Template talk:Infobox protected area/Archive 4

Propose to link to IUCN protected area categories
I propose to link the text "Category x" to IUCN protected area categories. --Gerrit CUTEDH 14:19, 2 March 2013 (UTC)

Infobox protected area of Australia
Way back in 2011 Infobox protected area of Australia was nominated for deletion but this was not possible as this infobox was not compatible. Droll did some work towards making it compatible, but work on this eventually went nowhere. Recently I looked at updating Infobox protected area of Australia but it's really not as well written as this template so I see some merit in replacing the template instead. In order to do this, as far as I can see, there are two things required. First, implement Droll's changes, which I've restored to the sandbox. Secondly, rewrite Infobox protected area of Australia as a wrapper for this template that can be substed. I haven't done a lot of testing yet, but this solution works in the articles that I've tested. -- Aussie Legend  ( ✉ ) 12:28, 13 December 2013 (UTC)

Deletion notice
I have just removed the deletion notice from this template, as it resulted in an ugly message being left at Sawtooth National Forest, today's featured article. While I understand the utility of such notices, having these kind of template messages at the top of today's featured article does not give a good first impression of Wikipedia. J Milburn (talk) 23:15, 29 May 2014 (UTC)

Too wide and too narrow
The long official URL seems to be pushing out the width of the infobox on Kasha-Katuwe Tent Rocks National Monument, and the notice about the proposed merge is too narrow at the top, creating a mess. Is there any way to fix this? - Gorthian (talk) 06:51, 12 June 2014 (UTC)
 * Aside from technical solutions, you could ask the relevant authority to set up a short, human-friendly URL; say  or even   instead of the current  . Any competent web manager will know how to do this; a good one would have done it as a matter of course.  Andy Mabbett ( Pigsonthewing ); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 10:00, 12 June 2014 (UTC)

Fix for map/coords problem
I have added a line to the sandbox so it uses any supplied coordinates in a location map, as well as any latitude/longitude. See the testcase here: Template:Infobox protected area/testcases and the report by here: Help talk:Coordinates in infoboxes, with some background. Please update the main template from the sandbox with this change.-- JohnBlackburne wordsdeeds 19:40, 17 November 2016 (UTC)
 * Yes check.svg Done I've also done the remainder of the necessary changes needed per Help:Coordinates in infoboxes. —&thinsp;JJMC89&thinsp; (T·C) 20:34, 17 November 2016 (UTC)

Dimension parameters
added dimension to the infobox, which I thought was a good idea. I went ahead and added length, length_mi, length_km, width, width_mi, width_km to the infobox. I also hooked up these (and the area parameters) to Infobox dim so that the Geohack map can produce the correct scale (see, e.g., Dry Island Buffalo Jump Provincial Park).

I would recommend using the unit-specific length and width parameters, instead of the general dimension parameters, so that the map autoscales.

Let me know if anyone sees any problems. —hike395 (talk) 18:23, 23 December 2016 (UTC)
 * hike395, could you add  in infobox dim so we don't have to decomma before passing the values? thank you. Frietjes (talk) 13:43, 24 December 2016 (UTC)
 * Good idea! ✅ —hike395 (talk) 14:28, 24 December 2016 (UTC)

Area parameters
, yesterday you added a bit to the documentation regarding units. In addition to the length/width parameters discessed above, you added documentation about unit-specific autoconverting area parameters. To the 'Parameter descriptions' table, the following was added regarding these parameters: "Area of the protected area, with autoconversion to metric/imperial units. Preferred to using bare area". You are now going page-to-page to 'fix' these parameters.I would like to know how an editor can control the output units with these new parameters. For example, I typically use convert to express very large acreages in both km2 and sqmi, as I had here. Now it outputs hectares only, which doesn't seem as helpful from a reader perspective. At the very least, conversion of large acreages to km2, rather than ha, seemed common practice when I was getting a feel for things, and it's something I've adopted as habit, maybe that's problematic? I've never seen actual guidelines on this.What is the advantage of using these unit-specific parameters, such that they are 'preferred' over area with convert? I'm happy to lose some control over output if there are good back-end reasons for it. Thanks - Antepenultimate (talk) 13:29, 24 December 2016 (UTC)


 * see above. By using unit-ed areas, lengths, and widths, the GeoHack map will have the correct zoom level (click through the coordinates at the top of the page to see what I mean). If you use the bare area, I don't know how to parse the convert template. Without the unit-ed parameters, I believe that the map defaults to 1 km across, which is often too small.


 * You can certainly feel free to use custom convert parameters with area, and manually select the dim or scale parameter in the call to coord.


 * If we can reach a consensus about what the default conversion should be, I would be happy to put that default into the Infobox protected area template. If the area is >100 sq mi, then ha should convert to sqmi? If the area is > 100 sq km, then acre should convert to km2? What do other editors think? —hike395 (talk) 14:53, 24 December 2016 (UTC)


 * Later --- I did a first cut at better formatting for the area, in the sandbox. In the the testcases, you can see large areas (like Yosemite) convert acres to km2, while small areas (like Ocmulgee) convert acres to hectares (0.01 km2). Not sure if this is an improvement --- what do others think? It's technically easy to add sqmi, also, but I'm concerned it will make the infobox too crowded.


