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Archive 1←Archive 3Archive 4Archive 5

Suggested change

Kudos to Exploding Boy for creating this template. I hope that it will encourage editors to reference their edits and fact check the edits of others a bit more. It currently reads:

This article is missing citations and/or footnotes.


To meet Wikipedia's style guidelines and conform to our NPOV policy, please provide appropriate citations.

Would anyone object to the following change:

This article is missing citations and/or footnotes.


To meet Wikipedia's style guidelines and conform to our policies regarding NPOV and verifiability, please provide appropriate citations and/or footnotes.

-AED 22:25, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

Redundant?

Other than being more obvious (intrusive?), what's the practical difference between this template and {{Unreferenced}}? GeeJo (t)⁄(c) • 17:21, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

I just chose it over {{Unreferenced}} because (perhaps unintentionally) it applies to cases where {{Unreferenced}} is misleading. For example, in Stalag Luft III, a general list of references is supplied, but the article is missing explicit footnotes that identify the sources for various statements in the article. This distinction is a useful one (and one reason cited for not deleting this template in the deletion vote mentioned above. 66.167.139.237 22:50, 19 June 2006 (UTC).
In that particluar case, why not simply add {{fact}} to the points needing references? GeeJo (t)⁄(c) • 01:49, 20 June 2006 (UTC)
That is fine when you only need a few footnotes, but it looks much worse than this template when you have too many {{fact}} tags in the article, plus it takes longer to track down every statement needing a footnote. --Lethargy 20:26, 15 September 2006 (UTC)

Specific Citations

I suggest we change the word "appropriate" to "specific", since that seems to be the problem this template addresses --SteveMcCluskey 01:59, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

I agree! That language change is subtle, but helpful. --Yatta! 06:09, 14 December 2006 (UTC)

Add tagged articles to Category:Articles lacking sources

I would like to suggest that we add code to this template so that articles tagged with it are added to the Articles lacking sources category. I realize this template is designed to be used on articles that provide some sources, but do not have proper in-line citations or footnoting. But my concern is that this template doesn't add the article to any category that editors routinely check for article that need cleanup, and thus might not get attention as quickly as it should. This category seems like the closest match: its description says "Wikipedia articles that are missing citations belong in this category." As an alternative, we could add the tagged article to Category:Wikipedia references cleanup, but it should definitely be listed somewhere. --Satori Son 16:03, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

I see that it now includes them it categories Articles lacking sources from December 2006 | All articles lacking sources [1]

Jeepday 15:23, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

Change proposed

Since the great majority of readers aren't experienced editors, I think that "NPOV" should be changed to "Neutral Point Of View" in the template: non-wikipedians will simply not understand what NPOV means. If nobody objects within the next few days, I'll change it. --Storkk 22:27, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

Prod it?

I suggest that this template should be prodded. There are several users who indulge in spamming it aggressively on every page they come across. I don't think that even 5% of articles in the project have inline citations. If the authors of the template want to see it transcluded to every WP page, perhaps they should set up a bot which would uglify the articles en mass. What is more important, I don't recall a single instance when the transclusion of this template led to some positive result, i.e., to addition of footnotes. --Ghirla -трёп- 12:14, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

  • I'm sorry that you think the template is ugly, but I personally have seen numerous articles improved with great references after the tag has been placed on it. And what's the alternative? Going through the article in question and placing a [citation needed] tag after each item of information that is not covered by the existing sources, if any? That would arguably make the article look even worse. Respectfully, though, we should not be concerned with making pretty articles, but accurate and useful ones. Also, this template has already been nominated for deletion and kept at Wikipedia:Templates for deletion/Log/2006 May 31#Template:Citations missing, so a Prod would not really be appropriate, but maybe TfD if you still feel really strongly about it. Thanks, Satori Son 13:07, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

Are 53 citations enough?

Talk:John_McCain#Straw_poll:_Use_of_Citation_Tag. Article has over 53 citations but a user wants a banner at the top of the article that says "Citations missing". When are enough citations enough? -- Stbalbach 17:03, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

Clearly, there is no magic number of citations that any article should have. The determinant is whether there are a significant number of uncited claims within the article that need attention. --ZimZalaBim (talk) 17:18, 13 November 2006 (UTC)
Are in-line uncited claims a free pass to avoid WP:Verifiable? If the article has that many uncited claims, maybe the problem is better solved by removing the uncited claims. -- Stbalbach 17:37, 13 November 2006 (UTC)
You might be correct, but this isn't the place for such a discussion. Perhaps WP:CITE? --ZimZalaBim (talk) 17:51, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

Can we have a date?

I see {{Unreferenced}} has a date parameter that may be useful in finding articles that have been tagged for a long time. What do people think of adding this functionality to this template also? Cheers. SeanMack 08:31, 2 December 2006 (UTC)

Done. Added to the template code by Rich Farmbrough, and I have added instructions for its use. -- Satori Son 01:36, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

Categorization

I've changed the category associated with this template from Category:Wikipedia references cleanup to Category:Articles lacking sources. The purpose of Category:Wikipedia references cleanup is to clean up the citation style on articles that already have citations. The purpose of this template seems to be to request citations that don't exist at all (similar to {{unreferenced}}). —Seqsea (talk) 03:50, 3 December 2006 (UTC)

Definitely a useful distinction but needs to be more compact (also a suggestion)

I've made repeated use of {{unreferenced}} in the past, and kept meaning to establish and use a different template to deal with the subset of the unreferenced articles where a list of general references are provided but are missing inline citations. Now that I've found this one, I'll start using it in those cases.

It's quite large though, so attempts to make it more compact would be appreciated.

Also, for articles which appear (admitted subjectively) to have a reliable and lengthy-enough list of general references, I'm thinking this template, or a version thereof, could be placed under the section heading for the article's eference list instead of at the top of the article. I'll check this talk page from time to time to see if a version tailored for such a use gets created.

