Template talk:Infobox settlement/Archive 5

message: Since Wikipedia is an encyclopedia whose contributors are the readers themselves today I attemped to produce an easier connection (which I really thought it was needed) between the article of a city and the major external services relating to its geographical coordinates. At the present State of the Art Google is a sort of standard in this respect and I've thought that now it's time to have this link directly embedded into the infobox.
It is true that a complete external service is already permanently linked  on the top right side of many city articles, under "coordinates", by means of the templates of the coor and geo* families and http://tools.wikimedia.de/~magnus/geo/geohack.php?, but as a user I did find not very practical having to open that link and to scroll the long and always growing list of geohack in search of the maybe most requested today (in its 2 most popular versions): Google Maps and Google Earth. So I've thought -maybe wrongly?- that a discussion wasn't even needed if I was simply trying to use some parameters (latitude and longitude) already present in the city infobox and attempting the best layout of their easy and (today) needed quick link. 
Under the infobox city title seemed to me the best and practical place (for its immediate use), but if it is too invasive for the eye the same can be done under the map and the geo coordinates below. 
So now, if you agree, following the suggestions received, I'll try to move the code I produced to that location inside the infobox.
Sorry for my bad English, but I was and I am really trying to help :)--Florenus 20:41, 2 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Hi Florenus. I certainly understand you were only trying to help. Personally, I don't think these two links should appear in the infobox. It is unusual for external links to appear outside of the external links or references sections. Although these may be commonly used mapping services, different users may have different preferences, and these are all available by clicking the coordinates themselves. Furthermore, maps of the locations are already shown in the infobox to provide a general overview of location.  This is just my opinion, and maybe we can get other editors to weigh in here. I'm fine with them being added if that is the consensus. --MattWright (talk) 20:56, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

text: Ok, I just put them for a trial in the lower location I previously announced.
I personally think that it is very useful for any user a quick location of a Geo subject to Google Earth or Maps, possibly -in my humble opinion- close to the city name, but where it is now it's equally fine, I think. I might improve also the layout to make it more 'gentle'. Some suggestions for this? I don't have much time now, but I can try to make soon 2 small icons to substitute the 'SEE' and that way can be less intrusive. What do you and other users think? :)   --Florenus 21:17, 2 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I'm still against it -- especially since one of the links requires some special software to be installed (Google Earth) to make use of it. I'll leave it up to other editors whether to revert or leave it. --MattWright (talk) 21:23, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

text: How about trying something like this out at Template:Infobox City/Test first? —MJCdetroit 04:49, 3 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: OK, I'm not a Google Agent and I give it up. --Florenus 07:58, 3 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Google Maps & Earth external links inside the infobox 

message: Can the flag image be set a bit wider than the seal/coat of arms/emblem, as in Template:Infobox Country? I believe that template uses 125px for the flag and 85px for the emblem, and I think it looks better that way. — Kelw (talk) 22:32, 5 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: You can manually adjust the size of all four images fields with |flag_size =,  |seal_size =, |shield_size =, and |citylogo_size =.  —MJCdetroit 01:39, 7 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Flag, Seal/Coat of Arms/Emblem

message: I installed a simple xy dot map to the template.  It is based on . I found a need for this and I thought that this would be useful for situations where an exact map was not available or the pushpin location map was not available or applicable. This does require that a blank map be available and that the editor use the dot_x and dot_y parameters to superimpose the dot in the appropriate location.  I found some good blank maps over at Wikimedia Commons. 
The new fields are: |image_dot_map =  |dot_mapsize=  |dot_map_caption = |dot_x =  |dot_y =.
I'll put together an example and an explanation for the table on the "doc" page soon.  —MJCdetroit 01:28, 7 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Simple x y dot map 

message: Can there be more of these Blank Info spaces?
|blank2name  =</br>
|blank2_info       =</br>
--Sonyuser 04:38, 9 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Based on your last edits, I don't have a problem with adding a couple more blank fields, but we probably shouldn't go beyond that.  Anyone object?  —MJCdetroit 17:21, 9 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Blank Info

message: I've added some HTML classes, to cause an hCard microformat to be included in the generated mark-up. See also WP:UF Andy Mabbett 16:05, 17 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Should we include further hcard markup? Such as replacing
		
