Help talk:Citation Style 1/Archive 17

This is an archive of past discussions about Help:Citation Style 1. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Archive 10

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Archive 15

Cite web vs. Cite news

Publisher parameter inconsistent formatting

This is in relation to two reversions by Codename Lisa of my edits: to Template:Cite news/doc and to Template:Cite web/doc. --Redrose64 (talk) 08:57, 30 March 2016 (UTC)

Moved from User talk:Redrose64 § .7B.7BCite web.7D.7D vs. .7B.7BCite news.7D.7D

– Redrose64 (talk) 17:56, 29 March 2016 (UTC)

Hi.

I'll get right to the point: It is quite okay to use a mixture of both only for news sources. The problem starts when {{Cite news}} is used along with {{Cite web}} to cite news websites on the web. It happened to me in one FA nomination: They said my citation style was inconsistent because some publishers were in parentheses and some were not. Actually, the main objector was User:Nikkimaria and she put it much vaguer terms. Of course, later I discovered she and others have done this in other FAs as well.

Best regards,
Codename Lisa (talk) 10:30, 29 March 2016 (UTC)

Once the |url= parameter had been added to all the Citation Style 1 templates, the intention of {{cite web}} has been that it should only be used for web sources that don't fit one of the other templates. That is, for news sources, {{cite news}} should be used - even where the article is only available online, such as with The Huffington Post. Where a website is used as a source, and that web page is not a news page, the use of {{cite web}} is quite in order, even when {{cite news}} has been used elsewhere on the page.

If Nikkimaria (talk · contribs) et al. have problems with the layout of the template output, it should be addressed by altering the template, not by using a different template. The place to bring that up is at Help talk:Citation Style 1 (that being the page that all the template talk pages redirect to), not on a FA nom. --Redrose64 (talk) 10:44, 29 March 2016 (UTC)

I would have loved you if you showed up and said it in that FA nom of Microsoft Security Essentials. But apparently, that FA requirement is very well etched in stone and at least has more force than the word of a newcomer who has dared a FA nomination shortly after coming to Wikipedia! (That's me, in 2012—2013.)

Also, regardless of the intention, since 2014, the output of these two templates have been almost similar, so much so that I often contemplated nominating one of them for deletion. (Of course, this is something that cannot be done yet.) But the point is, I myself can no longer call that requirement erroneous. One pair of parenthesis is all the glorious magical difference that there is.

Best regards,

Codename Lisa (talk) 11:07, 29 March 2016 (UTC)

@Codename Lisa: I don't hang around FAC except for articles which I've worked on, or where I've been invited there by a notice on a WikiProject's talk page. I don't think that I've ever had anything to do with Microsoft Security Essentials, which is probably why I said nothing at its FA nom. You don't link to that, so I'm unsure whether you mean Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Microsoft Security Essentials/archive1, Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Microsoft Security Essentials/archive2 or Wikipedia:Featured article review/Microsoft Security Essentials/archive1 - but none of those mention either {{cite news}} or {{cite web}} - or indeed any templates that concern citations. Also, none of them have anything about publishers in (or not in) parentheses.

Anyway, the phrase "articles that use a mixture of {{Cite news}} and {{Cite web}} may fail" in the version that you prefer implies that the two templates cannot coexist in the same article, which begs the question "how do I cite a web page that isn't a news source?" --Redrose64 (talk) 15:30, 29 March 2016 (UTC)

First, we look at WP:FACR. The following is one of the requirements. Focus at the part I colored green.

consistent citations: where required by criterion 1c, consistently formatted inline citations using either footnotes

This is an example of a {{Cite web}} citation:

Silverman, Dwight (July 15, 2011). "Microsoft envisions a universal OS, but it might not be called Windows". Houston Chronicle. Hearst Corporation. Retrieved May 26, 2015.

This is an example of a {{Cite news}} citation:

Silverman, Dwight (July 15, 2011). "Microsoft envisions a universal OS, but it might not be called Windows". Houston Chronicle. (Hearst Corporation). Retrieved May 26, 2015.

I have highlighted the minuscule different between the two with bigger font and the green color. As long as some of your citations have the parentheses and some don't, you are article does not have consistently formatted inline citations.

Here is exactly what Nikkimaria said: "multiple inconsistencies in reference formatting. Compare for example FNs 50 and 51, or 55 and 56, or 22 and 63".

Now, we go to your question: "how do I cite a web page that isn't a news source?" The answer is: The same way you cite a page that is a news source. Either all your web sources must use {{Cite news}} (news and non-news) or all your web sources must use {{Cite web}} (news and non-news). Whatever you do, do not let the names of these templates fool you.

Best regards,

Codename Lisa (talk) 17:49, 29 March 2016 (UTC)

Codename Lisa: as of the revision of the article I was looking at, it appears that each of those compared pairs used the same template as the other, but just used parameters differently. I've also made comments to the effect that citations to the same website should generally use the same template. I don't think I've ever said that {{cite web}} and {{cite news}} can't coexist in an article generally. Could you please clarify where you think I or another reviewer has said that? Nikkimaria (talk) 20:07, 29 March 2016 (UTC)

@Nikkimaria: And I don't think I've ever said that {{cite web}} and {{cite news}} absolutely can't coexist in an article either; every time, I added the phrase "for web sources". Redrose64 claimed that {{cite web}} and {{cite news}} cannot coexist for news sources only. I contested it. That's all. AFAIK, {{Cite news}} can cite offline news sources while {{Cite web}} can cite online ones. That's pretty much what you said after the FAC.

Best regards,

Codename Lisa (talk) 23:04, 30 March 2016 (UTC)

@Codename Lisa: This is your preferred form:

articles that use a mixture of {{Cite news}} and {{Cite web}} may fail to become a Featured Article

and this is my modified form:

articles that use a mixture of {{Cite news}} and {{Cite web}} for news sources may fail to become a Featured Article

Do you see the difference? Yours implies that in order to become an FA, an article can use either {{Cite news}} or {{Cite web}} but not both. What if I have two statements in an article, one sourced from a newspaper printed in 1964, and the other sourced from a non-news website? Must I use {{Cite web}} for the newspaper? Or must I use {{Cite news}} for the website? Neither is logical: that's my problem here. --Redrose64 (talk) 23:25, 30 March 2016 (UTC)

My dear Redrose64, have you ever heard of the word "context"? That whole section is talking about web sources and even says {{Cite web}} cannot be used for offline sources. Indeed if this was your sole concern, you should have skipped bringing this discussion here, so that I patch the sentence with a compromise that you and I both love.

And I see that you have ignored all my comments on the caveats of your version. That it implies one can use a mixture of {{Cite news}} and {{Cite web}} for non-news site. You seem to have taken for granted that nobody makes that mistake while I am experiencing and countering that mistake on a daily basis.

Best regards,

Codename Lisa (talk) 19:34, 31 March 2016 (UTC)

That's not quite what I meant, although I see how my phrasing may have caused confusion. You can cite online news articles using {{cite news}} as long as you do so for all online news articles, not just some of them; but that doesn't extend to non-news websites (which is what I was intending by "web sources" in that discussion). Nikkimaria (talk) 00:41, 31 March 2016 (UTC)

That's exactly what I get from what you said. Believe me, we are on the same page. Best regards, Codename Lisa (talk) 19:34, 31 March 2016 (UTC)

@Codename Lisa: It is simply wrong to use {{cite news}} for a webpage that isn't news. Accordingly, I have brought the thread to wider attention, at the (redirected) talk pages of the two templates concerned. --Redrose64 (talk) 17:58, 29 March 2016 (UTC)

@Redrose64: If you are uncomfortable because there is the word "news" in the template name, use the other one. Template names are arbitrary strings to me. They don't make me uncomfortable so easily. —Codename Lisa (talk) 18:03, 29 March 2016 (UTC)

I agree with Redrose: You have apparently had some very silly reviews on the point.