Thanks to everyone who got this started and helped it survive the TFD discussion. 66.167.137.9 23:25, 5 December 2006 (UTC).

See {{citation style}}. —Seqsea (talk) 04:29, 6 December 2006 (UTC)
I see that, unlike the other related templates, the second (not-bold) sentence is not <small>. Changing that would bring it in line with the unofficial standard, and make take less space. If there are no objections I'll make the change in a couple of days if no one beats me to it. --Eitch 00:49, 23 January 2007 (UTC)

Location to place this tag

The page Wikipedia:Template messages/Sources of articles list the location to place this tag as “To be Agreed”. I would suggest that the proper place would be at the top of the reference section. Jeepday 15:33, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

Inline citations are not required by policy

No policy requires inline citations. They are often a good idea, and are a requirement for feature article status, but it is not a requirement for all articles. Furthermore, the tag is often used when the article has adequate sources. This tag therefore enshrines a particular editor's view about style (that the article in question should have inline citations) in an inappropriate way. That point belongs on the talk page, not in the article itself. Robert A.West (Talk) 00:13, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

Where does it say that featured articles have different requirements then other articles? Jeepday 00:42, 11 January 2007 (UTC)
The whole point in to get citations for all articles so that they meet the WP:V requirements, I have noticed that tags quite often help by bringing this to attention of users, particularly new-ish users. Cheers SeanMack 11:32, 11 January 2007 (UTC)
I agree with Jeepday and SeanMack. Our ultimate goal should be for every article to be of FA quality. -- Satori Son 01:14, 23 January 2007 (UTC)
That goal is not consensus among editors. But more importantly, inline citations for every fact are not an FA requirement; see WP:FA? section 1c. CMummert · talk 05:00, 1 February 2007 (UTC)
As far as consensus, that is why I said "should be" and not "is". And no one here is arguing that policy requires "inline citations for every fact". Straw men aside, please feel free to share your position on the use of this template. -- Satori Son 14:57, 1 February 2007 (UTC)
Sorry, I was responding to several comments at once. The thing about cites not being required was a response to the comment by User:SeanMack above.
When do I think this template should be used? I don't know for sure; I haven't seen this template in use very much, and the meaning of templates on WP is often determined by their use more than their words. This template seems to lie between {{unreferenced}} and {{fact}}. One reasonable use might be to insert this template and make a list of the desired citations on the talk page instead of adding a large number of {{fact}} tags to an article.
My concern about this template is that unless the person who places the tag also leaves comments on the talk page, nobody will know which facts that person is challenging, and so nobody will know when the tag can be removed. Other tags, like {{confusing}}, have the same problem. I favor discussion on the talk page over tagging the article and forgetting about it; but once the discussion is started, there is no need for the tag in many cases. CMummert · talk 15:08, 1 February 2007 (UTC)

(reset indent) That sounds quite reasonable; explanations on talk pages are always a good thing, and I encourage users of this template to do as CMummert suggests.

Occasionally, however, it is fairly obvious for a long, detailed article that at least some citations are needed. And other times, it is helpful to use both the {{citations missing}} and {{fact}} tags together even in an article that already has some citations. For example, the John McCain article was significantly improved after both templates were used in conjunction, going from ~50 to 90+ citations in a relatively short period. (But note this was accompanied by significant discussion on the talk page.)

My main point, however, is that just because there is no specific policy that states all articles must use inline citations, that does not alleviate the need for this sometimes useful template. -- Satori Son 15:42, 1 February 2007 (UTC)

Recent edit

I've reverted the recent edit that expanded this template; it was quite unnecessary in my view, and only served to make the template more intrusive. The sentence "Failure to use citations when needed will be considered a sign of possible plagiarism or factual inaccuracy." seems like a harsh warning where none is needed. BuddingJournalist 01:27, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

The above post is a case in point as to why my expansion was necessary. The function of citations is to give credit to the source of information or writing whenever a text is using the ideas or words of other texts. They are necessary to prevent plagiarism, or simply adding fiction. Their function is not simply verifibility. (After all, plagiarized work can be verifiable too!) I don't think the language is too harsh either; note the qualification: "...a sign of possible." 172 | Talk 11:03, 31 January 2007 (UTC)
That's why there are links to the relevant guidelines. Take a look at the other cleanup templates for examples of succinctness; they don't throw around vague accusations of plagiarism either. There are other templates for stuff that is copy and pasted. There really is no need for three long, wordy sentences to explain citations to readers. It's all clear in the guidelines. BuddingJournalist 02:36, 1 February 2007 (UTC)
The tag is meaningless unless it conveys the function of citations. This conveys the function: Failure to use citations to support claims outside the realm of elementary factual knowledge of the subject may be considered a sign of possible copyright violation or factual inaccuracy. The subequent sentence about Wikipedia policies, however, uses terms in ways that are unfamilar to users who are not familar with the website. 172 | Talk 03:15, 1 February 2007 (UTC)
Then why do the other cleanup templates not go into long detail about the function of sources? By the way, your blanket revert removed the {{{1|article or section}}} functionality I added. I also fail to see how "This article or section uses words or ideas of other publications in its text, without citing the source(s) of the information" is better than the much more succinct "This article or section uses words or ideas of other works without citing sources". Ditto for "Knowing the source of information of particular claims" instead of "Knowing the source of particular claims". BuddingJournalist 04:49, 1 February 2007 (UTC)
Not all clean-up templates require detail about the function of templates. Take the case of the following tag: This article includes a list of works cited but its sources remain unclear because it lacks in-text citations. The said suggests that editors understood the function of citations, but just did not follow particular guidelines for including them. (2) I prefer the following: "This article or section uses words or ideas of other publications in its text, without citing the source(s) of the information." This distinguishes the article/section from the text it contains. It's less confrontational in that it suggests the problem is some of the text contained in the article/section, not the entire article/section. (3) "Knowing the source of information of particular claims..." was a typo. I was typing "claims" and then changed my mind and settled on "information." Skratch that. I changed my mind again. "Particular claims" is better, as we do not want to convey the misunderstanding that all information requires citations. 172 | Talk 05:02, 1 February 2007 (UTC)
(edit conflict) I agree that templates intended for article, rather than the talk page, should be succint, because they are read by everyone rather than just by editors familiar with WP policies. And a link into the Wikipedia: namespace should not appear in the article namespace; that's the spirit of WP:SELF.
Moreover, the claim

