Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Infoboxes/Archive 2

Archive 1

Archive 2

Archive 3

Archive 4

Archive 5

Ideas for simplifying infobox design

Hi Folks,

In my userspace, I've been playing with some ideas for simplifying the design of infobox templates. I've written a brief introduction to these ideas here, including many examples adapted from existing infoboxes. Of the four infobox templates that I've experimentally adapted from elsewhere, two required only simple template syntax.

I'd be grateful for any comments. Jakew 21:48, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

A clever idea, certainly; but it would probably be prohibitive to support infoboxes that have various sorts of complicated code tricks inside via this sort of syntax. For the more convoluted cases, raw parserFunctions are likely to be more maintainable than a meta-templated version of themselves.

As an aside, see this for a more brute-force approach to infobox standardization (albeit on a more limited scale). Kirill 00:20, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

I think you're correct in stating that very complicated infoboxes would probably not benefit from this approach. However, based upon an informal survey of existing infoboxes, I estimate that only 10-20% fall into this category. I'd guess that'll be the case for new infoboxes, too.

It occurs to me that WikiProjects which already have complicated infoboxes (and perhaps standardisation templates as in the example you gave) will probably have little use for this approach (though the entry templates might perhaps be useful). But I suspect these are in the minority.

Two questions spring to mind. Firstly, will these templates (in some form or another) be useful to people in creating any new infoboxes? And if so, where is the best place for them & their documentation (for example, a sub-page of this project) so that they can be easily found by those who might find them useful? Jakew 13:30, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

That looks highly valuable, Jakew. I assume it could be subst'd so infoboxes can grow beyond the template? I say move it to the public namespace and add something to the project page - see if other editors run with it. Vagary 01:12, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

Hi Vagary, thanks for your comments. I've moved the page to Wikipedia:WikiProject Infoboxes/Simple templates, and I'm in the process of moving all the templates. Hopefully these will be useful to someone.

My apologies for the very long delay in replying! Jakew (talk) 00:03, 30 April 2008 (UTC)

Default infobox styling

A while back I reforged {{infobox}} as a general-purpose infobox metatemplate, and now that it's starting to see more widespread usage there's a discussion underway about what default styling should be used. I set the original defaults based directly off of the default styles used in {{Navbox}}, since I presume they've undergone a very extensive debate and because I personally find them quite useful. However, there are a couple of editors who've requested that the default infobox to be colorless. I know this wikiproject specifically disclaims being about global discussion of default styles, but since I figure most people participating here will be interested in the subject I'm canvassing here for more input into the discussion over at Template talk:Infobox. Bryan Derksen (talk) 16:49, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

Customisable infobox colours/styles

Changes have just been made by an editor to {{Infobox Former Country}} where it is possible to add extra CSS code. One reason given was to address some differences in box presentation between Firefox and IE, which is on its own a good thing since that has been bugging me for a while. But this goes one step further and allows editors to choose different colours for the infobox, which I believe to be a bad thing (see discussion). A modified version of {{Infobox Country}} has also been made with these features and can be seen in action at the Wales article. What do other people think about this level of customisability? I'd like to undo these changes to the Former Country template, but not before discussion. 52 Pickup (deal) 09:20, 8 April 2008 (UTC)

The same look article to article is kind of the point of a standard infobox. If someone would like to introduce color into the template code to "spruce up" the infobox's appearance, then it should be agreed upon and done on a template wide level. Customizable individual infoboxes are just not a good idea. It is so much better to have a consistent look page to page than some different custom colored infoboxes from page to page. —MJCdetroit ^(yak) 11:57, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

I don't like it, it's against the point of having a standardised infobox. {{Infobox Musical artist}} has colour changing options which seem to work quite well, but they are agreed on so it's not just random. Severo^TC 12:18, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

This is starting to get out of hand. See Template talk:Infobox Country for further discussion and a lot of drama. 52 Pickup (deal) 11:55, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

