Template talk:Otheruses4

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Template:Otheruses4 is permanently protected from editing, as it is a heavily used or visible template.

Substantial changes should be proposed here, and made by administrators if the proposal is uncontroversial, or has been discussed and is supported by consensus. Use {{editprotected}} to attract the attention of an administrator in such cases.
Any contributor may edit the template's documentation to add usage notes, categories or interwiki links.

Contents

[edit] Didn't use template

Oops, just noticed that I could just create my own otheruses without using a template. Sorry.—The preceding unsigned comment was added by 132.205.3.20 (talk • contribs) 21:14, 1 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Indent

This template doesn't seem to indent like its dablink counterparts. Why? JFW | T@lk 19:36, 15 November 2005 (UTC)

Fixed it. They were doing things differently than all the other ones, so I changed it to match {{otheruses}}. Fitch 06:47, 5 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] This template was gutted without any Tfd discussion

I plan to revert the redirection of this template, and here's why:

  • There was no Tfd discussion. Yes, after I dug around a while I found the discussion on "otherusesabout" from August 2005 where some editors disliked seeing "redundancy" in the hatnotes. Yet the consensus was to "Keep". Now one of the editors who didn't like "redundancy" is using an old discussion surrounding a "Keep" verdict to delete a different template. This is a doubly unjustified action. It would be considerate to leave a message on WP:D if there is to be a Tfd discussion of this template, or any others that are used only for disambiguation.
  • Even if the template is deleted or gutted, it just takes away a tool from disambig-fixers, and there is always {{dablink}}, where "redundancy" can live on, but where it is so free-form that it may allow bad habits to flourish, and the variations can detract from the professional appearance of Wikipedia more than having "This article is about" at the start of a hatnote.
  • The editors who took part in the August 2005 discussion are not known to me as people who do a lot of disambig-fixing, in particular disambiguation of people. They perhaps do not see the value of a template that can clearly differentiate between the English-born Australian cricketer and the Australian-born English cricketer who share a name, when a reader may otherwise have to read two or three paragraphs to really find out who the article is about.
  • I can use {{dablink}}, but I don't want to go back over months worth of my contributions and convert them, and for future contributions, I don't really want to do ALL THAT STINKING TYPING! Chris the speller 01:43, 16 April 2006 (UTC)
I can see the next argument: The information should be in the first line. My reply: I won't get very many disambig pages fixed if I have to rewrite and reorganize the first few paragraphs of a lot of articles. I recently found 5 articles about George Smithers or whatever where you couldn't get from any one to any other, or to find most of them by going to George Smithers. To me it's more important to fix those glaring holes than to sweat the first 4 words of a hatnote. Chris the speller 02:19, 16 April 2006 (UTC)
So instead we should use a template which tolerates very badly written articles? ed g2s • talk 03:11, 16 April 2006 (UTC)
The consensus was not keep, but delete which changed to redirect towards the end. ed g2s • talk 03:11, 16 April 2006 (UTC)
I don't like badly written articles, either, but it's more important to get people to the right article than to have beautiful articles that people can't find, though you may feel otherwise. If the article is skillfully rewritten later, the skillful editor can then change the hatnote as appropriate.
We see the result of the discussion differently. In August, the template was removed from Tfd (that does mean discussion is closed and a decision is made, right?), but the template itself was not destroyed until 4 months later. I have seen others take this to mean that the decision back in August was to keep, and so do I. However, the discussion was not about otheruses4. The otheruses4 template existed at that time, but was never put up for Tfd, was never deleted, as far as I can tell, and so should not be deleted, or gutted, now. I halfway expected an apology when you realized that you had made a disruptive change without thoroughly investigating the situation, and with no regard for the editors who struggle along with crummy tools and sloppy guidelines, but perhaps I was just being a Pollyanna. Chris the speller 04:46, 16 April 2006 (UTC)
There were 12 delete votes (including 1 redirect vote), 2 keep votes and 2 further keep votes based on the disambiguation of Macedonia, which doesn't use the template. The templates were either deleted, orphaned or changed to remove the "This article is about" immediately after the TFD. The templates, in that form, were most definitely not kept. There should be a new discussion to overturn this decision, not the other way around. ed g2s • talk 15:39, 16 April 2006 (UTC)

