Template talk:Infobox person

For pending merger proposals (2009 to date) see Template talk:Infobox person/Mergers

Subordinate countries in infoboxes

Should we condense place names by omitting subordinate countries, for example, Template:Xt, Template:Xt or Template:Xt from past to present. After a discussion at Template talk:Infobox person/Archive 38#Adding "union republic" notion to the doc, and this edit. Absolutiva (talk) 22:41, 5 June 2025 (UTC)

I think subordinate countries should generally be included, because removing them makes the infobox much less informative. Using your examples, for instance:

• Berlin: whether someone was born in East or West Germany makes a major difference in their biography
• Soviet republics: removing them makes the location information 15 times less informative - we can no longer tell if someone was born in Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, Uzbekistan, Georgia, etc but just a vague "Soviet Union". This is especially true for less widely known place names, e.g. (picking a random place) Template:Tq would not say very much to many people, whereas Template:Tq would at least let readers see that the person was born in Ukraine.

How I think we should condense place names in infoboxes instead is to remove subdivisions below the level of subordinate countries - e.g. the Oleksandr Syrskyi article's infobox now lists his birthplace as Template:Tq. This is the worst of both worlds as it skips mentioning that he was born in Russia, but instead includes an oblast name that most readers not already familiar with the region wouldn't be able to place. Instead, I think this should be Template:Tq. We also shouldn't list both subordinate countries and their subdivisions, e.g. Template:!xt would be too long, but Template:Tq is just right IMO. Helpful Cat🐈(talk) 13:32, 7 June 2025 (UTC)

Take a look at discussion for Stalin's infobox (also for Putin's infobox as undiscussed), which "Russian SFSR" is omitted to make it concise as per MOS:INFOBOXPURPOSE, stated "Template:Tq". Absolutiva (talk) 14:15, 7 June 2025 (UTC)

Thanks for linking these. I do disagree that Soviet republics are Template:Tq, for the reasons I outlined above - Template:Tq is useful in a way that Template:Tq is not, because "born in the Soviet Union" is true of most people from that region who are 35 or older, and adds very little value. I can see the argument for removing Soviet republics when the city is very well-known (e.g. Moscow), but I wouldn't want to create a blanket guideline that subordinate countries should never be listed.

Per MOS:INFOBOXPURPOSE, the reason for conciseness is to Template:Tq - I think this would err too far on the side of removing key facts, rather than making them more accessible. If I saw Template:Tq in an infobox, I would have to look at the article text to see where that is, defeating the point of the infobox. But this is my opinion, and it would be good to see if there's a community consensus on this. Helpful Cat🐈(talk) 17:16, 7 June 2025 (UTC)

I agree with @Helpful Cat. The Soviet republics where those people were born are almost always relevant to the latter's notability (e.g. Mila Kunis, Milla Jovovich, and Georgiy Gongadze). Also, per MOS:INFONAT, we should include the former in |birth_place= if they imply the latter's citizenship (e.g. Vladimir Putin, Mikhail Gorbachev, and Alla Pugacheva). Thedarkknightli (talk) 13:53, 8 June 2025 (UTC)

Yeah, this is a great point about implying citizenship, which lets us skip the citizenship field in those cases. Helpful Cat🐈(talk) 14:41, 8 June 2025 (UTC)

Most Soviet people are considered to be Russian citizens, you cannot just add into |nationality= parameter, see this example. Absolutiva (talk) 21:52, 8 June 2025 (UTC)

Template:Tq

Well, no, that only applies to people from the Russian SFSR, not people from the other 14 Soviet republics. (Arguably the likelihood that readers will assume the Soviet Union = Russia is another reason why listing Soviet republics is an important clarification)

Also, per MOS:INFONAT, |nationality= should not be used, but |citizenship= is fine (but citizenship can be omitted if it can be inferred from the birth country). Helpful Cat🐈(talk) 02:01, 9 June 2025 (UTC)

See edits by a user for these examples of removing "Russian SFSR" from the infobox, it should be concise and comprehensible:

• Special:Diff/1180368251
• Special:Diff/1146990765
• Special:Diff/1136769412
• Special:Diff/1127336855
• Special:Diff/1046908553