The problem is that Template:Infobox Country did not allow styled borders, and so some users, many of them from Wales (where Talk:Wales has more drama about this, as well) wrote and started to use a template-fork: Template:Infobox Country styled. A disagreement began about whether this was useful and whether individual projects should go ahead with these kinds of forks. The template has now been nominated for deletion: the template's entry on the Templates for Deletion page, bringing about more drama, accusations of canvassing for votes to keep, and angry exchanges in many places, including the TfD entry. The whole mess does neither anyone nor wikipedia any credit regarding the collaborative way of doing things.  DDStretch  (talk) 12:14, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Is there an infobox anywhere that does allow individually-styled borders? I've had no luck finding one so far. Indeed, the mess does nobody any credit, but I guess this is what happens when process is ignored and collaboration is bypassed. 52 Pickup (deal) 12:21, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

(undent) Since there has been no solution so far, I've set up a RFC: link - 52 Pickup (deal) 21:12, 27 April 2008 (UTC)

External links

Discussion at Wikipedia talk:External links#Repetitive, redundant links, concerning external links in infoboxes. A few editors dislike the duplication between external links in infoboxes and the "External links" section, and one editor dislikes all external links in infoboxes. Input might be useful. -- Quiddity (talk) 20:45, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

Lists of infoboxes

There seem to be three lists of infoboxes:

1. Wikipedia:WikiProject Infoboxes/Directory of Infoboxes merged into the category system, redirected to Wikipedia:List of infoboxes
2. Wikipedia:List of infoboxes
3. Wikipedia:Manual of Style (infoboxes)#List of templates

• (Plus Category:Infobox templates)

Is there a preferred location, that these three manually created lists could be merged/redirected to? I imagine that the bad duplication, is the primary reason these are all so unkempt.

(I suggest moving them all to location #1, in the layout/style of #2, as that seems to include the worthwhile information, and allow them all to be easily watched). Thoughts? -- Quiddity (talk) 21:09, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

Is the category not enough? Severo^TC 21:16, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

That's another option (and fine by me). I just assumed that the obsessive list makers would demand a manually created location ;)

It would definitely simplify things... and a mw:Extension:CategoryTree could be added anywhere necessary... -- Quiddity (talk) 21:34, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

List of infoboxes definitely needs to be killed, I agree. It is one of those pages that can be outdated quickly, and categorizing all the infoboxes is best. But, the Infobox category is quite hard to navigate (for me), and I have found several boxes that aren't listed in the categ. The latest is example is Infobox:Television film--I was searching for 'TV movie' and it took a long time to discover it. StevePrutz (talk) 03:23, 16 June 2008 (UTC)

I'd suggest that infoboxes are most easily found (and listings kept uptodate by participants) by finding the appropriate WikiProject. We could put a note to that effect at the top of the category?

As for uncategorized infoboxes, hopefully thats something this merge will at least partially clear up :) -- Quiddity (talk) 18:56, 16 June 2008 (UTC)

Good call, I would make it so. The wikiprojects are fairly proud of their respective infoboxes. StevePrutz (talk) 02:33, 17 June 2008 (UTC)

On a related note, I just found this category: [Category:Infoboxes]. It looks a bit stagnant. Perhaps delete or redirect? StevePrutz (talk) 06:28, 17 June 2008 (UTC)

I've been doing some minor cleanup of the categories. I'll get to those merges today I think. -- Quiddity (talk) 01:18, 25 June 2008 (UTC)

I recently found Template:Missing-taxobox. If it is worthy of existance, it should go on the Infoboxwatch. StevePrutz (talk) 03:17, 25 June 2008 (UTC)

By the way: Great job, awesome show! StevePrutz (talk) 06:13, 25 June 2008 (UTC)

Updates

• I've overhauled Template:The Infoboxwatch. I'm going to let that sit for at a few days and ask a few questions elsewhere, and then start planning out a merge of the 3 lists above either into a single list (format and location undecided) or just into the category. Just fyi, and hope that's ok with all. Will update plans here before I go hog-wild. :) -- Quiddity (talk) 05:38, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

• I've asked at Wikipedia talk:List of infoboxes/Proposed whether they use that page, and whether its purpose could more usefully be merged to here. -- Quiddity (talk) 18:52, 16 June 2008 (UTC)

  I'm still not quite sure what to do with this page. It appears unused - I'm planning on tagging as historical and redirecting here(?). (In use)

WikiProject Infoboxes

• I've re-centered the category scheme around Category:WikiProject Infoboxes (cattree above). -- Quiddity (talk) 01:18, 25 June 2008 (UTC)