		
with
		
		
and even
		
and
		
(but the last two make some assumptions). --Qyd 19:52, 19 August 2007 (UTC)

text: No one seem to mind, so I'm going to go ahead and implement the changes. --Qyd 17:33, 23 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: hCard microformat

message: Commented out to make talk page look better. — Alex(T|C|E) 02:36, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Test it out in the test template: Template:Infobox City/Test first. —MJCdetroit 00:42, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  Done. For some reason I thought this page was under full protection. — Alex(T|C|E) 02:36, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Requested change

message: MJCDetroit has been working on removing single-use manual infoboxes and has come across a sticking point: Berlin. Meanwhile I have been working on the template  which covers the 16 German states (of which Berlin is one). Berlin is the only place where there is a problem with the template - an editor of the Berlin page is not so keen to let go of his version, and swiftly reverts any attempts to implement something else - usually with less-than-flattering edit comments for such good faith edits.
Now, this is not a matter of "my way" vs "his way". I'm always ready for improvements to the templates that I've done, and admittedly there were some aspects that I wanted to fix up anyway. Together with this user, I've bashed out a number of modifications, and the appearance of the template has considerably improved. But now an agreement still hasn't been reached. The remaining sticking points are varied, some which seem owing more to personal preferences, but others have wider-ranging implications for geographical infoboxes. 
Instead of repeating all the points, I'll just direct you to the discussion here. In the interests of consistency, and taking on a few new ideas for infobox design, I would like as many people as possible to get involved. - 52 Pickup 13:23, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Berlin 

message: how about a GDP per capita field? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Ninthroad (talk • contribs) 
:There are "blank fields" (|blank_name = |blank_info =) that you can use for stuff like that. —MJCdetroit 16:52, 1 May 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  GDP per capita 

message: The links to the flag and coat of arms articles are displayed at different levels, which looks ugly and disorganised. Could someone familiar with this template fix it so that they are on the same line? Also, a line separating the symbols from the location map would make things neater as well. It seems a bit strange not to have that, when we have a line separating the picture from the symbols. Thanks for your help.--Hadžija 20:44, 13 May 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I believe that the links at different levels has to do with the size of the images.  I adjusted the size for the COA at Belgrade (the last city you edited before this comment) in this edit .  I don't know of a way to make the links at the same exact level every time given the nature of the images.  As for the separating line, that seems like a reasonable request to me.  —MJCdetroit 14:22, 25 May 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Flag and coat of arms 

message: Somebody should add the frazioni, patron saint and feast day entries in order to this can be used for Italian comuni (it's already used at Perugia but misses frazioni list). Can anybody help? --Attilios 21:33, 18 June 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: There are "blank fields" for such things.  Check out Rome now. —MJCdetroit 03:08, 19 June 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Use for Italian communes

message: In Bratislava, I was a bit surprised by the shown flag, only after a while I realised that the wedge on the right-hand side is not a part of the flag. But could I know when the image has a visible border? Cf.  and .
I guess there should be a way to switch off the border flag and leave it to the image itself.
--Mormegil 09:35, 24 June 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Border around the flag 

message: Hi by looking at the template code 2 use, I noticed the following:

|elevation_footnotes    =  
|elevation_m            = 
|elevation_ft           =
there are two equations for elevation, instead we could use only  ( gives ) --Andersmusician $ 15:55, 27 June 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks, but I don't think that is needed.  In fact, I was thinking of turning the precision down for elevation so that 3,500 m would convert to 11,483 ft and not 11,482.9 ft and vise versa.  —MJCdetroit 16:37, 27 June 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Two Elevation Equations 

message: Excuse me - how shall I understand the "native name"? Is it the official name in the local language or the name in the language/s of the citizens including important minorities - or what? Thank You. --Okino 22:18, 27 June 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: that's easy, just take a look at Chicago, you see for example, "Chi Town", but not in native name eq but in the nicknames equation --Andersmusician $ 00:53, 28 June 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks. Please update help.  I was reverted many times. --mj41 19:07, 28 June 2007 (UTC)

