Wikipedia talk:Template namespace

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Shortcut T: for Template: ?

Is it possible to have this, as we do with H: for Help: and others? Facts707 (talk) 08:57, 13 June 2021 (UTC)

Facts707 we kind of do as can be seen at Category:Redirects to template namespace, but there are some problems with the practice in that they technically are in the article namespace meaning they show up in search results when they shouldn't. You can also not use them like you would expect for transcluding a template with a normal redirect in template space being better for that. --Trialpears (talk) 09:07, 13 June 2021 (UTC)

In addition, the issue has been discussed in the past and consensus is that introducing more abbreviations would be confusing and undesirable. Use {{tl}} if appropriate, otherwise write "Template" if that is what is meant. Johnuniq (talk) 10:03, 13 June 2021 (UTC)

This is just a side comment to John's post, but I don't understand why everyone insists on using {{tl}} when {{t}} is a character shorter and points to the same template. Also, this gets you essentially the same number of characters, as your hypothetical [[T:Example]] becomes {{t|Example}} (plus you don't need to worry about piping the "T"). Primefac (talk) 10:45, 13 June 2021 (UTC)

These sort of redirects were effectively deprecated in in 2014 for the reasons that Trialpears has laid out. The problems could be resolved if the T: shortcuts got hard-coded into the wiki software (the way WP: and WT: are), but this seems unlikely to happen. – Uanfala (talk) 11:55, 13 June 2021 (UTC)

There are a few redirects of this type. But T:MP is not a template, nor are T: The New York Times Style Magazine and t:kort. Except for the DYK related ones, there is very little reason to type them in and to ever use a shortcut. {{:T:ILL}} is longer than {{ill}}, so why would you want a T: shortcut that makes you type more when you transclude it? —Kusma (talk) 12:03, 13 June 2021 (UTC)

The benefit of such a shortcut would not be in transcluding templates or in referring to them in discussions like this one, but in edit summaries and search boxes. But because T:, unlike C: and D:, is already used widely for other purposes, that's not going to happen. -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 14:04, 13 June 2021 (UTC)

Edit summaries are the best use case. Your C: and D: links go to Commons and Wikidata. —Kusma (talk) 14:42, 13 June 2021 (UTC)

Using the searchbox when searching for the documentation of, say, {{Wikisourcelang-inline}}, would also be simpler with T: . The point of showing those links (C:, D:) was indeed to demonstrate how some single-letter "shortcuts" have been implemented; M: and S: are others, but the train for T: has left the station. -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 03:13, 14 June 2021 (UTC)

I don't know when the WP:ALIAS TM: was introduced, but that solves this problem. (E.g.: TM:cn)) -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 07:19, 14 January 2025 (UTC)

Apparently in April following this discussion. Trialpears (talk) 07:36, 14 January 2025 (UTC)

Article tables?

Templates should not normally be used to store article text. However, article tables (especially with detailed data) seem to be a common use for templates. See, for example, Template:Low melting point alloys and Category:Materials science templates. I'd like to propose clarifying the template guidelines with respect to stand-alone tables, please. Either permitting this particular use or making it explicit they are also discouraged. Just like any other type of article content, it's still difficult to edit content segregated in templates. (BTW, couldn't this issue be ameliorated with a standard template header/footer with View, Edit, Talk links?). If the banning of templates for article tables is ratified, should this updated guideline be pro-actively enforced on all current cases (with nominations for deletion or merging)? fgnievinski (talk) 02:06, 22 April 2023 (UTC)

Discussion at Template talk:Rotten Tomatoes prose § RfC: Should this and similar templates be substonly?

