Template:Navbox

Edit documentation

This template allows a navigational template to be set up relatively quickly by supplying it with one or more lists of links. It comes equipped with default styles that should work for most navigational templates. Changing the default styles is possible, but not recommended. Using this template, or one of its "Navbox suite" sister templates, is highly recommended for standardization of navigational templates, and for ease of use.

Usage

Please remove the parameters that are left blank.

{{Navbox
| name       = {{subst:PAGENAME}}
| listclass  = hlist
| state      = {{{state|}}}

| title      =
| above      =
| image      =

| group1     =
| list1      =

| group2     =
| list2      =
 ...
| group20    =
| list20     =

| below      =
}}

Parameter list

The navbox uses lowercase parameter names, as shown in the box (at right). The mandatory name and title will create a one-line box if other parameters are omitted.

Notice "group1" (etc.) is optional, as are sections named "above/below".

The basic and most common parameters are as follows (see below for the full list):

name – the name of the template.

title – text in the title bar, such as: [[Widget stuff]].

listclass – a CSS class for the list cells, usually hlist for horizontal lists. Alternatively, use bodyclass for the whole box.

state – controls when a navbox is expanded or collapsed.

titlestyle – a CSS style for the title-bar, such as: background: gray;

groupstyle – a CSS style for the group-cells, such as: background: #eee;

above – text to appear above the group/list section (could be a list of overall wikilinks).

image – an optional right-side image, coded as the whole image. Typically it is purely decorative, so it should be coded as [[File:XX.jpg|80px|link=|alt=]].

imageleft – an optional left-side image (code the same as the "image" parameter).

group_n – the left-side text before list-n (if group-n omitted, list-n starts at left of box).

list_n – text listing wikilinks using a wikilist format.

below – optional text to appear below the group/list section.

Parameter descriptions

The following is a complete list of parameters for using {{Navbox}}. In most cases, the only required parameters are name, title, and list1, though child navboxes do not even require those to be set.

{{Navbox}} shares numerous common parameter names with its sister templates, {{Navbox with columns}} and {{Navbox with collapsible groups}}, for consistency and ease of use. Parameters marked with an asterisk (*) are common to all three master templates.

Setup parameters

name*: The name of the template, which is needed for the "V • T • E" ("View • Talk • Edit") links to work properly on all pages where the template is used. You can enter {{subst:PAGENAME}} for this value as a shortcut. The name parameter is only mandatory if a title is specified, and the border parameter is not set.
state* [autocollapse, uncollapsed, collapsed, plain, off]

Defaults to autocollapse. A navbox with autocollapse will start out collapsed if there are two or more tables on the same page that use other collapsible tables. Otherwise, the navbox will be expanded. For the technically minded, see MediaWiki:Common.js.
If set to collapsed, the navbox will always start out in a collapsed state.
If set to plain, the navbox will always be expanded with no [hide] link on the right, and the title will remain centered (by using padding to offset the V • T • E links).
If set to off, the navbox will always be expanded with no [hide] link on the right, but no padding will be used to keep the title centered. This is for advanced use only; the "plain" option should suffice for most applications where the [show]/[hide] button needs to be hidden.
If set to anything other than autocollapse, collapsed, plain, or off (such as "uncollapsed"), the navbox will always start out in an expanded state, but have the "hide" button.

To show the box when standalone (non-included) but then auto-hide contents when in an article, put "uncollapsed" inside <noinclude> tags:

| state = <noinclude>uncollapsed</noinclude>
That setting will force the box visible when standalone (even when followed by other boxes), displaying "[hide]" but then auto-collapse the box when stacked inside an article.

Often times, editors will want a default initial state for a navbox, which may be overridden in an article. Here is the trick to do this:

In your intermediate template, create a parameter also named "state" as a pass-through like this:
| state = {{{state<includeonly>|your_desired_initial_state</includeonly>}}}
The <includeonly>| will make the template expanded when viewing the template page by itself. For example,

Example: TemplateA has autocollapse as the default initial state. When transcluded to an article with only one navbox, TemplateA's navbox will show. When transcluded on a page with two navboxes, TemplateA's navbox collapses.
Example: TemplateB has | state = {{{state<includeonly>|expanded</includeonly>}}} as the default initial state. All transcluding articles show the content by default, unless there is a hypothetical article that specifies {{templatename|state=collapsed}} when transcluding.

