Wikipedia talk:Article titles: Difference between revisions

By /

 

Line 182: Line 182:

Any thoughts about how to align these titles with the guideline? — [[User:Beland|Beland]] ([[User talk:Beland|talk]]) 01:26, 23 November 2025 (UTC)

Any thoughts about how to align these titles with the guideline? — [[User:Beland|Beland]] ([[User talk:Beland|talk]]) 01:26, 23 November 2025 (UTC)

:My thoughts at this time are that: (1) “th” is probably the best standard-keyboard equivalent to the thorn; (2) the apostrophe is probably a good standard-keyboard equivalent for the glottal stop character; (3) the alveolar click should be in the title, with the ASCII <code>!</code> as a redirect, so that the title most precisely captures the character that’s used; (4) for the same reason, <code>ß</code> shouldn’t be converted to <code>ss</code> in title, assuming there aren’t other considerations (e.g. COMMONNAME) that would direct us otherwise. The handling of currency symbols is probably going to vary on a case-by-case basis. For the points I haven’t addressed, I don’t have immediate opinions at this time, but I’ll think on it some more and see if any opinions come to me. [[User:ModernDayTrilobite|ModernDayTrilobite]] ([[User talk:ModernDayTrilobite|talk]] • [[Special:Contributions/ModernDayTrilobite|contribs]]) 04:58, 23 November 2025 (UTC)

I have been informed by Royiswariii on Talk:Ronald dela Rosa# Requested move 7 September 2025 that WP:RMs have been closed on arguments that what was used was how the subject was named on the sources’ title vs. how it was actually referred to in the prose. This can be an issue if the names used on the sources’ headline/title is different from how it is written in the prose; usually the names on headlines/titles are shorter or abbreviated. Is this the correct interpretation? Howard the Duck (talk) 12:28, 15 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Don’t use headlines as sources. See: WP:HEADLINES. Blueboar (talk) 12:50, 15 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Just as what I thought, Thanks! Howard the Duck (talk) 00:12, 16 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]
The following discussion is an archived record of a request for comment. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.
After nearly two weeks of discussion, I think it’s safe to say that it’s WP:SNOWing unseasonably early in Essex this year. There is a clear consensus in favour of the proposed change to remove unncessary disambiguators from articles on parliamentary constituencies, per our main guidelines on article titles and disambiguation. There is thus consensus to overturn WP:NCUKPARL, which I will mark historical. After discussion on my talk, I have restored NCUCKPARL, modified to be in line with this consensus. (non-admin closure) Cremastra (talk · contribs) 22:50, 14 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Should the titles of articles about parliament constituencies (e.g. in Essex) always contain the parenthetical “(UK Parliament constituency)” or only when one is needed for disambiguation? Surtsicna (talk) 00:27, 2 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Surtsicna (talk) 00:27, 2 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Discussion (parliament constituencies)

[edit]

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Please see Wikipedia_talk:Manual_of_Style/Military_history#RfC:_Proposal_to_remove_call_for_preemptive_disambiguation_from_MOS:MILUNITNAME. Mdewman6 (talk) 23:00, 14 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

That temlate doen’t explain when this should be used, and what’s the point (unlike Template:Italic title). Getting some titles italicized is hard, so sure, we need a template for that. But quotation marks? Shouldn’t they be just used directly when needed? Should this template be deleted? If not, its documentation should explain when it should be used. PS. There is also Template:Italic verbatim title. Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 12:15, 18 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Side note: It isn’t a very popular template, is it? It’s in use in only 40 articles, 74 pages altogether. {{Italic verbatim title}} is used in only 6 articles. Not that it’s usual to enclose article titles in quotes anyway: There are only around 240 (ignoring redirects) that begin explicitly with a double quote. Largoplazo (talk) 12:48, 18 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Should Wikipedia:Naming conventions (U.S. state and territory highways) be revised with regard to the naming conventions for state routes in Kansas and Michigan so that the parenthetical disambiguators “(Kansas highway)” and “(Michigan highway)” are only used when disambiguation is necessary, or another format entirely is used instead? 23:05, 17 November 2025 (UTC) Mdewman6 (talk) 22:25, 18 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Currently, the naming convention calls for articles about state highways in Kansas and Michigan to be titled K-X (Kansas highway) and M-X (Michigan highway), respectively, where “X” is the route number. These are unique among the states and territories, as all others include the state or territory name in the article title. Indeed, even North Carolina and Puerto Rico, where official route names use the format “NC X” and “PR-X”, respectively, nevertheless call for article titles to be North Carolina highway X and Puerto Rico highway X, respectively.

