Forum:Using just a first name as a link

Save time with more use of redirects
Would you save a bit of time typing " Gail " instead of "Gail" ? As long as there is only one "Gail" of note, you should be able to do that without straining the system. I've created such redirects for about half of the longest-running characters.

Anyone can create more. Just type the link in text as if it did exist, then after you Save the page follow the link, hit Edit, scroll down (using the scroll bar) to the wiki markup codes panel, click the " #REDIRECT " one, and type the full name in. --Robin Patterson 06:13, 7 June 2008 (UTC) (edited later)

Cautionary note
Please be careful here! Whereas there may be only one Elsie or one Ena, Granada does reuse first names (e.g. Jack Walker - Jack Duckworth) and confusion and errors could occur when you are dealing with the mass of data, episodes and characters that Corrie has. As it is, I seem to spend an awful lot of time on the "Wanted Pages" page clearing up duplicates. Also, I don't spend a lot of time with piped links - I always type in word first to bring up spelling and grammar checks and then use "Find/Replace" to produce the links.--Jtomlin1uk 07:30, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

The way to deal with duplicates
I said above As long as there is only one "Gail" of note. Where there are duplicates, such as Jack, writers will indeed have to be careful as JT says, but readers may remember only the first name and be pleased to see that we give them some help to find the right character.

We can handle the duplicates in one of at least two ways, depending on how comparatively notable the most notable character is.
 * 1) If one of the characters, such as Ken, is totally dominant (in terms of viewer perceptions, numbers of appearances, etc) over any other "Ken" in the series, we stick with the redirect to the dominant one (so as to save huge amounts of typing) and put a small italic note near the top of his or her page linking to other persons of that name, both as a matter of general interest and in case some editor was momentarily less careful than desired and used the first name on its own instead of giving the correct surname.
 * If, as with the Jacks, there could be less difference in notability between the two, we just create a disambiguation page instead of a redirect. It starts with a standard Wikipedia and Wikia template, template:disambig, and links to all the characters concerned, with maybe a few words of clarification. See the just-finished page about Jack. Robin Patterson 08:24, 7 June 2008 (UTC)