Template talk:Infobox album/Archive 5

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Are Allmusic reviews user-submitted?

Why is Allmusic included in the "Professional Reviews" section so many times, although any user of allmusic can write a review of an album - he/she needs not to be professional! --Luoma (My Second Wife) (talk) 12:01, 12 May 2009 (UTC)

On what do you base that assumption? According to Allmusic, reviews are "Editorial content" which features "Original and insightful writing by AMG’s staff and network of professional freelance music contributors." With respect to their reviews, they further say, "Our editorial staff and network of writers represent many of the most knowledgeable experts in music, movies and games today, with broad and lengthy experience in the entertainment media industry. We strive to provide editorial content that is balanced and informed. We understand that you may not always agree with our reviews or ratings" and "AMG's mission is to provide an independent expert editorial voice on recorded music, movies and games. While there is definitely a place for user reviews, and many forums, for those reviews, the AMG websites are not that place." Do you have some evidence that indicates otherwise? --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 12:56, 12 May 2009 (UTC)

Although people can submit content to Allmusic (I do it occasionally) it is heavily reviewed before being included, and the reviews themselves are completely the work of professional writers. J Milburn (talk) 15:52, 12 May 2009 (UTC)

More graceful way to recover from a missing Cover?

Right now it shows an ugly [[Image:200px.... etc thing if Cover is left blank. Can't it just skip that part? --Bunnyhop11 (talk) 22:42, 12 May 2009 (UTC)

Not sure what you mean. If "Cover" is left blank, then it doesn't show anything for me. It should only show the text you're describing if the image was deleted, which leaves a dead link that ought to be removed. --IllaZilla (talk) 23:10, 12 May 2009 (UTC)

This happens when there is an extra space or something after the equals sign. Let us know which article, and we can fix it. --A Knight Who Says Ni (talk) 13:13, 16 May 2009 (UTC)

Release date

Ki (album) is being released by HevyDevy Records (the artist's record label) on May 25 in the artist's country (Canada), but one of the album's distributors (InsideOut) is releasing it May 22 in Germany only. The guide for the infobox says to put the earliest release date, but the label that owns the album is HevyDevy, so what date and label should go in the infobox? It seems weird to have "May 22" and "HevyDevy" in the infobox since they don't coincide, but I don't want to put InsideOut as the record label because they're just a distributor, not the label that produced and owns the album.

To make it more convoluted, HevyDevy started shipping preorders last week, so they are the label that released it first, but there's no reliable source for this. Gendralman (talk) 14:25, 21 May 2009 (UTC)

I would go ahead and use May 22 and HevyDevy. Numerous albums have a primary label but several distributors, especially for overseas releases, so this isn't that unusual. I would assume InsideOut is releasing on that date with the blessing of HevyDevy. As for early shipping, I would ignore this, since it isn't an "official" release, in my opinion. — Huntster (t • @ • c) 22:53, 21 May 2009 (UTC)

Mistake

"Alternate cover" should read "alternative cover". See http://www.cjr.org/resources/lc/alt.php, Partridge - Usage and Abusage: A Guide to Good English, Fowler's Modern English Usage, Swan - Practical English Usage, http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/1995/07/msg00037.html, etc. for why the current version is erroneous. Turkeyphan^t 23:39, 22 May 2009 (UTC) (edited Turkeyphan^t 12:24, 23 May 2009 (UTC))

 Done. Very good point, and I've fixed the documentation to reflect this. However, I should note the wording that appears in articles is entirely the editor's choice, and the subtemplate {{Extra album cover 2}} does not force any particular wording. — Huntster (t • @ • c) 00:27, 23 May 2009 (UTC)

Really? According to the UC Davis link this isn't a mistake; if anything that link appears to suggest alternative is incorrect because it implies a choice, whereas alternate simply means substitute. And the Columbia one concedes "custom has allowed" this usage. If you're going to make pronouncements like this at least make sure you cite sources that are skewed in your favour. Flowerparty^☀ 09:11, 23 May 2009 (UTC)

Sorry, that was my mistake. Clearly the other sources cited are authorities on English Language and should be preferred. Custom has allowed informal usage such as "ain't", for example, which is incorrect and completely inappropriate for an encyclopaedia. I also note that http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Template:Infobox_album#Label reads "Only the record label that the album was originally released on should be specified. Where significantly different versions have been released (featuring alternate track listings) e.g. in the U.S. vs UK, the later release date and/or record label should be mentioned in the article, for example in a Release history section." I believe that this "alternate" should read "alternative" too and also that "US would be preferred over "U.S." (UK is used rather than U.K.). Finally, under http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Template:Infobox_album#Chronology, "alternately" is used when "alternatively" is meant. Turkeyphan^t 12:24, 23 May 2009 (UTC)

I meant that last statement as a joke, not an invitation to throw contradictory evidence down the memory hole. Ain't is a faulty analogy because it's recognised as nonstandard and whenever it's used the speaker is aware of this - nobody would use it in an encyclopedia; see the usage note here, there is no such note for the relevant meaning of alternate. I reject the assertion that these sources are authorities; that you've written a book on English usage doesn't make you an authority, although it might make you a bore (or a shrewd opportunist given the turnover of this industry). I do agree with you about the use of the adverb though, I've got rid of that. You can edit template:Infobox Album/doc, btw, that page isn't protected. Flowerparty^☀ 13:17, 23 May 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for letting me know about template:Infobox Album/doc and your contributions. Ain't may not be a perfect analogy but it is relevant. Ain't is widely recognised as non-standard, the incorrect usage of "alternate" is also recognised as non-standard, just on a smaller scale. It's obvious how the confused came about but it's well known that it is erroneous. I also have to respectfully disagree with your claims about the sources I provided - guides such as Fowler's and Usage and Abusage are widely respected as the authorities on English language usage. Turkeyphan^t 14:27, 23 May 2009 (UTC)

Cover artwork artist

Could a line be added to give the name of the artist who produced the cover art? I have copied the code from Template:Infobox Album into a new temporary template Template:Infobox Album2 and modified it to allow this box until it is resolved and have used this template on a few articles. - R160K (talk) 21:20, 23 May 2009 (UTC)

No, please. This is very much random trivia that can much more easily and appropriately be covered in the prose of the article. Keep the infobox for covering key data points. Artist just doesn't fit. I would also ask that you not create and actively use an entirely new template just to enable such a minor change. — Huntster (t • @ • c) 21:44, 23 May 2009 (UTC)

Why would you include the cover artist? There isn't even a line for any of the writers, performers, engineers, etc., all of whom make a much more direct and notable contribution to the album. The cover artist is interesting trivia, no question, but the infobox is supposed to be a summary of the most important details. —Gendralman (talk) 00:45, 24 May 2009 (UTC)

I agree, very few cover artists get to be notable; salient exceptions are Bob Dylan, Joni Mitchell (but then, they are already notable for other reasons), and Storm Thorgerson/Hipgnosis (who have their own articles anyway). I don't think it's the sort of thing people would be looking for in the infobox, and we already have categories that cover notable artwork providers, e.g. Category:Albums with cover art by Hipgnosis. Rodhullandemu 00:58, 24 May 2009 (UTC)

I agree with the above editors that this is better left to the article body. I sometimes wonder why we list producer in the infobox as well. There are many personnel involved in the creation of an album, and in theory they could all be listed in the infobox and it would seem to be a suitable place (as short, simple, factual summary info), however it would also bloat the box terribly. Best not to add any more. --IllaZilla (talk) 02:40, 24 May 2009 (UTC)

I'm not sure "producer" is a great example of what not to have in the infobox; there are many artists who would have been nothing without that link, e.g. The Ronettes, The Crystals, to cite only Phil Spector. More recently, producers such as Trevor Horn and Stock Aitken Waterman have had significant influence on otherwise minor artists. Whereas we might resolve this by applying categories (which we already do), in general, I think notable producers deserve a mention in the infobox. Rodhullandemu 02:53, 24 May 2009 (UTC)

I'm not saying get rid of it, I've just sometimes wondered why we have it when we don't have any other studio personnel. I guess it's comparable to having the director in the film infobox, as the producer is such an essential role in the crafting of an album. --IllaZilla (talk) 02:55, 24 May 2009 (UTC)

• <outdent: I think here it's a matter of creative influence, and credit for that- producer of The Beatles albums, for example, is usually given to George Martin; the technical innovations are, in relevant articles, attributed to others; however, Martin had the overview and got the nominal credit for supervising the creativity. He wasn't a producer in the sense of an overall project manager, as it is in film production; there are no credits for director of a music album, which is, in a film, strongly creative in input. There's a difference of terminology here, but at the end of the day, the producer of an album or track is roughly analogous to the director of a film. Rodhullandemu 03:11, 24 May 2009 (UTC)

I'm a huge fan of cover art and artists (in fact, I created that Hipgnosis category), and I oppose adding the artist to the infobox. For all the reasons listed above. Besides, we show the cover. And to add to the tangential conversation, I'll say that producers have a larger effect on the music than most people are aware of. All of Beck's albums, for example, would probably sound exactly the same without different producers. My infobox would include only: Name, Type, Artist, Cover, Released, Label, Producer. -Freekee (talk) 04:57, 24 May 2009 (UTC)

That's pretty much what mine would include too (well, maybe length as well, and I'd keep the chronology). I've also never understood why we have professional reviews in there, though that's a whole other can of worms. --IllaZilla (talk) 08:12, 24 May 2009 (UTC)

Alternative/alternate cover ever usable???

Under what circumstances can the Alternative/alternate cover template be used?

