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Deletion principles for unexplained redirects of alternative terms

The following issue came up recently in a dispute over a proposed redirect deletion.

  • Scenario #1: There is a redirect from X to Y that an editors knows is appropriate (say, because they have special domain knowledge that X is another commonly used term for Y) but which is not explained in the article about Y. Should the editor redirect at X for deletion because of the risk that the user would be confused when they arrive at Y and cannot find the term X addressed explicitly?
  • Scenario #2: There is a redirect from X to Y that could potentially be correct (e.g., X is plausibly an alternate term used for Y), but the editor has no domain knowledge and so is unsure. If the term X is not discussed on the article for Y, should the editor propose the redirect for deletion?

As always, "Redirected from X" will appear at the top of the page. Please assume for the sake of argument that the editor is unable add an explanation to the article because they have access to any sources or they don't have time; the only options are to delete or not delete the redirect. Assume also that any proposed deletion is announced in the appropriate place and no other editors respond, so the original editor must make a judgement call.

My intention is to discuss principles that should apply generally in these sorts of scenarios, but for reference the case the prompted this dispute was X="Hadamard-Gutzwiller model" and Y="Hadamard's dynamical system".

(If this is not the correct place to discuss abstract principles that ought to be applied when deciding whether to delete a redirect, could someone tell me where that is? The only other plausible page I found was Wikipedia_talk:Redirects_for_discussion/Common_outcomes but that seemed less appropriate.) Jess_Riedel (talk) 19:38, 24 June 2018 (UTC)

September 17th

RESOLVED
All dealt with JZCL 22:13, 6 October 2018 (UTC)

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

Several discussions from the 17th September remain unclosed and have not been relisted. JZCL 12:40, 6 October 2018 (UTC)

I've contributed to all of them, so can't help. Stephni meyer has been listed at WP:ANRFC since the 24th without success. Every active closing admin has commented on that one. I've invited very occasional RfD contributor Ivanvector (or anyone watching their talk page) to do the honours. Deryck Chan doesn't appear to have contributed to Windermere, Cumbria or Liberation Day (United Kingdom) though. Thryduulf (talk) 13:34, 6 October 2018 (UTC)
Deryck has now closed all except Stephni meyer (which they have contributed to), so we're down to just the one outstanding. Thryduulf (talk) 14:47, 6 October 2018 (UTC)
Yes, at risk of supervoting a few times, I've closed or relisted all remaining nominations of 27th September or before, except "Stephni Meyer". Let's hope we can pull someone in from WP:ANRFC. Deryck C. 15:10, 6 October 2018 (UTC)
Oh wow, it's already been on there for 33 days! I think this is one of the most involved RFD nominations I've ever seen... JZCL 18:56, 6 October 2018 (UTC)
I haven't looked to verify this, but my gut feeling is that this is not a record holder! Thryduulf (talk) 19:20, 6 October 2018 (UTC)
Maybe a new category for WP:Records? ;) JZCL 19:47, 6 October 2018 (UTC)
Closed as no consensus. I removed the log from the main page as well. Ivanvector (Talk/Edits) 21:57, 6 October 2018 (UTC)
Thank you. Thryduulf (talk) 22:06, 6 October 2018 (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.

Policy question: Where should generic trademarks redirect? (Popsicle or Ice pop?)

Please help with discussion on Talk:Popsicle (brand)#Requested move 10 August 2018. When evidence exists for a generic trademark, what threshold should we as editors use to definitively determine whether to direct the trademark name to the trademark page or its generic equivalent page? Examples of both have been presented in comments and I see no guidance within WP:Trademark or Category:Redirects from brand names. Leaving the decision to an editor/survey on whether or not Wikipedia should respect a book citation over easily verified live trademark ownership seems tenuous. Lexlex (talk) 11:59, 13 August 2018 (UTC)

File redirects with Commons equivalent

@Tavix and Steel1943: Thanks for pointing out there is {{Db-redircom}}. I speedy deleted one but not the other two because the first one is an exact shadow (so completely uncontroversial WP:G6). But the latter two actually have local redirects pointing to a different file than their Commons equivalents, which means they're also WP:G6 (because these are broken redirects anyway) but there may be other clean-up to do. Deryck C. 15:44, 6 November 2018 (UTC)

Voting limits

Is there a limit for how long after a redirect is nominated, for voting? Puzzledvegetable (talk) 20:31, 9 December 2018 (UTC)

Puzzledvegetable: The general rule is that a discussion stays open for at least seven days after nomination or the most recent relisting. If you see a discussion that is still open (not marked as closed with an orange box), feel free to comment on it. Redirects for discussion are a low-traffic forum so the exact time of discussion closure depends on volunteer availability. Decisions are made by finding consensus in the discussion, not just counting heads. Deryck C. 11:48, 10 December 2018 (UTC)

Question

Any easy way to get a list of all redirects from the Wikipedia namespace to the Article namespace? Just speedied (as recently created) 4 where editors erroneously moved an article from Draft to the Wikipedia space, and then corrected by a second move from Wikipedia to the Mainspace, leaving a redirect. But those speedies were only after a manual search that got up to "Am". A systemic list would be better of course, with any non-recently created to be brought here rather than speedied. Thanks in advance. UnitedStatesian (talk) 19:47, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

@UnitedStatesian: User:Nyttend/Project redirects is probably the list you are looking for, and it's from 2017. Most of the problematic redirects were taken care of via WP:G6, specifically deleting pages unambiguously created in error or in the incorrect namespace. JJMC89 created that list; in case you want an updated version, they might be the person to ask. -- Tavix (talk) 21:41, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

User:DumbBOT may be having issues

Posting here that I had to manually transclude 2019 January 27. May need to keep a lookout to see if DumbBOT is having issues again. (This isn't the first time something like this has happened.) Steel1943 (talk) 10:09, 27 January 2019 (UTC)

