Template:Infobox/doc

This template is intended as a meta template: a template used for constructing other templates. Note: In general, it is not meant for use directly in an article, but can be used on a one-off basis if required. Help:Infobox contains an introduction about the recommended content and design of infoboxes; Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Infoboxes contains additional style guidelines. See WP:List of infoboxes and Category:Infobox templates for lists of prepared topic-specific infoboxes.

Usage

Template:Tlf is a meta-template: used to organise an actual {{Infobox sometopic}} template (like Template:Tl).

For [[Template:Infobox sometopic]], template code then looks like this, simplified:

{{Infobox
| name     = {{{name|{{PAGENAME}}}}}
| image    = {{{image|}}}
| caption1 = {{{caption|}}}

| label1   = Former names
|  data1   = {{{former_names|}}}

| header2  = General information

| label3   = Status
|  data3   = {{{status|}}}
... <!-- etc. -->
}}

Optional control parameters

name 

If this parameter is present, "view/discuss/edit" links will be added to the bottom of the infobox pointing to the named page. You may use the value {{subst:PAGENAME}}; however, this is rarely what you want because it will send users clicking these links in an infobox to the template code rather than the data in the infobox they probably want to change.

child 

See the Embedding section for details. If this is set to "yes", this child infobox should be titled but have no name parameter. This parameter is empty by default, set it to "yes" to activate it.

subbox 

See the Subboxes section for details. If this is set to "yes", this subbox should be titled but have no name parameter. This parameter is empty by default, set to "yes" to activate it. It has no effect if the child parameter is also set to "yes".

decat 

If this is set to "yes", the current page will not be autocategorized in a maintenance category when the generated infobox has some problems or no visible data section. Leave empty by default or set to "yes" to activate it.

Content parameters

Title

There are two different ways to put a title on an infobox. One contains the title inside the infobox's border in the uppermost cell of the table, the other puts it as a caption on top of the table. You can use them both together, or just one or the other, or neither (though this is not recommended):

title 

Text to put in the caption over the top of the table (or as section header before the whole content of this table, if this is a child infobox). For accessibility reasons, this is the most recommended alternative.

above 

Text to put within the uppermost cell of the table.

subheader(n) 

additional title fields which fit below {{{title}}} and {{{above}}}, but before images.

Examples:

Infobox/doc

{{Infobox
 | name = {{subst:PAGENAME}}
 | title      = Text in caption over infobox
 | subheader  = Subheader of the infobox
 | header = (the rest of the infobox goes here)
}}

Infobox/doc

{{Infobox
 | name = {{subst:PAGENAME}}
 | above      = Text in uppermost cell of infobox
 | subheader  = Subheader of the infobox
 | subheader2 = Second subheader of the infobox
 | header = (the rest of the infobox goes here)
}}

Illustration images

image(n) 

images to display at the top of the template. Use full image syntax, for example [[File:example.png|200px|alt=Example alt text]]. Image is centered by default. See WP:ALT for more on alt text.

caption(n) 

Text to put underneath the images.

Main data

header(n) 

Text to use as a header in row n.

label(n) 

Text to use as a label in row n.

data(n) 

Text to display as data in row n.

Note: for any given value for (n), not all combinations of parameters are permitted. The presence of a Template:Para will cause the corresponding Template:Para (and Template:Para Template:Para, see below) to be ignored; the absence of a Template:Para will cause the corresponding Template:Para to be ignored. Valid combinations for any single row are:

• Template:Para Template:Para
• Template:Para Template:Para Template:Para
• Template:Para Template:Para Template:Para Template:Para

See the rendering of header4, label4, and data4 in the Examples section below.

Number ranges

To allow flexibility when the layout of an infobox is changed, it may be helpful when developing an infobox to use non-contiguous numbers for header and label/data rows. Parameters for new rows can then be inserted in future without having to renumber existing parameters. For example:

 | header3  = Section 1
 |  label5  = Label A
 |   data5  = Data A
 |  label7  = Label C
 |   data7  = Data C
 | header10 = Section 2
 |  label12 = Label D
 |   data12 = Data D

It is also possible to automatically renumber parameter names by using User:Frietjes/infoboxgap.js or Module:IncrementParams.

