View source for Module talk:Team appearances list

#REDIRECT [[Template talk:Team appearances list]]

{{Rcat shell|
{{R from remote talk page}}
{{R with history}}
}}
This module implements {{t|team appearances list}}, thus discussion about the template itself should happen there. Technical discussions about the module itself can be discussed here.

== Module output ==
Following a discussion at [[WT:WikiProject Templates#Module issue]], I am planning to make some changes to this module. Consider the following contrived example.
<pre>
{{Team appearances list
|team = Brazil
|competition = Pan American Games
|1940
|1967–79
|1991
|1996
}}
</pre>
This is the output from [[Special:ExpandTemplates]] so it will not change if the module is updated:
<div class="hlist"><ul><li><span style="color:gray">1996</span></li><li><span style="color:gray">1940</span></li><li>[[Brazil at the 1951 Pan American Games|1951]]</li><li>[[Brazil at the 1955 Pan American Games|1955]]</li><li>[[Brazil at the 1959 Pan American Games|1959]]</li><li>[[Brazil at the 1963 Pan American Games|1963]]</li><li><span style="color:gray">1967–79</span></li><li>[[Brazil at the 1971 Pan American Games|1971]]</li><li>[[Brazil at the 1975 Pan American Games|1975]]</li><li>[[Brazil at the 1979 Pan American Games|1979]]</li><li>[[Brazil at the 1983 Pan American Games|1983]]</li><li>[[Brazil at the 1987 Pan American Games|1987]]</li><li><span style="color:gray">1991</span></li><li>[[Brazil at the 1995 Pan American Games|1995]]</li><li>[[Brazil at the 1999 Pan American Games|1999]]</li><li>[[Brazil at the 2003 Pan American Games|2003]]</li><li>[[Brazil at the 2007 Pan American Games|2007]]</li><li>[[Brazil at the 2011 Pan American Games|2011]]</li><li>[[Brazil at the 2015 Pan American Games|2015]]</li><li>[[Brazil at the 2019 Pan American Games|2019]]</li></ul></div>

Problems:
*The output shows 1996 and 1940 as absences when actually no competition was held in those years. Should absences be omitted when not a competition year?
*Parameter <code>1967–79</code> produced output <span style="color:gray">1967–79</span> but only 1967 was skipped. Should additional years covered by a range (1971, 1975, 1979 in above example) be omitted?

Answering "yes" to these questions would give output:
<div class="hlist"><ul><li>[[Brazil at the 1951 Pan American Games|1951]]</li><li>[[Brazil at the 1955 Pan American Games|1955]]</li><li>[[Brazil at the 1959 Pan American Games|1959]]</li><li>[[Brazil at the 1963 Pan American Games|1963]]</li><li><span style="color:gray">1967–79</span></li><li>[[Brazil at the 1983 Pan American Games|1983]]</li><li>[[Brazil at the 1987 Pan American Games|1987]]</li><li><span style="color:gray">1991</span></li><li>[[Brazil at the 1995 Pan American Games|1995]]</li><li>[[Brazil at the 1999 Pan American Games|1999]]</li><li>[[Brazil at the 2003 Pan American Games|2003]]</li><li>[[Brazil at the 2007 Pan American Games|2007]]</li><li>[[Brazil at the 2011 Pan American Games|2011]]</li><li>[[Brazil at the 2015 Pan American Games|2015]]</li><li>[[Brazil at the 2019 Pan American Games|2019]]</li></ul></div>

