Of all the tags that editors place at the top of Wikipedia articles, the “lack of references” tag is one that bugs me the most.
If an article has no references, then an editor should either add one that is appropriate. Or, recommend the article for deletion (as if they cannot find a reference suitable enough then there is no significant coverage in reliable sources to establish notability).
I feel that tagging Wikipedia pages is lazy when the problem is easily fixed. Placing these badges of shame at the top of articles is a huge waste of time as you do not have to be an expert Wikipedia writer in order to add a reference.
To illustrate how easy it is to actually add a reference to Wikipedia, I thought I would put together a short how-to list so those who are not quite familiar with how easy this process is.
Creating an Account:
First, it is recommended that you create a user account with Wikipedia. Having an account does not make you an expert Wikipedia writer, but it does show the community that you are a little more willing to contribute to Wikipedia than someone who comes along and makes a single edit from an IP address. To walk you through the process, I am going to use the example of the article Conway’s Bridge.
A look at the article as of October 23, 2013 shows that there is a tag at the top of the article stating that the article does not cite any references or sources. The tag also warns that unsourced material may be challenged and removed. As ALL the information in the article is unsourced as of that date, the entire article can be in jeopardy of being deleted because the editor who placed the tag on the article simply failed to take an extra minute or two to add a reliable source. After seeing how easy it is to add a reference, you will understand my frustration with editors who tag as opposed to clean.
Finding a Reference:
I do not want to jump on all editors who put tags at the top of articles, but failing to take a single step to improve an article is ridiculous. In order to add a reference to an article, you need to find one. The simplest way to do this is to do a Google search or Bing search (who am I kidding, do people still use Bing?) on the title of the article. A search of “Conway’s Bridge” finds numerous results that can be used. The one that jumps out at me immediately is a book named British River Navigations by Stuart Fisher. Books are generally reliable references that can be used to cite sources on Wikipedia (not always, but as a general rule).
After clicking on the link to Google books, you will see that it says “The narrow Conway’s Bridge by Humphrey Gainsborough has large stones which may have come from Reading Abbey.” Comparing this sentence to the Wikipedia article, they both have something in common. The reference supports the information in the Wikipedia article stating that the bridge was designed by Humphrey Gainsborough. The reference can thus be used to support that content.
Formatting a Reference:
Now that you have a reference, you need to make sure that it is formatted properly prior to placing it in the article. While you can simply copy and paste the link into the code, this is just as lazy as an editor who places a tag at the top of the article. In addition, it could cause someone to come along and place another tag on the article stating that it uses bare URLs in the reference. As such, it is best to format it properly from the beginning. The location you want to go to find the format for your reference is at this link.
As an expert Wikipedia writer, I often vary the way I cite a reference as a way to keep other editors from knowing who I am. However, for the sake of this tutorial, I will use the basic templates provided by Wikipedia. Once you go to the link above, scroll down until you see the format for citing a book. It will look like this:
The code does not need to be up and down like it shows on the example. In order to make it easier for other editors who want to edit the article in the future, make the code horizontal as opposed to vertical. Here is what the code would look like:
{{cite book| last =| first = | authorlink = | title = | publisher = | series = | volume = | edition = | date = | location = | pages = | language = | url = | doi = | id = | isbn = | mr = | zbl = | jfm = }}
As opposed to talking you through each of the possible items you can place within the citation (as you can read more if you scan the link with the citation templates), I will show you how the information looks once it is placed into the citation. Note that I placed reference tags (“<ref>” at the beginning and “</ref>” at the end) at either end of the citation. These will need to be added in order for the reference to show properly in Wikipedia.
<ref>{{cite book| last =Fisher | first =Stuart | authorlink = | title =British River Navigations: Inland Cuts, Fens, Dikes, Channels and Non-tidal Rivers | publisher =A&C Black | series = | volume = | edition = | date =2013 | location = | pages = | language = | url = | doi = | id = | isbn =9781472906687 | mr = | zbl = | jfm = }}</ref>
You will notice that I did not use all of the different parameters that are in the citation. They do not all need to be used. I prefer to use as many as I know or can find, but for a simple citation for a book, you can use the last name, first name, title, publisher, date, and ISBN. The information that I used was found on the same page as the information about Conway’s Bridge under the Google Books entry. I simply clicked on “about this book” in order to find the ISBN and other information. You can also find the information on Amazon.com. Please note that you do not have to have a URL to cite anything in Wikipedia. It helps other editors verify the source, but is in no way mandatory.
Inserting the Reference:
To insert a reference, you will actually need to go to the “edit” function of the article.
Once you click on “edit,” you will see the source code of the article. For the Conway’s Bridge article, it will look like this:
Now that you have the source code, you are now ready to place the reference. To place the reference properly, it should be “inline” which basically means it should go right behind the content that it is supporting. For this article, we are using the reference to support that Humphrey Gainsborough is the designer of the bridge. So, the citation coding needs to go directly after the information about him being the designer. Here is what it will look like when you paste the code into the article:
I circled the area of the image so that you can see it easier. It does not look pretty, but trust me when I say that this will come out perfect when we are complete. Now, we need to add a small snippet of code for a citation table. If there is already one that you see in the code, then do not add a second one. If there is none, you will need to be the one to add it for the first time. The code is placed at the end of the article, prior to any external link section or categories. This is what it will look like after you add it:
Now that you have the reference inserted in the code, hit the “show preview” button at the bottom of the code so that you can see what your edit will look like. From the screenshot below, you can see that the reference has been added to the article and is also listed under the reference section at the bottom of the article:
If you are satisfied with your work (looking at the preview should always be done prior to making any edit live to make sure that it is correct), you can click the “save page” button at the bottom of the code. This will make the page live. If you are bold, you can also remove the tag from the top of the article. Here is what the page would look like if I actually did the edits to this article:
Of course if you want to work your way towards being an expert Wikipedia writer, you can check out a more thorough guide on referencing Wikipedia articles at this link.