Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Layout/Archive 8

This is an archive of past discussions on Wikipedia:Manual of Style. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

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Removal of two blank lines prior to stub guideline – correct or not?

I notice that a few weeks ago the guideline to have two newlines before stub templates was removed, citing this archived discussion as the basis for the change. On brief review it seems to me that archived discussion didn't reach a firm conclusion that it was appropriate to remove the guideline. I would ask editors here to confirm whether the removal of the guideline was indeed correct? If yes I will need to mirror the change for the next version of AWB. Thanks Rjwilmsi 08:08, 1 March 2011 (UTC)

I made the same change elsewhere, and was reverted on what I consider a weak argument if not outright incorrect. See also this discussion. Nevertheless, I think a double space is not needed because I think the spacing is not needed. I will now reopen the discssion at it's proper place. Debresser (talk) 09:58, 1 March 2011 (UTC)

Red links in the see also section

I was wondering what the policy is on red links in the see also section. I have seen a lot of these lately and it seems to me that they ought not be in the see also section because a red link has nothing to see. I just wanted to get some other opinions though because I couldn't find anything clearly in policy that relates to this. --Kumioko (talk) 19:10, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

WP:SEEALSO explicitly states 'The "See also" section should not link to pages that do not exist (red links) ...'. --Redrose64 (talk) 12:47, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

Nevertheless one should always have a look at the exact function of the red links in the "see also"-section rather than just deleting them. This section sometimes contains terms not yet integrated in article (but ideally should in the future). For instance if you have an short article about some scientist, the "see also"-section might contain a short list oft things named after him discovered by him. Such a list might be better suited in the article's "main body" however in reality for whatever reasons (convenience, lack of WP policy/guideline knowledge. etc.) authors do place it sometimes under "see also". If you come across the occasional red link in such a case it is important that you only delete it from the "see also" section after you've copied it to a location elsewhere in the article.--Kmhkmh (talk) 13:09, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

Thanks. --Kumioko (talk) 13:19, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

And then there are red links that are alternative spellings or word orders or disambiguation pages. One should always be careful before just removing a redlink. Although in general the See also section is definitely not the place to have them. Debresser (talk) 15:34, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

"See also" sections are for the benefit of readers, not editors. An editor is free to make notes on the discussion page or leave comments in the text. Leaving redlinks with no comment as to when it might turn blue, is useless and misleading IMO. A bonafide Wikipedia user (our target audience) is quite perplexed, being taken to an "article" with no content. Student7 (talk) 21:35, 2 April 2011 (UTC)

Primary research resources list goes where?

I started a discussion with User:Stevenmg regarding the Susan B. Anthony article at which he added three primary research collections in a new section entitled "Research Resources", placing it above References. He said that he and other editors have been listing such primary research collections for a while now in the hope that potential scholars use this information to begin their research. He notes that the collections are not used to build the article.

If the practice is to be supported, where in the layout does the "Research resources" section go? Binksternet (talk) 20:36, 17 April 2011 (UTC)

The Further reading section is described as containing "a reasonable number of editor-recommended publications that would help interested readers learn more about the article subject". I'd say either within that section (perhaps in a subsection thereof) or perhaps adjacent to it as a separate appendix section. Wtmitchell (talk) (earlier Boracay Bill) 13:07, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

That's a reasonable location. Though the boxed collections of primary materials are not "publications", they are certainly reading and further. Binksternet (talk) 14:50, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

I have left a note at the editor's talk page. WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:29, 22 April 2011 (UTC)

Where to place sister projects links if no External links section exists?

Wikipedia:Wikimedia sister projects#Where to place links states that if no "External links" section exists, then {{commons}} and {{commons cat}} "should be placed in the last section of the page, as described in the layout-related MoS". However this page does not contain such phrase. Should we add it? Where should I place sister projects links if no External links section exists? -- Basilicofresco (msg) 13:44, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

Yes, that's the rule, and maybe we should duplicate it here. However, I've been re-thinking the rule, because it is causing an unexpected problem when the last section is formatted in columns, which is typical for articles with many citations (and ==References== is the last section in about ~98% of articles without an ==External links== section). Here are two examples:

Wrap problem with columns

Text with a ref:^[1]

^ Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Phasellus ut mauris nisl, vitae sodales nisi. Curabitur sit amet felis eget nulla tincidunt suscipit at id lacus. Suspendisse placerat pharetra pretium. Aliquam bibendum ullamcorper tempus. Sed pharetra lorem vel leo dignissim sollicitudin. Donec viverra posuere nulla. Integer in consequat odio. Donec ullamcorper, quam nec hendrerit semper, dui dolor molestie purus, non condimentum justo metus at massa. Aliquam ullamcorper, libero at sollicitudin dictum, nulla lorem adipiscing lectus, eu convallis lectus nunc et nunc. Pellentesque non purus ac justo porta sollicitudin in in erat. Donec elementum, ante vitae feugiat tincidunt, orci turpis aliquam velit, vel semper lorem mi ac nibh. Sed tempor scelerisque hendrerit. Integer pulvinar lacinia fermentum. Morbi tempor elementum vestibulum. Nunc ut dui quis lacus pulvinar lacinia. Nulla facilisis adipiscing sapien, ac semper tortor volutpat eu. Proin ac velit non erat sollicitudin tincidunt. Sed in justo sed tortor aliquet tempus. Vestibulum non odio interdum elit interdum pellentesque sit amet at tellus. Aliquam cursus congue risus non eleifend. Nunc mi dui, feugiat non ultrices at, feugiat vitae tortor. Nullam accumsan tincidunt tellus, quis pulvinar augue dapibus in. Phasellus laoreet dolor non mauris facilisis quis gravida nunc sagittis. Donec volutpat elit vel purus interdum consectetur. In hac habitasse platea dictumst. Sed a mi vel tellus ultricies porta. Quisque quam lectus, sagittis eu dignissim eu, bibendum ac diam. Suspendisse mi neque, molestie id hendrerit vitae, congue in ipsum. Vivamus ultricies lacus id velit dignissim ac luctus velit malesuada.

Wraps correctly without columns

New ref:^[1]

^ Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Phasellus ut mauris nisl, vitae sodales nisi. Curabitur sit amet felis eget nulla tincidunt suscipit at id lacus. Suspendisse placerat pharetra pretium. Aliquam bibendum ullamcorper tempus. Sed pharetra lorem vel leo dignissim sollicitudin. Donec viverra posuere nulla. Integer in consequat odio. Donec ullamcorper, quam nec hendrerit semper, dui dolor molestie purus, non condimentum justo metus at massa. Aliquam ullamcorper, libero at sollicitudin dictum, nulla lorem adipiscing lectus, eu convallis lectus nunc et nunc. Pellentesque non purus ac justo porta sollicitudin in in erat. Donec elementum, ante vitae feugiat tincidunt, orci turpis aliquam velit, vel semper lorem mi ac nibh. Sed tempor scelerisque hendrerit. Integer pulvinar lacinia fermentum. Morbi tempor elementum vestibulum. Nunc ut dui quis lacus pulvinar lacinia. Nulla facilisis adipiscing sapien, ac semper tortor volutpat eu. Proin ac velit non erat sollicitudin tincidunt. Sed in justo sed tortor aliquet tempus. Vestibulum non odio interdum elit interdum pellentesque sit amet at tellus. Aliquam cursus congue risus non eleifend. Nunc mi dui, feugiat non ultrices at, feugiat vitae tortor. Nullam accumsan tincidunt tellus, quis pulvinar augue dapibus in. Phasellus laoreet dolor non mauris facilisis quis gravida nunc sagittis. Donec volutpat elit vel purus interdum consectetur. In hac habitasse platea dictumst. Sed a mi vel tellus ultricies porta. Quisque quam lectus, sagittis eu dignissim eu, bibendum ac diam. Suspendisse mi neque, molestie id hendrerit vitae, congue in ipsum. Vivamus ultricies lacus id velit dignissim ac luctus velit malesuada.

As you can see (unless your browser can't support the column-creating script), the version using columns loses a lot of screen real estate to the commons tag. So I'm thinking that the rule needs to be last section, unless that last section uses columns, in which case it should perhaps be placed in the penultimate section, or the graphic template should not be used at all, but converted to one of the inline options, and an ==External links== section created for it.

Another place to mention this might be the WP:External links guideline. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:21, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

I have seen this solved in some articles by placing the sister project links in the "see also" section, which normally has less text on the right, and even if you use columns there, it's easier to tweak. Tijfo098 (talk) 20:16, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

Since ==See also== is supposed to be reserved for pages on the English Wikipedia, I think it would be better to place it under ==External links==, assuming that section exists. Or perhaps if it doesn't, then the thing to do is to create an EL section, and change the template an inline style, e.g.:

Media related to Manual of Style/Layout/Archive 8 at Wikimedia Commons

What do you think? WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:45, 29 April 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia: Related information

There is an essay called Wikipedia:Related information (see also the talk page) suggesting using a section heeding for navigation boxes is a good thing. The essay has been around for some time now. Enough time perhaps to see if the approach has gained traction, as the proponents wanted to see. I think it's a good time to determine if a consensus can be reached on if this is a good idea or not. The essay itself mentions a lot of the pros and cons of the proposal. I don't think it is a good idea to have such a consequential thing remain ambiguous according to the MoS (as the essay claims it currently is). The matter boils down to, "Should there be a section heading before the navigational templates or not?". —Preceding unsigned comment added by Jason Quinn (talk • contribs) 22:34, 26 April 2011 (UTC)

Or, perhaps, the matter boils down to: "Should Layout ban a section heading before the navigational templates even if the editors of an article want to have one?" While I am hardly a dispassionate observer, I would argue that the answer is "no." A wiki is living thing and we should proceed cautiously when considering limitations. Butwhatdoiknow (talk) 01:01, 27 April 2011 (UTC)

I reject the idea that having clear guidelines prevents Wikipedia from being a "living thing". It fails to see the bigger picture. To use your terms, even if something is "banned" by the MoS, it stills lives through the process of discussion and can be changed via that avenue. Having general formatting guidelines is essential for the project to maintain a high degree of quality. Indeed your argument could be generalized to, "Why have any guidelines at all?" So, digging deeper still, I suggest the fundamental issue is, "Does having a guideline for the absence or presence of a heading preceding the navigational templates improve (on average) the quality of the Encyclopedia?". The answer I think is a resounding "yes" in this case. It's a matter that concerns almost every article so there ought to exist some guideline to help enforce some consistency. As a guideline, not policy, any article could still opt to ignore if it there's a common sense or good reason for it.

My main argument against such a heading is that it simply isn't needed and is distracting clutter. The heading also screws up the printed article as the templates aren't printed but the heading is. From my own personal experience (which is a lot from my editing style), no more than about 1 in a 100 articles uses the heading. I have not seen any evidence that usage of a "Related Information" header is gaining traction. If anything, I would venture a guess that it has become less popular than it once was. So this is just a wart on the overall formatting of Wikipedia.

