Wikipedia talk:Citation templates/Archive 02

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This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Need a template that cites original publication date

The format for citing books that had an original publication date different than the edition cited isn't supported. [Wikipedia:Cite sources#Complete citations in a .22References.22 section] suggests this:

Marx, Karl [1867] (1967) Capital: A Critique of Political Economy Vol. I. Edited by Frederick Engels. New York: International Publishers.

If you plugged this into the template it'd look like this:

Marx, Karl ([1867] 1967). in Frederick Engels: Capital: A Critique of Political Economy Vol. I. New York: International Publishers. 

or this.

Marx, Karl, [1867] (1967). in Frederick Engels: Capital: A Critique of Political Economy Vol. I. New York: International Publishers. 

Neither is particularly appealing, especially with "Authorlinks".

Interesting to note that the "Editor" field doesn't append "Ed." to the name. That's inconvenient, I think.

This has come up on Bahá'í literature where you can see how ugly this is. MARussellPESE 14:41, 17 February 2006 (UTC)

To add to that, there should also be a formatting for translator. Cuñado - Talk 20:25, 17 February 2006 (UTC)

With all the "copyright" noise going on everywhere, now, I think all citations need to distinguish among:

• original publication date, i.e. op2003
• copyright date, i.e. c2005 -- i.e. "official" / "formal" copyright date, as vs. pre-print or other pre-copyright original publication/op dates -- nowadays a pre-print can appear online, and be used for several years, before Nature or Science or the official printed book etc. ever get around to appearing... increasingly more useful to see the original, which actually affects research, than the "official" / "formal" version, which increasingly is too late...
• current version's publication date, i.e. 3d ed. 2007

-- so the whole mess becomes -- 3d ed. (2007 [c2005][op2003]) -- may not look pretty, but functionally it is important to distinguish among these three, and this importance will increase as online pre-print publishing increases.

--Kessler 22:38, 17 February 2006 (UTC)

If we are going to do that, I suggest the the "c" an "op" be active links to somewhere this is explained. - Jmabel | Talk 18:15, 25 February 2006 (UTC)

Consistency

To try to work out some consistency issues I have created this subpage for parameter and usage info so that one can see the frequency used and some proposed changes will make more sense.

Proposed changes to templates:

• rename {{Comic book reference}} to {{cite comic}}
• rename {{Comic strip reference}} to {{cite strip}}
  • consider consolidating these to one template
  • note these are very infrequently implemented so changes would not require massive updates to the pages where they are used
• delete {{Editorial cartoon reference}}
  • if needed incorporate it into {{cite strip}} and rename unique parameters:
    • cartoon to strip
    • page to pages
• in {{cite video}} rename parameters:
  • DistributorsName to publisher
  • DistributorsLocation to location
  • ReleaseYear to year
• in {{cite book}} and {{cite encyclopedia}} deprecate - (i.e. leave in coding but remove from instructions) the following parameters:
  • accessyear
  • accessmonth
• redirect {{cite paper}} to {{cite book}}
  • this would effect about 400 articles - but paper is really no different than book and it is confusing to people who are looking for {{cite journal}} as above (and I was similarly confused).
• decide what to do about {{cite newsgroup}}
  • if this is not to be used as a reference to verify content as indicated in the template notice - then we should not use the "cite" terminology but something else - mabe link newsgroup
  • make it easier for people looking to cite a paper to find {{cite journal}} and {{cite book}} see below

Proposed documentation:

Make all documentation similar to that on {{cite book}} i.e. use <noinclude> tags to put all documentation on the Template page instead of the talk page - have an example with full parameters and a second one where necessary with common parameters. Make spacing for cutting and pasting the example consistent.

Proposed change to the project page's table:

Make the table have this format. Also include an explanation at the top instructing users to click on the template for full list of parameters and additional instructions.

{{cite book
 | last = 
 | first = 
 | authorlink = 
 | coauthors = 
 | year = 
 | title = 
 | publisher = 
 | location = 
 | doi = 
 | id = 
}}

{{cite book
 | last = Mumford
 | first = David
 | authorlink = David Mumford
 | year = 1999
 | title = The Red Book of ...
 | publisher = [[Springer]]
 | doi = 10.1007/b62130
 | id = ISBN 354063293X
}}

{{cite book 
 | last = Cordell 
 | first = Bruce R. 
 | coauthors = Jeff Grubb, David Yu 
 | year = 2001 
 | month = September 
 | title = [[Manual of the Planes]] 
 | publisher = [[Wizards of the Coast]] 
 | id = ISBN 0-7869-1850-8 
}}

{{cite web
 | last =
 | first =
 | authorlink =
 | date = 
 | url =
 | title =
 | work =
 | format =
 | publisher =
 | accessdate =
}}

{{cite web 
 | title = Frances Kelsey 
 | work = Canada Heirloom Series 
 | date = [[1986-02-05]]
 | url = http://collections.ic.gc.ca/...
 | publisher = Heirloom Publishing Inc.
 | accessdate = 2006-04-30
 }}

{{cite web
 | first = Rachel
 | last = Spiegel
 | url = http://science-education.nih.gov/...
 | title = Research in the News: Thalidomide 
 | accessdate = 2006-04-30
}}

Please comment on the above proposed changes - thx in adv Trödel 02:05, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

"in {{cite video}} rename parameters: DistributorsName to publisher, DistributorsLocation to location, ReleaseYear to year":

I agree with that. Probably we can do this migration without a second temporary template thanks to the low use count. I can help with AWB/MWB (I did the regexes for the book reference → cite book et al. migrations). For ther rest of your proposal: I don't care that much (which means I'm not opposing ;). --Ligulem 08:28, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

As to the propoal, I support fully the proposed cite_strip and cite_comic proposed changes, as well as the {{Editorial cartoon reference}} and {{cite paper}} redirect (although cite paper could be kept for papers awaiting publication. These are often cited in academia.)

As for {{cite newsgroup}}, it probably ought to be deprecated completely, and treated as any other external link.

