Template talk:Deserts

Arctic Archipelago in northern Canada
Does the Arctic Archipelago in northern Canada qualify as a cold desert region? If not, why? Nicholas GunnThewayofthegunn 20:33, 5 June 2007 (UTC)

perhaps the deserts here should be grouped by continent or other like geographic entity? 24.218.100.40 15:06, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

Re-write
I'm working on a re-write of the desert template here. I'd appreciate some assistance. Just fix it yourself or leave a comment on the page below the template. Thanks. :) vıdıoman  (talk • contribs) 03:31, 9 December 2007 (UTC)

Nice work
You've all done some nice work here. I added the template to the Black Rock Desert page. Ikluft (talk) 23:58, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

autocollapse behavior
OK, I reverted a fellow editor's change so I owe an explanation here. A change was made to force Template:Deserts to always collapse, with the reason being because it's so large. It isn't a problem that the navbox is large - they're intended for navigation and there are a lot of related places to navigate to. But it can be a confusing problem for readers when navboxes don't behave consistently - it makes Wikipedia look inconsistent to them. WP:NAVBOX says autocollapse is the expected behavior for navboxes. On pages with multiple navboxes, such as Great Basin and Black Rock Desert, they'll all collapse automatically anyway unless specifically given a parameter not to. However, on pages with just this navbox, especially Deserts but also any of them with no other navboxes, it's part of the expected presentation for it to be expanded. A single collapsed navbox is not a common sight on Wikipedia. We have to take the wider view when editing templates and consider as many as possible of the pages which use it. If the size of the navbox is determined by discussion to be a big issue, then a better solution would be to break it up into templates of Deserts by continent, rather than be inconsistent with other navboxes. Ikluft (talk) 11:30, 13 March 2008 (UTC)
 * My problem was that several articles on deserts are very short (i.e. stubs) and the navbox is more than double the size of the text itself (see Oltenian Sahara as one example). I don't see a problem with it being collapsed when it is the only template on the page. пﮟოьεԻ   5  7  12:33, 13 March 2008 (UTC)
 * I made this template and was planning to eventually get around to making it region specific. For example, on an article for the Gobi desert, only deserts in Asia would appear listed, the others would be hidden. I don't know if I'll have the time but if someone else wants to do it that would be greatly appreciated. :) See Template:Numbertreaty for an example. Also, the standard navbox colour is that blueish purple colour; I chose orange because it's deserty but that can be reset if you feel it is necessary to do so.  vıd ıoman  17:27, 13 March 2008 (UTC)
 * That template is an excellent example - I shall have a go at that if no-one objects. Also, I think the colour is fine - most approoriate for the subject! пﮟოьεԻ   5  7  17:31, 13 March 2008 (UTC)
 * No objection here. It sounds like we're in agreement that reorganizing it by region is a better approach. I have no strong preference for the exact implementation - separate templates by region or one template that displays one region at a time. I'm swamped until Monday but may be able to help after that if still needed. Note for Vidioman - I think you made a good choice on the color. Ikluft (talk) 08:10, 14 March 2008 (UTC)
 * Thank you. :) I prefer having the one template with region-specific capabilities instead of making several different ones. Also, we may be able to remove Antarctica from the list? It might look awkward being there all by itself.  vıd ıoman  19:33, 14 March 2008 (UTC)
 * After reading this discussion about the navbox being perceived as too large, I've noticed a number of other navbox templates are as big as this one. For example, Template:Protected_Areas_of_Nevada or Template:SFBAtransit are among them.  I think that's just the direction Wikipedia is headed - navboxes will grow as they facilitate navigation among a greater number of articles.  No big deal.  So it's probably not worth the effort to optimize the Deserts navbox to show only one continent at a time.  Rather, a better use of volunteer time and effort would be to expand the articles that look too small with this template in them.  At least don't worry about it. Ikluft (talk) 03:33, 7 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Oh, and it's nothing compared to Template:Protected Areas of California. Ikluft (talk) 03:54, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

be careful not to lose entries in edits
I just restored the Rangipo Desert and Kaʻū Desert, which had been lost in several recent edits. Apparently two editors each wanted to reorg the template. One lumped together Australia, New Zealand and Hawaii and renamed the section Oceania. Another renamed it back to Australia and deleted the non-Australian entries. I renamed the section from Australia to Australia and Oceania, and re-added Rangipo Desert to it, and renamed another section to North America and Hawaii, and added Kaʻū Desert back to it, as in a previous configuration of the template.

This isn't necessarily right, certainly not perfect. And neither this nor several other previous configurations are wrong either. I can see the issue here looks like several editors are trying to deal with conflicting issues of formatting the template (i.e. not having any more sections with just one entry) and geographic grouping. Antarctica already stands out as having only one entry. New Zealand and Hawaii each would have one as well. And the problem people are having is where to put them. This seems like a good compromise, except that the title of North America and Hawaii is long so it squeezes an already-large template, tempting people to reorg it again.