Good work on the categorisation reworking! I think you raise some good points at Wikipedia talk:List of infoboxes/Proposed and I wonder if it's possible to rescope this project to cater more broadly for what Wikipedia:List of infoboxes/Proposed aims to achieve. Also, I'd kill Wikipedia:Manual of Style (infoboxes)#List of templates. Severo^TC 00:45, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

All merged and redirected to the main Category. Hope that worked out, without causing any problems. :) -- Quiddity (talk) 21:48, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

Since the parent page has been redirected, I propose moving Wikipedia:List of infoboxes/Proposed to Wikipedia:WikiProject Infoboxes/Proposals and rescoping the project to cater. Severo^TC 22:06, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

Agreed.

Would merging Help:Infobox to here, also be a good idea? I've been pondering it (as a weeks in the future task). -- Quiddity (talk) 04:18, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

I think I've completed all the tweaks I feel confident making. Hopefully nothing got broken in the process, and everything is a little easier to find and less outdated. Apologies to any who miss the raw lists. Feel free to revert any of my category resortings (in particular: I moved 4 of the Wikipedia infobox cleanup subcats into Category:Infoboxes needing cleanup, but that might be a mistake for any number of reasons) or general changes; or ask me for explanations to missed/incorrect changes. I'll add new threads for anything else. Thanks :) -- Quiddity (talk) 04:18, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

use of footnotes on infoboxes to avoid drive-by edits

Hi there, let's see if you can solve some doubts I have some infoboxes. There are some controversial articles, like Crown of Aragon, where readers will see the article and change parts of the infobox to what they think is a more correct version (in this case, the capital and the caption of the flag), and then think that wikipedia is biased when their changes are reverted.

This is currently solved by me by adding references to the polemical points, so people will check the sources first and not make drive-by edits without a good reason.

Is this an appropiate solution? Is it better to improve the article with better sections (which has to be done anyways) and then move all the references out of the infobox? will this solve the crive-by edit problems? Is it adequate to leave a footnote or two on the most controversial statements where there have been more well-intentioned drive-by edits? Do you know of cases where they have tried any of this? --Enric Naval (talk) 20:11, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

In the case of this example, I'd first like to refer you to the instructions for Infobox Former Country, which has a separate field for footnotes that must be used sparingly (eg. Austria-Hungary. Also, the guidelines that should be followed for using the template are also given - and at the moment, the article does not follow these guidelines. One major problem is the use of near-complete sentences in the box (that flag caption is way too long). This makes the whole thing very hard to follow.

And never try to shoehorn facts into a template. No template is perfect and it is better to say nothing than to present false information. 52 Pickup (deal) 11:11, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

I'll answer on the RfC that I opened Talk:Crown_of_Aragon#should_the_infobox_be_removed_for_being_an_inaccurate_summary_for_a_difficult_to_indentify_entity to keep all discussion in one place --Enric Naval (talk) 01:00, 30 April 2008 (UTC)

Infobox Windmill

Is there anyone who could make an infobox for use on articles on individual windmills? Please message me on my talk page if you can help. Mjroots (talk) 09:45, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

I've tried to create the template, but when I try to add it to an article it won't display correctly. The instructions given for creation are as clear as mud. See here and here for what I've done so far. Mjroots (talk) 07:47, 30 April 2008 (UTC)

Template:Chinese much too dominating

I have by now attempted in numerous ways to garner support for my contention that Template:Chinese, being a linguistics template, is way too dominating on the articles where it is being used. Could perhaps some people here who are versed in the guidelines, ideals and history of Wikipedia infoboxes give their opinion on this matter? __meco (talk) 07:54, 30 April 2008 (UTC)

Question re multiple infoboxes.

Is there anything that either this project has generated or that it uses in the way of guidelines for the use of multiple infoboxes in a single article? - J Greb (talk) 00:55, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

What article are you looking at? The guidelines say that infoboxes should be used at the relevant sub-heading. For example, I might write an article about railway stations in Wikitown. Neither railway station may qualify for it's own article and it may work well as one article. I could put a railway station infobox at the relevant subheading. Severo^TC 13:08, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

There's a lot of them. The one that pushed the question was Doctor Fate, since reduced to one 'box. An example of what was there can be seen with Blue Beetle.

