Wikipedia talk:Special:DoubleRedirects

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Update
Who is incharge in updating this page, please update. --Parker007 23:46, 26 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Notice the note placed by the developers: Updates for this page are currently disabled. Data here will not presently be refreshed. We need to come up with an alternate method.  Any ideas? — Mets501 (talk) 03:37, 27 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Bug the developers at wiki tech? --Parker007 05:20, 27 January 2007 (UTC)
 * I tried that one already :-) — Mets501 (talk) 14:22, 27 January 2007 (UTC)
 * https://wikitech.leuksman.com/view/Server_admin_log Whoever writes a log, tell them to update the double redirects. I don't see you telling them on their talk page there? I already told: https://wikitech.leuksman.com/view/User_talk:Brion & https://wikitech.leuksman.com/view/User_talk:Tim ; Lets send a message to all the devs of Wikipedia over there on their talk page. Hopefully one of them will listen. --Parker007 21:13, 27 January 2007 (UTC)
 * I spoke to many devs in person on IRC; they said that it was too taxing on the server to run, and it failed often anyway. — Mets501 (talk) 01:05, 28 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Can you tell them to run it for one last time? --Parker007 01:12, 28 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Do you want to try? I don't want to piss them off more than they already are :-) — Mets501 (talk) 01:42, 28 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Please Vote here: http://bugzilla.wikimedia.org/show_bug.cgi?id=8799 --Parker007 05:21, 31 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Huh? Decisions on Wikipedia are not made by voting, especially technical decisions. —Centrx→talk &bull; 05:25, 31 January 2007 (UTC)
 * No, but the more votes people put in for the bug (votes, not comments), the higher up on the devs priority list it goes. — Mets501 (talk) 05:43, 31 January 2007 (UTC)


 * It isn't really important to have the page updated. You can still download an XML dump and have a tool analyse it and fix double redirects. Now, we should really be bugging the devs about getting valid updated dumps, which are useful beyond merely fixing double redirects. --Gwern (contribs) 04:25 6 March 2007 (GMT)
 * The patch was released on Bugzilla, and yesterday the devs updated the Wikipedia version, which included a patch for the double redirects. --Parker007 07:40, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

Format change
Who decided to change the page format so that fixed redirects are shown struck-out instead of just disappearing? And why doesn't anyone announce these types of changes before they make them? If it were up to me, I'd have put the format in a CSS selector instead of a hard-coded element, so that individual users could decide for themselves how they want the list displayed. But nobody asked me.... Russ (talk) 16:49, 30 August 2007 (UTC)
 * In concur I do not like the strikeout. Now if I want to fix one I have to scroll through thousands of them to find one thats not struck out.  Not a very efficient use of time.--Kumioko (talk) 17:30, 10 April 2008 (UTC)
 * I know, it looks ugly. I cleared out almost every single Double redirect (some 60 pages) on the list, and I think it should be fixed -75.173.147.186 (talk) 22:51, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

Shouldn't some double redirects stay?
Shouldn't some double redirects stay in-case an article is split later?

I assume that many double-redirects are created when articles are merged, but if articles are merged and then expanded they might be separated again, so what's the harm in keeping the double-redirect if it makes sense?

I realize that 99% of double-redirects are not helpful, but there should be a way to flag your double redirect as being deliberately created so that the bots will skip it.

Example:


 * 1) Say you have a redirect One-Way Valve  -->  Valve
 * 2) But the Valve article is a stub, so it becomes a section in the Plumbing article.
 * 3) So this creates the double redirect One-Way Valve  -->  Valve  -->  Plumbing
 * 4) And the bot "fixes" it by creating One-Way Valve  -->  Plumbing and Valve  -->  Plumbing
 * 5) But then you have One-Way Valve  -->  Plumbing which is fine unless the Valve and Plumbing articles are split eventually, which is likely to happen as they are expanded.
 * 6) So then, if this redirect is missed, we end up with One-Way Valve  -->  Plumbing even though there is an article entitled Valve

SO THE QUESTION IS if removing double-redirects on a article that is being merged for lack of content, but that will likely be split again later, has the potential to create problems in the future, then why not keep these rare but useful double-redirects, since they are invisible to the average reader anyway? 72.197.190.17 (talk) 10:04, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
 * I thought double redirects didn't even work. As in, you didn't really get redirected. 200.127.223.79 (talk) 19:19, 19 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Pointless to me, as one of these 'rare but useful' double-redirects can always be added back later with minimal effort. And to my understanding double-redirects are not invisible to the average reader as the MediaWiki software will only redirect once. CKBrown1000 03:45, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

question...
I left a question for a bot owner, as to whether they intended their bot to ignore  #redirect   or  #redirect    templates?

They left a note on my talk page saying they didn't understand my question.

So, I will clarify here. It seems to me that there would be no purpose for these templates if they didn't cause people to think twice about "fixing" redirections. Operative word "People". Should bots really ignore these templates?