That said, I would support changing cite web to be more like cite news on this point. What do the other citation template do in a similar instance? Do any of the others add parentheses around the publisher? --Izno (talk) 18:02, 29 March 2016 (UTC)

@Izno: Thanks for your support for a change that is already done in 2014. And would you mind not insulting others? Best regards,
Codename Lisa (talk) 18:05, 29 March 2016 (UTC)

I called the review silly, not the reviewer.

I just checked your specific reference and it produced problematic output (to me):

cite news:

Silverman, Dwight (July 15, 2011). "Microsoft envisions a universal OS, but it might not be called Windows". Houston Chronicle. Hearst Corporation. Retrieved May 26, 2015.

cite web:

Silverman, Dwight (July 15, 2011). "Microsoft envisions a universal OS, but it might not be called Windows". Houston Chronicle. Hearst Corporation. Retrieved May 26, 2015.

cite book:

Silverman, Dwight (July 15, 2011). Microsoft envisions a universal OS, but it might not be called Windows. Hearst Corporation. Retrieved May 26, 2015. {{cite book}}: |work= ignored (help)

So the underlying template is still inconsistent. We should change that, not your article as pointed out. --Izno (talk) 18:09, 29 March 2016 (UTC)

I agree. Let's check:

{{Cite book}}:
Silverman, Dwight (July 15, 2011). Microsoft envisions a universal OS, but it might not be called Windows. Hearst Corporation. Retrieved May 26, 2015. {{cite book}}: |work= ignored (help)

{{Cite encyclopedia}}:
Silverman, Dwight (July 15, 2011). Microsoft envisions a universal OS, but it might not be called Windows. Hearst Corporation. Retrieved May 26, 2015. {{cite encyclopedia}}: |work= ignored (help)

{{Cite journal}}:
Silverman, Dwight (July 15, 2011). "Microsoft envisions a universal OS, but it might not be called Windows". Houston Chronicle. Hearst Corporation. Retrieved May 26, 2015.

{{Cite press release}}:
Silverman, Dwight (July 15, 2011). "Microsoft envisions a universal OS, but it might not be called Windows". Houston Chronicle (Press release). Hearst Corporation. Retrieved May 26, 2015.

{{Cite thesis}}:
Silverman, Dwight (July 15, 2011). Microsoft envisions a universal OS, but it might not be called Windows. Houston Chronicle (Thesis). Hearst Corporation. Retrieved May 26, 2015.

{{Cite techreport}}:
Silverman, Dwight (July 15, 2011). Microsoft envisions a universal OS, but it might not be called Windows. Houston Chronicle (Technical report). Hearst Corporation. Retrieved May 26, 2015.

Best regards,

Codename Lisa (talk) 18:20, 29 March 2016 (UTC)

I am unable to discern a pattern or a logical reason why the publisher is sometimes in parentheses and sometimes not. Unless one is forthcoming, I recommend removing the parentheses from around the publisher parameter value in all CS1 templates. – Jonesey95 (talk) 23:14, 29 March 2016 (UTC)

Parentheses are added if |work= is set and the template is not {{cite encyclopaedia}}, {{cite web}}, {{cite pressrelease}}, or {{cite podcast}}.

Cite encyclopedia. Publisher. {{cite encyclopedia}}: |work= ignored (help)

"Cite web". Work. Publisher.

"Cite press release". Work (Press release). Publisher.

"Cite podcast". Work (Podcast). Publisher.

Here, different templates and |work= set:

Cite book. Publisher. {{cite book}}: |work= ignored (help)

"Cite journal". Work. Publisher.

"Cite news". Work. Publisher.

those same but |work= not set:

Cite book. Publisher.

"Cite journal". Publisher. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help)

"Cite news". Publisher.

The key here is |work= and those four templates. The questions I have are: Why are parentheses added when |work= is set? Why were those four templates excluded? I can answer the last question for {{cite podcast}}: to be the same as {{cite web}} because it is the same except for the parenthetical annotation.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 00:15, 30 March 2016 (UTC)

Thanks for that breakdown. If that is the explanation in its entirety, this looks like a case of "we've always done it this way", and I suspect that there was never a considered discussion about how to treat the publisher parameter. My guess is that {{cite web}} was written by one person or group, and {{cite book}} was written by a different person or group, or someone changed one of them at one point without a discussion, and here we are.

Let's get rid of those parentheses. – Jonesey95 (talk) 00:39, 30 March 2016 (UTC)

Add this into your calculations. Here are a couple of {{cite book}} templates with and without |work= and with (I think) all of the publication specific parameters:

{{cite book |author=Author |title=Cite book |work=Work |location=Location |publication-place=Publication Place |publication-date=2016 |date=2010 |publisher=Publisher}}

Author (2010). Written at Location. Cite book. Publication Place: Publisher (published 2016). {{cite book}}: |author= has generic name (help); |work= ignored (help)

{{cite book |author=Author |title=Cite book |location=Location |publication-place=Publication Place |publication-date=2016 |date=2010 |publisher=Publisher}}

Author (2010). Written at Location. Cite book. Publication Place: Publisher (published 2016). {{cite book}}: |author= has generic name (help)

Because the cs1|2 templates don't all render in exactly the same way, we should do something similar to the above for all of them. That way, we can see how they all render and make a more informed decision.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 12:44, 30 March 2016 (UTC)

I have done what I suggested. Here is a link to my sandbox: Special:Permalink/712675628.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 14:07, 30 March 2016 (UTC)

(←) I would guess that it's because of the basis of these templates was an external style book. My inclination, given that these modules have evolved from what external style books say to do, is to remove the parentheses in all places also. MLA, Chicago, and APA don't appear to use parentheses from a brief skim of what's online. --Izno (talk) 11:57, 30 March 2016 (UTC)

@Izno: CS1 developed using APA as a basis, and APA uses parentheses for the year/date of publication after the author. It's also been heavily influenced by Chicago, which uses parentheses to group location, publisher and date of publication after a title. Imzadi 1979 → 12:13, 30 March 2016 (UTC)

Chicago is a moving target. If I remember correctly, way back when, they only footnotes and endnotes. But now they allow either notes or author-date parenthetical cites. So if we want to continue to be influenced by Chicago, we would do something like this:

Citation template (Chicago p. 530)

1. Emery Blackfoot, Chance Encounters (Boston: Serendipity Press, 1987)

cite book (Chicago p. 652)

Barbor, Ian. 1974. Myths, models, and paradigms: A comparative study in science and religion. New York: Harper and Row.