A last thing might be useful: a {{cite law}} thing for pieces of legislation (see Total dissolved solids, which involve one of these). Circeus 15:16, 28 June 2006 (UTC)

Implementation

Considering their are no objections after about 2 weeks, I am beginning implementation using the suggested table above. I will leave out any reference to {{cite}}. Additionally, I will only make comment changes to the other {{cite xxx}} templates. --Trödel 13:04, 29 June 2006 (UTC)

FYI - the current table adds scroll bars for any screen less than 1152x864; however, my goal is to have it fit in 1024x768 and have the example 1 fit on 800x600 screens without scrolling - of course for those of us with higher resolutions it works great! --Trödel 13:17, 29 June 2006 (UTC)

Template:Cite

Is there some reason this cite template is not on the template messages list? thx -Trödel 03:36, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

Yes. It shouldn not be mass used on article pages, because we have other templates which are better. Also if there is any chance we can ever consolidate all the citation tempate into one single uber-template, we might capture that name. Currently there is the uglier (only the name!) {{citation}}. Don't "advertise" {{cite}} on this page here ;). --Ligulem 08:33, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

{{cite visual}}

Appears to be a fork of {{cite video}} with more detailed variables. Circeus 15:17, 24 June 2006 (UTC)

Looks nice. Jude should have added that to the category earlier ;). Thanks for adding the cat. Hmm. Should we deprecate {{cite video}} and convert all cite video calls to cite visual? (I could do that with my modified AWB) --Ligulem 18:26, 24 June 2006 (UTC)

I think it should be looked what citation style guide most other {{cite foo}} templates conform to and keep the one that is already closest to the recommended format by that guide. Circeus 19:39, 24 June 2006 (UTC)

{{cite video game}}

Devellopment on this potentialy useful template seems to have stopped. Maybe you could have a look into it? Circeus 01:38, 25 June 2006 (UTC)

Citing a blog entry

Is anyone working on a generic template for citing a blog entry? There has been a recent instance where something like this would have been useful. —  Stevie is the man!  ^{Talk | Work} 18:37, 26 June 2006 (UTC)

{{Cite web}} should work just fine, at least if the entry can be linked separately.if it can't, then the page is probably not stable enough to be used. Circeus 00:05, 27 June 2006 (UTC)

The problem I have with using {{Cite web}} is that blog entries are kind of like news articles, in that they are time-sensitive and usually signed by the author. I would like to treat them like news articles in cites somehow. Do you know of examples where blog entries are being cited now that I can look at? Thanks. —  Stevie is the man!  ^{Talk | Work} 02:04, 27 June 2006 (UTC)

Fact is, weblog are not news sources and should not usually be considered as such. I can't think of anything about a weblog entry that cannot be covered in Cite web. I cannot think of a template use for blogs off hand, but here is a quick example I just converted. Blog entries usually convert perfectly to cite web, so I can,t really see your concern. Atworst, you can simply cite news, but a new template sounds like overkill. Circeus 02:27, 27 June 2006 (UTC)

There are indeed occasionally authoritative blog entries, believe it or not. At any rate, the example you provide looks all right. Thank you. I just wasn't sure {{Cite web}} was adequate before seeing a potential example. —  Stevie is the man!  ^{Talk | Work} 04:01, 27 June 2006 (UTC)

I never denied the usefulness of often citing blog entries. My comment had to do with how the two type of entries are presented in subtly different ways. Cite news uses the format that style guides uses for, well, news sources, but blogs cannot usually be cited as if they emanated from a news agency. In the end, though, I have to admit that both generally can cover the needs (actually, all the pertinent variables have the same name), it's just that they are semantically distinct for the purpose of bibliography. Circeus 04:13, 27 June 2006 (UTC)

first, last should be preferred over author

In re [1], I would recommend to show the examples using first,last instead of author. first,last should be preferred over author. See the doc of the mother of the citation templates: Template:Cite book. The author param is for backwards compatibility or newbie users as a fallback strategy. Citation wiki-professionals use first,last. --Ligulem 16:42, 29 June 2006 (UTC)

Will do - also - good idea to use the &nbsp; to get the widths to work out right - feel stupid not for not thinking of that. --Trödel 17:13, 29 June 2006 (UTC)

I also left an example where last, first is in the example but not assigned a value with a comment - do you think that is helpful? --Trödel 17:20, 29 June 2006 (UTC)

Looks everything fine. BTW no need to feel stupid at all. You're doing fine. I tweaked the width percentages for at least 20 minutes until I happend to have that idea with the &nbsp; ;) --Ligulem 17:59, 29 June 2006 (UTC)

a minor point, but how would your template deal with William of Ockham as an author? first=William | last=of Ockham? or first = William of | last = Ockham? My recent attempts to add proper citation templates there were summarily reverted. And what about medieval authors in general writing before the tradition of first name and surname settled down in Europe about the 13th century? Or authors with honorific titles? suggestions and discussion welcome. Thruston 10:39, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

Exactly for these special cases is the "author" param. The idea behind the first last thing is, that usually the information tuple (last,year) can be used as an identification. So everything that is not last should go into first. And if you don't know what do, put everything into author. And if these templates here don't fit at all, don't use them. And keep in mind that on this wiki here, there is no requirement to use these templates. There are even Wikipedians, that don't like them at all. That's probably one of the reasons why you were reverted. The citation templates can only be used on a per article consensus. But don't go around removing the citation templates from articles. There is no consensus for that either. --Ligulem 12:38, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

More advice on the interaction of |first=, |last=, |author= and |coauthors= would be appreciated. I usually use the formatting of the author's name used in the journal article, so if it's "Ian R. Rogers, MBBS, FACEM" on the title page of the paper, that's how I cite it. |first= and |last= makes that hard. I could easily include |author= with the preferred presentation as well, but at the moment |first= and |last= override that, making it useless. Also, when citing multiple coauthors in "Last, First" form, I like to separate them with semicolons. But mediawiki then gives me "Last, First, Last2, First2; Last3, First3; Last4, First4". All rather messy. Also, advice on the use of periods. Some journals like "J.Q. Public", while others use "JQ Public". For now, I'm avoiding |first= and |last= entirely, and not converting instances of "|author=Last, First; Last2, First2" to use coauthors. 192.35.100.1 09:17, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

If you don't feel comfortable with using first last, then by all means do it with author. There is no problem with doing so in your case. --Ligulem 13:23, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

I would prefer to see first replaced with forename and last replaced surname to clarify the names of east Asian authors. --Gerry Ashton 22:16, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

Brief Instructions

In trying to make these easier to use - especially for myself - I added a "Brief Instructions" column to the "mother of the citation templates,"(Ligulem. first, last should be preferred over author,. - just playin') {{cite book}}. see Template:cite book

Any objections/comments --Trödel 14:17, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

No problems with that. Just try to minimize the number of edits to that high use template. But if you must edit, edit! I'm not such a fan of having the usage section on the template page, but Wikipedians love to have it there. Bah, server load FUD anyway! :-) --Ligulem 15:45, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

Good point - I'll use a sandbox to edit in and get it right - I tend to hit save and then proof read - rather than proofreading first - probably because of the work I lost in early 2005 when the servers would occasionally go out --Trödel 14:14, 3 July 2006 (UTC)

cite conference

It seems dumb to me to have the variable booktitle be used for the name of the conference - I would think that conference would make more sense. --Trödel 14:14, 3 July 2006 (UTC)

cite paper

This has author not last, first - also seems like cite book could handle this completely fine. Is there a good reason that we can't use {{cite book}} instead. If there is I will add last, first to the template. using author for now. FYI - paper was in use on about 400 pages as of mid-June. --Trödel 14:22, 3 July 2006 (UTC)

format for cites

I have used the multi-line format for cites but was thinking of a couple of things. Below is an example of the cite template as it would appear in the edit box. I like the rightmost version (obviously) where the cite is ended on the same line as the last parameter, and the next piece of text begins on a new line of the edit window. This inserts a space in the text after the footnote number (or if an incline cite) after the "." of the cite. Using a double indent makes it easier to skip the cites and go to the next part of the text that is being edited.

