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view · edit Frequently asked questions Misplaced Pages's Manual of Style contains some conventions that differ from those in some other, well-known style guides and from what is often taught in schools. Misplaced Pages's editors have discussed these conventions in great detail and have reached consensus that these conventions serve our purposes best. New contributors are advised to check the FAQ and the archives to see if their concern has already been discussed. Why does the Manual of Style recommend straight (keyboard-style) instead of curly (typographic) quotation marks and apostrophes (i.e., the characters " and ', instead of “, ”, ‘, and ’)‍? Users may only know how to type in straight quotes (such as " and ') when searching for text within a page or when editing. Not all Web browsers find curly quotes when users type straight quotes in search strings. Why does the Manual of Style recommend logical quotation? This system is preferred because Misplaced Pages, as an international and electronic encyclopedia, has specific needs better addressed by logical quotation than by the other styles, despite the tendency of externally published style guides to recommend the latter. These include the distinct typesetters' style (often called American, though not limited to the US), and the various British/Commonwealth styles, which are superficially similar to logical quotation but have some characteristics of typesetters' style. Logical quotation is more in keeping with the principle of minimal change to quotations, and is less prone to misquotation, ambiguity, and the introduction of errors in subsequent editing, than the alternatives. Logical quotation was adopted in 2005, and has been the subject of perennial debate that has not changed this consensus. Why does the Manual of Style differentiate the hyphen (-), en dash (–), em dash (—), and minus sign (−)? Appropriate use of hyphens and dashes is as much a part of literate, easy-to-read writing as are correct spelling and capitalization. The "Insert" editing tools directly below the Misplaced Pages editing window provide immediate access to all these characters. Why does the Manual of Style recommend apostrophe+s for singular possessive of names ending in s? Most modern style guides treat names ending with s just like other singular nouns when forming the possessive. The few that do not propose mutually contradictory alternatives. Numerous discussions have led to the current MoS guidance (see discussions of 2004, 2005, 2005, 2006, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2008, 2008, 2009, 2009, 2009, 2012, 2013, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2017, 2017 (the RfC establishing the present consensus), 2018, 2018, 2019, 2021, 2022). Why doesn't the Manual of Style always follow specialized practice? Although Misplaced Pages contains some highly technical content, it is written for a general audience. While specialized publications in a field, such as academic journals, are excellent sources for facts, they are not always the best sources for or examples of how to present those facts to non-experts. When adopting style recommendations from external sources, the Manual of Style incorporates a substantial number of practices from technical standards and field-specific academic style guides; however, Misplaced Pages defaults to preferring general-audience sources on style, especially when a specialized preference may conflict with most readers' expectations, and when different disciplines use conflicting styles.

Template:MOS/R

Manual of Style

This page falls within the scope of the Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style, a collaborative effort focused on enhancing clarity, consistency, and cohesiveness across the Manual of Style (MoS) guidelines by addressing inconsistencies, refining language, and integrating guidance effectively.Manual of StyleWikipedia:WikiProject Manual of StyleTemplate:WikiProject Manual of StyleManual of Style This page falls under the contentious topics procedure and is given additional attention, as it closely associated to the English Misplaced Pages Manual of Style, and the article titles policy. Both areas are subjects of debate. Contributors are urged to review the awareness criteria carefully and exercise caution when editing. For information on Misplaced Pages's approach to the establishment of new policies and guidelines, refer to WP:PROPOSAL. Additionally, guidance on how to contribute to the development and revision of Misplaced Pages policies of Misplaced Pages's policy and guideline documents is available, offering valuable insights and recommendations.

Suggested abbreviations for referring to style guides User:Noetica/StyleGuideAbbreviations1

This is the talk page for discussing improvements to the Manual of Style page.

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Compromise on WP:REFPUNC?

Misplaced Pages talk:Manual of Style (footnotes)#Compromise on WP:REFPUNC? -- Jeandré, 2011-03-21t12:46z

Sub-pages

Should we move all the sub-pages of the MOS to actual sub-pages, rather than using brackets? For example, Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style (dates and numbers) → Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style/Dates and numbers. There doesn't seem to be any reason for them not to be sub-pages. McLerristarr | Mclay1 08:31, 28 May 2011 (UTC)

• I'm pretty sure this was proposed before, but anyway... Support. Among other things, Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style/Dates and numbers would have an automatically generated link back to Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style near the top of the page. ― A. di M.​_plé​ 11:12, 28 May 2011 (UTC)
• Good question. You might see some of the advantages and disadvantages at WP:Reference desk, which has seven main subpages such as WP:Reference desk/Humanities, although only one Misplaced Pages talk:RD page (I think by consensus rather than by necessity). —— Shakescene (talk) 11:20, 28 May 2011 (UTC)
• I also support. As A. di M. said, it will automatically generate breadcrumb to the main page. —Fitoschido // Leave me a shout! 17:24, 29 May 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose. There is little more frustrating to a new Wikipedian than to have six different pages open and still not being able to see the rules. Fewer big pages are a lot easier to work with than many small ones. Darkfrog24 (talk) 14:27, 30 May 2011 (UTC)
  • This proposal doesn't appear to change the number of MOS pages, only their organization, so I can't make sense of your argument. Ucucha 07:28, 31 May 2011 (UTC)
• Per Darkfrog. Support Tony (talk) 15:13, 30 May 2011 (UTC) Tony (talk) 02:38, 9 June 2011 (UTC)
  • Remember, any editor foolhardy enough to want to see all our guidelines (also remembering that almost everyone except MoS regulars agrees we should take a hatchet to our entire labyrinth) will need to be able to navigate to subpages. If they can't, combining our existing MoS with all its subpages would create an article bigger than any article on Misplaced Pages. This is not an opinion on whether subpages are better than brackets (why does the name of the subpage matter, anyway?) Art LaPella (talk) 04:18, 31 May 2011 (UTC)
• Support. May as well take advantage of the page hierarchy mechanism.  GFHandel.   04:45, 31 May 2011 (UTC)
• Absolutely Support. Anything to make navigating this byzantine monstrosity better should be done. Tony and Darkfrog, do you not understand that the MediaWiki software can help us here if we work with it? Why do you think that a small change, which will aid in navigation (albeit slightly), would be bad? My impression is that the above oppose rational is an "any change is bad" reaction.
  — V = IR (Talk • Contribs) 18:19, 31 May 2011 (UTC)
• Weak oppose because I don't think it will make navigating the pages any easier. They have a common category, which can at at least be massaged; there is a template which links to all current subpages - or should; on the other hand, if we adopt this, any {{historic}} subpages will be subpages for ever. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 21:39, 1 June 2011 (UTC)

  *scratches forehead* I don't follow the "historic" comment, at all... whether a page that is marked as historic is a sub-page or not doesn't seem to make any difference that I'm aware of. (By the way, I'm not really trying to change opinions here, I'm simply trying to understand them a bit better.)
  — V = IR (Talk • Contribs) 00:12, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

  If we simplify MOS (in itself, a utopian counterfactual) enough to no longer need WP:MOS (frammistans), we mark it {{historic}} and take it out of the navigation template. It's still named Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style (frammistans), but, as we are now set up, that doesn't matter. But if we rely on titles of the form Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style/Frammistans to identify our subpages, it will never leave. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 21:03, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

  Make that oppose; we don't use subpages. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 21:03, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

• Support. Thought heirarchy helpful. Hopeful it will lead to a better MOS.TCO (talk) 22:57, 1 June 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose Practice has been invariably to avoid using sub-pages on Misplaced Pages policies. Parentheses are not unheard of on WP for the purposes here used. Collect (talk) 15:32, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

Wait a second, McClay1, so you're not talking about creating more sub-pages but rather altering existing sub-pages? I reexamined your comment. Can you tell me how your proposal differs from simply renaming the existing sub-pages? Darkfrog24 (talk) 12:55, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

It doesn't. That's my proposal: just rename the pages. Use the standard sub-page format rather than the brackets system we're using now. McLerristarr | Mclay1 05:44, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

• Support. I'm seeing more and more of this hierarchical form of organisation across WP, and I like what they have done with the Reference Desk and believe it makes sense for us here. A simple rename that would improve cohesion of this set of guidelines, and give more clarity to the neophyte user. All users will be able to find stuff more easily. Has to be the way to go. --Ohconfucius 03:00, 8 June 2011 (UTC)
• Support per A. di M.​ This is a decent reason to do it, and I don't see any good reason not to. –CWenger (^ • @) 03:02, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

Should notification of this discussion be posted on the other MOS talk pages? GFHandel ♬  03:57, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

• Support If someone wants a separate page for each sub-page, they can create, and use, redirects. – Kerαunoςcopia_galaxies 04:09, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

• Support. I am not convinced there is any harm, but I am convinced there is benefit. This Google search finds "en dash" (as a phrase) on this talkpage, but also on its subpages: all the archives, and the voting page and discussion page for the current poll on dashes. Now that's useful! Some searches can be done internally on Misplaced Pages, some on Google, and some on both. (What if you knew someone had written "arbcom thing" near "fuss" here or on those subpages, but could not remember where? Use this search on Google.) Imagine such Google searching (with powerful refinements also) enabled uniformly across all our sprawling MOS pages, and also their sprawling talkpages – and their sprawling archives. (And of course, all of that sprawl needs to be diminished: a separate but far more pressing matter.)

By the way, I hope everyone here knows about that poll concerning MOS dash guidelines, and will consider voting and commenting. Noetica 23:09, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

• Support Greg L (talk) 18:10, 25 June 2011 (UTC)

There is enough support to push this further. What is the next step? How can I help with that? GFHandel ♬  21:35, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

An RFC, clearly. I've started one. (See below: #RFC: Should all subsidiary pages of the Manual of Style be made subpages of WP:MOS?). Noetica 03:53, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

subpages on articles?

(Admitting my ignorance) Should we use subpages on articles themselves more? The daughter articles (topics that are blown up) often have significant deviations from the mother articles' topics. Is there some better way to consilidate information? To allow re-use of references for instance. This is a strange one, where actually print sources seem to work better and where the nature of separate (but linking) webpages is poor. .TCO (talk) 15:46, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

Subpages are not enabled on articles, for example AC/DC or OS/2. ---— Gadget850 (Ed)  16:27, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

(edit conflict)What I was about to say... Though, right now we are in the situation where AC/DC is not a subpage of AC but Talk:AC/DC is a subpage of Talk:AC. That's inelegant, but I have no better idea. ― A. di M.​_plé​ 16:33, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

Just require people to use special markup for having a slash in title (as it is now, they can't have slashes in userspaces for instance if doing a sandbox vesion of AC/DC. There are probably more times when we want to use a slash for subpage than for title.TCO (talk) 16:42, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

All right, I'll bite. What is the special markup in titles for slashes that don't lead to subpages? —— Shakescene (talk) 17:05, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

create one...I'm thinking more about the users than the coders...I think there is some code for displaying a character but not having it function...TCO (talk) 17:21, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

The thing is that we decided a long while back that sub-pages in the mainspace were more trouble then they were worth, and just something that we didn't want. Unlike, say, the manual of style here, actual articles are generally supposed to stand on their own. Yea, there are "sub-articles" to main articles (History of the United States in relation to United States, for example), but even so the History of the United States isn't really dependent on the United States article, which is what would be implied by a hypothetical United States/History article, in my mind. Make sense?
— V = IR (Talk • Contribs) 18:23, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

hehe, I didn't do that on purpose. Notice in the revision history of United States/History when the change took place: around February 2002.
— V = IR (Talk • Contribs) 18:26, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

I get your point about something could be a daughter of two different articles. Although I think the same could be true of policy pages (or often of article pages is not a concern). Agreed, also, this would be a change from how we have done things so maybe not worht the disruption. Just floating the thought...TCO (talk) 21:16, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

RFC: Should all subsidiary pages of the Manual of Style be made subpages of WP:MOS?

