Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Worcestershire/Referencing

Building guidelines

I am impressed with the implementation of this page, and flattered to be asked, along with Kudpung for thoughts. I think some thoughts can be usefully, and more easily, fleshed out on a discussion page, where we don't care if we're wrong, we only care to figure things out. We can also archive stuff if and as necessary. And anything useful can be incorporated on the referencing page. We can thus do at least two things here: Work things out, and try out how we'd like to present it. Wotnow (talk) 07:24, 7 February 2010 (UTC)

Finding references

(Sample text on finding references. Here I'm portraying an idea. The layout for me portraying the idea is arbitrary Wotnow (talk) 19:46, 7 February 2010 (UTC)).
"In the search engine of your choice, there are lots of ways to try finding information. For a specific topic, it often helps to use the broadest term, which will give the most results

1. Sample 'advanced' search page for Internet Archive.
2. Search result using Worcestershire in "any" field gives the broadest number of returns.

If there are too many results to work through, try narrowing it down. You can do this with the same broad term in the title field, to see if there are any books specifically listing the term in the title.

1. Narrower search result using "Worcestershire" in title field.
2. Or you could add another word to see whether that narrows the search down in any helpful way. For example, typing "Malvern Worcestershire" in the 'any' field, gives a narrow number of titles.
3. Or just 'Malvern', gives these results.
4. Or Bomsgrove, which could do with some contributions to the article."

(Note: The object of examples such as above, would be to simultaneously demonstrate a type of search heuristic - ways to narrow or broaden searches - and at the same time, provide concrete examples. By using Malvern, a potential contributor can get an idea of how we got the article to how it is. By also using Bomsgove, we point to an article that needs developing, and where they might like to try their hand, from information they can find. Like me and Malvern, they don't have to know a thing about the place, other than what they learn from the exercise itself Wotnow (talk) 19:46, 7 February 2010 (UTC))

Adding references to articles

Simplest form

[Following on from: "It's also good practice to include the access date for online material - you'd be surprised how often link die. If we know when it was last readable, it makes it easier to find in something like Wayback Machine if we have to"].

About urls and internet info

(Consider something like Wotnow (talk) 19:46, 7 February 2010 (UTC) ):
"If you've cited a book or journal that is accessible in a scanned form online, this makes verification easy. Everyone can see for themselves what was written, and that the book or journal exists. But because links can die or change, it's no help if you just provide the link. It's important to provide the same information that you would provide if the resource wasn't available online.

The 'golden rule' is: if the information is from something physically existing somewhere, and you couldn't access it online, could you track it down with nothing more than the information visible in the reference? If the answer to that is "no", then you need to add more information".

(I think it useful to provide some examples. One or two simple ones, and a couple of ones that could prove really exasperating. The former are easy enough to find. We've probably all encountered the latter. The copyright expired versions of Encyclopedia Britannica comes to mind as a possible source of exasperating examples, thus Wotnow (talk) 19:46, 7 February 2010 (UTC) ):

"Using the term "Encyclopaedia Britannica" in the title field, these results are returned. Notice that the first three listings simply use the generic title. But have a look at them. Each one has different volume and publishing details. There is a wealth of information in these online volumes. But it's important to cite enough information so someone could track down information from the specific volume even if the link stopped working. It can be done if the reference information is sufficient. Letters, phone calls, faxes etc, all the methods that people used prior to the internet to obtain information from sources, will always be available. The internet simply makes it easier to find some information. It doesn't take away the need for full referencing. The three volumes above, may for example, be displayed something as below, based on the information on their title pages.

Notice that the first two listings were published in the same year (1907), by the same publisher, with the same information apart from volume number. But the last one, while also the ninth edition, was published in 1888 by a different publisher in a different city, and was already a reprint. It also contains no American Supplement, and no mention of who the editors are.

The Encyclopaedia Britannica is probably particularly illustrative of the need for sufficient information differentiate the source that you used for your citation. Apart from the above examples, there are other publishers, other editions, and other publishing dates. So the mere use of 'Encyclopaedia Britannica' isn't going to help. Nor as the above illustration shows, even 'Encyclopaedia Britannica, 9th edtiion' etc. If you check out other titles from the above list, you'll sometimes find discrepancies between the listing and the volume. Apart from being a nuisanceif you're wading through a lengthy list looking for a specific volume, it highlights that for citation purposes, you need to use the information provided by the publisher, not the information from a list made by someone scanning the book into the internet."

Illustrative examples

In a section like this, we could provide Wikilinks to articles that help demonstrate ideas we're trying to describe. We can certainly do it on a talk page. And if it proves useful to us here, it may prove useful to do a similar thing on the main page. Thus, text could read something like:

"There is no one way to display information that is always right, or always useful. Sometimes it helps to see examples of how others displaying information you're