Television Template‑class

This template is within the scope of WikiProject Television, a collaborative effort to develop and improve Wikipedia articles about television programs. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page where you can join the discussion. For how to use this banner template, see its documentation.TelevisionWikipedia:WikiProject TelevisionTemplate:WikiProject Televisiontelevision articles Template This template does not require a rating on Wikipedia's content assessment scale.

Infobox television
File:DSC02502 modified.jpg Look, it's Jimmy Wales.
Created by	Random person
Starring	John Doe Jane Doe Jim Doe Jill Doe
Narrated by	Random person
Opening theme	Random
Ending theme	Random
Country of origin	United States
Original language	English
No. of episodes	1
Production
Executive producer	Random person
Camera setup	Single-camera
Running time	60 minutes
Original release
Network	TNT
Release	July 2, 2000 – July 3, 2000

Documentation

{{Infobox Television
| show_name          = 
| image              = 
| caption            = 
| format             = 
| camera             = 
| picture_format     = 
| audio_format       = 
| runtime            =
| creator            = 
| developer          = 
| executive_producer = 
| starring           = 
| narrated           = 
| opentheme          = 
| endtheme           = 
| country            = 
| language           = 
| network            = 
| first_aired        = 
| last_aired         = 
| num_episodes       = 
| list_episodes      =
| preceded_by        =
| followed_by        =
| website            = 
| imdb_id            = 
| tv_com_id          = 
}}

Parameters in red are required fields. Link people if they have articles.

Parameter	Explanation
show_name	The name of the show.
image	An image relevant to the show. Should be resized to a width of 300 pixels or below.
caption	A caption explaining the image. An image with the title logo of the show does not need a caption.
format	The format of the show (examples listed at television program). Link if an article is available.
camera	Either Single-camera or Multi-camera
picture_format	The video or film format in which the show was released. Black-and-white, Film, 405-line, NTSC (480i), PAL (576i), SECAM (576i), HDTV 720p, HDTV 1080i
audio_format	The format in which the show’s sound is broadcast. (Monaural sound, Stereophonic sound, Surround sound)
runtime	How long each episode runs; should not include commercials and should be approximated (i.e. 22-26 minutes approx. for most half-hour TV shows).
creator	Who created the show. Separate multiple people with line breaks (<br />).
developer	Who developed the show.
executive_producer	The executive producer(s).
starring	Who stars in the show. Separate multiple people with line breaks (<br />).
narrated	The narrator for the show, if applicable.
opentheme	The name of the opening theme for the show.
endtheme	The name of the ending theme for the show.
country	The country of origin for the show. (See Category:Flag templates, e.g. {{USA}} for  United States.)
language	The original language(s) of the show. Please be sure that you link to an article that is actually about the language; for example, use [[English language|English]], not [[English]]
network	The original network(s) or channel(s) on which the show appears. Do not add the foreign broadcasters here. Use a link if an article is available.
first_aired	The first day the show aired. Use full dates like: [[February 2]], [[1981]] because these are properly formatted according to a reader's time and date preferences.
last_aired	The last day the show aired. Use Present if it is ongoing.
num_series	For UK, the number of series the show ran for.
num_episodes	The number of episodes currently produced.
list_episodes	If a Wikipedia entry exists for a list of the show's episode, put the 'List of ... episodes' page name here. Do not use a link (no [[]]).
preceded_by	If the show was preceded by another show in some form of chronology, put the title and the years here, with the title in italics and linked if an article is available, e.g. ''[[Show Title]]'' (Year–Year).
followed_by	If the show was followed by another show in some form of chronology, put it here, as for preceded_by.
related	Related TV shows. Such as remakes, spin-offs or when a show is adapted for a different audience. e.g. The Office (UK TV series) and The Office (US TV series) or The Upper Hand and Who's the Boss? etc.
website	The show's official website (usually hosted by the network or production company). Only type in the website. Formatting is automatic.
imdb_id	The relevant IMDb number. Only type in the number. Formatting is automatic.
tv_com_id	The relevant TV.com number. Only type in the number. Formatting is automatic.

