This template is within the scope of WikiProject American Open Wheel Racing, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of open wheelauto racing in the United States, with an emphasis on IndyCar racing, on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.American Open Wheel RacingWikipedia:WikiProject American Open Wheel RacingTemplate:WikiProject American Open Wheel RacingAmerican Open Wheel Racing
After using a "list" form from 2007-2011 for the race summaries section, I think it is time to be bold and move the IndyCar season articles into a cleaner, more relevant, dynamic, and visually appealing status, up-to-par with other similar projects (NFL, etc.) for 2012. With that in mind, I've created the new Template:IndyCarSeriesracebox, loosely based on the Template:Americanfootballbox. This will be the item that will be used to show the top three race results and race information. It willmake the page length a little shorter, and it will default into "hide" mode to prevent clutter. While it may look complicated at first, it will actually be simple to use, as it is merely "plug and chug" entries, and since it is a wiki template, it actually saves a little bit of space. Here is my example, and I filled it in with the info for the 2011 Indy 500. The first race it will be used for is St. Pete. Doctorindy (talk) 18:01, 16 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Race Summary: Ganassi teammates Scott Dixon and Dario Franchitti led 124 laps, but the race came down to the final few laps as several drivers pitted for fuel. Rookie J. R. Hildebrand took the lead with three laps to go, and led at the white flag. Coming out of the final turn on the final lap, Hildebrand hit the outside wall, and Dan Wheldon drove by to take the victory, which would turn out to be his last.
Ratings: 4.0, 6.71 million viewers (4.3 overnight)
A few things that immediately stand out to me:
1. Don't make it full page-width. I'm on 1080p and there is a LOT of middle white-space between the left-aligned data section and the right-aligned results.
2. No need for line breaks in the leaders and cautions sections.
3. No need for separate entries for miles and kilometers, use the conversion template for that.
(1) I can experiment with the width. That should be no problem. (2) The line breaks in the leaders/cautions can be cleaned up, however, I was having trouble getting it to format correctly without the linebreaks. That's a minor fix, and I can clean that up. (3) That's a problem, I think. There does not seem to be support to nest the convert template command inside the larger template. The original working table I had in my sandbox had that, and it kept blowing up the syntax. With some time, I can try some more, and perhaps figure that one out. Doctorindy (talk) 13:27, 17 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I think I have fixed the miles/km converter with an if/then statement, it appears to be working in usage, although it still gives an error in the "raw" form. Still tweaking, and it should be completed soon. Doctorindy (talk) 16:15, 17 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Also I wanted to note that the car/number colors are "Optional." If the user does not input anything into that field, it reverts to normal black number on the grey table background. It seems that color scheme is popular throughout the project, but not completely utilized in all articles. This allows it to be either way. Same with the flags. The flagicons are completely optional, and are actually user-input. Doctorindy (talk) 16:18, 17 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Fixed the table width and auto centering issues. I set it tentatively at a fixed width of 900px, which should be in the safe area for both 4:3 and 16:9 monitors. Doctorindy (talk) 17:11, 17 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks to an outsider, a syntax fix was made to correct the template error for the 'convert' commands. I have now adjusted the template the have the lap distance, race distance, and average speed all be single inputs with a conversion to SI units. Doctorindy (talk) 16:28, 20 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
A tiny tweak moved the "Weather" and "Attendance" lines fromt he header to under statistics, where is seems more pertinent. It does not change any syntax or input requirements. Doctorindy (talk) 16:38, 24 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Another tiny tweak...moved "Pole Position" into the bottom section. It's always the longest line of the top section, and always seems to wrap into a second line. It made it too crowded, and seemed to interfer with the Top 3 box. Now it can use the whole length of the infobox, and more information (car, time, speed, etc.) can be shown if we want. Doctorindy (talk) 15:40, 7 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Since there are multiple engine manufacturers, shouldn't the top three finishers section have a column for the engine used? Same for the Aero Kits in 2013, they'll need to be coded in as well, and a potential switch added so that the Aero Kit section can be hidden for 2012. TheChrisDRants•Edits10:51, 28 May 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I thought of that too. It can be added quite easily, however, it will make the template wider than it already is. it took several iterations to get the table to work well on multiple platforms (16x9 monitors, old style square monitors, ipads, etc.), so I was reluctant to add it. Note that in the actual race report articles, we do show engines in the full long style box score. Since the infobox/table is only supposed to be a quick reference of the top three on the main page, and not a full listing of all pertinent information, I think it is ok to have it left out. Doctorindy (talk) 15:28, 7 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