Knowing the source of particular claims is required to conform to Wikipedia policies regarding neutral point of view, original research, and verifiability.

is certainly not consensus.
I edited the template to make it useful for readers, not editors, and to remove the non-consensus claim. CMummert · talk 05:11, 1 February 2007 (UTC)
OK, but why did you comment out the date functionality? I re-added it. BuddingJournalist 06:24, 1 February 2007 (UTC)
...Wikipedia policies regarding neutral point of view, original research, and verifiability. I'm glad the line was removed. Indeed, the references to 'neutral point of view, original research, and verifiability' are incomprehensible to anyone not familiar with WP policies... In my defense, I kept the reference to "neutral point of view, original research, and verifiability," which was in the template before my edits, in my drafts because I had assumed there would be a strong consensus supporting the line. 172 | Talk 11:23, 1 February 2007 (UTC)

I think the way it reads now is just fine. It says exactly what it needs to say without hitting you over the head with it.--Aervanath 09:19, 1 February 2007 (UTC)

I agree. My rewrite improved the old version. BuddingJournalist and CMummert then did an excellent job rewriting my rewrite. 172 | Talk 11:25, 1 February 2007 (UTC)

And then there was peace throughout the land...--Aervanath 11:31, 1 February 2007 (UTC)

Well, it is a lot better. I looked at a bunch of other maintenance templates, and they seem to usually include a link to the talk page and a link to edit the article. Some of them do link to editing help, so I reintroduced the link to the footnote guide.
I am still confused about the the first sentence - this template is for article missing citations, not for articles missing footnotes. So why isn't the first sentence This article or section is missing citations ? CMummert · talk 12:06, 1 February 2007 (UTC)

I have added some citations, though I think much of the article is from the Ascent Media website and most of the claims could be referenced to this site. Is it really necessary to cite all of the article pieces to that site? —Preceding unsigned comment added by LizGere (talk • contribs) 20:15, 3 August 2009 (UTC)

Change Categories

This really should be probably be catagorized in Category:Articles lacking reliable references, rather than Category:Articles lacking sources. The category it is in now is for articles with no sources in any form. Maybe their is a better categoy than the one I suggeseted but the current one is not a good one to to use.--BirgitteSB 20:37, 25 May 2007 (UTC)

Mmmm ... it's tough - but it seems like the reliable references one is for pages with citations, just crappy ones. I think the best place would be the same place that {{fact}} puts them, Category:Articles with unsourced statements (it can also by done by date "Category:Articles with unsourced statements since [date]). Essentially, this template is just an alternative to a lot of fact templates, and if everything that had this and everything that had fact went in the same place - then editors going through the categories/backlog would have an easier time.danielfolsom 20:51, 25 May 2007 (UTC)
I'm going to go ahead and make the change - since the one it's going to now clearly says it shouldn't be there.danielfolsom 14:51, 28 May 2007 (UTC)
I agree it makes sense for this to agree with the fact template. CMummert · talk 15:11, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

Redirect to Refimprove

Given that we have {{unreferenced}} and {{Citations}} I think that this template should be redirected to {{Refimprove}}. The wording of this template is not a precise as {{Refimprove}} because WP:PROVEIT does not specify the type of citations to use (no preference is given to footnotes over Harvard style citations) so the wording "or needs footnotes." is redundant and therefore I think the wording of {{Refimprove}} " This article needs additional citations for verification" is better. --Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 14:20, 27 December 2007 (UTC)


Like the template, not the instructions

Why do the instructions say to put it on the main page? This template (and many other editorial templates) belongs on the discussion page. It does nothing to contribute to the facts or navigation to other similar subjects that are on the article page.

This template (and many others) gives an opinion which needs to have some specifics to at least be considered a valid observation. This class of template is not much different than a project template that offers a rating. Those are placed on the discussion page.

The template itself calls attention to the scholarly minded that some footnotes and references would be nice. Comments could be placed below the template on the discussion page. These would be a sign of collaborative, scholarly effort and cite some specific places where a cite should be placed. Otherwise placement of this template is just lazy academic graffiti or is a sign of some robot wikipedia tagger who is keeping score on template tags.

I just don't get it. Could somebody enlighten me about the placement. Thanks --Rcollman (talk) 03:04, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

I agree completely. I've seen several articles where this tag was slapped on over a year ago, with no explanation on the talk page, and everyone seems to just ignore it. -- Avenue (talk) 18:15, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

The reason the instructions say to put it on the main page is twofold: 1) it alerts readers of the article about possible inaccuracies due to a lack of credible sources and, 2), it makes the problems more easily seen, immediately once an editor goes to the page he can see that it needs citations.--danielfolsom 04:16, 29 May 2008 (UTC)

Grand Unified Citations Complaint System (GUCCS)

Have a look at User:Thinboy00/Template editing#Make a new template, or retool an old one? (please read, title is counterintuitive). Why don't we do that? --Thinboy00's sockpuppet alternate account 03:42, 29 May 2008 (UTC)

I've crossposted to Wikipedia talk:Template messages/Sources of articles#Grand Unified Citations Complaint System (GUCCS). Please comment there and not here. --Thinboy00's sockpuppet alternate account 20:43, 29 May 2008 (UTC)

Style tweaks

{{editprotected}}

I've started a sandbox for this page which includes some updates to the style to match the prevailing ambox layout. just needs synced. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 12:00, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

