Pensapedia:Redirect

This page is a how-to guideline for Pensapedia, reflecting how the authors of this encyclopedia address certain issues. This guideline is intended to help you improve Pensapedia content. Feel free to update this page as needed, but please use the discussion page to propose major changes.

For general info on creating redirects see Help:Redirect.

File:Redirectscreenshot2.PNG

Example of a redirect page

Contents

How to make a redirect

To redirect a page (1) to a different page (2), enter the following on the top of page 1.

#REDIRECT [[NAME OF PAGE 2]]

For example, to redirect the Whibbs Park page to the Vince Whibbs, Sr. Community Maritime Park page, edit the Maritime Park page and enter:

#REDIRECT [[Vince Whibbs, Sr. Community Maritime Park]]

Don't make double redirects (a redirect that points to another redirect); they don't work, create slow, unpleasant experiences for the reader, and make the navigational structure of the site confusing.

Double redirects are usually created after a move when old redirects are left unchanged and pointing towards an old name.

Another type of undesirable redirect is a self-redirect: an article that redirects to itself through a redirect.

Please note that you can redirect only to articles, not sections in them; although the syntax allows them, they don't work:

#REDIRECT [[University of Cambridge#History]]

Everything after the redirect line will be blanked when you save the page. Any text on the same line as the redirect will stay, but will not be visible unless someone edits the page.

To go back and edit your redirect after it's working, add ?redirect=no to the end of the URL for your redirect:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cambridge_University?redirect=no

To add a reason, select one of the tags from the Tag column below and add it one space after and on the same line as #REDIRECT [[Wherever]]. For example, on the redirect page University of cambridge,

#REDIRECT [[University of Cambridge]] {{R from other capitalisation}} 

That will also add the redirect to the category listed in the Category column below. Note that there must be a space between the end of the redirect code and the template code for this to work properly.

More examples are included below:

What do we use redirects for?

Compare the more complete template list and the corresponding category.

Reason	Usage notes, and text that will be shown	Tag / Category to find articles so tagged
Abbreviations	Template:R from abbreviation DSM-IV redirects to Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders	{{R from abbreviation}}
Misspellings	Template:R from misspelling Condoleeza Rice redirects to Condoleezza Rice	{{R from misspelling}}
Other spellings, other punctuation	Template:R from alternative spelling colour redirects to color Al-Jazeera redirects to Al Jazeera	{{R from alternative spelling}}
Other capitalisations, to ensure that "Go" to a mixed-capitalisation article title is case-insensitive	Template:R from other capitalisation Adding a redirect for mixed-capitalisation article titles (e.g., Isle of Wight) allows going to these articles to be case-insensitive. For example, without the redirect Isle of wight going to "Isle Of wight" or any capitalisation other than exactly 'Isle of Wight' would not find the article Isle of Wight. Why: Articles whose titles contain mixed-capitalisation words (not all initial caps, or not all lower case except the first word) are found only via an exact case match. (Articles, including redirects, whose titles are either all initial caps or only first word capitalised are found via "Go" using a case-insensitive match.) Note: Related redirects are needed only if the article title has two or more words and words following the first have different capitalisations. They are not needed, for example, for proper names which are all initial caps. Examples: Natural Selection redirects to Natural selection Redirect Vice chancellor of austria to Vice Chancellor of Austria is needed because the Go search is case-sensitive for mixed-caps titles. Adding this redirect allows the article to be found when a user enters "vice chancellor of austria" or "vice chancellor of Austria" as a Go search. No redirect to Francis Ford Coppola is needed because the "Go" command is case-insensitive for an article whose title is all initial caps. Any capitalisation (e.g. "francis fOrD CoPPola") entered as a "Go" will find the article.	{{R from other capitalisation}}
Other names, pseudonyms, nicknames, and synonyms	Template:R from alternative name Wellie throwing redirects to Wellie wanging Butcher of Kurdistan redirects to Ali Hassan al-Majid Rev. Fred Phelps redirects to Fred Phelps Linear operator redirects to Linear transformation	{{R from alternative name}}
Scientific names	Template:R from scientific name Heosemys depressa redirects to Arakan Forest Turtle Deuterium oxide redirects to Heavy water 1P/Halley redirects to Comet Halley	{{R from scientific name}}
Scientific names	Template:R to scientific name European shore crab redirects to Carcinus maenas Baking soda redirects to Sodium bicarbonate Alnitak redirects to Zeta Orionis	{{R to scientific name}}
Other languages	Template:R from alternative language The Abduction from the Seraglio redirects to Die Entführung aus dem Serail	{{R from alternative language}}
Accents	Template:R from ASCII Kurt Goedel and Kurt Godel redirect to Kurt Gödel	{{R from ASCII}}
Plurals	Template:R from plural greenhouse gases redirects to greenhouse gas, etc. Note that [[greenhouse gas]]es shows up as greenhouse gases, so it is not usually necessary to redirect plurals. However third-party websites started adding automatic links to wikipedia from their topics (see, e.g., [1]). Many of them follow the opposite naming convention, i.e., topics are named in plural, and the link to wikipedia may land into an empty page, if there is no redirect.	{{R from plural}}
Related words	Template:R from related word Symbiont redirects to Symbiosis	{{R from related word}}
Sub-topics or closely related topics that should be explained within the text	Template:R with possibilities Distributed denial of service redirects to Denial of service	{{R with possibilities}}
Facilitate disambiguation	Template:R to disambiguation page America (disambiguation) redirects to America	{{R to disambiguation page}}
To track statements that date quickly	Template:R for as of As of 2003 redirects to 2003 See Wikipedia:As of for more info.	{{R for as of}}
To redirect to decade article	Template:R to decade 1003 BC redirects to 1000s BC	{{R to decade}}
To redirect from a shortcut	This is a redirect from a Wikipedia shortcut. Shortcuts are generally reserved for Wikipedia project reference pages. For more information, follow the category link. WP:CAT redirects to Wikipedia:Category	{{R from shortcut}} Category:Redirects from shortcut
Oldstyle CamelCase links	Template:R from CamelCase DemocracY redirects to Democracy	{{R from CamelCase}}
links autogenerated from EXIF information	Template:R from EXIF Adobe Photoshop CS Windows redirects to Adobe Photoshop	{{R from EXIF}}
From school microstub to merge location	Template:R from school Culler Middle School redirects to Lincoln Public Schools	{{R from school}}