The template {{Collapsible option}} can be added to a <noinclude> section after the template definition to explain how to use the state parameter.

navbar*

If set to plain, the V • T • E links on the left side of the titlebar will not be displayed, and padding will be automatically used to keep the title centered. Use off to remove the V • T • E links, but not apply padding (this is for advanced use only; the "plain" option should suffice for most applications where a navbar is not desired). It is highly recommended that one not hide the navbar, in order to make it easier for users to edit the template, and to keep a standard style across pages.

border*

See section hereafter on using navboxes within one another for examples and a more complete description. If set to child or subgroup, then the navbox can be used as a borderless child that fits snugly in another navbox. The border is hidden and there is no padding on the sides of the table, so it fits into the list area of its parent navbox. If set to none, then the border is hidden and padding is removed, and the navbox may be used as a child of another container (do not use the none option inside of another navbox; similarly, only use the child/subgroup option inside of another navbox). If set to anything else (default), then a regular navbox is displayed with a 1px border. An alternate way to specify the border to be a subgroup style is like this (i.e. use the first unnamed parameter instead of the named border parameter):

{{Navbox|child

...

}}

Cells

title*

Text that appears centered in the top row of the table. It is usually the template's topic, i.e. a succinct description of the body contents. This should be a single line, but if a second line is needed, use {{-}} to ensure proper centering. This parameter is technically not mandatory, but using {{Navbox}} is rather pointless without a title.

above*

A full-width cell displayed between the titlebar and first group/list, i.e. above the template's body (groups, lists and image). In a template without an image, above behaves in the same way as the list1 parameter without the group1 parameter.

group_n*

(i.e. group1, group2, etc.) If specified, text appears in a header cell displayed to the left of list_n. If omitted, list_n uses the full width of the table.

list_n*

(i.e. list1, list2, etc.) The body of the template, usually a list of links. Format is inline, although the text can be entered on separate lines if the entire list is enclosed within <div> </div>. At least one list parameter is required; each additional list is displayed in a separate row of the table. Each list_n may be preceded by a corresponding group_n parameter, if provided (see below).

image*

An image to be displayed in a cell below the title and to the right of the body (the groups/lists). For the image to display properly, the list1 parameter must be specified. The image parameter accepts standard wikicode for displaying an image, e.g.:

[[File:XX.jpg|80px|link=|alt=]]

nb: including "|right" will produced the usual left margin to provide separation from the list items and zebra striping.

imageleft*: An image to be displayed in a cell below the title and to the left of the body (lists). For the image to display properly, the list1 parameter must be specified and no groups can be specified. It accepts the same sort of parameter that image accepts.
below*: A full-width cell displayed below the template's body (groups, lists and image). In a template without an image, below behaves in the same way as the template's final list_n parameter without a group_n parameter.

Style parameters

Styles are generally advised against, to maintain consistency among templates and pages in Wikipedia; but the option to modify styles is given.

style*

Specifies CSS styles to apply to the template body. The parameter bodystyle also does the exact same thing and can be used in place of this style parameter. This option should be used sparingly as it can lead to visual inconsistencies. Examples:

style = background: #nnnnnn;

style = width: N [em/%/px or width: auto];

style = float: [left/right/none];

style = clear: [right/left/both/none];

basestyle*

CSS styles to apply to the title, above, below, and group cells all at once. The styles are not applied to list cells. This is convenient for easily changing the basic color of the navbox without having to repeat the style specifications for the different parts of the navbox. Examples:

basestyle = background: lightskyblue;

titlestyle*

CSS styles to apply to title, most often the titlebar's background color:

titlestyle = background: #nnnnnn;

titlestyle = background: name;

groupstyle*

CSS styles to apply to the groupN cells. This option overrides any styles that are applied to the entire table. Examples:

groupstyle = background: #nnnnnn;

groupstyle = text-align: [left/center/right];

groupstyle = vertical-align: [top/middle/bottom];

