Template talk:R for convenience

"...another name, a pseudonym, a nickname, or a synonym..."

What about acronyms and abbreviations, like DS9, ANH or Wikipedia:NOT? Aren't they also redirects for convenience? --DocumentN (talk) 21:14, 9 January 2008 (UTC)

To editor DocumentN: Better late than never? In a sense, nearly all redirects are for some form of convenience or another. That's why this rcat is better reserved for those redirects that don't easily fall into other categories, such as Category:Redirects from shortcuts, Category:Redirects from alternative names, Category:Redirects from initialisms and so on. – Paine Ellsworth ^CLIMAX! 01:44, 8 December 2014 (UTC)

A pointlessly vague Rcat template

{{R for convenience}} was boldly created way back on 1 December 2004 by Sgeo, an editor who hasn't been active for a long time (their newest 50 edits date back to February 2007). They posted news of their creation the same day on a now inactive section of the village pump:

Template:R for convenience

Should be obvious. --Sgeo | Talk 22:59, Dec 1, 2004 (UTC)

• But isn't. What the heck is "the main article"? What redirects do you feel this should be attached to? And why? -- Jmabel | Talk 01:29, Dec 3, 2004 (UTC)

The village pump notice was posted a minute after Sgeo used their new template on AIDS mythsAIDS myths, where it was the only Rcat template until I replaced it with {{R from alternative title}}. I wouldn't be surprised if this was the only instance where the template's creator used their own template.

From there after a slow start this thing took off on a life of its own eventually getting to over 4500 transclusions. I've removed this template from pages where it was redundant to another redirect-category template, and replaced it with a more specific template from those listed on the {{R template index}} where it was the only redirect-category template on the page.

So now I suppose this template is just hanging around for the convenience of editors who don't want to take the time to peruse the {{R template index}} for a more specific redirect-category template, and expect another editor (like me) to do that for them. – wbm1058 (talk) 17:19, 2 July 2022 (UTC)

Template:R uncategorized

@ 23:53, 23 May 2008 . . Lenoxus Created page with:

This is a redirect page that has yet to be properly categorized with a redirect template.

• Wikipedia:Templates for discussion/Log/2009 December 1#Template:R uncategorized
• Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2009 November 15#Category:Uncategorized redirects

—wbm1058 (talk) 08:45, 19 September 2025 (UTC)

@ 16:36, 24 September 2009 Merge proposal closed by Debresser

Copied from deleted page Template talk:R uncategorized

Proposed merge from R for convenience

I've proposed that the template {{R for convenience}} be merged into this one. That template's current explanation is: "this is a redirect from a title that is another name, a pseudonym, a nickname, or a synonym as is used colloquially, but is not currently an officially accepted term, though it may have been." All of those things are or can be covered by their own templates ({{R from alternative name}}, {{R from pseudonym}}, {{R from nickname}}, {{R from synonym}}, {{R from slang}}, so tagged redirects should be re-sorted accordingly. $\sim$ Lenoxus " * " 01:25, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

In view of the fact that nobody has commented upon this proposal, I close this discussion. A future editor who would like to open a new discussion on this subject should do so at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion. Debresser (talk) 16:32, 24 September 2009 (UTC)

—wbm1058 (talk) 09:12, 19 September 2025 (UTC)

• Hi, Wbm1058. I see you have taken a long term interest in this category. And now it seems you might be preparing to reopen some discussion about the category being synonymous with "R uncategorized". Or maybe you are just gathering past related discussions? I'm not completely clear to me what your motivation is or your end goal. You seem to be very much of the opinion that this category be used as a "doesn't fit other redirect templates" catch all and are leaning heavily into and enforcing a strict interpretation of the word "reserved" in the part of the template that says "This rcat is reserved for redirects that may not fit other descriptions." I would just like to know your stance and what the meaning of the above post was. Jason Quinn (talk) 18:34, 27 September 2025 (UTC)

  Yes, I've been boldly working to clear Category:Redirects for convenience, with the idea of perhaps starting a discussion to delete {{R for convenience}}. As I said above, I find this to be a pointlessly vague redirect category. Do we have "redirects for inconvenience"? I think not, therefore all redirects are "for convenience". There is no point in using this template to state the obvious, which just creates "template clutter". {{Redirect category shell}} objects when it finds an empty shell, so perhaps the only legitimate use of this template is to fill the shell with the equivalent of the old {{R uncategorized}} when you don't want to take the time to search through the large index of templates to find an appropriate, more-specific template to fill the shell. There were over 4500 pages populating the category when I started clearing it in 2022, and reduced it to just a few dozen. Then, over the past ~3 years, it crept back up to around 200, and now, in the past several days, I've reduced it back below 40. In 99%+ of cases, I've been able to remove {{R for convenience}} or replace it with one or more better, more specific templates. I haven't run into issues with anyone objecting to my edits. I researched the background (see sections above) to see if there was any good rationale for this template that I was missing, and didn't find any. – wbm1058 (talk) 13:32, 29 September 2025 (UTC)