Template:Talk header

This is the talk page for discussing improvements to the Talk header template.

Put new text under old text. Click here to start a new topic.
Sign your posts by typing four tildes (~~~~).
New to Wikipedia? Welcome! Learn to edit; get help.

Find sources: Google (books⧼Dot-separator⧽news⧼Dot-separator⧽scholar⧼Dot-separator⧽free images⧼Dot-separator⧽WP refs)⧼Dot-separator⧽FENS⧼Dot-separator⧽JSTOR⧼Dot-separator⧽NYT⧼Dot-separator⧽WP Library

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This template is used on approximately 636,000 pages, or roughly 1574% of all pages.
To avoid major disruption and server load, any changes should be tested in the template's /sandbox or /testcases subpages, or in your own user subpage. The tested changes can be added to this page in a single edit. Consider discussing changes on the talk page before implementing them.

This template should not be substituted.

This template uses TemplateStyles:

Template:Talk header/styles.css

Shortcut

{{tph}}

This template is a signpost. It displays a talk page message box with four sections of content:

§ Intro – a short introduction and appropriate links for newcomers
§ Policies – a reminder of important policies for experienced users
§ "Find sources links" – a set of links to aid in finding reliable sources for the article topic
§ Archives – a list of links to the current talk page's archives, and a search box to search them

Portions of the standard boilerplate text may be modified with params that specify additional or replacement text.

Usage

Basic

{{Talk header}}

To add this template to a talk page, just open an edit of the talk page, and put {{Talk header}} at the top of the page.

By convention, this template goes at the very top of the talk page, above WikiProject templates and other talk-page banners. However, this is not an absolute rule, and editors should use common sense when deciding its placement. See also: WP:Talk page layout § Lead (bannerspace).

This template should be placed in accordance with talk page guidelines. This template does not need to be placed on every talk page, and should not be indiscriminately added to talk pages using automated editing tools. Talk pages that are frequently misused, that attract frequent or perpetual debate, articles often subject to controversy, articles that typically attract new editors, and highly-visible or popular topics may be appropriate for this template.

For more information on this topic, see the talk page for this template, including the talk archives and the TfD logs.

Parameters

Full syntax – Vertical

{{talk header
|bottom= [a]
|disclaimer= [b]
|custom_header= [c]
|wp= [d]
|display_title= [e]
|arpol= [f]
|sc1= [g]
|sc2= 
|sc3= 
|sc4= 
|sc5= 
|demospace= [h]
|hide_find_sources= [i]
|search_term1= [j]
|search_term2= 
|search-domain= [k]
|search= [l]
|noarchive= [m]
|bot= [n]
|age= [n]
|units= [n]
|minthreadsleft= [n]
}}

Horizontal

{{talk header |bottom= |disclaimer= |custom_header= |wp= |display_title= |arpol= |sc1= |sc2= |sc3= |sc4= |sc5= |demospace= |hide_find_sources= |search_term1= |search_term2= |search-domain= |search= |noarchive= |age= |bot= |units= |minthreadsleft= }}

Hiding the template

A registered user who prefers not to see this template on any talk page, may hide it from view. Note that this hides page archive links and the archive search box as well if they are configured to be shown through this template. You'll need to have an account to do this.

Edit your user style page at Special:Mypage/common.css.
Add a line: #talkheader {display:none;}
Save the change.
Bypass your cache.

Portions of the template may be hidden for all viewers using a template parameter: see here to hide the "find sources" links; see here to hide the archive links.

Parts of the header

This section describes the different parts of the header. Each subsection below corresponds to one of the four main areas of functionality listed in the bullet items at the top, and explains which parameters are available to modify their appearance.

Intro and newcomer links

Basic tips for newcomers are boxed with a white background and appear top left, and includes starting a new section, using tildes to sign their posts, and how to get help. The intro links are displayed in the top left portion of the message box:

Put new text under old text. Click here to start a new topic.
Sign your posts by typing four tildes (~~~~).
New to Wikipedia? Welcome! Learn to edit; get help.

Policies

Talk page policies

A bullet list of policies, and behavioral and talk page guidelines is included by default in the top right portion of the message box.

Article policies

In the article namespace only, a list of bulleted "Article policies" is included by default. It occupies part of the top right section of the message box, to the right of the talk page policies.

Article policies

In non-article namespaces, the "Article policies" box is absent by default, but it may be added via |arpol=yes. For example:

{{talk header|arpol=yes}}

Note: |arpol=no is an invalid setting, and has no effect on header display in any namespace. The article policies may be suppressed from view in all namespaces by adding #talkheader .talkheader-policies{display:none} to your common.css.

