Wikipedia talk:IPCC citation/AR6

Licence

For info: it was recommended a year ago the IPCC publish future reports under a Creative Commons licence https://apps.ipcc.ch/eventmanager/documents/65/240320210608-INF.%206,%20Rev.%203%20-%20Progress%20Report%20-%20TG%20Data.pdf

Whether it will ever happen and if so which licence I don't know.

However there is a summary for teachers of the 1.5 degrees report under CC but no commercial use so cannot be cut and pasted here

https://www.ipcc.ch/site/assets/uploads/sites/2/2019/03/ST1.5_final_310119.pdf

Chidgk1 (talk) 18:03, 3 February 2022 (UTC)

Question about citation guide for summary for policy makers

I am trying to get the citation guide for summary for policy makers right. In the report itself it says: "This Summary for Policymakers should be cited as: IPCC, 2021: Summary for Policymakers. In: Climate Change 2021: The Physical Science Basis. Contribution of Working Group I to the Sixth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change [Masson-Delmotte, V., P. Zhai, A. Pirani, S.L. Connors, C. Péan, S. Berger, N. Caud, Y. Chen, L. Goldfarb, M.I. Gomis, M. Huang, K. Leitzell, E. Lonnoy, J.B.R. Matthews, T.K. Maycock, T. Waterfield, O. Yelekçi, R. Yu, and B. Zhou (eds.)]. In Press." Based on that, we are not citing correctly, as we are not providing the names of the editors? Pinging Femkemilene. Also, I've tried to set up a standalone reference for it, not sure if I have done it correctly. EMsmile (talk) 11:22, 17 March 2022 (UTC)

Similarly for chapter 2 of the WGI report it says: This chapter should be cited as: "Gulev, S. K., P. W. Thorne, J. Ahn, F. J. Dentener, C. M. Domingues, S. Gerland, D. Gong, D. S. Kaufman, H. C. Nnamchi, J. Quaas, J. A. Rivera, S. Sathyendranath, S. L. Smith, B. Trewin, K. von Shuckmann, R. S. Vose, 2021, Changing State of the Climate System. In: Climate Change 2021: The Physical Science Basis. Contribution of Working Group I to the Sixth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change [Masson-Delmotte, V., P. Zhai, A. Pirani, S. L. Connors, C. Péan, S. Berger, N. Caud, Y. Chen, L. Goldfarb, M. I. Gomis, M. Huang, K. Leitzell, E. Lonnoy, J. B. R. Matthews, T. K. Maycock, T. Waterfield, O. Yelekçi, R. Yu and B. Zhou (eds.)]. Cambridge University Press. In Press." I've done it now like that for instrumental temperature record but I am not happy because I know I am now introducing inconsistencies. But I couldn't figure out from the template how to get a standalone citation as I am using long citation style for the smaller articles. I find it easier for when material and refs have to be copied across from one Wikipedia article to another. Can someone help me with the standalone citation style? I note they have been provided for the WGII report but not the WGI report. EMsmile (talk) 12:10, 17 March 2022 (UTC)

We don't have to follow external recommendations. That may lead to internal inconsistency here. Better to make sure we don't clutter the article wikitext, nor the references section with overly long citations.

I'll clean up the existing citations a bit more if you feel like helping out providing more standalone citations ready for copy-pasting.

I noticed a lot of harverrors in the more complex citations, likely from being copied from one article to the next. Hence my current preference for using standalone citations. Femke (talk) 17:16, 17 March 2022 (UTC)

Yes, we don't have to follow their recommendation but I would see it as a sign of respect if we did. I plan to work more with IPCC authors in future to improve Wikipedia articles and I just think they might appreciate it if their reports are correctly cited in the format that they had recommended. I don't think those citations would clutter a Wikipedia article's reference list much. Have a look at the reference list of instrumental temperature record where I yesterday added the reference for the SPM, chapter 2 and chapter 3 of the WG I report. I think it's not overly long. The advantage for me was also that I could just copy & paste from their recommended citation and didn't have to think about it (OK, admittedly I added "chapter 2" and "chapter 3" into the citation description because I felt that was useful/important). EMsmile (talk) 09:00, 18 March 2022 (UTC)

And yes, those harverrors are visible now in quite a few articles. They easily happen when copying text blocks from one article to the other. I agree with you that for that reason, the standalone citations are more practical, especially for shorter articles. For the big climate change article it make sense to have the short citation style but for all the little sub-articles, the long citation style (standalone) seems more practical. EMsmile (talk) 09:00, 18 March 2022 (UTC)

I do thinks it's overly long. Keep in mind that newer editors do not have syntax highlighting on, so that they will not be able to quickly see in wikitext where a citation ends a prose stops. Furthermore, it's significantly more time consuming to add all of these authors. Feel free to add citations in any manner you prefer, but let's keep this page manageable. Femke (talk) 17:04, 18 March 2022 (UTC)