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Template:Rfcid Misplaced Pages's Manual of Style (MOS) has one central page (Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style, or WP:MOS). But there are other pages: Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style (dates and numbers), Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style (footnotes), Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style (Hawaii-related articles), and many more.

Should all of those other pages be moved so that they are subpages of Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style? An example, after the proposed change: Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style/Hawaii-related articles. The question has come up at the central talkpage (WT:MOS). This would be a large structural change; so it needs thorough examination with wide participation from the Community.

NOTE: The RFC remains open, but there is now a new section on the page:

Subpage structure for the Manual of Style: implementation.

Submissions are requested there also.

Noetica 03:49, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Resources for this RFC

Summary of the case for subpages

• There are very many pages in the Manual of Style, making it extremely difficult to find or survey particular guidelines – to consult them, let alone edit them. Even with tailored search options that we now have (see at the right side of WP:MOS), it is hard to find everything one needs, or to know where to contribute in talkpages.
• Making all subsidiary pages strict subpages of WP:MOS has technical advantages. For example, with subpages it is much easier to find text using Google's highly refined searches. At present this can only be achieved in a limited and unreliable way using a combination of Google (or other external search facilities) and Misplaced Pages's internal search utility.
• The change would capitalise on the underlying file structure. Just one simple example: it automatically provides a link at the top of each subpage back to WP:MOS itself – helping everyone, especially editors unfamiliar with the workings of the Manual of Style.
• The use of subpages in WP project pages is permitted by WP:Subpages, and subpages are already used successfully in the RfC pages, Arbitration pages, and Reference Desk pages.
• The unmonitored spread of guidelines can be efficiently checked in the course of this structural reform. See discussion of implementation, below on this page.
• The implementation will provide an opportunity to review and refactor existing subpages (old drafts, misplaced discussions, surveys, or disused extensions of MOS pages). They can be relocated appropriately, by consultation. This will keep the overall structure rational and clear. Searches currently pick up material from those non-guidelines; in the new structure, they would not.

Summary of the case against subpages

• The convention established in WP article space is that subpages are prohibited. The primary reason is that many pages belong to two or more categories, and hence multiple "parent pages" exist for any given article. The article space relies on (in lieu of subpages) Categories, Lists, and NavBoxes to implement hierarchical organization. WP project pages should conform to that convention (prohibiting subpages) for the sake of consistency throughout WP.
• Unlike navigation by template, navigation by subpage will mean that rejected, proposed, and {{historic}}, pages will be a permanent part of this structure. For example, without subpages, if Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style (national varieties of English) is rejected, we take it out of the navbox and forget about it. With subpages, Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style (national varieties of English) will be permanently found on any search of subpages, forever more. There are already approximately 25 such rejected/proposed/historic MOS pages already.

Votes for subpages

1. Support as RFC proposer (acting on the initiative of User:Mclay1). Noetica 04:03, 13 June 2011 (UTC)
2. Support. WP's software provides for a hierarchy of pages, and the MOS structure is a natural fit for that. The breadcrumb at the top of each sub-page makes for a more consistent navigational aid. WP:Reference desk uses the mechanism well, and as long as we don't use a forward-slash in any sub-page name, I don't have a problem with the MOS using sub-pages. GFHandel ♬  04:44, 13 June 2011 (UTC)
3. Support as original proposer. Renaming to the standard format of sub-pages will provide a nagivational link back to the main MOS page at the top and has no drawbacks. McLerristarr | Mclay1 05:34, 13 June 2011 (UTC)
4. Support. Per GFHandel. Having thought about it for a while, I see significant advantages. The MoS subpages tend to be sprawling and poorly coordinated, and we owe editors and readers better. Tony (talk) 16:11, 14 June 2011 (UTC)
5. Support: McLerristarr | Mclay1 above took the words right out of my mouth. –CWenger (^ • @) 19:59, 14 June 2011 (UTC)
6. Support. Per discussion below (under NavBox topic). WP project space already does use subpages for RFC, etc, and it is useful. --Noleander (talk) 15:29, 20 June 2011 (UTC)
7. Support absolutely, as I've said prior to this. There are a ton of benefits to organizing these pages in a manner in which the MediaWiki software is able to recognize them as sub-pages to the main MoS page.— V = IR (Talk • Contribs) 01:02, 22 June 2011 (UTC)
8. Support - I proposed it a while ago, and my reasoning can be found at Misplaced Pages:Village pump (proposals)/Archive 50#Move all Misplaced Pages: namespace pages in (disambiguation) format to /subpage format. There was a small consensus, but I guess I got bored or distracted. I would really love to see this happen. ▫ JohnnyMrNinja 04:26, 22 June 2011 (UTC)
9. Support per what I said the last time. ― A. di M.​_plé​ 16:52, 22 June 2011 (UTC)
10. Why not? Although Special:PrefixIndex works either way. /ƒETCHCOMMS/ 03:20, 23 June 2011 (UTC)
11. Support - Better search suggestions in search box. Marcus Qwertyus 04:02, 23 June 2011 (UTC)
12. Sure If someone wishes to make these changes... Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 00:50, 25 June 2011 (UTC)
13. Yes, sure, fine, sounds reasonable. Herostratus (talk) 03:25, 25 June 2011 (UTC)
14. Yes, please. Imho this is a great idea, for the reasons laid out above, and also because even though it may seem like just a technicality, I'm convinced that having the subguidelines as subpages would automatically translate into greater efforts of streamlining it into one coherent guideline system (which it still isn't, quite), and an overall much less scattered perception. --87.79.230.11 (talk) 12:11, 25 June 2011 (UTC)
15. Support, as it will make it easier to browse the manual of style sub-pages. Thus improving usability. Dodoïste (talk) 13:26, 25 June 2011 (UTC)
16. Week support. Not a huge change and I'm quite partial to it; but the positives (which over-exaggerate search benefits) seem to slightly outweigh the negatives (which over-exaggerate the impairments from confusion). I guess WP won't fall apart either way, but having sub-pages is a little neater. —  HELLKNOWZ  ▎TALK 14:32, 25 June 2011 (UTC)
17. Support. Guidance has grown like a coral. A good review is needed so it can be made coherent and easier to access for users. Lightmouse (talk) 15:10, 25 June 2011 (UTC)
18. Support Greg L (talk) 18:11, 25 June 2011 (UTC)
19. Support —James • 3:16pm • 05:16, 26 June 2011 (UTC)
20. Support. A sensible fix. Neutrality 22:15, 27 June 2011 (UTC)
21. Support. Seems like a better way to keep things in order. --Coemgenus (talk) 11:22, 29 June 2011 (UTC)

Votes against subpages

• Is it really any easier to manage or find text in subpages than it is the current way? Explain and I'll reconsider. Probably this all came out in the previous discussion, but I wasn't following it; someone needs to make a more convincing case before I would support such a disruptive change. Surely having a link back to the main page is easy to implement in the current scheme, without this change. OK, I'm semi-convinced that it might help, so I withdraw my vote against. Dicklyon (talk) 04:12, 13 June 2011 (UTC)
• I sympathize with the proposal: I've been lost in MOS hell, stumbling around in a maze, annoyed and confused. Reform is sorely needed. But - speaking as a WP user - I expect important pages to have NavBoxes at the top, and I expect those NavBoxes to contain a comprehensive list of all related articles. A hierarchy can be clearly shown in the NavBox. We even have a format choice of either upper-right corner, or a full-width Navbox (such as at the top of WP:AN). The current MOS NavBox is (no offense to those who have worked on it) could be improved quite a bit. Shouldn't we work on improving the NavBox first and see if it can address the needs? And if it fails, then resort to subpages? Following a discussion (below) I've become convinced that the subpages may provide some searching benefits; plus the hierarchical organization is a natural way to organize data, so I'm withdrawing my Opposition. --Noleander (talk) 17:49, 16 June 2011 (UTC)

1. Can see no practical benefit: surely vast majority of navigation is by links, searches and categories, not by guessing an address to type into address box. Probably little real harm in it, just seems pointless. Kevin McE (talk) 07:32, 13 June 2011 (UTC)
2. The Manual of Style, in spite of what I think of it in practise, is perfectly titled. It's compiled in the wiki-equivalent of an instruction manual, and is intended to increase internal stylistic consistency. But there is one page that does not fit under that umbrella. WP:ACCESS is primarily focussed on making sure we don't discriminate against the visually impaired; to treat, or give the impression that it should be treated as supplimentary stylistic guideline would be entirely wrong. Equally significantly, ACCESS itself being the trunk of a hierarchal structure makes a lot of sense: the trunk itself should be easy for a novice to understand, and where appropriate there should be more detailed how-to subpages, such as the data table tutorial. There are several other pages that could be consolidated into ACCESS subpages, if that's the direction of travel. If this does go ahead – and I certainly see the overall merit – ACCESS should be removed from the MoS, and revert to being a stand-alone guideline. —WFC— 16:47, 25 June 2011 (UTC)

Neutral statements

1. Haven't really thought it through and have no strong opinion. Will let you all decide. I thnk my only take was to have subpages of article space content (as daughter articles feel too disconnected from mother articles...and the rest of the web has subpages of content...look at any corporate site). That said there were arguments that a daughter might have two mothers or whatever...plus I guess wiki is harder to be structured with than a thought out integrated website.TCO (talk) 06:50, 22 June 2011 (UTC)
2. Perhaps this is addressed somewhere in the voluminous discourse, but I think what a fuller reorganization is needed more than simply moving pages about. 1) I have no objection in principle to the core MOS pages being moved to be sub-pages of MOS. 2) I think there are many specialized MOS pages where the scope is limited to articles within the purview of a Wikiproject. I think this pages should be considered as supporting documentation for that Wikiproject rather than subpages of the core MOS. A consistent naming convention for such project-specific style guides might help to clarify both the scope of application and the relation with the core MOS (i.e., in cases of conflict , the core MOS takes precedence). older ≠ wiser 00:57, 25 June 2011 (UTC)
3. My only concern is that we not try to shoehorn a "one size fits all" approach to every disparate subject. From archaeology to comic books to Olympic swimming to what-have-you, I believe we need to retain the flexibility that we now have to address the unique specifics of each general topic.--Tenebrae (talk) 03:00, 25 June 2011 (UTC)
4. It really doesn't matter... (Also, there's an identical issue with notability guidelines, for what it's worth.) ╟─TreasuryTag►Subsyndic General─╢ 13:21, 25 June 2011 (UTC)
5. Why not? In fact, since these pages don't follow any of the other customs of Misplaced Pages space, give them a separate MOS namespace - it will make it even easier to know what to ignore. Making it easier for careless dogmatists to watch these pages would ordinarily be a disadvantage; but with luck this will make MOS even less functional; and so less harmful. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 00:29, 26 June 2011 (UTC)
6. I'm tending towards older/wiser and Tenebrae's comments 2 and 3 above. Something like Text Formatting or Dates & Numbers is really part of the M of S's core, and you'll often find similar clusters of editors discussing them, so it's probably best to make them slashed sub-pages. Even though different editors discuss Accessibility, that's also a core topic that might benefit from being attached as a sub-page . Style guides for things like naval topics, heraldry & vexillology, railways, royal & noble titles, comic books, Hawai'i, and French-related articles, on the other hand, inhabit a kind of limbo between general style guidance and the WikiProjects to which they're most closely allied. While I'm not sure what convention or even category would best suit them, I'm leaning against making them subpages of an already-huge set of general guidelines. —— Shakescene (talk) 00:47, 26 June 2011 (UTC)
7. MediaWiki pages are organized based on a flat hierarchy, though it has the functionality (via features such as Special:PrefixIndex) to organize pages as anything except. However, I won't complain if it ultimately serves as a better method of organization, so I'm not going to oppose at this time. –MuZemike 04:24, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

Discussion and replies

Dicklyon, how is moving the pages disruptive? We're not going to delete the resultant redirects so no links will be broken. Can you actually see any drawbacks to this move or are just opposing it because you don't see enough positives? McLerristarr | Mclay1 06:24, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Maybe disruption is the wrong way to characterize it. It seems like a lot of work and churn. So explain what it buys us. Dicklyon (talk) 14:47, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Is that list intended as an alternative to summarizing the case above? Doesn't work for me. Dicklyon (talk) 23:22, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

For clarity, I am revising my (unindented) message of 19:26, 13 June 2011 (UTC).—Wavelength (talk) 23:48, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

This is an extract of what I said at User talk:Wavelength/Archive 3#Hi—WT:MOS/x and WT:MOS(x) (section 25) .

