Template talk:Taxobox colour

Colour changes

After much discussion it has been agreed that changes need to be made to the colour scheme of taxoboxes. Your comments on this matter are welcomed here; the proposed new template can be viewed here.

Thanks,

Verisimilus T 20:26, 18 November 2007 (UTC)

{{editprotected}} Please replace the source code of this template with the source of Template:Taxobox colour/Update (which can be deleted after this request is fulfilled). Many thanks! Verisimilus T 11:15, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

I made the change. In a day or two, tag the other page with {{db-g7}} and it will be deleted. — Carl (CBM · talk) 15:18, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

{{editprotected}}

Sorry, I put in the wrong hex code by the Excavates. I've also streamlined the code. Could you please replace the source code of this page with that of Template:Taxobox colour/Update? Thanks, and sorry to be a pain! Verisimilus T 16:11, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Done. — Carl (CBM · talk) 17:12, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

update request

{{editprotected}} this edit seams to give some funny character ;"| on e.g. the shark page. It should be fixed, not sure exactely which to change though :-) --Stefan ^talk 09:35, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

It was fixed with this edit. The available regnum are in Template:Taxobox colour scheme. -- zzuuzz ^(talk) 09:55, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

Thanks, to tricky for me to figure out :-) --Stefan ^talk 09:58, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

Fix for garbled title characters (;"|)

{{editprotected}} In Template:Taxobox_colour, the final line of the switch-coding (stating "transparent") causes the bizarre semicolon-quotemark combination. It could be replaced as just white-color (FCFCFC), followed by the category and another quotemark, as follows:

|FCFCFC"[[Category:Taxoboxes with an invalid color]]"}}

Although the invalid-color category might seem excessive, it has helped to detect animal articles that were vandalized to specify an incorrect "regnum" value. -Wikid77 (talk) 07:44, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

OK, fixed up, but there must be a span parameter that's recognised as text? Rich Farmbrough, 23:13, 29 August 2009 (UTC).

After this fix there was even more extraneous text (' style="background:#FCFCFC"";"| ') in the header, so I reverted. Can you create a test template that shows the desired effects? -- Eugène van der Pijll (talk) 10:11, 30 August 2009 (UTC)

• I agree, I have created a next-generation template (see below). -Wikid77, 31Aug09

Replacing as next-generation template

31-Aug-09: {{editprotect}} I have re-designed it under User:Wikid77/Template:Taxobox_colour as a tested-template, which will insert a new "style=" after putting the category-name link. Based on template designs of 4 years, I've designed the newer template to also allow a non-wikilinked regnum (such as kingdom "Animalia" or "Plantae" w/o brackets) and other link forms (such as "[[Animal|Animalia]]" or "[[Plant|Plantae]]").

The plan is to replace the current template using the exact coding of the tested-template. No internal adjustments are needed, because the template's categories come from the doc subpage.

For final test, view Template_talk:Taxobox topic "Broken". -Wikid77 (talk) 07:49, 31 August 2009 (UTC) Tired that generates

...
viii
incertae sedis
incertae sedis
style="background:#FCFCFC;" style="font-color:black"| Monkey

on the test cases page. Rich Farmbrough, 08:01, 31 August 2009 (UTC).

Garish green

This is quite trivial but given the nice muted beige colour for animals, the greenyellow colour for plants now seems rather vivid (/ garish). Would anyone object if I were to mute it a little, whilst retaining (or perhaps increasing) the distinction from the archaeoplastid's lightgreen? I was thinking something along the lines of #adee3f. Martin (Smith609 – Talk) 21:07, 9 June 2010 (UTC)

Veterovata

Currently, eggshells (indicated in the box below by the word "Ootaxa") haven't got their own color. Whatever color is chosen will be used exclusively in all {{oobox}}es. I have exceptional color vision and can detect contrast a lot easier than someone who might have color vision problems, so I'd prefer some input from others. Bob the WikipediaN ^{(talk • contribs)} 22:45, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

