Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Disambiguation pages: Difference between revisions

This guideline is a part of the English Wikipedia's Manual of Style. It is a generally accepted standard that editors should attempt to follow, though occasional exceptions may apply. Any substantive edit to this page should reflect consensus. When in doubt, discuss first on the talk page.

Shortcuts WP:MOSDAB MOS:DAB

Disambiguation pages ("dab pages") are non-article pages, in the article namespace, similar to redirect pages. Disambiguation pages are solely intended to allow the user to choose from a list of Wikipedia articles, usually when searching for a term that is ambiguous.

This style guideline is intended to make the process more efficient, by giving disambiguation pages a consistent look and by avoiding distracting information, such as extraneous links (internal or external). The pages should contain only disambiguation content, whether or not the page title contains the word (disambiguation). This guideline does not apply to any articles that are primary topics, even if the articles contain a "see also" notice or the like.

Covered at Wikipedia:Disambiguation.

Rather than including a dictionary definition of a word, create a cross-link to our sister project, Wiktionary. To do this, use one of the Wiktionary link templates on the first line.

• {{Wiktionarypar}} –{{wiktionarypar|WORD|WORD2|...|WORD5}} - up to five optional parameters; useful for linking dictionary entries with multiple capitalizations (star, Star, and STAR).
• {{Wiktionary}} – {{wiktionary|WORD|optional display name}} - without parameters, defaults to using the current page's name

Important: Check the links created by these templates, as Wiktionary is case-sensitive on the first letter, using proper capitalization for its entries unlike Wikipedia's uppercased first letter for all page names.

For more information on linking see Wikipedia:Wikimedia sister projects#Wiktionary.

When a page has "(disambiguation)" in its title – i.e., it is the disambiguation page for a term that has a primary topic – users are most likely to arrive there by clicking on a top link from the primary topic article, generated by a template in the {{otheruses}} series. For example, the article School contains the hatnote: Template:Otheruses2

Since it is unlikely that this primary meaning is what readers are looking for if they have reached the disambiguation page, it should not be mixed in with the other links. It is recommended that the link back to the primary topic appear at the top, like this:

A school is an institution for learning. School may also refer to: School (discipline) or school of thought, a number of individuals with shared styles, approaches or aims School (fish), a swarm or group of fish or cetaceans . . .

When the primary topic is a redirect, the primary topic line normally links to the redirect:

Danzig is the former name of Gdańsk, a city in northern Poland.

In some cases it may be clearer to link directly to the redirect target:

Barack Obama (born 1961) is the president-elect of the United States.

instead of the more awkward

Barack is Barack Obama (born 1961), the president-elect of the United States.

As in articles, the title of the page should be in bold (not italics). It should begin a sentence fragment ending with a colon, introducing a bulleted list:

Interval may refer to: John Smith may refer to: or John Smith is the name of: ABC may refer to: or ABC may stand for:

It is not necessary to repeat any variations of capitalization, punctuation or spelling: "AU may refer to" is preferable to "AU, au, Au or A-U may refer to"; and "Saiyuki may refer to" is preferable to "Saiyuki, Saiyūki, Saiyûki, or Saiyuuki may refer to".

There are two exceptions to this:

• Where a word and an abbreviation are disambiguated together:

Arc or ARC may refer to:

• Where both singular and plural are disambiguated together:

Bang or bangs may refer to: or Bang(s) may refer to:

Individual entries follow the primary topic (if any) and the introductory line. Keep in mind that the primary purpose of the disambiguation page is to help people find the information they want quickly and easily. These pages are to help the user navigate to a specific article.