Jc3s5h (talk) 13:22, 30 March 2016 (UTC)

Yet another reason for us to write our own style guide.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 14:07, 30 March 2016 (UTC)

@Trappist the monk: Hi. So does all this means that the cosmetic difference between {{Cite web}} and {{Cite news}} gets eliminated in the near future? Best regards, Codename Lisa (talk) 20:23, 4 April 2016 (UTC)

I don't know. There have been a lot of words expended here with precious few suggesting a path forward – at least, I don't see much expression of opinion about what, if anything, we should do.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 21:47, 4 April 2016 (UTC)

@Trappist the monk: Well, I suggest all CS1 citation template must use parentheses consistently; i.e. when there is a |work= include it and when there is not, don't include it. Must I start an explicit RFC? —Codename Lisa (talk) 22:29, 4 April 2016 (UTC)

I notice that {{citation}} puts the publisher in parenthesis, if there is a work, regardless of whether the mode not set or is set to cs1. Jc3s5h (talk) 22:36, 4 April 2016 (UTC)

Yes, that is correct. |mode=cs1 does not change {{citation}} to another kind of template. The only things that change are the separator character, terminal punctuation, and enable/disable automatic |ref=harv. The template is still {{citation}} so it obeys the rules that I stated earlier.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 00:17, 5 April 2016 (UTC)

There is another reason for the appropriate selection of template - quite apart from variant layouts, they apply different classes. All of them apply the citation class, but those in the Citation Style 1 group apply a second class as well - for {{cite book}}, this is book; for {{cite news}}, this is news; and for {{cite web}}, this is web. These may be found by examining the HTML source, or by checking the template - go to the template page, click "View source" (or "Edit" if you are an admin), and look for the |CitationClass= parameter. The value of that is the extra class that is applied. These extra classes are not used by English Wikipedia, but other organisations may make use of them when examining the references in our web pages. --Redrose64 (talk) 08:57, 30 March 2016 (UTC)

Those classes are trivial CSS technicalities and are otherwise insignificant.They are means to an end, not the goal.

If you want to see what it their purpose, I suggest you open your browser's developer console and type the following while you are in this page:

$(".web")

Feel free to inspect the resulting object.

Best regards,

Codename Lisa (talk) 19:42, 31 March 2016 (UTC)

Position of date depends on presence of author

There is an inconsistency that seems more significant to me; there was a consensus to fix it a long time ago but the fix has never been done. Consider these cites without an author:

{{Cite book}}:
Microsoft envisions a universal OS, but it might not be called Windows. Hearst Corporation. July 15, 2011. Retrieved May 26, 2015. {{cite book}}: |work= ignored (help)

{{Cite journal}}:
"Microsoft envisions a universal OS, but it might not be called Windows". Houston Chronicle. Hearst Corporation. July 15, 2011. Retrieved May 26, 2015.

Notice how, for all the cites that have an author, the date is right after the author and in parentheses, but when there is no author the date moves to nearly the end of the citation, and there are no parentheses. Jc3s5h (talk) 19:38, 29 March 2016 (UTC)

I have split this into its own subthread so that we can keep the publisher and date discussions separated.

I think the above refers to a June 2013 RfC from this page. – Jonesey95 (talk) 23:13, 29 March 2016 (UTC)

RFC: Should all CS1 citation templates put the publisher name between parentheses when there is a work title?

OPTION 2

Participants unanimously supported "option 2", "removing parentheses from 18 templates".

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Hello everyone,

According to a test case compiled by User:Trappist the monk, out of 23 templates that implement the CS1 citation sytle, 17 of them place the publisher name (from |publisher=) between parentheses when there is a work title (from |work= or its numerous aliases like |newspaper=, |website=, etc.) In addition, {{Citation}} also does this (with or without |mode=cs1.) In all 24 cases, the parentheses do not appear when there is no work title.

The question is: Should we change the remaining 6 to adhere to this already-dominant style? In this discussion your verdicts may be:

Support adding parentheses to 6 templates — Certainly one style (CS1) can only have one form used consistently, not two inconsistent forms for no reason whatsoever. Templates that need to be changed are {{Cite web}}, {{Cite encyclopedia}}, {{Cite mailing list}}, {{Cite newsgroup}}, {{Cite press release}}, and {{Cite podcast}}.
Support removing parentheses from 18 templates — Templates that need to be changed are: {{Cite AV media}}, {{Cite AV media notes}}, {{Cite book}}, {{Cite conference}}, {{cite DVD notes}}, {{Cite episode}}, {{Cite interview}}, {{Cite journal}}, {{Cite magazine}}, {{Cite map}}, {{Cite news}}, {{Cite report}}, {{Cite serial}}, {{Cite sign}}, {{Cite speech}}, {{Cite techreport}}, {{Cite thesis}}, {{Citation}} (when |mode=cs1 is set)
Retain status quo — in case you have a genius reason as to why consistency among different template implementing the same style must not be established.

I'd like to invite the people already in the discussion to participate: Jonesey95, Jc3s5h, Redrose64, Trappist the monk, Imzadi1979, Izno, Nikkimaria

Best regards,
Codename Lisa (talk) 17:44, 9 April 2016 (UTC)

Poll

Option 2 - remove the parentheses from the 17 templates that include them. This will maintain a consistent form throughout. Nikkimaria (talk) 18:01, 9 April 2016 (UTC)
Which is actually the equivalent to "Oppose" but without a genius reason. —Codename Lisa (talk) 18:20, 9 April 2016 (UTC)
No, it's not. You specifically framed "Oppose" above as supporting inconsistency among different templates implementing the same style; my vote very clearly does not do that. I'm simply proposing a different means of obtaining consistency. Nikkimaria (talk) 18:40, 9 April 2016 (UTC)
~~You are opposing my proposal. Hence it is option 2, "Oppose". All you can conclude it that the potential reason I provided was not all-encompassing.~~Looks like someone has changed the RFC. NVM.

Anyway, why change 18 (not 17) other templates?

Best regards,

Codename Lisa (talk) 19:12, 9 April 2016 (UTC)
Because, as Trappist's tests show, all of them leave out the parentheses when no |work= is included, and I think it makes sense to be consistent in that way as well. I would also anecdotally suggest that |publisher= currently appears far more often without parentheses, given that it is most often filled in {{cite web}} (which never puts it in parentheses) and {{cite book}} (which puts it in parentheses only when |work= is present, which is rare for book citations). The other templates are for the most part far less common, or in some cases use of |publisher= is not as prevalent (eg. journals or newspapers) as it is for books. Nikkimaria (talk) 19:37, 9 April 2016 (UTC)
I'm amenable to options 1 or 2. I prefer option 2 slightly to option 1, but whatever floats the mass's boat. --Izno (talk) 19:16, 9 April 2016 (UTC)
Support consistency— so either the last six get them added, or the other 17 have them removed. I'd probably prefer the addition to the six over the elimination of the parentheses from the other 17. There's another consideration I have in mind, but it's outside the scope of this RfC. Imzadi 1979 → 20:30, 9 April 2016 (UTC)
Option 2 - remove the parentheses from the 17 templates that include them. Taking inspiration from the Chicago Manual of Style, a particular form of citation either puts the publisher in parenthesis, or not. It does not depend on whether there is just one title, or two (such as article and journal titles, or chapter and book titles). Chicago does make a distinction, but it is on whether the cite is a footnote/endnote versus a bibliography entry, and we don't seem to be interested in distinguishing on the basis of whether we are using the cs1 mode or cs2 mode. Since the majority of our citations use the cs1 mode, let's no put the publisher in parentheses. Jc3s5h (talk) 20:36, 9 April 2016 (UTC)
Don't care so long as the end result means that articles are no longer forced to use the wrong cite template in order to satisfy WP:WIAFA criterion 2c. --Redrose64 (talk) 20:49, 9 April 2016 (UTC)
Support Options 1 or 2. I don't care which one is chosen, as long as the CS1 citations either use parentheses all of the time or none of the time. – Jonesey95 (talk) 04:44, 10 April 2016 (UTC)