Why the default message was changed from article or section to article. Ruslik (talk) 13:41, 5 February 2009 (UTC)
That's the prevailing style. If the template is added to a section, then "section" should have already been specified; there is therefore no need to be ambiguous if it is not specified at the top of the article. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 15:31, 5 February 2009 (UTC)
 Done Thanks, PeterSymonds (talk) 07:08, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

The doc subpage

I just added a table to the doc subpage. The table shows more specifically worded templates that can be used instead of this one. Since this template is not needed (see the table, everything has a more specific template for it), I propose we deprecate it. Existing instances will continue to work, but new ones will be discouraged. Once the template is orphaned, it can be disabled with a deprecation notice. If anyone can come up with any use of this template which does not already have a more specifically worded alternative, I will reconsider (and note that I am of course not the only person making the decision; if I was, I'd be concerned about the safety of the wiki and its inhabitants)--Thinboy00 @202, i.e. 03:51, 14 February 2009 (UTC)

How is this template unneeded when it appears than in two cases of that table one would need to substitute it with two templates to achieve the same effect? I'm not a fan of dragging community discussion into the documentation either; the wording seems to suggest that this talk page has some kind of conclusion that this template shouldn't be used, when it has no such thing. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 10:57, 14 February 2009 (UTC)
  1. One template should not attempt to mark two unrelated problems (footnotes and references).
  2. This template is ambiguous between those two all 03:54, 15 February 2009 (UTC) cases from the table, but using two templates is not.
    1. It is also frequently used for drive-by tagging, exacerbating the ambiguity.
  3. Feel free to change the wording to something weaker if you feel that is appropriate.
  4. The template has not been deleted primarily because the community either didn't understand the existence/uses of this and other templates, or didn't know what to do with this template (TfD was the wrong venue for deciding that, it would need to be deprecated first, which is my proposal).
    1. I'll admit that community consensus is unclear on what should occur, so we should probably not rush into this (there's no deadline, after all), and we should seek further community input before we do anything.
Any other concerns? --Thinboy00 @203, i.e. 03:52, 15 February 2009 (UTC)
After re-reading my wording, I agree that it is too strong, and have weakened it accordingly. If you feel it is still too strong, don't hesitate to further weaken it. --Thinboy00 @210, i.e. 04:03, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

(undent)Striking my old text, because I feel we need wider community input, and the text implies that deprecation is imminent, which I (now) feel is certainly not the case (more discussion is needed first; an RfC might be the next order of business). --Thinboy00 @224, i.e. 04:22, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

RFC:Proposal to deprecate

There has been some controversy regarding the usefulness of this template and its redundancy. This can be seen at this template's more recent two TfD's (see top of this page). An alternative to deletion is deprecation (see Template:Qif for an example, but note that it is possible to deprecate a template without disabling its functionality -- namely, by prepending {{Tdeprecated-inline}} and retaining existing code.). There has been intermittant discussion on the talk page, and wider community input is desired.—Preceding unsigned comment added by Thinboy00 (talk • contribs) 23:56, 25 March 2009

Actually, I reckon this template is better worded than {{refimprove}} is. This template clearly asks for things which are not cited to be cited, whereas {{refimprove}} simply valuely asks for "more references". I agree that there is no need to have two templates, but I'd prefer the merge to be into this one. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 11:04, 12 September 2009 (UTC)
Actually, {{refimprove}} does not simply ask for "more references" it states "This article needs additional citations for verification." -- no mention of references -- PBS (talk) 21:14, 1 March 2011 (UTC)

Edit request

{{Editprotected}}

Can an admin please remove the {{DMCA}} from the template? It adds all pages with this template to Category:Articles with unsourced statements and Category:All articles with unsourced statements. Both of those categories are only for articles with {{Fact}} or {{Citation needed}}. Thank you. Samwb123T-C-@ 01:28, 8 January 2010 (UTC)

Those categories are populated by quite a few templates, this one among them. See e.g. the category page. Debresser (talk) 07:14, 8 January 2010 (UTC)

Edit request

I don't like the current wording "Please help add inline citations to guard against copyright violations and factual inaccuracies".

  • It doesn't make any sense - how do inline citations mean that something isn't copied verbatim?
  • It's vaguely annoying to readers who would rather see copyright on the dustbin of history.
  • It misses the point of inline citations in any article in any publication for any purpose!

Which is better expressed by: "Please add inline citations to document facts to reliable sources and facilitate further research."

March 2011

The current wording does not make a lot of sense. Particularly now that a list of general references are not considered on their own to be adequate as citations and that to meet policy requirements if text needs a citation it must be an inline citation.

The major problem is that "This article is missing citations or needs footnotes." is not clear. It implies that citations are separate from footnotes but in most articles that carry in-line citations the citations are in footnotes (If not then then are in parentheses). This template would be less confusing if the first sentence was dropped.

The table in the documentation section is also inaccurate, because despite the name {{unreferenced}} it does not ask for references it states "This article does not cite any references or sources". and then asks "Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources." No where does it ask for references. -- PBS (talk) 21:28, 1 March 2011 (UTC)

This template was obviously written by a cart00ney. Footnotes have no relevance for copyright law purposes. Adding a footnote would not be a defense for large blocks of text copied verbatim. The lack of a footnote where only an idea has been taken is not copyright infringement. Citations are good for Wikipedia, but they have nothing to do with copyright. This template should not falsely imply otherwise. Savidan 17:18, 12 March 2011 (UTC)

Remove the copywrite language - Fourth request

Remove the copywrite language or unprotect.—Machine Elf 1735 13:04, 22 April 2011 (UTC)

{{ambox | name = Citations missing | subst = <includeonly>{{subst:</includeonly><includeonly>substcheck}}</includeonly> | type = content | text = Please help improve this {{{1|article}}} '''by adding [[Wikipedia:inline citations|inline citations]] to [[Wikipedia:Identifying reliable sources|reliable sources]]. Unsourced material may be [[Wikipedia:Verifiability|challenged and removed]]. | cat = Articles with unsourced statements | date = {{{date|}}} | all = All articles with unsourced statements }}

opps... please. Thanks—Machine Elf 1735 01:14, 25 April 2011 (UTC)

Senator2029 | talk | contribs 00:13, 4 September 2011 (UTC)

Done. Ucucha (talk) 11:38, 4 September 2011 (UTC)

Redirect to Unreferenced instead of Refimprove?