Absolutiva (talk) 11:01, 14 June 2025 (UTC)

Yeah, I see that some users are currently doing this. My opinion (since I guess this discussion is meant to gather opinions) is that they shouldn't for all the reasons I listed above, though. Helpful Cat🐈(talk) 13:33, 14 June 2025 (UTC)

Not for people born in (or near) the largest cities in historical period (for example, Template:Tq, but not Template:Tq, because the German Empire or Weimar Republic is the common name for Germany). Everybody knows what capital and largest cities (including Berlin or Moscow) are. Infoboxes should be concise. On the other hand, specifying a small town and administrative division (for example, Template:Tq, but not Template:Tq) because it forces the reader to follow the link for the town that they might not know. Absolutiva (talk) 03:37, 15 June 2025 (UTC)

Yeah, I can see the argument for leaving out Soviet republics or other subordinate countries when the city is extremely well-known.

Template:Tq

Sorry, I don't really understand this sentence, maybe you could clarify?

I generally think that if we're going to list one subdivision, it should be a Soviet republic rather than an oblast (or in general, a subordinate country rather than a lower subdivision). Let's change your example a bit (because Template:Tq is obviously in Russia as you said). I think Template:Tq tells the reader very little, while Template:Tq at least tells the reader that this place is in Russia. Helpful Cat🐈(talk) 14:15, 17 June 2025 (UTC)

By avoiding the use of Soviet republics, for example, in Maxim Gorky's infobox where he died, in a small town: Template:Tq should be different by using subdivisions of the Russian SFSR. For the capital city in oblasts, krais and autonomous oblasts, by avoid repeating unnecessary subdivision: Template:Tq, so that Template:Tq, would be simple and concisely. Absolutiva (talk) 01:35, 18 June 2025 (UTC)

Template:OdAt the very least, let's establish that no further regional clarification is needed for immediately recognizable major cities such as Berlin, Moscow, St. Petersburg, Kiev. (For Berlin, one can use West Berlin if necessary, which is indeed important.) Similarly, for a small town in a large city's area it would be precise and sufficient to specify Moscow Oblast or Leningrad Oblast. And even if RSFSR ever needs to be mentioned, this alone is just too broad, it could be anywhere between Kaliningrad and Vladivostok. It's much less of a problem for the other Soviet republics since they are all much smaller. — Mike Novikoff 16:50, 20 June 2025 (UTC)

Again, Template:U restoring "Russian SFSR" to infobox for Vladimir Putin and Mikhail Gorbachev. Absolutiva 02:05, 24 July 2025 (UTC)

I agree with @Thedarkknightli here; I think "Russian SFSR" is useful in those infoboxes. One can easily imagine a reader with the basic question "Was Putin/Gorbachev born in Russia?", and the infobox should answer that quickly. This is especially true for Gorbachev, as Template:Tq is not an easily recognisable place; however, I would argue it's also useful and does no harm for Putin, as Template:Tq has undergone so many historical name changes that readers could be forgiven for not instantly recognising it. Infoboxes should be useful to readers and allow them to Template:Tq; while that means being concise, it also means not removing key facts that are useful to readers. Helpful Cat {talk} 03:05, 24 July 2025 (UTC)

See RfC discussion at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Russia#RfC: Omission of Russian SFSR from biographical infoboxes. Absolutiva 03:09, 24 July 2025 (UTC)

"Russian SFSR" is not any more recognizable than Leningrad - most readers will not understand that to be the country now known as Russia. Nikkimaria (talk) 05:38, 25 July 2025 (UTC)

I've got to disagree - I think it's intuitive to many/most readers that the Russian SFSR corresponds to Russia, the Ukrainian SSR corresponds to Ukraine, etc. In comparison, if you don't know a city name, you have no way of placing it. Helpful Cat {talk} 10:20, 26 July 2025 (UTC)

Birth name

The guidance for |birth_name= at Template:Infobox person states: "Name at birth; only use if different from |name=." This has been interpreted in two ways:

1. Use |birth_name= for the full birth name, unless the full birth name already appears in |name=. Example: |name=Richard Nixon and |birth_name=Richard Milhous Nixon in the article about Richard Nixon.
2. Use |birth_name= only if the name was subsequently changed. This is Template:U's interpretation. Examples: ""birthname" is redundant since he never changed it" and "Birth name is redundant".

