Template:Infobox German place/Instructions

The template Infobox_German_location is meant for cities, towns and municipalities in Germany, and their subdivisions. It makes it possible to copy town-data from other infoboxes, such as:

from German wiki de:Vorlage:Infobox Ort in Deutschland;
from English wiki {{Infobox Town DE}}.

For many fields, a simple copy-and-paste will suffice. But this template contains a few extra fields, and there are a number of translation issues that you must be aware of.

Parameters

Parameters with German names (plus geographical co-ordinates parameters) are the same names used in the German wiki infobox. Parameters with only English names are only used in the English wiki. There are English-name aliases for many of the German-name parameters (more in the future), so either the German or English parameter name can be used, depending on copying infobox data from other sources.

Required parameters are displayed in orange.

Delete any unneeded fields when using the full template syntax.

Name

English name of location. Use only if name is different from article name.

German_name or local_name

German name of location. Use only if name is different from English name.

Art or type

Needed. Type of location. Also used for article categorisation. Accepts German and English names. Accepted values:

Municipality / Gemeinde - default
Town / Stadt - if the municipality has town-rights (ie. it appears on this list)
City - towns with more than 100,000 people (ie. it appears on this list)
Amt / Gemeindeverwaltungsverband / Samtgemeinde / Verbandsgemeinde / Verwaltungsgemeinschaft / Verwaltungsverband - collective municipality
Ortsteil / Stadtteil / Borough / Quarter etc. - subdivision of a city, town or municipality

City or Town or Municipality

Used for places that are subdivisions of cities, towns or municipalities. Use the field name that corresponds with the higher administrative unit (e.g. "City = Berlin" for parts of Berlin, "Town = Memmingen" for parts of Memmingen, "Municipality = Sassenburg" for parts of Sassenburg).

borough

Used for places that are subdivisions of boroughs of cities. A borough (German: Stadtbezirk, Ortsbezirk, Bezirk) is a subdivision of a large city. Boroughs are subdivided into quarters (German: Stadtteil).

image_photo or repres_image

The top image, a representative photo of the location: skyline, notable landmark, etc. The image used should be wider than it is tall, to keep the infobox as compact as possible. No wikilinks.

imagesize

Avoid. Use only when it is necessary to reduce the size of the above image from its default value of 268px. Tall images could be reduced, such as 220px, to balance the infobox appearance.

image_caption

Caption underneath representative image. Keep as short as possible. Allows wikilinks.

Wappen or image_coa

Coat of arms image. No wikilinks. Leave blank if image is unknown or unavailable. If the location simply does not have a coat of arms, put: Wappen = none.

lat_deg, lat_min, lat_sec, lon_deg, lon_min, lon_sec

Deprecated. Geographical co-ordinates of location. Superseded by the (required) "coordinates" field.

Bundesland or state

Needed Federal state to which the location belongs. No wikilinks. Accepts English and German names, translates many names to English.

Regierungsbezirk or region

Name of the administrative region (Regierungsbezirk) that the location belongs to. Not used for all states. Regierungsbezirk articles on the English wiki are named "xxxx (region)", so only the name of the region is needed here (without wikilinks) and the infobox should link to the correct article.

Kreis / Landkreis or district

Needed. District that the location belongs to. If the location is an urban district, say Kreis = urban. District articles on the English wiki are named "xxxx (district)" or without the "(district)" part. For most cases, only the name of the district (xxxx) is needed here (without wikilinks) and the infobox should link to the correct article.

Amt, Gemeindeverwaltungsverband, Samtgemeinde, Verbandsgemeinde, Verwaltungsgemeinschaft, Verwaltungsverband

Some locations belong to a collective municipality of some sort. Fill in the corresponding field and delete all unused fields.

Gliederung or divisions

Local subdivisions. When copying towninfo directly from the German wiki, please translate content of this field to English and remove any red links.

Bürgermeister or mayor

Name of the mayor/lord mayor/etc. Wikilinks automatically generated if the entry exists.

