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Wikipedia:Templates for discussion/Log/2019 June 27

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June 27

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The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the template below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the template's talk page or in a deletion review).

The result of the discussion was Delete; deleted by Fastily (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA) AnomieBOT 03:05, 5 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

The template is only used on one page, so it is unnecessary. Famitenton (talk) 22:59, 27 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the template's talk page or in a deletion review).
The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the template below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the template's talk page or in a deletion review).

The result of the discussion was delete. Plastikspork ―Œ(talk) 23:18, 3 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

unused after being merged with the parent article (with attribution) per consensus at WT:FOOTY Frietjes (talk) 14:39, 27 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This discussion has been included in WikiProject Football's list of association football-related deletions. GiantSnowman 09:20, 28 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the template's talk page or in a deletion review).

Twin Cities s-line templates

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The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the template below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the template's talk page or in a deletion review).

The result of the discussion was Delete -FASTILY 01:30, 5 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

s-line data modules

{{S-line}} templates for Metro (Minnesota), Metro Transit (Minnesota), and the Minnesota Valley Transit Authority. Superseded by Module:Adjacent stations/Metro (Minnesota) and Module:Adjacent stations/Metro Transit (Minnesota). All transclusions replaced. There was a good deal of overlap and redundancy which I think is clearer now. There are thirteen dependent s-line data modules which should also be deleted. Mackensen (talk) 12:16, 27 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the template's talk page or in a deletion review).
The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the template below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the template's talk page or in a deletion review).

The result of the discussion was delete after substituting into the articles it's found in. Primefac (talk) 01:18, 10 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

It appears that Paradoctor was anticipating that this citation template would be widely used, but it's only in two articles. I believe it should be subst'ed and deleted. howcheng {chat} 22:08, 10 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Comment IMO, the current situation would justify it on its own. I wasn't aware at the time how irrational consensus can be, and what a mess resulted from that. After some resistance, I gave up the attempt at refactoring. Delete it if you must, this is for a time when the structural issues have been addressed. I would like to hear how this improves Wikipedia, though. Paradoctor (talk) 22:45, 10 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Comment Cf. {{BarrowTipler1986}} Paradoctor (talk) 22:48, 10 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]
After further investigation, I've discovered there are a number of these specific-source templates that are used on only a handful of articles. As a software developer myself, I'm all about code reuse (and I've even made my own), but I feel like there should be some sort of threshold at which point having a specific-source template outweighs the negative aspects of it, those being:
  1. Clutter: imagine if we had templates for every source that's used in multiple articles... I can foresee a whole ton of duplicates as people just decide to create their own (because we follow no standard naming convention), so we end up with CondellZabecki2001, cite Truppenführung, Beck1933, and German Art of War and now someone has to convert those into redirects... and the worst-case scenario would be that there are multiple versions of the same template and each one is only used in one article.
  2. The principle of least astonishment: I've been here for almost 14 years and I was still thrown for a loop when I saw this in the wikitext.
Anyway, for this specific instance, I suppose if it ain't broke, don't fix it, and I have neither the time nor energy to go on a crusade against sparsely used citation templates, but I would humbly suggest that if you intend to create specific templates that won't be widely used, that you do it in userspace and subst them when actually citing those sources in articles. howcheng {chat} 16:48, 11 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]
"duplicates": As a software developer with long Wikipedia experience, you should be able to "imagine" a simple, efficient approach for duplicate management, both incoming and legacy. It took me about a minute or so. ;)
"thrown for a loop": That's owed to the "structural issues" I mentioned.
"if you intend to create": As I said, "I gave up the attempt".
"subst them" You mean, refactoring by hardcoding every instance of a constant?
Anyway, I've taken Machiavelli's advice on reform and reprioritized long since, so whatever you do, happy editing! Paradoctor (talk) 17:38, 11 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Management of duplicates of course can be done with redirects but you have to know that those dupes exist in the first place; the problem is making sure that editors know what tools are available to them and if there's one thing my experience in software has taught me, it's that you cannot predict/control how users are going to behave (for anything that you try to idiotproof, there will always be a newer class of idiot). As for subst'ing citation templates from your user space, it's not like sources change very often. The most common might be that a web link rots and needs to be replaced by the Wayback Machine version. In all cases there has to be a balance between ease of use and ease of understanding. There are, after all, legitimate use cases for denormalizing a database table. That's why I was thinking that at certain threshold, using a custom template really starts to make sense. I don't know what that level is, but it's certainly not a handful of transclusions. Regardless, unless someone else feels really strongly about this, consider this request withdrawn. howcheng {chat} 18:26, 11 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]
WP:CITEVAR Paradoctor (talk) 14:23, 12 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Primefac (talk) 01:58, 27 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete. Source-specific templates for any but the most widely used sources (ones on thousands of pages) are unnecessary and also a bad idea: harder for most editors to understand and use, and harder to maintain. --RL0919 (talk) 12:02, 5 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the template's talk page or in a deletion review).