Images submitted for this purpose are disputed under:

Fails WP:NFCC#3a as multiple non-free images are being used when one would suffice, and also, or in the alternative, fails WP:NFCC#8 as the image does not add significantly to readers' understanding of the article and its omission would not be detrimental to that understanding

If this is the case, how can alternative covers ever be shown in wikipedia, as I cannot imagine many scenarios in which cover art for an album or single would be "free content." --JohnDoe0007 (talk) 00:03, 25 May 2009 (UTC)

The alternate covers have to be significantly different than the main cover (that is, not easily described with text), should be important enough to be given screen space, and have some explanation of what the cover is. The archives of the Albums project and the NFC talk pages have several discussions about this subject. -Freekee (talk) 04:35, 4 June 2009 (UTC)

lt version

{{edit protected}} same table in Lithuanian: lt:Šablonas:Infolentelė albumas

Are you asking for an interwiki link? Added. Flowerparty^☀ 18:38, 24 June 2009 (UTC)

Sandbox edits

Hey folks,

Can we make the text for this template the same as the text used for Infobox Single Template? —Preceding unsigned comment added by PK2 (talk • contribs)

Not a fan of the small text. I've noticed a trend lately of infoboxes moving to smaller text, generally because "the infobox takes up too much room, and this makes it smaller". But that's a reason to reconsider some of the box's contents and trim unnecessary parameters, not to shrink the text. There's no reason why the text in the infobox should be any smaller than the text in the rest of the article. --IllaZilla (talk) 16:30, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

I'm fine with doing so, as long as my chronology font size changes, which were incorporated into {{Infobox Single}}, are in this one as well. To address IllaZilla's concern: I strongly believe in sitewide uniformity, especially for infoboxes, and most of the other infoboxes have already been changed to include the smaller font size. I'm not particularly enthusiastic about the smaller font size myself, but as of now it's going to be just about impossible to reverse the current trend. Timmeh 00:32, 25 June 2009 (UTC)

Ideally, all infoboxen would use the {{infobox}} base class, which means that should there ever be a move to increase the default size then we can do those of the entire project at once. Anyway, I'll try to prepare the sandbox for syncing this template with the others now that the single infobox has been migrated to the new metrics. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 19:19, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

Please provide a specific diff showing the edit and I will be happy to help. Thanks! Plastikspork (talk) 20:22, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

The sandbox now contains a fully {{infobox}}ed implementation, which actually passes more of the test cases than the current deployed version. :) Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 20:35, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

 Done I made a small tweak due to the Released label not appearing, but it appears to be fine now. Let me know if there are any problems. Plastikspork (talk) 22:07, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

Comment

Please make the font size bigger; its difficult to read and looks silly when compared to the article text. Dan56 (talk) 22:10, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

That font size is now used on the majority of Wikipedia's infobox templates. If you disagree with the size chosen, the best place to argue it would be on template talk:infobox. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 22:20, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

Alt text support

As per WP:ALT images should have alt text, for WP:ACCESSIBILITY by the visually impaired. Please install this obvious sandbox patch to add support for a new Alt parameter. I've checked it with the testcase and have documented it. Eubulides (talk) 09:11, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

Double-checked; looks good to me. Please make the change.  Chzz  ►  17:00, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

 Done Plastikspork (talk) 00:53, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

Can we not have it default to display 'Album cover' as the alternate text? Flowerparty^☀ 00:44, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

Let me know if you want to add a default, but I believe the question is if that would be helpful for someone using a screen reader? Thanks! Plastikspork (talk) 00:53, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

Yeah, never mind - I thought the alt text was what displays when you hold your cursor over an image, but apparently it's something different. Flowerparty^☀ 01:18, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

New look

Come on, the new look is hard to read, text is too small. Daniil Maslyuk (talk) 05:22, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

Agreed. Text is far too small. — Σxplicit 05:35, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

I agree. I see no reason why the text in the infobox should be a different size from the text in the article body. Simply saying "other infoboxes do it this way" isn't sufficient; why do other infoboxes do it this way? Is there a useful reason for it? My impression is that most people feel something to the effect of "it looks less cluttered this way, and the box takes up less room." But IMHO that's a reason to reduce the amount of info we're trying to cram into the infobox, not a reason to shrink the text. Does anyone else have an opinion on this? --IllaZilla (talk) 05:37, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

I completely agree with IllaZilla. Standardization is a good thing in general, but not when it has clear drawbacks. Get the infobox base template to fit our needs and then apply it. —Gendralman (talk) 05:51, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

Agreed. Too small, no real reason for it to be so small. If it's really that busy in the infobox then you can use <small> tags. They did this to Template:Infobox Song and Single recently too, no idea why. k.i.a.c (talktome - contribs) 08:12, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

WAY too small. Can't even read the text in some sections. Dt128 14:34, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

We've discussed this in the past at Template talk:Infobox Music genre#less extreme makeover, where your conclusion appeared to be the opposite of that above.

This has been repeatedly discussed on other template talk pages as they have been migrated to use the {{infobox}} defaults. I'd advise those replying above to look into those discussions. It is unsurprising that when a change like this is made that a lot of knees are jerked, but considering that a majority of the rest of the project seems to be coping with the smaller font size I would hardly say that it was illegible. I'll happily cook up an edit which increases the font size of the next/previous section, though, as it is a little too small. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 17:10, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

Rewquesting re-sync to fix the exceedingly small font size on the next/previous section of the box. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 17:12, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

I have looked over Template talk:Infobox as far back as last April and the only discussion I have found related to changing the font size is this one which pertains to discrepancies between different browsers. Again, it seems to me that these sweeps of changes are being made "because other infoboxes do it this way" without anyone asking why it's done this way. Why does the basic infobox template use a smaller font size than the main article text? And why are we compelled to do the same? It seems to me that no one has bothered to ask these questions, despite many people complaining that the font is too small. I'm open to any compelling reasons as to why it's advantageous for the infobox text and the article text to be different sizes. --IllaZilla (talk) 20:52, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

With regard to my comments at the genre infobox linked above, my chief concern was for consistency across music-related infoboxes. I would rather that they all had the same size text as the article body, but looking at the discussion again I'm led to believe that the reason for the smaller size is because it renders the same in different browers? Is this correct? I'm not good with these kinds of technical issues. Is there a larger size that could be used that is closer to that used in the main article text, but would not cause discrepancies across different browsers? --IllaZilla (talk) 20:57, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

Again, that would be something best discussed centrally. Now that we use {{infobox}} here, if ever a decision is made to change the default font size then we will benefit from that automatically. My chief concerns here are making our templates as homogenous, easy to use and accessible as possible, and the music project has made significant inroads on that recently. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 13:44, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

 Done I have removed the 'font-size:0.8em' from the album chronology section as requested. Let me know if there are any problems. Plastikspork (talk) 05:40, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

I believe there is one additional problem: {{Extra chronology 2}} is used to add an extra album chronology to the infobox. Consequently the font size of its chronology should be the same as for {{Infobox Album}} otherwise it looks inconsistent. Take a look at Together for an example, and you will see that the font size in "The Supremes chronology" is larger than the one in "The Temptations chronology". Likewise, {{Extra chronology 2}} is used to add an extra album chronology to {{Infobox Single}}; consequently, the chronology font size in all three templates has to be the same. A good test case for a single with two chronologies is "Under Pressure". Besides this minor problem, I like the new layout. Cheers. – IbLeo (talk) 14:20, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

Note that there was another discussion on the font size of the chronology section here: Template_talk:Infobox_Single#Chronology_font_size. It seems like some changes were done at that point, but it's a bit too technical for me to follow. – IbLeo (talk) 14:50, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

I'd rather that the singles infobox were adjusted to just use the default size for the chronology section; I wasn't opposed to the change to make it smaller at the time, but given the comments here I'd rather we moved to keeping everything at the same size. I've updated the singles sandbox to make that change, along with adjusting {{Extra chronology 2}}, and posted a comment on the singles talk page at template talk:infobox Single#Update. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 15:07, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

Personally I don't have any preference for the actual font size of the chronology sections - only that it is the same in all three templates. – IbLeo (talk) 15:18, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

That's my chief concern as well, but I do sympathise with the comments that we should not be making elements small for the sake of it. Once the singles box is updated (if that happens) then we'll be fully consistent. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 15:38, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

The problem with removing the font size override for the chronology is that it makes the items in the chronology seem abnormally large in comparison to the rest of the infobox text. This was addressed here already. Also, the revert to the default font size really shouldn't have happened yet. You need to give editors more than just a few hours to weigh in. Timmeh 16:23, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

I didn't put in an editprotected for the chrono change; I'd expected it to be discussed before being rolled out. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 16:32, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

I've left Plastikspork a message regarding his implementation. Timmeh 16:37, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

Sorry if I changed it prematurely. I will be happy to revert it to either 'font-size:88%' or 'font-size:0.85em' or whatever is preferred. It would seem as though it would be useful to have the same font-size for all three pages? Thanks and sorry about that! Plastikspork (talk) 16:41, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

Well, consensus was to reduce the chronology font size to 88% for Infobox Single. This apparently caused an inconsistency with this template. Since this template has the same problem with the default size, I suggest reducing it for this template as well until and if consensus is reached to change it back to the default size. Timmeh 16:47, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

 Undone I changed both back to 'font-size: 88%'. Sorry for jumping the gun. Plastikspork (talk) 16:48, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

Thanks. It'd be best to wait a few days to allow for other editors to voice their opinion on the font size. Then the change can be reinstated if consensus is in favor of doing so. Timmeh 16:55, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

Agreed. We should try to make sure the discussion is centralized for all three templates to prevent future inconsistent changes and to alert any interested editors. Thanks again for pointing out my premature change to the template. Plastikspork (talk) 17:02, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

Can you please revert all of this until we actually agree to even use {{infobox}}? —Gendralman (talk) 23:08, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

Disabling. Discussion is ongoing, and there is no requirement for consensus prior to editing in the first place. The only potentially controversial issue here is the font size, which can easily be altered from the infobox version. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 23:30, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

So fix it and then implement it. At the moment there's no advantage to this and people hate it. —Gendralman (talk) 01:48, 22 July 2009 (UTC)

Still, no one has said why the font has to be so small? k.i.a.c (talktome - contribs) 04:25, 22 July 2009 (UTC)

There are several advantages - the code is significantly shorter, easier to read and maintain and will dynamically adapt to any future improvements in the base class. The template now uses the same font metrics as the vast majority of the rest of the project's infoboxes, which unsurprisingly contains nearly every major music-related template (none of which have resulted in this level of noise when converted). Even if the font size is changed, there is absolutely no reason to revert to the pre-{{infobox}} version when we can just add one line of CSS to the current version to correct that. Lastly, the issue was originally raised centrally months ago, which passed without protest, so the implication that the above responses are representative of the community doesn't seem to be valid. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 10:08, 22 July 2009 (UTC)

If we can do that (add a CSS line to fix this) then I support this completely. —Gendralman (talk) 11:19, 22 July 2009 (UTC)

disabled pending continued discussion and consensus on the best way to sort the font size issue. — Martin (MSGJ · talk) 12:53, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Question

Are the objections to the new look exclusively directed toward the font size in the album chronology section? Or are there other objections? It would be great if we could try to address the specific objections or non-objections. Thanks! Plastikspork (talk) 16:00, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

For the purpose of discussion, I have restored the sandbox to the 2008 version. You can see the difference by looking at the test cases page, unless someone has changed it since I last changed it. I personally don't see a major difference in font size. Plastikspork (talk) 16:06, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Fix broken microformat

Despite the warning in the docuemntation, this edit removed the class="summary" attribute. Please replace it, by adding:

aboveclass=summary

Thank you. Andy Mabbett (User:Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 17:50, 31 July 2009 (UTC)

Done. --- RockMFR 00:41, 1 August 2009 (UTC)

Many thanks. Andy Mabbett (User:Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 00:56, 1 August 2009 (UTC)

Overlinking

When the argument for the artist field is wikilinked, the template links twice to the artist article, contrary to WP:OVERLINK. The second link, in "Artist chronology" needs to be removed. Anyone know how to effect this?  Skomorokh  18:29, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

There's a field called 'chronology' that you can use. Put in the artist's name in plain text (Chronology = Artist) and the second instance won't be linked. Flowerparty^☀ 19:39, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

Length of the album

I think that length of the album should be specified in hours, minutes and seconds, if it is longer than one hour. James Michael 1 (talk) 14:35, 16 October 2009 (UTC)