The "Misplaced Pages talk" namespace has many pages beginning with "Misplaced Pages talk:Manual of Style (". Apparently some of those are subpages of "Misplaced Pages talk" pages, whereas others are talk pages of "Misplaced Pages" subpages.

—Wavelength (talk) 15:07, 14 June 2011 (UTC)

Noetica, I wish that I could be more definite about supporting your proposal, but the time that I have spent in pondering it has not fully cleared away my uncertainties about all the ramifications. Nevertheless, if one or more of the supporters is or are prepared to move (rename) all of the pages (including talk pages) affected by a supportive decision, and to update all incoming links to those pages (except those on archived talk pages), then I have no objection to the changes. Therefore, I am abstaining from expressing either support or opposition. Please consider the (possible) ramifications of the extract which I posted in my message of 15:07, 14 June 2011 (UTC). Also, what counts as consensus remains to be seen.
—Wavelength (talk) 19:35, 14 June 2011 (UTC)

Heavens, that's all right! Who knows? I might change my mind also. But so far just new benefits from this idea keep occurring to me. I intend to say more later on; I'm too busy to give it my full attention right now. Noetica 01:04, 15 June 2011 (UTC)

Is there any mechanism that makes subpages easier to find than what we have now? Something like a dir (ls) command? Dicklyon (talk) 01:46, 15 June 2011 (UTC)

Sorta kinda, apparently; prefix:WP:Manual of Style/ seems to do it. If the Search box had a nearby Help link, one would not need to guess at Help:Searching or Help:Search to find the search help. This would seem an easy thing to add . . . It’s hard to say how much of an advantage this would be over prefix:WP:Manual of Style with the current setup, but it’s hard to see how it would make things harder—hierarchical namespaces seem to have proven more effective than linear namespaces in many applications. JeffConrad (talk) 03:20, 15 June 2011 (UTC)

And I'm not saying it makes things harder; I just don't see how it makes things any easier. It's not different from a linear namespace if that's all the mechanism we have. Hierarchies are better when there are tools for navigating them. Where's the Finder? Dicklyon (talk) 06:20, 15 June 2011 (UTC)

Finder??? Misplaced Pages is not a Mac . . . I’m not sure the hierarchical namespace would make things easier to find via search, but it could make things easier for those who maintain the files. One of the great features of Unix (which actually runs Macs) was the hierarchical file system, copied by most OSs that still survive. I could scarcely imagine trying to keep track of files on my computer with a linear namespace. I’ve avoided comment on this so far because I haven’t been following the discussion, and recognize that a little knowledge can be dangerous. JeffConrad (talk) 08:42, 15 June 2011 (UTC)

I am not sufficiently familiar with the Misplaced Pages MOS to make specific suggestions, but I am, however, very familiar with the Associated Press Stylebook, and I think they've established an effective organizational system in their MOS for journalists, and this stylebook has pretty much become the industry standard for journalism. I believe they also have electronic/web/iPhone editions. It might be appropriate to look to these for ideas on organization. --Jp07 (talk) 15:41, 30 June 2011 (UTC)

Here is a list (from here) of subpages of talk pages in a form similar to that of talk pages of subpages.

—Wavelength (talk) 16:18, 20 June 2011 (UTC)

How searching would be improved with subpages

Let's suppose I want to find guidelines that mention hard spaces; so I set out to search with this string (just to pick one way, not the best!):

"hard space" OR " " OR "nonbreaking space" OR "non-breaking"

How do I get all the guidelines I'm after? Let's try four ways:

Reports of four searches

1. Do this search using Misplaced Pages's internal utility (the parentheses make no difference; just for clarity): ("hard space" OR " " OR "nonbreaking space" OR "non-breaking") prefix:Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style Try it. It yields 17 hits; they are all in WP:MOS, another page with the prefix "Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style", or a subpage of any of those pages. Two problems: first, we weren't after pages like these: Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style/Register Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style/Draft trim (November 2004) Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style (dates and numbers)/Three proposals for change to MOSNUM Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style (dates and numbers)/Date Linking RFC And second, the search finds pages that don't meet the criteria, like Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style (road junction lists) which includes none of the search terms. (The search seems to have captured a use of   in the code for that page.) 2. Do this search using Misplaced Pages's internal utility (that is, just add " (" at the end of search 1): ("hard space" OR " " OR "nonbreaking space" OR "non-breaking") prefix:Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style ( We now get just 12 hits, all of them Manual of Style pages other than WP:MOS. That's the first problem: we wanted WP:MOS also. The second problem is that we get subpages like this: Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style (Ireland-related articles)/Ireland disambiguation task force The third problem: once again, that page does not include any of the search terms anyway. 3. Do this search using Misplaced Pages's internal utility (that is, just add "/" at the end of search 1): ("hard space" OR " " OR "nonbreaking space" OR "non-breaking") prefix:Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style/ We now get just 4 hits: Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style/Register (section Non-breaking spaces) Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style/Draft trim (November 2004) (section Spaces after a full stop/period) Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style/(dates and numbers)/proposed revision Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style/proposal (section Spaces after the end of a sentence) That's not going to help much. 4. Do this search using Google: ("hard space" OR " " OR "nonbreaking space" OR "non-breaking") site:http://en.wikipedia.org/Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style We get 5 hits: Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style/Register Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style/(dates and numbers)/proposed revision Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style/proposal Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style/Draft trim (November 2004) This Google search is both good and bad. Each of the hits includes one of the desired terms, but only WP:MOS and its strict subpages are searched.

Results like this weigh heavily in favour of our proposed restructuring. If all of the Manual of Style were in Misplaced Pages:Manual_of_Style or a subpage of that, a Google search would retrieve all the target guidelines. (I would also want all the present overgrowth of subpages moved aside, so that only actual style pages were subpages of WP:MOS.) At present, all the guidelines dealing with hard spaces can be found only by painstaking and error-prone composite searching. What's more, Google searches are far more powerful than internal Misplaced Pages searches in other ways, beyond what we can explore here.

So the proposed change would make development far easier; and we could customise far better search boxes for users wanting to consult the Manual than we can now. If that involves using Google, so be it. In any case, it's time we recognised the larger potential of Misplaced Pages's style guidelines. They are useful (and beginning to be used) offsite as well. Google already loves Misplaced Pages! Let's harness Google to be an even better resource for retrieving material on Misplaced Pages.

I may have missed something; and my searches might be inept! But in that case, searching currently requires considerable sophistication. Under the proposed change, it would not. All of the above applies (with changed details) to Manual of Style talkpages too. Subpages, properly regimented, would make it much easier to track down previous discussion, no matter what corner of what talkpage or archive it might have fallen into – without false positive hits.

Noetica 10:44, 15 June 2011 (UTC)

Were I doing such a search with Unix-like utilities, I would probably try something like

grep -lE "(hard space| |nonbreaking space|non-breaking)" Manual_of_Style/*

More complex approaches could be used for more complex directory hierarchies if the volume of data was sufficient to warrant the added complexity. Knowing nothing about the internals of the wiki search engine, I’m reluctant to suggest that this example is directly applicable, but it does seem reasonable.

Ultimately, it’s a matter of what is required to find the desired information. That several of us with considerable experience on Misplaced Pages have had to think about this suggests that it’s just too darn hard to find many things, including help and general policies as well as items in the MOS. If it’s challenging for veterans, imagine what it’s like for newbies. Reorganization of the MOS hierarchy may be only one part of a possible solution, but if it really would make a significant improvement, it’s something that can be done without much help from others (e.g., changes to mediaWiki). JeffConrad (talk) 00:57, 16 June 2011 (UTC)

Question Under the current categories I can't see any MoS which is in two categories, however what would happen if such a situation was to arise? Gnevin (talk) 23:39, 21 June 2011 (UTC)

NavBox improvement

Above, I make the argument that the MOS Navbox Template:Style could be vastly improved, and would help address some of the concerns that gave rise to this proposal. I'm willing to make some of the improvements to the NavBox. But, I'd also like to hear from the "supporters": What issues will a great NavBox not resolve? In other words, assuming that the MOS NavBox and MOS Categories were excellent in their design and scope, what benefits - if any - would subpages bring to readers? --Noleander (talk) 17:57, 16 June 2011 (UTC)

FYI: I've solicited comments at the template Talk page regarding the proposal to add more detail/depth to the MOS NavBox. --Noleander (talk) 18:06, 16 June 2011 (UTC)

Good that you've joined the discussion, Noleander. I've explored your draft of an improved template. Just now I can't see how it conflicts with the RFC proposal here. Wouldn't these reforms work well together? The conversion to subpages is a partial solution, enabling efficient and rational searches. But so, I think, is what you put forward just a partial solution, addressing a different feature of a complex problem (with no improvement toward rationalising searches, per se). Is it just that you prefer consideration of one idea at a time, or is there some other reason for your present opposition? I'm inclined to support both initiatives. Noetica 22:44, 16 June 2011 (UTC)

Yes, perhaps the two proposals (NavBox expansion & supages) would work well together. It may be that they are entirely orthogonal and complementary. To be candid: I'm a bit fuzzy on the search benefits that the subpage proposal provides (I read some of the search examples above, but I could not see the point the examples were making). Can you (or anyone) provide a very specific example of how the subpages would improve the search capability for a typical user? (a user that is not a black-belt in search syntax). After I get clarity, I may retract my "Oppose" !vote. --Noleander (talk) 23:54, 16 June 2011 (UTC)

