This is an archive of past discussions about Template:Infobox scientist. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.
I was curious about the religious affiliations of a few enlightenment scientists, and while they were all laid out in their biographies none of them there included in the infoboxes.
A fair number of other infoboxes include religion as an option, would anyone object if I added it to this infobox? Juno (talk) 23:44, 23 January 2015 (UTC)
I see a couple of different discussions, most ending in different ways. Can we put it back so that the field wouldn't have to be added in future articles? Juno (talk) 09:01, 3 March 2015 (UTC)
I was trying to say "I guess", not "I believe" (Sorry, my bad in English). Each scientist is a person but it doesn't mean each person to be a scientist. There are some special attributes like Institutions a scientist has worked there which is different from Education. I don't guess sportsmen to work in the scientific institutions but both of them are person. I'm not sure about a scientist to work in a governmental office however (s)he may be a minister of science and education. However in "some countries" I know many people work in different unrelated positions. Whether we want to merge scientist and person templates or not, anyway there is one common question : Having a Religion in the Infobox scientist, Why not? As a web developer and DB designer I am, if I was familiar to wiki technical issues I would like to have a hierarchical structure of templates to extend scientist from person template or even a combinable mode of scientist and chairman to be able to present a mixed person. I think an OOP mode will be better than having a massive template like person having a vast set of attributes. --IranianNationalist (talk) 16:42, 9 April 2015 (UTC)
Done Ow That's right. Thank you. My problem was the absent of "Working Institutions" parameter in the guidance Template:Infobox person and its source code. But it works well, like something expandable number of parameters or attachable components. Thank you. I learnt a lot and must learn more :) --IranianNationalist (talk) 19:03, 9 April 2015 (UTC)
Infobox scientist doesn't allow us to mention collaborators. For instance, at Albert Einstein, his "notable students" were called in the Infobox Rosen, Straus, Szilard. But they didn't formally study with him, they published etc. with him. Einstein didn't want teaching etc. obligations. (Pais: Subtle is the Lord, gives an overview of his collaborations.) I put them in the field "Influenced" which is no good either.
So could someone add a field Collaborator to the Template:Infobox scientist plus documentation? I am not allowed to.
Just my thoughts (am not an admin or editor of this template): This type of information is more appropriate in the body of the article, not the infobox. Any given scientist could have dozens of notable collaborators, and listing all or any in the infobox is probably not warranted. Remember, an infobox is supposed to succinctly summarize the major aspects of a person's life, not shoehorn data just because it exists. --Animalparty! (talk) 21:49, 15 July 2015 (UTC)
the upper Blank syntax and right column indicators do not mention "parents"
but the Parameters do, the guidelines don't but the template data does.... ?? Dave Rave (talk) 09:13, 31 May 2016 (UTC)
Dave Rave (talk) 09:13, 31 May 2016 (UTC)
@Dave Rave: As far as I can tell, the template has never supported a "parents" parameter. I have therefore removed it from the description and the template data. The documentation, by the way, is on a separate page, Template:Infobox scientist/doc, and is not protected. Any time you see mistakes in template documentation, you should find you can fix it yourself. -- John of Reading (talk) 09:32, 31 May 2016 (UTC)
Not done That attribute is not directly related to the general profession of "scientist", you would need to establish a consensus amongst editors that it is relevant (by continuing this discussion below) before it can be added. — xaosfluxTalk14:03, 14 July 2016 (UTC)
H-index
I would like to suggest that the H-index be added to the template, since H-index or i10-index are significantly more important than the personal information for a living or recent died scientist.--Sahehco (talk) 15:12, 6 October 2016 (UTC)
When the template is embedded in {{Infobox officeholder}}, the heading ("Scientific career") displays with a different style of heading than those used by the main template (for, e.g, "Personal details"). I've made a correction in the template's sandbox that should resolve this through the use of the parameter embed_officeholder. 207.161.217.209 (talk) 20:04, 30 October 2016 (UTC)
How is this any different than just setting |embed=yes? In other words, why not add the |headerstyle= #if statement to trigger off the embed param? Primefac (talk) 23:33, 30 October 2016 (UTC)
@Primefac: I'm afraid that I'm not sure what you mean by your second question, could you clarify? But with respect to your first, it's different in that the "Scientific career" header in this infobox is styled differently than the "Personal details" header in {{Infobox officeholder}}. I've transcluded an example using the sandbox to the right. An example of the existing template can be seen at Ernest Rutherford. 207.161.217.209 (talk) 01:59, 31 October 2016 (UTC)
To be honest, I answered my own questions, but your post here and my own digging have prompted some more (so don't worry about the earlier questions):
As near as I can tell {{infobox officeholder}} is rather unusual in colouring their headers. All of the examples found at WP:IEmbed do not colour their headers. This makes me wonder - is IB officeholder the only one that colours their header? If there are more IBs that colour their headers, then we'd have to assign a different colour scheme for every one of them. This is both tedious and bad coding. If it is the only one that colours the headers, then we'd still have to go and change every transclusion of {{infobox scientist}} being used as a child to use this new parameter.
