Revision as of 18:27, 24 May 2006

Documentation

Usage

See →template:cite web.

Examples

Some standard use cases

• {{cite web | author=Doe, John | title=My Favorite Things Part II | publisher=Open Publishing | date=2005-04-30 | work=Encyclopedia of Things | url=http://www.example.com/ | accessdate=July 6 | accessyear=2005 }}
  → Doe, John (2005-04-30). "My Favorite Things Part II". Encyclopedia of Things. Open Publishing. Retrieved July 6. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help)

• {{cite web | author=Doe, John | title=My Favorite Things Part II | date=2005-04-30 | work=Encyclopedia of Things | url=http://www.example.com/ | accessdate=July 6 | accessyear=2005 }}
  → Doe, John (2005-04-30). "My Favorite Things Part II". Encyclopedia of Things. Retrieved July 6. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help)

• {{cite web | author=Doe, John | title=My Favorite Things Part II | date=2005-04-30 | url=http://www.example.com/ | accessdate=July 6 | accessyear=2005 }}
  → Doe, John (2005-04-30). "My Favorite Things Part II". Retrieved July 6. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help)

• {{cite web | author=Doe, John | title=My Favorite Things Part II | url=http://www.example.com/ | accessdate=July 6 | accessyear=2005 }}
  → Doe, John. "My Favorite Things Part II". Retrieved July 6. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help)

• {{cite web | title=My Favorite Things Part II | url=http://www.example.com/ | accessdate=July 6 | accessyear=2005 }}
  → "My Favorite Things Part II". Retrieved July 6. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help)

• {{cite web | url=http://www.nfl.com/fans/ | title=Digest of Rules | publisher= National Football League | accessdate=December 28 | accessyear=2005 }}
  → "Digest of Rules". National Football League. Retrieved December 28. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help)

No parameters

• {{cite web}}
  → {{cite web}}: Empty citation (help)

accessdate in ISO YYY-MM-DD format

• {{cite web | author=Doe, John | title=My Favorite Things Part II | publisher=Open Publishing | date=2005-04-30 | work=Encyclopedia of Things | url=http://www.example.com/ | accessdate=2005-07-06 }}
  → Doe, John (2005-04-30). "My Favorite Things Part II". Encyclopedia of Things. Open Publishing. Retrieved 2005-07-06.

Using format

• {{cite web | title=List of psychotropic substances under international control | publisher = International Narcotics Control Board | url=http://www.incb.org/pdf/e/list/green.pdf | format = PDF | accessdate=November 19 | accessyear=2005 }}
  → "List of psychotropic substances under international control" (PDF). International Narcotics Control Board. Retrieved November 19. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help)

language

• {{cite web | author=Doe, John | title=My Favorite Things Part II | publisher=Open Publishing | date=2005-04-30 | work=Encyclopedia of Things | url=http://www.example.com/ | accessdate=2005-07-06 | language=English }}
  → Doe, John (2005-04-30). "My Favorite Things Part II". Encyclopedia of Things. Open Publishing. Retrieved 2005-07-06.

coauthors

• {{cite web | first=John | last=Doe | coauthors=Peter Smith, Jim Smythe | title=My Favorite Things Part II | publisher=Open Publishing | date=2005-04-30 | work=Encyclopedia of Things | url=http://www.example.com/ | accessdate=2006-05-16 }}
  → Doe, John (2005-04-30). "My Favorite Things Part II". Encyclopedia of Things. Open Publishing. Retrieved 2006-05-16. {{cite web}}: Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)

No author

• {{cite web | title=My Favorite Things Part II | publisher=Open Publishing | date=2005-04-30 | work=Encyclopedia of Things | url=http://www.example.com/ | accessdate=2006-05-16 }}
  → "My Favorite Things Part II". Encyclopedia of Things. Open Publishing. 2005-04-30. Retrieved 2006-05-16.

No author, no publisher

• {{cite web | title=My Favorite Things Part II | date=2005-04-30 | work=Encyclopedia of Things | url=http://www.example.com/ | accessdate=2006-05-16 }}
  → "My Favorite Things Part II". Encyclopedia of Things. 2005-04-30. Retrieved 2006-05-16.

