User talk:Omrw510

Referencing books covering multiple claims in an article.

If you are using books listed at the end of an article to reference multiple claims within an article, they go in a section entitled "Bibliography" immediately after "References" and immediately before "Further reading". To use the book as a reference, you do not use the normal <ref> and </ref> method of referencing (they are provided with a different method of multiple referencing). Instead you use the {{sfn}} template as in "{{sfn|<author's last name>|<year of publication>|p=<page no>}}" (the '=' in the page number is compulsory - something undesirable happens if you omit it). The year of publication is optional and only really required if more than one book from the author is cited.

If the article exclusively uses referencing of this type then "References" is often changed to "Notes" and "Bibliography" is consequently changed to "References", but this does not appear to be consistent throughout Wikipedia.

Thus a sentence written "The moon is made of cheese.{{sfn|Smith|p=47}}" will resolve in the references as

"^ Smith, p. 47."

Smith will be a blue link but does not go anywhere.

The big advantage of doing it this way is that it handles the differing page numbers elegantly and you don't have to keep track of multiple claims that come from the same page of the same source. The template code automagically takes care of it for you.

For a simple example have a look at User:Elektrik Fanne/sandbox.

Hope that helps. --Elektrik Fanne 12:48, 13 October 2016 (UTC)

I have just discovered that using "{{cite book ...}}" on its own in the Bibliography section is the incorrect method of doing it. There are other parameters that need to be added and an alternate template is required for the actual referencing. Frankly, it doesn't do anything worthwhile anyway, and I can't find an example of its use.

"{{cite book}}" should not be used in the "Further reading" section because they are not citations. --Elektrik Fanne 13:17, 13 October 2016 (UTC)

Yes, that's good. I think it's better than the "old" method you see throughout the site. Much appreciated. Omrw510 (talk) 19:42, 13 October 2016 (UTC)

I'm glad that you found it useful. One small criticism: you failed to obtain the required consensus on the talk page before changing the citation style. However, having said that, judging by the edit frequency, the traffic at the article is probably so low that I doubt anyone is going to make a fuss (or even notice).

Ah, okay. I'll put something in the talk page just to point it out. Thanks. Omrw510 (talk) 09:39, 15 October 2016 (UTC)

You noticed that the referencing from the same page of the same book nicely took care of itself? I can tell you from experience that keeping track of these using the older system is nothing short of a nightmare, particularly for larger articles with lots of referencing. --Elektrik Fanne 13:30, 14 October 2016 (UTC)

Yes, the "ref name" method? I did use that for a couple of same page citations and it seems to be too easy to make a mistake. Omrw510 (talk) 09:39, 15 October 2016 (UTC)

I just spotted that you (probably very wisely) tried out the referencing in your sandbox. Just to point out: that if you use the year of publication in one or some references, you have to use it in all of them. Although it is a trivial point, the Wikipedia community likes things to be consistent within an article. --Elektrik Fanne 14:01, 14 October 2016 (UTC)

Right, I'll adopt that because cricket authors do tend to recur and then there are the annuals like Wisden and Playfair. Thanks very much. Omrw510 (talk) 09:39, 15 October 2016 (UTC)

Welcome!

Hello, Omrw510, and welcome to Wikipedia! Thank you for registering an account. I hope you like the place and decide to stay. Here are some pages that will help to get you started:
Introduction  5   The five pillars of Wikipedia   How to edit a page   Help   Tips	How to write a great article   Manual of Style   Be Bold   Assume Good faith   Get adopted
If you need help, feel free to ask me on my talk page, or ask at the friendly Teahouse. You can also place {{Help me}} on your talk page and someone will come shortly to answer your questions. Tony Holkham (Talk) 19:48, 13 October 2016 (UTC)

To editor Omrw510: Just a friendly word to say that your comment on the talk page of SovalValtos (talk · contribs) was inappropriate; differences of opinion on the content of an article are best dealt with on the article's talk page, where they can be discussed civilly and where other interested editors can see them, not with an unwarranted warning on a user's talk page. Please accept this in the courteous spirit with which it is intended. You may like to withdraw the comment and use the accepted procedure. Tony Holkham (Talk) 19:48, 13 October 2016 (UTC)

@Tony Holkham: Hello, Tony, and thank you for the welcome message. Sorry about the hasty response to my content being removed. The work I'm doing on the article is extensive and will not be finished for several days yet. Nothing is original research and all citations will be completed in due course. I'm using multiple sources as listed in the bibliography so it isn't always immediately definite which ones should be cited in each case and I don't want to omit any. Thank you again. All the best. Omrw510 (talk) 20:02, 13 October 2016 (UTC)

Understood. Sometimes I use the sandbox to put an article together to avoid leaving work liable to alteration before I've finished. It shouldn't be interfered with. There's a tab for it at the top of your page. Best wishes, Tony Holkham (Talk) 20:12, 13 October 2016 (UTC)

Another tip is that while you are actively editing an article is to change the {{under construction}} template at the top of the article to {{in use}}. This advises others to hold back from undoing your hard work (and editing articles with adequate referencing is not a trivial task). Be sure to change it back to {{under construction}} immediately you leave the article.

Yes, I got that one. I've used comments to suppress one while the other is active. Thanks. Omrw510 (talk) 09:39, 15 October 2016 (UTC)

It is also worth noting that the practice of adding {{citation needed}} tags to questionable uncited material is falling out of favour with many editors (including myself). The problem is, that many years after the tag is added, that the required referencing is often still not forthcoming. Deleting the material forces whoever restores it to provide the reference(s) as per WP:BURDEN, and it is no longer surprising to me how often it does not get restored. --Elektrik Fanne 13:55, 14 October 2016 (UTC)

As it happens, I've seen numerous articles that contain long-standing citation requests. You're right, of course, because one of the main criticisms of WP (from the academic world in particular) is misinformation, including dangerous nonsense. As I get more involved, I'll start dealing with doubtful content accordingly. Thank you very much indeed for all your help, EF, I really do appreciate it. All the best. Omrw510 (talk) 09:39, 15 October 2016 (UTC)