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TfD: Template:Geographic_location

FYI

 – pointer to relevant discussion elsewhere.

Please see Wikipedia:Templates for discussion/Log/2017 July 20#Template:Geographic location, which is likely of interest to the regular editors of MOS:ICONS. It cites this guideline, as the template uses decorative icons, but the main issue is whether the template is itself decoration for its own sake, or actually serves an encyclopedic navigation function.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  02:19, 20 July 2017 (UTC)

Flags in Infobox country in articles about the country

Does the guidance against using flag icons in infoboxes apply even to {{Infobox country}} in articles about the country? I understand that when an article is about, say, a sportsperson, the country the person is from is only one fact among many about that person, and marking the country with a flag gives it unnecessary prominence. It's also WP:COATRACKy, insofar as while we want to know that Andy Roddick is from the United States, it's as much a digression to then show us that "here is what the U.S. flag looks like" as it would be to list the population of the United States at that point.

But in an article about a country, the country's flag is as pertinent and deserving of prominence as its population, no?

The reason I'm asking is because of this edit by an editor who made several similar edits to other articles at about the same time. If I'm correct and it is acceptable for the flag to be displayed in the infobox in the article about the entity that the flag represents, then this guideline should say so. If it isn't acceptable, then I recommend the guideline clarify this, stating explicitly that flags shouldn't be used in infoboxes even in articles about the places the flags belong to. Largoplazo (talk) 10:35, 29 August 2017 (UTC)

The guideline referenced is about flag icons. I do not think it is relevant to the primary display of a flag. Ian Dalziel (talk) 10:41, 29 August 2017 (UTC)

Thanks, I see you communicated with him and got this worked out. I would have but wanted to double-check here that I was on firm ground. Largoplazo (talk) 20:02, 29 August 2017 (UTC)

Flags in location columns of terrorism list articles

As far as I can tell, every list article linked to from this template uses country flags in the 'location' column on each row in the tables. Does this comply, or not, with this guideline? My view is that it does not, as the locations of the various attacks were not representing their country in any respect. I tried to remove the flags from a couple of articles ([1], [2]), but was swiftly reverted ([3], [4]). Views please. -- DeFacto (talk). 18:51, 1 October 2017 (UTC)

It does not. We permit this in sport and military tables because reliable sources on them tend to do this themselves with tabular data. This is not true of reportage and other sources on terrorism; no one is publishing "score charts", our readers do not expect the information to be presented this way, it's a PoV imposition of nationalistic visual messaging, and it doesn't help the reader understand the encyclopedic material.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ<  23:17, 1 October 2017 (UTC)

I think their use in these articles are WP:ICONDECORATION and do nothing to help the readers understand the article. LLCoolpp, who reverted the flagicons removal first, tried to keep the articles consistent, but gave no other reason they should be used. The places where attacks occur does not represent the country as StrikeDog claimed. Aspects (talk) 23:53, 1 October 2017 (UTC)

Agree with all above - they are inappropriate uses for these articles, particularly as it could possibly be taken with the visual cue that the country is the one that supported the terrorist incident (which, no.). --MASEM (t) 00:43, 2 October 2017 (UTC)

I also agree that the usage is not MOS compliant and your edits to implement the guideline should not have been reverted. Mojoworker (talk) 16:55, 2 October 2017 (UTC)

Thanks for your opinions on this. It seems we should definitely remove the flag icons from those articles. -- DeFacto (talk). 06:17, 3 October 2017 (UTC)

Well that was short-lived! -- DeFacto (talk). 15:07, 3 October 2017 (UTC)

And they're gone again. It's nice to have new editors so long as they follow our guidelines and policies, but too many don't know about them or read them when they are pointed out. Doug Weller talk 18:18, 3 October 2017 (UTC)

And now an IP who is clearly someone with an account logged out (they were CU blocked for 3 months in June) has reverted arguing that they will continue to revert until the flags are removed from all similar articles. Doug Weller talk 18:42, 3 October 2017 (UTC)

Last I looked, an outright pledge to continue editwarring is grounds for an insta-block, without any CU stuff having to be invoked.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ<  10:16, 4 October 2017 (UTC)

I've applied the guideline again in the September article too. -- DeFacto (talk). 18:57, 3 October 2017 (UTC)

Removed again. Pinging BeMoreLikeSloths to this discussion. EvergreenFir (talk) 20:02, 4 October 2017 (UTC)

They keep being re-added. I'm very concerned about the contents of these lists. There seems to be a rush to add as much acts of violence (regardless whether they are confirmed to be terrorism) in order to make the list as lengthy as possible.Tvx1 18:18, 6 October 2017 (UTC)

I do agree that some of the content (beyond the flag icons) is certainly not what would fall under a more objective definition of "Terrorism", but that's likely an issue at WP:OR/N. The flags need to go, period. There's no allowance for them at all and implies something worse with their inclusion. --MASEM (t) 20:18, 6 October 2017 (UTC)

