Template talk:Cite court

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[edit] Comments

This is listed as "experimental", which is fine. The "optional" parameters seemed oddly optional. I've now used it to cite a wikisourced case. If Rene Joly isn't yet deleted, search wikisource for it. --Otheus 18:52, 17 March 2007 (UTC)

I see that about 40 pages link to this template. I'm not an experienced template coder, so I'm not going to mess with it.

I just used it for the first time on Status of religious freedom by country -- to cite a case decided in a non-US court, as follows:

<ref>{{cite court |litigants=Black v. The Commonwealth |court=High Court of Australia |date=[[2 February]] [[1981]] |url=http://www.austlii.edu.au/cgi-bin/disp.pl/au/cases/cth/HCA/1981/2.html?query=title(black+%20near+%20commonwealth }}</ref>

The results suprised me. The link to the external URL appeared as a numbered boxed external link. I would have expected the contents of the litigants= parameter to appear as a boxed link to the external URL if a URL parameter was supplied. -- Boracay Bill 02:55, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] US only

It needs to be noted that this is the correct way to cite US cases, but NOT those from the Commonwealth. To cite these, use "infobox court case" in curly brackets instead. --Matthew Proctor 22:53, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Which would be {{Infobox court case}}. However, this is entirely inappropriate for actual citations. Infoboxes would only be used for articles over the court cases, not for citing them. -- Huntster T • @ • C 23:27, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Case number

I think that besides the Reporter field, there should be a Case number or Application number parameter. It makes it easier to find the judgement in an electronic database, or with a search engine (perhaps this is different in the US or UK, but if you're looking for French or ECHR judgements, it's easier to find them through their case number). Apokrif 16:26, 14 June 2007 (UTC)

I agree. I'm trying to cite a case, but it was unpublished, so in order to reference it I need to state the case #. Case_citation states that this is acceptable when citing unpublished case dockets, because it's assumed that eventually the case will be published... Document number might also be handy, since it's unpublished, so page number only means something if you know which document it was from. Jabrwock (talk) 18:37, 21 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Buggy Template

It's rendering incorrectly in http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stuyvesant_High_School#_note-45 - for some reason the citation is bold and it's got a loose apostrophe in the beginning. Would the knowledgeable folks please address? -- Y not? 04:45, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

Well, I see where the bold comes from, but not the odd apostrophe. In any case, this template really should not be used, given it clearly says it is experimental. If/when I have time, I'll see about doing some proper cleanup of the template itself. -- Huntster T • @ • C 08:47, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Separate case number field?

For example, if an article were to cite a yet unresolved court case, then for me currently perhaps the most important part of the citation is the case number. For this I have so far been using the vol field, until something better springs up.

Another important consideration is that many U.S. courts already have separate Wikipedia pages to them.

My another proposal regarding these pages is that more of them should also have abbreviated redirects, like N.D. Cal. takes to the Wiki page of the District Court for the Northern District Court of California. -Mardus (talk) 16:17, 30 December 2007 (UTC)