_Way it is now_

...for such a length of time, 
sparked national interest and 
was featured ''[[America's 
Most Wanted]]''.<ref>{{cite web
 | last = Doe
 | first = John
 | title = Caught: Johnson
 | url = http://www.url.com
 | accessdate = 2006
}}</ref> On [[May 5]], [[2005]],
the body was finally identified 
as '''Erica Michelle Maria ...'''

_Compact version_

...for such a length of time, 
sparked national interest and 
was featured ''[[America's 
Most Wanted]]''.<ref>{{cite web
 |last=Doe
 |first=John
 |title=Caught: Johnson
 |url=http://www.url.com
 |accessdate=2006
}}</ref> On [[May 5]], [[2005]],
the body was finally identified 
as '''Erica Michelle Maria ...'''

_My Preference_

...for such a length of time, 
sparked national interest and 
was featured ''[[America's 
Most Wanted]]''.<ref>{{cite web
   | last = Doe
   | first = John
   | title = Caught: Johnson
   | url = http://www.url.com
   | accessdate = 2006 }}</ref>
On [[May 5]], [[2005]], the 
body was finally identified as 
'''Erica Michelle Maria ...'''

I much prefer this to the inline cite method below - which I find very difficult to jump to the next word or sentence in the article.

...for such a length of time, sparked national interest and was featured 
''[[America's Most Wanted]]''.<ref>{{cite web |last= Doe |first= John
|title= Caught: Johnson |url= http://www.url.com |accessdate= 2006 }}
</ref> On [[May 5]], [[2005]], the body was finally identified as 
'''Erica Michelle Maria ...'''

Any thoughts? --Trödel 17:15, 3 July 2006 (UTC)

I've been converting articles to the multiline variant in a past stupidity of mine. And I got biten by the "there is no consensus for this" wiki-woolves (and had to serially revert what I did on a bunch of articles). I don't care that much anymore. Feel free to write your articles as you see fit, but don't convert exisiting articles if you don't want to share the same experience. A significant drawback I noticed about the multiline format is the way the diffs are calculated by the MediaWiki software: I have done some paramater conversions on template calls and it happended to me a lot of times that when encountering the multiline style, the diff contained too little adjacent context lines to be meaningful (For example on this diff, you can't even tell to what template call that change was applied). This additionally helps upsetting the article watchers. So, actually, I sort of settled on inline myself. I can read {{..}} stuff like a newspaper anyway in the mean time, so I don't care that much. Maintaining template calls sprinkeled into these <ref> tags is hard anyway. BTW, technically, you can add as much spaces/newlines between the opening {{ and the name of the template as you want. So you can even do:

...for such a length of time, 
sparked national interest and 
was featured ''[[America's 
Most Wanted]]''.<ref>{{

cite web
 | last = Doe
 | first = John
 | title = Caught: Johnson
 | url = http://www.url.com
 | accessdate = 2006 

}}</ref> On [[May 5]], [[2005]], the 
body was finally identified as 
'''Erica Michelle Maria ...'''

and it works fine (Example: AIDS). Just in case you didn't know. --Ligulem 08:33, 5 July 2006 (UTC)

Thx for the warning - I am not brave enough to go around changing stuff - though I do get annoyed when someone changes my cites to inline cites ;) - I hope that the updated list works well for people - I am wondering if we should expand the table to include almost all the cites on Category:Citation templates.

One of my main purposes is to help people who don't wnat to figure everything out find the cite template that would work best for them quickly. and the length of the table seems to be counter to that goal - but I can't think of anything better --Trödel 14:04, 5 July 2006 (UTC)

Well, the table was certainly shorter when it showed the inline citations. I find the change to multi-line format in this page annoying as I find that very ugly to have in an article when using <ref></ref> tagging. You end up with single paragraphs that don't fit in the edit box. It also makes reviewing diffs painful because there are so many lines affected. The inline citation format lets the paragraph be a single line for diff purposes, so we can watch changes at the paragraph level quite easily. I find the inline style a lot easier to have in artciles under maintenance (remember, every article is permanently under maintenance, even if only anti-vandalism patrol), but I'm not about to go hunting for the multi-line style to convert it to inline. I do think, though, that using it here would make this table of exemplars somewhat shorter allowing more of the examples to be used. GRBerry 20:09, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

I am willing to make the change - I just am not sure what people like better - it seems to be not settled as far as a preferred style. What I really wish is that you could just use <ref name=blah /> in the article and then have a section under References where you put in the references <ref-define name=blah> Last, First, etc cite information</ref>- and it would number and do the same links there - so that you could have the references be in alphabetical order like a bibliography and they would refer back to the article as footnotes. If the <ref-define name=blah2> is not referenced in the article it would still be numbered and in the reference section but not have the footnote links. And also if a person put in <ref>short cite</ref> it would put that on the end of the manually defined references but I think that is asking too much :) --Trödel 21:54, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

cite encyclopedia

comma after volume and before pages needs to be made optional --Trödel 17:44, 3 July 2006 (UTC)

cite video

requires cite people - but about 75% of the cites I viewed off what links here do not have people assigned a value --Trödel 18:05, 3 July 2006 (UTC)

{{cite video}} example

Pleae change that example. We already have {{cite episode}} for tv series. Maybe change it for a television documentary instead? Circeus 02:46, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

What am I supposed to use?

