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Referencing for beginners |
Footnotes |
This page will help you to fix the error message:
The named reference $1
was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
- If you need help with a particular problem, please discuss it on the article talk page or at the Help desk.
- If you have read this help page and find something missing or confusing, please discuss it at the main talk page.
- Please reference this page and the page where you have the problem so we can understand your issues.
- For basic information on the footnotes system, see Referencing for beginners; for advanced help, see Footnotes.
Contents
Overview
A footnote used multiple times may be defined with a name:
<ref name="foo-bar">content</ref>
To invoke a named footnote:
<ref name="foo-bar" />
References may also be defined within the reference list. Here is a correct example:
{{reflist|refs= <ref name=rename1>refcontent1</ref> <ref name=rename2>refcontent2</ref> <ref name=rename3>refcontent3</ref> <ref name=rename4>refcontent4</ref> }}
Issues and resolution
A named reference was invoked but never defined. The reference may be defined inline or in the reference list. You may have misspelled the reference name, or used special characters that look the same but are actually different.
For instance,
<ref name="foo-bar">content</ref>
- and
<ref name="foo–bar">content</ref>
are not the same: one contains a hyphen while the other uses an ndash. To avoid this sort of error, try to use only the characters available on the standard keyboard.
You may have also invoked a reference but never defined it, for example: <ref name="foo–bar">...</ref>
or <ref name="foo–bar" />
.
You may have tried to include the reference inside the ref tag, for example: <ref foo–bar />
.
The full reference may have been removed from the article with other content, such as when removing information under BLP concerns. In this case the text of the reference will be available in the page history, and you can convert the single <ref />
tag into a full reference.
List-defined references may have this error if:
- The closing
</ref>
tag is missing or malformed. This would normally result in a A<ref>
tag is missing the closing</ref>
(see the help page).
message, but the missing tag causes the reference to "eat" the reference following in the list. Since that reference is undefined, the The named reference $1
was invoked but never defined (see the help page). for both references. This can be very confusing, as the order of references in the list may not match the order used in the content.
- If {{reflist}} is used and the
|refs=
parameter is missing or malformed. - If a named reference is invoked within the reference list markup:
{{reflist|refs= <ref name=refname1 /> }}
Display
If the reference name includes characters other than standard English alphabet and numerals, then those characters will be dot encoded. That is, the characters will be converted to ASCII hexadecimal and shown with a period before them. For example, a name such as $$abcd
would show as .24.24abcd
. As noted at WP:NAMEDREFS: "Please consider keeping names simple and restricted to the standard English alphabet and numerals."
Examples
Standard
Here the reference named minim is invoked, but never defined:
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipisicing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua.<ref name=ipsum>Reference 1</ref> Ut enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat.<ref name=minim/> Duis aute irure dolor in reprehenderit in voluptate velit esse cillum dolore eu fugiat nulla pariatur.<ref name=duis>Reference 3</ref>Excepteur sint occaecat cupidatat non proident, sunt in culpa qui officia deserunt mollit anim id est laborum. ==References== {{reflist}}
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipisicing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua.[1] Ut enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat.[2] Duis aute irure dolor in reprehenderit in voluptate velit esse cillum dolore eu fugiat nulla pariatur.[3]Excepteur sint occaecat cupidatat non proident, sunt in culpa qui officia deserunt mollit anim id est laborum.
Now minim appears to be defined, but the / actually invokes the reference before the definition; note that the closing </ref>
shows:
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipisicing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua.<ref name=ipsum>Reference 1</ref> Ut enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat.<ref name=minim/>Reference 2</ref> Duis aute irure dolor in reprehenderit in voluptate velit esse cillum dolore eu fugiat nulla pariatur.<ref name=duis>Reference 3</ref>Excepteur sint occaecat cupidatat non proident, sunt in culpa qui officia deserunt mollit anim id est laborum. ==References== {{reflist}}
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipisicing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua.[1] Ut enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat.[2]Reference 2</ref> Duis aute irure dolor in reprehenderit in voluptate velit esse cillum dolore eu fugiat nulla pariatur.[3]Excepteur sint occaecat cupidatat non proident, sunt in culpa qui officia deserunt mollit anim id est laborum.
List-defined references
Here, the referenced named excepteur is improperly closed— it causes the reference following in the list named ipsum to not close, thus both references show an error:
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipisicing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua.<ref name=ipsum/> Ut enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat.<ref name=minim/> Duis aute irure dolor in reprehenderit in voluptate velit esse cillum dolore eu fugiat nulla pariatur.<ref name=duis/> Excepteur sint occaecat cupidatat non proident, sunt in culpa qui officia deserunt mollit anim id est laborum.<ref name=excepteur/> Curabitur pretium tincidunt lacus. ==References== {{reflist|refs= <ref name=duis>duis</ref> <ref name=excepteur>excepteur<ref> <ref name=ipsum>ipsum</ref> <ref name=minim>minim</ref> }}
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipisicing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua.[1] Ut enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat.[2] Duis aute irure dolor in reprehenderit in voluptate velit esse cillum dolore eu fugiat nulla pariatur.[3] Excepteur sint occaecat cupidatat non proident, sunt in culpa qui officia deserunt mollit anim id est laborum.[4] Curabitur pretium tincidunt lacus.
Technical
Pages with this error message are placed into Pages with broken reference names. The system message page is at Cite error references no text.