Wikipedia:Templates for discussion/Log/2011 July 5



Template:WikiProject Echo

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

The result of the discussion was delete. JPG-GR (talk) 02:22, 13 July 2011 (UTC)



This banner is worse than useless. It has been applied indiscriminately to a random selection of FAs and former FAs in foreign languages without consideration of whether content from these FAs would be useful in expanding English-language Wikipedia articles. Most foreign-language Wikipedias have lower standards for FAs, so most of these banners are incorrectly applied. Note that WP:FAOL and WP:ECHO are currently dead.

Recently, User:Kobrabones has applied these indiscriminately to hundreds more articles corresponding with featured Polish articles, even where the English-language Wikipedia article was featured first and the Polish article was translated from English. I don’t mean to single out Kobrabones, though—this template has never been used in a rational, helpful manner. The current use of the template is worse than a random selection of foreign-language FAs, because the template was often applied long ago, so many of the uses don’t even correspond to foreign-language FAs currently (because those have been delisted), and more recent foreign-language FAs (which tend to be higher-quality) are not covered. If we merely want to know which foreign-language articles are featured, that is what link fa is for. It is consistent and bot-applied. I have spent probably dozens of hours—both recently and in years past—trying to assess these translation requests and see which are useful (and I have converted the worthy ones to the newer templates like Expand Spanish), but I have come to the conclusion that this is a huge waste of time. It would be more effective to just start at the list of featured articles for each wiki, and see which is better from there, than dealing with this random and unhelpful assortment currently tagged.

One of my biggest projects over the course of my time in Wikipedia is trying to consolidate and rationalize Wikipedia’s translation system (see Translation/Overhaul), and I think the time has come to get rid of this unhelpful template system in favor of targeted requests that are actually helpful. Getting rid of the banners could also be the first step in rolling the old WP:ECHO and WP:FAOL into a new, more effective translation wikiproject, which I hope to work on in the coming weeks and months. Calliopejen1 (talk) 17:15, 5 July 2011 (UTC)


 * Delete: Projects are dead.-- The     wikifyer's corner   20:48, 5 July 2011 (UTC)
 * It might be better to do this at MfD, what with the root problem being that the WikiProject is moribund. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward) - talk 21:28, 5 July 2011 (UTC)
 * I guess, but I don't think that the WikiProject itself needs to be scrapped - just this terrible template system. I think it could be useful to have this as some sort of task force within a bigger translation project, focusing on translating featured articles that are actually better than our articles. Some users might have different priorities - do we start with such articles (as this project meant to focus on), or on acceptable-quality articles where the english-language equivalent is most lacking (another possible priority, which is not currently addressed by any wikiproject in particular)? The newer expand language templates have the optional parameter fa=yes, which places them in a category so they can be targeted if desired (see Category:Featured articles needing translation from foreign-language Wikipedias and subcategories). Calliopejen1 (talk) 21:31, 5 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Even if this thread were to get moved to MfD, I'll still say "delete". But it's a template, so I don't see why it should be moved to MfD (unless you've spotted something that I havn't).-- The     wikifyer's corner   23:54, 5 July 2011 (UTC)


 * Transfer to MfD could also projectify the template out of templatespace. 65.93.15.213 (talk) 04:50, 6 July 2011 (UTC)
 * What do you mean by this? (Just moving it to project space wouldn't solve the issue of its misapplication on talk pages, but maybe this isn't what you meant.) Calliopejen1 (talk) 14:04, 6 July 2011 (UTC)
 * I meant it would be archived in projectspace. Placing the whole thing in a noinclude wrapper would fix transclusion. 65.93.15.213 (talk) 04:32, 7 July 2011 (UTC)


 * Comment this was nominated for deletion before, in 2005 65.93.15.213 (talk) 04:50, 6 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Delete per nom. Irritating thing. I was alerted to this TFD was not "canvassed". I fully agree its getting in the way.♦ Dr. Blofeld  15:40, 6 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Delete, for the reasons specified by the nominator; this template is often misleading and unhelpful. --Gyrobo (talk) 22:50, 7 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Delete If someone is going to translate good content from some other project to here, a rare thing indeed, they are not going to choose their work themselves. This isn't helpful.  S ven M anguard   Wha?  08:22, 10 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Delete. There are plenty of channels for getting articles translated: PNT for those who can't be bothered to ask, Request for Translation, and so on. As said above, the articles that get translated are those that the translator has some interest in, but this is not necessarily an interest in the subject as such, and for myself I learn a lot along the way on subjects I otherwise knew nothing about, which is the fun in it to me, and often end up cleaning up a lot of other English articles when I translate and see that another Wikipedia does some boilerplate (templates etc) in a better way. Tagging hundreds or thousands of articles with anything I tend to find pretty hopeless, it is a distraction for the reader, and unless you are superhuman like Dr Blofield the idea of taking on thousands of articles is too much and one gives up after the first half-dozen. So this kind of blunderbuss does not work in practice. Si Trew (talk) 08:32, 12 July 2011 (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 template's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

