Wikipedia:Disambiguation
 | This page documents an English Wikipedia editing guideline. Editors should generally follow it, though exceptions may apply. Substantive edits to this page should reflect consensus. When in doubt, discuss first on this guideline's talk page. |
 | This page in a nutshell: It is necessary to provide links and disambiguation pages so that readers typing in a reasonably likely topic name for more than one Wikipedia topic can quickly navigate to the article they seek. |
Disambiguation in Wikipedia is the process of resolving conflicts that arise when a potential article title is ambiguous, most often because it refers to more than one subject covered by Wikipedia, either as the main topic of an article, or as a subtopic covered by an article in addition to the article's main topic. For example, the word "Mercury" can refer to a chemical element, a planet, a Roman god, and many other things.
There are three important aspects to disambiguation:
- Naming articles in such a way that each has a unique title. For example, three of the articles dealing with topics ordinarily called "Mercury" are titled Mercury (element), Mercury (planet) and Mercury (mythology).
- Making the links for ambiguous terms point to the correct article title. For example, an editor of an astronomy article may have created a link to Mercury, and this should be corrected to point to Mercury (planet).
- Ensuring that a reader who searches for a topic using a particular term can get to the information on that topic quickly and easily, whichever of the possible topics it might be. For example, the page Mercury is a disambiguation page—a non-article page which lists various meanings of "Mercury" and which links to the articles that cover them. (As discussed below, however, ambiguous terms do not always require a disambiguation page.)
This page discusses the standard ways of handling the above issues. For detailed advice about the format of disambiguation pages, see the style manual.
Deciding to disambiguate
Disambiguation is required whenever, for a given word or phrase on which a reader might search, there is more than one existing Wikipedia article to which that word or phrase might be expected to lead. In this situation there must be a way for the reader to navigate quickly from the page that first appears to any of the other possible desired articles.
There are three principal disambiguation scenarios, of which the following are examples:
- The page at Joker is a disambiguation page, leading to all the alternative uses of "Joker".
- The page at Rice is about one usage, called the primary topic, and there is a hatnote guiding readers to Rice (disambiguation) to find the other uses.
- The page at Michael Dobbs is about the primary topic, and there is only one other use. The other use is linked directly using a hatnote; no disambiguation page is needed.
For how to decide which of these scenarios is appropriate in a given case, see the following two sections:
Broad-concept articles
If the primary meaning of a term proposed for disambiguation is a broad concept or type of thing that is capable of being described in an article, and a substantial portion of the links asserted to be ambiguous are instances or examples of that concept or type, then the page located at that title should be an article describing it, and not a disambiguation page. Where the primary topic of a term is a general topic that can be divided into subtopics, such as chronologically (e.g., History of France) or geographically (e.g., Rugby union in the British Isles), the unqualified title should contain an article about the general topic rather than a disambiguation page. A disambiguation page should not be created just because it is difficult to write an article on a topic that is broad, vague, abstract, or highly conceptual. Where there are additional meanings that are not instances or examples of a "Foo" primary concept or type, those should be included on a "Foo (disambiguation)" page.
For example:
- Particle (previously a disambiguation page) is a broad and abstract concept used to address many different ideas in physics, generally relating to small units from which larger things are composed. Although there are many different kinds of particles at levels ranging from the subatomic to the macroscopic, the broad concept is properly susceptible to explanation in an article. Truly unrelated meanings, such as Particle (band), are only presented at Particle (disambiguation).
- A Supreme court, National Trust, or Finance minister (or Ministry of Finance) is each a kind of entity occurring in multiple countries and possibly in other political entities, and serving the same purpose in each. Rather than having disambiguation pages at these titles linking to existing articles on these entities by nation, each should contain an article describing in general terms what the concept is, and how the different examples of this concept relate to each other.
- Central Asia, Northern Europe, and Southern United States are geographic designations that have been used with respect to different specific boundaries over time. Varying uses for broad geographic terms can be discussed in the context of an article describing the overall agreement of which areas definitely fall within that designation, and which areas are only occasionally described as falling within that designation, for certain purposes.
- The Nokia Lumia is a cell phone with many different design models. The fact that different models in the same series of product by the same manufacturer may have the same name, or the same combination of name and number, does not make them ambiguous. The relationship between these design models can and should be discussed on a page describing products created by or licensed by the same manufacturer.
- Football may refer to one of a number of team sports which all involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball with the foot. Although the word "football" can apply to whichever form of football is the most popular in the regional context in which the word appears, all of these variations share some common elements and can be traced to a common origin. Thus, the history and development of the general concept of football can be explained in its own article. Football (disambiguation) describes the various literal uses of the word including the actual balls.
