Wikipedia talk:Disambiguation/Archive 5

message: Consider these two ways of pointing to "other meanings" articles that are clearly minor to the main article:
Style A
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:Manga
:Manga (Kanji: 漫画, SAMPA: maNga) is the :Japanese word for comics; outside of Japan, it usually refers specifically to Japanese comics. Mangaka (漫画家) is the corresponding Japanese word for a manga artist. Because most Japanese nouns have no plural form, manga can be used to refer to multiple comics, although mangas is sometimes used in English.
:For other senses of the word, not covered here, see La Manga (a place in the Mar Menor, Spain), and Manga Entertainment (an American distributor of anime, but not manga).
:Origins
:Literally translated, manga means...
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Style B
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:Manga
::This article is about the Japanese medium. "Manga" can also refer to La Manga (a place in the Mar Menor, Murcia, Spain) and Manga Entertainment (an American distributor of anime, but not manga).
:Manga (Kanji: 漫画, SAMPA: maNga) is the Japanese word for comics; outside of Japan, it usually refers specifically to Japanese comics. Mangaka (漫画家) is the corresponding Japanese word for a manga artist. Because most Japanese nouns have no plural form, manga can be used to refer to multiple comics, although mangas is sometimes used in English.
:Origins
:Literally translated, manga means...
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In style A the alternate links are listed at the end of the introductory block, as part of the text.  In style B they are listed between the title and the intro paragraph, as a side annotation.
Methinks that style A is better than style B.  In both styles the alternate links break the flow of the article and are "noise" for readers who are intersted in the main sense.  However, in style A the break occurs where there is already a break in any case (the table-of-contents); whereas in style B the break occurs between the title and the crucial first paragraph.  Said another way, in style A the reader gets immediately the defining sentence, whereas in style B he/she is forced to read the alternate links first.
So, while style B seems to be the prevalent standard, I think that style A should be used whenever possible. What do you think?
(There is also a "style C" which places the alternate links at the end of the article.  However that is definitely bad because the reader will not see those links unless he/she scrolls to the end of the article.)
All the best,Jorge Stolfi 05:26, 1 Jun 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: I strongly prefer Style B, for much the same reason I agree that the bottom of the page is the last place they should be--if it's not the first sentence, I'm not going to read it if I'm looking for an alternate use. Also, I think the way it's offset by both the indentation and the italics makes it clear, even to most readers who haven't seen a Wikipedia disamb notice before, that if the first sentence tells them it is the subject they are looking for, they can skip down to the non-italic/non-indented text. Niteowlneils 01:03, 24 Oct 2004 (UTC)

text: Agree with Niteowlneils. Deco 03:21, 24 Oct 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: Low-key disambiguation

message: Should calls for fixing such links go to Wikipedia:Cleanup, Wikipedia:Pages needing attention or...?
I've come across two pages in need of assistance so far:
* Special:Whatlinkshere/Czech
* Special:Whatlinkshere/Yugoslavia (work in progress by Romanm and myself, but still a lot to go)
Of course, fixing this is non-trivial because it requires reading those pages to determine where the new link should go out of the context (or, in the case of Yugoslavia, should it be changed at all), so it may be useful to have a page listing those, they're not all likely to go away soon... --Shallot 18:17, 13 May 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: There is a page at Wikipedia:Disambiguation pages with links that might be the best place.  It used to be generated with a database query, but that can't be done at the moment so some manual updates have been added - you could do the same. -- sannse (talk) 11:46, 15 May 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: Fixing links to disambiguation pages

message: The policy states that if a title can be disambiguated by lengthening with appropriate words, that should be preferred over adding a parenthesized term, as in Java programming language instead of Java (programming language). Does this still correspond to actual practice? I think people are actually doing the paren thing by default, at least that seems like what I see 90% of the time or more. My surmise is that the support for piping the paren version is encouraging it despite policy, plus one doesn't have ponder whether a multi-word term is plausible - just put the proper name outside the parens, disambiguator inside. Should the policy be revised to reflect reality? Stan 04:08, 17 Aug 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: Maybe I'm not reading the same thing as you, but I don't see that it gives a preference either way. Mackerm 04:48, 17 Aug 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: Hmmm, good point. Perhaps it should be more explicit about the lack of preference then. Stan 05:40, 17 Aug 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: I was wrong to say it was clear about this; on the other hand, I think the fact that both are mentioned makes it pretty clear that neither one or the other should be totally eliminated. My other arguments also yet stand. Deco 16:59, 17 Aug 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  "X area term" vs "X (area term)" 