Support Option 2. Both options 2 and 1 achieve consistency, but I prefer option 2 over 1 because it appears to be more in line with the majority of citations displayed at present and it looks a bit cleaner to me. Also, I see other potential uses for parentheses in conjunction with alternative scripts like Cyrillic or Kanji (f.e. providing the actual Russian name of a publisher (in parentheses) preceded by its English transliteration. Example: Gosudarstvennoe Izdatel'stvo Tehniko-Teoretičeskoj Literatury (Государственное издательство технико-теоретической литературы)). At present, this can cause parentheses to become nested, which isn't a serious issue, but still nice if it could be avoided simply by "freeing" the parentheses for such uses. This would also be in line with my proposal further above to provide "script-" variants of the "author", "editor", "translator" etc. parameters (for something like this: Prudnikov, Anatolii Platonovich (Прудников, Анатолий Платонович)) --Matthiaspaul (talk) 16:05, 18 April 2016 (UTC)

Support Options 1 or 2. Parentheses are useful to further distinguish publishers from say, series, when you have Author (1990). "Chapter". Title. Series. Publisher. {{cite book}}: |author= has generic name (help) So I would prefer having them present in all cases even when |work= isn't used like in the example I mention. My example would become Author (1990). "Chapter". Title. Series. (Publisher). If that can't be done, then remove them everywhere.Headbomb {talk / contribs / physics / books} 18:03, 18 April 2016 (UTC)

Support a designed consistency— so readers know what to expect! In particular, so they know that a particular formatting means a particular attribute, e.g. why not introduce a general formatting rule such as (for argument's sake):

"parentheses mean publication date and brackets mean publisher."

I'd go further and suggest that since our formatting is electronic and virtually no-cost, we should (gasp!)

design a new, universal and consistent citation formatting style for use by all Wikipedia articles.

As to the print use case, formatting should follow that of the screen use case as closely as practicable; but in any case, the screen use case is already, and increasingly, preponderant. But absent such a sensible and creative solution to the many formatting issues that I see interminably discussed by editors who might have better things to do (such as writing new articles, or making existing ones more readable), I'd say for the moment, always parenthesise the publisher. yoyo (talk) 07:22, 28 April 2016 (UTC)

Support consistency. I slightly prefer option 2 to option 1 – it seems more consistent to me to never have parentheses rather than have parentheses only if a different parameter is also filled – but I'd be happy with option 1 also.
Support Option 2. Although there are fewer templates changed, {{Cite web}} represents the majority of citations. Tamwin (talk) 23:43, 7 May 2016 (UTC)

Discussion

comment – This statement in the RfC is false: In addition, {{Citation}} also does this when |mode=cs1 is set. |mode= does not change how Module:Citation/CS1 renders |publisher=.—Trappist the monk (talk) 18:08, 9 April 2016 (UTC)
In that case, it is not false. If it always exhibits said behavior, then without doubt, it exhibits said behavior when |mode=cs1 is set. Only a case-effect relationship is absent. But nevertheless, it is true. —Codename Lisa (talk) 18:20, 9 April 2016 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

After RFC

@Trappist the monk: Hi. Do you think it is okay to implement the result of the RFC now? Best regards, Codename Lisa (talk) 15:26, 9 May 2016 (UTC)

You needn't seek my permission.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 17:29, 9 May 2016 (UTC)

Yes, I do. I don't have enough edit privileges to edit the module and if I did, I don't know where to start.

History suggests you are the right person to call.

Best regards,

Codename Lisa (talk) 19:28, 9 May 2016 (UTC)

No, you don't. Module:Citation/CS1/sandbox.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 21:48, 9 May 2016 (UTC)

Just editing Module:Citation/CS1/sandbox won't do it. 'PublicationPlace'/'Place' (|location=) must be edited too (see ln #2048) because it is also formatted within parentheses, and 'Publisher' is included in them (ln #2902). So just changing 'PublisherName'/'Publisher' (ln #2894) won't work in all cases. 72.43.99.146 (talk) 14:29, 11 May 2016 (UTC)

Btw, this is just by looking cursorily at the code. Did not actually test it. 72.43.99.146 (talk) 14:47, 11 May 2016 (UTC)

Editor Codename Lisa's question was where to start. The beginning is always a good place and that beginning for the cs1|2 modules is Module:Citation/CS1/sandbox. But what perplexes me is your claim that there is someplace else that needs changes but all of your line references supporting that claim are in Module:Citation/CS1/sandbox.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 15:35, 11 May 2016 (UTC)

Sorry, my comment should have been "Just editing publisher in Module etc". As I mentioned, it was a cursory look. Since other arguments make use of the same parentheses, and since I was not certain, at first glance, of all the possible dependencies, I thought it warranted a warning. 65.88.88.62 (talk) 16:51, 11 May 2016 (UTC)

Whatever. I don't know enough Lua or enough about Wikipedia's Lua API, and Wikipedia does not have IntelliSense. I am like a blind man looking for several needles in a haystack. I have touched Lua twice so far and on both occasions, I cheated. Best regards, Codename Lisa (talk) 19:37, 11 May 2016 (UTC)

Whatever, what??? I am trying to point out that there may be other dependencies between |publisher= and certain parameters (such as |location=) that could affect display of the citation, over and above the presence/absence of |work=. Since the result of the RFC specifies a new design consensus for an area of CS1, its implementation should avoid introducing possible new inconsistencies. 65.88.88.126 (talk) 21:46, 11 May 2016 (UTC)

Coding multiple refs to one book, pages needed

reference info for Princeton University

unnamed refs

289

named refs

94

self closed

110

cs1 refs

408

cs1 templates

397

cs1-like refs

1

cs1-like templates

1

sfn templates

136

refbegin templates

2

webarchive templates

1

use xxx dates

mdy

cs1|2 df mdy

1

cs1|2 dmy dates

1

cs1|2 mdy dates

171

cs1|2 ymd dates

5

cs1|2 mdy access dates

356

cs1|2 ymd access dates

11

cs1|2 dmy archive dates

1

cs1|2 mdy archive dates

290

cs1|2 last/first

155

cs1|2 author

5

List of cs1 templates

cite book (12)
Cite book (9)
Cite journal (16)
cite journal (3)
cite magazine (1)
Cite magazine (4)
cite news (19)
Cite news (82)
Cite report (2)
Cite web (11)
cite web (238)

List of cs1-like templates

cite gnis (1)

List of sfn templates

Sfn (136)

explanations

This is not strictly a CS1 question, but I got no answer at WP:HD, apparently because there is not enough referencing expertise watching that page. If there is a better place for questions of this ilk, I'd like to know where it is for future reference (oops).

Princeton University contains 6 references to a book, all in need of page numbers. I don't have the book, and I'm not inclined to trudge down to the library and do the necessary research. How would you code this, assuming only one occurrence of {{Cite book}}?

