This is an archive of past discussions about Template:Infobox train. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.
As not having much time to spare on Wikipedia, I don't want to meddle in things like template design, but I have noticed that wheelbase (fixed wheelbase, bogie separation, bogie wheelbase) is conspicuously lacking from the "Specifications" section.
Also, the following parameters are neither defined nor (infinitely better) distinguished between:
- length as over couplings/buffers or body;
- height as over body or overall (including any roof-mounted gear);
- (less importantly) width as over body or overall (including grabrails etc.)
The lack of even the possibility to fill in those data, or at least to define how they have been measured when known, unnecessarily limits the value of these infoboxes. /Keinstein (talk) 13:52, 31 May 2009 (UTC)
I managed to add a parameter to this template about 6 weeks ago, and could probably do it again. Come up with a list of new parameters, and I'll see what I can do. I see that there may be a need for some duplicated parameters, due to the North American use of the term "truck", and the use of the word "bogie" in most other places. Wuhwuzdat (talk) 14:12, 31 May 2009 (UTC)
I just reverted a change[1] to enlarge the image from 229px to 300px. If the image is larger than 229px it causes the infobox to grow in size this becomes a issue because the infobox will steal space from the text of the article which is more important than the infobox. Plus there is not standard image size for infobox, but there is a standard size for infobox which is broken with this change. d'oh!talk05:09, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
What standard size for the imagebox? Question have you actually ever used the infobox train - take a look at a few examples - most use 300px, many explicitly - many of the ones that didn't use 300px explicity are now very long.
The default was 300px as it says in the documentation, which nobody even bothered to change, it was 300px for years, and was changed without any discussion in may. I'm changing it back to 300px. If you think it's too big then please discuss first..Sf5xeplus (talk) 05:31, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
This is my point there is no standard size for the image, there is a standard size for the infobox which is 22em (241px), which comes from the {{Infobox}}. The link you provided is a guideline, not a policy. Please read WP:Be bold, WP:BOLD, revert, discuss cycle and WP:Don't revert due to "no consensus". There was no objection to the previous bold edit. I am objecting to your bold edit and I started a discussion on your edit. You haven't addressed my concerns, so I am going to revert your edit again plus fix the documentation. d'oh!talk06:05, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
Don't start - there was no discussion on the previous change - so how could there have been no objection. I've only just worked out why some infoboxes look shit - that's one objection - it's a little late since nobody discussed or mentioned the changed.Sf5xeplus (talk) 06:11, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
Did you read the policies? The person who made the change doesn't start a discussion about it. If you object to the change you revert the edit and start a discussion. Which is what I did and you didn't. d'oh!talk06:28, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
I would also like to voice my support for keeping with the long-time default of 300px as recommended in the guidelines. As mentioned by the editor above, anyone who has actually used this infobox will be aware that 229px is too small and verges on the meaningless, which is why the majority of articles have the size explicitly specified as 300. Following the recent unilateral move to 229px, I spent several hours adding a size parameter specifying 300px to all of the Japanese trains articles, as 229px is hopelessly unusable. --DAJF (talk) 05:48, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
What makes the infobox unusable at 229px? And remember the editor change the image size not the box size, using the image to change the box size is a bad idea. d'oh!talk06:05, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
basically the problem is : try fitting text into half the width of a thumbnail - typically anything but very short info spreads over many lines - making the infobox very long, and this causing it to flow downwards - which in turn can mess up formatting of pictures that are right aligned (which is the default for thumb).Sf5xeplus (talk) 06:11, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
That issue is caused by the article not the infobox. If the infobox is causing stacked images then the lead is too short or the infobox is full with unneeded information. In the mean time you can align the images to the left until the article is fixed. d'oh!talk06:28, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
And stop reverting my edits. It's patently clear that the original change wasn't discuss and nobody change the documentation either. Reverting to an edit that was made without discussion and which has already proved problematic, as explained above is not helpful.Sf5xeplus (talk) 06:24, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
Can you give an example of a train or locomotive infobox you read or edit, since I'm interested why you recommend 229px; from my experience 229px is far too narrow causing text wrap. But there are a lot of them and some may be used differently. As an example of an infobox that works better when not very narrow see RENFE Class 130 - I think it is much harder to read at 229px. What do you think? Sf5xeplus (talk) 07:18, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
Electric Multiple Unit (Queensland Rail) has the stack images issue, you will notice this is not a issue with other articles with a long and "narrow" infobox. This is because the EMU article is too short causing the issue. There nothing wrong with wrapping of text but if you don't like it shorten the text in the infobox. For example for RENFE Class 130 change "250 km/h (160 mph) (standard gauge lines)" to "250 km/h (160 mph) (standard gauge)" etc. d'oh!talk07:29, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
The default size should not be set as a px value; it should be frameless. The difference between 220px (the default value for frameless if a user hasn't changed his thumbnail preferences) and 300px is a little over 17%, which is a noticeable reduction but hardly one to "break" anything. More importantly, it means that out readers' thumbnail preferences are respected, so users who choose not to see large images do not have them imposed by default. If an image really needs to be larger then the width can still be manually set, but I'm not prepared to accept that this applies to a majority of instances of this template. This all applies to {{infobox locomotive}} as well.