text: Excuse me, I do not speak English so well - native name sounds to me like the name under which the city was born ;-) - so please can You explain me exactly what is the native name? Thanks once more. --Okino 20:33, 28 June 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Native name is what it is called by the residents of the city if English is not the a major/only language spoken.  Here are some examples: Montreal, New Orleans, Baghdad. Ho Chi Minh City is an example where Official name (in English), Native name (in Vietnamese) and Other name (that being Saigon) is used in the infobox.  Nickname is a name bestowed upon a city over time (for one reason or another) but is in no way official.  For example Detroit's nickname is the Motor City (or Motown) because of the automotive industry and New York City is sometimes called the Big Apple because it is such a big city (I'm guessing).  Hope that helps some. —MJCdetroit 20:46, 28 June 2007 (UTC)

text: The native name is the name of the city in the language locally used. Example: the English language refers to a certain city as Prague but it native (Czech) name is "Praha". Other examples: Warsaw (native Polish name is "Warszawa") or Copenhagen (native Danish name is "København"). If the local population uses e.g. two languages, then by all means list both names. Valentinian T / C 20:51, 28 June 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Native name 

message: So is there a move towards merging these?  What would need to happen?  What are the differences? -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 14:38, 3 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: It would be best to only have one template and it has been brought up a couple different times but it seems that the Geobox editors do not want to merge.  Now that Geobox Settlement trancluses on 1,444 pages (and Infobox Settlement transcludes on 8,889 pages) it maybe more difficult.  Without looking at the codes, it could probably be done, but it would take a lot of cooperation from many, many editors. —MJCdetroit 19:25, 3 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Apretty hard merge would be because of the current number of pages where both are transcluded. --Andersmusician VOTE 03:23, 5 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: It's not that difficult for a bot, as long as someone can take the time to determine which parameters from one map to which parameters of the other.  Caroig mentioned having a script already - is that still available? -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 06:53, 5 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I would support the "geobox setl" to redirect "infobox setl" instead of a merge, IMO this infobox we're discussing on has  better and more specific parameter, as well as good conversion tools and pushpin maps. --Andersmusician VOTE 04:15, 6 July 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Infobox Settlement - Geobox Settlement 

message: Would it be possible to build in automatic calculation of density if one is not supplied so its not up to the individual article maintainers to keep density in synch with area and population? pw 12:24, 6 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Well I know its possible, too many curlies for me to get it right for some reason, anyone else want to take a stab at it? To make it backwords compatible I was just going to have it only calculate if the numbers weren't already present, and also if it has all the necessary inputs. pw 12:32, 6 July 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Calculating Population Density 

message: How about adding a row for demonyms? I noticed that the country infobox has this, but not settlements. Carson 23:31, 8 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: You can use one of the blank fields as was done in Tingwick, Quebec.  —MJCdetroit 04:11, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

text: Would probably look even better in the population_blank1/title field (in the Population section). --Qyd 05:16, 9 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Already following your lead. :) Carson 06:02, 9 July 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Demonym 

message: This infobox has started to be used in the United Kingdom, which is raising questions on certain details.
If one looks at Manchester, under "|city_logo = " is the coat of arms of Manchester City Council, however it's being presented as a "logo" as the city itself which isn't technically true.
We need a coat of arms field, or some other method of saying that it is the coat of arms of the local government, if this template is to be used on the districts of the UK. Jza84 18:43, 12 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: The field is actually called image_shield.  I am not sure why it started out being called "shield" but the title under the image is "coat of arms".  I'll fix Manchester.  —MJCdetroit 19:00, 12 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Hi. Can we add a 'crest' field. Kingston upon Hull has neither a shield nor logo, it has a crest and so the current fields are inappropriate. The crest is the three crowns seen on the city's page. Thanks. --TFoxton 12:43, 25 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I'll see if I can come up with something, but it won't be a "new" field.  Maybe just a way to modifiy the existing logo field to change the title under it.  —MJCdetroit 14:15, 26 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Many thanks, keep me posted. --TFoxton 16:44, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

text: Template:Infobox Settlement/testcases look at the infoboxes at the bottom. —MJCdetroit 20:17, 26 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Yeah, that works sound. Nice work. Do you need to edit the real thing now? TFoxton 21:02, 26 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Done.  I didn't add a new field, I just deprecated city_logo in favor of a blank_emblem field where Logo is the default type.  I updated Kingston upon Hull's infobox.  See the table on the template page for new field names. —MJCdetroit 17:21, 30 July 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Logo/Coat of Arms 