- Many definitions of triangle center are used in Euclidean geometry, which coincide only in the special case of equilateral triangles. The article lists a dozen of these, and also gives a validity criterion applicable to various definitions of "center".
In writing articles on these subjects, it is useful to directly address the scope of the term, and the history of how the concept has developed. Each of the examples of the concept or type of thing should be included at some point in the article, possibly in a list, so that no information is lost from what would have been presented in the disambiguation page format. Consider using summary style to incorporate information about the subtopics into the main article.
Pages needing to be expanded to describe the concept may be tagged with {{dabprimary}}.
Is there a primary topic?
Although a word, name, or phrase may refer to more than one topic, sometimes one of these topics can be identified as the the term's primary topic. This is the topic to which the term should lead, serving as the title of (or a redirect to) the relevant article. If no primary topic exists, then the term should be the title of a disambiguation page (or should redirect to a disambiguation page on which more than one term is disambiguated). The primary topic might be a broad-concept article, as mentioned above.
While Wikipedia has no single criterion for defining a primary topic, two major aspects that editors commonly consider are these:
- A topic is primary for a term with respect to usage if it is highly likely—much more likely than any other topic, and more likely than all the other topics combined—to be the topic sought when a reader searches for that term.
- A topic is primary for a term with respect to long-term significance if it has substantially greater enduring notability and educational value than any other topic associated with that term.
In most cases, the topic that is primary with respect to usage is also primary with respect to long-term significance; in many other cases, only one sense of primacy is relevant. In a few cases, there is some conflict between a topic of primary usage (Apple Inc.) and one of primary long-term significance (Apple). In such a case, consensus may be useful in determining which topic, if any, is the primary topic.
Determining a primary topic
There are no absolute rules for determining whether a primary topic exists and what it is; decisions are made by discussion among editors, often as a result of a requested move. Tools that may help to support the determination of a primary topic in a discussion (but are not considered absolute determining factors, due to unreliability, potential bias, and other reasons) include:
- Incoming wikilinks from Special:WhatLinksHere
- Wikipedia article traffic statistics and redirect traffic statistics
- Usage in English reliable sources demonstrated with Google web, news, scholar, or book. Note using this modified Google search string eliminates personal search bias.
Some general principles for determining a primary topic include:
- While long-term significance is a factor, historical age is not determinative. (Kennewick, Washington is primary for Kennewick over the much older Kennewick Man)
- Being the original source of the name does not make a topic primary. (Boston is about Boston, Massachusetts, not the English city that first bore that name)
- A topic may have principal relevance for a specific group of people (for example, as a local place name), but not be the primary meaning among a general audience.
Not "what first comes to (your) mind"
Perhaps the most commonly rejected criterion is that the primary topic should only belong to what "first comes to mind". This argument is inevitably tainted by the personal background, location, biases, ethnicity, and other pieces of one's own life, but we are trying to build an encyclopedia that is untainted by systemic bias. The primary topic is therefore determined without regard to (for example) the national origin, if any, of the article or articles in question.
Because many topics on Wikipedia are more interesting or pertinent to particular groups, one potential criterion to commonly avoid is what "first comes to mind". An American might first think of the city in Alabama when Birmingham is mentioned, but primary topic belongs to the city in England, which is far more notable and whose article is read much more often. A Scot might think of the Scottish city when the city of Perth is referred to, but the primary topic belongs to the Australian city for essentially the same reasons as for Birmingham. "Raleigh" takes you directly to the American city, even though a Brit may not even know of the city and only think of the explorer or bicycle manufacturer when Raleigh is mentioned. What first comes to your mind when you hear the word "Java"? It may be coffee or a programming language, but the primary topic belongs to the island with over 150 million people living on it.
Partial title matches should also be considered. For instance, New York City is far more notable than the British city from which it got its name, and the vast majority of the time that "York" is used in books, it is used in the names "New York City" and its containing state of "New York".[1] However, since sources rarely use an unqualified "York" to refer to "New York", York still hosts an article on the British city, and no suggestion to change that would be seriously entertained. Likewise, "Sofia" has been the first name of countless girls and women throughout history; however, as a single term it most commonly refers to the Bulgarian capital.[2]
Of course, coming first to mind does not preclude primary topic; Anne Hathaway takes the reader to the modern-day American movie star's page, not to the article on the wife of William Shakespeare. But in no case does "what comes first to mind" to any particular reader have much bearing, either positive or negative, on which topic, if any, actually is the primary topic.
Redirecting to a primary topic
The title of the primary topic article may be different from the ambiguous term. This may happen when the topic is primary for more than one term, when the article covers a wider topical scope, or when it is titled differently according to the naming conventions. When this is the case, the term should redirect to the article (or a section of it). The fact that an article has a different title is not a factor in determining whether a topic is primary. For example:
- The city which is the subject of the article on Gdańsk used to be called Danzig in English, but is now usually referred to as Gdańsk. Thus the primary topic for "Danzig" is this city; Danzig redirects to Gdańsk, and the latter page contains a {{redirect}} hatnote linking to Danzig (disambiguation).
