Template talk:Infobox election/Archive 4

United States presidential election, 1808
	Presidential election results map. Green denotes states won by Madison, orange denotes states won by Pinckney, light yellow denotes states won by Clinton. Numbers indicate the number of electoral votes allotted to each state.
President before election; Thomas Jefferson; Democratic-Republican	Elected President ; James Madison; Democratic-Republican

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.

Archive 1

Archive 2

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Leader field

Discussion opened at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Elections and Referendums#Who should be listed as a party's leader?. Timrollpickering (talk) 00:55, 9 May 2011 (UTC)

leaders_seat

Should the "leaders_seat" field of the infobox be filled with the seat the leader held prior to the election (of the article), or the seat the leader contested in the election (of the article)? The problem arose where the leader moved to a different constituency/seat. Apparently in Singaporean general election, 2011, User:Strange Passerby insisted that the field be filled with the seat the leader held at the time of the dissolution of parliament, which makes no sense considering it would further confuse the readers as if the leader contested the same seat as in the previous election, when in fact the leader have moved to another seat. The question: is it the seat held as of dissolution, or the seat the leader contested in the said election? 175.139.196.14 (talk) 01:59, 9 May 2011 (UTC)

The seat the leader contested in the election would make sense. 117Avenue (talk) 02:23, 9 May 2011 (UTC)

Filling "leader's seat" with the seat the leaders contested doesn't make sense for the simple reason that it gives the wrong impression that leaders who failed to win election hold/held the seat, and in Singaporean politics, only three of the seven political parties' leaders actually held seats in the last Parliament (and only two do now). To suggest otherwise is misleading. Strange Passerby (talk • cont) 11:24, 9 May 2011 (UTC)

In Canadian federal election, 2008, the leader's seat of the Green Party leader was listed as "Ran in Central Nova (Lost)", hence losing a seat is not an issue of confusion as it can be stated down that the person lost. In Malaysian general election, 2004, the leader's seat of the Democratic Action Party (DAP) was listed as "Ipoh Timur" even though the leader, at the time of the dissolution of parliament, had no seat as he had lost in another seat (Bukit Bendera) in the previous election in 1999. The DAP leader contested the Ipoh Timor seat in the 2004 election, and hence it was stated in the leader's seat as Ipoh Timur. Perhaps the two articles are mistaken? I am willing to dig up more articles that are of similar situation to strengthen my argument that the leaders_seat field should be filled with the seat the leader contested in the said election and not the seat held as of dissolution. 175.139.197.146 (talk) 13:34, 9 May 2011 (UTC)

Also, in Canadian federal election, 2011 two leaders lost the seats that they previously held. 117Avenue (talk) 19:41, 9 May 2011 (UTC)

Several days has passed and User:Strange Passerby has not made any reply, and I assume he does not object. I'll go ahead and make the changes. 175.139.197.146 (talk) 12:51, 15 May 2011 (UTC)

Removing suppression of party colour

At the moment the party colour bar is suppressed if there is no image of the party leader. I was wondering if this could be removed so that in a case where it has been decided to not apply any party leader images within the infobox, as in Northern Ireland Assembly election, 2011, the colour bar would still appear for an easier visual cue? If it still desired that the infobox defualts to this suppression when no image is present, setting the field: "| party_colour = yes" could be used to force the override (where a "no" would display the image and not the colour; and absense of this field would revert to the original default). Zangar (talk) 10:51, 9 May 2011 (UTC)

Sorry, what you are saying doesn't make sense. As long as the party name is provided, the colour bar displays, and even if there is no party, a colour can still be displayed using the colour parameters. I am seeing colour in the example you provided. 117Avenue (talk) 19:53, 9 May 2011 (UTC)

Damn Internet Explorer! They weren't displaying this morning (and I see nothing has changed to the article or the template to allow this)! I see the colours now. Sorry about that, I think I'll make Chrome my default browser now! Cheers, Zangar (talk) 22:07, 9 May 2011 (UTC)

"Acting"

For Ukrainian parliamentary election, 1994 the "before_party" field is set as "acting". The problem is that the template is converting this text into a link to acting, when the intended link is acting (law). Is there some way round this? Andrew Gwilliam (talk) 09:31, 15 September 2011 (UTC).

Fixed - I moved the template the infobox was targeting, Template:Acting/meta/shortname to Template:Acting (law)/meta/shortname. So now the "before_party" field can be set to "acting (law)", which will display as "acting" but link to the correct article. I've made the necessary changes to 1990 election infobox as well. Hope that helps. Cheers, Zangar (talk) 09:51, 15 September 2011 (UTC)

Thank you... and quick! I've taken the liberty to amend the documentation for the template so that mere luddites such as myself will know what to expect. Andrew Gwilliam (talk) 15:44, 15 September 2011 (UTC).

Problem

Hi. I've recently done articles on two by-elections, using the infobox to diplay results. In one (Nui by-election, 2011), everything comes up fine: candidate names, parties, popular vote and percentage. In the other (Tongatapu 9 by-election, 2011), only the candidates and parties are displayed; the popular vote & percentage are entered, but aren't displayed. I can't figure out what's wrong, and what I've done differently between the two. Could anyone take a look and help? Thanks in advance. Aridd (talk) 17:13, 15 September 2011 (UTC)

From the looks of it, it's all to do with the "ongoing = " field. If this is set to "yes" it suppresses the popular vote and percentage output (probably in case it changes in the mean-time). So once you set this to "no" then they will display. BTW - you may want to enter "Independent" politicians as "Independent (politician)" for better article linking. Hope that helps, Zangar (talk) 21:45, 15 September 2011 (UTC)

Ah, thanks a lot! That fixes it. (And I've fixed the "independent" link in the Nui by-election; thanks too.) Aridd (talk) 05:00, 16 September 2011 (UTC)

number of electors and states

Hi, one question: when you go throughout all the United States presidential elections in wikipedia it is easy to find out how many electors voted for each main candidate (field electoral_vote) or how many States carried. But there is no information about the total number of electors or states in each year. (like here with total number of electors) So what do you think about this version:

or to create two new fields (electors_number and states_number):

| nominee1 = James Madison
| party1 = Democratic-Republican Party
| home_state1 = Virginia
| running_mate1 = George Clinton
| electoral_vote1 = 122
| electors_number = 175
| states_carried1 = 12
| states_number = 17

Thanks, --W like wiki (talk) 23:20, 26 September 2011 (UTC)

You could've went with

| electoral_vote1 = 122 (out of 175)
| states_carried1 = 12 (out of 17)

Or include the number of electoral votes needed to win just as what is currently being done on legislative elections; the number of states won is mostly irrelevant anyway. –H T D 06:26, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

possible glitch

When I try to set up a presidential infobox and dont put party, it wont show the pictures.--Metallurgist (talk) 22:44, 19 January 2012 (UTC)

I haven't tested all the permutations, but it seems that if you specify the color parameter the pictures will display correctly. For example, at Republican Party presidential primaries, 2012, changing the Mitt Romney entry (currently candidate1) to include "|party1=|color1=FF333" (note the absence of a hash-mark), the Party line is eliminated for the first row of three candidates, but colors display correctly from either the colorn parameter or, for the second and third candidates, the partyn parameter. (I'm sure it will be more easily understood by later editors if colorn is used uniformly rather than playing mix-and-match).

If you need to display party names for some but not all candidates in the same election, it can be done, but with some caveats:

As indicated above, blanking the party for the first candidate on a row will erase the "party" line for the entire row.
If a party is specified for the first candidate on a row, the "party" line will be displayed for those three candidates.
- If the third candidate, or both the second and third candidates, have no party specified, the corresponding position(s) on the Party line will be blank.
- If the third candidate has a party specified, but the second does not, the third candidate's party will be erroneously shifted to appear as the second candidate's instead.
In other words, it's probably best to list all candidates without parties after all candidates with parties specified.