• {{cite web | title=My Favorite Things Part II | date=2005-04-30 | url=http://www.example.com/ | accessdate=2006-05-16 }}
  → "My Favorite Things Part II". 2005-04-30. Retrieved 2006-05-16.

• {{cite web | title=My Favorite Things Part II | date=2005-04-30 | url=http://www.example.com/ | accessdate=2006-05-16 | language=English }}
  → "My Favorite Things Part II". 2005-04-30. Retrieved 2006-05-16.

• {{cite web | title=List of psychotropic substances under international control | date=2005-04-30 | url=http://www.incb.org/pdf/e/list/green.pdf | format = PDF | accessdate=November 19 | accessyear=2005 | language=English }}
  → "List of psychotropic substances under international control" (PDF). 2005-04-30. Retrieved November 19. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help)

Discussion

Author → Last, First

I think we ought to transplant the "author/first/last" processing from {{cite book}} and {{cite journal}}. Or is there any particular reason why authors of web references should be treated less nicely than others? HTH HAND —Phil | Talk 08:01, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Yes. Can be transplanted. --Adrian Buehlmann 08:39, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Done, also includes "authorlink/coauthors". HTH HAND —Phil | Talk 15:46, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

I used this template with coauthors, where do they map to as they seemed invisible?Rex the first 21:48, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

Scratching my head and feeling a bit not to understand completely :P. The docs here are a bit short (look at the template page). You could also take a look at {{cite book}} (talk page there). coauthors here should work like on cite book. See this:

{{cite web | first=John | last=Doe | coauthors=John Smith, Jim Smythe | title=My Favorite Things Part II | publisher=Open Publishing | date=2005-04-30 | work=Encyclopedia of Things | url=http://www.example.com/ | accessdate=2006-05-16 }}
→ Doe, John (2005-04-30). "My Favorite Things Part II". Encyclopedia of Things. Open Publishing. Retrieved 2006-05-16. {{cite web}}: Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)

--Ligulem 22:07, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

When coauthors are used without authors: {{cite web | coauthors=John Smith, Jim Smythe | title=My Favorite Things Part II | publisher=Open Publishing | date=2005-04-30 | work=Encyclopedia of Things | url=http://www.example.com/ | accessdate=2006-05-16 }}
→ "My Favorite Things Part II". Encyclopedia of Things. Open Publishing. 2005-04-30. Retrieved 2006-05-16. {{cite web}}: Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help) Rex the first 16:18, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

Ah, ok. Think I got it. The thing is, the logic of the template is made in such a way that either (first and last) or author must be specified. This means the first author must be specfied in order to display what was given in coauthors. In other words: no coauthors without author. I hope I didn't increase the confusion... :-) --Ligulem 16:38, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

Would you mind if I tried to change to so you could specify coauthors only (as some links have two authors and neither are the senior author). My attempt so far (I know this doesn't work but it my first attempt)

{{#if: {{{author|{{{coauthors|}}}}}} |{{#if: {{{last|}}}|<nowiki>;</nowikii>}} {{{coauthors}}} | {{{coauthors}}} }} <--- I was trying to only get semicolon if 'last' was specified }} Rex the first 23:42, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

Please don't do that. If you feel compelled to put all authors into one param, put them all into "author". --Ligulem 09:29, 20 May 2006 (UTC)

Fine, I don't really understand how it works so if its a bad idea I will leave it! Rex the first 12:31, 20 May 2006 (UTC)

Accessdate

I assume that the accessdate is for when I, the editor, last accessed the URL, right? It's not actually stated. Also, if I happen to be editing the article and access the URL, and it's some times (months or whatever) past the last accessdate, should I update it if its convenient? Herostratus 16:48, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

You are right. That's also why the template spits it out like this: "URL accessed on xxxxx". The accessdate is the date when an editor checked the link works and points to the correct info. Per the updating, I'm not sure. At first sight I would say I can't see why it would hurt if you do update the accessdate (but only after having checked that the link works and points to the correct material). By the way, if you are changing accessdates, please enter them in the ISO format to the param accessdate (accessyear needs not be used in this case, just do not specify that param then). Some info may also be found on WP:CITE. --Adrian Buehlmann 18:26, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Why is the access date wiki-linked? It's certainly an insignificant date (per WP:DATE, and is arguably completely unrelated to the reference itself. Can we please remove the link? RossPatterson 21:07, 6 May 2006 (UTC)

