Wikipedia talk:Village pump (proposals)/Styling disambiguated titles

Previous discussions

 * Title was: "DISPLAYTITLE" magic word, and DAB titles

Discussions copied from the Village Pumps:


 * Moved from the Idea Lab

Hey. Currently, if we have two articles with the same title Article 1 with different topics, we disambiguate the headers as, for example, Article 1 (policy) and Article 1 (song). On the other hand, we are blessed with DISPLAYTITLE, a magic word. Why don't we clap our hands and integrate the DISPLAYTITLE in every article with a DAB-style title, to display only the main subject, in this case, Article 1. Whats even more interesting is that we could add a feature in preferences (which is on by default) where any registered user can enable the display of both the real title Article 1 (song) and the triggered title Article 1. The only question is, where to display the real title (as what shows in the current title area is the triggered DISPLAYTITLE)? Rehman(+) 11:42, 17 October 2010 (UTC)


 * Can't be done. DISPLAYTITLE can only change the format (lowercase, italics), not the title itself; in other words, it cannot cut off parts of the title. Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 > haneʼ 11:56, 17 October 2010 (UTC)


 * Well, once upon time I did see someone partially hiding his/her username title, without doubt. But if you're sure it can't be done through DISPLAYTITLE, then it should be something else... Kind regards. Rehman(+) 12:40, 17 October 2010 (UTC)


 *  . --Yair rand (talk) 13:16, 17 October 2010 (UTC)


 * There you have it! Right there! ;) Rehman(+) 14:35, 17 October 2010 (UTC)


 * Please don't do that. It makes it hard for someone to put in the correct link to the article ad could be quite confusing. Article names don't have to be definitive names for the topic, they are ways of finding the topic. Dmcq (talk) 17:13, 17 October 2010 (UTC)
 * I wasn't aware of that span-"hack". In any case, it would be confusing and cause more work when people link to the dab, and then someone else has to go fix it. Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 > haneʼ 22:44, 17 October 2010 (UTC)


 * Well, thats when the option in Special:Preference part come in handy; switching to the display of the actual Article 1 (song) title. The altered title would pretty much only be seen by IPs, as we could make the option to switch on by default for registered/logged-in users, as I said above. Rehman(+) 00:28, 18 October 2010 (UTC)

Full name of this article: Batman (1989 film) --Morn (talk) 17:57, 18 October 2010 (UTC)
 * A working compromise might be doing this similarly to redirects: If you get redirected you see a helpful reminder that you have been e.g. "(Redirected from Elvis)". In the same vein, it could look like this: Batman


 * Is displaying (eg) "Batman (1989 film)" really a terrible disservice to our readers, or just a vague "it could be tidier" issue? This seems in some ways to be a rather complicated solution in search of a problem... Shimgray | talk | 18:09, 18 October 2010 (UTC)


 * The parenthesized part of the title is only there for technical reasons and a good user interface should try to hide obscure implementation details. (That's why we have e.g. an article about "iTunes" instead of "ITunes".) As long as the full name stays within easy reach for linking, I think title simplification is a good idea. It conforms to the principle of least astonishment, because clicking the piped link Batman would take me to the title I expect to see. Of course power users glance at the status bar to know in advance to which page they are going, but everyone else probably does not. --Morn (talk) 19:33, 18 October 2010 (UTC)


 * That's a really bad idea I think. People need tags to organize information just as much as computers do. We just don't need the confusion of people not knowing how to refer to pages and mixing them up in their minds. It is better toi forgoaccuracy in order to get easy identification. For instance the name of the state described in the article Republic of Ireland is 'Ireland' and the name of the island described in Ireland is 'Ireland'. This sort of thing would lead to dreadful confusion when people refer to the article 'Ireland'. Dmcq (talk) 19:46, 18 October 2010 (UTC)


 * Nobody has proposed shortening a title like "Republic of Ireland"! This idea here is purely about the stuff we have to add to titles to make them unique in the wiki: "Republic of Ireland (1978 Portuguese movie directed by Martin Scorsese starring Bela Lugosi)", or somesuch. :-) --Morn (talk) 20:03, 18 October 2010 (UTC)


