Template:Automatic taxobox/doc/new

Are you trying to set up an automatic taxobox for a species, subspecies or variety? If this is your first time making an automatic taxobox, you'll probably find this guide indispensable. There's definitely a learning curve involved, but once you get the hang of it, you'll be able to figure out even the weirdest problems. This guide should walk you through a typical automatic taxobox setup.
 * Yes → This template should not be used for species: go to Template:Speciesbox/doc for a species; Template:Subspeciesbox/doc for an animal subspecies; Template:Infraspeciesbox/doc for a plant subspecies or variety.
 * No → You are setting up an automatic taxobox for a genus, family, or higher ranked taxon. Are you converting an existing manual taxobox (i.e. the article already contains   or are you writing a new one?
 * Converting – see Template:Automatic taxobox/doc/convert.
 * Writing a new one – read this guide.

Many automatic taxoboxes are very quick to set up; others require much more work. However, the advantage to all the work pays off when a taxonomy gets revised down the road – rather than updating thousands of taxoboxes, only one or at most a few templates must be altered in order to fix the whole thing.

Every automatic taxobox should contain the following general layout, often with many additional parameters:

For zoological taxa:

For botanical taxa:

The taxon is the scientific name for whatever the article is about. If you've never entered an authority, you can get help with that from the relevant WikiProject (see a directory at WP:TOL.

Never save the page until you've checked for and resolved all issues with the automatic taxobox first!!!

Hit "preview". If it looks correct, you're done. Save your changes.

Chances are, though, it's not perfect. The table of contents below should answer many of your questions on what to do next. As you follow instructions in this guide, you may be instructed to add a parameter to the template. To do this, just move the closing braces to a new line, and stick the parameter somewhere before the closing braces.

At the end of this guide is a list of all parameters available as well as definitions for all the parameters introduced by the automatic taxobox. Most parameters from the manual taxobox are valid in the automatic taxobox, and for descriptions of those parameters, see the documentation for that template.

"Taxonomy not available for..."
No, you didn't mess up. This error is actually normal. There are two reasons this error might show up. Firstly, it's rare the taxon you're addressing has already been entered into the taxon template database. Secondly, the Wikipedia cache lags a little bit.

If you're seeing the red error, here is a simple dichotomous key to help you figure out what to do about it:

1. Is the page you're working on an article page?

1A. Yes, it's an article page (2)

1B. No, it's a Template:Taxonomy/ page (3)

2. Create the taxon template for the taxon. Is there an error on that template's page when you're finished?

2A. Yes (3)

2B. No. Click the blue link next to "Category listings out of date?" to refresh the cache for the page, and you're finished.

3. One red error or two?

3A. One, and it's the current taxon. Click the blue link next to "Category listings out of date?" to refresh the cache for the page, and you're finished.

3B. One, and it's the parent taxon. Repeat #2 with respect to the parent taxon of the one you just worked on.

3C. Two. Repeat #2 with respect to the parent taxon of the one you just worked on. When finished, be sure to click the blue link next to "Category listings out of date?" on each template page you've worked on to refresh the caches for those pages.

Creating the taxonomy template
To begin resolving this ugly red error, right-click the "create" link and open that link in either a new tab or a new window. On the landing page, you should be editing a template corresponding to whatever taxon is at the end of the page's title.

First, fill in the rank parameter. Use the Latin name. Your options are pretty vast here (see TX for an extensive list of supported ranks). Some examples are as follows:
 * regnum
 * phylum
 * classis
 * ordo
 * familia
 * tribus
 * genus
 * clade
 * unranked

If what you need is something extremely atypical, you can actually just type it there instead of one of the supported ranks. It might break the taxobox, but that's what Template talk:Automatic taxobox is for.

You'll see link is already filled in for you with 2

which happens to be wikisyntax for "the part of the title of the page that comes after "Template:Taxonomy/". In other words, it will be the name of the taxon. Using the table below, you should be able to figure out what to enter:

(If there's a pattern missing here, either add it or explain the issue on the talk page.)