The module uses <code>pairs</code> when it should use <code>ipairs</code>, and there are a couple of other minor issues that I plan to work on. Before starting, I want to know what the module should do regarding the above. Also, are any further changes wanted at this stage? [[User:Johnuniq|Johnuniq]] ([[User talk:Johnuniq|talk]]) 04:04, 17 November 2016 (UTC)
*As to the first issue - yes, they should be omitted. Clearly if the PanAm Games weren't played in 1996, Brazil wasn't there.
:Second issue - yes, I think the entire range should be omitted (I think this will be more difficult than the first issue, though). If anything, I think this will give us more trouble than it's worth (specifically, I'm thinking about absences going between 19** and 20**). As a possible "2.5" fix, we could have it so that when 1967 and 1971 are both given, it combines them into 1967-71 (i.e. the module combines years). However, I'm always willing to give it the old college try.
:I'll try to take a closer look at the module and its coding to start a deeper discussion, but these two issues are (so fair) the main ones that I've noticed and would like to see fixed/updated. [[User:Primefac|Primefac]] ([[User talk:Primefac|talk]]) 04:13, 17 November 2016 (UTC)
::OK, thanks. Due to off-wiki stuff I'm not sure when I will make an edit: it may be soon, or possibly next week. The above is achievable. For minimum disruption, I might make the module work correctly for a range like 1967-79 (or 1967-1979, where the input dash can be a hyphen or an en dash), but do what it does now for invalid years such as 196x. I'll think about combining contiguous absences later. [[User:Johnuniq|Johnuniq]] ([[User talk:Johnuniq|talk]]) 04:36, 17 November 2016 (UTC)

===Combining years===
@[[User:Primefac|Primefac]]: I'm thinking it would be best if the module automatically merges years to make a range, so if there were competitions in 1951, 1955, 1959, and if a team was absent from those three, the output would show <span style="color:gray">1951–1959</span> and that would occur regardless of how the absences were entered (say <code>|1951|1959|1955</code> or <code>|1951-55|1959</code>).

I'm wondering whether it should be <span style="color:gray">1951–1959</span> or <span style="color:gray">1951–59</span>. I do not mind, and it can be changed later. It would always use four-digit years for something like <span style="color:gray">1995–2003</span>. [[MOS:DATERANGE]] suggests four-digit years should always be used for something like this because the space saved from using two digits is not worthwhile. Thoughts? [[User:Johnuniq|Johnuniq]] ([[User talk:Johnuniq|talk]]) 01:15, 19 November 2016 (UTC)
:I'd say we go with MOS on this one (YYYY-YYYY). And yes, I definitely think that successive years should be combined. This should be fairly easy to code, basically an "if next year is grayed out, keep going, else emdash" statement before everything gets printed. I think this would be best; trying to combine ''before'' graying out would probably make for unnecessary coding to account for all the possible input methods. [[User:Primefac|Primefac]] ([[User talk:Primefac|talk]]) 02:29, 19 November 2016 (UTC)
::OK, that should be done in the next couple of days. [[User:Johnuniq|Johnuniq]] ([[User talk:Johnuniq|talk]]) 05:45, 19 November 2016 (UTC)

== Handling future years ==

I'm not sure which would be better from a coding/maintenance standpoint with regards to future years. Clearly the [[2020 Summer Olympics]] exist, but none of the team appearances pages will exist for that (e.g. [[Afghanistan at the 2020 Summer Olympics]]). There are two upkeep/maintenance options to avoid swaths of redlinks:
#Remove any date that's more than one year in the future. This means that every year this module would have to be updated to add in the next year's numbers.
#Hard-code it so that if an end year isn't given, it assumes the current year +1 (I say +1 because the 2017 stuff will likely be created late 2016).
Either way, the lists will occasionally need updating to include new years, so I'm leaning towards #1. I thought I'd bring it up first before being too [[WP:BOLD|BOLD]]. [[User:Primefac|Primefac]] ([[User talk:Primefac|talk]]) 19:56, 19 November 2016 (UTC)
:I ended up removing anything after 2017. Feel free to revert. [[User:Primefac|Primefac]] ([[User talk:Primefac|talk]]) 21:05, 19 November 2016 (UTC)

== End Year still not working ==

End year isn't working at the moment: <code><nowiki>{{Team appearances list| begin_year = 1956| end_year=1988| team = Soviet Union| competition = Winter Olympics}}</nowiki></code> gives {{Team appearances list| begin_year = 1956| end_year=1988| team = Soviet Union| competition = Winter Olympics}}. I'll see if I can fix it, but if not I figured I'd post. [[User:Primefac|Primefac]] ([[User talk:Primefac|talk]]) 20:07, 19 November 2016 (UTC)
:{{fixed}}. Just had to switch it so it checked whether "y > end_year" ''first''. [[User:Primefac|Primefac]] ([[User talk:Primefac|talk]]) 20:15, 19 November 2016 (UTC)
::Thanks, that was a silly bug and it's good to fix it. I put the change in the new module. [[User:Johnuniq|Johnuniq]] ([[User talk:Johnuniq|talk]]) 10:39, 20 November 2016 (UTC)

