Category talk:Disambiguation pages

Introduction

[Moved from Help talk:Template#Creation of Template:Redirect hatnote. -- Larivact (talk) 20:22, 29 September 2018 (UTC)]

Disambiguation pages need Extension:Disambiguator. -- Lahwaacz (talk) 19:19, 29 September 2018 (UTC)

That would be nice but home-made disambiguation pages are still better than ambiguous redirects (or hatnotes). We wouldn't have many disambiguation pages anyway. I'll experimentally convert three of my four hatnotes to disambiguation pages (I will keep the well-used group redirect). The functionality of that extension could also be approximated with yet another Python script. --Larivact (talk) 19:23, 29 September 2018 (UTC)

I created a simple Python script to track disambiguation backlinks. --Larivact (talk) 07:26, 30 September 2018 (UTC)

Another thing to be discussed is whether all disambiguation pages should be translated or in which cases they shouldn't. Also, should there be separate category for disambiguation pages in each language or should all translations belong in this category? Extension:Disambiguator has only one "category"/group of disambiguation pages. -- Lahwaacz (talk) 08:14, 30 September 2018 (UTC)

I'd say they shouldn't be translated because a) they just contain a few links, so non-English speakers should still be able to follow them and then click on the interlanguage link and b) they are not linked anywhere and the only way to find them is through the search. --Larivact (talk) 08:27, 30 September 2018 (UTC)

This category should not be classified into any category

Just like Category:Maintenance, the disambiguation page is not about archwiki. -- Blackteahamburger (talk) 06:35, 19 May 2020 (UTC)

Does anyone have any objections? -- Blackteahamburger (talk) 09:19, 1 June 2020 (UTC)

What about moving it inside Category:English? Each language could have its own disambiguation pages in a separate category. -- Kynikos (talk) 14:57, 2 June 2020 (UTC)

In #Introduction it's suggested that disambiguation pages should not be translated, though. -- Lahwaacz (talk) 17:30, 2 June 2020 (UTC)

We can change that rule. It was decided based on discussion above by the way. -- Svito (talk) 04:19, 3 June 2020 (UTC)

I've changed the category to Category:English, IMO it's better than no category at all... If we ever change the rule about translation of disambiguation pages, each language should create its own category for translated disambiguation pages. -- Lahwaacz (talk) 17:20, 17 August 2020 (UTC)

I agree. What do we do then with Category:Lists which is similarly wiki browsing category? I don't know why it was created in the first place as whether article is a list or mostly lists should not matter in my opinion and can be subjective. -- Svito (talk) 04:19, 3 June 2020 (UTC)

For the moment I put Category:Lists into Category:English, but if you want to delete the category, I would be in favour. -- Lahwaacz (talk) 17:20, 17 August 2020 (UTC)

Remove category

This category and the pages it contains were added by User:Larivact in [1] as an alternative to "hat notes". Considering their limited value, I propose to revert to the previous state and remove this category, as well as the pages it contains. -- Alad (talk) 02:49, 11 March 2023 (UTC)

A happy 👍 from me for the general idea, but we have to:

• create a rule to explicitly forbid creating disambiguation pages (e.g. Special:Diff/775717 and Special:Diff/775719);
• define the style for "hat notes" and add them to the pages that might need them;
• find what to do with the existing pages:
  • Deleting? What to do when/if people create them back? Are they not considered pages with a history?
  • Archiving? People will complain they are redirected to the archive when searching for a common term.
  • Redirecting? To which of the pages it's disambiguating? Some of them are obvious, but others are not clear cut, like Archive
• have a procedure to deal with new disambiguation pages if they get created? Probably not necessary once we have figured out the above.

--Erus Iluvatar (talk) 13:06, 17 April 2023 (UTC)

What’s wrong with disambiguation pages?

A few weeks ago, User:Erus_Iluvatar reverted my edit on License. Their revert comment is a link to this talk page as an explanation.

However, I’ve found the discussion on this talk page a bit unsatisfying.

1. It’s been suggested that a rule be created “to explicitly forbid creating disambiguation pages”. So if there’s no rule (yet), then why the revert?
2. Every single existing {{Deletion}} hat note I could find in this category states a reason that doesn’t seem to have anything to do with disambiguation pages being generally unwelcome. Instead, the hat notes say e.g. “Already disambiguated by XYZ”, “Too specific for a disambiguation”, or “Trivial, serves no practical purpose”. But not once do the {{Deletion}} templates say that disambiguation pages are generally unwelcome. (Yea, I took my time to check them all before I even made my edit.)
3. According to a comment from User:Alad, disambiguation pages have “limited value”. It’s not entirely clear whether they mean a specific set of unhelpful pages, or all disambiguation pages in general. If it’s consensus that disambiguation pages are generally unwelcome, then we need an explicit rule that says so, so drive-by editors such as myself at least have a chance to notice beforehand.

So, what’s the deal with disambiguation pages? Generally ok or not? If not, why not? Help me understand. — Auerhuhn (talk) 17:22, 9 December 2024 (UTC)

The linked discussion above states "I propose to […] remove this category" which implies all disambiguation pages would have to completely go away.

Although there is no rule yet, the revert is to avoid more work for the two people agreeing on the need to improve the status quo. Until you voiced your ideas on them, there was consensus on their removal, but progress is slow in here :P

Disambiguation pages don't provide more value than simply having interlinks in pages themselves. For the example of license, a few words in the section explaining there should be no confusion between the upstream license of the package to be declared in the array and the license of the PKGBUILD itself with a link to the relevant RFC is less disruptive to a reader. Erus Iluvatar (talk) 18:24, 9 December 2024 (UTC)