This redirect seems like it should point to {{Unreferenced}} instead of {{Refimprove}}. There's some ambiguity in the phrase "citations missing". Does it mean some or all? I think that "all" is the stronger connotation. Jason Quinn (talk) 21:06, 3 April 2014 (UTC)

edit request

Hello,

I saw the note "citation needed" and "timeframe." How do I add the citation and timeframe info? I couldn't find how to do that.

Thank you for your assistance, Julie — Preceding unsigned comment added by Julie from Monroe Systems (talk • contribs) 20:25, 25 April 2019 (UTC)

Reply 25-APR-2019

  Wrong venue  

  • Please make your request on the talk page of the article where you're requesting the changes be made.
  • Also, (Please remember to sign your posts on talk pages by typing four keyboard tildes like this: ~~~~. Or, you can use the [ reply ] button, which automatically signs posts.)

Regards,  Spintendo  21:42, 25 April 2019 (UTC)

Broke template for Twinkle

Twinkle needs to be updated so that it can display the template again - the current version does not list the template for whatever reason. Kirbanzo (talk) 23:38, 12 January 2019 (UTC)

Template-protected edit request on 27 January 2019

Please change the code in {{More citations needed}} where it now says: 

| fix   = Please help [{{fullurl:{{FULLPAGENAME}}|action=edit}} improve this article] by [[Help:Introduction to referencing with Wiki Markup/1|adding citations to reliable sources]]. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed.
| removalnotice = yes

Making it instead say: 

| fix   = Please help [{{fullurl:{{FULLPAGENAME}}|action=edit}} improve this article] by [[Help:Introduction to referencing with Wiki Markup/1|adding citations to reliable sources]]. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed.<br /><small>{{find sources mainspace}}</small><br />
| removalnotice = yes

This will add
Find sources: "Archive 5" – news · newspapers · books · scholar · JSTOR
which is appropriate for a maintenance tag suggesting the inclusion of additional references. The change is reflected at Template:More citations needed/sandbox and has been tested using Special:ExpandTemplates with no adverse occurrences indicated. Thank you. --John Cline (talk) 11:27, 27 January 2019 (UTC)

 Done -- /Alex/21 11:46, 27 January 2019 (UTC)
Thank you.--John Cline (talk) 19:14, 27 January 2019 (UTC)
@Alex 21 and John Cline: this is a major change, and I suggest you obtain consensus for such a modification. The {{refimprove}} template is used on thousands of pages and the tag is now 50% bigger. Besides, it is now inconsistent with other maintenance templates. L293D (☎ • ✎) 02:15, 28 January 2019 (UTC)
I understand and will comply.--John Cline (talk) 02:20, 28 January 2019 (UTC)
The RfC is now underway and located at Wikipedia talk:Twinkle#RfC regarding Twinkle maintenance tags that recommend the inclusion of additional sources. Thank you.--John Cline (talk) 06:57, 28 January 2019 (UTC)

WP Library

I'd suggest resources accessed through the Wikipedia library program, be included. (Logins for research databases, like neespapers.com that I use a lot, given on application.) deisenbe (talk) 00:31, 9 February 2019 (UTC)

I think that's a very good idea, deisenbe. Unfortunately, I was going to just go ahead and boldly add it, but ... crap... I really miss the days when you'd click edit on a template, find the direct code, and make the changes. No, instead this is at multiple levels of remove; difficult to understand how the edit can be made; difficult to divine where the text is being magically called from and through what mechanism – forcing me and 99% of everyone similarly situated to beg someone else to solve ten levels of quadratic mystical Fibonacci-sequence-coded, lua riddles, while circling widdershins incanting to Wikipe-tan in Aramaic. Best I can make out, the text is from Module:Find sources, as passed through {{Find sources mainspace}}. The implication is that we can't just consider the one change we want, but must consider whether the change is warranted for every template that's using text passed through {{Find sources mainspace}}, and if we decided it was warranted, must also get the wider consensus attendant on that wider change. I hate that. Maybe it can be done just locally by grabbing the source code from a substitution of the Find sources mainspace template, if it's not too huge?--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 05:52, 9 February 2019 (UTC)
As a user who generally understands Lua code, I would agree that the implementation of Template:Find sources mainspace is a mess. The actual content comes from Module:Find sources/templates/Find sources mainspace. More generally, though, it's not clear to me what is being requested here? Could Deisenbe provide an example of the actual link you want to add?. {{3x|p}}ery (talk) 15:42, 10 February 2019 (UTC)

These are just the ones I use most often. Different editors would use different ones. See Wikipedia:The Wikipedia Library/Databases for a current list. deisenbe (talk) 17:09, 10 February 2019 (UTC)

JSTOR is already included in the links. As for the rest, the technical side of adding links to all those sources' search pages seems fairly easy to me (except for ebsco, which I don't have access to and therefore can't evaluate), but would of course need consensus.
Fuhghettaboutit, why are you complaining about the wrapper template {{find sources mainspace}}? Would it really be a good idea to have a different set of source links at {{More citations needed}} than at {{Notability}}? {{3x|p}}ery (talk) 03:11, 11 February 2019 (UTC)

Trim

Before

This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. Find sources: "(article title)" – news · newspapers · books · scholar · JSTOR (Learn how and when to remove this template message)

After

This article needs additional citations. Please help by adding reliable source citations. Find sources: "(article title)" news, newspapers, books, scholar, JSTOR.