Hope this helps. Fat&Happy (talk) 02:19, 20 January 2012 (UTC)

Error

If you have two columns, the wrong party is shown in the bottom left. The party from the top left is duplicated. See Croatian parliamentary election, 2011, National Assembly for Wales election, 2011 and Scottish Parliament general election, 1999 for examples. —LiterallySimon (talk) 11:32, 26 January 2012 (UTC)

Fixed two typos. Thanks. Fat&Happy (talk) 16:34, 26 January 2012 (UTC)

Adding a possible county parameter

Hello, I was wondering if there could possibly be a parameter for the counties that are won in smaller elections and primaries, such as the 2012 Arizona Primary to show users more relevant data in place of the "states_carried1" parameter which would not be appropriate for them. 204.106.255.122 (talk) 00:49, 1 March 2012 (UTC)

No Colour Bar, First Party, Second Party, etc.

For some odd reason I'm unable to see the First Party or Second Party label over the leaders of the various political parties in Bahamian general election, 2012. Also how do you get the colour bar below the pictures of these individuals, I'm not seeingit there at all. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Dannyboybs18 (talk • contribs) 10:29, 12 April 2012 (UTC)

The colour1, 2 and 3 parameters are only needed if you are going to override the color bars that automatically appear. Once you put the party1, etc. names in, the infobox will take that and grab the colors from templates. So putting the color parameter in is not necessary if you are using their standard colors. Also, I'm not completely certain you can just use the color names in the colour1 parameter. The template docs say you need to use the hex code (such as #008000). That's probably why it didn't show up like you wanted. Went ahead and corrected it. Thank you. -- JoannaSerah (talk) 16:17, 12 April 2012 (UTC)

As far as the First Party, Second Party, etc. Those do not show up with ongoing elections. This is for when the election is over. The infobox is marked yes for ongoing. Once the results are finalized and the majorities/pluralities are set, then you can mark the election as finished by changing ongoing to no. Once that is done, then it will show First party, etc. Whoever gets the most seats should be moved to party1, etc. Thank you. -- JoannaSerah (talk) 16:32, 12 April 2012 (UTC)

Well thanks alot that definately fixed everything and I also now know how to do this for myself.-- Dannyboybs18 (talk) 19:00, 12 April 2012 (UTC)

Seeking consensus for change of parameter from "presidential" to "individual"

I suggest changing the parameters from "presidential" to "individual," merely to avoid confusion. Is there a consensus? —GoldRingChip 14:39, 28 March 2012 (UTC)

Support: "Presidential" elections apply to races among individuals, who could be running for offices other than President. It's president-like, that's why it's currently called that. —GoldRingChip 14:39, 28 March 2012 (UTC)
Question: So you want to change the types of elections from being "presidential, legislative, or parliamentary" to "individual, legislative, or parliamentary"? I think Presidential is pretty descriptive. Not certain there's a need to change it. What other offices are we talking about? Hmm...I just thought of mayor and governor elections. Presidential might not be the best description for those. Would it be better served, though, by adding another type instead of just renaming presidential? Because it is very descriptive for a lot of offices. -- JoannaSerah (talk) 15:53, 28 March 2012 (UTC)
- Answer: Yes- I'm taking about mayors, governors, senators, popes, whatever. Just not group elections.—GoldRingChip 16:32, 28 March 2012 (UTC)
Question What is the benefit of doing this? The three parameters are essentially switches: the use of the "presidential" keyword puts the template in "presidential 'mode'," where some parameters that don't work for legislative & parliamentary would work now, while certain parameters on the latter two won't work. These have nothing to do with the display or how the template looks like on the screen, of course except on what parameters will be used. If this will be changed, it'll screw up the templates that are currently using the "presidential" keyword, so that's out of the question. Adding a 4th keyword that does exactly what the "presidential" keyword is redundant. So, what's the use? If anything, it shouldn't be even "individual" as an "individual election" means many different things; the correct term should've been "single winner election". –H T D 19:11, 21 April 2012 (UTC)
- Answer: True, it would be a problem with articles currently using 'presidential.' The purpose is only that 'presidential' is confusing and strongly implies an election for a president, not for another office. For example, when I first saw it, I thought it only applied to U.S. presidential elections. Obviously, upon further reading I learned otherwise. Perhaps, if we had a time machine, we'd go back in time and change it to a more logical name. Can you suggest: a) a better name than 'individual'? Maybe 'individualperson' or 'singleperson'? and b) how to overcome a change in parameter name?—GoldRingChip 19:16, 21 April 2012 (UTC)
  - I guess we'd be stuck with this now. The only remedy is to make sure everyone using the template is notified that "presidential" is not just limited to presidential elections; it can also be used for other single winner elections (governors, MPs, mayors, congressmen, etc.) as well. Adding a 4th parameter that is identical with "presidential" won't help and will just further the confusion.
  - The only method I can think of is to find a tool that scans Wikipedia for the instances of the use of "presidential" (there's one), then change it to a new name (if you can use a bot it'll be easy).
  - Interestingly, "parliamentary" and "legislative" are almost identical, save that legislative displays "Majority party" for the party in power/winning party while "parliamentary" displays "First party." –H T D 19:31, 21 April 2012 (UTC)
  - Couldn't this be accomplished through a multi-step process? We could add an option for "individual" that would behave exactly as "presidential" does, change the documentation to change references of the latter to the former, use a bot to change instances of "type=presidential" to "type=individual", then remove the presidential option when the bot finishes. -Rrius (talk) 20:18, 21 April 2012 (UTC)
    - Well sure that can be done, if someone does it... –H T D 03:48, 22 April 2012 (UTC)

Political party shortname templates?

I see that the abbreviation of party names is always determined by the appropriate party shortname template. However, on a page like Greek legislative election, 2012, it would be easier to follow the template if New Democracy (Greece) were called "New Democracy" instead of "ND"; Independent Greeks were called "Independent Greeks" instead of "ANEL"; Communist Party of Greece were called "Communist" instead of "KKE"; Golden Dawn (Greece) were called "Golden Dawn" instead of "CHA"; and Democratic Left (Greece) were called "Democratic Left" instead of "DIMAR". Unfortunately, I don't know if there is any way to make those changes other than to change the respective shortname templates, and I don't know if we need to change them for all purposes, just for this particular infobox on this particular article. --Metropolitan90 (talk) 06:44, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

If you just want to do it on (a) select article(s), add the parameter party_name = no to the infobox in the article, then specify the party1, party2... "the old-fashioned way" with brackets and a pipe. Will also need to specify color1, color2..., which can be copied (without the hashmark [#]) from the appropriate meta template. See Gatton by-election, 1803, which uses the general technique although the problem being solved was different and the pipe used pointed to the template in one case whereas yours would not. Fat&Happy (talk) 19:24, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

US Senate elections for Georgia broken

United States Senate election in Georgia, 2014 has a redlink in the infobox. From what I can gather, the issue is that

| country            = Georgia (U.S. state)

The link of senators is List of United States Senators from Georgia, not List of United States Senators from Georgia (U.S. state), which is how the infobox builds it. — MrDolomite • Talk 21:31, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

Fixed (quick brute force approach). Also, change of type = parameter to one of the only three recognized values was gratuitous, unrelated to this request...). Fat&Happy (talk) 22:25, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

Sometimes, when the world is all nails, one forgets to just use a big hammer to fix one's problems via a WP:RDR :) Thx. — MrDolomite • Talk 03:56, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

ALT text?

It has been brought to my attention that this template does not allow for alt text on the candidate images. I kindly ask that someone add that functionality, unless there is a good reason not to that I am unaware of.

Thanks! ThaddeusB (talk) 03:32, 18 July 2012 (UTC)

This isn't a template issue. The parameter asks for the full file link, prefix, size, and alt text. Just click edit on the article, and add your alt text to the file link like you normally would. 117Avenue (talk) 05:34, 18 July 2012 (UTC)

OK, thanks! --ThaddeusB (talk) 06:25, 19 July 2012 (UTC)

Election without parties

For World Bank presidential election, 2012 describing the candidates and incumbent as "Independents" doesn't really make sense, party politics isn't really a factor in this arena. I'd like to remove these labels, however any fix I attempt seems to also remove the photos. Any advice? Cheers, LukeSurl^{t c} 23:48, 23 April 2012 (UTC)

Fixed. I kept the same color for the bars under the images as would be used for Independents; you can adjust as appropriate (pr eliminate by adding a |party_colour = no parameter to the template). Fat&Happy (talk) 05:21, 24 April 2012 (UTC)

No, sorry, theres no consensus and more so when the editors involved remove it as and when mentioned here.