 * I think that's a valid idea for (info in brackets) but I what about doing something other than hiding the info altogether as it is usually important when a distinction can be made. A sub-title? ~ R.T.G 16:57, 20 October 2010 (UTC)

Hi. I propose the use of the DISPLAYTITLE magic word to hide unnecessary dab-style titles (such as "Article 1 (song)" to "Article 1"). Please see the original discussion above; copied from the Idea Lab. Rehman(+) 07:41, 24 October 2010 (UTC)
 * Strongest Possible Oppose Page titles and URLs should match. This proposal would complicate the creation of wikilinks and even just telling someone which page to go to. If I read "X" as the article title and tell someone to go to "X" on Wikipedia, it should take them straight there; this would break that. The disambiguation is also helpful for readers. Was I referring to the article on the video game or the the band? Guess now I'll have to inspect the URL instead of the much more obvious and friendly page title. I should be able to tell at a moment's notice even on a mobile browser which sense page a link has sent me to. --Cyber cobra (talk) 08:54, 24 October 2010 (UTC)
 * This. → ROUX   ₪  09:00, 24 October 2010 (UTC)

I don't think the disambiguating information should be hidden completely, but it would be a great help if we could present it as a subtitle, rather than as part of the title. That would help (to some extent) resolve a lot of silly arguments about how to name articles - for example (to take a current example), both the city and the state could have their articles titled "New York", and both could have a disambiguating subtitle (a lot less ugly and intrusive than the bracketed disambiguators that have to be in large type as part of the title). This idea was proposed a few(?) weeks ago and was generally quite well supported (it was even shown how it could work with a template).--Kotniski (talk) 10:25, 24 October 2010 (UTC)


 * Btw, I never said that disambiguating information should be hidden. ;) Rehman(+) 12:01, 24 October 2010 (UTC)


 * If you interpret the above as well-supported, I repeat myself: bad idea. Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 > haneʼ 11:59, 24 October 2010 (UTC)
 * It was well supported when it was proposed before, and when it was made clearer that the disambiguating information would still appear (but in smaller/different type). All the objections seem to be based on the premise that it wouldn't be visible at all.--Kotniski (talk) 18:06, 24 October 2010 (UTC)

Having an additional subheader would be cluttering, imo. Especially if the reader arrives at the target via a redirect, they'll have the "From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia" subheader, the redirect, and this proposed subheader. The design drafted above by Morn is definitely appealing: Batman Full name of this article: Batman (1989 film) But in practice, it would be more like this: Batman From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Full name of this article: Batman (1989 film)  (Redirected from [ Batman (1989 movie)]) So not a perfect idea. HTH. -- Quiddity (talk) 20:12, 24 October 2010 (UTC)
 * How about this?

Batman (1989 film)
 * --Yair rand (talk) 20:20, 24 October 2010 (UTC)
 * Interesting. That might be workable. However, it's a fairly major style change.
 * I'd recommend setting up a separate draft page, with
 * a multitude of examples of how various titles would be changed by this – (for easy before&after comparison, and for analysis of any potentially problematic instances)
 * using the exact sizing of the existing elements – (I've changed the 2 drafts above to reflect the 188% H1 title size),
 * settling upon a firm "suggested size and color" for the new proposed suffix change – (the current gray is possibly not dark enough, and the size possibly not large enough, for easy legibility)
 * so that an unhurried design can be agreed upon, and then a formal RfC can take place. HTH. -- Quiddity (talk) 21:13, 24 October 2010 (UTC)
 * Interesting indeed, but the title should not be bold, the disambiguation part should be black and at least be larger then normal text. Here's a H1/H4 combo example:
 * Batman (1989 film)
 * Or only change the color of the disambiguation part:
 * Batman (1989 film)
 * But yeah, setting up a draft page is a good idea. — Edokter • Talk  • 23:39, 24 October 2010 (UTC)
 * Now this I would be fine with. --Cyber cobra (talk) 01:00, 25 October 2010 (UTC)
 * I've fixed the bold in the earlier examples, and fixed the gray in Edokter's 2nd example. -- Quiddity (talk) 01:57, 25 October 2010 (UTC)
 * I know you can't read it, but see nv:Ndilkal (chʼil). Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 > haneʼ 02:23, 25 October 2010 (UTC)
 * Interesting. Any idea how that is done? — Edokter • Talk  • 11:10, 25 October 2010 (UTC)