message: Can somebody please remove the value from the main location equations? these make the infobox look compact.--Andersmusician VOTE 01:49, 19 July 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Bold format on Location equations 

message: Is it possible to toggle that field so that if the mayor is notable, s/he can be wikilinked, instead of having to put  tags around the name of the mayor? Most mayors are not notable by Wikipedia standards and the links often end up pointing to the wrong article. Katr67 16:43, 26 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: From the explanation table on the template page: Tip: Names are automatically wiki-linked if an article exists; if the target is not the intended one, insert a character such as "& nbsp;" to disable the link. How often can this happen?  You can always manually link the page if the article exists. —MJCdetroit 16:55, 26 July 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  City template automatically links name of mayor 

message: Hello. It is possible to add to infobox information about town parts or districts? When some town is divided into e.g. 7 districts, I would like to mention and link them from the infobox. - Darwinek 12:30, 27 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes, I think it is.  Send me a link. —MJCdetroit 13:19, 27 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  Geobox seems to has this option, see e.g. Ostrava. Has Infobox proper parameters? - Darwinek 13:38, 27 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I figured out how to force  to always stay collapsed and to hide its borders.  I think it is better to use that template within this template instead of making a hard-wired section within the code.  See examples at Vancouver, Hamilton, Ontario, and Halifax. —MJCdetroit 03:30, 29 August 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Hello and thanks for your answer. I see that change in the code but collapsed options (or links) or some hide/show button are not visible in normal article view. Am I missing something? - Darwinek 07:55, 29 August 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: ???Not exactly sure what you mean by normal article view.  I checked it in FF 2.0 and IE 7.0.57 for Windows XP and both work just fine.  I've checked it in the monobook, classic, and simple skins without any problems as well. I'll double check on my MAC when I go home. —MJCdetroit 12:02, 29 August 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: It works fine in Opera but doesn't work in my IE 6.0.28 on Win 2000. Do I need some additional driver or patch? - Darwinek 13:51, 29 August 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Hello. I downloaded the latest Java and enabled the settings. It seems to work now. My bad, sorry for bothering you. - Darwinek 13:02, 2 September 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Never a bother! I am sure that you probably unknowingly helped somebody else out. Thanks —MJCdetroit 13:46, 2 September 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Question to include collapsible lists

message: The following deprecated parameter names have been removed from the template:
city_logo</br>citylogo_size</br>logo_link</br>area_total</br>area_land </br>area_water </br> TotalArea_sq_mi</br>LandArea_sq_mi</br>WaterArea_sq_mi</br>area_urban </br>UrbanArea_sq_mi</br>area_metro </br>
MetroArea_sq_mi</br>elevation</br>population_density </br>population_density_mi2</br>population_density_metro_mi2</br>population_density_urban_mi2 
</br>
</br>
All of these parameters were switched over to the current names using a bot.  Please see the table on the main template page or the doc page for a description of all parameters used. —MJCdetroit 16:25, 2 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Deprecated parameter names 

message: I saw an infobox once that allowed adjacent settlements to be listed in a table (for instance, Town X has Y to the west, written left of X, Z to the east, written right of Z, etc.  Read as Y X Z).  Any possibility that can be incorporated into this template?  Andrew647 18:53, 9 August 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I think that idea was floated before and shot down. You can always use Template:Geographic Location (8-way) in addition to this template. —MJCdetroit 20:10, 9 August 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: That looks good.  Thanks for the advice, I didn't know about that template before.  I didn't figure people would shoot down something like that, I thought it was a good idea...then again, all of my ideas are good to me...oh well...  Keep up the good work!  Andrew647 01:06, 10 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Adjacent Communities 

message: For some reason, this template seems to be displaying pushpin maps incorrectly.  At Geneseo, New York/map test, you can see the results of creating the map with this template, with , and with .  The latter two have the correct position, but the dot on the infobox-created map is too high and too far to the left.  Can anyone explain and/or fix this behavior?  Thanks! bdesham ★ 05:31, 17 August 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I believe I've fixed the problem. The positioning calculation was incorrect. (Caniago 17:15, 17 August 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  Yes, it seems to have been fixed.  Thanks!  bdesham ★ 19:47, 17 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  This template displays pushpin maps incorrectly 

