Wikipedia talk:Drafts/Archive 14

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Split into help page and guideline

Wikipedia:Drafts currently tries to do things. The first two sections give basic information on how to use the draft namespace, and are aimed at (presumably newish) article creators. The remaining are an essay or proto-guideline outlining when articles can be draftified and when drafts can be deleted, aimed at more experienced editors and NPP/AfC reviewers. I think it would be more useful for both audiences if they were presented separately.

I propose we move the first two sections to Help:Drafts, leave the rest here at Wikipedia:Drafts, and update the leads accordingly. I don't know if having an identical name in two namespaces might be too confusing – in that case we could consider alternative titles like Help:Using drafts, Wikipedia:Draft namespace, or Wikipedia:Draft process. – Joe (talk) 09:53, 24 April 2024 (UTC)

I see where you are coming from but I don't think there is enough content to justify a WP:split and splitting would make things more confusing. Looking at the WP:Redirect guideline, there is quite a bit of basic and "how to" type information. While it does have an accompanying HELP:Redirect page, I can see why. First, WP:Redirect is double the size of this page and the help page is extensive so would overwhelm the main page. That's not the case here. If it is split, it should be other way. This page should remain the basics, as it has been since it's inception back in December 2013. S0091 (talk) 16:22, 24 April 2024 (UTC)

I don't think splitting the other way would make much sense? Editing guidelines like WP:DRAFTIFY would be totally out of place in the help namespace. – Joe (talk) 12:26, 26 April 2024 (UTC)

I didn't mean the new page should be in the help namespace. If there is split, which I don't think is warranted, this page should remain the basics and the title of the new page something else. S0091 (talk) 14:18, 26 April 2024 (UTC)

I notified the Teahouse and Helpdesk about this discussion given if this is split they need to know so they can direct editors to the correct page(s) and may also have helpful input. In addition I notified AfC and NPP. S0091 (talk) 17:41, 24 April 2024 (UTC)

I have been thinking along these lines myself for a little while now. I think it definitely would be confusing to have both a Help:Drafts and a Wikipedia:Drafts, so we can workshop a proposed title if the split is supported by consensus. It would also potentially define the scope of a page that could be codified as a true guideline in the future, which would be helpful in the process of formalizing a lot of the sometimes nebulous processes that NPP and AfC use. —TechnoSquirrel69 (sigh) 17:43, 24 April 2024 (UTC)

This essay seems to be trying to make up rules for AFC and NPP moving articles into draftspace. Due to the 90 day limit, almost always shorter than the NPP que, drafts is generally unusable by and irrelevant to NPP. And AFC is inherently dealing with articles already in draft so they don't move articles to draftspace. North8000 (talk) 18:03, 24 April 2024 (UTC)

I disagree with your assertion that this page is "irrelevant to NPP". Draftification by NPP-ers occurs on a daily basis, as not all of us are always looking at the back of the queue. As AfC's process often overlaps with NPP's, the page is relevant to both groups. —TechnoSquirrel69 (sigh) 18:14, 24 April 2024 (UTC)

The essay/potential guideline is relevant to anyone who can create drafts, nominate them for deletion (CSD or MFD) and/or move pages. Any new editor/IP can create drafts or nominate them for deletion. Any autoconfirmed editor can draftify an article and it's one the default WP:MOVE reasons ("Move to draftspace (WP:DRAFTIFY)"). S0091 (talk) 18:19, 24 April 2024 (UTC)

@TechnoSquirrel69: Good point, although my post isn't just about the back end of the cue. The very back of the cue (currently 5 years) is usually a few outliers but the age where there is a large quantity amount yet to be done is somewhere around 9 months. I tend to work where the creators have had a reasonable amount of time to deal with tags placed during a first NPP pass, and those are all older than 90 days. Sincerely, North8000 (talk) 19:28, 24 April 2024 (UTC)

@North8000: I don't think this page is "making up rules" any more than any other essay or guideline. The core of WP:DRAFTIFY dates back to c. 2017, has been incorporated into the NPP guidelines at WP:NPP for about as long (so NPP reviewers are generally expected to follow it), and subsequent modifications reflect a high degree of consensus. Some parts e.g. (WP:DRAFTOBJECT) summarise existing policies (i.e. WP:EW/WP:CONSENSUS). Personally I think it is overdue an upgrade to an official guideline and that is why I trying to to tidy up presentational issues like this. NPP reviewers are by far the most frequent users of draftification, which you can see for yourself here. In any case, I don't see how this is relevant to my proposal to split the page? – Joe (talk) 12:23, 26 April 2024 (UTC)