In general it's a recurring situation with Comics articles where the magazine series is lumped in with the character or team. As opposed to Anime/Manga where an "all-in-one" 'box is used. - J Greb (talk) 13:47, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

Template:Infobox Restaurant

I need some help setting up a placeholder for images in this template. I've tried twice and I'm not setting it up correctly.Shinerunner (talk) 22:18, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

FritzBot and ongoing attempt to document Mexican municipalities

There is a lively discussion about the proposal to have a bot create articles for all of the worlds documented towns and villages, see Wikipedia:Village pump (proposals)/FritzpollBot. There are already a LOT of responses on this page and I have only scanned the various comments. This may affect my use of Wikipedia for my English classes as such a bot would create a ton of articles about Mexican towns and villages... whether such have municipal status or not. For the purposes of my classes I have standardized the municipalities with active links on the Municipalities of Mexico State page, combining and distiguishing town vs municipality information (politically they are the same) under the town's formal name. I believe this is best and students need a clear example to follow. I wrote more about my rationals for naming and organization on my user page.

As far as infoboxes... I would like to see one for towns with municipal status and towns/villages without such. Ive made a first attempt at this at the Acambay, Mexico State page, though you will have to see it in edit mode to see all the information I think needs to be in there. I have not created one for non-municipal towns/villages but such should include a line stating which municipality it belongs to. However I am not an infobox expert and some attempts I made to distiguishing town and municipality information in the boxes is not great. I would really appreciate any help I could get to improving this infobox before I start putting same on a whole bunch of articles.

I am posting a similar message to Wikipedia:WikiProject Mexico.Thelmadatter (talk) 14:37, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

I tweaked how you had {{Infobox Settlement}} displaying at Acambay, Mexico State (diff). —MJCdetroit ^(yak) 20:07, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

Little-used infobox

Hello all. During a heated discussion in which I recently participated, on an article concerning a joint media project between two nations, I came to the conclusion that a lot of the unhappiness could be quelled not only by collecting more info sources and rewording contentious language, but also by changing the infobox. I searched high and wide for an existing template that would fit the article's needs, but because it's a "special case," I didn't find one. So I was bold and made one. I wanted to get it done and deployed ASAP before revert-edit-warring led to discipline against otherwise-constructive editors. :) Now I'm wondering...what do I need to do? Is there a risk of this infobox template being deleted because of its current one-article use? In the future I think I (or anyone else) can enhance it to make it potentially usable for other joint-nation media articles, but it will never be something with wide application. Is it better to dump the template and just try to hard-code the infobox into this particular article? (I don't really want to, personally, but I'm a team player). Advice? Thanks! --hamu♥hamu (talk) 22:01, 11 June 2008 (UTC) (Update - found another article that might benefit from using this infobox. I'll have to research the subject a bit more to know for sure, but the exact same bickering that was happening on the "other" article is happening on this one, for the same reasons. I think it will have wider application, but my questions still stand! --hamu♥hamu (talk) 13:23, 12 June 2008 (UTC))

Rugby League infoboxes

There are a couple of discussions listed here and here that show the move away from one standard infobox to another. My issue is not with the process, just looking to get a second opinion on whether we are moving away from an infobox and towards a point scoring box. An example of this can be shown with Brett Kimmorley and the previous Brett Kimmorley version seen before April 24, 2008. Just looking for a little feedback basically.Londo06 15:05, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

It's positive you have quite a discussion at the project page but I'll give some feedback here from a non-RL perspective. First, I find "App-T-G-FG-P" confusing. There is no key so it's too "in-universe" for my liking. I can guess what each letter means but I think in a comprehensive encyclopaedia I shouldn't have to guess. Second, as you suggest, it may be too much information in an infobox. Infoboxes are great when they present the most interesting facts about someone (or something). Appearances and points are interesting, the composition of those points is not so interesting: put it further down in the article. Third, the use of the colours next to team names covers pretty much the same ground as WP:FLAGS. I would hesitate a guess that such use would be discouraged. I see your discussion brings a symmetrical split on that one! It's possible this is covered by WP:FLAGS already. If not, it probably should be as it could be applied to most team sport bio infoboxes (hundreds of thousands at a guess!). That said, I think the cleanup of club information is positive and, with less sub-headings within the inforbox, I think it's very smart and effective. Severo^TC 13:26, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

