Wikipedia:COinS

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Shortcut WP:COINS

ContextObjects in Spans (COinS) is a unmaintained method of embedding latent OpenURL ContextObjects in web pages. This allows client software to retrieve bibliographic metadata and to use an OpenURL resolver to find a mediated link. A principal advantage of using COinS, rather than giving a static OpenURL, is that the client can determine which resolver to use. This allows, for instance, searching for a copy of a book in one's own library.

COinS have been added to various parts of Wikipedia. They are basically just a chunk of bibliographic information stored in a way that machines can read. This has two applications:

• The information can be converted into a full OpenURL and resolved by a local OpenURL resolver.
• The information can be stored by bibliographic tools like Zotero.^[1] The tool can download the bibliographic information from an article into a personal library for future research and retrieval.
  • Zotero also has Wikipedia export,^[2] which allows references to be dragged into a Wikipedia edit box, where they will appear formatted as Wikipedia citation templates.

So far, COinS have been added to:

• Wikipedia:Book sources – just contains the ISBN
• Many citation templates and infoboxes – see: Category:Templates generating COinS
• MediaWiki:Citethispage-content – generated when you click Cite this article; contains information for citing Wikipedia itself in other documents