Animalia	rgb(235,235,210)
Archaea	rgb(195,245,250)	also Nanoarchaeota (Nanarchaeota), Korarchaeota, Thaumarchaeota, Crenarchaeota and Euryarchaeota
Archaeplastida	rgb(180,250,180)	also Plantae and Viridiplantae
Bacteria	rgb(220,235,245)
Eukaryota	rgb(245,215,255)	For eukaryotes with no other colour defined, including Excavata, Amoebozoa and Opisthokonta
Fungi	rgb(145,250,250)
Ichnotaxa	rgb(230,222,214)
incertae sedis	rgb(250,240,230)
SAR	rgb(200,250,80)	also Harosa, Chromalveolata
Ootaxa	rgb(250,250,220)
Viruses	rgb(250,250,190)	also Viroids

How about a reddish color? Crimsonraptor | (Contact me) Dumpster dive if you must 22:49, 5 February 2011 (UTC)

Like this? Bob the WikipediaN ^{(talk • contribs)} 23:19, 5 February 2011 (UTC)

Yeah...like that! Crimsonraptor | (Contact me) Dumpster dive if you must 23:25, 5 February 2011 (UTC)

But is it too close to the color for Archaea? Bob the WikipediaN ^{(talk • contribs)} 23:34, 5 February 2011 (UTC)

Maybe...perhaps #FF4040 in CSS? (Sorry for using the Wikia colors, but it's listed as brown1 on this chart) Crimsonraptor | (Contact me) Dumpster dive if you must 23:42, 5 February 2011 (UTC)

I fixed your suggestion to display the color you suggested. It's a little uncomfortable for reading since it's so dark. Maybe we should try a completely different shade. I'm thinking of exploring the indigos now... Bob the WikipediaN ^{(talk • contribs)} 23:47, 5 February 2011 (UTC)

Is this color too close to the Bacteria Rhizaria one? I think the already existing ones have already over-exhausted the possibilies...Rhizaria is so close to Bacteria, Archaea, and incertae sedis that I can hardly tell a difference... Bob the WikipediaN ^{(talk • contribs)} 23:59, 5 February 2011 (UTC)

How about something like this? Sort of a medium-saturation cyan. Rivertorch (talk) 06:02, 7 February 2011 (UTC)

It looks too close to Fungi on my screen....As much as I hate to propose it, I think we need to try a darker color. Does Plain text and hyperlink display clearly? Bob the WikipediaN ^{(talk • contribs)} 15:20, 7 February 2011 (UTC)

That's better. Text + link fine. Crimsonraptor | (Contact me) Dumpster dive if you must 15:21, 7 February 2011 (UTC)

I'd like to go back to Bob's first proposal; do we really need to worry about confusion between eggshell fossils and Archaea? Besides, the colors aren't that close. Archaea and incertae sedis are almost identical, though, and more likely to be confused. (It seems more likely that the same persons would look up Archaea and incertae sedis [which are probably understudied little eukaryotes] than Archaea and ootaxa.) Ucucha 22:11, 7 February 2011 (UTC)

Soooo...any word yet? Crimsonraptor | (Contact me) Dumpster dive if you must 13:08, 15 February 2011 (UTC)

I'll begin transitioning it to pink right now. Bob the WikipediaN ^{(talk • contribs)} 16:12, 15 February 2011 (UTC)

 Done

In light of the luminosity increase

"Rhizaria is so close to Bacteria, Archaea, and incertae sedis that I can hardly tell a difference"....And suddenly it all makes sense-- those really bright colors on the taxa I mentioned above were probably all set back in the day when CRTs were used. CRTs naturally aren't anywhere nearly as bright, and therefore display the colors darker. Those are probably all easily distinguishable on a CRT, but on an LCD they're all too light to see due to the increase in luminosity. Or is it just me? I better request the participation of those WikiProjects... (done)

I'm making a motion to darken the colors of Rhizaria, Bacteria, and Archaea. Please comment. Bob the WikipediaN ^{(talk • contribs)} 15:48, 7 February 2011 (UTC)

Note that many of these colours are likely to be hard-coded in the taxoboxes, using the |colour= parameter (which is still widespread in these smaller taxa). They look easy enough to distinguish on my LCD, and I for one like a high contrast between background and text (the proposed pinkish egg colour above looks too dark for me). Martin (Smith609 – Talk) 17:26, 7 February 2011 (UTC)

I don't know, I'm using Windows 7 (fast-growing in many areas), and many of the colors seem lighter. I personally vote darker. Crimsonraptor | (Contact me) Dumpster dive if you must 22:16, 7 February 2011 (UTC)