I am not completely familiar with the history regarding consensus for these naming conventions, but do know they arose many years ago after much contentiousness, to the point that there was an ArbCom case in 2006. Nevertheless, the Michigan highway convention became an example of local consensus for unnecessary disambiguation at WP:PRECISION, calling for inclusion of the parenthetical qualifier even if the base name of “M-X” does not have other meanings covered in Wikipedia. Given the recent RfC regarding the naming convention for parliamentary constituencies, which was the other such example at WP:PRECISION, overwhelmingly rejected this call for unnecessary disambiguation, it seems timely to revisit the highway naming convention.

The most straightforward option would be revise the naming convention to call for titles along the lines of Kansas highway X or Michigan highway X (Option 1), thus utilizing WP:NATURAL disambiguation as is done for all other states and territories. Kansas state highway X or Michigan state highway X are also possibilities that offer more precision, given the existence of other classes of highways (county highways, U.S. routes, interstates) in these states.

Alternatively, if there remains consensus that the best format for Kansas and Michigan highways per WP:CRITERIA and particularly WP:COMMONNAME is the existing “K-X” and “M-X” format, then the naming convention should be amened to clarify that the “(Kansas highway)” and “(Michigan highway)” qualifiers should only be added if there are other uses of “K-X” or “M-X” covered in Wikipedia, per WP:QUALIFIER (Option 2). If the “K-X” and “M-X” names are really the common names, then the qualifiers shouldn’t be needed just for recognizability. Calling for inclusion of the qualifier in all cases regardless of whether it is needed conflicts with WP:CONSISTENT, which makes clear that parenthetical qualifiers shouldn’t be used for all articles within a particular topic just because some require them for disambiguation.

In many cases, there are multiple uses of “K-X” or “M-X” that would make the current disambiguation valid, particularly at lower numbers of X, often ships in the case of K and weapon systems in the case of M (though many of these are in my view should be disambiguated per WP:SMALLDETAILS instead). But there are dozens of cases where the “K-X” or “M-X” base names are WP:MISPLACED redirects to the “K-X (Kansas highway)” or “M-X (Michigan highway)” pages hosting the article, e.g. K-145, K-179, M-154, M-179.

To summarize, I feel the naming conventions should be revised in some form to address this longstanding issue and bring them in compliance with WP:Article titles policy. Mdewman6 (talk) 22:30, 18 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Discussion (U.S. state highways)

[edit]

Yes, I’m not sure what to do about that. It’s unclear to me why we have “Pennsylvania Route X” but others are just “State Route XXXX”, or why the disambiguator can’t just be “(Pennsylvania)”- for the latter I assume there can be multiple uses of “XXXX” in the state in different counties? Mdewman6 (talk) 22:40, 18 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • I suspect the reason for the “always disambiguated” titles is to make script and bot updates easier. While that may sound like a non-issue, there’s a lot of intricate code in the infoboxes and junctions list for roads (probably the most complicated next to rail line infoboxes, those things are insane) and when those infoboxes need to be updated or patched or whatever, and said patch requires a bulk parameter change in the articles, the ability to have a script and/or bot do it is most helpful. A benefit of having a uniform name for the entire set of articles is to minimize the number of “Special case” article titles the script or bot has to deal with. Dave (talk) 22:53, 18 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I wonder if that so long as a consistent version like “M-X (Michigan highway)” exists as a redirect, then scripts and bots can be run with minimal disruption depsite page moves? I do not know, I have little experience with that side of WP. Mdewman6 (talk) 23:02, 18 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

