Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Front matter

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WP:MFD

Please do not nominate your user page (or subpages of it) for deletion here. Instead, add {{db-userreq}} at the top of any such page you no longer wish to keep; an administrator will then delete the page. See Wikipedia:Criteria for speedy deletion for more information.

Miscellany for deletion (MfD) is a place where Wikipedians decide what should be done with problematic pages in the namespaces which aren't covered by other specialized deletion discussion areas. Items sent here are usually discussed for seven days; then they are either deleted by an administrator or kept, based on community consensus as evident from the discussion, consistent with policy, and with careful judgment of the rough consensus if required.

Filtered versions of the page are available at

Information on the process

What may be nominated for deletion here:

Pages not covered by other XFD venues, including pages in these namespaces: Draft:, Help:, Portal:, MediaWiki:, Wikipedia: (including WikiProjects), User:, TimedText:, MOS: (in the unlikely event it ever contains a page that is not a redirect or one of the 6 disambiguation pages), Event: and the various Talk: namespaces
Userboxes, regardless of the namespace
Any other page, that is not in article space, where there is dispute as to the correct XfD venue.

Requests to undelete pages deleted after discussion here, and debate whether discussions here have been properly closed, both take place at Wikipedia:Deletion review, in accordance with Wikipedia's undeletion policy.

Before nominating a page for deletion

Before nominating a page for deletion, please consider these guidelines:

Please familiarize yourself with the following policies

Wikipedia:Deletion policy – our deletion policy that describes how we delete things by consensus
Wikipedia:Deletion process – our guidelines on how to list anything for deletion
Wikipedia:Guide to deletion – a how-to guide whose protocols on discussion format and shorthands also apply here
Wikipedia:Project namespace – our guidelines on "Wikipedia" namespace pages
Wikipedia:User page – our guidelines on user pages and user subpages
Wikipedia:Userboxes – our guideline on userboxes

How to list pages for deletion

Shortcut

WP:MFDHOWTO

Please check the aforementioned list of deletion discussion areas to check that you are in the right area. Then follow these instructions:

Instructions on listing pages for deletion:

To list a page for deletion, follow this three-step process: (replace PageName with the name of the page, including its namespace, to be deleted)

Note: Users must be logged in to complete step II. An unregistered user who wishes to nominate a page for deletion should complete step I and post their reasoning on Wikipedia talk:Miscellany for deletion with a notification to a registered user to complete the process.

I.

Edit PageName:

Enter the following text at the top of the page you are listing for deletion:

{{mfd|1={{subst:FULLPAGENAME}}}}
for a second or subsequent nomination use {{mfdx|2nd}}

or

{{mfd|GroupName}}
if nominating several similar related pages in an umbrella nomination. Choose a suitable name as GroupName and use it on each page.

If the nomination is for a userbox or similarly transcluded page, use {{subst:mfd-inline}} so as to not mess up the formatting for the userbox.

Use {{subst:mfd-inline|GroupName}} for a group nomination of several related userboxes or similarly transcluded pages.

Please include in the edit summary the phrase
Added MfD nomination at [[Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/PageName]]
replace PageName with the name of the page that is up for deletion.
Please don't mark your edit summary as a minor edit.
Check the "Watch this page" box if you would like to follow the page in your watchlist. This may help you to notice if your MfD tag is removed by someone.
Save the page

II.

Create its MfD subpage.

The resulting MfD box at the top of the page should contain the link "this page's entry"

Click that link to open the page's deletion discussion page.
Insert this text:

{{subst:mfd2| pg={{subst:#titleparts:{{subst:PAGENAME}}||2}}| text=Reason why the page should be deleted}} ~~~~
replacing Reason... with your reasons why the page should be deleted and sign the page. Do not substitute the pagename, as this will occur automatically.

Consider checking "Watch this page" to follow the progress of the debate.
Please use an edit summary such as Creating deletion discussion page for [[PageName]]
replacing PageName with the name of the page you are proposing for deletion.
If appropriate, inform members of the most relevant WikiProjects through one or more "deletion sorting lists". Then add a {{subst:delsort|<topic>|<signature>}} template to the nomination, to insert a note that this has been done.
Save the page.

III.

Add a line to MfD.

Follow this edit link and at the top of the list add a line:

{{subst:mfd3| pg=PageName}}
Put the page's name in place of "PageName".

Include the discussion page's name in your edit summary like
Added [[Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/PageName]]
replacing PageName with the name of the page you are proposing for deletion.
Save the page.
If nominating a page that has been nominated before, use the page's name in place of "PageName" and add

{{priorxfd|PageName}}
in the nominated page deletion discussion area to link to the previous discussions and then save the page using an edit summary such as
Added [[Template:priorxfd]] to link to prior discussions.

If nominating a page from someone else's userspace, notify them on their main talk page.
For other pages, while not required, it is generally considered civil to notify the good-faith creator and any main contributors of the miscellany that you are nominating. To find the main contributors, look in the page history or talk page of the page and/or use TDS' Article Contribution Counter or Wikipedia Page History Statistics. For your convenience, you may add to their talk page in the "edit source" section, replacing PageName with the pagename. Please use an edit summary such as replacing PageName with the name of the nomination page you are proposing for deletion.
If the user has not edited in a while, consider sending the user an email to notify them about the MfD if the MfD concerns their user pages.
If you are nominating a WikiProject, please post a notice at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Council, in addition to the project's talk page and the talk pages of the founder and active members.

Administrator instructions

Administrator instructions for closing and relisting discussions can be found here.

Archived discussions

A list of archived discussions can be located at Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Archived debates.