How do you explain that the result of a discussion was "Keep" when the URL includes "Not deleted" Wikipedia:Templates_for_deletion/Log/Not_deleted/August_2005? Even if you feel that the consensus was to delete or change, why did you wait 4 months to change it? Once more I will say that the use of a discussion about one template to suddenly, and with no warning, delete a different template 8 months later seems unjustified and downright sneaky. There is a discussion going on now at WP:D about hatnotes. You may find it enlightening. It has input from people who actually work day in and day out to help readers get to the right article, not people who swooped in, complained about a 4-word phrase and then decamped. Chris the speller 18:36, 16 April 2006 (UTC)

As I explained before the template was not actually technically deleted, hence the (possibly incorrect) filing in "not_deleted". At the time the template only had a few uses, so I orphaned it. Nobody got around to actually deleting it, until a month later when it was marked as "survived TFD", due to the misleading filing. I may remind you that just because you spend a lot of time doing disambigution tasks, this does not make you the owner of these templates, nor does it give you any more say in these matters. I undestand that you are annoyed that you missed the original TFD, but that does not mean that you can just overrule it, otherwise the process would be utterly pointless. ed g2s • talk 13:37, 17 April 2006 (UTC)
As I explained before, THIS template was not Tfd'd, and was not deleted. How could an editor who started using it last Semptember, for example, know that it was condemned, deprecated, hanging by a thread (in your mind), even after adding it to his or her watchlist (and I dispute the notion that an editor should have to put a watch on every tool)? That is where the fast-and-loose process of yours shows itself to be a tissue of wishful thinking, with no consideration of due process. You should have protested the "misleading filing" back in August. I don't claim to own the templates, but Wikipedia is not well served by editors who do not do the work deciding to get rid of tools used by those who do. I will not agree to deleting templates until there is consensus, and I don't mean ancient history. The quality of disambiguation work being done today is not what it was in August 2005, not to personally disparage anyone, but there is a strong team now. I found an interesting comment on a different template in that August log, a little strong, but applicable here: "This goes beyond bad-faith; you want to take the tools away from the workers! Maybe you don't like the way those tools are used? You can't talk to other people, ask them maybe to use the tool another way? All you can do is smash and destroy!" Chris the speller 15:30, 17 April 2006 (UTC)

As far as I can tell, the only template that was went to TfD was Template:Otherusesabout, which is now a redirect. That should have had ZERO effect on any other template. If there are other TfDs for the other templates (which includes virtually every one at the top of this page), they should be presented. I note that they were all recently gutted similarly to this one. Powers 23:45, 18 April 2006 (UTC)

You have failed to demonstrate convincing consensus against the use of this template, and indeed, consensus here appears to be against you. If you would like this to be redirected to another template, put it up on TFD. My opinion is that it's quite atrocious style to refer to something that hasn't been said yet; using "other uses" to refer to something the reader hasn't yet read is unintuitive and annoying, and completely unnecessary. This is totally independent of the fact that not all articles have good introductions. —Simetrical (talk • contribs) 05:21, 23 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Abuse of TfD process

If a template is part of (the functioning of) a Wikipedia policy or guideline, the template cannot be listed for deletion on TfD separately, the template should be discussed where the discussion for that guideline is taking place.

  • So, it was improper to list at TfD in the first place!
    --William Allen Simpson 05:21, 20 April 2006 (UTC)
Templates for deletion This template was considered for deletion on 2006 April 18. The result of the discussion was keep.

[edit] Redundancy with template:about?

This template seems to serve the same purpose as "about":

  • Template:About:
    • This page is about Param1. For other uses, see Otheruses4 (disambiguation).
    • This page is about Param1. For Param2, see Otheruses4 (disambiguation).
    • This page is about Param1. For Param2, see Param3.
  • Template:Otheruses4
    • This page is about Param1. For other uses, see Otheruses4 (disambiguation).
    • This page is about Param1. For Param2, see Otheruses4 (disambiguation).
    • This page is about Param1. For Param2, see Param3.

