This page is an archive of a community-wide discussion. This page is no longer live. Further comments should be made in the Senate Hall or new Consensus Track pages rather than here so that this page is preserved as a historic record.
The result of the debate was move succession boxes to before the "Notes and references" sections of articles to fix sourcing issues. Graestan^(Talk) 19:20, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

I am proposing this CT to slightly change the layout of the Manual of Style to deal with a problem that come to light several months ago. In November, while coding reference tags for the article Dar Keyis, I noticed a strange occurrence; the ref tags for the succession box were not being picked up by the {{Reflist}} template. I directed the problem to Sannse over on the IRC channel, and she took a look but could not find an answer. In turn, she directed the problem to Uberfuzzy.

Uberfuzzy's response was that it is expected behaviour, as the ref tag was designed to go at the bottom of the page, and therefore would not pick up anything below it. However, because of errors in the old parser, it worked that way anyway, picking up ref tags below the template, taking advantage of the bug. The bug was recently fixed, and the tag works as expected now.

Compare the references section in this edit, to the references section in this one. Notice how the second example picks up the extra reference information, while the first does not.

So the problem now is that all articles with succession boxes are improperly sourced—especially many of our Featured and Good articles. To combat this, I propose a slight amendment to the MoS; namely, that the Succession Box Section is shifted to before the Notes and References Section.

Instead of an MoS like this:

1. Title/Eras/Infobox
2. Main article
3. Stub
4. Behind the scenes (notice the capitalization)
5. Appearances
6. Sources
7. Notes and references
8. See also
9. External links
10. Succession box
11. Category
12. Interwiki links

We would have it like this:

1. Title/Eras/Infobox
2. Main article
3. Stub
4. Behind the scenes (notice the capitalization)
5. Appearances
6. Sources
7. Succession box
8. Notes and references
9. See also
10. External links
11. Category
12. Interwiki links

Please note, this is not an attempt to change the MoS merely because I believe that it would look better this way. This is an attempt to cover a serious problem that has come to light, and to maintain our Sourcing policy. Obviously, if this CT passes, a bot will be needed to apply the needed layout changes to all articles.

Also, I apologise for the lateness in tabling this CT; illness and an enforced break from the Wook over the Christmas period did not help matters. - Cavalier One^{(Squadron channel)} 12:53, 16 January 2009 (UTC)

VotingEdit

In favor of amending the MoSEdit

1. It'd be ugly, but absent an actual solution, this seems like a logical way to do it. Gonk ^(Gonk!) 15:12, 16 January 2009 (UTC)
2. Show of good faith that our brilliant colleagues can work out any kinks in this system. The current system's kinks have been worked at unsuccessfully for ages. Graestan^(Talk) 15:19, 16 January 2009 (UTC)
3. You are smart. You make things go. We look for things to make us go. -- Darth Culator ^(Talk) 15:53, 16 January 2009 (UTC)
4. Seems necessary to make it work. Though I've always thought the Notes and refs section should be at the very bottom of the page after everything. - JMAS ^{Hey, it's me!} 15:56, 16 January 2009 (UTC)
5. Per Gonk. I think it is just the best of what we can do at this point. — Fiolli ^{{Alpheridies University ComNet}} 16:04, 16 January 2009 (UTC)
6. Grand Moff Tranner ^(Comlink) 18:16, 16 January 2009 (UTC)
7. Chack Jadson ^(Talk) 19:55, 16 January 2009 (UTC)
8. Doesn't look great, but if it picks up the references, I'm cool with it. DC 21:57, 16 January 2009 (UTC)
9. Any order that ensures the popular and occasionally useful succession box feature can be properly referenced makes sense to me. —Silly Dan _(talk) 22:08, 16 January 2009 (UTC)
10. Generally-speaking, succession boxes are better to have than to not have, IMHO. Support.--Goodwood ^{(Alliance Intelligence)} 22:20, 16 January 2009 (UTC)
11. With the understanding that KillerRoboLeia and Whistler will be getting quite the workout if this passes. Atarumaster88 ^{(Talk page)} 00:53, 17 January 2009 (UTC)
12. Not too happy about how it's going to look, but per Gonk, until a better solution is developed, this will have to do. I would rather sacrifice aesthetics than detract from our rigid sourcing regulations, which is one of the things what makes Wookieepedia so much more professional than some other wikis. SoresuMakashi^{(Everything I tell you is a lie)} 04:11, 17 January 2009 (UTC)
13. Per JMAS. Grunny ^(Talk) 04:32, 17 January 2009 (UTC)
14. Uggh, I think this will look pretty terrible, and I'm not a big fan of succession boxes anyway, but despite my misgivings, this seems like the best way to go for now. Doluk^Talk 17:38, 17 January 2009 (UTC)
15. I agree that this isn't the place for a succession box debate. This looks bad, and it's unfortunate that we have to resort to this, but the time for succession boxes will be reserved for another day. Toprawa and Ralltiir 02:04, 18 January 2009 (UTC)
16. IFYLOFD ^{(Come with me if you want to live.)} 03:37, 18 January 2009 (UTC)
17. If it's the only way to fix it. Havac 23:00, 18 January 2009 (UTC)
18. Functionality over aesthetics any day. Wildyoda 21:19, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
19. Proper sourcing is what makes us reliable. If there are problems, then our reliability disappears. --Michaeldsuarez ^{(Activate Holocron)} 18:52, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

Against amending the MoSEdit

1. No. I'd just as soon kill the use of succession boxes, which are poorly used anyway, IMO. Toprawa and Ralltiir 16:29, 16 January 2009 (UTC)
2. Per Toprawa. Mauser 20:28, 16 January 2009 (UTC)
3. Is this the "get rid of succession boxes altogether" line? I'd like to buy a ticket. They've always been royal pains in the choobies and massive fanon magnets, with no appreciable gain in article quality. jSarek 00:51, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

Comments/ discussionEdit

• It may be better to save the "get rid of succession boxes" argument for a different CT. That way, argument for and against can be presented separately, without confusing the two topics. It may be a good idea to simply solve this small problem before moving on to the big changes...--Goodwood ^{(Alliance Intelligence)} 00:54, 17 January 2009 (UTC)
  • Getting rid of succession boxes is not the answer. As far as the fanon goes, we can kill it like we kill any other fanon; I personally have eliminated information in succession boxes to this effect. Graestan^(Talk) 00:57, 17 January 2009 (UTC)
    • Indeed it isn't the answer, which I pointed out in my vote to support this measure.--Goodwood ^{(Alliance Intelligence)} 22:49, 17 January 2009 (UTC)
• From a coding standpoint, this is going to be quite difficult to get a bot to work correctly. However, if we did something like moving "Notes and references" to right before the categories instead of moving the succession boxes up, I think I could do it relatively easily. —Xwing328^(Talk) 02:13, 18 January 2009 (UTC)
  • If we're going to do this, let's please not separate the Notes and references from the Appearances and Sources. jSarek 13:09, 18 January 2009 (UTC)