ৱিকিপিডিয়া:Navigation templates

This guidance essay contains comments and advice of one or more Wikipedia contributors. It is not a Wikipedia policy or guideline, though it may be consulted for assistance on the ৱিকিপিডিয়া:Categories, lists, and navigation templates guideline. A potential measure of how the community views this essay may be gained by consulting the history and talk pages, and checking What links here.

চমুপথ: WP:NAV

A navigation template, navbox or topicbox is a grouping of links used in multiple related articles to facilitate navigation between those articles. Editing of a navigation template is done in a central place, the template page.

Navboxes are categorized under Category:Navigational boxes. Some WikiProjects maintain a list of their navigation templates.

Properties

The style of any navigation template depends on its articles, how they are most intuitively presented, and previously established convention.

Navigation templates provide navigation within Wikipedia

The goal is not to cram as many related articles as possible into one space. Ask yourself, does this help the reader in reading up on related topics? Take any two articles in the template. Would a reader really want to go from A to B?
They should be kept small in size as a large template has limited navigation value. For navigating among many articles, consider:
- Split them into multiple, smaller templates on each sub-topic. For example, {{EMD diesels}} lists all models of diesel locomotives built by one manufacturer, but is too large to be transcluded on each of their articles. Instead, the individual sections of {{EMD diesels}} were split out into their own templates: {{EMD GPs}}, {{EMD SDs}}, etc.
- Do the above with only one template using ParserFunctions.
- Link only the immediately related articles while hiding the rest, like in the case of Johnny Cash.
- Avoid repeating links to the same article within a template.
They should not be too small. A navigation template with fewer than a handful of links can easily be replaced by "See also" sections, or relevant {{main}} and {{see also}} links within the articles' sections.
Navigation templates do not provide ৱিকিপিডিয়া:External links to other websites.

Navigation templates provide navigation between existing articles

Red links should be avoided unless they are very likely to be developed into articles, and even if they do, editors are encouraged to write the article first.
Unlinked text should be avoided. For example, {{Axis of Justice}} lists non-articles under "Notable guests", but this content seems more appropriate in an article.
External links should be included in appropriate articles, rather than a navigation template.

Navigation templates provide navigation between related articles

If the articles are not established as related by reliable sources in the actual articles, then it is probably not a good idea to interlink them.
For complex topics in science, technology, history, etc., a navigation box can provide a comprehensive introduction to a topic. For example, {{Wind power}} links to subsidiary and supporting topics that provide background and context necessary for understanding the main Wind power article. While the main Wind power article already contains inline links to the subsidiary articles, the subsidiary articles themselves are smaller and their prose may not place them into the overall context with each other. Editors who work on the subsidiary articles in isolation may be unaware of this context. The navigation template provides an easy way for the subsidiary articles, even when they begin as stubs, to instantly inherit the conceptual structure of the main article.

Navigation templates are not arbitrarily decorative

অতিৰিক্ত তথ্য: Wikipedia:Manual of Style (icons)

There should be justification for a template to deviate from standard colors and styles
There are two basic layouts:
- On the right side of page—for example {{History of China}}.
  - For meta-template, see {{sidebar}}
- Footer boxes—for example {{Health in the People's Republic of China}}, designed to appear at the bottom of each article, stacked with other similar templates. See also: ৱিকিপিডিয়া:Footers for information on placement
  - For footer boxes, {{Navbox}} is the standard.
    - Existing hard-coded collapsible tables or NavFrames should be converted to {{Navbox}} if possible. This standardizes the look and eases future maintenance.
    - The width of footer boxes should be 100% unless the convention for that type of article is otherwise. It looks inconsistent if multiple boxes in the same article have varying widths.

Avoid redirects

The link to the page on which a particular instance of a navbox appears should be displayed in black, bold type, not as a link. This will happen automatically, provided all links go directly to their target pages, avoiding redirects. (Piped links are perfectly all right.)
In the rare event that a navbox contains a link to a disambiguation page that doesn't have "(disambiguation)" in its title, use the {{D'}} template to resolve the conflict between this requirement and the requirements concerning intentional links to disambiguation pages.

Advantages

অতিৰিক্ত তথ্য: Wikipedia:A navbox on every page#Benefits of navboxes

Advantages of using navigation templates rather than listing all the links under "See also" sections include:

reduction of clutter in that area of the article before "References" and "External links",
compactness of the template compared to a standard list or table, in the case of many links,
if the most immediately related links are kept under "See also", the reader has a better idea of scope,
less directly related links are out of the way or in some cases hidden by default,
ease of maintenance in updating the template as articles get created or deleted,
aesthetically pleasing appearance to many users,
new articles in a subject area immediately gain the basic link structure of existing related articles, eliminating the need for many editors to individually build up their own links and rewrite background material.
when a new article or an older article that was orphaned is placed in a navbox, the page instantly has a large number of links to it

Alternatives

In certain cases, there are alternatives preferable over the creation of a new navigation template.