The only difference seems to be that About doesn't link to Param3. Ouch. Should one be marked obsolete? Stevage 09:13, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

Template:About is used less than 500 times, which is many times less than Template:Otheruses4. Plus Template:About is not listed in Template:Otheruses templates. We should probably make that a redirect to this one. Powers 12:42, 30 May 2006 (UTC)
Actually, since "about" is so much more descriptive, it would surely be more sensible to move and redirect this to that name. At least, if all existing uses of {{about}} get converted to use the conventional wikilink-added format. —Simetrical (talk • contribs) 06:34, 31 May 2006 (UTC)
Actually, I think "otheruses" is a better description than "about". =) Powers 20:26, 31 May 2006 (UTC)
In that case:
Merge arrows
 It has been suggested that this page or section be merged with Template talk:otheruses. (Discuss)
("this article" being the template itself, which is currently edit-protected)
Why have an obtuse "4" on the end anyway? It should all be functional under the same template name. —Down10 TACO 08:30, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] "of the term"

{{otheruses}} has always (to my knowledge) read:

For other uses, see . . .

Originally, all templates with defaults followed that convention, but a while back I changed one (some? most? my memory blurs) of them to read

For other uses of the term, see . . .

This was in response to someone saying something to the effect of, "When I was reading Shotgun, and I saw for other uses, I thought 'What? Other uses for a shotgun?'". Anyway, when I added template defaults to this template, and a bit later made all the other templates that I could dependent on it so that the wording would be synchronized, I also made that say "for other uses of the term".

So, any objections to changing both this and {{otheruses}} to add "of the term" or some similar phrase? —Simetrical (talk • contribs) 20:58, 5 July 2006 (UTC)

I'm really reluctant to take a side on this one. =) User:Freakofnurture only recently removed that clause from this template, 'though I'm not sure of the reasoning. Powers 00:50, 6 July 2006 (UTC)
Probably consistency, which is moot if we change {{otheruses}} as well. He probably just decided to go with the more established wording. Anyway, I've pointed him here, so hopefully he'll comment. And I'll leave a note on Template talk:Otheruses too, come to think of it. —Simetrical (talk • contribs) 04:03, 7 July 2006 (UTC)
Hmm, I see there's a lot of preexisting discussion on this there. I've started a new thread at Wikipedia talk:Disambiguation#"Other uses" of what?; please continue any discussion there. —Simetrical (talk • contribs) 04:07, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] ParserFunctions

Is there any reason to work with the #if parser function instead of just using parameter default values? For instance, why does this template use {{#if: {{{2|}}}|{{{2}}}|other uses}} and not {{{2|other uses}}}? --Three Of Twelve 18:02, 25 November 2006 (UTC)

Err, sorry, i've just realized it ;-) It's because you needn't use {{Otheruses4|3=foo}} but {{Otheruses4|||foo}} instead, isn't it? --Three Of Twelve 18:06, 25 November 2006 (UTC)
No, in the template code when you're using a parameter, you can give it a parameter that becomes its default value. So if you need to use {{{1}}} and if there is no {{{1}}} you want the value "abc", you'd use {{{1|abc}}} --ffroth 20:55, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Edit request

Why does this template no longer indent or is italcized? Hbdragon88 02:31, 30 December 2006 (UTC)

Bypass your cache — Omegatron 03:11, 30 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Interwiki link to the Vietnamese Wikipedia

Please add an interwiki link to the Vietnamese version of this template:

[[vi:Tiêu bản:Otheruses4]]

Thanks.

 – Minh Nguyễn (talk, contribs) 18:58, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

Done. Thanks. Luna Santin 00:29, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

Please add sl:Predloga:Drugipomeni4. Thanks. --Eleassar my talk 13:22, 22 March 2007 (UTC)

Y Done - Harryboyles 13:30, 22 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] IW to Norwegian Wiki

no:Mal:Otheruses4 Nsaa 12:45, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] TfD notice

I've nominated the Otheruses templates for discussion on Wikipedia:Templates for deletion. --JB Adder | Talk 14:02, 8 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Bold "see"

{{editprotected}} When many articles are internal linked, its difficult to read. Bold see disambiguation like this:

for other uses, see Philosophy (disambiguation).