Interesting proposal, not sure I support it. I'm concerned about how however the software would handle pages like Voodoo Child (Slight Return), which is the correct title. Headbomb {talk / contribs / physics / books} 03:56, 25 October 2010 (UTC)
 * This has to be done by manually inserting a template on every applicable page. Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 > haneʼ 03:59, 25 October 2010 (UTC)
 * Yes, but then that creates a very ugly situation where similar articles have page titles displaying with striking dissimilarity. Some of the articles will have these tags, and others won't because no one bothered to add them yet, making the whole thing look very inconsistent. Therefore very strong oppose. Headbomb {talk / contribs / physics / books} 06:31, 25 October 2010 (UTC)
 * I guess that was my point from the beginning... I'm still against it on this three-million-pages-ten-thousand-plus-users deal; it's gonna be a mess. Just saying... Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 > haneʼ 06:33, 25 October 2010 (UTC)
 * That's a pretty poor argument - we should never change anything because there will inevitably be inconsistency during the time the change is being carried out. But once the changeover is complete, that won't matter any more (and the interim effects can be mitigated by doing the change in thematic batches).--Kotniski (talk) 08:24, 25 October 2010 (UTC)
 * It wasn't an argument, it was a warning. Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 > haneʼ 10:21, 25 October 2010 (UTC)
 * This should ideally be done by MediaWiki by changing the font of the (dab) part, or assigning a CSS class to it. — Edokter • Talk  • 10:58, 25 October 2010 (UTC)
 * Yes, if we could get the developers interested in treatment of page titles, all sorts of things might be achieved (I've always wondered why dabbing has to be done by hand, for example - and wouldn't it be good to have these hatnotes telling you what else you might be looking for not only generated automatically, but also tailored to how the user actually got to the page?) But as noted above, there would have to be a way of making an exception for those occasional titles that do have a bracketed part as part of the name, not a disambiguator.--Kotniski (talk) 11:31, 25 October 2010 (UTC)


 * Apart from the opposition voiced above, the original proposal is not even technically possible: DISPLAYTITLE will only display titles that differ in trivial ways (i.e., italicization) from the actual title. See http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Batman_%281989_film%29&oldid=392779157 (which has DISPLAYTITLE:Batman) for an example. Ucucha 12:53, 25 October 2010 (UTC)
 * It is technically possible (but you have to use a display=none tag around the bit you don't want displayed).--Kotniski (talk) 13:00, 25 October 2010 (UTC)
 * Not a good example, since the title is now governed by the infobox template. Here's a working example. Strangly, it only work 100% when viewing using the next link in the previous revision. Clicking the revision directly in the history loses the color somehow. Strike that; that works too, as long as it is not the last revision. It also does not work in preview, which is an issue. Strike that, it does work in preview, at least in the sandbox. — Edokter • Talk  • 13:15, 25 October 2010 (UTC)


 * Why change the colour why not just make it smaller in text as shown in one of the Batman (titles) above? ~ R.T.G 13:21, 25 October 2010 (UTC)
 * That is a matter of taste, that is why draft page with all examples is needed so we can come to a consensus. — <b style="color:#008">Edokter</b> • Talk  • 13:24, 25 October 2010 (UTC)

I have to agree with the opposers. I think this would really confuse people, especially with regards to disambiguation, especially with those not familiar with WP in general. –MuZemike 18:11, 25 October 2010 (UTC)


 * I don't understand why it would confuse people. Because: 1. I do not propose hiding the dab part. 2. The display of the dab part is always on by default to all registered users (as per my proposal), and will only be hidden to IPs... Rehman(+) 00:28, 26 October 2010 (UTC)


 * IMDb does the same thing (at least since their redesign; I don't know if this was different before) and I haven't heard reports of anyone being confused by it:


