Template:Reflist/doc

 replaces the simple parameter, you can control how the list is rendered. For example, using  will result in items being prefixed with roman numerals instead of decimal numbers. The parameter accepts any valid CSS value defined for  as shown below.

Multiple uses
If Reflist is used multiple times without a parameter, each instance will include all of the previously defined references. To force the parser to close previous references, each use of Reflist must be forced as a new instance by the use of any parameter. Even an undefined parameter such as will force the references to close.

Grouped references
As of June 2008, the footnotes system supports the separation of references into groups. This allows groups for explanatory notes, table references and the like. See WP:REFGROUP.

The general format for the reference tag would be:



And for the reflist:


 * Where groupname would be a group identifier such as "note", "nb" or "label".

There are three pre-defined group names that will automatically cause the link labels and this template to display ohter character instead of numbers (see List styles above). These are: "lower-alpha" (a, b, c...), "lower-greek" (α, β, γ...) and "lower-roman" (i, ii, iii...).

List-defined references
As of September 2009, references may be defined within Reflist using refs and invoked within the content. There are new error messages associated with this update, documented at Help:Cite errors. As usual, groups can be used. Defined references must be used within the body; unused references will show an error message.

Example
This is reference 1. This is reference 2. This is reference 3.

Result
This is reference 1. This is reference 2. This is reference 3.

Browser support for columns
Multiple columns are generated by using CSS3, which is still in development; thus only browsers that properly support the multi-column property will show multiple columns with Reflist.

These browsers support CSS3 columns:
 * Gecko-based browsers such as Mozilla Firefox
 * WebKit-based browsers such as Safari and Google Chrome
 * Opera from version 10.11 beta onward

These browsers do not support CSS3 columns:
 * Microsoft Trident-based browsers including Internet Explorer through to version 9
 * Opera through to version 11

Supporting CSS
Reflist uses a CSS rule in MediaWiki:Common.css to set the font size:



One of the following classes is assigned by the template when either column count or column width is set:


 * and  (where   is the numer of columns)

The following CSS properties are utilized using the column-count and column-width templates:


 * CSS3 standard
 * CSS3 standard
 * Mozilla CSS extension
 * Mozilla CSS extension
 * Webkit CSS extension
 * Webkit CSS extension

Customizing the view
By editing your CSS, the personal appearance of the reference list can be customized. From Preferences, select the Appearance tab, then on the selected skin select Custom CSS. After editing and saving, follow the instructions at the top of the page to purge. See Skin for more help.

The font size for all reference lists defaults to 90% of the standard size. To change it, add:
 * Font size

Change 90% to the desired size.

To disable columns, add:
 * Columns

Similarly, to force all reference lists to a number of columns, change the number.

To add dividers (rules) between columns, add:
 * Column dividers

You can alter the appearance of the dividers by changing the values.

Perennial suggestions
There have been a number of requests to add functionality for a collapsible or scrolling reference list. These requests have not been fulfilled to due to issues with readability, accessibility, and printing. The applicable guidelines are at MOS:SCROLL. Links between the inline cite and the reference list do not work when the reference list is enclosed in a collapsed box.
 * Collapsing and scrolling

To display the reference list in a scrollbox or collapsed per user, see Help:Reference display customization.

There have been suggestions to include section header markup such as. This is inadvisable because:
 * Including the section title
 * There is no standard section name; see WP:FNNR
 * When transcluded, the article will have an edit link that will confusingly open the template for editing

To do
In 2009, the template was updated on Wikipedia to allow for the ability to define references within the body of the template itself, which can be useful in certain situations.

For example,

The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog. Amazingly few discotheques provide jukeboxes. How razorback-jumping frogs can level six piqued gymnasts.

However, for reasons that are unclear as of 04:17, April 16, 2010 (UTC), this aspect of the template produces errors here on. This is what happens when you attempt to put the above example into pratice:

The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog. Amazingly few discotheques provide jukeboxes. How razorback-jumping frogs can level six piqued gymnasts.

It does no particular harm to have the template producing these errors, because this is not an aspect of the template that is actually used on Tardis at the moment. Thus the error will simply be recorded here until a solution can be found.

Note that as of 04:17, April 16, 2010 (UTC) the template has been slightly altered from its state on Wikipedia, in that a double-pipe workaround has been attempted. The "meat" of the code is this:

However, this presents the error code: Invalid tag; no input is allowed. Use. Going on advice from an error-reporting thread, double piping (|| as opposed to | to separate variable definitions) was attempted, thus:

This actually solves the error message reported above. Unfortunately, it introduces the wholly different error of: Invalid tag; no text was provided for refs named [refname] Different combinations of piping have been rather randomly tried, but all to no avail.

Solution
This problem definitively identified as having to do with the version of Cite.php used on this site. The latest version for our version of MediaWiki (1.15.x) is 48711, and we're considerably back at 47190. Upgrading will almost certainly make this aspect of the template work.