I have two TV-based interview projects I want to cite. One is an episode of a TV series which is a one-on-one interview in the Inside the Actor's Studio style; Another one is a Behind The Music documentary-type episode with interviews of many band members, associates, a naration, etc. What would be the proper citing for these projects? Each item would be used to cite various facts in an article. Thanks very much TheHYPO 06:17, 5 July 2006 (UTC)

I think {{cite episode}} is the better choice --Trödel 21:30, 5 July 2006 (UTC)

{{cite episode}} is aimed at fictional material. Documentaries should use either {{cite visual}} or {{cite video}} (there aren't much differences between them). Circeus 22:23, 6 July 2006 (UTC)

Request to move

I would like to ask an admin to move this page and the associated talk page to Wikipedia:citation templates. I can't do that because the page already exists. Thanks. --Ligulem 10:16, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

Citing ancient literature

Could we have a template for this please? See http://www.haverford.edu/classics/courses/omni/citations.html for things required.

Art exhibition catalogs

May I please have a citation template for AECs?--Rockero 17:52, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Two-author citations

Suppose I have a citation (let's say a journal) with two authors. According to the template, I will write something like,

   | last = Bak
   | first = P.
   | coauthors = Paczuski, M.

(This is a real example from the page on Self-organized criticality that I'm editing.)

So, as output, this produces, "Bak, P., Paczuski, M., ...." — no "and" in-between the authors. If I put in the "and" manually,

   | last = Bak
   | first = P.
   | coauthors = and Paczuski, M.

I get, "Bak, P., and Paczuski, M., ...." — which is grammatically incorrect since it adds a comma before the and (incorrect even for US English, since here there are only two authors).

Is there any way of getting what I want, which is, "Bak, P. and Paczuski, M. ....", automatically? If not, maybe some sort of correction should be put in the citation template system. Currently I've settled for the compromise of having no "ands" in the author list, but I don't want to keep that. —WebDrake 19:07, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

No, and actually, I think Cite_book uses a semicolon, not a comma. Could you provide style guides that suggest using and for two authors? Circeus 21:30, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

Well, look at e.g. Nature, Science, other mainstream science journals. Actually I note that one can use simply "author = " as a field, so I'll probably do that. —WebDrake 09:56, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

Style manual?

Do most of the cite templates mentioned in this project page attempt to follow any particular style manual? So far, it appears they come close to the APA style. --Gerry Ashton 22:22, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

Magazines?

What is the most appropriate template for citing magazines? (Or does one need to be modified or created to accomodate magazines?) Cite journal has volume and issue parameters, values that many magazines use. But it says it is intended for "academic" journals. Cite news is less "academic", which suits magazines, but lacks the volume and issue parameters (and it is strange to call magazines "news"). Punctured Bicycle 23:09, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

You could write them without a template. A radical idea, I know ... :-) SlimVirgin ^(talk) 23:46, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

Technically, newspapers also have volume and issues, IIRC. I usually use Cite news myself. Cite journal is inappropriate not because of the parameters, but because of the formatting (the bolding is specific to academic material). Circeus 01:13, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

CD-booklets?

Classical CD-booklets tend to be rather thick and full of information, what would be the most appropriate citation template for them? 194.144.188.198 11:42, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

I presume {{Cite album-notes}}, though I've never really looked at whether it is a well-done template. - Jmabel | Talk 04:18, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

Not recommended

JonAwbrey recently reverted to a "long standing version" that allegedly says that citation templates are not recommended. First, this supposeldy "long standing version" dates from SlimVirgin's edits of 1 August, which are not long-standing in my book. We discussed this at WP:CITE at the time and I thought had come to an understanding. Apparently SlimVirgin did not see fit to change things in other places. This is therefore disputed, and if you are to revert to anything it should be to the July 27 version. I therefore ask JonAwbrey to self-revert. Gimmetrow 04:45, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

"There is no recommendation..." has similar problems. Gimmetrow 05:07, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

No, it doesn't. It's a good compromise. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 05:25, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

"No, it doesn't"? From that I would gather that you understand the phrase differently than I, so it would seem the phrasing has a problem. Wikipedia:Citation guidelines is the same as WP:CITE, the paragraph doesn't need both links. Will you add a phrase explicitly saying that citation templates are not disapproved or discouraged in WP:CITE? Gimmetrow 05:30, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

I'm not aware from what discussions you are coming of but I would like to point out some general things. The citation templates emerged from constant repeated requests by some wikipedians. Others find theses templates in all shades of silly, ugly, whatever. So you can't enforce anyone on anything regarding these templates. If article writers on certain article don't want to have citation template calls in that article, then you are done. You can't use them there. On the other hand, if there is consensus to have them in another article, then ok. Just think about the pros and cons of using the citation templates yourselves and do make a decision.

The citation templates are en emerging concept not really completely understood now and there is no wiki wide consensus about whether they are an ultimate solution or not. They just do have some pros and cons like anything else. One thing I can say is, the Germans, which are known for quite a good quality of their wiki refuse to use citation templates. But what do they? Well, the have a red tape list of "instructions" that must be manually followed [2]. Any changes to this list does not propagate to existing citations in their articles. I have read requests on the German wiki for changes to the their format, which wikipedians there said would be good but then they said: "no, we can't change all existing citations and we want to have them consistent so we don't change anything." Well, if you are sure that you do have your rules perfect on first shot, then this might be not such a bad choice.

The citation templates are just a try to encapsulate that set of decisions at a few single places. We can't say yet if this is ultimately the best solution. But we can at the moment neither say it is a completely failed concept. Some say, it should not be used before it is completely thought to its end, super tested and demonstrated that it works in all shades. Well, you all know that then we wouldn't have anything new ever. And we can always go back and replace all template calls with their wiki text. Technically that's easy (We have enough people that can write bots who could do that in a few weeks). But once done, it is done. There is no way back. And that's what I think is a very interesting aspect of the citation templates. Do you know what: they increase the information content of the pages. As ever, the world is not simply black or white. Thanks for reading to whoever may have read thus far. Long live the citation templates! ;-) --Ligulem 09:20, 19 August 2006 (UTC)

Request cite:techstan or cite:techreg

I am urgently in need of a citation template for creating specific cites to particular paragraphs of technical standards, technical regulations, etc. None of the existing templates (that I've found) seems suitable or adaptable for the task. Will someone kindly please point me to where I can learn the process of writing or formally requesting such a template? I am happy to go into detail as to what is needed, if anyone would like to help. Thanks, --Scheinwerfermann 04:44, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

It sounds like you are saying you know what fields it would need. Nothing to stop you from making a first version yourself. I'm sure that if it needs cleanup someone will be glad to help. Place it in category:citation templates. -- Jmabel | Talk 23:45, 16 August 2006 (UTC)

I took a careful look at the templates. I do not understand the syntax to create or modify a template, and while I hesitate to request work from others, I don't want to make problems or create a mess. The closest one I could identify was Template:Cite_paper, though it contains fields I don't need and lacks fields I do. That template looks like this:

