Wikipedia talk:Citing sources/Archive 23

Question: Referencing something v. promoting it
This edit has been reverted twice now under an accusation that it is a promotional link. But it is serving a purpose of referencing the claim that goes before it. Is it possible that the removing user is being a bit over zealous in their enforcement of the rules, or is it that the including user (i.e. me) should find a different way to reference that statement? -- Roleplayer (talk) 11:16, 17 March 2008 (UTC)
 * To the extent that there is no other source for the claim, it may not be worth including. The company's own site is obviously not a great source for referencing the quality of its product. Christopher Parham (talk) 11:31, 17 March 2008 (UTC)

Archive moves and indexing, okay to set up?
Would it be agreeable to everyone to: Not to sound lazy but 21 archives is a lot to sift through. I would think the previous suggestion of splitting discussion into sub-pages would get unwieldy to maintain. -Optigan13 (talk) 07:09, 19 March 2008 (UTC)
 * 1) Move the archive pages to a standardized Talk:Citing sources/Archive <#> name;
 * 2) set up indexing of this page using User:HBC Archive Indexerbot;
 * 3) change the auto-archiving config to the more standard format by capitalizing the word Archive, and adding a space between the archive and the digits;
 * 4) changing the archive box to auto(Requires the page moves), and adding an auto archiving notice.
 * Why not just switch to yearly archives and combine the old ones as needed? Vegaswikian (talk) 07:34, 19 March 2008 (UTC)
 * The page is already archived by Miszabot. It doesn't matter to me, but why change? Gimmetrow 07:53, 19 March 2008 (UTC)


 * The indexing is the main thing I'm looking for, changing the archives to some consistent naming just makes it easier for setting up the mask. The same is true for not archiving based on year. Also looking at comments above where the same topic seems to come up repeatedly it helps to see the previous discussions on the index without having to load them all up on the latest discussion, or to simply title the conversation Topic Name(Part II), and the previous ones would be found based on naming. I find auto-indexing to be helpful and complementary to auto-archiving. -Optigan13 (talk) 08:43, 19 March 2008 (UTC)


 * Sounds like a great idea to me. Although Google searches can provide some of this information, I'd much rather have indexed keywords from the archives available here.  I regularly comb the archives and find out that the few words that made it onto the project page can't be understood properly without the context. - Dan Dank55 (talk) 19:42, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

STYLE1.0
Version 0.7 decisions are being made now, and the printed and DVD Wikipedia Version 1.0 is not that far off. Wikipedians don't have absolute discretion in formatting decisions (where the periods should go, where the lines should break, end section format, etc) in the printed version; there's also the publisher to deal with. Why formatting decisions in the printed version might affect Wikipedia style guidelines is a bit complicated (short answer: "Jimbo said so"), so anyone interested in either is encouraged to join the discussion at WT:STYLE1.0. Some of the discussions above do seem to involve these kinds of issues. - Dan Dank55 (talk) 18:34, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

Question on how to deal with citation issues
Please note the following discussion http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Divine_Science#References_were_deleted

Wouldn't the correct procedure be to leave the citations in place, flag the article for cleanup (not sure what tag) and then wait a reasonable amount of time for the editor to correct his/her own error? Low Sea (talk) 20:20, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

Non-print references
Can it be appropriate to cite a documentary? If so, can someone point me to a good example that I can emulate? Mingusboodle (talk) 16:40, 21 March 2008 (UTC)


 * Of course you can cite a documentary, if the publisher is reliable. The format of the citation should be in the same family as the citations already in the article; which article are you thinking of adding the citation to? --Gerry Ashton (talk) 17:00, 21 March 2008 (UTC)


 * It's important to distinguish between factual material present in the documentary and the editorial material that accompanies it. Both may be of value to articles but they need to be presented differently in articles. Christopher Parham (talk) 21:01, 21 March 2008 (UTC)

Over-referencing
Is there such a thing as over-referencing? The article which inclines me to ask is smokeasy, which currently has more than seventy references for a ~1-page article. Any advice on how to approach this, or is it OK as is? — Epastore (talk) 02:50, 21 March 2008 (UTC)
 * Yes, there is such a thing as over-referencing. See Featured article candidates/Horace François Bastien Sébastiani de La Porta/archive1. It would help to collect all the notes to the same text into one long note, by taking out the tags between them; at that point you can see where the documentation is repetitive. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 03:01, 21 March 2008 (UTC)
 * For reference here is Horace François Bastien Sébastiani de La Porta at the time of the FAC nomination. -Optigan13 (talk) 04:09, 21 March 2008 (UTC)
 * The references haven't changed much: chiefly by consolidating references to the same page in consecutive sentences, which is also a good thing; but that's not smokeasy's problem. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 14:40, 21 March 2008 (UTC)
 * My gut reaction on seeing a long list of references isn't "They must go" but "What is really going on here?" Clearly, the idea in smokeasy, from the word itself and from the number of references, is to draw a parallel to Prohibition (both inside and outside the U.S.).  In a sense, the number of references itself, if taken to an extreme, could be considered a kind of POV-pushing.  I don't have an argument with the article; I'm just saying that it's an interesting take on the signficance of the number of references.  Another interesting situation is the 84 references at Robot, where the number of references and size of the article reflects the fact that the article itself has become kind of a "hangout" for a certain group, and a prime target of people who want to add wikilinks to their favorite article.  For those and other reasons, people were not willing to break up the article when I suggested it a couple of months ago, and given the size and scope of the article, the references are well-chosen. - Dan Dank55 (talk) 18:14, 21 March 2008 (UTC)
 * First to recite the credo: The authority of Wikipedia comes from the authority of its sources. I'd like to see two reliable sources for every sentence in Wikipedia, but that's just me. There are literally millions of sentences in wikipedia that should be sourced but aren't. Who cares if there are a couple of sentences that have six or ten sources? I think we should give the article a medal of some kind.


 * Having said that, I would consolidate the big sets of footnotes (you know,  etc.) into a single footnote. It's prettier and easier to read.  CharlesGillingham (talk) 07:34, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

yes Blogs Again
As Blogs become more ubiquitous perhaps wikipedia could consider other exceptions than just the "under the direct supervision of a newspaper".

There is a situation going on right now where we have an AfD on a holiday. One of the many claims made by the nominator is that "I don't know if this is a 'holiday' that's just celebrated by three guys in a room."

A check of Google show 3,550 entries for the days' name, easily refuting that statement. However given that it is an annual holiday celebration, many of the entries are now being placed in Blogs -- either listings local events or of individuals commenting on their plans for the day. Without violating wikipedia policy that Blogs are not to be used as a reference is there some way to dig our way out of this quandary?

Especially given that the nominator explicitly did not assert that there were no references that might easily be found, just that they had not been used as references. BiAndBi (talk) 23:49, 22 March 2008 (UTC)
 * Well I think the idea is, if all the mentions are in blogs that don't have some special claim to credibility, then this doesn't really meet a solid level of reliability. Looking at the article, however, it seems that some non-blog sources have been discovered, so I don't quite understand the "quandry" -- if anything this is an AFD where the system worked and the article will, correctly, be kept. Christopher Parham (talk) 23:59, 22 March 2008 (UTC)
 * While I of course Assume good faith on the part of the nominator, I am guessing that should the article survive the AfD process soon Citation needed tags will be blossoming across the articles text. Especially where there is a statement that the holiday is widely celebrated and lists several countries/continents.  Just trying to get ahead of that eventuality. BiAndBi (talk) 00:12, 23 March 2008 (UTC)


 * Incidentally, it would make more sense to raise this issue at Wikipedia talk:Reliable sources. Christopher Parham (talk) 00:00, 23 March 2008 (UTC)
 * Oh sorry, Should I just re-enter the question verbatim over there? Should this one be left and just a pointer be put in?  How should I move it over there correctly? BiAndBi (talk) 00:12, 23 March 2008 (UTC)
 * You could just raise the same question there, and indicate here that the discussion is taking place elsewhere. Christopher Parham (talk) 00:14, 23 March 2008 (UTC)
 * As suggested have reintroduced the topic over at Reliable sources - yes Blogs Again BiAndBi (talk) 00:56, 23 March 2008 (UTC)

How to cite quotes of quotes?
I am the primary contributor to Michael Sinclair (British Army officer). I haven't worked on the article for quite a while but am trying to get back into it, and I have a question.