Named references, each followed by {{Page needed}}? That wouldn't work when the page numbers are identified, unless one wanted to use the "rarely used" {{Rp}} template for the page numbers.
{{Sfn}} templates, sans page numbers, each followed by {{Page needed}}? Is it considered proper to use {{Sfn}} in association with inline {{Cite book}}, or should it only be used with bibliographic entries such as at Princeton University#Further reading?
Other?

Thank you. ―Mandruss ☎ 07:49, 7 May 2016 (UTC)

I've added {{ref info}} at the top of this topic.

Is the book available at archive.org? google preview? Search the article history to identify and so contact the editor who added the book? Discuss on the article talk page?

Since the article isn't all that consistent in how it handles referencing, it looks like you can pretty much do what you'd like.

I think it is acceptable to have {{sfn}} link to an in-line citation when the article does not have a separate bibliography section – §Further reading is not a reference bibliography.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 10:47, 7 May 2016 (UTC)

Bingo! While I believe a separate bibliography ("sources") section is preferable (makes the full citations easier to find), it isn't really needed. The automagic of {{harv}} (which is the essence of {{sfn}}) will find the full citation where ever it is. ~ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 21:51, 11 May 2016 (UTC)

Mandruss: What is the book in question? – Jonesey95 (talk) 13:41, 7 May 2016 (UTC)

@Jonesey95: Princeton University: The First 250 Years. Some/most of the references are currently using {{Cite web}}, which is incorrect, and I'll fix that when this discussion is concluded. ―Mandruss ☎ 14:04, 7 May 2016 (UTC)

Through a series of coincidences, I own that book and can help you with sourcing. Contact me on my talk page. – Jonesey95 (talk) 14:34, 7 May 2016 (UTC)

Proposal: automatic hyphen replacement in date ranges

Whereas the en-dashes that MOS prescribes for date ranges are special characters, not generally found on standard keyboards, and whereas the error message the cs code emits on finding a hyphen is not clear that the hyphen is the basis for the complaint, I propose that where the cs code finds hyphens in date ranges it should automatically convert them to en-dashes, without complaint.

Any objections? ~ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 22:05, 18 April 2016 (UTC)

The proposal is about dates not pages.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 22:39, 18 April 2016 (UTC)

I support the proposal. One caveat is that we can't do a universal replacement, since yyyy-mm-dd, whatever your opinion of it, is a valid date format that uses hyphens. I recommend that the proposer list the valid date formats shown at Help:CS1 errors or MOS:DATERANGE or another appropriate location in order to start a conversation about the feasibility of the proposal. – Jonesey95 (talk) 23:33, 18 April 2016 (UTC)

I am not the proposer but this is the answer to the list the valid date formats request taken from the date validation code:

month day–day, year
day–day month year
day month – day month year
month day – month day, year
day month year – day month year
month day, year – month day, year
Winter year–year (YYYY–YY)
Summer year–year (YYYY–YY)
Winter year–year (YYYY–YYYY)
Summer year–year (YYYY–YYYY)
month year – month year
season year – season year
month–month year
season–season year
year–year

—Trappist the monk (talk) 12:10, 19 April 2016 (UTC)

Thank you. ~ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 17:21, 19 April 2016 (UTC)

ISO format uses 2 hyphens. That may be a unique attribute, to be used in coding the proposed date-checking/fixing scheme. Also: in general, I support the proposal. 72.43.99.146 (talk) 23:40, 18 April 2016 (UTC)

As long as the autoconversion leaves YYYY-MM-DD dates hyphenated, I am ok with converting other hyphens in dates to dashes. This is a much more constrained data format than pages where fewer things can go wrong. —David Eppstein (talk) 23:40, 18 April 2016 (UTC)

Again, I support the proposal, but not all hyphens should be auto-converted. |date=2008-03 and |date=March 27-April 3, 2002, for example, should still cause errors to be emitted and should not be auto-converted. We need to think this through. Maybe only dates that would be otherwise valid if the hyphens were en dashes should be auto-converted. Would that cover the whole list of possibilities? – Jonesey95 (talk) 00:29, 19 April 2016 (UTC)

This is getting complicated. It could be worth examining a different approach: ie whether |date= should require |df= (where |df=[full list of allowable date formats]). So a user would first have to specify a particular |df= choice, and then |date= could only be filled accordingly. Beforehand, I can't tell which programmatic approach would be optimal or easier. 72.43.99.146 (talk) 13:46, 19 April 2016 (UTC)

If I understand what it is that you wrote, your idea would break every cs1|2 template that has |date= and doesn't have |df=. Besides, |df= has a specific purpose which we should be changing without a bunch of deep thinking.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 15:03, 19 April 2016 (UTC)

You are correct. But I was thinking about new implementations. If such is to be considered, pre-existing uses will have to be bypassed by error checking until a mechanism to insert |df= (functioning as explained above) is devised. Just throwing around ideas. 72.43.99.146 (talk) 15:47, 19 April 2016 (UTC)

Not possible to distinguish a new cs1|2 template from an old one. Every time a page is parsed, whether that is because someone edited it, or because someone changed a template that the page transcludes, or for any other reason, each parsing causes Module:Citation/CS1 to process all of the cs1|2 templates as if they were new.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 16:37, 19 April 2016 (UTC)

I don’t mean to press this route, but indulge me for a minute.

In a new module iteration, introduce a date-related, non-displayed, flag with a short range of values (say, 0-3)
one-time maintenance routine: set this flag=0 in all existing templates
post-maintenance, set the default for the date-related flag=1
If flag=1, user-specified date format is required
if a template fulfills date requirements, flag=2
later, a mechanism can be devised to automate migration of templates where flag=0.

??? 65.88.88.127 (talk) 18:11, 19 April 2016 (UTC)

You forgot: PROFIT!!!

This is a mixture of module edits and bot edits (the module cannot edit wikisource).

—Trappist the monk (talk) 18:30, 19 April 2016 (UTC)

Sure. I think I had remarked previously about the cost/feasibility of doing complicated stuff like this. 65.88.88.127 (talk) 19:28, 19 April 2016 (UTC)

From the list above, these use hyphens:

Title. January 10–15, 2016.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: date format (link)

Title. 10–15 January 2016.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: date format (link)

Title. 10 January – 15 March 2016.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: date format (link)

Title. January 10 – March 15, 2016.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: date format (link)

Title. 10 November 2015 – 15 January 2016.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: date format (link)

Title. November 10, 2015 – January 15, 2016.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: date format (link)

Title. Winter 2015–16.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: date format (link)

Title. Summer 2015–16.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: date format (link)

Title. Winter 2015–2016.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: date format (link)

Title. Summer 2015–2016.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: date format (link)

Title. November 2015 – January 2016.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: date format (link)

Title. Winter 2015 – Summer 2016.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: date format (link)

Title. January–March 2016.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: date format (link)

Title. Spring–Summer 2016.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: date format (link)

Title. 2015–2016.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: date format (link)

these use ndashes:

Title. January 10–15, 2016.

Title. 10–15 January 2016.

Title. 10 January – 15 March 2016.

Title. January 10 – March 15, 2016.

Title. 10 November 2015 – 15 January 2016.

Title. November 10, 2015 – January 15, 2016.

Title. Winter 2015–16.

Title. Summer 2015–16.

Title. Winter 2015–2016.

Title. Summer 2015–2016.

Title. November 2015 – January 2016.

Title. Winter 2015 – Summer 2016.

Title. January–March 2016.

Title. Spring–Summer 2016.