{{Infobox Television
| show_name          = Random show
| image              = [[Image:DSC02502 modified.jpg|200px]]
| caption            = Look, it's Jimmy Wales.
| format             = [[Comedy-drama]]
| camera             = [[Single camera setup|Single-camera]]
| picture_format     = [[1080i]] [[HDTV]]
| audio_format       = [[Surround sound]]
| runtime            = 60 minutes
| creator            = Random person
| executive_producer = Random person
| starring           = [[John Doe]]<br>[[Jane Doe]]<br>Jim Doe<br>Jill Doe
| narrated           = Random person
| opentheme          = Random
| endtheme           = Random
| country            = {{USA}}
| language           = [[English language|English]]
| network            = [[Turner Network Television|TNT]]
| first_aired        = [[July 2]], [[2000]]
| last_aired         = [[July 3]], [[2000]]
| num_episodes       = 1
| website            = http://en.wikipedia.org/
| imdb_id            = 10000
| tv_com_id          = 10000
}}

Discussion

Archives

May 2005 - October 2006 Start Next

I guess it's probably because there are (too many) exceptions, but any reason why this infobox not named "Television series"...?  ("Television" alone seems a little vague...)  Regards, David Kernow (talk) 04:02, 11 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Smaller names are better until it becomes a problem. – Someguy0830 (T | C) 08:43, 13 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Smaller names also more ambiguous and/or less helpful, especially to those not regularly editing code. Regards, David (talk) 09:20, 13 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

...Just been reminded that there's {{Infobox Television episode}}, so {{Infobox Television series}} would seem logical...?  David (talk) 19:23, 15 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

It had been bothering me for sometime that the number of episodes was floating a few px below where it should be.. I couldn't see what was up.. it turns out there was a rogue line break, haha! Matthew Fenton (talk · contribs · count · email) 10:25, 14 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

It's confusing to have the infobox say "Genre" but you have to put the information under the header "Format" when you go to edit the box. I don't want to mess anything up so I won't do it myself, but I highly recommend that the coding be changed to the word "genre" too. 23skidoo 00:39, 27 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Done, format or genre will now both work when called. thanks/Fenton, Matthew Lexic Dark 52278 Alpha 771 01:06, 27 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

OK, so I'm being a bold newbie to this area. I noticed that a couple of shows didn't have infoboxes, or didn't have them fully filled out, so I added them. That led me to have to research what I should put into some of these fields, which in turn led me to record my observations back into the documentation and update the example to match observed common style.

It occurs to me that consistency could be aided by using strongly stylized values, with the template turning them into common presentations. (imdb_id and tv_com_id are good examples of what I mean.)

For instance:

I've only got a very little bit of experience with MediaWiki templates, so I don't know how practical those all are, but most of them seem possible. Thoughts?

Jordan Brown 03:14, 30 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

It seems to me that if a particular code style is desired for a particular value, the documentation should show the <nowiki> code rather than the as-formatted code, to make it easy to copy-and-paste into your article. language and first_aired show examples of this. I already did this to preceded_by; it seems like it's also appropriate in camera, picture_format, and audio_format. audio_format especially draws my attention, since it seems to want "[[Monaural]] sound" but "[[Surround sound]]". (I didn't do it, because picture_format looked like it would just get gross.)

Note that my standardization comments above might reduce the need for code examples.

Thoughts?

Jordan Brown 03:24, 30 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Like the section header says. Telenovela appears to fill the same ecological niche as this template. Thoughts? I suggest discussing it over on Template talk:Telenovela. Jordan Brown 08:32, 9 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Over in Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Television#Infoboxes on articles covering multiple media I've proposed reimplementing this template on top of a modular framework based on the one used in WP:ANIME, and have done some experiments. The intent would be to have a way to support articles that need to have infoboxes covering several "releases" - The Addams Family and Dragnet (series) come immediately to mind. One eventual goal of such a restructuring would be commonality with the anime template set, Template:Infobox Film, Template:Infobox Radio Show, and probably others.

Comments would be appreciated.