This is necessary because linked text look bolder than ordinary text. Lara bran 05:48, 15 July 2007 (UTC)

That sounds like a prominent style change; I think it would be better to ask for comments on the Village Pump (WP:VPR is the right one) before the templates are changed. There are a lot of templates in this series that ought to use similar formatting. — Carl (CBM · talk) 19:36, 15 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] New version

{{editprotected}} Please replace the page with this. It's a new version of the template which includes many more optional parameters. {{otheruses4|USE1|USE2}} still generates the same result, but {{otheruses4|USE1|USE2|PAGE2|USE3|PAGE3|USE4|PAGE4}} does the same as {{Three other uses|USE1|USE2|PAGE2|USE3|PAGE3|USE4|PAGE4}}. Basically, this is a merger of {{otheruses4}}, {{two other uses}}, {{three other uses}}, and {{four other uses}}. I've tested everything. Melsaran 15:09, 9 August 2007 (UTC)

Done. Cheers. --MZMcBride 16:53, 9 August 2007 (UTC)
Unfortunately, there is a very widely used but undocumented method of transcluding Template:This with only one parameter, which this change breaks. What had happened before is that if the second parameter was left off, it would default to PAGENAME (disambiguation). It still does that, but with an extra set of square brackets. Obviously, it's preferable to use Template:otheruses1, but since This was working as editors wanted it to, the issue went unnoticed until now. TCC (talk) (contribs) 19:58, 9 August 2007 (UTC)

Another problem with your version, Melsaran, is that it does not take into account the default value "other uses" for the parameter {{{4}}} in {{two other uses}} and the parameter {{{6}}} in {{three other uses}}. As a result, the template breaks by not showing the last link for those affected articles.

For example, the Alpha (letter) article currently has {{Two other uses||Latin ɑ|Latin alpha||Alpha}}, omitting parameter {{{4}}} to use the default value. With your modifications, the line "For other uses, see Alpha." does not appear.

Zzyzx11 (Talk) 05:50, 12 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Reasonable limits of the hatnote

Using all of the parameters of this template as so:

{{otheruses4|USE1|USE2|PAGE2|USE3|PAGE3|USE4|PAGE4|USE5|PAGE5}}

resulting in

This article is about USE1. For USE2, see PAGE2. For USE3, see PAGE3. For USE4, see PAGE4. For USE5, see PAGE5.

seems like an abuse of the idea of a hatnote – can anyone point out an instance where a hatnote should point to four different articles, rather than to a disambiguation page? Even three other pages seems like too many – I would consider a four article disambiguation page far preferable to a wordy three article hatnote. Is there some existing rule of thumb for the threshold where a dab page should exist? If so, would there be support for changing this template to only allow disambiguating one or two (possibly three, but certainly not four) other pages? Does anyone know how to find which pages transclude this template with all the parameters filled? — Swpbtalk|edits 15:35, 30 July 2007 (UTC) 19:20, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

That's completely true, but I don't see any harm in keeping them there, even if they won't be used; I think it would be reassuring to have them there just in case. Gracias, Drum guy (talk) 14:56, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Make this redirect to {{about}}?

At the moment, {{about}} redirects here, to {{otheruses4}}. I propose that we reverse this, and make {{about}} the main template. I think {{about}} is quicker, easier, simpler, more understandable, and more intuitive than {{otheruses4}}, which I see as hard to remember and having a '4' which doesn't make sense unless you've done a lot of work with hatnote templates.

Feedback would be very greatly appreciated.

Thank you all very much, Drum guy (talk) 22:37, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

Do people think this is a good idea? I'm tempted to do it slightly soon.. Thanks, Drum guy (talk) 21:07, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] "This article" in non-articles?

{{editprotected}} I sometimes transclude this template in the Wikipedia project space (such as in Wikipedia:Ownership of articles), but it still says "This article". Would it be hard to make it say "This page" outside of the main namespace? --Damian Yerrick (talk | stalk) 21:37, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

My proposal is in User:Damian Yerrick/Otheruses4. --Damian Yerrick (talk | stalk) 18:51, 31 May 2008 (UTC)
Done Happy‑melon 15:48, 1 June 2008 (UTC)
Thanks. --Damian Yerrick (talk | stalk) 16:58, 1 June 2008 (UTC)