Um. That's probably a controversial one. We have had it like that for a very long time already. And there are fans of having this linked. One argument for having it linked is that the user preferences (Special:Preferences → "Date and time" tab → "Date format") influence how that date is formatted, but only if that date is linked. If there is no link, user prefs have no effect. So I believe there are some fans of linking because of that effect alone. --Ligulem 22:08, 6 May 2006 (UTC)

Well, I can't see why it would be controversial in and of itself - the dates are meaningless, at least as far as the article goes. But I see your point about the date preferences, especially since I use a non-default setting myself. It's a weakness in the MediaWiki software that date preferences are only applied inside wiki-links, but I guess we have to live with it. Never mind! RossPatterson 23:19, 6 May 2006 (UTC)

The wiki-link is also causing a dab problem. I'm working on dab of "unknown", and I've got a template usage of: * {{cite web | title=Aristotle: Cardiff South and Penarth | work=Guardian Unlimited | url=http://politics.guardian.co.uk/hoc/constituency/history/0,9571,-791,00.html | accessdate=Unknown | accessyear=2004}} which automatically creates a link to unknown. How should I fix this. Can I delete the accessdate parameter, or fix some othew way. Thanks. Simon12 16:36, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

Your are using that template incorrectly. The accessdate is the date when the editor that created the reference checked that the link works and points to the material that serves as reference. Please specify the whole date for accessdate in the form YYYY-MM-DD (just ignore the accessyear parameter, it is optional in this case). See the examples on this page. Never specify a parameter as "unknown" on the citation templates. Just leave optional parameters away in the call. --Ligulem 16:58, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

I didn't create the templage usage in question, so it's not me who used it incorrectly, and I don't have the actual accessdate. (I'm just trying to remove links to the "unknown" dab page). I will remove the accessdate parameter, leaving just the accessyear parameter. Thanks for the quick response. Simon12 17:58, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

Well, that didn't quite work. Removing the accessdate paramater removed the "URL accessed..." phrase, and trying accessdate=2004 without the accessyear created "URL accessed on 2004". How should I do this when only the year of the access is available? Simon12 18:03, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

On which article is that problem? Might be easier if I can have a look. As I said, that usage of the template is wrong. If the link still works, then you could enter the accessdate of today. Otherwise convert the reference to not using this template (plain manual wikitext) and don't give the accessdate. The use of this template here for references is not mandatory. --Ligulem 18:49, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

Cardiff_South_and_Penarth - See Refs section at the end. I just checked and link does still work, so I will update the information later today. But I'm curious as to what your recommended fix would have been, if the link no longer worked, in case I see this in other places. Thanks! Simon12 19:35, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

Well then. This problem is solved. If you have another one, just drop a note on my talk if you need a second opinion :P --Ligulem 21:49, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

I have changed the wording to Retrieved from URL accessed as this is meant to be when the source was used and not when the URL was last checked to be online Misplaced Pages:Citing sources#Embedded HTML links, hope that doesn't ruin anything! Rex the first 07:52, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

You've just retroactively redefined a parameter in a template that is used by over 9,500 articles. I think that's a significant event, especially since you have no way of knowing if your new meaning is correct for those articles. How does Misplaced Pages:Citing sources#Embedded HTML links bear on this change? I see an example there that includes a "retrieved on", but nothing that justfies re-interpreting the accessdate parameter this way. RossPatterson 01:40, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

As far as I can tell (I could be wrong) but I left the parameter accessdate but it appears as 'retrieved on'. I would strongly disagree with "URL accessed on xxx" as this is not updated everytime it is accessed and shouldn't be; it is meant to explain when the source was used so if changes occur or the page is taken offline there is a possibility of using an internet archive to find the original source the editor used. I agree that re-interpreting retrospectively is bad but I feel not as bad as leaving "URL accessed on xxx" to perpetuate. Maybe we could introduce a new 'retrieved' parameter and run them side by side and phase accessdate out? Rex the first 16:15, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

Well, that's your interpretation, sure. But up at the top if this section you'll see an exchange between Herostratus and Adrian Buehlmann to the effect that accessdate is indeed a "URL was verified on" date, which would of course begin when it was first retrieved but can certainly be re-verified whenever someone undertakes a reference-check. The other templates that have it (e.g., {{cite news}}, {{cite journal}}, {{cite book}} are vague about what "access" means, but I believe the average editor would read it to mean "someone looked at this reference".