Many thanks for your feedback, it is also my opinion that it may well be a little confusing for the casual reader. Thankyou very much indeed for taking the time to look through the discussion and give very useful feedback, especially from a non-RL angle.Londo06 09:18, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

Infobox for confections

I was just wondering if there is an infobox to be used with confections (or candies such as the various Hershey's or Nestle products) and to be frank, it's damn hard to navigate through the seeming millions of infoboxes (perhaps there should be standardization?). Anyway, that's not why I'm here. Is there an infobox for these articles? If not, might there be someone who would create one if asked real nice like? Thanks. -- Chickenmonkey 10:39, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

One box is Template:Infobox Prepared Food Shinerunner (talk) 11:42, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

Hmm, thank you for your help, but I don't think that quite works. -- Chickenmonkey 12:01, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

Electroshock Infobox

The Electroshock infobox makes no sense. It is a collection of articles that are only very loosely related by the fact that they involve an electric shock in some form, but are otherwise not thematically related. Examples include Electroconvulsive therapy (should have a Psychiatry Infobox, if one exists), Pulsed energy weapon, Electric fence, Robert Dziekański taser incident, etc. It just doesn't hang together very well. Been trying to figure out how to propose deletion or get some other editors' eyes on it. Help? Steve Carlson^Talk 17:23, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

Well, it's not an infobox (aka Information box) but a navbox (aka navigation box). To propose deletion you would need to go to Templates for deletion and follow the instructions there. Severo^TC 22:44, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

Thanks, I just couldn't seem to find the right place to address this! Steve Carlson^Talk 08:02, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

Infobox request templates

1. {{Missing-taxobox}} (ambox style)
2. {{Needinfobox}} (ambox style)
3. {{Reqinfobox}}
4. {{Needs artist infobox}}
5. {{Needs football biography infobox}}
6. {{Needs television infobox}}
7. {{Needs venue infobox}}

(add to the list, if you know of more (not including wikiproject banners))

There are a quite a number of infobox request templates. I'm not sure what to do with them, and I wish to delegate this task to someone who knows the code and the category system better than I do.

(I'd guess that they could be merged into 1 or 2 templates, but possibly they are all useful and should continue to exist? (in which case I'll add them to the various lists...) Should probably ask elsewhere, if you're anywhere near as unsure as I am ;) -- Quiddity (talk) 03:57, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

{{Needinfobox}} needs merging into {{Reqinfobox}} - this is talk page material not main page. I prefer the style of {{Needs artist infobox}} etc. We could make one template out of them and use {{Needinfobox|artist}} and so on. Not sure about the taxobox one - I imagine it should be on the same line as standard infobox request templates, namely on the talk page. Severo^TC 09:12, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

Fix template please

Please look at Hamish & Andy (radio show). Some of the information in the Infobox doesn't show up. What's wrong with it? - Richard Cavell (talk) 02:46, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

Proposal for a revision of {{Infobox Library}}

For your information: a proposal for the revision/extension of this infobox is now open to discussion at Template_talk:Infobox_Library. Clpda (talk) 13:34, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

Infobox info needed

Is there an infobox I could use on an article about a disaster which killed almost 200 children?-- Seahamlass 13:49, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

What kind of a disaster is it? Was it an attack by some group or a natural disaster? Depending on what type it is you can either: 1. go through the list of templates and find one, or 2. go to a known attack of that type and see what kind of infobox is used and then pick it up from there. Lihaas (talk) 00:46, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

It is the Victoria Hall disaster, where 183 children were crushed to death while stampeding towards a stage after being offered free toys. the tragedy happened in Sunderland in the 19th century - and I just cannot find ANY infobox that is any help. Does anyone have any suggestions?-- Seahamlass 12:23, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

Creating Infobox

I was in the process of creating an infobox, but I don't quite know to how or where to save it on the database? I was rather lost in this documentation and alignment part. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Template:Start_infobox_page Can someone please help me? Lihaas (talk) 00:50, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Worry about the documentation second. The standard template name an infobox should have is Template:Infobox Xxxxx. Severo^TC 22:37, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

