Help:References
The preferred way of adding references to articles is through the use of footnotes. This is a good way of citing authoritative sources for the information given in the article. Citing sources helps readers of the wiki to confirm the accuracy of the information it contains.
Inserting a reference
To insert a reference, simply place ref tags around the reference at the point within the article where you want to insert the reference, e.g.:
- <ref>The Spooner Album, A. C. Gray, p15</ref>
Multiple references
If you want to insert multiple references to the same source, you need to give the reference a name when you first cite it, e.g.:
- <ref name="Boyd">The Festiniog Railway, Vol. 1, 2002 Edition, p243</ref>
At the second and subsequent reference, you simply insert:
- <ref name="Boyd"/>
What the user sees
- First[1] reference to Boyd
- Reference[2] to Spooner
- Second[1] reference to Boyd
- Third[1] reference to Boyd
Note that the reference numbers are generated automatically. Clicking on a reference number automatically scrolls down to that number in the reference list.
The reference list
To add the list of references, simply put:
- <references/>
where you want the list to appear. This would normally be near the foot of the page, followed only by a "See also" section (if included) and the list of categories.
For this page, inserting the reference list gives:
Clicking on the blue ^ or, for multiple references, the letters "a b c" automatically scrolls to the point in the article where the reference is cited.
Multiple groups
In some circumstances, you may want to have several separate groups of references on the same page. You can achieve this by adding group="groupname" in the ref and references tags, where groupname is the name you want to give the group. Adding group="Example" to each tag in the previous example gives:
- First[Example 1] reference to Boyd
- Reference[Example 2] to Spooner
- Second[Example 1] reference to Boyd
- Third[Example 1] reference to Boyd
As can be seen, the ref tags clearly show the name of the group to which they belong. However, the list produced by the references tag does not show the group name.