If the group of articles overlaps significantly with an existing category, consider using {{otherarticles}} instead. Of course, since the category is already linked within those articles, {{otherarticles}} may not even provide extra navigational value.
For a series of articles whose only shared characteristic is that they hold the same position or title, such as peerage or world champion sporting titles, consider using {{succession box}}. Variant templates for persons who have held several notable offices are discussed at সাঁচ বাৰ্তা:Succession box.
For relating articles across different categories in a logical sequence, use a succession template.

Building navboxes

The following are various components used in navboxes:

Code	Purpose
{{Navbox	Defines the start of a navbox
}}	Defines the end of a navbox
\| name = Example	Reflects the url of the navbox, and the name of the template to be added to articles. E.g. {{Example}}
\| title = [[Example]]	Displays the title contained in the top bar
\| bodyclass = hlist	Sets the hlist class on the whole navbox so that flatlists can be used
\| state= uncollapsed	Forces the navbox to remain expanded (or collapsed) in articles. The template transclusion itself can override to specify a different state
\| titlestyle = background:#FF033E;	Changes the background colour of the top bar (Normally to be avoided)
\| groupstyle = background:#FF033E;	Changes the background colour of the vertical bar on left side (Normally to be avoided)
\| abovestyle = background:#FF033E;	Changes the background colour of the second bar (beneath the top bar) (Normally to be avoided)
\| belowstyle = background:#FF033E;	Changes the background colour of the bottom bar (Normally to be avoided)
\| evenstyle = background:#F4F0EC	Alternates colours for each section
\| oddstyle = background:#F4F0EC	Alternates colours for each section
\| image = [[Image:Example.svg\|80px\|border\|Caption]] \| imageleft = [[Image:Example.svg\|80px\|border\|Caption]]	Displays an image inside the navbox on the right or left side
\| above = [[Example]]	Produces a second bar beneath the top bar
\| group1= [[Example]]	Displays the group title in vertical bar on left side
\| list1= * [[Item]] * [[Item]]	Displays items of the group within the body of the navbox
{{Navbox subgroup}}	Creates subgroups within the main group. Example: \|group1 = Example group \|list1 = {{Navbox subgroup \|listclass = hlist \|group1 = Subgroup 1 \|list1 = * [[Item]] * [[Item]] \|group2 = Subgroup 2 \|list2 = * [[Item]] * [[Item]] }}
\| below = [[Example]]	Displays bottom bar
{{collapsible option}}	Displays text below navbox giving instruction on collapsing and expanding
<noinclude>Example text</noinclude>	Prevents "Example text" from appearing in articles containing the navbox (This should be placed immediately after the closing brackets "}}" at the end of the navbox)

Example navbox

What you type

{{Navbox
| name = Example
| title = [[Example]]
| bodyclass = hlist
| state = uncollapsed

| titlestyle = background:#FFC569;
| abovestyle = background:#FFC569;
| groupstyle = background:#FFC569;
| belowstyle = background:#FFC569;

| evenstyle = background:#F4F0EC;

| image = [[চিত্ৰ:Example.jpg|70px|Caption]]

| above = [[Example]]

| group1 = Example group 1
| list1 =
* Item
* Item
* Item

| group2 = Example group 2
| list2 =
* Item
* Item
* Item

| group3 = Example group 3
| list3 = {{Navbox subgroup
  | group1 = Subgroup 1
  | list1 =
* Item
* Item
* Item
  | group2 = Subgroup 2
  | list2 =
* Item
* Item
* Item
  }}

| group4 = Example group 4
| list4 =
* Item
* Item
* Item

| group5 = Example group 5
| list5 =
* Item
* Item
* Item

| group6 = Example group 5
| list6 =
* Item
* Item
* Item

| below = Example

}}<noinclude>
{{collapsible option}}
</noinclude>

What it looks like

Note to editors on how to manage collapsibility:

Use {{Navigation templates|state=collapsed}} to show this template in its collapsed (hidden) state.
Use {{Navigation templates|state=expanded}} to show this template in its expanded (fully visible) state.
Use {{Navigation templates|state=autocollapse}} to show this template in its collapsed (hidden) state only if there is another template of the same type on the page. (This is usually the default.)

প্ৰদৰ্শন • আলোচনা • সম্পাদনা	Collapsible	Header color	Image	Groups	Style (body) parameter/s	Examples
{{Navbox}}	collapsible	navbox	Left/right of body	হয়	হয়	{{Solar System}} · {{United States Congress}}
{{Navbox with collapsible groups}}	collapsible	navbox	Left/right of body and/or in each list	হয়	হয়	{{Scouting}} · {{University of Michigan}}
{{Navbox with columns}}	collapsible	navbox	Left/right of columns	নহয়	হয়	{{Current U.S. Senators}} · {{Historical regions of the Czech Republic}}
{{Navbox years}}	collapsible	navbox	নহয়	নহয়	নহয়	{{Wimbledon tournaments}}