TBODY

Unresolved

I am adding microformats to a large number of infoboxes. Microformats use HTML classes, on nested elements. The only way to apply a class to several consecutive rows in a table, but not to the whole table, is to include those rows in a TBODY element (or THEAD or TFOOT, but I think those are less important, here). Is there a way to do this at present; and, if not, how would I go about requesting the addition of a mechanism for doing so? Andy Mabbett | Talk to Andy Mabbett 10:51, 24 August 2008 (UTC)

Here's a good example of a template, used as a component of a larger table, where each instance should be in a TBODY: {{LDS Temple list}}. Andy Mabbett | Talk to Andy Mabbett 11:58, 25 August 2008 (UTC)

Help? I broke my infobox

Hi-

I've created an infobox here (also in my sandbox, here, with documentation). When I was first building & testing it, it worked perfectly. Now, the only row that shows up is 'banner' (but no text displays), and only the 'bannerimage' image shows up. Could someone smarter than I am take a look and teach me what I missed? I can't figure it out. Prince of Canada ^{t | c} 22:37, 26 August 2008 (UTC)

Watch the capitalization, field names and underscores.

All of the text fields in the docs in the sandbox are capped. They aren't in the live coding. The field names are case sensitive.

Same with the space in "Other elements" and "Previous Versions". In the live code its "other_elements" and "previous_versions". " " are "_" are read as different in the coding.

And you replaced "Escutcheon" with "shield" in the live version.

Other than that, seems to work fine.

- J Greb (talk) 23:43, 26 August 2008 (UTC)

Ahhhhhhhh. Many thanks! Prince of Canada ^{t | c} 23:46, 26 August 2008 (UTC)

Request: generic religious festival

I looked around and couldn't find anything that would fit Millennium '73, a festival held by a new religious movement. Could one of the infobox wizards please create a template for religious festivals? It'd probably be similar to Template:Infobox concert, with fields for main speaker, venue, dates, religious denomination, and perhaps attendance. ·:· Will Beback ·:· 04:38, 13 September 2008 (UTC)

Redundant Templates

Theres some redundancy in the templates that can be used:

• {{Needinfobox}}

Merge with {{Reqinfobox}} and move all to template's to the talk page. and update Reqinfobox to have a switch (eg: "|section=") to nominate which section needs it.

• {{Needs television infobox}}

{{TelevisionWikiProject}} already handles this with the "needs-infobox" switch. Then add the WP banner to the article's talk page or update the already existing one.

• {{Needs venue infobox}}

Update {{WikiProject Event Venues}} to have a "needs-infobox" switch and then add the WP banner to the article's talk page or update the already existing one.

• {{Needs football biography infobox}}

Update {{Football}} to have a "needs-infobox" switch and then add the WP banner to the article's talk page or update the already existing one.

• {{Needs artist infobox}}

Most WP Banner templates that would be used on the article's talk pages such as {{WPBiography}} already have a "needs-infobox" switch that can be used so the appropriate banner just has to be added or updated.

I'm going to, if i get time this week to update the WP banner's to support the appropriate switches but i might not get a chance. Peachey88 ^{(Talk Page | Contribs)} 09:58, 24 September 2008 (UTC)

{{Needinfobox}} works well for me. Specifically, you can use {{Needinfobox-XXX}} and replace the X's with the specific type needed. I would keep this one, but axe the rest. StevePrutz (talk) 15:55, 24 September 2008 (UTC)

I fully agree. See the above thread, #Infobox request templates, if you haven't already. These definitely belong on the talkpage. ({{Incompleteinfobox}} is the only one neither of us have mentioned yet. It should/could possibly be merged too? (Only 1 current in-article usage)) -- Quiddity (talk) 19:08, 24 September 2008 (UTC)

{{Reqinfobox}} has been updated to use a |section switch. So it changes wording from "This article lacks an infobox," to "The following section <name of section> of this article lacks an infobox". So that can be used as well now. Hopefully i haven't broken anything, which it appears i haven't but feel free to revert if it does. Peachey88 ^{(Talk Page | Contribs)} 01:49, 25 September 2008 (UTC)

Biographical infobox mergers

Please see my note on merging biographical infoboxes. Thank you. Andy Mabbett (User:Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 19:36, 24 September 2008 (UTC)

