Template talk:forms

RFDO discussion: November 2015–March 2017
I’ve never seen one case where displaying “α forms” and “β forms” has improved an entry, or done anything other than confuse readers. Most uses can be removed; the few that contain useful information can be replaced with. — Ungoliant (falai) 16:44, 12 November 2015 (UTC)
 * Redirect to Template:qualifier Pur ple back pack 89  16:55, 12 November 2015 (UTC)
 * I don't see how that can be done, since the templates do totally different things. --WikiTiki89 16:56, 12 November 2015 (UTC)
 * We'd have to orphan after redirecting like Wikitiki89 says because they don't work in the same way. Renard Migrant (talk) 18:37, 12 November 2015 (UTC)
 * Yeah, “α forms” and “β forms” make it seem that α and β have a pre-determined linguistic meaning, which they don't in this case; they are simply being used as the name of an arbitrary group. If we really want to group alternative forms like this, we can do so visually without naming the groups with Greek letters. So delete. --WikiTiki89 16:56, 12 November 2015 (UTC)
 * Oh God yes delete. Doremítzwr had a reputation for creating things that he found pleasing but added no value to the project (or even harmed the project) but he felt as long as he was happy, stuff the project. Renard Migrant (talk) 18:37, 12 November 2015 (UTC)


 * Delete Absolutely useless – just gives an arbitrary name to something that's already described in a perfectly adequate way (and suggests an ordering that's inappropriate). Look at traveler's diarrhea – "UK", "US" and "mixed"(?) would suffice without Greek letters. Similiarly, scion, rix-dollar, poena, embryo etc could all lose the Greek letters without changing in any way. The only place the letters are actually referred to is finocchio... and really, that definition should be at finocchia, if it doesn't turn out to be totally spurious. Smurrayinchester (talk) 14:42, 13 November 2015 (UTC)
 * (As an aside, when this gets deleted, the corresponding glossary entry should also go) Smurrayinchester (talk) 14:48, 13 November 2015 (UTC)

This has a bunch of transclusions so cannot yet be deleted. I went to edit the template in light of the above discussion, removing the Greek letters, as a temporary measure until the entries could be edits. But then I realized: that's all that's really necessary. The template adds value to entries (see e.g. [[halfpenny]], though I haven't checked how many entries it adds value to): it's only the arbitrary Greek letters that don't. I think we should keep the newly edited template. Pinging the other discussants here, since it's been a while since there's been any activity in this section. Note that if this template is deleted or kept as edited, then [[Appendix:Glossary]] needs to have the entry for "α/β/γ/… form(s)" removed. And if the template is kept as edited, then its documentation needs to be updated. &#x200b;—msh210℠ (talk) 18:18, 22 December 2015 (UTC)
 * The same text could be put in a, could it not? The concept of separating alternative forms by features may add value, but this template itself does not, as far as I can tell. --WikiTiki89 18:24, 22 December 2015 (UTC)
 * I suppose that's right. &#x200b;—msh210℠ (talk) 20:15, 22 December 2015 (UTC)
 * What does the new template actually do? As far as I can tell, it just transcludes the text typed into it. I'd be happy to spend a few minutes subst'ing all the remaining uses (there's only 20-something). Smurrayinchester (talk) 09:12, 23 December 2015 (UTC)
 * It gives the third parameter and a adds a colon, right. Substing should not be mindless, though, because the surrounding text may refer to the (now-gone) Greek letters. (This is something I should've fixed when editing the template. That is, it's an issue related to changing the template, not to substing it.) &#x200b;—msh210℠ (talk) 17:38, 23 December 2015 (UTC)

Okay, so I guess there's some consensus here to subst: and then delete the new version. I'll start subst:ing. &#x200b;—msh210℠ (talk) 17:49, 23 December 2015 (UTC)


 * Has been orphaned, apparently for over a year. Deleted. - -sche (discuss) 03:04, 25 March 2017 (UTC)