You are invited to join the discussion at Template talk:Rotten Tomatoes prose § RfC: Should this and similar templates be substonly?. {{u|Sdkb}} ^talk 20:59, 1 December 2023 (UTC)

Advice on line breaks

The article says:

"Some templates may accidentally cause extra line breaks in the rendered articles."

but it does not explain how to avoid them. I believe comments avoid line breaks. I will add this to the page. Johnjbarton (talk) 17:08, 10 October 2024 (UTC)

The line breaks the section is referring to are at the beginning or end, for example if someone puts

<infobox code>
}}

{{main other|<tracking categories>}}
<noinclude>

Since the tracking categories aren't actually "shown" on the page it introduces extra spaces. This can be avoided simply be not having the extra line breaks in the code. Primefac (talk) 20:27, 10 October 2024 (UTC)

I find the issue of spaces and line breaks to be very mysterious. The discussion in the article was very disappointing. Johnjbarton (talk) 22:45, 10 October 2024 (UTC)

If you are referring to Help:Line-break handling, then improving that page would be a discussion for its talk page. Primefac (talk) 10:02, 11 October 2024 (UTC)

No, I actually meant in the context of templates. Previously section in this article on line breaks ended with a link Help:Line-break handling but that is not at all helpful because the linked page is not about templates. Your new version is very much better, thanks! Johnjbarton (talk) 15:38, 11 October 2024 (UTC)

Please update the section to explain "what this section is referring to". Johnjbarton (talk) 22:49, 10 October 2024 (UTC)

I'll see if I can add some additional clarification. Primefac (talk) 10:02, 11 October 2024 (UTC)

Template space alias

This has been mentioned in passing on this page; I thought it would be better seen in its own section. In case you haven't noticed yet, the template space alias is now "TM:". Just as WP:PAGENAME can be used as a shortcut for Wikipedia:PAGENAME, TM:PAGENAME is a shortcut for Template:PAGENAME. Just spreading the word. P.I. Ellsworth , ed. – welcome! – 16:09, 26 November 2025 (UTC)

Descriptive titles for sidebar and navbox templates

Templates like {{WWE}} and {{Socialism in Japan}} should use descriptive titles like {{WWE navbox}} and {{Socialism in Japan sidebar}}. This would make templates easier to discuss, and easier to tell apart in wikitext and in lists of templates; including in generated content like at TFD, in categories and in What-links-here lists, where context is often lacking.

Assuming consensus here, I would like to move templates, but I do not intend that we implement anything remotely resembling a mass name change or any bot actions. I personally would only intend to move pages one by one, and usually only as I edit templates in more substantive ways. Redirects would be left in place, and disruption would be at absolute minimal.

Note that there are some dual-purpose/multi-purpose templates, like {{History of England}}, which could probably just be left alone for the moment, but the goal is to eventually move away from ambiguous template names. — HTGS (talk) 05:13, 5 March 2026 (UTC)

What would {{Socialism in Japan}} be if not a navigation template? Doesn't seem very ambiguous to me assuming you know our conventions which people discussing templates can be assumed to do. My general thoughts is that this system probably would be slightly better but that the cost of switching would simply be way too large for minimal value. Trialpears (talk) 09:19, 5 March 2026 (UTC)

I was actually thinking more about distinguishing navboxes and sidebars from each other, but there’s a ton of them, so I doubt they’re all unambiguously navigation anyway. What do you see as the potential costs of switching?

At worst, I figure we can encourage new templates to be titled more descriptively as they’re created. — HTGS (talk) 09:14, 6 March 2026 (UTC)

The costs I see are tens of thousands of moves and uncertainty whether a template has the navbox/sidebar suffix or not. Lots of busy work for little value. I don't really care too much about distinguishing sidebars and navboxes tbh. Trialpears (talk) 11:43, 6 March 2026 (UTC)

I don’t mind the busy work. I sometimes need something to do semi-mindlessly while I am preoccupied with other stuff. But also, as we know, gnomes will do gnome things if given the authority.

But I really want to emphasize that this would not be a major project; I don’t see myself moving more than a handful of templates a month, and there would be no effort to move everything at once for the sake of such cleanup. Except where an acronym is wanted elsewhere, redirects would be left in place, and articles would not need to be edited for any renaming.

