Misplaced Pages

Revision as of 21:55, 6 July 2009

This page documents an English Misplaced Pages style guideline. Editors should generally follow it, though exceptions may apply. Substantive edits to this page should reflect consensus. When in doubt, discuss first on this guideline's talk page.

Shortcuts WP:SAL WP:STAND

Stand-alone lists and "lists of links" are articles that primarily consist of a list or a group of lists, linking to articles or lists in a particular subject area, such as a timeline of events or people and places. The titles of these articles usually begin with "list of", "outline of", "timeline of", "glossary of", or "index of". Stand-alone lists are Misplaced Pages articles; thus, they are equally subject to Misplaced Pages's content policies, such as verifiability, no original research and neutral point of view.

General formatting

There are a number of formats, both generalized and specialized, that are currently used on Misplaced Pages, for list articles.

"List of" articles

1. Alphabetized lists or indexes, such as List of mathematics articles (0–9) or List of economics topics, as well as simple, alphabetized lists, without letter subheadings.
2. Annotated lists, such as List of business theorists or List of topics in industrial organization.
3. Subheading-structured lists (i.e., categorized or hierarchical lists), such as List of cat breeds, List of finance topics, List of marketing topics, Lists of mathematics topics or Lists of philosophers.
4. Chronological lists, such as Deaths in 2007 or List of winners and shortlisted authors of the Booker Prize for Fiction. (Lists, whose titles begin with "timeline of", are always chronological.)
5. Sortable lists, which are formatted as tables, such as List of social networking websites‎.

Specialized "list of" articles

1. Timelines, using the timeline syntax, such as Timeline of architectural styles or Graphical timeline of the Big Bang. Most "timeline of" list articles do not use this specialized type of timeline syntax.
2. Glossaries, such as Glossary of philosophical isms or Glossary of pinball terms, where the annotations are definitions of the list's entries.

Usually, the best format to use in designing a list depends on how it will be used by the readers. If the list will be used primarily by those familiar with a subject, then a hierarchical list would be preferred; however, if it will be frequently used by those unfamiliar with the topic, then an alphabetical list may be more practical. Also, consider whether the list will be primarily used for navigational purposes or for developing Misplaced Pages content (redlinks). Remember, there are a number of formats that can be used in writing a list, that are equally helpful.

Lead and selection criteria

• WP:LSC

Lists should begin with a lead section that presents unambiguous statements of membership criteria. Many lists on Misplaced Pages have been created without any membership criteria, and editors are left to guess about what or who should be included only from the name of the list; do not simply say "This is a list of X", but make sure the scope of the list is understandable. Even if it might seem obvious what qualifies for membership in a list, explicit is better than implicit. In cases where the membership criteria are subjective or likely to be disputed, list definitions should be based on reliable sources. Non-obvious characteristics of the list, for instance regarding the list structure, should also be explained in the lead section.

When deciding what to include on a list, ask yourself:

• If this person/thing/etc., wasn't an X, would it reduce their fame or significance?
• Would I expect to see this person or thing on a list of X?
• Is this person or thing a canonical example of some facet of X?

Each entry on a list should have its own non-redirect article in English Misplaced Pages, but this is not required if the entry is verifiably a member of the listed group, and it is reasonable to expect an article could be forthcoming in the future. The one exception is for list articles that are created explicitly because the listed items do not warrant independent articles: an example of this is List of minor characters in Dilbert. Don't use a list as a "creation guide" containing a large number of redlinked unwritten articles; instead consider listing them in the appropriate section of Misplaced Pages:Requested articles or in the appropriate Wikiproject.

If a complete list is feasible in 32K and could be useful, go for a complete list. Otherwise, you will need to make sure section editing is enabled or you may want to build a selected list.

When the list includes a short introduction and a longer list, it may be advisible to include a "See also" section, that shows related lists and articles, after the introduction and before the list.

Naming conventions

• WP:LISTNAME

The name or title of the list should simply be List of _ _ (for example list of Xs). Many lists are not intended to contain every possible member (e.g. List of people from the Isle of Wight obviously does not include all people from the island). Instead, inclusion on the list should be determined by the criteria above. Because of this, "notable" is assumed, and that word (or similar subjective words such as "famous," "noted," "prominent," etc.) should not be included in the title of a list article. Similarly, do not use a title like: Xs nor list of all Xs. If (as is often the case), the list has multiple columns and so is in table form, the name or title List of _ _ is still preferable to Table of _ _ or Comparison of _ _.