group_nstyle*

CSS styles to apply to a specific group, in addition to any styles specified by the groupstyle parameter. This parameter should only be used when absolutely necessary in order to maintain standardization and simplicity. Examples:

group3style = background: red; color: white;

groupwidth

A number and unit specifying a uniform width for the group cells, in cases where little content in the list cells may cause group cells to be too wide. No default. However, may be overridden by the group(n)style parameter. Examples:

groupwidth = 9em

liststyle*

CSS styles to apply to all lists. Overruled by the oddstyle and evenstyle parameters (if specified) hereafter. When using backgound colors in the navbox, see the note hereafter.

list_nstyle*

CSS styles to apply to a specific list, in addition to any styles specified by the liststyle parameter. This parameter should only be used when absolutely necessary in order to maintain standardization and simplicity. Examples:

list5style = background: #ddddff;

listpadding*

A number and unit specifying the padding in each list cell. The list cells come equipped with a default padding of 0.25em on the left and right, and 0 on the top and bottom. Due to complex technical reasons, simply setting "liststyle = padding: 0.5em;" (or any other padding setting) will not work. Examples:

listpadding = 0.5em 0; (sets 0.5em padding for the left/right, and 0 padding for the top/bottom.)

listpadding = 0; (removes all list padding.)

oddstyle

evenstyle

Applies to odd/even list numbers. Overrules styles defined by liststyle. The default behavior is to add striped colors (white and gray) to odd/even rows, respectively, in order to improve readability. These should not be changed except in extraordinary circumstances.

evenodd [swap, even, odd, off]

If set to swap, then the automatic striping of even and odd rows is reversed. Normally, even rows get a light gray background for striping; when this parameter is used, the odd rows receive the gray striping instead of the even rows. Setting to even or odd sets all rows to have that striping color. Setting to off disables automatic row striping. This advanced parameter should only be used to fix problems when the navbox is being used as a child of another navbox and the stripes do not match up. Examples and a further description can be found in the section on child navboxes below.

abovestyle*

belowstyle*

CSS styles to apply to the top cell (specified via the above parameter) and bottom cell (specified via the below parameter). Typically used to set background color or text alignment:

abovestyle = background: #nnnnnn;

abovestyle = text-align: [left/center/right];

belowstyle = background: #nnnnnn;

belowstyle = text-align: [left/center/right];

imagestyle*

imageleftstyle*

CSS styles to apply to the cells where the image/imageleft sits. These styles should only be used in exceptional circumstances, usually to fix width problems if the width of groups is set and the width of the image cell grows too large. Examples:

imagestyle = width:5em;

Default styles

The style settings listed here are those that editors using the navbox change most often. The other more complex style settings were left out of this list to keep it simple. Most styles are set in MediaWiki:Common.css.

bodystyle = background: #fdfdfd; width: 100%; vertical-align: middle;

titlestyle = background: #ccccff; padding-left: 1em; padding-right: 1em; text-align: center;

abovestyle = background: #ddddff; padding-left: 1em; padding-right: 1em; text-align: center;

belowstyle = background: #ddddff; padding-left: 1em; padding-right: 1em; text-align: center;

groupstyle = background: #ddddff; padding-left: 1em; padding-right: 1em; text-align: right;

liststyle = background: transparent; text-align: left/center;

oddstyle = background: transparent;

evenstyle = background: #f7f7f7;

Since liststyle and oddstyle are transparent, odd lists have the color of the bodystyle, which defaults to #fdfdfd (white with a hint of gray). A list defaults to text-align: left; if it has a group, if not it defaults to text-align: center;. Since only bodystyle has a vertical-align all the others inherit its vertical-align: middle;.