Backing up, what problem are you trying to solve? Do you dislike the specific text "URL accessed on date"? I don't care what the text is, I care about the meaning of the date. We can always fix the text, after all, it's in the template. But we can't easily fix 9,500 pages that mean one thing by that date if we decide it should mean another. And I think there is genuine value in a "reference verified as of" date, much moreso than a "reference first examined on" date (which can always be ferreted out from the article history). RossPatterson 01:04, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

That seems fine, "reference verified as of" (or words to that effect) is better than "retrieved" and I think it might be worth changing it on Misplaced Pages:Citing sources#Embedded HTML links. I was trying to solve the problem that when I click on a link to see a reference I feel that I have 'accessed it' and I never update the reference last accessdate and neither do most editors/readers so saying that this accessdate is when the URL was last accessed seems wrong. (A few too many accesses in the last sentence!) Rex the first 07:41, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

Agree with RossPatterson, what's the problem with "URL accessed on XXX"? It shows the last time a website was accessed as a source. Clear, factual. "Reference verified as of" is unnecessary as this template is not exclusively used for references, see i.e. counter-terrorism. —SHININGEYES 03:34, 21 May 2006 (UTC)

Periods

This template. puts way too many. periods. in the listing, especially if. the author's first name. is. an. initial. Someone who understands "esoteric" templates should remove some of the periods and convert others to commas, at least in certain cases. e.g. if there is no year, but there is an author's name, use a comma between the author's name and the name of the page. There is no need for a period between the web link and the name of the complete work, etc.--Srleffler 03:35, 15 March 2006 (UTC)

On the other hand, here's a case of a missing period. Why doesn't Cite web put a period after the author when specified with last+first? Compare

{{cite web | last=Smith | first=Jane | title=My web page | url=http://example.com/ | accessdate=2006-04-25 }}

which produces

Smith, Jane. "My web page". Retrieved 2006-04-25.

(no period) with

{{cite journal | author=Smith, Jane | title=My web page | url=http://example.com/ | accessdate=2006-04-25 }}

which produces

Smith, Jane. "My web page". Retrieved 2006-04-25.

(correct, with period after the author). -- JimR 05:19, 25 April 2006 (UTC)

Fixed. --Ligulem 07:49, 25 April 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the quick fix! -- JimR 07:54, 25 April 2006 (UTC)

Date/Year/Month

Should we also transplant the date processing from other cite templates? —Phil | Talk 13:02, 15 March 2006 (UTC)

I'd like to see a full date, a la Template:cite book's "date". The date of "publication" of a web reference is important enough to be fully qualified when it can be determined, rather than just using "year". I'd be willing to code something up if there's interest. RossPatterson 20:54, 6 May 2006 (UTC)

We could copy that part from {{cite book}}. I think we would have to replace:

{{#if: {{{year|}}}
  |  ({{{year|}}})
}}

with

{{
  #if: {{{date|}}}
  |  ({{{date}}})
  | {{
    #if: {{{year|}}}
    | {{
      #if: {{{month|}}}
      |  ({{{month}}} {{{year}}})
      |  ({{{year}}})
    }}
  }}
}}

I have no objections to do that. Anybody unhappy if I do that? --Ligulem 21:16, 6 May 2006 (UTC)

Please do. It will make it much easier to switch between cite web and cite (anything else with an online reference).--Scott Davis 23:30, 6 May 2006 (UTC)

Done . --Ligulem 23:46, 6 May 2006 (UTC)

Misplaced Pages:Featured article candidates/AIDS

The article on AIDS has been nominated for FA status, yet the first comment in place is about the wikitext. It is called a perfect example of what best practice isn't. AIDS extensively uses this template along with the cite journal and cite book templates within the text. This makes for better reading and better referencing. Just thought people should know. --Bob 00:37, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

If no author?