== Should we hardcode the absent years? ==

So I've been updating the various [https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special%3AWhatLinksHere&limit=999&target=Template%3AInfobox+country+Olympics&namespace=10 country at Olympics] templates in order to merge them all per TFD, but it's rather tedious. Additionally, I realized that with over 4k pages calling these templates, there could be a massive lag in accurate information. Example:
:Trinidad and Tobago do not compete in the 2020 Summer Olympics. Every page currently using {{tlc|Team appearances list| ...|1960}} will have to be updated to include the <code>|2020</code>
Should we create /data submodules for the games/countries that have these greyed-out values already coded, so that if a country ''doesn't'' participate in a particular year one edit will fix everything? It would mean a lot of work initially (which I'm already rather invested in doing anyway) and would save a TON of work later on. It would also avoid a lot of clutter in the infoboxes that call the module (no need to have params for every omission). In the module itself it would just require an extra line essentially saying "if X games/Y country grey years exist, use it as the omit range". [[User:Primefac|Primefac]] ([[User talk:Primefac|talk]]) 23:11, 19 November 2016 (UTC)
:If things are quiet where I am, I will post my version of the module with massive changes to the code in a few hours. I would prefer to do that before thinking about new stuff. While bearing in mind that I know almost nothing about how the module is used, if you are saying that information about, say, Trinidad and Tobago appears on more than one page, then ''yes'', all information about each country should be in a data module so there is only one place to make updates. For my education, can you link to two or more articles where such information is duplicated? I am happy to refactor the code to do that sort of thing later (I would do it soon, but after finishing what I'm doing now). [[User:Johnuniq|Johnuniq]] ([[User talk:Johnuniq|talk]]) 01:26, 20 November 2016 (UTC)
::I'm not really sure what you want me to link to. There are 18 summer games listed at {{t|Infobox Olympics Trinidad and Tobago}}, which will all be calling this module; 21 summer games via {{t|Infobox Olympics Mexico}}, a whole slew of Youth Olympics pages are calling it via {{t|infobox country at games}}. Pages like [[Thailand at the Youth Olympics]] call this module directly, but even then most of the pages I've just linked to have to input a bunch of "omit" parameters for adding in the absence years.
::I do agree, however, that fixing the date ranges as discussed above is the best first step. I just didn't want to forget to mention it while it was fresh. [[User:Primefac|Primefac]] ([[User talk:Primefac|talk]]) 02:39, 20 November 2016 (UTC)
:::Thanks. For the record I will note examples that I found when I started extracting some testcases. The following each include:
::::<code><nowiki>{{Team appearances list|competition=Pan American Games|team=Trinidad and Tobago|1959}}</nowiki></code>
:::*[[Trinidad and Tobago at the Pan American Games]]
:::*[[Trinidad and Tobago at the 1991 Pan American Games]]
:::*[[Trinidad and Tobago at the 1995 Pan American Games]]
:::*[[Trinidad and Tobago at the 1999 Pan American Games]]
:::*[[Trinidad and Tobago at the 2003 Pan American Games]]
:::*[[Trinidad and Tobago at the 2007 Pan American Games]]
:::*[[Trinidad and Tobago at the 2011 Pan American Games]]
:::*[[Trinidad and Tobago at the 2015 Pan American Games]]
:::[[User:Johnuniq|Johnuniq]] ([[User talk:Johnuniq|talk]]) 04:05, 20 November 2016 (UTC)
:I was just checking the module's subpages to see if there were any tests, and noticed you have created [[Module:Team appearances list/absences]] and [[Module:Team appearances list/absences]]. It would be better to have only a single subpage, namely [[Module:Team appearances list/data]]. It would have all constant data, both appearances and absences and anything else needed in the future. I see you started with that and there is no benefit from splitting it up. However, details can be quickly sorted out later. [[User:Johnuniq|Johnuniq]] ([[User talk:Johnuniq|talk]]) 08:13, 20 November 2016 (UTC)
::I made changes so the data submodule is used. See [[#Module updated]] below. [[User:Johnuniq|Johnuniq]] ([[User talk:Johnuniq|talk]]) 10:41, 20 November 2016 (UTC)