It seems to often be the case that editors have an attitude of apathy towards "minor" issues. So what if 1% of articles deviate from the usual? The problem with lack of action now is that minor problems can grow into bigger ones. What if it became completely random which style was used? I think it is obvious people care a lot more. I also think it's obvious that a guideline would be adopted shorter thereafter. To me, not only is this a matter of improving 1% of articles but it is also a matter of foresight. Jason Quinn (talk) 14:16, 27 April 2011 (UTC)

Wow, you certainly have covered a lot of ground. Let's start with the issue of consistency.

Consistency is good. I agree with you, up to a point, that consistency is a good thing. For example, logically navboxes should be placed at the end of the See also section rather than at the end of an article. But experienced readers have become used to looking for Navboxes at the end of articles and the task of moving them in hundreds of thousands of articles would now be Herculean. So starting a new inconsistent practice of placing them in the See also section would lower the average usability - and therefore the average quality - of Wikipedia.

But not always. Putting aside for now the merits and demerits of a Related information hearing, I respectfully suggest that "it is inconsistent with past practice" is not a valid reason to reject it. Unlike moving navboxes, adding a Related information heading does not change any existing layout element, it only adds a new one. So there is no disruption to existing content. If we reject the heading now on the basis that it is inconsistent with prior practice then we are rejecting it for all time because no amount of discussion will change the fact that it will always be inconsistent with prior practice.

Move on to the merits? Will you agree with me that consistency alone is not a particularly strong argument in favor of banning navbox headings? If so then we can move on to your substantive concerns regarding the Related information heading. Butwhatdoiknow (talk) 12:32, 28 April 2011 (UTC)

I agree completely that consistency alone is not a particularly strong argument in favor of "banning" navbox headings. (I still think that is the wrong term.) Consistency for the sake of consistency is not a good idea. I don't think this falls under that category. Having the navbox, in nearly every imaginable case, makes the article slightly worse. I find none of the arguments in the essay persuasive, including the fundamental idea that the lack of the navbox heading confuses users. Some editors are using this essay as a way to try to prevent editors from removing the navbox heading. I find this kind of shady ethically. As far as I am aware, there is no competing essay to argue for the removal of the navbox heading. I have the urge to write one. I actually think it is implied implicitly in the MOS:APPENDIX that such a heading should not exist anyway. Personally, if either way if acceptable, I would have like to seen it adopted as the guideline in the first place and explicitly stated. I dislike entering editing conflicts so I have not bothered to push my view as strongly as a few editors would be willing to defend theirs. Edits wars aren't my thing. But such a thing can and eventually will happen and force a a more explicit guideline into existence. Jason Quinn (talk) 14:02, 28 April 2011 (UTC)

By my quick count, there are about 60 articles that contain a section heading that is (exactly) "Related information". Slightly more than half of them use this heading for something else, e.g., Vocational expert#Related_Information. This tells me two things: That it's not especially popular, and that ButwhatdoIknow has successfully avoided the temptation to spam his preferred style into articles.

I wouldn't use this style, and I hear that it creates problems for the print versions of Wikipedia, but I don't think that having fewer than 30 articles (one in about 130,000 articles) using it is really hurting us much. There are more articles that misspell "accommodate" than there are that use this. If I were trying to improve things, I might clean up those, first.

However, if you're determined that this causes problems, then taking the essay to WP:MFD is probably the right way to deal with this. Essays that clearly do not have the support of the community can be deleted. WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:10, 29 April 2011 (UTC)

I'm not sure I'd even want the essay deleted. It's a rational point of view supporting a topic. Thanks for counting up some of the examples. I will look into that more. There are definitely more pages than just 60 that use some sort of navbox heading though because I come across them somewhat frequently when I use the "random link" to find articles that need to be copyedited. If indeed, the numbers are so low, instead of taking a "not worth worrying about it" approach, I instead think a "be bold" approach to adopting it is perhaps warranted. I'll think about it for a while. Thanks for you feedback. Jason Quinn (talk) 15:26, 29 April 2011 (UTC)

Whatamidoing, thank you for the compliment. Unfortunately, it is undeserved. The fact is that, in the past, I have done what I call seeding (and you call spamming) the heading. However, most of those edits have since been reverted, with the reason most often given being that the heading is "non-standard" or "violates Layout" (my favorite is an editor who explained a series of reversions by simply saying "no"). In short, it appears that the principal reason the proposal hasn't taken root is not that it is a bad idea, but that it is a new idea. (That said, some folks have raised genuine issues - such as the fact that most navboxes do not appear in print versions - and I respond to them here. It is my contention that the benefit of the heading outweighs these problems. I understand that you disagree with this contention.) Butwhatdoiknow (talk) 02:30, 30 April 2011 (UTC)

Why Link To An Essay?

Are there any objections to changing

"However, whether a link belongs in the "See also" section is ultimately a matter of editorial judgment and common sense."

to

"However, whether a link belongs in the "See also" section is ultimately a matter of editorial judgment."

It doesn't seem to make sense that this guideline is linking to an essay.Curb Chain (talk) 00:28, 28 April 2011 (UTC)

NeutralYou are probably correct to assume that "common sense" is implied by "editorial judgment" and is therefore redundant. Sometimes there is value in being a little redundant to help convey a point. I don't think it matter much either way in this instance. Jason Quinn (talk) 19:03, 28 April 2011 (UTC)

I think that this is desirable, because it remind people that they're supposed to use their brains, not merely find a sentence in a guideline that they can use to bludgeon people in disputes. We have enough wikilawyering; a bit more common sense would do us no harm. WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:12, 29 April 2011 (UTC)

I dispute that because I think wp:username is fine linking to a common-sense-page, because it explains that discretion must be used when deciding on the propriety of a name, out of cultural sensitivity. But I think it is inappropriate here because this is more about readability, and this should be more open and clean, and using "common sense" is too gray.Curb Chain (talk) 09:43, 29 April 2011 (UTC)

Maybe the way it is linked or piped, but that would need an example.Curb Chain (talk) 09:44, 29 April 2011 (UTC)

IMO, a policy page should not be used to promote an essay (non-policy) article, no matter how "worthy." If it is that worthy, let's make it policy! Student7 (talk) 13:17, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

How does linking to it in this guideline have the effect of "promoting" an essay to policy status?

Note, please, that essays are linked in all sorts of pages. The body of WP:V links to one essay and three help/information pages. WP:NOR links to two essays (including the one disputed here). WP:NPOV links to six essays, one FAQ, and two help/information pages (not counting things in templates or under ==See also==). These are heavily-watched, major content policies, and the links exist because people found them helpful.

I don't think that we want to create a 'walled garden' effect, in which policies may only link to other policies and guidelines may only link to policies and guidelines. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:59, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

I would have hoped to have more than three interested editors! I can see the advantage of listing an external style guide. Still, we have a lot of essays. This one might be wonderful, but why is it "only" (pov word) an essay? (Apologies for repeating myself!). Student7 (talk) 20:44, 3 May 2011 (UTC)

O.k,, I'll add my two cents. First, in response to something Curb Chain didn't ask: Yes, the phrase "and common sense" is unnecessary. But it is also harmless and does help drive home a point. So I'd say leave it in (whether or not it is linked to the essay). Second, using essays as references - particularly one as uncontroversial as "use common sense" - keep the guides from bloat. So I am in favor of the link. Note: The box at the beginning of Layout also links to the common sense essay. So evidently the community has no problem with the practice. (Whether more essays should be elevated to policy is beyond the scope of Layout, but I'd vote "no" because we don't need any more hard and fast rules.) Butwhatdoiknow (talk) 11:58, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

One additional point: often, when "common sense" is referred to, the point is to discourage wikilawyering. We get some by-the-book editors who are convinced that the exact words in a guideline must be taken to extreme, regardless of what is good for the project. We occasionally need to remind people that they really are supposed to use their best judgment, not just mindlessly follow "the rules". WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:55, 7 May 2011 (UTC)

Whatamidoing, in response to your unconstructive comment here, I will state that I will no longer pursue my proposal on this page further because of the same rationale about cultural relativity I stated early-up.Curb Chain (talk) 06:06, 8 May 2011 (UTC)

Curb Chain has started discussions proposing the removal of "common sense" in at least these locations (the first of the following was started by Bernolákovčina):

It is unhelpful to discuss the same issue at multiple locations. The core page appears to be the last, and I suggest that any further discussion should occur at that page. I am suggesting that no further discussion should occur on this page until the issue is decided at one page. Johnuniq (talk) 09:08, 8 May 2011 (UTC)

Suggested rewording in SEEALSO

Coming from a discussion on an article talk page, I recently took a look at WP:SEEALSO, as I haven't been following changes closely. Some of the current wording looks to a bit clumsy to me:

"... although some links may not naturally fit into the body of text they may be excluded from the "See also" section due to article size constraints. Links that would be included in the article were it not kept relatively short for other reasons may thus be appropriate, though should be used in moderation, as always."

How about rewording that something like the following:

"... although some links may not naturally fit into the body the article due to size constraints. Such links might be placed in a "See also" section, but this should be done in moderation and editors should consider providing a clarifying annotation where the relevance of the linked article is not self-evident."

I'm not a particularly skilled wordsmith, and someone here can probably improve that. Wtmitchell (talk) (earlier Boracay Bill) 06:23, 21 May 2011 (UTC)

Sister projects links: Wikisource and Wiktionary

“

InterWikimedia links to other projects (except Wiktionary and Wikisource) should appear in this [External links] section.

”

So, where should links to Wiktionary and Wikisource appear? Fleet Command (talk) 14:57, 28 May 2011 (UTC)

Wiktionary and Wikisource links may appear in the EL section, but they may also be linked inline (e.g., to the text of a document being discussed or to a word that might not be familiar to all readers). WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:04, 31 May 2011 (UTC)

"External links" should come after "See also" (link)

I've started a discussion to elevate "External links" higher in article. After footnotes, seems extremely buried for valuable content. Feels like treating it like categories or somethink low content like that. Let's start putting "External Links" section after "See also" (archive link) TCO (talk) 17:30, 20 June 2011 (UTC)

This proposal was strongly opposed and thankfully did not succeed Jason Quinn (talk) 12:37, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

RFC: restructuring of the Manual of Style

Editors may be interested in this RFC, along with the discussion of its implementation:

Should all subsidiary pages of the Manual of Style be made subpages of WP:MOS?

It's big; and it promises huge improvements. Great if everyone can be involved. Noetica^Tea? 00:43, 25 June 2011 (UTC)

Seems like this one is going forward. Probably a good idea. Jason Quinn (talk) 12:40, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

In-text use of "See [[Article]]"

I've spent a while trying to figure out how to find any mention in WP:MOS of any guidelines on the use of "See [[Article]]" within the prose of an article, but to no avail. The material linked to by WP:SEEALSO seemed to be one logical place to have some mention of it (if only to distinguish from the related "See also" construct), so I'm asking here: Do we have any guidelines or even common practices described anywhere?