- The primary topic for the search term "Einstein" is the physicist, but the article title is Albert Einstein. Here Einstein redirects to Albert Einstein, and a hatnote then links to Einstein (disambiguation).
- The article at Defamation is the primary topic for five terms: "defamation", "libel", "slander", "vilification", and "calumny". Even though there is a film with the title Libel, the article at Defamation is still the primary topic for that title and the film must be disambiguated.
Sometimes, a disambiguated article title, such as Apostrophe (punctuation), may be moved to an unqualified title based on a consensus that this is the primary topic for the unqualified term. When such a page move is made, the redirect template {{R from unnecessary disambiguation}} can be used to categorize the redirect that results from the move under Category:Redirects from unnecessary disambiguation. Using the above example, Apostrophe (punctuation) would redirect as follows (where Apostrophe's topic is primary):
#REDIRECT [[Apostrophe]]
{{Redirect category shell|
{{R from unnecessary disambiguation}}
{{R unprintworthy}}
}}
Primary topic when a disambiguation page lists only one existing article by that name
When a disambiguation pages lists only one existing article by that name (all other suggested articles are red-linked), the normal rules for determining the primary topic still apply. The existing article does not automatically become the primary topic. So:
- If the article with the blue link is chosen to be the primary topic, it becomes the primary article. The disambiguation page is then moved to a page carrying the (disambiguation) qualifier.
- On the rare occasions that a red-linked article is preferred to be the primary topic, the disambiguation page will still occupy the primary position as long as the red-linked article has not been written.
- If no article is preferred to be the primary topic, then the disambiguation page will remain the primary landing page.
Example of such a page:
Urney may refer to:
- Urney, County Cavan, a civil parish and townland in County Cavan, Ireland
- Urney, County Donegal, a civil parish in County Donegal, Ireland
- Urney, County Offaly, a townland in County Offaly, Ireland
- Urney, County Tyrone, a civil parish and townland in County Tyrone, Northern Ireland
In this case, the Urney disambiguation page is the primary landing page, as neither of the mentioned parishes can claim to be the primary topic.
Please note, MOS:DABMENTION and MOS:DABENTRY rules still apply: any red-linked article must still be complemented by a blue-linked article, and each entry should contain no more than one blue link.
Disambiguation page or hatnotes?
As discussed above, if an ambiguous term has no primary topic, then that term needs to lead to a disambiguation page. In other words, where no topic is primary, the disambiguation page is placed at the base name.
If there is a primary topic located at the base name, then the question arises whether to create a disambiguation page, or merely to link to all the other meanings from a hatnote on the primary topic article.
If there are only two topics to which a given title might refer, and one is the primary topic, then a disambiguation page is not needed—it is sufficient to use a hatnote on the primary topic article, pointing to the other article. (This means that readers looking for the second topic are spared the extra navigational step of going through the disambiguation page.) If there are two or three other topics, it is still possible to use a hatnote which lists the other topics explicitly, but if this would require too much text (roughly, if the hatnote would extend well over one line on a standard page), then it is better to create a disambiguation page and refer only to that.
If there are only two topics to which a given title might refer, but per the criteria at Is there a primary topic? there is no primary topic, then the base name should lead the reader to the disambiguation page for the term. For example, John Quested is a disambiguation page for the two people by that name who can be found in the encyclopedia:
John Quested may refer to:
- John Quested (aviator) (1893–1948), English World War I flying ace
- John Quested (producer) (born 1935), film producer and owner and chairman of Goldcrest Films
If a disambiguation page is needed, but one of the other topics is of particular interest, then it may be appropriate to link to it explicitly as well as linking to the disambiguation page. For example, Inflation is about the primary topic—a rise in prices—and a hatnote links to both Inflation (cosmology) and Inflation (disambiguation).
If a disambiguation page does not appear to be needed because there are only two topics for the ambiguous title and one of them is the primary topic, but there could reasonably be other topics ambiguous with the title on Wikipedia now or in the future, an {{about}} hatnote can be used to link to a disambiguation page (either in addition to or instead of a link directly to the other article). At the same time, the {{Only-two-dabs}} template should be added to the top of the disambiguation page, which will inform users that the page has only two ambiguous terms, and may be deleted if, after a period of time no additional ambiguous topics are found to expand the disambiguation page. The {{Only-two-dabs}} template will also list the article in Category:Disambiguation pages containing one non-primary topic, allowing other editors to locate these pages and help in expanding them. If the two-dab page has been expanded to include additional ambiguous topics, {{Only-two-dabs}} template should be removed and a direct link in the primary article to the other article may not be needed anymore as a link to the disambiguation page alone may be sufficient.