Jordan Brown 08:24, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Could you provide an example please? thanks/Fenton, Matthew Lexic Dark 52278 Alpha 771 08:27, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

{{Infobox animanga}}

He means like that. – Someguy0830 (T | C) 08:30, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Yea, just found an example. My opinion is this: That is way to excessively long, remember an infobox isn't limited to one transclusion. thanks/Fenton, Matthew Lexic Dark 52278 Alpha 771 08:34, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I would agree. I dislike the anime box, though I will admit its usefulness in regards to its subject. I prefer the divided setup we have now. The anime/manga series tend to be more closely related than regular television. The current divided setup is more appropriate for mediums that don't often intertwine. – Someguy0830 (T | C) 08:37, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

There's definitely room for the anamanga box to be more efficient. But I do see what you're getting at, in that the series should be closely related to share an infobox. Maybe some kind of mini box could be used for different article sections, if there are not separate articles for each part. -- Ned Scott 08:52, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Or, another idea: the main topic/ part of the series/ article gets a normal infobox module, then additions get modules that are trimmed down to more basic info and don't list as much stuff. -- Ned Scott 08:54, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

(indentation reset)

Sorry for not giving an example here. Over in Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Television I'd talked about the proof-of-concept that I've done at User:Jordan Brown/Dragnet (series) and its transcluded templates. (Please discuss that implementation at User:Jordan Brown/Infobox media and User talk:Jordan Brown/Infobox media.)

There are any number of stylistic questions - color schemes, exact layout, et cetera. I don't have any real opinions on those and so at the moment in my proof of concept they're the same as the animanga scheme. My goals here are:

• Answer the question of what to do for works like Dragnet (series) and The Addams Family where there have been numerous "releases".
• Reduce duplication between the various templates.
• Improve consistency between the various templates.

From a stylistic point of view, it would be perfectly fine with me if Template:Infobox Television yielded exactly the same presentation that it does today... but its components were usable in a common way to support multi-release works and were sharable with Template: Infobox Film and others. (Of course, to the extent that the various existing templates yield different presentation, one of the goals would be to move to a common presentation. I don't have any strong opinions on what that presentation would look like.)

Jordan Brown 17:16, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not sure if I'm in favor of this. I don't think there are enough articles that require these kinds of "crossmedia boxes". What I do see is a general duplication of elements shared by all these templates. I'm not sure however if that can be solved easily. I also think that it's undesirable to make all these different media infoboxes tooo uniform. It would make wikipedia a bit boring I fear. TheDJ (talk • contribs • WikiProject Television) 19:45, 20 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Possibly, but there's a lot of things we might not have considered yet. I still think it would be interesting just to throw up a big brain storm of different styles for infoboxes. Even if we don't exactly do a modular form there may still be some interesting ideas we can get from our "sister" project infoboxes. -- Ned Scott 20:51, 20 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Well, the film box is basically the same as this. As for Jordan's setup, that's the animanga styled infobox, just colored differently. What would be useful, though somewhat unused, would be an incarnations or versions field, identifying if a particular series has several broken apart versions. Alternatively, a Television series infobox could be designed for such purposes, somewhat akin to the channel infobox. – Someguy0830 (T | C) 20:57, 20 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I don't know how many articles would use a "cross-media" infobox. Note that I haven't looked at all that many TV articles, and found two. However, if we did it right, single-media articles wouldn't see any coding change at all - Template:Infobox Television would invoke the modular framework internally. As for "boring", well, one man's "boring" is another man's "consistent". If there's a desire for stylistic differences, perhaps we could make one framework that could be invoked with different options to yield different colors and whatnot. (Perhaps via CSS?)

Surely there are ways that we can reduce duplication. At a minimum we could establish conventions for things like country-of-origin, but we should be able to build templates that are used for various common cases like "put this label and this value if the value is non-empty".

Note that both Dragnet and The Addams Family have not just multiple serieses but releases in multiple media (TV, film, video games, radio) and so a simple extension to Infobox Television might not be sufficient.

