Template:Parent cat/doc

This template formats an information box at the head of a geographical parent category, a category where all or most of the articles are held in sub-categories. It holds information such as notes on the content, Wikimedia Commons category, main article and "see also" links, and may link to a map from OpenStreetMap showing the coordinates of child pages. For a diffused parent category, it may provide a link to a canned PetScan query that gives a consolidated list of pages in the child categories. For a non-diffused category, it may provide links to PetScan queries on articles in child categories but not in the parent and articles in the parent but not in any child category. The PetScan links and the map should be useful in maintenance.

This template may replace All included for non-diffused geographical categories, and may also replace Cat main, See also, Catseealso and GeoGroup, presenting the same information in a less cluttered and more consistent format.

PetScan queries
PetScan is a useful maintenance tool held at petscan.wmflabs.org. Sample queries: The vertical bar and 0 after the parent category name overrides Depth=1 and tells PetScan to only list articles in the parent category, and not articles in categories below the parent.

If there is no metacategory holding all child categories, you may have to list the child categories in the query – or create a metacategory and add the child categories to it.

Before: multiple lines of text and templates
This category is for named unincorporated communities in the U.S. state of Alabama that lack political existence, whether census-designated places or neighborhoods.