WP:CFD discussion with incoming redirects eligible for WP:G8 if deleted

Editors who participate in RfD may be interested in participating in Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2019 January 31#Category:Canadian Research Publication academic journals. This WP:CFD nomination involves several incoming "article"-namespace redirects to the categories that will be eligible for WP:G8 speedy deletion if the categories are deleted. (Pinging UnitedStatesian, the nominator, to make them aware of this note.) Steel1943 (talk) 21:56, 31 January 2019 (UTC)

Notifications

Due to a recent RFD about the title of our WP:RS guideline, it has come to my attention that we have no system of notification in place for RFD discussions. We have such a requirement for RM discussions... but not for RFD discussions. Is this an oversight, or something intentional? Should there be notification? Blueboar (talk) 17:09, 3 January 2019 (UTC)

@Blueboar:, not sure I follow: each page subject to RfD is tagged, and nominators should be pinging the creator on their talk page, and the centralized discussions are linked from WP:RFD. What are you looking for specifically? UnitedStatesian (talk) 22:13, 31 January 2019 (UTC)
@UnitedStatesian: FWIW, see Wikipedia talk:Reliable sources#Page move regarding more history pertaining to this inquiry. Steel1943 (talk) 22:18, 31 January 2019 (UTC)

Nomination of redirects to targets currently at XfD

It's almost never the best use of time to discuss redirects to targets that are currently at an XfD. If the target is deleted the redirect can be speedily deleted under criterion G8 and any consensus at RfD becomes irrelevant or moot depending which is closed first. With any other outcome for the target the original rationale may or may not still be relevant so it's much better to wait until outcome of the XfD before nominating the redirect.

We should probably include something like this (but worded better) in the RfD guidance to (a) directly help people who read it before nominating and (b) have somewhere to point people to when we get nominations like Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2019 February 23#Template:Liga 2 Group 1 table rather than having to write a probably less-well phrased explanation out each time. Thryduulf (talk) 02:33, 23 February 2019 (UTC)

Not wasting time nominating a redirect to a target that might be deleted should be common sense, no? I doubt the people who nonetheless nominate such redirects are the ones who are likely to read in detail the guidance at the top of the page. – Uanfala (talk) 02:42, 23 February 2019 (UTC)
It's common sense for most experienced editors but not necessarily for inexperienced ones (who don't realise it's not necessary for example). Some of these people will read guidance, but for the ones that don't see my point (b) above. Thryduulf (talk) 02:47, 23 February 2019 (UTC)
I think I'd be in favor of this, although I think the larger issue is RfDs that point to subjects that are subsequently nominated. That is, the redirect artical typoe gets nominated for RfD, but two days later the target of that redirect, Article typo, gets nominated at AfD. If Twinkle leaves a notification of the RfD on the target's talkpage (see above) that might help some of those situations, but this would be good to point to. As above, the XfD of the target should almost always take precedence over the redirect discussion. ~ Amory (u • t • c) 20:45, 26 February 2019 (UTC)

Discussion about notification

There's a suggestion at Wikipedia talk:Twinkle#Notifying redirect targets that Twinkle should put a notice on the talk page of the target article of a redirect up for discussion at RfD. Best to keep the discussion in one place, so do join in the discussion there if interested. PamD 23:57, 13 February 2019 (UTC)

I've commented there, generally in support, but I do just want to add here that it would be great if more RfD regulars could chime in. As the majority of RfD noms are done by Twinkle, such a thing would be a de facto change/addition to the RfD nomination procedures. ~ Amory (u • t • c) 12:27, 15 February 2019 (UTC)
I think this is overkill. Is there an example of a problematic RfD discussion that might have ended differently had the target's talk page been notified? UnitedStatesian (talk) 23:20, 26 February 2019 (UTC)
I think the idea is more about finding people who might know what they're talking about. I dunno about "problematic", but there are occasional discussions (math, phylogeny, foreign languages) that the regulars aren't necessarily experts at; pagewatchers of the target might be helpful. Redirects only make sense if they end up somewhere, so I think of it sort of like TfM where the target is notified. Placing a template on the target is clearly overkill in this case, though, so a short talkpage note to awaken the watchers seems reasonable. ~ Amory (u • t • c) 16:41, 27 February 2019 (UTC)
The I think those would be better served by one-off notifications rather than changing the process so the every target talk page is notified. UnitedStatesian (talk) 16:59, 27 February 2019 (UTC)
Refactored to Wikipedia talk:Twinkle#Notifying redirect targets. Oops. UnitedStatesian (talk) 17:01, 27 February 2019 (UTC)

Withdrawing an RfD

PamD has pointed out that there are no instructions for withdrawing an RfD nomination. With that in mind, I propose to add a short subsection of Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion#Closing notes. My initial suggestion is below but improvements, comments and copyedits are more than welcome - in particular this is possibly too detailed.

If you want to withdraw the nomination for any reason, for example if you change your mind and there are no other editors advocating deletion, there are two options.

  • Close the discussion using the {{rfd-top}} and {{rfd-bottom}} templates, using "'''withdrawn'''" for the result parameter. You should then edit the redirect page to remove the rfd tag making it clear in the edit summary that the nomination has been withdrawn. On the redirect's talk page you should add the {{old rfd}} template, again including the word "withdrawn" in the result parameter.
  • Alternatively, you can simply add a note at the end of the discussion making it clear that you are withdrawing the nomination. An experienced closer will close the discussion and do the other steps for you when they see it.