Agreed. Also suggest it's time to have administrative action deal with the editwarring by these parties.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ<  21:42, 6 October 2017 (UTC)

Nobel icons next to name in infobox

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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A new editor has been adding Nobel Prize icons next to the awardees name in the infoboxes. The editor pointed out that this is common on other language wikipedias. (for example, see User talk:GustafSeb) I haven't seen icons used in this way before, and I can't find anything in the MoS to support this. Is there any guideline for or against the usage of icons in this way? Natureium (talk) 15:06, 10 November 2017 (UTC)

Examples:

* https://sv.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_Einstein

* https://an.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unión_Europea

* https://sv.wikipedia.org/wiki/Europeiska_unionen

* https://af.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dag_Hammarskjöld

It can also be noted that on the Swedish Wikipedia, the Icon is also put in front of the name of the Nobel Prize in the Infobox (se the Albert Einstein article linked above) GustafSeb (talk) 15:13, 10 November 2017 (UTC)

Now that I think about it, this might be better for the infobox MoS, so I posted this on WT:Manual of Style. Let's move the discussion there. Natureium (talk) 15:24, 10 November 2017 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Flags in Infobox rockunit

Does the guidance against using flag icons in infoboxes apply to {{Infobox rockunit}} in articles about geological formations? I recently had an edit war with a user citing MOS:INFOBOXFLAG as a reason for removing the flag icon but it is quite common for them to be used in such articles. And I gotta admit it looks quite bare without them. Volcanoguy 05:03, 5 December 2017 (UTC)

Inline flag-like icon for Wikidata, at TfD

FYI

 – Pointer to relevant discussion elsewhere.

Please see Wikipedia:Templates for discussion/Log/2018 January 16#Template:Wikidata icon.

The fact that the nominator was blatantly accused of bad faith in even daring to open this template for discussion says a lot about the bloc vote going on over there right now.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ<  00:35, 17 January 2018 (UTC)

Better example needed?

Repeated use of an icon in a table or infobox. This should only be done if the icon has been used previously with an explanation of its purpose. To me this means we should have the country name in words at least once. In which case List of WPA World Nine-ball Champions fails? Would you agree? Gnevin (talk) 11:29, 2 November 2017 (UTC)

Yeah, this needs work. It's unclear what the original intent was. One case is obviously that if the nationality parameter already gives the flag icon, then it should not be used again for death place, etc. In sports tables, the consistency of the layout is important and the flags get used repeatedly. Not sure how to encapsulate such a distinction, and there are others (e.g. use in tables about military conflicts).  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ<  12:16, 2 November 2017 (UTC)

Perhaps replace the example with European_Rugby_Champions_Cup#European_Player_of_the_Year  ? Gnevin (talk) 10:10, 23 January 2018 (UTC)

Transit system icons in nav templates

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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In responding to an edit template-protected request (temporarily declined), the question has come up whether to remove transit system icons entirely from station (and perhaps similar) navigational templates, or to preserve them along with plain wording; clearly the icons alone are not sufficient even with alt text because the words in many of them (when they even contain words) are not alway legible in icon size.

I.e., the question is whether to remove the icons like the one shown in front of "London Underground" in this example:

I declined the request at least initially because an argument can be made that the icons are helpful to a subset of editors (each is recognizable instantly to anyone familiar with the transit system in question) and thus are not purely decorative; these icons do not raise the socio-political and WP:UNDUE issues that overuse and misuse of flag icons do; and we're more tolerant of such images in nav templates than elsewhere. On the other hand, the icons are surely not necessary, and it's not clear how helpful they are nor to what percentage of readers. I remain neutral on the question; this is a procedural nomination so template editors know what to do.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ<  18:32, 18 November 2017 (UTC); revised: 20:12, 25 November 2017 (UTC); clarified: 08:03, 29 November 2017 (UTC)

• Keep, for recognition. Useddenim (talk) 22:22, 18 November 2017 (UTC)
  particularly when there are multiple lines/operators/modes at a major station. Useddenim (talk) 22:41, 25 November 2017 (UTC)
• Whether an icon is decorative is not a question of it being recognized, it's of question of what function it has. In this example I do no see how this gives our readers any additional information. It doesn't tell anything the text doesn't already tell them. So yes, they are purely decorative and therefore at odds with these guideline and should not be retained.Tvx1 14:22, 19 November 2017 (UTC)

@SMcCandlish: Maybe open an RfC. I guess it would be best to not show them at all for consistency, unless only the icon is shown and not the text (which wouldn't apply to the templates used above). Jc86035 (talk) 12:13, 25 November 2017 (UTC)

I'll put put an RfC tag on this, since it already asks a clear question.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ<  20:12, 25 November 2017 (UTC)

