirect from abbreviated name, Redirect from abbreviated title

If i clerk correctly, all the i/ii/init R and Redirect do target {{R from initialism}}, which must be unwise.

--P64 (talk) 01:50, 11 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Acronyms and initialisms

Preliminary to sorting redirects --that is, distinguishing redirects to and from acronyms and initialisms (and perhaps numeronyms) from those to and from other abbreviations or short names or shortcuts-- consider improving the categorization of articles (article pagenames) as acronyms and initialisms. The article categories are now small and some of the challenges must be identical.

Category:Acronyms --now 59 pages with 10 sorted to the top, 49 other
Category:Initialisms --now 18 pages with 2 sorted to the top, 16 other

Same as in the redirects category structure, the parent is Category:Abbreviations, now 26 pages with 4 sorted to the top, 22 other.

Some of the 49, 16, and 22 pages have been classed by mistake, clearly, but few of the articles provide supporting information. One that does is our article FAQ; its lead section shows that 'FAQ' belongs in both categories. But our article FERT calls its subject primarily a motto, believed to be an acronym. That article is in cat Initialisms and it is silent regarding pronunciation of 'FERT'.

--P64 (talk) 20:03, 14 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
(clarify that by adding markup, the terms 'Category:' and 'article', etc) (and fix typos, brainos) --P64 (talk) 19:25, 3 May; 17:48, 4 May 2016 (UTC)[reply]