It should be noted the image was set to "frameless" before I changed the image size to 229px back in July[2] this change also caused this discussion. After reading Chris's respond and reading up on "frameless", I now agree with Chris to set the image size back to "frameless". Also it might a good idea–after this discussion–to put this template up for full protection. d'oh!talk09:42, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
I've never agreed with preemptive full protection; this template is not being vandalised, and we'll never attract editors to templatespace if they have to jump through hoops to contribute to it. I've got it watchlisted and will protect if that changes, of course. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward: not at work) - talk12:38, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
I never said that you agreed to the protection or that you should protect it. I simply said in the future it might be a good idea to put this template up for full protection (via WP:RPP), on the grounds of "high-risk" template, as Sf5xeplus pointed out on my talk this template is used on hundreds and approaching a thousand articles. d'oh!talk13:06, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
MS logo - simple recognisable 2d image at lower sizestrain - more detail and form to see - suggest it needs a larger image than simple 2d images ?? I'm squinting, are you?
We protect pages to prevent disruption. If there's no disruption, then protecting pages just wastes people's time and increases the admin work backlog. And a thousand articles is pretty paltry by infobox standards: {{infobox football biography 2}} isn't protected and it's got ~30,000 transclusions. But anyway, we don't need to discuss that right now; let's wait for a response from Sf5xeplus on the image width. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward: not at work) - talk14:10, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
I agree that it should be frameless. There is some information about things like frameless at Wikipedia:Picture tutorial (search for frameless in the page text). The benefit of using things like "frameless" is that it allows the end user to override the image size, it will never stretch an image past its native resolution, and it works for tall and skinny images where setting the width is not what you want to do (instead want to specify a maximum height). If this isn't part of the guideline at WP:Manual of Style (infoboxes) then it certainly should be. Note that one can always override the default if necessary on a case-by-case basis. Thanks! Plastikspork―Œ(talk)16:22, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
Don't forget that the image is (should be) there for a reason -to clearly show what the thing the article is taking about looks like .. there's an issue here too - at certain size the images ceases to be a useful definative illustration - different from simple objects such as compant logos eg compare images right.
And can I point out that I'm not just a nutcase.. I regularily use Template:infobox company at the standard thumbsize. There are specific issues with these trains infoboxes - I'm not suggesting that all infoboxes should have a higher than usual width.
(Long comment please read) (gripe first)I understand the arguments about having it the same size as user thumb preferences - it is possible to have it set automatically to 1.3x thumb size? It's my opinion that the infobox image should be slightly larger than the other thumbs as part of the style of the page. (an iconic image). Additionally it still seems fairly obvious that 229px is too small. It would also be nice if you took some notice of what people who are actually using the template are doing - rather than saying "25em" is standard for templates - it isn't and never was here. 22em looks shit. It would help if you could account for that in your decisions. Also why do I get the impression that what I say will have absolutely no bearing on what you decide to do ???
(what seems ok) Anyway - a couple of points a. standardising the rail transport templates is a good idea as suggested above - locomotive looks difference from train, there are probably other - I like to see a consistent style, with no opinion on what that style should be. I'd like the current usuage to be taken into account though - looking at a selection of infoboxes (UK train, others) I found that 300px is used a lot, some others use around 260px, (I was going to suggest 270px as a good compromise). I'm fairly certain that many would agree that a infobox image larger than thumb is good presentational style - hopefully your final decision will reflect this. I would be nice to have a default reasonable width that feels workable, given the specific peculiarities of train/locomotive infobox data. Personally I prefer to use defaults and don't like fancy special coloured templates that much, but I think people (who work on these) with have problems with the 'way it looks' at anything under 250px. Also note that much of the width is taken up by the left hand column - if the width is reduced by 10%, the actual available text area is reduced by much more.
(initial conclusion) By the way take a look at Template:Infobox j-rail service which defaults to 250px , as used on Hitachi (Japanese train) - that looks totally acceptable to me in every way. If the width is reasonable then it's worth the effort to attempt to fix old infoboxes to that width. If it's narrow there's little incentive to comply..
(however) user thumb size can be up to 300px, if the setting is forced to less than 300 then this produces the wrong result with the infobox image less than thumbnail size.. So the options seem to be
Thumbsize
300px (or bigger)
A mathematical formula either scaling thumb size, or, selecting the bigger of 'forced image size'/'userthumb size' - is this possible - the issues with user defined thumb sizes and forced image sizes are described at Template:taxobox.Sf5xeplus (talk) 17:30, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
By the way someone suggested that the rail infoboxes are not good examples of the art - it would be helpful if someone could like to good examples of infoboxes from other subjects so that it can be seem what is good design.Sf5xeplus (talk) 19:02, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
even more an unrelated issue is that it may be the case, as I get the impression from User:d'oh! that the rail infoboxes are simply too complex with too many fields, and that is one reason why there are issues with them (in terms of vertical length). That's a different kettle of fish - but it may be worth considering if the infobox it the right way to present lots of data. I've never used more than half the fields, and the infoboxes are long .. God only knows what would happen if all the fields were filled in (which is possible - they're not exclusive to one another). Maybe it's worth looking at whether these infoboxes are getting bloated, and it's time to bite the bullet and accept they might be a little CRUFTY ? I counted over 50 in infobox EMU - that's probably overdoing it.Sf5xeplus (talk) 20:15, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
It's possible to upscale from the default size: upscaled using upright=1.5 But once again, the evidence that this is uniquely necessary on train articles is sparse indeed. The vast majority of Wikipedia's thumbnails use the default size and I don't think we've caused anyone eye damage yet. If a particular image has so much detail that it needs to be upscaled then that can still be done on a case by case basis.
Regarding these recent changes; I see no talk page discussion for this. Adding the |axleload= parameter is one thing; changing how another (|weight= displays is another, and WP:CONSENSUS should have been obtained.
I for one do not approve of the change: whilst "mass" may be the correct scientific term, most books and magazines that I encounter use the word "weight" and I would prefer that we continue to use that term. --Redrose64 (talk) 08:26, 22 April 2011 (UTC)
I agree that Weight should be used instead of mass. Not only is it the more common term (see WP:COMMONNAME) but also considering how these numbers are determined. Is the density and volume of the completed part or assembly determined, or is the part or assembly put on a scale? For the figures in question, the weight (the normal force felt by the rails) is what we're after. Rails (talk) 00:45, 23 April 2011 (UTC)
That said, it may be a good idea to have both available as an option in the template, especially for those instances where the sources state mass vs. weight in the specifications. It would then be left to the individual articles to use one or the other, though not both, as that would just get cluttered. Rails (talk) 00:56, 23 April 2011 (UTC)
General request - carriage
I was looking for and infobox:carriage and infobox:wagon - is there such a thing suitable for worldwide use. If not could someone either a. make one ;) or b. tell me where to go (literally not figuratively)
For what it's worth infobox:carriage could probably be made by removing:
Acceleration Deceleration Traction system Engine(s) Power output Transmission
from the list, whilst a "infobox:wagon" (or whatever the internationally favoured term is) would be a bit more complicated and I would need some help with that. Thanks in advance.Imgaril (talk) 19:54, 11 July 2011 (UTC)
I have seen {{Infobox train}} used for carriages several times (see, for example, Composite Corridor), although not (yet) for wagons. There's no need to fill in inapplicable parameters; if you leave |acceleration= etc. blank, you'll find that these rows are omitted from the final display. --Redrose64 (talk) 20:08, 11 July 2011 (UTC)