One can find all manner of variations, many of which violate basic Wikipedia style practices:

... some prose discussion (see [[Subject]]).
... some prose discussion. (See [[Subject]].)
... some prose discussion; see: [[Subject]]).
... some prose discussion (See: [[Subject]]).
... some prose discussion (see: [[Subject]]).
... some prose discussion (See article on [[Subject]]).

... etc.

Personally, I find the first two best – either [1] a parenthetical clause fully embedded within the related prose's sentence or [2] a separate, complete parenthetical sentence following that sentence; both following MOS:CAP and avoiding superfluous colons after "see". [3] inappropriately leaves the meta-statement unparenthesized; [4]-[6] have various style problems or needless verbiage; and I'm sure there are many more variants.

If we do have something documented, it should be linked to anywhere it might be sought for. I'm hardly an inexperienced Wikipedian, and I haven't figured out a good way to search only WP:MOS-related pages for mentions of "See:". ("Wikipedia:" and "Help:" namespace searches aren't nearly specific enough, punctuation is typically ignored in searches, and "see" is an extremely common word with many contexts.) ~ Jeff Q (talk) 12:46, 17 July 2011 (UTC)

My first impulse is always to see whether we can get rid of the "see also" altogether, and perhaps replace it with a piped link to the same article. This lets me turn it into ... [[Subject | some prose discussion]]. without needing to figure out a clean way to say "See this other article".

Occasionally, it's possible to replace it with a {{See also}} link at the top of the section.

Of your options, I happen to prefer #1 or #2 better, but I still prefer "avoid the whole mess" to any of them. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:07, 19 July 2011 (UTC)

I agree completely about replacing the whole "See [[Article]]" concept, since it's really a pre-Web artifact of publishing. But until we get rid of the habits of permanent, passively read text, we could use some guidelines. In fact, they should start by saying that 21st-century, Internet-based documents should do away with side notes that wrench the reader away from the material and into the meta-material. ~ Jeff Q (talk) 07:28, 3 August 2011 (UTC)

Is Bibliography acceptable in this article?

An editor has been revising the Old Testament article. The editor added a Bibliography section, separate from the references. I don't believe this use is correct. Could we please have a few eyes on the article's sections to confirm the order? --Walter Görlitz (talk) 13:56, 19 July 2011 (UTC)

Looks like a perfectly normal case of Harvard referencing. Personally, I would have given the title "Notes" to the section with the footnotes, but that is at least partly a matter of personal preferences. --Hegvald (talk) 16:23, 19 July 2011 (UTC)

Technically, it's shortened footnotes, rather than Harvard, but yes, it's an acceptable system. I also would have chosen Notes/References for the pair of section headings rather than References/Bibliography, for the reasons given against using "Bibliography" at all in this guideline. You could propose a change of section headings on the talk page, if you wanted. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:01, 19 July 2011 (UTC)

4.2 Links, define h2 section

Under 4.2 Links, the term h2 section is unclear for those who don't know HTML elements. Does anyone have a better idea of explaining what an h2 section is, and where the first occurance of a link should be placed? Maybe replace h2 section with lead section which is clearly defined. Gmcbjames (talk) 16:12, 31 July 2011 (UTC)

I read the current text as discouraging wikilinks in the lead section and, instead, saying they should only appear in the body of the article. I don't think that my reading reflects current practice. So we might want to consider making substantive changes to the text. Butwhatdoiknow (talk) 16:54, 31 July 2011 (UTC)

No, it's not discouraging links in the lead. It's trying to tell editors not to link every single occurrence of a word—just the first time it occurs in each ==Section==. Unfortunately, in addition to being confusing, that advice is wrong, as we don't normally link any word more than three times even in a long article, even if it appears in a dozen separate sections. Also, the first occurrence of the word isn't always the best one to link (e.g., if it's next to another word that needs to be linked). WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:21, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

Reading changes to the policy, and being forced to actually read it, I noticed a reference to "section" (which my softwear editor is using at the top of the screen). Anyway, since we use h2, aren't these technically "subsections?" That's what I have been calling them up until now. This may not be important. Student7 (talk) 12:31, 3 August 2011 (UTC)

It isn't important. So, of course, I'll continue the discussion. My guess is that, since we never use h1, h2 is the highest level of sectioning. Hence, "section" would be proper. Butwhatdoiknow (talk) 17:42, 3 August 2011 (UTC)

Also noticed the phrase "Avoid creating adjacent links to separate articles, because it is confusing for the reader." I'm missing something here. What is an "adjacent link?" Is this like [[King]] [[Richard I]] where the link to king should probably be omitted? Student7 (talk) 12:31, 3 August 2011 (UTC)

I think you have it right, except it doesn't matter whether one of the links should be omitted. In all cases it is better to avoid adjacent links. That said, we might want to edit the article to clear up any confusion regarding what is meant. Butwhatdoiknow (talk) 17:42, 3 August 2011 (UTC)

Yes, you've understood the issue correctly. I couldn't think of a way to give an example that wouldn't be confusing. Adjacent links are one of the primary reasons for not linking the very first occurrence of a given word. WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:51, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

Notes and References: Table footnotes?

Can tables have independent footnotes of their own? Fleet Command (talk) 07:12, 30 July 2011 (UTC)

I don't understand the question. Is it technologically possible? Yes. If you want to use footnotes ("ref tags") for both the table's notes and the rest of the article, then use the "groups" system to split them. If you can absolutely guarantee that there will never be any citations preceding that table (i.e., that ought to be listed with the rest of them), then you can use {{reflist|closed=yes}}. That will collect all the citations before the reflist, and send only those following it into subsequent lists of citations.

Is it a good idea to have bibliographic citations scattered about in multiple places in an article? Not usually, but I suppose that there might be a good reason for it. If the "footnotes" in question are explanatory comments (rather than bibliographic citations), then it might be highly desirable to have them next to the table. WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:16, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

Simply put: I see a lot of people creating tables and putting notes below the tables. I think this is a good idea, though I do not see this mentioned in this MOS. I am looking at the wrong place, or is not allowed at all? Fleet Command (talk) 06:20, 2 August 2011 (UTC)

This might not be the page where it would be documented, but if you think it's a good idea, and nobody's telling you to stop, then you don't really need to have "permission" from a guideline to WP:BOLDly try it. I think you might want to start with the WP:REFGROUP approach; it will take just a minute to figure out (very similar to naming a ref), and it's the most reliable method of splitting the citations. WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:56, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

I do need permission. I am nominating an article for GA status and the GA reviewer is requesting removal of table footnotes in favor of a Notes section, citing this page as a reason. But I am here to further investigate my options. Fleet Command (talk) 17:16, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

That is an issue of style, and you do not have to accede to every request or comment in a review. ---— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk 17:31, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

Not all piping is "the pipe trick"

I've amended the Links section because it told editors to use "the pipe trick", while linking to Wikipedia:Piped link. The pipe trick is a specific shortcut for creating some piped links - see Help:Pipe trick. I ~~assume~~ hope no-one will object! PamD (talk) 08:16, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

Placing of deletion templates

I previously raised this at Wikipedia_talk:Deletion_policy#Placing_of_deletion_templates but no-one commented in 10 days so I'll see if anyone here is interested!

Should deletion templates go above or below navigational hatnotes?

WP:HNP says that hatnotes are placed "at the very top", and cites accessibility issues, but doesn't mention deletion templates among the examples of things which hatnotes precede.

If deletion templates count as "Maintenance templates", then WP:LAYOUT and WP:LEAD specify that they go after hatnotes. But various deletion instruction pages refer to putting deletion templates "at the top" of pages, and this seems to be common practice.

I suggest that they should go below any navigational hatnotes / dablinks, because these can otherwise get submerged below large templates, making them difficult to see for sighted readers, and causing particular problems, I assume, for readers using screenreaders etc. WP:GLOSSARY doesn't define "Maintenance template", so gives no guidance on whether that term includes deletion templates.

An example of the problem was here (unfortunately now deleted!), where a redirect was over-written by an article which is being PRODded: the redirect, still needed, survived as a hatnote but was easy to miss below the large PROD template.

Is there any statement anywhere which specifies where speedy / prod / AfD templates should go on the page, relative to hatnotes? If not, I suggest that there should be - though not sure just where!

Any thoughts? PamD 12:59, 21 August 2011 (UTC)

Pam, when I use Twinkle to CSD my own edits, I see that the template is placed above everything on the page when i open it as I would to edit it. With that as a model, in my opinion, they should all go there. I can not say where an Afd is placed on the page. Try an experiment in your sandbox and see where it is placed. Regards,Buster40004 Talk 01:29, 23 August 2011 (UTC)

Hi Buster, Thanks. But "Twinkle does it that way" doesn't seem to answer the question! Twinkle should be implementing policy, not making it. My reading of WP:HNP suggests that deletion templates should be placed after navigational templates, so that TWINKLE has got it wrong. I'll raise it at Wikipedia_talk:Twinkle if there aren't any further comments here, but will give it a few more days first. I've tested CSD and XfD by TWINKLE in my sandbox, and confirm that it places the template above navigational hatnotes. PamD 07:29, 23 August 2011 (UTC)

I think either way is ok. I do not think that placing the deletion template above the hatnote makes the hatnote especially hard to discern, and anyways deletion templates are supposed to be in place for only 1 week. Debresser (talk) 09:34, 23 August 2011 (UTC)

As they are, indeeed, maintenance templates, they ought to go underneath hatnotes.