Allow more non-linked arguments

Could the internal linking be made optional for some more of the arguments that this templates takes? The specific on I had a problem with was Rhizaria, but I see a few others that still require linking. Thanks. --Auntof6 (talk) 07:45, 14 June 2011 (UTC)

Now optional for Rhizaria. Martin (Smith609 – Talk) 14:46, 14 June 2011 (UTC)

Thanks! --Auntof6 (talk) 20:22, 14 June 2011 (UTC)

Taxobox colors and accessibility

Due to some recent discussions about MOS:ACCESS and its requirements for WP:COLOR combinations compliant with the WCAG AAA standard for text accessibility, it occurred to me to check the taxobox color scheme. The AAA standard requires a contrast ratio between text and background of at least 7:1, and all but one of the current colors are (slightly) short of that standard relative to the default blue link color (#0645AD). Most do meet the weaker AA standard (4.5:1), but two cases - the colors for viruses and ichnotaxa - fall short of that too.

The table below defines a suggested revised color scheme with AAA-compliant colors. The only one that changes substantially is the viruses, because there's already enough light-pink-ish colors here. Note, these all also meet the AAA standard compared to dark blue/purple 'visited' links (#0B0080). For reference, black text on a white background has a contrast ratio of 21, and the grayscale value with a contrast ratio of 7.0 on a white background is #595959. Thoughts? Opabinia regalis (talk) 03:39, 26 July 2015 (UTC)

Old color	New color	Old contrast ratio	New contrast ratio	Old RGB	New RGB
Animalia	Animalia	5.53	7.19	rgb(211,211,164)	rgb(241,241,180)
Archaeplastida	Archaeplastida	6.02	7.17	rgb(144,238,144)	rgb(172,255,172)
Fungi	Fungi	5.58	7.28	rgb(173,216,230)	rgb(208,243,253)
Chromalveolata	Chromalveolata	6.12	7.51	rgb(173,238,63)	rgb(205,255,172)
Rhizaria	Rhizaria	5.78	7.09	rgb(225,204,252)	rgb(255,225,255)
Excavata	Excavata	6.66	7.61	rgb(240,230,140)	rgb(255,245,148)
Amoebozoa	Amoebozoa	5.69	7.19	rgb(255,200,160)	rgb(255,234,184)
Bacteria	Bacteria	5.70	7.02	rgb(211,211,211)	rgb(233,233,233)
Archaea	Archaea	5.98	7.09	rgb(236,210,210)	rgb(255,228,228)
Viruses	Viruses	3.68	7.63	rgb(238,130,238)	rgb(218,251,218)
incertae sedis	incertae sedis	7.58	7.58	rgb(250,240,230)	rgb(250,240,230)
Colors not produced by this template:
Ichnotaxa	Ichnotaxa	3.96	7.11	rgb(221,165,127)	rgb(255,231,200)
Ootaxa	Ootaxa	5.55	7.20	rgb(255,192,203)	rgb(255,230,231)

I'm certainly open to change for accessibility reasons, but it would appear we're limited by the number of taxa and other groups for which we assign colors. Side-by-side like this, I can't see much of a difference between the new Rhizaria and Archaea. The differences between the proposed Archaeplastida/Fungi/Chromalveolata are still noticeable, but this change would make them a bit harder to distinguish. Then again, you'll never see more than one taxobox on an article and so the point of the color was to allow the reader to easily and quickly determine the major group or kingdom the article belongs to. If we're going to change for reasons of accessibility, we might as well try to rethink which colors are used for the different taxa and try to find a set that is more easily distinguishable at the higher ratios. We've made big changes before -- the animal taxa used to be some shade of pink. Rkitko ^(talk) 13:45, 26 July 2015 (UTC)

Oooh, good eye. I admit I don't think much of them aesthetically; with the intensity cranked that high, I find the backgrounds looking washed-out and difficult to distinguish. (See comments above from 2011.) But there's not much we can do, I suppose. Messing with link color would be even more of a usability problem. I'm open to some rearrangement of colors, certainly. Choess (talk) 14:02, 26 July 2015 (UTC)

Contrast between foreground and background is more important than the difference between two of the background colours, since the information the latter conveys is also present in text. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 20:30, 26 July 2015 (UTC)

Thanks all. I tried to use minimal changes from the existing scheme, but I agree some of them are too close. The worst offenders to me are archaea and ootaxa, but I assume nobody mixes up prokaryotes and eggshells anyway. I'm not so sure that many readers see enough articles of enough different taxa to pick up on the color scheme, except for the 'photosynthesis=green' connection.