For example, Retrograde motion (disambiguation) contained links to only two articles, of which Retrograde motion was the primary topic. The disambiguation page is not needed, as the article links to the other meaning Apparent retrograde motion with a hatnote. However, if some more disambiguation links can be added, it would be useful to expand the hatnote with a link to the disambiguation page.
If the titles of two articles differ only in capitalization or the separation or non-separation of components (as per WP:DIFFCAPS or WP:PLURALPT), the articles each should contain a hatnote to link to each other.
Naming the specific topic articles
For disambiguating specific topic pages by using an unambiguous article title, several options are available:
- Natural disambiguation. When there is another term (such as Apartment instead of Flat) or more complete name (such as English language instead of English) that is unambiguous, commonly used in English (even without being the most common term), and equally clear, that term is typically the best to use.
- Parenthetical disambiguation. A disambiguating word or phrase can be added in parentheses. The word or phrase in parentheses should be:
- the generic class (avoiding proper nouns, as much as possible) that includes the topic, as in Mercury (element), Seal (emblem); or
- the subject or context to which the topic applies, as in Union (set theory), Inflation (cosmology); or
- rarely, an adjective describing the topic can be used, as in Vector (spatial), but it is usually better to rephrase such a title to avoid parentheses (for instance, Vector (spatial) was renamed to Euclidean vector).
- Comma-separated disambiguation. Ambiguous geographic names are often disambiguated by adding the name of a higher-level administrative division, separated by a comma, as in Windsor, Berkshire. See Naming conventions (geographic names).
Natural disambiguation is generally preferable to parenthetical disambiguation; for instance mechanical fan and hand fan are used instead of fan (mechanical) and fan (implement). If natural disambiguation is not available, a parenthetical is used. If there are several possible choices for parenthetical disambiguation, use the same disambiguating phrase already commonly used for other topics within the same class and context, if any. Otherwise, choose whichever is simpler. For example, use "(mythology)" rather than "(mythological figure)".
Naming conventions applicable to certain subject areas are listed in the box to the right; these often contain detailed guidance about how to disambiguate. In particular, for articles about people, see the Disambiguating section in the people naming convention.
Format
To conform to the naming conventions, the phrase in parentheses should be treated just as any other word in a title: normally lowercase, unless it is a proper noun (like a book title) that would appear capitalized even in running text.
For common disambiguation words, see User:Jarry1250/Findings.
Hatnotes
Users searching for what turns out to be an ambiguous term may not reach the article they expected. Therefore, any article with an ambiguous title should contain helpful links to alternative Wikipedia articles or disambiguation pages, placed at the top of the article using one or more of the templates shown below.
Disambiguation hatnotes are not article content—they are associated with the title, rather than any article topic content.
Most hatnote templates generate links automatically, so double square brackets are not normally used within the templates. In some cases there are multiple templates available, one including and another omitting information about the topic of the article. The shorter hatnote may be chosen if omitting the information is not likely to confuse the reader.
On a primary topic page for a term that has one secondary topic only (no disambiguation page):
- Type
{{about|TOPIC|TOPIC 2|ARTICLE (2)}}to produce: - Type
{{for|TOPIC 2|ARTICLE (2)}}to produce: - Type
{{see also|ARTICLE (2)}}to produce:
On a secondary topic page for a term that has one other topic only (no disambiguation page):
- As above, but consider whether the hatnote is really necessary (see the first of the usage guidelines below).
On a primary topic page that has an associated disambiguation page:
- Type
{{about|TOPIC}}to produce: - Type
{{otheruses}}to produce: - or, if the disambiguation page is not in the default location, type
{{otheruses|NAME}}to produce:
When the primary topic redirects to another page:
- If there is only one secondary topic, type
{{redirect|REDIRECT|TOPIC 2|ARTICLE (2)}}on the target page to produce: - If there is a disambiguation page, type
{{redirect|REDIRECT}}to produce:
Other variations on these templates are available, including templates for specific subjects such as places, numbers, etc. Templates are listed and illustrated at Template talk:About and Wikipedia:Otheruses templates (example usage). A longer list of disambiguation templates is found at Wikipedia:Template messages/General#Disambiguation and redirection; further style information is given at Wikipedia:Hatnotes#Templates. Many more templates are listed in Category:Disambiguation and redirection templates.