Thryduulf (talk) 12:12, 8 March 2019 (UTC)

There doesn't need to be instructions specifically for withdrawing. It's simply applying WP:WITHDRAW to the instructions already at WP:RFDAI. -- Tavix (talk) 14:38, 8 March 2019 (UTC)
Well at least one person has failed to find that so we need some mention of withdrawing, even if not necessarily instructions. Thryduulf (talk) 14:58, 8 March 2019 (UTC)
Then that person should be pointed to WP:WITHDRAW and have the common sense that withdrawing is the same as keeping, and maybe point out WP:XFDC which makes the process much easier. -- Tavix (talk) 15:08, 8 March 2019 (UTC)
Hmm, after 120k edits over 12 years I can sympathise with newbies who find Wikipedia a hostile environment, being told I lack common sense because I wasn't aware of the correct process in an area where I don't spend a lot of time. Thanks, @Thryduulf:, for a more welcoming response to my fumbled withdrawal. PamD 16:01, 8 March 2019 (UTC)
@PamD: I didn't think you have a fumbled withdrawal! It is not an issue at all for a RfD regular to "file the paperwork" after one withdraws in the way you did, and I am more than happy to continue to do so in the future. On the contrary, I'm confused why Thryduulf thinks it such a big deal to bother you about this supposed "issue", when there wasn't one in the first place. Closing discussions can be a daunting and challenging thing for anyone to figure out, regardless of the amount of time you have spent here, and I would hate for you to think you have to do that additional work when it's as easy as pressing a couple buttons on my end to formally close the discussion. My apologies if you took my comment the wrong way, but I absolutely think you did nothing wrong here. -- Tavix (talk) 16:09, 8 March 2019 (UTC)
I looked for advice on how to withdraw an RfD and couldn't find anything where I expected to find it, at WP:RfD. I didn't think to look under WP:WITHDRAW, so I stuck my "Withdraw" at both top and bottom because wasn't sure which was the right place. It would be useful to include something about withdrawing an RfD in the page which has instructions on adding and closing RfD discussions. PamD 16:30, 8 March 2019 (UTC)
And that's a perfectly acceptable way to do it! Back to the issue at hand, I think it would be relevant to point out that WP:RFDAI also doesn't have specific instruction for plenty of other common closures at RfD, including retargeting, disambiguating, soft redirects, etc. I like the way that WP:AFDAI explains all the common closes there, so perhaps it's time to overhaul WP:RFDAI to follow suit. -- Tavix (talk) 16:39, 8 March 2019 (UTC)
Overhauling that would be good but there would still need to be a sentence on the main page that notes you can withdraw by (a) commenting in the discussion that you've withdrawn it, and/or (b) following the closing instructions on the subpage. I'd also suggest renaming it from "Admin instructions" to "Closing instructions" as only a subset of closes need to be done by an administrator and the instructions are applicable to everyone who closes a discussion. Thryduulf (talk) 17:38, 8 March 2019 (UTC)
I don't see anything wrong with the current setup on the main page, where it simply points to RFDAI with the exception of a couple general notes that apply to all closures. At RFDAI it can be explained the same way as WP:AFDAI, including a link to WP:WITHDRAW for details on when withdrawing is appropriate. That being said, your (a) wouldn't be a closure though, so that would be inappropriate for closing instructions. I agree that a rename should happen, although it would need to be for all XFDAIs for consistency. -- Tavix (talk) 17:51, 8 March 2019 (UTC)
That why I said (a) should be on the main page. I don't know why we need constistency in closing instruction page locations, although I'm obviously not going to object to renaming others too (assuming there are closures at all of them that non-admins can do). Thryduulf (talk) 18:25, 8 March 2019 (UTC)
No, (a) shouldn't be on the main page, it would be out of place there. And yes, WP:CONSISTENCY across page titles is always desired unless there is a good reason otherwise. -- Tavix (talk) 18:31, 8 March 2019 (UTC)
Why are instructions about how to withdraw an RfD nomination out of place on a page giving instructions about RfD discussions? Consistency is desirable but not essential. Thryduulf (talk) 18:34, 8 March 2019 (UTC)
Because the page that gives instructions about closing RfD discussions is at WP:RFDAI. -- Tavix (talk) 18:38, 8 March 2019 (UTC)
(a) is not closure instructions, it's: "if you want to withdraw just leave a comment at the end of the discussion saying so, or follow the instructions in this page that sounds irrelevant.". Thryduulf (talk) 21:55, 8 March 2019 (UTC)
One doesn't need guideline to leave a note at a discussion. PamD was able to do this just fine and there is no evidence of others having "issues" withdrawing their own nomination because they didn't know they could leave a comment. -- Tavix (talk) 22:07, 8 March 2019 (UTC)
PamD didn't know whether that was sufficient, whether she should comment at the top or the bottom, whether she could close it, etc. and over the years I've seen plenty of people asking in threads "can I withdraw this?" or "how can this been withdrawn?", striking out of nominations, striking the whole discussion, removing of RfD tags without mentioning it in the discussion, etc, and we don't know how many people just don't . Just because very few people have explicitly complained does not mean that there isn't a problem. However, even if there isn't, what possible harm will result from adding the guidance? Thryduulf (talk) 13:24, 9 March 2019 (UTC)

Guiding principles

WP:RGUIDE says Redirects nominated in contravention of Wikipedia:Redirect will be speedily kept. This text has been around since at least 2005, and perhaps it made more sense then. But what does it actually mean now? WP:R is a vast and sprawling guideline detailing the purpose, scope and nature of redirects. Contravention of it is more likely to be a reason for deletion, rather than a reason for a speedy keep. Surely there is something more clear that can be said here. Triptothecottage (talk) 11:46, 15 March 2019 (UTC)

Changing when non-administrative closures are permitted

Editors may be interested in participating in this discussion about what types of non-administrative closures are permissible. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 16:32, 22 March 2019 (UTC)

Twinkle can now notify a redirect's target upon RfD nomination

When RfDing a redirect with WP:Twinkle you should now see a new checkbox. If checked (default), Twinkle will leave a notice on the talk page of a redirect's target upon RfD nomination. See discussion above. Also, the preview button now works for RfD! Other recent changes here; please let me know if there are any issues! ~ Amory (u • t • c) 15:31, 3 April 2019 (UTC)

Droz (professional wrestling

The above redirect is up for deletion, but I can't seem to find the actual discussion anywhere. It's clearly a typo (the disambig isn't closed), however, I found it odd there was no link to the discussion. Best Wishes, Lee Vilenski (talk • contribs) 08:30, 10 May 2019 (UTC)

Potential RFD

Upon researching to create Humera (disambiguation), the redirect Humera Alwani came to my attention. If there is no reason for such a redirect, you can nominate this for discussion.-TonyTheTiger (T / C / WP:FOUR / WP:CHICAGO / WP:WAWARD) 01:05, 18 June 2019 (UTC)

How to propose re-opening a Redirect deletion discussion?