How should the built-in absences work? For example, [[Module:Team appearances list/data]] includes:
<pre>
local all_absences = {
    -- Olympics --
    ["Afghanistan Summer Olympics"] = {
        1952, 1976, 1984, 1992, 2000},
    -- (other similar items omitted)
}
</pre>
*What is an example of the wikitext for a template that would use the above information?
*What should the module do if the template also provides parameters that specify absences?
*Or, are the parameters for absences going to be removed, so the module should ignore them?
[[User:Johnuniq|Johnuniq]] ([[User talk:Johnuniq|talk]]) 10:53, 20 November 2016 (UTC)
::Fair point on having one module; I'm still learning the scrib interface. 
::*I put in the absences like that because it feeds off two required items: "Team" and "Games". So when the data is loaded, it would check against "Team Games". For example, that particular line would be called any time {{tlc|Team appearances list|2=team = Afghanistan|3=competition = Summer Olympics}} is called.
::*I am going to be doing my due diligence to make sure all of the absences data is accurate. If everything on the module end is right, then there would be no need for a user to input the absences information. This would also allow for a "dummy check" if they put in the wrong begin_year (I found this a few times while working with the templates yesterday because I'd get a huge wall of redlinks instead of the much shorter version I was aiming for).
::*''However'', until I get all the information input, I think allowing for user input (to be used ''only if'' the module doesn't have data) would be acceptable.
::[[User:Primefac|Primefac]] ([[User talk:Primefac|talk]]) 16:54, 20 November 2016 (UTC)

== begin_year ==

@[[User:Primefac|Primefac]]: I did a test with the following input (from [[Netherlands Antilles at the Pan American Games]]):
<pre>
{{Team appearances list
|begin_year=1959
|competition=Pan American Games
|team=Netherlands Antilles
|1951–55|2015|2019
}}
</pre>

I may not understand what <code>begin_year</code> is supposed to do because the output from my new code does not match the current module.

Current module: output from [[Special:ExpandTemplates]]:
<div class="hlist"><ul>
<li><span style="color:gray">1951–55</span></li>
<li><span style="color:gray">2019</span></li>
<li>[[Netherlands Antilles at the 1959 Pan American Games|1959]]</li>
<li>[[Netherlands Antilles at the 1963 Pan American Games|1963]]</li>
<li>[[Netherlands Antilles at the 1967 Pan American Games|1967]]</li>
<li>[[Netherlands Antilles at the 1971 Pan American Games|1971]]</li>
<li>[[Netherlands Antilles at the 1975 Pan American Games|1975]]</li>
<li>[[Netherlands Antilles at the 1979 Pan American Games|1979]]</li>
<li>[[Netherlands Antilles at the 1983 Pan American Games|1983]]</li>
<li>[[Netherlands Antilles at the 1987 Pan American Games|1987]]</li>
<li>[[Netherlands Antilles at the 1991 Pan American Games|1991]]</li>
<li>[[Netherlands Antilles at the 1995 Pan American Games|1995]]</li>
<li>[[Netherlands Antilles at the 1999 Pan American Games|1999]]</li>
<li>[[Netherlands Antilles at the 2003 Pan American Games|2003]]</li>
<li>[[Netherlands Antilles at the 2007 Pan American Games|2007]]</li>
<li>[[Netherlands Antilles at the 2011 Pan American Games|2011]]</li>
<li><span style="color:gray">2015</span></li>
</ul></div>

Simulated output that is produced by new module (not yet uploaded):
<div class="hlist"><ul>
<li>[[Netherlands Antilles at the 1959 Pan American Games|1959]]</li>
<li>[[Netherlands Antilles at the 1963 Pan American Games|1963]]</li>
<li>[[Netherlands Antilles at the 1967 Pan American Games|1967]]</li>
<li>[[Netherlands Antilles at the 1971 Pan American Games|1971]]</li>
<li>[[Netherlands Antilles at the 1975 Pan American Games|1975]]</li>
<li>[[Netherlands Antilles at the 1979 Pan American Games|1979]]</li>
<li>[[Netherlands Antilles at the 1983 Pan American Games|1983]]</li>
<li>[[Netherlands Antilles at the 1987 Pan American Games|1987]]</li>
<li>[[Netherlands Antilles at the 1991 Pan American Games|1991]]</li>
<li>[[Netherlands Antilles at the 1995 Pan American Games|1995]]</li>
<li>[[Netherlands Antilles at the 1999 Pan American Games|1999]]</li>
<li>[[Netherlands Antilles at the 2003 Pan American Games|2003]]</li>
<li>[[Netherlands Antilles at the 2007 Pan American Games|2007]]</li>
<li>[[Netherlands Antilles at the 2011 Pan American Games|2011]]</li>
<li><span style="color:gray">2015</span></li>
</ul></div>