I have been going to great length to cite everything I write in the article, using the two books I have available about the subject. In order to make it easier for people to verify the information, I have included short snippets of the sections being quoted. This is particularly important since one of the books (Colditz / The Latter Days) has been published in numerous editions, originally as two books but later as one combined volume. The page numbers that I cite will not be valid for most editions.

I have indicated quotes from the books in italics and, in the cases where I am quoting a quotation in the book, I also enclose it in quotation marks. Someone mentioned that I should enclose all the quotes in quotation marks to indicate that they are quotes from the book, but then how would I indicate a quote of a quote? Two sets of quotations marks just doesn't look right to me.

Sorry about the excessive use of the word "quote" in this post, but there was no other way of putting it ;). Any ideas or comments?

Qarnos (talk) 11:05, 29 March 2008 (UTC)


 * Try WP:PUNC, top of that section, and also WP:MOSQUOTE, and see if that covers it. - Dan Dank55 (talk) 12:55, 29 March 2008 (UTC)

Citation and other citation templates
I have a problem with the following guideline:

"There are (at least) two families of citation templates. The Citation template is intended to provide citations for many types of references. The other family has names of the form (for example, Cite book and Cite web). These two families produce different citation styles. For example, the "Cite xxx" family separates elements with a full stop, and gives page ranges as plain numbers, while the "Citation" template separates elements with a comma, and precedes page ranges with "pp." Thus, these two families should not be mixed in the same article."

Unfortunately, there are no instructions in the documentation of Citation on how it should be used for web pages. Should some be added? Also, what about simply making the two types of citation templates consistent with each other? &mdash; Cheers, Jack Lee  –talk– 23:05, 29 March 2008 (UTC)

references vs. footnotes
I'm bringing rongorongo up for GA or FA, and have a question about notes.

The article has a large amount of supporting material in footnotes, things which are excessive for the body of the article, but which would be important for someone who really wants to delve into the subject. Since there are a lot of amateur epigraphers out there, and decipherment is a popular hobby, this is particularly important for articles such as this one.

The problem I have is with mixing these footnotes with the references, which is the style I've seen on Wikipedia and which is assumed by this page here. If they're mixed together, then the reader won't know until following it whether a note is simply a page number reference, or supporting material which may be important for fully understanding the text. This results in readers who are interested in the footnotes being distracted by each little reference as well.

My solution is a hybrid system, with inline Harvard refs for page numbers and separate footnotes. Is this justifiable, or is it something I'll eventually be forced to change?

Thanks, — kwami (talk) 19:17, 13 March 2008 (UTC)
 * I think this is fine. Many articles use different systems for explanatory footnotes and citation. Often, the cite.php system is used for citation and the ref/note template system for explanatory footnotes. For instance, see the FA Pericles. Your system is somewhat different, but serves a similar purpose of differentiating content footnotes from citations alone. This isn't to say that someone won't complain at FAC, but I think your method is well within accepted practice. Christopher Parham (talk) 03:04, 14 March 2008 (UTC)


 * Parenthesised in-text citations in combination with numbered content footnotes would be consistent with (for example) APA style, so I don't think there should be any problems. --SallyScot (talk) 13:08, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

Wiki development?
It'd be good if we had an easy to use 'notes' equivalent to go with. So, in addition to 's numbered references for citations, we could have something distinctive and separate for discursive notes. I'd suggest that these could have automatic assignment of roman numerals to coexist with and compliment 's Arabic numerals, for example  and tags (or and tags) which automatically generated separate numbered notes.

At the moment this can be achieved as in the following...


 * Example text,[i] more example text.[ii] A second appearance of a note.[ii]


 * Notes

 ^ This is an example discursive note. ^ a b Discursive notes can be shown separately from references or citations - giving a neater appearing alternative compared to having mixed "Notes and references" or "Notes and citations" sections. This is an example of such a note. It is not generated via the Footnotes method (i.e. via use of and
 * So this could be an option that editors can choose, much like they choose the citation format they prefer. And with Tim's list, there is no reason a bot/tool could not be used to help automate conversion -- though I would be opposed to making it anything other than editor choice on an article basis. Colin°Talk 23:09, 14 April 2008 (UTC)
 * So this could be an option that editors can choose, much like they choose the citation format they prefer. And with Tim's list, there is no reason a bot/tool could not be used to help automate conversion -- though I would be opposed to making it anything other than editor choice on an article basis. Colin°Talk 23:09, 14 April 2008 (UTC)


 * Strong oppose - Whilst I accept the initial proposition's observation that "Wikipedia does not have the limitations of print journals" there is a "need for such abbreviations" and that is our poor readers who do not have an unlimited ability to scan through full journal names that may easily stretch to nearly the whole width of a line. Any article that gives a few references to "Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America" is going to look horrible and we are supposed to also care about copyediting issues as editors, and not just the bulk of text we can type in as writers. What I look for first in a reference is the title and whether it has relevance to the question or issue that I seek to understand better. Next is still not the journal name, but the year; frankly a discussion on best chemotherapy for a cancer written in 1980 is of (almost) no relevance now, irrespective of how good the journal was. I can probably make a reasonable guess at say "Arch Otolaryngol Head Neck Surg", "Am J Gastroenterol", "J. Pediatr. Surg" or "J Clin Exp Neuropsychol" and yet have never seen nor read any of these journals. The last thing I need cluttering up articles is drawn out screens of references and nor would anyone who seeks to print out several articles. Have a guess at “Acad Rev Calif Acad Periodontol” – we can have a good idea, but full title of “Academy review of the California Academy of Periodontology, United States Section, ARPA Internationale” is just silly in our attempts to allow people with 800x600 screens to also read pages. We also forget that the full journal name often includes mention of the publishing medical group; hence “Acta Belg Med Phys” is clearly about Belgium Physical Medicine, yet the full name parameter would show “Acta Belgica. Medica physica : organe officiel de la Societe royale belge de medecine physique et de rehabilitation” or “Int J Dev Neurosci” clearly International Journal of Developmental Neurosciences, but take a look at “International journal of developmental neuroscience : the official journal of the International Society for Developmental Neuroscience” and at 135 characters long, cite 10 articles and the journal name alone occupies 4% of a "reasonable" 35Kb sized article.
 * The next proposal no doubt will be to insist on full names of authors with expanded forenames, indeed lets never have "et al" as Wikipedia is not short of space. There again, let’s not be miserly and consider why we do not advocate freely including the complete abstract paragraphs of PubMed (it is a publication of the US government after all) ... :-)
 * Clearly this is not how most biomedical journals format their references, and we have come to accept abbreviations throughout the rest of cite journal format with "12 (6): 25-7" being in full: "volume 12, issue 6, pages 25 to 27". Indeed this is part of the learning curve for people to understand references in the real world when they look at hardcopy papers and their reference list sections, nor do we treat our readers as infants wikilinking on section titles to help them understand what "Symptoms", "Diagnosis" or "References" are, so why oblige as a guideline on full journal names ? David Ruben Talk 00:13, 15 April 2008 (UTC)
 * If a journal is notable enough to be a reliable source, it is notable enough to have a page on Wikipedia. So, when using Diberri's tool, click "Link journal" to Wikilink the journal abbreviation. Then, create a stub for the journal if it doesn't exist yet (using Template:Infobox Journal where appropriate), and create the needed redirect. (Perhaps someday we could include the brackets directly in Template:Cite journal.) --Arcadian (talk) 03:00, 15 April 2008 (UTC)
 * I agree with this, although unfortunately (in my opinion) some deletionists regularly go after academic journals on "notability" grounds: WikiProject Academic Journals/Deletion contains a history. The inevitable deletion nom tends to dampen the enthusiasm of anyone inclined to chip away at List of missing journals. --JayHenry (talk) 03:41, 15 April 2008 (UTC)
 * I don't see the need for a sea of blue WP:OVERLINKing in citations. Sandy Georgia  (Talk) 03:45, 15 April 2008 (UTC)
 * You're opposed to linking the sources in citations? I have to say I find it extremely useful (about a billion times more useful than linking the dates).  I'm not suggesting it be required, but am more concerned about whether or not Wikipedia should have articles on journals. --JayHenry (talk) 03:51, 15 April 2008 (UTC)


