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 | This page in a nutshell: Small changes are good, but each change must improve the article and preserve its integrity. |
Every edit must stand on its own feet. Before making multiple edits, think twice about the order in which you make them. Do not make an article worse with one edit and justify it on the grounds that with others coming soon it will be better. It is weak to argue that it only causes limited disruption in the interim, because every edit is an edit. You cannot group edits together, categorize them or in any way make several edits into one. Articles are visible both to readers and to editors at all times, and members of either community who see the article degenerate may be confused about your intentions.
Reculer pour mieux sauter.
Retreat to make a better jump.— Napoleon I
This does not mean of course that every edit towards that goal must be independent of every other, only that it must move towards that goal and not away from it.
A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of small minds. — Ralph Waldo Emerson
For example, augmenting or formatting references can take some time and be done over several sessions. While doing so there may be a combination of styles in the references list, but on each edit it becomes slightly more consistent and so slightly better. If, in the alternate, the <ref> tags were renamed to something else in the meantime so that the reference list was consistent — consistently empty — that would be a backward step since the primary purpose of the reference list is to enable readers to find references.