Help:Reftags
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This page, Help:Reftags, explains the use of the reftag element,<ref>...</ref>
for defining reference footnotes, as displayed by using a <references />
tag or a {{Reflist}}
template to list the footnotes. A reftag can also be defined by using wikitext function {{#tag:ref|...}}
to generate the text <ref>...</ref>
and allow direct use of subst'ing of templates to embed equivalent markup inside a footnote, or to nest a <ref>...</ref>
inside a {{#tag:ref|...}}
.
Defining a reftag element
The general format is <ref>text</ref>
for a simple reftag footnote. However reftags can have a name="xx"
to define a footnote to be reused on a page by named ref, <ref name="xx" />
, as when citing the same webpage at several spots in the article text.
There can be more than 3,000 reftag footnotes defined on a page, but usually there are less than a hundred.[fn 1]
Citing different pages in a single source
When citing different pages in a single source, a named ref[1] can be followed by a {{R}}
template. Given a ref like "<ref name="author1990">book</ref>
", the ref "author1990"
can be reused, now using a different page number, say 53. This subsequent ref {{R|author1990|p=53}}
will show the same superscript number, with a suffix of a colon and, in this case 53, the page number.[1]: 53 This format allows the reader to click to the reference section, and then click on other references from the same source.
Named groupings
Rather than define hundreds of footnotes in a single list, various reftags could split to some named groupings, such as using "<ref group="gg">...</ref>"
" to collect those footnotes into group name "gg"
as displayed by <references group="gg" />
.[fn 2] For example, a common tactic is to define footnote group "fn" which shows each link as "[fn 9]" for the 9th footnote in the group="fn"
. A group name can be multiple words in straight double quotation marks (group="set xx yy"
), but a single-word name with no punctuation or other special characters, just ASCII letters and numerals, can omit the quotation marks (as: group=fn
). Hence, many group names are typically one-word labels, to avoid excessive quotation marks.[fn 3]
Defining a reftag function
Rather than using an element <ref>text</ref>
, an alternate method is to use the wikitext function tag:ref
, as {{#tag:ref|...text...}}
to define the contents of a footnote.
Examples:
- Using
{{#tag:ref|Example of tag:ref function}}
will show a superscript number: [2] and list footnote "Example of tag:ref function" under the References. - Using named
{{#tag:ref|Named reftag function xx1|name="xx1"}}
will show a superscript number: [3] and list footnote "Named reftag function xx1" under the References below. The footnote name"xx1"
then can be reused by putting<ref name="xx1" />
at various points in the text.[3]
Footnotes (fn)
References
See also
- Wikipedia:Advanced footnote formatting – special layouts
- Wikipedia:Citing sources (WP:CITE) – how to format footnotes or bibliography
- Wikipedia:Reliable sources (WP:RS) – about reputable references
- Wikipedia:Find sources – how to hunt for quality source documents
- {{Cite web}} – most common citation template, for sources with a URL
- {{Cite book}} – to cite a book/chapter or volume as a source reference
- {{Cite journal}} – to cite an article in a periodical as a source reference
- mw:Help:Cite – original documentation of the
<ref>
citation feature provided by MediaWiki