Jordan Brown 19:22, 21 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Does the template automatically add categories, like for genre, when it's entered into the infobox? JQF • Talk • Contribs 02:00, 1 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

No, but it would be possible. -- Ned Scott 02:04, 1 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

That would be a pain to code, though. Categories names are specific, and genre is often used for multiple entries. – Someguy0830 (T | C) 02:09, 1 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Yeah, it wouldn't really be a good idea for genres. There might be other types of categories that the infobox could add that are easier. I have nothing specific in mind, just thinking out loud. -- Ned Scott 04:43, 1 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Sure seems like a good idea, even if it means some reorganization of the categories. Perhaps the template could put the article into a genre category, and humans could optionally put it into a more specific one. What does MediaWiki do if a page is in both a category and one of its subcategories? Perhaps the genre entry should be expanded to be more specific.

In case it isn't obvious from my previous comments, I almost always think it's a good idea to standardize and automate "usual practice".

Jordan Brown 21:38, 2 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The only feasable way to implement this would be to make an auto-formatting, auto-catting template series like {{action}}, {{drama}}, etc. Besides, even then the cat type varies. – Someguy0830 (T | C) 21:45, 2 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I was thinking of something along the line of

! Genre
| {{{format|{{{genre}}}}}}[[Category:Television Genre {{{genre}}}]]
|-

That is, have a series of standard-format category names with the standardized genre names embedded in them. It'd require reorging existing categories, but the result would seem to be a win. Jordan Brown 22:05, 2 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

That would work, but you'd have to resort a bunch of categories and replace all the non-embedded usages. – Someguy0830 (T | C) 22:28, 2 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Without commenting on whether this would be a good idea, if there were a genre or other category field, for cross-genre works, editors would still be able to add categories to the article itself, as they do now, so this may not be a significant objection. Avt tor 17:22, 25 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I propose that we remove the IMDb, TV.com and possibly the Official website link from this infobox, external links are generally being duplicated in the infobox and the External links section - project wide all external links are kept in their own section ("External links") and so it does seem extraneous to list external links in the infobox when they do generally belong at the bottom of the page. thanks/Fenton, Matthew Lexic Dark 52278 Alpha 771 12:42, 9 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

No, for consistency with similar infoboxes (Film, for instance, has IMDb and others). If there are a duplicate links, then just remove them! All of the external links for mature articles should be inline citations anyway. The JPS^{talk to me} 12:56, 9 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I kind of like the links in the infobox, because it provides a simple and consistent way to get this information. OTOH, I sometimes automatically ignore infoboxes and so have trouble finding the information. Regardless, it's worth noting that WP:TV and WP:FILM disagree on convention; WP:TV#External links says to put them only in the infobox, but a response to a question at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Films#External links and IMDb says that the WP:FILM convention is to put them in both places. Jordan Brown 04:03, 10 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

An infobox usually is a duplication of the article content, since it's an "at-a-glance" tool. -- Ned Scott 05:33, 10 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

You mean that as such the links should be duplicated as well ? cause i think they should. TheDJ (talk • contribs • WikiProject Television) 05:44, 10 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The way it's done now seems fine with me. -- Ned Scott 05:58, 10 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I don't have a really stong feeling on whether or not to duplicate the information. It does seem like WP:TV and WP:FILM should have the same convention, whichever way it is. Jordan Brown 21:42, 11 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Surely there should be field to enter the number of seasons the series ran for? Joe King 19:56, 24 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I'm failing to see the usefulness to this, it also adds more Americanization, generally it's stated in an article how many seasons OR series the show has had, and it generally is usually on the LOE as well. thanks/Fenton, Matthew Lexic Dark 52278 Alpha 771 20:01, 24 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I must say I agree with Fenton.--NeilEvans 20:13, 24 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Number of seasons seems just as relevant as number of episodes. Although, we could probably just note it in the episode number parameter to make it simple, such as "52 episodes (2 seasons)" or something like that. It would not bother me to add a number of seasons parameter. -- Ned Scott 20:25, 24 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I suppose it is just as relevant as number of episodes. If it does get added, then a field should be added for number of series as well as number of seasons, so the correct field can be used for British TV Series.--NeilEvans 20:28, 24 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I agree with Neil's above comment. I think it could be a useful addition, and it's something that the British version has. Actually, if relevant fields (channel, etc) were added to this then we can lose the British fork. The JPS^{talk to me} 20:41, 24 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

