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Help:Referencing for beginners with citation templates

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This is an old revision of this page, as edited by Joy (talk | contribs) at 12:28, 19 March 2011 (use {{see also}}). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.
See also: Wikipedia:Referencing for beginners without using templates

Please see citing sources. When possible, please use the reference method others use in an article. There are many choices. Please don't change an article from one citation format to another. Try to use the format used by the first contributor.

This is one reference method. Copy and paste the following immediately after what you want to reference:

<ref>{{cite news
| author =
| title =
| quote =
| publisher = ''''
| date =
| pages =
| url =
| accessdate =
}}</ref>

Simply put as much information as you can to the right of the equal signs. Example:

Inflation seems unlikely in 2010.<ref>{{cite news
| author = Patricia Sabatini
| title = Inflation unlikely to be a threat as economy emerges from recession
| quote = ...the Federal Reserve would continue to leave interest rates at record lows.
| publisher = ''Pittsburgh Post-Gazette''
| date = October 16, 2009
| pages =
| url = http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/09289/1005873-28.stm
| accessdate = 2010-01-05
}}</ref>Cite error: The <ref> tag name cannot be a simple integer (see the help page).

Reporter Patricia Sabatini goes to the right of the "author =". Put the publisher's name inside the quotes to italicize Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Leave fields like "pages =" blank if it doesn't apply. The accessdate is when you fetched the reference such as today; the date is when the article was published. The url is the line like ''http://www.etc''; copy and paste the url in if available.

Try not to make arbitrary changes to the words left of the equal sign ("author", "title", "url", etc) because by and large any variations will cause those elements of the reference to be unrecognized and omitted. There are more fields possible like ISBN, co-authors which you can add; see citing sources.

That's it! You're done. When editing, you'll see your reference next to the text; but after saving, readers will only see a reference number there; your reference should appear below. Good luck!

Caveat: while this reference method is popular, some editors prefer alternatives (see below). It varies by article. When possible, use the citation style others prefer. Sometimes the choice of citation template can become contentious. See Citing sources for further discussion.

References

Further information

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