message: These would be very valuable additions to the infobox, I feel. I am not familiar with Infobox markup, though, so I will leave this task to another editor. Dave Runger 20:44, 4 September 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: At the bottom of the template are two sets of "blank" fields. You can use them for those two fields, if you wish. However, I think that adding those two will create headaches, since they will be subject to constant editing with sources of questionable accuracy. Unlike population and city area, which have reliable citation sources such as the US Census Bureau (or its equivalent in other countries), housing costs are extremely fluid and not tracked by any reliable source. Horologium t-c 04:35, 6 September 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Good points. I agree that it might not be best to implement median home price fields for most cities, but the reason I asked is because I wanted to add the astoundingly high median home price for Monterey, CA ($775,000, according to realestate.yahoo.com) to it's infobox. I think it will be more good than bad for Monterey's article. Thanks! Dave Runger 04:54, 8 September 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Please add Mean Home Price and Median Home Price variables 

message: City names displayed at the top of the infobox appear smaller than normal. This is recent. vid 02:32, 13 September 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Nothing appears to have changed in the last few hours, despite User:Tomruen's "tests".  Perhaps it is coming from somewhere else.  These "tests", brings me to another question: with this infobox transcluding on 14,607 pages, is it time to fully protect this template? —MJCdetroit 03:13, 13 September 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: It's back to normal now. Maybe it was a setting by administrators across the entire site and I only noticed it on these infoboxes? I would support protection for this page as well, I'm sure some idiot would get satisfaction is he knew screwing with this would effect 14,600 pages. vid 19:32, 13 September 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks whoever fixed it, but now there's another problem—the cities that have  filled in (Nanjing comes to mind) barely have no line break between the English name and the native name.  What would be the probable cause of this problem? —O (说 • 喝) 21:02, 13 September 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  City names are appearing small 

message: If I apply the Settlement Infobox to an article and there are a number of fields that are empty (and likely to remain so), do you recommend that I keep those empty fields, or can they be deleted?  Huwmanbeing 19:08, 14 September 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Whatever you like, I suppose.  With the exception of official_name, any of them can be deleted.  However, if you do remove the unused fields, I would recommend that you place the editor's note of:  next to the first line of {{Infobox Settlement... Just in case.  Regards,—MJCdetroit 20:02, 14 September 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Example: Stockwell, Indiana.  The only [minor] problem with removing the unused fields is that someone in the future may not know to look at the Infobox Settlement page for the full list of available fields.—MJCdetroit 20:32, 14 September 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Unused fields 

message: A minor thing -- when I add a reference to a community's sister city using the "twin" attribute, the horizontal rule that appears above it is incomplete.  (It goes only half way across.)  Lafayette, Indiana is an example.  Could this be tweaked to make it a full-width rule like all the rest?  Thanks!  Huwmanbeing 11:34, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Someone forgot a td colspan="2".  It has been fixed. —MJCdetroit 12:08, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Horizontal rule above sister cities 

message: When coordinates are provided without seconds (lats/longs), such as for Johannesburg, there is a small display issue: the coordinates are displayed as, e.g., 26°08′″S 27°54′″E. The ″ symbol should only be displayed if seconds are provided. Could someone more familiar with the template please fix this? Thanks in advance. Pruneautalk 11:26, 24 September 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Fixed by reinstating  which was replaced in this good faith edit.  ...and the saying goes, "If it ain't broke—don't fix it!".  Happy editing!—MJCdetroit 01:09, 25 September 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Empty lats/longs fields 

message: I am Eiyuu Kou and I am requesting a template I can copy for this so I can give locations in the game information for usage. There is not too much information based off of the game's locations, but for just enough. I may not pick up the template here, but send it to User Talk:Eiyuu Kou. --69.239.175.29 18:04, 26 September 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Infobox for http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Main_Page 

message: Would anyone else find these optional fields useful?
* Founder.  I see in the Politics section that one can already document the year of a community's founding by using the "Established" fields, and can show the current leader, but not the original founder of the town.
* Named for.  The U.S. County infobox includes this, and it's a handy way of noting the origin of the place's name.
They're certainly not priorities, but they're things I'd use.  Thanks!  Huwmanbeing 21:00, 27 September 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I would agree that both of those would be useful fields.  Good ideas! Omnedon 12:25, 13 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Proposed fields 

