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The {{Library resources box}} template provides a sidebar box of external links to resources in the user's preferred library about or by the topic of an article. The links go out to an external program ("FTL", currently hosted at the Online Books Page server at the University of Pennsylvania Libraries) that formulates an appropriate search request for a selected library's catalog or other discovery application. Users can register their preferred library with FTL for a one-click transition from Wikipedia to their library's relevant resources. Other links in this box allow the user to choose a different library, or (optionally) to see what books they can freely read online.
You can request additional libraries to be added to FTL's knowledge base via this form.
Usage
{{Library resources box |by= |onlinebooks= |others= |about= |label=
|viaf= |lccn= |lcheading= |wikititle= }}
<!-- All parameters are optional; last four are mutually exclusive -->
Parameters
by=If set toyes, links are shown for resources by the article's topic, as well as resources about article's topic.onlinebooks=If set toyes, links are shown for free online books (as listed on the Online Books Page). It is best to check to see if any such books are listed there. (If not, eligible books may be suggested.) You can setonlinebooksabouttoyes, instead of this parameter, to link to online books about (but not by) the subject, or setonlinebooksbytoyes, instead of this parameter, to link to online books by (but not about) the subject.others=If set tono, links are not shown to select other libraries.about=If set tono, links are not shown for resources about the article's topic. (If by is not set to yes in this case, the box will be linkless.)label=If set, the value is used in place of the article title on the label of the box.- The remaining parameters can be used to specify more precisely the topic to query in the destination library. By default, the FTL service will attempt to find a suitable library subject or author heading based on the title of the Wikipedia article, or use the article's title in a keyword query, but you can use one of the following parameters to more precisely direct the library query. No more than one of the following parameters should be used:
viaf=The topic is identified by the supplied Virtual International Authority File identifier, if known.lccn=The topic is identified by the supplied Library of Congress Control Number, if known. Currently only LCCNs for names are supported; we hope to add support for topical subjects, and titles, in the future.lcheading=The topic is identified by the supplied authorized name or subject heading from the Library of Congress Authorities.wikititle=The topic should be based on the supplied Wikipedia page title, instead of the current Wikipedia page's title.
Examples
{{Library resources box}}
The simplest template call generates a sidebar box with links to resources at the user's preferred library, and at other libraries, based the title of the current Wikipedia article. Links about the topic are shown; links by the topic, and links to online books, are not shown.
{{Library resources box
|onlinebooks=yes
|by=yes
|viaf=31432428
|label=George Washington}}
This generates a sidebar box with links to online books, resources at the user's preferred library, and resources at other libraries, both about and by the assignee of VIAF ID "31432428" (who happens to be George Washington). Using the VIAF ID makes this link less vulnerable to possible future changes in the Wikipedia article title (or in the Library of Congress authorized heading) for George Washington.
This is the code used to generate the box appearing in the top right corner of this section. (Because this page is not titled "George Washington", we also used a label argument to make that name appear in the box label. If this page were titled "George Washington", we would not need to use that label argument to make his name appear.)
{{Library resources box|onlinebooks=yes|label=the Underground Railroad}}
This generates a sidebar box with links to online books, resources at the user's preferred library, and resources at other libraries, about the Underground Railroad (if it is placed on a page titled "Underground Railroad", or the additional parameter wikititle is set to Underground Railroad). The label parameter in this case makes the box label render as "About the Underground Railroad" instead of "About Underground Railroad".
{{Library resources box
|onlinebooks=yes
|lcheading=World War, 1914-1918 -- Personal narratives
|label=World War I (in personal accounts)}}
This generates a sidebar box with links to online books, resources at the user's preferred library, and resources at other libraries, that are personal accounts of World War I. The lcheading parameter is used to explicitly specify a Library of Congress subject heading to use for the library links. (Note that we mark subdivisions in LC subject headings with two hyphens, preferably surrounded by spaces.) We also include a label parameter to label the concept using more everyday language.
Placement
From my understanding of Wikipedia conventions, this box should normally be placed in the External links section, the Further reading section, or the last section of the article. (There might also be other appropriate selections.) The box should be inserted at the start of the section before any section text (but after any sidebar boxes that take priority over this one).
If the box cannot cleanly fit in the appropriate section, consider instead using one or more of the inline text templates mentioned in the See also section below.
See also
- {{Library resources about}}—generates the same About links that this box does, but as inlined text instead of in a box.
- {{Library resources by}}—generates the same By links that this box does, but as inlined text instead of in a box.
- {{Library link about}}—generates a single About link as inlined text. Used by this template.
- {{Library link by}}—generates a single By link as inlined text. Used by this template.