@Joe Roe: I think that I should just say I'm neutral on this and step back. But to explain what I was thinking, a guideline is somewhat of a rule in Wikipedia, more so than anything except a policy. So talking about a new guideline is sort of creating rules (including turning standard practices into guidelines). The other thing is drafts is a place. I'm thinking that the main areas regarding rules/guidelines that are unique to draft space would be what isn't allowed to be in draft space (due to e.g. content or elapsed time) and regarding moving an article out of mainspace into draft space. And if a new guideline goes outside of that it is going to be overlapping with something else. For example, regarding moving into article space, that's really about rules about what can exist in article space, not about drafts. Again, I'm neutral on this. Sincerely, North8000 (talk) 13:42, 26 April 2024 (UTC)

@Joe Roe, I'm not really sure the first two paragraphs are aimed at new editors. If they are, they really fall short of the mark - I don't think the "Finding Drafts" section, in particular, is very newbie-friendly. So I'm not sure this needs to be split anywhere, since we have lots of more newbie-friendly guides on article creation. I do think "Creating and editing drafts" ought to be the first section, though, since it is the more newbie-friendly of the two (also I feel like "creating" ought to come before "finding"). -- asilvering (talk) 21:42, 26 April 2024 (UTC)

Oppose split because I agree with @Joe that the better discussion to have is how to improve this page and make it a guideline. I also agree with @asilvering that § Creating and editing drafts should be moved up. If I were a new editor trying to create a draft, that's what I would be immediately looking for. voorts (talk/contributions) 02:05, 19 May 2024 (UTC)

Moving drafts to mainspace - no mention of review?

I was trying to find information on this page on how to review drafts - and failed. Sigh. This (Wikipedia:WikiProject Articles for creation/Reviewing instructions) should be mentioned in this (too short currently) section. _{Piotrus at Hanyang| reply here} 04:11, 17 May 2024 (UTC)

Seems reasonable. I added the section Wikipedia:Drafts#Reviewing a draft just now. Feel free to take a look. –Novem Linguae (talk) 04:45, 17 May 2024 (UTC)

I have edited your addition in various ways, please take a look. —Alalch E. 11:21, 17 May 2024 (UTC)

Thanks for those edits. I'm not sure about the new section heading and section location. The rest looks good. –Novem Linguae (talk) 11:46, 17 May 2024 (UTC)

I changed the headings to reintroduce the term "review" and added Deletion review as another draft review venue (an exceptional one albeit). —Alalch E. 14:41, 17 May 2024 (UTC)

The result is all bloat, so I cut it. Anyone looking for information here on reviewing drafts is not ready to be reviewing drafts. Enough information is implicit that any user can do it, but if a user can’t read that, they should go through the usual channels. The link to WP:AfC is sufficiently prominent. SmokeyJoe (talk) 09:48, 19 May 2024 (UTC)

@SmokeyJoe: The sections "As part of Articles for Creation" and "As part of Deletion review" were also added during this discussion so please review those for bloatiness too. —Alalch E. 11:05, 19 May 2024 (UTC)

I think “As part of Articles for Creation” is good, but “As part of Deletion review” is not. WP:Drafts should not be defining anything about DRV, and I don’t think any newcomer to drafts should be encouraged to worry about DRV.

Avoiding bloat is important. The more words there are, the less likely they are to be read. SmokeyJoe (talk) 11:40, 19 May 2024 (UTC)

I've removed that section. However, how about restoring the second sentence from what you've removed: "A draft does not belong to the editor who created it, and any other user may edit, move, rename, redirect, merge or seek deletion of any draft.{{refn|group=note|name=editing policy|Wikipedia's [[Wikipedia:Editing policy|editing policy]] applies to all pages, including drafts.}}" I think that sentence is good. It had been there prior to this discussion. —Alalch E. 11:59, 19 May 2024 (UTC)

Actually it's covered by the later-added "Non-AfC reviewers should not accept, decline, or reject drafts using the gadget and templates, but may still edit or move the drafts as normal editor actions". I'll just restore the note there. —Alalch E. 12:01, 19 May 2024 (UTC)

So you are saying we need to hide information on reviewing drafts? How much less user friendly can we make Wikipedia? This page like many others is already bloated to a point nobody reads them. If someone wants to learn about reviewing drafts, it is reasonable they'd go to WP:DRAFT, CTRL+F for 'review' - and they should find something useful quickly. Which is not a case right now :( _{Piotrus at Hanyang| reply here} 07:19, 20 May 2024 (UTC)

For the review of submitted drafts see <this link> (where, in the AfC WikiProject, it’s described).

