Template talk:Educational assignment/2008-2013

Date parameter suggested
I suggest adding an optional "date=" parameter so we have some idea of the time period involved. Perhaps it should be the completion date of the assignment; readers will recognize that dates in the future implies that activity is ongoing. (SEWilco 18:16, 30 October 2007 (UTC))
 * Good idea, support - but not sure how to implement.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus 18:58, 30 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Done. (SEWilco 18:29, 31 October 2007 (UTC))


 * It seems if the date option is used, it should use "a" and not "an". "A" would be correct more often than "an" would be if used with a named date (January, February, etc) or a numbered data (4-6-2009, 11-13-2010, etc). I specified a semester for the date when I used it, and "a" would fit better there, too (e.g. "a Fall 2009 educational assignment" as opposed to "an Fall 2009 educational assignment"). However, I don't know if it's possible to make it use one or the other depending on something being defined. --pokasd (talk) 12:35, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

Link documentation
Maybe the documentation for the link should include an example of a link to Wikipedia:School and university projects. (SEWilco 18:16, 30 October 2007 (UTC))
 * Support as above.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus 18:58, 30 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Done. (SEWilco 18:29, 31 October 2007 (UTC))

Category
We should probably create a category that would add articles (or their talk pages) tagged with this template to a category. Any suggestions for the name and place in category structure? --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus 02:59, 5 November 2007 (UTC)
 * This template automatically places articles into Category:Wikipedia articles as assignments. --Geniac 19:06, 5 November 2007 (UTC)

Past projects
While it seems that the template has some if function that is supposed to change the wording from 'currently' to 'was' for past projects after given date, it does not seem to work - I see a lot of past projects with the 'current' wording. I am going to adjust the template, removing the if wording, and making it ambiguous (is or was the subject of...). Feel free to revert me and update the template if you know how to make the if function work properly (maybe its the fault of people adding template to the articles and not providing the correct date parameter...?).--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus 20:46, 25 February 2008 (UTC)


 * It would be simpler to just split this template into a "current" and a "past" one. There could then be two different categories for current and past projects. This functionality can be implemented with an if function, but it won't work if the ending date is not provided. As it will also make the template more complex and harder to edit in the future, I'd support the simpler, two-template solution. What do you think? --Waldir talk 13:59, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

There should be a parameter for was/is so people will know whether it still is part of a school assignment.Smallman12q (talk) 00:54, 2 November 2009 (UTC)


 * I would like to amend EducationalAssignment along the lines in EducationalAssignment/sandbox. The change does away with the grammatical error that occurs when a date is specified – "an 30 June 2010 educational assignment" is incorrect; it should be "a 30 June 2010 educational assignment". I've also added two new parameters called current and in. When " ", the template uses the words "is currently"; otherwise, it says "was". When " ", the template displays "in June 2010" instead of "on June 2010". See "Template:EducationalAssignment/testcases" to see how the sandboxed template works. If there are no objections, could an administrator update the template? Smuconlaw (talk) 17:15, 29 June 2010 (UTC)


 * ✅, looks like a clear improvement. I did some minor changes, like moving the space before the last (optional) sentence to inside the #if, and replace the #ifeq with a #switch, to keep current behavior as default. However, I am not entirely satisfied with the "in" parameter to change the date display. There are numerous date-related templates that can display dates input in quite a few different formats; please take a look at those and see if which of them what can be used here. Also remember to update the documentation. Cheers, Waldir talk 22:55, 29 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Thanks. Yes, I wasn't terribly happy about the in parameter but it was the best fix I could think of yesterday. Will have a look at the date-related templates you've referred me to. Smuconlaw (talk) 18:30, 30 June 2010 (UTC)
 * I've found the handy template date that will convert ISO-style dates into a "d mmmm yyyy/mmmm d yyyy" format, but the problem is how to identify when on (full date) and in (month and year, or year only) should be used. I think the only way is to split up the date and have editors enter the different components separately (day, month and year) so that it is possible to check if a full date has been provided. Smuconlaw (talk) 19:46, 30 June 2010 (UTC)