message: There are many pages containing a primary topic that have a disambig "see also" commentary on the header. Two styles of indicating this are abundant:
Style 1
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:See whatever (disambiguation) for other meanings.
Whatever is a bla bla bla...
...
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and
Style 2
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See whatever (disambiguation) for other meanings.
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Whatever is a bla bla bla...
...
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Even more, Wikipedia:Disambiguation uses the second style, and the example page used in the article, Rome, uses the first style. I think a decission should be made and a policy issued. My vote goes for the first style, it looks somewhat neater in my opinion. xDCDx 14:59, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: I also prefer the indented style, without the horizontal line, but the other one is okay, too, sometimes the line looks appropriate. Also, there are other forms such as noting the primary topic first and then linking disambiguation pages (which may or may not be of the form "<title> (disambiguation)"). I don't think we really need to set strict standards on this matter, just as long as the text is clear and simple enough. --Joy [shallot] 15:24, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: I also prefer the indented style (style 1), without a horizontal line. older≠wiser 15:31, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: Style one is a lot better. Horizontal lines are bad. Angela. 20:58, Aug 24, 2004 (UTC)
To Joy: I don't want to sound rude, but if we don't fix policies for details like this, although both styles are perfectly understable by a casual reader, this causes Wikipedia to look unprofessional, and I don't think we want that. Our goal is to make Wikipedia the best we can. :) 
It's a little of an offtopic but, in my opinion, the same must be followed for Title (movie) and Title (film). The current Wikipedia:Naming conventions (movies) page says the proper way is the first one, but there are (unfortunately) a good quantity of Title (film) pages.
xDCDx 00:59, 25 Aug 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Disambig: "primary topic" disambiguation style 

message: "One can also disambiguate at the bottom of the article like this:"
:Shouldn't this always be on the top, so that readers can quickly find what they're looking for?  I can't see why the bottom would be an official recommendation.  - Omegatron 17:04, Nov 1, 2004 (UTC)
::This was at one time a subject of considerable debate. However, I believe most people have accepted and prefer top dabs now. Would anyone object to modifying the policy to reflect this? Deco 18:31, 1 Nov 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: No, I think these are fine. The only thing I'd object to is placing a very short article at the bottom of a very long article, separated by a rule. Separating a number of small articles with rules is fine, or even placing the short ones above the long one, but at the bottom they're not likely to ever be encountered by those who seek them. I apologise for my hasty edit, which implied somewhat more. Deco 04:17, 8 Nov 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  at the bottom? 

message: What is the general policy or advice on disambiguating homophones? Example I was looking at: Mercia, Murcia, and Mircea are three different things (a kingdom, a city, and a prince, respectively), spelled differently; however, they sound the same to an English-speaker's ear, and someone who isn't familiar with them may not know that the small spelling differences indicate completely unrelated subjects (especially since they're all historical topics, and may appear in variant spellings in older sources). Would it make sense to have top(or bottom)-of-page disambig links on these pages for these things?
(A side note, of course, is that Mircea is already a disambig for two members of a dynasty, but that's a minor issue.) 
It seems odd to want to disambiguate things that are unrelated and spelled differently- I can hardly imagine wanting or needing to disambiguate hair, hare, and herr (or toxin, tocsin, and Taksin), after all- but something like this seems trickier.
-FZ 17:36, 1 Dec 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: I can't escape the impression that this is dumbing the encyclopedia down for people who can't spell, and that's a rather slippery slope. (I have pondered something similar at Talk:John Capodistria, but more as something slightly amusing than as a policy...) --Joy [shallot] 23:34, 1 Dec 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  question about the appropriateness of a disambig 

message: Please read the paragraph above ("Extra" disambig considered useful).
The second paragraph of the wikipedia:Disambiguation page currently says:
:Do not disambiguate, or add a link to a disambiguation page, if there is no risk of confusion. Ask yourself: When a reader enters this term and pushes "Go", would they expect to view any of the articles listed on the disambiguation page? Disambiguation pages are not search indices -- do not add links that merely contain part of the page title where there is no significant risk of confusion.
Per the above discussion I propose changing this to:
:Add a disambiguation page and disambiguation links if there is any risk of confusion.  Ask yourself: If a reader encounters this article from a Google hit, would they expect to see some other article instead?  Consider adding links containing part of the page title that might have sensibly been the target of a Google search.
Please indicate Support or Oppose and sign your vote.  - Rick Block 17:50, 20 Apr 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Proposal: When to disambiguate section

message: I come here, and discover to my surprise that there is absolutely no guidance for how to disambiguate, not even a notice to check the (sadly uncomprehensive) naming conventions page.  I say this because I've been trying to figure out what to do when you have two individuals with the same first and surname.  My contention is that if there are middle names which can be used to distinguish between the two, these should be used, even if the person is not commonly known by their middle name.  Others disagree, and prefer parentheticals.  I've raised this at Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions (common names) as well, because they say that middle names shouldn't be used unless they are commonly used, but make no notice of disambiguation at all.  This seems to me to be a serious issue, on which we should have a clear policy. john k 17:10, 2 Mar 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  How to disambiguate; middle names 

message: * Halló friends! Please take a look at :de:Bild:Logo Begriffsklärung.png, :en:Image:Disambig fork.png, :nl:Image:Begripsverklaring.png and :sv:Bild:Trisambig poseidon.jpg.
* Which do you prefer?
* Please answer at the oldest (?) discussion page :de:Bild Diskussion:Logo Begriffsklärung.png.  Thanks! Best regards Gangleri | [ Th] | T 14:15, 2005 Mar 8 (UTC)
:What?  That discussion page is a bleeding mess.  I have no idea where to park my two cents' worth. --Smack (talk) 18:16, 30 Apr 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Future image commons:Image:Disambig.png 

message: It seems that whenever you claim there will never be a page on something, someone will create it. There is now an article on fireplace poker. But any other example we could conjure would suffer the same fate. For this reason I've simply changed around this part of the article to acknowledge the article's existence but explain why it doesn't deserve a place in the main article. Deco 21:52, 20 Mar 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Self-destroying prophecy