Wikipedia talk:Disambiguation/Archive 9

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Disambiguating disambiguated articles

Let's say we have The Avengers (TV series). Should this article have a notice at the top like the following?

For other things named The Avengers, see The Avengers.

I thought it's convention to have such disambiguation notices, especially as if someone links you to the article like this (The Avengers) things are obfuscated. In some cases I've had my addition of such notices reverted. So, I'd like to know: is there any consensus on this? If not, why? Johnleemk | Talk 19:39, 28 November 2005 (UTC)

Personally, I thought the convention was rather the opposite--that it is unnecessary clutter to include dab notices at the top of articles where there is little chance of accidentally landing there. I don't think that the possibility that someone might contruct a bad or misleading link should warrant adding dab notes to every page where there is disambiguation. Those top of page dab notices as useful in cases such as 1) for articles where primary topic disambiguation occurs or 2) for articles which might easily be confused, such as if there are multiple places in a state with similar names or where there are multiple people with a similar name and occupation. Obviously there may be some differences of opinion as to how likely confusion is likely to arise, but I don't think there is any settled convention about it. older≠wiser 21:05, 28 November 2005 (UTC)
How about we fix it. I propose adding a line after the J.S. Bach example under "Disambiguation links" saying
Links to disambiguation pages are never necessary if the article title contains a qualifier in parentheses, such as Saturn (mythology), unless two or more articles might still be confused even with the qualifier.
At the same time, let's get rid of that stupid Horse example. Does anyone still support the bottom-of-the-page dablink? —Wahoofive (talk) 21:13, 28 November 2005 (UTC)
Agreed on both points above. Courtland 03:06, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
For this case, the television series is already unambiguous and has little to zero risk of being confused with anything else named "The Avengers". There's no reason to clutter the top of the page with otheruses or etc. To quote this guideline: "Do not disambiguate, or add a link to a disambiguation page, if there is no risk of confusion." K1Bond007 21:50, 28 November 2005 (UTC)

The only argument I can think of for doing the dab-link on disambiguous pages is the reader coming in via a search engine like Google. "Oh, that's not what I wanted" dablink fixes that situation. Josh Parris#: 04:47, 5 December 2005 (UTC)

I totally agree with this suggestion, and agree that the horse example needs to go—no one does it at the bottom anymore. I invite you all to add your thoughts to the developing Wikipedia:Hatnotes, which is meant to specifically address these kinds of issues.—jiy (talk) 23:43, 11 December 2005 (UTC)

Indie

Should indie be a disambig page? I've disambiguated about 30 pages and 29 of them point to indie (music) and the other one linked to independent record label. The other articles in the dab page aren't very common at all. Is this common? Should I continue disambiguating (I'm fairly new at this)? Thanks. Gflores Talk 03:23, 1 December 2005 (UTC)

Format/graphic

Why doesn't English Wikipedia use the "forking" graphic on the disamb pages common to many of the other languages? --Dpr 12:58, 4 December 2005 (UTC)

See template talk:Disambig. —Michael Z. 2005-12-4 17:00 Z

What to do about duplicate titles?

Hi:

Forgive my newb-ness.

I want to write an article about a person (Brian Jackson--jazz artist) and there is already an article, "Brian Jackson" about a sociologist. How do I proceed?

thanks, Eric

  • Name your article Brian Jackson (jazz artist) and start writing. Make a link at the top of the other page with an indented and italicized note directing users to your page. If you want, you could also move the existing page (move tab on the top of every page after you've made a hundred or so edits) to Brian Jackson (sociologist). Then turn the old Brian Jackson page into a disambiguation page that points to both articles. Have fun. SchmuckyTheCat 20:11, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

Greenwich University

Hi folks, can I get some community input into a disambiguation dispute at Talk:Greenwich University, please? Snottygobble | Talk 12:43, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

"No definitions": request for clarity

I disagree with this edit; this seems the place to come to get consensus. I know we have a "no definitions in disambigs" rule, but in this case I think it is confusing to give only specific contexts on the use of the word, and not indicate that it has a more general meaning (which may be the intended one in a link, after all). Thoughts? -- Jmabel | Talk 20:26, 11 December 2005 (UTC)