 {{cite paper
  | author = 
  | title = 
  | version = 
  | publisher = 
  | date = 
  | url = 
  | format = 
  | accessdate =  
}}

I would want to have fields along these lines:

{{cite techreg
  | agency = '''(mandatory)''' 
  | standard = '''(mandatory unless "title" specified)'''
  | title = '''(mandatory unless "standard" specified)'''
  | shortref =  
  | version = '''(mandatory unless "date" specified)''' 
  | date = 
  | paragraph = '''(mandatory unless "figure" specified)'''
  | figure = '''(mandatory unless "paragraph" specified)'''
  | url = 
  | format = 
  | accessdate =  
}}

such that when filled out like this:

{{cite techreg
  | agency = Transport Canada 
  | standard = Canada Motor Vehicle Safety Standard 108.1 
  | title =  Alternative Requirements for Motor Vehicle Headlamps
  | shortref = CMVSS No. 108.1
  | version = 
  | date = 10/05
  | paragraph = 2.1.4
  | figure = 
  | url = http://www.tc.gc.ca/acts-regulations/GENERAL/m/mvsa/regulations/mvsrg/100/mvsr108_1.html
  | format = online
  | accessdate =  2006-08-16
}}

it would generate something along the lines of this:

Transport Canada: CMVSS No. 108.1 (Alternative Requirements for Motor Vehicle Headlamps) 10/05, ¶2.1.4, online. Accessed 2006-08-16

Or, for a second example:

{{cite techreg
  | agency = UNECE
  | standard = ECE Regulation 112 
  | title =  Motor Vehicle Headlamps Emitting a Driving Beam or a Passing Beam or Both and Equipped with Filament Lamps
  | shortref = ECE R112
  | version = R4A1
  | date = 
  | paragraph = 
  | figure = 3.3
  | url = http://www.unece.org/trans/main/wp29/wp29regs/r112e.pdf
  | format = pdf
  | accessdate =  2006-08-16
}}

producing:

UNECE: ECE R112 (Motor Vehicle Headlamps Emitting a Driving Beam or a Passing Beam or Both and Equipped with Filament Lamps) R4A1, fig. 3.3, PDF. Accessed 2006-08-16

Can anyone kindly assist me in creating such a template?

Thanks.

--Scheinwerfermann 04:20, 17 August 2006 (UTC)

I don't think your "mandatory unless" rules can be enforced, or at least not by a single template. To some extent, you are going to have to settle for there being some instructions and trusting people to show some sanity in using the template. - Jmabel | Talk 23:11, 18 August 2006 (UTC)

That'd be fine. Can anyone help write the durn thing? --Scheinwerfermann 01:43, 19 August 2006 (UTC)

It's best if you get an expert yourself (really! Being dependant on a small set of geeks is a bad thing anyway :-). There are just a few concepts you need to learn. I assume you have understood "template call" {{ name | param = value1 | param = value2 | ....}}. A template call is nothing but an inclusion of a wiki page into another wikipage. The called wikipage can reside in any namespace, so you can start testing your template doing a mockup in your userspace, for example at User:Scheinwerfermann/cite techreg. You can then do test calls for example on [[User talk:Scheinwerfermann/cite techreg. Just call the template like this {{User:Scheinwerfermann/cite techreg | .... }}. Some documentation about writing templates can be found at m:Help:Template. An important concept are default parameter values, which are described at Help:Parameter default. The important built-in template "#if" is described at m:ParserFunctions. Also you can ask questions on my talk if you like (we could for example do a step-by-step dissection of an existing template like template:cite book or so. I hereby give you a coupon for 50 free questions ;-) (really, ask ask ask, silly questions are welcome too). Just ask what part you do not understand of the template syntax. But please try to learn writing templates yourself! --Ligulem 08:36, 19 August 2006 (UTC)

Pages should be cited for books ?

Books can be very long and adding page numbers can be extremely useful for someone looking for precise information (indexes aren't always present or helpful). For this reason I attempted to add a "|pages=", but this does not display and I cannot fix it. I assume that this may be a software bug which someone watching this page can fix. I really think that books should cite pages. --Ben Best 07:58, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

Please have a very close look at template talk:cite book, which currently contains the full documentation for that template ;-). And to be sure, a look at http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Template:Cite_book&action=edit also reveals that there *is* a pages parameter (doc and code might be out of sync by error on templates sometimes). --Ligulem 09:23, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

Ben, I did not see anything obvious in your edit history that pointed to the problem you were seeing (only a use of {{cite journal}} in which "pages" did work.) Could you provide a link to the problem you are seeing? ~ Jeff Q (talk) 09:28, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

The edit I had made and was referring to was to the project page associated with this TALK page Wikipedia:Citation templates. Specifically, I added a "|pages=" line to both the "common usage" and "Example 1 article text". I was mistaken in saying that my addition to Example 1 does not display. It does display, although it displays after doi and ISBN. I think that this is a confusing and inappropriate place for the page numbers to be displayed and I still think that a software fix is called for. I do think that I am right to add "|pages=" to "common usage". Books can be very long and having page numbers can be very useful in finding citations. I had not been aware of the Template talk:Cite book page, which I see does include page numbers. So my issue now is simply whether this should be common usage and the fact that the page numbers are inappropriately placed at the end even when the mark-up does not place them at the end. --Ben Best 16:40, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

I support the inclusion of "pages" in any examples. One critical aspect of sourcing is to provide verifiability, so it seems counterproductive to expect verifiers to read an entire book to find the cited material. I care much less about where it shows up in the citation, because (A) the information is more important than the presentation, as long as the latter doesn't mislead [e.g., confusion over page-count versus cited pages]; and (B) changes in the template affect all uses in articles immediately, so it's a problem that can be fixed independently and whenever the community changes its mind on such issues. ~ Jeff Q (talk) 17:38, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

I just added "|pages=pp.198-203" to Example 2 of "cite books" and (as before) it does not display at all, not in the preview and not now. Maybe if I wait a bit as I did before. The suggestion to add "pp." helps counter the problem with the page numbers confusingly appearing at the very end -- unless "pp." is somehow preventing any display.--Ben Best 18:24, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

Dear Ben, please note that everything that is inside <pre>...</pre> or inside <nowiki>..</nowiki> is displayed literally (it's like a commentary). If you want to change the template call then changing only a commentary doesn't change the call. Your "waiting" worked last time because I fixed your error ;-). So I'll wait with fixing now. --Ligulem 18:34, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

This time, Jeff fixed it [3] ;-). --Ligulem 18:37, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

And Ligulem beat me to the talk-page explanation. Thanks, Ligulem. Always remember, Ben, that for any of these methodology pages showing edit-window use and actual display, both must be edited to keep in sync. ~ Jeff Q (talk) 18:42, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

Yeah, but I admit the wiki-text is really confusing with all these duplicated things (once as commentary and once as actual template call). Also the table adds to the complexity as well. --Ligulem 18:49, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

OK, now I understand. However, the appearance of the pages citation after doi and ISBN is not just due to your editing, it is the result that I got when citing a book reference for Fulminate, and I still think that is the wrong location for giving the pages.--Ben Best 23:13, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

add my templates to page?

