Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Dates and numbers/Date autoformatting

First

A good instruction. I edited it a bit for style. I put back the bit at the start about discouraging the use of autolinking, because we went through a long discussion about it, and the consensus was that it's a bad idea, and I think it's good to make this clear to the reader. In fact, I would prefer to state the discouragement even more strongly. There's a need to have a NPOV in the main articles, but not in instructions for using Wikipedia, in my opinion.

I've also edited WP:CONTEXT and the parent article a bit to make this new rule clearer. Teemu Leisti (talk) 12:43, 25 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I agree that it was a bad idea. This is not the same thing as finding it prudent to deprecate it now. We don't have to order people not to use it, if its disadvantages can presented so as to persuade them not to use it. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 15:33, 25 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

No one is ordering anyone: you just have to have "a good reason" to use it. The page is now much better with "just the facts", as Anderson put it. Tony (talk) 15:55, 25 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, it looks fine now. My apologies, again, if in my enthusiasm I went beyond what the consensus was. No harm was intended. Teemu Leisti (talk) 06:26, 27 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

No one is ordering anyone?

The brusque treatment of Anderson, Dispenser, and Daytrivia below lead me to think I won't fare any better, but all the same, some thoughts.

1) "Depreciate," autocorrection via software, and the rude treatment just mentioned is certainly ordering, to the extent capable in this environment.

2) Given that it is, you could at least be clearer about the wording - depreciate, commonly understood, doesn't mean anything like its computer context; the base MOS page needs a link or better still a rewording. Discontinued means the same thing, discouraged is less prohibitive, avoid more; any of them is clearer.

3) While there may well have been very good points made about the reasons to stop linking dates (and even actively start delinking them,) Tony's page doesn't seem to have them. Disliking seeing links is a question of preference and the problems with autoformatting are... a problem with autoformatting, which could be best dealt with by petitioning to remove the feature.

4) Similarly, the "pro-link" 'arguments' presented on Tony's talk page are strawmen, while there are a number of reasons to maintain linked dates. As posters below mention, it's quite interesting and even useful to see what's occurring at the same time as a given event; likewise what else occured on a certain day. Those links are - by their very nature - informative about what else happened at that time, which is the information someone would be seeking by clicking the date in the first place. Most importantly, the date links allow people to improve the date pages by using the "what links here" feature to include things they might have forgotten or never would have thought of.

5) Contra Tony, none of that violates WP:NOT as it currently stands, though WP:Context is a valid argument (NB: Although the discouragement about dates there has been added since this discussion began.)

I appreciate WP:DEMOCRACY (love the irony there) and how frustrating it can be having to repeat your arguments across several pages or against people simply in the wrong; more importantly, it seems clear Tony is far more passionate about pushing through this policy change than I am about the minor benefits the links provide.

Still, I did want to add these thoughts (if there's still a vote or discussion somewhere, I'm a no to these changes as currently explained) and suggest that he be more accurate both about the real problems (some extra server space and slightly faster processing is about the size of it; the autoformatting problems are simply autoformatting problems that could be far more efficiently solved by ... removing date autoformatting) and the real reasons for opposition (above and below). Not doing so is part and parcel of the WP:Civility problems on this page and elsewhere and risk causing people to become more petulant or even militant in their opposition, when I'm sure that's not what he intends. -LlywelynII (talk) 22:15, 2 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, Tony and others are passionate about this change, and seem to believe it will lead to an improvement of our encyclopedia. My sense is that Wikipedia currently has no stylistic consensus at all regarding dates or date-autoformatting. Thus I currently advocate each editor doing what they feel is best on a case-by-case basis. This isn't an anarchy, though, so we all need to use our best collaborative skills during the chaos that's likely coming. (sdsds - talk) 23:23, 5 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Are you ignoring the overwhelming consensus at MONSUM and elsewhere? And the generally enthusiastic (or silent) attitude by most editors? I hope that sdsd isn't threatening to cause chaos—we've had enough of that, and want to settle down now that the issue has been resolved. Tony (talk) 00:14, 6 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

No Tony, I'm not threatening anything of the sort! I'm advocating colaboration. I was sayint that in my view, your well-intentioned efforts run a substantial risk of causing chaos. As for ignoring your "silence means consensus" attitude, is it possible you are ignoring something yourself? (sdsds - talk) 00:21, 6 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Gregorian calendar