Each Working Group report (and the coming Synthesis Report) has its own citation as each chapter in it and the Summary for Policymakers, as well as some other components. There is no overall citation for the Sixth Assessment Report as a whole. There is usually a citation page for each report e.g. https://www.ipcc.ch/report/ar6/wg1/downloads/report/IPCC_AR6_WGI_Citation.pdf from which we see that the citation for the Working Group I SPM is

IPCC, 2021: Summary for Policymakers. In: Climate Change 2021: The Physical Science Basis. Contribution of Working Group I to the Sixth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change [Masson- Delmotte, V., P. Zhai, A. Pirani, S.L. Connors, C. Péan, S. Berger, N. Caud, Y. Chen, L. Goldfarb, M.I. Gomis, M. Huang, K. Leitzell, E. Lonnoy, J.B.R. Matthews, T.K. Maycock, T. Waterfield, O. Yelekçi, R. Yu, and B. Zhou (eds.)]. Cambridge University Press. In Press.

Note that it's in press and will need to be updated when it's formally published in a few weeks or months. The comparable page for Working Group II is https://www.ipcc.ch/report/ar6/wg2/about/how-to-cite-this-report/ Jonathanlynn (talk) 15:28, 21 March 2022 (UTC)

Thanks for that, User:Jonathanlynn. @Femkemilene: I don't know if it's regarded as "cheating" within Wikipedia editing but when there are many authors, I usually just copy and paste it into the "basic form" of the cite tool and do not add each author manually. The reference that Jonathan mentioned would then be like this, which takes me only a few mouse clicks to set up: . I am not sure what you meant with "newer editors do not have syntax highlighting on, so that they will not be able to quickly see in wikitext". Do you mean when they use source editor instead of the visual editor? I find it more important that the readers get the exact citation, and the authors see that we respect their wish for how the report should be cited. EMsmile (talk) 16:25, 21 March 2022 (UTC)

I meant that when they use the source editor, normal prose and citations have the same colour (syntax is not highlighted). Most experienced users enable syntax highlighting in their settings.

By copy-pasting the citation, you're not using the same formatting as other citations. Mostly fine, but don't do this in FAs, or articles that people want to bring to FA. On this page, I'd like to give pre-formatted citations for those that prefer those. Femke (talk) 17:09, 21 March 2022 (UTC)

Huh - I had no idea Wikipedia had an option for syntax highlighting - I cannot see it in https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-editing - where is it - is the default "off" because it confuses color blind people I wonder - if not do you know where can I make a change request to change it to default "on" so other people don't waste ages reading more slowly than necessary? If you don't know offhand I will ask at tech helpdesk. Chidgk1 (talk) 17:20, 22 March 2022 (UTC)

I looked in my preferences, and I'm confused. There is a syntax highlighter under gadgets. I don't have that one enabled. Still, wikitext is highlighted for me, so the other one must be enabled elsewhere / default / default under certain skins. Femke (talk) 17:43, 22 March 2022 (UTC)

Now I have found and clicked the icon it should stay on. Have suggested default to "on" https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T304447 as surely hardly anyone would prefer it off (documentation explains how to customize colors so I guess should be fine for color blind people too) Chidgk1 (talk) 18:41, 22 March 2022 (UTC)

I am confused as well. Are we talking about this box?: " Syntax highlighter: Alternative to the default coloring of wiki syntax in the edit box (works best in Firefox and works almost all of the time in Chrome and Opera)" I have clicked is as on but am not seeing the highlighter colours, only the difference in font colour (I've tried Chrome and Edge). - Apart from that I don't think that the thing about syntax highlighting and the somewhat longer refs should be a big deterrent to using the referencing style that the IPCC reports recommended. Would it be a good compromise that in the collection of ready-made citations, we also offer the IPCC-preferred style? Then every editor can use the one that they want. And I don't think our target is new editors here, they are not likely to understand the issue with the different citation styles anyhow (it took me years to figure it out myself and I still haven't figured it out fully. E.g. I still don't understand what the difference is between a citation that uses last name = X, first name = XX, versus one that includes the list of names by using "basic form", like I did above. EMsmile (talk) 09:18, 23 March 2022 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Village_pump_(proposals)#Highlight_the_syntax_highlighter_with_a_ONE_OFF_message_when_we_open_the_source_editor 8th icon from left in source editor - supposed to look like a highlighter pen Chidgk1 (talk) 09:31, 23 March 2022 (UTC)

I still can't see it. When I am in source editor, the syntax is shown with different font colours (which suits me fine). But not with highlighting, which might be even better. Would be keen to try it out but can't find the icon. Will send you an e-mail so that you can send me a screenshot. EMsmile (talk) 14:15, 24 March 2022 (UTC)