I just want to establish that this should be the new norm, and it’s hard to make that norm apparent if we don’t lay it out clearly at WP:TPN (or wherever) and all the old templates are left named with only their {{topic noun}} format. — HTGS (talk) 00:32, 7 March 2026 (UTC)

I fully support clear names for templates. The examples you've chosen are actually quite good! I would focus on cryptic ones like {{HSwMS}}, {{FP-H&I-D RDT}} and {{VWFL}} — Martin (MSGJ · talk) 13:50, 6 March 2026 (UTC)

To be clear, I picked this particular focus because (a) it’s been a personal bugbear of mine, and (b) it’s a well-defined and delimited starting point that can set a good example for other templates across the board. I only bring it up here because (1) the scope of affected templates is very large, but also (2) I would like to have it written out somewhere, so ideally I can point to a consensus / guidance in my edit summaries. — HTGS (talk) 20:27, 11 March 2026 (UTC)

I’m going to make some WP:BOLD changes to WP:TPN now. Nothing crazy, but please stop me if anything seems like a mistake or a bad idea. — HTGS (talk) 20:31, 11 March 2026 (UTC)

TfD regarding template inserting article text

Editors may wish to review and opine at Wikipedia:Templates for discussion/Log/2026 June 18#Rotten Tomatoes and Metacritic film prose. These templates are being used to insert dynamic article text into many fim articles, and it's an active discussion point as to whether that fundamentally violates the guidelines laid out for the use of templates, with some editors noting that the use of "normally" in the guideline suggests that exceptions are allowed and may be merited in this case. DonIago (talk) 14:51, 24 June 2026 (UTC)

Text storage tweak

There has been confusion around the first point of WP:TMPG, with a 2023 RfC concluding that it did not preclude the existence of {{Rotten Tomatoes prose}} but a recent TfD that relitigated the issue finding no consensus on the same question, and more than 50 other templates existing (unchallenged, to my knowledge) in Category:Article shared content templates throughout.

To help clarify that this guidance should apply only to instances where the article text may need to be modified, I propose that we make the following edit:

This better clarifies the exclusion that aligns with our status quo practice of having templates like {{Year article header}} that set up consistent text in situations where there is no need for individual articles to differ. Sdkb ^talk 05:50, 10 August 2026 (UTC)

Done. Sdkb ^talk 22:51, 15 August 2026 (UTC)

RfC: Prose templates

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Should the line Templates should not normally be used to store article text that may need to be edited, as this makes it more difficult to do so. be changed to Templates should not normally be used to store article text, as this makes it more difficult to edit the content. at WP:TMPG? Sdkb ^talk 07:45, 10 September 2026 (UTC)

Survey (prose templates)

No. There was confusion for years around this line, with a 2023 RfC concluding that it did not preclude the existence of {{Rotten Tomatoes prose}} but a recent TfD that relitigated the issue finding no consensus on the same question, and more than 50 other templates existing (unchallenged, to my knowledge) in Category:Article shared content templates throughout. The change I made to the guideline a month ago clarified that the advice to avoid prose templates should apply only to instances where the article text may need to be modified, which was the clear original intention of the guidance.

It also aligned the guideline with our status quo practice of having templates like {{Year article header}} that set up consistent text in situations where there is no need for individual articles to differ. And that's a good practice for several reasons (all of which I've previously discussed):

Templated text is standardized, which is often good. Readers become accustomed to certain aspects of Wikipedia style over time, and when articles are similar, it makes it easier to navigate unfamiliar pages because they know what to look for.
Templating allows for optimization. When a format is applied over hundreds of pages, it becomes worthwhile to refine small details that probably would never have been considered at the level of an individual page. Disputes can be resolved at centralized discussion rather than playing out diffusely on thousands of low-visibility pages.
Templates can be improved over time. When circumstances or best practices change, we can easily make edits to templates that improve all their transclusions at once. That's a lot easier than trying to update individual articles.

The main downside of putting article text in templates, of course, is that doing so makes it harder to adjust the text. Given this, we don't want to do it for articles where the text may need to be changed frequently. But for pages where no frequent changes are needed, the stability of prose templates becomes a feature rather than a bug. It means that an individual editor's unconsidered personal preference won't override the standardized version collectively optimized by all the editors who contributed to the template — unless their preference is truly superior, in which case they'll be able to get consensus to change the template and improve many articles with it instead of just one.