A list of lists of X could be at lists of X or list of X: e.g., lists of people, list of sovereign states.

People are either list of Finns or lists of French people, preferring List of _ people. USA folk are a special case; list of United States people redirects to lists of Americans which contains, amongst other things, lists by US state. (Special treatment is necessary because American is ambiguous.)

Poets listed by language are at, for example List of German-language poets – see list of poets.

Fictional creatures at list of fictional dogs, etc., with real-life examples at list of dogs. Note that the lead section of both lists states what they include.

For multi-page lists (aka "long lists"), see Misplaced Pages:Naming conventions (long lists).

Set index articles do not need to be titled with "list of" unless there is also a disambiguation page using that title. For example, Dodge Charger is a list of cars named Dodge Charger, but does not need to be titled List of cars named Dodge Charger. However, since Signal Mountain is a disambiguation page, the related set index article is at List of peaks named Signal Mountain.

Chronological ordering

Chronological lists, including all timelines and lists of works, should be in earliest-to-latest chronological order. Special cases which specifically require frequent daily additions, such as Deaths in 2009, may use reverse chronological order for temporary convenience, although these articles should revert to non-reverse order when the article has stabilized, such as Deaths in 2003.

Appropriate topics for lists

• WP:SALAT

The potential for creating lists is infinite. The number of possible lists is limited only by our collective imagination. To keep the system of lists useful, we must limit the number of lists.

Lists that are too general or too broad in scope have little value, unless they are split into categories. For example a list of brand names would be far too long to be of value. If you have an interest in listing brand names, try to limit the scope in some way (by product category, by country, by date, etc.). This is best done by sectioning the general page under categories. When entries in a category have grown enough to warrant a fresh list-article, they can be moved out to a new page, and be replaced by a See ] link. When all categories become links to lists, the page becomes a list repository or "List of lists" and the entries can be displayed as a bulleted list. For reference see Lists of people, which is made up of specific categorical lists.

Lists that are too specific are also a problem. The "list of one-eyed horse thieves from Montana" will be of little interest to anyone (except the person making the list).

Some Wikipedians feel that some topics are unsuitable by virtue of the nature of the topic. Following the policy spelled out in What Misplaced Pages is not, they feel that some topics are trivial, non-encyclopedic, or not related to human knowledge. If you create a list like the "list of shades of colors of apple sauce", be prepared to explain why you feel this list contributes to the state of human knowledge.

Lists of people

Selected lists of people should be selected for importance/notability in that category and should have Misplaced Pages articles (or the reasonable expectation of an article in the future). For example, lists of atheists doesn't include every individual with a Misplaced Pages article who happens to be an atheist, because not all of them are notable for their atheism. However, it might well include Sigmund Freud. See also Misplaced Pages:Notability (people).

An exception is nationality/ethnicity. List of Elbonians would include persons who are famous in any category and who belong to Elbonia. The criteria for identifying as an Elbonian may not depend on the official citizenship laws of that country - the person could be related to the place by birth, domicile, parents, or by his or her personal admission, consider himself or herself an Elbonian at heart.

Lists of people must follow Misplaced Pages's policy on biographical information about living people. For example, care must be taken when adding people to the list of gay, lesbian or bisexual people, and must be sourced reliably.

Lists of lists

Misplaced Pages has many lists of lists articles. On lists of lists, nonexistent lists should not be included. That is, all the links in a "lists of lists" should be active (blue, not red).

Lists of lists should also be available as alphabetical categories. Put lists that have actual content in one of the subcategories under Category:Lists.

Categories, lists and navigation templates

As useful as lists are, certain lists may get out of date quickly; for these types of subjects, a category may be a more appropriate method of organization. See Misplaced Pages:Categorization and Misplaced Pages:Categories, lists, and navigation templates for more information on the appropriate times to use lists versus categories.

Taxonomic links

For many genera there may be a considerable number of species. For the smaller genera a taxobox may suffice but for the more specious including genera such as Anopheles it is probable better to move these into their own page. The bulk of the page will be taken up by the list. Such lists do qualify as encyclopedic: for many of these genera there are specialized monographs to assist in the identification of these species.

Lists and the "Related changes" link

A very useful Misplaced Pages feature is to use the "Related changes" link when on a list page. This will show you all the changes made to the links contained in the list. If the page has a link to itself, this feature will also show you the changes made to the list itself.

See also

• Misplaced Pages:WikiProject Lists
• Help:List
• Help:Table

• Misplaced Pages style guidelines