I'm having trouble knowing how to cite a web source that has no author (see citation of Vetch scandal in Vicia). Thanks. --Singkong2005 05:17, 6 April 2006 (UTC)

The parameter "author" is optional (see the explanations at template:cite web). Just don't specify it on the template call. Example:

• "My Favorite Things Part II". Retrieved 2005-07-06.

--Ligulem 07:30, 6 April 2006 (UTC)

year without author

It would be nice to be able to include the date of publication of documents that have no author. At present, this yields the year 'floating' at the start of the citation, which is unsatisfactory e.g.

"I Am A Search Engine". Google. 1066-01-01. Retrieved 2006-11-04. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |year= (help)CS1 maint: year (link)

A better renderingn would be

I Am A Search Engine. Google, 1066-01-01. URL accessed on 2006-11-04.

i.e. move the year to follow the publisher when there is no author. I don't speak metatemplate, so I don't want to boldly break everything... -Splash 17:35, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

You could start to get your feet wet on rocket science under your user space: user:Splash/cite web (could be used as {{user:Splash/cite web}} for test inclusions, for example on user talk:Splash/cite web). BTW, qif doesn't bite :-) (just don't look at the code of qif..). --Ligulem 18:04, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

Experimental implementation using ParserFunctions

Hi folks. I have done an experimental implementation of cite web using m:ParserFunctions at User:Ligulem/work/cite web 1 (first non-meta template implementation!). Test inclusions can be seen at User talk:Ligulem/work/cite web 1. Please keep in mind that ParserFunctions have been enabled on a trial basis . I would propose to put User:Ligulem/work/cite web 1 into template:cite web and see if it works. Thoughts? --Ligulem 15:40, 13 April 2006 (UTC)

My current version of User:Ligulem/work/cite web 1 doesn't work if any of the parameters is set to "0". See also . --Ligulem 22:54, 13 April 2006 (UTC)

Fixed by Tim: --Ligulem 17:59, 14 April 2006 (UTC)

Ok. I applied it on a trial basis . Please revert quickly if you see anything broken. Crossing fingers. --Ligulem 20:20, 14 April 2006 (UTC)

Consistency

I've noticed that mixing some of the cite templates can make a References section look a bit jumbled. For example, cite news puts the full date after the publisher, but cite web puts the year in parentheses after the author. I'm not saying one format is better than another, but that there should be consistency between the two, if possible. For an example, see: Ex-gay. eaolson 00:11, 14 April 2006 (UTC)

Style changes

I really like the cite web template, and think it makes web citation easy to do without having to worry about stylizing everything with wikicode. I do have some problems with its style, though:

• Retrieval dates are links — the dates that are linked are the dates at which the author of the Misplaced Pages article went and looked up the document. How are links that lead to pages that tell what happened on those days relevant? They don't have anything to do with the cited material or the article, and thus, we should acknowledge the manual of style in this instance and not link.
• Year of work is shown in front of the title when the author is not known (e.g. (2005). Title of book. URL accessed on ) — this is awkward. The APA style guide suggests that the title of the work goes first when no author can be identified.
• The place where the reference can be obtained states the word URL. Since this is a web citation, it's obvious that the resource must exist somewhere on the Internet, and as such, I would suggest omitting the word entirely.
• Since the "publisher" is the name of the site that the document came from, it's best off being italicized. It might also be useful to name the parameter "website_name" or something of the sort to indicate that one can input the name of the site in this field, since "publisher" might not be entirely obvious. This conflicts with "work", which is italicized; which one to prioritize?

Other than that, I find this an excellent template. I'm going to make an example of how I think the reference template should be in case no editor is willing to make any changes to this effect directly (and I really don't like editing high-use templates shamelessly). But it would be great if we could discuss changes like this. —Michiel Sikma, 19:04, 26 April 2006 (UTC)

The best way to propose changes is to make a proposal for a new version of the template code under your user space. This is quite common. For example you could do it under User:Michiel Sikma/cite web and do some test inclusions at User talk:Michiel Sikma/cite web (using the syntax {{User:Michiel Sikma/cite web|...}}. Please also have a look at the other citation templates like {{cite book}}, {{cite journal}}, etc (including discussions there). We usually try to keep them consistent where possible. --Ligulem 20:49, 26 April 2006 (UTC)