Long discussion of Noleander's question

Sure, Noleander. Just look at the search I introduce in the subsection before this one, and how it is handled by four currently available options. None works well. Each picks up, or misses, all sorts of things. The Google option (search 4) would work perfectly: if we implemented subpages (and cleared away ad hoc proposal subpages and the like – separate provision could easily be made for those). Any questions? Just ask, here. Noetica 00:00, 17 June 2011 (UTC) Okay ... I tried #4 in Google, and got the indicated results. But what I'm missing is: What is the scenario that a typical WP user/editor would benefit? Is this benefit only available within Google? Or would the WP "Search" field at the top of WP pages also benefit? Or is this benefit aimed primarily at black-belt WP editors that are searching for very specific data? (contrasted with novice editors just trying to get MOS guidance without leaving WP to go to Google). Or am I just backwards because I use WP "Search" field rather than Google (I must have missed the memo :-) --Noleander (talk) 00:05, 17 June 2011 (UTC) Three points in response to Noleander: 1. The needs of "black-belt" editors are important in their own right. For example, when they want to track down earlier discussion of guidelines (in any talkpage for the Manual of Style); or fine details of the existing guidelines that are spread across 57+ pages. Accurate searching is essential to efficient development of guidelines – including especially any effort to reduce their chaotic expansion. Editors who are advanced in these things will quite happily resort to Google, which is very powerful. 2. A reformed file structure will mean that "white- and yellow-belt" editors can more easily find things too. Try this simpler search within Misplaced Pages, if you can't see yourself looking for mentions of hard space: capitals prefix:Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style That gives you 11 hits, but 3 of them are drafts or other offshoots: not style guidelines. (For many searches the proportion would be worse, with false positives too.) Now try the nearest equivalent search on Google: capitals site:http://en.wikipedia.org/Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style That gives you 4 hits, but 3 are mere drafts and offshoots. If we had subpages for all pages of the Manual of Style (and only for those), Google would let us find things accurately. With substantial improvements to Misplaced Pages's own system, we might also get the same benefits as Google offers: but as a prerequisite, we'd still need a reformed file structure. Either way, even for simple searches the subpage proposal paves the way for better things. And if the change were managed with care, there would be no loss of present capabilities. 3. Since non-black-belt editors may not feel comfortable even with the simpler searches, we make customised search boxes (like at the top of this talkpage, and in the template you are working on). But we can't do that effectively without the reforms proposed here (along with some collateral fixes). Noetica 01:15, 17 June 2011 (UTC) Okay, I'm getting swayed. Just a few more questions: (1) are there any other project pages in WP that already use this subpage convention (e.g. all pages related to, say, Mediation, are subpages of some top-level Mediation page); and (2) assuming the answer to (1) is "no", then would this proposal also be appropriate for other project pages within WP? Or is "Manual of Style" the only topic that this subpage proposal is sensible for? (3) Would this subpage proposal also be beneficial for all the pages listed in Template:naming conventions (that is, they would be under the top-level Naming page)?--Noleander (talk) 02:21, 17 June 2011 (UTC) In the most general sense, very many subpages of project pages can be found in http://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=Special%3AAllPages&from=%21&to=&namespace=4. —Wavelength (talk) 03:16, 17 June 2011 (UTC) 1. Misplaced Pages:Reference desk has no activity in itself, but has one subpage for each specific reference desk, like Misplaced Pages:Reference desk/Language for Language. Archives are another branch, to contain huge numbers of daily archives for all the desks, like Misplaced Pages:Reference desk/Archives/Computing/2007 July 9. There is one central talkpage, with redirects from each desk's talkpage: Misplaced Pages talk:Reference desk/Language redirects to Misplaced Pages talk:Reference desk. There are a few add-ons that I have not discussed. It works! And it's easily searchable. I don't know about other areas of the Project. Anyone know? Wavelength's link gives a way to search for such things; for example, you can see the first of the zillions of Reference desk pages here. 2. 3. I thought a little about Naming conventions. I suspect something like this RFC proposal would help there; and possibly other areas could benefit too. Here and everywhere, the details should be worked out by experts – that includes some of us, and a few technical types (some of whom walk in our midst!). Of course, it should all happen with open scrutiny and consultation. This has not been the case with other technical developments, I fear. Be swayed! Noetica 03:36, 17 June 2011 (UTC)

See Misplaced Pages:WikiProject Council/Guide/Task forces.

—Wavelength (talk) 06:31, 17 June 2011 (UTC)

Fair enough. I've struck-out my Oppose !vote. My final comment is: If this is implemented, it should be widely publicized at the Village Pump, etc so that others could consider implementing it in other realms within WP (e.g. the naming conventions articles). Consistency is a good thing, and it's just not right for a couple of areas to use subpages (Reference desk & MOS) and others to not use it. --Noleander (talk) 13:31, 17 June 2011 (UTC)

Subpages of project pages are already widely implemented (Misplaced Pages:Subpages) and widely known (http://stats.grok.se/en/latest/Wikipedia:Subpages).

—Wavelength (talk) 15:01, 17 June 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for that link ... I see that now (for instance, specific RfC subgroups are subpages of the main RfC page, as in Misplaced Pages:Requests for comment/History and geography). But subpages are prohibited in article space, so they are a bit alien to many editors: it is a bit peculiar that they are prohibited in article space, but permitted in project space: but I can see the reasoning (the key distinction is that many articles belong in 2 or more hierarchies, but project pages often belong to just one). In any case, I like hierarchical organizations, and using subpages for MOS is sensible. --Noleander (talk) 15:23, 17 June 2011 (UTC)

Fine, Noleander. I hope you will stay with this and contribute as we proceed. I want to look at your work on the template; it seems that several coordinated efforts are best. Somehow we have to manage this inevitable spread of guidelines – for those developing them as well as for those using them. See the list of affected pages (in a navbox above). Even that took some work to establish. We cannot easily be sure that it covers all pages of interest, or when new pages will need to be added to to it.

Now, are you inclined to modify the "Case against", since your change of heart? I suppose it could stay, until someone opposing comes along and works on it. (You might consider a support vote, of course ☺.) Noetica 00:01, 18 June 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the reminder: I've rewritten the "Case against" to capture the only sensible argument against I can think of ... mostly for the sake of justice and balance :-) But I do support it, and will so !vote. Indpendently, the MOS Navbox improvement is still a good idea, and (baring any objections) I'll implement that in a day or two. --Noleander (talk) 15:28, 20 June 2011 (UTC)

Navigation by address box

In his vote against subpages, Kevin McE said the following.

Can see no practical benefit: surely vast majority of navigation is by links, searches and categories, not by guessing an address to type into address box. Probably little real harm in it, just seems pointless.

As I understand the proposal, it does not require "guessing an address to type into address box". However, one who knows the name of a subpage could add to what is already in the address box, for example, by adding /dates and numbers to Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style, and producing Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style/dates and numbers. That option constitutes one more benefit to from the proposal proposed changes.
—Wavelength (talk) 18:22, 17 June 2011 (UTC)

Technically, spaces are converted to underscores in the address bar, but the procedure can be used for navigation.
—Wavelength (talk) 19:01, 17 June 2011 (UTC)

Can we have a new namespace? MOS:Chemistry for example. The Chemistry MOS has numerous sub-pages already, and it seems a mouthful to have WP:MOS/Chemistry/Compound classes , for example. --Rifleman 82 (talk) 06:23, 25 June 2011 (UTC)

Rifleman, the issue of what to do about "legacy" structuring, such as the Chemistry MOS subpages you mention, would be better dealt with in Implementation, below. The reworking will have to take account of all such local solutions, in setting up an overall structure that can be navigated and searched by all. There are probably lessons to learn from what editors have done before. I note that some of the Chemistry subpages are genuine components of that MOS; but some of them are mere drafts, right? That may need sorting out, for reliable searching at least. Noetica 04:33, 26 June 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for getting back. To my knowledge, only Misplaced Pages:Manual_of_Style_(chemistry)/Elements/draft is a draft. We never got around to integrating WP:ELEMENTS' work. All the other level 1 subpages have been discussed and ratified by the current members of WP Chemistry/Chemicals before going live. --Rifleman 82 (talk) 04:26, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

Comments on neutral statements

Here are some remarks about neutral statements (see above) made so far. I hope this will encourage others to address them if they see the need. In some cases we can clear up misconceptions, or answer the inevitable concerns that have arisen. I would like to thank the editors for their generally constructive observations; we do need to take note of them. Noetica 04:21, 26 June 2011 (UTC)

On Statement 1

TCO seems to favour this sort of exercise, but expresses some general reservations about the details of the structure. I think we have to get on with filling out the details (see Implementation, below), so that such concerns can be allayed. Noetica 04:21, 26 June 2011 (UTC)

On Statement 2

Older ≠ wiser wants "a fuller reorganization than simply moving pages about", and fills in some details, while thinking that "perhaps this is addressed somewhere in the voluminous discourse." I think it is addressed to some extent. We certainly need to keep our dialogue clearly signposted, so newcomers can follow the trend. The need for some sort of hierarchy is noted; but I would add that nothing in this proposal seeks to overwhelm or diminish the needs of special areas. It's basically a very rational restructuring, one of whose benefits is that we can harmonise existing guidelines for the Project. Harmony is not hegemony! Noetica 04:21, 26 June 2011 (UTC)

On Statement 3

Tenebrae raises a similar and perfectly understandable concern: "that we not try to shoehorn a 'one size fits all' approach to every disparate subject". Again I would stress that the aim is to restructure, rationalise, and review. Many editors are worried about the unmanaged spread of guidelines; some speak of "instruction creep". They can be reassured that this initiative will counter that tendency, if we keep focused as we proceed. Noetica 04:21, 26 June 2011 (UTC)

On Statement 4

TreasuryTag reminds editors that "it really doesn't matter." Myself, I will concede that the heat death of the universe is a larger problem; but we must choose our battles, right? Enough people can see the merit of this restructuring for us to take it seriously – and to spend time getting it right. Noetica 04:21, 26 June 2011 (UTC)

On Statement 5

Noetica 04:21, 26 June 2011 (UTC)

On Statement 6

Shakescene resumes some themes from 2 and 3. At least initially, though, the pages targeted are the 57 advertising themselves as part of the Manual of Style (see the left column of the Links to 82 affected pages). There are further questions about the rest, and about naming conventions for example. I think the restructure provides an opportunity to examine these issues progressively and methodically, with the fullest consultation. Sure, some pages will clearly cohere, and make up the Manual of Style; and the Manual should be rationally organised and consistent. That does not deprive special areas of their special provisions; nor does it deny non-Manual pages their own role in the Project. Noetica 04:21, 26 June 2011 (UTC)

Procedural points

As proposer of this RFC I have refactored subsections for clarity and order. And I have moved material – putting some into well-labelled navboxes where this will keep things readable, especially for anyone coming new to the discussion. I have assumed that no one minds; and others can do the same, of course. Please raise any concerns in this subsection. Noetica 23:50, 17 June 2011 (UTC)

Noetica, if you still wish to convert the subsidiary pages of WP:MOS to subpage format, and if you do not see any problem involving subpages of talk pages, then please do proceed with the conversion at your convenience (possibly with the assistance of one or more helpers), because there seems to be no substantial objection from anyone at this time. If the proposal languishes without implementation, then this will have been another case of time and thought expended, perhaps wastefully. Let us declare consensus for this proposal.

—Wavelength (talk) 19:37, 21 June 2011 (UTC)

Agreed, Noetica. I assume that you are unfamiliar on a previous proposal on this topic (Misplaced Pages:Village pump (proposals)/Archive 50#Move all Misplaced Pages: namespace pages in (disambiguation) format to /subpage format) which went the same way. I believe all points to the negative have been soundly addressed, and general opinions range from "great" to "no clear benefit", which is as good as you can get on EN. ▫ JohnnyMrNinja 12:15, 22 June 2011 (UTC)

Very well, I have set up a new section below on this page: #Subpage structure for the Manual of Style: implementation.
Go to it! Keep it active but orderly, and let's work out how best to do this thing. Noetica 04:33, 23 June 2011 (UTC)

We have fairly clear guidance against refactoring without consent; I do not consent. This practice inhibits discussion, and prevents agreement on anything than simple accept/decline. If this practice continues, as here, I shall ask that Noetica be blocked. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 13:52, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

Our "fairly clear guidance" says "Relocation of material to different sections or pages where it is more appropriate", and in this case, the appropriate material for each section was labeled. You may debate those labels, but I can't imagine Noetica being blocked for his paragraph organization, and I can't imagine how suggesting a block can even be considered constructive. One would ordinarily leave alone material accompanied by a threat like "explain themselves to an admin", but such language is getting to be a habit. Art LaPella (talk) 22:08, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

Separate namespace is a much better idea

Apologies for the new section: this is a huge RFC and it's difficult to know where to put it. PMAnderson is the only person so far to have suggested simply co-opting ] as an entirely new namespace for these pages. I think this is fundamentally the best solution by far:

1. Searching is even easier (search by namespace is trivial)
2. A clear sign that the MoS is a fundamental part of Misplaced Pages
3. Far shorter full page titles
4. All the benefits of the sub-page approach as well

Am I missing a reason why this has apparently not been raised more often? Are there any drawbacks to this approach?

Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward) - talk 10:52, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

I like the idea too, CC. I guess I'm not alone in being put off by the motivation offered for it by PMAnderson!

I see no drawbacks; but I had thought it would be difficult to get accepted. In some quarters the Manual is not well received. Some of the mud sticks, and unfair as that is, it is a reality we must contend with.

Now, given the huge support we see for the present RFC, we could simply close it now as resolved in favour of the proposal. We could suspend the separate Implementation discussion for now (see below), while someone starts a similar RFC testing the namespace proposal. If you want to do that, I would certainly want to assist. I DO propose a structured, orderly approach like the one I instituted for the present RFC. "Huge" it may be; but far easier to navigate than the usual, I submit. Noetica 11:28, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

Two hyphens . . .

"These were typewriter approximations." Should be these ARE, since, well, they still are. Sincerely, GeorgeLouis (talk) 13:50, 17 June 2011 (UTC)

Agree, though nowadays the usage is more in ASCII text than with typewriters, and we might want to say this. In Misplaced Pages, I’d much rather see an editor who finds entering an em dash too onerous to use two hyphens rather than something else, because the double hyphen is much easier to recognize and correct. I suppose that a spaced single hyphen could be interpreted as a spaced en dash, though I don’t know if this is consistent with British convention for manuscript preparation. But in any event, the double hyphen is alive and well in some contexts, and at the very least, we should use present tense. JeffConrad (talk) 01:16, 18 June 2011 (UTC)

What Jeff said. Darkfrog24 (talk) 13:30, 18 June 2011 (UTC)

The use of double hyphens is a current keyboard convention.  For whatever reason we have the Manual of Style#Other dashes section, the text at Typewriter#Typewriter conventions is not explanatory, any more than mentioning that editors should not reach for the carriage return lever at the end of each line would be relevant.  Proposal

from: Do not use substitutes for em or en dashes, such as the combination of two hyphens (--). These were typewriter approximations. to:      Do not use substitutes for em or en dashes, such as the combination of two hyphens (--).

Unscintillating (talk) 14:36, 18 June 2011 (UTC)

What do we do about editors who don’t know how to enter dashes (or find it too much effort)? Though I think we should strongly encourage editors to use the proper characters, unless we’re considering sanctions for failure to do so, we should at least encourage those who for some reason will not use any character not on the keyboard to use preferred alternatives. I’d settle for two hyphens for an em dash, a spaced hyphen for a spaced en dash as an alternative to an em dash, and a hyphen (spaced or otherwise) for an en dash in most of its other uses. Although these alternatives aren’t pretty, their meaning is usually clear, and they’re easy to recognize for editors who want to replace them with the preferred characters. And I think it’s nuts to get huffy about long-standing and recognizable conventions (“typewriter”, “ASCII”, “manuscript”, or whatever) when we prefer equivalent conventions for quotes. JeffConrad (talk) 10:10, 19 June 2011 (UTC)

I think this is not a good idea. I'd forget em dashes for the moment. Why can't we put in a Bugzilla request to get a double-hyphen rendered in display mode as an en dash. That is more intuitive, and LaTeX already uses that system. Keep it simple. Tony (talk) 10:19, 19 June 2011 (UTC)

Jeff:

First, it is probably unwise to deal with this while en dashes are under discussion (along with hyphens, and to some extent slashes and em dashes) at the voting page and its discussion page under direction from ArbCom.

Second, it is a decidedly retrograde step, and unnecessary. Misplaced Pages has adopted certain standards of presentation, and it is not desirable to cater at every point for legacy practices from an earlier state of technology. We expect people to use diacritics in an encyclopedic way. We expect Schrödinger's equation, not Schrodinger's equation. The latter form would be normal in an email (so might Schroedinger's equation), but not in any respectable reference work. So Misplaced Pages provides tools under the edit window, including a means of typing "ö". And it also allows for redirects, so that all three of those approximations take the reader to a standard form, decided by the principles at WP:TITLE (sometimes supplemented by WP:MOS if punctuation is an issue): Schrödinger equation (no 's, note). Similarly, spaced and unspaced single and double hyphens, with various significance in various protocols (such as the influential MLA standard), are superseded as dash substitutes. They truly are vestiges of the typewriter age. Style guides adapt to this reality with varying sensitivity, depending on their intended users; but most have set a higher standard, as do published journals and monographs. Misplaced Pages recognises this, putting dashes under the edit window as the first available selections for insertion. And Misplaced Pages requires redirects from titles with incorrect hyphens to titles with correct dashes. There is no need to make any further provision in MOS. It only complicates things, and runs counter to modern practice and the general ways of Misplaced Pages editing. Most editors (and readers searching for titles) do not need any more concessions than are already provided. Those who are not up to speed will have their work improved by others, or can easily learn something new as they get more serious – about editing a serious encyclopedia. Noetica 11:02, 19 June 2011 (UTC)

I'm not sure what you're saying is retrograde; the text is there already. I would just get rid of it (why do we want to say "do not do X" in the MOS?), but I agree that we should settle the rest of the outstanding dash issues first if this one is at all controversial. Dicklyon (talk) 14:56, 19 June 2011 (UTC)

Dicklyon, I mean it would be retrograde in the broad. MOS used to allow two hyphens for a dash, but then moved to a higher standard, in accord with Misplaced Pages's status as a serious encyclopedia that in many ways outperforms traditional works of reference. The move would also be retrograde in not following the shifts of modern technology and practice. It would be like accepting underlining as an alternative to italics. That too was a typewriter convention; and that too has been superseded.

Yes, let's just drop this mention of alternatives to standard dashes; and yes, let's deal with the other dash business first.

Noetica 22:52, 19 June 2011 (UTC)

Tony and Noetica, I completely agree in principle. But I still have a real problem with idiocy that capriciously deprecates typographical quotes yet bans other equally good typewriter conventions. It should be obvious that, were it up to me, we would require the proper quotes, especially if we really do aspire to a higher standard. In my experience, use of typewriter quotes are the first and most obvious indicator of the rank amateur. It seems to me that you either give ENOTTY or treat all comparable typewriter artifacts equally. I realize this is another topic for another time, but when a style guide is capricious, it’s difficult for me to treat with much respect.

Though I’d still rather have an editor who won’t use an em dash use two hyphens than a single hyphen, I don’t really see a problem with dropping “Do not use substitutes for em or en dashes, such as . . .” It’s a minor issue compared to the main discussion, but if it’s not controversial, I think we could make the change whenever convenient.

I don’t think rendering two hyphens as a en dash is a good idea, because I think far more people know the typewriter convention than the TeX markup. JeffConrad (talk) 01:21, 20 June 2011 (UTC)

Jeff, I am more than a little surprised to find you using prejudicial language ("idiocy that capriciously deprecates typographical quotes"). This matter has been discussed at great length before, as a check of the archives will show. For the record, of course I insist on typographical quotes in my work away from Misplaced Pages; but I recommend a different approach here. I adapt; just as I adapt to using the em dash (which I abhor on perfectly rational grounds – like your own with respect to straight quotes ☺), to avoidance of the serial comma when that is consistently settled in an article, and to American spelling.

In brief, the difference between curly and straight quotes is not semantic, any more than the old ligature that joined st (s+t) means anything to the reader, or the current print ligature fl (f+l). A convention is never bad because it is associated with typewriter convenience. We avoid st and fl here because their use would not be helpful, and would involve massive inconvenience. Writing, editing, and especially searching would be a nightmare. Not so with "correct" dashes and hyphens. Rules are not handed to us on the summit of Sinai; but it turns out that en dashes (for example) almost invariably mean something different from hyphens. There is nothing like that semantic difference with quotes, whose significance is always fully determined by their immediate context.

Hyphen approximations for dashes vary from one old style guide convention to another; to learn them, explicitly permit them, or automate their conversion is no simple matter. I say again: their use is a step backwards. Misplaced Pages is not print; it is not written on a Remington; it is not selections from emails; it is not a blog. Misplaced Pages is unique, and must select what works best: respecting precedents, and occasionally surpassing them where all precedents fall away into the dust of history, and the Project advances on new ground.

Noetica 03:50, 20 June 2011 (UTC)

Perhaps idiocy was a bit strong (and pejorative), but I’ll stand by capricious. A few thoughts:

• Indeed the matter has been discussed extensively, and in the most recent discussion some editors expended far more effort arguing why typographical quotes cannot be used than I have expended in my entire life simply using them, in at least have dozen applications. A glance at the archives reveals that, though more people seem to prefer straight quotes, there clearly is no consensus. The bottom line is that many people simply don’t want to be bothered entering typographical quotes, and others apparently don’t want to be faced with cleaning up afterwards. The deprecation began when one editor simply added it to the MOS without any discussion.
• Writing and editing a nightmare? Offhand, this seems a bit strong (even prejudicial?) For some reason, I seem to have no problem correctly typing and editing typographical quotes. Again, I just do it, and spend far less time doing so than many spend arguing why it cannot be done.
• Be assured that my issue here is with the capriciously different treatment more than with straight quotes per se. I certainly don’t advocate the hobgoblins of foolish consistency, but simply note that almost everything here applies equally well to quotes, and vice versa.
• I don’t necessarily agree that there is no semantical difference between typewriter and typographical quotes; we have different marks for opening and closing quotations. In In most cases, a reader has no problem distinguishing the two, but in some cases, with long or complex nested quotes, it’s possible to get lost, and having the conventional marks helps avoid this. Even so, most readers can backtrack and figure it out, but this is also true in most cases for typewriter approximations to dashes. With good writing, of course, the reader should not need to backtrack. One could also make the case that there is no semantical difference between Schrödinger and Schroedinger; the latter, in fact, would be the only option for many official documents in the US (perhaps an issue of its own). So again, I just don’t see the different treatment.
• Searching? Again, the same arguments apply either way. If typographical quotes are used in article titles, redirects from equivalents with typewriter quotes are required. Intra-article searches? Well, the same problem arises with Schrödinger as with typographical quotes; it’s arguably worse because the o umlaut isn’t available from an Alt code.
• I’m not sure the fl (f+l) ligature is a valid comparison, though like the usually more useful  (f+i) ligature, it’s an interesting issue. When the output was strictly print, the transformation from fl and fi could be done at the time of printing, and troff and TeX both do this. It’s trickier with the advent of electronic copy such as PDF; when the transformation is done when the electronic document is created, the result is different characters than were present in the source. Acrobat is smart enough to find the ligatures in searches for the characters, but this is admittedly a kludge—a better approach would be to have the transformation done at the point of rendering, but even this could be tricky with a PostScript file that could either be sent to a printer that doesn’t make the transformation or converted to PDF. The situation isn’t quite the same as with typographical quotes, though—there is no character translation from source to output. For those who note that the two forms are nearly identical and wonder why anyone would waste time on something so silly: with most sans-serif typefaces, there is little benefit from the ligatures, but the same is not true for most serif typefaces (e.g.,  vs. fi). These ligatures were once expected in all quality typesetting, but now seem to be falling into disuse.
• Online media are somehow different from print media? Of course they are, but if the difference has anything to do with dashes, I cannot find it. I’ve mentioned the overblown issue of “web safety”; long ago, many browsers had limited Unicode support, some (Netscape) didn’t recognize HTML named character references, and some fonts provided limited Unicode support. If any of these concerns are valid today, I’d like to see some examples. Were there problems? Yes, but as I mentioned, most were from authors using incompatible proprietary eight-bit character sets (e.g., MacRoman vs. Windows “ANSI”); this is a nonissue with Unicode. Ultimately, I think it boils down to many web authors who do not know how to enter non-ASCII characters (or do not want to bother doing so). It’s certainly possible that I’ve missed something here, but if so, I’d like to know what it is.
• I don’t think our differing dash preferences are comparable. I generally use unspaced em dashes, spaced points of ellipsis, and of course use double quotes by default and outside of single quotes. It’s not that I abhor spaced en dashes, unspaced points of ellipsis, or using single quotes as the outermost—I simply follow common US practice, just as you follow common practice in the Commonwealth (outside of OUP). Straight quotes find almost zero support in quality published material, and as nearly as I’ve been able to find, zero support in widely used style guides. In fact, precisely the opposite obtains from those that even address the issue.
• Misplaced Pages is unique? I guess I’d like to know how it is. As several commenters in the last discussion mentioned, the problems with typographical quotes seem to afflict only the English Misplaced Pages. I could mention Mencken’s supposed comment, but will avoid something so potentially prejudicial.
• I’m all for adaptability if there’s a good reason for it. But here I just don’t see it.

