Wikipedia:Merging and moving pages

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'Merging and moving' are two fundamental aspects of how articles are developed and reformed on Wikipedia. A merger is a non-automated process by which two similar or redundant pages are united manually on one page. A move renames a page, giving it a new title.

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[edit] Merging

There are several good reasons to merge a page:

  • There are two or more pages on exactly the same subject.
  • There are two or more pages on related subjects that have a large overlap. Wikipedia is not a dictionary; there does not need to be a separate entry for every concept in the universe. For example, "Flammable" and "Non-flammable" can both be explained in an article on Flammability.
  • If a page is very short and cannot or should not be expanded terribly much, it often makes sense to merge it with a page on a broader topic.
  • If a short article requires the background material or context from a broader article in order for readers to understand it.

Merging should always leave a redirect or, in some cases, a disambiguation page in place. This is often needed to allow proper attribution through the edit history for the page the merged text came from. Even if it seems rather pointless or obscure, leave it in place. Superfluous redirects do not harm anything, and are sometimes helpful. Other websites may have made links to the old page title, so we will want to redirect incoming visitors to the merged page. We do not want people accidentally creating a new page under the old title, not knowing that the merged page exists. Redirects also show up in search results, helping people who might be looking under the "wrong" title to find the page that they are looking for.

You may find that some or all of the information to be merged is already in the destination page. That is fine; you can feel free to delete the redundant information and only add the new stuff. If there is no information to be added to the destination page, you can note in your edit summary on the source page (as you are turning it into a redirect) that there was nothing to be merged (or that the source page was entirely redundant with the destination).

[edit] How to merge pages

Merging is something any editor can do, and if you are sure that something should be merged, you can be bold and do so. If the merger is controversial, however, you may find your merger reverted, and as with all other edits, edit wars should be avoided.

If you are uncertain of the merger's appropriateness, you should propose it on the affected pages. After sufficient time has elapsed to generate consensus or silence (at least 5 days), you may perform the merger or request that someone else do so.

[edit] Proposing a merger

To propose a merger of two or more pages, place the tag {{merge|OTHER PAGE}} at the top of each page. It should appear like this:

It has been suggested that this article or section be merged with OTHER PAGE. (Discuss)

By default the "Discuss" link leads to the top of the article's Talk page. If you want some other behaviour then you can provide an explicit link as a second parameter to the template – for example, {{merge|OTHER PAGE|DISCUSSION PAGE}}. This is useful for directing the reader to a specific section of a long talk page, when it may not otherwise be obvious where the discussion is located. For example, {{merge|OTHER PAGE|Talk:THIS PAGE#Merger proposal}} directs the "Discuss" link to the section headed "Merger proposal" on THIS PAGE's talk page.

If you know which page should remain, use {{mergefrom|SOURCE PAGE}} on that page, and {{mergeto|DESTINATION PAGE}} on each of the pages that should be merged into and redirected to the destination page. Applying these templates relieves the merging editor from having to decide which way to merge, and causes both/all "Discuss" links to lead to the talk page of the destination page (instead of each page linking to its own talk page). These templates will appear as:

It has been suggested that SOURCE PAGE be merged into this article or section. (Discuss)

and

It has been suggested that this article or section be merged into DESTINATION PAGE. (Discuss)

If you are proposing that many pages be merged into one page, it is better to use a single template on the destination page rather than one for each source page. The above template will not work correctly unless modified, so use {{multiplemergefrom|[[SOURCE PAGE ONE]], [[SOURCE PAGE TWO]], [[SOURCE PAGE THREE]], etc}} to generate the following:

It has been suggested that SOURCE PAGE ONE, SOURCE PAGE TWO, SOURCE PAGE THREE, etc be merged into this article or section. (Discuss)

After proposing the merger, place your reasons on the talk page and check back in a couple of weeks for a response. You may be able to invoke a response by contacting some of the major or most-recent contributors via their respective talk-pages. If there is clear agreement after two weeks that the articles should be merged (or no response after four weeks), proceed with the merger.

[edit] Caveats
  • If you are unable to merge the pages, or you believe that the merger may be controversial, you might want to add a listing to Wikipedia:Proposed mergers.
  • When proposing a merger of pages within "Wikipedia" namespace (any pages that begin with the "Wikipedia:" prefix), do not include this prefix in the parameter.
  • Due to technical limitations, the above tags are incompatible with cross-namespace mergers (mergers between pages from both the article and Wikipedia namespaces). Such instances are rare, and should be handled via manual template substitution and editing.
  • Do not use the above tags to propose a category merger. This should be requested at Wikipedia:Categories for discussion, which uses a separate {{cfm}} template.

[edit] Performing the merger

[edit] Full-content paste merger
  1. Open the source and destination pages in two separate edit windows/tabs.
  2. Cut/paste the entire content from the source page into the destination page and remove the {{mergefrom}} tag.
  3. Save the destination page, with an edit summary noting "merge content from [[article name]]"
  4. Add #REDIRECT [[PAGENAME]] {{R from merge}} to the source page, note the merger (including the page names) in the edit summaries, and save the page.
  5. Edit the destination page again and delete the redundant content, editing until it looks good and consistent.
  6. Save the destination page. (Edit summary of "cleanup after paste/merge" is appropriate.)
  7. Check "What links here" on the source page for double-redirects.
    • Double-redirects will fail to link, and must be renamed to redirect to the current page name.

