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The fine folks over at
Talk:Donald Trump currently have a "Current consensus" item on their talk page that disallows including archive URLs for citations that aren't dead (25. Do not add web archives to cited sources which are not dead. (
Dec 2017,
March 2018)
). This runs counter to this guideline, specifically
WP:DEADREF, which seems to suggest that it's better to preventatively archive pages than to wait for them to be dead and hope that an archived copy is available (this guideline also notes that even if a link doesn't necessarily die, the content of the link can change and make the source unsuitable for statements it is used to support). My gut says to simply strike that item as a clear
WP:LOCALCON and direct those editors here to make their case for an exception, but I wanted to see what the feeling was here before proceeding. Also relevant is this closed discussion:
Special:Permalink/1197984238#Reversion_of_archives. —
Locke Cole •
t •
c 07:07, 23 January 2024 (UTC)
Preventing and repairing dead links, which is kind of where I got the impression it was more than simply a suggestion (and as to WP:ARCHIVEEARLY, it is literally tagged as a how-to guide). I agree it's possible to create an archive and not link it, but this still places the burden on future editors/readers to find a revision of the page that supports the statement being cited which can be problematic if a source changes (as you note for political content, this can happen frequently). I've also always viewed citations as a point-in-time thing when it comes to people/events, so the idea that an archive link might point to an "old" version is a feature, not a bug. The reasons given at Talk:Donald Trump all seemed to revolve around bloating of the page size which seems like a technical concern that shouldn't be getting used as a means to stifle page development. — Locke Cole • t • c 08:08, 23 January 2024 (UTC)
I am never touching this article again). Do we really want individual pages to unilaterally decide these guidelines are irrelevant and drive off productive editors doing what we're suggesting? — Locke Cole • t • c 18:44, 23 January 2024 (UTC)
code bloat that we don't needor
it is entirely possible to "preventatively archive pages" without pushing the archive link into Wikipedia(sic, emphasis added) then perhaps it's time to strike DEADREF or shuffle it off to a different (non-guideline) page. Sources, especially online sources, can be brittle and subject to the whims of website designers and complete site overhauls where old links die completely (and current "archives" are just "not found" pages). I don't think "code bloat" should be a concern used to undermine preventative measures to preserve sources/citations. — Locke Cole • t • c 04:45, 3 February 2024 (UTC)
When permanent links [DOIs, etc.] aren't available, consider making an archived copy of the cited document when writing the article; on-demand web archiving services such as the Wayback Machine ( https://web.archive.org/save) or archive.today ( https://archive.today) are fairly easy to use (see pre-emptive archiving).That does not say "and put the archived copy into the article before it is actually needed". All of the other material in that section, as in every single word of it, is about repairing citations with dead links.
What is broken is
WP:ARCHIVEEARLY (which is part of a supplementary how-to essay, not a guideline), which someone added as their opinion and which clearly does not represent an actual consensus. It says To ensure link accessibility and stability, please consider pre-emptively adding an archive URL from an archive source such as the Internet Archive or WebCite.
This practice is actually and clearly disputed, and that material should be changed, unless/until there is a firm consensus that not only is it good advice but that we actually need it despite
WP:CREEP. It should instead re-state in a how-to manner what is said about this at DEADREF: create the archive on-demand today, but do not put it into the article if it is not already needed. —
SMcCandlish
☏
¢ 😼 05:07, 3 February 2024 (UTC)
create the archive on-demand today, but do not put it into the article if it is not already neededcitation needed — Locke Cole • t • c 17:44, 3 February 2024 (UTC)
automaticallyI'm assuming you mean bot that finds dead references and attempt to produce an archive after the link has died? That's easy, see WP:DEADREF, but basically it's better to create an archive before a page goes missing (or changes substantially) than to wait until the worst has happened. If an archiving system like archive.org hasn't produced a backup, then there's no getting that source back (because it's already gone). — Locke Cole • t • c 05:45, 18 March 2024 (UTC)
|access-date=
the bot will also choose the version closest to or before the access date if the link 404s. What is being done that isn't just drive-by archivers duplicating bot work?
Ifly6 (
talk) 09:45, 18 March 2024 (UTC)
|archive-url=
when that occurs.
Ifly6 (
talk) 16:52, 18 March 2024 (UTC)
Will 1000 extra parameters and links slow the page loading?Even if it does, it shouldn't be the basis for how we edit the project. See WP:AUM for a time when
page loadingwas used as an excuse to try and prevent editors from creating a better encyclopedia. It's on the devs to look at things that are causing site problems and address them using technical means. — Locke Cole • t • c 05:48, 18 March 2024 (UTC)
Perhaps I am missing something, but I don’t really understand why anyone would want to archive a citation “preemptively”. Could someone who supports doing so enlighten me? Blueboar ( talk) 16:51, 18 March 2024 (UTC)
|url=
and |archive-url=
, and only when |url-status=dead
(or if |url-status=
is not set) does the |archive-url=
get used if it is present. If |url=
is still live, simply using |url-status=live
will keep |archive-url=
from being shown. This is all explained in the docs at {{
cite web}}. The only argument at
Talk:Donald Trump appears to center around "bloat" of the page, which again, is not a reason to avoid good maintenance of one of our more popular articles. —
Locke Cole •
t •
c 22:32, 19 March 2024 (UTC)There appears to have been some misunderstandings above about what archiving a citation means (see
WP:DEADREF for the current language and
WP:ARCHIVEEARLY for the process, see
WP:LINKROT for some reasons why archiving is a good idea). Just to reiterate, it does not mean replacing existing |url=
with a link to Archive.org/Wayback Machine. It means filling the |archive-url=
and |archive-date=
parameters and setting |url-status=live
for links that are not presently dead (see {{
cite web}} for more details on the parameters and how they interact). While my reading was that creating such archive URLs was strongly encouraged, there appears to be a consensus that the current language does not even say that. However, what I would propose is not explicitly requiring archive links, but perhaps language here that effectively disallows individual pages from banning the practice altogether. I can't really see where having them causes any harm to our editors or our readers, and the benefits of having them far outweigh the arguments against including them.