 * No, I'm opposed to bots, scripts, templates or whatever methodology automatically linking journals in citations. If you have, for example, The New York Times used 30 times to cite an article, I don't see the need for a sea of blue to link every occurrence.  As in all linking, WP:OVERLINKing should be avoided.  Sandy Georgia  (Talk) 21:18, 15 April 2008 (UTC)


 * Well, we've got the overlinking now, because Diberri added automatic links to his tool, and it's not optional (at this point). That means if you use the same journal multiple times in one article, they all get automatically linked now by Diberri, so we get not only a sea of blue, but a sea of red as well.  Sandy Georgia  (Talk) 05:41, 17 April 2008 (UTC)


 * This is such an incredible statement that I'm going to add you to my list of Wikipedian absurdities. On second thought, you make a good point about bots doing it, but I certainly think that journals do need to be wikified once per page if they appear. If you're trying to evaluate science, it's helpful to know the track record of academic journals and researchers. OptimistBen (talk) 07:08, 15 April 2008 (UTC)


 * I think it is overlinking. WP os not a source for tracking journal reputation. Our coverage of topics is much too erratic for thatto make any sense at all. It's an encyclopedia of articles of subjects. DGG (talk) 03:56, 16 April 2008 (UTC)


 * Encyclopedias serve purposes: they are references. Journals, since they output primary knowledge, are almost always notable. So is their science, regardless of whether the general public is aware of it. If a journal is involved in something controversial or has a follow-up on some big issue, that likely belongs on their Wikipedia page. And surely Wikipedia is not too erratic to cover journals; Wikipedia's erraticness makes it better at covering these things. I don't know if I'm for wikifying all journals. I'm not sure if I'm in favor of bots doing it either; I prefer that journals be cited in-text and wikified there. OptimistBen (talk) 00:58, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

Support 100% This is a general encyclopedia, not a specialist one. The argument that would we be required to include subtitles if we didn't abbreviate holds no water. PNAS has a website www.PNAS.org, and it is commonly written on this. Wikipedians, I've come to notice, tend to argue polarized positions: we can't do something one way, because if we did, then everything in the Wiki universe would be forced into that one method. The full title of a journal, in English, less subtitles, is a courtesy to the general reader glancing through a list of references who wants to pick and choose what to read. I research professional journals for a living and come across names of publications, abbreviated, that I can't make heads or tails of, can't find on the Internet, but need as sources (the librarian has a reference for these occasions.) If Wikipedia's goal is a lot of diverse knowledge, journal titles should not be routinely abbreviated because they hinder access for the laymen. Too many editors on Wikipedia argue that additional knowledge is one click away. I disagree with this. An article should be a complete discrete unit of its own, not a collection of clicks. I write for both a technical and a general audience, most scientists do have to communicate with lay audiences. It's no hinderance ot me to include full journal titles. It's the least of the things at Wikipedia keeping experts away. --Blechnic (talk) 05:42, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Support In general I think that studies should be cited in the text with the full journal name. In the citation all you need is the title, the link to the source if possible, and the doi/PMID. It's best to try to citations to the essentials to make editing easier. If there is no link/doi/PMID (in other words, it's a very old article), then you need to do a full citation. But it's preferable to reference the author, the journal, and the date in-text. In the future we can use these to analyze past errors and ethical concerns; it will be HIGHLY useful. I agree that we could be doing more articles on academic journals and academics, and that they are deleted far too often. OptimistBen (talk) 06:54, 15 April 2008 (UTC)
 * In other words, you want inconsistently cited articles, one kind of citation if there's a PMID, another if not. Doesn't sound good.  What we have now in medical/biology/etc articles are consistently cited articles thanks to Diberri's tool. Sandy Georgia  (Talk) 21:22, 15 April 2008 (UTC)
 * No, there's certainly consistency in citing internet-available articles one way and the others another way. We should keep in mind that citation templates make editing articles more difficult. Brevity in citations is thus valuable, at least for some (myself). At the same time, PMID/doi's allow even readers of the print version to find the articles. OptimistBen (talk) 00:58, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

Comment Linking in with general use: Pubmed holds medical science related articles. Can you expect an engineer to be familiar with that database. In my field everyone know the abbreviation JPSP, PSPB, JCR and JASP; I guess most of you don't (and anyway JCR can mean any of three academic journals). Pubmed uses different abbreviations to confuse the matter. So Yes, I support full titles as that is clearly non-biased, non-arbitrary and least likely to create ambiguous reference. Arnoutf (talk) 09:37, 15 April 2008 (UTC)


 * Strong oppose. I don't mind if either full names or recognised abbreviations are used (preferably without the dots, IMV), as long as consistent within a list. It's very easy to work out what they mean, and for the user, there's this and this.  Tony   (talk)  09:42, 15 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Oppose making this a requirement. WP has a history of allowing freedom in the choice of citation format but cares about consistency within an article. I don't believe any move towards requiring a certain format will achieve consensus. FWIW, WP:MEDMOS has long stated that "Some editors prefer to expand the abbreviated journal name." -- indicating that either style is acceptable, but that neither is preferred by WP. David Ruben makes a good case for why full journal names may be impractical, particularly in a long article with lots of references. Looking to the future, there is no reason why Wikipedia 2010 couldn't take a PMID, DOI or ISBN in the wikitext and format a citation according to reader preferences rather than author preferences. However, given the total inactivity wrt fixing date formatting, I'm not holding my breath. Colin°Talk 10:54, 15 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Oppose Wikipedia is open source and written by volunteers. Everyone hates doing their references and endnote is Horrible. I often copy and paste my citations from my work (all abreviated and mostly harvard style). I am against having a standard for references that has to be mannually imposed: There are few editors that try and keep everything togheter and fixing cleanups (way more important), those people are gold and must not be taxed. A unified standard can be discussed when and only when there is a good bot that autonomously fixes all the references using a database index, like pubmed. I for one will not abide by extended references as it will only mean wasting my time. Sorry --Squidonius (talk) 17:20, 15 April 2008 (UTC)


 * Support. I support this along the lines laid out above. As for the cumbersome task of formatting citations etc.: in Wikiproject:Mathematics, we are using a database called zeteo (which I wrote), which stores all the information (about journals, authors, and the references, as well). So it gives something like
 * (notice not only the fully written name of the journal, but also the issn, which is another valuable information for locating the journal, etc). Jakob.scholbach (talk) 17:50, 15 April 2008 (UTC)
 * (notice not only the fully written name of the journal, but also the issn, which is another valuable information for locating the journal, etc). Jakob.scholbach (talk) 17:50, 15 April 2008 (UTC)


 * Support. This is a small step towards making Wikipedia articles on scientific topics more accessible to non-experts, which I see as a good thing, and one that doesn't add significantly to our work as editors. —David Eppstein (talk) 21:27, 15 April 2008 (UTC)


 * Support as recommendation, oppose as anything stronger. The full name does look nicer; that's why I did it that way in my own dissertation. But I'm afraid that even strong language in a guideline has the potential to become a distraction and irritant. Let's put it in a guideline but make it clear that it's just a recommendation (even more so than guidelines already are). --Trovatore (talk) 21:27, 15 April 2008 (UTC)


 * Oppose as plain unnecessary hassle. Why not leave it alone? Furthermore, I am of the opinion that Wikipedia should move closer to established scholarly practice and not farther away. If this does go through, please make it no more than a recommendation, and please discourage editors going around changing J Clin Psychiatry to The Journal of Clinical Psychiatry. God knows we have enough lame quasi-edit wars as it is. Fvasconcellos (t·c) 22:34, 15 April 2008 (UTC)


