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Template sandbox and testcases for TEMPLATE_NAME

Overview

This page provides a clean workflow to safely edit and validate TEMPLATE_NAME:

Sandbox: Template:TEMPLATE_NAME/sandbox — a working copy where you make changes.
Testcases: Template:TEMPLATE_NAME/testcases — inputs that exercise typical and edge cases.
Live: Template:TEMPLATE_NAME — the production version. Do not edit directly without review.

Use this page to:

Preview sandbox output against fixed testcases without touching the live template.
Compare actual vs expected output for each testcase.
Track recent changes and invite reviewers.

Quick links

Live template: Template:TEMPLATE_NAME
Sandbox: Template:TEMPLATE_NAME/sandbox
Testcases: Template:TEMPLATE_NAME/testcases
Documentation: Template:TEMPLATE_NAME/doc (optional)
Talk page: Template talk:TEMPLATE_NAME

How to test

1. Edit the sandbox at Template:TEMPLATE_NAME/sandbox. 2. Open this test page and click “Show preview” to render the sandbox with inputs below. 3. Verify each testcase: Does the “Actual output” match the “Expected output”? 4. If all pass, consider copying sandbox to live using an edit summary like:

  “Sync from /sandbox: passes all /testcases as of YYYY-MM-DD.”

Previewing tips

Use “Preview page with this template” gadget or the built-in preview.
Check parser output in different skins and mobile view.
Validate accessibility: headings order, link text, ARIA where applicable.
Internationalization: test with non-ASCII parameters and RTL where relevant.

Test harness

The following sections render the sandbox template against curated inputs. Each testcase shows:

Parameters passed to the template
Expected output (as plain wikitext target)
Actual output (rendered via sandbox transclusion)

Testcase A: Minimal invocation

Parameters: {{TEMPLATE_NAME}}

Expected output: [Minimal successful output with defaults: e.g., a neutral message or basic box]

Actual output (sandbox):

Character and language test sandbox

This sandbox is used to test how Template:TEMPLATE NAME behaves with special characters (such as Greek letters) and language-specific spans.

Basic examples

Greek letter (direct character): α
Greek letter (HTML entity): γ
German span example: A

Within the template

Below are example calls of the template using these characters as parameters.

{{TEMPLATE NAME | title = Greek test: α γ | summary = Demonstrating Greek letters: α, β, γ, and entities like γ. | attr1 = Direct Greek: α β γ δ | attr2 = Entity Greek: α β γ δ | attr3 = German label: A, English label: A }}

Preview the page to check if:

Greek characters (α, β, γ, δ) display correctly.
HTML entities (α, β, γ, δ) render as the expected symbols.
The A is kept as a German-language span and does not break the layout.

Notes

Use this sandbox to experiment with different scripts (Greek, Cyrillic, etc.).
Test right-to-left scripts by adding spans with lang="ar" or lang="he".
If the template trims or escapes some of these, adjust the template code accordingly.

Testcase B: Common parameters

Parameters: {{TEMPLATE_NAME | param1 = Alpha | param2 = Beta | flag = yes }}

Expected output: [Example: shows "Alpha" and "Beta" in designated slots; flag toggles enhanced styling]

Actual output (sandbox):

Character and language test sandbox

This sandbox is used to test how Template:TEMPLATE NAME behaves with special characters (such as Greek letters) and language-specific spans.

Basic examples

Greek letter (direct character): α
Greek letter (HTML entity): γ
German span example: A

Within the template

Below are example calls of the template using these characters as parameters.

{{TEMPLATE NAME | title = Greek test: α γ | summary = Demonstrating Greek letters: α, β, γ, and entities like γ. | attr1 = Direct Greek: α β γ δ | attr2 = Entity Greek: α β γ δ | attr3 = German label: A, English label: A }}

Preview the page to check if:

Greek characters (α, β, γ, δ) display correctly.
HTML entities (α, β, γ, δ) render as the expected symbols.
The A is kept as a German-language span and does not break the layout.

Notes

Use this sandbox to experiment with different scripts (Greek, Cyrillic, etc.).
Test right-to-left scripts by adding spans with lang="ar" or lang="he".
If the template trims or escapes some of these, adjust the template code accordingly.

Testcase C: Edge values and escaping

Parameters: {{TEMPLATE_NAME | param1 = [[Linked target|Visible text]] | param2 = {{subst:CURRENTTIMESTAMP}} | raw = <code>escaped</code> }}

Expected output: [Links render correctly; timestamp subst is literal in expected; raw shows escaped markup]

Actual output (sandbox):

Character and language test sandbox

This sandbox is used to test how Template:TEMPLATE NAME behaves with special characters (such as Greek letters) and language-specific spans.

Basic examples

Greek letter (direct character): α
Greek letter (HTML entity): γ
German span example: A

Within the template

Below are example calls of the template using these characters as parameters.