I agree with you to some extent. For example, the British slang definition of fanny was removed from the disambig page because it was 'slang', and disambig pages aren't slang guides. However, thinking about this later, I realised that it was quite reasonable to assume that someone might come across that particular usage (whether or not they realised it was slang) and type it in, expecting to get either a relevant article or a link to one. Thus, on that count, it did not warrant being removed.
Of course, there is also the separate matter of whether a particular usage is (generally) common enough to warrant inclusion. In that case, it certainly was.
Perhaps not the closest match to your particular situation, but I believe that this sort of thing has a place in a disambig page... IF they help disambiguate when the user may be unclear which of two distinct meanings is being referred to. Fourohfour 22:49, 11 December 2005 (UTC)
I think that the editor User:Tedernst was being a little zealous in the edit taken, because it is quite within bounds to have clarification of context on a disambiguation page, particularly now that the middle ground (Category:Signpost articles) has been deleted, leaving only the two poles of dab pages and articles with nothing between to bridge the gap. However, before going any farther I would suggest that you create a wiktionary entry for Royalist and add a link to that article from the dab page via {{wiktionarypar}}. Also, consider using the talk-space as a place to discuss nuances of meaning rather than the dab page itself. There is precedence for the latter in dab pages, for instance where red-links are sometimes placed in the talk-space prior to their appearing as articles, and in other page types such as templates where the "business end" of the template is in the main space but "usage notes" exist in the talk-space. I would go so far as to say that there be a guideline composed that helps to head off future clashes by relegating some information types to the talk-space and some to the main dab page. Courtland 23:05, 11 December 2005 (UTC)
I agree that short contextualizing descriptions such as the one deleted at Royalist are helpful. A link to a Wiktionary entry would be fine as an additional reference, but should not replace entirely the brief contextual note. older≠wiser 23:32, 11 December 2005 (UTC)
As a matter of style, if the short contextualizing description is included, I think it should be separated in some fashion from the "may mean" sentence fragment so that the fragment stands alone as a clear entry point to the listing of entries; see for instance Pork (disambiguation), where the circumstance is different but I'd suggest the general form could be used. Courtland 23:43, 11 December 2005 (UTC)
Yes, that is a reasonable suggestion. older≠wiser 23:51, 11 December 2005 (UTC)
Upon examing this situation, I don't see strong reason for this disambiguation page to exist at all. Aside from Monarchism, the entries listed appear to be specific groups of royalists, not unrelated articles that share the same term. Dictionary.com lists royalist and monarchist as synonyms—Royalist should then redirect to Monarchism and say something like "Monarchism or royalism is the advocacy of the establishment, preservation, or restoration of a monarchy." The specific instances of royalists listed on the disambiguation page (including the two groups dictionary.com lists as being titled Royalists with a capital R, the Cavaliers and Tory) can be listed on the Monarchism article, which has designated a section specifically for this purpose.—jiy (talk) 23:35, 11 December 2005 (UTC)
Please don't muddy the water by bringing the matter of whether or not the page should exist up here .. it's a valid discussion point, but let's assume it can exist for now as it does for the sake of this discussion. Courtland 23:43, 11 December 2005 (UTC)
I find it difficult to use this as an example for this point of discussion now that these considerations have come to light. Can you find a stronger example, perhaps theoretical, and instead discuss based on that?—jiy (talk) 00:01, 12 December 2005 (UTC)
The page should exist for two reasons:
  1. A wikipedia editor, encountering the word "royalist" should almost always want to disambiguate it; this informs them as to where.
  2. A non-expert reader—say a school student—might encounter the word "royalist" and want to look up whether we have an article. This accurately directs him or her to the correct article, given a context in which the word was found. -- Jmabel | Talk 05:44, 12 December 2005 (UTC)

Redlinks and External links ... template wording suggestion

I'll start out with a suggested wording revision for the template:

Current wording: This is a disambiguation page — a list of articles associated with the same title.
If an internal link referred you to this page, you may wish to change the link to point directly to the intended article.