 * Comment This seems to assume old-fashioned print journals are the standard to which other media should conform. Maybe that's true today, and certainly a decade ago, or five decades, etc., but how long will it still work that way? Michael Hardy (talk) 00:05, 17 April 2008 (UTC)


 * Oppose (per Trovatore). I think this is a good idea, but it is already a guideline (or was, last time I was up to date) to not use abbreviations.  I say, keep it a guideline!  That way we have the best of both worlds:  well-intentioned (but busy) editors can more quickly cut-n-paste references, and the more detail-oriented folks can fill in the abbreviations if they wish.   silly rabbit  (  talk  ) 23:12, 15 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Concur. Keep it a guideline. --Squidonius (talk) 14:01, 16 April 2008 (UTC)


 * Oppose It makes refence lists harder to read by adding a lot of redundant info (since the abbreviations are standardised it is easy to check in google if there isn't a doi or pmid), and it makes it harder to read journals if you've had to learn another system for wikipedia, and the other way around. Narayanese (talk) 14:28, 16 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Comment in my scientific discipline (psychology) full journal names is the accepted standard, so using abbreviations demands me to learn the abbreviations, which may not be standardised at all. So your argument could be used both for and against full names. Arnoutf (talk) 15:22, 16 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Then it makes sense to use full names for psychology journal references. Narayanese (talk) 05:35, 17 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Euhm that's not what I said, in these journals the author is required to provide the full reference, also when a medical journal is cited. I am in favour of: Always being consistent within an article (cf either UK vs US spelling); If possible be consistent in Wiki. So I would accept full ref use in Psychology Wikipedia articles; and standard abbreviations in e.g. medical articles; but not a mix of styles within an article Arnoutf (talk) 08:43, 21 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Comment Oh, they're standardized? What is the reference for the standardized names of journals?  --Blechnic (talk) 02:12, 17 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Here is one Narayanese (talk) 05:35, 17 April 2008 (UTC)
 * One? So how many are there?  Do they all agree with each other?  Is it inclusive?  It looks like, from this resource, that if I want to find what a journal abbreviation means, I have to know what the subject matter is (for example, a biology article may have a medical journal, but would I have to search one of the 11 sources for abbreviations for journal titles in medicine?  Or one of about the same number for abbreviations of bioscience journals?)
 * When I can't find what an abbreviation is for, I have a librarian who looks it up for me. I think she uses primarily one resource for this, but I do use some foreign language journals and some fairly obscure ones, and their titles are not available so readily to the layman as people on this board seem to be saying.  I, on the other hand, have to know the full title of any journal I reference. If I, as a writer, am using a journal as a reference for a citation, I have to know what it's full name is.  Why not go the sensible way, honor the reader (the person the encyclopedia is written for), rather than the writers?  Why not ask the person who already has the knowledge right at hand (the person using the reference) to simply provide it?  If it is in the citations list, the reader can see its title. If the writer is using it, they know the title.  Technical journals often have very relevant titles, and the reader can decide if they want to access it, or a more familiar one.  The writer is giving fuller, more complete information every time they include the full name of the journal for the reader to see, right there, not obscured in its abbreviation.  If you've never sat and puzzled through the references in a lengthy research article in Science to get the background for something technical you may not appreciate how much work this is, and not just for the layman, but for the expert.
 * Consider the audience of Wikipedia. Is it the writer?  Or the reader?  Is it the technical reader or the general reader?  Generally the audience at Wikipedia appears to be the educated general reader.  This is the person for whom including the full name of a journal is perfect.  It gives him or her sufficient additional information to make an educated decision about the quality of a citation and decide whether or not to pursue it further.  The abbreviated title is for the specialist reader of that topic alone, not just for the educated technical reader in general, but for the person already educated in that topic.  And, are they coming to Wikipedia for their knowledge?  No. I don't get any of my information for my research from Wikipedia.  I won't be reading or needing your references, as I can't use them for anything.  So, you've designed a system for an audience you don't and won't have.  --Blechnic (talk) 05:55, 17 April 2008 (UTC)
 * PS And references are important to properly written encyclopedia articles. The reference is not a throw-away piece of information for a well-researched, verifiable article.  Consider how valuable it is.  Is it valuable enough that it should be written out in full and accessible, easily, by the audience?  Or is it secondary?  It's never secondary if you're not writing original research: you must credit those who contributed.  The entire article should rest upon the sources who did the original research upon which the Wikipedia article is based.  Don't obscure the sources in any way.  --Blechnic (talk) 05:59, 17 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Support I think journal names should be expanded to full form to be as understandable as possible to the general reader. Gary King ( talk )  19:11, 19 April 2008 (UTC)


 * Comment - whatever the result, there are probably people at WikiProject Academic Journals who are willing to refine and implement the required edits. I think linking journals from citations to articles about the journals (and sometimes the authors, if they have articles) is an important part of providing the background to the authors and journals we are citing. If a journal has an article, I would say link and either write in full or abbreviate, like we do with qualifications and titles (eg. MD FRCS, FRS). If the journal does not have an article, either create one (if needed) or write the name in full and provide the abbreviation. Citation style is less important than avoiding confusion over what we have cited. Carcharoth (talk) 07:36, 21 April 2008 (UTC)
 * An example of my idiosyncratic citation style is seen at Thomas Snow Beck. As long as the information makes it into the article, someone else will eventually tidy it up. OK, that's lazy rather than idiosyncratic, but I linked to Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine. I agree that there are concerns for overlinking, and maybe some way should be found to identify all the journal links that come from citation templates, and all those that come from elsewhere in an article. Both sets of information are useful. Carcharoth (talk) 07:49, 21 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Oppose. Some journal names are absurdly long and would look poor when cited multiple times. Those people who don't use templates and have to type them in by hand would be likely to make mistakes or shorten very long titles by omitting subtitles, which would hinder finding the journal. I would prefer a guideline which suggested using the long form of the abbreviation, preferably without the points, (for example Proc Natl Acad Sci USA), and generating redirects for journal abbreviations to the full title. That would remove the ambiguity over short-form abbreviations such as PNAS, without taking up too much space. The journal title is generally obvious from the long-form abbrevation, and a glossary of what the common abbreviated words expand to could easily be written. Wikilinking the first occurrence seems reasonable, but guidelines should not encourage multiple linking of the same title in a single reference list. Espresso Addict (talk) 13:59, 21 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Support Since Wikipedia is intended for a general audience, I think that  accessibility should be the primary factor in deciding which (if any) guideline to use. The space issue doesn't seem that compelling, as Wikipedia is not a paper encyclopedia, and the difference between, for example, Proc Natl Acad Sci USA and Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America isn't really that much (especially in small type in a list of references).  Listing the full name of the journal is much more accessible to a general audience, and thus seems to be the best option. Another good option, as has been suggested, is wikilinking each occurrence of the journal title. That way, anyone could easily find out what on earth something like Z Naturforsch B means. Of course, this requires that every cited journal has an article about them, but I (and others) are working on that. ;-) ~ Danelo (talk) 18:45, 30 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Support Wikipedia is a non-specialist encyclopedia and should aim to be as accessible as possible. Make this a MOS requirement for FACs if it's not already. I'm not sure a bot could parse all these (and would probably end up only doing some of each reference list, creating inconsistencies, so I don't think it's a good bot task. Mangostar (talk) 21:35, 4 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Support Wikipedia users may not be as conversant with standard sources and their "short hand" abbreviations. The use of full names for jounranls and periodicals will allow a easy reference connection. FWiW Bzuk (talk) 14:25, 11 May 2008 (UTC).
 * Technical alternative?. Can the wiki infrastructure support hovering 'thought balloon' type annoation?  If so, the abbreviation could be used, but hovering would reveal the full name.  This would keep the article shorter, and only those who wanted more information need see it.  It would also resolve the case of ambiguous abbreviations.  LouScheffer (talk) 18:44, 26 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Concur - general audience accessibility must prevail. Would (for example) the naysayers know what AMI is? Hint: it is not American Megatrends, even if Google says so. Also, one shouldn't intra-link titles (if at all such articles exist) since it fscks up COinS. And what about standard works, like ZZZ, that are not journals? What may be plain-as-day for one person is just alphabet soup for someone else. -- Fullstop (talk) 19:50, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

