Template talk:Taxobox/Archive 9

Space for "other" common names

Can I ask that we please include space for extra common names, such as "Hedge Sparrow" and "Hedge Accentor" for Dunnock, at the foot of the taxobox (in a clearly delineated section, of course)? As and when tools are available for parsing or scraping taxoboxes, that will make such names easier to find. Andy Mabbett 18:32, 24 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Andy, there are simply too many common names for some plants to realistically include all of them in the taxobox. This should be left for one common name, while all the others should be listed either in the first paragraph, or for large scale geographic variation, in a section discussing where they are applicable. KP Botany 21:00, 24 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Your first point is a fair one, but I don't see how it supports your following statement. It seems to be "punishing" all for the "crimes" of a few. Why not limit it to, say, five, or a number decided by consensus on a case-by case basis? The other solutions you suggest do not meet the "scraping" use case I outlined. Andy Mabbett 21:19, 24 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

(outdent)

If the goal is to make common names easier to scrape (identify with automated tools), there are other possible solutions. Already common names generally listed within the article and bolded and have redirects (or should), and there could be used as clues. Or, to make it more explicit we could have a template that simply bolds a common name, e.g:

"...also known as {{Common name|Bull kelp}}..."

which would render: "...also known as Bull kelp...". Thoughts? This doesn't address the issue of species with a huge number of common names (although a large list of common names would better suit a section of the article text rather than the taxobox); and also there could be a problem of large number of permutations (where each word or phrase within the common name has variations), but it's a start. Thoughts? —Pengo 23:27, 24 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

That expects the parser to be Wikipedia-specific. I was considering generic parsers, such as (but not only) those using the proposed "Species" microformat (see Wikipedia:WikiProject_Microformats and links from there). Templated data is easier to serve, and easier to parse. Andy Mabbett 23:45, 24 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The template could easily be adapted to use a microformat when the article is displayed. If there isn't an agreed on microformat now, it could be added later too using the template. —Pengo 00:37, 25 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not at all sure what you're saying here; but my point is that microformats (for example - again, I'm also thinking of other possibilities) require known types of data to be in a wrapper; and it makes sense, on Wikipedia, for that wrapper to be the template/ generated table, rather then the whole page. There's a wider issue. too, in that putting standard kinds of data in a template helps users to quickly scan the page. That's why we have them in the first place. Try reversing the issue - why shouldn't the most-common vernacular names be in the taxobox? Andy Mabbett 01:03, 25 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The main reasons it shouldn't be in there because in some cases there are too many to be comfortably displayed in the taxobox (as mentioned by KP Botany in the first reply), or they can often be too long, and because the common names are typically mentioned in the article anyway (as it stands) and are, by convention, in bold already in the main text so can be quickly found by people scanning the article. Putting the common names in the taxobox does not help (or hinder) using a microformat. Likewise, wikipedia-specific scrapers can just as easily check the taxobox or the main text for common names (assuming the template solution is used as above). So in sum, sure, why not. For many articles I'm sure a list of common names would be fine, as long as they're not required to be there. Common names wouldn't be so different from the lists of species in the taxobox of a genera. But if you think it will help scrapers or microformats, then you're mistaken, because a taxobox-neutral solution. It would be great if it were easier to decouple the data and the display of it on Wikipedia but really it isn't. —Pengo 08:11, 25 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for your "long winded" reply ;-). I think I've already addressed all of your points, except "Putting the common names in the taxobox does not help using a microformat", and I'm not sure how you come to that conclusion; in my experience of marking up microformats, it certainly would help, since (as I said above) they require (with the exception of the "include -pattern", which really wouldn't be suitable here) everything to be inside a wrapper (an HTML element, such as DIV or TABLE). Andy Mabbett 08:38, 25 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

As with many other proposals to put something more into the taxobox, no. The taxobox is to be used as a brief reference and navigational aid. For the most part, if the information isn't going to be linked, or if the presentation of the date is better served in the main text, then it shouldn't be in the taxobox. A list of common names won't be linked, and it will be in the main text, so it shouldn't be in the taxobox. - UtherSRG (talk) 11:55, 25 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