All that being said, please indicate whether you Support including language that would forbid individual pages from creating a WP:LOCALCON to disallow archive links, or whether you would Oppose such language. — Locke Cole • t • c 04:33, 27 March 2024 (UTC)
A proposed version appears below with the addition highlighted.
— Locke Cole • t • c 04:33, 27 March 2024 (UTC)
it is appropriate to simply ensure that an archive exists if it is neededThis does nothing for future editors or readers in determining the validity of a statement if an existing source becomes dead (either temporarily or permanently).
pre-emptive additions result in a lot of bloatThis is irrelevant, and can be mitigated by placing citations at the end of the article and referencing them earlier (see Ridgeline High School (Washington) for an example).
that this is a matter for local editorial consensusOur articles being verifiable with citations that are able to withstand sources changing or disappearing is not something up for
local editorial consensus.
a dead link is indicative of the need for editorial reconsideration rather than simple technical substitutionAnd an archive can aid in finding a live version if it is a copy of a widely published paper, but without a copy of the original source to refer to for quotations, such a search becomes more problematic depending on the citation/source used and the statement needing to be cited.
meatbotting is annoying??? I assume you mean people doing the good work of providing archives for references or are you engaging in personal attacks?
The people who formed a local consensus to exclude archivelinks felt they had good reason to do so.Well, you can certainly go see the
good reasonfor yourself. I hesitate to call the reasons provided
goodhowever:
web
and a ISO formatted date/time, then the original URI, so the major part, the original URL of the source, will be duplicated, which should compress very well; example: https://www.newsweek.com/fact-check-us-rounding-turn-covid-trump-claims-1542145
vs https://web.archive.org/web/20230510211847/https://www.newsweek.com/fact-check-us-rounding-turn-covid-trump-claims-1542145
)Consensus among a limited group of editors, at one place and time, cannot override community consensus on a wider scale.I'm very sorry that the editors at Talk:Donald Trump don't understand why we pre-emptively archive, but editors here have already made it a site-wide recommendation. The edit we were making was attempting to clarify this already existing consensus. — Locke Cole • t • c 04:20, 31 March 2024 (UTC)
They appear to have concern over "bloat" of the page wikitext (which can be resolved completely by formatting it to have references all at the bottom, this also makes reference/citation maintenance easier)Re that last, a subject dear to my heart. See the case study at Killing of Michael Brown. Yes, it eliminated a lot of clutter in the prose, which is why I did it. I soon discovered its downsides, including the fact that nobody else wanted to change the way they had always done citations. I ended up spending tons of time converting their work to conform. Every day I would have a number of new citations to convert. Editors could see me doing that, and still they didn't help out. No thanks. Have a look at the wikitext to see how well the convention held up after I left (spoiler: it didn't). And there are other more obscure downsides that I could get into but won't.
I'm very sorry that the editors at Talk:Donald Trump don't understand why we pre-emptively archive- Do you mean "pre-emptively add the archive parameters"? Those aren't the same thing. Let me reassure you that the article's editors do understand the link rot issue. You'd be surprised how much we understand. ― Mandruss ☎ 10:44, 31 March 2024 (UTC)
I looked over the "consensus" reasons provided and PEIS was never mentioned.Exactly what I previously said below.
the correct solution is to get that setting changed, not to make our articles worse.Self-quote from above:
Persuade the powers-that-be to increase the PEIS limit substantially (if they have the power to do that), and I'm sure we would be happy to revisit our consensus.Key word "revisit": upping the PEIS limit wouldn't guarantee a consensus change, since editors may still prioritize other factors over the avoidance of limited link rot. You and others are welcome to participate in a revisitation of the consensus at the article's talk page ("the article's editors" don't "own" the article by any means), but the issue is still subject to local consensus. All this talk about CONLEVEL appears to assume that there is a community consensus to use the archive parameters regardless of any other factors or considerations, and I'm not aware of any such community consensus (feel free to correct me, but WP rarely imposes such bright lines for anything). As I've said, guidelines are only guidelines. ― Mandruss ☎ 23:12, 1 April 2024 (UTC)
The fine folks over at Talk:Donald Trump currently have a "Current consensus" item on their talk page that disallows including archive URLs for citations that aren't dead. None of the current 837 cites at Donald Trump are dead, as proven by the last time someone "rescued 291 sources and tagged 0 as dead" on March 12, 2024, and added 57,600 bytes to the page’s 430,000 bytes. The page mostly relies on "news reporting from well-established news outlets" ( WP:NEWSORG), i.e., news articles that are permanent links and routinely and repeatedly archived on the Wayback Archive. I’m fine with a bot tagging an allegedly dead link or three and adding archive-urls, although they usually turn out not to be dead and easily found under their new url. Space4Time3Continuum2x 🖖 11:50, 31 March 2024 (UTC)
I didn't want you involved, actually.Lol. Yeah, I got that.