Harvnb
With Harvnb, which I am trying to get my head round, how to do you cite a plate? For example, I want to cite Loach, 1999, plate 22. (The plate pages don't have page numbers.) Cheers. I could just write it out, but the rest of the notes are all neatly blue, and I don't want to let the side down.qp10qp (talk) 18:02, 24 May 2008 (UTC)


 * You can use the "loc" parameter:, or with "nb" (no braces) form, you can just do this: , plate 22.  CharlesGillingham (talk) 04:59, 25 May 2008 (UTC)


 * That's great. (I thought I'd tried that second one and screwed the formatting, but obviously I did something wrong.) The first one is new to me. Many thanks! qp10qp (talk) 13:17, 25 May 2008 (UTC)

What to do with named references that have never existed in an article.
RFCstyle I've recently discovered a lot of broken references. These are the short version of named references like. The long version does not exist in the current version. Using the article history I've found it has never existed in the article. These ref tags give the appearance of a sourced statement that can mislead the reader if they do not look at the reflist. Furthermore it is difficult to link to and from the reflist with the broken reference. The list of broken references and articles can be found at User:Lemmey/L --Lemmey talk 20:59, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

What should I do with these broken ref tags? --Lemmey talk 20:59, 24 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Replace them with fact tags
 * Supplement them with [broken footnote]
 * Comment them out


 * As I said in the BRFA, replacing non-existent named refs with makes them more difficult to correct for a human looking at the last version. In the two examples you gave in the BRFA, I was able to find the intended references, but I don't usually do such searching for mere fact tags. I think simply commenting it out wouldn't work, since the comment is likely to be removed too. Identifying broken named refs for a cleanup category might be an option. Gimmetrow 21:53, 24 May 2008 (UTC)
 * All but one were fixed in the example. I also point out that United States housing market correction may not be representative of the majority of other faults in that it was essentially a copy of another article and had rather descriptive tags. With less descriptive names it is virtually impossible for users to find the material in question. By searching the article history the user has already assumed all good faith that can be considered reasonable.--Lemmey talk 22:49, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

--Lemmey talk 22:49, 24 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Garrison, North Dakota
 * 1921 Detroit Tigers season
 * Cigarette smuggling
 * United States housing market correction
 * Bank Rakyat Indonesia
 * Ron Paul presidential campaign, 2008

OReilly ref is: Replace that with a fact tag or something equally obscure, and I doubt anybody would find it. Gimmetrow 23:06, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

Comment: - there are multiple sources of orphaned (missing a parent) or or born-orphaned (never had a parent) named references. The first two require human research, and I speculate are far more common than the third. This implies that a Bot fixing these cites may not be that helpful, and human intervention is desirable. I guess if you're going to "quiet" incorrect references, a citation needed template with a comment about its apparently lost or never created parent is a step in the right direction. -- Yellowdesk (talk) 18:15, 26 May 2008 (UTC)
 * 1) Copy and paste from other wikipedia articles, without importing the parent.
 * 2) Re-naming of the parent, or for born-orphaned, renaming of the orphan.
 * 3) Intentional creation of the born-orphaned references.
 * I've done the following:
 * Garrison, North Dakota &mdash; Ref tag was added in Revision as of 05:55, November 25, 2007 with no ref definition supplied. I've removed it, leaving unsupported population figures. Apparently originally sourced from US Census data, but I don't know where to find that specific info.
 * 1921 Detroit Tigers season &mdash;Fixed by LemmeyBOT (Brilliant!! I've awarded a da Vinci Barnstar)
 * Cigarette smuggling Ref tag was added in Revision as of 03:23, December 31, 2007 with no ref definition supplied. I've replaced it with a cn.
 * United States housing market correction &mdash;LemmeyBOT has been busy here. I've replaced this remaining uncorrected ref with a .  Some googling suggests that the related assertion might have come from a blog.
 * Bank Rakyat Indonesia &mdash; Ref tag was added in Revision as of 15:28, April 25, 2007 with no ref definition supplied. I've replaced with cn
 * Ron Paul presidential campaign, 2008 &mdash;(and other refs) These were added without ref definitions in Revision as of 07:58, May 8, 2008, cut & pasted from Trevor Lyman.  I've imported the missing definitions from there. This article is still a mess.
 * -- Boracay Bill (talk) 22:57, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

Footnote Fonts? Current footnotes destroy layout, presentation and readability
One of the reason contributors are reluctant to lather their articles with inline citations is that the g-d footnotes destroy the paragraph formatting and readability of the article. The footnotes introduce unwanted extra line spacing that makes paragraphs visually run together and appear very unprofessional in presentation, with random and choppy confusing line spacing. The more citations, the worse this gets. Isn't there any way to code the footnotes so that the footnotes don't devastate the layout in this way? In a printed book or journal article, footnotes are of such a small font that they don't disturb the line spacing. Can't Wikipedia be the same? Is there any code to do this now in a ref tag? Rep07 (talk) 03:26, 17 May 2008 (UTC)


 * Short answer, no. Using the ref tag = using a foot note. I do not understand your statement about it introducing extra line spacing or making paragraphs run together at all. Never seen any instance of that at all. You can maybe resize them for yourself using monobook.css, if its something that particularly bothers you. AnmaFinotera (talk) 03:29, 17 May 2008 (UTC)


 * Footnotes don't introduce a whole extra line spacing, but they do make the line spacing wider than normal, at least on Internet Explorer. Thus the gap between two lines with footnotes will be wider than the gap between two lines without footnotes, and it can make paragraph spacing harder to distinguish. This was explained as part of WP:Footnotes to be a bug. See 2nd paragraph. There's a fix for logged-in users, but not casual readers. It would be better if it were fixed for everyone.  Ty  06:27, 17 May 2008 (UTC)


 * Wow! Great fix. I've always hated those uneven paragraphs. Is there any kind of a movement to include this as a part of cite.php? CharlesGillingham (talk) 07:27, 17 May 2008 (UTC)
 * You can start one!  Ty  01:10, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

Changing Author-date referencing to Parenthetical referencing
I'm sorry to bring this up so soon after I changed it from Harvard referencing based on the misgivings a few people had raised (see that talk page), as well as my own misgivings about the title (nondescriptive, and I hadn't heard it before; wasn't in my reference manuals). After I did it, though, I realized that author-date really refers to the system of citing with in-text, APA style. MLA doesn't do this. The broadest, most descriptive name for this type of citation is parenthetical, because it appears in parentheses. Thus, I feel we should switch it to that. ImpIn | (t - c) 00:44, 31 May 2008 (UTC)
 * I'm fine with that. Christopher Parham (talk) 00:55, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

Linking to full-text articles copied by non-mainstream sources
I'd like some input on this edit. Basically we're linking to the full text of an article. I undid Shot info's edit and added the NYT archive link, but left the full-text for convenience. Petergkeyes claims to have seen the full text, and the NYT archive looks the same for what we can see. I often see links to the full-text of for-pay articles for convenience. Is this wrong? ImpIn | {talk - contribs} 17:20, 23 May 2008 (UTC)
 * My input: Copyrights says, "... if you know that an external Web site is carrying a work in violation of the creator's copyright, do not link to that copy of the work." This link should be removed or tagged copyvio link. -- Boracay Bill (talk) 00:40, 24 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Makes sense. Thanks. ImpIn | {talk - contribs} 01:03, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

For clean NYT links, see User:Gadget850/New York Times. --—— Gadget850 (Ed)  talk  -  15:51, 27 May 2008 (UTC)


 * If you search for the link you provided back on that article, however, they ask to charge for it. Are you sure you're not kind of overcoming that and breaking copyright? ImpIn | (t - c) 01:15, 31 May 2008 (UTC)


 * I considered that, but links like these come up in Google searches. I registered with the NYT, but I don't have a subscription.  As I noted, the URL comes up in different ways— I don't know why.  --——  Gadget850 (Ed)  talk  -  10:01, 31 May 2008 (UTC)
 * http://www.fluoridealert.org/health/accidents/kennerly.html appears to be a copyright-violating link. If it is, it should not be linked from WP. Period. End of story. -- Boracay Bill (talk) 11:51, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