An alternative suggestion from Alakzi here is to redo the box using the original colors as dividers rather than as text backgrounds. I could see that working well, but that would be more work to mock up than I have time for right now. Opabinia regalis (talk) 21:10, 26 July 2015 (UTC)

Any appetite for this set? With the exception of keeping the already-compliant and appropriately indistinct color for incertae sedis, these are (close to) the most visually distinct 13 colors possible that meet the contrast requirements for the Vector skin link colors. If you think these are still too easily confused then we'll have to try something else, like using the colors as dividers rather than link text backgrounds, or increasing the font size. Opabinia regalis (talk) 23:59, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

Old color	New color	New contrast ratio
Animalia	Animalia	7.04
Archaeplastida	Archaeplastida	7.02
Fungi	Fungi	7.01
Chromalveolata	Chromalveolata	7.00
Rhizaria	Rhizaria	7.02
Excavata	Excavata	7.68
Amoebozoa	Amoebozoa	7.01
Bacteria	Bacteria	7.00
Archaea	Archaea	7.21
Viruses	Viruses	7.91
incertae sedis	incertae sedis	7.58
Colors not produced by this template:
Ichnotaxa	Ichnotaxa	7.02
Ootaxa	Ootaxa	8.03

Well, these are a lot more vibrant. No objections from me. Alakzi (talk) 01:35, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

Following up, pinging @Rkitko, Choess, and Pigsonthewing: thoughts on the second table above? Thanks! Opabinia regalis (talk) 22:37, 1 August 2015 (UTC)

Looks good to me. Thank you for your work on this. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 23:01, 1 August 2015 (UTC)

That's a little perkier. I still have a bit of trouble distinguishing between the turquoises, but such are the limitations we're working with. Nice work! Choess (talk) 00:43, 2 August 2015 (UTC)

I was entirely convinced I did this last week, but apparently it was all in my head. Will update the template in a bit.

Incidentally, I copied the tables from the docs and apparently they never did get updated when a color was assigned to the choanozoa, which I'm going to leave alone for now. (Not sure why the box treats choanozoa and opisthokonta as equivalent when one is a subset of the other...) Opabinia regalis (talk) 00:10, 13 August 2015 (UTC)

Template-protected edit request on 18 September 2015

Suggestion: add new colours for Hacrobia, Stramenopiles and Alveolata. Zorahia (talk) 02:08, 18 September 2015 (UTC)

You will need to suggest which colours, and why, and then get a consensus for the change. Regards — Martin (MSGJ · talk) 13:27, 18 September 2015 (UTC)

Hmm, looks like the colors are being directly set in the taxoboxes for these. Do we use these classifications in significant numbers? I have no strong opinions on that (clearly I am not a taxonomist!) but I did write the script that generated the new color scheme and we have pretty much run out of visually distinctive colors that are AAA-compliant with links. Pinging Zorahia. Opabinia regalis (talk) 01:51, 23 September 2015 (UTC)

Problem in Archaea in basque Wikipedia

Hello! Could someone help us with this issue? eu:Methanococcus -Theklan (talk) 13:22, 7 February 2016 (UTC)

@Theklan: ignore my previous comment. I looked, quickly, at the templates you have over there. But they are older than ours now, which may be the problem. I don't understand yours well enough to help. Peter coxhead (talk) 23:23, 1 November 2016 (UTC)

Colour request for SAR supergroup

As detailed in a discussion at Wikiproject Algae, "Kingdom" Chromalveolata has been replaced on a large number of taxoboxes by the SAR supergroup. Remaining taxoboxes that contain the disused taxon will be updated with the help of AWB. It would assist the process if we could have a colour for Sar. Since Sar is replacing Chromalveolata, it makes sense to keep its colour, greenyellow or rgb(200,250,80). Existing taxoboxes featuring Sar all use that colour.  Deuterostome  (Talk) 00:48, 29 October 2016 (UTC)

Just noticed that greenyellow, as used in the taxobox on the Chromalveolata article and in most taxoboxes that include Sar, is not quite the same as rgb(200,250,80), which is inserted automatically in taxoboxes of articles containing regnum = Chromalveolata. I have no firm opinion about what colour should be used, but would like to see consistency across articles, and would be willing to do the work to standardize all the taxoboxes, once a color for Sar is selected.  Deuterostome  (Talk) 14:57, 30 October 2016 (UTC)