message: Any idea why the United Kingdom's flag is showing up within the Franklin, Alabama infobox? It uses  which redirects here, but I can't quite figure out where the flags are coming from. - auburnpilot talk 20:56, 4 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Its showing up in all articles that use  and all articles using . I think someone made a mistake or vandalised the template.  And I don't know how to fix it.  Some one please help! -- Ltvine | Talk 21:11, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

text: Scratch that, it doesn't appear to be showing up in ALL articles using , see Helena, Montana or Los Angeles, California.  I have no idea what's going on. -- Ltvine | Talk 21:28, 4 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I just removed  from several places within the code. It was added by  here, with the edit summary "Unit conversion tweak". Not sure what the purpose was, but I'm guessing it wasn't to add the UK's flag. - auburnpilot talk 21:30, 4 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I added that on July 4th and there is/was no reason for it to all the sudden go crazy.  I've spent an hour or so trying to figure it out what was going wrong, but I can't figure it out.  The only thing I know for sure is that if that this was a direct result of the July 4th edit it would have been reverted in about 3 seconds after I hit 'Save page' because NYC was also showing the union jack.  It was definitely something that happened today.  I think it is coming from the   template itself or something associated with it.  In anycase, it is best to just leave  out of the code and continue to think WTF? —MJCdetroit 02:17, 5 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Flag of the UK

message: Is there any way to clarify how the various population fields, particularly "urban" and "metro", should be used?  Those fields are currently blank in the documentation. -- Sfmammamia 16:47, 5 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  documentation on use of population fields 

message: The font size for this template appears different to me in Firefox and IE.  This caused a few problems for me because I do all my editing in Firefox, but when I looked at pages in IE, I noticed some lines wrapped when I did not intend them to.  This could easily be solved by shrinking the current font-size for the "infobox geography" class in MediaWiki:Common.css from 90% to 89%.  By reducing it by just 1%, the browsers make the infoboxes look basically the same.  What do others think about this proposal?  It will also have an effect on a few other infoboxes that use that class, but this is the major one so I figured I'd ask here first.  Take a look at the testcases in IE to see the difference (the sandbox version has the font size manually reduced to 89%).  Personally, I think the slightly smaller size looks much better and is more readable because the words and lines aren't quite so mashed together.  --CapitalR 06:22, 13 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Font size is different in IE and Firefox 

message: I'm trying to "subclass" the Infobox Settlement, in order to map  to this one, without changing 200 articles. I'm carrying the experiments at User:Duja/Temp. However, I can't get the  parameter to work; the ultimate idea is that  parameter maps to , with "Municipality" in the title and metric preference, but I can't get it to display at all. See the usage tests at User talk:Duja/Temp. Can someone gently fix the issue? It does appears in this revision, but with wrong metric preference, and I can't for the life of me figure out what's the problem. Duja► 10:54, 16 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: There's really no need to "map" the Serbia municipality pages.  I can have a bot change them over to Infobox Settlement in about 10 minutes.  I did 15 test edits and everything looked good (to me).  —MJCdetroit 03:42, 17 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Actually, I think there is: see the elaboration on my talk page. I'm also a programmer, and I strongly prefer developing an "interface wrapper" to a global change. Apart from minor server effort required, what's the problem with the approach I proposed? Duja► 07:19, 17 October 2007 (UTC)

text: P.S. I think your problem above was that you had  listed twice. —MJCdetroit 03:44, 17 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks a lot. I still don't know what was the problem really; in the end, I had a few desperate & semi-random attempts to make it work, which apparently included the offending pipe in the argument name... y'know what happens when you try it too hard, too late in the day. I could swear that it didn't work without it either, but it's important that it works now. Duja► 07:19, 17 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Help needed 

message: I added a second Postal Code option for locations that wish to break down zip codes by physical location and PO Box. See Clinton, Mississippi to see how it works. Now, that change is working, no problem. The issue I need help solving is with the Area Code section. It's in the same whitespace as FIPS Code and GNIS ID but I think Area Code should be in its own whitespace just like the Zip Codes and Time Zone sections. I'm sure it's got something to do with a table TR or TD option but I'm not that advanced. Anyone? --  ALLSTAR  ECHO 05:36, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Made change, need additional help with change