Title. 2015–2016.

ymd dates and |df= are not broken:

Title. 2016-03-15.

Title. 15 March 2016.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 15:24, 22 April 2016 (UTC)

Replace hyphens, or not?

So where are we at with this? If the code is smart enough to declare an error in regard of hyphens, should it fix it? ~ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 19:41, 4 May 2016 (UTC)

If you mean have the template fix the wiki text then, no, not going to happen.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 20:38, 4 May 2016 (UTC)

Why not? Because you're God? ~ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 23:28, 6 May 2016 (UTC)

Yes. And because templates are not allowed to modify wiki text.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 00:15, 7 May 2016 (UTC)

I don't think a template can do that. One might be able to create an AWB script that uses the logic in the template to detect hyphen errors in the current date error category and fix them, but it probably makes sense to wait for the revised template to be deployed, which will make the errors go away. – Jonesey95 (talk) 20:46, 4 May 2016 (UTC)

Does not BattyBot 25 already do this? If not, why not?

—Trappist the monk (talk) 21:26, 4 May 2016 (UTC)

Maybe. My regex-parsing skills are not good enough to read User:BattyBot/CS1 errors-dates, but it looks like the sections marked "fix range of" may be fixing separators for us. – Jonesey95 (talk) 21:30, 4 May 2016 (UTC)

"... templates are not allowed to modify wiki text"? Bullcrap. We are not talking about modifying the text, but processing the input. Which is already done in regards of italicization, and even the replacement of hyphens in page ranges. ~ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 22:00, 11 May 2016 (UTC)

See the section above. Hyphenated input is converted to dashed input. This is in the sandbox version of the CS1 module code. It will be deployed in the next update. Updates typically happen every month or two.

The module/template code will not "fix" the wikitext, i.e. it will not change it, but it will display the date properly, per MOS. Is that what you are asking for? – Jonesey95 (talk) 22:06, 11 May 2016 (UTC)

Yes. ~ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 22:01, 12 May 2016 (UTC)

Category:CS1 maint: Ignored ISBN errors is being misused?

I've just noticed a bunch of edits in which correct use of ignore-isbn-error is being removed. The as-printed ISBN has been replaced with an ASIN (IMO bad to add this so really bad to also remove the ISBN) an OCLC (IMO good to add this but bad to remove the ISBN) or a different ISBN (IMO not necessarily OK but not necessarily bad either):

So my concern is that the new category is being misused to blindly remove all use of ignore-isbn-error and removing correct information about the source in the process. The removed ISBNs are confirmed to be as-printed either directly or based on library records which indicate that this is the case.

TuxLibNit (talk) 17:50, 7 May 2016 (UTC)

I think this is another off-topic issue raised here. To continue off-topic, there is a question of the origin of any "ignored-isbn-error". One assumes that the contributor handled the actual source in some form or other, and directly confirmed the isbn. It is conceivable that some time later the isbn was reassigned by the publisher who obtained it, or was obsoleted through an isbn reissue for the same title and edition. So even though the encyclopedia article text may no longer be verified through the original citation as formatted (if the reader decides to follow the erroneous isbn), it may be verified by an edited version of the citation. One that includes the newer isbn assignment or a different mechanism/identifier. If the citation editor does not have access to the source, but has only (through another, reliable source) information about the new correct identifier, h/she can input the new info, but the erroneous isbn has to be retained imo, and the error should be ignored. Because that was the only version of the supporting source that was actually consulted. To put it differently, the later editor cannot WP:SAYWHEREYOUGOTIT because s/he didn't. S/he only found information about the source, not the source itself. As I mentioned in the beginning, it is assumed that the original contributor did consult the source.

As an aside, (again off-topic) I think that IgnoreISBN should be flagged, precisely so that the situation is brought into wider attention and rectified one way or another. And also to avoid misleading readers who may try to verify the source by looking up a wrong isbn. 65.88.88.69 (talk) 20:19, 7 May 2016 (UTC)

To add, there is also the question of isbn formatting. There is no real standard about how the number may be sectioned/hyphenated. Some isbn search services may throw an error over a perfectly good isbn (as presented by the publisher), while others will correctly bring it right up. IgnoreISBN makes sense there too, and that isbn should be retained in the citation. 65.88.88.69 (talk) 20:29, 7 May 2016 (UTC)

The ISBN's being used in "ignore-isbn-error" are bad. ISBN's follow a pattern... country code, publisher code, checksum and so forth. If it is being flagged as bad, the ISBN is impossible to use within the ISBN system. These are not cases of reissued ISBNs or resigned, they are cases where they can never exist. There are cases of a publisher/self-publisher not wanting to spend the money to obtain ISBNs. Cases of people/publishers put a random ISBN on their work. Editor copies the wrong ISBN. Lastly, cases where the book never had an ISBN to begin with. Formatting has no bearing on if a ISBN is bad or not.

When a reader clicks on an ISBN, they are taken to a page where they can find the book, via Worldcat, Google, etc. There is now way to find them with the bad ISBN number. There is no way to look them up. The idea is for the reader to actually find the book. OCLC numbers used goes to the book used in the article.

This tag isn't "blindly" being removed. It is being removed when another source can be found.

Examples

isbn=0-9536475-4-8|ignore-isbn-error=yes  This is a self published book. A 9 digit ISBN was used. No way to find it. ASIN was used, but this is a last resort.
isbn=978-88-8446-157-X|ignore-isbn-error=yes Why use a made up ISBN (13 digits don't have X) that is only good at Harvard? Worldcat number was used so everybody can find it. Next item on the above list was also another Harvard one.
isbn= 90-286-0573-1| ignore-isbn-error=yes  This is a long series of books. Those before the late 1970's had bogus ISBNs, after that, they used correct ISBNs.
|=978-5-903368-45-0|ignore-isbn-error=yes It is a bad ISBN. It was replaced by the correct one.

Bgwhite (talk) 21:36, 7 May 2016 (UTC)

I think I'm being misunderstood. For most if not all of these ISBNs, if you click the ISBN link (taking you to the Special:BookSources page), scroll down a little to the "Online databases" section and then click the "Find this book" link for WorldCat, then you are taken to a database entry for the source. Are you all aware of that? Libraries around the world are recording the fact that these numbers (however invalid) are printed on these books and any of the "Find this book" links might work. For source-identification purposes they can be as useful as valid ISBNs. It is not that 978-88-8446-157-X ISBN is "only good at Harvard". Harvard is just one library of many that records in their database the fact that this number really is printed on this book even though it is invalid.

Regarding whether this is off-topic. I've raised this here because this is a question of how ignore-isbn-error=yes is supposed to be used in CS1 and whether the current CS1 templates are appropriately supporting its use. AFAIK this is the usual place to discuss CS1 and its template implementation.

I take the comments so far to imply either that ignore-isbn-error should be removed from the templates and/or that the documentation for Help:CS1_errors#Check_.7Cisbn.3D_value should be updated. That is fine, but I think it would help if you could be more explicit about exactly how you think ignore-isbn-error is supposed to be used (or not used).

TuxLibNit (talk) 23:12, 7 May 2016 (UTC)

I have seen a few different situations in which |ignore-isbn-error= is being used. Here are the ones I can think of and how I recommend dealing with them, after fixing a few thousand ISBN errors.

|ignore-isbn-error= used with a valid ISBN. In this case, remove the "ignore" parameter.
|ignore-isbn-error= used with an invalid ISBN that links through to WorldCat and that is sometimes even listed in WorldCat with the book. In this case, insert a comment that the ISBN is invalid but that it is listed in WorldCat.
|ignore-isbn-error= used with an invalid ISBN that is listed in the LCCN database as an invalid ISBN. This means that the invalid ISBN was printed in the book and should be left. Add a comment explaining why the invalid ISBN is there, with a reference to LCCN, and add the |LCCN= parameter if it is there.
|ignore-isbn-error= used with an invalid ISBN that does not link through to WorldCat and that cannot be verified. In this case, if you can locate an OCLC for the source, add it, and comment out (but do not remove) the invalid ISBN.

Those are all I can think of right now. There are probably more. We should probably add guidance like this in some form to the category page. – Jonesey95 (talk) 01:19, 8 May 2016 (UTC)

At present, |ignore-isbn-error= takes a number of "yes/no" arguments only. Why don't we define a wider set of predefined tokens so that editors could systematically specify what's actually up with an invalid ISBN?

I find it particularly important to record if an invalid code was verified by someone to be actually printed on the book.

Some books lack any printed ISBNs on them but still have ISBNs assigned to them in printed or online catalogs - in this case, the ISBN isn't invalid "as is", but still cannot be used directly to identify a particular book. If known this info can help obtaining a copy of a book by extending the search to listings stating that a particular book does not show any ISBN.

Some books have different ISBNs printed in the preface and on the back-cover. In such cases, it might be useful to record which one was chosen, or - better - to use the |ignore-isbn-error= parameter to record the other ISBN as well. Alternatively, the |isbn= parameter could be changed to accept more than one value. As some databases may list the book under one ISBN, and others under the other, this is important information to know, and omitting one of the ISBNs may reduce chances to locate a copy of the book.

The same applies when a book became available under more than one ISBN over the years (often in different countries or for different prices), even by the same publisher and with identical contents and outer appearance.

In yet other cases, a single ISBN was used for different editions of a book (even with slightly different contents). If an editor happens to be already aware of such oddities, it would be helpful, if this could be recorded somewhere in the citation, so that buyers don't end up with the wrong edition.

In some cases, ISBNs listed in some widely used catalogs have been identified to be invalid. If the book carries a valid ISBN, we should use this, of course, but it might still help to record somewhere that a book is also listed under another ISBN.

--Matthiaspaul (talk) 11:50, 8 May 2016 (UTC)

If an invalid ISBN works in WorldCat, an editor, or a librarian helping that editor, will have no trouble locating the book. As for multiple editions with the same ISBN, |edition= is useful for that situation. As for multiple ISBNs in the template, that will lead to all sorts of trouble; the idea of citing a source is to cite the specific item from which you got the information. – Jonesey95 (talk) 13:06, 8 May 2016 (UTC)

I wouldn't have mentioned these example scenarios if I hadn't personally run into problems when I tried to obtain specific editions of old books on the international market.

Ad "invalid ISBN in WorldCat" - I wasn't talking about WorldCat at all. WorldCat is a great resource, but often enough I don't find books listed there although I know they exist (because I own copies of them or find references to them elsewhere).

Ad "multiple editions with same ISBN", yes, specifying the edition is definitely helpful, but knowing that an ISBN was used for more than one edition is helpful as well. People often take it for granted that an ISBN isn't used for multiple editions, so trying to obtain a book, they might search for the ISBN only. Some books don't specify the edition (or in ambiguous ways - in particular with translations). Also, sometimes editions aren't given in used book listings, and not knowing that an ISBN is used for multiple editions a buyer may end up with the wrong book.

Ad "multiple ISBNs in the template", quite to the contrary, if a book actually has multiple ISBNs (not for different editions or output formats, but for exactly the same book, the very book an editor is citing from), only specifying one of those ISBNs is causing trouble, because different people will refer to it under different numbers, and searching for the book, a researcher or buyer knowing only one of them may only find a fraction of listings. Also, not knowing this fact, he might come to the conclusion that there were several different editions of a book while in reality there is only one.

That's why I think that it would be most helpful to record such oddities (if known) in some systematic and machine-readable form in the template. It will enable readers to make more sense of invalid ISBNs as well as valid ISBNs, which are used in invalid ways. Also, it would allow us to develop more specific guidelines how to deal with the various scenarios.

--Matthiaspaul (talk) 14:07, 8 May 2016 (UTC)

I'm personally always agreeable that we should have parameter values which include more semantic information. So in general, your proposal seems good. --Izno (talk) 13:50, 8 May 2016 (UTC)

The question is this: did the original contributor actually consult the source with the wrong isbn? If s/he did, then this is the isbn as published, and the "ignore-isbn-error" applies. The point is not to make sure the isbn as provided by the publisher is right; the point is to provide a source that supports text in a Wikipedia article. Now an editor may find a correct identifier. If and only if s/he actually consulted the same source with the correct isbn, the wrong isbn and the accompanying error flag should be removed, and the new identifier should replace it. If the editor only found a correct identifier through a search, both the original isbn and the new identifier should be in the citation. Because only one source has been consulted: the one with the wrong isbn. And all that is off-topic as relates to this page, because they affect verifiability, not presentation. There has been one proposal that is actually relevant to this page: let's present to readers the IgnoreISBN flag. That way they will know that something is wrong with the isbn, and editors may also be immediately aware that this is a matter needing attention.

As also stated above, some ISBN search engines (Google Books is one of them) sometimes throw an error with correct isbns. I can only surmise that this is because the particular isbn has been entered in the Google Books database with a specific mask, and if it is queried as say, a non-hyphenated number it is going to return an error. 72.43.99.138 (talk) 16:05, 8 May 2016 (UTC)

Keep in mind that there is no mandatory universal isbn repository. RR Bowker does maintain one, but unfortunately, national isbn agencies (or publishers) are under no obligation to provide the info to Bowker. AFAIK it is done voluntarily, and this may be another source of isbn errors that are not really errors. 72.43.99.138 (talk) 16:13, 8 May 2016 (UTC)

It's perhaps worth pointing out that Bowker does have a tool to interconvert 10 and 13 digit ISBNs. You can also use the tool to produce a standard hyphenation, e.g. given a non-hyphenated 13 digit code, input it to get the hyphenated 10 digit code and then input that to get the hyphenated 13 digit code. Peter coxhead (talk) 16:39, 8 May 2016 (UTC)

I'm afraid I must require proof that there is an ISBN hyphenation converter. The reason for my skepticism? 3 of the 5 isbn elements (registration group, registrant and publication) are fields of variable length (www.isbn-international.org/content/what-isbn). Any hyphenation-convertion scheme would have an unwieldy number of possible cases. 72.43.99.138 (talk) 17:04, 8 May 2016 (UTC)

Can we please discuss hyphenation in a separate discussion? It is irrelevant to ISBN error-checking as it is currently implemented. Thanks. – Jonesey95 (talk) 01:10, 9 May 2016 (UTC)

??? Even though hyphens/spaces are for readability purposes only (www.isbn-international.org/sites/default/files/ISBN%20Manual%202012%20-corr.pdf#page=8), incorrectly hyphenating (or spacing, if not using hyphens) a valid ISBN may cause an "ISBN not found" error in some sites. How is this not pertinent in CS1 ISBN error-checking? 65.88.88.126 (talk) 13:00, 9 May 2016 (UTC)

Just a quick note. In some cases the invalid ISBN was used by worldcat at some point. That does not make it valid nor it provides any proof that this ISBN was ever actually connected to the book. In these cases the ISBN was only used to find the book in worldcat. OCLC is a better choice for that.

Moreover, we mainly need ISBNs to help readers retrieve a reference. We should use the way that makes it easier to spot a book. An invalid ISBN could rarerly be of any help. -- Magioladitis (talk) 18:20, 9 May 2016 (UTC)

Er, what? OCLC operates Worldcat. Worldcat records are entered in the vast majority of cases by institutions such as libraries, universities, publishing companies, etc. who actually hold the item in question. As has been explained several times above, a so-called "invalid" ISBN may not be invalid at all. Nor can all valid ISBNs be found by using any one service. Bowker, whose Books-in-Print contains over 20 million records, certainly is not a complete ISBN repository, and also lists ISBNs that would appear "invalid" for a variety of reasons. The validity of the ISBN may make the citation harder to verify (and that should be noted), but does not automatically disqualify it. Other identifiers can/should be used. But until an editor actually consults the source with the proper identifier, the wrong ISBN has to stay, because it was published as such, and therefore it may be found as such. 72.43.99.130 (talk) 20:09, 9 May 2016 (UTC)

"But until an editor actually consults the source with the proper identifier" So as soon as we can provide proper ASIN and OCLC numbers the invalid ISBN becomes useless. -- Magioladitis (talk) 22:08, 9 May 2016 (UTC)

And to reply to an argument written above: Yes, I 've seen a lot of cases where the ignore-isbn-error is misused. It was even used to hide typos or other kind of errors. -- Magioladitis (talk) 22:11, 9 May 2016 (UTC)

We are not talking about typos, missing digits or other malformed ISBNs. If an item is in Category:CS1 maint: Ignored ISBN errors it does not necessarily follow that it contains invalid ISBNs. The only criterion for inclusion is a citation that uses the undocumented parameter |ignore-isbn-error=. The only authoritative ISBN error-checking is the one indicated here:

"Appendix 1: Check digit calculation and distribution of ranges" (PDF). ISBN User's Manual (6th International ed.). London: International ISBN Agency. 2012. pp. 27–31. ISBN 978-92-95055-02-5. Retrieved 2016-05-10.

Any ISBN error checking that does not exactly follow this 4-page ruleset is prone to be itself erroneous, and should be very carefully checked. There are cases, too many to be comfortable, where a valid ISBN cannot be found through some service or other or looks invalid. Blindly removing non-malformed ISBNs is not the right procedure, unless someone consults the same edition with a different correct identifier. 72.43.99.146 (talk) 14:47, 10 May 2016 (UTC)

I don't see a clear consensus that an ASIN or OCLC is so much better than an invalid ISBN that the ISBN information can be safely removed so I've reinstated that information. These are not reverts - I haven't removed the ASIN or OCLC. I've also added some documentation to Category:CS1 maint: Ignored ISBN errors.

TuxLibNit (talk) 02:14, 14 May 2016 (UTC)

bug fix in |vauthors= / |veditors= validation code

I've been working on an AWB script to cleanup Category:CS1 maint: Multiple names: authors list. In the process I've discovered and, I think, remedied a bug in the Vancouver style validation code.

Cite journal comparison
Wikitext	`{{cite journal\|doi=10.1056/NEJM200108023450501\|issue=5\|journal=New England J Medicine\|pages=311–318\|pmid=11484687\|title=A randomized, controlled trial of surgery for temporal-lobe epilepsy\|vauthors=Wiebe S, Blume WT, Girvin JP, Eliasziw M. A\|volume=345\|year=2001}}`
Live	Wiebe S, Blume WT, Girvin JP, Eliasziw M A (2001). "A randomized, controlled trial of surgery for temporal-lobe epilepsy". New England J Medicine. 345 (5): 311–318. doi:10.1056/NEJM200108023450501. PMID 11484687. `{{cite journal}}`: Vancouver style error: punctuation in name 4 (help)
Sandbox	Wiebe S, Blume WT, Girvin JP, Eliasziw M A (2001). "A randomized, controlled trial of surgery for temporal-lobe epilepsy". New England J Medicine. 345 (5): 311–318. doi:10.1056/NEJM200108023450501. PMID 11484687. `{{cite journal}}`: Vancouver style error: punctuation in name 4 (help)

—Trappist the monk (talk) 23:36, 14 May 2016 (UTC)

embargo date bug fix

The new code to validate the format of an embargo date is flawed. I've fixed it in the sandbox. I left in a line of code that preset the embargo date to the year 9999. The purpose of that was debug test in the development of the code. I neglected to remove it. So, all |pmc= identifiers are being treated as if the cs1|2 template has |embargo=9999.

Cite journal comparison
Wikitext	`{{cite journal\|pmc=12345\|title=Title}}`
Live	"Title". PMC 12345. `{{cite journal}}`: Cite journal requires `\|journal=` (help)
Sandbox	"Title". PMC 12345. `{{cite journal}}`: Cite journal requires `\|journal=` (help)

—Trappist the monk (talk) 01:07, 18 April 2016 (UTC)

is this going to be fixed any time soon? —Chris Capoccia ^T⁄_C 12:20, 20 April 2016 (UTC)

fixed in live module.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 15:34, 23 April 2016 (UTC)

@Trappist the monk: Has this been fixed for CS2 as well, {{citation}} does not seem to be generating the URL from the PMC here?

"Preface: Situating...", Medical History, 43 (3): 283–85, 1999a, PMC 1044146, PMID 16562317

Thanks Rjwilmsi 14:52, 16 May 2016 (UTC)

That functionality has never been part of cs2:

Citation comparison
Wikitext	`{{citation\|issue=3\|journal=Medical History\|pages=283–85\|pmc=1044146\|pmid=16562317\|title=Preface: Situating...\|volume=43\|year=1999a}}`
Live	"Preface: Situating...", Medical History, 43 (3): 283–85, 1999a, PMC 1044146, PMID 16562317
Sandbox	"Preface: Situating...", Medical History, 43 (3): 283–85, 1999a, PMC 1044146, PMID 16562317

(hmm, there is a bug in the page rendering code; but that's a different topic).

—Trappist the monk (talk) 15:05, 16 May 2016 (UTC)

Forgot this: To get the cs2 style, use {{cite journal}} and set |mode=cs2:

"Preface: Situating...", Medical History, 43 (3): 283–85, 1999a, PMC 1044146, PMID 16562317

—Trappist the monk (talk) 15:08, 16 May 2016 (UTC)

cs2 journal cite page rendering bug

When {{citation}} is used to cite a journal (or any alias of |work=) and the template does not have |author= or |editor= parameters then it renders page numbers out of order. This is fixed in the sandbox:

Citation comparison
Wikitext	`{{citation\|issue=3\|journal=Medical History\|pages=283–85\|pmc=1044146\|pmid=16562317\|title=Preface: Situating...\|volume=43\|year=1999a}}`
Live	"Preface: Situating...", Medical History, 43 (3): 283–85, 1999a, PMC 1044146, PMID 16562317
Sandbox	"Preface: Situating...", Medical History, 43 (3): 283–85, 1999a, PMC 1044146, PMID 16562317

—Trappist the monk (talk) 15:23, 16 May 2016 (UTC)