If you manually set color = {{taxobox colour|SAR}}, then you'll now get precisely the same colour as is set automatically for regnum = Chromalveolata. See SAR supergroup. I don't at present understand how to make this happen automatically within the automated taxobox system, given that the SAR group isn't declared to be of rank "regnum". I'll look into it, but if it needs more than trivial changes, then we should ask Wikid77, who currently best understands the top levels of the system. Peter coxhead (talk) 20:29, 30 October 2016 (UTC)

Wonderful, works perfectly. Thanks, Peter! Good luck with the deep magic at the "top levels of the system." As Plantdrew mentioned in a related discussion on Wikiproject Microbiology, the proper colour is automatic retrieved for an unranked_phylum, but evidently it doesn't work for an unranked_regnum.  Deuterostome  (Talk) 21:53, 30 October 2016 (UTC)

Well, I now understand a little better what is going on, if not totally. The underlying problem is as follows.

• When the taxobox system was set up, the idea was that every taxon would belong to one and only one kingdom, initially defined by |regnum= in the manual taxobox, and later by |rank=regnum in an ancestor of the taxon. The taxobox colour could then be found either from the value of |regnum= or by working up the taxonomy templates (those with names "Template:Taxonomy/...") until one and only one ancestral template with |rank=regnum was found – neat and reasonably simple.
• As cladistics has come to dominate the higher levels of classifications, fudge after fudge has been added to the system in order to allow a non-regnum taxon to set the taxobox colour. These fudges are, it seems, coded separately in different parts of the taxobox system (manual vs. automatic, taxobox in an article vs. taxon list on the right hand side of a taxonomy template). Thus as I've got it set up right now, the correct colour is displayed at the top right hand side of Template:Taxonomy/Rhizaria, but if I use {{Automatic taxobox}} for Rhizaria, the error taxobox colour appears.

Now I can try to add yet more fudges to make every part of the system work properly, although I hesitate to do so, since eventually these fudges will cause difficulties (e.g. the more "ranks" there are that can determine colour, the more chance there is of conflicting colours arising via different "ranks" in a hierarchy).

One such fudge is to add to the "ranks" that are examined as possible determinants of taxobox colour. What "rank" do you want SAR to be? It can't just be unranked or clade. Would it be ok to make it an unranked_regnum everywhere? (At Rhizaria it's currently declared as unranked_subregnum, but this is presumably wrong now.)

Then taxa declared to be unranked_regnum can be examined to see if they determine taxobox colour. Bear in mind that any other taxon declared as of this "rank" will then be able to affect the taxobox colour, and that in a manual taxobox it's necessary to have sufficient "ranks" available below and above SAR's. (There's also the possibility that adding yet more checking for taxobox colour will cause expansion depth failures in deep classification hierarchies.) Peter coxhead (talk) 23:06, 30 October 2016 (UTC)

Thanks for clarifying the issues, Peter. I think it would be simplest to treat Sar as an unranked_regnum, since it is replacing the purported "kingdom" Chromalveolata. Wherever Rhizaria appears as a kingdom, or unranked_regnum, it can be dropped to a lower "unranked rank" (it's an infrakingdom in Cavalier-Smith's system, so unranked_subregnum will probably do). I'll take responsibility for adapting the articles (it may take a few days). There shouldn't be any conflicts among stramenopiles or alveolates, since those have not been advanced as kingdoms on Wikipedia. It seems logical to have the taxoboxes assign colours on the basis of either "kingdom" or "unranked_regnum" (I don't see the reason for taking a colour choice from unranked_phylum, but I'm probably missing something). I can see that these decisions might have unforeseen consequences in other groups, like Archaeplastida...I hope this doesn't create cascading complexities.  Deuterostome  (Talk) 01:23, 31 October 2016 (UTC)

Ok, I'll try to set this up. I too can't see why not only unranked_phylum, but also unranked_superdivisio and even phylum are allowed to set taxobox colour. If it were restricted to just regnum and unranked_regnum, the system would be much easier to maintain. Peter coxhead (talk) 07:51, 31 October 2016 (UTC)

