Sub-referencing
Hi! Thanks for testing the new Sub-referencing feature developed by Wikimedia Deutschland. As of February 2026, sub-referencing is deployed to German, Polish and Swedish Wikipedia as well as some other projects.
What can you already test?
[edit]
In Wikitext
- You can create a sub-reference using the attribute details.
- You can re-use a sub-reference using
<ref name="main-reference name" details="Page 23."/>
In Visual Editor
- You can add details to re-used references.
- You can add or remove sub-references.
- You can re-use sub-references, just like regular references (either via copy & paste or using the re-use dialogue)
Templates
- You might want to try using templates in sub-references (e.g. {{Subref}}) and leave some feedback.
What doesn't work yet
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- VisualEditor still struggles with sub-references when {{reflist}} instead of
<references />is used in wikitext. - We are still fixing some minor issues in VisualEditor and are thinking about other usability improvements.
Where can you test the feature?
[edit]Here are some sample pages, which you can use for testing:
- Mathematical fallacy
- General Data Protection Regulation
- Murder in German law
- Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone
- Old Testament
- Mona Lisa
- Borussia Dortmund
- Eriauchenus zirafy
- Ogoki River
- Hella
- Margaret E. Bailey (already offers some sub-references you can test with)
- Medieval Arabic female poets (already offers some sub-references you can test with)
You can of course create your own pages on betawiki, by copying articles which you are editing on your home wiki. The details don't really matter, it's just important that you are testing with references similar to the ones you are used to.
Please note
[edit]Betawiki is different from your home wiki:
- Pages might look different (e.g. not use your preferred skin).
- The project might offer some new features that are still being tested.
- The project only contains some test pages and templates, not your entire wiki’s content, and not all the templates, modules, gadgets etc. you are used to.
- Your regular Wikimedia login doesn’t work on beta wikis. You can either register an account – make sure to use a different password than your regular Wikimedia account – or test the feature without an account, which will automatically create a temporary account.
Where to give feedback?
[edit]Please leave your feedback on this talk page on metawiki.
