I've just started a simple wiki and after three pages with about 20 references on each and finding it impossible to add any more references because it took literally an hour to check all the numbering, I decided I had to automate the process ofnumbering footnotes/references particularly where you have the same reference in several places. Having toyed with the idea before I came up with the following possibilities:-
[[[Footnote]]]
and
##Footnote text##
The idea of [[[NOTE]]] is that the note is an internal link, but I prefer ##NOTE## because it means "number" and so it is very easy to remember and most people will pick up this concept without having to have exhaustive guides on adding references (like wikipedia - I never really got the hang of adding a reference into wikipedia. For multiple references the format would be:
##REF|Foot note text##
To display the footnotes you just enter
####
In my own implimentation, a footnote is its own reference tag if none is supplied (i.e. if you enter the same reference twice it gets the same number!) And I've based comparison on case insentive [a-z][0-9]_-
Example:
The old creole##CREOLE|Creole 1.0 standard## standard did not include footnotes##FOOT|footnotes are wonderful## or references##References are useful## so it is time the Creole standard##CREOLE## included this essential feature, see below##FOOT## BLA BLA BLA ---- ####
The old creole[1] standard did not include footnotes[2] or references[3] so it is time the Creole standard[1] included this essential feature, see below[2]
BLA BLA BLA
- Creole 1.0 standard
- footnotes are wonderful
- References are useful
(Note: the [1] is a superscript "1" which is also a link down to the reference. For completeness I've also added one ^ before the listed reference which is an internal link back to each occurence of its use.)