I think I can make use of that - there are no obvious reasons not to, as for wagons - still need something for that. For what it's worth I see that the dutch have got one eg nl:Falns, the template nl:Sjabloon:Infobox goederenmaterieel which has just about everything needed (as a start anyway), with the addition of "number built" "build date" "builder" "service dates" "railroad" and "wagon code" field. If someone is willing to make such a thing, great, otherwise is there a guide -I could probably copy and modify the template here .. do I need permission ?Imgaril (talk) 21:05, 11 July 2011 (UTC)
You don't need permission per se, although if you go ahead and then somebody comes across it and decides that the function of your new template is adequately covered by {{Infobox train}}, they may well take it to WP:TFD as an unnecessary duplication. You can, however, seek opinion on whether or not it's a good idea at WT:RAIL. --Redrose64 (talk) 21:12, 11 July 2011 (UTC)
I've added it and it works but it is the last in the list, This needs to be changed so that it appears in the right place.. Can you choose the best place please. In Template:Infobox locomotive it comes before "length" 22:42, — Preceding unsigned comment added by Oranjblud (talk • contribs) 21 April 2012
Some railway vehicles are articulated, and this parameter shows how many sections the car is built up from. For example, the trams on the Manchester Metrolink are single-articulated, which means there is one articulation bogie supporting the inner ends of two body sections, the outer ends of which rest on normal bogies, so we put |art-sections=2 (see T-68). Cars on the Sheffield Supertram system are also articulated, but have three sections, two articulation bogies and two normal bogies - the middle section rests on both articulation bogies, hence |art-sections=3 (see Siemens-Duewag Supertram). --Redrose64 (talk) 22:49, 21 April 2012 (UTC)
ok - didn't know that. There is some space left in this template.. Or a new one could be made specially (which might make a lot more sense and isn't actually difficult) .. how many are there + translations..Oranjblud (talk) 00:30, 24 May 2012 (UTC)
Template forking just to add one or two more characteristics is discouraged, and forked templates don't usually survive at WP:TFD. --Redrose64 (talk) 10:49, 24 May 2012 (UTC)
Point noted - I was considering a new template in the case where addition of the rack railway fields to this template would overflow the standard 80 field limit.Oranjblud (talk) 11:53, 24 May 2012 (UTC)
It avoids the sea of often identical sources in a referenced infobox, obviously a "notes" section has many other uses, such a noting subtypes, nicknames etc
Oranjblud (talk) 13:54, 21 May 2012 (UTC)
There's a vertical split in the grey band because the table row consists of two cells, and the split is the border between them. Other rows with non-white background, such as the name at the top, or the heading "Specifications", have no split in the background grey because these rows consist of a single full-width cell. --Redrose64 (talk) 17:48, 21 May 2012 (UTC)
Thanks.. No way round this using the standard infobox template then I assume.. (rhetorical if true, please reply if not.._Oranjblud (talk) 21:37, 21 May 2012 (UTC)
Is there any way to hide the ugly "{{{notes}}}" that now appears at the bottom of every infobox even when it is not actually used? --DAJF (talk) 01:16, 22 May 2012 (UTC)
My demonstration earlier was not intended to be used as live code - I deliberately omitted the items necessary to make the parameter optional, in order that it would show up here. --Redrose64 (talk) 11:13, 22 May 2012 (UTC)
Sorry! I assumed the infobox code was cleverer than it is, and that it didn't display the heading if there was no content below, didn't realise this needed to be explicity done (and I didn't check the "specifications" code either which would have demonstrated by ignorance..)
There have been a couple of adverse changes to this template recently. On 22 May user:Thumperward changed |headerstyle=background-color#efefef to |headerstyle = background-color: {{{background|#eee}}}. At a stoke, any infobox with a dark |background= became unreadable – black text an a dark blue backgound is unreadble. It only works in the title because editors wrap the text with {{<font-color:white>Title Text></font>. When, on 5 July, user:Gezzza changed the title from using |above= to |title= without specifying |titlestyle=, all those titles became unreadable too (white text on white background).
