Welcome to Wikipedia, the Referencing for beginners is designed to help you put references in your text, or add missing references to existing text. While there are many types of referencing system in use on Wikipedia, only about four are now in common use. There are many types of beginner, who start in many ways. This page will help you recognise the referencing system that is the most appropriate for your editing context. It will give practical examples, then move on to help you understand the rules we all follow, and what makes a good reference.
Referencing is one of the core principles of wikipedia. [a] For every fact typed into Wikipedia there should be a link to say where the information came from. The Wikipedia software then displays the reference neatly at the bottom of the article. Academics are familiar with [footnotes and citations in their professional journals- this is almost the same.
With the Ctrl-a all of the text in that section is highlighted and Ctrl-c will copy it. The Ctrl-y is the "yes! I was right " key. It is a redo button, re-doing what you removed with Ctrl-z, This saves so much time.
<ref>...</ref>
is just a tag that makes the footnote magically appear in the proper place. There are toolbars to help placing standard information within the <ref>...</ref>
tags.<ref></ref>
, <ref name="" />
or {{Reflist}}
into your text with a single click.References appear at the bottom of the article in a nicely rendered list. This is sometimes called the notes, footnotes, bibliography or citations. However the reference itself is embedded in the text using the tags, <ref>freetext</ref>
. It goes immediately after the punctuation without a space.
==Article section== This is the text that you are going to verify with a reference.<ref>freetext</ref> ==References== {{Reflist}}
This will be rendered (displayed ) thus:
Article section
This is the text that you are going to verify with a reference.[1]
References
1. ^freetext
Whatever text, formatting, or templates you put in between these two tags <ref>...</ref>
will become visible in the "References" section as your reference. The reference in its <ref>...</ref>
pair belongs in the article, anything placed after the {{
reflist}}
template or the <references />
tag will not display.
Note the position of the reference after the full stop; see also WP:REFPUNC.
At its simplest, the reference can be any text. More likely it will include the authors name, year and page number. You need to include sufficient information to enable readers to find your source, and verify your facts. Wikipedia has four approved methods of displaying reference that are described below: any information, in any format is better than none. Other editors will eventually fix the format: help them by being as precise as possible.
Referencing is very important to Wikipedia and series of citation templates have been written to assist in writing the text that goes in the <ref>...</ref>
pairs. This ensures that the references displayed\ in the {{
reflist}}
are rendered to a consistent way. They can be written by hand- but normally are generated using a pop up tool called refToolbar . There are two important caveats: refToolbar does not help you edit existing citations only new ones, the refToolbar found on one user's Wikipedia may be different from his neighbour's depending on preferences that each user can set. The default version is refToolbar (Version 2.0b).
[c]
The refToolbar prompts the editor to provide the information needed. [d] It also has the ability to automatically fill in bibliographic data for many published books just using an ISBN, and academic journal or medical journal articles from a reference number, which reduces error-prone and tedious cut-and-pasting or retyping.
Click on the play button on the image to the right to view a refToolbar 2.0b video tutorial on how to use the citation dialog.
==References==
sectionWhen your edit is saved, the text of citations within the body of the article will automatically appear in the References section. References added using the refToolbar can still be edited manually after they are added; details on how to manually create or edit references are discussed in the Manual Referencing section, in a later section.
The refToolbar method can also be used to conveniently build correct citations for a "Further reading" or "Bibliography" section of an article. Use the refToolbar as described above, and insert the citation in the further reading" section. Then Show preview: manually edit the newly-inserted Wikisource text to remove the <ref> and </ref> tags to allow the citation to be displayed.
Returning to basics, references are included so that the reader can verify the accuracy of the fact, but for asthetic reasons we require a consistent approach. Custom and practice dictates that the rendered result should resemble the Harvard citations described in the Chicago manual of style. Academics are very comfortable with this style and can easily type up or copy such a reference without the assistance of refToolbar. This method is the most flexible- and can cope with the most extreme variations in the data to be displayed, and allows for simple cut and pasting from on-line dissertations. In other cases refToolBar is quicker.