That's not the industry standard, though. Albums & film runtimes are nearly always calculated in minutes rather than hours. I'm not really sure why, but it is what it is. --IllaZilla (talk) 17:04, 16 October 2009 (UTC)

I'm not sure that's a reason to do it that way here, although what you say is true when it comes to DVD "TV season" box sets which force you to convert 300+ minutes to hours when you're looking at it in a store. But why do you (James) feel this is a problem for albums? Most CDs are a single disc with less than 80 minutes run time, which is no problem to convert to 1 hour plus so many minutes, if there is a need to do that. --A Knight Who Says Ni (talk) 19:33, 16 October 2009 (UTC)

If that's the case, leave the running time in munites, but use hours and minutes when the set as a whole is over 90 minutes (1:30:00). MaJic Talk 2 Me. I'll Listen. 02:16, 24 November 2009 (UTC)

Extra cover and chronology 3

Hey people,

I was wondering if you could add up an extra cover and chronology as I need them for several projects in the future, and I am sure that other people would like this. Many artists and bands have more than one alternative covers and split CD's are often 3 and even 4 way splits, which would make a 3 chronology come in handy. Just a though. -- User:Petternitter (talk) 02:31, 20 October 2009 (GMT +1)

Many articles use more than one alternate image. Just use the extra cover parameter more than once. I believe the alternate chronology parameter can be reused too. Try it in a user sandbox page, and let us know if it doesn't work. Please add your posts to the bottom of talk pages, because they won't be noticed if posted at the top. --A Knight Who Says Ni (talk) 00:58, 20 October 2009 (UTC)

Caption size

{{editrequest}} In July we changed several caption sizes (making them bigger, i.e. normal sized for readability) and noted that captions in all "extra chronology" templates should be changed to match. I notice caption size of Template:Extra album cover 2 is small while the caption for the main album cover is normal. I suspect this was overlooked. Can we change the extra album cover template? I'll post a note on Plastikspork's page; he is the admin who made the previous change. --A Knight Who Says Ni (talk) 02:30, 12 November 2009 (UTC)

I can't remember if there was a reason to keep the font smaller. Enlarging the font to match seems like a reasonable idea, unless I am missing something. Plastikspork _―Œ^(talk) 07:10, 12 November 2009 (UTC)

It does indeed, I would fully support a standardisation. – IbLeo (talk) 12:23, 12 November 2009 (UTC)

 Done The caption size for {{Infobox album}} is set by a parameter (or lack there of) sent to {{Infobox}}. Currently, there is no value being set, hence the caption size is just the default text size for the first album cover. To match this, I removed the style statement in {{Extra album cover 2}}, which was explicitly setting the caption size. Hopefully, this doesn't cause any problems. If it does, please revert, and we can try to resolve the issues. Thanks! Plastikspork _―Œ^(talk) 15:54, 19 November 2009 (UTC)

Template:Audiosample no work

Tried to use the template {{Audiosample}} to incorporate an audio sample into an {{Infobox album}}, as suggested at Template:Infobox_album#Misc, but had a problem. Looks like the template {{Audiosample}} is broken. I have described the problem over at Template_talk:Audiosample. I am mentioning this here as the template {{Audiosample}} looks to be seldom visited. HairyWombat (talk) 00:22, 15 November 2009 (UTC)

Replying over there. It's not broken: the confusion is that "adds a captioN" does not mean "adds a user-provided caption". Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 11:12, 16 November 2009 (UTC)

Requested, over there, a change to the template {{Audiosample}}. HairyWombat (talk) 18:39, 16 November 2009 (UTC)

Split albums

Hi people,

This might have been discussed before, but I reckon it should be considered to implement a separate type for all Split releases; albums, EPs, singles etc. I understand this would require a whole bunch of new colour codes and would make the type list very extensive, so my though was that we could have a type that generates the 'Split' part of the text and a colour code whilst users can customly add the appropriate ending, such as 'album', 'EP', 'single' etc. I think this would work better than having Split releases marked with types like Studio album and EP. They are these types, though they are split releases making them something different from the norm, hence should be in some way seperated from the standard Studio albums and EPs.

Just a though.

Kindest, Petternitter (talk) 9:51 am, November 17 2009 (GMT)

Both {{Infobox Album}} and {{Infobox single}} already support splits, just not as a separate color. A split release is still either a single, an EP, or an album, so they use those colors. Simply put both artists' names in the "Artist" field and use the "Chronology" parameter in conjunction with {{Extra chronology 2}} to create 2 separate chronologies for the 2 artists. --IllaZilla (talk) 14:42, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

If you insert the participating artists or bands in the in the "Artist" field, the Chronology section will use both names as the headline. I understand this can be avoided by adding 2 additional chronologies, however generating an own type for split which implements this feature would be easier. But yes, I agree that Splits are still studio albums, EPs, singles etc., hence I understand that the suggestion for an own colour with be incorrect.

Kindest,

Petternitter (talk) 2:45 am, November 18 2009 (GMT)

Mix albums

There is currently no provision for mix albums, that are compiled by artists. (See DJ mix). In articles like these: The Trip: Created by Snow Patrol and Late Night Tales: Snow Patrol, using "mix" as the type generates the pink-ish color, and the page gets added to the hidden category (albums with non standard infoboxes). Both albums are one of their respective series, so its not that its a rare type of release. The latter (Late Night Tales) being the 22nd album in that series. Can this type of album be added and have a separate color code of its own? The closest thing to it might be "compilation". However, a compilation is typically a greatest hits album, and it'll usually contain the artist's original work. The Mix albums however are compiled by songs taken from different artists, so there's a difference. Its not "remix" either, as those albums contain only remixed versions of original content, which is not the case in "mix". Suede67 (talk) 00:29, 21 November 2009 (UTC)

Compilation album is not restricted merely to "greatest hits". It also refers to collections of works by various artists (for example the NOW series). If these mix albums you're referring to are compiled by Snow Patrol, but are composed entirely of songs by other artists with no remixing or new recording, then they are compilation albums. A "mix album" or "mix tape" is a compilation album. --IllaZilla (talk) 00:56, 21 November 2009 (UTC)

Wasn't aware of that, thank you. Suede67 (talk) 01:01, 21 November 2009 (UTC)

Possibly removing the "Professional reviews" field

There is currently a discussion at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Albums#Reviews in infobox: scrap? regarding the possible removal of the "Professional reviews" field from this infobox. Interested editors are invited to contribute to the discussion there. --IllaZilla (talk) 20:29, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Type - add "Mini album"

I think it would be useful to add "Mini-album" to the list of Types. At present these either get classed as "Studio" or "EP", the latter being completely incorrect. Certainly back in the pre-CD days, vinyl mini-LPs were fairly common, and were never classed as EPs, and it really annoys me to see them classed as "EP" out of either ignorance or the lack of any other suitably descriptive category.--Michig (talk) 22:26, 11 December 2009 (UTC)

I disagree that mini-album can't be a type of EP. "Mini-album" is a marketing term used in certain countries and eras. If you take a wider view of the marketing strategies used from many decades and in many countries, you will find hundreds (well, at least dozens) of terms that have come and gone. "EP" can be used in retrospect for anything between a single and an album, and while an article should refer to the record by whatever term was used to market it, we don't need "type" parameters for all these. Keep in mind the parameter mainly exists to change the colour of the heading bar. We already have more types than colours in use (several similar types will use the same colour),and if we created a mini-album type, we would probably use the EP colour. So I don't see the point in creating this new parm value. --A Knight Who Says Ni (talk) 13:09, 12 December 2009 (UTC)

Rethinking reply above: the parm does put "EP by..." in the heading bar, so perhaps your suggestion is valid. I did an archive search and found no previous discussion on the topic. Yep, I'm going to change my mind and agree with the proposal! But it should use the EP heading colour. --A Knight Who Says Ni (talk) 13:28, 12 December 2009 (UTC)

I disagree. A "mini album" is either an album or an EP, unless I'm misunderstanding their nature and Michig can explain it better or would like to provide some examples. If it's just a term for a short album, well then it's still a studio album, isn't it? If it's synonymous with EP, then there's really no problem labeling them as EPs (which is an industry standard term, whereas I've never seen the term "mini album" used). Either way this is a problem that can be fixed with editing and doesn't require an entirely new type for the template, much the same way that we rejected "maxi single" and a number of other types as superfluous & redundant to the existing types. --IllaZilla (talk) 18:31, 12 December 2009 (UTC)

Mini-LPs were generally 12" LPs with 7 or 8 tracks and were shorter than "full-length" EPs. Good examples are My Bloody Valentine's This is Your Bloody Valentine and Ecstasy, and Pixies' Come On Pilgrim, all of which were released as mini-albums, all of which were classified as albums by their record labels and the chart compilers, and all of which are currently wrongly classified as 'EP' in the articles here. I would be happy to have these listed as "Studio albums" but unfortunately there appear to be a number of editors here who consider anything shorter than a "full length" to be an EP, largely based on recentist concepts of album length - in the pre-CD days, albums were generally 30-40 minutes long, and EPs around 10-15 minutes long. It's wrong to retrospectively reclassify these releases as EPs.--Michig (talk) 19:25, 12 December 2009 (UTC)

Then I think they ought to just be changed to studio albums, and the problem editors pointed to the proper articles explaining the evolution of the album format. I don't see a need to create a whole new infobox type to solve an editing dispute. --IllaZilla (talk) 19:45, 12 December 2009 (UTC)

I agree that of the current types, Studio album is the most suitable. My suggestion for adding a new type was to remove the need for anyone to reach an opinion on which of the existing types was most appropriate.--Michig (talk) 20:50, 12 December 2009 (UTC)

To confirm what Michig says, "mini-album" was an actual marketing category briefly popular for a very short time in the UK in the early 1980s, but it never really caught on. A timing of 20 to 25 minutes was about average.

As a side note, one has to be careful when making generalizations about "general" album length. Even going back to the 1950s, one can find albums ranging anywhere from 22 to 60 minutes in length (the latter being not uncommon for classical music; spoken word albums can be even longer). Trying to define a typical length can become very POV.

For that matter, there is no typical length or definition for an EP across all eras. In the 1950s and 1960s, an EP was always a 7 inch disc, usually with 4 songs and a total playing time of 10 to 12 minutes. By the 1980s, an EP was usually a 12 inch disc with a longer playing time, and was often lumped in with 12-inch singles. In central Europe, a "maxi-single" was an "extended length" 12-inch 45 rpm record, which could have either 2 long tracks, or more than 2 tracks to reach an extended length, therefore a "maxi-single" could be either a single or an EP. Michig's suggestion of 10 to 15 minutes for an 80s EP could be a good average, but I have seen some that run up to 35 minutes (which is getting into album length), and are only called EPs or maxi singles by virtue of their having just the title track on side one, and the aim of gaining a charting on the singles charts. The style of packaging is also to be considered; 12-inch singles and some 12-inch EPs used a no-frills style of cover, often with lighter cardboard and no "spine", while mini-albums often used more detailed covers typical of albums.

