Suggestion regarding <ref> in in-line sourcing.

Question

For those of us who use in-line sourcing, editing/preparing bios can be a pain in the neck, separating the citation from the content. And when a <ref> error note pops up, it's another pain trying to find the error. What if those <ref>s could appear in red - either just the tags, or including the citations within also. It would certainly speed up my editing process!

Just to be clear: what I'm suggesting if the <ref> can be changed to <ref> so it appears that way automatically.

Comments

Not what you're looking for, but a work-around that works for me:

Set your browser to highlight all matches whenever you perform a search with Ctrl-F, then search the page for the string ref (or ref>).

Answer 1

Hi Jim. I’m sorry to say we spent some time trying to enable this and it turned out to be prohibitively complex.

Answer 2

That's a really good idea, as I often forget to put the / in the end <ref> and it can take ages to find where the problem is..I use control & find to search for errors, but having them a different colour would really help.

Comments

Me, too! This is a great idea Jim!

Answer 3

I discovered a useful tip when those pesky errors come up which say that there is a ref missing:

With the cursor in the Biography box on the Edit tab, press Control F and search for them.  You can even highlight them so they all stand out.

Comments

True, Ros, which I just learned, but it's an extra step the user has to take. My viewpoint is that any step that can be done behind the scenes which makes the user experience easier increases the value of WikiTree, and adds value. Any step that can make users have a more positive experience here is welcome!

PS: You must CTRL F <ref> and </ref> separately - it only allows one search parameter. (I tried using both separated by a comma - no dice!)

Answer 4

Also known as Syntax highlighting.

A great suggestion that has been brought up many times before. Not sure if its currently on the ToDo list or not.

Comments

Dennis: thanks for teaching me the correct jargon: syntax highlighting! After I posted my suggestion, I noticed that similar suggestions had been previously made. One hooes it's on the To Do list, but bringing it up again perhaps brings it to new eyes.

Answer 5

I write mine as below, that way you get the refs on their own line and it is easy to see where you are:

In 1911, John was living with his family in Pinfold Street, Loughborough, Leicestershire, England.
<ref>
"England and Wales Census, 1911," database, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:X75W-LBK : 20 January 2015), John Platts, Loughborough, Leicestershire, England; citing PRO RG 14, The National Archives of the UK, Kew, Surrey.
</ref>

If there are two sources, I daisychain the ref tags thus:

John was a master builder and roofer.
<ref>
Source 1
<ref></ref>
Source 2
</ref>

It saves time when editing later, and reduces eye strain :)