Referring URL

Has the inclusion of an optional parameter to hold referring URL information been considered? This information could be useful, displayed or not, for tracking URLs that have gone dead. User:Ceyockey (talk to me) 01:36, 2 May 2006 (UTC)

Considering merger with 'waybackref' template

There is a more specialized template, the {{Waybackref}}, which deals specifically with references to pages in the Internet Archive, but which has fewer parameters than {{cite web}}. I think that we could do away with {{Waybackref}} by making judicious additions to {{cite web}}. My suggestions for consideration:

• Add a parameter 'archive' with full name 'Archival Repository' with the usage description 'If the target URL points to a page in a page archive, such as Internet Archive, indicate the identity of the archive here.' This parameter could be used for Google Cache and other shorter or longer term archival stores if they exist.
• Add a parameter 'oriurl' with full name 'Original URL' with the usage description 'If the target URL points to a page in a page archive, such as Internet Archive, indicate the original URL that was at one time live on the Internet here.' This parameter wouldn't necessarily be needed, particularly if the original URL is included in the archival URL, and because the mechanics of page location as instantiated in the URL should be independent of the content of the page for purposes of Misplaced Pages.

Thanks for considering this. User:Ceyockey (talk to me) 01:11, 6 May 2006 (UTC)

Hey! Just dropping by to say that I've seen this proposal and I think it is noteworthy to have a deeper look at this. I will try to put it on the list of my "things to ruminate". Quick first comment: may I suggest to use lowercase parameter names only, this fits better with the new lowercase param style used on {{cite web}}, {{cite book}}, {{cite journal}}, etc. Another note: If possible, it would be cool if you could provide a proposal for the new code of the template. I know I'm getting boring with this perennial proposal here, but you could for example put the proposed new template code into User:Ceyockey/cite web and use that as {{User:Ceyockey/cite web|...}} on a page with test inclusions at, for example, User talk:Ceyockey/cite web. Just ask me on my talk if you need help with doing that (take also a look at user:Ligulem/work/cite book 1 and user talk:Ligulem/work/cite book 1 for an example how that can be done). The conditionals are documented at m:ParserFunctions. As an alternative, you could put up a page with simulated calls inside <pre>..</pre> (or <nowiki>..</nowiki>) tags and manually created proposed template output (just provide the plain wanted wikisource that your simulated template calls should produce). --Ligulem 07:57, 6 May 2006 (UTC)

I changed the 'OrigURL' parameter suggestion to 'oriurl' based on your lowercase suggestion. I'll look at doing a userspace version as you suggest. Thanks. User:Ceyockey (talk to me) 12:30, 6 May 2006 (UTC)

I've got a version of this that I'm playing with at User:RossPatterson/cite web, with examples of its use at User talk:RossPatterson#cite web-waybackref merger. The difference from the suggestions above is that I've only added archiveurl= and archivedate=, leaving the original URL in url= for historical reasons. The intent is to make it easy for someone to convert a {{cite web}} that has gone offline into an archive reference, simply by adding the URL of the archived copy and the date when it was archived. I've made both parameters required if either is specified, since I believe the date when a copy was made is significant. The end result is that if the archive parameters are specified, the link on the title= value points to the archive copy, and the text "archived from the original on archivedate" is added, with a link to the url= URL on the phrase "the original". See the examples I mentioned above for some test cases and one full example (User_talk:RossPatterson#Example 6). Comments and criticism are very welcome. RossPatterson 01:20, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

Good job done. This is a cool proposal. I think we should apply it on the hot template. However, waiting a few days for additional comments by others cannot harm. --Ligulem 07:32, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

I think this is a good solution. Thank you. What is the path toward consensus and a modification to the main template (the hot version)? The few of us agreeing doesn't exactly constitute a quorum for such a widely used template, I wouldn't think. User:Ceyockey (talk to me) 00:45, 13 May 2006 (UTC)

I would say if there appears no opposition within a week or so, we can do it. That's fair enough. Those that are interested in this template need to put it on their watchlists. --Ligulem 20:36, 13 May 2006 (UTC)