At a minimum the script/bot would have to recognize the db response was a redirect, and then parse the “real article”. However, I only know enough about the template and lua coding to be dangerous. I don’t know if that’s easy or difficult to do, and the people I used to rely on to help me with such coding have since left Wikipedia. Dave (talk) 23:21, 18 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Modules (like Module:Pagetype) can recognize redirects (using isRedirect attribute of the title object, and so can templates (like {{is redirect}}). I assume that means a bot could as well, but don’t take my word for it. Mathglot (talk) 00:03, 19 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose—there are several factors to consider in article titles. Outside of this discussion, would anyone know what “M-185” referenced on its own? A reader might assume it’s a Messier number for a galaxy, a motorway in a country that follows that numbering convention, a military equipment number, or a variety of other topics. One can make article titles too short and deprive others of the context.We need to balance all of the factors: “Recognizability”, “Naturalness”, “Precision”, “Concision”, and “Consistency”. Having some of Michigan’s highway article omit the “Michigan highway” portion would be concise for those specific examples, but it wouldn’t be consistent with the remainder of the article set. Removing it would harm recognizability as noted above.My last point is that Michigan’s highway articles have had stable titles ever since WP:SRNC and the ArbCom case in 2006. That’s a long time (19 years this month), and it would be strange to disturb such a stable precedent and convention. All of my comments here should be equally applied to Kansas mutatis mutandis. Imzadi 1979 → 04:31, 31 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]
@Imzadi1979: so what would be the drawback to option 1 above, i.e. changing the titles to “Michigan Highway X” or “Kansas Highway X”? North Carolina highways use this format rather than “NC X”, so why are these two states the only exceptions?
Either “M-185” is the common name of the highway and is recognizable on its own, or per WP:ACROTITLE, it’s not and abbreviations shouldn’t be used as the title. We can’t have things both ways by using an abbreviation and a parenthetical qualifier, even when the abbreviation isn’t ambiguous. MOS:ACROTITLE advises against using abbreviations with parenthetical disambiguation- instead, the title should just be the unabbreviated form.
And I strongly disagree with the argument that these conventions were settled on 19 years ago and therefore shouldn’t be changed. Just because these were the outcome of a contentious debate long ago doesn’t mean we should be stuck with them and they can’t be revised as needed, especially when they conflict with article title policy. And I see no distinction between this call for unnecessary parenthetical disambiguation and that for the parliamentary constituencies that was just unanimously stuck down in the last RfC. Mdewman6 (talk) 21:37, 1 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]

The “M-” is not an abbreviation. Ditto the “K-”. Your option 1 uses a falsehood and cannot be implemented on that basis. The letter is an integral part of the designation and does not expand to another word. Option 2 fails the consistency and recognizability criteria.
Any change to the naming convention should go through ArbCom as they imposed the process to settle the various naming conventions as part of the Highways 1 case in 2006. Discussions about changing these conventions have been considered a third rail ever since, and any changes to the conventions really need to go to ArbCom based on the decisions of that case. I would strongly advise you that nothing here is broke and needs to be fixed in the strongest possible terms. Seriously, please leave this all alone. Imzadi 1979 → 22:43, 1 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]

How is “M” in “M-185” not an abbreviation for Michigan? Mdewman6 (talk) 21:59, 2 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]

It is not an abbreviation and never has been. It may match the first letter of the state’s name, but neither the Michigan State Highway Department nor Michigan Department of Transportation have ever said it is an abbreviation for anything in the 106 years the naming scheme has been in use. Never. Imzadi 1979 → 23:36, 2 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I don’t have any strong opinion regarding how these articles should be titled, but I do disagree that it’s necessary (or even beneficial) for people to go to ArbCom if they want to change this titling convention.