{{TEMPLATE NAME | title = Greek test: α γ | summary = Demonstrating Greek letters: α, β, γ, and entities like γ. | attr1 = Direct Greek: α β γ δ | attr2 = Entity Greek: α β γ δ | attr3 = German label: A, English label: A }}

Preview the page to check if:

Greek characters (α, β, γ, δ) display correctly.
HTML entities (α, β, γ, δ) render as the expected symbols.
The A is kept as a German-language span and does not break the layout.

Notes

Use this sandbox to experiment with different scripts (Greek, Cyrillic, etc.).
Test right-to-left scripts by adding spans with lang="ar" or lang="he".
If the template trims or escapes some of these, adjust the template code accordingly.

Testcase D: Internationalization (i18n)

Parameters: {{TEMPLATE_NAME | lang = ja | text = こんにちは世界 }}

Expected output: [Text displays correctly for non-ASCII; applies lang attribute or rtl/ltr where applicable]

Actual output (sandbox):

Character and language test sandbox

This sandbox is used to test how Template:TEMPLATE NAME behaves with special characters (such as Greek letters) and language-specific spans.

Basic examples

Greek letter (direct character): α
Greek letter (HTML entity): γ
German span example: A

Within the template

Below are example calls of the template using these characters as parameters.

{{TEMPLATE NAME | title = Greek test: α γ | summary = Demonstrating Greek letters: α, β, γ, and entities like γ. | attr1 = Direct Greek: α β γ δ | attr2 = Entity Greek: α β γ δ | attr3 = German label: A, English label: A }}

Preview the page to check if:

Greek characters (α, β, γ, δ) display correctly.
HTML entities (α, β, γ, δ) render as the expected symbols.
The A is kept as a German-language span and does not break the layout.

Notes

Use this sandbox to experiment with different scripts (Greek, Cyrillic, etc.).
Test right-to-left scripts by adding spans with lang="ar" or lang="he".
If the template trims or escapes some of these, adjust the template code accordingly.

Testcase E: Error handling

Parameters: {{TEMPLATE_NAME | param1 = | required =  }}

Expected output: [Shows a gentle error or maintenance category; does not break page layout]

Actual output (sandbox):

Character and language test sandbox

This sandbox is used to test how Template:TEMPLATE NAME behaves with special characters (such as Greek letters) and language-specific spans.

Basic examples

Greek letter (direct character): α
Greek letter (HTML entity): γ
German span example: A

Within the template

Below are example calls of the template using these characters as parameters.

{{TEMPLATE NAME | title = Greek test: α γ | summary = Demonstrating Greek letters: α, β, γ, and entities like γ. | attr1 = Direct Greek: α β γ δ | attr2 = Entity Greek: α β γ δ | attr3 = German label: A, English label: A }}

Preview the page to check if:

Greek characters (α, β, γ, δ) display correctly.
HTML entities (α, β, γ, δ) render as the expected symbols.
The A is kept as a German-language span and does not break the layout.

Notes

Use this sandbox to experiment with different scripts (Greek, Cyrillic, etc.).
Test right-to-left scripts by adding spans with lang="ar" or lang="he".
If the template trims or escapes some of these, adjust the template code accordingly.

Maintenance

Add new testcases when introducing features or fixing bugs.
Keep “Expected output” updated; include rationale in edit summaries.
When deprecating parameters, add tests demonstrating legacy behavior and warnings.

Copy-paste skeletons

Below are ready-to-use skeletons for the sandbox and testcases subpages.

Skeleton: Template:TEMPLATE_NAME/sandbox

{{#if:{{{required|}}} |  <div class="tmpl"> {{{param1|}}} · {{{param2|}}} {{#if:{{{flag|}}}|✓|}} {{#if:{{{raw|}}}|{{{raw}}}|}} </div> |  TEMPLATE_NAME: missing required parameter [[Category:Pages with TEMPLATE_NAME errors]] }}

Skeleton: Template:TEMPLATE_NAME/testcases

; Minimal : {{TEMPLATE_NAME/sandbox}} ; Common params : {{TEMPLATE_NAME/sandbox | param1 = Alpha | param2 = Beta | flag = yes }} ; Edge and escaping : {{TEMPLATE_NAME/sandbox | param1 = [[Linked target|Visible text]] | param2 = 20250101T000000Z | raw = <code>escaped</code> }} ; I18n : {{TEMPLATE_NAME/sandbox | lang = ja | text = こんにちは世界 }} ; Error handling : {{TEMPLATE_NAME/sandbox | required = }}

Review checklist

Output is stable across re-parses; no expensive parser functions without need.
No unexpected categorization in mainspace; errors go to maintenance cats.
Template is documented at Template:TEMPLATE_NAME/doc with parameters, examples, and tracking.
Style is minimal; avoid inline CSS unless necessary; consider using existing module or template styles.

