Hi, all. I'd like to suggest a couple of imo-needed modifications to our {{Trade route}} infobox. This was highlighted during discussions I had with Ayrehead02, who has recently written up a number of Canon route articles, and I'll randomly refer you to the Lipsec Run one as an example.
First off, I don't believe the way the current |systems= and |planets= fields are set up serves the reader well. As a reader, I'd like to see at a glance - as far as available information permits - the order of all the "stops" on the route. In the Lipsec Run example, we have a systems field that lists the route's known star systems only, and then we have a planets field that, one would think, lists planets only but also lists other or unspecified objects, such as the Rycep asteroid belt and the Wretch of Tayron. In that same infobox we also have a situation where we know that a route travels through a system (the Virgillia system, and we are even shown where it does so), but that system doesn't have any known objects inside it - so it's getting listed in the systems field only but then the planets field doesn't reflect its relative position on the route. Alternately we could also squeeze that system into the planets field, which seems rather inelegant.
What I think would work better is if we had simply a, say, |transitpoints= field that would list all the top-most-level ones of such stops. That is, if a route passes through the Virgillia system or the Rycep asteroid field, we list those; if it goes through the Coruscant system and it has ten planets in it, we still only list the Coruscant system. That way, we serve the reader the full ordering of the places the route goes through.
Looking at another of the routes Ayre has written up, Vaathkree Trade Corridor, I'd say we also have a case for doing away with the systems and planets fields entirely and replace both of them with, say, an |otherobjects= field that would contain a simple alphabetic list for top-most-level places that we know are on a route somewhere but haven't been given sufficient information for a more precise placement in the |transitpoints= field - in this example, the Telerath system. This way we could avoid the arguable messiness seen in that example where a single field tries to convey both relative ordering but also an alphabetic list; plus, it's kinda strange anyway to be only having a dedicated planets field when, as seen with the Rycep asteroid field example, we also have cases of non-planetary objects being top-most-level stops on routes.
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And secondly, another problem is the naming of the |start= and |end= fields of the infobox. It's... kinda silly, since hyperspace routes don't necessarily have only one "starting" point and only one endpoint - they're both (all) just endpoints, really. Here, perhaps we could instead do just that - have one |endpoints= field in which we list in an alphabetic list both/all known endpoints?
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tl;dr I propose the following fields for the Trade route infobox to replace the start, end, systems, and planets fields (references not shown for clarity in this hypothetical example):
{{Trade_route
...
|endpoints=*[[Eriadu]]
*[[Lipsec]]
|transitpoints=Lipsec - [[Virgillia system]] - [[Shuraden]] - [[Sump]] - [[Merokia]] - [[Taul]] - [[Isde Naha]] - [[Bettel]] - [[Actlyon]] - [[Rycep asteroid belt]] - [[Wretch of Tayron]] - [[Eriadu system]]
|otherobjects=[[Telerath system]]
...
}}
Thoughts? Imperators II(Talk) 18:36, 3 March 2025 (UTC)
Discuss
- Assumed this goes without saying, but I support this :P Ayrehead02 (talk) 09:08, 11 March 2025 (UTC)
- Looks good Lewisr (talk) 02:13, 11 April 2025 (UTC)
- Sounds good —spookywillowwtalk 15:02, 11 April 2025 (UTC)
- Yes please OOM 224 10:32, 15 April 2025 (UTC)