Template:Tom Hanks

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

The result of the discussion was delete. JPG-GR (talk) 02:23, 13 July 2011 (UTC)



Unnecessary navigation template since Hanks has only directed two films. MOS:FILM says, "The number of blue links to related articles should be substantial enough to warrant a navigation template. For example, if a director has only made two films, each film article instead can have a 'See also' section linking to the other film article," which has been done. If Hanks does direct more films (and it was fifteen years between his two films), we can recreate the template. Erik (talk &#124; contribs) 14:02, 5 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Delete per nom. Silly. Theoldsparkle (talk) 19:27, 6 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Delete per nom. The one film can only reastically link to the other, and back again. Navbox excessive. Si Trew (talk) 09:18, 12 July 2011 (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 template's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

Template:Double category

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

The result of the discussion was delete. JPG-GR (talk) 02:25, 13 July 2011 (UTC)



Delete. Unused and unnecessary. -- Alan Liefting (talk) - 01:40, 5 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Also, I am unsure of the meaning of the text or if it simply states the obvious. -- Alan Liefting (talk) - 09:30, 5 July 2011 (UTC)


 * I assume this also covers Category:Double categories. I too have little idea why we would both categorising this way. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward) - talk 08:34, 5 July 2011 (UTC)


 * If this template is deleted then Category:Double categories becomes redundant since its other usage has been copied to user namespace. -- Alan Liefting (talk) - 09:30, 5 July 2011 (UTC)


 * Oppose – In what way is it unnecessary? It's just like any of the other category headers that explain the contents of the category, although I wouldn't mind getting rid of the concept of double categories. The template was used until I replaced it with a better template but it was deleted for irritating reasons. Whoever wanted my template deleted should have put the templates I replaced back but he didn't.  McLerristarr &#124;  Mclay1  14:16, 6 July 2011 (UTC)
 * What was the other template, and why was the other template deleted? A link to the deletion discussion would be useful. Calliopejen1 (talk) 14:19, 6 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Template:Category banner was deleted in this discussion. Basically, there were three reasons to delete it: 1) it had WikiProject information in it, which is used by the French Wikipedia among others but could easily have been removed; 2) I didn't discuss implementing it beforehand, which I tried to but received no reply; and 3) there were a few reasons which were reasons to delete all template headers, not just that one. Template:Category banner was intended (still is) to replace all other template headers. However, the question now arises, do we still want template headers? People have complained that they are too big and they provide editor-specific information, which is distracting to readers.  McLerristarr &#124;  Mclay1  15:07, 6 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Whoever wanted your template deleted should have notified that they were proposing the template for deletion. Why should the templates be replaced?Curb Chain (talk) 04:22, 7 July 2011 (UTC)


 * The templates should be replaced by one template for purposes of standardisation and because some categories end up with loads of message boxes cluttering up the top.  McLerristarr &#124;  Mclay1  10:09, 7 July 2011 (UTC)
 * It is unnecessary since it is stating the obvious. -- Alan Liefting (talk) - 05:55, 8 July 2011 (UTC)


 * It would have been courtesy to notify, and Twinkle etc will ask to do so. However, it is not a requirement of the process, and I imagine the author would have it on a watchlist, so beyond the lack of courtesy, I don't think that makes any difference to the delete/keep/amend discussion. Si Trew (talk) 10:04, 12 July 2011 (UTC)


 * Delete all I have no idea what this is, or why this would exist.  All categories either contain articles, contain subcategories, or both.Curb Chain (talk) 04:19, 7 July 2011 (UTC)
 * If you don't know what it is, you shouldn't really be participating in the discussion. A double category contains a set of articles and the articles' corresponding categories (e.g. Category:European countries). It is unusual for a set category to contain such categories because they are acting as members of the category, rather than subcategories. This message box alerts people to that fact and attempts to prevent editors from removing the subcategories from the set category.  McLerristarr &#124;  Mclay1  10:09, 7 July 2011 (UTC)
 * The point that Curb Chain is making is that the template is unnecessary. -- Alan Liefting (talk) - 05:55, 8 July 2011 (UTC)
 * I'm pretty sure he's saying that he doesn't understand what the template is for, so I explained it.  McLerristarr &#124;  Mclay1  04:43, 9 July 2011 (UTC)


 * Delete all. Even having followed the links I don't understand what a double category, pair category, etc is supposed to be. Articles live in categories, and they live in hierarchies, well acyclical directed graphs to be more accurate. So what is a double category? A category that has two parents or what? Delete as superfluous and confusing. Si Trew (talk) 10:01, 12 July 2011 (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 template's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.