"Find sources" links

For article Talk pages, a set of "find sources" links appears by default in the Talk header box. The default links correspond to the output of Template:Find sources; see Talk:Europe for an example. These links appear after the initial article policies and links for newcomers, and above the archiving section. For the article Europe, it looks like this:

Find sources: Google (books⧼Dot-separator⧽news⧼Dot-separator⧽scholar⧼Dot-separator⧽free images⧼Dot-separator⧽WP refs)⧼Dot-separator⧽FENS⧼Dot-separator⧽JSTOR⧼Dot-separator⧽NYT⧼Dot-separator⧽WP Library

Background

There are several flavors of "find sources" links (medical, video, general) targeted to different search domains. The flavor of "find sources" links displayed in the Talk header depends on WikiProject membership of the article and may correspond to one of these:

{{find medical sources}} – for articles in the medical search domain
{{find video game sources}} – for articles in the video game search domain
{{find general sources}} – the default, for everything else, is the general domain.

The default search domain is "general", which is the large majority of all Talk pages, and displays the links found in template {{find general sources}}. The search domain is determined automatically by the template, depending on the presence of the corresponding WikiProject. If an article belongs to WikiProject Medicine, it is in the medical search domain by default; if it belongs to WikiProject Video games, it is in the video game search domain by default. (If it is in both, then the highest domain in the list above is chosen; i.e, 'medical'.)

For the page Talk:Giardiasis, which belongs to WP:WikiProject Medicine, it looks like this:

Find medical sources: Source guidelines⧼Dot-separator⧽PubMed⧼Dot-separator⧽Cochrane⧼Dot-separator⧽DOAJ⧼Dot-separator⧽Gale⧼Dot-separator⧽OpenMD⧼Dot-separator⧽ScienceDirect⧼Dot-separator⧽Springer⧼Dot-separator⧽Trip⧼Dot-separator⧽Wiley⧼Dot-separator⧽WP Library

You can modify the nature of the source links displayed by § Hiding the links, § modifying the query terms, or by § modifying the search domain.

Hiding the links

By default, these links do not appear outside of article Talk space (ns=1).

Within article Talk space, the "find sources" links may be suppressed by setting parameter |hide_find_sources=yes.

Modifying the "find sources" query terms

The find sources links use the article title by default as the search term and forms an "exact search" (or "double-quoted query")^[o] from the title. If the article title contains parenthetical disambiguation portion, this is appended after the exact search query term, as an additional, unquoted phrase.

In place of the default, the query terms may be specified by using |search_term= (alias: |search_term1=) to specify the exact search string. Parameter |search_term2= may be added to specify additional, unquoted query terms, as many as desired.

Search domain override

The default domain chosen by automatic WikiProject detection may be overridden using param |search-domain=:

|search-domain=medical – use medical as the search domain, regardless what projects it belongs to (value alias: med)
|search-domain=video game – use video games as the search domain, regardless what projects it belongs to (value alias: video, and vg))
|search-domain=general – use general as the search domain, regardless what projects it belongs to (value alias: gen)

The parameter alias |domain= may be used instead; thus, |domain=med means the same thing as |search-domain=medical.

Archives

The archives section of the Talk header occupies the bottom of the Talk header box. It consists of two portions:

a set of links to Talk page archives
an archive search box

These are displayed automatically at the bottom of this template when used on a talk page that has archives that are named in the standard way. If no archives exist for the current talk page, or if they have non-standard names, no archive links or search box is displayed.

Parameters |noarchive=yes and |search=no are available to suppress the links to Talk archive pages and to the search box. Four additional parameters are available to add an optional § archive bot notice adjacent to the archive links and to control its appearance.

Links to archives

If Talk page archives exist and are named in the standard sequential way, using either a numeric sequence or the alphabetic system with names like /Archive A, or with yearly archives of the format /Archive 2026, links to all of the archive pages are displayed.

For archives using numeric sequencing, the archive links look like this (example shown is for Talk:Europe):

180 days

Archives: Index, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11

A link to the archive index is included in the list if it exists and has the name "/Archive index".

The archive bot notice containing the text "Auto-archiving period" at the right is controlled by the four related parameters: |archive_bot=, |archive_age=, |archive_units=, and |minthreadsleft=.

archive bot notice

If the page is auto-archived by a bot (typically by Lowercase sigmabot III or ClueBot III), an archive bot notice appears to the right of the archive links, as in the example shown above.

