Talk:Orphan

Target

Wouldn't Special:LonelyPages be a more natural target for this redirect? Or should we even have a redirect here at all? LtPowers (talk) 21:21, 14 January 2013 (UTC)

As a general rule, I think it's a good idea to provide easily memorable shortcuts to most of our policies and policy sections.

The most common use for shortcuts is probably in edit summaries to explain succinctly why an edit was made. Lots of newbies may not understand the "funny" HTML entity of " " (which is about the only exception to our avoid HTML strategy).

By contrast, currently there are only  four  two lonesome ones at http://en.wikivoyage.org/wiki/Special:LonelyPages.

By all means create the shortcut of lonely or LP or OP if you think there will be a frequent need ... -- Alice^✉ 22:05, 14 January 2013 (UTC)

It's not a matter of utility so much as hewing to the principle of least surprise. While I don't share your zealousness for shortcutting every miniscule section of policy pages, I recognize their utility for some purposes; the problem is when we take a useful word or other possible search term and co-opt it for internal processes like this. If you want to have the ability to link Wikivoyage:Measurements#Avoid orphaned units, a shortcut like aou would be more in line with our usual practice, while leaving the word "orphan" free to be searched by readers. LtPowers (talk) 23:31, 14 January 2013 (UTC)

The utility in a shortcut is at least three-fold. It's short, easily memorable and precise. If it's not precise, you either end up having to do more typing or it's difficult for the newbie to discover exactly what policy you are pointing him towards.

Your general point about searching is a good one.

But what sort of general reader is likely to go searching for "orphan" when they come to a travel guide - a paedophile sex tourist? If this was Wikipedia, where the shortcuts need to be ultra-cryptic and unlikely general searches I'd agree, but here we just need to avoid likely searches for travel destinations and topics (or probable mis-spellings of same).

At the end of the day, you're far more knowledgeable than I about this wiki, so if this is a real concern, then please make the necessary changes. -- Alice^✉ 23:52, 14 January 2013 (UTC)