 * Unhappily Ever After (TV Series 1995–1999)
 * That there is so much controversy about this simple change explains why Wikipedia is always a little backwards in its user interface decisions. Apparently we always need a usability study first to figure out the painfully obvious improvements that everybody else is already using. --Morn (talk) 20:53, 25 October 2010 (UTC)
 * I think the "oppose" commenters are still addressing the apparent original proposal to remove disambiguating information altogether. It's hard to see how putting the disambiguators in smaller type could confuse people - quite the reverse, as it would allow us to make clear what we consider to be the "name" (in the usual Wikipedia sense, i.e. the common name in good sources) and what information we are adding purely to distinguish it from other topics with the same name.--Kotniski (talk) 07:49, 26 October 2010 (UTC)
 * Then perhaps the original proposal should be updated to reflect the fact that complete removal of disambig info from the page is out of the question. Making the text smaller and less obtrusive is the good idea here, not removing it entirely. --Morn (talk) 13:48, 26 October 2010 (UTC)

I've left a pointer to here, at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Disambiguation. Feel free to spread the word to any other interested groups. A slow trickle of new input would be ideal :) -- Quiddity (talk) 04:22, 29 October 2010 (UTC)

Current examples not quite bold enough
The currently displayed examples are not perfect, as they don't exactly match the rendering that we get on the actual articles.

Eg Benchmark (surveying) is quite a bit bolder in reality, than in our examples.

But, it is not just a case of a missing "font-weight: bold" or triple- ''' -pair (that makes our examples too bold). Can someone help determine what code is missing, and fix our examples? Thanks. -- Quiddity (talk) 22:46, 26 October 2010 (UTC)


 * Actually, they look exactly the same as the H1 header (used for page titles) in Vector and Monobook, which has a normal font-weight. Might you be using a different skin? — <b style="color:#008">Edokter</b> • Talk  • 23:31, 26 October 2010 (UTC)
 * I get this: File:Wikipedia-Screenshot H1 title style.png (screenshot from this diff of the article). It looks the same if I log out, and I get a similar (though not identical) difference in Opera. I'm using Firefox in Ubuntu, so my fonts are definitely not the usual selection, but surely things should still appear the same if they're styled equivalently? If you're really not seeing any difference between those two, then I'm not sure what the problem is at my end... -- Quiddity (talk) 23:52, 26 October 2010 (UTC)


 * That is weird. If they do look the same when logged out, then it must be something in your personal CSS, but I can't find anything in your monobook.css or vector.css files. — <b style="color:#008">Edokter</b> • Talk  • 00:06, 27 October 2010 (UTC)
 * Styling is not quite the same though; the samples have a font-size of 188%, the actual font-size in the header is defined as 1.6em (same as 160% relative to the base font). Since the normal text is 80% of the base font size, H1 size should be 1.25 x 1.6em = 2em or 200%. I'll correct the samples. — <b style="color:#008">Edokter</b> • Talk  • 00:16, 27 October 2010 (UTC)
 * Sorry, I meant I get the same problem is I log out. Your change fixed it. Thanks :) Now is siesta time. -- Quiddity (talk) 00:20, 27 October 2010 (UTC)

Early discussion
To be considered. Your thoughts on the current examples? -- Quiddity (talk) 23:03, 26 October 2010 (UTC)


 * I think the text formatting should be taken out of scope here; italics is used to denote an artistic work (ie. a film). It the disambig part were also to be italizised, that would be potential confusing. I prefer the color-only option, size-change may also be confused as not being part of the page name. — <b style="color:#008">Edokter</b> • Talk  • 23:25, 26 October 2010 (UTC)
 * Sure. I only included it because that is what the Navajo Wikipedia is using. Feel free to remove it from the examples list too (currently #4), if you think that would be best. -- Quiddity (talk) 23:37, 26 October 2010 (UTC)
 * OK, I removed it. — <b style="color:#008">Edokter</b> • Talk  • 23:41, 26 October 2010 (UTC)

My original proposal was to completely hide the dab part for IPs (or users not logged in). If I followed the discussion right, then the above styles proposed is for users who are logged in, right? If so, we could also simply not make any change on the dab at all for logged in users (i.e. users who set the option of showing the dab part in Preferences). That would also not confuse the current 100,000 or so editors currently active on this Wikipedia, and also not make cross-wiki viewing confusing (unless we implement it on all wikis). Rehman(+) 00:13, 27 October 2010 (UTC)


 * A I read it, the proposal of hiding the disambiguation part has no consensus. So now we focus on styling, which would be visible to all users. — <b style="color:#008">Edokter</b> • Talk  • 00:22, 27 October 2010 (UTC)