Next, we have the parent parameter. All that you need to type here is the name of the immediate parent taxon, beginning with a capital letter. Use the refs parameter to cite a source which says that the taxon belongs in that parent taxon – in case someone challenges it later. (The only case in which you might consider omitting this parameter is if you're using a WikiProject approved taxonomy, e.g. APG III for flowering plants.)

If it's an extinct taxon, fill in the extinct parameter with true or yes. If it's extant, or if you're not sure, leave it blank.

Save the taxonomy template page and close it. Go back to the automatic taxobox we were making. Press "preview" again.

The odds are good that you'll get to perform this step a second time, maybe a third, fourth, or even twentieth time, depending on how much of the taxonomy you're working on has already been filled in by other editors. Continue previewing and creating taxonomies for the ancestor taxa until the "taxonomy missing" errors cease.

Special instructions for species
Species articles should not normally use this template but should instead use Template:Speciesbox. See that page and its documentation.


 * The reason is that whenever Automatic taxobox is used with taxon-name, a template named "Template:Taxonomy/taxon-name" must either exist or be created in order to specify the taxonomic position of taxon-name. However, for species this is not necessary, because the taxonomic position of the species can be found by extracting the genus name from the full binomial, and then looking for "Template:Taxonomy/genus-name". So using Speciesbox considerably reduces the number of taxonomy templates needed and avoids there being different taxonomies for different species in a genus.

Making the links bold
When a taxobox appears in an article, the taxon the article is about should have its name displayed in bold. For this to work, the link parameter in its taxonomy template must be right. Suppose the taxon in question has the name taxon-name and the article it appears in has the title article-title. Then in the template "Taxonomy/taxon-name": Ensure the link is entered so that it points directly to the article on that taxon without being redirected first. If the page gets moved, the taxon template that links to that article will need to be updated in order to maintain the proper bolding.
 * if taxon-name and article-title are the same, you should see taxon-name
 * if taxon-name and article-title are different, you should see link article-title|taxon-name.

Change the taxobox header
By default the header to the taxobox will be the value of the  parameter, and it will automatically be italicized if it's a genus (this template, automatic taxobox, shouldn't be used for species).

If you want a different header (e.g. the common name of the taxon), then specify name.


 * In the unlikely event that you want this different header to be italicized use italic_name. Do not use formatting markup to try to italicize the header, as this will cause errors.

Add an image
Use the image and image_caption parameters just like you would with the taxobox.

If you want a second image, add image2 and image2_caption.

Synonyms
Here's an example of what to add to a taxobox where Genius and Geniosus happen to be synonyms of the named taxon: |synonyms=
 * Genius Baggins 1934
 * Geniosus Harvey 1734

Forcing a taxon to display
If there's a particularly notable taxon of a minor rank, such as Theropoda (which contains all carnivorous dinosaurs) chances are that you'd like the taxon to display in every single taxobox that it could possibly be displayed in. Navigate to that taxon's taxonomy template. The link should be "Template:Taxonomy/" followed by the name of the taxon. In the case of Theropoda, the link would be "Template:Taxonomy/Theropoda". Add the code true anywhere you'd like inside braces, and that should force the taxon to display all the time regardless of its rank.

Correcting a taxonomy
Every automatic taxobox has an edit link on the right end of the bar that says "Scientific classification". That link should give you access to a full listing of that taxon's taxonomy.

From there, you may edit a taxon by clicking "Edit" next to its name. Doing so allows you to access the corresponding Template:Taxonomy/ page, where you can assign a different parent, rank, display text, link, references, extinction status, or "display always" value. Any edits you make to one of these templates will affect all its descendent taxa, so keep that in mind while editing.