The current text of the guideline strikes this balance exactly where it should be: allowing prose templates where they may be helpful, discouraging them where they won't be, and never forcing them on anyone (since even where prose templates exist, no article is ever required to use them). The misguided attempt to reintroduce ambiguity to this guideline should be rejected. Sdkb ^talk 07:45, 10 September 2026 (UTC)

Yes. Confusing RfC. You're asking the community to ratify a change you already tried to make unilaterally, which was reverted, and which you then tried to reinstate before being reverted again under BRD. So the proposed "change" (which now reads as changing nothing at all) should be supported because it upholds the removal of the text "that may need to be edited". That text creates a distinction between "stable" and editable article text that is not supported in the longstanding wording or history of WP:TG and effectively turns the expectation that article text will largely remain unchanged into a justification for storing it in a template. For anyone who like User:Voorts is confused by the seemingly identical text in the RfC prompt, the intent of this "change" is clearly that: To establish an exception for supposedly "stable" article text. I see no basis for treating one particular wording in articles as fixed boilerplate that ought to be protected from normal article-level editing. Certainly not at the level that would require us to soften the guideline as proposed (see my comment below). If such text is deemed "boilerplate" then that also applies to just about an endless amount of article text across Wikipedia that could be templated on the same basis. But the perceived convenience of using a template to deal with such repetition is not sufficient reason to hide article text behind a template. Nor is the notion that no particular editor sees an actual reason to change the text. Article text doesn't require evidence of a need for future edits to justify its continued existence at the article level. Οἶδα (talk) 21:08, 10 September 2026 (UTC)
If nobody sees an actual need to update the text of templates like Rotten Tomatoes etc., what is the point of this debate? If someone wants to change the text, they can simply remove the template from the article and rewrite it. (I will note that I've gotten several articles to GA and FA using these types of templates and not one person has suggested that the wording doesn't meet that quality of article.) voorts (talk/contributions) 21:41, 10 September 2026 (UTC)
I'd like to agree with you on that, except that my experience was that when I substituted the RT prose template on two different articles prior to the TfD another editor came along and reinstated the templates claiming that the prior RfC on the subject supported continued use of the template. Indeed, their restoration of the template was one of the things that prompted me to initiate the TfD. If we want to take this view on it, then, I think there needs to be an unambiguous statement that in-article prose is preferred over the use of templates. DonIago (talk) 01:32, 11 September 2026 (UTC)
The templates being allowed =/= they have to be used. The other editor who came along did not say that the prior RfC supported continued use of the template. The other editor said that your merely disagreeing with the use of the template was not sufficient to remove it because the RfC concluded that "the decision to use, not use, or substitute the template is made for each article individually". You could have gone to the talk page to get consensus for your edits per WP:BRD and WP:DR, instead of jumping several steps ahead in the dispute resolution process and opening a TfD. voorts (talk/contributions) 02:19, 11 September 2026 (UTC)
The template was being used on thousands of articles; was I supposed to rehash the same argument every single time I felt the template wasn't doing the article in question a service? I don't think that's reasonable, to the point that I'd almost think the suggestion wasn't even being made in good faith. The RfC I linked to indicated that editors at WT:FILM by and large had no love of the templates, so if the RfC lacked sufficient force to even allow for substitution on a limited basis, then TfD seemed like the next step, and was also supported by editors at WT:FILM. And given how the TfD concluded, my instincts seem to have been correct. DonIago (talk) 02:32, 11 September 2026 (UTC)
Donlago, looking at the edit war you had with @Indagate (in which you reverted 3 times in 24 hours), it doesn't appear you were looking to make any actual changes to the text beyond just substituting the template because you didn't like the idea of prose templates. If you had actually wanted to change something about the text, you would have had a better case for substitution. But the fact that, even in a marquee example like this, there was no change sought is part of what gives me the impression that "we need to make changes to the article text" was a hollow argument from the substitution/deletion camp in the TfD. Sdkb ^talk 02:43, 11 September 2026 (UTC)
If we're going to predicate this on changing the text, how much of the text would I have had to change before I had a good case for substitution? One word? Two words? Five? The closing comment on the RfC was that use of the templates should be discouraged, so it seemed to me emininently reasonable to interpret that as an argument to substitute them. And even then, I didn't go on a crusade to do so or such; I just changed them on the occasions where I saw them.

