Wikipedia talk:Citation templates

Sfn neglected

The section "Use in footnotes" starts with the sentence "For a citation to appear in a footnote, it needs to be enclosed in 'ref' tags." This gives the impression that REF tags are the only way. That is how I understood it, now a year ago, when I first learned to cite sources in Wikipedia. Clearly this is not the case as the Sfn template also generates a citation in a footnote. It took me a long time to discover Sfn, which I then preferred over the quite heavy-going REF.../REF for many reasons. I think the Sfn template, which Charlie Gillingham wrote in 2009, has still not found its deserved place in the Wikipedia documentation. - I might be wrong; perhaps most Wikipedians regret that Sfn was ever accepted and would like us all to exclusively use REF.../REF? Whatever might be the case, I do not want to edit this text without consensus and probably a newby like me is not the right person to do it. What do you all think of this? Johannes Schade (talk)

Mandatory title parameter

I see the title is required in Cite News, Web, and Citation templates or it generates an error. A lot of short newspaper articles over a hundred years old do not have a title because it required manually setting it in type for the printer, so they saved space by leaving it out. I'm using Cite News. Any suggestion on how to fill out the title field in these templates so they work? I've got the newspaper title, page, date, publisher, quote, and a url for books.google where the full newspaper has been visually scanned and archived (not in a book). The ref is going in a biography. Should I fiil in the title field with the bio subject's name, newspaper name, or use my best judgment to invent a title? 5Q5|^✉ 12:47, 15 December 2023 (UTC)

I was able able to find a title, but any suggestion for future use in filling out the parameter |title= when the publication omits it would be helpful. 5Q5|^✉ 15:20, 15 December 2023 (UTC)

In such a situation, I usually write in the first few words, with an ellipsis. I think that’s the most sensible, and it does makes it easier to find the relevant item on the page. (That was in fact the good old way of doing things before they came up with this novel fad of giving titles to things.)

Alternatively, I have sometimes found a suitable title in a table of contents, although it does not appear in the text itself. I don’t think it would be the case for short newspaper articles however, more for government gazettes, for example. Keriluamox (talk) 08:31, 22 December 2023 (UTC)

The proper way to cite US Senate and Congressional Documents?

What is the best way to accomplish this? 162.218.225.247 (talk) 09:30, 21 March 2024 (UTC)

It is always helpful to give an example. If it is on the web, you can use {{cite web}}. – Jonesey95 (talk) 23:08, 22 March 2024 (UTC)

References not notes

@Redrose64: Discussing as requested.

On the first page (20 results/page) of insource:"== Notes", I counted:

Search results, potentially offensive
URL, List of United States representatives from New York, Panama Papers, United States Senate, A, Georgia (U.S. state), Kendrick Lamar, Michigan, Protestantism, Nikola Tesla, Jake Gyllenhaal, List of A Song of Ice and Fire characters, One Piece, New Jersey, BDSM, Auschwitz concentration camp, Greek alphabet, Sanskrit, Operating system, IBM

• 6 {{notelist}}
• 1 {{notefoot}}
• 11 prose
• 1 {{reflist|group=nb}}
• 1 {{reflist|group="note"}}

Not even 1 of these are citations. All are for the explanatory footnote system, with 6 for {{efn}}, 2 for {{notetag}} and 1 for a non-predefined group "nb" but acting as an efn. I ask proponents of "Notes" for citations to present some evidence. It's they that need to start a RfC discussion.

Most importantly, this help page contradicts the guideline WP:EXPLNOTESECT, which says "respectively" and takes precedence. My edit was to "document the good practices accepted in the Wikipedia community".

The MOS further supports my observation:

more often used to distinguish between multiple end-matter sections or subsections.

...

If multiple sections are wanted, then some possibilities include:

• For a list of explanatory footnotes or shortened citation footnotes: "Notes", "Endnotes" or "Footnotes"
• For a list of full citations or general references: "References" or "Works cited"
  — MOS:FNNR

As to Editors may use any reasonable section and subsection names that they choose, a help page should document the most common practice, not unduly present edge cases. Based on the two linked guidelines, I would like to not only reinstate [1] but consider going further with completely removing mentions of "Notes".

−

section usually named "Notes" or "References" near

+

section named "References" near

142.113.140.146 (talk) 07:07, 17 August 2024 (UTC)

20 out of 922,951 is hardly representative. Your search will have picked up a lot of low-quality pages, not all of which will be best examples of ideal practice. It would have been better to examine our featured articles, which (according to WP:FA) ... are considered to be some of the best articles Wikipedia has to offer, as determined by Wikipedia's editors. They are used by editors as examples for writing other articles. and each of which (according to WP:WIAFA) exemplifies Wikipedia's very best work and is distinguished by professional standards of writing, presentation, and sourcing. I suggest that you examine some recent and upcoming TFAs to see just how inconsistent they are on section headings.