I have added a section about autoformatting being unsafe for non-Gregorian dates. I am not a calendar expert but I think I have enough knowledge to make the point that autoformatting can make a Julian date look like a Gregorian date. Lightmouse (talk) 18:01, 25 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

It's enough to discourage autoformatting into and out of ISO for historic dates. The present text should do that; if it were worth contacting the developers other than to get rid of autoformatting altogether, it would be nice to remove ISO from the list of formats. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 19:29, 25 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

In what way does a Julian date look different from a Gregorian one? Abtract (talk) 20:12, 25 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

This link may explain it better than I ever could: Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (dates and numbers)#Gregorian calendar. Hiding T 09:01, 26 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Abstract, if you mean, you read a date in a document and you're not sure if it's Julian or Gregorian, what about the format would clue you in, the answer is "usually you can't tell". If it is known that the document uses the ISO-8601 format, and the author knows what s/he is doing, then dates like 1582-02-10 would be Gregorian. If the date looks like 10 February 1582, you usually can't tell. You can tell for a few dates, such as 29 February 1700, because the Gregorian calendar didn't have a leap year but the Julian calendar did, so it must be Julian. --Gerry Ashton (talk) 18:19, 27 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

It just has to be mentioned separately, in a manner such as "In this chapter, the dates refer to the Julian calendar, used in Outer Slobobotnia until 1 April 1829 (Gregorian)". Isn't this how regular, printed text makes the distinction? Is there any other way? Teemu Leisti (talk) 22:02, 27 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Just for your information: after 1752 in Great Britain and her possessions, people would add "(O.S.)" (Old Style or Julian) or "(N.S)" (New Style or Gregorian) after the date to indicate the calendar to which a date referred. Thus George Washington's birthday could be rendered February 11, 1731 (O.S.) and/or February 22, 1732 (N.S.) [New Year's Day was moved from March 25th to January 1st at the same time the calendars were changed.] Historians and biographers treating the 16th-18th centuries often continue to use "(O.S.)" and "(N.S.)" or print both dates separated by a slash. E.g. "George Washington was born on Feb. 11, 1731/Feb. 22, 1732" or "born on Feb. 11, 1731 (Feb. 22, 1732 N.S.)". I've seen somewhat similar treatments the Russian Revolutions of February/March and October/November 1917. Sorry for the sidetrack. Shakescene (talk) 08:32, 14 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

On the strength of the statement on discouragement

Tony1 wrote to me on my talk page, and I'm moving the discussion here.

This is the edit history of the introductory statement of discouragement, which I'll abbreviate SoD hereinafter, on the main page's section Date autoformatting, and on the subpage:

editor	edit time of main page	SoD on main page	edit time of subpage	SoD on subpage	comment
24 August 2008
Greg L	19:32	The autoformatting of dates using the tools shown in the table below is no longer encouraged.	19:27	The autoformatting of dates using the tools shown in the table below is no longer encouraged.	The first appearance of the SoD. Greg L created the subpage.
Greg L	19:35	The autoformatting of dates using the tools shown in the table below is no longer encouraged and should generally not be used in articles unless there is good reason to do so (such as in articles that are intrinsically historical in nature).	19:37	The autoformatting of dates using the tools shown in the table below is no longer encouraged and should generally not be used in articles unless there is good reason to do so (such as in articles that are intrinsically historical in nature).
Greg L	19:38	The autoformatting of dates is no longer encouraged and should generally not be used in articles unless there is good reason to do so (such as in articles that are intrinsically historical in nature).
Pmanderson	20:08	The autoformatting of dates using the tools shown in the table below is no longer encouraged and should generally not be used in articles unless there is good reason to do so (such as in articles that are intrinsically historical in nature).	20:11	The autoformatting of dates using the tools shown in the table below is no longer required; many editors would prefer to discourage it. It should probably be avoided unless there is a good reason to use it (such as in articles that are intrinsically historical in nature).
August 25, 2008
Greg L	00:17	The autoformatting of dates is no longer encouraged and should generally not be used in articles unless there is good reason to do so (such as in articles that are intrinsically historical in nature, such as French Revolution).
Tony1	02:24	The autoformatting of dates is no longer encouraged and should generally not be used in articles unless there is good reason to do so.
Sdsds	10:14	The autoformatting of dates is no longer encouraged.	10:16	The autoformatting of dates using the tools shown in the table below is no longer required; many editors would prefer to discourage it.
Kotniski	10:18	The autoformatting of dates is no longer encouraged and should generally not be used in articles unless there is good reason to do so.
Sdsds	10:27	The autoformatting of dates is no longer encouraged.
Tony1	11:05	The autoformatting of dates is no longer encouraged and should generally not be used in articles unless there is good reason to do so.
Sdsds	11:09	The autoformatting of dates is no longer encouraged.
Abtract	11:20	The autoformatting of dates is optional.	11:18	The autoformatting of dates using the tools shown in the table below is optional.
Kotniski	11:40	The autoformatting of dates is no longer encouraged.
Teemu Leisti	12:57	The autoformatting of dates is optional. In fact, many editors discourage it, and prefer that it only be used if there is a particularly good reason, such as in articles that are intrinsically historical in nature.	12:33	The autoformatting of dates using the tools shown in the table below is optional. In fact, many editors discourage it, and prefer that it only be used if there is a particularly good reason, such as in articles that are intrinsically historical in nature.	My first edit, with the edit comment in the subpage: "style (in particular, following Strunk and White's advice to "omit needless words")". Tony1 replied to my talk page, saying "Well, when I said that, I didn't think you'd be going back on your "Support" for the consensus wording on the talk page, repeatedly. Very disappointed, and I take back my thanks, I'm afraid. Did you support it, or didn't you? Tony (talk) 15:47, 25 August 2008 (UTC)"[reply]
Tony1	13:13	The autoformatting of dates should not generally be used unless there is a particular reason to do so. In fact, many editors discourage it, and prefer that it only be used if there is a particularly good reason, such as in articles that are intrinsically historical in nature.	13:17	The autoformatting of dates using the tools shown in the table below is no longer encouraged and should generally not be used in articles unless there is good reason to do so (such as in articles that are intrinsically historical in nature).	Tony1's first revert, with the edit comment: "Going back to Anderson's version: if the consensus version is disputed, further consensus should be generated for an alternative wording of the key statement"
Teemu Leisti	14:12	The autoformatting of dates using the tools shown in the table below is no longer encouraged and should generally not be used in articles unless there is good reason to do so, such as in articles that are intrinsically historical in nature.	14:02	The autoformatting of dates using the tools shown in the table below is no longer encouraged and should generally not be used in articles unless there is good reason to do so (such as in articles that are intrinsically historical in nature).	I reverted back my copyediting changes, but left the introductory statement alone, except for style (deleted words "using the tools shown in the table below" and "in articles", and changed the parenthetical statement to a subclause).
Teemu Leisti	14:24	The autoformatting of dates is no longer encouraged and should generally not be used unless there is good reason to do so, such as in articles that are intrinsically historical in nature.	14:23	The autoformatting of dates is no longer encouraged and should generally not be used unless there is good reason to do so, such as in articles that are intrinsically historical in nature.
Pmanderson	15:24	Date autoformatting is a system by which dates which are wikilinked can be configured to the preference of readers who have accounts, are logged in, and have set their preferences on this question. Making such links is not required anywhere on Wikipedia; they have practical and aesthetic disadvantages, and many editors would prefer that the system not be used at all.	15:17	The autoformatting of dates is no longer encouraged; many editors feel it should generally not be used unless there is good reason to do so, such as in articles that are intrinsically historical in nature.	Edit comment on subpage: "rephrase. Deprecation is further than there is consensus for; but many editors object."
Tony1	15:46	The autoformatting of dates should not generally be used unless there is a particular reason to do so. In fact, many editors discourage it, and prefer that it only be used if there is a particularly good reason, such as in articles that are intrinsically historical in nature.	15:20	The autoformatting of dates should not be used unless there is a good reason to do so.	Edit comment on subpage: "No. Go take a look at the wording that was given "Support" by an awful lot of people. If you want to propose another wording, start it over again at talk."
Tony1	15:52	Date autoformatting should not generally be used unless there is a particular reason to do so. In fact, many editors discourage it, and prefer that it only be used if there is a particularly good reason, such as in articles that are intrinsically historical in nature.
Pmanderson	16:00	The autoformatting of dates is no longer encouraged.	15:43	(none)	Pmanderson removed the SoD from the subpage, and gave this edit comment: "Just the facts here." After this, no one has reintroduced the SoD to the subpage.
Abtract	20:03	The autoformatting of dates is optional.
Kotniski	20:30	The linking of dates purely for the purpose of autoformatting is now deprecated.
Kotniski	20:35	The linking of dates purely for the purpose of autoformatting is now deprecated.
Pmanderson	20:56	The linking of dates purely for the purpose of autoformatting is now deprecated by many editors.
Kotniski	21:05	The linking of dates purely for the purpose of autoformatting is now deprecated.
Abtract	21:10	The linking of dates purely for the purpose of autoformatting is optional.
Kotniski	21:19	The linking of dates purely for the purpose of autoformatting is now deprecated.
2008-08-28
Teemu Leisti	03:41	Autoformatting dates should generally be avoided unless there is a particular reason to do so, ...			My edit comment: "updated introduction to date autoformatting from subpage ("deprecated" becomes "should be generally avoided") + moved advice on using a non-breaking space from there to here". Tony1 wrote to me on my talk page: "I thought we'd finally settled the issue, but you keep changing the text—the rest of the consensus would, I'm sure, appreciate it if you didn't. I don't understand the edit-summary justification of consistency with the offshoot essay. In any case, I've adjusted the essay to be consistent with the consensus-driven change at MOSNUM proper: the essay is now a retrospective explanation of the mechanism, and has no need at all to explain how to autoformat dates, since dates should now not be autoformatted. The removal of DA will take some time, so the essay is useful in explain what the hell the residual bright-blue dates are. Tony (talk) 03:55, 28 August 2008 (UTC)"[reply]
Tony1	03:49	The linking of dates purely for the purpose of autoformatting is now deprecated.			Tony1's revert of my change, with the following edit comment on the main page: "I thought we'd settled on "deprecated". I see no countervailing text in the "essay" that requires that change".

