Template talk:Merge/archive2

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Template standardization

I've just started a brief framework idea about how to organise template standardisation for article templates. That would hopefully sort out (part of) this issue. violet/riga (t) 28 June 2005 17:36 (UTC)


Too many merge templates

Why do we have both Template:Merge and Template:Mergeto? Can they be meta-merged? -- Beland 4 July 2005 17:27 (UTC)

{{Merge}} is used when the merger proponent believes that two or more articles should be merged, but is unsure of which article should survive and incorporate the combined information. {{Mergeto}} and {{Mergefrom}} are used in conjunction with one another to specify a proposed source and a proposed destination. Please see Wikipedia:Template_messages/Cleanup#Merging_and_splitting for instructions. —Lifeisunfair 4 July 2005 17:37 (UTC)
I'm not convinced. I've always used {{Merge}} for the purpose you've described for {{Mergeto}}, possibly as I don'think I've ever seen {{Mergeto}} before. Is this a new guideline? — OwenBlacker July 5, 2005 14:48 (UTC)
This setup was introduced in February of 2005. —Lifeisunfair 5 July 2005 16:57 (UTC)

Perhaps we should reword merge to say: "this article and {1} should be merged." or any of the other variant wordings that gets chosen. "this article and {1} {wording}." --MarSch 5 July 2005 15:58 (UTC)

I don't follow. What distinction are you drawing? —Lifeisunfair 5 July 2005 16:57 (UTC)
I think the distinction is that the current wording "1 should be merged with 2" can easily be misinterpreted, confusing {{Merge}} with {{Mergeto}}. With "1 and 2 should be merged" both 1 and 2 are explicitly on equal grammatical footing, meaning you can't misinterpret the intent as proposing a merge direction. --Laura Scudder | Talk 8 July 2005 20:04 (UTC)
  • Isn't it generally obvious though that the larger of the two should incorporate the smaller? The main {{merge}} could be reworded to state that, maybe. Radiant_>|< 10:11, July 11, 2005 (UTC)
It's common for a pair of merge-worthy articles to be approximately the same size, or for the smaller one to have the better title. —Lifeisunfair 10:35, 11 July 2005 (UTC)


Voting

Since the voting has concluded, I've unprotected the relevant templates and updated their layout and wording according to the majority opinion. The style would be Style Y, e.g. the purple box. For the wording I've picked E for now since it has the majority. There is presently a runoff vote between that one and wording B. If it concludes in favor of wording B, the templates should of course be reworded.

Since there was no voting on the text of {{mergeto}} and the like, I've tried to match the wording of {{merge}} as close as possible.

Radiant_>|< 11:39, July 11, 2005 (UTC)


Arrows go the wrong way

I just noticed the new graphics for {{mergeto}} and {{mergefrom}} in use. They look wrong to me. The arrow coming in from left implies stuff coming here from elsewhere. Not as strong, but the arrow pointing left into a red diamond vaguely looks like it could be going away elsewhere. I think simply swapping the two images in the templates would be better. —Michael Z. 2005-07-13 14:31 Z

I'm confused by your claims that one arrow "implies stuff coming here from elsewhere" and the other arrow "vaguely looks like it could be going away elsewhere." Why does one direction mean "coming" and the other "going"?
The present (purely arbitrary) setup identifies the current article/section as the red (standout) object on the left (the logical starting point among readers of written languages that are read from left to right). —Lifeisunfair 17:51, 13 July 2005 (UTC)
That's exactly what I thought when I saw the template used earlier. It is more traditional to have it in the style "source → current → destination". violet/riga (t) 19:39, 13 July 2005 (UTC)
The {{mergeto}} template already uses the "current → destination" format. The {{mergefrom}} template formerly used the "source → current" format, but only because it featured the same icon. You appear to be suggesting a return to this state (thereby eliminating the graphical differentiation), while Michael Z. advocates swapping the icons (thereby assigning a left-pointing arrow to {{mergeto}}). —Lifeisunfair 19:57, 13 July 2005 (UTC)
Sorry, looking back it wasn't clear what I was trying to say. I'l like to see "→ <>" on {{mergefrom}} and "<> →" on {{mergeto}}. violet/riga (t) 20:02, 14 July 2005 (UTC)
Okay, I see what you mean. I just attempted to create a compatible icon resembling "<> →", and I was unable to do so. (It ended up looking like rubbish.) The problem is that all of the existing icons share contrary traits:
  • They depict content merging into other content, not content moving out of a page. This results in the distinctive purple coloring (where the "red content" and "blue content" converge). If the arrow is pointing away from its source (instead of toward its destination) there's no way to logically or artistically integrate this theme.
  • With the exception of the {{mergedisputed}} icon, they have interlinking red and blue points. The diamonds were created by mirroring the points of the two arrows from the {{merge}} template's icon. The {{merge}}, {{mergefrom}} and {{mergeto}} icons share a common center (and therefore a uniform appearance) that I feel should be preserved.
—Lifeisunfair 21:00, 14 July 2005 (UTC)