 * I'm about to go on wikibreak for a while. We can resolve in 2017: I won't push this to the main template without some feedback. Thanks! —hike395 (talk) 06:05, 25 December 2016 (UTC)


 * Hi, thanks for the quick response and for looking into customizing the auto-conversion! I like the idea and implementation so far, and I'm also very curious to hear from other editors re: what 'cutoff' is optimal for going to km2 vs ha. It's something I've always wondered about.In my own practice, I tend to reliably convert to km2 for areas greater than 1000 acre; this was somewhat based on what I observed in pre-existing articles. (And I mainly work on state-level protected areas, which tend to be on the smaller side.) I'm pretty inconsistent between 200 to 1000 acres, and tend to convert to ha below 200 acre. (I should probably be basing these decisions more on the outputs, rather than the inputs, I'm realizing now. For instance, a lower end of 250 acre would be more justifiable.)However, I'd really be happy to follow other suggested conventions; as mentioned this was mostly based on observation of existing practice but it's hard to say what reasoning existed for those choices. A big part of my problem is that, unlike acres, sqmi and km2, I have no conceptual reference for sizes in hectares, of any size. So while I know that (for example) length for items longer than 100 centimeters are often better expressed in meters, I don't know when the finer scale of hectares becomes conceptually less useful for a reader; it's just not a unit I've worked with in my day-to-day life. I'd be very curious to hear from others. Thanks again! Antepenultimate (talk) 17:10, 25 December 2016 (UTC)


 * If the WP custom is to reliably convert areas > 1000 acres to km2, I'm completely happy to plug in 1000 as the threshold. As you say, the purpose is to satisfy English-speaking readers in metric countries: like you, I'm not the target audience. I found an informal discussion from 2009, but didn't find it very illuminating. —hike395 (talk) 17:30, 25 December 2016 (UTC)


 * That's an interesting discussion, even if inconclusive. At least I know now that I'm not alone in being generally perplexed by hectares, even outside the US, and it also explains why I've occasionally seen very small acreages converted to m2. Thanks for finding that. Antepenultimate (talk) 17:46, 25 December 2016 (UTC)

I went ahead and changed the thresholds to be 4.0 km2 and 4.0 mi2, which is very close to your suggested threshold of 1000. It sounds like English-speaking metric-using readers aren't very familiar with hectares. I figure that if you have a protected area that's larger than 2 kilometers (or miles) on a side, then it makes sense to use square kilometers (or miles), rather than a smaller unit.

The template is live now. As usual, if anyone sees any problem, I can revert. If a problems occurs (or if consensus changes) while I'm on wikibreak, please feel free to edit or revert. —hike395 (talk) 20:21, 25 December 2016 (UTC)


 * Thanks hike395, I really appreciate you taking time to look into all of this. And I'll just re-iterate too that if others have different experiences or opinions about 'typical' use of units for area conversions, I'm all ears. Enjoy your wikibreak! Antepenultimate (talk) 20:37, 25 December 2016 (UTC)

Additional parameters
Hi, I'd like the template to be able to handle the following additional parameters, not least so we don't lose information as we import articles from other Wikis. I'd like to propose that we add:


 * Maximum elevation - elevation_max
 * Average elevation - elevation_mid
 * Minimum elevation - elevation_min
 * World Database on Protected Areas number - WDPA_no
 * Natura 2000 number - N2000_no
 * Special Protection Area area - area_SPA
 * Special Area of Conservation area - area_SAC

Thanks folks. Bermicourt (talk) 18:43, 27 April 2017 (UTC)


 * Shouldn't the numbers/codes of the bottom four be handled by Wikidata rather than the infobox? Fredlyfish4 (talk) 18:49, 27 April 2017 (UTC)

Label and data padding
I stripped out the non-standard extra label and data padding. I noticed it when I embedded this template inside of infobox mountain in Sapphire Mountains. hopefully, this didn't cause any other problems. thank you. Frietjes (talk) 20:50, 3 July 2017 (UTC)

Location map width
Frietjes, could these edits be modified so that a parameter is not passed to the Location map template unless mapsize/map_size/map_width is explicitly specified? The default width preferred by the infobox (284 or 300? Currently seems inconsistent) should be passed to, so that it may be modified by a scaling factor for maps which are vertically elongated. For example, see the following comparison between the current code and the sandbox (where I've reverted the change) for Alerce Costero National Park. --Paul_012 (talk) 21:12, 2 December 2017 (UTC)


 * ✅ --- Thanks for proposing this, Paul. I added your test to the testcases, and promoted your sandbox to the main template. I made a slight tweak to your proposal, using 284 as the default width rather than 300, since that has been the consistent default. —hike395 (talk) 03:40, 3 December 2017 (UTC)

Disestablished and/or dedesignated parameter(s) required
Would someone please add one or both of these. I want to add the date the provincial park designation was rescinded at Sylvan Lake Provincial Park. The designation was rescinded yesterday. Cheers, Hwy43 (talk) 07:53, 19 January 2018 (UTC)

Iucn category
Could someone please add the ability to add a reference for the iucn category. Possibly another parameter "iucn_ref"? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 107.77.209.233 (talk) 22:10, 12 June 2018 (UTC)

Template-protected edit request on 15 October 2018
Please change "World Heritage Site" to lowercase site: "World Heritage site" for consistency with MOS:CAPS and recent discussions and article moves. Dicklyon (talk) 14:56, 15 October 2018 (UTC)
 * Yes check.svg Done &mdash; Martin (MSGJ · talk) 07:33, 16 October 2018 (UTC)

Iucn_ref parameter missing in "Australian place" template
Can someone add the "Iucn_ref" to the ? Please see: Template_talk:Infobox_Australian_place --David Tornheim (talk) 01:23, 30 December 2018 (UTC)