At this point in time I'm not convinced that changing the code simply for the means of affecting one infobox combination is worth it. I'll leave the TPER open, though, in case others want to chime in. Primefac (talk) 02:57, 31 October 2016 (UTC)
Apparently this concerns Embedding other templates, and Ernest Rutherford is an example which embeds {{Infobox scientist}} in {{Infobox officeholder}}. The issue is that "Scientific career" on the Rutherford article has a white background, whereas "Personal details" has a bluish bar. By contrast, the Oliphant example on this talk page embeds {{Infobox scientist/sandbox}}. I suppose the change is good but I don't have time to examine it now. However, I agree with Primefac that changing working code to suit one example may not be worthwhile.
@Primefac and Johnuniq: Given that {{Infobox officeholder}} has over 100,000 transclusions, this is not a matter of just a few instances that have the clearly inappropriate formatting. And as it stands right now, the "Scientific career" module appears as though it is a subsection of the "Personal details" section.
There are other personal infoboxes that use coloured headers, but usually I see them embedded in {{Infobox person}} or a wrapper thereof (rather than {{Infobox person}} or a wrapper thereof being embedded in them). {{Infobox officeholder}} is a unique situation in that it can't be embedded in other infoboxes without a ridiculous-looking result (as I'm sure you can imagine).
If you know of an easier or more efficient way to do it, then I'm all ears. But the idea that we should prevent people from gradually fixing an obvious error because it would take too much effort is without merit provided that (1) we do not have an alternative and (2) the proposed solution is not detrimental. 207.161.217.209 (talk) 03:45, 31 October 2016 (UTC)
Not done: please establish a consensus for this alteration before using the {{edit template-protected}} template. Another issue in terms of consistency would be using the formatting in boldface type of "Scientific career" from the live version in the sandbox version, which makes it inconsistent with the formatting of the "Personal details" header. Paineu/c03:49, 31 October 2016 (UTC)
Hmm, there doesn't appear to be a change in the visual output when I remove the bold from "Scientific career". I'll remove it, in that case, but I don't see a visual distinction between the two. 207.161.217.209 (talk) 04:01, 31 October 2016 (UTC)
Just for the sake of argument, I have formatted "Personal details" in bold in the IBO sandbox. Can you see the difference? Paineu/c04:27, 31 October 2016 (UTC)
Sometimes I've found when I'm not logged in that my cache needs to be purged for me to see differences, so I've added a purge link to the top of this section. Try clicking on that link and see if that helps you to see the difference. Paineu/c05:13, 31 October 2016 (UTC)
Just because there are 100k transclusions of {{infobox officeholder}} doesn't remotely mean that we have an issue with the officeholder/scientist combo (IBO and IBS, for ease of typing). I would guess that less than 1% of all IBO have IBS as a subbox. Really, this would present itself as an issue with any infobox being a subbox of IBO.
IB person does not colour their headers (hell, it only has one header, for the signature). Also, IBO can be embedded into other infoboxes (it has the functionality), though the headerstyle of the parent would probably need to be adjusted.
My point regarding changing all instances of IBS embedded in IBO was not that it shouldn't be done, but that it would have to be done. A fairly straight-forward fix using something like AWB, but still a rather lengthy process.
Just because there are 100k transclusions of {{infobox officeholder}} doesn't remotely mean that we have an issue with the officeholder/scientist combo (IBO and IBS, for ease of typing). I would guess that less than 1% of all IBO have IBS as a subbox. — User:Primefac04:03, 31 October 2016 (UTC)
At no point did I suggest that more than 1% of those 100,000 transclusions would use this template as a module – I would be surprised if more than 0.5% did. I'm merely saying we're not talking about just a handful of uses (or potential uses) of this combination (even 0.1% is still 100 occurrences).