Suggested revision: This is a disambiguation page — a list of articles associated with the same title.
If an internal link referred you to this page, you may wish to change the link to point directly to the intended article.
Additional links to articles that do not yet exist may be found on [[Talk:{{PAGENAME}}]].

I'm not sure if that last is the right syntax for general deployment, but the point is to provide a link to the talk-page associated with the dab-page.

Why suggest this?: There are lots of voices that ask "why are red-links included on dab pages?" with the underlying reasoning going something like "if dab pages are navigational aids and you want to reduce the off-topic migration of folks, wanting them to stay focused on where they are going, providing links to non-existant articles defeats the aim of generating a minimalist, fit-for-purpose signpost." I don't 100% agree with this myself, and it's a paraphrase of a couple dozen voices. My thinking is that putting red-links and (as I suggested above) external links associated with those red-links on the talk-page for a dab-page should be encouraged. This would both enhance the navigation functions of the dab pages while satifying the need (or desire) to keep information about potential article destinations close at hand. Part of the dab-page maintenance activity would then become occasional examination of talk-pages for red-links-turned-blue, which could be facilitated by robotic routines.

Your thoughts?: This change is not small and it does come with a significant cost. The question is whether the direction the change points is right as perceived by the community at large. What do you think? Courtland 03:30, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

While I don't like the idea of dab pages containing lots of redlinks, it seems impractical to mandate that they be on the talk page, if it's a page with significant other talk content. They'd just be too hard to find, and trying to standardize a place for them seems like too much instruction creep. I just don't see this (redlinks) as a big problem. Putting a redlink on dab page is a statement that the article should exist; if that's not true, just remove the link. —Wahoofive (talk) 16:49, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
A tiny percentage of dab pages have a talk-page started for them at all, let alone having much discussion there. I'm not "mandating" anything .. the whole disambiguation scheme is a guideline that is liberally violated .. we can and do mandate nothing here. As for using dab pages as a way to collect "articles that should exist", there is an entire page set for that; see Wikipedia:Requested articles; lists of meanings belong in Wiktionary not Wikipedia. Courtland 02:45, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
I'm still trying to decide what problem you're attempting to solve. Someone types in the name of a magazine, say "Mercury" (an astronomy magazine). They get to the Mercury dab page, where they see that we don't yet have an article on their magazine. This may end their search, if they only wanted only that specific information, but that too is a convenience. If they just didn't see the magazine name there maybe they would waste more time looking for it. Our objective is to help users find their info efficiently, even if the info is that we have no info. —Wahoofive (talk) 16:49, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
I agree. If users are genuinely ending up at a dab page looking for a topic that doesn't exist, better that they know that it doesn't exist straight away. Of course there are limits - if there's no reason to think people are ending up at John Smith looking for a baker who made yummy scones in 1943, then don't make a link for it. Stevage 15:19, 17 December 2005 (UTC)

Homonym pages

I have been browsing the French Wikipedia and I notice that they call dab pages "homonym" pages. It's something we might consider, since it seems more encyclopedic to use real English words rather than made-up ones like "disambiguation". It might also serve to make clearer that Michael Jackson doesn't belong on the Michael page, and better embodies this principle: When a reader enters this term and pushes "Go", what article would they realistically be expecting to view as a result?. —Wahoofive (talk) 18:19, 14 December 2005 (UTC)