Which interpretation is correct? Khiikiat (talk) 12:20, 25 June 2025 (UTC)

The second. Nikkimaria (talk) 00:51, 26 June 2025 (UTC)

I am fairly sure the intended meaning is the first one. I have looked at many biographical articles, including many good articles and featured articles, and they all include the birth name in the infobox. Template:Infobox person gives the example of Bill Gates: |name=Bill Gates |birth_name=William Henry Gates III. And Template:Infobox academic gives the example of C. S. Lewis: |name=C. S. Lewis |birth_name=Clive Staples Lewis. Khiikiat (talk) 10:44, 27 June 2025 (UTC)

Criminal convictions

We have the parameter "criminal_charges", which is "for convicted criminals only". So shouldn't the parameter rather be "criminal_convictions"? —St.Nerol (talk, contribs) 15:45, 2 July 2025 (UTC)

Title parameter issue

Something has gone wrong in the "title" parameter. The text appears extremely large, a different font, etc. etc. See for example: Lisa Su. This is an issue going on with every article with the parameter.  GuardianH  08:34, 6 July 2025 (UTC)

Template:Ping it looks fine to me. Can you post a screenshot of what you are seeing? Also, what is your device, browser, etc? VanIsaac, GHTV ^contr_about 18:48, 6 July 2025 (UTC)

Vanisaac Possibly this is an issue going on only with my system (Macbook, Chrome). For some reason, anything in the parameter appears in an enlarged white-only font.  GuardianH  22:49, 6 July 2025 (UTC)

I can only surmise it has something to do with the class42=title for that data. Anyone know what's going on there or why it's in the code? I don't know how CSS works on Wikipedia, and it's very badly documented, but that seems misplaced to me. VanIsaac, GHTV ^contr_about 03:39, 7 July 2025 (UTC)

Template:Replyto Where do you see this class42=title? It's not in the page wikitext, and not in the HTML that is served either. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 21:01, 7 July 2025 (UTC)

When I use "View Source" for {{Infobox person}}, somewhere around line 125 is "| class42 = title". My understanding is that will format data42= based on the CSS class "title", whatever that is. I'm wondering if that's causing the issue with that line specifically on their device. VanIsaac, GHTV ^contr_about 03:04, 8 July 2025 (UTC)

Ah, I thought that you meant at Lisa Su. Anyway, as documented at Template:Infobox#Main data and Template:Infobox#HTML classes and microformats, the |class42= parameter is the class associated with the |data42= parameter. The code at Template:Infobox person has:

| label42    = {{#if:{{{office|}}}|Office|Title}}
| data42     = {{{office|{{{title|}}}}}}
| class42    = title

and since Lisa Su has

| title              = {{no wrap|President and CEO of [[AMD]]}} (2014–present)<br/>Chair of AMD (2022–present)

this is as if Template:Infobox was being fed

| label42    = Title
| data42     = {{no wrap|President and CEO of [[AMD]]}} (2014–present)<br/>Chair of AMD (2022–present)
| class42    = title

and the emitted HTML is

<tr>
  <th scope="row" class="infobox-label">Title</th>
  <td class="infobox-data title"><span class="nowrap">President and CEO of <a href="/wiki/AMD" title="AMD">AMD</a></span> (2014–present)<br>Chair of AMD (2022–present)</td>
</tr>

and that's where the class ends up - in the <td class="infobox-data title"> tag. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 18:20, 8 July 2025 (UTC)

I feel that class="infobox-data title" seems like it would be a CSS class for formatting article titles in an infobox, and that it would probably be inappropriate for a job title. I think it's probably what is causing the issues for GuardianH. VanIsaac, GHTV ^contr_about 21:53, 8 July 2025 (UTC)

A class is not necessarily used for CSS formatting; some classes have purposes that are totally unrelated to formatting. In this case, the infobox-data is used for formatting (it applies two declarations, text-align: left; and vertical-align: top; to the data cell where that "President and CEO of ..." text appears), but the title class is present for the benefit of external tools, in order to detect the type of data held in each cell - in this case, a job title. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 23:32, 8 July 2025 (UTC)

Issue with "Spouse" section and divorce.

