Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:About template mania

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 * The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the miscellaneous page below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the page's talk page or in a deletion review).  No further edits should be made to this page.

The result of the discussion was: Delete * Pppery * it has begun... 17:03, 20 January 2024 (UTC)

Wikipedia:About template mania

 * – (View MfD) &#8203;

This is outdated, super short, and never referred to on wiki. At best, it can be userfied. Zanahary (talk) 02:03, 11 January 2024 (UTC)
 * Delete (first choice) or userfy (second choice), never used, created by disruptive user Wikid77 who has been indefblocked for five years now. Graham87 (talk) 10:12, 11 January 2024 (UTC)
 * Delete per Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:Avoiding edit-conflicts, another essay with dubious advice by the same editor who probably should have been CIR banned earlier than their actual ban. SnowFire (talk) 23:26, 11 January 2024 (UTC)
 * Per SmokeyJoe below, I suppose that userfying, blanking, and deleting the resulting redirect would also be acceptable as a way of solely recording the history without displaying inaccurate and unreliable claims. SnowFire (talk) 06:42, 16 January 2024 (UTC)
 * Delete - I said that the previously deleted essay was no better than the rest of the originator's Wikipedia career. Neither is this one.  This essay seems to illustrate the Dunning-Kruger effect.  Robert McClenon (talk) 05:42, 12 January 2024 (UTC)
 * Keep . Reasonable project-related opinion.  While I am not up to speed on what exactly it is saying, it resonates with template troubles I have experienced, excessive use of template, and fiddling of templates, with poor service to readers, and especially with difficulties in viewing old versions of articles due to changed or deleted templates.  I remember some positive things about Wikid77, and object to the notion that a later block justifies deletion of earlier contributions, or slander of the user.  I do not agree that this essay has the shortcomings of the other. Noting that software changes, and this essay is from long ago, it might be sensible to tag it as historical, as relating to past versions of the software.  If anyone really thinks that the essay is wrong (I don’t) then Userfy it as a disputed single-author essay. —SmokeyJoe (talk) 08:44, 13 January 2024 (UTC)
 * Comment. I would have no objection to someone actually familiar with MediaWiki's technical side writing an essay about how templates "really" work, their load on the system, in what circumstances you can have a stale template, etc.  Maybe some spinoff of mw:Help:Templates called "Templates and performance" or the like.  That isn't this essay, which should still be deleted.  (In particular, the claim about navboxes not updating for a week seems at best historical, at worst wrong when it was written.)  SnowFire (talk) 18:33, 15 January 2024 (UTC)
 * It’s easier to delete due to being wrong, than due to being outdated. If it is possibly historical, but not reliable and definitely not correct now, it should be userfied and blanked. SmokeyJoe (talk) 20:20, 15 January 2024 (UTC)
 * Userfy without redirect and blank using Userpage blanked. It may have had merit, but I’m guessing not a lot if any. On the possibility that it did, and was written in good faith, keep the history available in the author’s userspace.  —SmokeyJoe (talk) 07:39, 16 January 2024 (UTC)
 * Comment. This essay appears to have a sequel: Page Reformat Crisis.—Alalch E. 12:40, 13 January 2024 (UTC)
 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the page's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.