The article also removes the pics when this is done AND that for the first time there could bbe party affiliation wth th enoomiation of govt ministers. It sets precedence for next election. At any rate, there is not party right now theyre "independents"(Lihaas (talk) 06:25, 25 April 2012 (UTC)).

Restarting this discussion: I was asked to help edit Somali presidential election, 2012. The problem faced is like the World Bank elections mentioned above. There is really no party to list. Putting them in as "Independent" is not exactly correct. Leaving the field blank makes the picture not show up. I would agree with LukeSurl and Fat&Happy that there needs to be a way to leave party affiliation out for those elections in which party affiliation plays no part. And secondly, regardless of whether we keep it the way it is or not, the picture should show up even if the party field is left blank. There's no reason for this and if it is accidentally left blank, the pic should still show up. Thank you. -- JoannaSerah (talk) 18:39, 20 August 2012 (UTC)

That was a very deceptive edit sumary.

Ayway, what needs to happen is a change in coding to allow the pic to show up regardless.Lihaas (talk) 19:31, 20 August 2012 (UTC)

Yes, I'm looking into the coding for the pic. How was the edit summary deceptive? I was just asked to look into editing an article and saw that you can't leave the field blank. Then I saw this discussion here. My edit summary here just summarized my statement that the party field should be able to be left blank. So, what gives? If you disagree, just say you disagree. Thank you. -- JoannaSerah (talk) 20:12, 20 August 2012 (UTC)

I think I see what you mean about deceptive. Really, though, it was not deceptive, the article had just had stuff taken out to make it look like these candidates had no party and that party played no part in this election. I did not realize that users had made incorrect changes in the Somali elections case. I see you have corrected that in the article. Your statement, though, implies that I purposefully deceived users which is absolutely not true. I was just incorrect (and mislead myself) that the Somali election was completely non-partisan. Regardless, leaving the party field blank should show a picture. Will look into that. Thank you. -- JoannaSerah (talk) 20:12, 20 August 2012 (UTC)

It is admittedly quite unintuitive, but leaving party1=, party2=, ... empty and specifying colo[u]r1=, colo[u]r2=, ... for each candidate has the desired effect, as demonstrated in this edit. The party_colo[u]r= parameter shouldn't have been included; it's useless since no partyn= parameter was included. I haven't verified the exactness of the match, but specifying the color as f8f8f8 seems to blend the bar into the background fairly indiscernibly. Fat&Happy (talk) 21:01, 20 August 2012 (UTC)

Or, after a bit more experimenting, I find that using none (or pretty much any word that's not a valid hex color definition) takes the guesswork out of it and displays the picture but no color bar. Of course, you could always just pick your favorite color, but neutral gray seemed a bit more... neutral. Fat&Happy (talk) 21:11, 20 August 2012 (UTC)

I see (Because the if statement is looking for partyn, colorn OR colourn). So yes, you could leave out party but only if you give a non-standard color/colour text. That does appear to work. Thinking about it more, I guess putting "Independent (politician)" or "Non-partisan" in and then change the colors as needed the way you suggest is alright. If party politics plays no part at all, then just listing a bunch of "non-partisans" doesn't really hurt, I suppose. It just doesn't seem that necessary. Thank you. -- JoannaSerah (talk) 21:44, 20 August 2012 (UTC)

Switching the party_colour to no will give the desired affect, rather than trying to break the template with fake colour codes. 117Avenue (talk) 03:43, 21 August 2012 (UTC)

Not exactly.

If party= is specified and color= is not specified, party_color=no will prevent the color bar from being displayed.
If color= is specified, the specified color will display, regardless of party_color= setting.
If party= is not specified and color= is not specified, neither value of party_color= causes the image to be displayed.
f8f8f8, as originally suggested, is as real as any other color code, but happens to be roughly the same as the infobox background.
none is simply easier to remember for the occasional user of the template; it hardly "breaks" the template, it is more of a workaround to ease obtaining the desired result. Fat&Happy (talk) 04:21, 21 August 2012 (UTC)

I must of been thinking about something else, I thought there was a way to do. I shouldn't have replied so hastily. 117Avenue (talk) 02:06, 22 August 2012 (UTC)

Map parameter stretches out the template

Using the map parameter (in place of the more common map_image) seems to have the effect of stretching the infobox so it covers the entire page. Could someone take a look? Thanks. – Arms & Hearts (talk) 02:06, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

Anyone? Please? – Arms & Hearts (talk) 15:34, 15 September 2012 (UTC)

~~Sorry I missed your question before. No need to take a look at this. It is working as it should. You really should use the map_image and map_size parameters, preferably.~~ If you read the instructions on the template page, it shows that the map parameter is for free-form and template coding. If you put an image file in that field, you need to specify the size of the image you put in, otherwise, some pictures could very well take up the whole page. Could you link to what you are trying to fix so we can see what is going on? Thank you. -- JoannaSerah (talk) 18:52, 15 September 2012 (UTC)

Ok, I think I see what you are wanting. You are wanting to use an image map template that you created, {{United States presidential election, 2008 imagemap}}, in this infobox such as on the article United States presidential election, 2008. What is happening is that without a map_size parameter, the infobox is not limited to a caption size and therefore, some long captions, such as on that article, make the image run the whole length of the page because they have nothing to limit them.

I'll test in the sandbox to see what we can do to fix that. The thing is, if we do change the infobox to use map_size with map, then it kind of defeats the purpose of using just map. That field is supposed to be a shortened way to include the map filename and map size in just one field. I don't have any issues with doing that. Just could be some slight redundancy. No redundancy there, really. It looks like it was correct at one point and time. fixed now, see following comment. -- JoannaSerah (talk) 03:05, 16 September 2012 (UTC)

Ok, I fixed it now. It is strange that the map2, map3, etc. parameters made their respective map_captionn use this correctly, but the main map and map_caption did not use the map_size parameter at all. Not sure if this was something that got deleted, but for consistency, I went ahead and changed the live template. You should be able to use that template you wanted to now, but make sure to use the map_size field to limit the caption size. Thank you. -- JoannaSerah (talk) 03:41, 16 September 2012 (UTC)

That's great, thanks (and sorry for not specifying the article). It's now in place at the article (I just left the map_size field as it was, which seems to be fine). – Arms & Hearts (talk) 14:52, 16 September 2012 (UTC)

UK by-election

Unresolved

How should this template be used on Monmouth by-election, 1939? I'd be grateful if someone could fill it out there, then we can use it as an example in the template's documentation. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 22:46, 11 April 2012 (UTC)

Anyone? Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 10:06, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

AFAICS, the solution so far has been to use the Presidential format, as I have just done for the Walthamstow by-election, 1910. (I copied that usage from Bradford West by-election, 2012).

If this is to be the solution, it should be documented ... but I think it's a very poor solution, because the output does not even include a link to the constituency, let alone any info on which parliament the election is for, or where the constituency is located. It would be much better to have a specific format for by-elections. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 12:42, 3 September 2012 (UTC)

Thank you; that's a good work-around, but I share you concerns about its imitations. I'll see if we can get some more input. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 12:49, 3 September 2012 (UTC)

Do we really not have a generic infobox template for polls which do not fit some rigid general election format? That seems astounding to me. If that is indeed the case, give me an idea of what features need added / altered here and I'll see what I can do. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward) (talk) 12:58, 3 September 2012 (UTC)

If ever there was a "perennial favourite" for discussion, it's this. Chris, we don't have a specific template, we use Presidential as a just-in-case for photos. I'd like to bring up into the debate now the issue of WHO to include. Consensus has always been that the summary box shows no more than six candidates in the run up to polling day, listed in the order those candidates' parties finished at the previous election. After polling day, the summary box shows the top six in order of the by-election result. With Mid Ulster, Cardiff, Manchester and Corby all happening on the same day, I'm concerned that editors of a less experienced bent might try to work outside this consensus. doktorb _words^deeds 13:44, 3 September 2012 (UTC)

Chris, many thanks for volunteering to do the templating. We now have hundreds of articles on UK by-elections, plus lots more in other countries), so there is a real need for this.