Nothing you've said here changes that.Your opinion. I think plenty of what I've said here changes that. You are free to assert your opinions in a local consensus discussion and, if you can persuade the majority, So Be It. That's how it works around here. ― Mandruss ☎ 03:02, 2 April 2024 (UTC)
That's how it works around here.Somebody better tell WP:ARBCOM that their thoughts at WP:CONLEVELS aren't relevant to the editors at Talk:Donald Trump. After all, their opinion (
Where there is a global consensus to edit in a certain way, it should be respected and cannot be overruled by a local consensus) is only eleven years old and been used repeatedly in ArbCom decisions... — Locke Cole • t • c 03:09, 2 April 2024 (UTC)
Key word "revisit": upping the PEIS limit wouldn't guarantee a consensus change, since editors may still prioritize other factors over the avoidance of limited link rot.You would still need to get a new local consensus after the increase. I don't wish to be accused of moving goalposts. ― Mandruss ☎ 00:03, 3 April 2024 (UTC)
There appears to have been some misunderstandings above about what archiving a citation means [...]". Are you discounting the lack of consensus for your interpretation based on the belief that dissenting editors don't understand your position? I don't think that opening a discussion at ANI about Mandruss will have any positive effect in this discussion, Rjjiii ( talk) 06:42, 3 April 2024 (UTC)
Thank you for making it clear it's not about WP:PEIS though.That is not what I said. I said it's not only about PEIS. ― Mandruss ☎ 06:52, 3 April 2024 (UTC)
Me, I've been on the losing side of many debates where I "knew" we were in the right and the opposing side was "patently" wrong. It's a tough pill to swallow, but it gets easier with practice. I had to learn to let go and not care so damn much (and that benefited me in real life, too, so WP editing has been therapeutic for me). Welcome to Wikipedia.You're not here to improve the encyclopedia. You're here to win a battle and apparently welcome people to a project that have been here longer than you. I'm not seeing how that's civil at all. Like I said, there's a reason I didn't go out of my way to solicit comments from editors at Talk:Donald Trump here. You're proving my point in spades though. — Locke Cole • t • c 06:58, 3 April 2024 (UTC)
A few comments above show resistance to having explanatory notes separate from the references that support the article text. Two points here: (1) a (very brief) survey of featured articles and (2) thoughts on technical reasons whey separate notes are desirable (is the technical argument right?)
(1) Surveyed 10 featured articles and found 2 that did not use explanatory notes in any way. The remaining 8 all had the explanatory notes separate from references.
(2) I believe that the only way to put explanatory notes in the same section as the references is with ref../ref. However, for technical reasons, you could not put any links or other markup elements in the explanatory note. The only way to reference the note (and if it is an explanatory note, it almost certainly needs a reference) is to just type it in with the rest of the note content. This is, essentially, parenthetical referencing, which is deprecated. The only way that I know to show explanatory notes without using ref.../ref is with a template such as {{ efn}}, which seems to compel a separate explanatory notes section. Therefore, if explanatory notes are to be referenced, surely anything other than a separate explanatory notes section is deprecated. Does this idea hold water? ThoughtIdRetired ( talk) 12:10, 15 February 2024 (UTC)
<ref>
tag is missing the closing </ref>
(see the
help page).</ref>Note that ThoughtIdRetired is very aggressively campaigning to force a change of the note standard in talk:Vasa (ship). They've been at it at galley too. Peter Isotalo 20:15, 19 February 2024 (UTC)
Recently at Heidi Game, Khoa41860 changed most citations from short to long format, see these diffs. As one of those who improved the article to FA standard, my inclination is to consider this a violation of WP:CITEVAR and no real improvement to the article, but it's essentially a matter of formatting, so I'd appreciate opinions on whether it is something to keep or revert per the MOS. I don't think leaving a note on the talk page of the article would get me the informed opinions I seek on a matter of MOS, and I already have left a note on the editor's talk page to no real result. Thoughts?-- Wehwalt ( talk) 16:13, 21 February 2024 (UTC)
I believe the project has created a pretty unique and kinda unrecognizable standard for notes without actually knowing how it actually affects anyone outside the project.
First off, the terms "footnotes", "notes" and "references" tend to have artificially exact definitions here on en.wp compared to elsewhere. Outside of the project, "footnotes/notes" have nothing to do with the content of the notes, but are simply typographical terms. "Notes" are just any kind of notation that is set aside from the main text while "footnotes" are notes that are placed at the bottom of a page [3] [4] [5] in documents that have a page structure. "Footnotes" are distinct from "endnotes" which are placed at the end of the text. "References" is not a term specific to anything related to notes as such at all. I don't think it's appropriate that Wikipedians are using their own definitions of these terms. It makes for a very obvious hurdle to newcomers, even if they are very familiar with how to use notes from other contexts. And it can create a lot of confusion and pointless disputes simply due to misunderstanding of terms.
Secondly, using two sets of notes with a very sharp distinction between those containing any kind of explanatory text and those that only contain citations is in my experience non-existent outside Wikipedia. There's also no evidence that splitting notes up is actually beneficial to readers in any way; as far as I know, all arguments are 100% based on the opinions and observations by individual Wikipedians. On the other hand, there's a very easy argument to make that using rare or unique formatting style might unnecessarily astonish readers and distract from the reading experience.
Thirdly, there seems to be a very clear bias among experienced Wikipedians to favor solutions for notes that are supported by specific technical solutions like template:sfn and template:efn, and also to favor templates over just using plain ref-tags. Strictly speaking, it seems to be a lot easier to apply the sfn/efn system in an article than not. In my experience, it's actually quite complicated to have a single set of notes and still apply templates. So there's a situation where we're supposed to allow different formats, but in practice, only one format is actually properly supported by well-functioning templates. Also, the choice of deliberately excluding citations from the explanatory notes is a complete mystery to me. The only logic I can see in it is technical convenience; it creates a neat and tidy separation of two kind of notes, but without any known benefits to anyone actually reading the note.
And lastly, we might also a have a problem with users who have taken upon themselves to force the standard of two sets of notes on articles in general. That's technically an issue with consensus-building and user behavior, but it is definitely tied to the uncritical introduction of splitting up explanatory notes from citations.
What is sorely missing is concrete evidence of external effects. Like with all other mainspace content, notes are intended for readers. I'm all for leaving established standards in articles alone to avoid subjective bickering; I for one am not going to start campaigning for a Wikipedia-wide switch to one set of notes. But I also believe that we need to start applying a more critical view that is focused on what we actually know about how readers interact and read notes. Peter Isotalo 12:38, 10 March 2024 (UTC)
{{
efn}}
template reports that it is used on approximately 196,000 pages.