Another possibility would be to make a miscellaneous category of Antarctica and Pacific, moving the New Zealand and Hawaii entries in there. Though that would solve the formatting issue of having Antarctica with just one entry, I think it makes less sense than the current layout. Nobody really thinks of Hawaii along with Antarctica in any other category. And New Zealand only associates well with Antarctica as the base from which research expeditions to it are made, not for geography.

Yet another option would be to add a new section called Pacific and put the Hawaii and New Zealand entries there. It would have only those 2 entries.

So while we figure out the best way for format the template, let's be careful not to lose any entries in the process. Ikluft (talk) 17:29, 27 July 2008 (UTC)


 * The article for Ka'u desert was duplicated in the North America section, I removed the second instance and added breaks in Aussie/Oceania and NA/Hawaii to make the bar on the left smaller. I'm going to go through and add this template to those articles because almost none of them have it.  vıd ıoman  19:02, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

Deleted two minor NAM deserts
I've removed Tule Desert (Arizona) & Tule Desert (Nevada) from the template: these are two minor features, just barely notable, and their articles are barely stubs. Cluttered the template, imo. Cheers, Pete Tillman (talk) 23:21, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

Template problems
This template has a serious problem -- it mixes major and minor deserts, with no real indication to the user as to which is which. For instance, in North America, the template lists the Sonoran Desert and the Nk'mip Desert as of apparent equal rank -- but the Sonoran encompasses an area of 311,000 km², in two countries and five states, while the Nk'mip is an invented name for a small, dry area in British Colombia, that isn't really a desert!

The List of deserts actually does a better job in making the hierarchy of deserts clear. We need something similar (perhaps the same?) for this template. Cheers, Pete Tillman (talk) 23:44, 10 August 2008 (UTC), Consulting Geologist, Arizona and New Mexico (USA)


 * Reorganizing it to match List of Deserts would probably be best. I was going to make it specific to continent but can't figure out how to do that so just having larger regions would likely be better. If it is warranted, each region could have its own navbox linking to the smaller desert areas, communities, landforms, waterbodies, etc.  vıd ıoman  20:26, 11 August 2008 (UTC)

Toggle template?
Is there a syntax to collapse this template for a single page? I couldn't find one, but I don't know template syntax, really... TIA, Pete Tillman (talk) 15:48, 24 April 2009 (UTC)
 * I set it to always be collapsed.  vıd ıoman  19:25, 24 April 2009 (UTC)
 * I just looked in the history and this was done before and then reverted because it is against some policy. There is no other way to get it to close automatically on short pages as far as I know. vıd ıoman  19:27, 24 April 2009 (UTC)
 * Huh. Weel, if there's only one choice, I guess I'd vote for "open". Odd that you can't choose on a page-by-page basis. Thanks, Pete Tillman (talk) 19:32, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

Middle East?
Why is the so-called "Middle East" not listed as part of Asia where it belongs; and rather singled out? Lostinlodos (talk) 23:38, 4 July 2009 (UTC)
 * It is generally treated as a distinct region. If you like, you can merge it with Asia. vıd ıoman  00:01, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

Deliblatska Peščara
Deliblatska Peščara is not actually a desert. Just see the photos. Vanjagenije (talk) 12:09, 7 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Acutally Deliblatska Peščara receives between 6 and 8 inches of rain per year in some areas, making it a desert. While bending the definition slightly (others areas receive many feet of rain), it works for this case well enough to be included. Lostinlodos (talk) 18:13, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

Not Deserts?
Some Deserts ie Okanagan Desert and Carcross Desert have been removed from the category:Desert and the categories Deserts of Canada/Yukon deleted. The initiator could have discussed the matter here. See the discussion page Hugo999 (talk) 12:54, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

Deserts on other planets?
I wonder if this category is really encyclopedic, an/or helpful to the reader. All of the listed examples are on Mars; by any reasonable definition, the entire planet is a desert. As are our Moon, Venus, Mercury etc etc. Probably this section should be deleted. Thoughts? --Pete Tillman (talk) 15:00, 28 December 2009 (UTC)
 * Mars is probably a bad example. Venus is probably a better choice, as it has both flowing oceans and deserts. Also Titan and IO. There are many good examples for this, it simply needs to be expanded. Lostinlodos (talk) 18:07, 29 December 2009 (UTC)


 * Venus has flowing oceans??? --and, ims, the lakes on Titan are hydrocarbons. Um. Pete Tillman (talk) 18:23, 29 December 2009 (UTC)
 * None of those articles made any reference to deserts or desertification, aridity or anything relating to this topic. There is also no section about "deserts on other planets" in the article Desert, so I don't think it is helpful or necessary. The articles in this template should be relevant. vıd ıoman  00:32, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

Overlinking terms
We seriously don't need to a link to World here. I'm sure Ohconfucius can fix the linking to common terms, but I am tired of battling with IP editors. Frietjes (talk) 16:20, 5 October 2014 (UTC)
 * --  Ohc  ¡digame! 01:48, 6 October 2014 (UTC)
 * thank you. I also agree with Colonies Chris on this one, so it seems there is a general consensus here to not overlink. will, unlink the content links in a moment. Frietjes (talk) 13:37, 6 October 2014 (UTC)