Where did I suggest that {{Infobox person}} had coloured headers? I was making the point that most personal infoboxes with coloured headers look perfectly fine when embedded (e.g, {{Infobox musical artist}}) whereas {{Infobox officeholder}} does not and, therefore, personal infoboxes with coloured headers, in my experience, tend to be embedded in infoboxes without coloured headers (e.g, {{Infobox person}}, which I am well aware does not have coloured headers). As a result, {{Infobox officeholder}} would naturally be more likely to be a widespread problem in this respect than other infoboxes.
Also, IBO can be embedded into other infoboxes (it has the functionality), though the headerstyle of the parent would probably need to be adjusted. — User:Primefac04:03, 31 October 2016 (UTC)
I did not suggest that embedding {{Infobox officeholder}} was not technically feasible. I was merely speaking to the desirability of embedding it in the current context (i.e, without amendments to templates).
As I said earlier, if you have any ideas about a better way to do this, then I'm all ears. And I'm certainly eager to continue the discussion to find how best to implement this. Any thoughts? 207.161.217.209 (talk) 04:44, 31 October 2016 (UTC)
Alma_mater
"Alma mater" is singular so I would like to remove the wording that the field can be used for multiple universities as it is at the parent template "person". If the field contains a person's full education, it is then just a duplicate of the education field. We have the education field for a person's full education. See "template: infobox person". --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 19:30, 6 November 2016 (UTC)
It appears that in this more specific template, readers might be interested in, at the very least, where a scientist received a master's and a PhD "at a glance". If received from different schools, then more than one alma mater can be listed. I think the ed. field asks for more detailed info, and if that detail is unavailable, then editors are asked to use the alma mater field instead. In short, while alma mater is itself singular, its application in this template and even in the Ibox person template sometimes requires more than one listing, so as to give readers useful at-a-glance info. Just a thought. Paineu/c04:54, 11 November 2016 (UTC)
Parents
Can someone add the code so "parents" displays. I see the data in about 50 templates, but it is not displaying. We have the odd situation where we link to children, but once there we are not linking back to parents. Every other biographical template includes it. --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 02:19, 19 August 2016 (UTC)
Typically parents are not notable, and the addition of such a field tends to attract bloat. Per MOS:INFOBOX, infoboxes are most effective when limited to key datapoints. Nikkimaria (talk) 13:08, 5 December 2016 (UTC)
In a similar situation, {{infobox person}} allows parents provided that they are notable. Would updating the documentation to require only notable parents be an acceptable compromise? Primefac (talk) 13:14, 5 December 2016 (UTC)
I am concerned that in this case such a step would be insufficient to prevent problems - for example, there is already guidance in the documentation that non-notable children should not be named, and yet even experienced editors are adding the names of non-notable children. Indeed, non-notable parents have already been added in several cases, such as the one mentioned by DP. Nikkimaria (talk) 13:31, 5 December 2016 (UTC)
If people are adding information that shouldn't be in there, then it should be removed. It doesn't really matter who adds the information. If we explicitly state that parents should only be added if they are notable, then it makes it easy and non-negotiable to remove unlinked parents. Primefac (talk) 13:35, 5 December 2016 (UTC)
Easy and non-negotiable? If the below is an example of what happens when we remove one such addition, I'd hate to see what would happen if we removed all of them. I completely agree that documentation should be sufficient, but my worry is that in practice, it has often proven not to be. Nikkimaria (talk) 04:56, 6 December 2016 (UTC)
The Chris Dobson article has a religion field that is not handled by the template (and unmentioned in the documentation, I also saw no alternative). As I'm rather new to infoboxes I thought I'd mention it here, so someone who knows better if the template should be updated, or page fixed, can possibly deal with this. Thanks, PaleoNeonate (talk) 15:51, 26 March 2017 (UTC)
PaleoNeonate, this is a perennial request, and the overall consensus is that we should not have a |religion= parameter in the infobox. Obviously, some people add it to the actual article, but it does not (and will not, barring an RFC) actually display. Primefac (talk) 16:09, 26 March 2017 (UTC)
