Wikipedia talk:Disambiguation

how reader navigation functions without our navigation elements set up right

Here's an interesting example I stumbled upon:

• All-time monthly page views for "Tivadar" and "Tivadar (given name)"

The village article was effectively set as a primary topic for "Tivadar" since it was created in 2006.

The name article was written in late 2019, and it immediately got some persistent traffic, which is not what I'd expect when it wasn't linked from "Tivadar" itself - a hatnote was missing throughout this period.

In early 2020, someone adds[1] an indirect link to the name by linking Theodore (name) in a Name section, and the traffic at Tivadar seems to start dropping, while the traffic at Tivadar (given name) starts rising, and since 2021 it regularly overtakes the village traffic.

All this time, the list at Theodore (name) was still linking back to the (misplaced) village article, and again there was no hatnote even.

Seems like search engines learned where our navigation was lacking and worked around the problem - at least most of the time. --Joy (talk) 08:50, 20 August 2024 (UTC)

And in turn, since then the new pattern has emerged: page views with the new layout included. Given name list is at peak volume, while the traffic at the base name fell to its lowest volume ever. --Joy (talk) 12:52, 13 October 2024 (UTC)

I happened to find another example: Libertine did not have a hatnote for Libertine (disambiguation) since this November 2003 edit, which did make a significant dent in how much traffic the latter receives, cf. page views. Yet, some amount of traffic remained consistently, driven by Special:WhatLinksHere/Libertine (disambiguation) as well as other traffic. A look into clickstream archive shows other-search Libertine_(disambiguation) external 10 in January, which is also the anonymization threshold. --Joy (talk) 16:00, 25 November 2024 (UTC)

Merging dab pages

I couldn't find any guidelines on the process for a possibly contentious disambiguation page merge. Perhaps the process for articles applies: Wikipedia:MERGEPROP?

Discussion is at Talk:Alex Ferguson (disambiguation). Commander Keane (talk) 12:07, 5 November 2024 (UTC)

on what statistics should look like for hatnotes, primary redirects, primary topics

This is a bit of a continuation of Wikipedia talk:Disambiguation/Archive 56#on what statistics should look like for hatnotes, primary redirects, primary topics. Reusing the old section name might not be the best as I'm also updating the methodology, but it seems useful to have a few old incoming links keep working :)

In the meantime we've had some fresh examples in this vein, so I wanted to keep tracking this matter.

Because of numerous findings of how search engines take a lot of hints from our navigation and guide user traffic to wherever we hint them to, I have stopped focusing on trying to make sense of every little bit of stats WikiNav generates, because it often compares apples to oranges.

• Talk:Toner
  • primary topic in place, proposal was to disambiguate as another topic is noticed
    • it consistently exceeds the volume of page views for the presumed primary topic
  • hatnote traffic for it barely visible compared to incoming traffic, somewhat visible comparing outgoing volume, quite visible comparing outgoing ranking
• Talk:Trans
  • no primary topic, proposal was to promote the one most popular
    • listed first, positive trend, but several more individual topics matching a natural pattern of ambiguity (prefix, Latin) with some popularity and long-term significance
  • clickstreams show less than a third of incoming readers choose the most popular topic, ~60% of identifiable outgoing, ~15% filtered, several topics noticable outgoing
• Talk:Erika (discussion is at Talk:Erika_(song)#Requested_move)
  • no primary topic, proposal was to promote the one most popular
    • listed in the first section, positive trend, but several more individual topics matching a natural pattern of ambiguity (suffix - surname) with a lot of popularity and long-term significance
  • clickstreams show ~70% of incoming traffic matches the most popular topic, ~80% of identifiable outgoing, but ~37% filtered, and second index noticable outgoing
• Talk:Parana
  • no primary topic, proposal was to promote the one most popular
    • listed in the second section, second subsection, probably visible on the first screen of desktops, probably requires tapping once and scrolling on mobile
  • page views show a positive trend but no overall advantage over several other topics of obvious significance
  • clickstreams show a scattering of incoming traffic, less than half to the most popular, three more visible; more than half of identifiable outgoing, but 37% filtered
• Talk:Thune (discussion is at Talk:Thune (company))
  • primary topic in place, proposal was to disambiguate as another topic is noticed
    • hatnote traffic was the first thing visible in WikiNav, then another related topic, but also 38% filtered
  • several more individual topics matching a natural pattern of ambiguity (suffix - surname) with some popularity and long-term significance
• Talk:PVV
  • no primary topic, proposal was to promote the one most popular
    • foreign abbreviation but found in English-language sources as well, some seasonal
  • one possibly generally relevant topic otherwise, but couldn't measure well because no WP:DABREDIR was in place before the discussion
  • clickstreams show ~62% of incoming viewers went there, and 100% identifiable outgoing, but ~39% filtered
• Talk:Orlando
  • primary redirect in place, proposal was to disambiguate instead
    • numerous internal incoming links to the redirect
    • redirect overall traffic pattern did not quite match destination article, was a better match for hatnote traffic pattern
    • ratio of identified hatnote clicks to redirect views was consistently ~13%
  • numerous individual topics, both mononymous and those matching a natural pattern of ambiguity (prefix - given name) with a lot of popularity and long-term significance
  • after the move, previous primary redirect destination gets a bit less than half of incoming traffic and a bit more than half of identifiable outgoing traffic, but there was ~35% filtered, and a handful of other topics are noticable outgoing
• Talk:ATM (discussion re primary topic was at Talk:ATM (disambiguation)#Requested move 4 November 2024)
  • no primary topic, proposal was to promote the one most popular
    • common abbreviation (finance), article later actually moved to use it instead of expanded name
    • was linked second in the common section at the top
    • a quarter of identifiable clickstreams went there compared to incoming traffic, with ~5% filtered, and a bit over a half of all identifiable outgoing
  • several other topics with some significance
• Talk:EP (disambiguation)
  • no primary topic, proposal was to promote the one most popular
    • common abbreviation (music)
    • a bit over a third of identifiable clickstreams went there compared to incoming traffic, ~95% of identifiable outgoing
  • few other topics of readership/significance

