Template:Citation/doc


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The Citation template generates a citation for a book, periodical, contribution in a collective work, patent, or a web page. It determines the citation type by examining which parameters are used.

If invoked with the right parameters, this template produces output identical to that of the Cite templates, such as Cite book and Cite web. The default behavior sometimes differs from that of the Cite templates; for example, this template by default generates anchors for Harvard references whereas the Cite templates do not (although they can be made to do so), and this template by default uses commas to separate some fields that the Cite templates separate with periods (full stops).

The template should be inserted after punctuation, such as a period or comma.

All parameter names are lowercase.

Simple citation
The table below gives the most commonly used attributes; you can copy the horizontal form below or vertical form in the left hand column and then add in extra attributes from the full list. Spacing and ordering is irrelevant.

Full citation parameters
These can be used for all types of publication except patents. All are optional and indentation is used simply to group related items&mdash;these may be mutually exclusive where indicated. Some hyphenated names can also be placed without hyphens.