Is it OK for me to edit the project page and add my own Harvard templates? Examples of them in use are here. Will add them to page if no one objects in a day or two. Thanks --Ling.Nut 15:46, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

I'm confused what these templates are for. At least one has a pair of parentheses one of which is part of a link and the other isn't; all seem to contain at least one irrelevant link target. I don't know whether the problem is with the templates or the examples given. - Jmabel | Talk 04:53, 13 September 2006 (UTC)

Hi Jmabel, I've seen your name a lot on pages related to Wikipedia:WikiProject Ethnic groups. The templates are for citations (see examples in Taiwanese aborigines or the Homeland section of Austronesian Languages). I'm sorry about the one that has one linked parenthesis linked and one unlinked. There was no easy way to avoid doing that in the logic of the template... On the other hand, I intentionally didn't include page numbers in the links, purely as a matter of logic, since the reference at the bottom of the page is to the entire work (although the passage in context may refer to one or more pages)... I'm not sure what you mean by "irrelevant link target." The examples are the sort of thing one would very commonly encounter in the social sciences. You often run into sentences like "...most scholars agree with the blahblah theory, but a few have raised fundamental objections (e.g. Lincoln, Washington & Adams 2007; Smith 1879)." Please do let me know whether I have answered your questions accurately, because I may not have understood you well. Cheers, --Ling.Nut 05:18, 13 September 2006 (UTC)

Now I see how you are using them; it's not at all obvious from the individual templates. It would be really useful to prepare a project page some place showing exactly how to use these. - Jmabel | Talk 06:26, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

Thanks, that's a good idea. I'm getting into the thick of this semester, so finishing the page may be a little slow... but I can do that. When I get it done, I'll put a link to the example page in the same place as I put the new examples on this project page. Cheers --Ling.Nut 14:13, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

The page is Wikipedia:Harvard citation template examples and is linked from this project page. I anticipate expanding it in the future. --Ling.Nut 04:02, 23 September 2006 (UTC)

Citations for patents

It would be nice to have a template for patents, e.g. patent number, authors, company (if any), when granted, etc. Jpaulm 15:27, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

There seem to be some in category:Law citation templates, which is a subcategory of category:citation templates. --Ligulem 18:14, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for your prompt answer! I used the one that says US Patent Reference, but I found the quotes didn't line up with some other conventions - the name came out in bold, and the title in italics. I hesitate to change the template though... Jpaulm 22:33, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

Evolved Position: Fewer is better. Standardization is better.

I've made three in-text citation templates, but my position on the issue of citation templates in general has evolved. The more I delve into the issue, the more I think that creating citation templates for the text portion of an article is a Bad Thing, and templates for the References section should be standardized to a relatively small (here I'm thinking a dozen or so, not two or three) set of options:

1. There's a great deal of argument going on regarding whether transclusion itself is a Bad Thing. The current profusion of citation templates flies directly in the face of this.
   1. Templates serve a useful purpose within the References section.
      1. Formatting the references in the Refences section is a pain. That's why we need templates to do the heavy lifting.
         1. There should be a limited number, following Harvard and APA styles for regular articles, and the accepted legal citation style for legal topics (e.g., Blue Book.
         2. They should have clear, intuitive, short names.
      2. Moreover, the link in the text needs some to link to, and templates help with that as well.
      3. There should be one and only one page listing their full syntax; one and only one page listing full examples of their use, and one and only one nutshell page of syntax.
   2. But the in-text notes are far easier to format manually: (Blust 1999) or (Blust 1999, Yamada 2006) or similar. These should be made without transclusion, e.g. [[#Reference-Blust-1999|(Blust 1999)]]. (But see related note just below).
2. There's no standardization regarding how the templates link to in-text notes. The Harvard templates link to #CITEREF{{{1|}}}{{{2|}}}{{{3|}}}{{{4|}}}{{{5|}}}. The Cite book template uses id="Reference-{{{last}}}-{{{year}}}. They are incompatible; a Harvard citation cannot link to a Cite book in the references (at least not without using a kluge such as placing a {{note label|}} on the same line as the {{Cite book|}}.I'm not arguing which one is better; I'm saying pick one and stick with it. Standardize.
   1. But in fact, the existing sytems described above are both too inflexible.
   2. The best way is probably to make a field for a custom named id, similar to <ref name="make_up_a_name_and_put_here"</ref>. This avoids the issue entirely.
3. As per WP:CITE, templates should follow established practice, which means they should follow major journals.
   1. Styles peculiar to Wikipedia should be deleted, without mercy.
   2. Following the example of the Disambiguation pages with links project, it would not be difficult at all for a relatively small group of Wikipedians, working at the same time, to repair non-standard citation in a seamless (i.e., invisible to the public) manner.

--Ling.Nut 20:01, 24 September 2006 (UTC)

Radio?

Anyone have any advice for citing radio shows/interviews? --- 164.107.252.198 19:01, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

You can use {{Cite interview}} -- Lost^(talk) 03:31, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

Citing subscription services

Hey, If I want to cite a subscription service for newspaper articles (NewsBank), would I use the {{cite news}} template? If so, would I include the url to the article on the subscription service, or would I act as if it was a print source and not include the url (since probably not many people can access it since most people don't have a subscription)?

Thanks! --Darkdan 22:22, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

You can give the URL as a convenience link, but make it clear that it is a subscription service. The citation should be written in such a way that it will stand up without the convenience link. - Jmabel | Talk 16:34, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

Cite hansard

I think it might be good to have a {{Cite hansard}} for citing, well, Hansard. Would take house, url, date, column - possibly generalise to legislatures whose reports aren't called Hansard. Hansard doesn't fit any of the existing templates well because it doesn't have page numbers, but column numbers. Morwen - Talk 10:18, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

Further discussion moved to Template talk:Cite hansard. Please follow to over there. --Ligulem 13:38, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

Streaming media

Hi, can someone guide me to the right template to be used for streaming media? Thanks -- Lost^(talk) 13:28, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

TV shows

How do I cite a T.V show? and is there a tag I could use?--Lucy-marie 23:00, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

{{cite episode}} — Omegatron 22:32, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

Citing the same source from different places in the article

Is there a way to do that? Copying the same cite to two different places will naturally repeat the source in the references section. — Ravikiran 15:35, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

Yes. When you make the ref, use <ref name="Smith">blah blah blah</ref>^[4] or whatever the author's name is.. here I assume "Smith" wrote the article or book.

