Template talk:Cite SEP

Why?
Hi. What is it good for? trespassers william (talk) 20:23, 30 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Uhhh...Absolutely Nuthin! No seriously, it links to relevant entries at the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, (optionally) listing their authors and the date the entry was written, for referencing use.  Skomorokh  20:47, 30 April 2008 (UTC)
 * I'm not stupid (though I don't know Brown). How is it better than a normal link? trespassers william (talk) 21:56, 30 April 2008 (UTC)

I am sorry if my initial reply seemed obvious; if you wanted a nuanced answer, it may have been a better use of your time to phrase your question more concisely. A typical link I would find pre-template would be this hypothetical addition to our article on Perception: Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Note that the entry is actually on the philosophical Problem of Perception, that it was written by Tim Crane, a leading scholar in the field, and that it has not been updated with recent scholarship in the last three years. None of this information is included by the bare link. A reader uninterested in learning about epistemological uncertainties surrounding hallucination and illusion etc. will not discover that that is the content of the linked entry until they click the link; a browsing scholar may not be interested in what she imagines to be a mediocre summation of the topic and will not click the link (oblivious to the fact that it is written by the highly respected Crane); a research student looking for responses to recent work in the field will have to visit the entry before noting to his disappointment that it has not covered any of the controversy of the past few years. This template solves all those issues by listing the link as.

Now you might ask that is all well and good, but how is the template superior from just writing "The Problem of Perception entry at the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy by Tim Crane, March 8, 2005." One possible response is that most users will use their own style ("article" instead of "entry" perhaps, or Crane, Tim (2005) instead of the other format) - and that consistency and standardisation is expected from an encyclopedia written to professional standards. But let's image for the sake of argument that users add links to the SEP in the exact same manner as the template; why then, bother with the template? Firstly, it makes it very easy to format links, especially for users unfamiliar with HTML markup. is far easier to master than "The Problem of Perception entry at the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy by Tim Crane, March 8, 2005." (separations vs datelinks, wikilinks and ex links). Secondly, it is less effort to type (79 characters vs 173 in this example, so a 90+ characters extra to type in general). Thirdly, using template makes it very easy to change something across all articles that link to the SEP; for example, if the SEP were to change its name to the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy Online, it would take less than a minute to make this change across every linked article - as opposed to manually altering hundreds of articles. A more likely example of this might be if the SEP were to overhaul its website so that entries were moved to a different subdomain; this would instantly render all Wikipedia's links to the SEP dead. A minor alteration to the template would solve that problem immediately, whereas manually updating a) probably would not be done b) would take hours even for the most dedicated editors if it was done. Finally, templates are much more friendly to bots and to WikiProject Templates, who have the capability and motivation necessary to monitor usage/update/standardise/correct the template, where otherwise ex links to the SEP would go unchecked. This template makes it easy to form a policy amongst interested editors on how and when it is appropriate to link to the SEP. Hope this addresses your concern, Skomorokh  22:34, 30 April 2008 (UTC)
 * I appreciate the detailed response. I still have some questions, for tomorrow. trespassers william (talk) 23:28, 30 April 2008 (UTC)