The References, notes, footnotes, bibliography or citations appear at the bottom of the article in a nicely rendered list. However the reference itself is embedded in the text using the tags, <ref>freetext</ref>
. Expanding on the method already shown:
==Article section== :This is the text that you are going to verify with a reference from a book.<ref>{{Alt, Peter-André (2005). Franz Kafka: Der ewige Sohn. Eine Biographie (in German). München: Verlag C.H. Beck. {{ISBN|978-3-406-53441-6}}.</ref> :This is the text that you are going to verify with a reference from a journal.<ref>Banakar, Reza (Fall 2010). "In Search of Heimat: A Note on Franz Kafka's Concept of Law". Law and Literature (Berkeley, California) 22 (2). doi:10.2139/ssrn.1574870. SSRN 1574870.</ref> :This is the text that you are going to verify with a reference from a website.<ref>Kafka, Franz (2012). "Franz Kafka Letter to his Father". Kafka-Franz. Archived from the original on 13 July 2011. Retrieved 3 August 2012.</ref> ==References== {{Reflist}}
This will be rendered (displayed ) thus:
Article section
This is the text that you are going to verify with a reference from a book.[1]
This is the text that you are going to verify with a reference from a journal.[2]
This is the text that you are going to verify with a reference from a website.[3]
References
1. ^Alt, Peter-André (2005). Franz Kafka: Der ewige Sohn. Eine Biographie (in German). München: Verlag C.H. Beck. {{ISBN|978-3-406-53441-6}
}.2. ^Banakar, Reza (Fall 2010). "In Search of Heimat: A Note on Franz Kafka's Concept of Law". Law and Literature (Berkeley, California) 22 (2). doi:10.2139/ssrn.1574870. SSRN 1574870.
3. ^Kafka, Franz (2012). "Franz Kafka Letter to his Father". Kafka-Franz. Archived from the original on 13 July 2011. Retrieved 3 August 2012.
The cite templates used by refToolBar can be entered manually and edited later to add missing infomation. These are placed in the body text inside the <ref>...</ref>
pair. This sort of formatting is preferred. Here are a selection:
* {{cite book | last = Alt | first = Peter-André | year = 2005 | language = German | title = Franz Kafka: Der ewige Sohn. Eine Biographie | publisher = Verlag C.H. Beck | location = München | isbn = 978-3-406-53441-6 | ref = harv }} * {{cite journal | last = Banakar | first = Reza | authorlink = Reza Banakar | title = In Search of Heimat: A Note on Franz Kafka's Concept of Law | ssrn = 1574870 | date=Fall 2010 | volume = 22 | issue = 2 | journal = Law and Literature | location = Berkeley, California | doi = 10.2139/ssrn.1574870 | ref = harv }} * {{cite news | last = Adler | first = Jeremy | url = http://www.textkritik.de/rezensionen/kafka/einl_04.htm | date = 13 October 1995 | work = New York Times Literary Supplement | title = Stepping into Kafka's Head | accessdate = 4 August 2012 | ref = {{sfnRef|Adler|1995}} }} {{subscription required}} * {{cite web | last = Kafka | first = Franz | url = http://www.kafka-franz.com/KAFKA-letter.htm | archiveurl = https://web.archive.org/web/20110713133359/http://www.kafka-franz.com/KAFKA-letter.htm | archivedate = 13 July 2011 | year = 2012 | publisher = Kafka-Franz | title = Franz Kafka Letter to his Father | accessdate = 3 August 2012 | ref = {{sfnRef|Kafka-Franz, Father|2012}} }}
Citation templates will be used for other forms references. They are powerful tools.
The first time a reference appears in the article, you can give it a simple refname inside the first <ref>
code. To avoid
name collisions, you can use the author name followed by year of publication, or an abbreviated version of the title. If it will be used often, pick a unique, memorable, and easily-typed refname.
<ref name="smith2008">DETAILS OF REFERENCE</ref>
Subsequent times that you cite the same reference in the article, you can use this shortcut instead of re-typing it (take note of the "/" at the end):
<ref name="smith2008" />
You can then use the refname shortcut as many times as you want (but never forget the "/", or it will blank the rest of the section).