Here's my suggestions (in no particular order) for what to include in a by-election infobox:

The type office which is up for election (MP/MSP/MEP/Senator etc) and/or the parliament (e.g. Westmister, Scottish Parl, European Parl, Dáil Éireann, etc)
The constituency or electoral area
The number of seats in the constituency, and the number up for re-election. (This is needed for cases such as Stockport by-election, 1920 and Dublin South by-election, 2009)
Date of polling
Electoral system in use (e.g. FPTP, STV, AV)
The geographical location of the constituency, e.g. City, County and Country preferably with a geo-coordinate thingy
A map
The name and party of the officer-holder(s) before the election
The name and party of the officer-holder(s) after the election

To my mind, those are the defining characteristics, and I think we should start by getting them included.

@Doktorbuk, may I suggest that the who-to-include question would be better parked until we have a working template? Or discussed separately, to avoid confusion. I am not persuaded that listing any candidates is a good idea, either before the election or after it, but let's discuss that separately. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 15:03, 3 September 2012 (UTC)

I'd add something about the cause of the by-election (death or resignation of sitting candidate, for instance. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 20:15, 3 September 2012 (UTC)

In principle, I favour including the cause, but it does need to be brief. In most cases that is easily done with the name plus 2 words (cause=death/resignation/expulsion of Sir Bufton Tufton) ... but in some cases the explanation is longer. Before 1926 there a lot of ministerial by-elections, where the most concise statement of the cause will be along the lines of John Simon appointed as Solicitor General". The most recent case I can find is that of George Robertson who was appointed as NATO Sec-Gen in 1999. He did not resign, and allowed himself to [George Robertson, Baron Robertson of Port Ellen be disqualified from the Commons when he was made a life peer].

In cases like Robinson's, it's hard to write a brief statement of the reason. "George Robertson made a life peer" is as brief as I can get it, but by omitting the NATO job that's a little misleading.

So I suggest some caution in using this field. There may be some cases where it will be better omitted. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 08:30, 4 September 2012 (UTC)

Thanks, Chris. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 20:15, 3 September 2012 (UTC)

A thought: rather than trying to add yet another variant to this infobox, it might be easier to create a separate by-election infobox. The coding would be much simpler. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 08:46, 4 September 2012 (UTC)

That's probably for the best. If it needs merged later that can be carried out. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward) (talk) 10:14, 6 September 2012 (UTC)

Is anyone drafting a new template design? If not, I can take a shot at cobbling something together in a sandbox. Once the new layout is agreed we can take a look at whether it can be merged or kept separate. Road Wizard (talk) 17:47, 8 September 2012 (UTC)

If you could, please. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 09:43, 12 September 2012 (UTC)

Any news? --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 13:52, 19 September 2012 (UTC)

I should have time to start digging through the code tomorrow.[1] Road Wizard (talk) 18:15, 19 September 2012 (UTC)

I have taken an initial stab at the template in my sandbox. The current version includes most of the requested details but involves minimal changes to the Infobox election template.[2]

The points requested above that are still missing are the voting system (I think I can hijack the votes_for_election field for that) and the reason for the election (I will probably need to add a parameter). Are there any other additions or changes that you think would be worthwhile? Road Wizard (talk) 20:01, 22 September 2012 (UTC)

Looking good, so far. Thank you. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 09:58, 24 September 2012 (UTC)

Using the votes_for_election field didn't work as it overwrites the seats_for_election field. However, as seats_for_election is a free text field we can theoretically put as much information into it as we want. What are your thoughts on the current version in my sandbox? Road Wizard (talk) 19:56, 27 September 2012 (UTC)

→Any further comments on this? The version in my sandbox appears to meet the requirements above and requires minimal changes to the template. If there is nothing more to add then I will make the edit in the next couple of days. Road Wizard (talk) 20:16, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

Template needs adjusting

A template says,

Democratic presidential candidate before election
John Kerry

It should say,

Democratic presidential candidate in prior election
John Kerry

Please see the discussion at the 2008 primary article. Thanks. Yopienso (talk) 01:17, 17 October 2012 (UTC)

votes_for_election confusing

In the template documentation, the parameter votes_for_election is described as "The number of votes for election and the system of voting (eg. Electoral College)." This is a little ambiguous, but apparently it's supposed to be used for what positions the voters are actually voting to fill (e.g., in the U.S. not the President directly but the presidential electors, or in the U.K. not the Prime Minister but seats in parliament). In the displayed infobox, this information is presented with absolutely no context, making it potentially confusing to the reader. For example, in United States presidential election, 2008, the infobox starts out (formatting notwithstanding):

2004 ← November 4, 2008 → 2012

All 538 electoral votes of the Electoral College

270 electoral votes needed to win

Turnout 61.6% (voting eligible)

[images of candidates, etc.]

When I first saw this, it struck me as very odd. Wouldn't it make more sense if the "All 538 electoral votes" line were labeled something like "Election to determine" or "Positions filled" or... whatever? I think for clarity we need an appropriate label for this information. - dcljr (talk) 00:00, 8 November 2012 (UTC)

Just to correct a minor point there, the UK uses the "seats_for_election" parameter not the "votes_for_election" parameter. Are you wanting to change both or just "votes_for_election"? Road Wizard (talk) 01:10, 8 November 2012 (UTC)

I guess both, since neither apparently provides any additional context. - dcljr (talk) 06:35, 10 November 2012 (UTC)

Additional candidates

Standard use of the infobox is to list the main candidates/parties, but not to list all of them. This is perfectly sensible, but we then see endless edit disputes as people keep adding in minor candidates/parties, and then these get removed again (see edit histories of Manchester Central by-election, 2012, Cardiff South and Penarth by-election, 2012 etc.). Would it be possible to edit the infobox so there's the option of having some small text at the bottom saying "Other candidates are standing" or "... stood" (with a link to the relevant full list in the article)? (This sort of wording is standard practice in the UK media to respect laws around reporting elections.) This would cut down on edit disputes. Bondegezou (talk) 12:35, 10 November 2012 (UTC)

I think the main issue surrounding the infoboxes will always be their attraction to minor party candidates whose IP address army feel that Wikipedia is the best promotion tool out there. I'm aware of dozens of articles whose editing is interrupted by IP addresses determined to add UKIP, BNP and other names to the summary boxes. I support anything which cuts this down. The note you suggest is a good idea, and I support it. I'd go one step further, and I accept this is a controversial step. I would say - explicitly - that the infobox summary is for parties which got 5% of the vote at the most recent election, and 5% at the by-election after polling day. We need to be clear about this - it's a summary box, not a duplicate results box. doktorb _words^deeds 14:48, 10 November 2012 (UTC)

Is this a bug or am I doing something wrong?

I noticed a quirk of this template at Nova Scotia general election, 1984. When I set the parameter |party_name = no, it makes the first column much wider than it needs to be. This happens even if the party names are changed to something much shorter than than the names on the /meta/shortname templates, like a single letter. Does anyone know what's going on? —Arctic Gnome (talk • contribs) 02:26, 28 November 2012 (UTC)

Not sure, but one problem could be the wide images? Plastikspork _―Œ^(talk) 03:29, 28 November 2012 (UTC)

Make sure you are also changing the |before_party= and |after_party= to something short as well. It appears that section is the one that is stretching the infobox when |party_name=no. Thanks! Plastikspork _―Œ^(talk) 03:39, 28 November 2012 (UTC)

The only change I see on your edit is the addition of the Labour colour. 117Avenue (talk) 05:13, 28 November 2012 (UTC)

The before_party and after_party parameters were the culprits. Thanks. —Arctic Gnome (talk • contribs) 02:08, 29 November 2012 (UTC)

Runoff/2nd preference?