This box: view • talk • edit

Template:Terminate sentence ensures a sentence ends with a specified terminator (default: a period). It avoids adding duplicate terminators and can optionally trim trailing spaces. It attempts to ignore trailing closing quotes or brackets when deciding whether a terminator is already present.

Usage

Basic:

{{Terminate sentence|This is a sentence}}
→ This is a sentence.

Named parameters:

{{Terminate sentence
 |text=He said "Hello"
 |term=.
}}
→ He said "Hello".

Custom terminator:

{{Terminate sentence|text=Warning|term=!}}
→ Warning!

Avoid duplicate terminator:

{{Terminate sentence|text=Already done.|term=.}}
→ Already done.

Trim trailing spaces:

{{Terminate sentence|text=Ends with space   |trim=yes}}
→ Ends with space.

Skip processing:

{{Terminate sentence|text=No changes here|skip=yes}}
→ No changes here

Append a note:

{{Terminate sentence|text=Complete|note=(source: 2025)}}
→ Complete. (source: 2025)

Parameters

1 / text: The input text to terminate.
term: The terminator to enforce at the end. Default is .. Common choices: !, ?.
trim: If yes/true/1, strips trailing spaces before checking.
skip: If yes/true/1, returns text unchanged (still appends note if provided).
allowdup: If yes/true/1, allows duplicate terminators (e.g., ellipses). Default disallows duplicates.
note: Optional text appended after a space, unaffected by termination logic.

Behavior details

Terminator detection attempts to ignore trailing closing quotes/brackets (", ', ”, ), ], }).
If the last visible character equals term, no extra terminator is added unless allowdup=yes.
If trim=yes, trailing spaces are removed before detection.
If note is present, it is added with a leading space after the final text.

Examples

Quotes:

{{Terminate sentence|text=He whispered "hush"|term=.}}

 → He whispered "hush".

Parentheses:

{{Terminate sentence|text=Complete (verified)|term=.}}

 → Complete (verified).

Exclamation:

{{Terminate sentence|text=Alert|term=!}}

 → Alert!

Ellipsis (allow duplicates):

{{Terminate sentence|text=Wait...|term=.|allowdup=yes}}

 → Wait....

Best practices

Prefer using term that matches the sentence intent (., !, ?).
For complex punctuation, consider the Lua-powered variant below.
Document usage in your template’s /doc page where you incorporate this helper.

Lua-powered variant (optional)

For more robust detection (including multilingual quotes and punctuation), create Module:TerminateUtil with:

-- Module:TerminateUtil
local M = {}

local closing = {
  [")"] = true, ["]"] = true, ["}"] = true,
  ['"'] = true, ["'"] = true, ["”"] = true, ["’"] = true, ["»"] = true, ["›"] = true
}

local function trimRight(s)
  return (s:gsub("%s+$",""))
end

function M.lastVisibleChar(args)
  local s = args.s or ""
  s = trimRight(s)
  local i = #s
  while i > 0 do
    local c = s:sub(i,i)
    if closing[c] then
      i = i - 1
    else
      return c
    end
  end
  return ""
end

return M

Then update the template to call:

{{#invoke:TerminateUtil|lastVisibleChar|s=text}}

This improves detection for closing quotes and brackets.

Usage

Normally this template is used without any parameters, placed at the bottom of the template or page being documented, within a <noinclude>...</noinclude> container:

<!--Last line of your template code--><noinclude>
{{Documentation}}
<!-- Add categories to the /doc subpage and interwikis in Wikidata, not here! -->
</noinclude>

Then this template automatically loads the content from the /doc subpage of the template it is used on.

This template can also load the content from any other page. Like this:

<!--Last line of your template code--><noinclude>
{{Documentation |Template:Other page/doc}}
</noinclude>

Note that when loading the documentation from a page other than the local /doc page it becomes tricky to handle the categories.

The content can also be fed directly as text. Like this:

<!--Last line of your template code--><noinclude>
{{Documentation
 | content =
(some documentation)
}}</noinclude>

When the |content= parameter is used, the doc box normally does not show the [edit] [purge] links in the top right corner. Note that if the /doc page exists, a link to it is still shown in the link box below the doc box.

Parameter |1= and the |content= parameter can also be combined, like this:

<!--Last line of your template code--><noinclude>
{{Documentation |1=Template:Any page/doc
| content =
{{Template:Any page/doc |parameters}}
}}</noinclude>

Then the pagename fed as parameter 1 is used for the [edit] [purge] links and for the /doc link in the link box below the doc box. But the content parameter is used for the content shown in the doc box. The above code means that the content is transcluded as {{Template:Any page/doc|parameters}}. In this example a parameter is also fed to the /doc page being loaded.

Best practice

The code should be added at the bottom of the template code, with no space before <noinclude> (which would cause extra space on pages where the template is used).

