Template talk:Cite AustLII

Requested move

 * The following discussion is an archived discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review. No further edits should be made to this section. 

The result of the move request was: no objections, so page moved. — SMUconlaw (talk) 10:09, 17 November 2012 (UTC)

Template:Cite Case AU → Template:Cite AustLII – In line with other Legal Information Institute templates such as Cite BAILII, Cite CanLII, Cite CommonLII, Cite WorldLII, and so on. — SMUconlaw (talk) 18:54, 7 November 2012 (UTC)

There were no objections, so I've gone ahead and made the move. — SMUconlaw (talk) 10:07, 17 November 2012 (UTC)
 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

Updates to the template
Hi, thanks for updating the template. Could you also update the template documentation at "Template:Cite AustLII/doc" to reflect the changes you've made? Thank you! — SMUconlaw (talk) 13:58, 22 May 2017 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the suggestion I have used the template for a while, but this is the first I have modified. I have updated "Template:Cite AustLII/doc" & picked up a couple of minor issues from my edits in the template which I have fixed. Let me know if I have missed anything. Find bruce (talk) 02:18, 23 May 2017 (UTC)
 * Great, thanks! — SMUconlaw (talk) 09:37, 23 May 2017 (UTC)
 * wondering if you can help - I am trying to get the template to work like Template:Cite BAILII for the privy council where courtname=auto - ie if juris is blank "Privy Council (on appeal from Australia)" and if juris=Vic, "Privy Council (on appeal from Vic, Australia)", but if you look at the Template:Cite AustLII/testcases it is not quite right. Thanks Find bruce (talk) 09:08, 7 June 2017 (UTC)
 * OK, let me have a look. — SMUconlaw (talk) 22:34, 7 June 2017 (UTC)
 * I made this change. — SMUconlaw (talk) 18:16, 8 June 2017 (UTC)

Changes to AustLII url
AustLII has moved to a new interface. One aspect of the change is that the url has changed - eg Blundell v Vardon used to be http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/cases/cth/HCA/1907/75.html and now resolves to http://www.austlii.edu.au/cgi-bin/viewdoc/au/cases/cth/HCA/1907/75.html While the old address currently still works, do we need to change the template ? Find bruce (talk) 01:23, 24 August 2017 (UTC)
 * It would make sense to do that. Do all new URLs begin with http://www.austlii.edu.au/cgi-bin/viewdoc/... ? — SGconlaw (talk) 01:58, 24 August 2017 (UTC)
 * Doesn't seem to be necessary at this stage - AustLII are still showing the permanent url at the bottom right which is what the template resolves to. Find bruce (talk) 20:21, 4 September 2017 (UTC)
 * OK, then. — SGconlaw (talk) 11:07, 5 September 2017 (UTC)

One change I missed is that the "source=clr" no longer seems to work. eg works, but  gives a server error. Changing it to the new style url such as http://www.austlii.edu.au/cgi-bin/viewdoc/au/cases/cth/high_ct/65clr255.html gives the same server error. Looking at the cases it seems that AustLII now only hyperlink to the HCA reference. An external links search suggests 193 pages are affected, although not all pages use the template. It is beyond my technical knowledge whether there is an alternative to manually fixing these. Find bruce (talk) 11:08, 9 October 2017 (UTC)


 * OK, let me look into this. — SGconlaw (talk) 07:40, 11 October 2017 (UTC)

I updated the template so that all uses of the CLR reference as the only citation now link to a search page on the AustLII website where that case should be the top result. This was the only way I could figure out how to implement this as it seems there is no longer a way to create a URL to a case's CLR reference. Likewise, I did this for the former pre-2003 hcatranscripts URL style which was also broken. All HCA transcripts on AustLII are now accessed via the same URL schema, but without the correct medium-neutral item number (such as in Teoh, where it should be 88 not P20 as it was under the old URL format) the new URL is impossible to determine. Having a search results page seemed more optimal than having hundreds of broken links that can only be fixed manually.

I also updated the HCATrans function to link to the current version of the website  rather than the old , which is in line with the version of the site every other link generated through this template goes to. The content is identical, but the styling of the website has been updated.

The documentation will need to be updated as a result. I'll do it when I get a chance if nobody beats me to it. (Edit: Done!) Kb.au (talk) 15:56, 29 January 2018 (UTC)


 * Excellent – thanks! Sorry, just haven't had time to work on this. — SGconlaw (talk) 17:37, 30 January 2018 (UTC)


 * Thanks kb.au Your work gives a way to search for pages using the template by doing an external link search for http://www.austlii.edu.au/cgi-bin/sinosrch.cgi? which currently shows 50 results, most of which are on the page High Court of Australia. I will begin the manual process of changing these.  Interestingly an external links search http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/cases/cth/high_ct/ shows 88 results, so I will manually change those to template citations. Find bruce (talk) 22:20, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Thanks Find bruce, it's just another example of the benefits of having the citation in template format; even though the links were broken completely we've been able to create some sort of fallback. Updating all those links to templates though won't be a fun job. Good luck! Kb.au (talk) 00:03, 31 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Think I have fixed the references in mainspace. Find bruce (talk) 05:21, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

Need help citing a case
Does anyone here know how to cite this decision of the High Court of Australia using a template? I've tried writing it manually but the square brackets cause a linking problem, and anyway I don't know how to cite it correctly. Any help would be much appreciated. SarahSV (talk) 16:15, 25 October 2019 (UTC)
 * The basic code is . I would suggest also citing the judgment summary which many readers will find more accessible so that the full reference would be   --Find bruce (talk) 18:32, 25 October 2019 (UTC)
 * that's brilliant, thank you. SarahSV (talk) 18:55, 25 October 2019 (UTC)
 * Sorry, I've just noticed that you linked to a different page. SarahSV (talk) 18:59, 25 October 2019 (UTC)
 * Yes cite austlii links to austlii.edu.au.  If you want to link to the High Court website using Australian legal citation style is The Queen v A2 . --Find bruce (talk) 01:28, 26 October 2019 (UTC)
 * , thanks again! SarahSV (talk) 01:30, 26 October 2019 (UTC)

For fuure reference I should have mentioned 2 other ways of getting square brackets without pain - you can use &lt;nowiki>&lt;/nowiki> eg [2019 HCA 35 ] or the html code &amp;#91; and &amp;#93; eg &#91;2019&#93; HCA 35. --Find bruce (talk) 01:56, 26 October 2019 (UTC)
 * , thank you, that's very helpful. There's also Square bracket open and Square bracket close, but I don't think I've ever been able to get them to work. Ditto !(. SarahSV (talk) 21:31, 27 October 2019 (UTC)

Citing Austlii journals
At present there is no template to cite journals from Austlii in accordance with the Australian Legal Style. I have been using a hybrid citation eg (1993) 21(2) Federal Law Review 151. however these are being changed to cite journal which creates an awful mash.

I an thinking of modifying this template to add journals, unless people think that will be too confusing, in which case I will create a new template. Find bruce (talk) 03:04, 16 July 2022 (UTC)


 * Seems to me that it's best to just use cite journal. I agree it will be rather confusing to use this template for articles; the LII citation templates are generally used for citing court cases. — SGconlaw (talk) 14:18, 17 July 2022 (UTC)
 * Unfortunately cite journal does not use Australian Legal Style, which is particularly problematic where the year is the journal issue. Given the potential for confusion I will set it up as a separate template, probably Cite law journal AU, similar to the approach with cite Legislation AU. Find bruce (talk) 01:19, 18 July 2022 (UTC)