Blogs as a source
Are blogs an acceptable source?(Bonzai273 (talk) 11:29, 1 June 2008 (UTC))


 * Generally not. See WP:SPS. -- Boracay Bill (talk) 11:42, 1 June 2008 (UTC)


 * Depends on whose (am I using the correct word?) blog it is, as SPS notes. RealClimate has been used as a RS. By the way, Bill, did you see my comment on getting the vote out on that code improvement for footnotes? ImpIn | (t - c) 05:09, 2 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Yep&mdash;never say never. I saw the comment and the vote on 12796. Thanks. That makes two. -- Boracay Bill (talk) 05:32, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

alphabetizing authors with different naming traditions
Cambodian names follow a surname + given name pattern. Given names are the names most commonly used in formal discourse. In an alphabetized reference list, should it be Given name, surname or Surname given name? (e.g. name is Chea Phalla [Chea=surname, Phalla=given name], should it be Phalla, Chea or Chea Phalla?) Thanks, Mangostar (talk) 05:29, 3 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Even when English language names would appear as "Smith, Michael", it should appear as "Chea Phalla". If you are alphabetizing a list of authors, the entry would be alphabetized with the "C"s. This is true in all systems I am familiar with. Christopher Parham (talk) 06:08, 3 June 2008 (UTC)
 * A follow-up: I have changed it so now I'm not alphabetizing, but I'm doing last names first in in-line cites for Western names, and first names first for Cambodian names. But now the issue is how to do op cits for Cambodian names.  If you were addressing Chea Phalla in polite company you might say something along the lines of Mr. Phalla, or if you were writing an encyclopedia you would write Phalla.  Should I then use Phalla in the op cit refs? It has the disadvantage of being visually confusing, since it's not the leftmost name (since we're righting "Chea Phalla", it is harder to skim for Phalla than if we were looking for "Jones, Smith" based on a Jones reference). Mangostar (talk) 09:19, 3 June 2008 (UTC)
 * By the way, the relevant article is Ratanakiri Province. Mostly now it's just the Sith Samath one that's tripping me up. (And I guess Phat Palith.) Mangostar (talk) 09:21, 3 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Personally I would prefer to stick to surnames and use "Chea, op. cit" but you would have to consult the style guide you are trying to adhere to for a definitive ruling. Christopher Parham (talk) 22:51, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

Best reliable sources
In case of multiple possible references for a statement, the "best" reliable sources should be used. This line from WP:WHEN indicates that best practice is not to cite every possible reference for a statement, but to select responsibly among them; otherwise people are often tempted to string five or more citations together for a single proposition. I believe this is an important balancing guideline for WP:CITE, that needs to be stated to affirm best practices; where and how would it best be inserted? JJB 08:09, 4 June 2008 (UTC)


 * I think this is something which should be left up to the judgement of the editors of a particular article. Some subjects are non-controversial and hardly need a reference at all. Other subjects require intensive sourcing. (For example, when there is a constant flow of original research and fringe points of view. If several major sources make the same point, it proves that it is an essential part of the subject matter.) Sometimes a few extra sources doesn't hurt.  CharlesGillingham (talk) 09:28, 4 June 2008 (UTC)


 * Agreed. I don't think we need a statement about that on this page. It is part of the NPOV policy, and this page doesn't need to repeat everything in the policies. Multiple references for a statement (I mean more than three) are not as common as you imply, and the phenomenon is usually related to talk page controversies of some sort. qp10qp (talk) 12:42, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

Citation templates considered harmful
I have grown to loath the citation template system, which I believe is seriously degrading the source text of the wiki to the point of inedibility. I am not alone; when this discussion opened in the tech mailing list, it went on for days. But nothing came of it. I want to make sure people are aware of this problem, and hopefully get some sort of solution.

To be exact, it's not a single problem, its really a combination of two different issues. The first is that the CITE template is, itself, complex. Careful editing is required to ensure that a single-character problem doesn't render the entire article unreadable. But because there are so many "subparts" to the template, this sort of mis-edit is all too easy to make. The second aspect is that references are supposed to be placed in-line. Since the REF tag requires the CITE to be "inside it". The result is that, if one uses CITE + REF, the article source text can be made almost completely uneditable.

How big is this problem? Well a good example came up when I wanted to make a few minor edits to the excellent Cygnus X-1 article. Please take a moment and go read it over. It's fantastic. Now click Edit and try to find anything at all. It's completely indecipherable gobblygook. This is precisely the sort of technicality that can scare away the very editors we need to encourage on the wiki.

The general consensus last time this issue came up was that it was fixable through a change to the way REF works. If we could put the "body" of the CITE at the bottom of the article, where it belongs IMHO, the entire problem would go away. Not only that, but it would make finding, updating and editing references far easier than it is today. In a general sense, what we want to do is place all of the CITEs together, with whitespace of course, at the bottom of the article somewhere, likely inside the References section. Then we would "wrap" these somehow so they would not appear (a hidden DIV almost works). Finally we would place REF tags in the body text as we do today, except they would all be the "short form" that we have today. This makes everything much easier to read, easier to edit, and IMHO, easier to understand. There were several suggestions on how this could be accomplished.

I really believe that this is a significant technical problem that needs to be addressed. How do I go about trying to get some traction on this issue?

Maury (talk) 18:58, 9 May 2008 (UTC)


 * You're right, but the problem seems to be more how the editors of Cygnus X-1 used the cite template (with each term on a separate line) than with the template itself. It's entirely possible, and in my opinion preferable, to list the terms one after another, separated by the | symbol.  In that case, the CITE template isn't much more of an obstacle to editing than the standard footnote entry -- and it does have the advantage of forcing stylistic consistency in the notes.
 * BTW, it took me a while to accept the CITE template; it lacks the flexibility historians like, but for most published works (which are what we cite in Wikipedia) it seems an acceptable solution. --SteveMcCluskey (talk) 19:32, 9 May 2008 (UTC)
 * I see your claim, and raise you a John Titor. As you can see in this example, the "inline CITE" doesn't really change the situation very much. I'm shooting for perfection here, and I'll happily accept half-way.  Maury (talk) 19:39, 9 May 2008 (UTC)


 * IONO how many people came up with the shortened notes style independently, but I am one of them and I cranked out a lot of such-referenced articles last autumn to make it more familiar. I came to use this style (I found out later it was already being used by many SocSci people, but primarily in combination with Harvard cites and I usually don't do SocSci stuff) to be able to combine a clean referencing format with annotations, i.e. explanatory footnotes in the strict sense. (For me it's basically a Popperian consideration: I don't care how cool a referencing system works under ideal conditions; my aim was a way of referencing the most outlandish sources without breaking, that additionally looks tolerably well and codes cleanly.)
 * Shortened notes can be spiced up with whatever you like. I needed something that did not break easily, something to handle things like the poetry in Senna obtusifolia or the diversity of footnoteable information in Buteo or things like Passerine, and I categorically needed alphabetically-sorted reference lists and so on. And there is perhaps one source in 150-200 where I cannot use it straightforwardly.
 * But I would not recommend to treat it as one of "the" referencing systems. Shortened notes are really more something like a building block or a foundation that can be used in combination with most all referencing systems to make the code neater and articles better-referenced and more informative. The advantage of the shortened notes style is that it can be used (and I can only highly recommend using it) as a baseline. It is clean and flexible, and it is code-wise nonintrusive, does not require templates or scripting except the barest necessity.
 * It provides a lot of benefits for the scholarly-minded editor: it is easy to see, at one glance, how much of the article is based on up-to-date sources, and what if any parts would benefit from digging up a newer, better source perhaps. References can be neatly sorted; it is very easy to see if one particular source is missing (this can be hard if the entire source is footnoted, as many editors cut corners to avoid overlong footnotes e.g. by just linking to an online fulltext). Dysmorodrepanis (talk) 14:01, 11 May 2008 (UTC)
 * I have found the template to be seriousöly lacking and do not use it. For one thing, it creates between 10 and 50% code overhead, and this is simply bad programming style. But more importantly, as soon as you e.g. cite a text with a lot of East Asian or Hungarian authors in rudimentary style (only initials, comma delimitation), you are likely to run into trouble. Ditto nobility-based names etc. The templates work well for most Germanic and many Romance authors; they are liable to produce ambiguous or wrong cites for anyone else. I have noticed this when I came across some citations that proved to be untraceable, because the shorthand style in combination with the template messed up the authors' names. Dysmorodrepanis (talk) 13:16, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

---

I also would like to see the changes suggested above to support the "body" of the CITE at the bottom of the article where it belongs. That said, it's probably worth bearing in mind how the Shortened notes method already described in the project page achieves this. I've copied relevant subsection below.