• The individual entry list is a bulleted list: preface each entry with a bullet (an asterisk in wiki markup).
• The link should be the first word or phrase in each entry. For example:
  • Neapolitan chord, in music theory, a major chord built on the lowered second scale degree
  • not: In music theory, a Neapolitan chord is a major chord built on the lowered second scale degree.
  • but: see Red links and Items appearing within other articles below for exceptions to this rule.
• Start with a capital letter, unless the target article is marked with {{lowercase}}.
• The link should not be emphasized with bolding or italics, although titles (such as for books and movies) may need to be italicized, in conformance with Wikipedia:Manual of Style (titles). If the article's title contains both a title and a clarifier, use a piped link to quote or italicize only the part requiring such treatment, as opposed to the entire link (see below).
• Entries should not be pipe-linked—refer to the article name in full. See below for several exceptions to this rule.
• Entries should nearly always be sentence fragments, with no final punctuation (commas, full-stops, semicolons, etc.).

Example:

Interval may refer to: Interval (mathematics), a certain subset of an ordered set Interval (music), the relationship between two notes

There are some further points on the design of links and their entries, based on practical experience.

• The description associated with a link should be kept to a minimum, just sufficient to allow the reader to find the correct link.
• To avoid confusing the reader, each bulleted entry should, in almost every case, have only one navigable (blue) link. Do not wikilink any other words in the line, for example:
  • "Dark Star" (song), by the Grateful Dead
  • not: "Dark Star" (song), a song by the psychedelic rock band The Grateful Dead

Including no links at all makes the entry useless for further navigation. (See "red links" below for cases in which no article yet exists.) Never link days or dates.

• Never 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 as <!-- comments --> or on a talk page.

On a page called Title, do not create entries merely because Title is part of the name (see Wikipedia:Disambiguation#Lists).

Common examples:

• Title County
• Title City
• Title Hospital
• Title University

These may require their own disambiguation pages. For example, Jefferson County (disambiguation) should list the counties in all the states, but Jefferson (disambiguation) ideally would not. Instead, it should link to the Jefferson County disambiguation page.

The above does not apply if the subject is commonly referred to simply by Title. For instance, Oxford (disambiguation) should link University of Oxford and Catalina might include Santa Catalina Island, California. If there is disagreement about whether this exception applies, it is often best to assume that it does.

You may want to create entries on the same page for:

• TITLE and Title
• Title town and Title township
  • An example is Willow Valley, which lists a town of that name as well as "Willow Valley Township" in another state.

• Title Smith
• Title Lee
• John Title
• Jane Title

Persons who happen to have the same surname or given name should not be mixed in with the other links unless they are very frequently referred to simply by the single name (e.g. Elvis, Shakespeare). For short lists of such persons, new sections of Persons with the surname Title and Persons with the given name Title can be added below the main disambiguation list. For longer lists, create a new Title (name), Title (surname) and/or Title (given name) page.

Pages only listing persons with certain given names or surnames who are not widely known by these parts of their name otherwise are not disambiguation pages, and this Manual of Style does not apply to them. In such cases, do not use {{disambig}} or {{hndis}}, but {{given name}} or {{surname}} instead.

Common misspellings should only be listed if there is a genuine risk of confusion or misspelling. These cross-links should be placed in a separate section entitled "Common misspellings" or "See also". For example, in a page called Kington (disambiguation), a link to Kingston (disambiguation) would appropriately be included in the "See also" section.

Piping and redirects are two different mechanisms, both having the effect that the displayed text of a link is not the same as the title of the article at which readers will arrive when they click that link.

• Piping means concealing the actual title of a linked article by replacing it with other text, often to suppress parenthetical expressions in an article. For example, instead of linking Moment (physics) in a normal article, it will be presented as [[Moment (physics)|Moment]] to display as a single word: Moment.
• A redirect is a special page used to "jump" readers from one page title to an article with a different title. For example, a redirect is used at the title 9/11 to send users, who navigate there, to the article at September 11 attacks.

Subject to certain exceptions as listed below, piping or redirects should not be used in disambiguation pages. This is to make it clear to the reader which article is being suggested, so that the reader remains in control of the choice of article. For example, in the Moment disambiguation page, with the entry for Moment (physics), "physics" should be visible to the reader. In many cases, what would be hidden by a pipe is exactly what the user would need to be able to find the intended article.