Performing a merger in this manner is beneficial when you want to include all the content from both articles in the article history of the final article.

[edit] Selective paste merger
  1. Open the source and destination pages in two separate edit windows/tabs.
  2. Cut/paste the non-redundant content from the source page into the destination page.
  3. Add #REDIRECT [[PAGENAME]] {{R from merge}} to the source page.
  4. Be sure to remove the {{mergefrom}} tag from the destination page before previewing
  5. Preview and edit the destination page until it looks good and consistent.
  6. Save both, and note the merger (including the page names) in the edit summaries.
  7. Check "What links here" on the source page for double-redirects.
    • Double-redirects will fail to link, and must be renamed to redirect to the current page name.

Performing a merger in this manner is beneficial when the source document includes a great deal of nonsense.

[edit] Text dump merger

Simply dumping the text from one page onto another is progress, because it puts all of the information on the same topic on the same page. This, however, seldom results in a smooth-flowing article. Fixing that may require a great deal of time and rewriting. If you can do that, terrific! Future readers will greatly benefit from your contribution. If you do not have the time or expertise to do so, please tag the article for attention; select a template from Wikipedia:Cleanup resources, such as {{cleanup-date|December 2006}} (using the current month and year as the parameter).

[edit] Renaming / Moving

See policy related to article naming conventions and how to move a page.

On Wikipedia, usually anyone logged in can rename a page from its current name to a new one. This is also called "moving" because the effect is as if the page has been moved. A redirect is automatically created at its old name so that links still work. After a move to correct a spelling mistake, you may want to list the resultant redirect for deletion at Wikipedia:Redirects for deletion. This, however, isn't necessary, and ideally should be done only for redirects which meet the deletion criteria as outlined at Redirects for deletion. If a redirect is a plausible or common misspelling, it is very likely to be kept.

  • Misspelled – The most common reason is that a page name is misspelled or incorrectly capitalized. Please fix any and all of these as you see them.
  • NPOV – Terms used in a title express a bias or POV. NPOV policy requires that articles be given "neutral" titles — using the most general and objective terms.

Sometimes, you may feel that a page is wrongly named for another reason. For example, "Napoleon" is more properly known as "Napoleon I of France." However, this is a situation in which a redirect would be appropriate. Most people would not search for Marie de Rabutin-Chantal, marquise de Sévigné, but rather for Mme de Sevigne.

[edit] Cross-namespace moves

The move feature is capable of moving pages in any namespace (except category), and even of moving pages from one namespace to another. Cross-namespace moving is useful when a page is accidentally created in the wrong namespace; for instance, moving Talk/Abraham Lincoln to Talk:Abraham Lincoln, or moving Articles for deletion/Some article to Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Some article. In some cases, new users may create articles on themselves that they intend to serve as their user page, in which case such an article may be userfied.

Generally speaking, other types of cross-namespace moves will be controversial and worth discussing with other editors. Wikipedia:Requested moves is the proper place for this. However, when proposing to move what appears to be an article out of the main namespace, it is strongly recommended that some form of Wikipedia:Deletion process should be used, preferably Wikipedia:Articles for deletion, as Wikipedia:Proposed deletion and Wikipedia:Speedy deletion don't build consensus. This is because the redirect that is created by such a move is subject to speedy deletion, which would effectively cause the article to be deleted from the main encyclopedia.

[edit] How to rename a page

Note, you must be logged in to do this, to an account that is at least 4 days old.

  1. Go to the page that you wish to rename.
  2. Click the tab labeled "move."
  3. Type the new desired title, add a reason, and click "Move page."
    • The old title will redirect to the new title.
    • The old edit history will be moved to the new title.
  4. Check for redirects.
    • Double-redirects will fail to link, and must be renamed to redirect to the current page name.
  • Do not move or rename a page by copying/pasting its content, because doing so destroys the edit history. (The GFDL requires acknowledgement of all contributors, and editors continue to hold copyright on their contributions unless they specifically give up this right. Hence it is required that edit histories be preserved for all major contributions until the normal copyright expires.) If you come across a cut-and-paste move that should be fixed by merging the page histories, please follow the instructions here to have an administrator repair it.

If you cannot rename a page, or you think that the renaming may be controversial, please go to Wikipedia:Requested moves and list it there.

The most common reason for failure is that there is already an article at the location to which you're trying to move the article. This is especially likely to happen if there is a history of moves from one name to another. This can be dealt with by an administrator after discussion at WP:RM.

If the destination does exist, but it only contains a redirect without any history, the move will still work — the designers of the MediaWiki software recognised this as a special case in which no information will be lost if a move is performed.

[edit] Pages to merge

  • Category:Merge_by_month lists pages that have been tagged for merging since a particular month (tagging was begun in September 2006).
  • Wikipedia:Proposed mergers has a list of pages that are proposed to be merged, with discussion and explanation (this is an optional step; all of these articles should have merger tags as well).

[edit] See also

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