Clearer editing with shortened notes
Because footnotes work by placing the required content inside tags within the article text they necessarily break up the text to some degree when in edit mode. Article text can become difficult to read and maintain. In this respect well referenced articles can unfortunately suffer disproportionately in comparison to those not so well sourced. In any case the disruptive effect can kept to a minimum by using shortened notes.

See the "Example edits for different methods" page for some comparative examples using shortened notes and full length references in footnotes. These offer representations of edit mode views with examples of how they render to the reader.

--SallyScot (talk) 19:55, 9 May 2008 (UTC)


 * Actually I like the "Shortened notes with wikilinks" version very much. However I find the internal portion "too complex", I would prefer a "fully shortened" version like you outline above. The downside to that version, which is also on that page, is that you have to hunt around for the unlinked reference. But that said, I think that it might be easier, technically, to introduce these changes because all it really needs is an additional tag in the CITE and REF to refer to each other...
 * would be the "placeholder" in the text, and by adding a similar "name=smith" in the CITE would allow the system to be completely automated. I threw in the page numbers because everyone complains about that :-) Maury (talk) 20:33, 9 May 2008 (UTC)

One can actually simulate, although not perfectly, this concept. See this version of the water memory article for instance. I used a "trick", and if you look at the source text I think you'll agree that it's very editable. It seems quite reasonable to suggest that there will be some sort of marker where the numbered note will appear in-line, and using the short refs makes it almost trivial. Maury (talk) 20:05, 9 May 2008 (UTC)
 * The solution proposed by you here has been suggested before (about 6 months ago). One of the reasons, I recall listed against it, that it may be instable in certain situations/editors. I do agree however that some kind of "reference library" somewhere at the end of the article, only using pointers inside the maintext would be a great development. This, apparently, needs some hardcore code rewriting (which I don;t know anything about). Arnoutf (talk) 21:13, 9 May 2008 (UTC)
 * That makes two of us! I did look into the code, and in spite of a relatively knowledgeable background in programming in general, I was completely stumped by the syntax in question and decided it was best left to the experts. :-( I am quite heartened to see that I am not entirely alone in believing this needs some attention though! Maury (talk) 23:27, 9 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Another argument which came up against this "trick" is that all the footnotes produced contain a nonfunctional backlink. In the example article, the final backlink in each footnote is nonfunctional.  Placing the hidden div (&lt;div name=cites style="display:none;"> ... &lt;/div>) containing the footnote declarations at the beginning of the article instead of at the end provides the additional capability for the editor to control the ordering of the footnotes by declaring them in that hidden div in the their desired appearance order.  In that case, however, the nonfunctional backlink in each footnote would be the initial backlink instead of the final one. 12796 is a proposed mediawiki enhancement which would provide this functionality without resorting to the hidden div "trick" and without producing a nonfunctional backlink. Code to implement this is included there. This was submitted to Bugzilla on 2008-01-26, and is tagged "need-review". -- Boracay Bill (talk) 01:58, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

There's a simpler way to do this: use author-date/Harvard referencing. In fact, if you use anchors and then the cite tag at the bottom, you completely avoid these hassles. Now, you can clutter the visible page up some with authors and dates, but I believe that as an electronic encyclopedia we don't have to do that necessarily. We could just do away with the author and date in-text if we wanted and anchor page numbers to the source; if there were no page numbers to reference we could do the author or some sort of title. We're electronic; the author-date isn't necessary in-text. The CMOS basically says: ultimately do what makes the most sense for your reader, and in this case I think we could use an entirely new system, for the benefit of the readers and writers. Also, I like raw citations. The templates are terrible to read, and terribly wordy as well. ImperfectlyInformed | {talk - contribs} 03:37, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

---

I've got nothing against author-date referencing, but it isn't really much simpler than Shortened notes. Shortened notes can be coded as pretty much the same thing, only with the opening bracket of the author-date reference replaced with a.

An author-date example:   The Sun is pretty big ( Miller 2005, p.23), but the Moon is not so big ( Brown 2006, p.46). The Sun is also quite hot ( Miller 2005, p.34). &#61;= References == * Brown, R (2006). "Size of the Moon", Scientific American, 51(78). * Miller, E (2005). "The Sun", Academic Press. </tt>

Same example using Shortened notes: <blockquote style="color:#999; background:white; padding:1em; border:1px solid DarkSeaGreen;"> <tt> The Sun is pretty big, &lt;ref> Miller 2005, p.23.&lt;/ref> but the Moon is not so big. &lt;ref> Brown 2006, p.46.&lt;/ref> The Sun is also quite hot. &lt;ref> Miller 2005, p.34.&lt;/ref> &#61;= Notes ==     &#61;= References == * Brown, R (2006). "Size of the Moon", Scientific American, 51(78). * Miller, E (2005). "The Sun", Academic Press. </tt> --SallyScot (talk) 10:19, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

And author/date doesn't really work well when you're using a reference for a single item. I really hate having to jump from section to section to read it. Maury (talk) 11:50, 10 May 2008 (UTC)
 * but how well does "when you're using a reference for a single item" relate to WP, where you are not the only editor of the article at issue?


 * A-D is less repetitive, however. With your shortened footnotes you would have to glance down at the bibliography, while with A-D you would be taken immediately to the source. I'm not sure I'm following when you say "jump from section to section". If you anchor your A-D references, how is it any different from footnotes? ImperfectlyInformed | {talk - contribs} 15:51, 10 May 2008 (UTC)


 * Yes, author-date in-text references, if wikilinked, do allow the reader to link straight to references rather than two steps as with shortened notes. The disadvantage with parenthetical systems is that they break the flow of the text for the reader more than less intrusive footnotes references. The effect that this has varies from article to article depending on the number of references of course. Author-date references are fine for articles about uncontroversial subjects which may not require so many references. A footnote system (of some sort) comes into its own the more references are used. --SallyScot (talk) 19:17, 10 May 2008 (UTC)


 * In a controversial article, readers might or might not find the author-date system more intrusive. If the reader is checking the source of each claim, and the reader becomes familiar with the various source authors, it is more convenient to have the source of the claim right there in the text. --Gerry Ashton (talk) 19:29, 10 May 2008 (UTC)


 * The option to use inline author-date referencing is available. No technical barrier exists which would prevent use of both inline author-date and footnoted author-date references. Without closely re-reading the current version of this project page, my recollection is that it has little or nothing to say on the subject of inline author-date vs. author-date in numbered footnotes vs. both intermixed. The project page probably should provide some guidance in this area. In practice, when I see author-date, my impression is that it's usually either inline or in numbered footnotes &mdash; seldom if ever intermixed &mdash; and the choice of inline vs. footnoted seems to be made by the creator of the initial ref, and changing from that initial choice seems to be by consensus (either through prior discussion or by discussion of a reverted WP:BOLD change) on an article-by-article basis. I tend to use footnoted author-date myself, as most pages I edit have preexisting footnoted citations. -- Boracay Bill (talk) 23:24, 10 May 2008 (UTC)