In any case, I'm not going to defend myself further here. The TfD stands. DonIago (talk) 04:55, 11 September 2026 (UTC)
Return to allowing the use of RT & MC prose and similar templates. This whole dispute seems to be based on a serious misreading of TG (see my comment below). If an editor believes that a prose template should be removed entirely or replaced with bespoke text in an article, they can simply do it. If another editor contests that, editors can follow WP:BRD/WP:DR. The push to apply TG to these templates (which nobody has identified any substantive issues with, as far as I can tell from glancing at past discussions) smacks of "I just don't like it". voorts (talk/contributions) 05:22, 11 September 2026 (UTC)
If you're serious about this, then this RfC will need to be much more widely advertised. I only came across it because it was mentioned at the Talk page for the RT prose template. Given the amount of participation at the TfD, if nothing else the participants there should have a reasonable opportunity to know there is a movement under way to reverse it. DonIago (talk) 12:54, 11 September 2026 (UTC)
I am serious about it. It's my !vote in this discussion and I encourage others to !vote the same way. voorts (talk/contributions) 13:20, 11 September 2026 (UTC)

Only DRV can do that. * Pppery * _{it has begun...} 15:58, 11 September 2026 (UTC)
Why can only DRV do that? We're already at an RFC. Per WP:NOTBURO, why not just hash this out here? voorts (talk/contributions) 16:02, 11 September 2026 (UTC)
Because what you're really doing here is challenging the outcome of a closure, not trying to change a guideline. If closures can be undercut outside of the established processes for challenging them then it renders the entire XfD system meaningless. * Pppery * _{it has begun...} 16:15, 11 September 2026 (UTC)
One could say the same about the TFD being used to get around an RFC outcome that zealous editors on the other side of the dispute didn't like. voorts (talk/contributions) 16:20, 11 September 2026 (UTC)
For the record, some of those "zealous editors" were encouraged to start a TfD on the grounds that an RfC wouldn't (and ultimately didn't) satisfactorily resolve questions regarding how the templates should be handled. Do you think you could find it within yourself to stop attacking editors who were just trying to do the best job they could of trying to get firm answers to questions that weren't being answered? I made it very clear in my opening TfD statement that I was only initiating it reluctantly and that I would have preferred it never got to that point.

And frankly, if my substitutions hadn't been reverted then it likely wouldn't have been me to start the TfD, so maybe you should save some of your evident ire for the editors who wouldn't accept having the templates substituted in piecemeal instances. They were just as capable of starting Talk page discussions as anyone else, after all. DonIago (talk) 18:02, 11 September 2026 (UTC)

not trying to change a guideline This RfC is literally about changes to a guideline. Sdkb ^talk 16:21, 11 September 2026 (UTC)
That comment was a reply to Voorts, hence Voorts is the referent of "You". What Voorts is really doing here is challenging a closure, since he seems to think the two wordings of the guideline say the same thing. However, your real goal here still appears to be to challenge the closure and this RfC is merely a means to an end. * Pppery * _{it has begun...} 20:07, 11 September 2026 (UTC)

Ping Primefac since they should probably be aware that their closure is being attacked here. * Pppery * _{it has begun...} 15:59, 11 September 2026 (UTC)
Appreciated; this page is on my watchlist and I have been keeping an eye on the discussion. If someone wants direct input from me feel free to name-drop (but no need for a ping). Primefac (talk) 11:12, 12 September 2026 (UTC)

Discussion (prose templates)

Notified: Category talk:Article shared content templates. Sdkb ^talk 08:07, 10 September 2026 (UTC)

Notified: Wikipedia:Village pump (policy). Sdkb ^talk 16:56, 11 September 2026 (UTC)

Comment - I'm a bit confused. I haven't often seen where there's an RfC, and the only comment is by the proposer, who is opposed to the proposal. Was there an WP:RFCBEFORE to this that I'm missing? Samuelshraga (talk) 16:14, 10 September 2026 (UTC)
Timeline of what happened here. While I have opposite opinions to Sdkb, I'm attempting to present this neutrally. This rule has been fraught with conflict for years, but I'm only focusing on the recent spat.

June 2026: Doniago starts Wikipedia:Templates for discussion/Log/2026 June 18#Rotten Tomatoes and Metacritic film prose, relying on this guideline

August 2, 2026: Primefac closes this discussion at "Keep and make subst only".