The following parameters may be used to control the display of the archive bot notice:

|archive_bot= – The bot used to archive the page, unwikilinked. (Alias: |bot=.)

|archive_age= – Enter a number to convey the amount of time the bot must wait after the last update to a discussion before archiving the discussion, as expressed as a number of time units, or days by default. (Alias: |age=.) The 'days' interval may be changed using the archive_units parameter.

|archive_units= – Enter a string to convey the unit the archive_age parameter refers to. (Alias: |units=.) Useful examples include days, month, months, etc. As this is just an advisory notice and not a configuration parameter, you can use any string you wish here: if you want to specify the archiving delay as |age=2 |units=fortnights, you can.

|minthreadsleft= – The amount of threads the bot will leave. The tooltip includes a message telling the reader that after minthreadsleft threads, threads older than archive_age will be archived.

Some examples:

{{talk header|archive_bot=lowercase sigmabot III|archive_age=30|archive_units=days}} – This informs the user that lowercase sigmabot III will autoarchive talk page sections that are older than 30 days.
{{talk header|bot=lowercase sigmabot III|age=6|units=months|minthreadsleft=4}} – This informs the user that the lowercase sigmabot III bot will autoarchive talk page sections that are older than six months, as long as at least four sections remain. (See § Examples.)

These parameters are for informational purposes in the talk header, and do not actually set up archiving. For instructions on how to configure Talk page archiving, see Help:Archiving a talk page.

The template includes a tooltip informing readers of the amount of time before discussions are archived. This tooltip is not shown if there are no archives present, or they are not named in the standard way.

If you wish to include an independent, stand-alone archive bot notice on the page outside of the Talk header message box, set |noarchive=yes in this template, and see Template:Archives for an alternative method of generating an archive bot notice.

Search box

The archive search box may be used to search the Talk page archives, and is displayed automatically at the bottom of this template just below the archive page links, when used on a talk page that has archives that are named in the standard way. If no archives exist for the current talk page, or if they have non-standard names, no search box is displayed.

Parameter |search=no may be used to suppress the search box.

If present, the search box appears below the Archiving links, and is the last element to appear in the template:

In this working example, entering search terms searches the talk page archives of the article Europe.

Suppressing links or search box

By default, the Talk header template displays a list of archive links, if any archives are present. Parameter |noarchive=yes may be used to suppress the list.

By default, the template displays an archive search box if any archives are present. Parameter |search=no may be used to suppress display of the archive search box. Note in particular that |search=yes has no effect, and will not place a search box on a talk page that has no archives.

Additional and replacement text

Besides the four main sections of the talk header box, the template provides four parameters which may be used to include additional sections or modified text:

|bottom=
|custom header=
|disclaimer=
|wp=.

bottom

|bottom=yes – adds a message above the main talk header box, separately bordered, about where to place new discussions:

Please place new discussions at the bottom of the talk page.

custom_header

|custom_header=your text here – adds any desired text above the main talk header. Text is in boldface by default, and has a horizontal rule below, separating it from the rest of the content.

Example, showing : |custom_header= with the first line of Lorem ipsum text:

Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua.

Put new text under old text. Click here to start a new topic.

Assume good faith

If used together with |bottom=: the "New discussions placement" text appears above everything in a separately bordered box; the main talk header box is below that, and the custom text appears in the main box, above the newbie and article policy links and separated from them by a horizontal rule.

disclaimer

|disclaimer=yes – may be used on User talk pages. This param includes the user page disclaimer text found in the current version of template {{user page}}, centered in a contrasting color box above the Talk header template, as follows:

This is a Wikipedia user page.
This is not an encyclopedia article or the talk page for an encyclopedia article. If you find this page on any site other than Wikipedia, you are viewing a mirror site. Be aware that the page may be outdated and that the user whom this page is about may have no personal affiliation with any site other than Wikipedia. The original page is located at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Template:Talk_header.

This parameter has no effect on pages outside of the User talk namespace.

wp

|wp=yes – Extends the bolded lead sentence of the header, to add the words "Pagename and anything related to its purposes and tasks":

This is the talk page for discussing Pagename and anything related to its purposes and tasks.

This parameter has no effect on pages outside of the Wikipedia talk namespace.

Testing issues

Find sources testing

For testing and demonstration purposes, this template accepts parameter |demospace= which enables testing of the find sources opt-out parameter |hide_find_sources= from other namespaces.

If |demospace= has the value main or the value 1 it returns the findsources text it would normally return when transcluded from mainspace.
If |demospace= has any other value such as the name of some other namespace it returns the text it would if transcluded outside of mainspace.
If the parameter is empty or undefined, the actual page type determines the result.