This template already displays channel anyway. I feel the british template is redundant anyway, as the info provided by that template are covered in this one.--NeilEvans 20:50, 24 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

So it does! I thought it just said 'network'. Well, I guess if we add the series field then we can start merging them. The JPS^{talk to me} 20:53, 24 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

In the code it says network, but it displays on the page as channel. The British one really just needs to be redirected to this one.--NeilEvans 22:15, 24 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

A redirect now would mess up some articles, surely? The JPS^{talk to me} 22:29, 24 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Recently i noticed someone made all arguments of the template optional. They i'm not hellbend against it, i do think it's a shame. There is nothing wrong in having a few required arguments to force people to fill in some of the stuff. Where there other reasons that attributed to this change ? TheDJ (talk • contribs • WikiProject Television) 00:03, 2 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Sort a whim thing, really. Seemed nice to have consistent code throughout. Plus, if nothing else, it keeps the fields from appearing blank, which I find worse than their simple disappearance. – Someguy0830 (T | C) 00:06, 2 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I came up with an interesting idea for Template:Episode list a while back that makes it possible to require any option that is listed but left blank. Easy enough to do, yes, but remove the option and it is no longer required, thus no blank space will show. This way you can leave blanks when you want to (to encourage people to fill it out) but still only have the options that are needed for that specific page. Maybe we can do that here? -- Ned Scott 05:41, 2 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not quite certain what you mean by that. I know that "episode list" can ignore most fields if not included, but I don't see how that would be incorporated here. – Someguy0830 (T | C) 05:46, 2 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Let me put it this way, lets say you want someone to fill out "Narrated by" because you don't know who did, but that someone did. If you do:

{{Infobox Television

| show_name = Name

| image =

| rating = Template:TV-14

| format = Animated television series

|narrated =

| tv_com_id = 3417

}}

It would then make a blank space for "Narrated by", thus encouraging others to fill out that section. It doesn't matter if the parameter has text or not, it will render a field for it. If you don't want the field, then exclude the parameter from the template and no box is generated. -- Ned Scott 06:11, 2 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Basically it's a step up from normal "#if" statements, because you can still trigger the field without having text. -- Ned Scott 06:12, 2 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Ah. That sounds good. – Someguy0830 (T | C) 06:16, 2 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Nice idea Ned. i think that could be used here.... TheDJ (talk • contribs • WikiProject Television) 14:34, 2 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

On the main page, I edited the syntax so that it says "genre" instead of format, mostly because the template uses the input of genre, not format. Also genre is the more common term for the... genre... of the show. Format is confusing. Some other talk page mentions need to be altered as well, I suspect. -Elizabennet | talk 03:24, 16 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Currently, this infobox has far too many slots - it is unwieldy and very confusing to readers, and is very off-putting to new editors. I feel that the following slots should be removed because they're unnecessary (the information could be better included in a different 'production' category on the page). I'm using the {{Infobox Film}} and {{Infobox Novel}} as the example of a good infobox, by the way. -Elizabennet | talk 03:24, 16 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

1. camera, picture format, audio format, opening theme, ending theme, and related shows should be deleted entirely, in my opinion. The information would be better suited for elsewhere in the article.
2. First run should be removed because it is the same information as in first aired.
3. preceded_by and followed_by should be removed because they very rarely apply. They're not needed in a universal infobox.
4. num_series should say something about the number of seasons (possibly as well as the number of series) - wikipedia is meant to represent all english speakers, and in the U.S., we call them 'seasons' instead of 'series'. I think that 'season' is the more common term for it, but I could easily be wrong - Brits, do you use season and series interchangeably?

These sound like good ideas to me. Getting really detailed like format and .. audio format... is not the level of detail for an "at-a-glance" infobox. -- Ned Scott 03:51, 16 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Second. I don't mind. — Someguy0830 (T | C) 04:07, 16 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Unwieldy is the correct description i guess, perhaps we should specify some "Default set" of options somewhere that shows should have and hide the rest a bit better. Some people seem to make it their mission to fill in every single field of a template, whereas that is not the intention the optional parameters.