Remsense
诉 15:33, 10 March 2024 (UTC)
... there's a very easy argument to make that using rare or unique formatting style might unnecessarily astonish readers and distract from the reading experience.
Also, the choice of deliberately excluding citations from the explanatory notes is a complete mystery to me.
So there's a situation where we're supposed to allow different formats, but in practice, only one format is actually properly supported by well-functioning templates.
Badian 2009, p. 14; Goldsworthy 2006, pp. 31–32. The consul of 157 BC was Sextus Caesar; the consuls of 91 and 90 were Sextus Caesar and Lucius Caesar, respectively.? Ifly6 ( talk) 18:15, 10 March 2024 (UTC)
using two sets of notes with a very sharp distinction between those containing any kind of explanatory text and those that only contain citations is in my experience non-existent outside Wikipedia.I see explanatory notes at bottom of page and sources at end of work/chapter all the time in nonfiction works. This isn't unique to Wikipedia at all. I don't see either configuration as a detriment to usage in general; it just depends on context. VQuakr ( talk) 20:05, 10 March 2024 (UTC)
<ref>
or {{
sfn}} and similar templatesIs anybody very familiar with Citing Medicine? I found this recommendation, though it refers specifically to tables
Authors should place explanatory matter in footnotes, not in the heading. Explain all nonstandard abbreviations in footnotes, and use symbols to explain information if needed. Symbols may vary from journal to journal (alphabet letter or such symbols as *, †, ‡, §), so check each journal's instructions for authors for required practice.
Can we learn from their long experience? -- 𝕁𝕄𝔽 ( talk) 00:41, 14 March 2024 (UTC)
May I be first to argue against the principle of this proposal? IMO it is critically important for Wikipedia that our articles distinguish [on the one hand] between statements that we assert to be valid (because they are supported by evident reference to reliable sources) versus [on the other] our own supplementary notes (which are just body text in another form). Wikipedia is not itself a reliable source, so readers must be able to identify the evidence basis for the text. Footnotes are a form of parenthesised text, perhaps clarification of a detail for readers unfamiliar with the topic, but are still part of the article and may (and often do, even should) themselves contain citations. To me, it is critically important to our readers (and to some editors) that we maintain a clear distinction between what is reliable and what is not. Peter identifies that a work by a credible researcher might not not usually make this kind of distinction [though in my experience, most do, by putting explanatory footnotes at the bottom of the page and putting citations at the end of the chapter or of the book]; fundamentally the status is different – if they do not do so then it is because they believe that they don't need to. The same need for distinctive treatment does not arise. -- 𝕁𝕄𝔽 ( talk) 17:33, 10 March 2024 (UTC)
Note that there is a proposal in Village pump regarding the consistency requirement for short and long inline citations: [8] Bogazicili ( talk) 14:57, 17 March 2024 (UTC)
What happens when {{ cite book}} is autofilled from the ISBN field, yet the date field has a different year from the date of publication shown in printed book? As far as I can determine, there has only ever been one edition of Hocker, Frederick M. (2011). Vasa. Stockholm : Oakville, CT: Medstroms Bokforlag ; David Brown Book Co. [distributor]. ISBN 978-91-7329-101-9. (this is autofilled). But the printed book says "copyright 2015 ..." and also gives a printing date of 2015. There is reason to believe the book was actually written in 2011, as the foreword is dated August 2011.
What date should appear in the date field? Is this the date that a short reference template such as harvnb would pick up as the identifier of the cited work? If you were filling in cite book manually, rather than using the autofill, would you ever get to use a date different from that in the printed book? ThoughtIdRetired ( talk) 20:41, 22 March 2024 (UTC)
What is the preferred way to cite specific sections of a book that does not have page numbers? I'm looking to overhaul Vince Gill using the book For the Music: The Vince Gill Story (Jo Sgammato, Random House, 2008), but the copy I found does not have page numbers. What would be the best way to tie citations to specific passages from the book using the {{ sfn}} system? Chapter numbers? Quotes? Both? Ten Pound Hammer • ( What did I screw up now?) 20:56, 25 March 2024 (UTC)
28 if I counted right
https://en.wikipedia.org/?title=European_emission_standards&diff=1215675542&oldid=1215553786 Chidgk1 ( talk) 14:27, 26 March 2024 (UTC)
I am working on a request from another user at
WP:AWBREQ to add author links to citation templates. The
first edit I did on the AWB run ended up with, I believe, 159 {{
cite web}}
templates for the given author. My
regex of course identifies each of those templates for adding in the author link, and I dutifully included the author link in all of them as per the request. But before I do this on the hundreds of pages where this is germane, I was wondering whether we are bound to the MOS guide to only link the first instance in an article, or whether that does not apply to references as well.