"Disambiguation" is not a made up word, or at least no more so than "smog" or "radio". It has been in common use in computer science at least since the 1970s. I suspect that it was not a new term then, and I suspect that at least linguists also used it. Does someone have an OED handy to check? I presume it's in there. And "homonym" in English would certainly not be right. "Here" and "hear" are homonyms. Michael Jackson (beer critic) and Michael Jackson (entertainer) are not. -- Jmabel | Talk 07:51, 15 December 2005 (UTC)
at least no more so than "smog"? Well, smog is a totally made up word, so what's your point? :) Stevage 15:16, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
  • (belated interpolation): My point is that it has passed into the language. -- Jmabel | Talk 01:03, 19 December 2005 (UTC)
Correction: "Hear" and "Here" are homophones, whereas "desert" (a dry region) and "desert" (to abandon) are homonyms, even though they're pronounced differently (specialists use the term "homograph" in the latter case). —Wahoofive (talk) 18:13, 15 December 2005 (UTC)
Oops. But a parallel point applies. -- Jmabel | Talk 21:46, 15 December 2005 (UTC)
A Google search shows that over two thirds of webpages containing the word "disambiguation" also contain the word "Wikipedia". We are the only ones really using this word much. It is gibberish only used by computer geeks. Even given the high proportion of Wikipedians who are geeks, I doubt many of us had heard of the term before seeing it here. It is a made-up word on the level of "wikify", not on the level of "smog". "Disambiguation" doesn't appear in my OED, though the most recent editions will have it, as they have hundreds of words that barely exist. — Chameleon 08:14, 15 December 2005 (UTC)
Entries at onelook.com (dictionary portal) → http://www.onelook.com/?w=disambiguation&ls=a. Try looking with Google at the query "disambiguate thesaurus -site:wikipedia.org" (>21,000 hits) and you'll get a better apprecation for the scope of use of the term. Courtland 02:40, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
Yes, I particularly like the listing at "worthless word for the day". —Wahoofive (talk) 06:24, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
Disambiguation is a major issue at Wikipedia, whereas I can't immediately think of other situations where the concept itself really exists. Hence it makes sense that we're the major source of its usage. If it's a neologism, so be it, if the concept itself is new too. Stevage 15:15, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
The first place I encountered the term was compiler theory, circa 1979) One disambiguates an overloaded variable. But it is definitely much older, and may have its origin in talking about the possibility of computer comprehension of human language. Nancy Ide & Jean Véronis, [Word Sense Disambiguation: The State of the Art] Computational Linguistics, 1998, 24(1) cites an impressive number of papers that use it in their title. The earliest appears to be "Stone, Philip J. (1969). “Improved quality of content analysis categories: Computerized-disambiguation rules for high-frequency English words.” In Gerbner, George; Holsti, Ole, Krippendorf, Klaus; Paisley, William J.; and Stone, Philip J. (Eds.), The Analysis of Communication Content, John Wiley and Sons, New York, 199-221," so the word is at least 36 years old. If anyone has access to that work, it would be interesting to see if Stone seems to be inventing a word, or is citing even earlier uses. -- Jmabel | Talk 01:03, 19 December 2005 (UTC)
Even if the specific word disambiguation is a recent construction, the word ambiguity from which it obviously derives is from 1375-1425 according to my dictionary. It's not as if the word was picked out of thin air. As Wikipedia:Disambiguation clearly states, disambiguation is the process of solving ambiguity. Many probably have to look disambiguation up in the dictionary, but I don't find homonym to be a suitable alternative; speaking for myself I had to look the word up as soon as I saw this suggestion, and already in this discussion there has been confusion over its meaning.—jiy (talk) 01:45, 19 December 2005 (UTC)
"Homonym" is not suitable, as the word "homonym" specifically describes single words with multiple meanings. It is not normally applied to proper names or phrases. Although we may have chosen the word because we are geeks, it's become part of our jargon and gained a very specific meaning within Wikipedia. That said, we usually try to keep our jargon out of articles - so we may want to edit it out of the template and remove any occurrences in articles. I can't think of a succinct replacement, however. Deco 08:33, 15 December 2005 (UTC)
Some possibilities: topic selection page, selection page, fork page, forking page, multiple redirection page, gateway page. None of them feel right to me. Deco 08:37, 15 December 2005 (UTC)
I concede your first point, Deco, but I still think "homonym" would be a big improvement over "discombobulation". —Wahoofive (talk) 06:29, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
This dictionary defines "disambiguation" as "clarification that follows from the removal of ambiguity". It also has the word "disambiguate" reference. Hence, I conclude that disambiguation is a normal word (and of course its meaning can be readily figured out by someone who doesn't already know it). Even if it is a rarer word, I figure it's still appropriate. Therefore, deciding between "disambiguation" and another equally appropriate word is arbitrary. Neonumbers 10:03, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
I find "disambiguation" to be such a perfectly clear statement of what the page does that it's hard to improve on. My only other suggestion would be a "context page". Stevage 15:13, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
Anyone whose used Wikipedia for any amount of time by now has run across a Disambiguation page and knows what it is. Why alienate the current users to avoid confusing future ones?
Above, Jmabel added some info on the history of the word "disambiguation" (the comment was addded above other comments, out of chronological sequence). Jmabel's description involved computers. I thought I'd share the earlier ODE online references:
  • First used in 1827, "Disambiguation - where it is to fix the sense of an ambiguous term"
  • 1832, "Disambiguation is distinction applied to words"
That 178 years old, and not geeky.--Commander Keane 01:58, 19 December 2005 (UTC)
Can I guess that ODE was meant to be OED? Interesting: earlier, when I suggested "Does someone have an OED handy to check?", Chameleon replied "'Disambiguation' doesn't appear in my OED, though the most recent editions will have it, as they have hundreds of words that barely exist." I wonder when they started listing it, if they now list an 1827 citation. Chameleon, may I presume that your edition dates from some time in the 20th century, rather than the 19th? (That's not a joke, I have my 1904 Merriam Webster next to my computer.) -- Jmabel | Talk 00:57, 20 December 2005 (UTC)
I hope I'm not spoiling the fun of your fascinating historical research by suggesting that how long ago the word was invented isn't terribly relevant; the question is how widespread its usage is today. And would "homonym" be better known? —Wahoofive (talk) 21:30, 22 December 2005 (UTC)
I think "homonym" is a more widely understood word, at least in the United States where it is used in grade school english classes (it was used when I was a child - maybe not now). People tend never to encounter the term "disambiguation" during general schooling. However, that's not an argument to switch to using the inaccurate "homonym". User:Ceyockey 16:39, 24 December 2005 (UTC)
Indeed. And "Doggie" is a yet more widely understood word, that has even less to do with the purpose at hand. If we really need to dumb this down, we could go for "multiple meanings" instead of disambiguation. I myself think that such a change would be a massive waste of time and effort. -- Jmabel | Talk 02:48, 25 December 2005 (UTC)