Usage guidelines
- There is not always a need to add disambiguation links to a page whose name already clearly distinguishes itself from the generic term. However, for some topics this is a good idea. For example, Treaty of Paris (1796) should include a hatnote point to the disambiguation page Treaty of Paris (disambiguation), since many users might not know that there is more than one treaty with this name, and we cannot predict what external search engines will link to. In other cases, such a hatnote is not necessary. For example, Solaris (1972 film) is clearly about one specific movie and not about any of the many other meanings of "Solaris", and most users will know to type Solaris in the search box to find other topics.
- As noted above, disambiguation links should be placed at the top of an article, where they are most visible. For alternatives that are related to the article but are not a source of ambiguity, the "See also" section at the end of the article is more appropriate.
- Do not use piping to change the title of disambiguation entry links. Showing the actual linked entry title avoids confusion. (Piping may be used for formatting or technical reasons; see the Manual of Style exceptions.)
- Consolidate multiple disambiguation links into as few dablink hatnotes as possible.
- See Wikipedia:Hatnote for other guidelines on the proper use of disambiguation links.
Disambiguation pages
Combining terms on disambiguation pages
A single disambiguation page may be used to disambiguate a number of similar terms. Sets of terms which are commonly so combined include:
- Terms which differ only in capitalization, punctuation and diacritic marks. These should almost always share a disambiguation page. For example, the terms Oe, Ōe, OE and O.E. are disambiguated on a single page (Oe).
- Corresponding singular, plural and possessive forms, or compound words. For example, the terms Eaglenest, Eagle Nest, Eagle's Nest and Eagle Nests all appear at Eagle's Nest, and Stars (disambiguation) redirects to Star (disambiguation).
- Variant spellings. For example, Honor and Honour both appear at Honor (disambiguation).
- Variant forms of names. For example, Fred Smith also includes persons named Frederick Smith.
- Terms which differ by the presence or absence of an article (i.e., "a", "an", or "the" in English). For example, Cure (disambiguation) also contains instances of The Cure.
Editorial judgement should be used in deciding whether to combine terms in the ways described above. If a combined disambiguation page would be inconveniently long, it may be better to split the disambiguation page into separate pages.
When a combined disambiguation page is used, redirects to it (or hatnotes, as appropriate) should be set up from all the terms involved.
Naming the disambiguation page
The title of a disambiguation page is the ambiguous term itself, provided there is no primary topic for that term. If there is a primary topic, then the tag "(disambiguation)" is added to the name of the disambiguation page, as in Jupiter (disambiguation).
When a disambiguation page combines several similar terms, one of them must be selected as the title for the page (with the "(disambiguation)" tag added if a primary topic exists for that term); the choice should be made in line with the following principles:
- A word is preferred to an abbreviation, for example Arm (disambiguation) over ARM.
- When no word can be formed, all capitals is preferred. For example, the disambiguation page for "ddb" is DDB (disambiguation), not "Ddb".
- English spelling is preferred to that of non-English languages.
- Singulars are preferred to plurals.
- The simplest form of the term is preferred to those containing punctuation, diacritics and articles; for example SA is preferred to S.A., and Shadow (disambiguation) is preferred to The Shadow (disambiguation).
- The spelling that reflects the majority of items on the page is preferred to less common alternatives.
In addition, when a disambiguation page exists at the ambiguous term, there should also be a redirect to it from the "(disambiguation)" title; in other words, if "Term ABC" is a disambiguation page, a redirect from "Term ABC (disambiguation)" should be created if it does not already exist. This type of redirect is used to indicate any intentional links to the disambiguation page, to distinguish them from accidental or erroneous incoming links that should be disambiguated to the appropriate article.
Page style
Each disambiguation page comprises a list (or multiple lists, for multiple senses of the term in question) of similarly titled links.
- Link to the primary topic (if there is one):
- A school is an institution for learning.
- Start each list with a short introductory sentence fragment with the title in bold, and ending with a colon. For example:
- Blockbuster may refer to:
- Try to start each entry in the list with a link to the target page, unless the link provided gives context rather than a synonymous meaning.
- Each bulleted entry should have a navigable (blue) link, normally as the entry itself (see the previous bullet), or in the description if the entry is red-linked or unlinked.
- Rarely should a bulleted entry have more than one navigable link; including more than one link can confuse the reader.
- Do not pipe the name of the links to the articles being listed. (See exceptions.) (Hover here for why.)
- Entries are sentence fragments; do not end them with periods or other punctuation.
Include the template {{disambiguation}} (or another disambiguation template, such as {{Geodis}} or {{Hndis}}) at the bottom as an indicator of the page's status. For more information, see the relevant style guide section.
For prime examples of disambiguation pages, see "Lift" and "Aurora (disambiguation)".