Hi. I would like to reopen the discussion of the Redirect for Speak Welsh which I created sometime earlier this month. I only became aware of the proposal after it was deleted (somehow I didn't see the notification) so I couldn't participate in the discussion. I have some points which weren't considered. Where is the right place to do this? --DadaNeem (talk) 02:34, 24 July 2019 (UTC)

RFD filers and/or participants should consult a romanization list for alternate spellings (for example Kunrei-shiki for Japanese)

I have created many redirects from Kunrei-shiki spellings, some of which may appear unusual to an English speaker. In the past I did not include this detail in the edit summaries/internal comments/talk pages in the redirects. I am concerned that years down the line a person unfamiliar with this may file a redirect for discussion and get the redirects deleted because other Wikipedians don't know about the fact it is a legitimate redirect spelling. I think RFD filers and participants should be familiar with the romanizations of say Arabic, Chinese, Japanese, Korean, etc. when a redirect in that subject area is discussed.

Thanks, WhisperToMe (talk) 19:00, 16 August 2019 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2019 August 17#Sinai

Can someone please take a look at this? I'm reluctant to close it myself as I'm "involved" but clearly it's not conducive to have parallel discussions at at WP:Rfd and WP:RM. PC78 (talk) 13:39, 18 August 2019 (UTC)

Coal truck & coal trucks

Indiana State Road 64, Tennessee State Route 132 & others are linked to coal truck and a redirect to mineral wagon appears to be an error. But coal trucks is linked to Withdrawn British Rail stock, User:Wavelength/Articles userfied/List of environmental topics/C & William Galloway (mining engineer) and redirects to mineral wagon. This is a terminology conflict of sorts. I did not figure out how to post this on the project page. Vive the difference between American English and British English. Peter Horn User talk 13:52, 24 October 2019 (UTC)

Redirects with database (e.g. Wikidata) identifiers

I've started a discussion about the speedy deletion of this sort of redirect (e.g. Aisa Bint Ahmad (Q30904322) → Aisa Bint Ahmad) at Wikipedia talk:Criteria for speedy deletion#Redirects with database (e.g. Wikidata) identifiers. Please comment there to keep discussion together. Thryduulf (talk) 13:21, 4 November 2019 (UTC)

Redirect page that there is no articles link to that page

hi, i just found some new redirect pages that there is no articles link to that page. for examples: Yu Lang Lin, Lin Youlang targeting to Lin Yu-lang page. but after i checked, there is no articles in wikipedia that linked to Yu Lang Lin or Lin Youlang (see: Yu Lang Lin ,Lin Youlang ). anyone know which criteria should i tag in the redirect page for deletion? thank you --Stvbastian (talk) 03:21, 15 November 2019 (UTC)

  • @Stvbastian: Just because no pages link to a redirect does not mean they should be deleted - indeed Lin Youlang as a good example of a useful redirect that should not be linked - it is a very plausible misspelling of the target article name. Similarly Yu Lang Lin is probably a good redirect because it's the subjects name but in Western name order, which is how it will be rendered in some sources. Thryduulf (talk) 00:34, 16 November 2019 (UTC)
  • @Stvbastian: I don't understand why you want to redirect all my redirects. They are legitimate redirects, see for example: [1]

Retargeting a WP redirect

If a redirect in the Wikipedia namespace has lots of incoming links (I stopped at 1500), is it possible to retarget it to a more appropriate target? If not, I won't submit that for discussion. ―Mandruss ☎ 01:26, 21 November 2019 (UTC)

I'm assuming this is a shortcut. Is it used as intended? If there's a large number of incoming links where the intended meaning is something other than the current target, then that would be a strong argument for doing something about this redirect at RfD. On the other hand, if it's used correctly and it has already caught on, it's rarely sensible to attempt to retarget it, as that would entail changing the following: incoming links from pages (laborious, though not impossible), habits of editors who've become accustomed to the shortcut (borderline impossible), and incoming links from edit summaries (properly impossible). – Uanfala (talk) 01:50, 21 November 2019 (UTC)
Kind of what I assumed, just wanted to be sure we didn't have some magic solution. I spot-checked a few and they are used as intended. It was WP:ATP which in my strong opinion should have targeted Wikipedia:Talk page guidelines or Wikipedia:Talk page guidelines#How to use article talk pages, consistent with WP:UTP. Ah well. Thanks. ―Mandruss ☎ 01:58, 21 November 2019 (UTC)

Shorthand redirects to XfD daily log pages

Per Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2019 December 8#Wikipedia:RFD/2018 November 18, would it be good practice to routinely create redirects of the forms Wikipedia:RFD/2018 November 18 and/or Wikipedia:RFD/2018Nov18 as pseudo-shortcuts to daily log pages for XfDs? As of this writing, these two are the only ones in existence, and the consensus at the linked RfD is shifting in favor of keep. As several users suggest that there could be value in using these redirects as shorthand in edit summaries or perhaps even as shortcuts (to avoid typing long titles), I'm bringing this here for a broader survey. Should there be consensus in favor of mass creation, a new bot task could be requested for its implementation.