My code omits <span style="color:gray">1951–55</span> because that is before begin_year (1959), and it omits <span style="color:gray">2019</span> because that is not in the definition for "Pan American Games". What is correct?

If my code is not correct, please explain what the point of begin_year is.

For the above input, my code gets the definition of "Pan American Games", but it considers only the years >= begin_year (and <= end_year if it is specified). For the specified competition and begin_year, the years are:
:1959, 1963, 1967, 1971, 1975, 1979, 1983, 1987, 1991, 1995, 1999, 2003, 2007, 2011, 2015
My code then processes those years. Is that what is wanted? [[User:Johnuniq|Johnuniq]] ([[User talk:Johnuniq|talk]]) 05:26, 20 November 2016 (UTC)
:To answer your last question - yes. If Netherlands Antilles didn't play in the PanAm games before 1959 (the begin_year), then there's really not much point in having greyed-out values from before then. Similarly, if an event is in the future (e.g. 2019) we simply have no way of knowing if they'll participate (and if they said "2011 was our last year ever" then we set {{para|end_year|2011}} and 2015/19 would be irrelevant). [[User:Primefac|Primefac]] ([[User talk:Primefac|talk]]) 05:30, 20 November 2016 (UTC)

== Module updated ==

I updated [[Module:Team appearances list]] with a major refactor per discussions above. See [[Template:Team appearances list/testcases]] for some simple checks. I used all the unique {{tl|Team appearances list}} examples in articles that I could find. Please give it a solid test using quirky input parameters, and let me know if there are any problems. Assuming it is ok, I was planning to enhance the way it checks the input parameters, but that had better wait until deciding what is going to happen with moving the data to a submodule. I'll look at that soon. The following allows comparison of the module and its sandbox, although the diff is too massive to be helpful at the moment.
{{#invoke:convert/tester|compare|Team appearances list|Team appearances list/data}}
Further update: I created the data submodule and changed the main module to load it. [[User:Johnuniq|Johnuniq]] ([[User talk:Johnuniq|talk]]) 10:38, 20 November 2016 (UTC)
:<s>The main error I'm seeing is that any invalid absence years (top three tests) are just chucked at the beginning of the list. If there is no match, it should just be ignored. [[User:Primefac|Primefac]] ([[User talk:Primefac|talk]]) 16:58, 20 November 2016 (UTC)</s>B Never mind. I was looking at the sandbox, which hadn't been updated. Everything looks good. [[User:Primefac|Primefac]] ([[User talk:Primefac|talk]]) 21:59, 20 November 2016 (UTC)

== Data arrangement ==

The current [[Module:Team appearances list/data]] has one table of competitions, and another of absences. The keys in the absences table would be calculated from "Team + space + Competition". That would work, but requires duplication of the competition names. I'm wondering if an alternative arrangement might be better. I do not have strong feelings about this—it's just something to consider.