trespassers william (talk) 20:20, 5 May 2008 (UTC)
 * 1) SEP has a preferred citation style, referring to archived entry versions. If we decide to standardize things, why not accept it? The situation in wikipedia is a mess, and anything else is a little arbitrary. Even if the link is not used to support anything in particular, but as further reading, the SEP editors do seem to deem the archive as their publication's core. Is linking to it enabled?
 * 2) Relatedly, the date stamp in the template is misleading. Entries undergo revisions, including "substantive" ones. However, there is no indication on the site as to what counts as such, and what is a minor revision. Is there a parameter for substantive revisions?
 * 3) Some links to SEP are part of a footnote (see in Hilary Putnam). Setting the appearance of links in the template might interfere with a footnote's style. We might wish to present links differently in othercases as well (See for example Isaac_Newton, where I added links to three entries, preceded by one SEP wikilink). Generally, if you will press that some parameters are optional (I don't get exactly which ones), it must be asked what will be kept of the uniformity you are looking for.
 * 4) How are people supposed to learn about the template? I saw edits by a dedicated user on my watchlist, which, by the way, weren't completely uniform. Don't you imagine the work with the template like running after good intentioned gnomes who use it in their own way, and users who don't at all? It doesn't look more useful than consenting on citation conventions on WP:PHILO. Anyway, it is appropriate to start a discussion there before using it throughout the all site.
 * 5) Do pages using the template appear on Special:Linksearch? If not, this shows most clearly that the initiative is only of illusory organizational merit.
 * 6) The template code is more strict and obscure, and thus harder to use. Brackets and double brackets are probably the common items of wiki markup, urls encountered everywhere (and copy-pasted). In the template, every misunderstanding, misplacement or typing (more appealing the shorter the text is) is fatal.
 * 7) Your closing point is important. I wonder whether there is a way to recruit the citation templates, philosophy portal pointer or Article Talk-Page Philosophy-Wikiproject Assessment Box to list SEP links without determining their presentation, but I don't really know about these things.

Two changes
I made two changes:

1. Rearrange the author's name just after the title. A citation such as
 * "Foo", entry in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy by Dr. X

looks like Dr. X wrote the whole SEP

2. Made the "Stanford Encyclopedia" part always display, not just when there is an author's name. This shouldn't break anything if this template is used to make an external link, which is what I think all its uses are. Otherwise all that was displayed was the title of the article.

— Carl (CBM · talk) 03:10, 22 August 2009 (UTC)
 * Carl, not sure I agree with your first point – I understand the ambiguity, but this is supposed to be consistent with the other, which are typically of the form "Foo" at/in the Website name. The author and date fields here are optional extras. As to your second point, I don't believe it functioned as you describe – most of the time this template is used it is without authors defined, and it showed up as "Foo entry in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy" just fine. Regards, Skomorokh  10:57, 22 August 2009 (UTC)


 * I realize #1 is more subjective. However, the author name and date are still optional extras even with things rearranged; they are just inserted at a different pace when they are included. Compare springer and mathworld and citizendium.


 * Re point #2, if you look at this diff, you'll see that previously the "Stanford Encyclopedia" text was inside the #if for the author. I noticed this because I went to look to see if change #1 would break things, and I noticed that many pages only showed the title of the article, without saying "Stanford Encyclopdia". — Carl (CBM · talk) 12:41, 22 August 2009 (UTC)


 * On #1, springer looks far more like a citation than an ex link (see above conversation on the importance of distinguishing between the two), and citizendium is not an ex link but an attribution statement. mathworld is an appropriate comparison, but I must (subjectively) object as it flies in the face of ex link conventions (i.e. in the most commonly used templates such as imdb title, Youtube, Facebook etc.). I would settle for compliance with another ex link convention of using words instead of punctuation, i.e. "Foo entry by Dr. X in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, date", again to distinguish from a citation and make it more accessible to the lay reader. Would this be acceptable do you think?


 * On #2, either you're mistaken, I misunderstand you, or we are having different user experiences of the same Wikipedia. I copied the version of this template before your edits to SEP/old. No inputting "", we get " ", which to me reads as "Functionalism entry in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy". No need for author or date to be defined for the template to work. Does this match your experience or am I missing something?  Skomorokh  12:55, 22 August 2009 (UTC)


 * I added some additional text per your suggestion. — Carl (CBM · talk) 14:10, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

Documentation?
Could the frequent users of this template bestow us with some documentation? Like springer has for instance. Tijfo098 (talk) 09:28, 6 April 2011 (UTC)
 * Will have a crack at it, yeah.  Skomorokh   11:06, 6 April 2011 (UTC)

Cite SEP
I have moved the template from "SEP" to "Cite SEP" so that its name is similar to other standard citation templates like and wrappers that use it like.

I have rewritten the code so that it is a wrapper around. Currently it is backwards compatible with the unnamed parameters that were used previously.

Using a wrapper around has the advantage of formatting the output in a standard way. It also means that this template like can be used in a References section and like  can support  templates.