If Smith wrote more than one thing,^[5] or there are more than 1 "Smith"s,^[6] you can use <ref name="Smith99">^[6] or whatever.

If you refer to exactly the same source again, I think you can do it either one of two ways:

1. Either repeat the exact same link. Just copy/paste. Actually, all you need is the two tags with nothing in between, after you have accurately and fully made the first reference. You don't need the blah blah blah in between.^[4]
2. Or, if I remember correctly, you just need a single tag <ref name="Smith99" />^[6]...after you have accurately and fully made the first reference.

There's documentation somewhere, but I gotta run... --Ling.Nut 17:22, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:Footnotes#How to use, though I would start with Help:Footnotes. I also inserted examples above and below --Trödel 22:14, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

Thanks! That was really helpful. — Ravikiran 04:08, 2 October 2006 (UTC)

Source code?

How can I cite source code? Visor 22:23, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

Why would you need to do that? — Omegatron 22:26, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

Newspaper

Which, if any, of these citation templates should be used to cite a news paper? TomStar81 (Talk) 21:27, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

{{cite news}} would be my choice. --Cpt. Morgan (Reinoutr) 22:22, 12 October 2006 (UTC)

Thanks. TomStar81 (Talk) 03:49, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

Inline page-number refs while reusing citation templates

I want to place page numbers inline re WP:CITE#Page_numbers and use the appropriate template. For example, on

White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives is this sentence and its ref:

Between fiscal years 2003 and 2005, the total dollar amount of all grants awarded to FBOs increased by 21 percent (GAO 2006:43^[3]).

I've done it this way so that the footnote link can be reused, and the inline page ref is different. (Note that this example references an online PDF, in which a specific page cannot be linked.) Is there a better way to do this? -- Renice 14:04, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

Explicit hand-created superscripts is generally a bad idea, because they are unlikely to be maintained consistently as the article evolves. What you could do is something like:

(GAO 2006:43<ref name=GAO-2006> Provide the footnote text and links here </ref>) on first reference

(GAO 2006:43<ref name=GAO-2006/>) on subsequent references

Another approach is to describe and link the document in a separate references section, then make links like this:

([http:blah_blah_blah.pdf GAO 2006:43])

This gives you Harvard references that double as links to the PDF.

If this is unclear, ask me on my user talk page and I'll try to give more concrete examples.

Jmabel | Talk 06:27, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

Cite Music, CD, LP

Anyone care to recommend how I cite a CD? I'm referring to the lyrics on a track on the CD.

Ashley VH 07:33, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

{{Cite album-notes}}? — Omegatron 22:30, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

AFD - Explanation

An article for speedy deletion tag on the grounds of pure vandalism and a content totally disputed tag were recently added to this page by an anonymous user. I reverted them both on the premis that they were added as vandalism, and that the normal protocol for not deleting deletion tags did not apply in this situation.

If you disagree, feel free to restore that tags.

perfectblue 18:18, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

Citing mailing lists

We're missing a template for citing mailing list archives, and they are cited pretty often in computing/software-related articles. Currently, {{cite web}} is typically used, but I think the {{cite newsgroup}} template should be generalized to also work for mailing lists, as they are very often used for analogous purposes and mailing lists are also sometimes mirrored on Usenet. -- intgr 10:14, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

Only public mailing lists would be acceptable sources, I believe. It should also be extended to cover discussion boards, forums, etc. — Omegatron 22:24, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

Edition ?

Why isn't edition given as part of the citation template of a book? I see edition mentioned once in the archive: Wikipedia_talk:Template_messages/Sources_of_articles/Generic_citations/Archive_01#Book_.26_journal_template_suggestions but evidently this was not taken seriously or (at least) is not being shown in the templates. The edition of a book often makes a great deal of difference when you are trying to locate specific material. --Ben Best 20:01, 3 December 2006 (UTC)

{{Harvard reference}} and alternatively {{Harvrefcol}} handle edition information.--Ling.Nut 20:09, 3 December 2006 (UTC)

PS so does {{Cite book}}, according to its documentation.--Ling.Nut 20:11, 3 December 2006 (UTC)

accessdate

A common description of the "accessdate" param is:

accessdate: Full date when item was accessed, in ISO 8601 YYYY-MM-DD format, for example "accessdate = 2006-02-17". Must not be wikilinked

This leaves a few aspects unclear:

• In the event that it was not provided by the original contributor, what should be done to add it after the fact: should it record the earliest time the page was retrieved (i.e. dig back through the history and find the date the citation appeared), or the most recent time.
• When a webpage indicates it was updated after a retrieved date, is there a standard practise to indicate that the citation is stale. If not, is there an existing appropriate template; something like {{review required|yyyy-mm-dd|The internet resource has been updated}}: ^{[review required]} ?

John Vandenberg 21:08, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

The whole point of an access date is to say that the page was valid and contained the cited content on a given date. If no date was provided by an earlier contributor, then go to the site and see if the info is correct as cited. If so.. then put today's date on it as the last date accessed. Easy.

As for updated/stale, I haven't looked into the "Wayback Machine" yet. Dunno how it works. I'll have to look into that. In the absence of some "Wayback Machine" option; if the info is stale as in no longer exists on the cited page, then I would remove the content and the relevant citation.