I put a demonstration of one alternative at [[Module:Team appearances list/data/sandbox]], although I only did Summer Olympics and Winter Olympics, and the values are not the most recent—it's just a demo. The absences table has been removed, and the absences have been incorporated into each competition. For example, "Summer Olympics" starts:
<pre>
["Summer Olympics"] = {
    1896, 1900, 1904, 1908, 1912, 1920, 1924, 1928, 1932, 1936, 1948, 1952,
    1956, 1960, 1964, 1968, 1972, 1976, 1980, 1984, 1988, 1992, 1996, 2000,
    2004, 2008, 2012, 2016},
    ["Afghanistan"] = { 1952, 1976, 1984, 1992, 2000},
    ["Albania"] = { 1976, 1980, 1984, 1988},
    ["Algeria"] = { 1976},
</pre>
*The numbers (1896, 1900, ...) are the years the competition was held.
*The other items specify the years some teams were absent (Algeria did not attend in 1976).
Thoughts? If this is wanted, I can rearrange the data as done for the demo (not manual editing). [[User:Johnuniq|Johnuniq]] ([[User talk:Johnuniq|talk]]) 03:43, 21 November 2016 (UTC)
:Just checking, but in your brief example above the country names are outside of the "Summer Olympics" brackets. That means that if there are two "Algeria" sets (Summer/Winter) it has no way of distinguishing them... right? Or are you doing a depth-first search to say "Find ''Summer Olympics'', then find the country name"? Of course, that wouldn't work either because if there ''wasn't'' a country in the Summer but ''was'' in the Winter, it would skip all the way down (right?). [[User:Primefac|Primefac]] ([[User talk:Primefac|talk]]) 12:55, 21 November 2016 (UTC)
::Oops, that's a blunder! The Afghanistan table should be ''inside'' the Summer Olympics table. I fixed the syntax in the module and [[Module:Team appearances list/data/sandbox]] is now good. I added two examples at the top of [[Template:Team appearances list/testcases]] showing Afghanistan in the Summer Olympics and in the Summer Paralympics. The first output line shows the results from the main module, while the second output line shows the sandbox output. It appears to be working—the first line uses the all_absences table, while the second line uses the combined tables in the sandbox. The examples show that there probably should be a built-in begin_year. Afghanistan needs 1936 as the begin_year in the Summer Olympics and 1996 in the Summer Paralympics. [[User:Johnuniq|Johnuniq]] ([[User talk:Johnuniq|talk]]) 22:48, 21 November 2016 (UTC)
:::I am hesitant to have a built-in begin_year, because they user ''may'' want to have a different one. For example, someone may wish to have some sort of "USA in the 21st Century" list, where they specify {{para|begin_year|2000}}. If we hard-code the begin_year, they wouldn't be able to do that.
:::As for the modified list (team as a subset of competition), I think it will be a lot easier to deal with. I'll work on getting the other values translated over. [[User:Primefac|Primefac]] ([[User talk:Primefac|talk]]) 00:31, 22 November 2016 (UTC)
::::Good point, so begin_year for a team can be a ''default''. I added some code to the sandbox main and data modules to demonstrate begin_year as a default for Afghanistan. See the first two examples at [[Template:Team appearances list/testcases]]. [[User:Johnuniq|Johnuniq]] ([[User talk:Johnuniq|talk]]) 01:26, 22 November 2016 (UTC)
:::::Okay, when I update everything else I'll add those in as well. [[User:Primefac|Primefac]] ([[User talk:Primefac|talk]]) 02:00, 22 November 2016 (UTC)
:::::Addendum: I just realized that we'll need entries for ''every'' team that participated so that we can define the begin_year. Is this still a desirable path to walk down? [[User:Primefac|Primefac]] ([[User talk:Primefac|talk]]) 02:05, 22 November 2016 (UTC)
::::::I don't have a feeling for how huge the job is, although I see you have done a lot of difficult stuff already. However, we are just talking about setting a default begin_year. Let's say there was an "Xyz" team that competed at the Summer Olympics but the absences for Xyz were not entered for whatever reason. That would mean there was no default begin_year, and every template mentioning Xyz would need to specify absences (if any) and begin_year (if wanted). It would not be ''necessary'' to enter Xyz into the data table.
::::::Which data module would you planning to change? If [[Module:Team appearances list/data]], I guess you should copy the data from [[Module:Team appearances list/data/sandbox]] first, but copy the sandbox module to the main module before that. Working in the sandbox might be better (although perhaps harder to see results) because each edit to the main module causes MediaWiki to purge the cache of all pages which use the module. It would be better if we work in the sandbox and move the results to the main module when satisfied that things have settled down for a while. [[User:Johnuniq|Johnuniq]] ([[User talk:Johnuniq|talk]]) 02:31, 22 November 2016 (UTC)
:::::::Good point, and it goes back to the "dummy check" I mentioned earlier (if someone sees a huge list of redlinks they would probably double back and make sure they didn't miss something). I'll update the Olympics (and related games) first and then start up on the other comps. [[User:Primefac|Primefac]] ([[User talk:Primefac|talk]]) 02:45, 22 November 2016 (UTC)

