Template talk:obsolete capitalization of

RFDO discussion: August 2014–January 2015

The following discussion has been moved from Wiktionary:Requests for deletion/Others (permalink).

This discussion is no longer live and is left here as an archive. Please do not modify this conversation, but feel free to discuss its conclusions.

---

Template:obsolete capitalization of

Delete. To me it seems a bit over the top to be creating separate entries for every noun that was once written with a capital letter. That would be almost every noun, wouldn't it? What's next -- separate entries for every term that was once spelled with the long "s"? -- · (talk) 18:18, 4 August 2014 (UTC)

I agree, and while we're at it, we need to delete Extenuation, the one page it's used on. —Aɴɢʀ (talk) 18:58, 4 August 2014 (UTC)

OK,

1. What about {{alternative capitalization of}}, on which I based the template?
2. Extenuation has five supporting quotations, so, on what basis should it be deleted?

 — I.S.M.E.T.A. 19:15, 4 August 2014 (UTC)

# See the difference between blood (which uses this template) and Blood.

# Because we don't by convention list English words with initial capital letters separately from English words without, except where they're always capitals, where the capitals makes a difference. There's no value in keeping Extenuation, when people can find it by extenuation just as easily, and a definite cost to keeping it, as it implies we should have at least ten thousand more entries for no value.--Prosfilaes (talk) 19:51, 4 August 2014 (UTC)

@Prosfilaes: I agree with you regarding Extenuation, so I wouldn't mind at all it that entry were deleted. Re {{obsolete capitalization of}}, however, I believe it should be kept, because there will be cases analogous with the Blood–blood case, except that the capitalising variability will no longer be current. One of those analogous cases, I think, is god in its long-obsolete use to denote the proper noun which we would now spell God (see Citations:god). — I.S.M.E.T.A. 21:03, 4 August 2014 (UTC)

(after e/c) Extenuation and anything like it should be deleted per Prosfilaes and per longstanding practice; compare also Talk:The and the comments I made on Talk:euery. That might mean that this template has no legitimate uses and should be deleted, but I'm not sure. I notice the addition of a proper noun section using this template to god. The very same lack of standardization of Capitalization which led to Terms being made uppercase if they were Important also led to terms we would now capitalize (including e.g. personal- and place-names) sometimes being found in lowercase, and I don't think we should have entries like michael and germany. But perhaps god (lowercase) / God (honorific/proper-nounal uppercase) and lord (lowercase) / Lord (honorific/proper-nounal uppercase) / LORD (proper name, translation of the Tetragrammaton) are special cases in one way or another and should be kept even if we continue to delete entries like michael and germany. This requires more thought... - -sche (discuss) 21:20, 4 August 2014 (UTC)

@-sche: I think Profilaes hinted at a salient point with "[t]here's no value in keeping Extenuation, when people can find it by extenuation just as easily". The system autoredirects to extant entries from searches for forms with the opposite capitalisation (e.g., if Extenuation didn't exist, searching for Extenuation would automatically redirect the user to extenuation); therefore, sense lines for {{alternative capitalization of}} or {{obsolete capitalization of}} are only useful where both pages exist anyway. Does that make sense? — I.S.M.E.T.A. 22:01, 4 August 2014 (UTC)

Are you saying if someone finds three instances of Hand being capitalized in English, then we should add an English section to [[Hand]] and call it an "obsolete capitalization of hand"? That seems silly to me. —Aɴɢʀ (talk) 22:38, 4 August 2014 (UTC)

All pages like Hand should have headnotes pointing to hand. It's generally not a problem; it doesn't take much English to realize that pages are indexed under their lowercase forms. I think it was the Merriam-Webster's 3rd Unabridged that had one word listed as a capital--God--with the rest listed as lowercase with (usu. cap.) in the definition.--Prosfilaes (talk) 23:03, 4 August 2014 (UTC)

...although, as someone (DCDuring or Angr?) commented elsewhere, it took them a while to learn that MW's "usu. cap." actually meant "always and invariably capitalized". Anyway, yes, pages like [[Hand]] should use {{also}}, they shouldn't have "alternative/obsolete capitalization of" if the only reason for it would be instances of the capitalized Form in old Texts, or Honorific Capitalization (as in "the Holy Church"). Contrast aboriginal/native and Aboriginal/Native, where the capitalization generally imparts a semantic difference, even though it is (notably) not always followed (one can find instances of honorific "Native" where it does not mean "American Indian", and instances of "native" where it does). - -sche (discuss) 00:02, 5 August 2014 (UTC)

That was me. Always and invariably capitalized unless you're Archy the Cockroach. —Aɴɢʀ (talk) 08:36, 5 August 2014 (UTC)

@Angr: I suppose, strictly speaking, that would follow, yes; however, as Prosfilaes notes, {{also}} should do in cases where the only entries at the opposite capitalisation are for terms in other languages (except where {{also}} only links to Appendix:Variations of "string"). When there are entries at both capitalisation variants for terms in the same language, by contrast, noting alternative or obsolete capitalisation is more necessary, because otherwise it is quite likely for a user to assume that the sense is simply missing.

@Talking Point Please explain why you did this. (I'd like to hear a rationale, instead of just reverting you.)

 — I.S.M.E.T.A. 15:41, 7 August 2014 (UTC)

Hello META -- Sorry, I thought I had explained adequately in the edit summary for that edit. The source of my disapproval with the edit was not that it assigned a Proper Noun POS to (deprecated template usage) god, but, rather, the edit's use of the "capitalization" template, which constituted the whole definition and which was not a correct definition. Although User:-sche thinks otherwise, I see no credible support anywhere (not in OneLook, the unabridged Random House, or the OED, or the citations at capitalisation) for using "capitalization" to refer to the act or result of writing a term in lowercase letters. Anyhow, I have now restored the Proper Noun POS for (deprecated template usage) god, avoiding the use of "capitalization". (In addition to my believing that the {{obsolete capitalization of}} template should be deleted, it also seems to me that a number of the usages of the {{alternative capitalization of}} template are wrong (because they refer to lowercase terms). I discussed this with User:-sche on my talk page and User:Donnanz and User:DCDuring also previously raised this objection with User:-sche on his talk page.) I hope this clears up my reasons. Respectfully -- · (talk) 20:44, 7 August 2014 (UTC)

@Talking Point: Yes, that clears up my confusion perfectly. I've also checked the OED on this, and it's certainly true that they do not list a sense that reflects the usage at issue. How would you feel about substituting casing for capitalization, resulting in alternative casing of and obsolete casing of? — I.S.M.E.T.A. 16:40, 2 September 2014 (UTC)

• Delete this and delete Extenuation. --Dan Polansky (talk) 06:48, 27 September 2014 (UTC)

Deleted. — Keφr 10:51, 18 January 2015 (UTC)