@Deuterostome: I think this is all working now, both in manual and automated taxoboxes. However, it's not possible to leave Rhizaria as a 'kingdom' for the purposes of taxobox colour and add SAR as a 'kingdom', because this makes two 'kingdoms' in the taxonomic hierarchy and the system doesn't work. So I've removed Rhizaria as a source of taxobox colour, which will make some un-fixed taxoboxes display error colours (see what happens in the tables at #Taxobox colors and accessibility above). So please fix any taxoboxes that have Rizaria as 'kingdom' as soon as possible. Peter coxhead (talk) 09:26, 31 October 2016 (UTC)

It seems to be working well. I converted all taxoboxes containing Kingdom Rhizaria (oddly, most were displaying the old Rhizaria color, rather than the red error box...a cache issue, maybe). Next, I'll review the rhizarian boxes that had already been converted, and remove the hardcoded "greenyellow."  Deuterostome  (Talk) 12:26, 31 October 2016 (UTC)

Yes, a cache issue. It's worth remembering that if a template is changed, pages using that template only get updated slowly; you have to purge the page (e.g. by a null edit) to see the effect immediately. It's caught me out before: "why did that change I made to a template not work?" "Because you didn't purge the cache!" If you look now at a page before you edited it (e.g. this one) you will see the error box.

Let me know if you come across any problems. The whole taxobox system is a mess of ad hoc fixes, fudges and sometimes downright errors. Changing any of it is stressful! Peter coxhead (talk) 13:06, 31 October 2016 (UTC)

RfC: multiple determiners of taxobox colour

As noted in the section above, the colour used in a taxobox is determined by either the taxon or (more usually) an ancestor taxon being classed as equivalent to a 'regnum' for taxobox colour purposes, i.e. as what I'll call a 'colour-determining taxon'. (This happens at several different places in the entire set of taxobox templates, making maintenance difficult.)

The way that it's set up at present means that it only works properly in all kinds of taxoboxes if one, and only one, of the taxa in a particular classification is flagged as a 'colour-determining taxon'.

It would be possible to alter the system so that if more than one 'colour-determining taxon' were present, only one of them was chosen. This would make incremental updates easier; for example, to get SAR to be a 'colour-determining taxon' I had to stop Rhizaria being one, but this causes taxobox colour errors until all the relevant taxoboxes in articles are fixed. So I have two questions:

1. Should the taxobox colour system be changed so that if more than one 'colour-determining taxon' is found, one is chosen and the rest ignored?
2. If so, should it be the lowest in the hierarchy or the highest?

I'm at present neutral on (1), but favour the lowest for (2), since the more specific case should over-ride the more general. Peter coxhead (talk) 09:45, 31 October 2016 (UTC)

Lowest for (2). If problems related to multiple color determining taxa stem from inconsistent classifications at higher ranks (which I understand to be the case), I'm OK with an color errors being returned as that will flag an inconsistency that ought to be fixed anyway (though I realize it won't be obvious to editors that aren't very familiar with the intricacies of taxoboxes why the error is being produced). Plantdrew (talk) 16:43, 31 October 2016 (UTC)

@Plantdrew: having spent most of a day working on it, I can only say that it won't be obvious to editors who claim to be familiar with the intricacies of taxoboxes either! The question is complicated by what you led me to discover, namely that |domain=Bacteria is hard-coded in manual taxoboxes (as is now |domain=Archaea). Sigh... Peter coxhead (talk) 18:09, 31 October 2016 (UTC)

@Peter coxhead: OK, scratch that idea. Playing around with color-determining taxa, I see that having more than doesn't produce an error at present, and it's not worth bothering to make it produce an error. It looks to me like the system is already choosing one color-determining taxon and ignoring the rest; it's just starting at the top of the hierarchy rather than the bottom. Starting with a blank taxobox, |phylum=Animalia makes it brown, adding |unranked_superdivision=Plantae turns it green and |regnum=Fungi makes it blue. Plantdrew (talk) 19:46, 31 October 2016 (UTC)

@Plantdrew: in a manual taxobox, yes, because the order in which ranks are examined is hard-coded into {{Taxobox}}. However, if you were able to use an automated taxobox, which is tricky because it means setting up incorrect taxonomy templates, it would be an issue – at least there was an error when I altered the SAR taxonomy template while the Rhizaria one was unchanged. I'll check it out again. Peter coxhead (talk) 19:56, 31 October 2016 (UTC)