As they are temporary, compliance is possibly not the single most important issue. However, if someone wants to drop a friendly note to the Twinkle folks about this, that might be helpful. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:38, 18 September 2011 (UTC)

A template has been created, and is being used, which adds links to relevant portals etc automatically and adds a "headline" Additional, more specific, and related topics may be found at: to the See also section. I don't think the headline is a useful addition, and I'm pretty sure it goes against WP:LAYOUT. Any thoughts? PamD 22:51, 14 September 2011 (UTC)

This looks like the same sort of thing (on steroids) talked about at the "Additions to See also" section above. My thought, for what it is worth, is that the template does not violate Layout. Whether it is useful or not is probably a non-Layout question. Butwhatdoiknow (talk) 23:45, 14 September 2011 (UTC)

Template:OEIS

You are invited to take part in a discussion, whether links to the OEIS should look like this A190939 or somehow else. Lipedia (talk) 14:45, 18 September 2011 (UTC)

This question is about the placement and formatting of an WP:External link (i.e., should a link to some non-WMF-related website appear in the middle of the article and look almost like a link to another article), not really a layout question. I'll let the EL folks know about it. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:41, 18 September 2011 (UTC)

reflist not catching references from external links section

In Universal Plug and Play I dutifully moved the "References" section up under "See also": http://en.wiki.x.io/w/index.php?title=Universal_Plug_and_Play&oldid=452930581. But then three references that are made in the External links section below that don't show up anywhere, and an error message shows up at the bottom. Is that a bug in reflist, or does reflist always only show stuff above it? If so, is there supposed to be a ban on references from stuff below the references section? I see no guidance on this question on this page, on External links, or in the help document that accompanies the reference error. In this case for the time being I moved some of the external links up higher to a different section so their references would show up, but it does seem that there would be times folks would want to add references to text in a section that is supposed to go below reflist. They should at least be explicitly told that this isn't good/supported/whatever ★NealMcB★ (talk) 20:48, 28 September 2011 (UTC)

Per the help page: "This message may also show if there are <refs>...</refs> tags after the reference list markup." The Cite extension displays all reference preceding the <references /> or {{reflist}}. This really doesn't come up too often, as external links don't usually have references. The section in that article really needs a lot of work. ---— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk 21:41, 28 September 2011 (UTC)

The external links section should not have references, or very much non-link text for that matter. In this case, the Software subsection should probably be its own section earlier in the article rather than part of External links. Antony–22 (^talk⁄_contribs) 02:42, 29 September 2011 (UTC)

"Formatting" section

I propose stubbing this section as an unnecessary duplicate of the existing guideline, since it's not in the "layout" scope and prevents unnecessary accidental forking or misunderstanding. Grandiose (me, talk, contribs) 20:30, 30 September 2011 (UTC)

I must admit that I don't know what "stubbing" is, and I don't even want to guess at the meaning of "forking." That said, I have always wondered why this section was in this article. So if the suggestion is to remove the text and substitute links to a formatting article that contains the same information then I agree. Butwhatdoiknow (talk) 13:11, 2 October 2011 (UTC)

Pretty much, yes. Sorry, just to explain: since a "stub" is a short, often very short article, then "stubbing" refers to removing (controversial, e.g. copyright-infringing) material to leave an unobjectionable stub; for a fork see WP:FORK just in this sense having two copies of something that may be contradictory. Grandiose (me, talk, contribs) 13:14, 2 October 2011 (UTC)

Additions to See also

There is an editor who is prolifically adding "Wikipedia outline" articles to the "See also" subsection of state articles (and probably other articles). And "main" templates. Comments? Student7 (talk) 21:07, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

Linking to the the outline article makes sense to me. But then I am usually wrong about these things. I do question whether the main template is appropriate. Butwhatdoiknow (talk) 03:26, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

Do you mean adding {{Main}} templates that link to outlines to the regular article sections, or do you mean adding Main templates to ==See also== sections? The first is okay, the second is not.

WP:Outlines are a relatively little-known page style. They are basically stand-alone lists. As a general rule, if you would accept a "List of foo" link, then you should probably accept an "Outline of foo" link—and if you wouldn't accept a list on the same subject, then you probably shouldn't accept an outline on that subject. WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:46, 16 August 2011 (UTC)

It was the "second", adding "main" templates to "See also" subsections which you both seem to agree is inappropriate. And also appear to agree that outlines are acceptable. Thanks. Student7 (talk) 22:19, 17 August 2011 (UTC)

Adding Category listings to See also

On a related matter, I have seen the addition of category listings to See alsos. They have been piped so that it does not appear as a "Category:xyz listing". Instead, it appears as [Category:xyz|listing of articles in xyz]. (Does this make sense?) In effect it becomes a double listing of the Category already at the bottom of the page. With this in mind, I propose to modify the See also guidance to discourage such listings.--S. Rich (talk) 02:10, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

Against putting nav boxes in their own section

The essay Wikipedia:Related information is being used to support putting the navboxes in their own section. I along with many other people object to this. Let us fix this int he MOS one way or the other. Mangoe (talk) 14:13, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

So you think they should stay in the External links section? Butwhatdoiknow (talk) 00:28, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

They don't belong in a section. They belong at the end of the article. The section above might be anything at all. SchmuckyTheCat (talk)

Thank you for that clarification. Unfortunately, it raises a new question: WHY do they not belong in a section (at the end of an article)? Butwhatdoiknow (talk) 01:08, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

I think because they're not part of the article text. The graphical form of the navboxes themselves is sufficient to "section them off" from the rest of the article. To give them a section title as well looks over-fussy, and gives the impression that there's some text missing between the title and the navboxes.--Kotniski (talk) 12:32, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Related information offers three potential benefits to using a navbox heading: First, as we have been discussing, it separates the internal links in the navboxes from the external links in the External links section. While we experienced editors certainly don’t need this signpost, casual readers can benefit from the “heads up.” But, for the sake of argument only, let’s say that as many casual readers as would benefit from the separation would be confused by a section that contains only navboxes. That turns this benefit into a neutral, leaving two other benefits.

Second, giving navboxes a heading creates an entry in the table of contents. Some articles have navboxes, others don’t. Having a separate listing in the table of contents alerts casual and experienced readers that an article has navbox content. Third, an admittedly minor benefit is that the entry in the table of contents gives the reader a link to quickly navigate to the navbox “section.”

Keeping in mind the organic nature of Wikipedia, I respectfully suggest that the question now becomes “Why not continue to allow optional navbox headings?” (Other than “it is disconcerting to me because we’ve never done it that way before.”) Butwhatdoiknow (talk) 13:06, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

I am against he whole section header for navbox thing. I don't think anyone needs a "heads up" there is a navbox; they are likely to scroll to the bottom anyway. It would clutter thousands of tables of contents without serving any real purpose at all. Navboxes are visually completely different to other content and this is obvious. The heading looks wrong; in fact, it could easily confuse as the reader imagines something's missing. Allowing such a heading optionally would be the worst of both worlds. Also, the suggested heading "related information" is vague and sounds as if it includes "see also", portal links, etc. which it doesn't. Grandiose (me, talk, contribs) 14:42, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

If you will permit me, let's discuss your concerns one at a time. On what do you base the conclusion that "Allowing such a heading optionally would be the worst of both worlds"? Butwhatdoiknow (talk) 12:32, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

Having some articles covered would be confusing. People would think there were no navboxes, or there wouldn't be enough pages with the heading for the average reader to quickly understand what they are there for. In your edit summary, you make a perfectly logical point: "Consistency is the enemy of all change, both bad and good." The problem here is that "Why not continue to allow optional navbox headings?" was the posed question. If they are optional, then they will never become the "new" consistent, or at least I consider this highly unlikely. Grandiose (me, talk, contribs) 14:11, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

If, as you say, readers "are likely to scroll to the bottom anyway" then I find it difficult to understand how you conclude that an optional navbox heading would cause readers to think that an article without the heading does not have a navbox. Butwhatdoiknow (talk) 12:00, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

WP:Related information is ButwhatdoIknow's own idea, of course, so it's natural that s/he would defend it. It does not appear to have been a very popular idea, and at last check, it was used on only a few dozen pages. Given the lack of popularity, I'm not sure that it's worth the bother of officially doing anything about it, but if you think so, then you might consider which of the steps outlined at WP:PROPOSAL to advertise this discussion might be appropriate. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:32, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

A historical note: While I am certainly guilty of being the most ardent promoter of a heading for navboxes, I am not the originator of the idea. (The conclusion on this Talk page when it was first proposed: "This method can be used. Whether or not it will gain popularity with other editors, or whether or not it will be seriously opposed, isn't up to us.") Butwhatdoiknow (talk) 17:38, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

True enough. I'll add that being an ardent but non-disruptive/non-edit-warring supporter of what you believe is a good idea is not exactly a matter of "guilt". I wonder whether Franamax is still watching this page. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:50, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

Breaking footnotes into two groups: notes and citations. Add clarity to FNNR?

This guideline says (in WP:FNNR) that articles can split footnotes into two groups: "These sections present (1) citations that verify the information in the article, and (2) explanatory notes that would be awkward in the body text. Some articles divide this type of information into two or more separate sections; others combine it into a single section. There is no consensus establishing a particular structure when footnotes and the works cited in those footnotes are placed in separate sections." I've seen this done on some top quality articles, like the Manhattan project. But in the many thousands of books I've read, I cannot recall reading any that split their footnotes that way (granted, it would be hard in a hardcopy book, since they dont have hyperlinks to distinguish the two groups of footnotes). Even if there are a few books like that split the footnotes into two groups, they are in the tiny minority. Most good books often add comments within their footnotes, like: "Smith, p 23. Smith also points out ..." That kind of supplementary info in a footnote is valuable to a reader, so shouldn't this guideline make it easier for editors to add comments (from sources) in the footnotes? So my question is: What is the justification for WP presenting this "two group" approach as standard or desired? Should the "one group" approach be preferred? --Noleander (talk) 15:17, 20 October 2011 (UTC)

See Help:Shortened footnotes, which is a well-used style. There are examples at the end of the page. ---— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk 15:20, 20 October 2011 (UTC)

Hmmm, I looked at Help:Shortened footnotes, but that is an independent issue. That is talking about separating Citations from References: the details about a source (publisher, etc) can be put in the References section, separate from the Citations. That is okay ... I'm not asking about that. My question above is about separating Citations from Notes; i.e. the case when an article includes two kinds of footnotes: citations (whether long or short); and notes (detailed commentary that is important to the reader, but too detailed to go into the article body). --Noleander (talk) 15:25, 20 October 2011 (UTC)

The difference in length is visually unappealing, and also the purposes get confused. Are we referencing, perhaps with a quotation with the source, or adding new information? Grandiose (me, talk, contribs) 15:31, 20 October 2011 (UTC)

I see— this is referring to explanatory notes. Again, this is a well-used style; see WP:REFGROUP and Arthur Rudolph for example. The practice is already extant, so the section is documenting the use. ---— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk 16:01, 20 October 2011 (UTC)

Yes, I've seen articles that split the Notes & Citations. In my opinion, splitting them is not as good as combining notes & citations in one section. I was just wondering if there was some could recollect the discussion that concluded that both were equally good/valid/desirable for WP. Most good scholarly books do not split them. --Noleander (talk) 16:20, 20 October 2011 (UTC)

There were a multitude of discussions that lead to the update of Cite to add the groups parameter. Before that, a myriad of templates were devised for this specific purpose, of which only a few remain. ---— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk 16:32, 20 October 2011 (UTC)

Add example into WP:FNNR?

Okay, I've studied the archives that Gadget pointed to. They indeed there are good reasons for both approaches to the footnote layout. I'm wondering if the WP:FNNR section could include some examples? I had a heck of a time figuring it out, and from the discussion immediately above, confusion can happen pretty easily. In the spirit of "a picture is worth a thousand words", what about an illustration such as the following, to go into WP:FNNR? --Noleander (talk) 16:18, 21 October 2011 (UTC)

Proposed new examples for FNNR

See also: Wikipedia:Citations § Variation in citation methods

There are several layouts that are acceptable for the sections which contain citations, references, and explanatory notes. Wikipedia does not have a single style that is mandatory, or preferred. The notes can be placed within a single section or in two sections, and the citations can either be "short" (with a separate Reference section) or long.

