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Date and year ranges

Why does {{Cite encyclopedia |title=dummy date=2000-2001}} create an error? Imho date=2000-2001 should be valid, and I think it used to be. Debresser (talk) 20:33, 14 December 2013 (UTC)

This is a topic that hasn't been fully discussed and there is a feature request to support it because year ranges are permitted by MOS:DATES.

The date checking is new so year ranges worked because they were never checked. My opinion: year ranges in citations are inappropriate. When using {{cite encyclopedia}}, an editor is usually citing an encyclopedia's article, perhaps a page or page range, and a volume of an encyclopedia that was published in a particular year. The WP:SAYWHEREYOUGOTIT ethos, in my mind, requires a modicum of specificity. If an encyclopedia was published across a range of years, 1885–1920 for example, it seems to me that the editor is obligated to state the year of the publication that was consulted to support the Wikipedia article text. To do otherwise indicates laziness on the part of the editor.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 21:20, 14 December 2013 (UTC)

I would disagree with you on this issue. In any case, {{Cite Jewish Encyclopedia}} disagrees with you. When will this feature request be implemented, or is it still being discussed? Debresser (talk) 22:21, 14 December 2013 (UTC)

Ok, let's look at {{cite Jewish Encyclopedia}}. Yes, the whole encyclopedia was published beginning with volume 1 in 1901 and ending in 1906 with volume 12. Apparently, this edition is collectively referred to as the 1906 edition. At {{cite Jewish Encyclopedia}} the examples given are to an article "Atonement, Day of":

1. Singer, Isidore; et al., eds. (1901–1906). "Atonement, Day of" . The Jewish Encyclopedia. New York: Funk & Wagnalls.
2.  Jastrow, Morris (1901). "Atonement, Day of". In Singer, Isidore; et al. (eds.). The Jewish Encyclopedia. Vol. 1. New York: Funk & Wagnalls. p. 1.

The other two examples at {{cite Jewish Encyclopedia}} are similar and illustrate the use of |noicon= so are not included here. In example 1, the template links to "Atonement, Day of" at Wikisource. The Wikisource transcription of the article is not dated, nor does it identify the specific source (volume, page, contributor, etc). From the Wikisource article, you can link to Jewish Encyclopedia where publication dates are listed as 1901–1905. This date range is not supported by any citations (the Wikisource Jewish Encyclopedia is very incomplete).

Were I citing the Wikisource transcription I might do it this way:

{{cite encyclopedia |encyclopedia=[[Jewish Encyclopedia]] |via=Wikisource |chapter=Atonement, Day of |chapterlink=:s:Jewish Encyclopedia/Atonement, Day of}}

→"Atonement, Day of". Jewish Encyclopedia – via Wikisource. {{cite encyclopedia}}: Unknown parameter |chapterlink= ignored (help)

In example 2, the template links to "Atonement, Day of" at a website called jewishencyclopedia.com. This too, is undated except that at the top of the page there is text that reads: The unedited full-text of the 1906 Jewish Encyclopedia. From this example, one might expect that "Atonement, Day of" is found on page 1 of volume 1 (of a website?) and was written by Morris Jastrow. There is a Jastrow mentioned in the article's bibliography but it's not clear that that Jastrow is Morris Jastrow.

Were I citing the jewishencyclopedia.com transcription I might do it this way:

{{cite web |website=Jewish Encyclopedia |title=Atonement, Day of |url=http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/2093-atonement-day-of |date=1906 |accessdate=2013-12-15}}

→"Atonement, Day of". Jewish Encyclopedia. 1906. Retrieved 2013-12-15.

If you go to the Internet Archive, you can find all of the 12 volumes of Jewish Encyclopedia. So, I looked up "Atonement, Day of". It's in volume 2 (not 1), begins on page 284 of that facsimile (not 1), and the contributor is Max L. Margolis (not Jastrow). Were I citing the Internet Archive facsimile I might do it this way:

{{cite encyclopedia |encyclopedia=[[Jewish Encyclopedia]] |publisher=KTAV Publishing House |via=Internet Archive |location= |date=nd |volume=2 |title=Atonement, Day of |last=Margolis |first=Max L. |editor-last=Singer |editor-first=Isadore |url=//archive.org/stream/jewishencycloped02sing#page/284/mode/2up |pages=284–289}}

→Margolis, Max L. (nd). "Atonement, Day of". In Singer, Isadore (ed.). Jewish Encyclopedia. Vol. 2. KTAV Publishing House. pp. 284–289 – via Internet Archive.

(Undated because I couldn't find a publication or copyright date in the volume 2 facsimile.)

Given all of this, it seems to me that {{cite Jewish Encyclopedia}} is rather desperately in need of an overhaul which it is in my mind to do.

If the point is to cite an article whether it is at Wikisource, or at jewishencyclopedia.com, or at Internet Archive, then I see no point in using date ranges because either the specific location of the source has a particular date or it is undated. If you must use a date, and you are consulting either Wikisource or jewishencyclopedia.com then the date should be 1906 (although |accessdate= might be a better choice for the latter). If you are consulting a physical copy of Jewish Encyclopedia, |date= should be the date of the volume you are consulting.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 13:23, 15 December 2013 (UTC)

I have seen many citation templates that use date ranges. So do sources often. And for good reason, as in the case of a several day conference. What it comes down to is that date ranges are a fact, both on Wikipedia and in the real world, and they need to be supported. Like it or not. :)

As a reply to what you say above. I think it is more correct to have a date range than no date at all, as you propose in your "how I would have done it" above. I'd rather see that done soon, than an overhaul of Template:Cite Jewish Encyclopedia, which everybody seems quite happy with. Debresser (talk) 14:46, 15 December 2013 (UTC)

I think it is more correct to have a date range than no date at all isn't a very persuasive argument because it amounts to little more than "because I like it." Can you at least say why you think this?

—Trappist the monk (talk) 16:54, 15 December 2013 (UTC)

Likewise, at Template:Egyptian parliamentary election, 2011 there is a source that uses a range: 22 - 28 December 2011. This should be allowed. Debresser (talk) 22:59, 14 December 2013 (UTC)

Who is making decisions on what is appropriate? Not it seems people who were involved in many of the PD templates?

@Debresser I have just put back month in to {{Cite Jewish Encyclopedia}} better it passes it through to to be handled at a lower level than that it kills it silently as then there is no way to tell how many articles are using it. I think you really should have discussed it on the talk page of the template before removing it.

@Trappist the monk you write "My opinion: year ranges in citations are inappropriate" be that as it may, if one does not know from which volume a citation comes then a date range is appropriate over the whole volume print. Indeed some of the templates, for things like the DNB calculate the year if the volume number is given, but if it is not then it puts in a year range. With the DNB the project is nearing completion on Wkisource and has all the facts such as author volume and page on each article, but many of the encyclopaedias do not. Therefore it is quite common for someone to have access to the text of an encyclopaedia without knowing the volume and therefore the precise year of publication. Besides some volumes are split into parts and difference parts may come out in different years.

BTW the month parameter is very useful for volumes that span a range of months but only one year. The span of months can be dropped in to the month parameter for visual reference leaving the year parameter to be used with the author or editor last name in a standard ref=harv manner. If the day and month range is such that the date parameter can not handle it then one is faced with two alternative. Either pass in a date and a year parameter (but that is subject to some good citizen removing the year parameter not realising its use with ref=harv or putting in a ref={{sfnRef}} which is more trouble than it is worth. -- PBS (talk) 22:52, 14 December 2013 (UTC)

Editors should be citing the source material as they know it to be. If the information is taken from a paper copy of DNB or Venn or Jewish Encyclopedia, then all of the normal information one expects from {{cite book}} should be in the citation. If the source is an electronic facsimile like Venn or Jewish Encyclopedia at Internet Archive or any number of works at Google Books, then one should include all of the information normally used with {{cite book}}. If the source is an electronic transcription like Wikisource or jewishencyclopedia.com or A Cambridge Alumni Database or Project Gutenberg then one should include all of the information normally used with {{cite web}} and |accessdate= is likely appropriate.