Hi, I noted that neither this infobox or the academic infobox has fields for titles. Could these be added? I'd propose a field for Academic Title(s) and a field for Administrative Title(s) (which could also be labeled leadership position or leadership role). Examples for the former would be: assistant professor, project scientist, postdoc, etc. Examples for the latter field would be Chair, Dean, Director, Vice Chancellor, etc. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Pokeweed (talk • contribs) 19:08, 14 April 2017 (UTC)
Any chance of an analysis of what differences this will make? And a testcases page which shows differences? Would the documentation of the current infobox need any changes? Johnuniq (talk) 22:56, 15 May 2017 (UTC)
Thanks for the testcases but it is a bit awkward how each person wanting to review that page has to work out what changes have occurred. It is obvious that there is some re-arrangement of the items, but is anything omitted or is anything added? Also, as you have worked on the wrapper, could you confidently say that these testcases cover all potential changes that may be introduced by the new system? Johnuniq (talk) 07:49, 17 May 2017 (UTC)
There is nothing deleted. Converting to wrapper is not that big a process, it is just making this infobox use parameters from Infobox person directly. The parameters of {{Infobox person}} are the only additional parameters added. -- Pankaj Jain Capankajsmilyo(talk·contribs·count)14:08, 17 May 2017 (UTC)
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
I suggest adding |Sub-fields= to complement the current |Fields=. This would allow the later to describe the general field(s) in which an individual works (eg physics), and the new parameter would then be used for more specific areas (eg string theory and astroparticle physics). This would then match Infobox academic which has "Discipline" and "Sub-discipline" parameters. Gaia Octavia AgrippaTalk17:21, 14 October 2017 (UTC)
The box is now cut in half by "scientific career" being centered halfway through. This looks very strange when not much information is available about the scientific career and you have a line or two stuck below, and not all of the lines relevant to a person's scientific career are below the line (awards, known for, perhaps alma mater, etc). I think we should remove this. If is it an infobox for a scientist, there's no need to divide the career information from the rest. Natureium (talk) 14:04, 19 September 2017 (UTC)
In modern English, the word "nationality" often means the same as citizenship, like in Nationality: American, though even the population of the USA alone is racially and ethnically diverse - but those parameters could be termed race and ethnicity.
My question is: what meaning of the word "nationality" is used in this template? I am writing about a scholar from Russia, thus Russian in a broad sense, but not in the narrow sense: her father was of Ukrainian Jewish and of Polish descent. In modern Russian usage we have two different words for 1) members of population of Russia of whatever ethnicity (россиянин, россиянка; россияне) and 2) for ethnic Russians (русский,русская; русские). We also have two different words for Jews 1) ethnically (еврей, akin to Hebrew) and 2) religiously (иудей, from Jehuda, lit. Judaist) as in modern times a person may choose to be one and not the other.
GregZak (talk) 16:04, 25 December 2017 (UTC)
There are two cases when nationality is different to citizenships. The first is when someone has multiple citizenships or gain/loses citizenships over time: a scientist may have been born and educated in the UK and gained additional American citizenship through their career; citizenship = United Kingdom and United States, nationality = British. The other case is when a "state" is formed of more than one nation/country. So someone may have UK citizenship but a Scottish nationality, or US citizenship and a Navajo nationality. Gaia Octavia AgrippaTalk18:05, 26 December 2017 (UTC)
How to use this template in a translated article?
How to proceed when translating? I have found a similar template in the other language, but fields are all different, missing etc.
Should I copy this template to a version in the new language and then translate fields etc to make my own template in the new language, or is there a smarter way? Uffe (talk) 16:23, 2 January 2018 (UTC)
Uffe, which template is it? We have a lot of "cite web" templates in various languages, I suppose we could create some for IB scientist. Primefac (talk) 16:50, 2 January 2018 (UTC)
Hmmmmm.... two issues. The first being I don't know the translation between fields. Second is that it looks like da:Skabelon:Forsker is actually a redirect to da:Skabelon:Infoboks Wikidata person, which is a wikidata template.