Is this feasible? –H T D 15:10, 10 January 2013 (UTC)

Possibly. What, exactly, should show up differently in the infobox? – Philosopher ^{Let us reason together.} 09:27, 20 January 2013 (UTC)

Like this:

CANDIDATE 1     CANDIDATE 2     CANDIDATE 3
PARTY 1-        PARTY 2         PARTY 3
POP VOTE 1-1st  POP VOTE 2-1st  POP VOTE 3-1st
PERCENT 1-1st   PERCENT 2-1st   PERCENT 3-1st
POP VOTE 1-2nd  POP VOTE 2-2nd  POP VOTE 3-2nd
PERCENT 1-2nd   PERCENT 2-2nd   PERCENT 3-2nd

Unsure on whether the 2nd round be on top or at the bottom. –H T D 18:12, 1 February 2013 (UTC)

Update party title

At Liechtenstein parliamentary election, 2013, DU links to The Independents, which is a DAB page. We should probably bypass this to Die Unabhängigen, to avoid the dab. Could someone who knows how this template works do that? Thanks in advance. --Jayron32 05:38, 5 February 2013 (UTC)

Request for help with alliance#=none

Maharashtra state assembly elections, 2009 and Indian general election in Sikkim, 2009 contain |alliance#=none in {{Infobox election}}, which generates a link of [[None|Nonpartisan]]. Since None is a disambiguation page, could someone with experience with this template change it so they links to Nonpartisan (or somewhere other than the disambiguation page)? Thanks! GoingBatty (talk) 03:52, 6 February 2013 (UTC)

Italian_general_election,_2013: "party" v. "coalition"

Something wrong about the infobox at Italian_general_election,_2013: it says "first/second party", but it means "first/second coalition". How to fix it? Thanks--Dans (talk) 11:11, 26 February 2013 (UTC)

I'd say we remove the headers. No reader is stupid enough to note that the first party that they see isn't "the first party". The presidential election mode doesn't have headers. –H T D 16:16, 28 February 2013 (UTC)

Widths

The widths work unless pictures (either candidates'/leaders' thumbs or a map) are added. How can this be remedied? The widths have to be fixed unless the picture forces the widths to be changed. –H T D 10:40, 17 March 2013 (UTC)

Iranian presidential election, 2013

Something about Iranian presidential election, 2013. In the colors section, most of candidates don't have any official color. What we should do? Tabarez (talk) 18:47, 29 May 2013 (UTC)

Remove the colour fields, and add party_colour=no. 117Avenue (talk) 04:48, 30 May 2013 (UTC)

Wikidata can help you!

Hello,

Since the beginning of the year there is a new way to reduce the effort in fill in an Infobox. This new way is use the information stored in wikidata. This new way to work is explain in the Introduction to Wikidata. Let take the example of the Afghan presidential election, 2014. If we compare the 2 Wikipedia articles in English and French, you can see that the displayed information is equivalent, but the useful code is quite simplier in French.

Side by side comparison

fr:Modèle:Infobox Élection générale

{{Infobox election
|election_name = Afghan presidential election, 2014
|country = Afghanistan
|type = Presidential
|ongoing = No
|previous_election = Afghan presidential election, 2009
|previous_year = 2009
|next_election = Afghan presidential election, 2019
|next_year = 2019
|election_date = April 5, 2014
|title = President
|before_election= Hamid Karzai
|before_party= Independent (politician)
|after_election= 
|after_party = 
}}

{{Infobox Élection générale
|encours                = oui
|date_précédente        = 2009
|date_suivante          =
|poste                  = Président de la République
|site_web               = [http://www.iec.org.af/ commission électorale indépendante]
}}

To make that work you have to use the syntax:

{{#property:p17}}

to display the country.

The fields that could be linked to Widata properties are:

country = P17
previous_election = P155
next_election = P156
type = P173
after_election = P991
election_date = P585

See Wikidata:Politics infoboxs task force

Dom.fr (talk) 14:26, 3 November 2013 (UTC)

Documentation requires guidance re which party/coalition comes first, etc

The Documentation for this template requires guidance re which party/coalition comes first, second, etc, in various kinds of election, or at least a Wikilink to where such guidance can be found. (Or if this info is already there it may need better highlighting, as I have spent several minutes failing to find it). The problem, which is utterly commonplace, is that the order is often unclear as different parties can be deemed ahead depending on number of seats (or sometimes local councils, governorships, mayors, etc), number of votes, and whether parties should be treated individually or grouped into coalitions (including catchall pseudo-coalitions such as 'Independents' (which are sometimes formal 'technical groups' in an assembly and sometimes not) and/or 'Others' (for instance 'Others' arguably won the 2014 European Parliament election in Ireland as they got most votes, etc...). The kind of election arguably also matters - clearly when a British party wins an overall majority in the House of Commons despite coming second in votes, it has 'won'(as happened in 1951), and similarly for George W Bush in the US in 2000 (when he lost the popular vote but won in the electoral college). But other cases might be different, as when a US Senate election results in a party retaining control of the Senate despite winning fewer votes and seats, because only a third of the seats were at stake in the election. And so on ad infinitum. Tlhslobus (talk) 21:56, 27 May 2014 (UTC)

The problem is that there doesn't appear to be agreement on who is "first". IMO, for single-person elections, the winner (regardless of how they got there) should be listed as first. Legislative elections are a lot more difficult though, my preference is to put the party with the largest number of seats first, even if they did not form the government, as seats is the ultimate outcome of the vote (although in the actual results table I would always sort by votes). Proper alliances (on the same list) should probably be grouped, but there are probably occasions on which the wider coalitions could be grouped, such as in countries where all the parties split into two or three blocs. Number 5 7 00:01, 18 July 2014 (UTC)

Picture widths

Is there a way to handle issues where one candidate has a picture and another does not? It looks like we're saying that one candidate is more important than the other because the picture makes the space given to the pictured candidate bigger than the other in, for example, United States Senate election in Kansas, 2014. --JFH (talk) 01:19, 19 September 2014 (UTC)

Yes, you can use File:Blank.png and size it to the same as the picture. I've done it on the example you linked to. Number 5 7 12:17, 19 September 2014 (UTC)

Parameter alliance problem

In Swedish general election, 2014 parties 2, 4, 5 and 8 have the parameter alliance#=The Alliance (Sweden). In the infobox "Alliance" only shows for party 4 and 5 (Liberal People's Party (Sweden) and Centre Party (Sweden)). Why is that? Sjö (talk) 20:01, 5 May 2014 (UTC)

I found that the parameter doesn't show for any of the parties in a row when the first party in the row has nothing after alliance#=. Sjö (talk) 08:44, 3 June 2014 (UTC)

I agree; the "alliance" parameters don't work correctly in situations where some, but not all, parties are members of an alliance. If you enter "None" for an alliance, the template incorrectly links to the disambiguation page None. If you leave it blank, it doesn't display at all for the entire row. --R'n'B (call me Russ) 09:26, 16 July 2014 (UTC)

If you enter something that doesn't have an article it displays [[-|Template:-/meta/shortname]]. This is really ugly so it's better to use "None" even if it links incorrectly. I've added that to the Usage section. Sjö (talk) 07:59, 24 September 2014 (UTC)

@Sjö and R'n'B: There is a hidden parameter for this (it wasn't in the documentation) - simply use "alliance_name = no", then manually link to ones that exist. I've just added it to the documentation, and updated the Swedish election article. Number 5 7 08:51, 25 September 2014 (UTC)

Great, thanks. I've reverted my change to the documentation since it's no longer needed. Sjö (talk) 09:37, 25 September 2014 (UTC)

Noprint

I tweaked the noprint feature per Wikipedia:Templates for discussion/Log/2014 October 6, and checked it by using the 'print version' link in the toolbox. let me know if there are any problems. thank you. Frietjes (talk) 17:00, 6 October 2014 (UTC)

What's wrong at Next United Kingdom general election?

The infobox of Next United Kingdom general election seems broken, but it looks the same going back at least 500 versions of the page so I'm inclined to think it must be a change to this or another template which is causing the problem. Can someone help fix it? Thanks. Will also mention this on the article talk page and at PamD 10:37, 6 October 2014 (UTC)

Meant to say "... and at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Elections and Referendums." PamD 21:08, 6 October 2014 (UTC)

@PamD: There have been no changes to the template since December last year. I can only assume something that the template relies upon has been broken by someone (other articles such as Latvian parliamentary election, 2014 are now also broken, having been ok earlier this morning). Can you redirect all the other discussions here so that it can be done in one place? Thanks, Number 5 7 10:55, 6 October 2014 (UTC)

It was a change to Template:Hide in print which I have reverted. -- WOSlinker (talk) 11:13, 6 October 2014 (UTC)

Fantastic - thanks! How did you know? Number 5 7 11:21, 6 October 2014 (UTC)

When looking at an article, the "Related changes" link in the "Tools" sidebar can draw attention to recent template edits affecting the page. -- John of Reading (talk) 11:33, 6 October 2014 (UTC)

Thanks for pointing that out - I had never realised what that was for. Cheers, Number 5 7 11:53, 6 October 2014 (UTC)

@WOSlinker: Thanks - and also for the info about "related changes". Always something new to learn! PamD 21:08, 6 October 2014 (UTC)

Bolding of winners

A recent trend I have observed is for the winners names, parties and votes (# and %) to be bolded. This is largely being done by IPs, but occasionally done by normal editors. Today I reverted one of these changes, asking why this was needed. The response was that it is "standard practice".

