Infoboxes
This template is within the scope of WikiProject Infoboxes, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of Infoboxes on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.InfoboxesWikipedia:WikiProject InfoboxesTemplate:WikiProject InfoboxesInfoboxes articles

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.

Archives

Index 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 11, 12, 13, 14

This page has archives. Sections older than 90 days may be automatically archived by Lowercase sigmabot III when more than 4 sections are present.

It seems to me that the |list_episodes is just as useful when the list is in the same article, so I have started a discussion on the policy that appears to discourage this.

Jim Craigie (talk) 10:18, 8 September 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Taking into consideration the variety of articles that use {{Infobox television}}, are the parameters first_aired= and last_aired= appropriate, or would first_broadcast= and last_broadcast= be more appropriate? Not every show was transmitted only through airwaves. Aired is pretty specific, while broadcast is non-specific.
Christopher, Sheridan, OR (talk) 07:15, 18 September 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Is | name = deliberately or accidentally missing from the syntax and example in Usage (before the Parameters sub-heading)?
Jim Craigie (talk) 12:54, 24 September 2020 (UTC)[reply]

• In 99% of the situations it is not needed as the page title is used. --Gonnym (talk) 13:05, 24 September 2020 (UTC)[reply]

The description of |preceded_by= and |followed_by= makes reference to a predecessor or successor show without specifying if this should be understood to be with the respect to the chronology of the storyline or of the broadcasts. Thus, if a show B is a prequel to show A, it is a predecessor in the story timeline but a successor in the broadcast timeline. Which one was intended? It would be nice to get this clarified in the description. jmsofia (talk) 01:34, 25 September 2020 (UTC)[reply]

These parameters are normally from a real-world perspective, so a prequel would be in |followed_by= as far as I understand it. See Breaking Bad, where both the prequel show Better Call Saul and the sequel film El Camino: A Breaking Bad Movie are listed in |followed_by=. El Millo (talk) 01:54, 25 September 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Facu is correct in what the parameters mean (real world, not in world). But I also feel like the text we have in the doc is very poorly written and could use a rewrite to be clearer. - Favre1fan93 (talk) 03:01, 25 September 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Fandom is mostly used for Television Programmes, You should make a entry in the infobox. by [[User:FunctionalMetatable FunctionalMetatable]] (talk) 18:39, 7 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]

For me it looks rather strange formatting the page titles this way, see for example Talk:Man in the Mirror: The Michael Jackson Story#Title in strange font??.

Could someone please tell me the reason for formatting titles with this template that way?, i would prefer having the title formatted as normal pages are or at least don't use a stile that makes letters like a J looks like some strange character (see screenshots there)...

Thanks in advance --2001:16B8:6099:FD00:1843:53BC:DC7C:C347 (talk) 09:33, 15 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

It's not because of this template. The general font your web browser uses for Wikipedia (either by default or because you chose it) is different from the one I have for example, and likely different from the one most people have. That's why the J's are "weird", probably because the italic uppercase J in that font looks like that. El Millo (talk) 17:11, 15 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

As it currently stands, the runtime field is only supposed to detail per-episode length. More often than not, this is completely fine and appropriate, but in some cases, such as certain mini-series like Battlestar Galactica, it is not followed, instead given the total runtime. Zack Snyder's Justice League is another example; the upcoming miniseries is made up of four 60-minute episodes, so it stands to reason that the running-time be listed as 60 minutes, and the number of episodes be 4. The problem is that the num_episodes field is only to be updated as and when episodes are aired, of which none of these episodes have. This leaves us with an issue, since we can only list the per-episode length, giving the impression that the total runtime for the four episode series is a single hour. Multiple users have had to revert good-faith edits changing the runtime to 240 minutes (four hours) since we cannot, currently, include the number of (unaired) episodes in the table also, leaving us with an incomplete set of data.

Now, I'm perfectly happy to continue reverting these edits, but this does raise the question of how this template can be improved to account for such circumstances going forward. The way I see it, we have two options: a) we alow the total runtime be included and keep the num_episodes criteria as is, or b) since we know there are four planned episodes, we allow this information in the num_episodes field (or add a new field for expected episodes). I'd appreciate thoughts and input. -- JascaDucato (talk | contributions) 13:21, 19 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Runtime should probably be excluded along with the number of episodes until an episodes is released. While yes, for the JL example, we can put "60 minutes" right now, once episode one releases it could be 54 minutes or 68 minutes etc. so it should be added then to accurately reflect what the runtime is, not the generalized one now. - Favre1fan93 (talk) 14:45, 19 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Probably an unpopular opinion, but I find the runtime parameter for the series very pointless. Each episode on broadcast television can be slightly different. There are even special episodes which are longer. So what's the point? The runtime should really only be handled at the episode level, where it has any relevance. --Gonnym (talk) 14:46, 19 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I can see this, but I also feel like with pre-streaming series, having it in this template can give the general idea that episodes are either an hour or half-hour long (which translates usually to 42 and 22 minutes, respectively with commercials) outside of "one-off" episodes. But yes, series today, is a bit of a crapshoot about this. Like take The Mandalorian for example. Going in to it, we thought it would be a "typical" hour-long drama, but episodes have erred more towards the 30 minute mark than the hour mark. - Favre1fan93 (talk) 14:50, 19 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

The thing is, most episodes do not have articles of their own, and it's still useful to have an overview of how long the episodes are, and what's the range from the shortest to the longest one is useful as well. El Millo (talk) 15:20, 19 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I disagree that its useful giving a range. If we take Favre's example of The Mandalorian, how is 32–54 minutes useful? What does it tell you about the series? Wouldn't it be more useful instead adding the length of each episode to the {{Episode list}} template? While not every episode has an article, every series article should have an episode list. --Gonnym (talk) 15:25, 19 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Oh, I though that by handled at the episode level you were referring to episode articles. Including it in {{Episode list}} would be a viable option. I don't know if it would be more useful though, and we would be trading a bit of info at the infobox for a bunch more info in the table. But I'd be for it. El Millo (talk) 15:35, 19 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

To be fair I did mean at the episode level, meaning article, but if it's still needed, then the episode list is the other logical place where individual episodes have representation. --Gonnym (talk) 15:45, 19 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I wouldn't be in support of adding them to the episodes tables, at least not as a column. I'm okay with having them in the infobox as it exists now, but would be open to wording saying something like "if episode articles exists for the series, keep the information there". That way, if episode articles don't exist for every episode, the info remains in this infobox. - Favre1fan93 (talk) 17:32, 19 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I have to question what problem, if any, moving the runtime from the infobox to an episode list will solve? so far as I can tell, all we'd be doing is moving the same information from one point in the article to another (and potentially duplicating it four times). I would image this is the reason it was placed into the infobox in the first place. -- JascaDucato (talk | contributions) 11:29, 20 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

That's true. Most episodes of most TV series will have very similar if not identical runtimes. El Millo (talk) 17:00, 20 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Resolved

|released= is a synonym for |first_aired= but if a template has |released=some date followed by |first_aired= (with no entry), then nothing is displayed. MB 15:21, 26 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

• Yes, that is as intended. |first_aired= has precedence over |released=. There is never a reason to have both in the template, and this silent error is working as intended. --Gonnym (talk) 17:03, 26 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

The documentation says "use either but not both". If you use just |released=some date followed by |first_aired= (with no entry), then nothing is displayed even though the editor thinks they are using just one because they have only given a value to one. Templates should not do this without at least generating a warning. MB 19:41, 26 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Jonesey95, as an experienced T.E., do you have any comment on this? MB 23:38, 30 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I've changed it to use {{if empty}}, removing the oddities of having a blank-but-in-the-template parameter messing up the values. Primefac (talk) 00:55, 1 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

@Gonnym: I understand your reasoning for reverting back to company(s), but I think there are better solutions available. A quick Google leads me to believe that "company(ies)" is a technically correct and accepted, if inelegant, option. "Company(s)", however, appears to be fundamentally wrong. Alternatively, we could simply change it to "companies" since it would not be incorrect grammar when a list of companies only contains one entry. Your thoughts? -- JascaDucato (talk | contributions) 14:58, 1 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I oppose the reversion to "company(s)". It's just grammatically wrong. – Jonesey95 (talk) 15:12, 1 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

FYI, this was previously discussed recently here. - Favre1fan93 (talk) 15:14, 1 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for the link. Whilst I agree that company(ies) might "look odd", it's better than company(s), which is fundamentally wrong. -- JascaDucato (talk | contributions) 15:43, 1 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

As I said before in the linked discussion (which I completely forgot about), a plural parameter is something I can support. I can also support having this label always plural. --Gonnym (talk) 15:53, 1 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

To circle around to my comment from the last go-round, why not just add a new parameter that switches the function? It would require manually updating existing transclusions, but would technically solve the problem of "ugly vs accurate". Primefac (talk) 15:54, 1 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

To clarify, would that require the editor to choose between using |company= and |companies= or would it automatically update if more than one list entry is detected? -- JascaDucato (talk | contributions) 15:58, 1 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Having |company= and |companies= change the text in the label is the "easy" way to do it. In theory we could set up a {{str find}} that could (in theory) check for the common indicators of multiple companies (e.g. <br>, commas, etc) in order to switch the label.Primefac (talk) 16:02, 1 December 2020 (UTC) (for the record, I don't really care what's done, I just know that often I end up coding these things, so the simpler we can go, the happier I generally am)[reply]

If there is some good system that can catch the many ways editors add multiple entries (templates, breaks, commas, etc) then that could be used for the entire template. --Gonnym (talk) 16:04, 1 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Lua, really... and writing a Lua module for one parameter is kind of silly. Primefac (talk) 16:07, 1 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

There's a nice template, {{detect singular}}, that does this. See {{infobox settlement}} for usage. Here's the usage in that template: {{#if:{{detect singular|{{{area_code|}}}}}||{{Main other|[[Category:Pages using infobox settlement with possible area code list]]}}}}}} – Jonesey95 (talk) 16:24, 1 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

That would seem to tick all of our boxes - one parameter, but dynamic display of the label to match. Primefac (talk) 17:46, 1 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

While I understand the desire for two separate parameters, I think if what Jonesey95 suggested of using a single parameter to adjust the label, we should use that. - Favre1fan93 (talk) 03:04, 2 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

/sandbox has been modified with {{detect singular}} for all plural labels. Please take a look and see if this isn't breaking anything. --Gonnym (talk) 09:48, 2 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Looks good to me. I did a far-from-thorough test on a live article using /sandbox and everything seemed to worked properly. If we can guarantee that nothing is broken, I don't see why this solution couldn't be used more widely. Nice work, Gonnym (and Jonesey95, Primefac for the suggestions). ---- JascaDucato (talk | contributions) 10:42, 2 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

What's in the testcases also looks fine. - Favre1fan93 (talk) 14:47, 2 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

 Done. Primefac (talk) 16:05, 2 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

In the template instructions, there is no |music= parameter indicated, but the template does contain one. If used, it renders "Music by" in the infobox as shown here, whereas if you use |composer=, it renders "Composer" as shown here. Is this by design? If |music= is supposed to be an alias of |composer=, (or vice versa), then shouldn't they both render the same way? And if they're supposed to be used differently, it would seem we need to add |music= to the template instructions and clarify what it's for. Cyphoidbomb (talk) 22:17, 7 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]