I'm not saying that it cannot be done, but the first issue cuts me out of it and the second makes me wonder if a 1-to-1 translation will result in a lot of "missing" fields that would normally be added by WD. Up to you, though. Primefac (talk) 19:55, 2 January 2018 (UTC)
The infobox uses {{smaller}}, which only drops the font size to 90%. Also, if you're going to fight against small font sizes, you'll have to go to {{infobox person}} itself, which sets the |above= at 77%. Primefac (talk) 11:42, 16 March 2018 (UTC)
The infobox uses {{smaller}}, which only drops the font size to 90%. Ok, but that's 90% of 88%, according to this VPT thread (the infobox default font size is already reduced to 88%, before application of {{smaller}}). 90% of 88% is 79%, which is below the MOS:FONTSIZE minimum of 85% of page font size. Six percentage points may not seem like enough to fuss about, but I've found that small numerical differences mean very significant differences in readability. And we're talking about accessibility, which WMF and Wikipedia appear to take seriously, more than the usual MOS stuff. I don't understand what you're saying about Infobox person; perhaps you could rephrase/elaborate? ―Mandruss☎18:00, 16 March 2018 (UTC)
(edit conflict) now-irrelevant comments removed... If you're looking to get rid of all smalls in all infoboxes, though, you might want to start a Village Pump thread and unilaterally deprecate all usage of {{small}} and {{smaller}} across all infoboxes, because this template is definitely not the only one that uses it. Primefac (talk) 18:21, 16 March 2018 (UTC)
We need an explicit community consensus to observe a guideline which has been in place for years and is presumed to represent community consensus? ―Mandruss☎18:51, 16 March 2018 (UTC)
Mandruss, I think what I wrote wasn't really clear. My point was more that rather than going to every template and saying "these need to be removed," it would be easier/more efficient to make a centralized posting so that a) there was a clear place to point to and b) you don't have to put in as many requests (i.e. I'm happy doing legwork, maybe even a bot run, to remove all instances). Primefac (talk) 15:42, 17 March 2018 (UTC)
@Primefac: Sorry for the misunderstanding, probably due in part to my past experience in trying to get obvious template changes made by the select few who are template-qualified (and template-authorized, in the cases of template-protection). Witness Template talk:Infobox civilian attack#image_upright—after one month, not so much as a reply, and justification for the change is roughly as clear as for this one. If you're happy doing legwork for this one, that's great, and we could do with a dozen more like you. I expect I'll let that VPR thread run for a few days and then close it if nobody beats me to it, unless there's still some useful discussion happening by then. Thanks for the assistance. ―Mandruss☎18:49, 17 March 2018 (UTC)
IB "Historian" redirects here
Why? Von Ranke may have begun the a scientific approach to history, but to say they're the same is a bit like saying a bus driver = tank driver... Can we split them up please? Someone reckoned above that having "Scientific career" looked wierd half-way through a scientist's infobox... imagine how it looks on a page for someone who never possessed one! >SerialNumber54129...speculates21:31, 28 January 2018 (UTC)
Serial Number 54129, you're talking about the result of a seven-year old TFD, which seems to imply that "historians" are "social scientists". I'd say it's a little late for a DRV, but if you can think of a better redirect target and can make a convincing case I'm sure it would go over fine. Primefac (talk) 21:38, 28 January 2018 (UTC)
Nice one Primefac always glad to hear from you! :) "More or less the same as social scientists" my new hat :D thanks for pointing that TfD out though. Tbh, I wasn't thinking of another redirect, but an actual infobox. >SerialNumber54129...speculates21:46, 28 January 2018 (UTC)
If you did want a redirect {{infobox academic}} would be another potential target - to set up a new infobox you'd have to make a case why neither of those would suffice for the purpose. Nikkimaria (talk) 22:41, 28 January 2018 (UTC)
Agree with Serial Number, I just saw this and it was especially strange. I think just making the caption customizable, so it doesn't say "Scientific career", would already go a long way. —Ynhockey(Talk)08:12, 20 March 2018 (UTC)
Moving science parameters down to "Scientific career"
I suggest to move the scientific-related labels down to the section "Scientific career". I.e. "Awards", "Education", "Alma mater", "Known for" and "Awards" should be moved down. The only reason they are in the top section is that they are in "infobox person" too, and when the wrapper was implemented the rest was just placed in the bottom. Christian75 (talk) 09:49, 25 June 2018 (UTC)
Well, education and alma mater isn't always directly related to one's scientific career, nor are awards. Known for might be worth shifting though. Primefac (talk) 22:02, 28 June 2018 (UTC)
The same as it is for any other academic biography – or any biography generally. It's key to having a full portrait of their background. In cases where the subject's home town differs from their birth place and their main residence (i.e., the only cases in which the parameter's use is permitted), it is much more pertinent than their birth place. 142.160.89.97 (talk) 04:27, 1 October 2018 (UTC)
Hi all. I'm a bit new to Wikipedia's editing community, so please bear with me.