Also, the "discuss" link doesn't look right. It appears capitalized and italicized, in parentheses, after the period of the message, but without its own period. If it's meant to be an action button, it would look better if it were similar to the section edit links—lower case in square brackets. —Michael Z. 2005-07-13 14:42 Z

This is entirely subjective, of course. It lacks a period because it isn't a sentence. —Lifeisunfair 17:51, 13 July 2005 (UTC)


Problem with template

There's a minor glitch with the way the template interprets the WP namespace. using {{mergeto|Wikipedia:XYZ}} and {{mergefrom|Wikipedia:ZYX}} ends up making a screwy link to Wikipedia:Wikipedia:XYZ (or ZYX, whichever). Tomer TALK 19:34, July 13, 2005 (UTC)

Right, just use the PAGENAME part, without the "Wikipedia:". -- Netoholic @ 19:38, 13 July 2005 (UTC)
This unfortunately makes it impossible to merge across namespaces; for instance, merging a Wikipedia: page in to a category. -- Beland 22:05, 31 July 2005 (UTC)
It might be better to leave the NAMESPACE out of the template. It causes problems for those wishing cross-namespace merges and is counter-intuitive to those used to "prepending" the namespace to article names. DoubleBlue (Talk) 22:19, 31 July 2005 (UTC)
Keep in mind that the template contains two links. Either way, the "Discuss" link is incompatible with cross-namespace mergers. If {{NAMESPACE}} is removed, it will become incompatible with all non-article mergers (including those that are confined to one namespace).
For the relatively uncommon cross-namespace mergers, the best solution is to manually substitute the appropriate code. —Lifeisunfair 07:21, 1 August 2005 (UTC)


Other templates

Some other templates may benefit from this template's standardization (e.g. using CSS, applicability to other namespaces, possibly a similar icon). The first that came to mind is Template:Move, but there probably are others. Opinions please? Radiant_>|< 09:19, July 14, 2005 (UTC)


Merge link wrong?

OK I don't want to kick all this argument off again but I think the Merge link inthe template should link to Wikipedia:Duplicate articles as it used to rather then Wikipedia:Merge as it does now. Idealy both pages are important and could be linked to but I think that Wikipedia:Duplicate articles is the most important showing as it does the argy-bargy of mergation rather then a dry discription. Maybe the two pages could be involved in some amazing Meta-Merge. If nobody seems to care in a few day I may change it unilateraly.

Also while I musing something could be done about the problem that a tag is only put on one of the articles meaning that less people are aware of a duplication and a merge takes longer. Although I don't know a good way to solve this. MeltBanana 20:47, 17 July 2005 (UTC)

  • The idea behind Wikipedia:Merge is that it gives a simple explanation of how to merge, which should be useful for newbies. WP:DP is rather messy at the moment with template links and short descriptions of why to merge etc. Of course an oldbie is not likely to click on either link, but WP:Merge is easier for the newbie. Radiant_>|< 09:54, July 18, 2005 (UTC)


New format

The reformatting of these templates so that they appear without the box is causing bizarre indents in articles. Has anyone else noticed this? It may be because I have the "justify text" preference activated. Why was it reformatted anyway?--Cyberjunkie | Talk 08:06, 19 July 2005 (UTC)

  • Try emptying your cache, that should help (hold shift key, then click on 'reload'). Radiant_>|< 08:17, July 19, 2005 (UTC)
  • The above instructions apply to the Mozilla browsers (Mozilla Suite browser, Firefox, Camino, Netscape 6+), as well as Safari and Konqueror. In Microsoft Internet Explorer, press Ctrl-F5 (or hold Ctrl while clicking on the "Refresh" icon). In Opera, press F5. This page contains additional details. —Lifeisunfair 08:45, 19 July 2005 (UTC)
Okay, thanks. All is fine now. I should have reviewed the revision history.--Cyberjunkie | Talk 09:31, 19 July 2005 (UTC)


NAMESPACE?

I see in the history that a {{NAMESPACE}} prefix was added to the destination article "so this works in non-article namespaces". Huh? This works in non-article namespaces, you just have to add the namespace yourself!

As it stands this makes cross-namespace merging impossible. This doesn't occur often, but it does occur: Wikipedia:Criticisms.