Template:Infobox rugby league biography

Just looking for a little clarification on the usage of the infobox. It concerns the opting out of the current club field for players who play in Australia. I have found that for other sports that the current club field was one that is almost unilateraly in place. I believe it is fine for those who are very familiar with the subject, but for a player like Brett Kimmorley it is unclear who he plays for. I think that the user who only has a passing contact with the sport will be unclear who he plays for, or for a player such as Chad Robinson, whos infobox is the same as a player who retired in 2005. I think the current field is a necessity for issues like this, and further ones beyond those such as will be encountered with the season drawing to a close. Wondering if there is any directive or protocol for issues such as these on sporting infoboxes.Londo06 10:15, 30 September 2008 (UTC)

Link to a previous discussion here at Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Infoboxes#Rugby_League_infoboxes.Londo06 10:15, 30 September 2008 (UTC)

Anyone have an opinion on the matter, else I shall be the defacto voice of the Infobox WikiProject.Londo06 13:55, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

Pronunciation infobox

We put a request up for help with an new (simple) infobox that can display pronunciation (IPA) of foreign terms to keep them from cluttering up the main text body - someone recommended I put a note up on here too rather than just the Infobox Help page. More on why and what at Help_talk:Infobox#Help_with_a_new_infobox. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Akerbeltz (talk) 12:52, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

Time for a Change

The infobox format for NHL and NBA players should be changed to that of the format that is used for the MLB, NFL and the NBA's retired players, just check out what I'm trying to say the current format for the NHL players is this, similar to the NBA players (I'll use Eric Lindros as an example)

WikiProject Infoboxes/Archive 2
Born	(1973-02-28) February 28, 1973 London, ON, CA
Height	6 ft 4 in (193 cm)
Weight	244 lb (111 kg; 17 st 6 lb)
Position	Centre
Shot	Right
Played for	Philadelphia Flyers New York Rangers Toronto Maple Leafs Dallas Stars
NHL draft	1st overall, 1991 Quebec Nordiques
Playing career	1992–2007

What I'm proposing is to use the NFL/MLB format like this

WikiProject Infoboxes/Archive 2

No. 88
Position:	Centre
Personal information
Born:	(1973-02-28) February 28, 1973
Career information
NFL draft:	1991 / round: 1 / pick: 1
Career history
Philadelphia Flyers (1992-2000) New York Rangers (2001-2004) Toronto Maple Leafs (2005-2006) Dallas Stars (2006-2007)
Career highlights and awards
NHL All-Rookie Team selection (1993) Hart Memorial Trophy (1995) Lester B. Pearson Award (1995) Bobby Clarke Trophy (1994-96, 1999) NHL All-Star Selection (1994, 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2002)
Career NFL statistics
Goals: 372 Assists: 493 Points: 865

Should you adopt this format which is far better than the current format, I will do everything I can to make sure every player gets this infobox.Beast from da East (talk) 20:04, 14 October 2008 (UTC)

Infobox SSSI

My first attempt at playing with a complex template—User:MortimerCat/Template in use at User:MortimerCat/Sandbox. It is intended to replace Template:Infobox SSSI, all I have done is add the location map.

I have added two new parameters latitude= and longitude=, which deprecates the use of the coordinates= template. Doing so ensures that existing usage is not affected.

I am nervous about making it live. Could an experienced template editor give it a quick check for me please. Thanks ++ MortimerCat (talk) 19:41, 18 October 2008 (UTC)

I've made some changes, but the "English Nature" map link seems redundant. Andy Mabbett (User:Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 20:19, 18 October 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for looking. I agree the English Nature map link is redundant although I have plans for that (to be discussed on a suitable talk page). ++ MortimerCat (talk) 20:30, 18 October 2008 (UTC)

De-linking of words by bots

Noticed it going about; not bothered within articles, even support it, but the removal of links within the infoboxes doesn't sit well with me. Wondering what others thoughts are on the matter.Londo06 23:28, 21 October 2008 (UTC)

I think it is a bad idea. Often there are wikilinks in the infobox that are repeated in the main article. Is there any way to keep these bots from editing the links in the infoboxes? Repeated links in the boxes themselves is a bad idea, but not between the box and the article itself.--User:2008Olympian_chitchat^seemywork 04:42, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

Sportspersons captions

Anyone know if there is anywhere else that has anything about captions on sportspersons infoboxes are discouraged when the player in question is depicted.Londo06 16:06, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