Even when the disambiguated term is an acronym, initialism or alphabetism, links should not use redirects to conceal the expanded version of that initialism. For example, on the disambiguation page BNL, linking to the full article title Banca Nazionale del Lavoro is preferable to linking to a redirect at BNL (bank).

Though piping and redirects should generally not be used in disambiguation pages, there are certain cases in which they may be useful to the reader:

Where redirecting may be appropriate

• A redirect should be used to link to a specific section of an article only if the title of that section is more or less synonymous with the disambiguated topic. This indicates a higher possibility that the topic may eventually have its own article. For example:

Delta may refer to: (correct) Delta Quadrant, from the fictional Star Trek universe ([[Delta Quadrant]], from the fictional ''Star Trek'' universe) (incorrect) Delta Quadrant, from the fictional Star Trek universe ([[Galactic quadrant#Delta Quadrant|Delta Quadrant]], from the fictional ''Star Trek'' universe)

• The above technique should be used only when the link is the subject of the line, not when it is in the description. For description sections, consider piping instead.
• Linking to a redirect can also be helpful when the redirect contains the disambiguated term and could serve as an alternative title for the target article, meaning an alternate term which is already in the article's lead section. For example:

Cell may refer to: (correct) Cell phone, a type of mobile phone ([[Cell phone]], a type of mobile phone) (incorrect) Cell phone, a type of mobile phone (Cell phone, a type of [[mobile phone]])

• The above example of a redirect is only appropriate because Cell phone is indicated as an alternate title in the lead section of the mobile phone article. If it were not, then the second example could have been used instead.
• For situations where the primary topic is a redirect, see Linking to a primary topic above.

Where piping may be appropriate

• Use piping to add italics or quotation marks to part of an article name; for instance, Harvey (film), USS Adder (SS-3), "School" (song), Saturnalia (dinosaur), "Hush" (Buffy episode), Neo (The Matrix).
• Similary, use piping if the article title differs from what it should be due to technical limitations per {{wrongtitle}}; for instance, The Singles 81>85 or Softimage|XSI.
• When a disambiguation page is linking to a specific section of an article, rather than an entire article, piping may be used for linking to that section via anchor points or section linking. This technique is used commonly for piping to the track listing section of an album; a further example, from E (disambiguation), is that the piped ESRB ([[ESRB#Current | ESRB]]) is preferred to simply linking to the top of the target page ESRB.
• When piping is used on a disambiguation page to link to an article section, the link should be in the description, and should avoid surprising the reader. The text of the link should not be the title of a different article. For example:

Ten may refer to: (correct) Ten or Tien Shinhan, a character in Dragon Ball media (Ten or Tien Shinhan, a [[List of Dragon Ball characters#Tien Shinhan|character in ''Dragon Ball'' media]]) (incorrect) Ten or Tien Shinhan, a character in Dragon Ball media (Ten or Tien Shinhan, a character in ''[[List of Dragon Ball characters#Tien Shinhan|Dragon Ball]]'' media)

• There are other situations when creating a pipe link is preferred to linking to a redirect, such as when a page has been merged to a section of another article.

For foreign-language terms, be sure an article exists or could be written for the word or phrase in question. Usually this means that the term has been at least partially adopted into English or is used by specialists.

Tambo may refer to: Tambo (weapon), a very short staff used in martial arts

Avoid adding lines for words or phrases that are simply spelled the same as an English term. For example, do not include:

• Tambo, a Japanese word (田んぼ) for rice paddy

Instead, consider linking to Wiktionary.

For people, include their birth and death years (when known), and only enough descriptive information that the reader can distinguish between different people with the same name. Keep in mind the conventions for birth and death dates—see Wikipedia:Manual of Style (dates and numbers)#Dates of birth and death. Do not include a, an or the before the description of the person's occupation or role.

John Adams (1735–1826) was the second President of the United States. John Adams may also refer to: John Adams (composer) (born 1947), American composer who came to prominence with his opera Nixon in China John Adams (physicist) (1920–1984), Director general of CERN and particle accelerator designer John Adams (martyr) (died 1586), Catholic priest and martyr under Elizabeth I of England

For places, it may only be necessary to write the name of the article.