TLDR: Should I add author-link to every citation of a given author, or only the first reference on the page? Van Isaac, GHTV cont WpWS 01:34, 30 March 2024 (UTC)
|title=
, then find other instances of that title that are missing an author-link and add it there. With some sanity error checks. Could be fully automated. --
Green
C 02:01, 30 March 2024 (UTC)Hi, I have a general question. Why is it required by the MOS to always put a citation immediately after the final character, instead of leaving a space in some cases? For the body of an article, I understand leaving no space. But for some areas, like an infobox, my humble opinion is that a space looks far better. Please see the infobox on this page. By the time you click the link, hopefully nobody has edited it, but currently some of the lines have spaces before citations and some don't. I may be in the minority, but I think when there is no space it looks dreadful, cluttered, and sometimes difficult to read if the word ends with a certain character, such as lowercase "i". If there's plenty of room for a space without messing up text or formatting, is there any flexibility for using spaces? Sorry, but this is just my pet peeve. I hate seeing those citations slammed up against the words when there is apparently no practical reason for it, other than adhering to a rigid policy. Wafflewombat ( talk) 16:48, 20 April 2024 (UTC)
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The fine folks over at
Talk:Donald Trump currently have a "Current consensus" item on their talk page that disallows including archive URLs for citations that aren't dead (25. Do not add web archives to cited sources which are not dead. (
Dec 2017,
March 2018)
). This runs counter to this guideline, specifically
WP:DEADREF, which seems to suggest that it's better to preventatively archive pages than to wait for them to be dead and hope that an archived copy is available (this guideline also notes that even if a link doesn't necessarily die, the content of the link can change and make the source unsuitable for statements it is used to support). My gut says to simply strike that item as a clear
WP:LOCALCON and direct those editors here to make their case for an exception, but I wanted to see what the feeling was here before proceeding. Also relevant is this closed discussion:
Special:Permalink/1197984238#Reversion_of_archives. —
Locke Cole •
t •
c 07:07, 23 January 2024 (UTC)
Preventing and repairing dead links, which is kind of where I got the impression it was more than simply a suggestion (and as to WP:ARCHIVEEARLY, it is literally tagged as a how-to guide). I agree it's possible to create an archive and not link it, but this still places the burden on future editors/readers to find a revision of the page that supports the statement being cited which can be problematic if a source changes (as you note for political content, this can happen frequently). I've also always viewed citations as a point-in-time thing when it comes to people/events, so the idea that an archive link might point to an "old" version is a feature, not a bug. The reasons given at Talk:Donald Trump all seemed to revolve around bloating of the page size which seems like a technical concern that shouldn't be getting used as a means to stifle page development. — Locke Cole • t • c 08:08, 23 January 2024 (UTC)
I am never touching this article again). Do we really want individual pages to unilaterally decide these guidelines are irrelevant and drive off productive editors doing what we're suggesting? — Locke Cole • t • c 18:44, 23 January 2024 (UTC)
code bloat that we don't needor
it is entirely possible to "preventatively archive pages" without pushing the archive link into Wikipedia(sic, emphasis added) then perhaps it's time to strike DEADREF or shuffle it off to a different (non-guideline) page. Sources, especially online sources, can be brittle and subject to the whims of website designers and complete site overhauls where old links die completely (and current "archives" are just "not found" pages). I don't think "code bloat" should be a concern used to undermine preventative measures to preserve sources/citations. — Locke Cole • t • c 04:45, 3 February 2024 (UTC)
When permanent links [DOIs, etc.] aren't available, consider making an archived copy of the cited document when writing the article; on-demand web archiving services such as the Wayback Machine ( https://web.archive.org/save) or archive.today ( https://archive.today) are fairly easy to use (see pre-emptive archiving).That does not say "and put the archived copy into the article before it is actually needed". All of the other material in that section, as in every single word of it, is about repairing citations with dead links.
What is broken is
WP:ARCHIVEEARLY (which is part of a supplementary how-to essay, not a guideline), which someone added as their opinion and which clearly does not represent an actual consensus. It says To ensure link accessibility and stability, please consider pre-emptively adding an archive URL from an archive source such as the Internet Archive or WebCite.
This practice is actually and clearly disputed, and that material should be changed, unless/until there is a firm consensus that not only is it good advice but that we actually need it despite
WP:CREEP. It should instead re-state in a how-to manner what is said about this at DEADREF: create the archive on-demand today, but do not put it into the article if it is not already needed. —
SMcCandlish
☏
¢ 😼 05:07, 3 February 2024 (UTC)
create the archive on-demand today, but do not put it into the article if it is not already neededcitation needed — Locke Cole • t • c 17:44, 3 February 2024 (UTC)
automaticallyI'm assuming you mean bot that finds dead references and attempt to produce an archive after the link has died? That's easy, see WP:DEADREF, but basically it's better to create an archive before a page goes missing (or changes substantially) than to wait until the worst has happened. If an archiving system like archive.org hasn't produced a backup, then there's no getting that source back (because it's already gone). — Locke Cole • t • c 05:45, 18 March 2024 (UTC)
|access-date=
the bot will also choose the version closest to or before the access date if the link 404s. What is being done that isn't just drive-by archivers duplicating bot work?
Ifly6 (
talk) 09:45, 18 March 2024 (UTC)
|archive-url=
when that occurs.
Ifly6 (
talk) 16:52, 18 March 2024 (UTC)
Will 1000 extra parameters and links slow the page loading?Even if it does, it shouldn't be the basis for how we edit the project. See WP:AUM for a time when
page loadingwas used as an excuse to try and prevent editors from creating a better encyclopedia. It's on the devs to look at things that are causing site problems and address them using technical means. — Locke Cole • t • c 05:48, 18 March 2024 (UTC)
Perhaps I am missing something, but I don’t really understand why anyone would want to archive a citation “preemptively”. Could someone who supports doing so enlighten me? Blueboar ( talk) 16:51, 18 March 2024 (UTC)
|url=
and |archive-url=
, and only when |url-status=dead
(or if |url-status=
is not set) does the |archive-url=
get used if it is present. If |url=
is still live, simply using |url-status=live
will keep |archive-url=
from being shown. This is all explained in the docs at {{
cite web}}. The only argument at
Talk:Donald Trump appears to center around "bloat" of the page, which again, is not a reason to avoid good maintenance of one of our more popular articles. —
Locke Cole •
t •
c 22:32, 19 March 2024 (UTC)There appears to have been some misunderstandings above about what archiving a citation means (see
WP:DEADREF for the current language and
WP:ARCHIVEEARLY for the process, see
WP:LINKROT for some reasons why archiving is a good idea). Just to reiterate, it does not mean replacing existing |url=
with a link to Archive.org/Wayback Machine. It means filling the |archive-url=
and |archive-date=
parameters and setting |url-status=live
for links that are not presently dead (see {{
cite web}} for more details on the parameters and how they interact). While my reading was that creating such archive URLs was strongly encouraged, there appears to be a consensus that the current language does not even say that. However, what I would propose is not explicitly requiring archive links, but perhaps language here that effectively disallows individual pages from banning the practice altogether. I can't really see where having them causes any harm to our editors or our readers, and the benefits of having them far outweigh the arguments against including them.
