Template talk:Hr

Template-protected edit request on 17 March 2019

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Please remove the unneeded line

<noinclude>{{pp-template|small=yes}}</noinclude>

since this is automatically added by {{Documentation}} (see Template:Documentation/doc#Automatic functions.

Thanks, --DannyS712 (talk) 17:48, 17 March 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Done — JJMC89 (T·C) 18:05, 17 March 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Template-protected edit request 28 Feb 2020

What about implementing the width parameter so that |width=75% yielded <hr width=75%> or

YBG (talk) 01:42, 29 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Short description

The Wikidata description for this page, also displayed here for the short description, in lower case, is

simple wikimedia template displaying a horizontal line with adjustable thickness

which I think is inaccurate, since as far as I can tell, the template is here on English Wikipedia. I think the description should be

on Wikidata: template on English Wikipedia displaying a horizontal line with adjustable thickness
on this page: Displays a horizontal line ~~with adjustable thickness~~

(Template is in the page title, so needn't be in the local short description.)
So, two questions:

Is there any reason I shouldn't simply go ahead and change the Wikidata description?
Assuming it would be sensible to give a local short description, please can someone with template-editing rights add it to this page? (I'm assuming that even if adding a short description to the /doc page does the job, any short description there should really say it's the documentation page, not a template, meaning the SD needs adding here.) Musiconeologist (talk) 20:14, 12 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Re Wikidata: wrong venue to discuss it here; but nothing is stopping you from commenting or making the change over there.

Here: I disagree. There is a common misconception that the SD should define the page, but that is not what SD is about. It's a scoping statement, more something to help the user pick the right page out of a list, when not seeing the page itself, just the title and a bunch of SDs. Let's say you were scrolling down the 'hr' titles in a list (or it popped up somewhere in response to you typing hr, and you saw this:

department in a company
HTML tag
ISO language code

Would you be able to figure out which was the one you were interested in? That is really the core use of Short desc; it was never intended to be a short definition, even though it is widely [ab]used that way. Really all you need is 'HTML tag'. The page title already says it is a template, and SDs work with titles, so you don't need to say it is a template. I suppose it doesn't *hurt* in this instance to say, 'HTML tag for a horizontal bar' because that is 39 characters, so still under the limit, but in a way it does hurt, because it encourages others to view SD as a definition, or it reinforces editors who already view it that way, that they are correct in their assumption, regardless what the info page WP:Short description actually says.

And finally, be aware that a great number of pages should not have one because the title is clearer (and often shorter) than any Short desc could be. It is fine to add, {{short desc|none}} to articles—this will override the Wikidata sd, and replace it wit nothing. I wish they had called it 'Scoping statement' and not 'Short description', because imho the name of it is partly responsible for its being misused so often.

Some might object to 'HTML tag' as too short, because then it would be identical to the SD for other templates that generate HTML tags. Precisely; they should be identical, their scope is identical; it is not a definition.

My feeling is that there is so much misunderstanding and misuse of SD, that the battle is already lost. See for example, Template:Clear, another HTML tag-generating template which merits the identical SD as this one, but which has an 86-char long definition, instead of a short desc. I have kind of given up hope for SDs as a lost cause. Practically speaking, you can do whatever you like here. If I were editing the page for some other reason and decided to fix the sd, I would change it to 'HTML tag' (or if you prefer, 'HTML tag template', although that is redundant with the title). Doing the right thing with an sd often ends up with it being 'fixed' later, by someone adding a definition in good faith, so don't be surprised if that happens. It's not worth the effort to try to make them compliant. Mathglot (talk) 00:34, 13 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

You're right, it's too much like an attempted definition. I was focused on modifying the existing one rather than starting from scratch.

Re SDs: after some discussion on the Short description talk page, I've recently done some work there rewording things to emphasise precisely the points you make, based on the idea that it complements and clarifies the title and isn't meant to replace it, define it or whatever, just add useful context for searches and the like. My question is always "What does this add to the title that will help anyone?"

I think the template is likely to be used by people who don't like HTML though, so I think mentioning its function is more useful than mentioning HTML—anyone who knows HTML will recognise what it is from the nsme. Left to my own devices, I think I'd go for "Inserts a horizontal rule". My own feeling is that for the SD, HTML tag adds unnecessary information about how it works, rather than useful information about what it's for.

Anyway, my main practical question is whether the SD can still override the Wikidata one if it's on the /doc page rather than the actual template page, but maybe that's a question to ask over on the SD page. Musiconeologist (talk) 01:34, 13 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I've gone ahead and added it to the /doc page. I had to purge the page to get it to then display on the template page, but it's now visible. Musiconeologist (talk) 02:22, 13 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Regarding this:

anyone who knows HTML will recognise what it is from the nsme...

No, they won't, or shouldn't, because HTML is not in the title. It could perfectly legitimately be a template about Croatia (ISO-639 code hr}}, or about Human Resources, or other things; it just so happens it is about the HTML tag, and that's where the sd can help. Also, people will never see it, unless they look at the doc page, so they still don't know what Template Hr is about, until they get there. Mathglot (talk) 03:46, 13 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

The title in combination with "Displays a horizontal line" tells them that, though—whereas the title combined with "HTML tag" won't tell people unfamiliar with HTML what either the tag or the template does. That's my point: one version is clear to everyone, while the other is only clear to people who know HTML.

Anyway, the SD is now editable by anyone able to edit the documentation page, so if anyone finds it unhelpful they can change it, assuming they work out where it is. Musiconeologist (talk) 04:06, 13 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]