The dynamic features of WikiProject autodetection and § Search domain override depend on the article title where it appears, and therefore cannot be tested in the normal way. The test cases page provides an explanation of how to test these features using Special:ExpandTemplates with the ContextTitle enabled, or by using in situ testing.

Expensive parser functions

This template uses up to twenty expensive parser functions (during 2022, with it increasing by one a year) depending on what parameters are used. In theory, on pages with very large numbers of other templates using expensive parser functions this could result in template limits being reached, but this is very unlikely. It could also affect expansion of templates on a test page that has more than 25 uncollapsed invocations of this template, especially ones appearing lower on the page.

TemplateData

A signpost for the top of talk pages

Template parameters
Parameter		Description	Type	Status
Shortcut	`1` `shortcut` `shortcut1` `sc` `sc1`	Shortcut that displays similar to the {{shortcut}} template, but within the Talk header message box Example WP:SHOR	Page name	suggested
Shortcut 2	`2` `shortcut2` `sc2`	A second shortcut	Page name	optional
bottom	`bottom`	Set to "yes" to add additional instructions at the top to "please place new discussions at the bottom of the talk page" Suggested values `yes`	Boolean	optional
disclaimer	`disclaimer`	Set to "yes" to add an additional banner which identifies the page as being originally from Wikipedia (and modify the width to suit), matching the style of {{User page}}.	Boolean	optional
Custom header	`custom_header`	Replaces the entire header with customized text	Line	optional
WikiProject?	`wp`	For use on WikiProject talk pages; set to "yes" to add "and anything related to its purposes and tasks" to the header	Boolean	optional
Display title	`display_title`	Displays a custom page title	String	optional
Article policies	`arpol`	Adds a link to the article policy pages Default On for article talk pages, off otherwise	Boolean	optional
demospace	`demospace`	Namespace number or name for testing purposes	String	optional
Hide find sources?	`hide_find_sources`	Set to "yes" to hide the find sources banner on article talk pages	Boolean	optional
Search term	`search_term` `search_term1`	Changes the search term used in the {{find sources}} module	String	optional
Search term 2	`search_term2`	Adds a second search term for unquoted search, as used in the {{find sources}} module	String	optional
Search domain	`search-domain` `domain`	Changes the default search domain used in the {{find sources}} module Suggested values `medical` `video` `general`	String	optional
No archives?	`noarchive` `noarchives` `archives`	Set to "yes" to hide the archives links	Boolean	optional
Archive age	`archive_age` `age`	Amount of time, by default in days, before discussions will be automatically archived. Note: Does not actually trigger automatic archiving; see [[WP:ARCHIVE]].	Number	suggested
Archive bot	`archive_bot` `bot`	The bot used to archive the page. Note: Does not actually trigger automatic archiving; see [[WP:ARCHIVE]]. Suggested values `Lowercase sigmabot III` `ClueBot III`	String	suggested
Archive units	`archive_units` `units`	The units for archive_age Suggested values `hours` `days` `months` `years` Default days	String	optional
Minimum threads left	`minthreadsleft`	The number of threads the archiving bot will leave. Currently affects only the tooltip.	Number	suggested
Search	`search`	Set to "no" to override the default behavior for the search box appearance	Boolean	optional

Tracking categories

Category:Pages using Talk header with unknown parameters (0)

Notes

^ Use |bottom=yes to add additional instructions above the talk header box to "place new discussions at the bottom of the talk page"; see details here.
^ On user talk pages, |disclaimer=yes adds an additional identification banner primarily to alert viewers who see a copy of the page on a mirror site that the page originally comes from Wikipedia and is a user page, and provides the full url of the page. Details here.
^ To add customized text in the talk header box, use |custom_header=Your custom text; see details here.
^ Designed for use on project (Wikipedia namespace) talk pages, parameter |wp=yes may be used to alter the intro line of the banner ("This is the talk page for...") in order to add "and anything related to its purposes and tasks". Details here.
^ To display a custom page title, use |display_title=custom page title.
^ To force inclusion of the "Article policies" section of the template in non-article namespaces where they are normally excluded, use |arpol=yes. (See § Article policies below for an example.)
^ Up to five shortcuts may be added to the template, as unnamed parameters, or as named ones (any of |1=, |sc=, |sc1=, |shortcut= or |shortcut1=, then |2=, |sc2= or |shortcut2=, etc., work). For example, {{Talk header|WP:SHOR|WP:TCUT}}. They display similar to the {{shortcut}} template, but within the Talk header message box.
^ For additional information on |demospace= see § Testing issues.
^ To hide "Find sources" on article talk pages, use |hide_find_sources=yes. More details at § "Find sources" links and § Testing issues below.
^ To override the article title as the default search used by § "Find sources" links, use params |search_term1= and |search_term2=. Details at § Modifying the "find sources" query terms below.
^ To override the search domain chosen automatically by the template, use |search-domain=domain value. See details at § Search domain override.
^ To suppress the archive search box from the template, use |search=no; see section § Search box for details.
^ Archive links and an archive search box are displayed automatically at the bottom of the template. Use parameter |noarchive=yes to suppress display of the archive links and search box. See section § Archives below.
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d An optional notice regarding automatic archiving by bot may be displayed near the archive search box. Use optional parameters |bot=, |age=, |units=, and |minthreadsleft= to control display of this notice. See section § archive bot notice below.
^ Exact search is also known as a "double-quoted query" because major search engines interpret paired double-quote characters as indicating that everything between the double quotes must be found exactly as specified.