All that being said, please indicate whether you Support including language that would forbid individual pages from creating a WP:LOCALCON to disallow archive links, or whether you would Oppose such language. — Locke Cole • t • c 04:33, 27 March 2024 (UTC)
A proposed version appears below with the addition highlighted.
— Locke Cole • t • c 04:33, 27 March 2024 (UTC)
it is appropriate to simply ensure that an archive exists if it is neededThis does nothing for future editors or readers in determining the validity of a statement if an existing source becomes dead (either temporarily or permanently).
pre-emptive additions result in a lot of bloatThis is irrelevant, and can be mitigated by placing citations at the end of the article and referencing them earlier (see Ridgeline High School (Washington) for an example).
that this is a matter for local editorial consensusOur articles being verifiable with citations that are able to withstand sources changing or disappearing is not something up for
local editorial consensus.
a dead link is indicative of the need for editorial reconsideration rather than simple technical substitutionAnd an archive can aid in finding a live version if it is a copy of a widely published paper, but without a copy of the original source to refer to for quotations, such a search becomes more problematic depending on the citation/source used and the statement needing to be cited.
meatbotting is annoying??? I assume you mean people doing the good work of providing archives for references or are you engaging in personal attacks?
The people who formed a local consensus to exclude archivelinks felt they had good reason to do so.Well, you can certainly go see the
good reasonfor yourself. I hesitate to call the reasons provided
goodhowever:
web
and a ISO formatted date/time, then the original URI, so the major part, the original URL of the source, will be duplicated, which should compress very well; example: https://www.newsweek.com/fact-check-us-rounding-turn-covid-trump-claims-1542145
vs https://web.archive.org/web/20230510211847/https://www.newsweek.com/fact-check-us-rounding-turn-covid-trump-claims-1542145
)Consensus among a limited group of editors, at one place and time, cannot override community consensus on a wider scale.I'm very sorry that the editors at Talk:Donald Trump don't understand why we pre-emptively archive, but editors here have already made it a site-wide recommendation. The edit we were making was attempting to clarify this already existing consensus. — Locke Cole • t • c 04:20, 31 March 2024 (UTC)
They appear to have concern over "bloat" of the page wikitext (which can be resolved completely by formatting it to have references all at the bottom, this also makes reference/citation maintenance easier)Re that last, a subject dear to my heart. See the case study at Killing of Michael Brown. Yes, it eliminated a lot of clutter in the prose, which is why I did it. I soon discovered its downsides, including the fact that nobody else wanted to change the way they had always done citations. I ended up spending tons of time converting their work to conform. Every day I would have a number of new citations to convert. Editors could see me doing that, and still they didn't help out. No thanks. Have a look at the wikitext to see how well the convention held up after I left (spoiler: it didn't). And there are other more obscure downsides that I could get into but won't.
I'm very sorry that the editors at Talk:Donald Trump don't understand why we pre-emptively archive- Do you mean "pre-emptively add the archive parameters"? Those aren't the same thing. Let me reassure you that the article's editors do understand the link rot issue. You'd be surprised how much we understand. ― Mandruss ☎ 10:44, 31 March 2024 (UTC)
I looked over the "consensus" reasons provided and PEIS was never mentioned.Exactly what I previously said below.
the correct solution is to get that setting changed, not to make our articles worse.Self-quote from above:
Persuade the powers-that-be to increase the PEIS limit substantially (if they have the power to do that), and I'm sure we would be happy to revisit our consensus.Key word "revisit": upping the PEIS limit wouldn't guarantee a consensus change, since editors may still prioritize other factors over the avoidance of limited link rot. You and others are welcome to participate in a revisitation of the consensus at the article's talk page ("the article's editors" don't "own" the article by any means), but the issue is still subject to local consensus. All this talk about CONLEVEL appears to assume that there is a community consensus to use the archive parameters regardless of any other factors or considerations, and I'm not aware of any such community consensus (feel free to correct me, but WP rarely imposes such bright lines for anything). As I've said, guidelines are only guidelines. ― Mandruss ☎ 23:12, 1 April 2024 (UTC)
The fine folks over at Talk:Donald Trump currently have a "Current consensus" item on their talk page that disallows including archive URLs for citations that aren't dead. None of the current 837 cites at Donald Trump are dead, as proven by the last time someone "rescued 291 sources and tagged 0 as dead" on March 12, 2024, and added 57,600 bytes to the page’s 430,000 bytes. The page mostly relies on "news reporting from well-established news outlets" ( WP:NEWSORG), i.e., news articles that are permanent links and routinely and repeatedly archived on the Wayback Archive. I’m fine with a bot tagging an allegedly dead link or three and adding archive-urls, although they usually turn out not to be dead and easily found under their new url. Space4Time3Continuum2x 🖖 11:50, 31 March 2024 (UTC)
I didn't want you involved, actually.Lol. Yeah, I got that.