• Personally i think camera and picture format are important production cinemetographic aspects that should stay.
• Themes and audio format, I don't really care about (even though i think i once added the themes myself)
• First run in is (i think) for when a show is run first in a country in which it was not produced and was needed to merge the UK infobox into this one. In my eyes it's useless info.
• preceded_by and followed_by are used for MANY gameshow seasons. The Apprentice, American Idol, The Amazing Race, that type of show.
• num_series (again from the UK template merge) specifies the total number of seasons the show ran. And NO, not the whole world says seasons, in the UK they say series (because it's often not really a seasonal broadcast schedule).

I agree that the template seems to have gone out of control a bit perhaps. I'm sure it can be condensed a bit, the problem is that every single removal can be a bit complicated, because to do it right you have to merge all that information back into the article again (and i do think that should be done). There is a trick to check which pages use which options, by inserting non visible wikilinks to specially created pages. By checking those pages "What links here" page, you can then see which articles use which options. My personal cleanup lists:

Delete list:

• theme_music_composer
• opentheme
• endtheme
• first_run
• related
• language

Rename:

• num_series -> num_seasons

Condense (put on one output line):

• location and country
• num_episodes, num_seasons

TheDJ (talk • contribs • WikiProject Television) 04:10, 16 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

My response is leave it as it is, if the field is not relevant to the article, leave it blank. If Americans want a "seasons" field then just add it. In the UK "season" is never used, whereas "series" is always used.--NeilEvans 21:02, 18 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I have made some changes to the template to get an idea about the amount of usage of certain params. I started with uses of Location param, uses of first_run param. This should help us determin how useful these options actually are/can be. --TheDJ (talk • contribs • WikiProject Television) 00:13, 21 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Location is used in 19 articles, first run in 10 articles. So they could be easily eliminated if we want to. Also location is ambigious (location of what? production/setting?). first_run is equally bad defined and underused. Wouldn't it be better to simply include this information in the article ? --TheDJ (talk • contribs • WikiProject Television) 18:13, 21 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

First run is there to make an article factual and avoid an edit war, would be better if we had some sort of "auxiliary field" thanks/Fenton, Matthew Lexic Dark 52278 Alpha 771 18:27, 21 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I still say that can be detailed in the article. first shown in != country of origin (which it explicitly is called) If needed comments can be added to the infobox to prevent people readding "first_run" countries there. Similar for location. My problem with Auxillary fields is that you never know what's gonna be in it and as such hard to check wether what people use if for is proper stuff for an Infobox. --TheDJ (talk • contribs • WikiProject Television) 20:02, 21 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

"Proper stuff" is a persons definition, you say "first shown in != country of origin", others say "country made in != country of origin" thanks/Fenton, Matthew Lexic Dark 52278 Alpha 771 20:14, 21 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

"Location" is there to avoid edit wars, because "country of origin" only refers to copyright and distribution, not production. I think location is intuitive, easy to define, and easy to verify factually. Location is not needed where it is the same as country of origin, which is why it occurs less often, but also why it's very relevant when it is used. Avt tor 23:30, 26 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Personally, I think only "theme_music_composer" should go and perhaps "endtheme" too, since often it's same or it's not even heard. I think the "opentheme" field is good, specially is the song is well-known. About the series/seasons field, I think the field is good and sorry, but as neither American or British, I have no personal preference for the name. Either num_series or num_seasons is good to me, or we can even got the nitpicking way with num_series_or_seasons. --Andromeda 13:59, 27 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I was thinking that maybe the problem is not as much the amount of information in the Infobox, but more the way it's presented to the user. So I was toying around a bit and perhaps we should consider something like:

Wikinews has {{{1}}}:

--TheDJ (talk • contribs • WikiProject Television) 19:42, 2 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Looks very cool to me. thanks/Fenton, Matthew Lexic Dark 52278 Alpha 771 19:45, 2 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