But this gets us back to the question of what an EP is. Really an EP is supposed to be a "little album" and not just a long single. In the era of 12-inch singles, it was the record industry that lost sight of the EP's original intention. You complained about "editors here who consider anything shorter than a 'full length' to be an EP", but record companies in the 1980s were guilty of that too. And since that's how they used and marketed the term, it has become a legitimate definition, if not a universal one.

So to bring it back to the question: An EP means many different things. Sometimes a mini-album is just a kind of EP (that is to say, a certain kind of EP), and sometimes it isn't. In your last response, you seemed to agree a mini-album is more like a type of album. But I'd suggest sometimes it is, sometimes it isn't. You wanted to create a field to save the editor from making a decision on whether the article they are trying to create is about something that is more like a kind of EP, or a kind of album. So I'll suggest that we probably should force them to make that decision, by only giving them a choice of EP and album. (And sorry, but that means I'm changing sides again, and am now opposed to the "mini-album" parameter value. Also sorry for such a long response. It's my bad habit!) --A Knight Who Says Ni (talk) 15:28, 13 December 2009 (UTC)

Well, no, an EP is and always has been an "extended play" single (hence the name), not a "little album". Mini-albums, in contrast were albums, but not as long as most, often due to budget constraints. They were fairly common throughout the 1980s and into the 1990s. A release is only ever a mini-album if it was marketed as such - these were classified as albums by the chart companies, the main difference to the consumer was reduced price compared to "full-length" (whatever that means) albums. This is really where the distinction is. Record shops would put 12" EPs and 12-inch singles together, and they would put LPs and mini-LPs together. I'd be happy if we could agree that all LPs, whether "mini" or "full-length", should be classed as "Studio album", but a lot of editors seem to find it hard to see a 20-minute LP as an "album" these days. I guess you have to be old enough to have been around before CDs to understand it.--Michig (talk) 15:53, 13 December 2009 (UTC)

Yes, but are you old enough to remember EPs of the 50s? Especially when RCA was trying to market the 45 rpm record in competition to 33 rpm, and created the EP as a direct response to albums? Or when EPs were often just selected tracks from an album (using the same cover art), or an entire album split up into "volume 1, 2, 3" EPs (in the 1950s in the USA, and into the very early 1960s in the UK)? That's what I mean by having a wider POV. Also, your experience of seeing mini albums marketed a certain way in shops, makes me think you saw this in the UK, but you would probably not have seen that at any time in North America (not to mention most of the world). --A Knight Who Says Ni (talk) 16:38, 13 December 2009 (UTC)

I have one or two "old" EPs, and even those old ones, e.g. the Beatles and Kinks ones were extended singles in format. Yes, the mini-albums that I'm talking about were from the UK. Would I have seen these in North America? Frankly, it's irrelevant - we're discussing UK releases, so the way they were classified in the UK is all that matters.--Michig (talk) 17:05, 13 December 2009 (UTC)

Assuming your old EPs have covers, look again at how the covers are laid out. They are nothing like singles covers, but were trying to be something presented like a tiny little album with four songs. And even those are not the "real" original type of EP that came out in the USA in the early 1950s, to compete with the LP format. Anyway, you can't drive Wikipedia policy from the way records (mini albums) were classified in one country. (Which is a bad argument anyway; the mini album format existed in other countries too, including the USA.) To get the discussion back on track, do you think that all (so-called) mini albums are better associated with albums rather than singles, so that our template would be right in making that decision for the editor? --A Knight Who Says Ni (talk) 19:59, 13 December 2009 (UTC)

Certification parameter

Can a parameter for Certification be added, just as there is one for singles in {{Infobox single}}? It seems almost ridiculous that there is not already a parameter for this. Adabow (talk) 03:53, 12 December 2009 (UTC)

I don't think this would be appropriate. Firstly, {{Infobox single}} gives no explanation of how it's to be used. Secondly, album certifications are different in every country (both the sales thresholds and the types of certifications given), so for popular albums this would lead to a lot of infobox clutter. Thirdly, the vast majority of albums don't reach any significant sales certifications, so it would only apply to the minority of articles. In summation, sales certifications are best left to the body sections of the article, presented in either prose or table format (such as 21st Century Breakdown#Chart performance...trying to cram a dozen certifications into the infobox is a horrible idea). --IllaZilla (talk) 10:14, 12 December 2009 (UTC)

OK, fair enough, by why does {{Infobox single}} contain this parameter when both your second and third points apply there? Adabow (talk) 08:56, 13 December 2009 (UTC)

I have no idea. I've never seen it used. It should probably be removed. --IllaZilla (talk) 08:59, 13 December 2009 (UTC)

Extra chronology 3

In reference to extra chronology 3 above, adding a second extra chronology 2 does not work, as evidenced by Cry Cry Cry (band) Any thoughts on how to fix this? Nlaporte (talk) 04:43, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

The "Misc" parm can only be used once, but you can add several sub-template calls within one "misc". The infobox has been repaired. --A Knight Who Says Ni (talk) 06:05, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

Release Date

Hi everyone,

I'm not sure if this has been mentioned before, so I'm going to go ahead and say it: I've noticed that in the infobox, the first heading "released" lists different release dates depending on the artist's country of origin, etc. On this article for the template There seems to be no consensus on which date should be used, I'll give you a few examples:

X (Kylie Minogue album) - An Australian artist, Japanese release date is used, which is the first worldwide release.

It's Not Me, It's You - A British artist, British release date is used, which isn't the first worldwide release.

And on others (e.g. The Secret Life of... (album) - Australian) the infobox has multiple release dates, with the country in brackets after the date, all in the infobox.

I feel this needs to be clarified in this template so we can have a consistent release date. The two options are:

-The release date in the infobox is for the artist's country of origin, regardless of which country released it first.

-The release date in the infobox is always the very first instance the album was released, regardless of which country it was in.

Please help clarify this, and thank you for your time  :)

--Rhys (talk) 09:07, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

• Only the earliest date should be included, see Template:Infobox album#Released. Most folks don't read the Wikiproject pages, point them to the page if you run into conflict, that normally works. J04n(talk page) 10:43, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

Unreleased albums

I couldn't find any discussion of this in the archives. There appears to be no handling for unreleased albums (yes, I'm aware of WP:CRYSTAL; it's moot when WP:GNG can be satisfied). Many of the fields, particularly the release date are in the past tense (i.e. "released"). Potentially, we could change the headings to present tense, add optional fields (e.g. "expected release date") or clever macro handling to format future-release albums differently, or just have a separate infobox for unreleased albums. I'm a bit against a separate infobox, as it will just need to be converted whenever the album actually comes out. If a separate infobox is created (or already exists), the documentation here should have a hatnote pointing to it. Could I get some input on what people think should be done, if anything? -Verdatum (talk) 17:49, 8 January 2010 (UTC)

Are you talking about unreleased as in "recorded but were never released" (as in Songs from the Black Hole), or "upcoming" (as in This Addiction)? From your wording above it seems like the latter, in which case I don't really think it's a problem. If the "released" date is sometime in the future, then any reader with an ounce of common sense should be able to figure out that it's an upcoming release. And even if they can't, the article's opening sentence should say something like "upcoming" or some other phrasing indicating that its release is in the future. --IllaZilla (talk) 18:01, 8 January 2010 (UTC)

Considering notability issues, I don't see how an article on a forthcoming album (or book, TV series, movie) can justifiably have its own article, therefore infobox issues are not relevant, though there can be occasional exceptions ("recorded long ago, never released, became legendary anyway, soon to be released at last"). Forthcoming albums can be mentioned in the musician's article and discography, though such entries should clearly be marked as not released at time of edit. I often see an unreleased album listed and dated the current year, and no note that it means later this year, which is dangerous because releases can be postponed, cancelled, or retitled. For similar reasons, an article that goes into great detail about a forthcoming release is often based on speculation, rumours, and details subject to change, so I prefer to see such information kept to a minimum, i.e. less than what would justify it having its own article. --A Knight Who Says Ni (talk) 16:27, 9 January 2010 (UTC)

That's a very restrictive view, Knight. There are plenty of articles about upcoming albums, films, games, events, etc. that have more than enough information and reliable sources to pass the general notability guideline, not to mention WP:MUSIC. Chinese Democracy didn't come out until 2008 but had a sufficiently-sourced article as early as 2006. Avatar, which has been out less than a month, had an article with sources as early as 2006 as well. This Addiction doesn't come out for 6½ more weeks and I was able to write a detailed article with over 20 sources. As long as editors are willing to put in the effort to find good sources, write good articles, and keep speculation out and information up-to-date, then there's absolutely nothing wrong with having articles on future topics. Particularly when it comes to popular media like albums, films, and games, numerous reliable sources generally cover their development and details months, even years ahead of their release dates. --IllaZilla (talk) 20:45, 9 January 2010 (UTC)

Fixing the single type

{{editprotected}} The single type of this infobox is broken. I can't figure out why, but when 'single' is put into the type field, it treats it like it was a custom argument (with the colors set to peachpuff instead of khaki). I'm not sure if there is something missing through all the subpages somewhere or what. See Remixes 2004 to see what it is doing. Also, a link needs to be set so the line reads "Single by [artist]" instead of the current "single by [artist]" (note the capitalization also). —Akrabbim^talk 18:39, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

From reading the source, it appears that the template deliberately disables the use of |Type=single or any other |Type= value that returns the color value "khaki". — John Cardinal (talk) 19:03, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

Unless I'm mistaken, I think this is because {{Infobox single}} is the infobox for singles. That being the case, shouldn't we remove the "single" option from this template's documentation? --IllaZilla (talk) 19:24, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

The singles infobox surrounds the title with " " instead of italicizing it, which is what needs to be done with certain singles whose titles aren't the same as the title of the A-side (e.g. Remixes 2004). See the discussion here and here. These are basically the same as EPs, except that they are called singles for whatever reason. Therefore, it would make more sense to use an album infobox (especially since the code is almost there anyway) than to try to tweak the singles infobox (which met resistance before I realized that there was a single type in the album infobox documentation). —Akrabbim^talk 21:02, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

It needs to be CD single. Single won't work since in Greece a CD single is like an EP, while a single is still a single. That was one of the concerns of the discussion. Grk1011/Stephen (talk) 22:09, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

So should we make a new type "CDsingle", or just re-enable "single"? Should it say "Single by [artist]" or "CD single by [artist]"? Should it link to Single (music) or Compact Disc single? Should it be khaki like a single or lightsalmon like an EP? —Akrabbim^talk 22:22, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

Definitely "CD single" because like I said plain "single" is classified as a different thing. I would also suggest Compact Disc single because it is specifically released on a CD, it's not a song as I feel "single" implies. It doesn't have to be yellow, but it shouldn't be the "error" color. The EP color might work since they are so similar. Grk1011/Stephen (talk) 22:29, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

It should be the EP colour since, as per previous discussion, it appears that a "CD single" in Greece is the same thing as a "CD EP" elsewhere. We're trying to accomodate this situation, but we don't want to invite the use of the the album infobox for singles worldwide. Ignoring that problem for the moment, I believe the main concern at this point is getting the album infobox's title line to say "Single" (or "CD single") and otherwise function the same as EP.