For an example article where there are three sources, and they are each referenced three times, see William Bowyer (artist). For more details see WP:REFNAME.
Based on existing text- but standardising format, and simplifying grammatic structure
The above method is simple and combines references and notes into one section. A refinement is to put the full details of the references in their own section headed "References", while the notes which apply to them appear in a separate section headed "Notes". The notes can be inserted in the main article text in an abbreviated form. To add the citation:
<ref name="smith">Smith, 1946, p=157</ref>
it will appear in the {{reflist}} at the end of the article. At the end of the article the mark-up is as follows:
==See also== ==Notes== {{reflist|2}} ==References== * Full Citation 1 * Full Citation 2 * Full Citation n ==Further reading and external links==
The separation of "Notes" and "References" in this way is in line with scholarly works.
A further refinement that is used by some scholarly editors is to use notes and footnotes. For example the article on
Franz Kafka is referenced this way making use of two helpful templates. {{
sfn}}
and {{
efn}}
. Throughout the article you add the reference so:
{{sfn|Smith|1889|p=157}} or {{sfn|Smith|Jones|1892|pp= 213-218}}
that is the name, year and page reference or author, second author, year and page references. The full citation, which is generated by the method above is added (without its reference tags) to the Bibliography section.
{{efn|Free-text note}}
is inserted in the text and will appear in the {{notelist}} [e] This has many uses.
The last sections of the article provide the links for the references and the notes: they take this mark up.
==See also== ==Notes== {{notelist}} ==References== ===Citations=== {{reflist|2}} ===Bibliography=== * Full Citation 1 * Full Citation 2 * Full Citation n ===Further reading=== * Further Citation 1 * Further Citation 2 * Further Citation n ==External links==
This method is useful when you are making many page references from a limited number of books. It relies on the Authors name and Publication year to make the links. Which ever system is used try to be consistent.
There are a number of tools available to help with citation placement and formatting.
The Yarkard button generates a citation from a ISBN, DOI or URL. It does a similar job to ISBN-autofill on some RefToolbar templates.
Ctrl-D
to set it as a bookmark. In the dialog, you are give the choice of where to put it, choose the toolbar, and what to call it, choose something short like ISBN-sfn. When you need it- it is ready.Generally sources are added directly after the facts they support at the end of the sentence and after any punctuation. Wikipedia permits editors to use any citation system that allows the reader to understand where the information came from, and strongly encourages use of inline citations to do so. Common methods of placing inline citations include footnotes, shortened footnotes, and parenthetical references.
A citation to a reference must verify the statement in the text. To verify the statement "Mike Brown climbed Mt. Everest", you cannot rely on a general reference about Mt. Everest or a reference on Mike Brown. You need to cite a source that directly supports the statement about his achievement.
You must use reliable sources, such as published books and mainstream press publications.
Blogs, Facebook, MySpace, YouTube, SoundCloud, fan sites, and extreme minority texts are not usually acceptable, nor is original research (e.g. your own unpublished, or self-published, essay or research), or another Wikipedia article.
If the reference source is a lengthy book, paper, or article, you should give specific chapter, section, or page numbers if possible, to save the reader from having to search the entire document.
These formats are preferred for dates:
Generating refnames as suggested above is not difficult, but the complete rules are quite detailed. See: ref-name rules
Based on existing text- but standardising format, and simplifying grammatic structure
A little used, and discouraged technique, allows you to add page numbers after the reference in a similar superscript format. The numbers are in the form of a comment and do not link anywhere. It is best avoided, but can be used if other editors have used on the same page. In a lengthy paper you can use the {{ Refpage}}, or {{ Rp}} to appends the page number(s) as a superscript after the usual reference superscript. For an example of how this is applied, see the article about Frank Oppenheimer. It can also be used to add simple comments such as {{Rp|q=Unique to this edition}}
|ref = {{sfnRef|''Los Angeles Times''|2009}}
may be added to the {{cite XXXX}} code. This links on the chosen freetext- such as the publication, and year.