@BrownHairedGirl, Utopes, and Thryduulf: pinging the participants of the linked RfD.

I'm at weak support right now; the idea and its rationale look reasonable, but I'm not sure how necessary it is. ComplexRational (talk) 21:06, 9 December 2019 (UTC)

  • Support. As I mentioned at the RFD, this is something which I have been meaning to propose for ages, for the three CXFD venues which use a daily log page: RFD, CFD and TFD. It would allow much easier linking to XFD discussions.
The examples above were both created by me to allow linking to the discussion in edit summaries of a few thousand AWB edits which I made as a result of the deletion of the redirect, e.g. [2]. This was needed because AWB allows only 156 characters in edit summaries, compared with the 500 chars in the default source editor. This is a fairly common situation, and having these redirects in all cases would be very helpful.
If there is consensus to do this, I suggest that there should be a one-off bot task to do it for all the historical cases, and an ongoing bot task to do it for all new daily pages. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 01:46, 10 December 2019 (UTC)
  • Oppose, I don't see the need. I don't mind these being created on a case by case basis, like your bot task, but situations like this don't pop up every single day. -- Tavix (talk) 01:55, 10 December 2019 (UTC)
  • If an editor has created a few redirects to use in certain situations (like stringently short edit summaries in AWB), then sure, let them do that. However, I don't see a benefit in this type of redirect in the general case. To begin with, RfD doesn't work by precedent and so situations where you'd need to regularly refer to an older RfD are generally rare. And if you want to link to one, what you'd normally do is locate the discussion and then copy-and-paste the link. I don't think you would normally be able to type it off the top of your head (short or not) as that would imply remembering both the exact date of the discussion and the exact section header. Even if these redirects make it a little bit easier to type out a link, I don't think this would be a practice we'd want to be encouraging: typing stuff out of memory has a high potential for error that you don't get with copy and paste. – Uanfala (talk) 02:15, 10 December 2019 (UTC)
  • Support the existence of. I said in the RfD that a redirect such as the one presented allows for easy reference to a past RfD result. I'm not suggesting that a shorthand redirect is added for every month, but I can definitely see the worth in having one around, even if it is just for personal use. If there is a significant result that a user wants to link to multiple times, I wouldn't be opposed to them making a shorthand redirect for discussion purposes, as long as they all follow the same naming convention. To that effect, the redirect has a usage and cannot be misinterpreted. To Uanfala's point, I wouldn't suggest encouraging the creation of these redirects, but WP:R#KEEP point 5 says that we shouldn't delete a redirect if somebody finds them useful. And the only reason that these redirects would exist would be "to be useful". Utopes (talk) 04:04, 10 December 2019 (UTC)

Deletion without nomination?

Wikipedia:Books/Mathematics, which was redirected to Book:Mathematics ten years ago, was deleted on 3 November 2019 by JJMC89 following this discussion (opened by Black Falcon). The page was not actually nominated in that discussion, nor apparently in any other deletion discussion, based on what currently links to that title. This is worrisome. Are deletions becoming so routine that they can't even wait for the affected pages to actually be nominated? Note that Portal:Mathematics was still linking to there (through one of its "component" subpages) at the time of deletion, which is how I learned about it. Although the idea of breaking links was considered in the discussion, apparently it wasn't taken seriously enough for anyone to actually check each page (sufficiently carefully, anyway) for that possibility. To all relevant parties involved (including UnitedStatesian, who argued all similar redirects should be deleted without further discussion), I say: please be more careful when deleting pages (even lowly redirects), and do not delete an entire "class" of pages without linking to and checking all of them to see how deletion might affect "reader-facing content". I know that's annoying to do for hundreds of pages, but if something is worth doing, it should be worth doing right. - dcljr (talk) 10:03, 28 November 2019 (UTC)

My original intention was to nominate all ~600 Wikipedia:Books/... redirects in a series of nominations, specifically so that incoming links could be checked in smaller, more manageable batches. While I support the subsequent decision to speedily delete all similar redirects on the basis of efficiency (nominating hundreds of redirects is quite time-consuming), I also agree with you that it is important to check incoming links to each affected page even when deleting hundreds of pages at once. Tedious, to be sure, but still important. -- Black Falcon (talk) 20:48, 30 November 2019 (UTC)
That strikes me as highly irregular. Yes, occasionally IAR could be invoked to delete a class of redirects without a deletion discussion, but I'd normally expect the "precedent" to have had a decent quorum, something of the order of an RfC, or a lengthy and well-attended RfD. If I understand correctly, the redirects concerned are all redirects from moves, and that makes it necessary to have a workflow for fixing incoming links before any deletion is carried out. But I think we really need to hear from JJMC89. – Uanfala (talk) 02:21, 10 December 2019 (UTC)
I agree that all of these redirects should have been individually tagged for deletion (doing so via AWB or similar is fine, it doesn't have to be done manually) and would support their undeletion. This should probably be at WP:DRV rather than here though. Thryduulf (talk) 10:58, 10 December 2019 (UTC)

DumbBOT down

Looks like DumbBOT is down. (RFD subpages not being created or transcluded.) Tizio, any status on this? Steel1943 (talk) 21:04, 15 December 2019 (UTC)

See Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Food_and_drink#Food_additives_codes_redirect_to_chemical_compounds_instead_of_E_number_article where I make a suggestion to mass-change a class of redirects. It has attracted no discussion so far, so I believe the logical next step would be to mass-nominate the redirects in question. My question is twofold:

  1. Should I do this? (that is about 1000 redirects)
  2. If yes, how to do it? More precisely: I would want the list of all existing pages with a title full-matching the regexp E1?[0-9]{3}[a-j]? and which are redirects, ask for a bot-task to tag them, and put up a bundled nomination. But I do not know how to search for that list.