Jacksonville may refer to: Jacksonville, Florida Jacksonville, Alabama Jacksonville, Arkansas

It may be appropriate to add the country after the link. Leave the country unlinked.

Kimberley is the name of: Kimberley, Nottinghamshire, England Kimberley, British Columbia, Canada

A link to a non-existent article (a "red link") should only be included on a disambiguation page when another article also includes that red link. There is no need to brainstorm all occurrences of the page title and create red links to articles that are unlikely ever to be written, or likely to be removed as insufficiently notable topics. To find out if another article uses the red link, click on it, and then click "What links here" on the toolbox on the left side of the page to see if any other articles use the red link. See Help:What links here for more information.

A disambiguation shouldn't be made up completely of red links or have only one blue link in it, because the purpose of disambiguation is solely to refer users to other Wikipedia pages. If the only article that uses the red link is the disambiguation page, unlink the "entry word" but still keep a blue link in the description.

Red links should not be the only link in a given entry; link also to an existing article, so that a reader (as opposed to a contributing editor) will have somewhere to navigate to for additional information. In the following (made-up) example, the architectural motif is judged to be appropriate for a future article, but the noodle is not; therefore, only the entry for the architectural motif includes a red link:

Flibbygibby may refer to: Flibbygibby (architecture), a flamingo motif used on cornices Flibbygibby, a type of noodle

If the link is to a synonym, simply use it as it is named:

Serving spoon may also refer to: Tablespoon

If a topic does not have an article of its own, but is mentioned within another article, then a link to that article should be included. In this case, the link does not start the line, but it should still be the only blue wikilink. It is often useful to link to the relevant section of that page (using the #anchor notation) and conceal that by making it a piped link, as shown with "coin" below.

Tail may also refer to: The empennage of an aircraft The luminous train behind a comet The reverse side of a coin

Only use this feature if the item being described actually appears on the page you are linking to, so avoid:

• On-off switch is what turns on a television set

if the television article does not mention it.

In most cases, place the items in order of usage, with the most-used meanings appearing at the top and less common meanings below. A recommended order is:

1. Articles with a clarifier in parentheses: (South Pacific (film))
2. Articles with the item as part of the name: (Electronic keyboard as part of a Keyboard dab page)
3. Synonyms
4. Larger subject articles which treat this item in a section: (Medieval art from a Fresco dab page)

Unless the list is quite short, separate the articles in categories (1) and (2) from those in (3) and (4), with the "may also be" line shown below:

Thingamabob may refer to: Thingamabob (mathematics), the square root of minus-pi Thingamabob (music), a note slightly higher than Q-sharp House thingamabob, a door-knocker Computer thingamabob, carving-knife device for cutting off mouse's tail Thingamabob may also be: Thingy-ma-bob Doodad A flag used in Anytown, U.S.A.

The list may be broken up by subject area:

Thingamajig may refer to: In science: Thingamajig (chemistry), an isotope of chlorine Thingamajig (physics), a kind of pulsar Thingamajig (biology), an invasive plant used as ground cover In world music: Thingamajig (Qatar), a seven-stringed musical instrument Thingamajig (Peru), a wind instrument similar to an aulos thingamajig (UK), a wind instrument, similar to, but longer than the Peruvian one

Subject areas should be chosen to best aid navigation. Choose divisions that are well-defined, and that break the entries up into similarly-sized chunks. Very small divisions may impede navigation, and should usually be avoided. Disambiguation pages will frequently have an "Other uses" section for entries that don't fit neatly into another section. Keep in mind that a particular division scheme may not work equally well on all disambiguation pages.

Section headings may be used on longer lists instead of, or in addition to, bold subject area headings, but using more than a single level, as on Aurora (disambiguation), is rarely necessary. Section headings should not include links. See Wikipedia:Writing better articles#Headings for more.