Clearly, we’re getting far from the original topic. I never meant to imply that typewriter approximations were acceptable as a final result in Misplaced Pages. I dragged the quote issue up mainly in response to comment that we should aspire to the highest quality. If that’s indeed the case, we should really do it, just as non-English versions of Misplaced Pages seem to do. JeffConrad (talk) 05:49, 20 June 2011 (UTC)

I do like a well-turned delivery, and though brevity be the soul of wit it is not the whole of wisdom. I strive for wit and wisdom in replying; but I will not achieve brevity. At the outset I affirm that the distinction MOS essays is not capricious. That is not caprice which has an articulated foundation in reason. You may show contrary reasoning; but you do not prove caprice in the position you oppose. Now, your ten points:

• I too would find it trivially easy to use directed quotes, in Misplaced Pages or anywhere. The fact that you do it here and I do not is immaterial. We make recommendations for the whole Project. Consensus? What in MOS has consensus, if we use the hardest criteria? But then, what in Misplaced Pages does? Accurate and meaningful use of dashes, as against careless ancient hyphens, have stood the test of time and disputation. Test them again; but don't single them out as especially ill supported.
• I wrote: "We avoid st and fl here because their use would not be helpful, and would involve massive inconvenience. Writing, editing, and especially searching would be a nightmare. Not so with 'correct' dashes and hyphens." I did not write, as you impute to me, that using curly quotes would be a nightmare. As I have said, I could and do handle them with ease and accuracy. But I don't impose them on Misplaced Pages; and I recommend that others avoid them here also.
• Again you mention caprice; but that is already dispatched.
• Tradition and typewriters have left-handed and right-handed parentheses, yes. Their different forms help us to read efficiently. This is an accident of typographic history, and there is no reason for us to move against it. But if parentheses had not evolved to be uniformly directed, we would have adapted to that: their context too makes their significance as openers or closers clear. The different forms of typographic quotes helps reading, yes. So do many ligatures, though to most readers they are utterly transparent. No single set of conventions for all media was handed down to Moses, nor is there uniformity even within one medium. Many publishers use slanted quotes, barely distinguishable (if at all) for starts and ends of quotes. The readership survives the wilderness. Practice is more mosaic than Mosaic.
• It is necessary to distinguish four kinds of searching: with Google or other web facility; within Misplaced Pages; within the browser; and within external programs such as Word, or other applications adapted for editing Misplaced Pages text. Thank you for being aware of this. The simpler the variations to search for, the better. This is just one determinant of our choices, but let it be weighted with sophistication.
• I agree with you in general about typographic ligatures. But you have not shown that the comparison with curly quotes is inept. Ligatures help reading, and have aesthetic value that varies with fashion. So does styling of quotes; and both are inconvenient for editors, especially for the army of amateurs that makes Misplaced Pages. We agree, I think, that there is no reason to impose the one on them; I say we should also not impose the other, but only differences that mark a distinction in meaning. Who is capricious?
• You declaim (☺): "Online media are somehow different from print media? Of course they are, but if the difference has anything to do with dashes, I cannot find it." Well, nor can I. In both, dashes for sentence punctuation have always been distinct from hyphens for word punctuation; and en dashes have evolved, over the last century, to be distinct from both em dashes and hyphens. That need not be a matter of the medium, especially now that online text can easily do the same with dashes and hyphens as print does.
• You expect that I cleave to "Commonwealth English", as if that were a coherent entity and "American English" were another. But I do not, as the preceding sentence shows. I accept that English is becoming more international. Misplaced Pages is a huge player in that development, and will grow huger yet. I use what is good and widely acceptable from all sorts of literate English, and am as likely to prefer a CMOS convention if it works and has acceptance as I am to reject a Cambridge convention if I find it moribund and fusty. Unlike you, I do see that new collaboratively edited online text is a departure from traditional print text. (Consider searchability and the need to preserve it, once more.) We both respect both, and work with both; we should adapt to the needs of both.
• If you have not yet noticed that Misplaced Pages is a unique pioneering effort, at the forefront of ineluctable change in protocols for text, I will not attempt to open your eyes. As for other languages, I am concerned with punctuation in several of them. The histories and politics differ in fascinating ways, and comparisons can be deceptive. Other-language Wikipedias struggle in ways that reflect national and regional cultural and linguistic politics – ripe for PhD dissertations. Do not assume that all is straightforward in them, nor that the dialogue is always as advanced as ours here.
• If you don't see the good reason for adaptability, that is not for the want of evidence all around you. I have done what I can to show it, matching your ten points with ten in reply; but your opinions remain your responsibility, not mine.

I wish dialogue on this page were always be so reasonable and orderly! We might make quicker progress; and I'm confident that your way and mine are close. It has taken us a long time for a gap to open up between them, and it is not unbridgeable.

Noetica 10:28, 20 June 2011 (UTC)

As with so many things, I guess “caprice” and “articulated foundation in reason” are in the eye of the beholder. Brevity (and perhaps wit) has never been my strong suit, so I shall make no attempt at it.

• Be assured that I have nothing against dashes, as should be obvious from my comments in that discussion. I’ve used en dashes for 25 years, so my preaching and practice are consistent. As strange as it may seem, I somewhat agree with PMAnderson that en dashes (save perhaps number ranges) find more support in style guides than in practice. Of course, this may say more about the practitioners than value of dashes. My point was, and remains, that quotes or dashes are essentially no different from any other non-ASCII character.
• If you lived here, you’d be home by now; hypotheticals concerning typographical development are tough to deal with.
• Admittedly, my reference to nightmare made an inference from the mention of f–i ligatures; I assumed they would have not been mentioned in a discussion about quotes unless they were seen to present a similar problem. Incidentally, I agree that they make for easier-reading copy in serif typefaces because the normal alignment of the f and i usually looks like crap. And despite philosophical concerns with encoding them in the source rather than having them rendered on output, I use them in my own work with anything that is to be printed or converted to PDF.
• My reference to “online media” was admittedly somewhat preemptive, and probably drew more from comments in the last discussion about quotes than anything you said here. Absent a convincing explanation, I still don’t buy the claim that “online media” are somehow different from print media in the context (I really meant to say with regard to quotes rather than to dashes, but I’m not sure there’s much of a difference). Perhaps differences become more apparent if we get more specific about the media. It’s conceivable that there is a difference between something presented in HTML and one in PDF. If something in the latter format is generated using MS Word, a user can rely on the “smart quotes” feature (at least most of the time) to handle the typographical quotes. But this strikes me as more WP:IDOWANNADOIT than anything else. And of course, not all PDF is generated from Word. I do concede one real difference between the two formats: searches in Acrobat Reader using fi will match ligatures, while searches in the five majors will not. The same is largely true for searches using typewriter quotes; they find typographical quotes in Acrobat (and in Chrome and Safari), but not in the other major browsers (I haven’t checked IE 9).
• I don’t think I mentioned “Commonwealth English”, but simply noted that I seem to follow US practice while you and others tend to follow British practice (OUP excepted). I don’t suggest that one is necessarily better than the other, but simply recognize that there is more than one way to do it. More important, both practices are well established, whereas use of typewriter quotes with proportionally spaced typefaces is not.
• New collaboratively edited online text? Seems to me that this encompasses several issues . . . Different is never the same; the operative question is the significance of the difference. But whatever the difference, it applies to any non-ASCII character as to quotes (or dashes or whatever).
• Searchability and the need to preserve it? Once again, this applies to any non-ASCII character as well as to quotes.
• However Misplaced Pages may represent a pioneering effort, there is nothing about it that argues persuasively for treating quotes differently from any other non-ASCII character. I think introducing “national and regional cultural and linguistic politics” is a distraction from the simple fact that WP:IDOWANNADOIT seems less of an issue for the editors of those wikis. I usually rail against the oversimplification inherent in “Just do it”, but in this instance I think it’s the proper answer.
• Again, so many things are in the eye of the beholder. What’s clear and convincing evidence to one can be insignificant to another. Though many arguments against typographical quotes have been presented, I agree with the editor who added the comment to the MOS register that most of the arguments are utterly unpersuasive, and some are just silly. This isn’t to say that every argument is insubstantial, but in balance, I remain thoroughly unpersuaded. I concede that the silliness of some of the arguments probably wields disproportionate influence on my resistance to persuasion. Though I’m apparently in the minority, it’s far from a small minority.

I suspect that we really aren’t that far apart, especially in what we do outside of Misplaced Pages. Where we seem to differ is on why quotes merit special treatment. Since the equivalent of typesetting has been available to ordinary mortals, I have required (or strongly urged) people who have worked for me to employ normal standards of typography (there are advantages to benevolent dictatorship). For what it’s worth, I’ve encountered little resistance to typographical quotes, but have probably come close to death threats over en dashes. JeffConrad (talk) 08:58, 21 June 2011 (UTC)

• WP:What Misplaced Pages Is states, "Misplaced Pages is not paper".  Which is more obsolete, the Linotype or the typewriter?  It shouldn't matter here, since by fundamental policy we are not a publishing house, nor are we a typing pool; our typography is paperless.  The proposal under discussion removes four words, "These were typewriter approximations."  This is a flawed rationale, for example, the intentional misstatement that the combination of two hyphens is an approximation, and the misdirection that the Misplaced Pages decision involving computer keyboards and a paperless encyclopedia is somehow an obvious pushback against the typewriter.  Unscintillating (talk) 01:12, 29 June 2011 (UTC)

Other dash issues

Not to get sidetracked by yet other dash issues, but we currently say nothing about the use of two-em and three-em dashes. Though I did only a quick search, I could find nothing on the elision of parts of a word. New Hart’s Rules and the Oxford Style Manual prefer “f––– off” (three en dashes), while US practice seems to prefer “f—— off” (two-em dash) or sometimes “f— off”; I’ve also seen “f--- off”.

I see a possible issue with some fonts: on my system, two consecutive em dashes display fine with the default typeface (e.g., “Mr. P——”) and with my default serif typeface (“Mr. P——”) but aren’t continuous in the example font (“Mr. P——”). I haven’t done extensive testing, so perhaps the last example is one of few exceptions to normal behavior.