The above documentation is transcluded from Template:Talk header/doc.
Editors can experiment in this template's sandbox and testcases pages.
Add categories to the /doc subpage. Subpages of this template.

[bottom-yes-1] Use |bottom=yes to add additional instructions above the talk header box to "place new discussions at the bottom of the talk page"; see details here.

[disclaimer-yes-2] On user talk pages, |disclaimer=yes adds an additional identification banner primarily to alert viewers who see a copy of the page on a mirror site that the page originally comes from Wikipedia and is a user page, and provides the full url of the page. Details here.

[custom_header-3] To add customized text in the talk header box, use |custom_header=Your custom text; see details here.

[wp-yes-4] Designed for use on project (Wikipedia namespace) talk pages, parameter |wp=yes may be used to alter the intro line of the banner ("This is the talk page for...") in order to add "and anything related to its purposes and tasks". Details here.

[display_title-5] To display a custom page title, use |display_title=custom page title.

[arpol-yes-6] To force inclusion of the "Article policies" section of the template in non-article namespaces where they are normally excluded, use |arpol=yes. (See § Article policies below for an example.)

[shortcuts-7] Up to five shortcuts may be added to the template, as unnamed parameters, or as named ones (any of |1=, |sc=, |sc1=, |shortcut= or |shortcut1=, then |2=, |sc2= or |shortcut2=, etc., work). For example, {{Talk header|WP:SHOR|WP:TCUT}}. They display similar to the {{shortcut}} template, but within the Talk header message box.

[demospace-8] For additional information on |demospace= see § Testing issues.

[hide_find_sources-yes-9] To hide "Find sources" on article talk pages, use |hide_find_sources=yes. More details at § "Find sources" links and § Testing issues below.

[search_term-10] To override the article title as the default search used by § "Find sources" links, use params |search_term1= and |search_term2=. Details at § Modifying the "find sources" query terms below.

[search-domain-11] To override the search domain chosen automatically by the template, use |search-domain=domain value. See details at § Search domain override.

[search-no-12] To suppress the archive search box from the template, use |search=no; see section § Search box for details.

[noarchive-yes-13] Archive links and an archive search box are displayed automatically at the bottom of the template. Use parameter |noarchive=yes to suppress display of the archive links and search box. See section § Archives below.

[bot-14] An optional notice regarding automatic archiving by bot may be displayed near the archive search box. Use optional parameters |bot=, |age=, |units=, and |minthreadsleft= to control display of this notice. See section § archive bot notice below.

[exact_search-15] Exact search is also known as a "double-quoted query" because major search engines interpret paired double-quote characters as indicating that everything between the double quotes must be found exactly as specified.

[a]

[b]

[c]

[d]

[e]

[f]

[g]

[h]

[i]

[j]

[k]

[l]

[m]

[n]

[o]

v t e Userspace messages and disclaimers
User pages	{{This is a user page}} {{User page}} {{User page mini}} {{Userpage bar}} {{Userpageblue&round}}
User talk pages	{{Message}} {{Not Christmas}} {{Talk header}} {{Talk header preload}} {{Talkpagecool}} {{User notification preference}} {{User talk}} {{User talk page mini}} {{User talk-page header}} {{User talk rules}} {{User talk top}} {{Usercomment}} {{Usertalk bar}} {{Usertalkback}} {{Usertalkconcise}} {{Usertalksuper}} {{Userwhisperback}}
Editnotices	{{Editnotice userpage}} {{User time zone editnotice}}
Drafts and sandboxes	{{User sandbox}} {{Userspace draft}} {{Workpage}} {{Userspace notes}} {{Draft article}} See also: {{New user article}} {{Template draft}} {{Draft RfC}}
Blanking	{{Userpage blanked}} {{Courtesy blanked}} {{Intentionally blank}} {{Spam blanked}}
Category