User:Johan G/Help:Footnotes and references

This help page is a draft on a userpage. Please suggest changes to this draft on the discussion page.

Footnotes and references are very useful when you want to add additional information and refer to sources without cluttering the running text in an article.

Footnotes are added with reference tags, <ref>.

When referencing sources a template like {{cite web}} or another link template should preferably be used.

Adding footnotes

Footnotes are added using <ref>Foot note or link template</ref> in running text. Please put these tags after punctuation, like commas, periods, etc.

References are added like for example below in running text:

One way to describe the handling qualities of an aircraft is the ''Cooper-Harper Aircraft Handling Quality Rating'' (HQR).<ref>{{cite web
| url             = https://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19690013177.pdf
| title           = The use of pilot rating in the evaluation of aircraft handling qualities
| author          = Cooper, G. E.
| coauthors       = Harper, R. P., Jr.
| date            = Apr 01, 1969
| publisher       = NASA Ames Research Center
| format          = pdf
}}</ref>

Which would render like below (see also the references section):

One way to describe the handling qualities of an aircraft is the Cooper-Harper Aircraft Handling Quality Rating (HQR).

Showing the footnotes

To show the footnotes add a <references /> tag under a == Footnotes == or == References == heading to the end of the article, but above the related content and external link headings.

Using a footnote multiple times

If you need to use a footnote multiple times, use named footnotes by adding a name attribute, name="footnote name", to the first reference tag, like <ref name="footnote name">Footnote or link template</ref>.

To invoke the named footnote you will only need to type <ref name="footnote name" />.

The footnote would then have links to each of the invocations.

Grouping footnotes

References can be grouped together by adding a group attribute, group="group name", to the reference tag.

To show the groups separately add the group attribute to the references tag, like <references name="footnote name" />.

The appendix template

If you have a lot of footnotes, you might want to consider using the {{appendix}} template.

Related content

• Category:Link templates