Tony1, the table you posted on the main page's talk page, to which I added my vote of support, and which I thought was the "consensus" you referred to, was as follows:

A combination of day-number and month can be autoformatted by adding square brackets ([[5 November]] or [[November 5]]; [[5 November]] [[1989]] or [[November 5]], [[1989]]). The square brackets instruct the MediaWiki software to format the item according to the date preferences for registered users who have chosen a setting and are logged in. This should not generally be used unless there is a particular reason to do so. Careful consideration of the advantages and disadvantages of the autoformatting mechanism should be made before applying it: the mechanism does not work for the vast majority of readers, such as unregistered users and registered users who have not made a setting, and can affect readability and appearance if there are already numerous high-value links in the text.

That box says "This should not generally be used unless there is a particular reason to do so", not "deprecated". On the 28th, I edited the main page's SoD from "The linking of dates purely for the purpose of autoformatting is now deprecated." to "Autoformatting dates should generally be avoided unless there is a particular reason to do so, ..." — because I thought that that's what you preferred, because you reverted my change of the subpage's SoD the 24th to "The autoformatting of dates should not generally be used unless there is a particular reason to do so.", which doesn't include the word "deprecated".

So, I'm now confused as to how you would like the SoD to read.

Now, I agree with you that "deprecated" would be better than "discouraged". But I also think that the edit history above shows that there is no consensus yet on how strong the SoD should be. Therefore, it's a bit too early to admonish me on breaking the "consensus".

I think a discussion should be started on exactly how strong the SoD should be. I vote for "deprecated". Teemu Leisti (talk) 09:42, 28 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'm fine with "deprecated", of course. Tony (talk) 10:07, 28 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

OK, cool. But like I explained, it was earlier less than clear to me what your preference was. Teemu Leisti (talk) 10:40, 28 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think, as I said above, that the SoD should be here; we should stop sticking guidance away in obscure places so that nobody can find them who doesn't already know about it.