Example A) This example uses a single section layout, which combines explanatory notes with citations in a Footnotes sections, and does not use shortened citations:

The Sun is pretty big.^[1] But the Moon^[2] is not so big.^[3] The Sun is also quite hot.^[4]

Notes

^ Miller, The Sun, Oxford, 2005, p. 23. But Miller points out that the Sun is not as large as some other stars.

^ The Moon goes by other names, such as Selena - see, for example Jones, The Solar System, MacMillan, 2005, p 623.

^ Brown, The Moon, 2006, Penguin, p. 46. Historically the Moon was not always considered to be large, see, for example Peterson, Astronomy, MacMillan, 2005, p 623.

^ Smith, The Universe, Random House, 2005, p. 334.

Example B) This example uses shortened citations (with a References section) and combines explanatory notes and citations in a Footnotes section:

The Sun is pretty big.^[1] But the Moon^[2] is not so big.^[3] The Sun is also quite hot.^[4]

Notes

^ Miller, p. 23. But Miller points out that the Sun is not as large as some other stars.

^ The Moon goes by other names, such as Selena - see, for example Jones, The Solar System, MacMillan, 2005, p 623.

^ Brown, p. 46. Historically the Moon was not always considered to be large, see, for example Peterson, Astronomy, MacMillan, 2005, p 623.

^ Smith, p. 334.

References

Brown, The Moon, Penguin. 2001.

Miller, The Sun, Oxford, 2005.

Smith, The Universe, Random House, 2005.

Example C) This example uses shortened citations (with a References section) and separates explanatory notes from citations. Notice that for an article without explanatory notes (in other words, an article with only citations) example B and example C are nearly identical (the only difference is the section names).

The Sun is pretty big.^[1]^{[Note 1]} But the Moon^{[Note 2]} is not so big.^[2]^{[Note 3]} The Sun is also quite hot.^[3]

Notes

^ But Miller points out that the Sun is not as large as some other stars.

^ The Moon goes by other names, such as Selena - see, for example Jones, The Solar System, MacMillan, 2005, p 623.

^ Historically the Moon was not always considered to be large, see, for example, Peterson, Astronomy, MacMillan, 2005, p 623.

Citations

^ Miller, p. 23

^ Brown, p. 46

^ Smith, p. 334

References

Brown, The Moon, Penguin. 2001.

Miller, The Sun, Oxford, 2005.

Smith, The Universe, Random House, 2005.

Discussion

I understand that there is some latitude on what the sections are named and the precise nature of the Citations section (small vs large footnotes, with the source details in another References section, or not, etc). But the point is to give a boilerplate illustration so new editors can quickly grasp what the FNNR text means when it says: "These sections present (1) citations that verify the information in the article, and (2) explanatory notes that would be awkward in the body text. Some articles divide this type of information into two or more separate sections; others combine it into a single section. There is no consensus establishing a particular structure when footnotes and the works cited in those footnotes are placed in separate sections." A picture is worth a thousand words. --Noleander (talk) 16:23, 21 October 2011 (UTC)

What happens in the proposed example if "Miller, The Sun, Oxford, 2005, p. 23." is then used as the reference to something else? This could be very misleading. Grandiose (me, talk, contribs) 17:46, 21 October 2011 (UTC)

The intention of the proposal is simply to illustrate the existing guidance in WP:FNNR. There is no intention to introduce any new guidance, or to recommend one approach or another. I believe the examples in the proposal reflect commonly used approaches in WP articles (not to say all approaches: they don't illustrate the "short citations with Reference section" ... but the decision to use shortened citations or not is independent from the decision of whether to split out Notes from Citations). Would you agree that an example would be useful to new editors to help them understand how alternatives suggested by WP:FNNR look in an article? Also, if you were to illustrate WP:FNNR with example(s), what examples would you suggest? --Noleander (talk) 19:57, 21 October 2011 (UTC)

Grandiose: Just to help illuminate FNNR more, I've added a two more examples in the proposal above. That may help clarify the confusing difference between the "short cites with References section" choice; vs the "split out Notes from the Citations" choice. I know these examples may look rather large, but would a new editor, trying to figure out how to layout their article, find these examples useful? Do they illuminate the textual guidance already in FNNR? --Noleander (talk) 20:20, 21 October 2011 (UTC)

I don't have a dog in this hunt but, to keep the body of the article manageable, if the consensus is to add an example then I suggest it be placed in a footnote. (That said, my inclination is to help users. So if this example would be helpful then I'm all for it.) Butwhatdoiknow (talk) 19:34, 21 October 2011 (UTC)

Sure, the MOS page should be kept clean and terse, and if the footnote region is best, that is fine with me (also, the irony of putting footnote guidance in a footnote is appealing :-) Another alternative is to capture the examples as an image, and display them as thumbnails in the MOS page body, as is already done with some other examples. For example, FNNR already has the picture shown at right. That said, the page is only 2,170 words long, not overly large by any measure. --Noleander (talk) 20:03, 21 October 2011 (UTC)

Another thought: Should these examples be in Wikipedia:Citing sources#How to create the list of citations and then Layout could add a link sending readers there for more information? Butwhatdoiknow (talk) 12:55, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

That is an excellent question. There are several pages in WP that sort of cover this topic area:

1) WP:Citing sources

2) WP:Manual_of_Style/Layout

3) Help:Footnotes

4) Help:Shortened footnotes

Each of these pages serves a slightly different purpose, but they inevitably overlap a lot. The essence of the WP:Manual_of_Style/Layout page is to explain what sections should be in an article, in what order, and with what names. The WP:Manual_of_Style/Layout#Notes_and_References (FNNR) section is perhaps the most confusing, because there are so many choices: it is not just a question of "there are two titles you can use" or "this section is optional". In fact, there are probably 15 or 20 different permutations of how to layout footnote/reference sections. The current guidance in FNNR is okay, but is brief and textual. The proposal above is just trying to illustrate, with examples, what the choices are for the section titles/order/layout. You are correct that the details of the footnote guidance is not really appropriate for this article. On the other hand, this page is the best page to explain when/why an editor may choose 1 or 2 sections for footnotes (i.e. "if you want to break out explanatory footnotes from citations then ..."). --Noleander (talk) 13:08, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

I've labeled the examples A,B, C. Just offhand, based on the articles I've seen:

A) Very common, often used in simpler articles, or articles not based on scholarly sources, or articles whose sources are all journal articles or newspaper articles (rather than books)

B) Very common. Assuming that the article has no "explanatory notes", this is probably the most common approach.

C) Not too common, but often found in excellent quality FA articles.

Again, my point is not to push one approach over the other. They are all valid. In fact, the "common-ness" of any approach really shouldn't enter into our decision of whether examples are good or not. The point of the proposal is simply to help new editors that are reading FNNR to see examples of the choices that FNNR is talking about. --Noleander (talk) 20:44, 21 October 2011 (UTC)

Proposal tweaking finished - I have reviewed the proposal above, and found several improvements that could make it better, so I took the liberty of directly changing the proposal above to include the improvements. I apologize if that caused any confusion or annoyance: I know that a couple of responses were made before I tweaked it. (I was motivated only by a desire to make the proposal as informative for users as possible). My tweaks are now finished, and I'll leave it alone for anyone to comment on. If more improvements are desired, I suppose we could just put a working draft in a subpage of this Talk page, or just start a "version 2" below. --Noleander (talk) 12:59, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

I put notifications on the Talk pages of the WP Citations and WP Footnotes-Help pages, letting them know about this proposal, in case anyone is interested. --Noleander (talk) 13:19, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

One alternative to including bulky examples on this page is to link to articles that are currently using a given style: "For an example of an article that separates explanatory footnotes from citations to references, see Jane Austen." WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:43, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

Hmmm. Is that permitted in MOS pages? Isn't there a risk that the pages pointed-to might change, and the MOS would then be giving bad advice? It would probably be better to capture a screen shot of Jane Austen (or just the portion of that article that is relevant) and permanently save it, and use a thumbnail of that. It seems that there is some concern that the examples above are too "bulky" and would not fit well within this MOS page. But I dont see any objection to the notion of supplying examples. So it looks like we should now focus on how/where to display the examples. Some ideas to include examples, but not so bulky include:

1) capture an image of sample article, and thumbnail it within FNNR

2) put the bulky examples in another page, e.g. WP:CITATIONS and have FNNR just refer to that article

3) put the bulky examples in this MOS page, but at the bottom, in footnotes or similar. Have FNNR refer to it.

4) change the examples to be streamlined and much smaller (e.g. just show the section titles, with perhaps one line in each)? and put them directly within FNNR in this MOS page.

5) ... other?

--Noleander (talk) 17:09, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

Maybe the best solution is a hybrid of the above: Put a terse summary of the choices in FNNR, and put the detailed example elsewhere, either in this Layout page's footnotes, or in WP:CITATIONS. For the terse summary in FNNR, maybe something like:

There are several layouts that are acceptable for the sections which contain citations, references, and explanatory notes. Wikipedia does not have a single style that is mandatory, or even recommended. An article may use one, two, or three sections for this material. Here are three common layouts:

1) This layout puts citations and explanatory notes in a single section, and does not have a separate Reference section:

Notes - Includes all citations and explanatory notes. All citation details are in this section, embedded in the footnotes.

2) This layout uses shortened citations (with a References section), and combines explanatory notes and citations in a single section:

Notes - Includes all citations and explanatory notes. Citations may be shortened and refer to works in the References section.

References - Lists some of the reference works that are used in the citations.

3) This layout uses shortened citations (with a References section), and separates explanatory notes from citations. Notice that for an article without explanatory notes (in other words, an article with only citations), this is the same as the two-section layout above, except for the section name "Citations".

Notes- Includes only explanatory notes.

Citations - Includes only citations, which may be shortened and refer to works in the References section.

References - Lists some of the reference works that are used in the citations.

It looks like the detailed examples may be placed into Help:Footnotes, so the "terse" proposal immediately above (not the larger proposal farther up) is now proposed to go into WP:FNNR. Any final thoughts before FNNR is updated? --Noleander (talk) 15:00, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

Three is really bad because the note is not tied into a citation. It totally depends on the citation and the note remaining as pairs with no method of tying them together it is the equivalent of "ib."