 * Most (all?) of the prior-opposition was to the idea that any part of the title might be completely-hidden. Very few editors would agree to completely hiding part of the title. Hence that idea has been modified to the current proposal.
 * (I.e. Your idea to modify the titles was really interesting, and we're running with the part of it that might get consensus). :) -- Quiddity (talk) 00:27, 27 October 2010 (UTC)


 * No problem ;) I just didn't follow the discussion properly... Rehman(+) 09:18, 27 October 2010 (UTC)

Style
To be considered. Your thoughts on the current examples? Thanks. -- Quiddity (talk) 23:03, 26 October 2010 (UTC)
 * Size
 * Color

Comments on format (hoping this is the right place)
 * Colour change: grey font seems likely to be difficult to read for those with poor eyesight or poor equipment: one of the virtues of Wikipedia is a clear, black-on-white (plus blue/red links), simple, format which values legibility over glitz.
 * Size change: 62% looks good - 75% is not quite obvious as a size change, 50% looks very small. But I guess this all depends on the particular screen size etc which people are using.
 * So I guess my preference, if a format change is needed at all, is for the black 62% version. (Could the examples be labelled or numbered in some way to make it easier to talk about them? Perhaps change them to "Benchmark (Style1)" etc? PamD (talk) 08:05, 29 October 2010 (UTC)


 * I've added an example with extra letter-spacing. With spacing, the big and small text look more similar in tonal density on the page and the disambig is more legible IMHO. --Morn (talk) 18:04, 29 October 2010 (UTC)

Technical problems and solutions
Partially outlined on the draft page. What other options and problems are there? -- Quiddity (talk) 23:03, 26 October 2010 (UTC)


 * Two option: 1) a template like italic title, 2) having MediaWiki automatically style (or class) the part in brackets. Both options will have consistency problems. Not all titles with bracketed parts are disambiguated titles, which means that option 2) will style articles titles that are not disambiguated. These could be excluded by using with no parameters.
 * With option 1), there will be a split between articles that use a template and those that don't. This will prevent the problem with option 2), but all articles would have to be checked (using the most common infoboxes). On the other hand, this requires no actions from the devs and we could start experimenting immediately. — <b style="color:#008">Edokter</b> • Talk  • 23:53, 26 October 2010 (UTC)

Color change (namespace)
That example is definitely an intriguing addition. I'm wondering if it might be less complicated if we were to tackle that as a separate endeavour, if/once the concept has proven itself. I'd suggest moving that example down to the bottom of the RfC page, with a header or note explaining that it is something to consider in the future. -- Quiddity (talk) 04:12, 29 October 2010 (UTC)
 * Agreed. It was just a idea that popped into my head, and would technically be much easier to implement (by MediaWiki). — <b style="color:#008">Edokter</b> • Talk  • 13:22, 29 October 2010 (UTC)

Comma disambiguation?
As a newcomer to this debate, brought by Quiddity's note on Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Disambiguation ...

Question: Is this proposal intended to include geographical disambiguation by comma? I can see one comment about New York in the previous discussion. It needs to be made clear whether a heading like Scarborough, North Yorkshire is, or is not, included in this proposal. PamD (talk) 07:47, 29 October 2010 (UTC)


 * I would not consider that part of this proposal; Scarborough, North Yorkshire is a unique geographical name as a whole, whereas bracketed disambiguation titles denote differentation for subjects which have no unique names. — <b style="color:#008">Edokter</b> • Talk  • 13:17, 29 October 2010 (UTC)

Only for logged-in editors?
Another question on which I'm not clear from skimming the previous discussions: is it intended that this proposed new formatting applies only to logged-on editors, or is it for all readers? I'd suggest that any formatting must be for the benefit of all readers of Wikipedia, the vast majority of whom (I guess - are there stats?) are reading it without being logged on as editors. WP exists to be read and used, although discussions about it are held only among those who edit it, in the nature of things. PamD (talk) 07:54, 29 October 2010 (UTC)
 * We want to be as unambiguous to all our readers as possible, so the scope for formatting the titles would apply to all readers. — <b style="color:#008">Edokter</b> • Talk  • 13:20, 29 October 2010 (UTC)