Syntax highlighting means that there are different font colours, and sometimes bolding. It's not the type of highlighting where the background is yellow. Femke (talk) 17:28, 24 March 2022 (UTC)

References

Very long citations

OK, I have to admit the recommended citation for the AR 6 WGI Technical Summary really is extremely long... Curious that they want all these authors to be listed, makes it very cumbersome. I guess there is a case to be made here to use "et al." after a dozen (?) or so authors: The citation template doesn't even let me add a URL when the citation is this long... EMsmile (talk) 11:25, 28 March 2022 (UTC)

Hi All, as an author on most of these publications, there's a real reason why each author is included in each. These are subsets of the >230 authors involved in WGI, and in some cases (e.g., the SPM) the professionals who spent years preparing for that report are acknowledged one-by-one. In the Technical Summary the list of the volunteer scientists who spent > 3.5 years donating their time to not only contribute to a chapter (those also have lists with important authorship), but also to work overtime on the summary across chapters. The reason why WGI specifically lists the citations with all of the authors is to acknowledge these many ways of contributing. Baylorfk (talk) 12:59, 2 May 2022 (UTC)

I see your point Baylorfk but unfortunately Wikipedia seems to set a limit as to how many authors can be included in the reference form. My observation is that if I include all of them then Wikipedia no longer lets me add the URL to the reference entry. This was the case when I inserted the technical summary of AR 6 WGI as a reference to water cycle. I had to abbreviate it with "et al." at an arbitrary place. Maybe other Wikipedians have an idea how this could be overcome. (User:Femke?). Luckily, some of the chapters have shorter author lists so there it's no problem to include all of them. - By the way, I noticed the the DOIs that are provided for all the chapters don't work. See e.g. here at the bottom of page 3. I'll notify the IPCC secretariat about it. EMsmile (talk) 11:13, 29 September 2022 (UTC)

References

I have formed a preference for long citation style

I know this guide here recommends the short citation style but I want to make a plug for long citation style (for all articles that don't have hundreds or thousands of publications in their reference list, like climate change does). So for articles that are a bit shorter and have perhaps up to 200 publications I think the long citation style is better for the following reasons:

• It is much easier to understand for new editors.
• It does not result in broken links when content and references are copied from one article to another.
• It can be corrected automatically using the automatic generator with a DOI number (all the IPCC report chapters now have a DOI number (although right now they don't seem to work)).
• It's easier to see how many times the same publication is cited (which I find an interesting metric).

Do others follow my reasoning or do you think it's completely flawed and I should always use short citation style for all the climate change sub-articles? EMsmile (talk) 11:19, 29 September 2022 (UTC)

I prefer the long style too, and have tried to change the documentation to be less prescriptive. The only downside of the long one, is that it's more likely that people forget to add page numbers, or overlook them when reusing a cite. Femke (alt) (talk) 11:46, 29 September 2022 (UTC)

What do you mean with forgetting to add page numbers? Do you mean when people don't add the {{rp|6}} for page 6 for example? And what do you mean with "reusing a cite"? I find people often don't add page numbers but it would be good if they did, especially when it's a long report. For a journal paper I usually don't add a page number as those tend to be fairly short. Page numbers seem to be optional but I think they are good to have for long reports. EMsmile (talk) 12:27, 8 October 2022 (UTC)

Within the long form people can add page numbers in two ways, either by using the rp template, or by using the page parameter of cite report. Neither of these are very obvious. At FA level, page numbers are de facto required, and a majority of GA editors will also ask for them when citing the almost infinitely long reports of the IPCC.

By choosing the long-form cite only, we will likely see less people adding page numbers. Femke (talk) 12:32, 8 October 2022 (UTC)

I don't think this will necessarily happen in the way that you fear, as it's just a matter of getting used to a different technique (and possibly an IT adjustment later?): If Wikipedia editors know that they should add a page number for long reports and if they choose the long ref style more in future then they'll also look for the most convenient method to add the page number. I find the "rp template" very suitable and adaptable. When you say "cite report", do you mean "cite > book" or is there a "cite > report" option that I somehow don't have enabled? I don't see a "cite > report" field. I only see either "automatic" (where the page number cannot be added), or "manual" where the sub-options are: Website, Book, News, Journal, Basic. (I use "basic" whenever there are lots of authors because then I don't have to add author names one by one but can just copy the information from the "please cite this report as" information from the report itself.) EMsmile (talk) 17:00, 17 October 2022 (UTC)

Let's hope you're right. I've seen quite a few mistakes with the long-version omitting page numbers, or more seriously, using the wrong page numbers, because people don't realise when they copy it, that page numbers have been provided, and therefore don't change it.

Yeah, I meant cite book. ({{cite report}} is only meant for reports without ISBN number. You can insert that template in if you use manual -> basic in VE). Femke (talk) 17:16, 17 October 2022 (UTC)