Template talk:External links/Archive 1

Suggestion
I suggest using a div instead of a table, using the styles set in the classes messagebox, cleanup and metadata to match the other cleanup tags. In example,

The external links section for this article is too big and should be toned down. Wikipedia is not a link repository. Please discuss this on the article |talk page.

Just a suggestion. -- ReyBrujo 01:20, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

I think this template is a potentially useful addition, as it's more general than cleanup-spam. In addition to renaming the template as suggested on the WP:EL talk page, I suggest refactoring the template to match existing cleanup templates; something along these lines:

To meet Wikipedia's content policies, the external links section for this article may require cleanup.

This section may contain excessive or inappropriate external links. See Wikipedia's external links guidelines for further information. Please improve the article or discuss proposed changes on the talk page. --Muchness 02:19, 11 June 2006 (UTC)
 * Yes, that looks much better. I would remove the "this external links section", so that it could be used either at the top of the article, or inside the external links section. -- ReyBrujo 02:29, 11 June 2006 (UTC)
 * I've reworded it as suggested. One thing to consider if we use this reworked version is that we may need to rename the associated category from Category:Articles with too many external links. Maybe Category:Wikipedia external links cleanup or Category:Articles with external links sections needing cleanup?--Muchness 03:35, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

Optional date
I have added an optional parameter for the date. shows:

while shows:

I suggest moving the template to, , or something including the cleanup like most of the cleanup templates. -- ReyBrujo 18:29, 11 June 2006 (UTC)


 * I agree with either of the second two options, but is too ambiguous in my opinion – there's potential for confusion with existing cleanup tags like ,  , etc. --Muchness
 * Why isn't the category ordered by month like other cleanup categories are? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Mahanga (talk • contribs) 00:56, 23 October 2007 (UTC)

What is the purpose of the second parameter? Current template isn't affected by the specified date. --219.165.188.51 (talk) 00:13, 15 February 2008 (UTC)

New parameter
I plan on adding a new parameter to classify the "abuse". A numeric value to roughly count the amount of links in the article. If this category becomes big, we can then divide it into several categories. Classification could be minor (less than 10 external links), important (between 11 and 20 external links), major (between 21 and 50 external links) and critical (over 50 external links in a single article). Opinions? -- ReyBrujo 19:48, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

Revised wording
I've started a sandbox page with a revised version of the template which additionally addresses reference spam; that is, the inclusion of an excessive number of non-Web references in an article. A comparison between the two can be found at the test cases page. I believe this version more clearly explains what's wrong with the article and better follows the layout of contemporary cleanup templates. Suggestions? Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 13:21, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

Section parameterization?
I'm no template wizard and I'm afraid to make more than a simple change to this lest something go wrong, but I would like to add a section parameterization on to this template. Just as we have and  I would like to be able to have an  tag that would read something like "This section's external links..." instead of "This article's external links". If there's any template-savvy page watchers here that would be willing to make this change I'd be most appreciative.  Them From  Space  22:40, 20 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Sections other than EL shouldn't have ELs strictly as ELs. ELs in other sections are inline sources for information, and sources should not also appear in the EL section.  Therefore, the reference section template should suffice. MSJapan (talk) 01:29, 16 January 2011 (UTC)

Template:El redirect conflicts with Greek language icon
Template:El redirects to Template:External links and not to the Greek language icon. EL is the official ISO language code of Greek. Unlike other languages where you can use e.g for English,  for German and  for French you have to use  because  misdirects you to Template:External links. Is the redirect actively used? If not it should redirect to Template:El icon to ensure consistency with the language codes. SpeakFree (talk) 12:20, 2 April 2011 (UTC)
 * Discuss at Template talk:el, not here. Amalthea  12:51, 2 April 2011 (UTC)