I propose that |background= be deprecated, and all instances of this template use the same colour. As for which colour, that is open for debate, but using the same colour as {{Infobox locomotive}} (whose users have no colour choice) — namely #cc9966 — would seem consistent and logical. It has the advantage that both back and white text are readable, so that a graceful transition can be made to black title text. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Iain Bell (talk • contribs) 10:01, 6 July 2010
I agree, but I think there shouldn't be a background with title and background for the specifications header should be grey (#eee) just to improve readability. Gezzza (talk) 10:31, 6 July 2010 (UTC)
Even better would be to remove the background colour entirely. {{infobox locomotive}} is an outlier and its styling should be ignored; the brown chosen there was arbitrary and distracting and I'm eventually going to request that it be changed (again). There's no compelling reason to need to override the default styling here at all. For now, I agree that the header be moved back into the template box, as using a background colour with a floating title looks ridiculous. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk10:36, 6 July 2010 (UTC)
Well, I have found a workaround. By changing |background=black to |background=black;color:white, the headerstyle text becomes readable. I will amend the documentation page shortly to add this (and deprecate the practice of |name=<font-color:white>Title Text</font>). Iain Bell (talk) 10:06, 7 July 2010 (UTC)
|traction motors= seems to be in the test at the end of the template to check if an article is placed in the "unusual parameters" category. I suspect that a number of the articles in that category are there because of this parameter. If it is deprecated, what is the alternative? Robevans123 (talk) 20:06, 16 March 2015 (UTC)
Some editors put all the right info in the wrong fields. Please see samples at the right. The overhead lines or third rails feed while the pantographs or collector shoes pick up or collect I'll give references to specific articles if necessary. Peter Horn.2 (talk) 23:06, 28 April 2016 (UTC)
You added it to the doc page, that is all - the template itself hasn't been changed in over six months. Since the doc page is supposed to follow the template's behaviour, I have reverted. I think that any parameter like that needs to be discussed before adding for real. --Redrose64 (talk) 18:55, 28 April 2016 (UTC)
We either delete "| stoppingaccuracy = ±300 mm (11.8 in)" from the infobox in the aforementioned articles or we add this new field to the template.Flip a coin. Peter Horn.2 (talk) 22:40, 28 April 2016 (UTC)
People shouldn't be using nonexistent parameters. If they can demonstrate that this information is desirable to have in the infobox, lets discuss it. Let's not pretend that parameters are valid when there is no code in the template to support them. --Redrose64 (talk) 22:44, 28 April 2016 (UTC)
On occasion, I have seen people adding items to an infobox and using non-existent parameter names (as in |Automatic Ticket Gates=Yes), in the assumption that they will be displayed as such. --Redrose64 (talk) 10:47, 29 April 2016 (UTC)
By making the remaining templates redirect to the one into which they are merged, and ensuring backwards compatibility for parameter names. No changes to individual articles would be required. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits17:22, 3 October 2016 (UTC)
What would be the correct application of the template when used to give details about a group of carriages, where different subclasses are mostly identical but occasionally different, say capacity or tare weight?
For example, Victorian Railways Z type carriage, where all cars (except one, the sleeping carriage VAM1/SZ287) have the same height, length, width, bogies and bogie spacing; but different internal layouts, capacities and tare weights. My method in the past has been to use a single infobox at the top with all the common elements, and then mini-infoboxes at each specific section for those vehicles. But is there a standard I should be adhering to?
There are technically, or English language, challenged contributors who put info in the wrong field, see samples. I thus corrected all articles in the following box.
Okay so the "HVAC" portion, when (pre)viewed, only shows "Train heating".
This sounds ironic at most, given that there are many tropical countries that usually omit the heating system for a train, can there be a revision altogether in this infobox, by naming it simply as "HVAC" or provide options to simply separate the data in heating, ventilation, and air-conditioning?
In our case (Philippines), we used to have LRVs that used only ventilation, before shifting to roof-mounted ACUs. We do have some trains with unused heating, but that is irrelevant given the nature of our climate. Hopefully this gets a solution. {{ping|Koressha}} {interact|ambags}05:19, 30 May 2020 (UTC)
We're trialing out some changes with the tram infobox. these trialing changes involve seperating the tram infobox from the train infobox. these changes may be reverted at any given point in time 122.104.181.64 (talk) 00:07, 1 May 2023 (UTC)
I feel like the Commonwealth classification parameter should be added to the infobox template
Instead of using the AAR wheel arrangement, people are using the Commonwealth classification of locomotive axle arrangements on the AAR wheel arrangement parameter. To prevent this, there needs to be a Commonwealth classification parameter. The parameter's template is britishclass. Aitraintheeditorandgamer (talk) 18:49, 15 July 2023 (UTC)
Will a proposed new term appear in the infobox when the template page is saved?
Hello fellow editors,
I have added the item "Consist" and its definition to the Sandbox, which I have saved pending resolution of this question: Will "Consist" appear in the infobox's template page when the infobox is saved? At present I have included it in the list of code that comprises the infobox but it doesn't appear in the infobox itself. Help would be appreciated before I add the proposed changes to the /doc page. Cheers, Simon – SCHolar44 🇦🇺💬 at 05:18, 27 December 2023 (UTC)
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Unresolved