Template:Compact ToC/doc

Template:Mbox {{#invoke:Message box|ombox}}

Purpose

This is a Table-of-Contents replacement for alphabetical lists:

• The compact format goes sideways: A B C D E F G H I J K L ....
• The centering and numbers are optional.
• The "Contents" heading can go on top (default) or the side (side=yes).
• Letter ranges can be set (see below: #Letters): A B C-F G H-K L...
• Some letters can be omitted, instead of 26 separate letters.
• Any custom subheaders can also be listed in the TOC (see below: Examples).
• There are many other options, including: top=yes, refs=yes, etc.

The template provides all the features of Template:CompactTOC7, plus ones from Template:CompactTOC2, etc. that #7 doesn't have (the "Top" "0-9" sections, optionally), and allows you to select what other sections you want.

Usage

Typical:

{{CompactTOC8|symnum=yes}}

For alphabetical only (no number or symbol entries):

{{CompactTOC8}}

For maximum number of features and centered placement (leave off a parameter or change it to blank or "no" to disable a feature)

{{CompactTOC8
|name=
|side=yes
|center=yes
|right=
|align=center
|nobreak=yes
|top=yes
|num=yes
|sym=yes
|symnum=
|custom1=
|custom1name=
|custom1link=
...
|custom5=
|custom5name=
|custom5link=
|seealso=yes
|notesfirst=
|refs=yes
|notes=yes
|extlinks=yes
|a=
...
|z=
}}

Parameters

• name= — change the heading to an alternative name instead of "Contents", or hide it completely by entering name=no
• side=yes — put the "Contents" heading on the left side with a colon, instead of the top without one
• center=yes — center to ToC in the horizontal middle of the page, instead of floated left
• right=yes — align the ToC horizontally to the right of the page (may require <br style="clear:right;" /> after it, depending on page layout), instead of floated left (this parameter is mutually exclusive with the "center" option above, and should be used sparingly and with good reason)
• align= — sets the alignment of the links inside the table; default is left; use center, right or left
• nobreak=yes — no linebreak between the A-B-C-etc. stuff and the See also/References/etc. stuff (note: does not affect the heading; use side= for that)
• top=yes — enable the "Top" link; this is only useful if this copy of the ToC is a secondary ToC not at the top of the page, e.g. in the middle of a long glossary. (Every rendered page has a hidden <a name="top" id="top"></a> above the sitenotice which makes this link work without having to do anything but enable it in the template.)
• sym=yes — enable the "!$@" link for symbolic entries section
• num=yes — enable the "0–9" link for numeric entries section (create a heading of ==0–9== for the link to work)
• symnum=yes — enable the "!–9" link for combined symbolic and numeric entries section (create a heading of ==!–9== for the link to work)
• custom1 to custom5 — add up to 5 extra "custom" sections at the end of the list. These appear as [[#custom1|custom1]].
• custom1name to custom5name — modifies the way the custom section headers appear: [[#custom1|custom1name]]
• custom1link to custom5link — modifies the targets of the custom sections: [[custom1link|custom1]]. Use this only for linking to another page. Use sparingly! About the only legitimate use for this is connecting the sub-pages of multi-page articles, like long lists that have been broken up. Do not repurpose the ToC as a makeshift navbox.
• seealso=yes — enable link to the "See also" section
• refs=yes — enable link to the "References" section (observe that it is plural)
• notes=yes — enable link to the "Notes" section (observe that it is plural)
• notesfirst=yes — enable link to the "Notes" section, but placed before "References"; do not use with notes (and do observe that it is plural)
• extlinks=yes — enable link to the "External links" section
• a= through z= — individually disable particular letters that have no entries. Use with caution and check regularly to make sure that new entries do not require the removal of these parameters. Can also be used to create range links, e.g. "X-Z". (See #Letters below for more detailed documentation of this feature.)

Letters

Any letter can be deleted (i.e. because it has no entries in the list) by adding it as a lower case blank parameter {{CompactTOC8|side=yes|j=|q=}}

Or it can be replaced with an unlinked letter by using that letter (upper case): {{CompactTOC8|side=yes|j=J|q=Q}}

Note: It is often better to create an empty placeholder span (e.g. <span id="Q" /> where the letter's heading would be in the page if it existed, since in most cases it is quite possible that it will come to exist in the future.

This feature can also be used to create range links:

{{CompactTOC8|side=yes|x=[[#X-Z|X-Z]]|y=|z=}}

The feature can also be used (very tediously) for linking to sub-articles (e.g., for long lists that have been split into multiple pages):

{{CompactTOC8|side=yes|n=[[Articlename (N–Z)#N|N]]|o=[[Articlename (N–Z)#O|O]]|...|z=[[Articlename (N–Z)#Z|Z]]}}

Or, as another example:

{{CompactTOC8|side=yes|n=[[Articlename (N–Z)| N–Z (next page)]]|o=|p=|...|z=}}

Shorthand

• short1 can be used as the very first parameter (before name=) for shortening a common usage:

{{CompactTOC8|short1}}

It replaces {{CompactTOC8|side=yes|center=yes|nobreak=yes|refs=yes}}

Examples

{{CompactTOC8|top=yes}} Template:CompactTOC8

{{CompactTOC8|name=no|center=yes|top=yes|custom1=New section|custom2=Additional section}} Template:CompactTOC8

{{CompactTOC8|name=no|center=yes|top=yes|seealso=yes|notes=yes|custom1=New section|custom1name=Custom section name|custom2=Outside page|custom2link=Main Page}} Template:CompactTOC8

{{CompactTOC8|side=yes|sym=yes|num=yes|refs=yes|seealso=yes|custom1=Other}} Template:CompactTOC8

{{CompactTOC8|name=Directory|top=no|refs=yes|notes=yes|extlinks=yes}} Template:CompactTOC8

{{CompactTOC8|name=no|side=yes|right=yes|symnum=yes|seealso=yes}} Template:CompactTOC8

{{CompactTOC8|short1|num=yes|sym=yes|seealso=yes|notesfirst=yes|extlinks=yes}} Template:CompactTOC8