My case against saying "deprecate", while presenting the arguments that autoformatting is a bad idea, is long enough to be a subsection. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 14:53, 28 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Why not deprecate

Why not say "deprecate"? Because what we want out of this is a wave of editors saying "Date formatting is not a good idea, and this is why. Can we change this page, please?" We do not want "Out of my way, peasants! I'm on a mission from MOS, and I'm going to delink this page whether you like it or not."

Experience suggests that the line between these two is, all too often, whether the wording of this page can be read as a mandate. This is why I oppose mandates in general. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 14:53, 28 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, Anderson, you oppose the whole idea of the MoS, and we're all heartily sick of it. Of course you oppose any strong moves to reform the project that might involve ... that c word ... compulsion. Fine, you've had your say. Many people happen to think that this is important enough to require strong guidance. I'm not going to open up a whole chapter of argument with you along the same lines that you love to fight over. Tony (talk) 15:51, 28 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Is your only idea of MOS mandates and orders? No wonder it works so badly and so many editors ignore it. One catches more flies with honey than with vinegar; and still fewer with a cricket-bat. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 16:57, 28 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

However it is phrased, there will be points on which the MOS should indicate that certain choices depart far enough from our preferred style that all editors are encouraged change it to our preferred style for that reason alone. --Gerry Ashton (talk) 17:12, 28 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Yes. We should have a reason, though, and our encouragement will usually be more persuasive if editors can tell what our reason is; their compliance will also produce less collateral damage if they understand why MOS encourages something. I agree, however, that there are such points and that autoformatting should be one of them; my concern is what phrasing of the encouragement will be most helpful to the encyclopedia. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 17:42, 28 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Metadata

One of the arguments for linking dates that it would create a metadata structure of times and events. Another argument is that I've also found that the blue color helped me quickly distinguish between numbers and dates, although we've first dropped it for year only numbers and now for dates completely. Shouldn't these be arguments be addressed? — Dispenser 04:37, 30 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

They seem to be very weak arguments, hardly in need of addressing. As has been pointed out, such metadata can easily be recreated. Since when did our readers need 24 August 1999 to be bright blue to distinguish it from a number? We've survived very well for a long time with black text on paper; it's no different on a screen. On rare occasions when it might help, a comma can be used. And we do this, too: "thirty .22 caliber rifles", not 30 .22-caliber rifles". Tony (talk) 06:24, 30 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Not sure if this is the place but I need to express some of the advantages to autoformatting since I am convinced the disadvantages are not strong enough: For me trying to find all of the ingredients of autoformatting link is like a catalyst for continued research and at times being rewarded with a treasure of information found serendipitously while searching for the date info. Primarily, however, I have found, that in helping students with homework generally initiates from wikipedia and the autoformatting element enables them to readily access a timeline, etc. Just recently, I assisted a student, who was very excited to be able to see what else happened in 1854 with the clickable link provide by another article. The disuse of this autoformatting feature would be sad and I believe turn Wikipedia into another nonclickable document source. The calendar issue would still be an issue no matter what. Daytrivia (talk) 14:33, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Just remind the students that they can tap four keystrokes into the search box to find a year article. Sorry, those articles represent "diversionary browsing", and providing a blue-splotch magic carpet to them in a single click actually goes against one of the basic tenets of "What WP is not". Tony (talk) 15:15, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Very true Tony but the "diversionary browsing" and "providing a blue-splotch magic carpet to them in a single click" seems to be what makes Wikipedia so popular. This popularity, in turn, demands discussions like we are having and the unending efforts of editors toward keeping Wilipedia accurate and making it better. I am sure the autoformatting feature will be resolved and accepted one way or the other I just hope we retain Wikipedia's appeal. Daytrivia (talk) 20:58, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I had an idea for creating a timeline tool, but the overuse of autolinking in citations kills it for the most part. — Dispenser 00:19, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

What I was getting is similar to capitalizing nouns or using punctuation, while neither are actually necessary they both make sentences faster and easier to read. — Dispenser 00:19, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Discussion moved again

Sorry to do this a second time, but since the main page has now been protected, and a moderated discussion concerning its contents is now taking place on page Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (dates and numbers)/Autoformatting proposal, let's move this there. Teemu Leisti (talk) 05:38, 30 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

