Editing Incubator escapee wiki:Protection policy (section)

=== Protection of templates ===
{{shortcut|WP:PTPROT}}
{{see also|Wikipedia:High-risk templates|Wikipedia:Template documentation}}
Highly visible templates{{snd}}those used on a large number of pages or frequently substituted{{snd}}are often protected based on the degree of visibility, type of use, content, and other considerations.

Protected templates should normally have the {{tl|documentation}} template. It loads the unprotected <code>/doc</code> page, so that non-admins and IP-users can edit the documentation, categories and interwiki links. It also automatically adds {{tl|pp-template}} to protected templates, which displays a small padlock in the top right corner and categorizes the template as protected. Only manually add {{tlf|pp-template}} to protected templates that do not use {{tlf|documentation}} (mostly the flag templates).

Cascading protection should generally not be applied directly to templates, as it will not protect transclusions inside {{tag|includeonly|o}} tags or transclusions that depend on template parameters, but ''will'' protect the template's [[Wikipedia:Template documentation|documentation subpage]]. Instead, consider any of the following:
* If the set of subtemplates is static (even if large), protect them using normal protection mechanisms.
* If the set of subtemplates is unbounded, use [[MediaWiki:Titleblacklist]] to protect all subtemplates using a particular naming format (as is done for [[WP:Editnotice|editnotice templates]] and subtemplates of [[Template:TFA title]]).

Note: All [[WP:Editnotice|editnotice templates]] (except those in userspace) are already protected via [[MediaWiki:Titleblacklist]]. They can be edited by admins, [[WP:Template editor|template editors]] and [[WP:Page mover|page movers]] only.