Later that same day: Doniago attempts to implement that consensus via Special:Diff/1367269223. This edit was not effective because of Special:PermaLink/1367274426#TemplateSubster: Template:Metacritic film prose has too many transclusions.

A few hours later, Sdkb reverts that edit and challenges the closure on Primefac's talk page. This results in Primefac clarifying the closure with an additional comment but no other action being taken. No DRV was filed.

A week later, Sdkb starts #Text storage tweak above, which receives no comments, and implements it 5 days ater.

This awkward status quo, where the TfD closure has not been implemented but has no active discussion, remains for 3 weeks without any action being taken.

September 3, 2026: Favre1fan93 reverts Sdkb's August 2 edit, reinstating the attempt at bot substing, which remains ineffective for the same reason as a month before.

September 8, 2026: I notice the bot whining about the ineffective subst instructions and attempt to solve the problem by adding the templates to User:AnomieBOT/TFDTemplateSubster. I knew at the time I was doing this that I had participated in the discussion and thus might have been seen as WP:INVOLVED. My attempt at substing {{Rotten Tomatoes prose}} was ineffective due to a typo, which I then failed to follow up on for technical reasons not relevant here, however my attempt at substing {{Metacritic film prose}} was effective.

September 9, 2026: Sdkb challenges my addition at User talk:AnomieBOT/TFDTemplateSubster#Metacritic prose substitution, claiming in part that #Text storage tweak has undercut the reasoning for the closure. This inspires me to revert Sdkb's edit, of which I had not previously been aware since I was on a wikibreak for almost all of August.

Sdkb responded by starting this discussion. * Pppery * _{it has begun...} 16:40, 10 September 2026 (UTC)
That's a fair summary, @Pppery. I appreciate you laying it out (despite us disagreeing about these templates). Sdkb ^talk 16:55, 10 September 2026 (UTC)

(edit conflict) @Samuelshraga, the beforehand element is that the wording of the guideline was clarified a month ago following Wikipedia talk:Template namespace § Text storage tweak. Pppery tried to restore the ambiguous wording yesterday. He accused me in the edit summary of wanting to change the guidance because I disagreed with the outcome of the recent TfD on {{Rotten Tomatoes prose}} (which I mentioned both in § Text storage tweak and in the RfC above). And yes, that's exactly correct — I think that a misguided reading of the ambiguous guidance prompted an errant outcome there, so I support the version clarifying the guidance for the sake of both future discussions about that template and all the other templates in Category:Article shared content templates. Hope that helps clarify! Cheers, Sdkb ^talk 16:50, 10 September 2026 (UTC)
I'm also going to add that, this RfC, in my opinion, lacks the authority to overrule Primefac's bold instruction to make the templates in question subst-only. Only DRV can do that. I care much more about the fact that Sdkb is refusing to actually take this to DRV and instead trying to undercut the closure through actions in other forums than I do about the merits of this dispute. * Pppery * _{it has begun...} 16:58, 10 September 2026 (UTC)
Primefac's close makes clear that it's a bartender's closing — it explicitly states that this close is not saying that there is a straight-up consensus to make this template subst-only, but rather that it there is no consensus to keep the status quo or make an exemption to the template guidelines, and in turn substitution becomes a viable alternative. Given the lack of clear consensus about the template guideline, it's an appropriate topic for further discussion, which is what I'm trying to do here.

DRV would not be an appropriate venue for this RfC because it concerns the underlying guidance that was discussed/interpreted in the TfD rather than the TfD itself. Sdkb ^talk 17:29, 10 September 2026 (UTC)
Am I the only one who sees absolutely no substantive difference between the current and proposed text? voorts (talk/contributions) 20:54, 10 September 2026 (UTC)
You're not the only one, @Voorts. I already interpreted the as this makes it more difficult to edit the content clause in the legacy text to mean that the advice applied only to content that might need to be edited in the future, as otherwise that rationale doesn't make any sense. But at the recent Rotten Tomatoes RfC it seems that some other editors didn't interpret it that way, and instead saw it as advising against prose templates no matter the circumstance. The current text clarifies that ambiguity by specifying explicitly that the advice about prose templates applies only when their content might need to be edited in the future. Does that help? Sdkb ^talk 21:14, 10 September 2026 (UTC)
Not really. These templates should either be allowed or not allowed. That's the issue we should be resolving. We shouldn't be changing guidelines because a group of editors are misreading it in support if their absolutist position. voorts (talk/contributions) 21:22, 10 September 2026 (UTC)
Also, this language about storing article text is literally about writing part of an article, putting it into template space, and then calling that template into an article. I don't think this part of the guideline was intended to cover templates that take parameters and then output text. voorts (talk/contributions) 21:27, 10 September 2026 (UTC)
I agree that whether to allow prose templates is the core issue. If you don't want editors to be able to take the absolutist position that prose templates should never be allowed, then you should !vote no. Since some editors are interpreting the ambiguous version to mean precisely that, and unambiguous language is the easiest way to prevent misinterpretation.

