Information:Drafts

This page is about the Draft namespace. For drafts in the User namespace, see Help:Userspace draft.

BattleTechWiki data structure

Namespaces
Subject namespaces		Talk namespaces
0	(Main/Article)	Talk	1
2	User	User talk	3
4	BattleTechWiki	BattleTechWiki talk	5
6	File	File talk	7
8	MediaWiki	MediaWiki talk	9
10	Template	Template talk	11
12	Help	Help talk	13
14	Category	Category talk	15
100	Policy	Policy Talk	101
102	Property	Property talk	103
106	Form	Form talk	107
108	Concept	Concept talk	109
112	smw/schema	smw/schema talk	113
114	Rule	Rule talk	115
118	Draft	Draft Talk	119
828	Module	Module talk	829
3000	Portal	Portal Talk	3001
3010	Guideline	Guideline Talk	3011
3012	Information	Information Talk	3013
Virtual namespaces
-1	Special
-2	Media
Current list (API call)

Drafts are pages in the Draft namespace (draftspace) where new articles can be created and developed, for a limited period of time. They allow editors to develop new articles and to receive feedback before being moved to BattleTechWiki's article namespace (mainspace). If you are logged in, creating a Draft version first is optional. Editors may instead choose to create draft pages in their userspace, or new articles directly in mainspace after the user has become autoconfirmed or confirmed.

How drafts work

Finding drafts

Drafts are not indexed by most search engines including Google, meaning most readers will not find them. Anyone can search and view drafts on BattleTechWiki directly using BattleTechWiki's built-in search engine: simply choose "Advanced", then tick "Draft" and/or "Draft talk" on the list of options. The list of all draft pages is at Special:AllPages or Special:PrefixIndex. You can also view recent Draft changes to the namespace, newly created drafts, visit a random draft. Some drafts are sorted by subtopic under Category:Draft articles.

Creating and editing drafts

Anyone, including users who are not logged in, can create and edit drafts. Drafts have "Draft:" before their normal title, and also have an associated draft talk page. An autoconfirmed account (an account with at least 10 edits and created at least 4 days ago) is required to change a page from a draft to an article. Doing so is done by moving the page to a title without "Draft:" in front of it. If there is a technical barrier to the move, such as when the creation of an article may be protected, seek assistance at places such as the Our Discord, or the Request for Change page.

Preparing drafts

• (Optionally) add the template {{Draft article}} at the top of the draft (not the talk page), along with the template's parameters |name and |subject=. A list of appropriate subject fields can be found here. If the draft name has a redirect page of the same name, you can use {{R with possibilities}}.
• Disable any categories by inserting a colon before the word "Category", e.g. change [[Category:Real people]] to [[:Category:Real people]] , or by using the {{Draft categories}} template.
• Non-free content cannot be included in draft articles,as the pages are hidden as described above. Any desired non-free content should be added to the article once it has been moved to the mainspace.

Moving drafts to mainspace

Putting the article in the main namespace (where normal articles are) requires an editor to use the page move function to move it into the Main (article) namespace. If there is a technical barrier to the move, such as when the creation of an article may be protected, seek assistance at places such as the Our Discord, or the Request for Change page.

An article created in draftspace does not belong to the editor who created it, and any other user may edit, move, rename, redirect, merge or seek deletion of any draft.

Moving articles to draftspace

The aim of moving an article to draft is to allow time and space for the draft's improvement until it is ready for mainspace. It is not intended as a backdoor route to deletion. As a matter of good practice, the editor moving a page to draft should mark its talk page with the tags of any relevant projects as a means of soliciting improvements from interested editors. {{uw-articletodraft}} may be used on the creator's talk page to notify them.

During new page review

The community has also allowed for new articles to be moved to draft space as an alternative to deletion. Below are a set of best practices to follow when draftifying an article in these circumstances. As part of the review of new pages, an unreviewed page may be moved to draft if:

1. the topic has some potential merit, and
2. the article does not meet the required standard, and
3. there is no evidence of active improvement (at least one hour since the last constructive edit), and
4. the article does not contain copyright violations.
5. or when the author clearly has a conflict of interest.

Requirements for draftifying editors

To unilaterally move an article to draft space, you should:

• notify the author
• be accountable for your draftification decision

Objections

Other editors, including the author of the page, but excluding editors with a conflict of interest, have a right to object to draftifying the page. If an editor raises an objection, move the page back to mainspace and, if necessary, record on its talk page the reasoning.

A page may only be moved unilaterally to the draftspace a single time. If anyone objects, it is no longer an uncontroversial move, and the page needs to be handled through other processes, such as deletion, stubbing, tagging, etc.

Deleting a draft

Drafts are meant to be works in progress, and most will not meet BattleTechWiki's standards for quality at first.

Drafts are not subject to normal article deletion criteria like "no context", "no indication of importance", or "not in English" so creators have time to e.g. establish context or notability, translate, and make other adjustments and improvements. Drafts may be nominated for deletion (using {{speedy}}, but not solely because the draft fails to show that the notability guidelines are satisfied.

Basically substantial leeway is given to drafts; however, the community may decide to delete a draft if it is determined that the reasons for deletion are strong.

Just like any other page on the BattleTechWiki, drafts that are copyright violations, vandalism, disparage or attack their subject, are tests, or unambiguous advertising or promotion will be deleted.

Deletion of old drafts

Drafts that have not been edited in six months may be deleted, unless the editors working on the draft have a good and valid reason for forgetting to update it.

Redirects from drafts moved to mainspace

Redirects that are a result of page moves from the draft namespace to the main namespace should be retained only if those drafting the page feel it's needed.

See also

• See the technical requirements and future development ideas on MediaWiki.org