But leaving that aside. All these examples presented above are far too complicated for this guideline. This guideline if has to have an example should only present the most simple of examples and then {{main}} to the appropriate detailed guideline. -- PBS (talk) 10:52, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

Put In Footnote Or Not

@ButWhatDoIKnow: Do you have some concern about placing the "terse" examples in the body of the FNNR section? What is the concern? I thought that was discussed above, and there was concernt that the lengthy examples were a bit too large, and so we went with plan B, which was to put a terse summary of the examples directly into FNNR. Do you think that even the terse examples are too large? Why? I reviewed about a dozen other MOS pages, and virtually all of them are chock-full of detailed examples. For example: WP:DATE - all examples are in the body; MOS:DAB - all examples in the body. WP:MOSTV - all examples in the body. In fact, I cannot find any other MOS page that has examples down in footnotes. --Noleander (talk) 01:31, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

This issue is more art than science. Regardless of how other articles handle them, in Layout the examples are generally placed in the footnotes. So maybe I'll try to shift the burden to you - is there something so important about these examples that they demand to be in the body of the text (making the substantive content more difficult to follow)? Butwhatdoiknow (talk) 03:03, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

Virtually all examples in MOS pages are within the body of the MOS page, not in the footnotes. Why? Because a picture is worth a thousand words. Good instruction is not about telling someone how to do it, it is about showing them. Imagine a novice editor writing a new article, and they want it to be WP:GA quality. The time comes to write the article's notes/refs material, so they glance at a few other WP articles but see that there is a large variation in approaches, but they want GA quality, so they want to find out what the recommended approach is. They stumble on the MOS, and arrive at this Layout page. "Finally" they say "I'll get some examples that show best practices for the notes/refs layout!". They find the FNNR section and read it. Disappointment spreads across their face as they are confronted with prose that doesn't show them what their choices are, and doesn't give them guidance on the most fundamental question: whether they should use one, or two, or three sections, or show them how that choices would look. The little blue [1] barely registers in the novice's mind, because footnotes hold non-essential information, and an example layout is precisely what the MOS:Layout is supposed to be showing the novice.

You suggest that putting the examples in FNNR "mak[es] the substantive content more difficult to follow" , but the examples were originally at the end of FNNR, but you yourself moved the examples into the middle of FNNR. Questions for you: This Layout MOS page already has several examples in the body: (Links, SeeAlso, Order of Sections, Section templates, Lead section, etc). What makes the FNNR examples different from those? And, the other MOS pages have tons of examples, some very large, throughout their bodies. Why should the Layout MOS be different? --Noleander (talk) 12:29, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

Let me answer your last question first: Because we're better than them. Turning to your first question: My opinion (which, granted, ain't worth much) is that this particular example is not terse enough to be passed over quickly by the reader who is searching for quick substantive guidance. As for telling vs. showing, you and I agree that the "show" should be in the article. Putting it in a footnote just prevents it from overwhelming the substantive content. My thought is that a novice is just the person who would click on a footnote because that is just the person who would be hunting for more information. What about doing the footnote and then flagging it by saying, "As illustrated in the footnote to this sentence," at the beginning of the "There are several acceptable layouts for this material" sentence? Butwhatdoiknow (talk) 17:41, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

Regarding other MOS articles: As you say, your opinion and my opinion are rather insignificant, that is why when there is a difference of opinion, it is instructive to look at comparable situations, and see what the broader WP community has decided in similar situations. All the other MOS pages include extensive examples in their bodies, so we can use that as guidance of what other editors have decided in the past, when facing a similar decision. Examples within MOS pages are the essence of MOS pages: readers want examples. Indeed, the prose surrounding the examples is of secondary importance to many readers: they want to see what the guidance is. --Noleander (talk) 17:53, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

My opinion, untarnished by any actual research, is that Layout is one of the - if not the - most stable of MOS pages. I, again without resort to actual facts, credit this to the brevity of Layout's principal text - the substantive content is clear and uncluttered. Perhaps the other MOS pages could benefit by adopting Layout's approach. (And please stop trying to convince me that examples are good things. As I have tried to make very clear, you are preaching to the choir.) Butwhatdoiknow (talk) 10:52, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

What about doing the footnote and then flagging it by saying, "As illustrated in the footnote to this sentence," at the beginning of the "There are several acceptable layouts for this material" sentence? Butwhatdoiknow (talk) 10:52, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

Examples for FNNR: combine two

I'm glad to see the Examples for FNNR are considered useful, and a couple new examples were added. I combined two of the examples, because they were virtually identical: The 3-section example, and the Jane Austen example. (BTW: I dont think it is proper to refer to a particular article such as Jane Austen .. articles may change over time, and that would leave the MOS giving bad information to readers). The JA article uses 3 sections; Notes (explanatory notes), References (citations), and Bibliography (list of books). That is virtually identical to the 3-section example - the only difference is the section names. The section names are important, of course, but if we gave an example for every permutation of section names, we'd have a couple dozen examples. --Noleander (talk) 14:08, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

Also, the three-section example attempted to be generic, and defines its middle section as "The Citations section includes citations, which may be shortened and refer to works in the References section", thus that middle section may include shortened citations or non-shortened citations; so there is no need to split that into two sub-examples: one where Citations section is restricted to shortened citations, and another where it is not restricted. --Noleander (talk) 14:14, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

It's a basic fact that Wikipedia avoids the holy war associated with demanding a particular system for citations.

However, one of the things we have tried to discourage is having a separate section for "special" sources—say, websites and newspapers and magazines and short cites to books lumped in one section, and books in a separate section. The "correct" answer (if we were prescribing formats, which we officially aren't willing to do) splits all citations according to form: if you have short cites, you may have a section exclusively for short cites, but you may not mix short cites with only some of the full cites while separating out the "special" full cites.

So basically I think this description is not going to help people follow the best practice.

Also, we have a long history of problems with the section heading ==Bibliography==. Different English-speaking countries have wildly different expectations for what gets listed in this. Its use is actually officially deprecated on purpose by this guideline. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:18, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

Another merge?

Here are two examples that look virtually identical:

Two sections - This layout uses shortened citations (with a References section), and combines explanatory notes and citations in a single section:

Notes - The Notes section includes all citations and explanatory notes (if any). Citations may be shortened and refer to works in the References section.
References - The References section lists some of the reference works that are used in the citations.

Two sections — This layout does not use shortened citations, or combines shortened citations with other inline citations. It separates inline citations from Wikipedia:General references.

Notes - The Notes section includes only inline citations.
References - The References section lists online sources that are not cited inline.

The References section, in both examples, may include general reference works that are not mentioned by citations. The Notes section, in both examples, may or may not include explanatory notes. In both examples, all inline citations are listed in the Notes section. I presume that both examples permit a long citation in the Notes section (that is always a possibility, for a one-off source that is not important enough to be listed in the References section). So what is the difference? Should they be merged in the spirit of making it more digestible for novices? --Noleander (talk) 14:19, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

... also, the Wikipedia:General references link is a redirect to WP:Citing sources so it should probably be changed one way or another. --Noleander (talk) 14:34, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

My problem with this "merge" is that the result does not even mention the possibility of explanatory footnotes being placed in a section that contains zero citations of any sort, even though this is very commonly done (in the small number of articles that have any explanatory footnotes at all). WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:12, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

I guess we should ask the question: What is the purpose of the examples? Is it to exhaustively enumerate all possibilities? Or just list a few of the best practices? I guess I was leaning towards the latter. How about this as a merger of the two:

Notes - The Notes section includes inline citations (if any are footnoted) and explanatory notes (if any). Citations may be shortened or not.
References - The References section lists the reference works that are used in the article, including those referenced by the shortened citations.

Does that look like it would be a good way of covering all the "two section" best practices? --Noleander (talk) 17:37, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

I find the first half of the proposed "Notes" section confusing. What exactly are you putting under ==Notes== if it's not shortened? Surely we're not going to recommend something like this:

The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog.^[1] Notes ^ Expert, Alice. (2011) Behavior of Foxes in the Presence of Dogs" References Expert, Alice. (2011) Behavior of Foxes in the Presence of Dogs"

That would be silly.

So assume that the citation is for a single web page (e.g., a newspaper article you found online). How would you cite that in dual-section system without shortening the citations? WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:21, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

I must not be explaining this example very well. It is supposed to be very simple :-) The concept is this; One very common way of presenting notes/cites/references is two sections. The first section includes all footnotes (citations and explanatory notes); and the second section contains a list of reference works. There is a lot of latitude: the first section may contain shortened cites, and/or long cites. The first section may or may not have any explanatory notes. The second section should contain references utilized by the shortened cites, and it may additionally contain some works that are not referenced by citations. My point is this: Rather than try to give four or five examples of the different permutations, why not just give one generic template and explain the various possibilities within the example. Does that make sense? --Noleander (talk) 21:17, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

... also, I do not understand your question about citations in a dual section article. I would not suggest that every citation in the first section must also have its reference repeated in the second section, that would be senseless for non-shortened cites. For example, the recent FA article 1964 Brinks Hotel bombing has 2 sections, and the first Notes section mixes shortened and non-shortened citations. That is very common, so the FNNR guideline should accomodate it. But I'm probably misunderstanding your question: could you re-phrase it? --Noleander (talk) 21:27, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

I think the simplest path forward is for you to tell me how you would cite the example above. Assume that I've rejected any use of shortened citations anywhere in the article.

How would you cite Alice Expert's website (1) in two sections and (2) without using shortened citations?

I'm trying to figure out what "or not" means in your statement that "Citations may be shortened or not."

1964 Brinks Hotel bombing is IMO what we shouldn't be doing, i.e., putting equally reliable sources into separate sections because we splitting the citations into proper groups is more complicated technically. It technically complies with the guidelines (because the guidelines resolutely decline to take a side on anything about citation formatting), but it is not an example of best practice. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:57, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

Re your question on Alice's Expert - Personally, I have no strong opinion, but I would limit myself to an approach that is found in FA-quality articles. And that is the whole point of these examples: if FA-quality articles use, say, 2 or 3 approaches to the Alice's Expert situation, FNNR should acknowledge that, perhaps with a hint about which approach is more common. Would you agree with that? Regarding the FA article 1964 Brinks Hotel bombing, there are many recent FA articles (e.g. Manchester United F.C.) that split their citations that way. I understand that you personally feel it is not wise, but the FNNR guidance should reflect what the community thinks is appropriate, true? I can think of no better guidance than the articles that the best editors and reviewers are putting on WP's Main page. Would you agree that the FNNR should provide novice editors with some patterns that are commonly found in FA-quality articles (in an illustrative, not prescriptive manner)? --Noleander (talk) 17:19, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

Titles

I've removed your changes to the "Titles" paragraph, because it's not actually true. We actually ran the numbers on a random sample of articles, and these were the results. What you've proposed is sensible enough, but it's not what's actually happening. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:10, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

The current Titles section is not optimal. First, the "Citations" section title is used in many outstanding articles that pass FA review, and is considered very acceptable, so the Title section should not discourage it. Second, the entire Title section is written as if there is only one section involved; it does not acknowledge the Content discussion immediately above, which discusses the possibilities of 2 or more sections. The Title section should somehow address that: "If there is only 1 section .... but if there are 2 sections ...". Third, the use of raw frequency/statistics is not helpful to readers: statistics should be discussed on this Talk page, but when translated into the MOS, it should be worded differently (using words like should/ought/common/rare, etc) --Noleander (talk) 17:46, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

