On Wed, Dec 3, 2008 at 8:46 PM, Thomas Larsen larsen.thomas.h@gmail.com wrote:
Hi all,
The current <ref>...</ref>...<references/> system produces nice references, but it is flawed--all the text contained in a given reference appears in the text that the reference is linked from. For example:
[snip]
Once way I could conceive of correcting the problem is to have a reference tag that provides only a _link_ to the note via a label and another type of reference tag that actually _defines_ and _displays_ the note. For example:
[snip]
Thats a lot like what we used to do, the problem is that references were *constantly* orphaned, scrambled, etc. The references were often nonsense.
My view is that the current behavior is bad mostly because it makes it very hard to read the text in edit, you get this wall of meaningless markup.
Instead I propose: Have javascript mediate the edit box so that inline references are converted to little red [R] text, moving your cursor into the [R] area by clicking or arrowkeying causes it to expand to display the full reference. You can add references by simply typing them like normal and then they'll collapse when you navigate away, or you can press some "insert reference" button that pops up a dialog that asks for the relevant information which then types the completed reference for you.
This type of hiding could also be applied to other common inline markup and dramatically improve usability.
This type of edit box mediation has been done by other edit-helper userscripts, so it's certainly possible.
Thoughts?
Gregory Maxwell wrote:
Instead I propose: Have javascript mediate the edit box so that inline references are converted to little red [R] text, moving your cursor into the [R] area by clicking or arrowkeying causes it to expand to display the full reference.
How about making individual references as distinct entities in themselves? I.e. - namespace Reference: with a page like Reference:King Lear (Shakespeare).
Then have <ref name="King Lear (Shakespeare)" page=22-26>
That allows for a single source of each reference, convenient for those references that show up in multiple articles. I certainly find it awkward to enter the identical reference in several related articles and ensure that they are all the same.
This could create a mess if authors create new references without checking for the prior existence of the reference. However, other authors could police the pages and watch for dupes, especially if it's convenient to list all pages in the namespace with common terms etc (rather than just alphabetically by name).
On my wiki, I created a page with a table of references, each with a <section> tag and then use LabeledSectionTransclusion to include them on the pages they are needed. Thus the table becomes a "database" of references. Awkward, but usable.
Mike
I've found that neatly spacing references does wonders for keeping wikitext readable. For example:
Acid2 was first proposed by [[Håkon Wium Lie]], chief technical officer of [[Opera Software]] and creator of the widely-used [[Cascading Style Sheets]] [[web standard]].<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.root.cz/texty/hakon-wium-lie-css-was-created-to-save-html/ |title=Håkon Wium Lie: CSS was created to save HTML |last=Hassman |first=Martin |date=2008-05-12 |accessdate=2008-07-27 }}</ref> Together with a colleague, [[Ian Hickson]], he created the first draft of Acid2 in February 2005.<ref name="Hickson">{{cite web |url=http://ln.hixie.ch/?start=1137799947&count=1 |title=People who don't realise that they're wrong |last=Hickson |first=Ian |work=Hixie's Natural Log |date=2006-01-20 |accessdate=2008-04-01 }}</ref> Acid2 was first publicly announced on March 16, 2005 in a [[CNET]] article where Lie challenged [[Microsoft]] to design [[Internet Explorer 7]], then in development, to pass the test.<ref name="Lie">{{cite web |url= http://news.cnet.com/The-Acid2-challenge-to-Microsoft/2010-1032_3-5618723.ht... |title=The Acid2 challenge to Microsoft |author=Lie, Håkon Wium |authorlink=Håkon Wium Lie |publisher=[[CNET Networks]] |date=2005-03-16 |accessdate=2008-01-12 }}</ref>
With this style, it's pretty easy to distinguish prose from reference.
On Fri, Dec 5, 2008 at 12:41 AM, Remember the dot rememberthedot@gmail.com wrote:
I've found that neatly spacing references does wonders for keeping wikitext readable. For example:
Yes, but then the text is no less impossible to simply read through if you don't care about the refs and you're just editing the text, especially if you[] have cases[] where the refs are sprinkled liberally[][].
As a reader like the end result of the refs being placed as close to the fact that support as possible, but it makes the paragraph hell to edit.
Gregory Maxwell wrote:
On Fri, Dec 5, 2008 at 12:41 AM, Remember the dot rememberthedot@gmail.com wrote:
I've found that neatly spacing references does wonders for keeping wikitext readable. For example:
Yes, but then the text is no less impossible to simply read through if you don't care about the refs and you're just editing the text, especially if you[] have cases[] where the refs are sprinkled liberally[][].
As a reader like the end result of the refs being placed as close to the fact that support as possible, but it makes the paragraph hell to edit.
I think, rather than using JS to hide refs in page text, defining them all in the references section, or at least at the end of the section they're used in for larger articles, using some sort of new option in the ref tags to make them not display - <ref name="Foo" nodisplay="1">...</ref> - or something, then referring to them inline with only the short form - <ref name="Foo"/> - would be better. A lot of refs on one sentence would still be a little messy, but much better. Of course, the problem would be migrating all the existing refs to such a system, the benefit to just hiding them is that it'll work with everything as it is now.
The problem with hiding them with JS is that you need to be able to detect them reliably. I have some regexes I've used for other things, but they tend to assume that people have formatted the refs correctly. A few months ago, I ran a script on a db dump looking for broken ref formatting - unclosed tags, etc. What I found was that people manage to break ref formatting in unimaginable ways, and ways that resisted all my attempts at semi-automatic repair. Hiding them would work in the majority of cases, but in a few strange cases it will likely just explode horribly.
On Fri, Dec 5, 2008 at 3:29 AM, Alex mrzmanwiki@gmail.com wrote:
Gregory Maxwell wrote:
On Fri, Dec 5, 2008 at 12:41 AM, Remember the dot rememberthedot@gmail.com wrote:
I've found that neatly spacing references does wonders for keeping
wikitext
readable. For example:
Yes, but then the text is no less impossible to simply read through if you don't care about the refs and you're just editing the text, especially if you[] have cases[] where the refs are sprinkled liberally[][].
As a reader like the end result of the refs being placed as close to the fact that support as possible, but it makes the paragraph hell to edit.
I think, rather than using JS to hide refs in page text, defining them all in the references section, or at least at the end of the section they're used in for larger articles, using some sort of new option in the ref tags to make them not display - <ref name="Foo" nodisplay="1">...</ref> - or something, then referring to them inline with only the short form - <ref name="Foo"/> - would be better. A lot of refs on one sentence would still be a little messy, but much better. Of course, the problem would be migrating all the existing refs to such a system, the benefit to just hiding them is that it'll work with everything as it is now.
<snip>
You should check out http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Extension_talk:Cite/Cite.php#Variation_for_ref... this has already been done, but not yet implemented in the Cite-code.
We'd like to see this (or something similar) implemented as soon as possible.. :)
/Stig
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Gregory Maxwell wrote:
Instead I propose: Have javascript mediate the edit box so that inline references are converted to little red [R] text, moving your cursor into the [R] area by clicking or arrowkeying causes it to expand to display the full reference.
We're planning to work on such things in the usability projects next year.
- -- brion
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