On longer lists, {{TOCright}} may be used to move the table of contents to the right hand side of the page. This reduces the amount of white space and may improve the readability of the page. (For more information, see Help:Section#Floating the TOC.)

Including images is discouraged unless they aid in selecting between articles. Examples of this are the images at Congo and Mississippi Delta (disambiguation).

There may be a "See also" section which can include:

• Terms which can be confused with Title, for example New Market and Newmarket
• Likely misspellings of Title, for example Belmont, Belmonte and Bellmont
• Different forms of Title, for example Splitting, Split (disambiguation), and Splitter

When appropriate, easily confused terms can be placed in a hatnote.

Depending on the type of disambiguation page, there are different templates to use, including {{disambig}} for general use, {{geodis}} for locations, {{hndis}} for human names, {{numberdis}} for number-related pages, and {{mathdab}} for mathematics pages. However, if the page encompasses multiple topics, {{disambig}} should be used to avoid confusion.

Place the appropriate template after all of the content sections (disambiguation entries and See also entries) and before any Categories (see below) or interlanguage links. {{disambig}} produces the following message (as of December 2006), and also places the page in Category:Disambiguation pages.

This disambiguation page lists articles associated with the same title. If an internal link led you here, you may wish to change the link to point directly to the intended article.

If a disambiguation page needs cleaning up to bring it into conformance with this style manual, use {{disambig-cleanup}}. This replaces both {{disambig}} and {{cleanup-date}}.

Do not use {{subst:disambig}} or {{subst:disambig-cleanup}}, as the contents of this notice may change in the future (see Wikipedia:Transclusion costs and benefits). Also, the Wikipedia software relies on links to the templates to determine which pages are disambiguation pages (see MediaWiki:Disambiguationspage), and subst'ing breaks this feature.

If topical categorization of the disambiguation page seems to be needed, please bring this need up for discussion at Wikipedia talk:Disambiguation. Experience has shown that ad hoc and un-discussed category creation is controversial and prone to create agitation among the many editors working in the area of disambiguation. Be bold, but as that exhortation warns, don't be reckless.

Categories aid the ability to navigate between articles. However, disambiguation pages are non-articles and generally do not require categorization, other than for maintenance purposes. These pages are categorized automatically, by using one of the following templates: {{disambig}}, {{hndis}}, {{geodis}}, or {{disambig-plants}}.

For a disambiguation page containing both human names and other entries, do not use the {{hndis}} template. Instead, add at the bottom of the page:

{{disambig}}
[[Category:Human name disambiguation pages]]

Similarly, for a disambiguation page containing both plant common names and other entries, do not use the {{disambig-plants}} template. Instead, add at the bottom of the page:

{{disambig}}
[[Category:Plant common names]]

Disambiguation pages listing common names of plants are usefully placed in relevant plant categories.

Set index articles are list articles about a set of items that have similar or identical names. Set index articles are disambiguation-like pages that do not obey the style outlined on this page. Note that the set index article exception was designed to be narrow: for pages that contains links to articles about different topics, please follow this style guide for disambiguation pages. One example of a set index article is a list of ships with the same name. For more information about such ship lists, see Wikipedia:WikiProject Ships/Guidelines#Index pages.

Some disambiguation pages with "(disambiguation)" in the title list only two meanings, one of them being the primary topic. In such cases, the disambiguation page is not strictly necessary, but is harmless. The recommended practice in these situations is to place a hatnote on the primary topic article to link directly to the secondary topic. The {{for}} and {{redirect}} templates are useful.

If neither of the two meanings is primary, then a normal disambiguation page is used at the base name.

Application of these guidelines will generally produce useful disambiguation pages which are consistent with each other and therefore easily usable by most readers. Usefulness to the reader is their principal goal. However, for every style recommendation above, there may be pages in which a good reason exists to use another way; so ignore these guidelines if doing so will be more helpful to readers than following them.

• Disambiguation pages with links
• Category:Disambiguation pages in need of cleanup