Though two-em and three-em dashes aren’t everyday characters, they are used for elision of letter, whole words, and in bibliographic entries, so they might be worth covering. I think we should resolve the current issue with en dashes, but may wish to address these issues if we get around to making changes to the MOS. JeffConrad (talk) 01:50, 20 June 2011 (UTC)

More conventional: f... off. Tony (talk) 07:43, 20 June 2011 (UTC)

Nah! "f&*^ off" or "fxxx off" is more conventional. --Ohconfucius 07:51, 20 June 2011 (UTC)

Looks like finding consensus for expletives could be tough; presumably, we won’t need to deal with them very often. But what about the other uses? As might be expected, I tend to follow CMOS here, using a 2-em dash for omission of part of a word (expletive or otherwise), a 3-em dash for omission of an entire word, and a 3-em dash in a bibliography or author-date (or should that be author–date?) reference list. But recommendations of style guides are all over the map just for bibliographies: MWSM called for single em dash (MWM seems silent on the issue), and OSM and NHR call for a 2-em rule. JeffConrad (talk) 08:32, 20 June 2011 (UTC)

If this ever comes up, then presumably it's because we're quoting a censored source. In that case I think we should just copy whatever style the source uses. A long time ago I recall reading a newspaper column (as I said, a long time ago) where the columnist said that he and other journalists used to carefully count the dashes in words like "a------" but now the rule was to use dashes. He had some lament about dashes, but I forget what it was (being a newspaper column, it was about as deep and thoughtful as an average blog post). Ozob (talk) 00:09, 21 June 2011 (UTC)

I've actually never seen that one before, Tony. Darkfrog24 (talk) 13:11, 20 June 2011 (UTC)

I have a similar recollection; apparently showing the number of characters in a word offends some. I agree we can deal with elided expletives if and when we ever need to. JeffConrad (talk) 07:02, 21 June 2011 (UTC)

I've seen two-em and three-em dashes in various guides, esp. older ones, but never have used such a thing, and hope we won't need to. None of the example dash groupings above show up as a continuous rule on my font/browser. Dicklyon (talk) 14:24, 20 June 2011 (UTC)

Um, see Depth of field—I simply followed Chicago style. The rules are continuous for me using the default fonts in Firefox 4, IE 8, Chrome 12, Safari 5, and Opera 11. I cannot find a 2-em or 3-em in the Unicode tables, so using three consecutive dashes is apparently the only option. JeffConrad (talk) 07:02, 21 June 2011 (UTC)

• Seriously? Oh well… It has been my experience that the most common English-language convention is to substitute redacted letters with hyphens one for one. Editors use the bare minimum of letters in the expletive so as to clue adults as to what the expression means and then substitute the correct number of redacted letters with hyphens; thus He called him a “mother f-----” and he took offense and He said “I don’t give a s---.” I’ve seen this over and over. Greg L (talk) 18:19, 25 June 2011 (UTC)
• As Misplaced Pages is not censored, we should only be dealing with redacted letters if we quoting a source that has redacting them - therefore we should follow the source.Nigel Ish (talk) 20:03, 25 June 2011 (UTC)
  • I completely agree. We should format a censored word how it is in the source. Censoring written words is pointless anyway since censoring it doesn't mean you didn't write it and anyone can still know read it says. McLerristarr | Mclay1 06:25, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

And I’ve seen f**k off! as commonly as anything else. At the risk of being a killjoy, my inclusion of the example eliding some of the letters in an expletive was largely tongue in cheek. What do we do about the elision of words or with repeated authors in bibliographies? Or are these uses sufficiently infrequent that we’re OK as long as we follow some reasonable style guide and do so consistently within any article? JeffConrad (talk) 06:52, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

Subpage structure for the Manual of Style: implementation

The subpage RFC currently under discussion on this page has overwhelming support. No one speaks strongly against it so far, and some editors urge that we go ahead and do it. I agree that we should press on with this valuable reform; but we need to discuss the details of its implementation. So here I sketch a systematic way to proceed, taking full advantage of what the change will allow.

Proposed stages

(Stages 1 and 2 can be undertaken at the same time; but the elements of Stage 2 will require careful sequencing.)

Stage 1: clear the way

Existing miscellaneous subpages of Misplaced Pages:Manual_of_Style (hereafter called WP:MOS) to be relocated

This is a necessary step in the overall process, since the present structure is a mess. See this list of current subpages:

• Many are simple redirects, like Misplaced Pages:Manual_of_Style/(mathematics) which redirects to Misplaced Pages:Manual_of_Style (mathematics).
• Some are vestiges of defunct discussions or initiatives: Misplaced Pages:Manual_of_Style/(biographies)/Survey_on_Style-Prefixed_Honorary_Titles/Ratification.
• Some have a vital role to play, and should be preserved in a suitable location: Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style/Register.
• At least one is a current draft of guidelines for consideration: Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style/Dash draft.

I propose that we discuss options for relocating all such non-guideline subpages, both existing and future.

Discussion of Stage 1

The discussions should be moved to Misplaced Pages talk:, where they will supplement the talk archive searches (they should have been there in the first place). Redirects cause no harm, provided they point to the correct source. Some might find them annoying when looking at list of subpages, so they can be deleted (provided all inbound links are edited). Pages such as Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style/Register are merely an index of decisions made by consensus in relation to the MoS. These serve as a supplementary index of sorts, so I don't think the current location is inappropriate, even if it is slightly inconsistent. Drafts should be located at either the future title and marked as "proposed", or in user-space. If editors wish community involvement with their draft then it should be in the logical proposed location, so that everyone can easily guess its location, can easily stumble across it, and can automatically understand its purpose. If the proposer does not wish outside involvement, then standard practice is to keep it in user space until it is ready. So Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style/Dash draft should be at Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style/Dashes. ▫ JohnnyMrNinja 05:24, 23 June 2011 (UTC)

For clarity, this is the list of all pages beginning with "Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style". This includes current subpages and (proposed) future subpages. ▫ JohnnyMrNinja 05:31, 23 June 2011 (UTC)

Johnny, the matter may not be entirely straightforward. (See a related concern I have just added about exact naming, for Stage 2 below.) We need to think through how Misplaced Pages searching will work, using the prefix system. And also web-searching (such as with Google), which is only going to get more important, given Misplaced Pages's preeminence on the web. Did you mean exactly what you wrote: "Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style/Dash draft should be at Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style/Dashes"? Please amend for accuracy, or clarify.

Your list is handy. See also Links to 82 affected pages in the RFC above.

Noetica 07:56, 23 June 2011 (UTC)

About Dashes, what I meant exactly was that it should be at the proposed title, whatever that ends up being in future. Worst case you could have "/Dashes (draft)", but I still think the exact proposed title is ideal. Are you questioning me about Dashes specifically, or about formatting of all MoS titles? BTW, in contrast to the link I posted above, this is all pages beginning with "Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style/". The ending "/" makes a big difference, and this is what we can base the pre-built searches off of. ▫ JohnnyMrNinja 17:02, 23 June 2011 (UTC)

To minimise possible ructions with local editors, could the moves be preceded by a notice on the talk pages? Tony (talk) 12:01, 23 June 2011 (UTC)

Stage 2: progressively move Manual of Style pages

Existing pages to be moved one by one, with full consultation, and checked for consistency in the process

As a great advantage of the subpage proposal, we can take the opportunity to check each new candidate subpage for internal consistency (and general quality), consistency with WP:MOS itself, and consistency with others that have already been brought in as subpages. This was not proposed in the RFC; but it was always clear that the proposal was part of a larger purpose: to contain the unexamined and disorderly proliferation of guidelines. I am proposing that we set up that reform now, while there is an opportunity. We can take our time. Reform has been tried before, but too hastily and without a clear enough mechanism. Along the way it may be found that pages can be merged (mutually, or into WP:MOS); or that some can be abandoned. I suggest we start with WP:MOSNUM, because it is obviously of major importance. WP:MOS itself, and all other pages of the Manual, must be in accord with its provisions.

We also need to discuss the exact form that titles of subpages should have, to keep things absolutely clear and simple, and especially to optimise searching under both Misplaced Pages- and web-searching.

I propose that we discuss an order of procedure for these careful progressive moves; or if people take a different view, for alternative ways to implement the proposal approved in the RFC.

Discussion of Stage 2

Support. Consistency between the main MoS and subpages/subsections actually strikes me as more important than the subpage/subsection issue itself. We should plan to do this regardless of the outcome of the rest of the current proposal. Darkfrog24 (talk) 13:43, 23 June 2011 (UTC)

More input needed regarding improved MOS NavBox

Additional editors would be appreciated at Template_talk:Style#Draft_navbox to appraise a proposed improvement to the MOS Sidebar NavBox (which appears in upper right corner of most MOS pages). Thanks. --Noleander (talk) 01:26, 24 June 2011 (UTC)

Hyphen usage for "very well-known" vs. "very well known"

From WP:HYPHEN: "A hyphen is normally used when the adverb well precedes a participle used attributively (a well-meaning gesture; but normally a very well managed firm, since well itself is modified); ..." Could someone supply a reference to support the usage indicated in the underlined part? I can't seem to find this exception (i.e., advocating the removal of the hyphen when well is modified) in my style guides. Thanks, Sasata (talk) 02:37, 24 June 2011 (UTC)

says "Exception: In compounds beginning with good-, well-, ill-, better-, best-, lesser-, least-, etc., use a hyphen except when preceded by another modifier."

"very well known dude" Chris the speller  02:46, 24 June 2011 (UTC)

says "Use a hyphen after full or well when it's used in a compound modifier immediately before a noun, unless the word itself is modified."

"a very well known professor" Chris the speller  02:48, 24 June 2011 (UTC)

says "Hyphenate compounds that include well- and ill- when they precede the noun. Do not hyphenate if the expression carries a modifier."

"a very well known woman" Chris the speller  02:50, 24 June 2011 (UTC)

says much the same as the second source I gave. Chris the speller  02:53, 24 June 2011 (UTC)

(<-) Thanks. Learn something new every day I guess. I have fixed the problem in the articles we were discussing by removing the nearly useless modifier "very". Cheers, Sasata (talk) 02:55, 24 June 2011 (UTC)

Naming conventions (use English)

Because User talk:Jimbo Wales is on my watchlist, I noticed User talk:Jimbo Wales#Wikipedia_talk:Naming_conventions_(use_English)#Specific_proposals_to_change_the_wording_of_the_policy, which refers to and links to Misplaced Pages talk:Naming conventions (use English)#Specific proposals to change the wording of the policy.
—Wavelength (talk) 20:08, 24 June 2011 (UTC)

I am revising my message by converting the second and third links from simple permanent links to piped links (showing non-permanent links but hiding permanent links). I did not do this at 20:08, 24 June 2011 (UTC), because I wanted to save time. I am doing it now, because the permanent links are very long and affect the width of the text on the screen.
—Wavelength (talk) 15:25, 25 June 2011 (UTC)

Page protection

It looks like the dispute that led to this page being protected dates back to February. Unfortunately, I can't even find the discussion at this point, so does this mean that the Manual of Style is going to be protected forever? For what it's worth, I think the disputed sentence is completely redundant and pointless. Why is there so much controversy over it? Kaldari (talk) 21:33, 24 June 2011 (UTC)

Kaldari, could you remind us what the disputed sentence is? It's all so long ago. A couple of months back I called for those disputing it to work things out, so we can get on with the work of this page. (I had nothing to do with it, and just wanted to make a series of tidying edits in MOS.) But that call was inexplicably rejected by commenters on this page. Noetica 23:39, 24 June 2011 (UTC)

This was the last edit before the page was protected. (An edit war over a hidden comment? FFS!) ― A. di M.​_plé​ 00:18, 25 June 2011 (UTC)

(BTW, gotta love the way WP:3RR reminds me of threefold repetition.) :-) ― A. di M.​_plé​ 00:24, 25 June 2011 (UTC)

Well, it was the dispute behind that sentence, plus all the drama involving hyphens and dashes that was going on concurrently. I was waiting for the conclusion of Misplaced Pages talk:Manual of Style/dash drafting (or alternatively, the mass rename of subpages) to remove the protection, with the hope of preventing continued flare-ups over the same dispute. That said, I have no opposition to unprotecting earlier if you guys think it would not re-escalate tensions or somehow influence the poll's results. Titoxd 01:21, 25 June 2011 (UTC)

Titoxd, it's time to think about alternative approaches. As I see, reviewing the history of the page in late February 2011, just two or three editors were involved in that sharp exchange over hidden text (!), and over a political point (against MOS) inserted among practical guidelines. This is not a reason for the central page of Misplaced Pages's Manual of Style (applicable to 6,942,002 articles) to be disabled for months. Nor is the dispute over dashes and hyphens a sufficient reason. That issue came to the fore because the very same extremely small minority brought it to the fore; and it is being dealt with in a proper way under ArbCom supervision, right now.