The existing text doesn't ban any choice, but identifies known problems with certain choices. If you're writing about a military person, you shouldn't use ==Citations==, because it confuses readers into thinking that section of the Table of Contents is what you should click on to see the list of awards. If you're writing about an academic journal or a person who has published a lot of scientific papers, then you should avoid that section heading, because readers will expect to find a discussion of impact factors and H-indexes there. But if you're writing about, say, Bread or Automobiles or Ecology, then none of that applies, so it's just fine in those subjects. This is why we're identifying what the context-sensitive problems are rather than saying "Bad. Don't use."
The vast majority of our articles do contain only one section, so it's not an unreasonable bias. In the few articles that have multiple sections, there is no agreement at all about which label to use for which sections. Consequently, we can't really say "Use ==Notes== for this and ==References== for that", because we can trivially find examples of articles that do the opposite of any recommendation we might make.
The section does not provide any raw statistics. It only names the most common and says that they are the most common. (==Citations==, by the way, isn't one of the most common.)
This page shouldn't tell people what they "should" or "ought to" use, because the community refuses to engage in the holy war over the one True™ section heading. Every academic discipline has a different True™ answer. User:WhatamIdoing#Why_Wikipedia_doesn.27t_standardize_everything lists several, if you're interested. We are not going to enshrine one choice over the others. The very most we are going to do is tell editors what's actually happening in real articles, not what they "should" be doing. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:32, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

Re 1) Okay, "Citations" can be an issue in some articles. But "Citations" is often used in top-notch FA articles. Would you agree that the wording "Citations ..... is problematic:" could be enhanced so readers are not led to think that Citations is bad in general?

Re 2) I agree that single-sections are more common than 2-sections. But would you agree that the "Titles" text could be improved to give some guidance as to what the common conventions are for articles when 2 or 3 sections are utilized (especially since virtually all FAs use 2 or 3 sections)? --Noleander (talk) 21:42, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

Re 3) The Titles text I supplied is:

The section titles depend on the layout choice (see above). When there is only a single section, "References" or "Notes" are commonly used. When there are two or more sections, "Notes", "Footnotes" or "Citations" are commonly used for the footnote sections, and "References" or "Bibliography" for the list of reference works. "Sources" is sometimes used, but should be avoided in computer-related articles. With the exception of "Bibliography," the titles should be plural even if it lists only a single item.

The intention was to simply clarify - not change - the existing guidance, and I don't think it is prescriptive at all. To the contrary, it is uses very non-judgemental words like "are commonly used". I agree that there is no one best standard for Titles, you'll get no argument from me there. But can we not indicate which titles are commonly used in the best articles? --Noleander (talk) 21:42, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

Your proposed text fails to identify the significant, context-sensitive problems with using these words for section headings. If we don't tell editors about the persistent objections to these terms, they won't be able to make informed choices about whether these objections apply to their particular subject matter.

I am not convinced that we can provide accurate advice on what to call the two sections. Two sections are distinctly uncommon and (last we checked) there really was no correlation between the section names and their contents—even in FAs. I just checked the first five FAs in the featured log for September, and although four out the five use two sections, all four use different titles for those sections. (Also, many of them fail to heed the advice about level 3 headings at MOS:APPENDIX.) We cannot honestly tell people that the standard practice is ___ when we know that no standard practice exists. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:10, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

Hmm, I think your opinions may be at odds with what the wider community is thinking. Specifically, "Citations" is used by several recent FA articles, yet you resist any effort to suggest to users that it may be okay in some situations. And, as you say, 4 out of 5 FA articles use two (or more) ref/notes sections, yet you resist any suggestion that FNNR should mention patterns of what those titles are. You also seem to be answering different questions than I am asking. I never suggested that FNNR identify a "standard practice", I simply suggested that it acknowledge that many top-quality articles use 2 or more sections, and that it comment on what patterns are found in those titles. FNNR could also say that most WP articles use just one section, I have no problem with that.

How about this: Let's collaborate on this. Let's say we could write the "Titles" portion of FNNR from scratch, which would provide good, clear, comprehensive guidance to novices. What would you write if you had that opportunity? If you write up what you consider the best title guidance that could be given, maybe I can touch it up a little, and we can see if the final result would be good to put into FNNR. Does that sound good? --Noleander (talk) 17:28, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

Quick point about this: "4 out of 5 FA articles use two (or more) ref/notes sections, yet you resist any suggestion that FNNR should mention patterns of what those titles are."

That's because there is no pattern. Zero out of those four use the same pair of titles. I resist declaring that a pattern exists because no pattern exists. I resist saying that 1 + 1 = 3 with exactly the same vigor that I resist declaring that 0% correlation in the sample set shows any pattern at all. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:09, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

All good points. What do you think of my offer of collaborating to re-write FNNR to be clearer and more understandable for novices? Is that okay? Or do you think it cannot be improved beyond its current state? --Noleander (talk) 22:10, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

References and Notes

I am going to revert out the changes made over the last few days.

Extended content

Single section - This layout puts citations and explanatory notes in a single section, and does not have a separate Reference section:

Notes - The Notes section includes all footnotes, including citations and explanatory notes, are in this single section. All reliable sources are identified within the notes.

Two sections - This layout uses shortened citations (with a References section), and combines explanatory notes and citations in a single section:

Notes - The Notes section includes all citations and explanatory notes (if any). Citations may be shortened and refer to works in the References section.
References - The References section lists some of the reference works that are used in the citations.

Two sections — This layout does not use shortened citations, or combines shortened citations with other inline citations. It separates inline citations from Wikipedia:General references.

Notes - The Notes section includes only inline citations.
References - The References section lists online sources that are not cited inline.

Three sections - This layout uses shortened citations (with a References section), and separates explanatory notes from citations. Notice that for an article without explanatory notes (in other words, an article with only citations), this is the same as the two-section layout above, except for the section name "Citations".

Notes - The Notes section includes only explanatory notes.
Citations - The Citations section includes citations, which may be shortened and refer to works in the References section.
References - The References section lists some of the reference works that are used in the citations.

As I think they need more discussion and an RFC if such large changes are to be made.

Some points that I am concerned about.

Single section -- If there is only one section it is usually called References not Notes.

Two sections -- well it may have just citations and references or it may have notes and citations mixed together or it may have two bold lines (not headings such as

==Notes==
Footnotes: lots of notes here
Citations: lots of citations here

Three sections -- I have never seen a three section like this:

==Notes==

==Citations==

==Refereces==

That is not to say that they do not exist, it is just that I have not seen one. So is it common enough to mention here? A more common layout is the sort for which some editors will breach the 3RR rule to defend such as that in Guy Fawkes Night or Tower of London

==References==

;Notes

;Footnotes

;Bibliography

Personally I do not like using "Bibliography" in this case because I think it is confusing, but at least I have come across this example which is more than I can say for the "three sections" as described above.

My own POV on this is we should leave well enough alone. But if we are going to look at these again I would like to throw

==References==

==Footnotes==

into the arena as having Footnotes last allows for footnotes in the other Appendix sections which would often be useful for making notes on entries in References and Further reading -- PBS (talk) 11:21, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

What are you suggesting should go to RfC: The concept of providing examples or the particular examples used as "some common presentations" (emphasis added)? Butwhatdoiknow (talk) 11:54, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

An RfC is a great idea ... I was already crafting one. I'll post it below. --Noleander (talk) 14:53, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

RfC: Add some illustrative examples to Footnote/References guidance?

The WP manual of style guidance on notes and references (aka WP:FNNR) provides some instructions on how to craft sections related to notes/references. This RfC asks if the following guidance should be added to WP:FNNR:

There are several acceptable layouts for this material, utilizing one, two, or more sections. Here are examples of some common presentations of this material. These examples, including the titles, are merely illustrative, and are not required or even preferred:

Example A) Single section - This layout uses just one section:

References - The References section includes all references and footnotes, including citations and explanatory notes.

Example B) Two sections - This layout uses shortened citations (with a References section), and combines explanatory notes and citations in a single section:

Notes - The Notes section includes citations (if any) and explanatory notes (if any). Citations may be shortened and refer to works in the References section.

References - The References section lists works referenced by the article, particularly those utilized by citations.

Example C) ... ... - This layout uses .... [another common example] ...

--Noleander (talk) 14:58, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

RfC discussion

Yes - The existing guidance in WP:FNNR is okay, but is missing some information that may be useful to editors: (1) it does not give any concrete examples of common layouts; and (2) it gives the impression that a single section is somehow best, when in fact two sections are very commonly used in good quality articles. Of course, the section layout used for footnotes/references varies widely from article to article, and the WP community has decided to not establish any particular standard or recommendation. The intention of this RfC is to maintain the current policy that the many alternatives are equally valid. The goal of the RfC is simply to supply some examples so readers can get a concrete feel for what some of the the choices look like. The intention of this RfC is NOT to mandate two sections, but instead merely to point out that two sections are an alternative that many editors choose to utilize in good articles. Finally, if the specific examples in the RfC proposal above are not ideal, alternative examples can be used. --Noleander (talk) 14:52, 28 October 2011 (UTC)
Yes, I don't see why not. It's quite hard to get at first reading unless you're shown explicitly.--Kotniski (talk) 15:15, 28 October 2011 (UTC)
No. The definitive guidance about citation style is at WP:CITE, not WP:MOS. This is acknowledged right at the top of WP:FNNR, where it says that WP:CITE is the main article. So if you think something needs to be said about layout of reference section(s), say it at WP:CITE and/or WP:LAYOUT, and leave WP:MOS as a brief summary.
It is essential that WP:CITE be regarded as the definitive guide for citation style, because it allows any consistent style, such as one taken from a style guide like Chicago style or APA style. It would be far too bulky to describe in WP:CITE all the style variations that exist in all the world's English-language style guides.
If you think WP:CITE is inadequate in some way (perhaps it is too long or hard to read) fix it, rather than creating duplication on other pages that is apt to develop contradictions as people only think about changing WP:MOS and never even notice WP:CITE exists. Jc3s5h (talk) 15:59, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

Sure, WP:CITE is paramount, but we can at least ensure that WP:FNNR is correct and useful. FNNR, like all sections in WP:Layout lists acceptable section names, and discusses how many sections are involved. So, acknowledging that WP:CITE is the "main" guidance, WP:Summary style suggests that WP:FNNR should contain a decent summary of WP:CITE, true? The point of the RfC is that the existing FNNR summary is inadequate, and even misleading. --Noleander (talk) 16:13, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

I'm currently thinking about the suggestion above about creating a separate page for examples. The advantages include plenty of room to provide lots of examples, including examples that don't use <ref> tags (e.g., you can see an example of parenthetical citations being used to avoid a three-section system at Breast cancer awareness). Such a page could be just as much a supplement to CITE as it is to LAYOUT. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:52, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