Removed bits
  • "for verification"
  • "improve this article"
  • "Unsourced material may be challenged and removed."
  • "(Learn how and when to remove this template message)"

These are superfluous.

Things to add

Should have a link to a talk page section for discussion, at which place the above superfluous details can be mentioned.

Final

This article needs additional citations. Please help by adding reliable sources citations. Talk section. Find sources: "(article title)" news, newspapers, books, scholar, JSTOR.

-ApexUnderground (talk) 14:34, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

Actually, the template:More citations needed doesn't link any kind of ope source of informations, which is released under an open-license or a public-domain-equivalent license. It would be helpful to add in the template a link to DOAJ or to the WP List of open-access journals, some of which are peer-reviewed.

This would be compliant with Wikipedia as an open and collaborative project. It also would enable user to make a back-up copy into the Internet Archive, archive.is or similar websites for their long-term digital preservation, avoiding to have broken links to be checked inti the WP articles. Hope it helps.Micheledisaveriosp (talk) 15:09, 15 September 2019 (UTC)

The template diplays the same message, maybe someone prefer closed and proprietary sources, even if this type of sources isn't compliant with Wikipedia verifiability rules.Micheledisaveriosp (talk) 14:35, 31 October 2019 (UTC)
How would you suggest the "find sources" portion of the template be formatted? I see https://doaj.org/ has the ability to search but there are far too many open-access journals to list individually. Perhaps a system like the GeoHack page that is linked to by {{coord}} template might be created, but that would require some coordination. Walter Görlitz (talk) 15:49, 31 October 2019 (UTC)
And DOAJ only has 439,560 entries. It is not likely to return many good results. I tried on five topics and only got good results on one search. Walter Görlitz (talk) 15:52, 31 October 2019 (UTC)
Effectively, it seems that they have only the following data jump https://doaj.org/public-data-dump, with no care for unsubscribed Internet users trying to access and take advantage/promote their Open Access contents. To say a little, it's bad designed and worse organized. I hope some of them casually reading this discussion will have the courtesy to publish a Web Page with a basic and simple categorization of their journals by language, publishing house, subject matter and so on. Otherwise, if they just have one like this -like probably is-, I hope someone will have the courtesy to put it in a more easily viewable position.Micheledisaveriosp (talk) 00:05, 3 December 2019 (UTC)

TemplateData fixes

The TemplateData for this template seem to be outdated. They don't reflect how the parameters actually behave. I propose some fixes, but I wanted to consult here about them before I attempt them on this very popular template. 

		"talk": {
			"label": "See talk page",
			"description": "Any value (such as 'y') for this parameter will result in the addition of 'See talk page for details.' to the tag",
			"type": "boolean",
			"required": false,
			"example": "y"
		},

I propose replacing with: 

		"talk": {
			"label": "Section name on talk page",
			"description": "Section name on talk page where further information or discussion can be found",
			"type": "string",
			"required": false
		},

in line with other templates. This template uses an Ambox. Just read the documentation there. That means that the text in the "talk" parameter becomes part of the link to the talk page, as a section. It's not a boolean value at all.

Just look:

{{More citations needed|talk=This is a test; hover over the talk page link in the template}}
		"small": {
			"label": "Small",
			"description": "Set to 'y' to make the template box smaller",
			"example": "y",
			"type": "boolean",
			"default": "n"
		}

I propose replacing with: 

		"small": {
			"label": "Small",
			"description": "Enter any text to make the template box smaller. Leave blank to leave it unchanged.",
			"example": "y",
			"type": "boolean",
			"default": "n",
			"autovalue": "y"
		}

Once again, as an Ambox, and based on the specific code in this template, any value at all in the "small" parameter causes the box to change into a small, left-hand side version. Despite what the Ambox page says, "left" is a meaningless value in this template. Meanwhile, an empty value leaves it unchanged. "n" or "no" in the parameter also turns it into a small box, against what it currently says, so it needs to be changed. The default value may as well be "y" also, but it's entirely unnecessary if an autovalue is present.

Example:

{{More citations needed|small=n}}

In addition to these critical updates, I propose some additional updates of convenience. 

		"1": {
			"label": "Type (typically section)",
			"description": "This parameter allows an editor to replace the default word \"article\" with another word, usually the word \"section\"",
			"type": "string",
			"required": false,
			"default": "article",
			"example": "section"
		},

I propose adding 

			"autovalue": "section",

in line with some other templates. The only time anyone's going to be clicking this parameter is to turn the notice into a section notice. Save everyone some time. 

		"date": {
			"label": "Month and year",
			"description": "The month and year that the need for citations is identified, such as 'June 2013'; may use '{{subst:DATE}}' template instead; if not specified, this parameter will be filled automatically by a bot",
			"type": "string",
			"required": false,
			"autovalue": "{{subst:CURRENTMONTHNAME}} {{subst:CURRENTYEAR}}",
			"suggested": true
		},

I propose adding 

			"example": "June 2013",

in line with other templates, to make it just that bit more obvious for those who blank the box and don't know how to click the question mark.

Hopefully these proposals go down well. · • SUM1 • · (talk) 15:40, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

I'll just make the fixes. · • SUM1 • · (talk) 07:31, 13 February 2020 (UTC)

Feedback sought in discussion about find sources in reference templates

Your feedback would be welcome at this discussion concerning the impact of using {{find sources}} in templates that have "section" variants, such as {{unreferenced section}}, and others. Thanks, Mathglot (talk) 01:00, 23 June 2020 (UTC)

Add param 'find' to control display of Find sources

Note: Use the following code to include the background subsection in related template discussions:
  • {{trim|{{#section-h:Template talk:More citations needed|Background}}}}

Background

Recent changes to a series of templates (i.e., {{unreferenced}} (diff), {{More citations needed}} (diff), and {{More medical citations needed}} (diff) ) and their analogous *_section templates altered the output of these templates to add the output of {{find sources}} to the template display. In this template, this occurred in revision 880434394. These changes were originally requested in this discussion, and a related follow-up Rfc discussion is here.

