Template talk:US DOS Background Notes

Usage

• Place {{StateDept}} in articles that incorporate text from the U.S. State Department's Background Notes (see below). The template should go in the "References" section or somewhere else near the bottom of the article. -- Gyrofrog (talk) 05:43, 8 October 2005 (UTC)

Description

Many of Wikipedia's country-related articles (e.g., Demographics of Egypt) contain text from the U.S. Department of State's Background Notes (link). I wanted to use a template similar to {{CIA World Factbook}} (for CIA World Factbook}} or {{Loc}} (for Library of Congress Country Studies). I couldn't find such a template so I've created one.

I have also added this template to Wikipedia:Template messages/Sources of articles, which is where I would have expected to find this.

Originally I had added a variable (or whatever "{{{1}}}" is called) in which the user could put the name of the country. But as the link points to the list of Background Notes, and not that of an individual country, I removed this feature (anyway, neither {{CIA World Factbook}} nor {{Loc}} work this way). -- Gyrofrog (talk) 05:09, 8 October 2005 (UTC)

• P.S. I intentionally omitted any image bearing the official seal of the State Dept. I recall reading that public domain does not apply to any official governmental seals and, in fact, that it is illegal to use such seals in a non-official capacity. (I think I mentioned this on the Talk page of a template that does use such a seal.) -- Gyrofrog (talk) 05:13, 8 October 2005 (UTC)

Optional URL parameter

I added two three new parameters to this template; url, title, and an unnamed parameter for labelling sections and lists. I created a /doc subpage as well, and updated the template to use it. --HughCharlesParker (talk - contribs) 21:01, 16 October 2008 (UTC)

Limited to part of State Dept?

Why does this template presume the source is State's "Background Notes"? Surely there is other content available at the State Dept that is not in Background Notes but still qualifies as a PD source. This is out of sync with other Federal Agency source templates such as {{DoE}} or {{USGS}}. What's the template for State Dept sources that are not part of Background Notes? - Keith D. Tyler ¶ 20:35, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

Agreed. I moved this one to {{US DOS Background Notes}} (though keeping the redirect for backwards compatibility). Then, I created {{US DOS}} as a generic template. Superm401 - Talk 03:57, 8 April 2013 (UTC)