<Sigh>, I suspect that almost all editors here think we've trodden over the same ground quite enough, over a long long time. Why there's a need to have a little corner bubbling away I don't know. We should move on and get on with the job of ensuring the change is implemented smoothly. Tony (talk) 06:27, 30 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Because (a) there's no consensus yet on how strongly date autolinking should be discouraged, and because (b) there are other issues connected with autolinking, namely formatting, that are also being contested, leading to the temporary page protection and the moderated discussion on the subject, now taking place on the new discussion page. Teemu Leisti (talk) 10:58, 30 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Teemu Leisti's attempt to estaplish a new place for discussion has, at this time, been ignored, because the page is empty. All editors have the prerogitive of ignoring this attempt to move the discussion if they so desire. --Gerry Ashton (talk) 19:02, 30 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Very well. Don't mind me. I'll just shuffle along... Teemu Leisti (talk) 11:35, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

What I want to know is......

What is current policy regarding wikilinking dates? I have been around and around the mulberry bush in these discussions and still can't see where a policy was agreed to. And yet, the MoS says "The use of full date formatting is now deprecated". Believe me, not every Wiki reader will know what that actually means, so it needs to be simpler/clearer. Could someone state the dates piping policy on this page. Kaiwhakahaere (talk)

To put it simply, don't wikilink dates unless you actually want to link to an article about a date. —Remember the dot ^(talk) 22:56, 30 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Riiiiighhhht!. Now, if the MoS said something like "dates are no longer wikilinked unless to an article about that date", that would be much simpler than "The use of full date formatting is now deprecated".Kaiwhakahaere (talk) 23:26, 30 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Article titles that are full dates are so rare that they weren't considered. How many are there? I see the argument for "September 11, 2001", but what others are there? There may be a case for saying "unless to an article for which the title is a full date". Tony (talk) 03:01, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I think it's implied... —Remember the dot ^(talk) 03:06, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'm glad to hear it, then, Dot. I'd rather avoid more text than is absolutely necessary. Tony (talk) 03:23, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Me too, but I'd like to avoid "use of full date formatting is now deprecated". Sure this is the en wiki, but people with en as a second or even third language may not realise deprecate is a latter day computing term. Confusing. Kaiwhakahaere (talk) 03:52, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Origin in the 17th century. Tony (talk) 15:17, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I've spoken, read and written English as my first language all my life (even learning to improvise in a theatrical approximation to Elizabethan English), and I pretty well knew the common, ordinary, usual meaning of the word "deprecate". It's only tonight that I found out that it had a distinct meaning in computer programming—and yet another in Wikipedia—both of which meanings are loosely related to but quite distinct from their meaning in ordinary English. There's no way that this would be obvious to those who do not closely follow the development of computer software. Shakescene (talk) 08:52, 14 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Dates and links

Why are the dates in articles never linked again ? --AndreaMimi (talk) 13:00, 22 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'm responding on the editor's talk page. Tony (talk) 13:10, 22 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Why not use something like DTS template than just plain text?

I left a comment at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (dates and numbers)#Did I miss something, why are we not suggesting the dts template instead of unstructured text?, but it might be better linked here... dm (talk) 04:49, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Confused about options and usage

I'm confused. I saw an edit on MOS about date linking being deprecated and that details are in the page. So I come here to find details and it starts with:

As of September 2008, it has been possible for registered users to choose one of four preferences regarding how dates are to be presented to them. The four choices are:

I thought that there have been preferences for quite some time. OK, assuming that there are preferences now, this page seems to contain a description of several date formats which people use, followed by a description of wikilinking dates. Stirred in are phrases which imply something in this page is past tense as if something is no longer true. And although an impression is provided that articles should contain dates in consistent formats, it is clearly stated that autoformatting exists and that implies that dates appear to be consistent. So where in this "Manual of Style" detail page does it state what style exists and how it is to be followed or used? I'm confused and just hope that the autosigning will show a legible datetime stamp. -- SEWilco (talk) 04:14, 23 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The preferences sets a preference for two completely different things (which is probably a bad idea): autoformatting of dates in articles, and the appearance of system timestamps, such as you would see in your watchlist. As far as the Wikimedia software is concerned, both continue to function as before. What has changed is the English Wikipedia community has decided that linking dates in articles for the purpose of autoformatting them is a bad idea and shouldn't be done anymore. --Gerry Ashton (talk) 05:05, 23 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