You appear to have ignored each point I've made in favour of including common names in the taxobox (including their use as a "brief reference"). Would you care to address them? Andy Mabbett 11:59, 25 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

(reply to UtherSRG) Umm.. Common names are pretty "referencey" just as synonyms are, which are in there already and aren't linked. Short lists of common names can take up too much of the first paragraph of articles. —Pengo 12:08, 25 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Andy, don't be so set on only one solution. It's a valid point, being able to gather information from the articles, and that putting this information inside a wrapper facilitates this. Finding a way to make this happen should be our focus now. Taxoboxes were never designed to do this when it comes to common names of plants. So, let's post to TofL and see if someone has other ideas for how this can be done, as I think it's one of the things that needs to be done with biota articles. KP Botany 20:42, 25 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not "set" on one solution - I'm proposing one, and asking for reasons why it's been rejected. Happy to raise this on TofL (I've asked for responses here). Incidentally, vernacular names can be linked - not least to disambiguation pages. See also Lady's Slipper. Andy Mabbett 23:01, 25 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I'm against it. Taxonomy is too complex already without trying to say that common names are taxonomic. We'll have the same common name attached to multiple taxoboxes, and no way to explain it within the taxobox. Or we'll have lists of 13 common names in some taxoboxes, pretty much taking away their original usefulness and making them articles unto themselves. If the common names are treated in the taxobox they may not be treated within the article which is where notations about common names can be put. The taxonomy of the scientific names (at least at lower levels) can stand alone, the common names cannot--they're not fly-by information. I don't see any good reasons for crowding taxoboxes with this information, namely lists of common names. We don't currently include scientific synonyms in the taxobox, much less all the common ones. KP Botany 03:45, 26 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

KP Botany makes some good points. I'd like to summarize and add some that others have made, as well as some of my own:

Common names are arguably not taxonomy.
1. They convey no place in a hierarchy.
2. They can be attached to multiple species or even supraspecific groups.
3. There are no central sources for verifiability, except to the extent that common names in some groups and in some countries are standardized.
The number of common names for any given taxon can vary from none to a mind-numbing horde (the same is true of synonyms). An ideal treatment for a mind-numbing horde is a structured list or table in the article that includes their provenance and a reference for each.
There are ways of making common names machine-readable even in the article content.
Taxoboxes were originally intended to be human-readable, and machine-readability should not excessively impair that. To that end, extreme care should be taken before adding new categories of information. The number of useful categories exceeds the limits of an easily human-readable taxobox, which means that of necessity many useful things must be left out. The current procedure seems to be to add useful items in priority order, so that, for example, conservation status worked its way in and is effectively grandfathered, although some arguably more useful category may never make it in. IMO the only appropriate approach to this is to rigorously define the purposes of a taxobox before allowing more items.

--Curtis Clark 14:12, 26 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I don't know if it's exactly what [User:Pigsonthewing|Andy Mabbett]] had in mind, although from his examples I'm guess it's not far from it, but we should have a space just for standardized common names (by country/authority). That would be useful aid to taxonomy, and be informative. I certainly would not know that bird names are standardized from any bird article I recall reading, and while I know fish names were recently standardized in Australia, I don't see articles mentioning it specifically. For example, the article Australasian snapper spends the first three paragraphs running through common mames for the fish without mentioning which is its legal common name in Australia. If I were looking to buy Snapper in Australia this would let me know that it was indeed the same species (fish markets don't use binomials). Ordinary vernacular names can be left to the article, but standardized common names would be useful for cross-referencing material (in ways that non-standardized ones are not). When running Beastie Bot, synonyms were extremely useful for matching species, while the name of the article naturally couldn't be used as much more than a minor clue, but standardized names would be useful (and would be useful to humans as well). —Pengo 22:00, 26 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Pengo, except that common names aren't standardized for everything and everywhere, they're country specific, and some countries don't have them. So, in the taxobox, you're suggesting we use the taxobox to list the common name for every country that has a standardized common name for the species, for every country that has a standardized common name in English for the species, for every country that has a standardized common name for its endemic species? In the United States we'd have USDA, and state official common names for a number of species, cosmopolitan weedy species might have 48-50 common names for a species NOT USDA listed, but listed in each state (non-agricultural weeds). Exactly how would you go about this? Common names are not standardized in every country, not standardized for every type of organism, and may run into the 3-digits for weedy species.