Cheers! Geo Swan (talk) 17:41, 16 March 2008 (UTC)
 * On English wikipedia we deal with hundreds of double redirects and in certain cases thousands.
 * Double redirects are an interface hazard to the reader. Which is exactly why they are unwelcome and need to be fixed.
 * Redirect pages do not have to contain a "redirect template" of any kind as the reader does not see these pages. Such templates are notes to the editors not readers - which is fine. Their purpose is to inform the editor why that redirect exists, they do not have any other function.
 * A -> B -> C -> D (double redirect)
 * A -> D
 * B -> D
 * C -> D
 * A bot fixing double redirects basically makes sure no redirect links to another redirect. That is whats expected of the bots in question to do.
 * -- Cat chi? 01:03, 17 March 2008 (UTC)


 * I realize that redirects do not require a template. I have created thousands of redirects that do not have templates.


 * I know that some people regard double redirects as unwelcome, though I don't really understand why they feel so strongly about them.


 * The two templates I asked you to look at ask editors to pause for reflection before monkeying with the redirect where they are placed. This is a courtesy your robot cannot observe.  Therefore I think your robot should check for the existence of these templates, and leave those redirects for humans, who can exercise meaningful judgment, rather than tackling them automatically.


 * I ask again, if that is not what those templates are for, then what are they for? Geo Swan (talk) 16:34, 17 March 2008 (UTC)


 * Speaking only for myself, I use a bot that refers any redirect containing templates to me for review prior to fixing. And if I see R with possibilities on the target page, I don't change it.  However, R from misspelling is a different matter.  If Emperor of France redirected to Napolean (it doesn't actually) and Napolean redirected to Napoleon R from misspelling, of course I would change the first redirect to point to the correct spelling.  Why shouldn't I?  And if Napoleon is a redirect to Napoleon I of France (as it is), why shouldn't I change Napolean so that its target is the actual article and not another redirect?  --Russ (talk) 21:35, 19 March 2008 (UTC)


 * Why shouldn't you change the redirect... well, in your example, presume that Napoleon eventually becomes the disambiguation page Napoleon (disambiguation) to differentiate between the three or so French leaders, the George Orwell Animal Farm character, and the rapper. Now someone has to go through and fix all those redirects that no longer point to the place they are supposed to.
 * So particularly when redirects are due to misspelling, they should point at the correct spelling, not some article "downstream". Or for instance, when a person is covered in the article of a family member, redirects to their name shouldn't get moved. --Marcinjeske (talk) 23:51, 13 May 2008 (UTC)


 * I strongly disagree. As a matter of fact, Napolean is a redirect to Napoleon I of France, not to Napoleon, and has been since it was created in September 2004.  "Napolean" is a pretty common misspelling, so we have to assume that there are a fair number of users who either enter this term in the search box by accident, or click on a misspelled internal or external link.  (According to the tool, there were 13,579 hits on the misspelling just last month.)  If we changed the redirect as you suggest, every one of these users would be inconvenienced (if not hopelessly puzzled) by arriving at a redirect page instead of an encyclopedia article.  By contrast, the only benefit of your suggestion is that if the title Napoleon ever is turned into a disambig page (which isn't going to happen in this case, but in some other double-redirect situations I suppose it could), the single editor who makes that change is spared the one-time inconvenience of having to check for and fix this single redirect.  And, bear in mind that this editor (or someone else, if the editor who makes the change neglects to do it) is going to have to look through all the other redirects to Napoleon I of France anyway to see if there are others that need to be retargeted.  (There are, as of today, 46 redirects to that article, and at a glance it looks to me like at least 9 or 10 would need to be retargeted if "Napoleon" no longer redirected there.)  To me, it's not even close -- we have a recurring inconvenience to a large number of users weighed against a minor one-time burden on a single editor.  Even if the balance weren't so clearly tipped, I think we should be skeptical of any practice that shifts inconvenience from the authors and editors to the readers of the encyclopedia.  We are writing it for them; they aren't reading it for us.  --Russ (talk) 22:16, 14 May 2008 (UTC)

Are double redirects still being fixed by bots?
I've noticed that the redirect bots are working a lot more slowly than usual, if they are working at all. This could become extremely problematic in the event of page moves when disambiguation pages are created. Since I do not have the skill set to create a redirect bot, should this be posted in some more highly visible forum, such as WP:AN? --Jax 0677 (talk) 14:59, 25 September 2013 (UTC)
 * To go with this, why hasn't it updated in over two weeks? Chris857 (talk) 14:58, 26 September 2013 (UTC)
 *  Reply  - This is exactly the problem. I have taken it upon myself to post a thread about this at WP:AN. --Jax 0677 (talk) 17:26, 26 September 2013 (UTC)
 * Sounds like bug 53227 (Stale non-slow maintenance Special pages on Wikimedia wikis: bi-weekly updateSpecialPages.php no longer successfully running), fixed ~ 2013-11-08. --Jeremyb (talk) 04:10, 24 November 2013 (UTC)

would suggest a seperate list of protected double redirects
Special:DoubleRedirects mentions:(bold added)
 * It is usually not necessary to fix these by hand. Bots will go through the entire list periodically and fix all of the double redirects, except for protected pages.

But the page does not seperately list the protected pages and also does not mark the protected pages, so it is difficult to see which pages do need to be fixed by hand. Could there be a (sub) list of Double Redirects that do need to be fixed by hand? (or, a lesser solution, a mark that the first or second redirect is a protected page) Thanks WillemienH (talk) 14:47, 18 March 2016 (UTC)

Protected edit request on 31 May 2018
Add Category:Redirects to special pages Dpleibovitz (talk) 22:42, 31 May 2018 (UTC)
 * Done. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 09:03, 1 June 2018 (UTC)