Talk:Russian (spelling)

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[edit] Justification

[edit] Russian (spelling) page

IMO it is highly improbable that anyone would want to click at the Russian link in places, like this: "Moscow ([[Russian(usage)|]]: Moskva)". Therefore these links only clutter the list of references to the Russian language article. When you click "What links here", you would probably want to find articles that discuss Russian language as such. Currently this is simply impossible.

Therefore I am trying to introduce these "link concentrators" for natural cases of reference to "Russian language" which are mostly uninteresting.

As a by-product, if someone will wish to actually know which pages do provide Russian spelling, then this page will be even more useful. Mikkalai 03:58, 12 Jan 2005 (UTC)

I, for one, while appreciating the effort and completely understanding the reasoning behind this page, am still left worried about the inconsistencies it is going to introduce towards other languages. Chechnya, for example, now links to Russian (spelling) when showing the Russian name of the republic, but the Chechen spelling links to Chechen language. My questions are thus many-fold: who is going to change the links to other languages (and is anyone planning on this at all)?—Ëzhiki (erinaceus europeaus) 15:00, Jan 12, 2005 (UTC)
I will do it for Russian. Other languages may suit themselves. Mikkalai 20:36, 12 Jan 2005 (UTC)
Changing links to the Russian language only and leaving other links intact in hopes that some other people will eventually do the same with them just does not sound right. This will introduce a huge formatting inconsistency for many days to come. Furthermore, if people interested in other languages are not going to be as eager as you to hurry and replace the links to some obscure technical page, the inconsistency will stay forever, creating grounds for silly, unproductive, and useless discussions and revert wars over what you deem to be a technicality anyway. It will probably be even worse than an idiotic revert war over countries infoboxes currently going on, because the scope is much bigger. To me, possible benefits just do not outweigh possible consequences.—Ëzhiki (erinaceus europeaus) 21:47, Jan 12, 2005 (UTC)
If this particular page is turned into a redirect, who is going to watch all of the articles linking to Russian (spelling) (because there will surely be hordes of uninformed volunteers bypassing a seemingly redundant redirect)?—Ëzhiki (erinaceus europeaus) 15:00, Jan 12, 2005 (UTC)
I will. But the whole point is that it is not a redirect. Redirects are transparent to "what links here" and not eliminate the clutter. Mikkalai 20:36, 12 Jan 2005 (UTC)
It is, of course, up to you what you want to do with your free time, but to me this seems a rather unproductive waste. You are too valuable of an editor to devote your efforts to keeping what you see to be a correct way to handle links.—Ëzhiki (erinaceus europeaus) 21:47, Jan 12, 2005 (UTC)
But redirects are not transparent. If this was a redirect, then all the links to this page would be collected under a single subheading in Russian Language's "what links here" page. Just make this a redirect, and you've accomplished your goal, without changing the way the links work.
No, it will not. First, there will be never lack of smarties that will try to kill redirects by all means and will find a dozen of convincing reasons to do so. Second, this will not solve the problem of finding backlinks from Russian language page. For example, please try to find this page in the list of "what links here" at Russian language pageMikkalai 00:32, 13 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Anyway, this would tidy up the clutter on "what links here", but it's creating a clutter of links to an un-intuitive redirect page, inconsistent with all other language links. Six of one...