Is this the case? Do people agree with it? Personally I think it's completely pointless, but it would be interesting to see whether people share this opinion. Number 5 7 21:15, 17 March 2014 (UTC)

It most certainly is not standard practice. I'd revert on site. doktorb _words^deeds 21:31, 17 March 2014 (UTC)

You might want to see Romanian general election, 1990, as I am not minded to get into an edit war. Number 5 7 22:44, 17 March 2014 (UTC)

Nonsense. The winner is bolded in the articles for ALL elections I have ever read on Wikipedia. This IS standard practice and there is no reason to change that. Zozs (talk) 17:36, 1 June 2014 (UTC)

Seein as Zozs thinks no-one will see this discussion (who'd have thought a discussion about template use would be on that template's talk page!), I have asked for further input from WP:Politics and WP:Elections and referendums. Number 5 7 08:20, 2 June 2014 (UTC)

Uphold standard practice and do not engage in edit war until you achieve wide consensus for a change, in which case you can start making the changes. Zozs (talk) 20:36, 2 June 2014 (UTC)

Seriously? You were the one who made the change, as the article in question didn't have bolding until yesterday. You then repeatedly readded it despite me pointing you here. Why won't you "uphold standard practice" and follow WP:BRD? Number 5 7 21:16, 2 June 2014 (UTC)

User:Zozs I have to disagree. If an editor has done their job correctly, the winner of an election will be at the top of the election template. No need to embolden anything doktorb _words^deeds 03:48, 3 June 2014 (UTC)

So far, 2 people who agree with not bolding any longer, even though on every single article about elections the winner is bolded. When and ONLY WHEN a wide consensus is achieved here, you guys can start removing the bold. Zozs (talk) 04:15, 3 June 2014 (UTC)

Zozs, you may want to look at the hundreds of constituency articles across the UK project alone, adding up to thousands of election boxes, where no bolding has even been entertained. The consensus exists in the fact barely anybody does it doktorb _words^deeds 04:19, 3 June 2014 (UTC)

So-called "standard practice" is a euphemism for "we don't know why." But I say we should seek consensus and change it. Bold makes no sense. Use a check mark, or something that's intuitive.—GoldRingChip 02:17, 3 August 2014 (UTC)

The person/party is already listed as the winner or first party in the infobox - we don't even need to add anything. Number 5 7 17:24, 3 August 2014 (UTC)

Bolding the winner of an election is an affectation and serves no useful purpose. From context and layout of infoboxes it is obvious who the winner is and we don't need our attention drawn to the obvious. Fan

| talk | 22:05, 7 October 2014 (UTC)

It's probably okay for single-winner elections, although the first person on the infobox is pretty much a giveaway on who won (if the election already happened). For multiple-winner elections I'd probably avoid it. Personally, it's handy if the winning president and vice president came from different parties so I'd bold both winners. –H T D 00:02, 28 October 2014 (UTC)

Two-round elections

Would it be possible to add optional parameters called round1_popular_vote1 and round1_percentage1 under popular_vote1 and round1_percentage1? This would allow the infobox to display the information properly regarding elections that take place in 2 rounds. I dare not make the edit myself! Thanks. Abjiklɐm (tɐlk) 00:44, 5 November 2014 (UTC)

Is it really needed? The infobox is meant to be a minimalist summary, and I don't see why this is entirely relevant - it will be in the results table of course. Number 5 7 08:30, 5 November 2014 (UTC)

I think it is relevant. Showing only the second round result says nothing about the popularity of the run-off candidates/parties when compared to all others. Plus it seems the French legislative election articles are already using a workaround to display this information. I'm simply suggesting to have it built into the infobox instead. Abjiklɐm (tɐlk) 10:04, 5 November 2014 (UTC)

But the first round results are in the results table. I would say that figures in the French articles should be removed as they are meaningless/unrepresentative of the general vote - not all constituencies go to a second round, so the figures are highly distorted depending on which seats did go to a second round. Number 5 7 10:45, 5 November 2014 (UTC)

Also, if you really did want to add it to the article, you could simply use the blank data fields! Number 5 7 11:34, 5 November 2014 (UTC)

We cannot remove the figures in the French article. Like in any election, we have to show the popular vote in the infobox. But in a two-round election, not one round is more important than the other. Therefore both numbers are needed. As for your second point, it's true we can use the blank data fields, but that means we cannot parse the information for future use in case we ever need to. It would be more useful to take this information in separate parameters so that we may show them as we wish independently. Abjiklɐm (tɐlk) 23:32, 6 November 2014 (UTC)

We can remove the figures - there's no rule saying we must have them. In fact I had never seen this included in an infobox before, and I have edited thousands of legislative election articles, including many that use the two-riund system. I also disagree with the claim that one round isn't more important than the other, at least in legislative elections. If all but a handful of seats are won in the first round, the second clearly isn't as important. The number of votes in the second round of a legislative election is always distorted by the fact that only some seats (which may have certain voting behaviours) go to a second round. The figures from the second round are therefore unrepresentative of the election as a whole, and their inclusion in the infobox is misleading without context. But anyway, I suggest you post a message at WP:E&R and WP Politics asking for more input. Cheers, Number 5 7 23:45, 6 November 2014 (UTC)

Infobox size

I know that this topic has been discussed on numerous occasions, and it has also come up with the 2014 New Zealand general election article. There are issues being discussed there that watchlisters of this infobox template may well find interesting. Schwede 66 18:57, 9 October 2014 (UTC)

Discussions related to the maximum number of places in the infobox are going on at Talk:United Kingdom general election, 2015, where there are currently 12 parties with MPs elected to the Parliament (plus an independent), and a non-proportional electoral system where the 4th, 5th, 12th & 13th parties by share of the popular vote at the last General Election didn't get representation then, but the 6th-11th and 14th by share of popular vote did (subsequent by-elections have meant that the 4th and 15th parties by share of popular vote now have MPs). This has been made more complicated by changes in support that mean that the 3rd party at the last general election (and junior partner in the coalition govt) have lost most of their support, meaning that in opinion polls they are 4th or 5th. There is a strong argument that the info box used should include as many of the parties currently in Parliament as possible, but satisfactory criteria for inclusion/exclusion in a 9 space info box are proving elusive. If a 12 space info box was available, we might be able to solve the problem. DrArsenal (talk) 10:19, 18 December 2014 (UTC)

Next UK general election

Hello. There's been long-running debate about infoboxes for forthcoming UK elections where we face the challenge of appropriately representing new parties with growing support and where the FPTP electoral system means there is a disconnect between national vote share and seats won. The big challenge at present is the infobox for United Kingdom general election, 2015: there has been lots of discussion on this, but you could start at Talk:United_Kingdom_general_election,_2015#Can_we_agree_on_any_general_principles.3F. Input from more people may help us move beyond our current impasse. I'm curious to hear from those outside the UK, who may be able to bring some new perspectives. Bondegezou (talk) 14:18, 30 December 2014 (UTC)

Transclusion errors

@WOSlinker and Frietjes: The template has recently started appearing malformed on some articles, e.g. Uzbekistani parliamentary election, 2009–2010. I can't work out what has caused this, but presumably it's a recent edit to this or a related template. Can anyone suggest what it may be? Cheers, Number 5 7 18:56, 1 January 2015 (UTC)

@Number 57: it was Absolute98's changes to the associated color templates (e.g. see my fixes to Template:Uzbekistan Liberal Democratic Party/meta/color, Template:Uzbekistan Liberal Democratic Party/meta/color, ...). 19:02, 1 January 2015 (UTC)

Great, thanks for working it out :) Number 5 7 20:29, 1 January 2015 (UTC)

New templates

Over at Talk:United_Kingdom_general_election,_2015#Infobox_again, we faced a problem about this infobox not being suitable for larger number of parties. So some helpful editors have now created {{Infobox multiple party election}} and some others. Thought people here would be interested. Bondegezou (talk) 14:58, 23 April 2015 (UTC)

Registered voters parameter

I see that Impru20 has just added a registered voters parameter to this infobox (see an example of its use here. Is this a useful addition, or just more clutter? Personally I am of the opinion that it would have been better to remove the turnout parameter rather than add another one – it has always seemed a little out of place (an example of it on its own here). Number 5 7 12:58, 25 April 2015 (UTC)

The addition of the registered voters parameter came as a result of a discussion here; basically, to have a "registered voters" field available in case some people would want to use it in election articles (it's modeled on the Spanish and French wikipedia infoboxes, which include both "registered voters" and "turnout" parameters). Personally, I'm for maintaining the two, seeing as those are not compulsory parameters but just optional. Also, because they are being extensively used in Spanish election articles, which are designed on a little bit different way than the Danish example you put in by including not only turnout % but also the actual number of voters (see here).