Nothing you've said here changes that.Your opinion. I think plenty of what I've said here changes that. You are free to assert your opinions in a local consensus discussion and, if you can persuade the majority, So Be It. That's how it works around here. ― Mandruss ☎ 03:02, 2 April 2024 (UTC)
That's how it works around here.Somebody better tell WP:ARBCOM that their thoughts at WP:CONLEVELS aren't relevant to the editors at Talk:Donald Trump. After all, their opinion (
Where there is a global consensus to edit in a certain way, it should be respected and cannot be overruled by a local consensus) is only eleven years old and been used repeatedly in ArbCom decisions... — Locke Cole • t • c 03:09, 2 April 2024 (UTC)
Key word "revisit": upping the PEIS limit wouldn't guarantee a consensus change, since editors may still prioritize other factors over the avoidance of limited link rot.You would still need to get a new local consensus after the increase. I don't wish to be accused of moving goalposts. ― Mandruss ☎ 00:03, 3 April 2024 (UTC)
There appears to have been some misunderstandings above about what archiving a citation means [...]". Are you discounting the lack of consensus for your interpretation based on the belief that dissenting editors don't understand your position? I don't think that opening a discussion at ANI about Mandruss will have any positive effect in this discussion, Rjjiii ( talk) 06:42, 3 April 2024 (UTC)
Thank you for making it clear it's not about WP:PEIS though.That is not what I said. I said it's not only about PEIS. ― Mandruss ☎ 06:52, 3 April 2024 (UTC)
Me, I've been on the losing side of many debates where I "knew" we were in the right and the opposing side was "patently" wrong. It's a tough pill to swallow, but it gets easier with practice. I had to learn to let go and not care so damn much (and that benefited me in real life, too, so WP editing has been therapeutic for me). Welcome to Wikipedia.You're not here to improve the encyclopedia. You're here to win a battle and apparently welcome people to a project that have been here longer than you. I'm not seeing how that's civil at all. Like I said, there's a reason I didn't go out of my way to solicit comments from editors at Talk:Donald Trump here. You're proving my point in spades though. — Locke Cole • t • c 06:58, 3 April 2024 (UTC)
A few comments above show resistance to having explanatory notes separate from the references that support the article text. Two points here: (1) a (very brief) survey of featured articles and (2) thoughts on technical reasons whey separate notes are desirable (is the technical argument right?)
(1) Surveyed 10 featured articles and found 2 that did not use explanatory notes in any way. The remaining 8 all had the explanatory notes separate from references.
(2) I believe that the only way to put explanatory notes in the same section as the references is with ref../ref. However, for technical reasons, you could not put any links or other markup elements in the explanatory note. The only way to reference the note (and if it is an explanatory note, it almost certainly needs a reference) is to just type it in with the rest of the note content. This is, essentially, parenthetical referencing, which is deprecated. The only way that I know to show explanatory notes without using ref.../ref is with a template such as {{ efn}}, which seems to compel a separate explanatory notes section. Therefore, if explanatory notes are to be referenced, surely anything other than a separate explanatory notes section is deprecated. Does this idea hold water? ThoughtIdRetired ( talk) 12:10, 15 February 2024 (UTC)
<ref>
tag is missing the closing </ref>
(see the
help page).</ref>Note that ThoughtIdRetired is very aggressively campaigning to force a change of the note standard in talk:Vasa (ship). They've been at it at galley too. Peter Isotalo 20:15, 19 February 2024 (UTC)
Recently at Heidi Game, Khoa41860 changed most citations from short to long format, see these diffs. As one of those who improved the article to FA standard, my inclination is to consider this a violation of WP:CITEVAR and no real improvement to the article, but it's essentially a matter of formatting, so I'd appreciate opinions on whether it is something to keep or revert per the MOS. I don't think leaving a note on the talk page of the article would get me the informed opinions I seek on a matter of MOS, and I already have left a note on the editor's talk page to no real result. Thoughts?-- Wehwalt ( talk) 16:13, 21 February 2024 (UTC)
I believe the project has created a pretty unique and kinda unrecognizable standard for notes without actually knowing how it actually affects anyone outside the project.
First off, the terms "footnotes", "notes" and "references" tend to have artificially exact definitions here on en.wp compared to elsewhere. Outside of the project, "footnotes/notes" have nothing to do with the content of the notes, but are simply typographical terms. "Notes" are just any kind of notation that is set aside from the main text while "footnotes" are notes that are placed at the bottom of a page [3] [4] [5] in documents that have a page structure. "Footnotes" are distinct from "endnotes" which are placed at the end of the text. "References" is not a term specific to anything related to notes as such at all. I don't think it's appropriate that Wikipedians are using their own definitions of these terms. It makes for a very obvious hurdle to newcomers, even if they are very familiar with how to use notes from other contexts. And it can create a lot of confusion and pointless disputes simply due to misunderstanding of terms.
Secondly, using two sets of notes with a very sharp distinction between those containing any kind of explanatory text and those that only contain citations is in my experience non-existent outside Wikipedia. There's also no evidence that splitting notes up is actually beneficial to readers in any way; as far as I know, all arguments are 100% based on the opinions and observations by individual Wikipedians. On the other hand, there's a very easy argument to make that using rare or unique formatting style might unnecessarily astonish readers and distract from the reading experience.
Thirdly, there seems to be a very clear bias among experienced Wikipedians to favor solutions for notes that are supported by specific technical solutions like template:sfn and template:efn, and also to favor templates over just using plain ref-tags. Strictly speaking, it seems to be a lot easier to apply the sfn/efn system in an article than not. In my experience, it's actually quite complicated to have a single set of notes and still apply templates. So there's a situation where we're supposed to allow different formats, but in practice, only one format is actually properly supported by well-functioning templates. Also, the choice of deliberately excluding citations from the explanatory notes is a complete mystery to me. The only logic I can see in it is technical convenience; it creates a neat and tidy separation of two kind of notes, but without any known benefits to anyone actually reading the note.
And lastly, we might also a have a problem with users who have taken upon themselves to force the standard of two sets of notes on articles in general. That's technically an issue with consensus-building and user behavior, but it is definitely tied to the uncritical introduction of splitting up explanatory notes from citations.
What is sorely missing is concrete evidence of external effects. Like with all other mainspace content, notes are intended for readers. I'm all for leaving established standards in articles alone to avoid subjective bickering; I for one am not going to start campaigning for a Wikipedia-wide switch to one set of notes. But I also believe that we need to start applying a more critical view that is focused on what we actually know about how readers interact and read notes. Peter Isotalo 12:38, 10 March 2024 (UTC)
{{
efn}}
template reports that it is used on approximately 196,000 pages.