You mention WP:EXPLNOTESECT but that is just part of Wikipedia:Citing sources, which early on (specifically at WP:CITESHORT) describes the Notes/References convention. I will also direct you to Help:Shortened footnotes. Where there is inconsistency between frequently-used guidelines, you should not act unilaterally but discuss it centrally. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 14:01, 17 August 2024 (UTC)

As suggested, I examined Wikipedia:Today's_featured_article/August_2024:

• "Explanatory notes" for efn: 1: Homeric_Hymns
• Notes for efn: 17:
  Charles_Edward,_Duke_of_Saxe-Coburg_and_Gotha, Aston_Martin_Rapide, Existence, Albert_Stanley,_1st_Baron_Ashfield, St_Melangell's_Church, Phoolan_Devi, Yugoslav_torpedo_boat_T2, Worlds_(Porter_Robinson_album), Hudson_Volcano, Snooker, Kes_(Star_Trek), Battle_of_Winwick, Turabay_dynasty, John_F._Kennedy_document_hoax, 24th_Waffen_Mountain_Division_of_the_SS_Karstjäger, Nadezhda_Stasova, Cross_Temple,_Fangshan
• No notes section: 11:
  Free_and_Candid_Disquisitions, Alice_of_Champagne, Blackrocks_Brewery, Flag_of_Japan, IMac_G3, Pan_Am_Flight_214, Outer_Wilds, Total_Recall_(1990_film), Black-throated_loon, Bäckadräkten, Segundo_Romance
• Notes for bundled references: 1: Rachelle_Ann_Go
• Notes with sfn mixed with citations: 1: Anna_Lee_Fisher
• Notes for full citations only: 0

If we stretch it, Anna_Lee_Fisher can be considered a inconsistency between frequently-used guidelines. When Shortened citations appear separately in ==Notes==, the full citations still need to appear in ==References== or similar. In total, the notes section is efn 18:2 non-full citations, and efn 18:0 full citations. "references" is more common overall.

Any inconsistent ... section headings is mostly WP:CITEVAR, which is accepted. However, no major citation styles put citations in Notes.

Mentioning Notes should require:

−

Note, if this is a new page or if there are not already references previously cited, it is necessary to create a section usually named "Notes" or "References" near the end of the page

+

Note, if this is a new page or if there are not already references previously cited, it is necessary to create a section usually named "References" (and sometimes also "Notes") near the end of the page

But that is too complex. Basically a "Notes" section requires a later "References" section created first. Articles don't generally put a bare {{reflist}} after ==Notes==, so proponents should at least wikilink some articles exemplifying their claims.

In conclusion, I would like to improve the help page by editing it show the wikicode used in the featured articles you suggested that I examine. 142.113.140.146 (talk) 18:40, 17 August 2024 (UTC)

Yes, some styles are in the majority over others. But that does not mean that the majority is any more "correct" than the minorities. What it means is that for those carrying our FA reviews, several different styles are considered acceptable, provided that the article is internally consistent. I would also like to point out that this is the talk page for making improvements to the page Wikipedia:Citation templates, which as its title implies, is about citation templates and how they are used to create citations. It is not about citations as a whole, nor is it about citation style. As stated at WP:CITESTYLE, Wikipedia does not have a single house style (see WP:PEREN#Establish a house citation style). Forcing people to use one kind of heading to the exclusion of others creates a house style. If you want to change that, this is the wrong page. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 07:41, 18 August 2024 (UTC)

No, I never intended to try Forcing people to use one kind of heading to the exclusion of others creates a house style. If you want to change that, this is the wrong page. I accept all the different styles in the FA articles you linked. ==Notes==<references/> for full citations is found in neither, so presenting it here is undue.

I never suggested any changes to citation style. I just want this help page's § Use in footnotes to be more generally helpful by reflecting your FA articles and the other guidelines. This help page is not the place to controversially introduce a never-seen-before style. 142.113.140.146 (talk) 10:16, 18 August 2024 (UTC)

@Redrose64: Would an acceptable resolution be to remove the controversial paragraph and code between "Note," and "/>"? After all, you agree this help page is about citation templates and how they are used to create citations. It is not about citations as a whole, nor is it about citation style, and the references tag is not a template, while {{reflist}} falls outside the main topic of {{cite xxx}} citation templates. 142.113.140.146 (talk) 11:01, 18 August 2024 (UTC)

Notified: Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Reliability, Wikipedia_talk:Help_Project. 142.113.140.146 (talk) 10:46, 18 August 2024 (UTC)