--Joy (talk) 10:18, 20 November 2024 (UTC)

• Talk:The Dress
  • no primary topic, proposal was to promote the one most popular
    • another recent RM moved that article as well to a primary topic position for a slightly different title
    • ~15% of identifiable clickstreams went there compared to incoming traffic, and there was traffic in the other direction as well
  • some other topics of readership/significance
• Talk:Montserrat
  • primary topic in place, proposal was to disambiguate
    • island with near-country status, small but had a major disaster and relief effort in the UK in recent memory
    • thousands of incoming links, contributing to half the incoming traffic
  • eponym and other topics from Spain of substantial readership/significance
  • overall traffic around 55-60 : 40-45 in favor of the island
  • several other topics of readership/significance, including naturally disambiguated classes (biographies)
• Talk:Sloboda
  • primary topic in place, proposal was to disambiguate
    • a bunch of incoming links contribute half the incoming traffic
    • hatnote sees a lot of traffic
  • some controversy in the discussion, no consensus twice
• Talk:Jennie
  • no primary topic, proposal was to promote the one most popular
    • recent mononymous use of one spelling of a common given name
    • receives about two thirds of incoming traffic from disambiguation page, though ~37% filtered
• Talk:Suga
  • primary topic in place, proposal was to disambiguate
    • recent mononymous use popular
    • other uses of the human name with natural disambiguation with arguably more significance
  • hatnote in top 20 but dwarfed by other traffic
  • several contentious discussions, no consensus
• Talk:Cobbler
  • no primary topic, proposal was to promote the one most popular
    • receives a third of the identified clickstreams
  • one other general topic popular, and some other specific entertainment topics
• Talk:Godric
  • no primary topic, proposal was to promote the one most popular as primary redirect
    • receives considerable general interest, but derived works also do
    • receives a third of the identified clickstreams

--Joy (talk) 18:13, 23 November 2024 (UTC)

• Talk:Nacho
  • primary redirect in place, proposal was to disambiguate
    • singular of a lowercase plural, but uppercase also a naturally disambiguated name and eponym
  • logarithmic pattern of views of primary redirect and destination didn't match too well, while views of redirect and hatnote seemed to match better
  • two matching topics in the top ten outgoing clickstreams, hatnote views compared to redirect views around a third, some 'other' clickstreams detected
  • ngrams inconclusive
  • after the move the previously redirect destination gets less than half of the interest

--Joy (talk) 12:34, 6 December 2024 (UTC)

Requested move at Talk:LGBTQ topics in Chile#Requested move 24 November 2024

There is a requested move discussion at Talk:LGBTQ topics in Chile#Requested move 24 November 2024 that may be of interest to members of this WikiProject. --MikutoH ^talk! 04:12, 24 November 2024 (UTC)

Discussion at Wikipedia talk:Redirects for discussion § Is RFD a valid forum to discuss cases of PTOPIC disambiguation pages?

 You are invited to join the discussion at Wikipedia talk:Redirects for discussion § Is RFD a valid forum to discuss cases of PTOPIC disambiguation pages?. —CX Zoom[he/him] ^{(let's talk • {C•X})} 13:46, 10 December 2024 (UTC)

principles for naming

WP:DABNAME was brought up recently in Talk:Joaquín.