Date ranges do little to identify the specific location of the source material. In your example of the DNB, the date range that covers the period during which the individual volumes were published does little to identify the specific volume that an editor is citing. On the other hand, knowing the year of publication can narrow the field. But, I have to wonder, if an editor is stating some fact and supporting it with {{cite DNB}} citations but doesn't know the volume, then that editor should step back, and simply cite where he got the fact and not try to misapply {{cite DNB}}.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 16:54, 15 December 2013 (UTC)

PBS, you are right. I should have discussed this. In any case, as soon as the article that use it are fixed, it can (and as a deprecated parameter should) be removed. Debresser (talk) 23:02, 14 December 2013 (UTC)

I notice that you have done it for a lot of templates, have you checked them all before you did it and have you updated the documentation of all the templates to reflect you change? It seems to me that you need to write some code to check all the instances. The you need to change the documentation for each template, then run your code over very instance, check if combining month and year into the date parameter breaks date parameter, if not then combine them automatically if it does work out how you can fix it manually. Only after those steps have been taken should the templates be changed to stop passing through month parameters. -- PBS (talk) 23:11, 14 December 2013 (UTC)

I have not done this for other templates, to the best of my memory. If you see any, please write me on my talkpage. Debresser (talk) 23:37, 14 December 2013 (UTC)

(edit conflict)I'll get round to answering other issues raised above later.

1. A wrapper template can pass |date=, |month=, and |year= to {{cite encyclopedia}} which then passes them to Module:Citation/CS1
2. If |date=, |month=, and |year= are all passed from the wrapper through {{cite encyclopedia}} to Module:Citation/CS1 then:

   |date= becomes a new variable called Date

   |month= is discarded

   |year= is used for the |ref=harv anchor id

3. If |month= and |year= without |date= are passed from the wrapper through {{cite encyclopedia}} to Module:Citation/CS1 then:

   the module concatenates |month= and |year= into the new variable Date.

   |month= and |year= are then discarded

   the year portion of Date is used for the |ref=harv anchor id

4. If |date= without |month= and |year= is passed from the wrapper through {{cite encyclopedia}} to Module:Citation/CS1 then:

   |date= becomes the new variable Date

   the year portion of Date is used for the |ref=harv anchor id

This is an attempt a clarity. If I haven't succeeded, let me know.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 23:43, 14 December 2013 (UTC)

This I think is clear. Just to remind everybody that the issue of this subsection is to allow ranges of dates. It seems to be in practical use, based in at least some cases on sources. Debresser (talk) 01:28, 15 December 2013 (UTC)

This happens often with {{Cite conference}}, because many conferences last several days. Debresser (talk) 09:24, 15 December 2013 (UTC)

Citation Style 1 currently lacks it's own well-considered, well-known advice on publication dates. To form such advice, it makes sense to look at printed style guides, such as The Chicago Manual of Style (16th ed.). That guide has relevant guidance.

Sec. 14.151 on p. 772 indicates that "when an entire multivolume, multiyear work is cited, the range of dates is given (see 6.79)." If the work is not completed, the first year is given followed by an n-dash. Two examples given are:

Hayek, F. A. Contra Keynes and the Cambridge: Essays, Correspondence. Vol. 9 of The Collected Works of F.A. Hayek. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1998-.

Tillich, Paul. Systematic Theology. 3 vols. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1951–63.

Jc3s5h (talk) 17:10, 15 December 2013 (UTC)

It seems that your first example doesn't comply with the when an entire multivolume, multiyear work is cited clause. Volume 9 is clearly only part of The Collected Works of F.A. Hayek so the publication date of that volume is the appropriate date. For Tillich, a date range is appropriate and is in compliance with the multivolume, multiyear criteria.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 17:30, 15 December 2013 (UTC)

It's not my example, it's Chicago's example. You don't get to overrule Chicago. Furthermore, since I have proven that date ranges are accepted in citations by one of the most important citation styles, it is inappropriate for Wikipedia editors to decide to overrule Chicago on an obscure page about how a module is coded. It seems to me if you want to overrule Chicago you must first obtain consensus to do so through a widely-advertised RFC. Jc3s5h (talk) 17:44, 15 December 2013 (UTC)

Who said anything about overruling Chicago? Obtain consensus to overrule Chicago? We here at Wikipedia have no power over Chicago. You are reading something there that I did not write. I merely pointed out that the Hayek citation seems to violate Chicago as you quote it. Nothing more.