As has been mentioned above several times, this template is entirely experimental, and thus should not be used right now. There are too many things wrong with it, and much discussion needs to take place to decide what formats to use and how to use them. It should never have been placed out in the open like this, but for now we just have to deal with the fallout from its use. I'm not sure that it'll ever be ready for use. -- Huntster T • @ • C 18:35, 30 December 2007 (UTC)
Borcay Bill counted 40 pages in April above, and the count is currently about 175, so this template's use is growing. Since you seem to have definite ideas of what's wrong with it, please share them with us. I'm happy to work on improving it and getting it to the point where it's appropriate to use. RossPatterson (talk) 19:12, 30 December 2007 (UTC)
It is hard for me to express those ideas since I'm by no means knowledgeable about court documents. You might take a look at Wikipedia talk:Citation templates/Archive 03#Court_cases, where there was a brief discussion. An editor expressed concern that it was entirely U.S.-centric, and others showed how it didn't cover a wide variety of types of court documents. That's probably the biggest problem aside from the centrism...court documents can be cited a variety of different ways, it seems, based on which type of court you are trying to cite. However, nothing came of it. If various types of court citations can be compiled, or a single unified format can be worked out that can accommodate all the various fields that may be needed, I can code the template without much problem. The difficulty is that the template is already in use on a number of articles, and if changes are made, all of those articles must be updated to fix their formatting. I'm simply unsure whether I have the knowledge to fix each of them individually, but if nothing is done soon, it may well grow beyond means to control. — Huntster (talk • email • contribs) 19:53, 30 December 2007 (UTC)
Perhaps an optional field like style may help, which could have only a few specified values, the default being US since that is what the template does today Kevinp2 (talk) 23:06, 12 February 2008 (UTC)
Another option, albeit involving more maintenance is to have several templates with structured names, like:
*Cite court:US Federal
*Cite court:US State California
*Cite court:AU Federal
*Cite court:AU State Tasmania
*Cite court:CA Province Alberta
They could all have the same set of fields, differing in just their style and the destination of the links. This would allow new styles to be constructed without risking the old ones. Kevinp2 (talk) 23:53, 13 February 2008 (UTC)
This is certainly a valid option. In this situation, I'd probably go with a call to various subpages rather than a completely different set of templates, similar to how {{Convert}} is designed. However, I don't think there would be a problem to simply come up with a standardized appearance for court cites on Wikipedia that are dependent only on the country in question, rather than each individual state.
As has been noted here and elsewhere, this template is very U.S.-centric, and since I know nothing about court cases worldwide, I'd need a number of different specific citations from various locations to even begin to code up something that works for most or all of them. And then, the current instances of use here will each have to be fixed. I sincerely wish this template hadn't been created as it was, and am currently quite tempted to remove all instances from articles and have it locked until something more permanent can be designed. — Huntster (t • @ • c) 23:02, 15 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Requests for enhancements

I would like a request a field named quote, with the same usage as in the rest of the citation templates, such as Template:Cite_web. I don't know anything about creating templates, or I would try my hand at it. I did provide an example here. Huntster, it looks like we are all asking for an encore ;-) Kevinp2 (talk) 22:51, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

Y Done I've also completely redone the documentation and moved it to a subpage. If you notice anything amiss, just leave a message here or enact a fix yourself :) — Huntster (t • @ • c) 23:02, 15 February 2008 (UTC)
Cool, thanks! I added an example for the quote field to the example. It works well Kevinp2 (talk) 05:00, 28 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] usefulness

I would like to use this Cite court template in an article. Is it okay to use this template. If I can't use this template yet then what template should I use for now. QuackGuru 02:25, 4 May 2008 (UTC)

Here are the two refs I want to format. QuackGuru 02:30, 4 May 2008 (UTC)

As the template says on the main page, it is not ready for use. Just include exactly what you have above in the article, though it would be useful if you could locate additional information for the second, so it is as complete as the first. There's some additional info on page 44 of the second PDF that will help, but it doesn't include enough for a proper legal citation. Still, better than nothing, and providing the link means that researchers won't necessarily need to locate the actual annum. I'm retracting this...best to locate the full citation if humanly possible. — Huntster (t • @ • c) 02:43, 4 May 2008 (UTC)
I want to format the refs. What template may I use instead of the Cite court template. QuackGuru 02:50, 4 May 2008 (UTC)
Susan Getzendanner United States District Judge August 27, 1987
Permanent Injunction Order against AMA
IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE NORTHERN DISTRICT OF ILLINOIS
EASTERN DIVISION
CHESTER A. WILK, et al., Plaintiffs, v.
AMERICAN MEDICAL ASSOCIATION, et al., Defendants.
No. 76 C 3777
Here is from page 44. I'm not sure exactly what should I add to the ref. QuackGuru 02:58, 4 May 2008 (UTC)
Don't use a template...it isn't necessary. The first one you have is already formatted properly. As for the second, I located the information in the relevant article regarding the case. So, just use the lines below as your two citations, wherever it is you need to place them:
Where are you intending to use these? I'll help with their placement if you need it. — Huntster (t • @ • c) 03:42, 4 May 2008 (UTC)
I'm working on my sandbox. I will add the improved refs without the link to Wilk v. AMA article. Thanks for everything. QuackGuru 04:05, 4 May 2008 (UTC)
Gotcha, didn't know where it was going so tossed in the link to be safe. If this template ever gets off the ground, I'll try and remember to apply it to this article. Good luck. — Huntster (t • @ • c) 04:09, 4 May 2008 (UTC)