creating a disambig from an existing article

For example Black Triangle. Should it have been moved and then a new Black Triangle created? --Gbleem 05:41, 23 December 2005 (UTC)

Could you expand on that a bit? What would you strive to disambiguate? User:Ceyockey 05:47, 23 December 2005 (UTC)

The existing article is certainly on the primary meaning of "Black Triangle". If disambiguation is needed, it should be at Black Triangle (disambiguation) and {{Otheruses}} placed on Black Triangle. -- Jmabel | Talk 02:23, 24 December 2005 (UTC)

This is a primary topic disambiguation. If there are one or two other topics, just link them at the top with a brief explanation in italics (This article is about X. For Y, see Z.). If there are a bunch of other topics, create a disambiguation page at Black Triangle (disambiguation) and briefly link it at the top it italics. Also consider whether one topic belongs at black triangle and another at Black Triangle. Deco 04:14, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

"Other use" notice for King James Version

I removed this disambiguation at the top of the article: This page is about the version of the Bible; for the Harvey Danger album, see King James Version (album). The reason for this is that, according to disam. guidelines, "Do not disambiguate, or add a link to a disambiguation page, if there is no risk of confusion."[1] In addition, since this album is named after this version of the Bible and is not that well known, the link should not be placed here.--Alabamaboy 17:39, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