I believe usefulness does not depend on the existence of those parameters, but rather on the use people make of them. If done properly, they can help to provide quick and useful information to the casual reader. Impru20 (talk) 13:24, 25 April 2015 (UTC)

These discussions really need to happen centrally, either on this talk page or at WP:E&R – very few editors would have been aware of a discussion occurring on a single article's talk page, and it doesn't give a true picture of wider opinion. Number 5 7 13:36, 25 April 2015 (UTC)

Indian_general_election,_2014

The infobox doesn't seem to work quite right in the Indian_general_election,_2014 article. If you look at the text in edit mode, you will see that "alliance8 = ". However in the actual article it shows up as Alliance LF. Basically the cell for alliance has shifted once to the left, the LF should be for alliance9 rather than alliance8.

JS (talk) 20:38, 4 April 2015 (UTC)

interesting, basically we need to generate the empty cells if any of the cells in the row are non-empty. will work on this shortly. Frietjes (talk) 14:59, 12 April 2015 (UTC)

Thank you, I meant to fix it properly but forgot. Alakzi (talk) 15:04, 12 April 2015 (UTC)

we now have a new version. the logic is to simply render all cells in all rows if any of the cells are non-blank, which will fix any spurious data shifts. the prior version is saved in the sandbox for comparison on the testcases page (will probably move this to /old sometime in the next week if there are no problems). let me know if you see any problems. Frietjes (talk) 16:35, 16 April 2015 (UTC)

and again we have a new version. and again, if there is a problem, please post here. Frietjes (talk) 13:18, 3 May 2015 (UTC)

More than 9 parties?

Greetings! Over at da-wiki we're working on an article about our parlimentary election coming up in June, problem is that there are more than 9 parties that are eligible for the election. As far as I can see our Infoboks valg1 is very similar to this template, so I was wondering if any template-savvy users could help us with expanding the template so we're not unfairly excluding any candidates from the infobox. Best Regards InsaneHacker (talk) 11:47, 28 May 2015 (UTC)

You might want to consider whether it is better to create a new version of the template to cope with these types of elections. We have developed one at {{Infobox legislative election}} for parliamentary elections with numerous seat-winning parties. Number 5 7 11:56, 28 May 2015 (UTC)

Thanks Number 57, is the template viable for use before the election has started or is it only post-election? Best Regards InsaneHacker (talk) 12:19, 28 May 2015 (UTC)

Both; if you look at the test cases, you can see it has a function ("ongoing=yes") that will display current seats only. Number 5 7 12:21, 28 May 2015 (UTC)

Independents

I think there needs to be some acknowledgement of independents in a lot of election articles, and one way of doing that would be in the infobox template. Here in Australia there are usually between 1-4 independents in most parliaments, more than some parties have. I thought that underneath the main parties, a list of independents could be added (with perhaps their seat name). This is my crude attempt at a depiction of what I mean:




Red Party Party details Results	Blue Party Party details Results		Yellow Party Party details Results
Independents
MP		Seat
Cathy Independent		Indi
Frank Independent		Seat

This proposal keeps it fairly minimal in terms of WP:UNDUE as they aren't parties. My reason for this proposal is because at Wikiproject Australian Politics there was a recent RfC which ended up saying parties with one seat in the lower house should be in the infobox. Perhaps as an extension independents should be listed (not proposing that as a policy or anything, just suggesting this be added in some form to the template so if it does end up becoming a policy, it can be implemented). Thanks :) - Hshook (talk) 13:31, 23 April 2015 (UTC)

Crickets, crickets. Would love some feedback on this idea. – Hshook (talk) 13:32, 28 May 2015 (UTC)

I think Template:Infobox legislative election would be better suited for that. Øln (talk) 02:41, 30 May 2015 (UTC)

Clarify that the infobox is a summary

I think there ought to be a link to the full results and a mention that it's a summary, like in Template:Infobox legislative election, currently the infobox doesn't give any indication of this. This is particularly an issue with legislative elections, since the infoboxes don't always show all parties that have won seats. The new Template:Infobox legislative election is probably preferable for for elections with multiple seats, but it doesn't have much use yet. Maybe something like "this is a summary, see full results below". Øln (talk) 17:22, 8 May 2015 (UTC)

Since no one answered, I attempted to add it in the sandbox, only for finished elections for now. Does it look okay, or does it add too much clutter? Øln (talk) 21:51, 16 May 2015 (UTC)

I strongly support the concept. Where is the sandbox? DrArsenal (talk) 22:32, 16 September 2015 (UTC)

Should polls really be included in the infobox?

There's a couple reasons I think they shouldn't be.

1). There are separate tables for polls meaning the information is duplicated in the article when included in the infobox as well.

2). This is true of a lot of the information in the infobox, true, but I don't think polls are nearly as important as most other things in the infobox for having a succulent understanding of the elections.

3). Unlike simple facts like other information in the infobox (eg. parties running, their performance last election, date the election will take place ect.) polls are a). not necessarily accurate and b). best looked at in context. When included in tables later in the article they contain equal or more context and/or information than the minimal presentation in the infobox.

4). There seems to be a lot of selective/abusive use of the function. For example, most notably on Australian election pages, editors are including only the most recent poll in the infobox no matter what firm its from. To make things worse, it doesn't even list what firm its from in the infobox! Example here (its done on all Australian election pages just look at the template at the bottom.) While this is not necessarily an argument for getting rid of the function altogether I think it ties back in to the need to look at polls with more context.

5). Also, its ugly in my opinion (although YMMV.)

Thoughts? --4idaho (talk) 15:11, 14 September 2015 (UTC)

Support removal They only appear to be used on a very small number of articles, and there is the potential for NPOV violation if editors seek to use a preferred poll. Number 5 7 15:17, 14 September 2015 (UTC)
Strongly and vehemently agree with the above. Bondegezou (talk) 16:39, 14 September 2015 (UTC)
Support removal It's detail that can easily be taken out of context when it's included in the infobox. Schwede 66 21:01, 14 September 2015 (UTC)
Support removal no individual poll can ever be deemed reliable until out-of-date. DrArsenal (talk) 22:34, 16 September 2015 (UTC)
I guess this refers to the "poll1_date", "poll1_source" and so on fields and not the "opinion_polls" one (which only provides a quick redirect to the section or article in which all polls are shown and is a valuable addition). In that case, then yes, please, I support removal. I've got used to use as many fields as possible of those available in this template, but I have never found any usefulness in those fields. They make no sense, since those only allow for a limited amount of polls to be added (thus potentially violating NPOV, as stated above), and would need to be constantly updated in order to properly reflect reality. But since this would already be done in the opinion polling section of each article, it is useless to have fields like those in the infobox. Impru20 (talk) 19:32, 22 September 2015 (UTC)

Template too wide for small screens

To my mind this info box is too wide when large pictures are used. Is the standard size 160x150px as used in the examples in the documentation?

I first came across this problem on the Greek election page, see discussion at Talk:Greek legislative election, September 2015#Infobox election template too wide

With pics at 170x170px it takes over 50% of the page:

With reduced sized pics at 140x140px, its just about okay at around 50% of the page:

Other examples include European Parliament election, 2014 (United Kingdom) (over 50%), Indian general election, 2014 (worse at around 66%).