Drafts don’t have to be reviewed. Most drafts don’t get reviewed. SmokeyJoe (talk) 07:47, 20 May 2024 (UTC)

Something short like this would be enough. _{Piotrus at Hanyang| reply here} 02:50, 28 May 2024 (UTC)

If this page is already bloated to the point that nobody reads it (though note that above, people are also saying that it's too short to split), it doesn't follow me that we should add further instructions for a process that is not a core part of draftspace and which is already covered elsewhere. – Joe (talk) 11:59, 20 May 2024 (UTC)

I think that instructions for reviewing (AfC) drafts should remain with WikiProject AfC. Seeking review from another editor is not an intrinsic part of draftspace and many would say that it should be avoided if at all possible. The review process is a part of AfC, which is one but not the only user of draftspace. Indeed, AfC operated just fine without draftspace for many years. – Joe (talk) 19:05, 19 May 2024 (UTC)

I agree.

To User:Alalch E., for observations, comparisons and contrasts, of DRV and draft reviews, I think they are very interesting and worth recording, just not here. I suggest an essay. SmokeyJoe (talk) 21:40, 19 May 2024 (UTC)

I agree with this too. I think it's fine both with and without this subsection. The only thing I actually don't agree with and which was the precursor to what you removed was a previous addition corresponding to the start of this talk section (that I changed into the AfC subsection), which said that AfC is a "formal process" and that AfC reviewers "officially accept" drafts, which is a terminology that I don't agree with. AfC is an optional process and as such it is not formal or "official".

@SmokeyJoe: Yes, I might write an essay, thanks.—Alalch E. 21:41, 19 May 2024 (UTC)

Shortcuts and Linkboxes

Shortcuts are cheap. Anyone can create them. If they get used, and are well used, and seem helpful to be used, then others will use them. If lots of people are using them, it may be a good idea to add a WP:LINKBOX so that people know lots of people use them.

Linkboxes are not cheap. They are visual clutter. Please don’t add them, or add to them, unless there an important shortcut to be advertised to newcomers.

Please don’t confuse the purpose of a linkbox with the purpose of the {{anchor}} template, which may be needed to make a shortcut work. SmokeyJoe (talk) 13:14, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

I find these useful and not cluttering. WP:LINKBOX merely advises not listing too many redirects; it doesn't say they have to meet a certain threshold of incoming links. None of the linkboxes you just removed listed more than three. Many were created recently (two today), hence the small number of incoming links right now.

And incidentally, since a linkbox does also serve as an {{anchor}}, by removing them, your edit broke several (e.g. WP:DRAFTREASON and WP:DONTDRAFTIFY). – Joe (talk) 13:35, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

Discussion at Wikipedia:Village pump (idea lab) § Ready for the mainspace

 You are invited to join the discussion at Wikipedia:Village pump (idea lab) § Ready for the mainspace. –Novem Linguae (talk) 13:46, 20 June 2024 (UTC)

Add/mention "not ready for mainspace"?

Reading that Idea Lab discussion I linked above, even though the phrase "not ready for mainspace" creates a lot of ambiguity, we may need to add that phrase somewhere in this document, as it does appear to be current practice. –Novem Linguae (talk) 13:51, 20 June 2024 (UTC)

It's already in the "during new page review" section – that's where the phrase originates, in fact. Do you mean add it somewhere else, assuming we remove that section as you've proposed above? – Joe (talk) 14:12, 20 June 2024 (UTC)

Ah, I missed it when I did Ctrl+F for "not ready for mainspace". It's phrased as "unready for mainspace". So yeah, I think it needs to stay in the document somewhere for now even if we give the "during new page review" section a haircut. –Novem Linguae (talk) 14:14, 20 June 2024 (UTC)

Well, it's been there since 2017, so the default should be to keep it, for sure. However, I don't think we should feel obligated to: it's widely used 'in practice' because of automated scripts, which a) are paraphrasing this essay to begin with, and b) are a poor indicator of consensus, since individual editors using them don't choose the wording. If we think we can express current consensus in a better way we can certainly drop it, and I read the general sentiment in the VPI thread as that if we can agree on one thing, it's that that particular phrase is poorly defined. – Joe (talk) 15:11, 20 June 2024 (UTC)

Additional reasons for draftifying

Following on from #Positive criteria for draftifying and a related discussion at VPI, where there was support for the idea stating what specifically makes an article "not ready for mainspace" rather than relying on that ambiguous phrase alone, I'd like to move forward with organising an RfC on additional reasons for draftifying. WP:DRAFTREASON currently lists three bright-line circumstances with an existing strong consensus behind them. Above I came up with several more that are seen with varying degrees of regularity (mostly because they're the canned reasons given by the draftify script), but which don't appear to have consensus behind them (yet):

