Raison : « Useful for debugging. »
This template does nothing visually. Technically, it throws away its parameters and outputs the null string.
Usage[]
{{ void | ... }}
Use cases[]
It is useful for programming advanced templates, and is often used within a template to the right of an equals sign. It may also be used in a template to disambiguate parsing of braces.
It can also be used to temporarily disable code, and unlike "commenting out" with <!-- -->, it nests. This means that {{void|foo {{void|bar}} baz}} is valid, whereas <!-- foo <!-- bar --> baz --> will produce baz -->.
It provides a particularly concise way of temporarily disabling templates, so the template name becomes the (ignored) first unnamed parameter. For example, suppose you have a page under {{construction}} for several days, and wish to remove that template between active editing sessions. Rather than delete the unused template, you can leave it in the wikisource and change from {{construction|...}} to {{void|construction|...}}.
Another possible application would be to temporarily disable an infobox on an article page while a problem with the infobox template itself is resolved.
Furthermore, the template can be substituted: {{subst:void}}. This saves (and effectively purges) the page without saving a record in the page history, similar to a null edit, which is particularly useful for bots.
See also[]
- The original template on Wikipedia: Template:Void