I've been working on C.-T. James Huang's page for awhile now. One thing that I would really like to have in the infobox is his Chinese name, and I'd like to do so in a way that will help non-Chinese scientists and readers absorb this information better than the current |native_name= and |native_name_lang= combination can deliver. The following parameter in Template:Infobox Chinese-language singer and actor accomplish this perfectly (example shown for Mandarin Chinese traditional characters, Template:Infobox Chinese-language singer and actor also has parameters for simplified and pinyin romanization):
{{#if:{{{tradchinesename|}}}|<span class="nickname" style="font-size: 120%;" lang="zh-Hant">{{{tradchinesename}}}</span> <small>([[Traditional Chinese characters|traditional]])</small>}}
For a live example of its implementation in context, see the infobox on Jia Zhangke.
While I know that suggesting such a narrow modification to Infobox_scientist is unprofitable, I would like to know how to accomplish this. In particular, I believe that many scientists' pages and the communities that read them (especially readers who speak that scientist's native language) would benefit from the ability to display native names more flexibly. In the case of Chinese, which has multiple orthographies (in addition to the most crucial distinctions: Traditional vs. Simplified (the standard in Mainland China) characters, and Pinyin romanization for non-speakers), this is an absolutely crucial range of featuration when one chooses to display Chinese language names.
Now, since my technical skills are novice at best, I'd like to ask whether there any recourse for my proposal, besides taking the issue to Infobox_person and arguing for a more widely-adapted solution which would vacuously satisfy my request.
Thanks for reading. – Mczuba (talk) 7:56, 24 October 2017 (UTC)
I'd be inclined to wait for that merger to take place, at which point the change you want will just be a simple matter of exposing the underlying parameters in {{Infobox_person}}.
This infobox doesn't play nice with multiple modules
I've noticed a few discrepancies when editors attempt to use this infobox with multiple modules. One example would be what happens at Steven Novella. Because this gentleman is both a scientist and a physician, editors attempted to use the module template:infobox_medical_details to add physician details to the infobox. But, as a result, the "Medical Career" heading is off-center. The only reason this is necessary is that the infobox also includes a module for a voice recording. I fixed this temporarily by putting the voice parameter as a separate infobox inside the infobox instead of as a module, but this is a bandaid. Can someone enable multiple modules inside this infobox as exists with template:infobox_medical_person? Thank you. I can imagine there are other physicians/scientists who could have voice recording sections in their infobox, as well as a number of other small modules.--Shibbolethink(♔♕)18:20, 25 November 2018 (UTC)
To quote myself: Well, education and alma mater isn't always directly related to one's scientific career, nor are awards. Known for might be worth shifting though. I also changed the diff to an archive link. Primefac (talk) 16:23, 15 July 2019 (UTC)
Please add this TfD notice to the template itself. Thankyou. StarryGrandma (talk) 23:29, 19 March 2020 (UTC){{Tfm/dated|page=Infobox scientist|otherpage=Infobox academic|link=Wikipedia:Templates for discussion/Log/2020 March 19#Template:Infobox scientist|bigbox={{#invoke:Noinclude|noinclude|text=yes}}}}
I've removed this parameter as {{infobox person}} no longer supports it (see discussion at Infobox_person#Residence_parameter). I note that some infoboxes such as {{infobox officeholder}} still use this parameter, but that template doesn't wrap {[tl|infobox person}}. If there is a desire to retain the parameter, the template would need rewriting along similar lines using {{infobox}} directly. Personally, I see no need. — Jts1882 | talk09:37, 24 February 2020 (UTC)
The infobox for persons has an occupation field, but there seems to be nothing corresponding to that here. Might such be added? --Brian Josephson (talk) 16:52, 5 May 2020 (UTC)
Move "Alma mater," "Known for" under "Scientific career"
The organisation of this infobox as it is right now doesn't make sense (see, e.g. Stanisław Łojasiewicz). Clearly what a scientist is known for is part of his scientific career (except maybe for corner cases who are known for appearing in a movie or something). --bender235 (talk) 22:35, 31 May 2020 (UTC)
REQUEST for Post-Nominals
Can somebody please add the 'Post-nominals' option to infobox scientist. On normal infobox person you get to add any text, e.g. "MD" and "Phd" below their name at the top of the box which looks good. Sxologist (talk) 10:28, 18 July 2020 (UTC)
It seems like there should be more options besides thesis_url like using a parameter instead of a URL like ProQuest template, doi, hdl, etc. — Chris Capoccia💬13:16, 12 September 2020 (UTC)
Students parameter consistency
Infobox scientist has the following description for its doctoral_students field:
If a student does not have a wiki article, then comment the name out. It can be reinstated once such an article appears. The idea is to list only those students who are significant enough to warrant their own article.
