# Wiki edit question **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [January 22, 2010, 5:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wiki-edit-question/525970 "2010-01-22T05:41:11Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Johnny\_L.A](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_l.a/32/1084_2.png) [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2010, 5:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wiki-edit-question/525970/1 "2010-01-22T05:41:11Z")
I’ve attempted my first Wiki edit, adding a birth date to an entry. I’ve got a reference ([sup][1][/sup]) by the date, but it doesn’t link to the reference. That is, I have \[referenced text],\ after the date. Below, I have : ==References== {{Refbegin}} - [the reference] {{Refend}} How do I make the [1] link to the reference? ---
**Author:** ![BorgHunter](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@BorgHunter](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BorgHunter)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2010, 5:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wiki-edit-question/525970/2 "2010-01-22T05:52:45Z")
You’re basically combining two separate, noncompatible ways of doing references. The \ tag is part of the Cite.php MediaWiki extension, which does a lot of stuff automagically. {{refbegin}} and {{refend}} are a manual way of doing the same thing, but are less useful in that they don’t bother to look for \ tags in the article body. To fix this, just change that references section to simply: ==References== {{reflist}} ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_L.A](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_l.a/32/1084_2.png) [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2010, 5:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wiki-edit-question/525970/3 "2010-01-22T05:56:58Z")
Perfect! Thanks. ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_L.A](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_l.a/32/1084_2.png) [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2010, 6:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wiki-edit-question/525970/4 "2010-01-22T06:02:50Z")
Oh – Suppose I want to include a link in the cite? ---
**Author:** ![BorgHunter](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@BorgHunter](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BorgHunter)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2010, 6:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wiki-edit-question/525970/5 "2010-01-22T06:19:40Z")
> [@Johnny\_L.A](#): > > Oh – Suppose I want to include a link in the cite? That’s fine, just put it in the \ tag. Basically, whatever is in the \ tag gets regurgitated later in the references section. So, for a really simple example, you could do \[[http://straightdope.com](http://straightdope.com) The Straight Dope]\ (The single bracket enclosure there means, the first “word” here is a URL, and the remainder is the text of that URL.) If you’re feeling more adventurous, you can also use a template called Cite web, which pretty much just takes what you tell it about your citation and puts it in a nice pretty format. Cite web has two required parameters: url and title. So you could do \{{cite web|url=[http://straightdope.com](http://straightdope.com%7Ctitle=The) Straight Dope}}\. It also has a number of optional parameters, listed in its documentation at [Template:Cite web - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Template:Cite_web) So an even more complex example could be \{{cite web|url=[http://straightdope.com](http://straightdope.com%7Ctitle=The) Straight Dope|accessdate=2010-01-22|first=Cecil|last=Adams|publisher=Chicago Reader|month=July|year=1988}}\. Finally, I’d like to mention that you can name \s, and reuse them later. So if you’re citing Unca Cece a bunch of times, your first cite looks like \{{cite web| … }}\. Then, following cites of that reference can be only \ with none of the rest of that mess. ---
**Author:** ![Dewey\_Finn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dewey_finn/32/4222_2.png) [@Dewey\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Finn)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2010, 6:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wiki-edit-question/525970/6 "2010-01-22T06:26:51Z")
Note that when I’m trying to learn how to do something on a Wikipedia page, I find it useful to look at the code for a page doing something similar, and then copying the formatting. Another thing that’s useful is to set up a [Sandbox page](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Sandbox). You can set one up as a user subpage and then leave it open as long as you need to edit your page and get it ready for prime time. ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_L.A](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_l.a/32/1084_2.png) [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2010, 6:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wiki-edit-question/525970/7 "2010-01-22T06:27:47Z")
Thanks again. I’m not feeling too adventurous, as this is the first time I’ve tried this. I just looked at the source and mimicked what I saw. (I did see the links made the way you said, but I didn’t try it because I didn’t know how it worked until you explained it. I have the reference linked now.) If I’m feeling adventurous mañana, I may add an Info box. 😉 EDIT: **Dewey Finn**. That’s what I did (though I didn’t go to the sandbox). 😉 . ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_L.A](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_l.a/32/1084_2.png) [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2010, 12:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wiki-edit-question/525970/8 "2010-01-23T00:26:44Z")
I copied some code to add an infobox, but it’s not showing up on preview. What am I doing wrong? {{Infobox Historian |birthdate = {{birth date and age|1929|10|31}} |birthplace = [[Bauxite|Arkansas]], [[Arkansas (U.S. state)|Arkansas]], U.S. |spouse = Melody Webb (1982?-present) |occupation = Historian |yearsactive = 1957 – present }} ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_L.A](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_l.a/32/1084_2.png) [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2010, 12:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wiki-edit-question/525970/9 "2010-01-23T00:42:53Z")
Hm. Apparently ‘Historian’ is not a valid infobox title. On a hunch, I replaced it with ‘Actor’ (which he isn’t) and the box came up. So I tried ‘Person’. Only his occupation and spouse came up. No birth date and age, no birthplace. ---
**Author:** ![Dewey\_Finn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dewey_finn/32/4222_2.png) [@Dewey\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Finn)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2010, 1:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wiki-edit-question/525970/10 "2010-01-23T01:10:36Z")
[Here](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:People_infobox_templates)’s a list of people infoboxes. As you noticed, historian doesn’t exist, although “writer” does.