But going back to the question about whether to call it "CD single", this would be a unique situation where the category is only applicable to one format. Most other parameter values such as "single", "EP", etc. are not tied to just one medium. Some of us may remember a time when albums were issued simultaneously on LP (vinyl), cassette, and 8-track cartridge. And it's not so different today, when albums are issued as CD, download, and in some cases as a memory stick, and of course vinyl is still around, but in all cases they are still albums. Terms like "album" and "EP" should be "format independent", so I'm not entirely comfortable with "CD single" (are they not also available as downloads in Greece, and if so, what are they called?), or a solution which declares a "CD single" is something completely different from a "single". We want to accomodate the Greek singles situation, but we need to have a solution that works worldwide. --A Knight Who Says Ni (talk) 13:38, 19 January 2010 (UTC)

I am not sure I like this idea, but I'll suggest it anyway in order to learn what other people think. What if we modified the Infobox album template to allow the caller to override the text that appears in the "<type> by <artist>" header? So, for example, if the parameter was |typetext=, a user might use the template this way: {{Infobox album |type=ep |typetext=CD single ...}}

In this example, the resulting infobox would use the EP color but the text would say "CD single by artist'".

I think this might help in this specific case, but it also opens us up to a lot of non-standard use of the template. — John Cardinal (talk) 15:05, 19 January 2010 (UTC)

I can't see there being much use for the settings on non Greek releases since they are the only ones that use the title for EPs, so I don't think it will be a problem. John, I think I like your idea the best. It is more EP than single so it makes sense that it just be a special setting of the EP formatted infobox. Grk1011/Stephen (talk) 15:26, 19 January 2010 (UTC)

I agree, but I'm not sure how big a coding change this would be. If it can be done, this would be the best solution. --A Knight Who Says Ni (talk) 03:00, 20 January 2010 (UTC)

The coding is not difficult. One complicating factor is the existence of |Longtype= which is almost what I described above. (I forgot about it when proposing |typetext=. When you use Longtype, you can specify text that appears after the type, but it doesn't replace the type. — John Cardinal (talk) 04:37, 20 January 2010 (UTC)

It could be used to make the text say "EP (CD single) by..." --A Knight Who Says Ni (talk) 13:20, 20 January 2010 (UTC)

Though it would be really easy to implement this way (no tweaking of the code), I think it may be a but confusing for the reader. It would be best for it to just say CD single with EP color, but without it saying EP. Grk1011/Stephen (talk) 20:11, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

IllaZilla, the doc transcludes a page that shows the colors supported by the ({{Infobox album/color}}) sub-template and that's why single and song appear. It's convenient for other templates that are used with {{Infobox album}}, {{Infobox single}}, and {{Infobox song}} for that template to support colors used by all those templates. I am sure the problem can be fixed, but I am not sure the best way to do it. — John Cardinal (talk) 03:08, 19 January 2010 (UTC)

Remove template comment

The doc page includes the comment <!-- See Wikipedia:WikiProject_Albums --> in the examples/models for how to use the template. This seems useless to me and adds clutter to the articles. It's unlikely any newbie will follow the instructions, and experienced editors know how to find the help page for a template. While many templates include comments like this, most do not and I propose that we remove it. Before you disagree, please consider what would happen if every template that was closely aligned with a WP project included such a comment. — John Cardinal (talk) 16:45, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

Can you describe what you think would happen? Because I imagine...nothing would happen. I think it's pertinent to point new editors to the template page, so they can see the documentation and understand how to properly use the infobox before simply copy/pasting from an existing article into a new one. Rather than remove the message, I think it should be changed to <!-- See Template:Infobox album -->. What we really want these noobs to do is read the template documentation, which is right there on the template page, rather than transcluded way down on the WP:ALBUMS page. Unlike you, I fail to see how it "adds clutter to articles" as it is hidden text that doesn't show up except in the edit window. Having the message causes no harm, and potentially benefits newer editors. I just don't see the problem. --IllaZilla (talk) 22:51, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

My point was that if {{Extra track listing}}, {{Extra chronology}}, {{cite web}}, and thousands of other templates included such comments, article text would be a big mess. Regardless of what the HTML comment message is, it's unlikely to help much. Will a newbie know to copy/paste "Wikipedia:WikiProject_Albums" or "Template:Infobox album" into the search textbox? Perhaps, but I doubt it. In my experience, most people who need help do not read the docs except as a last resort and only if it's dead-easy to find it. If the comment could be a link, then it might be useful. As it is, I doubt anyone follows its advice. — John Cardinal (talk) 23:49, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

I'll take the pro-comment stance. Templates with a detailed documentation page should have this kind of comment, and I think most of them do. "Extra track listing" and "Extra chronology" are attachments to the infobox, and do not need to have a comment, because they don't really have their own doc pages. They are always used within an infobox which has the comment, and points to instructions which also document the use of these "extra" templates. "cn" doesn't need a comment because it doesn't have many parameters, and it's not essential that users read up on it before using it, which is not the case with a complex infobox template. An absolute newbie isn't ready to use infoboxes, or coding that requires knowledge of coding with parameters. A semi-newbie who has figured out infobox code, can probably figure out how to get to the doc page from the comment. As for "article text" clutter, you mean "edit window" clutter. Infoboxes already have a lot of invisible coding that can only be seen in the edit window. A little more text that points to help, may be just the thing some users need. --A Knight Who Says Ni (talk) 13:17, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

So far I am in the minority, which I can accept, but I don't agree. It would be better to teach newbies how to find the docs (such as they are) for any template rather than randomly sprinkling HTML comments into the text for some templates and hoping they figure it out from there. If we must have a comment, it should point directly to the template page as suggested by IllaZilla. — John Cardinal (talk) 14:35, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

I agree with changing it to point to the template, instead of the wikiproject. --A Knight Who Says Ni (talk) 14:47, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

But I don't see how removing the comment, helps newbies to learn to find documentation. It seems to me that if the comments stay in, then the first template doc a newbie is likely to find, will be one that has a lot of content, and is very helpful to that user. It may encourage the user to habitually look up documentation on all templates before using them. (I can't honestly say I do that myself!) --A Knight Who Says Ni (talk) 14:53, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

Give holiday album its own type parameter?

Santa Claus Lane
Holiday album by Hilary Duff

A recent content dispute I have been involved in with several editors on various Hilary Duff album pages has shown that many do not consider holiday albums to be actual studio albums. This discussion is hopefully to gain some consensus with other editors on what should be done, since many artists and the media do not consider Christmas-themed albums as a part of one's studio chronology. How I see it is this: holiday albums are essentially studio albums (or extended plays) that contain material based on the Christmas holiday.

To the side is what I am proposing, using the article Santa Claus Lane (the primary topic of the dispute I have been involved in) as an example of what could possibly be used. But I would like to be clear that my opinion in this matter is to refer to holiday albums as studio albums or EPs. –Chase (talk) 21:41, 19 February 2010 (UTC)

"Holiday" is a genre (am I wrong?). We don't write "Rock album by____" or "Pop album by____" so why would we make an exception in this case. Lots of albums have themes, but that has nothing to do with the type or format of the album, which in this case seems to be a "studio album". Grk1011/Stephen (talk) 21:51, 19 February 2010 (UTC)

This issue is brought up frequently, last time only 2 months ago: Template_talk:Infobox_album/Archive_4#Holiday_album_sub-type. The current consensus is nicely resumed by IllaZilla in his entry: "...we don't categorize (for infobox purposes) albums by content, but rather by the manner in which they are recorded (studio, live)." So holiday albums are of type studio. – IbLeo^(talk) 21:57, 19 February 2010 (UTC)

Sorry for not looking through the archives before asking. Thank you for making me aware of the current consensus. –Chase (talk) 22:00, 19 February 2010 (UTC)

I'm surprised by this, because it certainly contradicts what I would consider to be standard practice. The reason holiday albums are distinct is because of marketing: Christmas albums were placed on the shelves every holiday season, a mixture of albums from artists that hadn't charted in years and reasonably fresh talent. They have their own Billboard chart (Top Holiday Albums). They just aren't the same breed of thing.—Kww(talk) 22:17, 19 February 2010 (UTC)

Some albums are also exclusively released through specific outlets (see LOtUSFLOW3R, The Time of Our Lives) as a form of marketing, but we do not refer to them as "Exclusive-release album by artist". Also, many albums of various genres have their own charts as well (R&B/Hip Hop Albums, Dance/Electronic Albums, Rock Albums, etc.). –Chase (talk) 22:24, 19 February 2010 (UTC)

But we do treat promotional releases differently from standard releases. That seems more applicable.—Kww(talk) 04:29, 20 February 2010 (UTC)

You lost me here. What type would you put on a promotional release other than "studio"? – IbLeo^(talk) 06:44, 20 February 2010 (UTC)

Kww, you lost me too. A little way back you said, "they have their own Billboard chart (Top Holiday Albums)". Before that, Grk1011 said the infobox doesn't categorize by genre ("rock album by", "pop album by"), which is what most charts do, so you seem to be making an argument against your own position. (Unless IbLeo and I have both misunderstood, and you are arguing in favour of treating holiday albums as studio?) --A Knight Who Says Ni (talk) 12:21, 20 February 2010 (UTC)

I think the "infobox" argument is a minor point. We do break discographies up by type, and list soundtracks, promotional, and holiday releases away from the conventional studio albums and singles. As noted elsewhere, this discussion is really about how to treat Santa Claus Lane, which is clearly a Disney holiday release starring the then-current tween star of choice. It will sell a few copies every Christmas forever, and will probably get trotted out and promoted every few Christmases if Duff has done something to make the Disney demographic notice her again. Clearly different marketing, clearly different sales profile, and deserving of separate tracking from conventional albums.—Kww(talk) 15:25, 20 February 2010 (UTC)

You said, "I think the infobox argument is a minor point". This is the talk page for the infobox. The section heading is "Give the holiday box its own parameter?". You mention "tracking" which I presume is about the chronology chain (previous album, next album), but I don't believe that was the topic when the discussion began. I don't see where "marketing / sales profile" is a criteria for creating a separate chain, nor for a separate infobox heading. A separate chain may be appropriate for certain artists, where (a) the holiday album just doesn't fit into their main body of work (for some it does, for some it doesn't), or (b) they have made a series of such albums. There isn't a one-size-fits-all answer, which is why you need to discuss it at the article's talk page. --A Knight Who Says Ni (talk) 13:33, 21 February 2010 (UTC)

They're ultimately studio albums with a theme to them - I don't personally think the infobox should change to adhere to a chosen theme. However, I think they should not be treated as genuine major studio albums. For clarity though, I wouldn't be bothered if they were called holiday albums in the infobox, as it would avoid the confusion I probably just caused! :) kiac. (talk-contrib) 13:50, 20 February 2010 (UTC)

But it can't be marked "holiday album" in the heading if it's not an official parameter value, right? --A Knight Who Says Ni (talk) 15:08, 20 February 2010 (UTC)

Comment I seem to be posting this a lot lately: With regard to the particular album mentioned as an example, here is another case of an article with raging edit/revert disputes, and a virtually empty talk page. Please use the article's talk page, not user talk pages or project / infobox talk pages or edit summaries, and certainly not edit warring, as first attempts at resolving disputes. --A Knight Who Says Ni (talk) 15:18, 20 February 2010 (UTC)

No Other artist have holiday albums as studio album (i.e.) christina aguilera's album stripped is her second studio album, but she released a holiday album before that... before Chase change santa claus lane into Duff's first studio album, chaos has occured. other users have revert his vandalism, —Preceding unsigned comment added by Iiismael (talk • contribs) 00:30, 21 February 2010 (UTC)

If you read the comments above, you will see it has been stated that this subject has been discussed before, and we have been generally in favour of treating holiday albums as studio albums (which is not to say there can't be exceptions), therefore your statement that "no other artist(s) have holiday albums as studio albums" is not true, nor is it true that "choas has occurred" over a change like this, nor is it appropriate to categorize this change as "vandalism". It looks like editors on your article need to learn to work together, and again, the article's talk page is the place to discuss it. Try stating actual reasons for wanting it done a certain way. Discuss the advantages and consequences of both proposals, and be willing to acknowledge when the other person has the better idea. --A Knight Who Says Ni (talk) 13:33, 21 February 2010 (UTC)

Why haven't MiszaBot auto-archived this page for the last 6 months?