Realistically, Wikipedia can't count on you to be around and maintain this arrangement forever. Why not work out a standard procedure with the languages project? Otherwise this will end up undone sooner or later anyway. —Michael Z. 22:18, 2005 Jan 12 (UTC)
Who is going to explain to new readers why Russian must link to a redirect, while other languages link to the language article directly?
They will read this article and understand. Mikkalai 20:36, 12 Jan 2005 (UTC)
I think it would not be easy to understand why only Russian is handled this way (unless you want to explain the reason to each wondering person yourself). If all links to all languages were to be simultaneously changed in a similar matter, that, while of questionnable value, would at least be consistent. The way you propose is quite confusing to an inexperienced Wikipedia reader.—Ëzhiki (erinaceus europeaus) 21:47, Jan 12, 2005 (UTC)
Surely, there must be a better way to resolve a 'what links here' problem. Is it really that much of a problem anyway?
Yes, it is; aggravated by the fact that only 500 backlinks are displayed now. Mikkalai 20:36, 12 Jan 2005 (UTC).
I can agree that showing only 500 links is a problem, but the way you propose to solve the problem just does not seem to be the best. There surely are a lot of other cases similar to the situation with the Russian language. If they are to be solved, they should probably be solved on developers' level. Don't ask me how—if I knew, I'd already share it.—Ëzhiki (erinaceus europeaus) 21:47, Jan 12, 2005 (UTC)
To group articles, there are always catergories—isn't that a better solution?—Ëzhiki (erinaceus europeaus) 15:00, Jan 12, 2005 (UTC)
How you will group articles that discuss Russian language as such (and its features in articles about general language issues) Mikkalai 20:36, 12 Jan 2005 (UTC)
I don't see why it is a problem to use Category:Russian language, which would only group articles directly connected to the Russian language as such. This is a much more efficient way of decluttering, don't you think?—Ëzhiki (erinaceus europeaus) 21:47, Jan 12, 2005 (UTC)
I am not at all sure that pages like "centum" belong to category "RuLa". Mikkalai 00:34, 13 Jan 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Russian (usage) page.

It pursues exactly the same goal. Its talk page redirects here, since any discussion will probably relevant to both of them. Mikkalai 03:58, 12 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Are you planning to turn these into redirects pointed at Russian language? —Michael Z. 06:38, 2005 Jan 12 (UTC)
If he isn't, I am, because this page at least is pointless as is. --Joy [shallot] 10:40, 12 Jan 2005 (UTC)
Please clarify. Mikkalai 20:31, 12 Jan 2005 (UTC)
You only wanted a technical means to differentiate between various ways of linking to Russian language. This is accomplished with redirects.
Of course, you may have to wield the axe against the occasional redirect-flattening nazis :) but that's much better than having this confusing sub-stub. --Joy [shallot] 23:22, 12 Jan 2005 (UTC)
Yep, you got it right. Were not theze redirect-flattening nazis, I wouldn't bother creating a full-blown page. What I miscalculated that these very nazis will oppose any other conveniences without thinking much. I am done here. Mikkalai 23:28, 12 Jan 2005 (UTC)
Er... if you need help convincing someone that redirects aren't the worst thing since sliced bread and that they do not have to flatten them out, please let me know. --Joy [shallot] 01:46, 13 Jan 2005 (UTC)
I suspect these "re-direct flattening nazis" won't be impressed much by being called "re-direct flattening nazis". And I suspect victims of the Nazis wouldn't be impressed with your comparing the actions of on-line encylopedia editors to people who engaged in genocide. Jayjg | (Talk) 19:10, 21 Jan 2005 (UTC)
I really don't care much for political correctness... in techspeak, /something/-nazi is a fairly common phrase for people who are hell-bent on something, in case you didn't know. I for one could be grouped among the short paragraph nazis, because I hate thousand-word paragraph and use every opportunity to split them up. One can substitute the word "nazi" with "zealot" in those sentences if they wish to feel better about them. --Joy [shallot] 21:12, 21 Jan 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Vfd

This page and its sister page have been suggested for deletion. You'll find the deletion vote page here: Wikipedia:Votes_for_deletion/Russian_(usage)#.5B.5BRussian_.28usage.29.5D.5D Jayjg | (Talk) 22:08, 12 Jan 2005 (UTC)

  • Also, you'll find plenty of other discussion of the issue. Mikkalai 00:27, 13 Jan 2005 (UTC)

[edit] How about...

Instead of creating this strange and unhelpful (to the average browser) page, why not link to Cyrillic from place names written in Cyrillic, instead of link to Russian language? Worldtraveller 09:34, 13 Jan 2005 (UTC)

An interesting suggestion, though it would be like linking to Latin alphabet for every spelling of an English, French, German word. Evil Monkey → Talk 10:27, Jan 15, 2005 (UTC)
That is the drawback; but really in most cases the word is not any different, it's just in a different script, eg Smolensk/Смоленск, Volgograd/Волгогра́д. Another alternative is just not to link to anything when quoting the Cyrillic form of a place name, like in the Smolensk and Volgograd articles. Worldtraveller 12:39, 15 Jan 2005 (UTC)