Wikipedia:Disambiguation

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This page documents an English Wikipedia editing guideline. It is a generally accepted standard that editors should attempt to follow, though it is best treated with common sense, and occasional exceptions may apply. Any substantive edit to this page should reflect consensus. When in doubt, discuss first on the talk page. Shortcuts:
WP:D
WP:DAB
WP:DISAMBIG
This page in a nutshell: When an article title could refer to several things, it is necessary to provide links or a disambiguation page so that readers typing in that title can quickly navigate to the article that interests them.
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Disambiguation in Wikipedia is the process of resolving conflicts in Wikipedia article titles that occur when a single term can be associated with more than one topic, making that term likely to be the natural title for more than one article. In other words, disambiguations are paths leading to different articles which could, in principle, have the same title.

For example, the word "Mercury" can refer to several different things, including an element, a planet, an automobile brand, a record label, a NASA manned-spaceflight project, a plant, and a Roman god. Since only one Wikipedia page can have the generic name "Mercury", unambiguous article titles are used for each of these topics: Mercury (element), Mercury (planet), Mercury (automobile), Mercury Records, Project Mercury, Mercury (plant), Mercury (mythology). There must then be a way to direct the reader to the correct specific article when an ambiguous term is referenced by linking, browsing or searching; this is what is known as disambiguation. In this case it is achieved using Mercury as a disambiguation page.

Two methods of disambiguating are discussed here:

• disambiguation links: links at the top of an article (hatnotes), that refer the reader to other Wikipedia articles with similar titles or concepts.
• disambiguation pages: non-article pages that refer readers to other Wikipedia articles.

Deciding to disambiguate

Disambiguation is required whenever, for a given word or phrase on which a reader might use the "Go button", there is more than one existing Wikipedia article to which that word or phrase might be expected to lead. In this situation there must be a way for the reader to navigate quickly from the page that appears on hitting "Go" to any of the other possible desired articles.

There are three principal disambiguation scenarios, of which the following are examples:

• The page at Joker is a disambiguation page, leading to all the alternative uses of "Joker".
• The page at Rice is about one usage, called the primary topic, and there is a hatnote guiding readers to Rice (disambiguation) to find the other uses.
• The page at Michael Dobbs is about the primary topic, and there is only one other use. The other use is linked directly using a hatnote; no disambiguation page is needed.

Is there a primary topic?

Shortcuts:
WP:PT
WP:PRIMARYTOPIC

Although a term may potentially refer to more than one topic, it is often the case that one of these topics is highly likely – much more likely than any other, and more likely than all the others combined – to be the subject being sought when a reader clicks the "Go" button for that term. If there is such a topic, then it is called the primary topic for that term. If a primary topic exists, the term should be the title of (or redirect to) the article on that topic. If there is no primary topic, the term should be the title of a disambiguation page (or redirect to a different disambiguation page, if more than one term is combined on one page).

There are no absolute rules for determining primary topics; decisions are made by discussion between editors, often as a result of a requested move. If there is extended discussion about which article truly is the primary topic, that may be a sign that there is in fact no primary topic.

Tools that may help to support the determination of a primary topic in a discussion, but are not determining factors, include:

• Incoming wikilinks from Special:WhatLinksHere
• Wikipedia article traffic statistics
• Google web, news, scholar, or book searches

For some terms with primary topics the title of the primary topic article may differ from the term itself (as when the article covers a wider topical scope, or is titled differently according to the naming conventions). In this case the term should redirect to the article (or a section of it). For example, the primary topic for "Danzig" is the former German city of that name, but the article on that city is titled Gdańsk. Therefore Danzig redirects to Gdańsk, and the latter page contains a hatnote linking to Danzig (disambiguation).

Disambiguation page or disambiguation links?

If there are three or more topics associated with the same term, then a disambiguation page should normally be created for that term (in which case disambiguation links may or may not be desirable on the specific topic articles – see below). If only a primary topic and one other topic require disambiguation, then disambiguation links are sufficient, and a disambiguation page is unnecessary. However if there are two topics for a term but neither is considered the primary topic, then a disambiguation page is used.

For more about disambiguation links, see Disambiguation links below. For rules about naming disambiguation pages and combining similar terms on a single page, see Disambiguation pages.

Naming the specific topic articles

Article titles
Nature
Birds • Fauna • Flora
Literature, music and entertainment
Books • Broadcasting • Comics • Films • Manuscripts • Music • Operas • Television • Video games
People
All people — Ancient Romans • Baseball players • Clergy • Royalty and nobility
Science, technology and transport
Astronomy • Chemistry • Medicine • Programming languages • Aircraft • Ships
Organizations
Companies • Government and legislation • Latter Day Saints • Political parties • Sport teams
Time, numbers and money
Numbers and dates • Money
Places, events and trademarks
Places • Events • Trademarks
Lists and categories
Categories • Lists • Long lists • Stub sorting
Language/country-specific
All languages • All countries — Armenian • Burmese • Chinese • German • Greek • Hebrew • Irish • Japanese • Korean • Macedonian • Mongolian • New Zealand • Old Norse • Polish • Russian
Format
Capitalization • Articles • Plurals • Abbreviations • Restrictions
Shortcut:
WP:NCDAB

For disambiguating specific topic pages by using an unambiguous article title, several options are available: