[WikiEN-l] Citation templates s__k

[Daniel P. B. Smith]

> From: "Steve Bennett" <stevagewp at gmail.com>

> The benefit of storing citations in a semantically marked up format
> (such as the cite templates) should be self-evident. The fact that
> this is difficult to achieve at the present without producing
> unreadable wikitext is a problem - but it doesn't mean we should
> abandon the goal of maintaning references at a high level.

Agree, absolutely, but I'd certainly like to see a whole lot of  
improvement. This is an area where I think there could be a lot of  
technical fixes.

I use the "cite book" template a lot.

It's a mess.

About half the time, I have no clue what to enter for "first=" and  
"last=". I type in something, anything, that makes the formatted  
citation have a reasonable _appearance_, but the semantics are all  
wrong.

--What if the author has a middle name or initial? What if the author  
customarily is known only by initials and surname?

First=Katharine Anne|Last=Porter?
First=H. G.|Last=Wells?

--What if the author has an honorific or other prefix or suffix?

First=Roy|Last=Blount Jr.?
First=Dr. Phil|Last=McGraw?
First=Isidore|Last=Rosenfeld, M.D.?

--What if the book has no "authors" as such, only editors?

Title=The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language| 
First=Editors|last=of the American Heritage Dictionaries?
Title=The Norton Anthology of American Literature|First=M. H.| 
Last=Abrams (General Editor)?