The new arrangement is growing on me because all related information is together, and there is no duplication. However, it depends on how many more competitions and team-absences need to be added. If there are too many, having separate data might be best for human comprehension. While we are pondering that, I have uploaded a new version which should cope with either scheme. It will use the absences specified in the first of the following which is defined (ignoring any other definitions):
* The competition table (for example, "Afghanistan" for the "Summer Olympics" competition above).
* The all_absences table (for example, "Afghanistan Summer Olympics").
* The template parameters.

The new code allows the data to specify absent years as numbers or as strings. For example, 2012 and "2012" would have the same result. More useful is that "1998-2012" (or "1998–2012" with en dash) would specify a range of absent years, inclusive.

The new code needs testing! [[User:Johnuniq|Johnuniq]] ([[User talk:Johnuniq|talk]]) 10:14, 21 November 2016 (UTC)

== Parameter validation ==

I have updated the sandbox module so it validates the template parameters. The following shows what is now required.
<pre>
Always:
    competition   required : non-empty string
    team          required : non-empty string

If competition is defined in data module:
    begin_year    optional : number from 1800 to 2100 inclusive
    end_year      optional : as above (and end_year >= begin_year)
else:
    begin_year    required : as above
    end_year      optional : as above
    interval      required : number from 1 to 30 inclusive
</pre>
Let me know if any adjustments are needed. [[User:Johnuniq|Johnuniq]] ([[User talk:Johnuniq|talk]]) 00:23, 23 November 2016 (UTC)

== Status ==

The points discussed recently have been implemented:
* Parameters are validated. The error messages are ugly—could think about that later.
* The data module has no absences table. Instead, each competition can define team absences, and a default for begin_year can be defined for each team.
* The main and sandbox modules are currently identical.
{{#invoke:convert/tester|compare|Team appearances list|Team appearances list/data}}
I have finished what I planned doing but would be happy to help add more team definitions or modify the modules as needed. I might get around to writing some module documentation. When the data is reasonably finished, I could think about some tests; at the moment all I know of is at [[Template:Team appearances list/testcases]]. [[User:Johnuniq|Johnuniq]] ([[User talk:Johnuniq|talk]]) 02:53, 24 November 2016 (UTC)
:The main data modules will be heavily updated in about an hour. Sorry, but I'll be overwriting all of your work in that regard. [[User:Primefac|Primefac]] ([[User talk:Primefac|talk]]) 02:54, 24 November 2016 (UTC)
::OK, I guessed that you had paused for a while. No problem. I will examine what happens and restore anything I think is needed, hoping that you will check my edits. I had to edit {{tl|Infobox country at games}} ([[Special:Diff/751213735|diff]]) so missing parameters are passed as empty strings to the module. [[User:Johnuniq|Johnuniq]] ([[User talk:Johnuniq|talk]]) 03:05, 24 November 2016 (UTC)
:::Yeah, no worries. I figured you'd get tired of waiting and implement your changes. I was mainly just letting you know about the next update. The Olympics (and related entities) will be done tonight, and I'll start working on the Commonwealth in the next few days. [[User:Primefac|Primefac]] ([[User talk:Primefac|talk]]) 03:07, 24 November 2016 (UTC)

== Showing all competitions/teams ==

@[[User:Primefac|Primefac]]: You may find a new module useful while fixing/checking the large number amount of data the module uses.
*[[Module:Team appearances list/show]] • Test [[Module:Team appearances list/data]] by showing results for all competitions/teams.
*[[Module talk:Team appearances list/show]] • Results of invoking above.
[[User:Johnuniq|Johnuniq]] ([[User talk:Johnuniq|talk]]) 00:36, 25 November 2016 (UTC)
:The Olympics results are accurate, but for some reason none of the Commonwealth values are working (absences or begin/end years). [[User:Primefac|Primefac]] ([[User talk:Primefac|talk]]) 01:37, 26 November 2016 (UTC)
::Sorry about the confusion. My note was misleading—what it meant was that you can pass the sandbox data module to show, and it will use each competition/team pair found in that module. What it failed to mention is that it will still use the main module which will use the main data. I have updated a couple of things so the following should work:
::*Use [[Module talk:Team appearances list/show]] to show the results of [[Module:Team appearances list]] + [[Module:Team appearances list/data]].
::*Use [[Module talk:Team appearances list/show/sandbox]] to show the results of [[Module:Team appearances list/sandbox]] + [[Module:Team appearances list/data/sandbox]].
::[[User:Johnuniq|Johnuniq]] ([[User talk:Johnuniq|talk]]) 03:56, 26 November 2016 (UTC)
:::Ah, yes. I should have figured that, since everything else works that way. Cheers. [[User:Primefac|Primefac]] ([[User talk:Primefac|talk]]) 04:00, 26 November 2016 (UTC)

