Redirects

Redirects are pages that forward users from one page name to another. They can be useful if a particular page is referred to by multiple names, or has alternative punctuation, capitalization or spellings.

For example, AWB, a commonly-used acronym, redirects to AutoWikiBrowser, the tool's full name.

Creating or editing a redirect

Page settings button located in the drop-down menu.

Page settings menu.

To create a new redirect, create a new page (see Starting a new page) or edit an existing one.

Once you are in the Creation window (or Edit window if you edit an existing page), insert the following code into the text entry field:

#REDIRECT [[pagename]]

where pagename is the name of the destination page.

You can also turn a page into a redirect (or edit an existing redirect) via the visual editor. To do that, follow these steps:

1. Open the visual editor.
2. Click the "Page settings" button located on the "Page options" drop-down menu.
3. (if turning a page into a redirect) Enable the "Redirect this page to" option and enter the name of the destination page.
4. (if editing an existing redirect) Change the name of the destination page to the name you want.

Note: if you don't know how to view a redirect, see Viewing a redirect section below.

Notes on usage

The keyword REDIRECT is not case-sensitive. Note, however, that there must be no characters before "#" on the page, and no characters between "#" and "REDIRECT". If these conditions are not met, the redirect will not work.

There should usually be no more text on the page after the redirect code. Any such text will not affect the target page, and users would have to go to the redirect page to see it. As such, if a template or a category is designed to be used on redirects, it's fine to put it after the redirect code.

Preview

Preview of a redirect page.

To preview a redirect, use the "Show preview" button below the edit window or the Alt-Shift-P key combination. Previewing helps you check that you have entered the correct target page name.

If the page name looks like a working internal link, open that link in another tab to ensure that it's exactly the page you want the redirect to point to.

If the page name looks like a broken internal link, the target page does not exist. Such broken redirects are useless, so please try to avoid creating any.

Viewing a redirect

Example of the note on the target page

After creating a redirect, going to a page with the redirect code will send you to the target page. However, that page will have a slight note at the top, which tells you that you were redirected from another page.

The redirection process does not change the target page in any other way. You can interact with that page like if you visited it directly.

If want to view the redirect page itself, you can do that in a few different ways:

1. Click on the link with the name of the redirect in the note mentioned above.
2. Use the "What links here" tool in the sidebar, find the redirect page you need to view and go to that page.
3. Edit your browser's address bar to point to the redirect page, but add ?redirect=no after the title. For example, to visit https://help.gamepedia.com/AWB this way, use https://help.gamepedia.com/AWB?redirect=no.

When you get to the redirect page, you will be able to do anything with it that you can do with any other page.

Deleting a redirect

Assuming you have the user right to delete pages, you can delete redirects as well. Redirects are deleted just like any other pages. To delete a redirect, go to the page with the redirect code and open the deletion menu as with other pages.

Double redirects

Double redirects are redirects that point to other redirects. They do not work on Gamepedia, as redirects are followed only once. Turning on the setting that allows to follow more creates major technical issues. As such, it is not available on Gamepedia.

If you find a double redirect, edit it to point to the final target page directly. If the redirect is not needed, you can instead delete it or mark it for deletion.

Moving pages can create double redirects, most often if you move a popular page or many pages at once. To find double redirects that point to a specific page, use the "What links here" tool in the sidebar. If you want to list all double redirects on the entire wiki, visit Special:DoubleRedirects.

If you encounter double redirects often and struggle with fixing them, you can use Pywikibot to automate this process. However, PWB is difficult to set up.

Moving pages without creating redirects

Users with the suppressredirect right can move a page without creating a redirect. By default, all autoconfirmed users have this right.