Template:Citation/core/doc

This is a documentation subpage for Template:Citation/core.
It contains usage information, categories, interlanguage links and other content that is not part of the original template page.

About this template

Template:Citation/core can be thought of as an engine producing consistent output for Wikipedia's citations. Templates such as {{Citation}} provide this core template with a list of parameters, which it uses to produce a formatted text (HTML) output, which contains embedded COinS metadata. This metadata allows many readers to find cited references more easily, or to extract their details to a reference manager.

The presence of a central template makes individual citation templates simpler to code and amend, and produces a consistent look throughout the encyclopaedia.

Templates using this 'engine'

Changes to this central template can affect the output of several 'upstream' templates. A list of templates using citation/core is provided below for testing purposes.

Parameter details

Note that the examples below are common uses of each parameter, intended to help editors understand the functioning of this template. In the most part, there is nothing wrong with passing different data to any of the parameters below if it produces the output that is desired. The exception is in parameters which are associated with a COinS field.

Template:Para date when the Template:Para was accessed. Should not be wikilinked.
archive parameters (if used, must be used both of them together)
- Template:Para the URL of an archived copy of a web page, if (or in case) the url becomes unavailable. Typically used to refer to services like WebCite and Archive.org.
- Template:Para date when the item was archived. Should not be wikilinked.
Template:Para If an archived URL is provided elsewhere, the original URL should be specified here.
Template:Para page reference within the source.
Template:Para replaces the first author with a score of length AuthorBlock em. Metadata is still produced from Template:Para and Template:Para.
Template:Para title of an existing Wikipedia article about the first author.
Template:Para, Template:Para, ..., Template:Para title of an existing Wikipedia article about up to seven additional authors.
Template:Para A Bibcode id
Template:Para Digital object identifier.
Template:Para date of the authorship, if different from date of publication.
Template:Para Date the DOI is broken
Template:Para number or name of the edition, if not the first; for example: Template:Para
Template:Para first editor's first or given name(s).
Template:Para, Template:Para second and third editors’ first or given name(s).
Template:Para first editor's surname or last name.
Template:Para, Template:Para, Template:Para second, third, and fourth editors’ surname or last name. The fourth is not actually used, but causes et al. to be generated.
Template:Para title of an existing Wikipedia article about the first editor.
Template:Para, Template:Para title of existing Wikipedia articles about the second and third editors.
Template:Para file format of the source, if not the common format. Or; "Free full text", "abstract", or similar descriptor
Template:Para first author's first or given name(s).
Template:Para, Template:Para, ..., Template:Para up to seven additional authors' first or given name(s).
Template:Para miscellaneous identifier, other than Template:Para, Template:Para, Template:Para, Template:Para, Template:Para, or Template:Para.
Template:Para International Standard Book Number.
Template:Para International Standard Serial Number identifying the periodical.
Template:Para Specific title, to be displayed in quotation marks. Contrast with Template:Para, which is displayed in italics. In some cases (e.g. Template:Cite web) it may be desirable to use IncludedWorkTitle for the title, and not use the Title parameter at all.
Template:Para URL of the contribution or chapter, or other included work.
Template:Para issue number of the periodical.
Template:Para specifies the language in which the source is written, if not English.
Template:Para Date of a lay summary
Template:Para Summary of the source in a layman-friendly journal - for instance a BBC news article about a paper in Nature.
Template:Para Online Computer Library Center ID number.
Template:Para Other details to be inserted in a particular place
Template:Para PubMed Central article number for full-text free repository of an article.
Template:Para PubMed Unique Identifier.
Template:Para name of the periodical, journal, or magazine. This parameter controls whether or not the template will generate a citation in the style appropriate to a periodical, journal, magazine, or other serial publication.
Template:Para place where the item was created (outputs "written at location"; this parameter should not be used for location of publication; see Template:Para, below.
Template:Para date of publication.
Template:Para city of publication.
Template:Para name of the publisher.
Template:Para text to be quoted from the source. If supplied, this is enclosed in double-quotes.
Template:Para postscript terminating the citation. This is empty by default.
Template:Para A reference name - if the citation is referred to using the Harvard referencing suite of templates.
Template:Para specifies the punctuation mark used to separate fields. This usually defaults to a period, but may occasionally be a comma. For technical reasons, the template will malfunction if a semicolon is passed as a separator. To circumvent this, the calling template should encode semicolons:
|Sep = {{#ifeq:{{{separator}}}|;|;|{{{separator|!}}}}}
Replace the exclamation mark with a default separator, if one different to a period is desired.
Template:Para series of which this periodical is a part.
Template:Para first author's surname or last name.
Template:Para, Template:Para, ..., Template:Para up to eight additional authors’ surnames or last names. The ninth is not actually used, but causes et al. to be generated.
Template:Para Title, to be displayed in italics after Template:Para. Used, for example, when citing the title of a book; the chapter title would be passed to IncludedWorkTitle
Template:Para specific type for a thesis or dissertation. Example: PhD thesis. Appears in parentheses immediately after Title (or TransTitle).
Template:Para Translated italicized title, in case the original title is in a foreign language. Can be used in conjunction with TransTitle, e.g. for book and chapter title, respectively. This translated string will appear in square brackets, following the italicized book title, with the same URL link.
Template:Para Translated title, in case the original title is in a foreign language. The translated title will appear inside square brackets, enclosed within the quotation marks of the IncludedWorkTitle.
Template:Para Uniform Resource Locator of an online location where the article can be found.
Template:Para volume number of a multi-volume book or compilation.
Template:Para Note to accompany the year. Example: First published 1886
Template:Para year of authorship or publication.