Remsense
诉 15:33, 10 March 2024 (UTC)
... there's a very easy argument to make that using rare or unique formatting style might unnecessarily astonish readers and distract from the reading experience.
Also, the choice of deliberately excluding citations from the explanatory notes is a complete mystery to me.
So there's a situation where we're supposed to allow different formats, but in practice, only one format is actually properly supported by well-functioning templates.
Badian 2009, p. 14; Goldsworthy 2006, pp. 31–32. The consul of 157 BC was Sextus Caesar; the consuls of 91 and 90 were Sextus Caesar and Lucius Caesar, respectively.? Ifly6 ( talk) 18:15, 10 March 2024 (UTC)
using two sets of notes with a very sharp distinction between those containing any kind of explanatory text and those that only contain citations is in my experience non-existent outside Wikipedia.I see explanatory notes at bottom of page and sources at end of work/chapter all the time in nonfiction works. This isn't unique to Wikipedia at all. I don't see either configuration as a detriment to usage in general; it just depends on context. VQuakr ( talk) 20:05, 10 March 2024 (UTC)
<ref>
or {{
sfn}} and similar templatesIs anybody very familiar with Citing Medicine? I found this recommendation, though it refers specifically to tables
Authors should place explanatory matter in footnotes, not in the heading. Explain all nonstandard abbreviations in footnotes, and use symbols to explain information if needed. Symbols may vary from journal to journal (alphabet letter or such symbols as *, †, ‡, §), so check each journal's instructions for authors for required practice.
Can we learn from their long experience? -- 𝕁𝕄𝔽 ( talk) 00:41, 14 March 2024 (UTC)
May I be first to argue against the principle of this proposal? IMO it is critically important for Wikipedia that our articles distinguish [on the one hand] between statements that we assert to be valid (because they are supported by evident reference to reliable sources) versus [on the other] our own supplementary notes (which are just body text in another form). Wikipedia is not itself a reliable source, so readers must be able to identify the evidence basis for the text. Footnotes are a form of parenthesised text, perhaps clarification of a detail for readers unfamiliar with the topic, but are still part of the article and may (and often do, even should) themselves contain citations. To me, it is critically important to our readers (and to some editors) that we maintain a clear distinction between what is reliable and what is not. Peter identifies that a work by a credible researcher might not not usually make this kind of distinction [though in my experience, most do, by putting explanatory footnotes at the bottom of the page and putting citations at the end of the chapter or of the book]; fundamentally the status is different – if they do not do so then it is because they believe that they don't need to. The same need for distinctive treatment does not arise. -- 𝕁𝕄𝔽 ( talk) 17:33, 10 March 2024 (UTC)
Note that there is a proposal in Village pump regarding the consistency requirement for short and long inline citations: [8] Bogazicili ( talk) 14:57, 17 March 2024 (UTC)
What happens when {{ cite book}} is autofilled from the ISBN field, yet the date field has a different year from the date of publication shown in printed book? As far as I can determine, there has only ever been one edition of Hocker, Frederick M. (2011). Vasa. Stockholm : Oakville, CT: Medstroms Bokforlag ; David Brown Book Co. [distributor]. ISBN 978-91-7329-101-9. (this is autofilled). But the printed book says "copyright 2015 ..." and also gives a printing date of 2015. There is reason to believe the book was actually written in 2011, as the foreword is dated August 2011.
What date should appear in the date field? Is this the date that a short reference template such as harvnb would pick up as the identifier of the cited work? If you were filling in cite book manually, rather than using the autofill, would you ever get to use a date different from that in the printed book? ThoughtIdRetired ( talk) 20:41, 22 March 2024 (UTC)
What is the preferred way to cite specific sections of a book that does not have page numbers? I'm looking to overhaul Vince Gill using the book For the Music: The Vince Gill Story (Jo Sgammato, Random House, 2008), but the copy I found does not have page numbers. What would be the best way to tie citations to specific passages from the book using the {{ sfn}} system? Chapter numbers? Quotes? Both? Ten Pound Hammer • ( What did I screw up now?) 20:56, 25 March 2024 (UTC)
28 if I counted right
https://en.wikipedia.org/?title=European_emission_standards&diff=1215675542&oldid=1215553786 Chidgk1 ( talk) 14:27, 26 March 2024 (UTC)
I am working on a request from another user at
WP:AWBREQ to add author links to citation templates. The
first edit I did on the AWB run ended up with, I believe, 159 {{
cite web}}
templates for the given author. My
regex of course identifies each of those templates for adding in the author link, and I dutifully included the author link in all of them as per the request. But before I do this on the hundreds of pages where this is germane, I was wondering whether we are bound to the MOS guide to only link the first instance in an article, or whether that does not apply to references as well.
TLDR: Should I add author-link to every citation of a given author, or only the first reference on the page? Van Isaac, GHTV cont WpWS 01:34, 30 March 2024 (UTC)
|title=
, then find other instances of that title that are missing an author-link and add it there. With some sanity error checks. Could be fully automated. --
Green
C 02:01, 30 March 2024 (UTC)Hi, I have a general question. Why is it required by the MOS to always put a citation immediately after the final character, instead of leaving a space in some cases? For the body of an article, I understand leaving no space. But for some areas, like an infobox, my humble opinion is that a space looks far better. Please see the infobox on this page. By the time you click the link, hopefully nobody has edited it, but currently some of the lines have spaces before citations and some don't. I may be in the minority, but I think when there is no space it looks dreadful, cluttered, and sometimes difficult to read if the word ends with a certain character, such as lowercase "i". If there's plenty of room for a space without messing up text or formatting, is there any flexibility for using spaces? Sorry, but this is just my pet peeve. I hate seeing those citations slammed up against the words when there is apparently no practical reason for it, other than adhering to a rigid policy. Wafflewombat ( talk) 16:48, 20 April 2024 (UTC)