1. The article does not cite any sources at all
2. The article needs more references
3. The article reads like an advertisement
4. The article has too many problems of language or grammar
5. Sources cited in the article do not show that the topic is notable

I envisage a centrally-advertised RfC asking participants to indicate whether they support or oppose each of these as an acceptable reasons to move an article to draftspace, subject to the established exceptions. Any that find consensus would be added to WP:DRAFTREASON; if there is a consensus against some, we could consider a new list of unacceptable reasons. We should state at the outset that is explicitly not aiming to be a comprehensive list: the option to IAR and move an article to draftspace for any reason is always there, and supported in the script via the "other reason(s)" field.

Before we get to that point, though, I'd like to workshop the above options and make sure nobody feels they're being unfairly presented. Is there anything that should be added or removed? Any wording changes? Bad idea altogether? Pinging @Novem Linguae, Alalch E., Kvng, WhatamIdoing, SmokeyJoe, and Thryduulf: who have participated in previous discussions. – Joe (talk) 12:02, 20 June 2024 (UTC)

What's the motivation for adding new WP:DRAFTREASONs? For each case, what's the goal for moving to draft space? Do we think these problems are (more) likely to get addressed once the article is in draft space? ~Kvng (talk) 12:13, 20 June 2024 (UTC)

The motivation is to accurately describe the expectations of the broader community when it comes to draftifying and so give new page patrollers and others who do a lot of draftifying better guidance on when they should and shouldn't do it. That said, one very plausible outcome of this RfC (and my preferred one), is that none of these are added to WP:DRAFTREASON. I think your other two questions will be important points of discussion for the RfC but perhaps we could hold off on them for now. – Joe (talk) 12:21, 20 June 2024 (UTC)

It seems like a more direct approach would be to modify the script to remove canned reasons that do not appear in WP:DRAFTREASON. ~Kvng (talk) 12:38, 20 June 2024 (UTC)

Worth distinguishing newly created from old articles. Draftification of an old article is basically just delayed deletion unless the article creator is still around and available, so I don't expect there would be consensus for draftifying old articles for things like "not enough references". — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 12:43, 20 June 2024 (UTC)

That's already an established exception. ~Kvng (talk) 12:45, 20 June 2024 (UTC)

Thanks. Forgot that. — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 13:00, 20 June 2024 (UTC)

I wonder if the script can detect 'old age' and refuse to send it to Draft: space. (You'd have to move it manually.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:35, 20 June 2024 (UTC)

The MoveToDraft script definitely alerts potential draftifiers about this. It doesn't outright ban draftification for articles over 90 days old, but the giant red warnings and alert windows it generates are impossible to miss. –Novem Linguae (talk) 21:46, 20 June 2024 (UTC)

The options are presented fairly and nothing should be added or removed. I agree with proceeding with the RfC to discuss these five additional reasons to move an article to draftspace. Wikipedia:Drafts and the canned reasons in the script should be in agreement. —Alalch E. 12:57, 27 June 2024 (UTC)

Delete the section "During new page review"?

I'd be interested in removing the "During new page review" heading and all its associated text. I feel it duplicates the sections above it and does not concisely state current practice. In other words, I prefer the sections above it. Thoughts?

If folks don't want to delete the entire section, I think it'd also be acceptable to keep 1-5 but then delete everything from "Expanding on the above" down as too detailed and procedural. –Novem Linguae (talk) 13:53, 20 June 2024 (UTC)

I'd support removing it entirely. All the substantive points are now covered in the other sections of WP:DRAFTIFY, IMO in a more approachable way. – Joe (talk) 15:12, 20 June 2024 (UTC)

I also support removing it. S0091 (talk) 16:04, 20 June 2024 (UTC)

Do the numbered items correspond to options in the AFCH script? The script's options should be documented somewhere. WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:39, 20 June 2024 (UTC)

AFCH is for promoting drafts to mainspace so probably isn't applicable to draftification. If you meant the MoveToDraft script, no. MoveToDraft's message options more closely correlate to the recently added WP:DRAFTREASON and also the bullet points above that Joe Roe wants to RFC, rather than this "During new page review" section that is proposed for deletion. –Novem Linguae (talk) 21:49, 20 June 2024 (UTC)

I agree with removal. I also find this content to be duplicative. —Alalch E. 13:16, 27 June 2024 (UTC)