I noticed on Miley Cyrus' page it says her spouse is Liam Hemsworth. (and vice versa) They are divorced and were married for barely over a year. One of these people was really abusive to the other. Google searches for "Who is Miley Cyrus' Spouse" gives her ex husband's name in enourmous 150 pt font with Wikipedia listed as the source. I know the idea is that it says Spouse if there's one and Spouses if there's two or more. I also understand the section is designed to be a list. Can we make it say "Marriage history" or "Former spouse" if there's one person AND a divorce date? Is there a better idea for renaming? A lot of the history of Marriage comes from literal ownership, Mrs. means "belonging to the mister." I don't think people who were divorced want listed under "Spouse" and it's generally confusing. GlowingLava (talk) 14:12, 21 July 2025 (UTC)

The infobox states both the year they were married, as well as the year they were divorced, directly after the name of the respective spouse. Google AI's inability to glean context is a Google problem, not a Wikipedia problem. The information is clearly and concisely stated, with context provided immediately after the name. Literally within a dozen text characters after the name, you can see that they are divorced. I don't know what else we can do without misleading readers by withholding pertinent information. Talk to Google - they're the ones lying to readers. VanIsaac, GHTV ^contr_about 04:09, 24 July 2025 (UTC)

Thanks, the Google thing is just an example. The issue is more fundamental to the English language. If someone asked who your spouse was and you said your ex-spouse's name, you'd be wrong. Does the infobox have the ability to avoid this confusion? More than half the marriages in my country end in divorce, the infobox should be able to elegantly handle this situation or be worded as not to cause the problem in the first place. GlowingLava (talk) 06:14, 24 July 2025 (UTC)

Tooltips for relatives and partners

Should we add a tooltip for the relatives and partners parameters? I frequently see a lot of back-and-forth edits of users adding exhaustive lists of non-notable relatives and partners to infoboxes. The labels would read Relatives and Partners. MB2437 23:42, 31 July 2025 (UTC)

Nay. It's semantically redundant, and would imply any other parameter in the infobox somehow needn't be "notable"—i.e. key information on a topic. What's more, given the majority of our readers are on mobile, which has as a rule spurned use of the <abbr>...</abbr> HTML tag, our style policy of avoiding it whenever possible and never using it for bespoke information seems better-justified than ever. Remsense 🌈 论 23:46, 31 July 2025 (UTC)

(It seems to me that infobox inclusion tugs-of-war are more or less endemic to how Wikipedia works, and there's not really any quick fix for that other than educating newer editors about the consensus regarding what information infoboxes are capable of presenting well.) Remsense 🌈 论 23:51, 31 July 2025 (UTC)

Religion parameter for non-clergy

The RFC deprecrating the parameter stated it would 'Permit inclusion in individual articles' infoboxes (through the template's ability to accept custom parameters) if directly tied to the person's notability, per consensus at the article.', would someone be able to explain how one can do this? I believe including religious affiliation of ecclesiastical architects is appropriate and within the scope of the infobox purpose. Traumnovelle (talk) 00:48, 20 August 2025 (UTC)

Can you link to an article as an example where this would be helpful? In that article, what source identifies the religious affiliation? Johnuniq (talk) 02:57, 20 August 2025 (UTC)

I haven't finished writing the expansion but I was planning on using it for Frederick de Jersey Clere, an architect who primarily designed churches, was hired as an architect by an Anglican diocese, member of the synod, and whose most notable work was on Anglican churches.

Architect of the Angels by Susan Maclean identifies him as an Anglican. Traumnovelle (talk) 04:26, 20 August 2025 (UTC)

New Code Alert! Review requested…

I have a written a new module… Module:Person date. Loosely based on Template:U’s incredible work with Module:Person height & Module:Person weight, the purpose of this module is to automatically parse |birth_date= and |death_date= into their proper {{birth date}}/{{death date}} templates. A few things to note about the template:

• If one of the many date templates is in use already (i.e {{birth date}} or {{death date and age}}) the module does nothing. It will not change the output in any way.
• If raw dates are passed in (|birth_date=12 Nov 2002, |death_date=2009 etc.) the code will call the appropriate template to wrap the value in hCard microformat. The code will also automatically place the age in either the birth or death section depending on whether the person is still alive (determined by whether the |death_date= is set to a value or not).
• The code will automatically determine if an age range is appropriate (this occurs when only a year is provided and not a full date).
• The code will also allow for cases where a reference appears after the date. It will parse the date and leave the reference in place.

I have created a myriad of test cases which can be found in the respective documentations for {{Infobox person/birth}} and {{Infobox person/death}}. I have also implemented the code in {{Infobox person/sandbox}} as well as added a number of testcases to the testcases page for the infobox.

I would LOVE some feedback on what people think of this code. Please try to break it and let me know if there are edge cases I have not accounted for. I’d love to add this to the Infobox but want to get a little peer review before I shove it into use.

Pinging frequent editors of {{Infobox person}}: Template:Ping —Zackmann (^{Talk to me}/_{What I been doing}) 06:10, 18 September 2025 (UTC)

I added a degenerate test case called "Still alive MDY much too old". Module:Age checks for life spans of 130 years or more. – Jonesey95 (talk) 13:48, 18 September 2025 (UTC)

The "Month and Year only" does not always compute the age correctly. Somebody born on 30 September 1993 is not 32 years old on 18 September 2025, while someone born on 1 September 1993 is. Shouldn't the output be "31–32 years"? —Kusma (talk) 13:55, 18 September 2025 (UTC)

Nice catch. I worked back in 2015, I think, to get this range issue sorted out in some of the age templates. I have further adjusted two of the test cases to use the current month name in order to test this age range ambiguity. – Jonesey95 (talk) 15:14, 18 September 2025 (UTC)

Template:Ping it would appear you have found a bug in {{b-da}} because:

{{b-da|Dec 12, 1795}} → Template:B-da

{{bda|1795|12|12}} →

Not sure how best to proceed with this. I think it is an extreme edge case that may not need to be accounted for in Module:Person date but should definitely be addressed over at {{b-da}}. Thoughts? Zackmann (^{Talk to me}/_{What I been doing}) 21:20, 18 September 2025 (UTC)

It might be better for your new module to call Module:Age, which has error-checking features. I don't know if that is feasible. – Jonesey95 (talk) 21:59, 18 September 2025 (UTC)

Hmmmm. That is worth investigating. —Zackmann (^{Talk to me}/_{What I been doing}) 22:00, 18 September 2025 (UTC)

I have the basis for an edge check mapped out. Gotta run for a few hours but will finish up this evening. —Zackmann (^{Talk to me}/_{What I been doing}) 23:18, 18 September 2025 (UTC)

Ok. Template:Ping I have implemented a check for the age and used the same MAX_AGE of 130. As you can see in the test case it now displays a pretty clear error message. What you cannot see is that it also does a {{main other|Category:Articles using module person date older than 130}} so it will be easy to monitor any errors that pop up when the code is first implemented. Let me know if you find any other issues or edge cases. —Zackmann (^{Talk to me}/_{What I been doing}) 05:25, 19 September 2025 (UTC)

Found some more weird edge cases that I just resolved… In all of these the code will now just return the original input and not parse it:

• {{infobox person/birth|{{bya|1990}}}} → Template:Bya
• {{infobox person/birth|1990 (age 25)}} → 1990 (age 25)
• {{infobox person/death|1960|{{dya|1965}}}} → Template:Infobox person/death
• {{infobox person/death|1960|1965 (aged 5)}} → Template:Infobox person/death
• {{infobox person/death|1960|1965 (age 5)}} → Template:Infobox person/death

Zackmann (^{Talk to me}/_{What I been doing}) 05:58, 19 September 2025 (UTC)

Why base your code on the horrible Template:Birth date and age text and not Template:Birth date and age? Gonnym (talk) 17:03, 22 September 2025 (UTC)

Template:Od Some more testcases to look at:

• {{infobox person/birth|Sep 1930}} → September 1930 (age 95)
• {{infobox person/birth|SEP 1930}} → September 1930 (age 95)
• {{infobox person/birth|Sept 1930}} → September 1930 (age 95)
• {{Birth date and age text|Sep 1930}} → Template:Birth date and age text
• {{Birth date and age text|SEP 1930}} → Template:Birth date and age text
• {{Birth date and age text|Sept 1930}} → Template:Birth date and age text
• {{infobox person/birth|1930-31}} → 1930-31
• {{infobox person/birth|1930-1931}} → 1930-1931
• {{infobox person/birth|1930 or 1931}} → 1930 or 1931
• {{infobox person/birth|1930/1931}} →1930 /1931
• {{infobox person/death|1930-31|1980}} → Template:Infobox person/death
• {{infobox person/death|1930-1931|1980}} → Template:Infobox person/death
• {{infobox person/death|1930|1980-81}} → Template:Infobox person/death
• {{infobox person/death|1930|1980-1981}} → Template:Infobox person/death
• {{infobox person/death|1 Jan 1980|1 Jan 1930}} → Template:Infobox person/death

-- WOSlinker (talk) 07:20, 19 September 2025 (UTC)

Why are these here, and not at Template:Infobox person/testcases? --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 07:53, 19 September 2025 (UTC)

To prevent filling up Template:Infobox person/testcases with JUST tests of this, can I suggest that we take further testing over to Template:Infobox person/birth/testcase? —Zackmann (^{Talk to me}/_{What I been doing}) 08:01, 19 September 2025 (UTC)

So I’m going to put this on hold for a little bit. Template:U pointed out some really good edge cases that I missed. Been thinking about how to solve them for the past few hours and think I need a new approach… If anyone thinks of more edge cases feel free to add them to Template:Infobox person/birth/testcases but I‘m going to take a few days break from working on it. Template:Smiley—Zackmann (^{Talk to me}/_{What I been doing}) 20:26, 19 September 2025 (UTC)

Template:Ping went back to the drawing board and made some major changes. It is a bit more selective now. It will NOT process date ranges (i.e. |birth_date=1990-1991) and will simply display the unparsed input, but it is far less likely to break. The regex now matches from start to finish, rather then just the start of the line. So hopefully there will be fewer issues. Please test away at your leisure and let me know if you find any errors.

Note that I have initiated a discussion at {{b-da}} about the case where the day is not known and the month is the current month (ex: {{b-da|October 1990}} which should display an age range but instead displays Template:B-da). That discussion can be found here. I’ll keep an eye on that but is a fairly small use case and is a preexisting bug so I don’t think it should delay this module… Thanks in advance for the assistance! Template:Smiley —Zackmann (^{Talk to me}/_{What I been doing}) 09:16, 22 September 2025 (UTC)

I don't love the last bit, where you would be spreading known bugs into this template. We know that Module:Age does some validity checks; why not use that module instead of a buggy template? – Jonesey95 (talk) 12:12, 22 September 2025 (UTC)

Template:Ping The reason for using {{Birth date and age text}} is it simplifies the parsing of string. I don’t have to convert 12 August 1990 to 1990|8|12 to call the agreeably better {{birth date and age}} (or related template). If you feel strongly that this code needs to use that format, I can certainly venture down that avenue. Literally as I’m typing this I’m thinking that I actually agree with you… Template:Smiley… So I will make that my goal tonight. I’ll do another refactor. I think I can make use of Module:Date to simplify my work… To be continued. Thanks again for the feedback! Zackmann (^{Talk to me}/_{What I been doing}) 21:47, 22 September 2025 (UTC)

This happens to me all the time. It takes me actually typing out a response or a question to figure out what I should really do. Keep plugging away, and ask for feedback when you make some progress. – Jonesey95 (talk) 00:15, 23 September 2025 (UTC)

Ok… Template:U I think I’ve got it working. I’ve looked through the testcases as well as the documentation for both {{Infobox person/birth}} & {{Infobox person/death}} (which both have a bunch of their own test cases). There are definitely areas for future improvement. For example, at the moment the code will not parse dates that have a reference (it just displays the original input unchaged). But I cannot find any testcases that break or cause errors.

I have also added Category:Age error (0), Category:Pages using age template with invalid date (0) & Category:Articles using module person date older than 130 (0) to the categories I monitor so if/when this is rolled out I can spot any errors right away. Zackmann (^{Talk to me}/_{What I been doing}) 08:18, 23 September 2025 (UTC)

The functions should not be changing a DMY formatted date into a MD,Y formatted date. {{infobox person/birth|1 January 2000}} → (2000-01-01) 1 January 2000 -- WOSlinker (talk) 20:59, 23 September 2025 (UTC)

Template:Od Template:Ping good catch! I have initiated a discussion at Module talk:Age where the underlying problem is. I’m going to hold out implementing a custom solution in my code in hopes that Template:U can work some magic with Module:Age but will definitely not roll this out until that is resolved. —-Zackmann (^{Talk to me}/_{What I been doing}) 22:43, 23 September 2025 (UTC)

So Template:Ping turns out it was easier/faster to just implement the code in Module:Person date. Only took a few minutes. Check out the various test cases of DMY vs MDY. I think I checked every permutation possible, but feel free to correct me… Zackmann (^{Talk to me}/_{What I been doing}) 07:06, 24 September 2025 (UTC)

All looks good now. -- WOSlinker (talk) 10:14, 24 September 2025 (UTC)

Template:Ping any objections to rolling this out? —Zackmann (^{Talk to me}/_{What I been doing}) 20:35, 24 September 2025 (UTC)

As a test, I have implemented the templates on {{Infobox Twitch streamer}} (421 transclusions). Hopefully that will help weed out any unforeseen issues…—Zackmann (^{Talk to me}/_{What I been doing}) 03:27, 25 September 2025 (UTC)

A number of the testcases in the Full birth date set section are failing at the moment for some reason. -- WOSlinker (talk) 06:44, 25 September 2025 (UTC)

Template:Fixed Template:Ping that would be because I am a complete and total moron… You make ONE TINY LITTLE CHANGE… Oh well. Thanks for catching that. Resolved. —Zackmann (^{Talk to me}/_{What I been doing}) 06:49, 25 September 2025 (UTC)

The rollout

Starting VERY slow and checking for breakage along the way. A few tracking categories and searches to track the progress for those interested…

• Category:Pages where birth or death is being automatically determined (0) (these are pages where the module is actually affecting what is being displayed.
• Category:Articles using module person date older than 130 (0)
• Category:Age error (0)
• Templates where the module has been involked
• Templates where the module will eventually be involved.

Keep the feedback coming and let me know if any issues arise. —Zackmann (^{Talk to me}/_{What I been doing}) 07:47, 25 September 2025 (UTC)

So just an update. I’ve run into a few issues.

1. Lots of pages with a birthdate but the deathdate is unknown. The workaround is of course to just set |death_date=Unknown. This suppresses the code from trying to calculate the age. An example of this is Lucas Boada. I would imagine that someone may want to be able to suppress the display of deathdate from the infobox when it is unknown without causing the code to go berserk… Anyone have thoughts on that? Maybe creating another param along the lines of |suppress_death_date=? Open to any suggestions.
2. There are a few pages that are {{Infobox royalty}} for fictional characters. For example Belgarion. This fictional character was born in the year 5355 so naturally this causes the code to get very confused. My thinking of how to resolve this is that the page should use {{Infobox character}} (which will NOT get the Module:Person date treatment because fictional characters can live longer than 130 years). Again open to suggestions.