• Avoiding broken links (see below)
• Minor but notable topics

Sub-topic redirects are often temporary, eventually being replaced by fully fledged articles on the sub-topic in question. Be conservative when creating sub-topic redirects — they can sometimes be counter-productive, because they disguise the absence of a proper article from editors. Sub-topic redirects should only be used where the main article has a section on the sub-topic. For example, denial of service has a section on distributed denial of service. Sub-topics should be boldfaced on their first appearance in the section, to indicate that they are in fact alternate titles or sub-titles.

In accordance with wikipedia:naming conventions (precision) it's best to have an article at a well-defined, unambiguous term, with redirects from looser colloquial terms, rather than vice versa.

Some editors prefer to avoid redirects and link directly to the target article, as it is reported that redirects lower search engine rankings.

See also: Wikipedia:Template messages/Redirect pages which contains a somewhat longer list of available redirect templates

When should we delete a redirect?

To delete a redirect without replacing it with a new article, list it on redirects for deletion. See deletion policy for details on how to nominate pages for deletion.

This isn't necessary if you just want to replace a redirect with an article, or change where it points: see How do I change a redirect? for instructions on how to do this. If you want to swap a redirect and an article, but are not able to move the article to the location of the redirect please use Wikipedia:Requested moves to request help from an admin in doing that.

What needs to be done on pages that are targets of redirects?

We follow the "principle of least astonishment" — after following a redirect, the reader's first question is likely to be: "hang on ... I wanted to read about this. Why has the link taken me to that?". Make it clear to the reader that they have arrived in the right place. Normally, we try to make sure that all "inbound redirects" are mentioned in the first couple of paragraphs of the article.

Don't cause a secondary redirect. They don't work like a primary redirect; same with tertiary redirects.

Self-links, duplicate links

Avoid self-links, including self-links through redirects ("loop links"). Also, avoid having two links that go to the same place. These can confuse readers, and cause them to unnecessarily load the same page twice.

Template redirects

A template T2 can be redirected to another template T1. This creates an alias (T2 is an alias for T1). The alias name T2 can be used instead of the "real" template T2.

Aliases for templates can cause confusion and make migrations of template calls more complicated. For example, assume calls to T1 are to be changed ("migrated") to some new template TN1. To catch all calls, articles must be searched for {{T1}} and all aliases of T1 (T2 in this case).

See also

• Pensapedia:How to rename (move) a page
• Pensapedia:Disambiguation