As nobody has replied, would you be interested in implementing your new design DJ? Matthew 15:49, 7 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Strike my last, you've already done it, excellent work! Matthew 16:31, 7 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Funny, I only saw your new comment a couple of mins ago :D --TheDJ (talk • contribs • WikiProject Television) 19:38, 7 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I think we should loose the external links in the infobox. I can't see why they can't just be in an "External links" section. --Maitch 19:34, 7 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Well they can, but so can all the information in the infobox be somewhere else in the article... Personally i like having the links available with a quick click on a visible place. But I can't say it's one of the problem areas atm with this template. --TheDJ (talk • contribs • WikiProject Television) 19:38, 7 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

What does anyone think about having small channel logo templates next to the channel name in infoboxes, similar to the country name with flag icon?

Such as, Template:BBC Three

Logo's can't be used like that. They're only fair use in the article they describe. It's the same reason we did away with ratings images. — Someguy0830 (T | C) 21:08, 18 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Technically the US ones are public domain (not sure about other countries), but the channel logos are fair use. No getting around that. Pacific Coast Highway ^{{The internet • runs on Rainbows!}} 16:57, 3 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

What's everybody's opinion on these flags that are popping up all over the place? thanks/Fenton, Matthew Lexic Dark 52278 Alpha 771 15:56, 3 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

/me thinks they take up way too much space and deserve to be deleted :X .. Illyria05 (Talk • Contributions) 19:38, 4 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Your comment took up considerably more space than a 20px flag. Does that mean it deserves to be deleted? And what about the many much larger images used in Wikipedia? Would these then take up way too much space? An infobox is intended to be a summary of the information - flags can convey nationality of a program more effectively than text, and makes the infobox less plain. Flags could be overused, but not in this case since there is only one item (country of origin) for which a flag is appropriate. Dl2000 23:04, 5 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I see flags being used to indicate nationalities of people in the infobox. Is that appropriate here? And should we enforce that a flag can only appear in the country of origin? Tinlinkin 07:01, 6 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I think indicating people's nationality by using flags is a bit over the top. Perhaps that's something we indeed should advice against. --TheDJ (talk • contribs • WikiProject Television) 12:56, 6 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

In most cases, I believe it is a little over the top to have flags next to people's names unless the subject is one where the country is part of the issue (eg: Miss Universe), but I don't see a problem when talking about a flag next to it's country (in infoboxes anyway) when the number of countries listed in that infobox is minimal. Category:Flag templates were designed to show a country with its flag in a simplified manner that is not obtrusive. Since they were created, to my knowledge they have never been TfD nominated. Although a few countries do share the same flag, many don't, and many people when looking at information pick up clues in images faster than in text. Since in infobox summarizes key information in many articles, it seems reasonable that a single flag would not be such a horrid thing to see if someone is looking at key information and a Country of Origin is one of these factors. — CobraWiki ^{( jabber | stuff )} 23:06, 6 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Can we have a Director parameter? I figured that perhaps there is currently no Director paramter because many US series have multiple directors - I'm thinking of Lost, Sopranos, The Wire, Deadwood etc etc, though they do have a Creator. In contrast, most UK tv shows don't have a Creator as such - or if they do, the creators are the director and/or principal actor(s). Most UK shows only have one Director per series. Of course there are exceptions, and I'm not suggesting that we scrap the Creator parameter, or edit it to read "Creator / Director". Rather, I think both parameters should be available. Gram123 11:16, 7 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

A director is usually episode specific information. I guess that's why it's not in the Infobox right now. But I'm not sure how much this has been discussed. - --TheDJ (talk • contribs • WikiProject Television) 15:15, 7 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, Gram123 makes good points. Although it would be episode specific for US shows (a list in that field should be discouraged in those cases), most British shows only have a handful or less. One Foot had Belbin and Gernon, Joking Apart just Spiers, etc. The JPS^{talk to me} 17:15, 7 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

OK the template needs to be reverted as the Heroes page uses black as the background colour and the text is also black so disappears.--NeilEvans 19:37, 7 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

No, that means the Hero template needs fixing, or the idea of how the colours are implemented need fixing. --TheDJ (talk • contribs • WikiProject Television) 19:39, 7 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]