Advanced parameters

bodyclass
aboveclass
groupclass
listclass
belowclass: This enables attaching a CSS class to group or list cells. The most common use for listclass is to give it the hlist class that will cause lists to render horizontally. All these parameters accept the hlist class, but if more than one parameter is used for hlist, use |bodyclass=hlist instead.
titlegroup: This puts a group in the title area, with the same default styles as group_n. It should be used only in exceptional circumstances (usually advanced meta-templates) and its use requires some knowledge of the internal code of {{Navbox}}; you should be ready to manually set up CSS styles to get everything to work properly if you wish to use it. If you think you have an application for this parameter, it might be best to change your mind, or consult the talk page first.
titlegroupstyle: The styles for the titlegroup cell.
innerstyle: A very advanced parameter to be used only for advanced meta-templates employing the navbox. Internally, the navbox uses an outer table to draw the border, and then an inner table for everything else (title/above/groups/lists/below/images, etc.). The style/bodystyle parameter sets the style for the outer table, which the inner table inherits, but in advanced cases (meta-templates) it may be necessary to directly set the style for the inner table. This parameter provides access to that inner table so styles can be applied. Use at your own risk.

Microformats

bodyclass: This parameter is inserted into the "class" attribute for the navbox as a whole.
titleclass: This parameter is inserted into the "class" attribute for the navbox's title caption.

This template supports the addition of microformat information. This is done by adding "class" attributes to various data cells, indicating what kind of information is contained within. To flag a navbox as containing hCard information about a person, for example, add the following parameter:

| bodyclass = vcard

and

| titleclass = fn

or (for example):

| title = The books of <span class="fn">[[Iain Banks]]</span>

...and so forth.

See Wikipedia:WikiProject Microformats for more information on adding microformat information.

Layout of table

Without image, above and below

Table generated by {{Navbox}} without image, above and below parameters (gray list background color added for illustration only):

With image, above and below

Table generated by {{Navbox}} with image, above and below parameters (gray list background color added for illustration only):

With image and without groups

Table generated by {{Navbox}} with image, imageleft, lists, and without groups, above, below (gray list background color added for illustration only):

Examples

No image

{{Navbox
| name  = Navbox/doc
| title = Brightstone Heroes
| listclass = hlist

| group1 = Centre
| list1  =
* Brightstone

| group2 = Area
| list2  =
* Dawning Wood

| group3 = Major landmarks
| list3  =
* Feathergale Spire
* Scarlet Moon Hall
* Rivergarde Keep
* Sacred Stone Monastery
* Temple of the Mind's Eye
* The Mindspire
* Winter's Gate

| group4 = Infrastructure
| list4  =
* Silverstone
* Korthaz

| group5 = Prime applications
| list5  =
* Human
* Dwarf
}}

With image, without groups

{{Navbox
| name  = Navbox/doc
| title = Brightstone Heroes
| listclass = hlist
| image = [[File:Black dragon.jpg|80px|link=|alt=]]

| list1 =
* Feathergale Spire
* Scarlet Moon Hall
* Rivergarde Keep
* Sacred Stone Monastery
* Temple of the Mind's Eye
* The Mindspire
* Winter's Gate
}}

With two images, without groups, multiple lists

{{Navbox
| name  = Navbox/doc
| title = Brightstone Heroes
| listclass = hlist
| image = [[File:Black dragon.jpg|80px|link=|alt=]]
| imageleft = [[File:Silver dragon.jpg|80px]]

| list1 =
* Feathergale Spire
* Scarlet Moon Hall
* Rivergarde Keep

| list2 =
* Sacred Stone Monastery
* Temple of the Mind's Eye

| list3 =
* The Mindspire
* Winter's Gate

| list4 =
* Dawning Wood
}}

With image, groups, above, below

{{Navbox
| name  = Navbox/doc
| title = Brightstone Heroes
| listclass = hlist
| above = Above text goes here
| image = [[File:Black dragon.jpg|80px|link=|alt=]]

| group1 = Centre
| list1  =
* Brightstone

| group2 = Area
| list2  =
* Dawning Wood

| group3 = Major landmarks
| list3  =
* Feathergale Spire
* Scarlet Moon Hall
* Rivergarde Keep
* Sacred Stone Monastery
* Temple of the Mind's Eye
* The Mindspire
* Winter's Gate

| group4 = Infrastructure
| list4  =
* Silverstone
* Korthaz

| group5 = Prime applications
| list5  =
* Human
* Dwarf

| below  = Website: [http://dnd.wizards.com/]
}}

Child navboxes

It is possible to place multiple navboxes within a single border with the use of the border parameter, or by specifying the first parameter to be "child". The basic code for doing this is as follows (which adds a subgroup for the first group/list area):

