Template:Infobox/doc
This template is intended as a meta template: a template used for constructing other templates.
In general, it is not meant for use directly in an article, but can be used on a one-off basis if required.
Usage
{{Infobox}} is a meta-template: used to organise an actual infobox template like {{Infobox teams}}.
For [[Template:Infobox teams]]
, 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/talk/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.
- autoheaders
- If this is set to any non-blank value, headers which are not followed by data fields are suppressed. See the "hiding headers when all its data fields are empty" section for more details.
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:
Subheader of the infobox |
{{Infobox | name = {{subst:PAGENAME}} | title = Text in caption over infobox | subheader = Subheader of the infobox | header = (the rest of the infobox goes here) }}
Text in uppermost cell of infobox | |
---|---|
Subheader of the infobox | |
Second subheader of the infobox |
{{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:BTX.png|100px|alt=Example alt text]]. Image is centered by default.
- 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.
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
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 }}
- below
- Text to put in the bottom cell. The bottom cell is intended for footnotes, see-also, and other such information.
Presentation parameters
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 being used for microformats.
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 |name = Infobox/doc |bodystyle = |titlestyle = |abovestyle = background:#00c; |subheaderstyle = |title = Test Infobox |above = Above text |subheader = Subheader above image |subheader2 = Second subheader |imagestyle = |captionstyle = |image = [[File:BTX.png|200px|alt=Example alt text]] |caption = Caption displayed below File:Example-serious.jpg |headerstyle = background:#300; |labelstyle = background:#030; |datastyle = |header1 = Header defined alone | label1 = | data1 = |header2 = | label2 = Label defined alone does not display (needs data, or is suppressed) | data2 = |header3 = | label3 = | data3 = Data defined alone |header4 = All three defined (header, label, data, all with same number) | label4 = does not display (same number as a header) | data4 = does not display (same number as a header) |header5 = | label5 = Label and data defined (label) | data5 = Label and data defined (data) |belowstyle = background:#003; |below = Below text }}
Embedding
One infobox template can be embedded into another using the child
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}}
.
First subsection | |
Label 1.1 | Data 1.1 |
---|---|
Second subsection | |
Label 2.1 | Data 2.1 |
Below text |
{{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
First subsection | |
---|---|
Label 1.1 | Data 1.1 |
Second subsection | |
Label 2.1 | Data 2.1 |
Below text |
{{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,
First subsection | |
---|---|
Label 1.1 | Data 1.1 |
Second subsection | |
Label 2.1 | Data 2.1 |
Below text |
{{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 title
parameter, and not including any text preceding the embedded infobox, may result in spurious blank table rows, creating gaps in the visual presentation. The garbage output can be suppressed using rowstyleN=display: none
, replacing N with the data/header number.
Wikipedia:WikiProject Infoboxes/embed includes some links to Wikipedia articles which include infoboxes embedded within other infoboxes.
Subboxes
An alternative method for embedding: use subbox=yes
, 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.
Main 1 | |||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Main 2 | |||||||
| |||||||
| |||||||
Label 5 | Data 5 | ||||||
Main 6 |
{{Infobox | headerstyle = background-color:#fbb; | labelstyle = background-color:#bfb; | header1 = Main 1 | header2 = Main 2 | data3 = {{Infobox | subbox = yes | headerstyle = background-color:#ff4; | labelstyle = background-color:#4ff; | header1 = Sub 3-1 | header2 = Sub 3-2 | label3 = Label 3-3 | data3 = Data 3-3 }} | data4 = {{Infobox | subbox = yes | labelstyle = background-color:#444; | label1 = Label 4-1 | data1 = Data 4-1 }} | label5 = Label 5 | data5 = Data 5 | header6 = Main 6 }}
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.
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
- {{Navbox}}