Powerbase:How to Rename (Move) a Page

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If you discover that you've created a page with the wrong title (maybe you misspelled it) and you want to make it fit in more cleanly with the rest of Powerbase, you can rename it by moving it to a new title.

Before moving a page, check What links here for your page (located at the side of the page) and fix the links to point to the new location directly. This is necessary because redirects to redirects aren't automatically followed (this prevents infinite loops and spaghetti linking). Always check the what links here for your page, and if there are multiple levels of redirects, go fix the links to point to the new location directly.

To move a page, click on the "Move" link at the top of the article's page. You'll be asked for a new name for the article, but before doing so, familiarise yourself with Powerbase Naming Conventions for things to consider when naming a page. You will also be asked to give a reason for the move. Once you've completed this, click on the 'Move Page' button, and the page will be renamed using the new title. The old title will become a redirect page, so any links to the old title will still go to the new page.

Benefits of using the Move function

The nice thing about using the "move page" function is that it keeps the entire edit history of the article, before and after the move, in one place; it's as if the article were always named that way. So, it's preferable to use this method over just cutting text out of one article and cramming it into a new one; old revisions, notes, and attributions are harder to keep track of it you do that. (But you may have to if, for instance, you're splitting a page into multiple topics. If you do, please include a note in the new article's summary and talk page of where you took the text from.) The move itself is shown in the edit history of the page with the old title.

But what if the new title already exists?

If the new title already exists and isn't just a redirect with no history, the software will tell you that you can't rename the article. You'll then have to manually merge the two pages together.

Before you move a page

Another thing to remember is that redirects to redirects aren't automatically followed (this prevents infinite loops and spaghetti linking). Always check the What links here for your page, and if there are multiple levels of redirects, go fix the links to point to the new location directly.

Avoid moving a page while the edit box of the corresponding Talk page is open: when you hit "Save page" you overwrite the redirect to the new talk page (you do not get the usual warning that the page has been edited while your edit box was open) and get a duplication of the contents of the talk page, with your latest addition added to the old instead of the new one.

Familiarise yourself with Naming Conventions for some things to consider when naming a page.

After moving a page

It is useful to copy the message "Page ... moved to ..." to the new talk page, especially if there has been discussion about the name of the page.

See also:

• Powerbase:How To Edit A Page

• How to redirect a page

• Practice editing pages in our Powerbase sandbox!