So what is deprecated is linking non-significant dates, while what is obsolete is the autoformatting of dates (because dates won't be linked not all dates will be autoformatted)? -- SEWilco (talk) 05:18, 23 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Some people feel significant dates should still be linked, others feel readers can look up the date on their own if they want to, and there is no need to link it. If you do link a date, it should be done so that it will not be autoformatted. If you just link the year, no autoformatting will occur. If you want to link the month and day, you could use a pipe, something like February 29. --Gerry Ashton (talk) 05:53, 23 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Just to confuse things further, I just discovered when editing something rather different on the main article page, that, for all dates since January 1, 2003 you will (willy-nilly) get a link to the specific day in the specific year, for example May 15, 2005, by typing the unbroken string [[May 15, 2005]], regardless of your expressed or unexpressed date preference. However this is not true for the unbroken strings [[15 May 2005]] (15 May 2005) and [[2005 May 15]] (2005 May 15). [[2005-05-15]] will produce a date (according to your own date preference) like 2005-05-15, but not a link to the specific page for May 15, 2005. Glad to try clarifying anything here that's too murky. —— Shakescene (talk) 08:46, 23 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Now I find things a little different, since [[15 May 2005]] does lead now, through a redirect from 15 May 2005, to May 15, 2005, an article about one specific day. However, when I tried this for August 16, 2006 (groundbreaking day for the New Yankee Stadium), it didn't work. Curiouser and curiouser. —— Shakescene (talk) 02:13, 30 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I made the new redirect for the 15 May date. WhisperToMe (talk) 03:15, 30 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Without wanting to be rude or abrupt: Why? That date was just an arbitrary example used in the table to show how all such dates (besides 11 September 2001) work. Now it's atypical and therefore less useful. Will you make similar redirects for 9 November 2003 > November 9, 2003, 23 April 2004 > April 23, 2004 (Shakespeare's 440th birthday), 14 July 2005 > July 14, 2005 (the 216th anniversary of Bastille Day) and all other such dates? Confusedly, —— Shakescene (talk) 04:14, 30 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

1. Redirects are done. 2. Redirects are cheap and in many cases are useful. Now, if at a later point an RFD decides they should be deleted, then that may as well happen. But until then I feel that making these date redirects are useful. WhisperToMe (talk) 04:20, 30 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'm probably doing a poor job of making my point. If you want to go ahead and do that for all (or most) of such dates (I was picking random dates, not significant ones, to make my point), then all the more power to you. Even better if, after doing so, you can let us know the magic date when individual days stop having their own pages. But otherwise why just scatter redirects randomly? At least, if you can't be comprehensive, pick days (like the dates of elections, battles, artistic performances, athletic achievements, meteorological events or stock market crashes) that mean something. But, as you say, at the very least no harm done. —— Shakescene (talk) 04:55, 30 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

So, in biography articles, should we still leave the birth and death dates linked? WhisperToMe (talk) 00:57, 30 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Only if there's some earthly reason to divert the readers. Show me an example, please. Tony (talk) 04:07, 30 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I think there might be some purpose to autoformat (or to avoid un-formatting) the day & month, since some people like to know who else was "born on the Fourth of July" or (like Adams, Jefferson and James Monroe) died on 4 July, and some date pages do have such interesting details/trivia (depending on your point of view). [For example, I delinked all the dates in a sentence about groundbreaking at New Yankee Stadium except April 26, because the groundbreaking was scheduled for the anniversary of Babe Ruth's death.]

There are already categories for (e.g.) Category:1564 births and Category:1826 deaths, so the years need not be or stay formatted; in fact leaving them unformatted would make clearer what's linked and what isn't. As for the limited number of links to specific whole dates like [[11 September 2006]], I'm not sure what would be best. If two notable, or at least interesting, people were born or died on exactly the same day (e.g. Aldous Huxley and JFK on November 22, 1963), perhaps that's worth rearranging the autoformatting for. But I'd like to hear other people's thoughts and reasoning. —— Shakescene (talk) 04:41, 30 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]