Template talk:UOL

Question here, how does the reference in the format differ from the version which I usually use, the <noinclude> version found on the Lore:Nede page? And will the template work in the same way with that one?Temple-Zero 20:17, 9 February 2009 (EST)

The only required change is that this template (i.e., the text {{OOG}}) gets added after the link to the book name; the rest of the stuff remains the same. Part of the complication, I'm guessing, is that there are a few different things going on here.

• The basic format for a reference would be as follows. (Don't look at these examples in the editor window -- there's a bunch of extra stuff that needs to be used in the editor window to make these examples display properly that just makes them even more confusing. What you see on a standard, non-editing screen is what matters.)

<ref name="Nu-Mantia Intercept">[http://www.imperial-library.info/obscure_text/nu-hatta_nu-mantia.shtml Nu-Mantia Intercept]</ref>

• Adding this template changes that reference to:

<ref name="Nu-Mantia Intercept">[http://www.imperial-library.info/obscure_text/nu-hatta_nu-mantia.shtml Nu-Mantia Intercept] {{OOG}}</ref>

• The <noinclude> bit of text is then another layer added to some, but not most, references. If a reference is in the first paragraphs of an article and that article gets transcluded elsewhere (e.g., the first paragraphs of Lore:Argonian also shows up on Oblivion:Argonian and Morrowind:Argonian), then it may be appropriate to wrap the reference in a pair of noinclude tags. This makes the reference only appear on the Lore version of the article, not on the Oblivion and Morrowind versions.
  • Example 1 (no OOG) becomes:

<noinclude><ref name="Nu-Mantia Intercept">[http://www.imperial-library.info/obscure_text/nu-hatta_nu-mantia.shtml Nu-Mantia Intercept]</ref></noinclude>

• Example 2 (with OOG) becomes:

<noinclude><ref name="Nu-Mantia Intercept">[http://www.imperial-library.info/obscure_text/nu-hatta_nu-mantia.shtml Nu-Mantia Intercept] {{OOG}}</ref></noinclude>

Note that there's both a <noinclude> tag before the reference and a </noinclude> tag after the reference.

Really, the noinclude stuff is a separate bit of code that isn't necessary for most references. If you're not sure whether or not to use noinclude, it's probably best to just never use it for now. Adding them where they're not needed can cause more problems than skipping them all the time; patrollers can easily add any necessary noincludes. The most important part is to get the <ref>....</ref> chunk added, because that's the part that patrollers or other editors won't be able to figure out. --Nephele^Talk 21:23, 9 February 2009 (EST)

I see. Not to clutter this talk page, but looking at Lore:Nord, I assume that <'includeonly'> denotes texts that only appears in other namespaces. What then, determines the part of the article that is transcluded?Temple-Zero 21:29, 9 February 2009 (EST)

By default, everything is; without any tags, everything appears both on the original article and on the extra copies of the article. noinclude is used to get text to only appear on the original article; includeonly is used to get text to only appear on the extra copies. (As for what makes it even appear, that's the snippet {{Lore:Argonian}}, i.e., the original article's name within double braces. That's been added to articles such as Oblivion:Argonian, as you can see if you pull up the article in an edit window.) --Nephele^Talk 21:44, 9 February 2009 (EST)

Thus, per the new policy, oog material should be located in sections that are enclosed by a noinclude. Got it.Temple-Zero 21:50, 9 February 2009 (EST)

Yep. And just to make sure there's no confusion, that means that noinclude tags immediately surrounding the ref tags are not needed, because the entire section should already have a pair of noinclude tags (or in the case of pages that are never transcluded anywhere else, for example Lore:Nede or Lore:Heart of Lorkhan, include-type tags are not needed anywhere on the article). So it's safest to just do refs using the format shown in example #2 above (which not coincidentally matches the example on the template page). --Nephele^Talk 22:56, 9 February 2009 (EST)

Quotes and Capitalization

I'd like to remove the quotes around "OOG" in the example on the page. They seem pointless. I've never gotten a clear answer on what purpose they were supposed to serve. Maybe it was once necessary to add quotes to a name parameter. If so, the software has clearly been upgraded along the line, as I never include them in an OOG cite, and I don't think any other currently active regulars do, either. They seem purely extraneous, so we shouldn't be encouraging their use. Minor Edits^{Threats•Evidence} 05:55, 14 May 2013 (GMT)

In this situation it was never needed. Quotes used to be needed to include spaces in the name, but the ref template removes that need. Currently the quotes are entirely useless and I hate them with a vengeance. I would also like to propose that the OOG tag actually be in lowercase as a standard. I think that it looks cleaner and distracts the reader less. Jeancey (talk) 06:08, 14 May 2013 (GMT)

I was going to bring that issue up on your talk page, so allow me to copy and paste here: Hello, Jeancey. I was wondering if you could stop putting the OOG reference names in lowercase, as you did here and here. Obviously, it's not a big deal, but I felt it was big enough to mention for four reasons: first, the vast majority of pages with OOG citations use "OOG", not "oog", so for the sake of consistency, that should be our standard. Second, the example at {{OOG}} shows it capitalized, indicating it was the intent of the makers and implementers for "OOG" to be capitalized. Third, changing "OOG" to "oog" would be a big, unnecessary project, as the aesthetic benefit of "oog" versus "OOG" is arguable. Fourth and most importantly, we need to call attention to OOG cites, and "oog" is a little less eye-catching. That's probably why you think it's more appealing, but the OOG cite is intended to be eye-catching. We are and should be calling attention to the fact that something is not official content, and thus is of an inherently more dubious reliability. Minor Edits^{Threats•Evidence} 06:17, 14 May 2013 (GMT)

Fair enough :) I personally find it aesthetically displeasing, but I can understand the need. Jeancey (talk) 06:18, 14 May 2013 (GMT)