Also agreed on your second point. But some editors at the Rotten Tomatoes RfC indeed interpreted the guideline to cover that sort of instance. Sdkb ^talk 21:32, 10 September 2026 (UTC)
Why not just have an RfC on whether prose templates are allowed? voorts (talk/contributions) 21:36, 10 September 2026 (UTC)
I think (hope?) there are relatively few editors in the extremist camps of "use prose templates at every possible opportunity" and "never use even prose templates like {{Named storms intro}}". Most editors are somewhere in the middle, so I'm not sure an RfC just asking if they're allowed would be all that clarifying. The locus of debate is around when it's permissible to use them. That is spelled out in this guideline, so I made the RfC about the text in this guideline. Sdkb ^talk 21:50, 10 September 2026 (UTC)
Comment Reposting what I wrote in the RT/MC prose TfD: {{Aired episodes}} is used in 485 articles but I cannot find any past discussions at TfD or elsewhere determining its acceptability as a template on Wikipedia or compliance with WP:TG. {{Television franchise episode count}} is only used in 24 articles and likewise has no discussions about it beyond a few merges of duplicate templates. I also cannot find meaningful discussion about {{Year article header}} despite its use in roughly 500 year articles. If these are the only examples, essentially 2 across all of Wikipedia, and there has been no actual discussion regarding the appropriateness of their function in the template namespace then it is dubious to claim that they somehow establish why WP:TG specifically includes the word "normally" or that they serve as proof that such "exceptions are allowed" to the top-level guideline that "Templates should not normally be used to store article text. Such content belongs in the article pages themselves." Especially when we're talking about templates used to store text in the ordinary running text of articles rather than templates with some ancillary article text function that might plausibly justify an exception. The 2014 RfC that introduced "normally" to WP:TG was also rather brief and unimpressive. Either way, "exceptions are allowed" is not, by itself, an argument that a particular exception is warranted. If anything these few examples would indicate how rare exceptions are here on Wikipedia, not that such exceptions should be expanded. And as Netoholic stated in that RfC, such exceptions would have to maintain their status as exceptions which "break" this particular rule by way of strong consensus.
And as Netoholic wrote in their endorsement there: Ever since 2005, its been the intent of the community that the Template namespace not be used to store encyclopedic content. Templates are used to maintain formatting of that content (such as {{cite web}} calls), alert messages to readers ({{citation needed}}), and to provide navigation, but the main "meat" of an article, its information and data that we want editors to freely and easily be able to update, should be in the article namespace itself. Wikipedia:What is an article? describes what counts as encyclopedic content. Οἶδα (talk) 21:16, 10 September 2026 (UTC)
If these are the only examples, essentially 2 across all of Wikipedia It's not just two examples. There are more than 50 templates in Category:Article shared content templates, including very clear-cut use cases like {{Named storms intro}}. Sdkb ^talk 21:24, 10 September 2026 (UTC)
I am aware. And nearly all of them are not comparable to the kinds we are discussing both in terms of content and in the frequency of their use throughout Wikipedia. They're basically all data tables. And as with the others, I cannot find any actual discussion regarding the appropriateness of their function in the template namespace. WP:OTHERSTUFF that could just as likely be subst'd for the same reason. Or perhaps retained by way of consensus. But that has not occurred. And consensus through editing is no longer presumed when disagreement becomes apparent. *gestures around* Οἶδα (talk) 22:51, 12 September 2026 (UTC)