Wikipedia:As of
 | This page documents an English Wikipedia editing guideline. It is a generally accepted standard that editors should attempt to follow, though occasional exceptions may apply. Any substantive edit to this page should reflect consensus. When in doubt, discuss first on the talk page. |
 | This page in a nutshell: Wikipedia contains date-sensitive information which may require revision on a future date. The template {{As of}} is used to help track and maintain such statements. |
The "as of" technique is a method to deal with information that will quickly become dated. Some articles have information that is valid only at a specific moment in history, such as population statistics and current events. If you suspect that a fact in an article will become dated at some point in the future, and want to ensure that people will update it, include a tag of the form
with the year of validity in place of year and the month number in place of month. See the {{As of}} template for additional options and detailed examples.
Every individual, non-contiguous statement in an article that may date quickly should be so tagged, even if there are several such statements that link to the same year. Otherwise, it is possible that when one statement is updated, other statements in the article might be overlooked, and no one will realize that they need to be checked also.
Usage guidelines
Usually "as of" is used only in cases where an article is intended to provide the most current information available and will need a future update. It should not be used for historical information that will not change. For example, a mention that the historical "population of Toledo, Ohio, was 13,768 as of the 1860 Census" should not be tagged, as it is a historical fact which will not change. It is appropriate to tag "the population of Toledo as of the 2020 Census was 287,208", as this figure should be updated when a newer census is conducted. The date used for a given statement should be the date of the most recent reliable source (for currently valid statements), or the date on which the data were obtained (for example, when using census figures).
"As of" should not be used with future dates, as it will place the article in nonexistent categories. Instead, use {{Update after}} to mark when the next event will occur. Here are two ways to correctly mark statements with future dates:
{{As of|2024|post=,}} construction is expected to finish in 2034 and cost US$28 billion.
Construction is expected to finish in 2034 and cost US$28 billion.{{update after|2034}}
Remember to always use precise language when writing about future or current events. The statement should make sense to a reader years into the future, even if the information has changed. If it is possible to predict when a statement will need updating, use the {{Update after}} template to indicate when it should be updated. In the above statement the most obvious date is 31 December 2034, after which time construction will have finished or the statement will have become inaccurate. In either case the article should be updated to reflect this.
When the "as of" phrasing is not ideal, it should be changed to improve encyclopedic prose in either of two ways:
{{As of|since=y|2024|01|post=,}} the head of the congregation has been the Rev. Ann O. Nymous, which gives: Since January 2024,[update] the head of the congregation has been the Rev. Ann O. Nymous{{As of|alt=Beginning in early 2024|2024|01|post=,}} production of the series moved to Toronto, which gives: Beginning in early 2024,[update] production of the series moved to Toronto
Avoid beginning a series of paragraphs or sentences with repeated instances of the wording "As of", as this can produce a distracting list-like effect. Both "As of" and "Since" can be made lower-case for use in mid-sentence, by addition of the |lc=y parameter, and any use of |alt=... can contain text beginning with lower case.
Precise language
In general, editors should avoid using statements that will date quickly. This does not apply to quotes, which must remain true to their source.
Where possible, avoid terms such as "now" and "soon" (unless their intended meaning is made apparent), "currently" and "recently" (except on rare occasions where they are not redundant), or phrases such as "in modern times" and "the sixties" (unless their frame of reference was previously made clear). One exception to this is in articles that are regularly updated, such as those that cover current events.
Do not use variables to automatically update the date, such as "as of {{CURRENTYEAR}}", unless the information being referenced is automatically updated each time the page is parsed, such as {{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}.
When writing about past events, use more precise language, such as "during the 1990s", or "in August 1969". For future and current events use phrases such as "as of March 2007", or "since the start of 2005", which indicate that the information is time-specific. The "as of" technique/template described above can be used to assist fellow editors in keeping information up-to-date. However, this technique is not intended to replace precise language.
"As of" categories
When statements are tagged using {{As of}} the article they are in is automatically added to one or more of the categories in the table below. This allows editors to browse the statements by date of origin. Statements from 2005 onwards will be sorted into categories by month and year if a month is specified, otherwise they will be placed in the parent year category. Statements from 1990–2004 will be categorised by year only, and all other statements will be placed in a separate category.
New categories should be created every month using the {{Category as of}} template, and the navbox below should be updated to reflect the changes. No other maintenance should be required for these categories.
Maintenance tasks
Article maintenance
If you are looking for work and are interested in helping this project there are a number of routine tasks that you can perform. The most demanding, and also most important, is to go through the above categories checking the statements that have been tagged, updating the statement or "as of" tag wherever possible. You may not be able to update some data at this point in time, for example census figures. You may find it easiest to work through the subcategories chronologically, or you may prefer to look through all tagged articles or work on today's focus letter.
When checking articles for updates you may find it helpful to add one of the following lines of code to your common.css page:
.asof-tag { display: inline !important; } /* Show all links */
.asof-tag.ref { display: inline !important; } /* Only show reference links */
.asof-tag.update { display: inline !important; } /* Only show (unreferenced) update links */
This displays a link to the location specified by the url parameter in the article, if given, which should lead to a webpage containing an updated version of the statement. The URL is visible in the edit window if available, this technique is intended to provide a faster way to check information. For an example see the template documentation. If the url parameter is not specified, this will display a link to edit the page, indicating the implementation of the template and allowing editors to quickly update pages.
Project maintenance
If you have less time to spare, you can check if this month's maintenance category has been created yet. If it hasn't, create it using the {{Cat ASOF}} template, and update the above navbox to include it. You can also help by adding "as of" tags whenever you come across an appropriate statement while editing articles.
Also see the next section for tasks relating to converting articles from the previous "as of" method.
See also
- Wikipedia:Template messages/General#Timing-related messages
- Wikipedia:Updating information, for updating information at a known future date, and:
- The accompanying {{Update}} template.
- The accompanying {{Update after}} template.
- {{Recentism}}
- {{Show by date}}/{{subst:Show by}}