Perhaps there should be specific bans for sections of the page; or narrowly defined topic bans – like no alterations about reliable sources, or whatever the "hot spot" happens to be. Or perhaps we need to look seriously at topic-banning individuals who cause huge disruption here, and whose agenda is clearly to weaken MOS, no matter what it takes. Perhaps we are too tolerant of politically driven disruption. It's insidious; and we need to be watchful. One hundred editors can behave well and work productively on MOS; but if two want to disable that work, they can easily do so. Let's rethink this. Noetica 01:45, 25 June 2011 (UTC)

I agree. Additionally, for what it's worth, I feel that administrators in general have been far to trigger happy about fully protecting this page over the years. I don't know about specific bans (although that's certainly something to consider), but... I have a hunch that part of the problem here is the constant page protections that occur. I don't have any hard evidence to base this on, but getting the page protected seems to have become something of a strategy. Fights shouldn't be allowed to escalate too far, but... let people bicker for a while. Doing so can relieve some of the stress, and once certain partisans realize that the page isn't going to immediately be protected that can have the effect of slowing down the battles somewhat. This document isn't that important, after all.
— V = IR (Talk • Contribs) 05:50, 25 June 2011 (UTC)

Let's remember one thing: The MoS has not been disabled or inaccessible these past few months. To do its job, it needs to be viewable by readers. Being editable by us is not its main function. Let's also remember that no one wanted to shut down the page. This was not a case of troublemakers or vandalism. It was a discussion that got more intense than usual.

That being said, the way things tend to go here, it would be fantastic if there were a way to edit-protect only certain sections of the MoS. They're big enough and self-contained enough to merit it. Darkfrog24 (talk) 13:19, 25 June 2011 (UTC)

The normal work of editing the page has been disabled. There are dozens of small things to attend to in its maintenance, at least. Editors are not motivated to go through the laborious business of asking admins to fix them. And admins have edited the page in the meantime, without consultation here; there is therefore a heightened imbalance of power, and non-admins committed to developing this page through consensus have their task made even harder.

I note the assertion that "this is not a case of troublemakers". I regret, however, that the evidence is clear. It is. And it has been going on for far too long, so that it seems to be almost normal and acceptable. Through "a discussion that got more intense than usual", occasioned by an interest in weakening the role of MOS, all editors here have been tarred by the same brush and the page has been protected for four months. People will choose what to call that: I don't call it normal; I don't call it acceptable. We should require that the editors responsible undo their ill work; and that we are not all treated so shoddily in future, as we go about our work maintaining and improving the Manual of Style.

Noetica 22:26, 25 June 2011 (UTC)

The "normal work" of this page consists of pretentious editors imposing their provincial versions of English on this page (and, they hope, on the rest of Misplaced Pages). The rest of the encyclopedia has not missed it. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 23:46, 26 June 2011 (UTC)

(outdent) I know nothing about the dispute that led to the current page protection. However, it is embarrassing that those who are the self-appointed arbiters of Misplaced Pages's style guidelines (I have been one in the past) have difficulty complying with Misplaced Pages's behavior guidelines and policies, which require collaborative editing, to a degree that led to the MoS being protected indefinitely. I take issues of style as seriously as anyone, and perhaps more seriously than is sane; I am not alone in this affliction. However, the success of Misplaced Pages as a project depends more on fostering a spirit of community and collaboration than on the resolution of any particular issue of style. I urge all who are involved, perhaps with the assistance of those who are not involved, to resolve the issue, whatever it is, and end this sorry situation now.—Finell 23:58, 26 June 2011 (UTC)

Well, you may want to look into the actual dispute. It seems to me that the full protection was jumping the gun a bit (and maintaining it for four months is indefensible, in my opinion). In my experience, I've witnessed much worse edit wars on policy and guideline pages then have ever occurred here.
— V = IR (Talk • Contribs) 00:04, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

It's always the same dispute: a handful of editors want a "strong" page, whether or not what it demands is what editors or readers actually want or regard as English. This is not, of course, consensus; the usual suspects then remove all signs that it is not consensus. That appears to have been the impulse for the latest protection; it will be the impulse for the next protection. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 00:31, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

Finell, we are all "self-appointed" volunteers at Misplaced Pages, with our diverse skills to donate. You have missed the point I make above. It is easy for one or two editors, set hard and fast against Misplaced Pages having a robust and usable Manual of Style, to disrupt and defame its work. The guidelines here are developed through an open process. Any editors can contribute to it ("self-appointing" themselves); and the most vociferous detractors have themselves done exactly that. We are seeing evidence right now, at Wikipedia_talk:Manual_of_Style/dash_drafting, how well the guidelines enshrine common best practice, and how solidly they are endorsed by the community. In any case, WP:MOS is indeed a set of guidelines, not edicts. Those thinking it dictatorial are typically those who most vehemently enforce policy, against even reasonable exceptions or WP:IAR; they are the most likely to assert for WP:TITLE an unnegotiable dominance, even in areas that have always been the business of WP:MOS.

I would not have started this section. It has turned out not to be a constructive discussion. I hold off from escalating things, and from responding further to manifest abuse and misrepresentation. As one who had no part in bringing on the present protection, as one who resolutely called for orderly centralised discussion and made peace proposals in the dash débâcle, as one who just wants to get on with the hard work of developing the page, I again ask those who caused the protection to take responsibility, and undo what they did. Noetica 01:02, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

update and unprotection

Right, I am going to unprotect this page in a few minutes. Let's really really not have edit warring over the hidden comment ( <!--The preceding sentence is not consensus and is disputed--> ) after this sentence

Many points of usage, such as the treatment of proper names, can be decided by observing the style adopted by high-quality sources when considering a stylistic question

Instead, if anyone wishes to readd or subtract it, it needs to be discussed below. Also remember that edit warring is not strictly tied to the magical number '3' and an administrator can view a lower number as disruptive in a volatile situation such as this, so if folks want to raise this again, raise it below not on the article pages or risk sanctions. Casliber (talk · contribs) 02:05, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

Thank you Cas! Let's all try for collegiality, respect, restraint, and good order. (I hope that edit summaries will be full and informative also, so that nothing is done surreptitiously. A problem in the past.) Noetica 02:27, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

Yes, thanks. :) More on topic though, we should remove the comment, in favor of a talk page discussion (If that's still needed, which I suspect it is). Hidden comments such as those are just silly.
— V = IR (Talk • Contribs) 04:51, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

The comment should be removed, ultimately; but the provision that it comments on needs to be reviewed, since it was never remotely consensual. I am therefore starting a new section, suggesting a compromise. Noetica 05:47, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

Nothing on this page is, or ever has been, consensual. Why should this be any different? Septentrionalis PMAnderson 14:15, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

Follow the sources: a compromise proposal

Here is the content of a guideline that occasioned so much trouble, back in February of this year:

Follow the sources

See also: Manual of Style:Trademarks and Misplaced Pages's policy on no original research Shortcuts

• MOS:FOLLOW
• WP:MOSFOLLOW

Many points of usage, such as the treatment of proper names, can be decided by observing the style adopted by high-quality sources when considering a stylistic question. Unless there is a clear reason to do otherwise, follow the usage of reliable English-language secondary sources. If the sources can be shown to be unrepresentative of current English usage, follow current English usage instead—and consult more sources.

Immediately after the first sentence come these words, in hidden text: "The preceding sentence is not consensus and is disputed." It is true that the provision was disputed, and that it still is. It is also true that the wording of the guideline, while seemingly innocuous, is thought by some editors to undermine and weaken WP:MOS. There is something of value in the guideline; but it certainly does not support the other guidelines on the page, or in the Manual more broadly. Never having edited that guideline myself, I now propose the following alteration and shortening:

Follow the sources

See also: Manual of Style:Trademarks and Misplaced Pages's policy on no original research Shortcuts

• MOS:FOLLOW
• WP:MOSFOLLOW

Many points of style can be decided by observing usage in high-quality sources. If a question cannot be settled using Misplaced Pages's guidelines, in the Manual of Style and elsewhere, follow relevant English-language sources. If major sources are not representative of current English usage, consult others; and give weight to current English usage.

This would not be my own preferred wording; but I offer it as giving due weight and respect to all our other guidelines. I commend it to editors here, so we can all move on from a sore point of contention. Noetica 05:47, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

Proposed wording: support votes

1. Withdrawn support as proposer. This is definitely a compromise proposal, enabling due weight for WP:MOS and the Manual of Style more broadly. Ultimately, the place to decide what weight these guidelines should have is not here: not among the guidelines themselves. It is an external matter. The guidelines should simply stand as well-founded recommendations: based on open, rational discussion, already giving weight to precedent and to major style guides. If a compromise like this is not adopted, it will be reasonable to require that the section be removed entirely. It was never consensual; it was inserted for political reasons, and works against all that MOS offers as a major element among Misplaced Pages's policies and guidelines for maintaining an excellent encyclopedia.
   I see that there is no bilateral movement toward compromise, and no general will to keep discussion civil, unthreatening, and orderly. With regret, I therefore withdraw my initiative toward compromise and settlement of an old dispute – a dispute that I had no part in. I now support withdrawing the section altogether. It has caused a ridiculous amount of turmoil and division, and is completely unnecessary in any case.
   Noetica 06:05, 29 June 2011 (UTC)

   This was no compromise: it was the same old demand: "Do whatever MOS says, whether there is any reason to do so or not." Why does Noetica think it one? And why does the proposal below not count as a bilateral attempt? (No sentence in it is mine.) Septentrionalis PMAnderson 14:12, 29 June 2011 (UTC)

2. Support. I have often argued that if the Manual of Style is wrong (not just an unlisted exception, but wrong as written), then we should change the Manual, not do it your way. If you believe you have an unusually wonderful reason to do it your way, in this case "high-quality sources", then it should be unusually easy to correct the Manual. And if you're really really really really sure we should do it your way, then it should be really really really really easy to correct the Manual. And if the Manual's regulars systematically keep the Manual wrong, then the Manual shouldn't be called a WP:GUIDELINE. But if it is a guideline, let's use it. Art LaPella (talk) 20:46, 27 June 2011 (UTC)
3. Support – while not optimally clear, definitely an improvement on the current formulation. In any case, people, please do not forget that the MOS is not a policy to bang others on the head with, but just a guideline intended to offer guidance to editors who care about stylistic issues.  --Lambiam 09:21, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

   Thank you; your comment is much better than the wording proposed. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 13:28, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

4. Support since it's basically the same thing as before. Headbomb {talk / contribs / physics / books} 18:39, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

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