The intent of this change was desirable, but caused some undesirable knock-on effects to existing invocations of the analogous section-level templates (i.e., ({{unreferenced section}}, {{More citations needed section}}). These undesirable effects are described in detail along with a proposed fix here. The fix requires changes to templates in pairs, and the fix was implemented for templates {{unreferenced}} (diff), and {{unreferenced section}} (diff) on July 2. The same undesirable effects are present in this template and the analogous section-level template. They need to be fixed in the same way as {{unreferenced}} and {{unreferenced section}} were.

Fixing this pair of templates means creation of, or changes to six files :

Note: this is a transcludable section; if redlinks appear below then just ignore that step or create the files.

Thanks, Mathglot (talk) 06:10, 2 July 2020 (UTC)

Implement and test

This has now been implemented in three template sandboxes:

All tests appear to be working properly. This matches the functionality recently added to {{Unreferenced}} and {{Unreferenced section}}. If there's no objection in around a week, I'll move this live. Normally, I'd prepare sandbox versions of the /doc pages for each one as well, but the changes are very similar to the changes to {{Unreferenced/doc}} and {{Unreferenced section/doc}} that they can just be done live after the templates are released. Thanks, Mathglot (talk) 09:44, 2 July 2020 (UTC)

Error?

Hi, Mathglot, and all. I have just used this at Jacques_Cousteau#Filmography and it does not look OK to me. The link to the talk page does not show up, and the template is crammed on the left side of the page. - Nabla (talk) 15:06, 18 July 2020 (UTC)

User:Nabla, thanks, I will revert the most recent change until I can figure out what happened. Mathglot (talk) 19:18, 18 July 2020 (UTC)
Hm, reverted, but that didn't fix the problem. (I didn't actually see how it could have.) Perhaps a downstream problem with another template? Looking into it. Mathglot (talk) 19:22, 18 July 2020 (UTC)
Added additional testcases to Template:More citations needed section/testcases (which never tested for the |small= parameter) and these show that this template is failing (after reversion) when |small=n or |small=y is used. Is it possible there was an earlier error not related to the most recent change to the template? Still checking... Mathglot (talk) 19:40, 18 July 2020 (UTC)
In an attempt to see what's going on, I've made major additions to the testcases for both Template:More citations needed section/testcases and Template:More citations needed/testcases. In addition, I have a copy of the previous version of {{More citations needed}} (rev 956943948 of 04:51, May 16, 2020 ) installed in my sandbox, and assuming I've faithfully copied the correct version and set up the tests correctly, the testcases for that version seem to be failing as well in the same way. The pattern seems to be, any time the |small= parameter has a value (n, y, or a bad value) the bug is produced (small banner, flush left). Empty value doesn't produce the error. I'm going to try and narrow it down further to see how far back it goes. Mathglot (talk) 00:54, 19 July 2020 (UTC)
NablaSomething just changed. Now I'm thoroughly confused. I had already convinced myself that multiple versions of this template going back all did the same thing, and was starting to think about widening the net, so I created a section in my sandbox using {{POV}} with various combinations of |talk= and |small=, and there was no talk link either in the wide banner, or the small one. I came here to post this as a question to you whether something much bigger was going on, and by the time I hit SAVE here, the problem vanished. Then I thought, okay, it works in template space, but there's something squirrely about trying it from my sandbox, so I went back there, and after refreshing the page, it worked there, too. So, something was just fixed somewhere in the last five minutes. Now I really don't know where we stand. I'll try reverting the change to Jacques Cousteau, and see if it's working now. I don't know what else to say. Mathglot (talk) 02:39, 19 July 2020 (UTC) Oh, except NPOV small is not working at all. See my sandbox, or here's one:
{{NPOV|talk=Discuss it}}
{{NPOV|talk=Discuss it|small=y}}
{{NPOV|talk=Discuss it|small=left}}
{{NPOV|talk=Discuss it|small=right}}
As we speak, I see three wide NPOV template with a talk link, and full page width, and the third one small, flush left, no talk link. Is this proper behavior? Mathglot (talk) 03:07, 19 July 2020 (UTC)
I've restored Template:More citations needed section, as I don't think the problem, whatever it is, is related to recent changes to either of these templates; at least, I don't see a connection. If you think it is related, please let me know. Mathglot (talk) 03:18, 19 July 2020 (UTC)
Mathglot, thank you for the effort and the improvement. Looks like "small" being on the left is intended behaviour for a long time, my mistake not to look at the docs... it is there for long, I was expecting "small" to be... well... smaller, with terse text, small font; not narrower but higher as it gets and actually uses more space (including the blank space on the right). Anyway, not a bug but a (poor) feature, it seems. Missing the talk page link is a bug (or a very, very!, bad feature). I have no idea how to help. I have a grasp of the template language (and I am a decent coder) but it is too intricate (say, too much closer to brainfuck than to PHP or TCL), kept on changing, and there is too many dependencies so I mostly gave up understanding it enough to write it. - Nabla (talk) 11:38, 19 July 2020 (UTC)
@Nabla: Yes, it looks that way. The key is class mbox-small-left and how the various templates interact to use the class from the config definition in the module. The flush-left behavior is only partly due to the #if in the code which passes "left" no matter what non-empty value it has; i.e., invoking this template with "right" or "no" passes "left" (whereas {{POV}} does it differently, passing through whatever you pass it). But {{Ambox}} has had only had two varieties, regular and flush-left/small, going back a long way, to before it was a module. The Ambox doc for small gives guidance about usage: Template:Ambox/doc#small. Ambox is implemented by Module:Message box and its config file defines smallClass for type Ambox as mbox-small-left (a skinnable class defined in MediaWiki:Common.css) so it's buried pretty deep. If you want your "small" box to appear flush right, I think you could do it by modifying your common.css to redefine html body.mediawiki .mbox-small-left using a copy of the definition for html body.mediawiki .mbox-small in MediaWiki:Common.css instead, but I haven't tried that.
I agree that dropping the talk page link is a bug/bad feature, and if box size was an issue, I'd just drop "learn how and when" from the box, and use the space to include a "Discuss" link. I think we should propose this. If you agree, could you please do the honors? Any such changes would have to happen at Module:Message box, so the place to propose it is at its talk page. Turns out our timing is pretty good, because someone just raised the same issue fairly recently, so if you can go express your concerns there, I will, too. See Module talk:Message box#Talk should not be hidden in small boxes. (Possibly related: Template talk:Mbox#Small non-talk messageboxes?.) Mathglot (talk) 00:24, 20 July 2020 (UTC)

Reason parameter?