What not to include
The purpose of a disambiguation page is to direct a reader seeking information on a specific topic to the right page. Strictly speaking, entries should be just sufficient for this purpose. It is common to add a little additional information (which may make reference to the full article unnecessary). For example, consider the text "Franklin Delano Roosevelt, U.S. president 1933–1945, Democratic Party, a central figure in world events, creator of the New Deal, in a wheelchair from polio since 1921, died in office". The name only is sufficient in FDR (disambiguation) (for example, to distinguish the president from a flight data recorder). The next phrase, office held and incumbency, is unlikely to be objected to. The rest is unnecessary and inappropriate; it very briefly summarises the article, rather than merely disambiguating.
Dictionary definitions
A disambiguation page is not a list of dictionary definitions. A short description of the common general meaning of a word can be appropriate for helping the reader determine context. Otherwise, there are templates for linking the reader to Wiktionary, the wiki dictionary; see Template:Wiktionary. It is also not an interlanguage dictionary; while Geneva is Ginebra in Spanish and other languages, this is not listed in the article, so the Ginebra disambiguation page should not include Geneva.
Partial title matches
A disambiguation page is not a search index. Do not add a link that merely contains part of the page title, or a link that includes the page title in a longer proper name, where there is no significant risk of confusion or reference. For example, Louisville Zoo is not included at Zoo (disambiguation) because people outside Louisville would not readily identify it as the "Zoo", and including all zoos in the world in the disambiguation page is impractical (though List of zoos is listed in the "See also" section). Add a link only if the article's subject (or the relevant subtopic thereof) could plausibly be referred to by essentially the same name as the disambiguated term in a sufficiently generic context—regardless of the article's title. For instance, the Mississippi River article could not feasibly be titled Mississippi, since that name is used by the U.S. state article, but it is included at Mississippi (disambiguation) because its subject is often called "the Mississippi".
Place names are often divided between a specific and generic part: "North Carolina" (where "Carolina" is the specific, and "North" the generic part). Other common generics are compass points, upper/lower, old/new, big/small, etc. It is entirely proper to include such place names in disambiguation pages with the specific title (North Carolina is properly listed at Carolina (disambiguation)); but only exceptionally in the generic title (we do not expect to see North Carolina in North (disambiguation), just as we do not expect to see Mississippi River in River (disambiguation)).
To prevent disambiguation pages from getting too long, articles on people should be listed at the disambiguation page for their first or last name only if they are reasonably well known by it. We reasonably expect to see Abraham Lincoln at Lincoln (disambiguation), but very few sources would refer to the waltz composer Harry J. Lincoln by an unqualified "Lincoln", so he is only listed at the Lincoln (surname) anthroponymy article. This is even more widespread for first names—many highly notable people are called Herb, but typing in Herb gets you an article on plants. Herb (disambiguation) does not even list any people named "Herb", but instead links to Herb (surname) and Herb (given name), where articles on people named "Herb" are listed. Consensus among editors determines if an article should be listed on the disambiguation page.
Instead of listing partial title matches, consider adding the {{look from}} or {{intitle}} templates in the "See also" section, which link to all articles starting with or containing a particular term, respectively.
Related subjects
Include articles only if the term being disambiguated is actually described in the target article. For example, a use of the term "set" is discussed in the article on Volleyball, so Set (disambiguation) legitimately includes "Set, the second contact in [[volleyball]]".
Abbreviations, initials and acronyms
Do not add articles to abbreviation or acronym disambiguation pages unless the target article includes the acronym or abbreviation—we are resolving an ambiguity, not making yet another dictionary of abbreviations. If an abbreviation is verifiable, but not mentioned on the target article, consider adding it to the target article and then adding the entry to the disambiguation page. In particular, do not include people and other things simply because of their initials, unless those initials have been widely used. John Fitzgerald Kennedy is widely known as JFK and this is discussed in the article, so the initials are appropriately disambiguated; however, Marilyn Monroe was never commonly known as "MM", nor was A. A. Milne known as either "AA" or "AAM". See also MOS:DABACRO.
Sister projects
Disambiguation descriptions should not be created for subjects whose only articles are on pages of sister projects, even if the disambiguation page already exists.
References
Do not include references in disambiguation pages; disambiguation pages are not articles. Incorporate references into the articles linked from the disambiguation page, as needed.
External links
Do not include external links, either as entries or in descriptions. Disambiguation pages disambiguate Wikipedia articles, not the World Wide Web. To note URLs that might be helpful in the future, include them on the talk page. An exception is linking to Wiktionary for the dictionary definition of the disambiguated topic.
Preparation
Before constructing a new disambiguation page, determine a specific topic name for all existing pages, and the name for the disambiguation page. Move any page with a conflicting title (i.e., the same exact title) to its more specific name. Use the What links here list for the moved page to update pages that link to that page.
Construction
If an article has been moved to make way for the disambiguation page, use the What links here list of the moved page to access the redirect page created by the move, and replace that redirect page with the new disambiguation page.