TigraanClick here to contact me 13:05, 17 January 2020 (UTC)

Encourage new article creation

In a recent RFD folks argued that #KEEP clause 7 is obsolete and incompatible with #DELETE clause 10: Please delete the keep clause for clarity. –84.46.52.210 (talk) 04:22, 7 January 2020 (UTC)

Please remove keep clause 7 as obsolete, it is not always compatible with delete clause 10, and while it is in theory still true, in practice deleting a redirect makes it more obvious on other Wikipedias that enwiki does not yet have a corresponding article. "Obsolete" as in "since ILLs are managed on WikiData and not more a hopeless mess tackled by bots". –84.46.53.221 (talk) 21:11, 14 January 2020 (UTC)

 Not done: The page's protection level has changed since this request was placed. You should now be able to edit the page yourself. If you still seem to be unable to, please reopen the request with further details. Sakura CarteletTalk 21:35, 14 January 2020 (UTC)
Resolved
 – I anyway like DIY or {{sofixit}} better. –84.46.53.221 (talk) 21:48, 14 January 2020 (UTC)
Hi IP84, thanks for being bold! Editing policies is a valid way of testing and building consensus. I disagree that KEEP7 is obsolete, and the linked discussion doesn't give me reason to believe that consensus has changed. I totally understand your problem with K7 and D10, but disagree that it's one or the other. Neither of them is an absolute truth, in every case we need to weigh the benefits of deleting and keeping an article (you may find this essay interesting). I don't think the discussion shows that editors came to a decision on whether K7 or D10 is better in this case, so I asked Rosguill to reconsider the close. It may well be that K7 has outlived its usefulness, but I'd want wider consensus than an RfD with 3 participants before removing it entirely. — Wug·a·po·des​ 23:23, 14 January 2020 (UTC)
You should have something on public record that supports #Encourage new article creation as valid delete reason overruling #K7. I don't care how it's arranged, I was only surprised by this "obviously wrong" argument, and folks convinced me that the ILL argument is in fact better than what I recall from 2006…2011. –84.46.53.221 (talk) 23:55, 14 January 2020 (UTC)
I think it is reasonable to wait for more participation, but fundamentally I agree with IP84 on striking K7. Incidentally, K7 appears the newest of the clauses; it was added in May 2015, apparently unilaterally and without associated discussion. In addition to being inconsistent with D10, it also seems to highlight a loophole to (or promote bypassing) the long-standing restriction on article creation by unregistered accounts. -- Black Falcon (talk) 03:56, 15 January 2020 (UTC)
"Loophole" or "Feature" is interesting, AFAIK it's a feature of redirects. I tested it two years ago (works), I suggested it as AFC accelerator one year ago (not done). As a potential "attack vector" creating yet another account is simpler for the attacker, and CU is more expensive than NPP as defense.
It could be a free honeypot to catch stupid attackers, and at that point I'd think that the main purpose of enwiki is not to be the biggest computer adventure of all time, otherwise I'd login and look for a clan/alliance. –84.46.53.192 (talk) 06:19, 19 January 2020 (UTC)
AFC/R feature example: 3, 2, 1, ignition. –84.46.52.152 (talk) 23:34, 21 January 2020 (UTC)

Rewriting WP:RFD#HARMFUL

Currently, WP:RFD#HARMFUL reads:

The major reasons why deletion of redirects is harmful are:

  • a redirect may contain nontrivial edit history;
  • if a redirect is reasonably old (or a redirect is created as a result of moving a page that has been there for quite some time), then it is quite possible that its deletion will break links in old, historical versions of some other articles—such an event is very difficult to envision and even detect.

Additionally, there could exist (for example) links to the URL "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attorneygate" anywhere on the Internet. If so, then those links might not show up by checking for (clicking on) "WhatLinksHere for Attorneygate"—since those links might come from somewhere outside Wikipedia.

Therefore consider the deletion only of either really harmful redirects or of very recent ones.

Now, the second bullet point and the paragraph that immediately follows it are all really about the same thing (breaking incoming links), so I think it's reasonable to merge them. Additionally, I think it goes to a greater than necessary length explaining external incoming links. And the presence of really in the last sentence seems to imply – using the common everyday meanings of the words – that we should only delete really harmful redirects, but keep redirects that are just a little bit harmful, which I take to be obviously bad advice. I'm proposing the following version:

The major reasons why deletion of redirects is harmful are:

  • a redirect may contain nontrivial edit history;
  • if a redirect is reasonably old (or a redirect is created as a result of moving a page that has been there for quite some time), then it is possible that its deletion will break incoming links (if such links come from older revisions of Wikipedia articles or from the internet outside Wikipedia, they will not show up in "What links here").

Therefore consider the deletion only of either harmful redirects or of very recent ones.

— Preceding unsigned comment added by Uanfala (talk • contribs) 14:48, 1 January 2020 (UTC)

  • I certainly see the rewritten section as an improvement. I'd also remove very for the same reasons you removed really. Perhaps it may be a good idea to pipe break incoming links with WP:EXTERNALROT (or is there a better location?) in case someone does want more detail on that. -- Tavix (talk) 15:38, 1 January 2020 (UTC)
  • I agree with Tavix that this is an improvement and that the "very" is not really needed (although I'm not opposed to it remaining). I would though expand the final sentence to: "...if such links come from older revisions of Wikipedia articles, from edit summaries, from other Wikimedia projects or from elsewhere on the internet, they will not show up in "What links here")". It might also be worth mentioning offline sources as well, but I can't think how to elegantly do this. Thryduulf (talk) 21:59, 1 January 2020 (UTC)

Incorporating the above suggestions, and with a little tweak to the wording, the section could look something like that:

The major reasons why deletion of redirects is harmful are:

  • a redirect may contain non-trivial edit history;
  • if a redirect is reasonably old (or is the result of moving a page that has been there for quite some time), then it is possible that its deletion will break incoming links (such links coming from older revisions of Wikipedia pages, from edit summaries, from other Wikimedia projects or from elsewhere on the internet, do not show up in "What links here").