Available parameters and how to use them
Available parameters (note that all parameters are optional, although to produce the desired results, many may be required):

All parameters
taxon

name

authority

display_parents

italic_name

edit_link

fossil_range

oldest_fossil

youngest_fossil

display_parents

parent_authority

grandparent_authority

greatgrandparent_authority

greatgreatgrandparent_authority

color

status

status_system

status_ref

status2

status2_system

status2_ref

image

image_width

image_alt

image_caption

image2

image2_width

image2_alt

image2_caption

classification_status

diversity

diversity_link

binomial

binomial_authority

trinomial

trinomial_authority

type_genus

type_genus_authority

type_species

type_species_authority

subdivision

subdivision_ranks

display_children

type_strain

range_map

range_map_width

range_map_alt

range_map_caption

binomial2

binomial2_authority

range_map2

range_map2_width

range_map2_alt

range_map2_caption

binomial3

binomial3_authority

range_map3

range_map3_width

range_map3_alt

range_map3_caption

binomial4

binomial4_authority

range_map4

range_map4_width

range_map4_alt

range_map4_caption

synonyms

synonyms_ref

Parameters unique to automatic taxobox
In the following sections, parameters used by taxobox will not be covered. Usage for those parameters has not changed.

Parameter taxon
The name of the taxon the article is about. In the taxobox, this parameter is the one that is bolded. To bold multiple taxa, see.

When moving an article to another title, always check to see that the taxon parameter is present, to ensure the taxonomy continues to display properly. Additionally, you will need to update the display link on the taxonomy template. See for instructions on how to do this.

Parameter name
If the title of the taxobox should be different from the value entered in the taxon parameter, enter it here. This is most commonly used for common names. If, for whatever reason, the title should be italicized, do not use name. Instead, use italic_name.

Parameter italic_name
This parameter duplicates the functionality of name except that it italicizes the title. This parameter should never be used in conjunction with name.

Parameter authority
This parameter is similar to the authority parameters in the taxobox. The only difference is that you don't have to specify the rank this authority matches up with-- it will pair it with the taxon listed in the taxon parameter.

Parameter fossil_range
The new features for the fossil range are currently under development. Please use it the same as you would with the taxobox.

Parameter edit_link
In most cases, there is no reason to use this parameter. If used, whatever is entered here will display in single brackets in place of the letter "e". This is the "edit taxonomy" link which allows readers to easily access the taxonomy for quick, universal edits.

Parameter oldest_fossil
This untested feature is currently being developed. Please do not use it yet.

Parameter youngest_fossil
This untested feature is currently being developed. Please do not use it yet.

Parameter display_parents
If you need to display a certain number of parent taxa, adding a number here will force that many parent taxa to appear.

Parameter parent_authority, etc.

 * Parameter parent_authority
 * Parameter grandparent_authority
 * Parameter greatgrandparent_authority
 * Parameter greatgreatgrandparent_authority

These function just like authority, except they match up with the parent taxon, grandparent taxon, etc.

Warning The "ancestor" taxon is the one defined by the taxonomy templates (i.e. the various "Template:Taxonomy/ " pages, where is the name of a taxon). This "ancestor" taxon may not be the taxon you expect! Further, if someone later changes the taxonomic hierarchy defined in the taxonomy templates by adding or removing a taxon, the authority can become incorrect. For example, if you are setting up a taxobox for a genus and the parent taxon is currently the family, parent_authority shows the authority for the family in the taxobox. If someone later adds a subfamily between the genus and the family, parent_authority will now refer to the subfamily, and the authority will be displayed incorrectly. These parameters should only be used if really necessary.

Parameter display_children
This is a new feature that takes the place of the subdivision parameter. It displays a list of all the taxa whose taxonomy templates list the current taxon as the immediate parent. You may fill this in with 1, 2, 3, 2 collapse, or 3 collapse. The "collapse" causes daughters past the first generation to remain hidden unless the reader clicks "show" next to one of the daughter taxa.