-- PBS (talk) 22:33, 15 April 2016 (UTC)

Please use up-to-date HTTPS URL for the SEP template
The purpose of this edit is to reduce the number of HTTP redirects and to provide increased privacy and security for users by having the SEP template use an up-to-date HTTPS URL when generating links to SEP. For example,  generates a 301 Moved Permanently redirect to   which generates another 301 redirect to. In the SEP template, please change  to   instead. Thanks. --Elegie (talk) 20:46, 12 May 2017 (UTC)
 * ✅ -- John of Reading (talk) 21:09, 12 May 2017 (UTC)

Template-protected edit request on 28 October 2017: add editor-link, and default to Zalta
Please replace |editor-first= |editor-last=    Galobtter (pingó mió) 17:04, 10 June 2018 (UTC)

Template-protected edit request on 29 October 2018
This template addresses main articles in SEP. It does not handle supplements to main articles. For example, https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/school-names/paradoxes.html can only be listed with the  of , but not with the supplement of. This would be a valuable addition.--Caorongjin (talk) 11:17, 29 October 2018 (UTC) Caorongjin (talk) 11:17, 29 October 2018 (UTC)
 * Red information icon with gradient background.svg Not done: please make your requested changes to the template's sandbox first; see WP:TESTCASES. &mdash; Martin (MSGJ · talk) 11:24, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

De-cruft
Please change {cite encylopaedia to {cite encylopedia in this template (like in the other templates}. (See also [Encyclopedia]). --A876 (talk) 04:25, 2 August 2021 (UTC)
 * that's not "cruft", that's just British English spelling, which is acceptable. (See also .) Thank you for your input!  P.I. Ellsworth   ed.  put'r there 12:45, 3 August 2021 (UTC)

Avoid redirecting in this template
Please consider changing "{cite encylopaedia" to "{cite encylopedia" in this protected template; like similar templates already do or have been changed (by others) to. It doesn't suit to have this template (cite SEP) transclude a template (cite encylopaedia) that simply transcludes another template (cite encylopedia). (Yes, this request is for "byp redir".) By chonce or good fortune, Wikipedia uses Encyclopedia, ra spelling acceptable throughout Oceania. ((If you cont, then please create {Template:Cite encyclopædia} for true Wikipædians.)) --A876 (talk) 20:17, 3 August 2021 (UTC)
 * Red information icon with gradient background.svg Not done: as before, this is just the British spelling and is fully acceptable. There is nothing at WP:REDIRECT that does not allow such a usage. Thank you for your input.  P.I. Ellsworth   ed.  put'r there 07:53, 4 August 2021 (UTC)

Consider unprotecting
Please consider unprotecting this protected template.

On 2013-12-20, new editor vandalised this template (while it was still named {Template:SEP}). 26 seconds later, person 1 reverted that and hid the vandalised version. 11 seconds after that, person 2 protected this template. And 66 seconds after that, person 2 blocked "100% noided".

On 2016-04-15, person 3 moved this template to {Template:Cite SEP}: Consistency with other similarly named templates. Protection moved with it. Several (uncounted) similar lesser-used {cite templates are not protected (Cite IEP, Cite bioRxiv, etc.). --A876 (talk) 20:17, 3 August 2021 (UTC)
 * Full-protection-shackle-no-text.svg Not done: requests for decreases to the page protection level should be directed to the protecting admin or to Requests for page protection if the protecting admin is not active or has declined the request.  P.I. Ellsworth   ed.  put'r there 07:55, 4 August 2021 (UTC)

Shortened footnotes
This template doesn't seem to work with shortened footnotes using when year= is used instead of date=, for example:. Is there any way to fix this? --Sangdeboeuf (talk) 05:03, 1 February 2022 (UTC)

Archive links
The SEP itself suggeests a different citation style be used than the one the template is currently using; here for example. One might consider changing the template to allow for that style of linking. Compare this citation for link-style. (To clarify, I am not talking about the web.archive.org link, but the original link being in an archive format already, one SEP itself supports.) JackTheSecond (talk) 16:47, 12 March 2024 (UTC)