  • First off, I reviewed the final decision at WP:RFAR/HWY and ArbCom didn’t impose the current guideline in the first place—they encourage[d] the community to adopt a formal policy on the naming of state highways, and placed a restriction on moving highway articles [u]ntil a formal naming convention policy regarding state highways is reached. That is to say, while ArbCom may have encouraged the creation of the existing guideline, they explicitly left the actual shaping of the guideline in the community’s hands, and any content restrictions that they placed have elapsed now that that guidance exists.
  • Second, while I wasn’t active in 2006 and can’t attest to what arbitrators thought then, current-day arbitrators consistently take the stance that ArbCom should not be in the business of ruling on article content (see the proposed decision subpages at WP:HJP or WP:ARBTRANS for recent high-profile cases where arbs expressed that view). If this debate were to be brought before ArbCom, it’s almost certain that they would (rightly) decline it as outside of their remit.
In short, this is exactly the kind of debate that should be hashed out within the general community, and in that respect I think that—however the discussion ultimately resolves—the venue chosen for it was exactly correct. ModernDayTrilobite (talk • contribs) 23:44, 2 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support for the same reason NCUKPARL was recently changed. Crouch, Swale (talk) 23:37, 2 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support any option that brings that guideline into compliance with the WP:AT policy (including with regard to titles of “Pennsylvania Quadrant” articles). The titles that option 1 proposes seem to be descriptive, so they do not inherently imply that the shorter formal names of the relevant highways are acronyms, and they are consistent with those of other articles that describe U.S. state highways as outlined in the guideline. If the base titles of the highway articles are more recognizable on their own, option 2 may also work. –Gluonz talk contribs 14:26, 11 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Except that as I’ve tried to explain apparently to no avail that Option 1 is improper and unacceptable to those few topic editors left remaining here. I would say that it isn’t come across as “descriptive”; instead it expands a letter incorrectly into a phrase, and the lowercase letter isn’t enough of a distinction to correct the error. The nomenclature suggested does imply a convention that doesn’t exist. Imzadi 1979 → 05:40, 12 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose. For Option 1, those aren’t the designations of the highways, as Imzadi1979 pointed out. For Option 2, recognizability and consistency are just as valid as concision. In this case, keeping a consistent naming convention for a clearly-defined set of articles is more helpful than deleting a handful of characters from the titles of certain pages. There is no benefit to the encyclopedia (and plenty of opportunity for unproductive arguments over what the primary topic may be where some other thing has a similar nomenclature). —Sable232 (talk) 22:32, 16 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose both options, as neither satisfies WP:AT. While I am not a great fan of parenthetical disambiguation in this manner, it is still preferable to have an article title that is accurate (which Option 1 is not) and consistent (which Option 2 fails). If another option that can resolve these issues is proposed, I would be inclined to change my !vote accordingly. SounderBruce 06:12, 18 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose both options per Imzadi1979.–~2025-35594-96 (talk) 00:23, 23 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I direct editors to long standing and agreed policy (Wikipedia:Naming conventions (UK Parliament constituencies). This has been in place for many years and I would ask that any moves made by the RFC are reversed.

Thanks

doktorb wordsdeeds 23:21, 23 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

That was a guideline, not a policy; and it was a guideline that contradicted policy. The RfC has overturned it; the consensus was unanimous. I would ask fellow editors to help with moving more pages to titles that conform to WP:AT policy. Surtsicna (talk) 23:32, 23 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I refute that decision which was not made by wide enough discussion (did you consult the UK politics project group members?). I’m trying to revert changes now doktorb wordsdeeds 23:34, 23 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

The RfC was properly advertised at Wikipedia_talk:Naming_conventions_(UK_Parliament_constituencies)#RfC. Mdewman6 (talk) 23:43, 23 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

