Talk:Van Diemen's Land (folk song)

Latest comment: 7 years ago by Ojorojo in topic Alternative infobox

Alternative infobox

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"Van Diemen's Land"
English Folk Song
Other name"Henry the Poacher", etc.
CatalogueRoud 221
GenreTransportation ballad
TextUnknown
Published1800 (1800) – 1850 (1850): England
PublisherBroadside

There are unused fields for composer, when & where written, when & where composed, translation, language, etc. —Ojorojo (talk) 20:12, 25 April 2017 (UTC)Reply

I tend to write articles about traditional songs, and usually we don't know who composed them. That's the case with this song. It would be more useful to fields for earliest known date of publication which might be a range of dates, earliest date collected, areas collected from, and so on - though those dates are in the articles. I don't understand the field "text: unknown" - as is usual for traditional songs there are a number of texts which may vary to a greater or lesser extent.Joe Fogey (talk) 22:29, 26 April 2017 (UTC)Reply
P.S. Thanks for your help, Ojorojo. I didn't mean to sound ungrateful. It is a more useful template. I think it might be worth having a template for traditional folk songs to include things like where they have been collected from. It would certainly bear thinking about. Thanks again! Joe Fogey (talk) 22:43, 26 April 2017 (UTC)Reply
As an example, I added an arbitrary "end date" option to Published= in the above, which gives it a range. {{Musical composition}} has over 50 parameters (see Full syntax infobox section). A subset tailored to traditional songs may be warranted if this subset isn't adequate (or is overinclusive). Infoboxes should only contain key facts as discussed in the articles, not miscellaneous details or "information for information's sake". If most traditional song articles don't discuss "key" (generally, they are not locked into one key) or who wrote the melody (distinct from who composed the song), these fields shouldn't be included in a general traditional song infobox. Additionally, they should aim for consistent usage or uniformity from article to article (infoboxes are not open ended – they are limited to a set of parameters with guidelines). —Ojorojo (talk) 17:06, 27 April 2017 (UTC)Reply