== Changing games names ==
TL/DR: This module needs to be modified to better handle when a competition has a name change. [[User:Primefac|Primefac]] ([[User talk:Primefac|talk]]) 02:40, 2 December 2019 (UTC)
----
{{u|Johnuniq}}, it's been discussed in a few places (most recently [[Template talk:Team appearances list/Archive 1#2019 World Championships in Athletics|here]]) regarding the change from "World Championships in Athletics" to [[World Athletics Championships]]. Unlike the team name changes (e.g. Swaziland/Eswatini or the GB/UK thing), which can be handled with a few different switches here or in [[Module:Country alias]], changing the competition name causes this template/module some issues. A prime example is basically any template calling {{t|infobox country at games}} involved with the WAC; for example [[Afghanistan at the 2019 World Athletics Championships|Afghanistan]], which I had to somewhat hack-and-slash the 2019 WAC so that it would link to the pre-2019 ''WCA'' variants properly (and vice versa).

At the moment there are three major competitions with this issue; WCA/WAC, the Commonwealth Games, and the [[Southeast Asian Games|SEA Games]] (formerly SEA''P'' Games). I've [[Template:Infobox country at games/Commonwealth|mostly dealt with]] the Commonwealth and haven't really had time to tackle the Asian Games problem (like [[Malaysia_at_the_1965_Southeast_Asian_Peninsular_Games|this beauty]]), but with this new one I figure the module might as well accommodate multiple-name-games (i.e. there's no need to have the four-level split for the Commonwealth). 

I can't decide if it would be better to have a secondary check that basically says "if it's one of ''these'' games, add on ''these other'' games", OR split each "games" into its own subpage (instead of one gigantic /data module) which could then be called and match up the proper year/games pair. I'm leaning towards the second one – though that would require a fair amount of recoding the main module – as opposed to the first one which just involves a new function. Thoughts? [[User:Primefac|Primefac]] ([[User talk:Primefac|talk]]) 02:39, 2 December 2019 (UTC)
:{{ping|Primefac}} Problem: It is three years since I developed the module and two years since I tweaked it. I now have only the dimmest of recollections regarding what it does. It would be best to give me a concrete example, preferably of something I could paste into a sandbox to see what it does. Let's start with an assume-anything-is-possible wishlist of what should happen when a competition changes its name. That is, what input would produce what output. Taking your [[Afghanistan at the 2019 World Athletics Championships]] example, I gather that {{tl|Infobox country at games}} calls {{tl|Team appearances list}} which invokes [[Module:Team appearances list]]. Would the optimum be for different output to occur with the same wikitext input? [[User:Johnuniq|Johnuniq]] ([[User talk:Johnuniq|talk]]) 06:52, 2 December 2019 (UTC)
::Apologies for never really writing back about this; every time I went to describe the issue and how it could be solved I realized that the proposed solution wouldn't work, and then by the time I figured out the solution it was simple enough to implement (despite some serious sandbox fiddling). You're welcome to take a look at my fixes and see if there's a more elegant solution. At the moment it can handle a country's name change (first example) and the games changing its name (second example).<s>, though I just realized I didn't add in the backend for the country name changes (will get to that asap).</s>
::*{{team appearances list|team=Swaziland|competition=Summer Olympics}}
::*{{team appearances list|team=Australia|competition=Commonwealth Games}}
::[[User:Primefac|Primefac]] ([[User talk:Primefac|talk]]) 04:16, 5 January 2020 (UTC)