Commons:Deletion requests/Template:Double MetaCat

This deletion discussion is now closed. Please do not make any edits to this archive. You can read the deletion policy or ask a question at the Village pump. If the circumstances surrounding this file have changed in a notable manner, you may re-nominate this file or ask for it to be undeleted.

Template:Double MetaCat

Going by this and OmegaFallons talk page, as well as my own experiences dealing with it there seems to be a lot of problems with this template. Just to name a few it leads to a bunch of overcategorization. As well as the addition of pointless and obtuse dublicate categories to category structures that are already complex enough without the template being involved. There is also no way what-so-ever to deal with that because the template makes it impossible to remove or otherwise delete the problematic categories it created and added.

It doesn't help that OmegaFallon seems unable or unwilling to deal with most, if not all, of the issues it's causing. There was also no discussion about it or approval by the wider before it was implemented. Which there really should have been considering the massive number of categories it involves. Apparently the template isn't super intuitive or easy to edit either and it doesn't help that there's no documentation. So it should just be deleted. There's no reason we need a template like this one for this particular thing anyway. Nor is there a valid reason to make it impossible to edit or remove categories from thousands of subcategories just because a single user thinks their way of categorizing things is the best way to do it. Adamant1 (talk) 07:33, 28 August 2024 (UTC)

 Comment Deletion is well possible, including 6 stupid redirects, after removing ca 7'000 transclusions. Taylor 49 (talk) 21:00, 28 August 2024 (UTC)

I'm not sure exactly how they work but apparently there's also like 9 subtempletes that will have to be dealt with as well. So its certainly going to be a hassle to deal with, but that's just all the more reason to delete it IMO. Clearly the things way to complex. --Adamant1 (talk) 21:06, 28 August 2024 (UTC)

Once the main template is deleted, the 9 subpages probably can be deleted as well, unless it turns out that they are used by some other template. I discourage overcomplex poorly working or poorly documented templates. Still, the 7'000 transclusions should be removed before deletion. Immediate deletion would not ruin Commons, still it would show ugly red links on 7'000 pages. Taylor 49 (talk) 21:45, 28 August 2024 (UTC)

That's fair. You think I should nominate them for deletion now or it be better to just let an admin deal with them after this is closed depending on how it goes? (I think you could argue they should probably be deleted regardless of what ends up being the outcome of this, but I don't want to screw anything up by nominating for them for deletion in the meantime if there's some wierd dependency thing involved in it or something). --Adamant1 (talk) 21:59, 28 August 2024 (UTC)

So you want to delete those ca 7'000 categories? You should probably explicitly nominate them in a separate request. The risk with the task is that some categories become uncategorized. Category:Geography by country by continent uses Template:Double MetaCat whereas Category:Topography by country by continent uses Template:MetaCat, and there are probably other types. Do you want to eliminate all meta categories with double criteria? This is a major principal question. Alternatively, the templates Template:Double MetaCat and Template:MetaCat could be simplified and merged. It's undeniably a mess now. Not sure whether all meta categories with double criteria deserve deletion. On the User_talk:OmegaFallon#Template:Country_by_year_by_topic user page there is some discussion, but not a consensus for deletion. Taylor 49 (talk) 01:09, 29 August 2024 (UTC)

So you want to delete those ca 7'000 categories? No. I want to delete however many it takes to cleanup the mess. If that's three, cool. If it's all 7000, that's cool to. I didn't look at every single category before I started this though because it's really a separate issue IMO to the overall issues caused by the template. I did decide to take this particular route instead of just nominating the 7000 categories for deletion in separate individual deletion requests though because the categories will just recreated or added back to other ones if they are deleted without template being dealt with in the meantime.

But the fact is that most, if not, all "meta categories with double criteria" are either just totally pointless, duplicate existing categories, make no sense, clearly go against the guidelines or have some combination of those issues. So say I have 5 of those 7000 categories deleted. Then all it takes is someone adding this template to something and we're right back where we started. That's fine, but I do think that we as users should have the say in how and when this template is used and it's pretty clear we don't have the say in either one.

In a perfect world that could probably be solved by pairing it down and documenting it. I don't really see that happening though and I rather live in reality then let it continue causing problems for no other reason then...What exactly? "Someone created it so it must be worth having"? It seems like you at least agree with me that it's a mess. It's fine if you don't think deleting the template is the way to clean it up. But realistically what actual alternative to deal with it beyond that is there at this point? --Adamant1 (talk) 02:51, 29 August 2024 (UTC)

• As currently used, it certainly has some inappropriate results, e.g. it gives Category:Buildings by function by condition a non-existent parent Category:Countries by function by condition. Fayenatic london (talk) 16:32, 21 September 2024 (UTC)

Lol that category makes absolutely no sense what-so-ever. --Adamant1 (talk) 17:47, 21 September 2024 (UTC)

•  Delete as nobody wants to fix it. ∞∞ Enhancing999 (talk) 13:15, 22 September 2024 (UTC)

The template causes problems at Category:Music by genre, please at least fix it. Prototyperspective (talk) 12:03, 2 October 2024 (UTC)

•  Delete The concept is good, but the execution can be hard to work with and most people probably wouldn't know how to fix it. In addition, there are probably more special cases for "double meta cats" than there are for "single meta cats", and to accommodate them all would make the code very complex. I came across this discussion because I found the template populating Category:Countries by city by year (which isn't defined) with several kinds of things, none of which were countries. --Auntof6 (talk) 13:20, 11 October 2024 (UTC)

I also just found the template populating Category:Countries by color by country with things that aren't countries. I think this and the one I mentioned above were supposed to be "Categories by" instead of "Countries by". --Auntof6 (talk) 13:22, 11 October 2024 (UTC)

And another one: Category:Countries by quantity by country (hasn't been created, but it's populated). -- Auntof6 (talk) 16:58, 29 November 2024 (UTC)

 Keep I would keep the template, as it also has advantages. A uniform, precise categorization. The template is used in an almost four-digit number. If it were simply deleted, it would lead to chaos, tear huge gaps in the existing category system and lead to uncontrolled growth with different sorting for similar structures. -- Triple C 85 ^{| User talk |} 07:18, 5 November 2024 (UTC)

The problem is that it's broken and apparently nobody can fix it.
 ∞∞ Enhancing999 (talk) 12:29, 30 November 2024 (UTC)

 Keep unless there is a definite plan how clean up after deletion. --Krd 06:29, 8 December 2024 (UTC)

Its not neccessarily my wheel house but I'm more then willing to put the work into cleaning it up when or if there's a consensus and plan to deal with it. I don't think something like this should be kept purely because there's plan to deal with it yet though. There's reason there would be at this point anyway. But I was already planning to deal with that aspect of it once we agree it should be dealt with (assuming we do of course). --Adamant1 (talk) 06:40, 8 December 2024 (UTC)

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Kept: Kept per Krd. --Bastique ^{☎ let's talk!} 15:32, 8 December 2024 (UTC)