I have compared its configuration to those of WT:ALBUM and WT:SONG where it works fine and I can't see any significant difference. Can someone figure it out? – IbLeo^(talk) 22:31, 19 February 2010 (UTC)

I've noticed it's stalled on a number of talk pages I watch. I've been able to fix most of them with a bit of a kickstart. I'll see if that works here. --IllaZilla (talk) 23:03, 19 February 2010 (UTC)

Looks like the stall resulted from the page moves from "Infobox Album" to "Infobox album" (note the case change). Should be fixed now. --IllaZilla (talk) 23:05, 19 February 2010 (UTC)

Well spotted! Sounds like a reasonable explanation. Thanks :-) – IbLeo^(talk) 23:16, 19 February 2010 (UTC)

Bingo! MiszaBot just archived 16 threads. Thanks again for your help. – IbLeo^(talk) 09:20, 20 February 2010 (UTC)

Writer/composer fields

It would be useful to have a field for the writer and a field for the composer in the album infobox, especially for the singles, because often it's not the same person and there seems to be confusion sometimes about it.Neon Tiger 21 (talk) 23:06, 27 February 2010 (UTC)

Albums typically have multiple writers, so this wouldn't be useful. {{Infobox single}}, however, does have such fields. --IllaZilla (talk) 23:39, 27 February 2010 (UTC)

Do the single infobox have a composer field? I think they only have a writer field. I'm working also on the french Wikipedia, and in the french single infobox, there's a field for both. Exemple: For a single by the Smiths, you'll have Morrissey as the writer and Johnny Marr as the composer, so for someone who doesn't know much about the Smiths, he'll know that Morrissey wrote the lyrics and that Marr did the music. Right now, in the english Wikipedia, you only have one field with the two names, Marr first and Morrissey second, so it's like who did what? On other pages, you have only the writer. Neon Tiger 21 (talk) 00:04, 28 February 2010 (UTC)

Terminology problem: We rarely see "writer" used to mean lyricist. Writer and composer are interchangeable terms, composer being preferred, as writer is vague. The vast majority of songwriting credits do not separate out the music composer from the lyricist (and if they don't, we shouldn't guess), and when they do, it can be stated in the body of the article, but need not be in the infobox, which is only here to summarize points from the article. --A Knight Who Says Ni (talk) 00:44, 28 February 2010 (UTC)

Ok, I think I see now... but sometimes the information is available, like in the Smiths or like in Green Day where almost all lyrics are done by singer Billie Joe and music by the band (I'm taking the information from the CD booklets). So sometimes it could be useful and, like I said, their is two fields in the french Wikipedia single infobox (we call them "Auteurs" and "Compositeurs"). Anyway, this is no big deal, thanks for your answer.Neon Tiger 21 (talk) 01:04, 28 February 2010 (UTC)

Labels

The label guideline is currently very vague. It currently states "Drop words like "Records" from the end of the label's name (e.g. use Universal rather than Universal Records)". What exactly are the "like" words. Would "music" as in Sony Music be considered a word to drop? That specific example is hard to determine since most albums on English Wikipedia don't include Sony Music under label, as emphasis is generally put on the label imprints instead. This is because the labels operate as standalone companies in the US and the UK. But in the case of domestic repertoire of the big 4 music companies outside of the US and UK, these companies usually only have only one company (one office) which is the parent name followed by the name of the country. For example, in Greece there is only one Sony Music standalone company and that would naturally be “Sony Music Greece”, therefore the release label is almost solely referred to as “Sony Music”. They also use imprints to segregate A&R operations, such as Columbia and RCA, but these are more of am internal formality and never used in promotion. Since the guideline is very vague, various users have been removing "Music" from “Sony Music” for Greek album pages I oversee, leaving it as “Sony” as per the infobox guidelines. I believe that in the case of Sony Music, or any of the big 4 parent companies who use their name in marketing outside of the US, "Music" should be in use, especially since these conglomerates have other media and technology business (e.g. Sony Music vs. Sony Pictures vs. Sony Electronics etc.). Any input on this would be appreciated. Greekboy (talk) 03:48, 1 March 2010 (UTC)

I'd decide by asking: Do people often refer to it as just "Sony" (i.e. "it's on the Sony label")? Your experience of seeing other editors specify Sony seems to back that up. The full company name is Sony Music Entertainment, and according to its article, it had that name in 1991, but changed it to Sony BMG Music Entertainment in 2004, then back to Sony Music Entertainment in 2008. At one point, the article refers to it by a shorter name of "Sony BMG", and frequently uses the name Sony in reference to the parent company.. With all these name changes, I suspect most people are more likely to call it Sony rather than Sony Music. You also have to consider how it may be referred to internationally, which may differ from your own experience locally. But here's the main thing to consider: You wouldn't put "Sony BMG" or "Sony BMG Music" in the infobox just for releases between 2004 and 2008, right? And what if it changes to "Sony Entertainment" next year? The reason for the infobox rule is to weed out minor changes to the full, technical company name over time, and just call it by its simplest name. --A Knight Who Says Ni (talk) 13:44, 1 March 2010 (UTC)

Just a quick note to answer your Sony BMG question, yes on wiki we put "Sony BMG" for albums released during those years as wp:albums/infobox albums stipulate that you must use original labels. Imperatore (talk) 18:17, 1 March 2010 (UTC)

Yes, the official name is Sony Music Entertainment, but it is known/referred to as Sony Music. In fact their website is also www.sonymusic.gr. Editors are not changing just to Sony because it is commonly referred to as that, but because of the vague guideline. (as stated for their reason in the edit summaries) Greekboy (talk) 21:30, 1 March 2010 (UTC)

Separating form and content in the Type field

Question I have always been a little confused about the Type field and its purpose. Does this establish an albums format or its content? For instance, parameters such as Holiday have been removed from the template for referring to the kind of music. Simultaneously, we have a parameter for EP, in contradistinction to long-play albums. What is to be done about (e.g.) iTunes Live from London? Is it a "live album" or an "EP"? Clearly, it is both. So which one takes priority in this field? What is the function of it in the first place? I've only seen this discussed here and I don't know that there is a meaningful discussion of the philosophy of the Type field. Thoughts? —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 22:25, 8 March 2010 (UTC)

In my experience live EPs are generally classified as EPs, despite the fact that they are live, just as a live single would still be classified as a single. EPs are tricky little beasts; I've seen a lot of discussion and back-&-forth (particularly lately at CfD) about what exactly constitutes an EP, and why they're lumped in with the Albums project to begin with when singles aren't. My interpretation is that there simply isn't any other home for them and WP:ALBUMS has always just put them within our scope by default, and they're lumped into this infobox because a separate "Infobox EP" would just be 99% identical to this template (whereas {{Infobox single}} has significant differences). I consider "EP" to be sort of the red-headed stepchild of the "Type" field: All of the other types refer to particular kinds of albums and the manner in which they are recorded or compiled, while "EP" is really just there because it has no other home. --IllaZilla (talk) 22:48, 8 March 2010 (UTC)

IllaZilla's reply is exactly what I would have said. This question has been asked a few times in the past, and although the situation isn't ideal, nobody has proposed an accepted solution. Also, it's not really a big problem; the "type" field is mainly there to select a colour for the box's title bar, and doesn't really affect categorization in a data-related way. --A Knight Who Says Ni (talk) 03:05, 11 March 2010 (UTC)

Interwiki

Template is protected, so I can't edit it myself, but the interwiki to the Dutch version is wrong. It should link to nl:Sjabloon:Infobox muziekalbum. If anyone could fix that, thanks. -- Sander (talk) 09:31, 26 March 2010 (UTC)

 Done. The interwiki links are not on the template page but in it's documentation page which isn't protected. I did the update. Thanks for bringing it up. – IbLeo^(talk) 11:15, 26 March 2010 (UTC)

Apply hAudio microformat

{{editprotected}} Please make the following changes, to apply the hAudio microformat:

[redacted]

No visual changes will occur and the category is hidden. For background see the microformats project. Andy Mabbett (User:Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 16:00, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

Would you mind applying your changes to the /sandbox version and replacing the request? — Martin (MSGJ · talk) 16:20, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

Done; thank you. Andy Mabbett (User:Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 16:49, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

 Done  Ronhjones  ^(Talk) 00:29, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

Thank you. Working well. Andy Mabbett (User:Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 11:24, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

Question The above request included the addition of this line in the infobox coding:

header1 = {{Template:Infobox album/link|{{{Type|}}} }}{{#if:{{{Longtype|}}}| {{{Longtype}}}}}{{#if:{{{Artist|}}}| by <span class="contributor">{{{Artist}}}</span>

Does this mean the microformatting is being used to assist entities outside of Wikipedia to track which contributors (Wikipedia editors) are writing articles on which artists? If so, is this something we should be concerned about? --A Knight Who Says Ni (talk) 12:02, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

No; and no. (The class="contributor" identifies a contributor (an artist, producer or conductor, say) to the recording.) Though if having edits to articles about artists tracked does concern you, bear in mind that such data can be extracted from RSS feeds of page histories; or from the database itself. Andy Mabbett (User:Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 13:34, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

Removal of "reviews" field

See original discussions at:

• Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Albums/Archive 33#Reviews in infobox: scrap?
• Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Albums/Archive 33#Reviews discussion continued
• Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Albums/Archive 34#Implementation of consensus on album reviews
• Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Albums/Archive 34#Professional reviews moved from infobox
• Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Albums/Archive 35#Reviews in infobox
• Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Albums/Archive 35#Album ratings template and bot actions

As you may have noticed, we're not using the reviews field anymore. Can someone re-code the template so it no longer recognizes the "reviews" field -- so that no matter what you put in it, nothing shows up, as was done with the "chart position" field on {{Infobox single}}? This point was raised on my page by Bearcat, who said:

"If the reviews field in {{Infobox Album}} isn't supposed to be used anymore, then it should probably be disabled in the template itself — because as long as it's still visible in other albums, people will continue to add it to new ones. So if it's deprecated, then it should be made invisible so that people aren't led to believe that it's standard."