In the article namespace, needless to say, this will do nothing. In other namespaces it's a gotcha. I've tentatively removed it; I'd like to have explain someone why it should stay if it should return. As it stands it makes something impossible and seems to offer nothing but a typing convenience in return. JRM · Talk 11:05, 6 August 2005 (UTC)

Update: I've read the discussion above and still don't understand what it's supposed to do. I did not, of course, remove the {{NAMESPACE}} tag that constructs the talk page name, which is independent and will work regardless of namespace (unless you'd want to merge talk pages... but I don't see that happening soon.) JRM · Talk 11:08, 6 August 2005 (UTC)

You're ignoring the {{mergeto}} template (which you didn't even edit). It contains a link to the other article's talk page. As far as I know, this cannot be made compatible with a cross-namespace merger.
"{{NAMESPACE}} talk:" (or simply "Talk:", within the article namespace) is appended to the parameter (the other page's title). If the namespace is typed as part of the parameter (as you propose):
  • If only the host page is in non-article namespace, a broken link along the lines of this is created. (This is unaffected, but it already is incompatible.)
  • If only the other page is in non-article namespace (as in your example cited above), a broken link along the lines of this is created. (This replaces a different broken link.)
  • If both pages are in non-article namespace (a situation that the current system supports, provided that it's the same namespace), a broken link along the lines of this is created.
The problem, of course, is that the namespace (if applicable) must precede "talk:", and must not follow it. Your proposed system renders this impossible. —Lifeisunfair 12:30, 6 August 2005 (UTC)
You're right, I didn't edit it, because it wasn't used on the other page. Note that neither {{merge}} nor {{mergefrom}} have this problem, because they link to the talk page of the article they're placed on, not the article they're pointing to.
It seems we can choose between these alternatives:
  1. Include the namespace in the argument. Mergeto breaks on non-article pages.
  2. Do not include the namespace in the argument. Mergeto breaks on cross-namespace merges.
I can see why we'd prefer #2. (Technically there's a third option, supply the namespace as a separate argument, but that's too contrived to be worth it.) Of course, if we had some way of generating "the talk page of page X" without resorting to substitution hacks it would be even better (in fact I know multiple places where this would come in handy), but we don't. JRM · Talk 13:22, 6 August 2005 (UTC)
It's important to note that "mergeto breaks on cross-namespace merges" either way. —Lifeisunfair 13:33, 6 August 2005 (UTC)
Yes. #1 includes #2. JRM · Talk 13:35, 6 August 2005 (UTC)
Therefore, this isn't a choice between two tradeoffs; it's a choice between:
  • one flaw
  • the same flaw, plus another flaw
—Lifeisunfair 13:50, 6 August 2005 (UTC)
Are we still discussing this, or something? :-) You were right, I was wrong. (Or rather, ignorant.) JRM · Talk 13:52, 6 August 2005 (UTC)
Wiki is unfair. JRM · Talk 13:39, 6 August 2005 (UTC)
Very cute, Germ. ;-) —Lifeisunfair 13:50, 6 August 2005 (UTC)


Discuss link

Can the discuss link be changed to [[Talk:Article name#Merge]], so that clicking on discuss actually goes to a discussion about merging? — Omegatron 18:02, September 12, 2005 (UTC)

The problem with that is that the discussion is not always under the section title "Merge". I have seen "Proposed Merge", "Reasons for the merge", "combining articles" and other section titles, and often this discussion has been started before the merge tempalte is applied. If you want a section link, subst in the template and edit the link manually. DES (talk) 18:08, 12 September 2005 (UTC)
The idea was to standardize on a name. In cases where there is already a section with a different name, the link will just go to the talk page, which isn't any worse than it currently behaves. — Omegatron 18:28, September 12, 2005 (UTC)
I've considered this idea in the past. As I see it, the problem is that a talk page might contain multiple relevant discussion sections, one of which happens to be named "Merge" (or whatever designation is selected for the template). Under the proposed setup, readers would be directed specifically to one arbitrary section (to the exclusion of all others). Under the current system, readers are encouraged to browse through the entire talk page, which generally is a good idea.
Another concern is that readers who notice that the "#Merge" portion of the link has no effect might be misled to believe that no pertinent discussion exists (when in fact, it exists under a different name, but isn't visible without page scrolling). —Lifeisunfair 22:01, 12 September 2005 (UTC)


Template creates broken pages

Somehow it keeps creating things like Talk talk:Santur and Talk talk:Santoor. 205.166.76.3 02:40, 15 October 2005 (UTC)

Mhm. The template assumes that it is placed on the front of an article, and always adds the "talk -" prefix to a self-link. —Michael Z. 2005-10-15 15:51 Z
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