Does anyone else in this wikiproject share Londo's views as expressed at Wikipedia_talk:Captions#When_captions_are_redundant_within_infoboxes, Talk:Jonny_Wilkinson#Caption_for_photo_in_infobox, Talk:Alain_Prost#Caption_for_photo_in_infobox and Talk:Anna Kournikova?--Jeff79 (talk) 17:07, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

WP:INFOBOX

This is a good a place as any to bring this up. WP:Infobox and WP:INFOBOX point to two different locations. To avoind conflict in just changing one arbitrarily, I figured some input was needed. -- Mufka ^{(u) (t) (c)} 00:09, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Additionally, Wikipedia talk:Infobox and Wikipedia talk:INFOBOX go to different places too. Talk pages of different articles than the above. -- Mufka ^{(u) (t) (c)} 00:23, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

If there is no comment on this in a day or two, I'll just change everything to go to here since that is where the proper WP:INFOBOX goes. Then I will gird my loins against any possible backlash. Sound good? -- Mufka ^{(u) (t) (c)} 15:07, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Sure—MJCdetroit ^(yak) 16:53, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

 Done -- Mufka ^{(u) (t) (c)} 15:33, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

Spacing

Simple query about Infoboxes in general; is there really a need for all the spacing in it? For example: Template:Infobox Musical artist#Code. There's a space between the beginning of of the field between the (|) and name of the field and multiple spaces between the name of the field and the equal sign. Wouldn't it be cleaner to have just have it like the following?

{{Infobox Musical artist <!-- See Wikipedia:WikiProject Musicians -->
|Name = 
|Img = 
|Img_capt = 
|Img_size = 
[Imagine the rest here]
}}

Thoughts? DiverseMentality 02:57, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

There is no need for it, it's just a neatness thing that many people do. Peachey88 ^{(Talk Page | Contribs)} 03:08, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

Makes it *much* easier to read and edit. -- SatyrTN (talk / contribs) 17:26, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

Geobox auto-link

There's a discussion going on at Template_talk:Geobox/issues regarding the {{Geobox}}. Currently, a name in the "mayor" parameter is automatically linked. This causes two issues:

1. The majority of small and medium sized town/city mayors will never meet WP:N guidelines.
2. In some cases, a person with the same name is notable. The a DAB needs to be added, which creates a redlink for an article that will probably never be created.

The obvious solution is to remove the automatic linking, but I wanted to get a bit more input from a wider audience. Please continue the discussion there? -- SatyrTN (talk / contribs) 17:25, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

Categories

Should Infoboxes be used to add articles to categories? i.e. should, say, {{Infobox spaghetti knitter}} automatically add the articles in which it is used to Category:Spaghetti-knitters? Andy Mabbett (User:Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 18:08, 15 November 2008 (UTC)

Texcaltitlán

Can someone take a quick look at this page? I dont understand why this infobox goes all crazy. I use the same one for the other municipalities of Mexico State and dont have the problem I see here. Thanks!Thelmadatter (talk) 21:19, 29 November 2008 (UTC)

There was a rogue > lurking by the pushpin_map parameter MortimerCat (talk) 21:34, 29 November 2008 (UTC)

Infobox Military Unit

{{Infobox Military Unit}} doesn't post images placed in the box -- see [1] for an example. TIA, Pete Tillman (talk) 18:01, 30 November 2008 (UTC)

The correct image format is clearly explained in the template's documentation - did you look there? Andy Mabbett (User:Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 19:20, 30 November 2008 (UTC)

Adding banner to stubs

Is it really a good idea to add the "needs infobox" template to tiny stubs, as here? It overwhelmed the little article. Almost every stub could potentially be given this banner, but it doesn't seem helpful (it doesn't even specify which infobox would be appropriate). Could I suggest that the banner go on talk pages rather than on main article pages? PamD (talk) 08:29, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

{{Reqinfobox}}'s documentation states it should be placed on the talk page. Maybe notify the user who is misplacing it to fix their edits. BTW, they should have used {{WPBiography|needs-infobox=yes}}. Rgrds. --Tombstone (talk) 09:29, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

Should 'Infobox film' use 'Infobox'?

Please see discussion at Template talk:Infobox Film#Conversion to use 'infobox' base class Andy Mabbett (User:Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 15:24, 29 December 2008 (UTC)