 * Instead of saying inline, perhaps you should differentiate between parenthetical author-date and footnote author-date (I should have changed "Harvard referencing" to "Parenthetical referencing"). I suspect that's what you mean. Structuring references by author and date is a very simple and useful way to structure references in general because the author and the date are two of the most relevant facts, whether the inline is a footnote or not. I think that both parenthetical in-line cites and footnotes should be allowed on any one page. That way you can avoid repetitive footnotes and give people freedom. The Chicago Manual of Style does not appear opposed to using both for references, although I don't know that I've ever seen it professionally. WP, as electronic, should not be constrained by style: it should be constrained by functionality. And, as I said before, we don't necessarily need to use the author and date inline when your citation is anchored; could just use (p. 32) and let people click to see the reference. I know this sounds radical, but it makes sense. Of course, that does reduce the advantage when you're familiar with authors, and it makes it useless in print...but Wikipedia should not be printed anyway. ImperfectlyInformed | {talk - contribs} 23:37, 10 May 2008 (UTC)


 * At present, there does not seem to be any citation template that uses the Modern Language Association (MLA) style guide. The MLA guide is widely used and is the most commonly used style guide worldwide in the area of the social sciences which represent much of the Wikipedia material. I find that APA guides are often assigned at university as a "simplified style" most often associated with the sciences. What is often difficult to determine in the APA style is the use of multiple editions as the date is tied to the author note. As well, dropping the place of publication also leaves a gap as many publishing houses operate international offices. Due to these limitations, I often "scratch" catalog or reference source using the MLA guide of: Author, title, place of publication, publisher and date format. The APA citiation template also has certain limitations in its format including the use of ISO dating only which often introduces a jarring element in the article as invariably, two date conventions are in play. I would almost (repeat, almost) accept the APA guide as a standard if the ISO dating could be altered to a more readable m-d-y or d-m-y format. I had earlier asked a question as to why no MLA template exists? Again, why not? FWiW Bzuk (talk) 14:25, 11 May 2008 (UTC).


 * MLA is certainly not the most commonly used style for the social sciences. It is mainly used in the humanities. Since Wikipedia does more scientifically-oriented documentation than humanities documentation, we haven't added the MLA format. However, I think we should change the "author-date referencing" to "parenthetical referencing"; which is a more global and descriptive term. Under that system author-date is the most common method, but we should also mention MLA style. ImperfectlyInformed | {talk - contribs} 22:17, 11 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Since I write mainly in history-related articles, I would see the need for the use of the MLA system, especially for editors unfamiliar with the conventions of setting up a reference notation or citation, and rely on templates. One of the common issues that I see is that the information  provided from templates are rife with errors, mainly due to inputs being made inaccurately.  Again, I tend to "scratch" catalog and do not use the templates, but I can see the need to have templates to suit diverse subject areas, especially in the humanities. Wikipedia had primarily scientific-oriented articles? Really? maybe my reading of articles is too limited. FWiW Bzuk (talk) 03:04, 12 May 2008 (UTC).

I would also like to endorse Shortened notes. They easily resolve the problems detailed at the beginning of this thread and are quite easy to use and edit, even for novices. Madman (talk) 19:34, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

A method that doesn't require big changes
I don't foresee using the proposed shortened notes for articles I am typically involved with. It might be suitable for low-editor-activity articles that are stable. One un-described method (in this thread) is what I would describe as "formatted references & text" which separate the text from the references, and actually do make it easier to edit both text and references, and have been used on very actively edited articles. The good result of my technique for reference-heavy articles, is that the editor can locate the end of any reference easily, since the closing is on the first column of the editing window. This should make it easier to add or edit the text of the article while noticing where the end and start of each reference is. Here is the format, with a two-reference example: some text at the end of the sentence.NOSPACE Start of next sentence. The result looks like this while editing: some text at the end of the sentence. Start of next sentence.

Recapitulating:
 * The intended result is that the editor can easily find: - the end of any reference, - the beginning and start of each reference when there are several together at the end of a paragraph or sentence, - and not least, easily find the start of the sentences, - plus generally all sentences are set-off from the references, instead of all being run-on together.
 * The run-on aspect of references and text in a reference-intensive article--is avoided. The run-on aspect is challenge for most editors.

This is not a theoretical item. It's in use here: Dismissal_of_U.S._attorneys_controversy. -- Yellowdesk (talk) 04:06, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

Return to the "shortened notes" topic

 * I agree with User:Madman, User:SallyScot, User:Dysmorodrepanis who lean towards shortened notes. The short footnotes keep the source as clear as I can imagine and they don't clutter up the text for the non-academic reader. When they are also linked (with anchors or with Harv) there is very little functionality lost. In this system, the original complaint (that templates take up too much space in the source) is moot.  CharlesGillingham (talk) 08:18, 17 May 2008 (UTC)


 * I think we should stick to the current system of letting the primary editors use what works best for them. I personally find the shortened notes system ugly, non-user friendly, and a pain to use. I much prefer using cite templates within a ref tag, as do many others. Why try to force other people to use such a system when its clear that Wikipedia allows and endorses several different methods. Shortened notes seems to primarily be preferred in topics with primarily academic type editors. Let them be used there then, but I see no reason to try to force all other articles to use it. AnmaFinotera (talk) 08:31, 17 May 2008 (UTC)


 * I think you might have misread me. I think we're just making suggestions here -- exploring some of the possibilities that an editor could choose. I never intended to suggest that we should "force" anyone to do anything. There are articles where shortened notes are appropriate and articles where they are not. Shortened notes solve a few problems (for example, if you are citing several different pages from the same book, it saves you from repeating the citation for each new page reference). They are useless for articles that use a different source for every paragraph (like articles on current events) or articles that use mostly online sources (no page numbers).


 * More to the point, shortened notes clutter the source a little less, and cluttered source text is the problem that this discussion was trying to solve. CharlesGillingham (talk) 09:50, 17 May 2008 (UTC)


 * Okay...cause it read to me like this was an attempt to make this the preferred method. AnmaFinotera (talk) 05:33, 18 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Just to bring up an opinion (that can be a disturbing image, I agree), contrary to Collectie's reversion to the shortened notes, I think they are actually more readable and less obtrusive then full reference citations. Again, only IMHO. LOL Bzuk (talk) 13:25, 18 May 2008 (UTC).

I don't like shortened notes (too repetitive), but I do want less of the references cluttering up the edit window. Why can't we have some sort of way to build a special footnote reference (the "base" reference) without turning it into a footnote, and instead having it display the reference in full? That way we could give it a name and reference it all we want with the given name in the article, with each reference adding an a b c d ect to the main reference. If anyone's not following me, let me know and maybe I could make it more clear. Impin | {talk - contribs} 19:56, 18 May 2008 (UTC)
 * You seem to describe the current status quo, with the use of named references, such as . Not sure what your point is. -- Yellowdesk (talk) 02:07, 19 May 2008 (UTC)
 * The difference is that in the current system, the "base" reference creates a footnote. What has been repeatedly requested is a way to put all the base references outside the actual text, for instance in the reference section, without creating anything visible at that location. Christopher Parham (talk) 04:54, 19 May 2008 (UTC)
 * ...such as the cite.php extension submitted in January of 2008 as 12796, including code to implement it, still marked "need-review". -- Boracay Bill (talk) 06:04, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

Why don't we get people to vote for this? I just voted. By the way, I'm inclined to put this in Persistent when it's archived to make sure it gets noticed. I really want this to happen, and it seems to have consensus. Perhaps I could just put a summary of it, with a reference to your Bugzilla fix? ImpIn | (t - c) 22:49, 30 May 2008 (UTC)
 * I thought I'd stop back here and cite (so to speak !) Wrigley Square as an example of the non-shortened-notes citations making it very difficult to read (in edit mode) the text of the article. The frequent long citations, many of which containing random-ish strings of numbers, just overwhelm the actual text.
 * And, no, I don't want to force anyone to use shortened notes, but I'm thinking that it should perhaps be the suggested format. Thanks, Madman (talk) 18:44, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Please cosider voting for 12796
A fair amount of people were involved with this discussion. It appears that there is a relatively easy way to hide all of the reference junk at the bottom of the article. Boracay Bill has done much of the work, it just needs to be glanced over and plugged in. Please vote so that we don't have to deal with all this junk when we edit; it's terribly distracting. If you disagree with the change, please let us know. ImpIn | (t - c) 08:54, 5 June 2008 (UTC)