--Ling.Nut 21:25, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

I poked around a bit. At the bottom of this page Template talk:Waybackref there's discussion of a new version of "cite web" that covers archived data. But I still don't know how to use the Wayback Machine. --Ling.Nut 21:59, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

If the page linked to no longer exists, don't delete the info and reference. Find another reference or find an archived version of the page. If you can't be bothered to do either, leave it in the article and someone else will. — Omegatron 22:22, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

Table of templates

This must exist. I'm looking for a template that contains a listing of all the parameters of all the other templates, so you can put it in your article, Preview, and copy and paste the bare template you want, instead of opening up a separate page for each one to copy and paste from. — Omegatron 17:18, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

Ummmm, not sure.. but that sounds like something that should be on someone's to do list. Perhaps I can help in a couple weeks, but it's final exams time now. --Ling.Nut 18:08, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

Better idea

If you just type {{cite book}} by itself, it just says {{{title}}}, bceause the title field is mandatory. What it should do is show you the full citation template with all of the possible parameters for copying and pasting. So you'd go:

1. Edit the page
2. Type {{cite book}}
3. Push preview
4. Copy from the preview the full {{cite book|title=|author=... bare template
5. Paste over the original you typed
6. Fill in the blanks — Omegatron 05:19, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

CITE Letters

How do you cite letters like a letter from the President to Congress? Sam D Ware 20:36, 14 December 2006 (UTC)

We don't have a template for that. There are quite a few things for which we don't have a template, and even where we have a template, many footnotes need additional material following the template. My suggestion is that you just make sure that you cite it clearly and unambiguously; if a copy is available on line, your citation should include a link, but it should also read clearly to anyone who does not follow the link. - Jmabel | Talk 06:41, 18 December 2006 (UTC)

Usage of citation templates: some possible suggestions

I've been seeing quite a bit of debate in the wikipedia community recently regarding the usage of these citation templates. It seems to me that about 50% of users love them, and 50% hate them. Personally, I'm not a big fan of them. But I do see the advantages of having a clear and consistent format for handling references. And it's in the best interests of further establishing wikipedia's overall credibility to have a consistent format, and definitely something more than the simple single-link-URL-references that many anonymous editors seem to throw in.

My two biggest beefs with the citation templates are mainly inconsistent date formatting and difficulty of use. The date formatting thing isn't quite as big of an issue now that I've learned to adjust my date preferences in the 'my preferences' menu. This issue is mainly that the default numeric date format (e.g. 2006-12-20) is a bit confusing to non-technical types, and writing out the date (e.g. December 20, 2006 or 20 December 2006) makes a lot more sense to your average reader. Furthermore, your average reader could get confused when reading dates like 2006-03-04 (is it March 4, 2006, or April 3, 2006?). Those of use that understand the YYYY-MM-DD format might not be confused, but I think a lot of people like to swap the MM & DD numbers (european vs. US, for example). Changing the setting under 'my preferences' seems to solve this for logged in users, but I still think it would a good idea to change the default setting for non-logged-in users, which are perhaps the largest percentage of users that read wikipedia.

The bigger problem I have with the templates is their difficulty of use. I find it ridiculously cumbersome to have to remember all of the variables for all the templates, and then put them in. Furthermore, a lot of non-technical users would equate this more with programming, and probably shy away from using them because they don't want to screw up (e.g. forget a comma between variables, put an extra equal sign in, etc). True, you could just open up a separate browser window with a blank template to use for cut-and-paste, and this might work well for intense, active editing of articles. But I think the vast majority of edits are more casual edits; you want to go in, and a brief sentence or two and need to cite your source from the news article you read it in. For that case, it's too cumbersome to have to open up the separate blank template to cut-and-paste from. A reasonable solution here, that would appeal mostly to the non-technical user (but would also make things easier for the techies as well) would be to design some type of widget (pop-up window or something) using javascript or AJAX or something, that would have some fields in it for author, title, and other information, and would automatically insert the correct citation template into the article in the correct format. If something like this existed, I think usage of the citation templates would skyrocket (and you might even convince those pesky Germans to use it over there, too,... hehehe ;-). Until then, the citation templates may only remain in somewhat of an experimental and optional usage.

Any thoughts on this? Dr. Cash 00:39, 21 December 2006 (UTC)

Talking of difficulty, non-techies could (and usually do) use plain old free-format citations in their favorite style, and just rely on more technical editors to convert those for them. I think this should even be encouraged for people who don't like the cite templates for whatever reason. Even if the editor does not enter all the necessary information in free form, it can usually be found from the supplied URL or Google search to make the conversion. I've myself done lots of such conversions, and I'm even starting to remember all the fields and templates without referring to WP:CITET. ;)

I agree with you about dates. While I myself prefer the ISO 8601 date format, dynamically "translating" them to the local or preferred format would be a good idea, especially if the same approach could be applied to, for example, dates on talk pages. However, I'm not sure whether or how this would work with caching of prerendered articles. I would guess that MediaWiki developers have thought of this before and have decided not to implement it for their reasons. -- intgr 08:38, 21 December 2006 (UTC)

I don't particularly like the templates. My biggest beef is that people leave out any useful information that doesn't neatly fit the template. This has been particularly frustrating to me when someone imposes these templates on an existing, well-cited article and throws away information that they cannot easily squeeze into the template. - Jmabel | Talk 04:34, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

Hey jmabel, I know this is a lot to ask, but do you remember specific examples? Some time when I have time (not now) I could fix the templates to include the offending info.

As for dates... I confess to be at a loss to see any problem. A date is a date is a date, and it takes less than a second to interpret any date format, except for the European preference of reversing month and day. [Here insert snide comment about how we reverse the European style, blah blah blah.].

I'm always willing to help with this kind of stuff (if I can), provided (again) that I have time.

--Ling.Nut 15:36, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

I don't think it is readily solved by changing the templates. The sort of things I'm thinking of include:

1. changing a weekly paper that should have a date like 23-29 March to just 23 March
2. throwing away a foreign-language quotation that was a relevant part of a citation
3. throwing away the distinction between original publication and where something was accessed online or (similarly) that a quotation was from one work, as cited in another.

Jmabel | Talk 06:47, 27 December 2006 (UTC)

Substitution

I would say it is highly advisable that these templates should be substituted. Not only are these templated incredibly bulky in the edit window, but there is very little value for them to not be subst'd considering the bandwith issue. I think we should start contemplating making the substitution of these templates mandatory.--Esprit15d (talk ¤ contribs) 13:34, 21 December 2006 (UTC)

I would say it is highly inadvisable that these templates be substituted. Do you have a good reason for them to be? — Omegatron 14:44, 21 December 2006 (UTC)

Oppose: What "bandwidth issue"? Not substituting templates does not incur any bandwidth overhead. I also don't think substituting them would be a good idea, as the templates could not be updated later in that case. -- intgr 14:56, 21 December 2006 (UTC)

Conditional code (such as in the cite templates) often doesn't subst nicely. Just look at most vandal warnings. Gimmetrow 15:19, 21 December 2006 (UTC)

There's a bug filed fro this already. Circeus 16:08, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

One of the primary values of these templates is that if changes are needed to the format, all articles will reflect those changes and maintain a consistant appearance. There is no sense in subst'ing...little good can come from it in this situation. -- Huntster ^{T • @ • C} 20:07, 25 December 2006 (UTC)