Wikipedia talk:Writing better articles/Avoid making your articles orphans

Supporters of this rule include: Clasqm, Larry Sanger, Damian Yerrick, Josh Grosse, 24

Opponents include: AxelBoldt (a chain of links is desirable, but orphans really don't pose a problem, since most people use the search engine anyway) and David Cannon.

My opinion: It's a good guideline, but shouldn't be taken as a hard-and-fast rule; doing so may result in more spurious links, in cases where related articles are sparse. Categories help too. Derrick Coetzee 23:44, 11 Oct 2004 (UTC)


 * At present there are many articles in the Wikipedia namespace that seek to give guidance on how to write better articles. I propose consolidating these into a much smaller number. On User:Jongarrettuk/Better writing guide I propose how these could be consolidated. The proposal is not to change advice, just to consolidate it. If I have inadvertently moved what you consider to be good advice that is currently in the Wikipedia namespace, please re-add it. I'm hope that the proposal to merge all these articles, in principle, will be welcomed. Of course, it may be preferred to have 2, 3 or 4 inter-connected articles than just one and would welcome advice on how this could be done. (In particular, perhaps all the guidance on layout should be spun off into one consolidated article on layout.) I'm also aware that putting lots of different bits of advice together may throw up anomalies or bits that people now disagree with (including bits that I myself disagree with:) ). I ask for support for the consolidation. Once the consolidation has happened, the advice can be changed in the normal way. Please feel free to improve on the current draft consolidation, but don't remove or add advice that is not currently on the Wikipedia namespace. If all goes well, I'll add a new Guide to writing better articles page on the 19th, though maybe some bits of the new article will need to be phased in over a longer period. I'll also take care to preserve all the archived discussion in one place. jguk 19:36, 11 Nov 2004 (UTC)