It feels like every single decision we made, in good faith, are now reversed by future editors who don’t know or don’t understand the project, or the reasons we made those decisions. We put in so much effort to standardise constituency articles across Wikipedia. This isn’t the first time I’ve wondered why we put in such effort. I’m very deflated, again, by a decision which ends a long standing period of standardisation. doktorb wordsdeeds 23:46, 23 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Also at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Politics of the United Kingdom and Wikipedia talk:WikiProject UK Parliament constituencies. If you want to challenge the RfC closure, you should follow the process for doing that rather than just trying to unilaterally overrule it. Extraordinary Writ (talk) 23:45, 23 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

 You are invited to join the discussion at Talk:Violations of non-combatant airspaces during the Russo-Ukrainian war (2022–present) § Requested move 26 October 2025. –Gluonz talk contribs 01:00, 27 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Should Wikipedia:Naming conventions (UK Parliament constituencies) be further modified to only require “(UK Parliament constituency)” or “(Scottish Parliament constituency)” when there are multiple constituencies such as North East Fife (UK Parliament constituency) and North East Fife (Scottish Parliament constituency) and otherwise use Clacton (constituency) instead of Clacton (UK Parliament constituency) and Orkney (constituency) instead of Orkney (Scottish Parliament constituency). At #RfC on pre-emptive disambiguation in constituency article titles there was consensus to move unambiguous articles to the base name such as Bury St Edmunds and Stowmarket (UK Parliament constituency) to Bury St Edmunds and Stowmarket but this RFC deals with removing extra disambiguation when the topic does need disambiguation because of a different use such as a settlement or district. Crouch, Swale (talk) 22:03, 9 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]

But preferably mark NCUKPARL as historical per Extraordinary Writ. Graham11 (talk) 02:41, 12 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • Just get rid of NCUKPARL, as the closer of the previous RfC originally interpreted the consensus. In practice that’s no different than this proposal (so I’ll stick in a bolded support as a second choice), but if we all want to treat UK constituencies the same way we treat any other kind of constituency, we don’t need the clutter of a separate guideline for them. Extraordinary Writ (talk) 00:55, 11 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support per unnecessary disambiguation. I also Support Extraordinary Writ’s astute proposal to remove the guideline in question entirely, since this proposal obviates the only content the guideline has. В²C ☎ 05:08, 11 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Hi, please take a look at this discussion at your convenience and weigh in there if helpful, or here:

Should or does which article name actually sees the most usage by readers factor? Discussion related to a proposed merger, and which direction to merge to, or whether we should merge to a new name. — Very Polite Person (talk/contribs) 17:59, 13 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]

WP:TITLESPECIALCHARACTERS says to use redirects when characters not on a standard keyboard appear in titles. I wrote a script to make sure this is happening, but for some characters it’s unclear what the standard-keyboard equivalent should be, or if the character should be removed from the title and replaced with a word or letters (for example by Anglicizing). This happens in a lot of proper nouns, including people’s names, place names, and titles of musical works. The most common cases include these characters:

Any thoughts about how to align these titles with the guideline? — Beland (talk) 01:26, 23 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]

My thoughts at this time are that: (1) “th” is probably the best standard-keyboard equivalent to the thorn; (2) the apostrophe is probably a good standard-keyboard equivalent for the glottal stop character; (3) the alveolar click should be in the title, with the ASCII ! as a redirect, so that the title most precisely captures the character that’s used; (4) for the same reason, ß shouldn’t be converted to ss in title, assuming there aren’t other considerations (e.g. COMMONNAME) that would direct us otherwise. The handling of currency symbols is probably going to vary on a case-by-case basis. For the points I haven’t addressed, I don’t have immediate opinions at this time, but I’ll think on it some more and see if any opinions come to me. ModernDayTrilobite (talk • contribs) 04:58, 23 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Must Read

Leave a Comment

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Scroll to Top