I think WhatAmIdoing is on to something here. An examples page could be referred to by both Layout and Cite. (And getting the examples out of both guides will make them more readable.) Butwhatdoiknow (talk) 17:47, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

I have no objection to a dedicated examples page. It appears that there are 40 or 50 different approaches that are used throughout WP, and it could be instructive to catalog all the common/important/nice ones in one place. That way novice editors could peruse them and pick an approach that suits their article. However, even if we agree to make such a page, we are still left with the question of whether FNNR's current text should be tweaked a little to properly summarize all those approaches. I maintain that FNNR, as it stands now, is not a good summary of the various approaches (with or without a new Examples page). --Noleander (talk) 19:42, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

I'm not convinced that CITE should be the authoritative page for this. We are considering the titles of sections (which is part of the subject of this page), not the formatting of the citations themselves - and we are not even concerned exclusively with citations, but potentially with other footnotes as well. So we should deal with this matter here, and refer to it from WP:CITE. But wherever we do it, we need to spell out the guidance more clearly - there are about a dozen different configurations for these 1/2/3 sections, and we need to say what configuration and what section we're talking about when we say that a particular title may be appropriate. An examples page may be useful as well, but we can still do a better job of presenting this (somewhat confusing) issue on the main guideline page. --Kotniski (talk) 12:07, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Your logic is impeccable. The problem has been in its execution. In the past Layout would say one thing and Cite another. To prevent such conflicts the decision was made by Layout to defer to Cite. That said, the Layout notes and references section does contain a paragraph that begins with the word Title and does not explicitly refer to Cite. So maybe we are already doing as you suggest.Butwhatdoiknow (talk) 12:24, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

I mean, we could give a bulleted list where each item lists the possible titles for one of the types of section (a section of explanatory footnotes only; a section of citation footnotes only; a section containing both types of footnote; a section of general refs). Then people could pick and choose depending on what combination of sections they're dealing with.--Kotniski (talk) 12:21, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

WP:CITE currently says we can use any citation style we want in an article, including printed style manuals; lets use APA style as an example. APA also has a lot to say about the running text, but we ignore that and go by WP:MOS for the running text. So I think we should decide what the relationship should be between this guideline and printed style guides. Should we require that titles for sections containing citations or descriptive notes follow this guideline notwithstanding anything APA says, or should the titles recommended in APA be an option when the citations are in APA style?
- Does APA recommend anything about titles that conflicts with what we say here? (Unlikely, I'd have thought, since we don't give any concrete musts or must-nots here, except that we use the plural even if there's only one item in a section.)--Kotniski (talk) 14:21, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

As you say, there are few musts or must-nots in the guideline as it currently stands. The sample APA paper included as a separate pamphlet shows the heading "References" for the alphabetical list of works cited, and "Footnotes" for the descriptive footnotes, despite the fact they are actually end notes. The "Footnotes" section is placed after the "References" section, which goes against our principle of placing material written by Wikipedians closer to the article body, and external sources farther away. (They also offer the option of using real footnotes, but that does not apply to web pages since there is no real pagination.) Jc3s5h (talk) 14:42, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

I do not see that footnotes are any more material written by Wikipedians, than the other the information in the other Appendix sections, and I do not remember that being advanced as a argument when the Notes section ended up where it is today. If you look through the archives of this page you will find that the major reason for wanting "Notes" above "References" was that editors (at that time) wanted the two to be side by side and so if "References" were to be placed before "Further Reading" and "External Links" (not unreasonable given their relative importance in most articles), then if Notes were to remain next to References, it followed that they should go before References. At that time this section was not considered to be advisory of just one of many formats, but along with such thing a logical punctuation in paragraphs, to be best practice that all articles should conform to. -- PBS (talk) 21:12, 29 October 2011 (UTC)
There is a useful practical reason for placing Footnotes (and for this discussion let's call them Endnotes) at the end of the page. It allows for endnotes to be placed in other Appendix sections. For example if an editor wants to note on the merits of a book in "Further reading" with the notes section above "Further reading" there is a tendency to note it at the end of the line on which the description of the book is displayed. The only way out of that using reference tags, is to use a group and another {{reflist}} at the bottom of the page. That is a step too far (needless complication) for many editors. -- PBS (talk) 21:12, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

It looks like there may be some interest in establishing some section-order recommendations in FNNR. I really don't have a strong opinion on that, but this RfC is very limited in scope: Should FNNR be enhanced to contain some illustrative examples, so readers get a better feel for what FNNR is talking about? The only "no" comment so far was (I'm paraphrasing): "Yes, examples are good, but they should go in WP:CITE, not in WP:FNNR.", but I think there are some strong "yes" arguments above. --Noleander (talk) 21:58, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

I've tried to clarify this part of the guideline a bit more, by saying which of the possible section titles correspond to which type of section (in a bulleted list, like I suggested above). Please tweak.--Kotniski (talk) 07:23, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Thanks, that looks like an improvement over the original text (but still not as good as the examples I proposed above :-) ... but at least your change helps readers get more insight into the choices available to them. --Noleander (talk) 14:18, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Support Johnbod (talk) 17:31, 8 November 2011 (UTC)
Support - As it is, it is rather confusing; examples can do nothing but help editors to figure out what they are doing. I see no problem with including examples here, as opposed to WP:CITE; WP:CITE might be meant to be definitive, and this might be meant to only be a summary, but even if both of those are true, this should still be helpful, or it might as well not even be included. ~~ Hi878 ^{(Come shout at me!)} 23:08, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

"Bibliography"

This is rarely seen as a section title in articles WP:FNNR here says:

"for a list of general references: "References", "Works cited" ("Sources" may be used but may be confused with source code in computer-related articles; "Bibliography" may be used but may be confused with a list of printed works by the subject of a biography)."

-that's one good reason, but another, that applies to nearly all articles, is that a "bibliography" is meant to be complete, or at least comprehensive, or it becomes a "select bibliography", or no bibliography at all. Sadly, relatively few of our articles have surveyed the whole range of specialized RS on whatever the subject is, and chosen the best. The great majority have used what sources, typically tertiary or at a further remove, that they had to hand/found in the library/could get by an internet search, and we should avoid suggesting otherwise. To have a bibliography and then "further reading" is rather against usual publishing practice - in fact our further reading sections are typically more like a standard bibliographies than our references sections. If there is a measure of agreement on the general point I'll draft a line or so & propose. Johnbod (talk) 17:31, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

I recommend using "Bibliography" (one def from Webster's 3rd = "a list or catalog, often with descriptive or critical notes, of writings relating to a particular subject, period, or author"). Much of our audience comprises students writing papers and they are typically told to use "Bibliography" rather than "Further Reading." [for example 1) see Ellison McGraw-Hill's Concise Guide to Writing Research Papers (2010) p 55: Many times an assignment will ask you to produce an “annotated bibliography”] [ 2) Rozakis, Schaum's quick guide to writing great research papers (2007) p. 73 says When you start your research, your instructor may ask you to prepare a working bibliography] Rjensen (talk) 05:46, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

What readers and editors expect to find under that heading differs dramatically according to which continent they grew up on. It's simplest to just avoid it altogether whenever reasonable alternatives are available. WhatamIdoing (talk) 07:16, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

Should "See Also" sections be discouraged for Featured Articles?

I've seen a few editors say that "a FA-quality article shouldn't have a See Also section". I understand that a top-quality article will have in-depth coverage, and that 99% of all relevant links will be included in the body. But to jump from that to stating that See Also sections are indicative of an unfinished article doesn't seem logical. Here are two concrete examples of "finished" articles which follow the FA convention and thus not have a See Also section - these articles are missing an important, relevant link that could be in a See Also section:

American Livestock Breeds Conservancy - Has no link to heirloom plants
Birth control movement in the United States - Has no link to Timeline of reproductive rights legislation

It appears that editors preparing articles for FA status are forced to choose between omitting the link altogether, or contriving some prose in the body that makes a reference to the other article. It seems more reasonable that we instead acknowledge that See Also sections are appropriate and acceptable even for FA-quality articles. Thoughts? --Noleander (talk) 04:00, 6 December 2011 (UTC)

Discouraged doesn't mean forbidden. SchmuckyTheCat (talk)

True. The WP:SEEALSO text is rather permissive on this. It says:

A reasonable number of relevant links that would be in the body of a hypothetical perfect article are suitable to add to the "See also" appendix of a less developed one…. Indeed, a good article might not require a "See also" section at all.

which seems like good guidance. My impression of "forbidden" comes more from the FAC discussions, but maybe I'm just reading too much into some stray comments. --Noleander (talk) 04:09, 6 December 2011 (UTC)

Many smaller communities, and I imagine FAC is one, develop their own practices that may deviate stricter from general guidelines. If that is so, the problem is there, not here. SchmuckyTheCat (talk)

Yeah, the more I read WP:SEEALSO, the more I see that it is consistent with my opinion that See Also sections can be downright beneficial for FA articles. So I guess I have no changes to propose to to WP:SEEALSO. I'm just ruminating. --Noleander (talk) 04:17, 6 December 2011 (UTC)

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[noteFoot01c] Miller, The Sun, Oxford, 2005, p. 23. But Miller points out that the Sun is not as large as some other stars.

[noteFoot02c] The Moon goes by other names, such as Selena - see, for example Jones, The Solar System, MacMillan, 2005, p 623.

[noteFoot03c] Brown, The Moon, 2006, Penguin, p. 46. Historically the Moon was not always considered to be large, see, for example Peterson, Astronomy, MacMillan, 2005, p 623.

[noteFoot04c] Smith, The Universe, Random House, 2005, p. 334.

[noteFoot01c] Miller, p. 23. But Miller points out that the Sun is not as large as some other stars.

[noteFoot02c] The Moon goes by other names, such as Selena - see, for example Jones, The Solar System, MacMillan, 2005, p 623.

[noteFoot03c] Brown, p. 46. Historically the Moon was not always considered to be large, see, for example Peterson, Astronomy, MacMillan, 2005, p 623.

[noteFoot04c] Smith, p. 334.

[11] Brown, The Moon, Penguin. 2001.

[12] Miller, The Sun, Oxford, 2005.

[13] Smith, The Universe, Random House, 2005.

[noteFoot01e] But Miller points out that the Sun is not as large as some other stars.

[noteFoot02e] The Moon goes by other names, such as Selena - see, for example Jones, The Solar System, MacMillan, 2005, p 623.

[noteFoot03e] Historically the Moon was not always considered to be large, see, for example, Peterson, Astronomy, MacMillan, 2005, p 623.

[noteFoot01d] Miller, p. 23

[noteFoot02d] Brown, p. 46

[noteFoot03d] Smith, p. 334

[20] Brown, The Moon, Penguin. 2001.

[21] Miller, The Sun, Oxford, 2005.

[22] Smith, The Universe, Random House, 2005.

[3] Expert, Alice. (2011) Behavior of Foxes in the Presence of Dogs"

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