Editing Help talk:Citation Style 1 (section)

== Proposal: De-link "ISBN" in CS1 templates ==

Hello,

I have no idea if this is the right place to propose it, but something that was bugging me.  Suppose isbn=XXX (replace with some ISBN) is set.  The CS1 templates emit wikitext that looks like <nowiki> [[ISBN (identifier)|ISBN]] [[Special:Book sources/XXX]]</nowiki>.  Is the link to "what is an ISBN itself" really necessary?  I'd argue it isn't.  If that ISBN (identifier) link was removed yet a reader wants to know more, and they click the link that does display, [[Special:BookSources]] includes a link to [[International Standard Book Number]] in its very first sentence, and then there are further links in a hatnote to [[Help:ISBN]].  So readers can find out "what is an ISBN" just fine.  For the users who either don't care or already know, we avoid a [[WP:SEAOFBLUE]] unhelpful link to click.  More generally, if someone is trying to find out more about a citation, they probably want the Book sources link that will tell them more about this book, not the generic link.

I don't know if this will require a Village Pump RFC or just a talk page consensus or what, since I know citation templates aren't to be changed lightly.  But I don't think all those links to the article on ISBN-itself are that helpful.  SEAOFBLUE is good guidance in my opinion; we should highlight the most relevant links that we "want" the reader to click, not "eh it might be helpful 0.01% of the time" links.  And in this case, per above, the user will still find that info on the other target page anyway.

(Before people bring it up, I would potentially be okay with delinking some of the other "identifier" fields as well, but some of those have a slightly stronger case since, say, DOI links go straight to the DOI website without an intervening Wikipedia stop.  ISBN doesn't, though.) [[User:SnowFire|SnowFire]] ([[User talk:SnowFire|talk]]) 20:09, 16 February 2026 (UTC)

:'''Nonstarter''' we should and must treat all identifiers equally. That ''you'' know what an ISBN is doesn't mean that Timmy the 4th grader knows.  &#32;<span style="font-variant:small-caps; whitespace:nowrap;">[[User:Headbomb|Headbomb]] {[[User talk:Headbomb|t]] · [[Special:Contributions/Headbomb|c]] · [[WP:PHYS|p]] · [[WP:WBOOKS|b]]}</span> 20:30, 16 February 2026 (UTC)
::This isn't responsive to the point I made above.  Fine, Timmy the 4th grader doesn't know what an ISBN is.  He'll find out when he clicks the link right next to "ISBN."  This is the general reasoning behind avoiding extra links in [[WP:SEAOFBLUE]].  Take an example: we now discourage linking styles like <nowiki>[[Baltimore]], [[Maryland]], [[United States]]</nowiki>.  Just link Baltimore, instead.  If someone is genuinely curious about Maryland, then they'll find many links to Maryland by clicking on the Baltimore article, which is the relevant link we "want" the reader to click 99% of the time.
::While I'd thought that starting with one identifier would be the less controversial way, if this is truly a sticking point, then I'd be down for delinking ''all'' identifiers, yes.  But I don't want to divert to that immediately as my assumption is that this would be a far larger ask and one harder to find wider consensus for.  [[User:SnowFire|SnowFire]] ([[User talk:SnowFire|talk]]) 21:05, 16 February 2026 (UTC)