message: Hello. MJCdetroit made some edits to pushpin map on 27 October and since then coordinates (red dot) on some maps display wrongly (i.e. in completely other, wrong location). - Darwinek 09:42, 27 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Fixed.  The problem was over at  and involved the seconds not being conditional within an #expr.  I fixed it over there.  This upgrade will allow users to use only decimals with the pushpin_map.  —MJCdetroit 20:12, 27 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Pushpin map 

message: Hi. I've been working on a few minor additions to the template. They ought to have no effect on any existing pages, but provide some extra options based on new parameters (mostly ideas stolen from Geobox). The changes made so far in the sandbox are supposed to have the following effects (please let me know if they do anything they shouldn't - I'm new to this):
*New parameters image_skyline_position, image_maps_position, image_dot_map_position, pushpin_map_position, which when set to bottom cause the relevant image/maps to be displayed near the foot of the infobox rather than at the top. This would seem to be useful in cases where multiple images/maps take up so much space that the reader is forced to scroll down to find basic textual information.
*Automatic calculation of population density, when population_density is set to auto. This could be extended to urban density and so on.
*A new parameter category (intended to contain values like Town, City, District, etc.) When non-empty this has two effects:
**It is displayed in the infobox header under the names (in slightly smaller non-bold type). This is suppressed however in the case when category is Town and settlement_type is empty.
**If it is the same as settlement_type, or equals Town when settlement_type is empty, it causes the total area (if defined) to display on the same line as the word Area, and similarly for total Population - instead of having an extra line displaying settlement_type/City.
I know the logic of the last one seems rather strange, but I wanted to make all options available without affecting the display of existing pages. Basically I envisage category as the general description of the entity, with settlement_type continuing to play the role it does now, namely the row header for total area and total population. When the two are the same, that row header is not needed (just Area or Population seems natural). And if you want to suppress the row header but not display the category at the top (for example, when the place is in a country which doesn't distinguish towns from cities, and thus any category is liable to be misleading), you can set category to Town and leave settlement_type empty. Obviously all this can be changed in many different ways if people have better suggestions.
Anyway, I'm announcing this here before moving the changes to the live template, to give others the chance to comment. --Kotniski 14:18, 30 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: They (who ever they are) say a picture is worth a thousand words.  SO, can you set up some examples here: Template:Infobox_Settlement/testcases?  The only thing I don't care for is the positioning down of the skyline image, but I'm ok with the maps.  However, let's see what it looks like first.  —MJCdetroit 14:33, 30 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: By way of demonstration I've altered the Amsterdam testcase to use the new options. (Map moved to the bottom; density calculated automatically; word City displayed at the top of the box but not in the Area and Population sections.) Not all these changes are necessarily improvements in this particular case, but I stress that they are all entirely optional and can be used or not in any given article. I agree it's quite unlikely you'd want to move the skyline (or equivalent) image to the bottom, but perhaps there might be occasional cases where this would be useful.--Kotniski 15:07, 30 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I don't really care for the area and population same line scheme.  If you'll notice in Amsterdan's population, because the date in typed in full, it breaks the line and forces it to wrap.  The extra extra space behind the "Area" and "Population" was intended for the dates and footnotes (I think?).  It looks neater the old way.  The category/settlement type at the top is probably a good idea, but it needs to stand out better than your sandbox version. I don't mind the optional map placement, but if you want to have the option to move the map then the coordinates should also move with it.  They look out of place by themselves.—MJCdetroit  —Preceding comment was added at 19:26, 31 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: OK, you're right, the pop/area display doesn't look good in this case. I intended this option for use with more modest infoboxes, like the ones for Polish villages, which contain much less information. But in fact I can probably achieve what I want here without changing the template, just by setting settlement_type to be something like Total or just a dash. When I next get a moment I'll try improving the display of the category at the top, and moving the coordinates with the map. I would also like to simplify the code of the template (by transcluding a subtemplate instead of repeating the same complex code for area and population density many times). That way it will be easier to make changes, such as implementing automatic density calculation for every density position.--Kotniski 10:45, 1 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Having it set to total if your category is full is not a bad idea.  Subtemplating is also a very good idea.—MJCdetroit 11:55, 1 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Proposal to move new functions from sandbox