Or are you saying a dedicated space just for common names outside of the taxobox? Please clarify, and repost this suggestion on TofL, as I think Andy has made it clear he is only seeking input on his suggestion of putting the common names in the taxobox. An example taxobox might help clarify, if the first point, again, picking a troublesome species, such as a weed. KP Botany 13:56, 27 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

You make a good point, but can you give a specific example please? Where could I find a list of 48 official state common names for milk thistle or for a species of dandelion? The obvious answer to the problem of "too many common names", however, is simply to restrict the "offical common names" field to animal taxoboxes (or specific orders) and to at least country-level standarisation, (unless the species is endemic only to a single state), and possibly also only to English-language standarisations. As an example Chrysophrys auratus. Imagine this in a taxobox:

Standardized names

Squirefish (Fishbase) [1]
Snapper (Australia) [2]

—Pengo 23:40, 27 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The big problem, imo, is making taxoboxes too variable, and this is what will happen, because essentially you're making rules that apply to everywhere but the United States, to all taxa but flowers, to only specific orders of animals, to only organisms endemic to one state only for US organisms, and only for countries that standardize common names. I know that in the USA fishermen use some type of standardized names for fish, as I read fisheries reports that have the standard common names listed--the fish are listed by these, not by their binomials.

New Zealand usually has two official common names for plants, and Maori taxonomy is not the same as Western taxonomy?

You CAN'T find a list of 48 official state common names for milk thistle because common names are NOT standardized in America. Each state either has an official common name, a prefered common name, no common name, translation of the binomial as a common name, the USDA common name, or the scientific name, or some combination of the preceding or more than one common name, all official, depending upon the state. The USDA has official common names for agricultural pests, the Forest Service uses some types of official common names, but looking at some USDA and USFS reports on some chaparral, these do not coincide.

Convolvulus arvensis L. is an example that crops to mind, however, I don't work with common names, and for good reason. This plant is known as field bindweed on its weed profiles in most US states, is called European morning glory in Iowa, creeping Jenny in Wisconsin, and the USDA lists these five synonyms: European bindweed, creeping jenny, field bindweed, morning glory, perennial morning glory, small-flowered morning glory. In spite of our article on the plant you will find all of these names in the literature about this noxious pest. So, for the taxobox we have 6 English-language common names on the USDA list, plus 3 for various states, and the USDA only lists the states for which this is a noxious weed. If the state hasn't filed a report on the weed's status, the common names might not be listed. For native flora, and there are plenty of plants that stretch from the eastern slope of the Sierra to the Atlantic Coast, the official common names are obtained from the state's floras, not from the USDA. And, USDA common names don't necessarily trump state common names, because common names are NOT standardized in the USA. KP Botany 03:04, 28 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I agree with KP - adding common names to taxoboxes doesn't strike me as feasible. There are just too many of them, they are too variable, and only a minority of them have standardised common names, and those are locally specific. Take Attalea crassispatha - there are 10 common names for a species endemic to a small corner of Haiti...which had a population size of 25 in 1991. Granted, they were all variations on a single word, but it still illustrates the problem with common names. In Trinidad well-known plants tend to have three common names (one with Creole roots, one with Hindi roots, one with English roots). And then you have variations on each of them, and non-standardised spelling... (in Trinidad tree names are written "Bois", but in St. Lucia they are written "Bwa"). Guettarda 13:17, 28 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I'm thoroughly convinced that listing all common names for every species is not "feasible" in the taxobox. How about I just put in a field for listing standardized common names at a country or higher level, and it can be used when it's "feasible", and ignored when it's not. —Pengo 03:03, 29 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

But that would only be workable for species that are endemic to that single country. If a species is present in a country for which there is a "standard" common name, and another one in which there isn't one, then one country's common name is prioritised above the other. Why is Bufo marinus at Cane Toad, when you people so despise our crapaud? You don't want it in your country, give the article name back! :) Guettarda 04:17, 29 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