• Support removal. I don't see any evidence that these icons provide additional information that text doesn't already provide and thus that they are not decorative. The guidelines is clear in that case they should not be used.Tvx1 21:54, 25 November 2017 (UTC)
• Remove them all. Not only are some of these icons being used as text, which is absolutely unacceptable at any time due to accessibility implications; the icons as a whole are blatant cruft. We are an encyclopedia, not a train guide. The systems are clearly identifiable by their names; like Tvxl says above, this is a clear violation of the MOS's directives on decorative images. James (^talk/_contribs) 11:00, 28 November 2017 (UTC)
• Keep. I'm generally opposed to "icon cruft" for the sake of it, but, in considering SMcCandlish's example above, I do find that the icon aids recognition and adds to the text. No, we are not a "train guide", but equally we should not exclude graphical aids to recognition where they can be helpful, and, the more I consider it, the more I feel they can actually be helpful, alongside the text, in this scenario. With regards to "it's not clear how helpful they are nor to what percentage of readers.", I agree - but if we accept that they are helpful at all, to any readers, then what 'improvement' do we achieve by their removal? -- Begoon 11:32, 28 November 2017 (UTC)
• Keep — they make for faster recognition than text alone. Obviously the text must also be present, as per the WP:ACCESS argument already mentioned, but at a glance, they make it quicker to see what is what. —Joeyconnick (talk) 23:26, 28 November 2017 (UTC)
• Comment in regard to the recognition argument − these logos are only recognizable to a) people who already use the system in question (i.e., locals) and b) railfans. Keeping them strikes me as special pleading and a failure of our obligation to write for a general audience. James (^talk/_contribs) 00:44, 29 November 2017 (UTC)

Well, I live 12,000 miles from London, it's hard to be less 'local', and I am no 'railfan', yet the icon in the above example aids recognition for me. The names of the stations might "only be recognisable to locals" too - should we also omit them in our quest to "write for a general audience"? From the guideline, as far as I am concerned, the icons "serve as visual cues that aid the reader's comprehension, [and] improve navigation", so should be retained. -- Begoon 01:45, 29 November 2017 (UTC)

My family and I easily and readily recognize the logo as it is so firmly associated with the London Underground, and by extension, London. Considering the millions of annual visitors (including me) to London and its cosmopolitan nature, it has wide recognition beyond the locale. Even though I am from Nor Cal, I find the words London Underground incomplete without the icon--at least in this context. Thus, I too believe the inclusion of the icon aides comprehension and writes for the general audience. Thanks for everyone's work.Horst59 (talk) 22:20, 16 December 2017 (UTC)

I could have been able to agree with you if it were the only such logo in use. That is not the case however. Transport for London has twelve such roundels in use for different systems differentiated only by a specific color. For instance, in Queens Park (London) station the navboxes contains two such roundels with only a tiny difference in color yet signaling a different railway service. A difference the many users which do not have full color vision can't see. Moreover, one of the railway services listed there even has two icons for the same bit of text, which only increases the confusion. In the infobox, there are two roundels as well which are not differentiable. So no, I really can't agree that this is appropriate, helpful use of icons.Tvx1 22:48, 16 December 2017 (UTC)

You make a compelling point, User:Tvx1, and I believe you are right. Accessibility is critical, and as information, information fails when it lacks clarity, causes confusion. Thanks for letting us know about the similar design and colors.Horst59 (talk) 23:42, 17 December 2017 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Transit system icons in non-transit infoboxes

Should transit system icons be used in non-transit infoboxes? The two types of infoboxes that use these icons the most are Template:Infobox venue and Template:Infobox museum in their publictransit field even though both give the same advice of "Example: [[Roosevelt/State (CTA)|Roosevelt Station]], [[Chicago Transit Authority]]" like Soldier Field does.

Some articles use generic bus and rail icons (Cardiff Story Museum), some use the transit logos (Spectrum Stadium) and others use templates like rail color box (Golden 1 Center). The article that brought me to start this discussion was the icon overload that is Madison Square Garden.

These icons have their place in transit infoboxes, but I oppose the use of these icons in non-transit infoboxes. The infobox parameters do not use them as examples, they do not provide additional information that the text does not provide thus being decorative against WP:ICONDECORATION, some of the icons are being used as text against WP:ACCESS and the icons could also be seen as going against WP:TRAVELGUIDE.Aspects (talk) 17:12, 1 April 2018 (UTC)

I don't see any problem with generic icons (e.g. {{rail-interchange|bus}} , {{rail-interchange|subway}} , etc.) plus route name or number to indicate mode and service(s), but anything beyond this is unnecessary window-dressing. Useddenim (talk) 23:38, 1 April 2018 (UTC)

The trouble with those icons is that with out you using tlx to show the name that would of been meaningless to me Gnevin (talk) 12:36, 6 April 2018 (UTC)