Hey there, no idea how traveled this talk page is, but is there any way someone could add a |reason= parameter here? In these edits I added an explanation for why I was flagging it (knowing that it wouldn't display) but I think it should display! Thoughts? Cyphoidbomb (talk) 01:58, 7 January 2021 (UTC)

It would make sense, yes. Walter Görlitz (talk) 06:08, 10 January 2021 (UTC)
@Cyphoidbomb: Given that you already can (and did) use |reason= param in the wikicode, I don't see an advantage in displaying it. The reason is, that the banner is aimed at editors not readers, and only a tiny number of editors will pick up the gauntlet and attempt to do something about it the missing references. When they do, they will see the "reason" that you left. All those other editors that don't follow up, will have to just skip even more text than they do now. Can you think of a use case where having a visible "reason" param would lead to the article having references added more quickly than otherwise, to offset the additional bother? After all, the underlying reason is always the same: there aren't enough references for the amount of content in the section or article. Or, am I missing something? Mathglot (talk) 03:25, 4 July 2021 (UTC)

Edit request to complete TfD nomination

Template:More citations needed has been listed at Templates for discussion (nomination), but was protected so could not be tagged. Please add:

{{subst:tfm|help=off|1=More citations needed section}}

to the top of the page to complete the nomination. Thank you. Favre1fan93 (talk) 17:07, 28 July 2021 (UTC)

 Done Elli (talk | contribs) 19:03, 28 July 2021 (UTC)


@Elli: I request the template be removed. This is the merged-to template, it has a ton of transclusions, and there is about a snowball's chance in hell of the discussion closing with action that impacts this template's behavior (there's not no support for a merge, but so little that any merge will be REQUIRED to not impact this template's behavior). User:力 (power~enwiki, π, ν) 02:35, 29 July 2021 (UTC)

@力: aah, hate to do this to ya but this is kinda a flaw of the TfD process. Maybe the TfM can be closed per SNOW, but until then the tag has to remain. Elli (talk | contribs) 04:44, 29 July 2021 (UTC)

Section detection

Based on the TfD I was curious whether we would be able to have the template detect whether it's in a section and then automatically toggle its "section" param. If possible, that would save a lot of headache. (not watching, please {{ping}}) czar 17:24, 29 July 2021 (UTC)

"Template:Reimprove" listed at Redirects for discussion

A discussion is taking place to address the redirect Template:Reimprove. The discussion will occur at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2021 October 5#Template:Reimprove until a consensus is reached, and readers of this page are welcome to contribute to the discussion. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward) (talk) 09:17, 5 October 2021 (UTC)

"Template:MCN" listed at Redirects for discussion

A discussion is taking place to address the redirect Template:MCN. The discussion will occur at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2021 October 31#Template:MCN until a consensus is reached, and readers of this page are welcome to contribute to the discussion. — Mikehawk10 (talk) 02:08, 31 October 2021 (UTC)

Template-protected edit request on 16 September 2021

Bold suggestion: Replace File:Question book-new.svg with File:OOjs UI icon notice-warning.svg, in line with Wikipedia's mobile interface and aiding its ongoing transition into more modern web design. Throast (talk | contribs) 22:30, 16 September 2021 (UTC)

 Not done: This would probably be controversial, so let's try to get a consensus first. Also, do you intend to make this change across more templates, such as {{Primary sources}}, {{Refexample}}, etc? If so, maybe a broader RfC would be a good idea. Elli (talk | contribs) 22:46, 17 September 2021 (UTC)
@Elli: Sorry, totally forgot I made this request. Yes, that's the idea. Where would I start such an RfC? Throast (talk | contribs) 01:46, 20 November 2021 (UTC)
@Throast: I'd start by asking for opinions on WP:VPIL, if you make a post there people will discuss it a bit and if it looks good, point you in the right direction for a formal RfC. Elli (talk | contribs) 01:48, 20 November 2021 (UTC)

Edit request to complete TfD nomination

Template:More citations needed has been listed at Templates for discussion (nomination), but it was protected, so it could not be tagged. Please add:

{{subst:tfm|help=off|1=BLP sources}}

to the top of the page to complete the nomination. Thank you. 🐶 EpicPupper (he/him | talk) 21:07, 4 April 2022 (UTC)

Not done for the same reasons as Template talk:Unreferenced#Edit request to complete TfD nomination. – Uanfala (talk) 23:47, 4 April 2022 (UTC)

good examples

User:Mathglot dislikes these good examples:

  • {{More citations needed|find=search "" keyword(s)|{{subst:DATE}}}}
  • {{More citations needed|find2=search keyword(s)|{{subst:DATE}}}}
  • {{More citations needed|find=search "" keyword(s)|{{subst:DATE}}}}
  • 0mtwb9gd5wx (talk) 07:08, 13 August 2022 (UTC)
They are neither comprehensible, nor correct. They would have to be both, to be added to the /doc page. Also: there's no need to post the same message at two discussion forums, as you did here, and here, at my Talk page. One posting is sufficient. Thanks, Mathglot (talk) 07:15, 13 August 2022 (UTC)
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