Wikipedia:WikiProject Elements/Guidelines

[edit] Article structure guidelines

With a few suggestions for unified phrasings. (Note that the coding of headings is different only for this illustration, the usual article editing guidelines apply.) (_ElementDescription_ is something like: "silvery and ductile member of the poor metal group of chemical elements.")

[edit] Notes on reference links

• http://periodic.lanl.gov/elements/{atomic_number}.html Los Alamos National Laboratory - _ Even though this text was paid for by CA State and US Federal tax dollars, it may be covered by a semi-proprietary license held by the UC Regents and therefore needs to be rewritten so that it passes the Google test (specifically they don't allow for commercial redistribution without permission which is not compatible with our license). The UC Regents claims copyright on most texts at LANL and the 3 emails I sent to them requesting the status of the perio text were never answered. In addition, the LANL periodic table hasn't been touched since 1997 but it has won several awards. --mav
• http://minerals.usgs.gov/minerals/pubs/commodity/{element_name,lowercase}/ USGS _ Statistics and Information This is public domain material and can be copied verbatim but it isn't available for every element. The text may also be under a different name. They sometimes combine entries, such as iron and steel. If nothing comes up, then look for the element at http://minerals.usgs.gov/minerals/pubs/commodity/ .
• http://dict.org (input the name of the element) These databases are covered by more or less public domain licenses. The main thing that is asked for is some attribution (which isn't mandatory but would be nice to have on talk pages). This material is useful when creating the definition/introduction paragraphs.
• http://wwwrcamnl.wr.usgs.gov/isoig/period/{element_symbol,lowercase}_iig.html USGS Periodic Table - _ This is public domain isotope info and can be copied verbatim but it is very technical and usually only the first paragraph or two are useable at all (the focus of the USGS period table is hydrology and we needn't fill our period table with material that is that specialized). Not all elements are included in this source. Several months ago I ported over all the elements that they then had. Since then, however, they seem to have either added more elements to their database or I somehow missed some. --mav

[edit] Reference data pages

Recommended values for many properties of the elements, together with various references, are collected on these data pages. Any changes to the infobox data should be checked against these pages, and/or the available references should be expanded accordingly, so that the decision for or against certain values remains transparent and easily retraceable.

• list of elements by atomic mass — atomic mass, atomic number, symbol, name
• electron configurations of the elements (data page) — electron configuration, electrons per shell
• densities of the elements (data page) — density (solid, liquid, gas)
• melting points of the elements (data page) — melting point
• boiling points of the elements (data page) — boiling point
• critical points of the elements (data page) — critical point
• heats of fusion of the elements (data page) — heat of fusion
• heats of vaporization of the elements (data page) — heat of vaporization
• heat capacities of the elements (data page) — heat capacity
• vapor pressures of the elements (data page) — vapor pressure
• electronegativities of the elements (data page) — electronegativity (Pauling scale)
• ionization energies of the elements (data page) — ionization energies
• atomic radii of the elements (data page) — atomic radius (empirical), atomic radius (calculated), van der Waals radius, covalent radius
• electrical resistivities of the elements (data page) — electrical resistivity
• thermal conductivities of the elements (data page) — thermal conductivity
• thermal expansion coefficients of the elements (data page) — thermal expansion
• speeds of sound of the elements (data page) — speed of sound
• elastic properties of the elements (data page) — Young's modulus, Poisson ratio, bulk modulus, shear modulus
• hardnesses of the elements (data page) — Mohs hardness, Vickers hardness, Brinell hardness
• abundances of the elements (data page) — Earth's crust, sea water, Sun and solar system

[edit] Previous data sources

The earlier guide for acquiring the data included these sources:

• http://www.WebElements.com/ for series, period, block, density, appearance, atomic weight, atomic/covalent/van der Waals radii, electron configuration, electrons per energy level, state of matter at STP, melting and boiling point at SP, molar volume, velocity of sound, ionization potentials.
• http://EnvironmentalChemistry.com/ for hardness (Mohs), oxidation states, crystal structure, heats of vaporization/fusion, vapor pressure, electronegativity, specific heat capacity, electrical conductivity, thermal conductivity, nuclides.

The recommendation regarding which nuclides should be included in the infobox table has been: "Choose all the stable forms and only the most stable isotopes. Please don't include any isotopes with half-lifes less than a week."

• http://chemlab.pc.maricopa.edu/periodic/periodic.html for "oxide is (...)", heats of vaporization/fusion (alternate source).
• http://www.allmeasures.com/Formulae/static/materials/ for velocity of sound (alternate source), specific heat capacity (alternate source).

[edit] Color standard

Table headings all have fill colors that match the fill colors used for that element's chemical series in the periodic table. Their text color is black for elements that are solid at ambient conditions, green for liquids, and red for gases. Color scheme and rationale for the table:

Templates of the form {{Element color/Alkali metals}} are also available to include these color codes.

[edit] Locator map image

The periodic table locator map images at the top of most infobox tables were 250 pixel wide images (naming scheme "symbol-TableImage.png") created from 890 pixel wide images (named "symbol-TableImage-BIG.png", not all available). Later some but not all "symbol-TableImage.png"s were adapted to use the big version directly and let the Wiki software downscale automatically. A set of these images was uploaded to commons:periodic table.

The master image template is media:Perio Table.png. Source images for each period are at media:-TableImage-BIG-Period1.png to media:-TableImage-BIG-Period8.png.

• The font type for the lettering is Helvetica (urw), medium, with unscaled font sizes for the element symbol of 56 and the nucleons of 38, respectively.
• The element highlight box should be black, 2 pixels wide and within the element's box.
• The images for the different crystal structures are at crystal structure and are already the right size for the large image.
• Images of the different shell structures and blocks are already on each of the different period templates.
• No part of the images is in English so they may be usable for many languages.
• You may also notice a single black dot as a guide near where the element's symbol is supposed to go.