Therefore consider the deletion only of either harmful redirects or of recent ones.

I'm not sure of the best place to refer to WP:EXTERNALROT, I've provisionally linked it from the text from elsewhere on the internet as it's the most specific: WP:EXTERNALROT doesn't seem to talk of the other types of incoming links, though of course, linking earlier in the text as Tavix suggests would in some ways be more natural. I'm going to update the project page with this provisional new version (obviously, feel free to edit). – Uanfala (talk) 23:23, 27 January 2020 (UTC)

WP:RFD#KEEP says that we don't delete "Links that have existed for a significant length of time".

My question: Is there an agreed-upon understanding of what "a significant length of time" means?

Concern for breaking internal and external links was added by User:Angela in August 2004. It was updated once or twice soon after (e.g., to include the old subpages – most editors won't remember when AliceExpert was the "correct" title for an article about Alice Expert, and that AliceExpert/talk was what Wikipedia used instead of Talk:Alice Expert, because the idea of namespaces hadn't been invented yet), and it reached its current version in this edit by User:Thryduulf.

Given that the first edits to the English Wikipedia were made about 3.5 years before the creation of the rule, I don't think it's unreasonable to guess that this was meant to discourage deletion (though not changing the target of) of "unnecessary" redirects that something in the range of months to a couple of years old. Do we have anything like a modern understanding of what "a significant length of time" means to us? If we have an estimate, then it'd be a kindness to all concerned if we actually wrote it down, instead of making editors guess whether "a significant length of time" is usually taken to mean approximately a week, a month, a year, or a decade. WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:34, 30 December 2019 (UTC)

There isn't really a consensus. Those people like me who take the attitude that redirects should generally be kept unless it's clear they are harmful or very clearly useless, generally regard being old as a factor tending to indicate a redirect should be kept ("old" here meaning more than, generally, 6-12 months). Others, Tavix for example, generally recommend deleting redirects that don't have clear utility, and for them age is generally not regarded as anywhere near as significant.
There are a host of exceptions however. For example, if a redirect is the result of a page move shortly after creation from a clearly incorrect original title (e.g. a typo) and the author(s) of the page before the move are (or should be) aware of the new location then it will almost certainly be deleted regardless of age. Thryduulf (talk) 21:12, 30 December 2019 (UTC)
I don't appreciate you misinterpreting my redirect philosophies. -- Tavix (talk) 00:06, 31 December 2019 (UTC)
Tavix, I'd really like to know how you interpret "a significant length of time" in the context of this criteria. Do you agree with Thryduulf that 6–12 months is approximately the right range, or would you pick a different length of time? WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:37, 31 December 2019 (UTC)
I decline to give generalities because it depends on the context. -- Tavix (talk) 01:07, 31 December 2019 (UTC)
  • It really surprises me that length of existence should have been stated as relevant at all. Of course, I'm not referring to either extreme of the scale: redirects created in 2001 should be part of our hallowed heritage, no matter how silly they might be, while redirects created just now are immediately eligible to get summarily deleted if implausible. But otherwise, I can't see why length of existence should get into the equation. Sure, if a redirect has been around for a long time, it's possible that it might have had a higher likelihood of becoming entwined into the navigation network of Wikipedia and the wider internet, but then we have more direct proxy measure for that (like incoming links or traffic statistics). An argument can conceivably be made that the longer a page has been around the more likely it is to have gained some sort of tacit approval by the community, but this is applicable (within limits) to articles, and not to redirects (most of which tend to remain forever off peoples' radars: redirect gnoming is really a small corner of our garden). – Uanfala (talk) 01:26, 31 December 2019 (UTC)
    • I think that the longer a URL has existed, the higher the likelihood of it being linked from somewhere – but "higher likelihood" is not at all the same as "actually happened in the particular case". Traffic statistics will probably show links from external sites (at least higher-traffic sites), but we have no easy way to find links in edit summaries or previous versions of an article. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:08, 31 December 2019 (UTC)
      • Do we ever strive to keep links alive in older revisions or in edit summaries? Whether a link is blue or red doesn't really change the communicative value of the text (and anyway, from a redlink, any logged in user should be able to get via the deletion log to the relevant RfD discussion). I take it we're not talking about retargeting (rather than deleting) WP space redirects (like shortcut for policies and guidelines), in which case a change of the status quo will obviously be a bad idea for redirects that have existed for any non-trivial period of time. – Uanfala (talk) 22:27, 31 December 2019 (UTC)
        • Yes. In fact, WP:RFD#HARMFUL indicates that it is one of two major goals for RFD: "if a redirect is reasonably old (or a redirect is created as a result of moving a page that has been there for quite some time), then it is quite possible that its deletion will break links in old, historical versions of some other articles—such an event is very difficult to envision and even detect." WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:43, 1 January 2020 (UTC)
          • Whoa! We should chuck that bit out. It's not that I don't care for preserving old revisions (quite the contrary: I've often argued at Templates for Discussion that templates that have formerly been used widely should always be kept for this precise reason, and I've almost always been a lone voice there), but that just doesn't make sense. The only difference that the existence of a redirect will make on the pages that link to it is the colour of the link, and that's beyond trivial. – Uanfala (talk) 01:26, 1 January 2020 (UTC)
            • If you keep an old redirect, then anyone reading will see a blue link and be able to reach the target article (either by clicking on it or by using WP:NAVPOPS and similar tools). If you delete an old redirect, then anyone reading will see a red link, and instead of reaching the article, if they click on it, they'll be taken to a wikitext editor to re-create the page. (There's a handy red link at the top of WP:Red link if anyone wants to try it out.) If you delete a redirect, a red link is the result, but the difference between a blue link and a red link goes well beyond the visible color. WhatamIdoing (talk) 06:24, 1 January 2020 (UTC)
              • I agree completely with WhatamIdoing here. If someone sees a link and understands from the combination of context, their memory and experience what the target is and why it was referenced then all is fine. However, if any one of those four is missing or if they are unsure then with a blue link they can find all the necessary understanding with a single click. With a red link they will be taken to either (a) an edit screen to create the page after a summary of the deletion log (if they have the necessary permissions to do so), or (b) a page explaining there is no article at that title, and that they do not have permission to create it. The message invites them to search for a page with a similar title, or as the last of about 6 options, search the deletion log to see if it was previously deleted. If someone does choose to view the deletion log, there is no guarantee that the message will give any hints about the previous content meaning the reader is not helped. These are only some of the reasons why deleting redirects can be harmful and why I recommend keeping so many redirects that have evidence of potential use. Thryduulf (talk) 10:12, 1 January 2020 (UTC)
                • Well, if preserving the clickability of links in old revisions is so important, then imagine what grave consequences there might be when retargeting redirects. So a link that previously went to one article, now goes to a completely different one, and the meaning of the original text is turned on its head. If old revisions are an argument for not deleting redirects, there are all the more an argument for not retargeting. If this logic is followed through, then redirects that have existed for a certain amount of time should never ever be edited again! – Uanfala (talk) 14:23, 1 January 2020 (UTC)
                  • Yes and no. We do always need to be careful when retargetting (and especially so for shortcut links, which are referenced far more often than they are read) but when a page is retargetted the link remains blue and hatnotes/disambiguation pages can give links back (with context) to the previous target and a user is never confronted with an apparent dead-end. Thryduulf (talk) 21:53, 1 January 2020 (UTC)
    • With the recent changes, deletion is acceptable for "recent" (rather than just "very recent", which sounds more like weeks or a couple of months) redirects. Looking at this discussion, I think that about a year is probably "recent". This, of course, is unrelated to other considerations; elderly redirects that are actually harmful (e.g., insults) should still be nuked on sight. This will mostly apply to the harmless-but-pointless redirects. I think I'll go add that note to the page, so that nobody else will have to guess what our unwritten rules are. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:24, 11 February 2020 (UTC)