Use the new disambiguation page to find and replace (see Table of keyboard shortcuts#Text editing) any existing disambiguation links in existing pages with a link to the new disambiguation page.
Note that the standard link templates will actually point to a Term XYZ (disambiguation) version of the new name. Use the red-link on an existing page to create a redirect page marked with the {{R to disambiguation page}} template.
For example, Term XYZ (disambiguation) could be redirected to the new disambiguation page Term XYZ as follows:
#REDIRECT [[Term XYZ]]
{{R to disambiguation page}}
Links
Double disambiguation
A double disambiguation is a link to a disambiguation page from another disambiguation page. This kind of disambiguation is typically more specific than one with a simplified name. This kind of disambiguation is relatively rare on Wikipedia.
- For example, Montgomery is a disambiguation page that includes a link to Montgomery County, a secondary disambiguation page. Because the intended target page is also a disambiguation page, the link is to "Montgomery County (disambiguation)" rather than directly to "Montgomery County". There are two reasons for this: One is so the page will not show up as an error needing to be fixed, and the other is so our readers know it is a link to a disambiguation page. See WP:INTDABLINK for further information on creating intentional links to disambiguation pages.
Incomplete disambiguation
When a more specific title is still ambiguous, but not enough so to call for double disambiguation, it should redirect back to the main disambiguation page (or a section of it). This aids navigation, and helps editors to avoid creating new articles under the ambiguous title by accident.
Such redirects should be marked with {{R from incomplete disambiguation}} (which places them under Category:Redirects from incomplete disambiguations). For example, Aurora (album) could redirect as follows (where Aurora (disambiguation) is a disambiguation page):
#REDIRECT [[Aurora (disambiguation)#Albums]]
{{R from incomplete disambiguation}}
In some cases, information may be more appropriate as a list than a disambiguation. For example, Cleveland (NFL) should not be a disambiguation page, but should instead redirect to List of Cleveland sports teams#Football.
Interlanguage links
Pure disambiguation pages should contain interlanguage links only where a similar problem of disambiguation exists in the target language; that is, they should refer to another disambiguation page, not to one of the many meanings from the list.
Links to disambiguated topics
When creating disambiguation pages, fix all resulting mis-directed links.
Before moving an article to a qualified name (in order to create a disambiguation page at the base name, to move an existing disambiguation page to that name, or to redirect that name to a disambiguation page), click on What links here to find all of the incoming links. Repair all of those incoming links to use the new article name.
When repairing a link, use pipe syntax so that the link does not show the new qualifier. For example, when renaming Topic Name to Topic Name (qualifier), [[Topic Name (qualifier)|Topic Name]] will render as Topic Name just like the original.
A shorter alternative is to use empty pipe syntax, also known as the pipe trick. This allows editors to leave out the piped alternative when editing. For example, typing "[[Topic Name (qualifier)| ]]" will automatically produce "[[Topic Name (qualifier)|Topic Name]]". Read Help:Pipe trick for more information.
Ambiguous links are periodically checked and repaired, but even if some ambiguous links remain, one of the primary reasons for making a disambiguation page is so that following such links will still be useful to the reader.
There is a tool to facilitate ambiguous link repair in the Python Wikipedia Robot. The bot offers to update links to choices listed on the disambiguation page. Do not forget to seek approval on the Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval page if doing extensive or fast runs.
Links to disambiguation pages
Links to disambiguation pages from mainspace are typically errors. In order to find and fix those errors, disambiguators generate a wide array of reports of links needing to be checked and fixed. Because these reports can not distinguish instances where an editor has made such a link with the intent to point to the disambiguation page, the community has adopted the procedure of rerouting all intentional disambiguation links in mainspace through "Foo (disambiguation)" redirects. This makes it clear that such links are intended to point to the disambiguation page.
For example:
- In text or in a "see also" section of an article that is not itself a disambiguation page:
- Incorrect: There are many places named [[Springfield]]
- Correct: There are many places named [[Springfield (disambiguation)|Springfield]]
- An intentional link to another disambiguation page that does not contain "(disambiguation)", placed in the "See also" section of a disambiguation page:
- Incorrect: [[Springfield]]
- Incorrect: [[Springfield (disambiguation)|Springfield]]
- Correct: [[Springfield (disambiguation)]]
- In a hatnote:
- Incorrect: {{for|other uses|Springfield}}
- Correct: {{for|other uses|Springfield (disambiguation)}}, or
- {{for|other uses|Springfield (disambiguation){{!}}Springfield}}
With few exceptions, creating links to disambiguation pages is erroneous. Links should instead point to a relevant article. The purpose of a disambiguation page is to give a user who has typed an ambiguous term into the search box a list of articles that are likely to be what that person is looking for. Disambiguation pages are not articles and so should not be tagged as orphans per the Orphan criteria.