Only include students who have been supervised at doctoral level by the academic and are notable enough for WP articles. Should be explained in the main text of the article; Those that are not mentioned in the main text may be deleted
The two agree that non-notable students should not be included but differ in the recommended solution when a non-notable student has been included. I see no reason why one should recommend deletion while the other recommends commenting out. I think that commenting is a worse solution (in what other situations do we retain commented mentions of non-notable – and often living – people?). I suggest changing the text on Infobox Scientist to recommend deletion of non-notable students from the infobox. - Astrophobe (talk) 18:29, 13 December 2020 (UTC)
This template doesn't have the occupation field from {{infobox person}}. It could be assumed that the person is a scientist, but that doesn't actually get displayed anywhere in the infobox (except indirectly as the Scientific Career heading. There is no place to say the person was a professor, corporate researcher, etc. I think the occupation field would be helpful as this is certainly "key information" about a person. The documentation even says that |field= is not to be used for occupation, but there is no place for occupation (without going to the trouble of using infobox person and embedding infobox scientist just to get occupation). MB02:07, 13 February 2021 (UTC)
Right now these descriptions are as follows:
death_date: Date of death
birth_date: Scientist's date of birth
I think it would be helpful to copy the descriptions from Template:Infobox_person so it is easy for people using the GUI to see the date templates and copy them.
For example:
Date of birth: {{Birth date and age|YYYY|MM|DD}} for living people. For people who have died, use {{Birth date|YYYY|MM|DD}}. If only a year of birth is known, or age as of a certain date, consider using Template:birth year and age or Template:birth based on age as of date.
Date of death: {{Death date and age|YYYY|MM|DD|YYYY|MM|DD}} (if birth date is known) or Template:death date (if birth date unknown). See Template:Death date/doc for details on usage. If exact dates are unknown, consider using Template:death year and age.
This template has spouse/partner/children, but not the other commons relatives (mother/father/parents/relatives). As in other bios, scientists can also have notable relatives. There are articles in Category:Pages using infobox scientist with unknown parameters trying to use these. I would like to clean these up without going to the trouble of embedding within infobox person. Jonesey95? MB01:08, 24 August 2021 (UTC)
I have added those four parameters, and they appear to work. They are handled by {{infobox person}}, since this template is a wrapper. Someone could add them to the documentation. – Jonesey95 (talk) 16:11, 24 August 2021 (UTC)
unused para check
|honorific-suffix= and |honorific-prefix= were not listed as valid parameters even though they were. I've changed all articles using them to the "_" version, so I guess they should be completely removed at this point. Frietjes ? MB22:03, 12 October 2021 (UTC)
The spouse parameter was deleted by consensus in 2006, for good reason, and then arbitrarily reinstated in 2011. It should be deleted again. There's no reason to be naming people's spouses in infoboxes, unless they are also notable themselves (which is rarely going to be the case), otherwise it's just an invasion of that person's privacy for no purpose. Richard75 (talk) 23:41, 26 December 2021 (UTC)
Remove "update needed" tag from template page
This edit request has been answered. Set the |answered= or |ans= parameter to no to reactivate your request.