It has been suggested that there should be some standard guidelines, rather than individuals articles deciding on whether and how to tackle the problem.Jonpatterns (talk) 18:25, 22 September 2015 (UTC)

As I have commented on Talk:Greek legislative election, September 2015#Infobox election template too wide, and thanks to Jonpatterns's uploading of images to check how does his issue really look, I guess his issue is one related to the operative system in use. I used to have the same "issue" with screen width when I used Windows XP (not only for infoboxes, which anyway did not caused my any real concern, but with tables too (and that did cause problems), then disappeared once I upgraded to Windows 7, so that it now looks like this with pics at 170x170px:

As such, it is not an issue caused by the template itself, but rather, with the screen settings of the operative system. Impru20 (talk) 19:26, 22 September 2015 (UTC)

I have to agree than in many articles the infobox is too large, almost always because the candidate pictures are overly large. Personally I would always try and reduce the width of the infobox as much as possible without forcing text to display over two lines. It's particularly problematic for people with poor eyesight who have to use smaller resolutions on their screens. Number 5 7 20:25, 22 September 2015 (UTC)

In my case, I usually tend to use the 170x170px size for infobox pics because it's the smallest size that allows for reasonably-long text to don't display over two lines (though very long texts will always show in two lines). My basis for the "reasonably-long" standard is based on the "Leader since" field (applied to the longest-written possible date, XX September XXXX). But that's my case.

Others may want to make sure no text is displayed over two lines and increase the pic size to 200x200px (like here), while others wouldn't care about it and decrease it to 150x150px (like this). That, coupled with the fact that many people don't care about the image size itself and tend to use wider pics; I myself tend to crop them to make them less wider but with more height.

There's not an established standard on infobox pic size, and some people don't even care to resize all pics within the same infobox to have the same proportions, resulting in ugly things like this (which spans almost 50% of the article's width on my screen, so guess out for those having smaller resolutions), this or this. Those surely are not the best examples of how to avoid getting unnecessarily and horribly wide infoboxes. Impru20 (talk) 22:36, 22 September 2015 (UTC)

The screen settings aren't a problem its a small screen, the only way to increase width is to zoom out - making the text hard to read. Additionally, blaming the operator seems like poor policy practice - ideally Wikipedia should be accessible to as many people as possible, without them needing to change their hardware or operating system.

Another problematic factor with the Swedish general election, 2018 and Next German federal election articles is that some parties have two leaders.

It would be useful if the proportion of the screen width could be specified, that way it would not be too wide on small screens, but could also be able to take advantage of wider screens. It may be possible using the 'upright' attribute ( Wikipedia:Extended_image_syntax#Size).

Another possibility would be if the left column with Wikipedia could be toggle closed, probably possible with css.Jonpatterns (talk) 09:14, 23 September 2015 (UTC)

I didn't blame the operative system for anything; I only said that it could be the cause of your infobox looking wider, since that was how it used to look to me before when I had Windows XP (and since then I did not change my screen or browser settings, nor my monitor; only the operating system). But I don't think your issue is one that causes a significant harm or one that prevents you (or anyone's else) from doing things like reading articles. As I said, back on its day that was the way infoboxes looked to nearly everyone, and we were used to work with it. Surely, it was easier before as you could change the infobox' width knowing that it would look the same to everybody (not now, yeah). Now we have some issues regarding the infobox' width, in which having a wider infobox causes no noticeable issues to newer operating systems (but does to old ones, as it is your case), but having a less wide infobox does to both new and old (and specially to new, since they tend to look much smaller). Surely, this is an issue that will never find a solution that will please everyone, but one that, in any case, is not of a significant relevance either, as an infobox' larger width does not really affect the article's navigation or readability.

Yes, that is a problematic factor. But adding to it is that there is not a standard either on how to handle the two-leader slot issue. Some people make horizontal pics with both leaders' images, others go up vertical. And size varies a lot. There's not a costume on people here to try to have the leaders' pics "armonized"; this said, on my view this looks much better than this, because pics have the same proportions and fit perfectly with each other. Something much editors simply don't take time to work out.

Your idea on specifying the screen proportion could be interesting, so that it does look fine to everyone disregarding the resolution they use. I have made the test on the Greek legislative election, September 2015 using the 'upright' attribute. Tell me how does it look to you to see if it works. Impru20 (talk) 15:55, 23 September 2015 (UTC)

Thanks for trying at the Greek article. Using the upright=0.55 looks the same as 170x170px for me. How does it look for you?Jonpatterns (talk) 16:01, 23 September 2015 (UTC)

Your 170x170px or my 170x170px? To me it looks a bit larger that my 170x170px. Impru20 (talk) 20:27, 23 September 2015 (UTC)

To clarify, it looks the same on my set up with the images set to 170x170px or upright=0.55 (ie. same as my 170x170px above).Jonpatterns (talk) 09:44, 24 September 2015 (UTC)

Experiment failure I guess. The 'upright' attribution won't solve the issue then... Impru20 (talk) 09:49, 24 September 2015 (UTC)

Monitors, browsers and operating systems

@Impru20:Monitors, browsers and operating systems can all effect how a Wikipedia page is rendered. Currently I'm using a HP vs17, Puppy Linux - Slacko 5.3.1 and Chromium.Jonpatterns (talk) 09:30, 23 September 2015 (UTC)

Answered above already. Impru20 (talk) 15:55, 23 September 2015 (UTC)

Should parties without any seats after the election be included?

Should parties without any seats after the election be included in this infobox? I have seen different usage across Wikipedia. Is there consensus? Like, including only parties with seats in the newly elected parliament. Thanks, Orgyn (talk) 20:05, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

A case for that can sometimes be made, but inclusion would have to be justified. One example is the New Zealand general election, 1984, where the New Zealand Party played a substantial role, and gained over 12% of the votes (which made it the third strongest party), but no seats, whilst the Social Credit Party with 7.6% of the votes did get two seats. To my mind, it would be wrong to exclude the New Zealand Party from that particular infobox. Schwede 66 20:11, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

Agreed. The infobox should capture the important facts about the election. Usually, that's the parties that won seats, but in some cases, a party might have got a significant vote share, but no seats. Bondegezou (talk) 20:55, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

Thanks for your answers. There is a threshold for parties to enter the Greek parliament (3%) and apparently, parties which were between 2.5 and 3% are shown in the infobox. IMO, parties under this low threshold, even with 2.99%, should be removed, as they also rank in the 8th or 9th place. However, I could understand if people would want to keep them. What do you think? Orgyn (talk) 18:51, 27 September 2015 (UTC)

I favour including every party that won seats, and no more unless some specific case can be made. In the Greek case, I don't see that a specific case can be made to include parties that didn't win seats. Obviously, those parties are still in the main results table and can still be discussed in the text. Bondegezou (talk) 20:04, 27 September 2015 (UTC)

Maps

I'm concerned that the inclusion of maps can lead to very distorted impressions, since some of the electoral areas represented in a map can be sparsely populated, thus giving the impression that a party that represents sparsely populated area(s) is more significant than one that represents as many, or more, densely populated areas. DrArsenal (talk) 23:15, 22 September 2015 (UTC)

I'm not concerned about that at all. Schwede 66 18:38, 23 September 2015 (UTC)

The map is useful for seeing who controls which area, aren't he vote percentages provided above? How could it be improved without totally removing the maps?Jonpatterns (talk) 09:47, 24 September 2015 (UTC)

Maps like this could be a solution, although the distortion may be too great in some countries. If it's really a problem, the spread of parliamentary seats (like this) could be used instead of a map. Number 5 7 09:53, 24 September 2015 (UTC)

To give another example at BBC election2010 results there is a 'proportional' option. DrArsenal (talk) 22:45, 24 September 2015 (UTC)

So the solution is to give the option of either 'geographic' or 'proportional' (if technically feasible)? Jonpatterns (talk) 12:21, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

And another UK-based proportional map: Guardian Newspaper 2015 results map — Preceding unsigned comment added by DrArsenal (talk • contribs) 22:05, 11 October 2015 (UTC)