When to link to a disambiguation page
The exceptions, when an intentional link to a disambiguation page is appropriate, are:
- Disambiguation hatnotes: Watergate redirects to Watergate scandal, which carries a hatnote linking to Watergate (disambiguation) for other uses.
- Links from one disambiguation page to another for further disambiguation: British has a link to Britain (disambiguation) for further disambiguation.
- Links from set indexes: Laing (surname) contains a link to Laing (disambiguation).
- Exceptionally, in a "See also" list of interesting internal links where several different articles might be of interest to the reader and multiple ones are listed on the disambiguation page.
- In a redirect page (below)
How to link to a disambiguation page
To link to a disambiguation page (rather than to a page whose topic is a specific meaning), link to the title that includes the text "(disambiguation)", even if that is a redirect—for example, link to the redirect America (disambiguation) rather than the target page at "America".
- If the redirect does not yet exist, create it and tag it with {{R to disambiguation page}}.
- If you are linking within a template, such as a hatnote template, you can still use pipe syntax so that the link does not show the new qualifier. To do this, use the {{!}} meta-template.
This helps distinguish accidental links to the disambiguation page from intentional ones. (For use in navboxes, see the {{D'}} template.) There is nothing wrong with linking to a redirect instead of linking directly to the disambiguation page; redirects are cheap and are basically transparent to the reader.
Redirects to disambiguation pages
Valid causes for redirecting to a disambiguation page include:
- Incomplete disambiguation (see above)
- Redirects from misspellings: Britian redirects to the "Britain" disambiguation page.
- Redirects from alternative spellings if separate disambiguation pages are not warranted: Türk redirects to the "Turk" disambiguation page.
- Redirects from variations in capitalisation, word separation, or punctuation, if separate disambiguation pages are not warranted: Bullet Proof redirects to "Bulletproof (disambiguation)".
The rule about linking through a "(disambiguation)" redirect does not apply to redirects to disambiguation pages: do not create a double redirect, but make a redirect to the disambiguation page directly (thus Bill Cox, a redirect from an alternative name, redirects to the disambiguation page and does not go through the redirect William Cox (disambiguation)). Although it is permissible for this redirect to be made, it generally should not be linked to in an article for the same reasons direct links to disambiguation pages are discouraged.
See Category:Redirects to disambiguation pages.
Visualizing links to disambiguation pages
Links to disambiguation pages can be displayed in orange in the settings under "Gadgets" by checking "Display links to disambiguation pages in orange".
Deletion
Although disambiguation pages are not articles, a disambiguation page may be listed at Articles for deletion to discuss whether the disambiguation page should be deleted.
Categories
Disambiguation pages are not articles and should not be categorized as such. Article categories should lead readers to relevant articles; disambiguation pages should be placed in disambiguation categories only. Some categories are automatically provided by use of the {{disambiguation}} template and parameters (geo, surname, etc.). Hidden categories may appear due to maintenance or other tags and templates, but other explicit categories (such as Category:Mountains of Fooland) should not be used on disambiguation pages. When a disambiguation page includes a list of name-holders (in cases where the separate anthroponymy list article has not yet been created), explicit categories such as Category:Fooish surnames are acceptable on the disambiguation page until the anthroponymy article is split from the disambiguation page.
Set index articles
A set index article (SIA) is a list article about a set of items of a specific type that share the same (or similar) name. For example, Dodge Charger describes a set of cars, List of peaks named Signal Mountain describes a set of mountain peaks, and List of ships of the United States Navy named Enterprise describes a set of ships. Being of a specific type means that they share a common characteristic in addition to the similarity of name. A list is only a SIA if inclusion of an item in the list is due to the name of the item—e.g., every entry in a list of earthquakes may include the word "earthquake", but that does not mean the list is a SIA.
A set index article is not a disambiguation page.
See also
- Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Disambiguation pages
- Wikipedia:WikiProject Disambiguation
- Wikipedia:Disambiguation dos and don'ts
- Help:Disambiguation
- Wikipedia:Red links § Disambiguation pages
- Wikipedia:Partially disambiguated page names (essay)
- Wikipedia:Primary topics in WP:TWODABS situations (essay)
References
- ^ See Google Ngram Viewer results for York/New York and York is/New York is.
- ^ U.S. cities (such as Anaheim, California) are not considered as partial title matches when deciding whether they are the primary topic for the base name ("Anaheim"). They are considered full title matches for primary redirect concern; the only reason that many U.S. city articles are located at the elongated title is the current Wikipedia policy for keeping state names in virtually all US cities and counties.
External links
- Wiki ViewStats, a Tool labs tool that shows global and per language / project traffic statistics with disambiguation support.