The "update needed" tag on the template page is from October 2017, and seems to refer to the lack of parameters for spouses and family members in the template. As those are now included, the tag should probably be cleared? Thanks! PianoDan (talk) 23:40, 14 January 2022 (UTC)
Frietjes, this has |workplaces=, |work_institution=, and |work_institutions=. I happened onto one article that used two of these; there are probably more out there. As a highly used template, it's probably worth adding a clobbered parameter check. MB05:17, 7 February 2022 (UTC)
The "resting place" field seems to be misspelled "resting rlace" when I add this template to an article. Can that be fixed? 𝕱𝖎𝖈𝖆𝖎𝖆 (talk) 05:26, 29 June 2022 (UTC)
Not done for now: I see no indication that anything in this template is misspelled. Could you please point to a page (or two) where you see this happening? Primefac (talk) 07:44, 29 June 2022 (UTC)
It looks like the fields are spelled properly when I edit the page, and it's not throwing a "bad parameter" error. I did fix a typo in the TemplateData, but that doesn't seem to have affected any pages. Primefac (talk) 09:13, 29 June 2022 (UTC)
Currently the |awards= parameter is placed outside the "Scientific career", meaning that the awards aren't given as part of peoples' scientific careers. E.g. Svante Pääbo has been awarded a Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, but not as a part of his scientific career.
Proposal
Creating an additional "|scientific_awards=" (or something like it) within the "Scientific career", allowing for differentiation between academic/scientific awards and civil/chivalric orders. Alternatively, move |awards= down, so awards given for scientific works are included in the scientific career. Skjoldbro (talk) 19:12, 9 October 2022 (UTC)
There is some precedent for this with {{Infobox officeholder}} which has |awards= which is in the main section and |mawards= which goes in the Military subsection.
However, in this case, unless it is demonstrated that there are many cases where there are non-scientific awards, I think it is sufficient to just move awards down into the Scientific career section. I've noticed this myself but never said anything. The same exists in {{infobox academic}} and probably others. MB19:43, 9 October 2022 (UTC)
The addition of "honorific suffix" as a documented parameter
I know that "honorific_suffix" made be added via the source, but for the sake of convenience I am wondering if it made be made a documented parameter in the infobox—it seems many scientists have honorific suffixes which, among others, include titles such as FRS, etc. etc. GuardianH (talk) 02:23, 24 December 2022 (UTC)
Thesis identifier instead of just thesis url?
to reduce potential for link rot and given that many theses have a standard identifier like hdl, doi, proquest, oclc, etc, should there be a place to put this identifier instead of just a url? — Chris Capoccia💬14:35, 10 February 2023 (UTC)
Mass-removal of residence parameter from existing infoboxes
Hi all. In 2019, consensus was reached to remove the residence parameter from the parent template, Template:Infobox person. This was completed shortly thereafter. However, today we are left with thousands of articles that clutter up Category:Pages using infobox scientist with unknown parameters. I'm here to seek consensus on whether we should have an automated bot task clean up the thousands of infoboxes that are using the now-removed residence parameter. This seems like a perfect task for PrimeBOT 30, which already has open-ended approval for removal of deprecated parameters. This would help significantly clean up Category:Pages using infobox scientist with unknown parameters, which currently has 4600+ articles, the vast majority of which are for the residence parameter. After doing a dry AWB run searching for anything with a residence parameter, I have determined that roughly 95-98% of the articles in that maintenance category can be fixed with a simple removal of the residence parameter. There is precedent for this type of bot work, as can be seen here. Phuzion (talk) 01:48, 3 February 2023 (UTC)
I don't think there is a need for additional discussion, since the RFC was pretty clear and has not been challenged, AFAIK. Pinging Primefac for this request. – Jonesey95 (talk) 15:54, 16 February 2023 (UTC)
None on this template. As far as I can tell, the only articles in the above maintenance category are just for use of the removed residence parameter. Phuzion (talk) 18:30, 16 February 2023 (UTC)
Pulication item
Hi
I reckon this infobox needs and item publications like books and papers.
Don't think this improves the "Notes" section. Tested both the template and the div style in the sandbox here and here, but in both cases the "Notes" caption was forced to appear even when there were no footnotes, and the existing footnotes looked odd due to the centering effect. Even if the "Notes" caption could somehow be subdued when there are no footnotes, I would have to oppose this change. P.I. Ellsworth , ed.put'er there13:46, 20 May 2023 (UTC)
It might look a little better when the footnotes are enclosed in <ref></ref> tags, but I think it looks weird when the footnotes are written out, like they are on this template's test cases page. P.I. Ellsworth , ed.put'er there17:19, 24 May 2023 (UTC)