{{Navbox
| name = {{subst:PAGENAME}}
| title = Title

| group1 = [optional]
| list1  = {{Navbox|child
   ...child navbox parameters...
 }}

...
}}

Subgroups example

Main article: Template:Navbox subgroup

This example shows how subgroups can be used. It is recommended that one use {{Navbox subgroup}}, but the same result can be reached by using {{Navbox}} with border = child or the first unnamed parameter set to child. The evenodd parameter is used to reverse striping in some of the subgroups in order to get all of the stripes to line up properly. To remove the striping altogether, you can set liststyle = background:transparent; in each of the navboxes.

Multiple show/hides in a single container

Main article: Template:Navbox with collapsible groups

The example below is generated using a regular navbox for the main container, then its list1, list2, and list3 parameters each contain another navbox, with 1 = child set. The view (v), discuss (d), edit (e) navbar links are hidden using navbar = plain for each of them, or could be suppresed by just leaving out the name parameter (child navboxes do not require the name parameter to be set, unlike regular navboxes).

Relationship with other Navbox templates

This navbox template is specifically designed to work in conjunction with two other sister templates: {{Navbox with columns}} and {{Navbox with collapsible groups}}. All three of these templates share common parameters for consistency and ease of use (such parameters are marked with an asterisk (*) in the parameter descriptions list hereinbefore). Most importantly, each template can be used as a child of one another (by using the |border=child parameter, or by specifying the first unnamed parameter to be child. For example: {{Navbox|child ...}}, {{Navbox with columns|child ...}} or {{Navbox with collapsible groups|child ...}}.

Technical details

This template uses CSS classes for most of its looks, thus it is fully skinnable.
Internally this meta template uses HTML markup instead of wiki markup for the table code. That is the usual way we make meta templates since wiki markup has several drawbacks. For instance it makes it harder to use parser functions and special characters in parameters.
For more technical details see the [CSS classes in MediaWiki:Common.css and the collapsible table used to hide the box in MediaWiki:Common.js.

Intricacies

The 2px wide border between groups and lists is drawn using the border-left property of the list cell. Thus, if you wish to change the background color of the template (for example bodystyle = background:purple;), then you'll need to make the border-left-color match the background color (i.e. liststyle = border-left-color: purple;). If you wish to have a border around each list cell, then the 2px border between the list cells and group cells will disappear; you'll have to come up with your own solution.
The list cell width is initially set to 100%. Thus, if you wish to manually set the width of group cells, you'll need to also specify the liststyle to have width: auto. If you wish to set the group width and use images, it's up to you to figure out the CSS in the groupstyle, liststyle, imagestyle, and imageleftstyle parameters to get everything to work correctly. Example of setting group width:

groupstyle = width: 10em;

liststyle = width: auto;

Adjacent navboxes have only a 1 pixel border between them (except in IE 6, which doesn't support the necessary CSS). If you set the top or bottom margin of style/bodystyle, then this will not work.
The default margin-left and margin-right of the outer navbox table are set to "auto;". If you wish to use navbox as a float, you need to manually set the margin-left and margin-right values, because the auto margins interfere with the float option. For example, add the following code to use the navbox as a float:

style = width: 22em; float: right; margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 0;

Known issues

If the heading of the navbox spans more than one line, the second line will be displayed to the right of center. This can be avoided by hard-coding linebreaks with <br clear="all" />.
In Internet Explorer 8 and 9, there is a bug when using hlist; navbox will fail to wrap the list to the next line if the list items start with an image, causing navbox to extend its width outside the screen. This can be fixed by adding   in front of the images.
Excessive use of the unsubstituted {{•}} template as a delimiter, can in extreme cases cause the wiki page rendering to fail — there is a limit to the number of templates that can be used on a page (for instance, a page where the inclusion of eleven Navboxes with hundreds of bullets caused the page load not to complete, only the substitution of the bullets in those navboxes cured the problem). Use of the hlist class avoids the delimiter transclusion issue altogether, as the delimiters are rendered via CSS.