Wikipedia:Shortcut

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✔ This page documents a guideline on the English Wikipedia. While it is not policy, editors are strongly advised to follow it. As the occasional exception may arise, it should be approached with common sense. When editing this page, please ensure that your revision reflects consensus. When in doubt, discuss first on the talk page.
Shortcuts:
WP:SHC
WP:SHORT

Shortcuts in Wikipedia are a specialized type of redirection page that can be used to get to a Wikipedia project reference page more quickly. Lists of available Wikipedia shortcuts can be found at WP:WP = Wikipedia:List of shortcuts, WP:WPR = Wikipedia:Project shortcuts, and WT:WT = Wikipedia:Shortcuts to talk pages.


Contents

[edit] Procedures


Example: #REDIRECT [[Pagename]] {{R from shortcut}}.

[edit] How to use Wikipedia shortcuts

A Wikipedia shortcut can be entered into the Wikipedia search box to quickly bring you to a reference page.
For example, you can type "WP:R" into the search box and click the "Go" button to get to the Wikipedia "Redirect" reference page, instead of having to type "Wikipedia:Redirect".

Alternatively, you can use the shortcut in the URL (web address). For example, you are currently viewing the Wikipedia:Shortcut page in English. The URL for the English-language page is:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Shortcut

You could get from here to the Wikipedia:Redirect project reference page by replacing "Wikipedia:Shortcut" with "WP:R" in the URL (web address) field (followed by "Enter").

Shortcuts are presented in all capital letters ("All-Caps"), but the search box is case-insensitive. For example, in the search box, you can type "wp:r" instead of "WP:R".

However, using the URL method typically requires that you match the capitalization of the shortcut itself.

[edit] Readability

Shortcuts are often linked on talk pages without any piped text, although for the general reader this type of shortcut can decrease readability. Some editors are familiar with the bulk of Wikipedia's project namespace shortcuts, recognizing what they stand for on sight. Others get a cold elitist insiders-only impression when faced with a page full of shortcuts, the meaning of which is undecipherable and worse, unaccessible if e.g., the reader happens to be offline.

While shortcuts can help with linking, it is best not to use them as a title when referring to a page. For example, the link shortcuts uses a shortcut to link but gives readers an idea of the target, while quoting WP:SHC is unhelpful to those unfamiliar with the page. One should be mindful of the intended audience, and when quoting a page one should consider using its proper title.

A proposed method to increase readability is using templates producing full meta links. Individually a registered user can use navigation popups, a JavaScript tool.

[edit] Adding shortcut link boxes

A shortcut link box can be added to a page by placing {{shortcut|[[WP:<x>]]}} at the top of the text while editing. A note from the "shortcut template" page:

Please do not use this template on other templates, e.g. to state that the shortcut to Template:Foo is in fact {{Foo}}. There's no need to state the obvious like that, each template uses its own name as a shortcut, by default.

Guidelines with shortcuts pointing to them typically use {{guideline|[[WP:<x>]]}} instead of {{shortcut}}, for an example see above. Another example is {{style-guideline|[[WP:<x>]]}}, see also Wikipedia header templates.

[edit] How to create a shortcut

For an existing page like Wikipedia:Template Standardisation create the desired new Wikipedia:TS page with a single line: (example, this shortcut already exists)

#REDIRECT [[Wikipedia:Template Standardisation]] {{R from shortcut}}

The abbreviation "WP" or "wp" for the namespace "Wikipedia" works anyway, regardless of redirects. Similarly "WT" or "wt" for the namespace "Wikipedia talk".

Many shortcuts are acronyms, others are abbreviations, quite a lot are simply WP:BAD, but technically they are redirections.

[edit] Changing shortcuts

Technically that's easy, click on the shortcut wherever it is, on the page it leads to (a shortcut is a redirect) click on the "redirected from" link (forcing &redirect=no), edit the target #REDIRECT [[Wikipedia:Whatever]], then add {{r from shortcut}} if that expression doesn't already appear. But there are some potential traps and pitfalls:

  1. If the shortcut is already listed on Wikipedia:List of shortcuts or a similar list like Wikipedia:Shortcuts to talk pages, please update that entry showing the new target page.
  2. If the old target page mentions its shortcut, then that also should be updated, typically in {{shortcut}} or similar Wikipedia header templates.
  3. Above all check the shortcut backlinks with "what links here"; changing a shortcut used elsewhere can be highly disruptive.
  4. If it has no backlink folks might still use it directly with search forms, if you're not 100% sure that the old target is unused; so ask about it on the shortcut's talk page.
  5. For controversial cases, go to Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion.

[edit] List of shortcuts

An incomplete list of shortcuts can be found at Wikipedia:List of shortcuts, and as expected this page has itself various shortcuts like WP:WP, WP:CUTS.

Other shortcuts for shortcut lists are WP:WPR for Wikipedia:Project shortcuts and WT:WT for Wikipedia:Shortcuts to talk pages. Obviously many shortcuts are (ab)used to make a WP:POINT and best described by WP:WOTTA.

On Meta shortcuts start with WM:, the list is at m:WM:WM. As shown, links to shortcuts on other projects work as expected, but redirects (incl. shortcuts) to pages on other projects won't work - this former feature was abused and hence it has been disabled.

Use special pages to find uncategorized or unlisted pages starting with a given prefix, e.g. Special:Prefixindex/CAT: for some category shortcuts.

[edit] List of prefixes

As mentioned, the abbreviation "WP" or "wp" for the namespace "Wikipedia" works anyway, regardless of redirects.

Commonly used pseudo-namespaces include:

WT: Wikipedia talk:
MOS: Wikipedia:Manual of Style
CAT: Category:
P: Portal:

The following pseudo-namespaces are less commonly used, for a variety of reasons:

Wt: Wikipedia talk:
WPP: Wikipedia:WikiProject
MoS: Wikipedia:Manual of Style
Mos: Wikipedia:Manual of Style
Special talk: Wikipedia talk:Special
Cat: Category:
C: Category:
T: Template: or Template talk:

[edit] See also

Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Shortcut"
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