What think? Ten Pound Hammer, his otters and a clue-bat • ^{(Many otters • One bat • One hammer)} 19:59, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

The plan was always to have a bot move the reviews to a different location. I'm sure that hasn't been done. I see many infoboxes where reviews still appear. I realize co-ordination could be tricky. I am reluctant to remove the field and do the bot fix later, but I'm even more reluctant to remove the field when we have no plan in place for the bot work. If we've neglected that part, shame on us, but we're not ready to move on and take the field out.

I think we need to have a bot programmer actually committed to doing this, then set down a timetable with deadlines. The bot will convert all articles by a certain date, then the field will be removed as of a certain date unless deadline #1 gets pushed back, in which case deadline #2 moves back as well. Then a third date for running the bot again, to catch last minute additions and unwitting reverts. --A Knight Who Says Ni (talk) 20:13, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

I'm hesitant My problem with the removal of reviews is that they have been simply deleted by editors without adding them to the text of the article and I fear that the same thing would happen if reviews just vanished from {{Infobox album}}. I think one step toward a solution would be to make every article that contains Reviews in {{Infobox album}} be added to a hidden category such as Category:Album articles with reviews in the infobox and work from there with WP:AWB, a bot, and hand-editing. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 20:38, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

Knight, in fact, this process has been started but is not (yet) completed. DASHBot operator Tim1357 took it upon himself to implement this change in the beginning of January (bot approval). After some small test runs and fine tuning he started the bot on a major scale on 31 January. After processing of a few hundred articles several editors noted a variety of problems and I took the decision to shut the bot down. Subsequently I contacted Tim1357 on his talk page and provided guidance about how process the Review-Christgau template which is sort of tricky. Last time I heard from him was on 28 February where he stated that he had finished coding the various fixes and was about to start testing them. Since then we haven't been in touch, but I have the impression he has been quite busy in real life and didn't want to push him too hard. Now, 2 months later, maybe it's about time to ask for an update. – IbLeo^(talk) 21:06, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

I left a message on Tim1357's talk page asking for an update. – IbLeo^(talk) 21:11, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

Ah yes, I remember now. Koavf's solution is okay if someone is able to devise the code to do it, but if the bot work can be restarted soon, the hidden category step may not be necessary. It creates several extra steps, including one in which the parm is not actually gone, but now displays a hidden category instead of the review, so the infobox coding would need to be changed twice, the second time for permenant removal of the parm. --A Knight Who Says Ni (talk) 21:33, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

FYI, Tim1357 replied me on his talk page (here). In a best case scenario he will get the bot started on this task the coming weekend. – IbLeo^(talk) 05:19, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Could someone reinstate the reviews field please until the reviews have been migrated? We're already getting articles prodded because the reviews are not showing on the articles.--Michig (talk) 07:38, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

The field hasn't been removed. It was only removed from the documentation and samples therein; it still exists in the template coding and should work if used. I just tested it with a null edit to (GI) and it still displays. I believe the decision was made not to remove it from the template coding until we completed most of the migrations. I haven't seen any reviews disappear in any articles I've looked at recently. If you're referring to Crosswinds (album), the problem wasn't with the field, it was that somebody had put too many "|"s into the coding, causing a number of fields not to display (genre, producer, etc.). I've fixed it. --IllaZilla (talk) 07:57, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

My mistake. Thanks for fixing it. My eyes obviously haven't woken up yet. --Michig (talk) 08:15, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

Has there been any update on the migration of professional reviews to a dedicated "Reception" section that DASHBot was undertaking? It's been almost seven months now since consensus was reached to do away with the professional reviews in infoboxes but there are still lots and lots of album articles out there with the professional reviews intact. I can't say that I've noticed DASHBot doing much to migrate reviews recently, although perhaps I'm mistaken about that.

In addition, I would like to echo Ten Pound Hammer's earlier call for the "Reviews" field of this infobox to be re-coded and deactivated, so that even if reviews are still in the infobox, at least they won't display. Editors still continue to add reviews to album articles daily, as we all know. It is my belief that while the "Reviews" field of the infobox remains operative, this will never stop. I for one am getting tired of removing or relocating professional reviews, only to have other users revert my changes or continue to add new reviews to the infobox. WP:ALBUM guidelines state that professional reviews are no longer allowed in infoboxes, so we as editors need to get serious about implementing this change. So far, this hasn't really happened. --Kohoutek1138 (talk) 15:27, 27 June 2010 (UTC)

As before I am strongly opposed to deactivating the Reviews field in the infobox until the reviews are all moved to Album Ratings templates or to a different part of each article. Deactivating the infobox field before that would have the effect of removing many important, reliable, third party references from thousands and thousand of articles. When I say "removing", they would still be there as comments, but that won't do the readers of Wikipedia any good. It would also be a major disservice to editors, to ask them to manually update so many articles. The reviews really need to be moved by a bot to Album Ratings templates in each article before the infobox field is turned off. — Mudwater ^(Talk) 16:55, 27 June 2010 (UTC)

I agree with Mudwater. We ultimately should aim for reviews to be worked into prose and properly cited and simply hiding them isn't going to help. Perhaps the number of editors who still see value in having reviews in the infobox suggests that there's more consensus for keeping them there than for removing them, a decision that was taken after discussion by a handful of editors. If we're going to change the template at all, maybe moving the reviews to the end would make them less offensive to those who want them removed.--Michig (talk) 17:07, 27 June 2010 (UTC)

OK, those are fair enough view points and I do agree with a lot of what you're both saying, but the fact remains that we need to get on with this. Let's get a bot assigned to doing this job...I have no idea how we would go about this by the way, I'm just frustrated by the apparent lack of progress in implementing a change that was agreed upon over six months ago. Do we know if User:Tim1357 and his DASHBot are still working towards implementing these changes?

I notice that earlier A Knight Who Says Ni suggested recruiting a bot programmer who is committed to doing this task, then set down a timetable for the changes, with monthly deadlines. I think that this sounds like a really constructive proposal but again, I'm not exactly sure how we would find a bot to carry out the task. I don't really know how Tim1357's DASHBot got involved in the first place, so I'm relying on folks who are more knowledgeable about this sort of thing than I am to point the way. To sum up, I agree that hiding the reviews is perhaps not the best option at the moment, but that shouldn't be used as an excuse to just ignore this issue and do nothing...which seems to be what's happened thus far. --Kohoutek1138 (talk) 17:26, 27 June 2010 (UTC)

Add language to list

Could someone with the authority to please add "ang:Infobox Album" to the list of languages? Gott wisst (talk) 03:39, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

 Done, ang:Bysen:Infobox Album added. — ξ^xplicit 03:47, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Studio album or EP or both

So, if an album is comprised of all studio tracks, but it is considered an EP, is it not also a studio album? What if the band includes the EP in their count of studio albums...should we treat it as both an EP and a Studio album or just one or the other. My specific issue is with regards to Rush's upcoming album, Clockwork Angels. The band describes the album as their 20th studio album, but that must include an EP named Feedback. Should we consider Feedback both an EP and a studio album, or do we ignore the band and just call Clockwork Angels the 19th studio album without a citation?LedRush (talk) 14:57, 27 May 2010 (UTC)

This is a duplicate of a thread raised at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Albums#Studio or EP or both?. Per WP:MULTI, let's keep all comment in one place; I suggest on the other thread. --Redrose64 (talk) 16:21, 27 May 2010 (UTC)

WP:MULTI – I was looking for that one the other day. Thanks. ;-) We really need to keep discussions in one place. – IbLeo^(talk) 17:14, 27 May 2010 (UTC)

Tribute album behavior

Question Why does the Type=Tribute option default to "Studio album"? If anything, I would gather that most tributes are various artist compilations. This should probably just make a template error and add the page to Category:Album articles with non-standard infoboxes--along with Type=Christmas and any other deprecated fields. Then, it would be easy to fix them and properly sort these articles. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 04:27, 11 June 2010 (UTC)

"Released" vs. "Release date"

Currently the template has the word "Released" for the release date, which I see even on albums that are yet to be released, such as this one. Wouldn't it make more sense for it to say "Release date" so that it would apply correctly to albums that have been released as well as albums that have not yet been released?Betterusername (talk) 21:58, 10 July 2010 (UTC)

• Support. Your proposal makes good sense to me. It would also be in line with Infobox film and Infobox video game so more coherent with other similar uses. – IbLeo^(talk) 21:40, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

Greatest Bits

Another type of album that is a 'Greatest Bits', which when you type in in an infobox comes under the colour of the 'other' type.

Here is an example of what it will look like if one types it in. By the way, B-Side album and N/A aren't real, they're just examples.

Untitled

--77.99.231.37 (talk) 21:00, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

Another example

I'm surprised that, even though the 'Greatest Bits' exsists, it isn't credited in the Infobox album article. Here's a better example, using the current state of Green Day's album Shenanigans, just look to the right.

