Editing Incubator escapee wiki:Citing sources (section)

===Bundling citations===
{{shortcut|WP:CITEBUNDLE|WP:BUNDLING}}
{{main|Help:Citation merging}}
{{See also|Help:Shortened footnotes#Bundling citations|Wikipedia:Citation overkill}}
Sometimes the article is more readable if multiple citations are bundled into a single footnote. For example, when there are multiple sources for a given sentence, and each source applies to the entire sentence, the sources can be placed at the end of the sentence, like this:{{dummy ref|4}}{{dummy ref|5}}{{dummy ref|6}}{{dummy ref|7}} Or they can be bundled into one footnote at the end of the sentence or paragraph, like this:{{dummy ref|4}}

Bundling is also useful if the sources each support a different portion of the preceding text, or if the sources all support the same text. Bundling has several advantages:
*It avoids the visual clutter of multiple clickable footnotes inside a sentence or paragraph;
*It makes it less likely that inline citations will be moved inadvertently when text is re-arranged, because the footnote states clearly which source supports which point.

Keep in mind that there can be some disadvantages as well:
*When multiple sources are bundled into a single citation, it can be unclear which source supports which specific point, particularly if the text contains multiple claims.
*Readers and editors may need to cross-check all sources in the bundle to verify a single point, increasing the time and effort required for fact-checking.
*Bundling can inadvertently suggest that all sources equally support all points in the cited text, which may not always be accurate.
*Bundling shifts the explanatory burden to the footnote, which may disrupt the reading flow for those who frequently reference them.
*Rearranging or modifying text later can create confusion or errors if the bundled note needs to be updated or split to reflect new changes.
*If an additional source is required for one use of the bundle, then adding it to the bundle will add a useless reference to all the others, or else require a new bundle duplicating all the other references, defeating the purpose of bundling.
*In the extreme case, all the references in the article could be placed in one bundle, effectively duplicating the case where there are references but no inline citations.

To concatenate multiple citations for the same content into a single footnote, there are several layouts available, as illustrated below:

<div style="background:white; padding:1em; border:1px solid #999;"><!--code for display-->
The Sun is pretty big, but the Moon is not so big. The Sun is also quite hot.<sup id="nbFoot01a" class="reference">[[#noteFoot01a|[1]]]</sup>
<br /><br />
<span style="font-size:medium">Notes</span>
----

'''Use {{tl|Unbulleted list citebundle}}:'''

<ol class="references">
<li id="noteFoot02a" value="1">
'''[[#nbFoot02a|^]]''' {{Unbulleted list citebundle
|For the Sun's size, see: Miller, Edward. ''The Sun''. Academic Press, 2005, p. 1.
|For the Moon's size, see: Brown, Rebecca. "Size of the Moon", ''Scientific American'', 2007, 51 (78): 46.
|For the Sun's heat, see: Smith, John. ''The Sun's Heat''. Academic Press, 2005, p. 2.
}}</li>
</ol>

'''Use an inline paragraph:'''

<ol class="references">
<li id="noteFoot03a" value="1">
'''[[#nbFoot03a|^]]''' For the Sun's size, see: Miller, Edward. ''The Sun''. Academic Press, 2005, p. 1. For the Moon's size, see: Brown, Rebecca. "Size of the Moon", ''Scientific American'', 2007, 51 (78): 46. For the Sun's heat, see: Smith, John. ''The Sun's Heat''. Academic Press, 2005, p. 2.</li>
</ol>

'''Use a bullet list:'''

<ol class="references">
<li id="noteFoot01a" value="1">
 '''[[#nbFoot01a|^]]''' Multiple sources: 
* For the Sun's size, see: Miller, Edward. ''The Sun''. Academic Press, 2005, p. 1.
* For the Moon's size, see: Brown, Rebecca. "Size of the Moon", ''Scientific American'', 2007, 51 (78): 46.
* For the Sun's heat, see: Smith, John. ''The Sun's Heat''. Academic Press, 2005, p. 2.</li>
</ol>

This last approach needs an introductory line like "Multiple sources:" to prevent an unwanted linebreak after the footnote number.
</div>

Simply using line breaks to separate list items breaches {{section link|MOS:Accessibility|Nobreaks}}: {{tq|"{{tag|br|s}} line breaks&nbsp;... should not be used."}} {{tlx|Unbulleted list citebundle}} a.k.a. {{tlx|Multiref}} was made specifically for this purpose. Some other templates in the same vein are listed at the disambiguation page [[Template:Multiple references]].

Within a given article only a single layout should generally be used, except that inline may always be appropriate for shortened references, often all for the same statement:

<div style="background:white; padding:1em; border:1px solid #999;"><!--code for display-->
<ol class="references">
<li id="noteFoot03a" value="1">
'''[[#nbFoot03a|^]]''' For the Sun's size, see: Miller (2005), p. 1; Brown (2007), p. 46; Smith (2005), p. 2.</li>
</ol>
</div>