Ok, here's an example. Go to Template:Taxonomy/Animalia and set the parent to Rhizaria. Now press preview, and you'll see the error colour appear. The reason is that Animalia and the now ancestor SAR are both colour-defining, and the conflict causes an error. The same would happen if we allowed the genuine ancestor Opisthokonta to define a colour in the automated taxobox system. It doesn't, as you can see if you go to Template:Taxonomy/Opisthokonta, which doesn't show a colour, or if you go to Opisthokonta, which uses an automatic taxobox, delete |color=, and then press preview – you'll see no colour, even though one is defined in {{Taxobox colour}}. Yet I think it would be desirable to allow both Opisthokonta and Animalia to set colours, choosing Animalia when both are possible, but Opisthokonta above this level. Peter coxhead (talk) 20:38, 31 October 2016 (UTC)

Tested, agree. Enabling auto taxoboxes to bypass errors and select the appropriate (lower) rank for taxobox color is desirable. Plantdrew (talk) 03:30, 1 November 2016 (UTC)

@Plantdrew: note that the built-in order for checking multiple colour-determining taxa in manual taxoboxes is top-down. If you start the test you reported above with |regnum=Fungi, and then add |unranked_superdivision=Plantae, the colour doesn't change. However, you and I agree that the lowest in the hierarchy should determine the colour in the case of multiple colour-determining taxa.

I'll wait a bit to see if anyone else is interested, and then try to implement bottom-up selection in both manual and automatic taxoboxes. The latter can't be done using a sandbox unless you create an entire set of sandbox taxonomy templates, so it's a fraught exercise. Peter coxhead (talk) 09:00, 1 November 2016 (UTC)

Taxobox colour for Bacteria

Please see Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Microbiology#Taxobox colour for Bacteria. Peter coxhead (talk) 18:02, 31 October 2016 (UTC)

Taxobox incertae sedis colour

Please see Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Microbiology#Taxobox incertae sedis colour. Peter coxhead (talk) 10:33, 3 November 2016 (UTC)

New taxobox parameter to set colour

I've added |color_as= (+ aliases without the underscore and with British spelling) to make it easier to set a taxobox to the colour of a higher ranked taxon. The following are exactly equivalent:

• |color_as=Eukaryota
• |color={{Taxobox colour|Eukaryota}}

I think we should deprecate the use of |color=; maintaining and updating the set of colours used in taxoboxes will be much easier if only |color_as= is used.

If you notice any problems, revert the edit to {{Taxobox}}. Peter coxhead (talk) 11:26, 5 November 2016 (UTC)

Changes to colour setting in taxoboxes

Please see Template talk:Automatic taxobox/Archive 13#Major rewrite of the colour setting system and Template talk:Taxobox#Update to taxobox colour setting. Peter coxhead (talk) 10:45, 17 November 2016 (UTC)

Use of Lua

Please see Template_talk:Automatic_taxobox#Lua_coding. Peter coxhead (talk) 11:23, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

Template now sets colours for ichnotaxa and ootaxa

Up to now, the colours of taxoboxes for ichnotaxa and ootaxa were set manually in the taxobox templates {{Ichnobox}} and {{Oobox}} rather than in this template. This meant that (a) they were not being set when taxonomy templates were viewed (b) they could be set inconsistently in other parts of the taxobox system (manual and automated).

I've now added the colours to the template here, which should be the only place that actual colours appear. In most taxoboxes, you can use |color_as= to set a colour. If you want the actual colour values for some reason, use {{Taxobox colour}}, e.g. {{Taxobox colour|Animalia}} → rgb(235,235,210).

For reference, the current colours are shown again below. Peter coxhead (talk) 17:35, 8 December 2018 (UTC)

Animalia	rgb(235,235,210)
Archaea	rgb(195,245,250)	also Nanoarchaeota (Nanarchaeota), Korarchaeota, Thaumarchaeota, Crenarchaeota and Euryarchaeota
Archaeplastida	rgb(180,250,180)	also Plantae and Viridiplantae
Bacteria	rgb(220,235,245)
Eukaryota	rgb(245,215,255)	For eukaryotes with no other colour defined, including Excavata, Amoebozoa and Opisthokonta
Fungi	rgb(145,250,250)
Ichnotaxa	rgb(230,222,214)
incertae sedis	rgb(250,240,230)
SAR	rgb(200,250,80)	also Harosa, Chromalveolata
Ootaxa	rgb(250,250,220)
Viruses	rgb(250,250,190)	also Viroids