I've added a note about this discussion at Template talk:Waybackref in case there are folks that monitor the template. User:Ceyockey (talk to me) 00:50, 14 May 2006 (UTC)

I had no idea that template existed, but think adding the arhive parameters to this one is a good idea. --Scott Davis 10:53, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

Usage documentation

The usage needs to be explained much better, such as for author, last, first, authorlink. - Centrx 18:57, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

author, last, first, authorlink should behave the same as in {{cite book}} (see ). We had some complaints that the docu there is too complicated :P. --Ligulem 21:08, 13 May 2006 (UTC)

Quotes and MediaWiki

Hi guys,

please, take a look at the note section in the G. Napolitano article: any idea why the "double arrow" image which marks external links is put before, or on top of, the final quotation mark? BTW, article titles may already contain quotes. What we can do for this case? :-/ --Gennaro Prota  00:11, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

In my opinion, that article titles may contain quotes in the first place is a non-issue. We're just following standard documentation procedure for nearly every citation format in existence. I have several objections to changing from " to &ldquot;/&rdquot;, most importantly that the distinction is meaningless in monobook. I'll get back to you in a few hours on the Napolitano issue. Ingoolemo  00:59, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

Position of date/year/month if no author

The newest changes by Evil Saltine look interesting . I did some fixes. The new position for the date stuff when there is no author is handy (We have discussed something similar on cite book but haven't yet taken it into use over there, maybe we can learn form here). Some notes: Being bold is sometimes cool, but please don't forget that if this template is changed, 9'500 pages get their cache invalidated on the en wiki. So doing brain surgery in a sandbox might be a good idea (ok, I'm guilty on this myself, just as a reminder :-). --Ligulem 09:23, 21 May 2006 (UTC)

Question: couldn't we keep using the enclosing braces on the date/year/month, even if it is at the "no author" position? What are the pros and cons? --Ligulem 09:23, 21 May 2006 (UTC)

'Format' parameter

I have used the 'format' parameter a bit more expansively recently than is noted in the usage guidelines. For instance, I've entered the values 'BLOG' and 'FAQ' in a couple of instances. The reason why I've done this is that source lifecycle and notability can significantly differ based on the type of web resource; I don't advocate a drastic atomization of 'types' of web sources, but I think that someone knowing that a source is a blog entry or an FAQ page is somewhat useful to the interpretation and utilization of that web resource. Perhaps rather than contaminating the 'format' parameter, a new parameter might be created, or would such 'type' information be better placed in the 'work' parameter field? Your thoughts would be appreciated on this. Regards, User:Ceyockey (talk to me) 13:26, 21 May 2006 (UTC)

Uh. Please not into the "work" parameter. Using the "format" param for this fits much better. Or do we need a new param? (Oh noes! not another param :-). I'm thinking about a param with name "type". But I have no idea how that should be displayed... --Ligulem 16:46, 21 May 2006 (UTC)

Removing links from dates

Hey all. What do you think about dropping the internal link brackets around the dates at the end of Cite web? I don't see why they're there, to be honest. They're used as reference to the date at which the author of the article grabbed the link and put it up there. If you think about it, you'll find that this has absolutely nothing to do with the article or the source and therefore seems a bit odd to be linking you to a page which is completely irrelevant. You're not likely to find "Author X adds source to Misplaced Pages article" in one of the date articles, afterall. I'm not exactly sure what the policy on linking is on Misplaced Pages, but isn't it so that one of the criteria is that links are to be relevant to the subject or something the author might want to also read about when he's reading that article? Or maybe there's some other reason why the links are there? —Michiel Sikma, 05:43, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

Copying here what I wrote at (scroll up) in reply to RossPatterson:

"Um. That's probably a controversial one. We have had it like that for a very long time already. And there are fans of having this linked. One argument for having it linked is that the user preferences (Special:Preferences → "Date and time" tab → "Date format") influence how that date is formatted, but only if that date is linked. If there is no link, user prefs have no effect. So I believe there are some fans of linking because of that effect alone.--Ligulem 22:08, 6 May 2006 (UTC)"

See also the controversy around the edits of user:Bobblewik (). --Ligulem 07:32, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