It is still possible that someone might come to this article looking for the album. In such a case wouldn't it be nice for the reader to have a disambig link to the latter? Some clueless Harvey Danger fan might not know the origin of the album title... -- Rmrfstar 20:25, 25 December 2005 (UTC)
Perhaps if the band was more well known (such as if the band was the Beatles or Eminem something). As it is, since the title of the album is obviously playing off this version of the Bible, and since the guidelines on disambig links are very clear, I don't think it's needed. In fact, the link struck me as link spam to promote the album and band. If anything, the album article is more in need of a disambig link than this article.--Alabamaboy 02:33, 26 December 2005 (UTC)
The guidelines are clear, "if there is no risk of confusion". Do you deny that there is a risk of confusion? Imagine a clueless music fan types King James Version and hits "Go". The newb would be stuck. The connection is only obvious if you already know of the Bible version. Furthermore, the tag does not detract at all from the King James Version of the Bible article. It's one line of italicized text which one does not read if one's not looking for it. -- Rmrfstar 12:37, 26 December 2005 (UTC)
I'd be ok with a "see also" link at the bottom of the article. But as I said, there is no risk of confusion b/c the band is almost unknown and the album is even less well known (being, according to the band's Wikipedia article, not a very successful album). As I said before, placing this at the top of this article seems more like a marketing trick or link spam than a valid disambiguation link since there's no risk of confusion. Best, --Alabamaboy 13:45, 26 December 2005 (UTC)
The "See also" section is not appropriate for such content. And there is a risk of confusion as I have pointed out above, it's just very small; the band is "almost unknown", but someone could still get stuck. It doesn't matter whether the addition of the notice was originally link spam or some such ploy, the tag is necessary now for those few helpless newbs: the policy is quite clear on this. -- Rmrfstar 09:08, 27 December 2005 (UTC)
The disambiguation should be here and should be at the top, because "King James Version" redirects here. The only possible alternative is to add a link to King James Version (disambiguation) and put it there. This is simply a matter of policy and convention - links later in the article are unlikely to ever be found by the people who actually need them. A third option is to put King James Version (album) up for deletion. :-) Deco 04:36, 27 December 2005 (UTC)
I should mention, there is one more alternative, but I don't like it: turning King James Version from a redirect into a disambiguation page. Then this page would not require any dab notice. Deco 04:40, 27 December 2005 (UTC)
Yes, the tag should be at the top, but that is all that is required; the album article is not notable enough to warrant a disambiguation page, nor not-notable enough (and bare) to warrant deletion. -- Rmrfstar 09:08, 27 December 2005 (UTC)
Disambiguation notices do not require notability - really, just try to find a provision claiming this. Only primary topic choice requires this (when used, the primary topic should be the most notable of the bunch, as it is here). I don't really like this album article, but the other contributors are in the right saying that someone looking for this information would probably never find it. Every article must be linked in the standard manner from the article bearing its name, or its (disambiguation) page, or else it is inaccessible by name, which is highly undesirable.
For what it's worth, this is a general enough situation that I would advise that you take this discussion to Wikipedia talk: Disambiguation to get a verdict from the people most familiar with that policy. Deco 09:49, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

I still say there is no risk of confusion. I'd also avoid making a disambig page for this. If others want to take the discussion to Wikipedia talk: Disambiguation for an opinion, I'd be good with that and will go with whatever the consensus is. Best, --Alabamaboy 14:36, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

What do you think? -- Rmrfstar 20:17, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

I think that just to avoid the weirdness of linking from the article on the actual KJV to a record album, I would introduce a page King James Version (disambiguation) and have the hat-text go there instead of directly to the album. But, yes, I think there is some chance of confusion. If someone is looking for the album, enters "King James Version" in the search box, and hits "Enter", they'll end up with the Bible, and it may not be clear how to navigate to the other article.
How prominent are Harvey Danger? Not much on an international basis, but here in the Pacific Northwest, very prominent. Because they don't tour a lot, they are one of those bands whose fame falls off rapidly with distance. I just randomly heard a longish interview with Jeff Lin (on the economics of the music business) last night on the local NPR station. -- 09:41, 30 December 2005 (UTC)
I was thinking about that and I'd be ok with a King James Version (disambiguation), as long as the main article remained at King James Version. However, perhaps the better thing to do would be to simple refer people at the top of the page to the King James disambiguation page. This way people who are looking for King James can also find him.--Alabamaboy 14:26, 30 December 2005 (UTC)
Here's what the disambiguation link could say: ":For alternative meanings, see the disambiguation page for King James. This is the type of disam used for United States. My feeling is that if we are concerned about people trying to find this article, we should also link them to the larger King James disambig b/c we might get some people looking for King James who stumble upon this article.--Alabamaboy 14:32, 30 December 2005 (UTC)
There should be a disambig link, though it should probably be more concise and less prominent. It's not appropriate to link to King James, because most of the links there are (oddly enough) for kings named James, and the KJV is stuck in the "see also" section.

