This page is an archive of a community-wide discussion. This page is no longer live. Further comments or questions on this topic should be made in a new Senate Hall page rather than here so that this page is preserved as a historic record. Toprawa and Ralltiir 20:23, October 2, 2009 (UTC)
Maybe somebody can explain this to me... is Template:Subcat really needed anymore?
- "This template should be used instead of [[Category:]] declarations inside category pages. This ensures that subcategories are listed before all other pages, so that nobody has to slog through three or four pages before they know what all the subcategories are."
- ―Template:Subcat Usage[src]
It seems that Wikia/MediaWiki is already doing this for us, even dividing the subcategories up by first character. But some categories that use the Subcat template are disrupting the sorting. For example Category:In-universe articles lists subcategory Technology before anything else because Technology uses the Subcat template. Unless somebody can explain why we use the template instead of the default sorting, I plan on TC'ing the template. - Esjs(Talk) 22:31, 8 July 2009 (UTC)
- Makes no sense to me. Be bold and toss it in the TC. —Master Jonathan(Jedi Council Chambers) 04:58, 9 July 2009 (UTC)
- I believe the reason for the template is so all the subcategories are placed on the first page of the category rather than automatically being alphabetized, which causes them to appear on different pages when the category contains more than 200 items. As the template says, this "ensures that subcategories are listed before all other pages, so that nobody has to slog through three or four pages before they know what all the subcategories are." Grunny (Talk) 05:05, 9 July 2009 (UTC)
- But that's just it... the sub-categories come before the hundreds of pages anyway - automatically! First the sub-categories are arranged alphabetically, then the normal articles get their own alphabetizing. There is no mixing. All without the Subcat template. I'll let this sit for a day before I TC it (unless somebody gets impatient and beats me too it). - Esjs(Talk) 06:02, 9 July 2009 (UTC)
- Does it really? It didn't use to. —Xwing328(Talk) 06:05, 9 July 2009 (UTC)
- I don't think it's a wise idea to TC such a thing. Nearly 500 categories use this feature. Do we really know what will happen once it is obliterated? -- Riffsyphon1024 06:40, 9 July 2009 (UTC)
- They still don't come before all the pages as you can see by looking at Category:Food. On the first page three subcategories are shown while on the next page the other subcategory is shown. Using the subcat template would put all of these on the first page, allowing a user to view all the subcategories listed before all other pages. Grunny (Talk) 15:14, 9 July 2009 (UTC)
- I don't think it's a wise idea to TC such a thing. Nearly 500 categories use this feature. Do we really know what will happen once it is obliterated? -- Riffsyphon1024 06:40, 9 July 2009 (UTC)
- Does it really? It didn't use to. —Xwing328(Talk) 06:05, 9 July 2009 (UTC)
- But that's just it... the sub-categories come before the hundreds of pages anyway - automatically! First the sub-categories are arranged alphabetically, then the normal articles get their own alphabetizing. There is no mixing. All without the Subcat template. I'll let this sit for a day before I TC it (unless somebody gets impatient and beats me too it). - Esjs(Talk) 06:02, 9 July 2009 (UTC)
- I believe the reason for the template is so all the subcategories are placed on the first page of the category rather than automatically being alphabetized, which causes them to appear on different pages when the category contains more than 200 items. As the template says, this "ensures that subcategories are listed before all other pages, so that nobody has to slog through three or four pages before they know what all the subcategories are." Grunny (Talk) 05:05, 9 July 2009 (UTC)
- Thank you, Grunny, for finding a good example of why the default software sorting is not sufficient and the template is still needed. I think, instead of TC'ing the template, a note could be added to the template page (or its talk page) explaining this nuance. Then we can get to work on fixing categories, (unless somebody with fancy-shmancy droid programming skills wants to write a droid to that). - Esjs(Talk) 17:10, 9 July 2009 (UTC)
- I'd rather write a script to put
[[Category:whatever| ]]on the page instead of using the template, as the template tends to mess with other bot scripts. —Xwing328(Talk) 02:14, 10 July 2009 (UTC)- I'll agree to that; it's a good compromise. Will the bot/droid watch for recent changes to the categories to handle sub-categorizations by those who are not aware of this decision? - Esjs(Talk) 06:38, 11 July 2009 (UTC)
- If I did it, it would just go through once, not constantly monitor it. Somebody else like Sikon may know how to "schedule" a bot to monitor those. —Xwing328(Talk) 23:30, 11 July 2009 (UTC)
- Yeah just where are all those smart Russians anyway? :P If the bot can do the work of the template, then I'm for that. If not, then I say we keep the template. -- Riffsyphon1024 06:11, 15 July 2009 (UTC)
- If I did it, it would just go through once, not constantly monitor it. Somebody else like Sikon may know how to "schedule" a bot to monitor those. —Xwing328(Talk) 23:30, 11 July 2009 (UTC)
- I'll agree to that; it's a good compromise. Will the bot/droid watch for recent changes to the categories to handle sub-categorizations by those who are not aware of this decision? - Esjs(Talk) 06:38, 11 July 2009 (UTC)
- I'd rather write a script to put
- I've created a TC thread for the template. - Esjs(Talk) 17:02, 15 July 2009 (UTC)