Perhaps we should rehold this discussion. It's true that dates may be changed to suit the needs this way, but that's essentially going against pretty much every style guide ever written, including WP:DATE. It's also true that the links should never have been made in the first place by whomever designed that aspect of this template, since it's true that they really don't hold any relevance to either the cited text or the article at all. Users may like to see dates in their format, which is perfectly understandable, but there's not really any reason for it. Unless the dates have some kind of other use, but I don't think so at the moment. —Michiel Sikma, 19:07, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

For myself, I do not have a problem if you want to remove the link. I just wanted to warn that this is a controversial topic and once the links are removed, date preferences won't work any longer. I also know that there are a whole lot of fans for that feature. You could be bold and remove the linking from the template, but I would expect that this will be reverted within less than 24 hours (not by me, I try to be neutral on this :-).--Ligulem 20:23, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

Well, I don't want to do something that might upset a lot of users. I just think it's too bad nobody's here to discuss it. Maybe I should remove it and then later immediately add it back in, in case people post here stating that they disagree with such an edit (or simply revert my edit). —Michiel Sikma, 05:27, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

Ok. That's a valid reasoning. If you are prepared to recieve the potential flak, remove the link on a trial base. As I already said: I for myself do not care if there is a link or not. But maybe it would be good to wait until the "" issue (below) is settled. Sigh. --Ligulem 07:26, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

I think you were also taking part in that huge debate on reference sizes. Because of it, I know how annoying it is if someone makes an edit to something that's used a lot and then isn't around to change it back. So yeah, I'll wait until other discussions have settled so that things don't get too complicated. —Michiel Sikma, 10:21, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

Here's a vote for keeping the links based on the format effect. WP:DATE says If a date includes both a month and a day, then the date should normally be linked in order to allow readers' date preferences to work, displaying the reader's chosen format. In particular, if you remove the linking, most uses will get the ISO style "2006-05-24" instead of 2006-05-24, which many readers will find quite odd. --Scott Davis 10:28, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

"Publisher" field just broke

Don't know if it's been noticed here or not, but I was just adding some cites to Civil Air Patrol and the publisher field isn't showing up in the output any more. Maybe considering the complexity and very wide usage of this template it should be reverted back a ways to a working version and then any changes should be tested out on a sandbox version before implementation. Bryan 07:42, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

{{cite web| url=http://level2.cap.gov/index.cfm?nodeID=5243| title=Emergency Services| publisher=Civil Air Patrol| accessdate=2006-05-22}}
→"Emergency Services". Civil Air Patrol. Retrieved 2006-05-22.

Bug confirmed. I'll have a look. Thanks for reporting. --Ligulem 08:40, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

I've reverted my last edit, which introduced a serious bug. This should be fixed now. My apologies. --Ligulem 08:47, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

About the ""

I noticed that ShiningEyes (talk · contribs) removed them a few days ago and I totally agree with him, they're irrelevant and ugly for citing sources. If nobody cares, I'll remove them. --Nkcs 03:05, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

I don't think they're unnecessary. It's simply style, and a style I happen to think it useful for references, which ought to clearly distinguish the different metadata it represents. —Michiel Sikma, 05:29, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

At least please do it correctly when removing. In this edit (which I reverted) you left two brain dead #if's behind (see M:PF for the syntax). Also removing the "" without prior discussion after they already have been reintroduced (even with a new "curly" param, which was added to the usage documentation right before your edit) is bad. Please keep in mind that this is a high use template. As per the matter, I don't care if there are "" or not. But obviously there are others who do. So bold removal is not a good idea. I'm glad you brought this issue to the talk page now. --Ligulem 07:20, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

Sorry but I agree with their removal, some sections look really disgusting with quotes. See, i.e., the Japan Coast Guard article:

==External links==

• Japan Coast Guard. "Official website." URL accessed on May 14, 2006.
• Japan Coast Guard Academy. "Official website." URL accessed on May 14, 2006.
• UMIZARU (The Sea Monkey) is a 2004 Japanese film related to the JCG. "Official website." URL accessed on May 14, 2006.

I don't see any reason for quotes' inclusion, and also, don't you think that official website is quite better than "official website"? In templates like {{cite news}} or {{cite book}} they can be useful, but not here. —SHININGEYES 18:27, 24 May 2006 (UTC)