I created a disambig link at King James Version (disambiguation) and I'd be ok with placing that at the top of the King James Version article (and the others). Since I was the only voice originally opposed to the original disam link, I'll add this in. If anyone opposes this, let us know and we can remove it and discuss some more. The wording can say, ":For other uses of King James Version, see King James Version (disambiguation).Best, --Alabamaboy 18:13, 30 December 2005 (UTC)

Sounds good to me. In fact, I suggested this solution briefly - I guess I should've been more explanative. Deco 02:41, 31 December 2005 (UTC)

Root pages...

Lindosland added: "Disambiguation should avoided for articles that only start with the same word, but have a common core of knowledge. For these, the Root page should be used to create a hierarchy of articles, with the Root page serving as a common introduction referred back to from each article to avoid duplication of effort in explaining basic principles." to the page without discussion. I've now removed it.

Gives me a sense of deja-vu - this is exactly like the signpost articles I put up for deletion a month back: Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:Manual of Style (signpost articles) and Wikipedia:Categories for deletion/Log/2005 November 30#:Category:Signpost articles. I'll list root pages later on this evening. Thanks/wangi 19:33, 30 December 2005 (UTC)

No, this is not the same, and certainly not the same as a Disambiguation page, as you have alleged elsewhere as your reason for deletion. It does not add confusion, because those who see reason to use it will put it into effect, and the concept greatly assists editors in avoiding duplicated effort by providing a place to list all associated pages, as well as providing a common introduction that avoids putting basics on every page. Please reconsider, and allow time for others to consider the idea. Sorry if you feel it was not discussed, but I did start a discussion on the Talk page for Root page. --Lindosland 22:18, 30 December 2005 (UTC)
Lindosland, this page is a wikipedia guideline and as it says at the top "please use the discussion page to propose any major changes" - I would say adding a new paragraph telling folk to not use disambiguation pages for certain classes is a major change and as such should have been discussed here prior to changing the guideline. Can you please remove the paragraph for now and discuss it here? Thanks/wangi 22:23, 30 December 2005 (UTC)
And worth a read: Wikipedia:How to create policy. Thanks/wangi 22:33, 30 December 2005 (UTC)
Lindosland, when you write something about using/editing Wikipedia, it goes in the Wikipedia: namespace. So Root page should have been created at Wikipedia:Root page. That's been fixed now, but just so you know for the future. Now, about the additon. I think it is an interesting guideline, and it ties in with Signpost articles (an idea that's recently been deleted, but may repear sometime) . However, the idea is new and should be developed further before it's included on this page.--Commander Keane 22:52, 30 December 2005 (UTC)

Sorry if I'm not quite getting this right, I followed the command to be bold and try things, and it seemed to make sense to put in the proposed text knowing it would rapidly be judged!

I note the comment about the namespace, but I was not sure that this was correct as I wanted to put the simple description Root page on articles. I guess redirect can be used but wasn't sure this was within the rules. --Lindosland 01:12, 31 December 2005 (UTC)

I've removed the text as requested. Please note that the article Wikipedia:Root page has been promtly marked for deletion, and I am looking for support for it staying. --Lindosland 01:17, 31 December 2005 (UTC)

--- moved section on naming to Wikipedia talk:Root page wangi 16:23, 1 January 2006 (UTC)