User:Johantheghost/Cite

I've written a perl helper script to automate the process of converting {{ref}}-style references to -style. It works on Linux, but should be usable on any system where you can execute a perl script.

The script: User:Johantheghost/wp-refconvert.pl

Usage:

1. Edit the article
2. Save your article text in a file (eg. article.txt)
3. Run this command: wp-refconvert article.txt
4. Paste the contents of the file article-new.txt into the edit buffer
5. Preview and check the changes before saving; check that Unicode characters (eg. em dash, accents, etc.) are still intact

What it does:

• Scans the article for all {{ref}}, {{ref_label}}, {{ref_num}}, {{note}}, and {{note_label}} tags.
• Checks that all tags refer to the correct notes.
• Converts {{ref}}, {{ref_label}}, and {{ref_num}} to text, where text is taken from the appropriate {{note}} / {{note_label}}.
• Replaces the {{note}}s with .

Assumptions:

• All the {{ref}}s and {{note}}s are consistent.
• All the {{note}}s are in a single block, numbered consecutively, with one {{note}} and possibly multiple {{note_label}}s per line.

Notes:

• The script attempts to handle Unicode correctly, and should do as long as your perl system does. BUT make sure that when you cut-and-paste the text in and out of the edit buffer that the text doesn't get wrecked — Windows seems to take pleasure in doing this. Bottom line, check before comitting the edit. Make sure em dashes etc. are still OK.
• The script attempts to output an error message if it finds any inconsistency; if you get a mismatch message, the script thinks that the {{ref}}s and {{note}}s don't match. This is quite possible, due to the lack of checking in {{ref}} / {{note}}. Check them carefully.

Error messages:

; can't open foo.txt : obvious.

; can't create foo-new.txt : can't create the output file.

; unknown reference style {{ref-xxx|foo}} : don't understand the reference tag.

; note mismatch- ref 3=foo; note=bla : the third reference in the article was called foo, but the third note in the note list was called bla.

; note number mismatch- seq = 4, explicit = 5 : a {{note_label|foo|5|a}} tag was found in line 4 in the note list (the number should match the position in the list).

; unknown note style {{note-xxx|foo}} : don't understand the note tag.

; note mismatch- no ref 4 (foo) : note 4, named foo, was found, but there is no fourth reference.

; ref mismatch- no ref 4 (foo) : reference 4, named foo, was found on pass 2, but not pass 1 (should never happen).