Discussion at Talk:Equinox#RfC on season-specific redirects

 You are invited to join the discussion at Talk:Equinox#RfC on season-specific redirects. Shhhnotsoloud (talk) 17:33, 22 February 2020 (UTC)

Discussion at Wikipedia talk:XFDcloser#Deleting redirects that are at RFD

 You are invited to join the discussion at Wikipedia talk:XFDcloser#Deleting redirects that are at RFD. Evad37 [talk] 00:41, 26 February 2020 (UTC)

Nominating lots of redirects associated with Category:English words

See also "Nominating lots of related redirects" asked above and never answered.

Category:English words is currently occupied largely by redirects whose sole purpose seems to be to force non-word things into that category. Each of the following articles simply redirects to the article on the thing; e.g. Aardvark (word) is a redirect to Aardvark, and so on.

I'd propose all of these redirects for deletion, if there were some way to do it speedily. Alternatively, if someone with the proper permissions could just WP:BOLD all of these away, that would be cool. --Quuxplusone (talk) 21:24, 8 March 2020 (UTC)

In principle, you can mass-nominate these redirects using one of several ways: 1) use Twinkle to nominate each redirect individually, and at the end merge the nominations (if desired); 2) create a single nomination consisting in an instance of {{rfd2}} for each redirect (setting |multi= to "yes" for all except the first one), and then tag the individual redirects; 3) use AWB to automate the previous step. However, I don't think a mass nomination is a good idea in this case, it will likely result in a WP:TRAINWRECK: some of these redirects were formerly articles (so there might be issues with preserving history and attribution), some are redirects from moves (potentially needed to preserve incoming links), so could have been created for ease of linking. Probably some are not needed, so deletion may be in the interest of the encyclopedia, but if your sole concern is the redirects' membership of Category:English words, you can simply take them out of it. – Uanfala (talk) 22:19, 8 March 2020 (UTC)
@Quuxplusone: To avoid the "trainwreck" scenario, treat the request as if you were preparing a consent agenda and only mass-nominate ones that are extremely likely to be non-controversial. If it has any incoming link other than possibly "historical" discussion or user-space page, if it or its talk page has any history or log history that isn't purely trivial or administrative, or if there is any other reason to give it individual consideration, don't put it in the mass-nomination. Ditto if it has more than a handful of pageviews in the last few months, not counting page views driven by discussion such as this one. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs) 17:24, 9 March 2020 (UTC)
Well, I just went ahead and removed Category:English words from all of those (and repointed Rape (word) and Mate (term) at the appropriate articles). I'll leave any further cleanup to someone who has (A) the necessary credentials to WP:BOLD it, or (B) the patience to RFD it. --Quuxplusone (talk) 01:01, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

Discussion regarding wording of Template:RFDNote

There is currently a discussion occurring at Template talk:RFDNote#Phrasing regarding the wording used for {{RFDNote}}, the template used primarily on redirect creators' talk pages to inform them the redirect they created is nominated at WP:RFD. Participants in RfD are invited and may be interested to participate in this discussion. Steel1943 (talk) 21:19, 25 March 2020 (UTC)

Redirects with malformed or misspelled (disambiguation) qualifiers

I have opened a discussion at Wikipedia talk:Criteria for speedy deletion#Proposed new CSD criterion: R5, for redirects with malformed or misspelled (disambiguation) qualifiers which may be of interest to editors who follow this page. Narky Blert (talk) 19:50, 31 March 2020 (UTC)

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