OK, how's this? One can either enter a full date in YYYY-MM-DD format using date or using day, month and year separately, and adjust its formatting using dateformat. (If using the day, month and year parameters, then the only values accepted for dateformat are "dmy" or "mdy", and the default is "dmy".) If entering only a month and year or a year alone, then the month and year parameters must be used. Smuconlaw (talk) 08:18, 1 July 2010 (UTC)
 * A few comments if I may.
 * Nice work with the template coding.
 * I fear you might be over-complicating this.
 * I don't think dateformat is really needed. Just decide which format to use and stick with it.
 * I think you might find #time a useful function to use because it is very clever and can work out itself which format the date has been entered. That would be easier than using separate parameters for day/date/month.
 * Past/current/future could be detected automatically by comparing with the current time (see Help:Calculation). This would make the current parameter unnecessary.
 * —Preceding unsigned comment added by MSGJ (talk • contribs) 11:39, 1 July 2010(UTC)
 * Will look into the use of #time. However, the main reason for using separate day, month and year parameters is so that the template can detect whether a full date has been provided, or only a month and year or just a year. If a full date is used, then it should be expressed in the template as "on 30 June 2010", whereas if an incomplete date is specified, then it should appear as "in June 2010" or "in 2010". I'm not sure what other way there is of detecting whether a complete date has been specified. Just to clarify: you don't think it's necessary to accommodate editors who wish to have the date appear in a month-day-year format instead of a day-month-year format? I think it would be a good idea to provide flexibility if we can. — SMUconlaw (talk) 13:05, 1 July 2010 (UTC)
 * I understand the problem with "in"/"on". I could look at a way of using #time to automatically detect that if you like. Or alternatively you could get #time to always use the "in *month* *year*" format and ignore the date if it is entered. That might be the simplest - unless you think the date is necessary? About the date format, yes I don't think it is necessary to accomodate different formats. We don't do this in articles, and per WP:ENGVAR all editors have to be familiar with both formats anyway. Usually the first editor who first adds a date chooses the format and then other editors continue using that format. &mdash; Martin (MSGJ · talk) 13:25, 1 July 2010 (UTC)
 * Actually, a full date is only required if an editor wishes to state: "This article was the subject of an educational assignment that ended on 30 June 2010". In other cases, whether an assignment is ongoing or completed, it should be enough to specify just the month and/or year: "This article is currently [or was] the subject of an educational assignment in June 2010". We could structure the template to provide for these two options. On your other suggestion, I had a look at "Help:Calculation" and the ParserFunctions help page but didn't see any straightforward way of calculating whether a particular date is before, the same as, or after the current date. However, I found a possible solution: Gregorian serial date (gsd) converts a date to a number representing the number of days since 1 January 1 AD. Something like this might work:
 * Do you want to give the template a shot before I try something? — SMUconlaw (talk) 14:18, 1 July 2010 (UTC)
 * Do you want to give the template a shot before I try something? — SMUconlaw (talk) 14:18, 1 July 2010 (UTC)

Version as of 16 July 2010
I've tweaked the template in the sandbox. One can either enter a date in yyyy-mm-dd format using date, or using day, month and year ("day" and "month" can be omitted). Note that the month must be entered as a number. dateformat with the value "dmy" or "mdy" can be used to adjust the date format. The template then does the following: See "Template:Educational assignment/testcases" for examples. If this is all right, can an administrator please update the template? Thanks. — SMUconlaw (talk) 17:55, 16 July 2010 (UTC)
 * If a full date is specified using date or day, month and year, the template assumes that the user is specifying the end date of the project and displays: "This article was the subject of an educational assignment that ended on 30 June 2010."
 * If only the month and year, or the year alone, is specified, the template checks if the (month and) year is/are before the current (month and) year. If so, the template displays "This article was the subject of an educational assignment in June 2010." (or "... in 2010."). If not, the template displays "This article is currently the subject ...".
 * ✅ —  Tivedshambo   (t/c) 07:11, 18 July 2010 (UTC)
 * Thanks! I've added a documentation page. Whoops, I forgot to make the template automatically add articles to "Category:Wikipedia articles as assignments". Can you please update the template again based on the sandboxed version? — SMUconlaw (talk) 08:17, 18 July 2010 (UTC)
 * ✅ - if you need anything else doing, leave another editprotected tag on this page, as I'm going out now :-) —  Tivedshambo   (t/c) 08:26, 18 July 2010 (UTC)
 * I think that's it for now. Thanks very much! — SMUconlaw (talk) 08:41, 18 July 2010 (UTC)

Understanding the project is current or when it will end
Currently, if I add a date to the template, the template default to "project has ended on", even if the date is future. If there is no date, it still is "this article is or was the subject of...". Can we add a "current" parameter to the no date version, and make the template understand dates, so if a future ending date is added, it correctly displays "is the subject... that will end on" up to that date, and then switch to "was... has ended on"? --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus&#124; talk 15:30, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

Requested edit
Per Enb where I ask that "Could someone with admin rights please edit educational assignment to point the link to Student assignments to match course assignment. Thanks." Thank you. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. ) while signing a reply, thx 17:27, 29 September 2013 (UTC)

In other words:
 * Please point the link to Student assignments instead of where it's going. Thanks. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. ) while signing a reply, thx 17:29, 29 September 2013 (UTC)
 * ✅ &mdash; Martin (MSGJ · talk) 12:00, 2 October 2013 (UTC)
 * Thank you good sir. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. ) while signing a reply, thx 12:14, 2 October 2013 (UTC)