Help:Footnote
From CreationWiki, the encyclopedia of creation science
A footnote is a note placed at the bottom of an article that expands on a section of the text. The connection between a portion of text and its footnote is indicated by a number or symbol that appears after the text. This page explains very briefly how to create numbered footnotes and references using the <ref> ... </ref> and <references/> syntax, which is the current best-practice method in most circumstances.
The <ref> and <references />; operate together to add citations to pages.
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Usage
The basic concept of the <ref> tag is that it inserts the text enclosed by the ref tags as a footnote in a designated section, which you indicate with the placeholder tag <references />. The new format cannot be used interchangeably with the old format - you must pick one or the other.
If you forget to include <references /> at the end of the article, none of the footnotes will appear.
This page itself uses footnotes, such as the one at the end of this sentence.[1] If you view the source of this page by clicking "Edit this page", you can see a working example of footnotes.
Example
According to scientists, the Sun is pretty big.<ref>E. Miller, The Sun, (New York: Academic Press, 2005), 23-5.</ref>
The Moon, however, is not so big.<ref>R. Smith, "Size of the Moon", Scientific American, 46 (April 1978): 44-6.</ref>
==Notes==
<references/>
Multiple uses of the same footnote
To give a footnote a unique identifier, use <ref name="name">. You can then refer to the same footnote again by using a ref tag with the same name. The text inside the second tag doesn't matter, because the text already exists in the first reference. You can either copy the whole footnote, or you can use a terminated empty ref tag that looks like this: <ref name="name" />.
In the following example, the same source is cited three times.
This is an example of multiple references to the same footnote.<ref name="multiple">Remember that when you refer to the same footnote multiple times, the text from the first reference is used.</ref>
Such references are particularly useful when citing sources, if different statements come from the same source.<ref name="multiple">This text is superfluous, and won't show up anywhere. We may as well just use an empty tag.</ref>
A concise way to make multiple references is to use empty ref tags, which have a slash at the end. Although this may reduce redundant work, please be aware that if a future editor removes the first reference, this will result in the loss of all references using the empty ref tags.<ref name="multiple" />
==Notes==
<references/>
The text above gives the following result in the article (see also section below):
This is an example of multiple references to the same footnote.[2]
Such references are particularly useful when citing sources, when different statements come from the same source.[2]
A concise way to make multiple references is to use empty ref tags, which have a slash at the end. Although this may reduce redundant work, please be aware that if a future editor removes the first reference, this will result in the loss of all references using the empty ref tags.[2]
<references />
Placing <references /> inserts the full text of all pending inline citations defined by <ref>, anywhere on the page. For example, based on the citations above, the code:
<references />
will yield:
- ↑ This footnote is used as an example in the "Usage" section.
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 Remember that when you refer to the same footnote multiple times, the text from the first reference is used.
In some language editions of Wikipedia, long reference lists may be placed using the template {{Reflist}}, which incorporates <references />. It provides an optional parameter to display the reference list in multiple columns. For instance, the English, Hindi and Interlingua Wikipedias use the css selector references-small to make the reference text smaller than normal text.
 This page (Footnote) is part of the CreationWiki help series - prepared to assist editors in becoming productive members of the CreationWiki community. Browse the Table of Contents
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