CS1 is not Chicago. CS1 is not ALA. Nor is CS1 any of the other style guides.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 18:19, 15 December 2013 (UTC)

Editors have been using CS1 for years. There has never been any guidance that I can find telling the users of these templates that they shouldn't have publication dates (whether using the date parameter or year parameter) that contain date ranges. In the absence of any rules to the contrary, we would expect editors to follow normal scholarly citation practices, and guides such as APA and Chicago are evidence of what normal scholarly citation practice is. In the absence of any CS1 rule to the contrary, a practice found in two major style guides is not an error. Jc3s5h (talk) 18:37, 15 December 2013 (UTC)

It seems APA Style largely agrees with Chicago. The 6th edition p. 185 states

*For several volumes in a multivolume work or several letters from the same collection, express the date as a range of years from earliest to latest (see Chapter 7, examples 23 and 65).

23...Koch, S. (Ed.). (1959-1963) Psychology: A study of science (Vols. 1–6). New York, NY: McGraw-Hill.

65...Allport, G. W. (1930-1967). Correspondence. Gordon W. Allport Papers (HUG 4118.10). Harvard University Archives, Cambridge, MA.

Since APA uses parenthetical citations, the details about which Allport letter was being cited would be contained in the in-line parenthetical citation.

Jc3s5h (talk) 17:56, 15 December 2013 (UTC)

To not loose my reply in the discussion, I'll post it here. I said that I like a range better than no date at all. Trappist the monk asked if this isn't the "I like" argument. Of course it is not. Having some information, in this case a range of a few years, is better than having no information at all. If I know a work was written from 1901-1906, e.g., I will at least understand it is not a contemporary work. Also, and this I can not stress enough, sources themselves often give a date range, like in the writings from a scientific conference e.g. If it is in sources, we should be able to allow for it. Debresser (talk) 20:44, 15 December 2013 (UTC)

Consider the hypothetical case of a journal published more than once a year, which uses neither volume nor issue numbers. The obvious unique identifier is the cover date, which might be shown as "January-April 2013", "May-August 2013", and "September-December 2013". Let's say we use the second one as a ref source. Do we put contrived dates like |date=May 2013 or |date=August 2013, or the truth |date=May-August 2013? --Redrose64 (talk) 21:03, 15 December 2013 (UTC)

Month ranges are supported already:

{{cite journal |journal=Journal of Foo |date=May-August 2013}}

Journal of Foo. May–August 2013. {{cite journal}}: Missing or empty |title= (help)CS1 maint: date format (link)

What needs to be added are valid day ranges, e.g. "5-11 December 2013" and valid year ranges, e.g. "1898-1900".

{{cite journal |journal=Weekly Journal of Foo |date=5-11 December 2013}}

Weekly Journal of Foo. 5–11 December 2013. {{cite journal}}: Missing or empty |title= (help)CS1 maint: date format (link)

{{cite web |website=Journal of lazy publishing dates |date=2005-2013|url=http://foo}}

"Web site with copyright range but no findable publishing date". 2005–2013.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: date format (link)

– Jonesey95 (talk) 21:47, 15 December 2013 (UTC)

I think most editors here agree that date and year ranges should be valid. Can this be implemented? Note, ranges may be indicated with a variety of dashed (regular, en-dash, em-dash). Debresser (talk) 16:40, 21 December 2013 (UTC)

Valid date ranges are what the documentation of the various templates say are valid. I haven't looked at all the templates, but Help:Citation style 1 says to use WP:DATESNO (which does not address date ranges). In addition, seasons, hyphenated seasons ("spring-summer") and dates in religious calendars are listed as valid. There is no description of how to write day, month, or year ranges. Should these proposed changes be the subject of a well-advertised RFC before implementation?

My position is if you don't have consensus for the documentation changes, or don't even know what the documentation changes will be, then you're not ready for implementation. Jc3s5h (talk) 17:12, 21 December 2013 (UTC)

WP:DATESNO addresses date range style in the third bullet point below the acceptable dates table. Date range style is also addressed at WP:DATERANGE and MOS:DOB; both of which are subsections of WP:DATESNO.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 18:08, 21 December 2013 (UTC)

Sorry, I missed that; day, month, and year ranges are indeed covered. Jc3s5h (talk) 18:15, 21 December 2013 (UTC)

So will the module start allowing it? Debresser (talk) 19:02, 21 December 2013 (UTC)

I second that. The rejection of year ranges by the validation has broken links to valid citations from {{harv}} and {{sfn}} in many articles. Kanguole 02:28, 26 December 2013 (UTC)