Making data fields optional

A row with a label but no data is not displayed. This allows for the easy creation of optional infobox content rows. To make a row optional use a parameter that defaults to an empty string, like so:

 |  label5 = Population
 |   data5 = {{{population|}}}

This way if an article doesn't define the population parameter in its infobox the row won't be displayed.

For more complex fields with pre-formatted contents that would still be present even if the parameter wasn't set, you can wrap it all in an "#if" statement to make the whole thing vanish when the parameter is not used. For instance, the "#if" statement in the following example reads "#if:the parameter mass has been supplied |then display it, followed by 'kg'":

 |  label6 = Mass
 |   data6 = {{ #if: {{{mass|}}} | {{{mass}}} kg }}

For more on #if, see here.

Hiding headers when all data fields are hidden

You can also make headers optional in a similar way. Consider this example:

Infobox/doc

{{Infobox
 | title   = Example of an undesirable header
 | header1 = Undesirable header
 |  label2 = Item 1      |   data2 =
 |  label3 = Item 2      |   data3 =
 |  label4 = Item 3      |   data4 =
 | header5 = Static header
 |  label6 = Static item |   data6 = Static value
}}

If you want the first header to appear only if one or more of the data fields that fall under it are filled, one could use the following pattern as an example of how to do it:

Infobox/doc

<source lang="moin" style="overflow:auto">

Infobox/doc

</source>

header1 will be shown if any of item1, item2, or item3 is defined. If none of the three parameters are defined the header won't be shown and no empty row appears before the next static content. The trick to this is that the #if returns false only if there is nothing whatsoever in the conditional section, so only if all three of item1, item2 and item3 are undefined will the if statement fail.

Note that such trick may be sometimes very complex to test if there are many data items whose value depends on complex tests (or when a data row is generated by a recursive invokation of this template as a subbox). Ideally, the Lua module supporting this template should now support a new way to make each header row autohideable by detecting if there is at least one non-empty data row after that header row (a parameter like Template:Para, for example, would remove the need to perform the #if test so that we can just to define Template:Para),

Footer

below 

Text to put in the bottom cell. The bottom cell is intended for footnotes, see-also, and other such information.

Presentation parameters

Italic titles

Titles of articles with infoboxes may be made italic, in line with WP:ITALICTITLE, by passing the italic title parameter.

• Turn on italic titles by passing Template:Para from the infobox.
• Turn off by default (notably because only Latin script may be safely rendered in this style and italic may be needed to distinguish foreign language from local English language only in that script, but would be difficult to read for other scripts) but allow some instances to be made italic by passing Template:Para
• Do not make any titles italic by not passing the parameter at all.

CSS styling

bodystyle 

Applies to the infobox table as a whole

titlestyle 

Applies only to the title caption. Adding a background color is usually inadvisable since the text is rendered "outside" the infobox.

abovestyle 

Applies only to the "above" cell at the top. The default style has font-size:125%; since this cell is usually used for a title, if you want to use the above cell for regular-sized text include "font-size:100%;" in the abovestyle.

imagestyle 

Applies to the cell the image is in. This includes the text of the image caption, but you should set text properties with captionstyle instead of imagestyle in case the caption is moved out of this cell in the future.

captionstyle 

Applies to the text of the image caption.

rowstyle(n) 

This parameter is inserted into the style attribute for the specified row.

headerstyle 

Applies to all header cells

labelstyle 

Applies to all label cells

datastyle 

Applies to all data cells

belowstyle 

Applies only to the below cell

HTML classes and microformats

bodyclass 

This parameter is inserted into the class attribute for the infobox as a whole.

titleclass 

This parameter is inserted into the class attribute for the infobox's title caption.

aboveclass 

This parameter is inserted into the class attribute for the infobox's above cell.