Categories that apply to the template itself should be added to the bottom of the /doc subpage, inside <includeonly>...</includeonly> tags. Interwiki links that apply to the template should be listed at Wikidata (more at Wikidata). For more complex cases, see Wikipedia:Template documentation#Categories and interwiki links.

If the documentation page contains <includeonly> or <noinclude> tags as part of the visible documentation text, replace the "<" with "<".

Heading

When in the Template namespace, this template shows this heading:

Template documentation

In most other namespaces, such as "Wikipedia:", it shows this heading:

Documentation

But when on File (image) pages it shows this heading:

Summary

The heading parameter can be used to set the heading to something else. Like this:

{{Documentation |heading=Infobox documentation}}

If the heading parameter is empty but defined, no heading is shown and no [edit] [purge] links are shown. Like this:

{{Documentation |heading=}}

The heading-style parameter can be fed optional CSS values. Without quotation marks " " but with the ending semicolons ;. For example:

heading-style=font-size:150%;color:red;

Below the big doc box is a small link box that shows some meta-data about the documentation. The link box shows different things depending on what parameters are fed to this template, and in which namespace it is used. In some cases the link box is not shown at all.

To hide the link box, add the parameter |link box=off.

You can also insert customised text in the link box, by defining the |link box= parameter. For example: |link box=This documentation is automatically generated by [[Template:Country showdata]]

Automatic functions

If the documentation page does not exist, the [create] link includes a preload page so that clicking it will pre-fill the edit form with the basic documentation page format. Preload text is also used for the /sandbox and /testcases [create] links.

When this template is on a protected template page it now automatically adds {{pp-template}} which shows the grey or red padlock in the top right corner. So no need to manually add {{pp-template}} to templates that use {{Documentation}}.

When this template is on a /sandbox subpage it automatically adds the {{Template sandbox notice}}.

Subject namespaces vs. talk namespaces

Terminology: Subject namespaces are the opposite of talk namespaces. For instance "Template:" is the subject space of "Template talk:".

This template is usually placed in a subject namespace, within <noinclude> tags. But in some cases this template needs to be on the talk page:

In the Mediawiki namespace, since <noinclude> often does not work in system messages, and since the Mediawiki namespace needs to be kept clean for performance reasons.

When placed on talk pages, this template usually is placed near the top of the page and without <noinclude>...</noinclude> tags.

The /doc, /sandbox and /testcases pages should normally be in the subject namespace, except in the namespaces that do not have the MediaWiki subpage feature enabled: Main, File, Mediawiki and Category. (But currently we only show the /sandbox and /testcases links from User, User talk, Template and Template talk namespaces.) There are also a whole bunch of other technical reasons why the /doc page must be stored under the talk page for those (but only those) namespaces.

This template automatically points its [create] links for the /doc, /sandbox and /testcases to the right namespace.

Testing

You can simulate the output for a given page by using the |page= parameter. For example, if you use the code |page=Template:Edit protected, the template will behave exactly as if it were on the page Template:Edit protected, including showing the documentation from Template:Edit protected/doc, linking to Template:Edit protected/sandbox, etc. This parameter is useful for testing and is used extensively on the module testcases page.

Technical details

This template calls {{Documentation/start box2}} and {{Documentation/end box2}} which, in turn, call {{Documentation/start box}} and {{Documentation/end box}}. The /start box (and /end box) hold most of the code, while this template and /start box2 (and /end box2) do parameter preprocessing.

The preload page for the /doc [create] link is Template:Documentation/preload. The preload pages for the /sandbox and /testcases [create] links are Template:Documentation/preload-sandbox and Template:Documentation/preload-testcases.

For more details, see the talk page.

Full syntax

{{Documentation}}

{{Documentation
 | content =
}}

{{Documentation
| [path to documentation page]
| heading-style = 
| heading = 
| link box = 
}}

Template documentation

Template sandbox and testcases for TEMPLATE_NAME

Overview

Quick links

How to test

Previewing tips

Test harness

Testcase A: Minimal invocation

Basic examples

Within the template

Notes

Testcase B: Common parameters

Basic examples

Within the template

Notes

Testcase C: Edge values and escaping

Basic examples

Within the template

Notes

Testcase D: Internationalization (i18n)

Basic examples

Within the template

Notes

Testcase E: Error handling

Basic examples

Within the template

Notes

Maintenance

Categories

Copy-paste skeletons

Skeleton: Template:TEMPLATE_NAME/sandbox

Skeleton: Template:TEMPLATE_NAME/testcases

Review checklist

Usage

Parameters

Behavior details

Examples

Best practices

Lua-powered variant (optional)

See also

Usage

Best practice

Heading

Link box

Automatic functions

Subject namespaces vs. talk namespaces

Testing

Technical details

Full syntax

See also