Make Harosa the same colour as SAR

Harosa is a synonym of the SAR supergroup used by some authors, but isn't registered in the taxobox colour template. This means taxoboxes invoking this one in the phylogeny get the default eukaryote colour instead, making the whole thing look pretty inconsistent. As I don't think it is a controversial fix, could it be changed please? Thanks a lot! ChaotıċEnby(t · c) 23:44, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

@Chaotic Enby:  Done. What article was displaying the eukaryote colour before? Peter coxhead (talk) 11:27, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

Halvaria was, for instance. ChaotıċEnby(t · c) 13:02, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

References

Vector 2022 and taxobox colours

As Vector 2022 changed the link colours slightly to rgb(51,102,204), most of the current taxobox colours aren't AAA compliant anymore, or even AA compliant, with many of them dancing on the wrong side of the 4.5 contrast ratio limit. However, many supergroups have been merged since (Rhizaria with Chromista into SAR), have been deprecated (Excavata) or just aren't used in the taxobox colour scheme anymore (Amoebozoa). With the added liberty in colours of having a few less clades, there is more space to fit 11 lighter but still distinctive colours, meeting the accessibility requirements.

Clade	Colour	Contrast ratio
Animalia	rgb(235,235,210)	4.43
Archaea	rgb(195,245,250)	4.53
Archaeplastida	rgb(180,250,180)	4.41
Bacteria	rgb(220,235,245)	4.40
Eukaryota	rgb(245,215,255)	4.10
Fungi	rgb(145,250,250)	4.41
Ichnotaxa	rgb(230,222,214)	4.03
incertae sedis	rgb(250,240,230)	4.77
SAR	rgb(200,250,80)	4.40
Ootaxa	rgb(250,250,220)	5.05
Viruses	rgb(250,250,190)	4.97

Right now, only four (Archaea, incertae sedis, Ootaxa and Viruses) pass the much lower AA bar (4.5), and none of them even comes close to the AAA criterion (7.0). While the current version worked before Vector 2022, we imperatively need a new colour scheme that fits these requirements today. ChaotıċEnby(talk · contribs) 15:50, 5 February 2024 (UTC)

I support making the contrast ratios meet accessibility requirements. However, stepping back and looking at the big picture, why do we need to have different colors in the taxoboxes at all? What function does it serve? Do readers know what they mean (OK, there is some logic for making plants green but the rest seem pretty arbitrary). Some templates that used to support different colors have had that support removed (see e.g. Template_talk:Infobox_character#Propose_removal_of_the_Color_parameter). Plantdrew (talk) 17:05, 5 February 2024 (UTC)

A major reason why colors were removed in {{Infobox character}} is because they were selected arbitrarily for each character as a "theme" and often led to edit wars. Here, given they're defined based on taxonomy, this issue isn't applicable. Another important difference is that the colors serve a more crucial purpose (knowing which kind of stuff an organism is at first glance), as compared to matching a character's color scheme.
Also, when considering readers, there are different kinds of scenarios. Yes, a reader encountering a taxobox for the first time might not know precisely what each color means, but imagine one used to look at species articles (which, honestly, is the biggest audience of most taxoboxes). When reading an article about marine biology, they would benefit by typing a scientific name on Wikipedia and seeing, at a glance, if it is about an animal, plant, or any other miscellaneous creature.
While one could argue that the taxonomical classification already serves this purpose, it is much less intuitive and relies on more expert knowledge, which in this case also becomes detrimental to the newer reader. Without further context, how could one know that pseudofungi like the potato blight are completely unrelated to fungi, or that brown algae have nothing to do with green algae and land plants? A color-coding of major taxonomic groupings helps readers that could otherwise be lost in the myriad of Latin names, and is much more intuitive to remember after seeing a few taxoboxes. ChaotıċEnby(talk · contribs) 17:43, 5 February 2024 (UTC)

Okay, I checked and even a white background only has 5.36 of contrast ratio with Vector 2022 blue links. The problem might not be only on the taxobox side, unfortunately... ChaotıċEnby(talk · contribs) 18:57, 5 February 2024 (UTC)