Traveller:Sources

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Sources are the materials from which Library Data articles are derived. The sources are primarily used to list the published works where the information in the article was originally published. Using citations in a manner similar to academic research or Wikipedia, the sources listing refer interested readers back to the original material. In addition to the published works, the sources may reference websites, unpublished notes or drafts, or simply contributions made directly to the wiki itself.

It is important to make sure that as many references as possible are noted here at the wiki. The wiki is a source reference document for the greater Traveller community. The source references make it easier for future authors to research what exists and how to expand the future storyline.

The Traveller RPG Wiki uses two citations: End citations and Inline citations.

End citations

These are the citations at the end of the article subheading References & Contributors (Sources) and following the article citation from the manual of style. If the article has multiple sources, either republished or expanded on, include all (or as many as you are sure of).

For all library articles, include a Sources template with citations listed in order:

1. Published references in chronological order
2. Links to external websites
3. Contributor: Wiki contributor updates to the article directly.

Published reference citations

For citations of published sources, the policy is to prefer using the Template:Ludography cite. This is both faster and ensured the citations of published works are formatted consistently.

External site references

For references to external websites, the policy is to include the author's name (if known) and a direct link to the page where the material was copied from.

Contributor references

In some articles of the wiki, in addition to the usual published sources, there are contributors listed. If you are contributing to an article you may add your own contributor's attribution. The general guideline for contribution is a paragraph, 50 or more words, not including infobox or formatting templates, headings or article layout, or categories. You can make up any titles you would like (within the bounds of decorum and length), but please start the list with "Contributor: " and include a link to your user page so we can find you.

Keep in mind the wiki keeps every contribution, no matter how small, as part of the history of the article. Everyone can review who has made changes to the article, what the change was, and when the change occurred.

Example

There is an example of how the end citation should look using the Source and Ludography cite templates:

{{Sources
 | {{Ludography cite|name=The Travellers' Digest 11|page=2}}
 | {{Ludography cite|name=Vilani & Vargr|page=22}}
 | [[Marc Miller]]. [https://www.farfuture.net/FFEFairUsePolicy2008.pdf FFE Fair Use Policy]
}}

which produces:

This list of sources was used by the Traveller Wiki Editorial Team and individual contributors to compose this article. Copyrighted material is used under license from Far Future Enterprises or by permission of the author. The page history lists all of the contributions.

• Gary L. Thomas. The Travellers' Digest 11 (Digest Group Publications, 1989), 2.
• James Holden, Joe D. Fugate Sr., Terrance McInnes. Vilani & Vargr (Digest Group Publications, 1990), 22.
• Marc Miller. FFE Fair Use Policy

Inline citations

Inline citations mark individual sections of text, usually a sentence or paragraph. Again this is similar to the footnotes added to academic articles to show where the parts of the article are from.

There are three templates to mark footnotes. The page cite template is used for referencing published material. The unpublished cite template for unpublished information or direct contributions to the article. And source cite for information published in external websites and books not included in the Ludography.

 {{Page cite|name= Mercenary |page=5 |version=Classic Traveller}}

is an example of a page citation. This internally uses the Ludography cite template, so please read the documentation about the parameters for both templates.

{{Unpublished cite|author= Strephon Aella Alkhalikoi }}

is an example of an unpublished citation.

{{Source cite|author=Strephon Aella Alkhalikoi |source=[http://www.travellerrpg.com/CotI/Discuss/showpost.php?p=529279&postcount=1 CotI post]}}

is an example of an source citation.

These are placed at the end of the sentence or paragraph. They show as a small hyperlink like "[1]" where they are placed and the information is expanded within the Sources template at the end of the article.

If you are marking the different sentences or paragraphs from the same page of the publication, same author, or same page or post from a website, please use the "citeName" parameter.

In the first use of the site template, include a "citeName=XXXX" parameter where "XXXX" is a short unique name for the citation. If you are going to cite more than one item multiple times, the names must be different.

The second and subsequent use of the cite template for the same citation would just use the "citeName=XXXX" parameter. For example, the first citation would be:

{{Unpublished cite|author= Strephon Aella Alkhalikoi|citeName=SAA}}

with the second (and third, ...) being:

{{Unpublished cite|citeName=SAA}}

This collapses the citations into a single number like "[1.1]", "[1.2]", and so on. In the sources template, there is only one citation. This makes them easier to read and understand for the users.

Research Source Types

Source text, in research (...especially in the humanities), is a source of information referred to by citation. Research divides sources into Primary (first-hand evidence or original research), Secondary (second-hand evidence), or Tertiary (compilation research). Here at the Wiki, we divide sources by their relationship to Canon.

Primary canon sources are considered in this order from the published materials:

1. Traveller5
2. Mongoose Traveller and Mongoose 2nd
3. GURPS: Traveller
4. Traveller The New Era
5. MegaTraveller
6. Classic Traveller

Most other published material is considered Secondary, and websites and unpublished references are considered Tertiary. The final arbiter of Canon is Marc Miller and Marc reserves the right to change his mind.