Bürgermeistertitel

Title: Mayor / Bürgermeister, Lord Mayor / Oberbürgermeister, etc. Use wikilinks only if linking to a specific article (eg. Lord Mayor). Default is "Mayor"

Partei or party

Political party of Mayor/Lord Mayor/etc. Use standard party abbreviations (CDU, SPD, Green, FDP, PDS, FWG, etc.) and the correct wikilinks should be generated (if not, leave a comment on the template talk page). For independent politicians, say Partei=ind

ruling_party1, ruling_party2, ruling_party3

Party or parties that govern this location. Fill in this field in the same way as the Partei field.

Fläche or area

Area in square kilometres. Will automatically calculate value in square miles. Enter value without spaces or commas, otherwise an error message will be displayed in the area field.

area_metro

Are of metropolitan area in square kilometres. Will automatically calculate value in square miles. Enter value without spaces or commas, otherwise an error message will be displayed in the area field. Only the bigger cities will have a need for this field.

Höhe or elevation

Elevation in metres. Will automatically calculate value in feet. For some entries, a range of elevation values is given in the German wiki. To prevent an error in the conversion to feet, any range values must use a simple minus sign instead of any other dash characters. Elevation ranges will not be converted to feet.

Gemeindeschlüssel

The Gemeindeschlüssel is the code for the municipalities, cities, districts etc. as used by the German statistics offices. For municipalities and cities this is an 8-digit number, either formatted "XX X XX XXX" or unformatted. This infobox uses this code to retrieve the municipality population from a database, see {{Population Germany}}. The code is not displayed. It is required for independent municipalities and cities. For dependent areas and settlements (quarters, boroughs, villages) use the "Einwohner" or "population" field.

Einwohner or population

Population. Don't use this for independent municipalities and cities, use the "Gemeindeschlüssel" field instead. If area is also given, population density will also be calculated. Enter value without spaces or commas, otherwise an error message will be displayed in the density field.

Stand

Date for population value. Enter in YYYY-MM-DD format (eg. 2006-12-31)

pop_metro

Population of metropolitan area. Only the bigger cities will have a need for this field.

pop_urban

Population of urban area. Only the bigger cities will have a need for this field.

pop_ref

Source for population statistic(s). Needed to make it easier to update population values in the future. The German wiki does not use this field, but the earlier English template {{Infobox Town DE}} does. This field must use the <ref>-code, citing the document or website. When this field is filled in, you must add a references section at the end of the article if it does not already have one. (eg. with {{reflist}})
Citation examples:

Minimum requirement: pop_ref=<ref>[http://www.samplesite.de Population source]</ref>
Expanded syntax: <ref>{{cite web |title=Bevölkerung im Regierungsbezirk Köln |url=http://www.lds.nrw.de/statistik/datenangebot/Regionen/amtlichebevoelkerungszahlen/rp3_juni06.html |author=Landesamt für Datenverarbeitung und Statistik Nordrhein-Westfalen |accessdate=2007-04-25 |language=German}}</ref>

Kfz or licence

Car number plate code for the location (1-3 capital letters).

Vorwahl or area_code

Telephone area code. If various values are given, display as a simple range (if possible). Avoid descriptions of each code.

PLZ or postal_code

Postal code. If various values are given, display as a simple range (if possible). Avoid descriptions of each code.

year

Year of foundation, NOT the year of the first recorded mention of the location.

Website or website

Official website of the location. Trim displayed URL as much as possible. (eg. Website=[http://www.samplesite.de samplesite.de])

Lageplan or image_plan

Zoomed-in map image displaying location within a region of Germany (e.g., a state or a Kreis), with optional width, plansize=265px. If not provided, a mapframe map will be shown.

Lageplanbeschreibung or plantext

Caption for map image given by Lageplan. The template will attempt to automatically create a caption, using values given for other fields. If the caption does not match with the image, use this field to manually enter a caption.

_noautocat

Give a value of "yes" to prevent auto-categorisation. Used only on draft articles (ie. in the User space)

Non-displayed fields

The German wiki has a number of variables that are not displayed here if copied over:

PLZ-alt Older postcode(s)
NUTS NUTS value: "DEXXX"
LOCODE UN/LOCODE value: "DE XXX"