subheaderrowclass(n) 

This parameter is inserted into the class attribute for the complete table row the subheader is on.

subheaderclass(n) 

This parameter is inserted into the class attribute for the infobox's subheader.

imagerowclass(n) 

These parameters are inserted into the class attribute for the complete table row their respective image is on.

imageclass 

This parameter is inserted into the class attribute for the image.

rowclass(n) 

This parameter is inserted into the class attribute for the specified row including the label and data cells.

class(n) 

This parameter is inserted into the class attribute for the data cell of the specified row. If there's no data cell it has no effect.

belowclass 

This parameter is inserted into the class attribute for the infobox's below cell.

This template supports the addition of microformat information. This is done by adding "class" attributes to various data cells, indicating what kind of information is contained within. Multiple class names may be specified, separated by spaces, some of them being used as selectors for custom styling according to a project policy or to the skin selected in user preferences, others beig used for microformats.

To flag an infobox as containing hCard information, for example, add the following parameter:

 | bodyclass = vcard

And for each row containing a data cell that's part of the vcard, add a corresponding class parameter:

 | class1 = fn
 | class2 = org
 | class3 = tel

...and so forth. "above" and "title" can also be given classes, since these are usually used to display the name of the subject of the infobox.

See Wikipedia:WikiProject Microformats for more information on adding microformat information to Wikipedia, and microformat for more information on microformats in general.

Examples

Notice how the row doesn't appear in the displayed infobox when a label is defined without an accompanying data cell, and how all of them are displayed when a header is defined on the same row as a data cell. Also notice that subheaders are not bold by default like the headers used to split the main data section, because this role is meant to be for the above cell :

Infobox/doc

<source lang="Sass" style="overflow:auto" highlight="15">

Infobox/doc

</source>

For this example, the Template:Para and Template:Para parameters are used to adjust the infobox width and define a default width for the column of labels:

Infobox/doc

<source lang="sass" highlight="3,9" style="overflow: auto">

Infobox/doc

</source>

Embedding

One infobox template can be embedded into another using the Template:Para parameter or the Template:Para parameter. This feature can be used to create a modular infobox, or to create better-defined logical sections. Long ago, it was necessary to use embedding in order to create infoboxes with more than 99 rows; but nowadays there's no limit to the number of rows that can be defined in a single instance of {{infobox}}.

Infobox/doc

{{Infobox
 | title = Top level title
 | data1 = {{Infobox | decat = yes | child = yes
    | title = First subsection
    | label1= Label 1.1
    | data1 = Data 1.1
   }}
 | data2 = {{Infobox | decat = yes | child = yes
  |title = Second subsection
  | label1= Label 2.1
  | data1 = Data 2.1
  }}
 | belowstyle = 
 | below = Below text
}}

Note, in the examples above, the child infobox is placed in a data field, not a header field. Notice that the section subheadings are not in bold font if bolding is not explicitly specified. To obtain bold section headings, place the child infobox in a header field (but not in a label field because it would not be displayed!), either using

Infobox/doc

{{Infobox
 | title = Top level title
 | header1 = {{Infobox | decat = yes | child = yes
    | title = First subsection
    | label1= Label 1.1
    | data1 = Data 1.1
   }}
 | header2 = {{Infobox | decat = yes | child = yes
    | title = Second subsection
    | label1= Label 2.1
    | data1 = Data 2.1
   }}
 | belowstyle = 
 | below = Below text
}}

or,

Infobox/doc

{{Infobox
 | title = Top level title
 | header1 = First subsection
   {{Infobox | decat = yes | child = yes
    | label1 = Label 1.1
    |   data1 = Data 1.1
   }}
 | header2 = Second subsection
   {{Infobox | decat = yes | child = yes
    | label1 = Label 2.1
    |  data1 = Data 2.1
   }}
 | belowstyle = 
 | below = Below text
}}

Note that omitting the Template:Para parameter, and not including any text preceding the embedded infobox, may result in spurious blank table rows, creating gaps in the visual presentation.

