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Template:Distinguish has been protected indefinitely. Use {{editprotected}} on this page to request an edit.

[edit] Discussion

[edit] Rationale for this template

• Some articles have deceptively similar names, eg. French Guinea/French Guiana, Plattsburg/Plattsburgh or Ultima Thule (band)/Ultima Thule (rock band). This template could be useful in those cases. Disambiguation pages do not always cover this particularity, and when they do, they are sometimes superfluous. Maybe "Not to be confused with" is better that "Distinguish from". --Ezeu 11:58, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
  • I'd say this is different enough from "otheruses' to be a useful addition to the range of templates, but I'd prefer "Not to be confused with". I can think of several more obvious places, like like the two Frank Lampards (father and son) who have played football for England, or cricketers Herbert Sutcliffe and Bert Sutcliffe, or Azerbaijan and Azarbaijan, or.... Grutness...wha? 12:48, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
    • Changed to "Not to be confused with". It was my first choice anyway. --Ezeu 13:14, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
      • I think "Not to be confused with" is ugly and often wrong for the articles in which this is used. Is this some kind of regional expression that means something different to some other people than it means to me? I'd limit this to cases such as "French Guinea" and "French Guiana", distinct things where neither term is legitimately used when the other is meant. I don't think it is the appropriate terminology when the term it is being distinguished from is also a legitimate term for the article in which this appears. Gene Nygaard 08:39, 24 September 2006 (UTC)
        • This template dismbituates deceptively similar titles. It does not refer to synonyms. --Ezeu 10:04, 24 September 2006 (UTC)
          • Then why is it on Vector Prime to distinguish it from Vector Prime (Transformers), to list just one example? This illustrates a couple of things:
            1. No matter what the creator has in mind, if it isn't explained in the template or its talk page, it isn't going to be followed.
            2. You, and anyone else who interprets it that way, isn't doing a very good job of policing the "What links here" list. Gene Nygaard 20:03, 24 September 2006 (UTC)
            • • I forgot to ask, what template should be used instead, for cases such as "Vector Prime"? That is additional information, which, if it were included on the "See also" line at the bottom of the template page, would help people in choosing the appropriate templage. And, do we really need different templates for those two cases—what purposes might be served by that? Gene Nygaard 13:01, 25 September 2006 (UTC)
        • I do not see the problem. This template is for distinguishing from articles with similar titles (titles that are deceptively similar), but that refer to different subjects. All templates can be misused. This template is a merely a compliment to the templates at Category:Disambiguation and redirection templates, and when it is used inappropriately, one should swap to a more correct template. As for Vector Prime vs Vector Prime (Transformers), template {{for}} or perhaps a regular disambiguation page could be more appropriate as this is a case of two articles with the same (and not merely similar) titles. I'll go ahead and edit both articles appropriately. --Ezeu 17:49, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Wording

The good and the bad... I can see how this could be useful, especially for articles with closely worded titles. But I have a problem with the template's wording. The wording is — with all due respect — a grammatical eyesore. It might also be construed as mildly derisive; that is, gently chiding the reader for typing the wrong name.

I believe that the wording should sound as neutral as possible (and should also be grammatically correct, like the wording used in other templates) — perhaps something like:

For a similar name, see [[{{{1}}}]]

-,-~^R'lyehRising~-,- 17:18, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

I don't like "similar name", as not everything is a name. How about:

Distinct from [[{{{1}}}]]

or perhaps,

Sometimes confused with [[{{{1}}}]]

Or if we're willing to be more verbose, something like:

This topic is sometimes mistaken for [[{{{1}}}]]

Or even

For a similarly spelled topic, see [[{{{1}}}]]

It's an awkward thing to come up with a good name for. I agree that the current form is not optimal, though. It doesn't sound very neutral. -- Zawersh 01:35, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

• What about:

  For a similar term, see [[{{{1}}}]]

  or:

  The title of this article is similar to [[{{{1}}}]]

  or:

  Another article has a similar title; see [[{{{1}}}]]

  In any event, I think the wording should be as concise as possible.
  ,-~^R'lyehRising~-, 23:30, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Screwed Up

Hi. Something got screwed up with this template. In the past day, it has lost the indent and italics. It looks bad now. Can someone please fix it? Thansk. —Dfass 01:11, 31 December 2006 (UTC)

Bypass your cache. — Omegatron 05:44, 31 December 2006 (UTC)

Thanks. —Dfass 15:56, 31 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] More parameters

I have modidied the template so that it will take more than the current two parameters.

Previously it offered:

{{Distinguish|foo|bar}}

Now it can do:

{{Distinguish|foo|bar|something}}

or

{{Distinguish|foo|bar|something|something else}}

--BrownHairedGirl ^{(talk) • (contribs)} 19:55, 26 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Error in documentation

This line of the template code:

<nowiki>{{Distinguish|foo|bar|something}}</nowiki> {{Distinguish|foo|bar}}

should be replaced with this:

<nowiki>{{Distinguish|foo|bar}}</nowiki> {{Distinguish|foo|bar}}

for reasons that I hope are fairly obvious.

—Ruakh_TALK 07:15, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

Heh, good catch. Took care of it. – Luna Santin (talk) 08:47, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

Thanks. :-) —Ruakh_TALK 17:05, 13 February 2007 (UTC)