Sadly the "Who Wrote That?" extension doesn't work in Wikipedia namespace, but a quick search of the talk page archives indicates this was added after Wikipedia talk:Disambiguation/Archive 30#Using redirects?

Does this change to the guideline actually have proper consensus? There's some level of organic consensus stemming from the fact nobody reverted it, but that is pretty flimsy :) --Joy (talk) 08:02, 26 December 2024 (UTC)

Thanks to WikiBlame, I actually traced this to this August 2008 edit, so the discussion was actually Wikipedia talk:Disambiguation/Archive 27#Next section requiring work where it's apparently two to three people talking about it. --Joy (talk) 08:08, 26 December 2024 (UTC)

Fundamentally, the question is what does this sentence actually have to do with disambiguation:

English spelling is preferred to that of non-English languages.

What would be some examples where a foreign spelling is still ambiguous with an English spelling of a term? This seems like a solution in search of a problem, because foreign terms are usually fairly distinct. The idea that there would be ambiguity between different words just seems like a non sequitur here. --Joy (talk) 08:15, 26 December 2024 (UTC)

We also noticed the contradictory nature of these principles a few months ago in Wikipedia talk:Disambiguation/Archive 57#Capitalization of a disambiguation page title with both all-caps and lowercase senses. --Joy (talk) 08:22, 26 December 2024 (UTC)

Herding cats

The first entry at Herding cats has as its only blue link, 'Idiom', which seems singularly unhelpful at a D-page. And yet (at least for me) the idiom covered at wikt:herding cats is by far the primary topic here. In the absence of a Wikipedia article by that name, how should this be handled? The current situation seems very unsatisfactory. Mathglot (talk) 12:21, 30 December 2024 (UTC)

I'd link to the Wiktionary entry as the primary topic if there's nothing explicit against linking to a sister project in policy. I see the fourth entry has no link, and I just removed some terminal punctuation from the first and second entries per WP:DABSTYLE RE sentence fragments. Fred Gandt · talk · contribs 13:44, 30 December 2024 (UTC)

WP:DABDICT applies. Fred Gandt · talk · contribs 13:47, 30 December 2024 (UTC)

List of Hindi films of xxxx

The known link-breaking nuisance is back, this time as 2A00:23C5:A15:5400:2489:53D:4C68:C30D on List of Hindi films of 1969 and elsewhere. Revert on sight. Narky Blert (talk) 04:38, 31 December 2024 (UTC)

Merely fixing DABlinks will leave behind bad links to name pages such as Dhumal and Mehmood and to PTOPICs such as Krishna and Prince. Narky Blert (talk) 04:58, 31 December 2024 (UTC)

PS feel free to upgrade my {{uw-vand1}} warning if they keep at it; but they're an IP-hopper, and I suspect a combination of WP:THEYCANTHEARYOU, WP:IDHT, and assorted other guidelines; so I doubt whether a WP:BLOCK would be of much use. Should they persist, I have an idea for a WP:EF request which would be both concise and precise ({{ping}} me). but it's too soon for that while the problem can be handled manually. Sigh. Narky Blert (talk) 15:25, 31 December 2024 (UTC)

Catch all cat for {{One other topic}}

What do people here think about creating a catch all cat for {{One other topic}}. Currently, Category:Disambiguation pages containing one non-primary topic lists only monthly subcats. Should Category:All disambiguation pages containing one non-primary topic be created, in line with Category:All orphaned articles for example? ~/Bunnypranav:<ping> 14:22, 2 January 2025 (UTC)

Hatnote for Birger Jarl

There's a minor dispute on whether a hatnote for "Birger Magnusson" is needed at the article Birger Jarl. Please comment at Talk:Birger Jarl#Birger Magnusson (link to the part concerning the hatnote). Jähmefyysikko (talk) 06:58, 3 January 2025 (UTC)

Francisco Campos

Can someone check my newly created Francisco Campos (disambiguation) for proper format and content? I created it because I found a double hatnote at Francisco Campos, and then found even more possible articles it could be confused with.

One issue I haven't attacked yet, is that of primary topic; currently, the person described at Francisco Campos is a Mexican baseball player (b. 1972) which seemed a little surprising; I was kind of expecting to find no primary. So, I went to Google books and searched, and lo and behold, seven of the top ten book results, and all of the top five are about Brazilian jurist Francisco Campos, cabinet minister (multiple offices), and author of the 1937 Constitution, for whom we have no article. So that seems likely to be primary (unless we count sports articles on the web as having equal weight to books, an open question in my mind). I am about to create Francisco Campos (jurist) (or maybe, Francisco Campos (Brazilian jurist), although that seems needlessly long). After I get a stub created and linked from the D-page, any thoughts on what to do about the primary topic issue? Mathglot (talk) 11:44, 3 January 2025 (UTC)