Last modified: 2011-03-13 18:04:53 UTC
This is so useful... the current "add random text, save, delete random text, save" process for creating a blank page isn't elegant. A small "Create as blank page" button that showed up for new pages would be so nice :)
blank pages should not exist or links pointing to them will be blue instead of red (non existant article).
Sometimes you want a blank page, eg user and user talk. It happens enough that the help pages have directions how to create one. It just seems silly that you can do it ... but to do it you have to add something, and then edit *again* to delete it.
just because you can do it doesn't mean you should do it or that it should be encouraged. a red link is a hint that there is no information there. this applies just as much to user or user talk pages as to any other page. Why are you helping users to break this functionality?
Mediawiki is used by a wide range of sites. Some may want that functionality and not see it as "breaking" anything. A config option to allow it doesn't strike me as "breaking" anything, it's just best not to assume because you personally wouldn't want blank pages to exist at times, others wouldn't either.
Another way of phrasing Ashar's objection (if I can call it that) is that creating a blank page is, in itself, an inelegant solution to a different problem. Better than creating a "make me a blank page" button, with its accompanying disadvantages, would be to analyse what the problem is you are actually trying to solve. For instance, you mention User and User_talk pages, so perhaps what you actually want is a way for these to appear as "blue links" [i.e. exist] as soon as the user is created? Creating a blank page (or, even better, a page with appropriate and configurable filler text - e.g. "This user joined on..." for User:, "Welcome..." for User_talk:) as part of the user creation process is a very different proposition from letting any user create empty stubs at the click of a button. I suspect that other uses of such a feature could be similarly reframed as more specific requests. Meanwhile, what's wrong with creating a page with a single '.', or the text "This page deliberately left blank.", or referencing a template containing one of those - or even referencing a completely blank template? :P