This is an interesting comment, and something that this discussion brought up to me, naming articles after their weedy common names rather than their indigenous common names. Cane toad is certainly the most common common name in English for Bufo marinus, but it is not the common name used by English-speaking peoples in areas where it is indigenous rather than introduced or invasive. KP Botany 20:08, 30 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, again, it simply adds mayhem to the taxobox. New users would have to know to only insert a common name if it's endemic, or to guess what is "feasible" and what is not. And does "feasible" have any taxonomic implications, since it's a taxobox, or does "feasible" like the common names have nothing to do with taxonomy? Once you have to make umpteen exceptions, create ambiguous rules, acknowledge that there are no straight-forward rules that can't be spelled out, and have to fall back on policies like "feasibility," which require OR on the part of an individual editor each time the policy is consider, I think you've really outdid the potential usefulness of what you want to accomplish.

Again, there are so many questions, and changes. You're also running into politics with American names, first of all, why should the USDA's common names for California plants, given that they are used predominantly for weeds, have precedence over California common names for California plants? This may be fine in countries where you have strong central governments, but us folks who like to believe we really are a republic, don't take kindly to having federal issues rammed down our throats (not what you're doing, but, really, this issue could wind up being touchy with US common names). So, for example, a plant that is endemic to North Carolina, and weedy in the west, has as its official common name, the USDA name, because of its agricultural problems. This may not even be the most common common name, but simply the official one.

I just don't see the justification for establishing a preference for federal and national weed listings for US plants, a the way to include common names for other countries. Also, for cosmopolitan plants, again, how many common names, or is this, too, the feasibility issue? KP Botany 04:31, 29 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Query regarding the statusref attribute

Could someone take a look at Ross's Gull and confirm that I have used statusref correctly? There appears to be a problem, hence my question - while the ref has been inserted in the correct place in the references list, there is no inline note linking to it - I would expect to see one, probably just after the status. Thanks SP-KP 19:31, 1 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

You were so very close... "status_ref" not "statusref". - UtherSRG (talk) 20:08, 1 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Type strain field (edit request)

I am requesting that a field for type strain be included in the taxobox. It would follow the same format as the already-existing type species field and it may be placed directly underneath the type species position. For further discussion, see Wikipedia talk:Taxobox usage#type strain field. Ninjatacoshell 16:04, 23 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Replace the template when you have exactly what you want in the template ready to copy and paste. John Reaves (talk) 22:07, 23 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Here it is. I think this'll do it. It's the same template for "type_species" but "type_strain" is inserted and the field for "type_strain_authority" is eliminated because it is unnecessary (as it is, by definition, the same as the "type_species_authority"). It doesn't show up on this page because it's in the taxobox format, so just open this up as though you were going to edit it and you can copy and paste it into the template.

|- bgcolor="white"

Ninjatacoshell 15:38, 24 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not quite certain that's right; shouldn't the first line also be conditional on the type_strain parameter? If you could set up a working demo in userspace (there are instructions on the template page itself), it would help make sure that the change is correct (changing this particular template is hard on the servers, so it would help to make sure we get things right first time). --ais523 16:27, 24 April 2007 (U T C)

I'll work on it. I'm disabling the template until I get that done. Ninjatacoshell 18:15, 24 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Okay. I've got the taxobox set up here and the results can be observed here. It looks like it works like I wanted it to. I'm not sure what you meant about the first line being conditional on the type_strain parameter. If you're still concerned, you can either instruct me here or play around with it on my userspace. Ninjatacoshell 19:14, 24 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Done. What I meant about 'making the line conditional' was that the |- bgcolor="{{{color|white}}}" bit had to be moved inside the type_strain #if so that the template worked if the strain wasn't given, but I've done that too. (I'm just about to disable the 'protected template' notice on your userspace copy, so that it doesn't appear on the protected-template list now that the change has been done; you can place {{db-userreq}} on your userspace demo if you wish to ask an admin to delete it, but you don't have to. --ais523 08:15, 26 April 2007 (U T C)