Name Sub Page

Like others I'm sure, I have a lot to say that's OnTopic for the Wiki, but stems from personal opinion or experience. While I search for an appropriate place to make my observation, and/or decide whether it really belongs on a PersonalWiki instead, I'd like to keep it somewhere personally accessible. Meanwhile, my own HomePage is long enough as it is without having all of these comments inline.

A NameSubPage is a page where the "primary" BackLink is from the corresponding HommePage?. I propose that the author should prefix these page titles with their initials (rather than full UserName) to keep the titles reasonably short. E.g., KkOoPuristRant, which is my page (Kk for KarlKnechtel) ranting about Object-oriented programming purists. This creates a sort of NameSpace for yourself.

Refactoring your home page in this way is probably a net gain: it keeps pages reasonably short (same idea as having short function bodies), and separates out a block of text which you could later insert somewhere else. Alternatively, if there's some particular thing you don't like for personal reasons, and have frequent occasion in ThreadMode discussion to assert that you don't like it, you can refer people to your NameSubPage ranting about the thing (very much in the OnceAndOnlyOnce spirit of things) and then they don't have to find the relevant section of your whole HomePage.

Refactoring could be done by checking LikePages for a NameSubPage: if it is discovered that there are separate FbThingRant, BqThingRant etc. pages, they could be merged into a general ThingRants (or ThingConsideredHarmful, or whatever) page by some considerate WikiGnome (who might also notify the original authors of the change!)

-- KarlKnechtel

Not everyone has unique initials.

BlackHat:

Seems like you've solved your own problem. If we're allowed to refactor similar subpages into a common page, why not just create a "ThingRant" page in the first place, sign your contribution, and link to the page? Not only would your opinion be preserved, but everyone else can contribute to the topic, and Wiki doesn't end up with parallel BobsThingsRant and JanesThingRant pages. WikiWorks already without NameSpaces. IfItAintBrokeDontFixIt.

RedHat:

The notion of a "primary" BackLink lacks an element of WikiNature. The flatness of the Wiki page space and the lack of identification of pages with their creators is an asset, not a drawback. It encourages people to feel they can contribute anywhere, as all pages (HomePages excepted) belong to the WikiCommunity as a whole.

GreenHat:

How about solving this "home page spillover" by condensing what's spilling over until it fits on your HomePage? Could be an interesting exercise in increasing SignalToNoise.