Untitled

Professional ratings

Review scores
Source	Rating
Allmusic	link
Rolling Stone	link

--77.99.231.37 (talk) 22:01, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

What the hell is a "greatest bits"? Do you mean "greatest hits"? Because that's supported by typing greatest. "Greatest bits" sounds like a joke title, certainly not worth its own type. By the way, Shenanigans is a compilation album, not a greatest hits (it consists of B-sides & outtakes). Such albums should use compilation as their type. --IllaZilla (talk) 23:11, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

I admit it's a bit stupid. It's if you type in 'Greatest Bits', not hits. I think it means a B-Side or Rarity album. It was created around 2007 for the McFly album, which has a similar title (The Greatest Bits: B-Sides & Rarities). I did not mean Greatest hits, Shenanigans is not a greatest hits - i never said it was. A greatest bits is a wikipedia term for a b-side or rarity album, like i pretty much said, although i doubt people would like to use it (like you). Weird thing with the example image. --77.99.231.37 (talk) 17:22, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

The example image was popped in with this edit as a replacement for the original, because that image does not have a fair-use rationale for being used on this page. --Redrose64 (talk) 17:39, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

Ah, I see. Greatest Bits is a title (and a joke one at that), not a type. The infobox in that article should use compilation as its type, since B-side collections are compilation albums. "Greatest Hits" albums are a subtype of compilation albums that specifically compile successful or popular tracks. --IllaZilla (talk) 18:05, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

I do think Greatest Bits is weird, but why does it exsist as an acceptable album type in an infobox. It's not even mentioned in Template:Infobox album (the page that this discussion is for) - it's the only acceptable album type in an infobox which is not listed with it's respective colour in the article. Is there a reason for that? --77.99.231.37 (talk) 18:12, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

It doesn't exist as an accepted album type. The peachpuff color is the default color that appears when |type= is either left blank or given an unsupported value. You'd get the same result if you typed in "gefilte fish" (see below). --IllaZilla (talk) 18:28, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

Ok, i understand now. It's just a made up type used as a one-off, which was quickly reverted for both the McFly record in 2007 and the green day record this year. Good album title and band name by the way. --77.99.231.37 (talk) 21:43, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

Untitled

Reviews

Excuse me, but why would you want to move the professional reviews box when many people have gotten use to looking at it from the top right hand corner box? It has caused a great INCONVENIENCE and I think something as big as this should be discussed with all the administrators in wikipedia, preferably a poll should be held. Moving the review box to another location is like moving somebody's pinky to the back of your palm. I think you should review this immediately before further complaints arise. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Aaronpon (talk • contribs) 13:44, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

This discussion is taking place at WT:ALBUMS#Professional reviews. Please respond there. --JD554 (talk) 14:37, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

That discussion has been archived, so here is an updated link--Music+mas (talk) 20:46, 23 January 2011 (UTC)

Release date

I think the "Released" date should be the official date if it is known. The official date is the most reliable and is the one set but the artist. Any other dates are unreliable and are a variation of the official date set by the artist and their management. --98.234.74.77 (talk) 10:28, 5 September 2010 (UTC)

No, the "official" release date you are referring to is the American release date which you find on the artists page. There are other release dates around the world that are supported by reliable sources other than the artists official page. The American release date is not the most important and not always the first. BOVINEBOY2008 10:35, 5 September 2010 (UTC)

I never said that the American release was more important. Like I said before. If the artist sets a date and the American date is different than the artist official date should still be used regardless of if it is the American date. The official date should be used because it is MORE RELIABLE than any other source. Metal Hammer and The Metal Forge could easily have incorrect information. --Jimv1983 (talk) 22:30, 5 September 2010 (UTC)

Jimv1983, I think you need to not be so hung up on "official"ness. Artists' websites generally give the most significant release date, which is typically their home country or most major market. Earlier release dates in other countries, reported by music publications that are widely considered reliable, are no less "official", and we go with the earliest release date. --IllaZilla (talk) 02:22, 6 September 2010 (UTC)

Excuse me IllaZilla for using the wrong words. It makes more since for the main date to be the most significant release date. Any other release date besides the significant/official have a much higher chance of being incorrect. It is much more reliable to list the bands/labels publicly announced release date as it has a much lower chance of being wrong. Any date other than the one announced by the band/label is a deviation from the established date and is therefore less relevant. --Jimv1983 (talk) 00:31, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

The "official" release date is the date that the album is first released regardless of whether or not it is in a large or important market for the artist. An artist's website may be aimed at a specific market and therefore will most likely only have the date for that market listed. That does not make it the "official" date because its not like the other releases are inadvertent or without the knowledge of the artist or label. Grk1011/Stephen (talk) 02:35, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

Length

Why does the length section say to list as minutes and seconds even if the length is over an hour. If something (a CD or even a movie for example) was an hour and five minutes you wouldn't say its 65 minutes you would say its 1 hour 5 minutes. This is basic time format. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Jimv1983 (talk • contribs) 07:04, 17 September 2010 (UTC)

Nope. In the music industry the standard is to use minutes and seconds, not hours. That's why when you look at a site like Allmusic, all the times are listed in mm:ss even if the album is over 60 minutes long. In the film industry the standard is to use minutes, not hours, which is why when you look at movie listings in the paper, or at runtimes on the back of DVDs, it will just say minutes, not hours (ie. 143 minutes). --IllaZilla (talk) 08:58, 17 September 2010 (UTC)

Border

This documentation should mention the optional "Border" field somewhere other than just the optional "Extra album cover" template. I have been editing Wikipedia for three years now and never knew this field was available until yesterday. After digging through the archives here I found this discussion Template talk:Infobox album/Archive 4#Edit request for image border from 2007 where this feature was was added to the infobox, but it looks like its use was never properly documented. Could we add this to the "Advanced usage" section? Fezmar9 (talk) 17:45, 4 September 2010 (UTC)

Done But I have now made Cover a black field in the Advanced Usage section and I'm not sure how to fix it. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 18:00, 4 September 2010 (UTC)

Furthermore Compiler and Chronology should be made black as well. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 18:01, 4 September 2010 (UTC)

These secondary issues Koavf brought up have not been fixed. Fezmar9 (talk) 13:53, 27 September 2010 (UTC)

Image size

Would there be any objection to setting the default image size to frameless (obviously this would apply to {{extra album cover}} as well)? In practise this would increase the default size from 200px to 220px, but the infobox can easily accomodate the extra width and there's no reason for the infobox image to be smaller than a standard thumbnail. This would also eliminate the need for a |Cover size= parameter, as any small images would automatically display at full size. Thoughts? PC78 (talk) 11:12, 16 September 2010 (UTC)

{{editprotected}} Apparently uncontroversial. Please update with the code at Template:Infobox album/sandbox (this revision) and update {{extra album cover}} with the code at Template:Extra album cover/sandbox (this revision). I've also added a tracking category for use of the |Reviews= parameter, per discussion above. Thanks! PC78 (talk) 22:42, 26 September 2010 (UTC)

 Done, though I've used {{px|{{{Image size|}}}|frameless}} so that the image size can still be manually overridden if required. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward: not at work) - talk 10:48, 27 September 2010 (UTC)

I'm not sure that was wise. The infobox was previously coded so that images couldn't be displayed larger than the default, so "Image size" was exclusively used for smaller images. Since "frameless" makes it completely redundant for that purpose, there was no other reason to keep the parameter. PC78 (talk) 11:32, 27 September 2010 (UTC)

Is it still deployed in the wild? I can see an argument for flipping its functionality and letting it be used to embiggen images in future if it's currently unused. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward: not at work) - talk 11:45, 27 September 2010 (UTC)

You mean |Cover size=? I would expect so, and it would be good to keep it in harmony with |Cover=. I don't personally have much objection to allowing for larger images so long as there is no standing concensus to the contrary, though I think there is at least some benefit in forcing a standard width and preventing users from arbitrarily making images bigger because it "looks better". It's worth bearing in mind that we're dealing almost exclusively with non-free images here, though of course they shouldn't be uploaded to any great size in the first place. PC78 (talk) 12:11, 27 September 2010 (UTC)

I think the new size of 220 px is better than the old size of 200 px. But I think it might be better not to allow a larger size. That way the infobox and the album cover image size will be standardized for all articles. — Mudwater ^(Talk) 23:12, 27 September 2010 (UTC)

I like the old size better than the new one. It just seems a bit extensive but maybe I'm not used to it. -- ipodnano05 * ^{leave@message} 00:25, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

I too prefered the previous size to what's in place now. The change seems to have also introduced an issue with cooperability between the infobox and the Track listing template as well, that sees the track list(s) pushed below the infobox. – Mizery Made ^{(talk · contribs)} 16:09, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

Looking at Everready (The Religion), that does not appear to be the case. PC78 (talk) 16:20, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

{{Track listing}} has its own issues, and in my experience its behavior varies depending on a variety of factors (browser, screen/window width, etc.). Adjusting the infobox to facilitate cooperability with the track listing should not be a priority, adjusting the track list template should be (or simply expanding articles so that they do not overlap each other, which renders the point moot. Any article where the infobox & track list overlap can't be above stub or start class, I'd imagine). --IllaZilla (talk) 17:30, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

Do not like the new size. Way too large. The 200px thumbnail was fine. –Chase (talk) 20:14, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

Agreed I don't particularly care for the new size for completely subjective reasons--the way that I have my browser set up, it's too wide to display this and {{Track listing}}. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 20:18, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

20px is not a significant change. Per my initial comment, there is no reason for the infobox image to be smaller than a thumbnail image, and there are inherant benefits to using "frameless". The increased image size does not affect the width of the infobox. PC78 (talk) 20:24, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

Thumbnails You may be right about the infobox (I'm not doubting you; I just haven't investigated myself), but your comment about thumbnails is confusing: the size of a thumbnail is set by Special:Preferences. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 20:28, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

"Frameless" works in the same way as "thumb"; the default size is 220px unless you change this via "My preferences". So it would be more correct to say that the infobox is not normally stretched, only if you have thumbnails set to 250 or 300px. But if you have made a concious decision to display images larger than normal, why would you want the infobox to be different? PC78 (talk) 20:35, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

Looking at "My preferences," I saw that mine was set to 250px. Setting it to 220px solves the issue. However, to my knowledge, I've never changed that setting so are you certain about the default? – Mizery Made ^{(talk · contribs)} 23:05, 29 September 2010 (UTC)

Sure. If you log out you can see for yourself. ;) PC78 (talk) 06:44, 30 September 2010 (UTC)

Redux PC78 has claimed "The increased image size does not affect the width of the infobox", but this would show otherwise, with a difference of 23 (!) pixels. Is there something I'm missing here? —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 22:27, 30 September 2010 (UTC)

Not sure what to tell you. I've looked at both of those articles and for me there is no difference in the width of the infobox. The Crocodiles image is displaying at 200px × 196px (full size) and Heaven Up Here at 220px × 220px. Are your user preferences set to display thumbnails at 250 or 300px, because that would cause the difference on your end. PC78 (talk) 06:40, 1 October 2010 (UTC)

A discussion concerning musical infoboxes

Please see the discussion here. J04n(talk page) 22:38, 1 October 2010 (UTC)

Edit request

{{Edit protected}} In the album type parameter, "EP" should be "extended play" - no reason to abbreviate the term especially when the linked article is extended play. –Chase (talk) 18:53, 7 October 2010 (UTC)

{{Edit protected}} is to be placed after consensus for the change is made. The template automatically pipes the link to extended play, so there is no problem with the link. "EP" is the common phrasing both in the recording industry and in common usage (much like CD or DVD), so the abbreviation/piped link is appropriate and not misleading. --IllaZilla (talk) 19:57, 7 October 2010 (UTC)

Sorry about that, didn't fully look over the doc. Anyway, my concern is that some Wikipedians who may not be as knowledgeable of the music industry and its terms may be confused by EP, even though it's piped to extended play. CD and DVD are more widely known acronyms, however. –Chase (talk) 20:24, 7 October 2010 (UTC)

As a general principle we use the most common names for things (for example BBC rather than British Broadcasting Corporation, or NASA instead of National Aero-whatever... but United Kingdom instead of UK because the full name is commonly used). Even though "EP" comes from the term "extended play", the music industry almost exclusively uses "EP", so that's what we use. If you don't know what an EP is, knowing the full term still doesn't explain what it is. The extended play article should be at EP but there are too many other articles with that abbreviation so it got stuck with the full title. —Gendralman (talk) 20:57, 7 October 2010 (UTC)

Fair enough. –Chase (talk) 21:28, 7 October 2010 (UTC)