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Using a template

A template is used by typing it's name surrounded by curly braces. Eg. {{Template name}}. You can often pass data to a template by adding the data after a pipe character ( | ). Eg. {{Template name | send this data to the template}}. When data is passed to a template, the data is referred to as a template variable. Template variables are separated by pipe characters. Eg. {{Template name | first variable | second variable}}. Sometimes, template variables may be named, in which case the variable name is entered first, followed by an equals sign ( = ), followed by the variable data. Eg. <nowiki>{{Template name | variable name = the variable data}}

Templates on Practical Plants

Practical Plants makes heavy use of templates to create a consistent appearance across articles. For most contributors, you only need to know of a few important templates which you can use throughout articles, most of the hundreds of templates that make up Practical Plants are only of interest to the site developers and administrators.

Format a plant name

The {{Plant name}} template will create a formatted link to a plant article, adding appropriate italics and epithets where needed. By passing abbr and/or common as additional template variables, the plant genus can be abbreviated, or the common name appended.

Accepted plant name formats

Binomial (latin name, genus and species)
Malus domestica
Binomial with variety epithet
Malus domestica var. domestica
Binomial with subspecies epithet
Malus domestica ssp.
Binomial with cultivar name in single quotations
Malus domestica 'Golden Delicious'
Binomial with cultivar group
Brassica oleracea Italica Group

Usage examples

{{Plant name | Malus domestica}}
Malus domestica
{{Plant name | Malus domestica | abbr}}
M. domestica
{{Plant name | Malus domestica | common}}
Malus domestica (Apple)
{{Plant name | Malus domestica | common | abbr}}
Malus domestica (Apple)