Wikipedia:WikiProject Infoboxes/embed includes some links to Wikipedia articles which include infoboxes embedded within other infoboxes.

Subboxes

An alternative method for embedding is to use Template:Para, which removes the outer border from the infobox, but preserves the interior structure. One feature of this approach is that the parent and child boxes need not have the same structure, and the label and data fields are not aligned between the parent and child boxes because they are not in the same parent table.

Infobox/doc

<source lang="sass" style="overflow:auto">

Infobox/doc

</source>

Similar embedding techniques may be used within content parameters of some other templates generating tables (such as Sidebar) :

Template:Sidebar <source lang="sass" style="overflow:auto"> Template:Sidebar

</source>

Note that the default padding of the parent data cell containing each subbox is still visible, so the subboxes are slightly narrower than the parent box and there's a higher vertical spacing between standard cells of the parent box than between cells of distinct subboxes.

Controlling line-breaking in embedded bulletless lists

Template Template:Tlx may be used with Template:Tlx and Template:Tlx to control line-breaking in bulletless lists embedded in infoboxes (e.g. cast list in Template:Tlx), to prevent wrapped long entries from being confused with multiple entries. See Template:Wbr/doc#Controlling line-breaking in infoboxes for details.

Full blank syntax

(Note: there is no limit to the number of possible rows; only 20 are given below since infoboxes larger than that will be relatively rare. Just extend the numbering as needed. The microformat "class" parameters are also omitted as they are not commonly used.)

{{Infobox
| name           = {{subst:PAGENAME}}
| child          = {{{child|}}}
| subbox         = {{{subbox|}}}
| italic title   = {{{italic title|no}}}
| bodystyle      = 

| titlestyle     = 
| abovestyle     = 
| subheaderstyle = 
| title          = 
| above          = 
| subheader      = 

|   imagestyle   = 
| captionstyle   = 
|   image        = 
| caption        = 
|   image2       = 
| caption2       = 

| headerstyle    = 
|  labelstyle    = 
|   datastyle    = 
| header1  = 
|  label1  = 
|   data1  = 
| header2  = 
|  label2  = 
|   data2  = 
| header3  = 
|  label3  = 
|   data3  = 
| header4  = 
|  label4  = 
|   data4  = 
| header5  = 
|  label5  = 
|   data5  = 
| header6  = 
|  label6  = 
|   data6  = 
| header7  = 
|  label7  = 
|   data7  = 
| header8  = 
|  label8  = 
|   data8  = 
| header9  = 
|  label9  = 
|   data9  = 
| header10 = 
|  label10 = 
|   data10 = 
| header11 = 
|  label11 = 
|   data11 = 
| header12 = 
|  label12 = 
|   data12 = 
| header13 = 
|  label13 = 
|   data13 = 
| header14 = 
|  label14 = 
|   data14 = 
| header15 = 
|  label15 = 
|   data15 = 
| header16 = 
|  label16 = 
|   data16 = 
| header17 = 
|  label17 = 
|   data17 = 
| header18 = 
|  label18 = 
|   data18 = 
| header19 = 
|  label19 = 
|   data19 = 
| header20 = 
|  label20 = 
|   data20 = 

| belowstyle     = 
| below          = 
}}

Porting to other MediaWikis

The infobox template requires the Scribunto extension and HTMLTidy to be installed. It may not work with other MediaWikis. WikiProject Transwiki has a version of this template that has been modified to work on other MediaWikis.

See also

• Module:Infobox, the Lua module on which this template is based
• Template:Infobox/old, the previous ParserFunctions implementation
• Module:Check for unknown parameters
• Template:Tl
• Template:Tl and Template:Tl
• List of infoboxes
• Module:InfoboxImage
• Maintenance categories:
  • Category:Articles which use infobox templates with no data rows (0)
  • Category:Pages which use embedded infobox templates with the title parameter (0)

Tracking categories

• Category:Articles with missing Wikidata information (0)