—Zackmann (^{Talk to me}/_{What I been doing}) 05:21, 26 September 2025 (UTC)

For the unknown death dates, maybe just embed the date/age template inside a conditional Template:((#switch:deathdate|unk|unknown=birth date info|#other=date/age template logicTemplate:)). VanIsaac, GHTV ^contr_about 17:11, 26 September 2025 (UTC)

Yes, please don't add visible "unknown"s. Nikkimaria (talk) 04:37, 27 September 2025 (UTC)

Need for custom header when embeded

So ran into an issue… When you embed a {{Infobox person}} wrapper, you have to manually pass in a header. For example see 9lokkNine which embeds {{Infobox person}}. In order to get a header over the criminal section, you must do

…
| module  = '''Criminal information'''<br />{{infobox criminal
| child   = yes
…

I’m going to modify {{Infobox person}} so that wrapper templates can pass in a custom header for when |child=yes or |embed=yes. Wanted to make sure there are no unforeseen consequences to this. Anyone have objections?

For context I created a tracking category: Category:Pages using infobox criminal embeded (0).

— Zackmann (^{Talk to me}/_{What I been doing}) 21:39, 26 September 2025 (UTC)

I’ve mocked up a fix in the sandbox See this comparison. SHOULD have no impact on existing pages. Will slowly rollout with {{Infobox criminal}}. Template:Ping can I request a peer review? —22:38, 26 September 2025 (UTC) Zackmann (^{Talk to me}/_{What I been doing}) 22:38, 26 September 2025 (UTC)

I think you've got the wrong end of the stick. Look at the code for |subheader= at {{Infobox military person}}. – Jonesey95 (talk) 00:27, 27 September 2025 (UTC)

On second thought, it's a bit more complex than I thought, since {{infobox criminal}} is a wrapper for infobox person. I wonder if there is code in the template wrapper that allows passing a subheader when the template is a child template. I have been on WP too long today to go looking now. – Jonesey95 (talk) 00:36, 27 September 2025 (UTC)

Yea the issue is precisely that {{Infobox criminal}} is a wrapper for {{infobox person}}. Otherwise this would be much more trivial. — Zackmann (^{Talk to me}/_{What I been doing}) 03:29, 27 September 2025 (UTC)

The recent changes you have made have caused misnested tags at articles such as Hiroyasu Koga, where a child infobox is being used in |native_name=. More testing may be needed. See this new test case, copied from that article. – Jonesey95 (talk) 20:21, 27 September 2025 (UTC)

Thanks Template:U. I thought I had thought of everything when I tested it but there is always an edge case. I’m starting to think I should just never use span tags in infoboxes… — Zackmann (^{Talk to me}/_{What I been doing}) 20:31, 27 September 2025 (UTC)

The div tags don't work either. That's why I didn't change the main template. I think those tags need to come out entirely. – Jonesey95 (talk) 20:35, 27 September 2025 (UTC)

Wait… I’m not seeing any errors at Lint errors. What am I missing… —Zackmann (^{Talk to me}/_{What I been doing}) 20:37, 27 September 2025 (UTC)

Website, social media and other links

Should we consider having a row of icons/badges at the bottom of the box for social media links etc. as most living public figures now have one or more of these?

These would only include the most prominent social media sites:

• Facebook, Instagram, Threads [Meta]
• X/Twitter [Elon Musk]
• LinkedIn, GitHub [Microsoft]
• YouTube [Google]
• Snapchat [Snap Inc.]
• Reddit [Reddit Inc.]
• TikTok [ByteDance]
• Bluesky [???]
• Mastodon [???]

and of course, personal website, which should be first. I would not, however, include handles for 1:1 communicator apps like WhatsApp or Signal, which are not meant to be public-facing, nor media sites like OnlyFans, which seem inappropriate for general use on Wikipedia.

These can all easily be brought in from Wikidata, and the use of their copyrighted/trademarked site icons would be justified by their use to refer to those sites, a clear case of fair use. We could also use letter-in-a-circle icons to denote sites, if there were to be licensing issues.

Or is this instead a job for {{authority control}} - I'm not sure it is, because none of these were ever intended to be authority control identifiers. — The Anome (talk) 13:38, 27 September 2025 (UTC)

Per WP:ELMIN, "Wikipedia does not attempt to ... provide readers with a handy list of all social networking sites". Before discussing how such a thing could be implemented, that guideline saying we shouldn't do it at all would need to be changed. Nikkimaria (talk) 14:21, 27 September 2025 (UTC)