LEMDO: Encode Reference Links

Encode Reference Links

Prior Reading

Introduction to Linking Mechanisms

Choose Linking Mechanisms

Hash Character

Rationale

The reference link is one of the linking mechanisms that we use. Unlike pointer links, reference links allow you to control what you want to appear in a parenthetical citation.

Principles

The


                                             <ref>

element allows you to control what text appears as a hyperlinked citation in the digital output of your edition.

You will always use the


                                             <ref>

element to link outside of your edition (e.g., to other LEMDO editions, to project-wide databases, and to external sources).

You may choose to use the


                                             <ref>

element to link within your edition.

While the


                                             <ref>

element grants you more control over what appears in citations, it also leaves more room for human error.

Step-By-Step

You will follow many of the same steps when encoding your


                                          <ref>

elements. The exception to this is when you encode


                                          <ref>

elements linking to LEMDO’s project-wide bibliography (BIBL1) and production database (PROD1); these links require an extra step. See Practice: Link to LEMDO Databases. Follow these steps to encode


                                          <ref>

links:

Add a


                                                <ref>

element to your text.

Add your citation to the text node of the


                                                <ref>

element. This will become hyperlinked text in the digital output of your edition. Note that if you are adding your


                                                <ref>

link to pre-existing text (i.e., you have already typed everything out before encoding link in it), you can simply highlight the text that you wish to be hyperlinked and wrap it with the


                                                <ref>

element.

Add a


                                             @target

attribute to your


                                                <ref>

element with either a pathway or a URL as the value. Note that the value of


                                             @target

depends on what type of entity you are linking to; see Practice: Link to a LEMDO Edition, Practice: Link to LEMDO Databases, Practice: Link to MoEML Entities, and Practice: Link to External Sources for more information.

Practice: Link to a LEMDO Edition

There are two practices for linking to editions within the LEMDO ecosystem: 1) Practice for linking to an edition within your anthology (including linking to your own edition) and 2) Practice for linking to an edition in a different anthology.

When you link to an edition within your anthology, use a pathway as the value of the


                                       @target

attribute on your


                                          <ref>

element. See Hash Character for information on creating pathways. When you link to editions in your anthology, you may only link to files that will be published at the same time as your edition. This means that when you create your link, you must ensure that the file that you are linking to will be published in the same release as the file that you are linking from.

When you link to an edition in a different LEMDO anthology, treat the entity that you are linking to as an external source. Use the URL for the entity that you wish to link to as the value of the


                                       @target

attribute on your


                                          <ref>

element. You may only link to LEMDO editions that have already been published.

Practice: Link to LEMDO Databases

You will use the


                                          <ref>

element to encode links to LEMDO’s project-wide bibliography (BIBL1) and to our project-wide production database (PROD1). There is one additional step when you encode


                                          <ref>

elements that link to either of these databases. We add the


                                       @type

attribute with a value of "bibl" (when linking to BIBL1) or "prod" (when linking to PROD1).

Follow these steps when linking to BIBL1 or PROD1:

Ensure that the source you are citing is in the correct database. You can do this by searching for bibliography entries and for productions. If your source is not in our databases, follow the instructions outlined in Prepare Edition Bibliography.

Add a


                                                <ref>

element around your citation.

Add a


                                             @type

attribute on your


                                                <ref>

element. If you are linking to BIBL1, give the


                                             @type

attribute a value of "bibl". If you are linking to PROD1, give


                                             @type

a value of "prod".

Add a


                                             @target

attribute on your


                                                <ref>

element. If you are linking to BIBL1, give the


                                             @target

attribute a value of "bibl:" followed by the xml:id for your source as given in . If you are linking to PROD1, give


                                             @target

a value of "prod:" followed by the xml:id for your production as given in .

Practice: Link to MoEML Entities

Practice: Link to External Sources

To link to external Web sources, give the URL of the source as the value on the


                                       @target

attribute. Note that even if the text that you wrap in the


                                          <ref>

element is the source’s URL, you still need to use the URL as the value of


                                       @target

Examples

This


                                          <ref>

element links to a LEMDO edition in the DRE anthology:

(<ref target="doc:emdAHDM_emStaging#emdAHDM_emStaging_Doors">
<title level="a">Early Modern Staging</title>
</ref>).

This example assumes that 1) The edition we are linking from is also in the DRE anthology and 2) That the edition that we link to will be published in the same release as the edition that we are linking from. When someone clicks this link, it will bring them to the section titled Doors in the page Early Modern Staging in Eleanor’s edition of An Humorous Day’s Mirth.

This


                                          <ref>

element links to a published LEMDO edition in the MoMS anthology:

(<ref target="https://lemdo.uvic.ca/moms/emdDEVI3_M.html">
<title level="m">Device of the Pageant</title>
</ref>).

This example assumes that the edition we are linking from is not in the MoMS anthology. When someone clicks this link, it will bring them to Laurie Ellinghausen’s modern edition of Device of the Pageant on the published MoMS website.

This


                                          <ref>

element links to an entry in BIBL1:

(<ref type="bibl" target="bibl:ALEX1">Alexander and Wells</ref>).

When someone clicks this link, a pane will open up on the right side of the page with the bibliography entry for Alexander and Well’s Shakespeare and Race.

This


                                          <ref>

element links to an entry in PROD1:

(<ref type="prod" target="prod:MUAT1">Muat</ref>).

When someone clicks this link, a pane will open up on the right side of the page with the production entry for Maria Muat’s production of Twelfth Night from Shakespeare: The Animated Tales.

This


                                          <ref>

element links to an external source:

(<ref target="https://deepplaybooks.org/">
<title level="m">Database of Early English Playbooks</title>
</ref>).

When someone clicks this link, it will bring them to the homepage for the Database of Early English Playbooks.

Prosopography

Chloe Mee

Chloe Mee (she/her) worked as a research assistant with the LEMDO team over several periods from 2022 to 2025. She graduated from the University of Victoria in 2025 with a BA (Hons with distinction) in English. She will be studying at the University of British Columbia to complete her MA in English. Chloe collaborated with the LEMDO team on a VKURA internship in summer 2022, mainly focusing on Hamlet quartos. Following her internship, she also worked as a research assistant in 2022–23 and 2025.

Isabella Seales

Isabella Seales is a fourth year undergraduate completing her Bachelor of Arts in English at the University of Victoria. She has a special interest in Renaissance and Metaphysical Literature. She is assisting Dr. Jenstad with the MoEML Mayoral Shows anthology as part of the Undergraduate Student Research Award program.

Janelle Jenstad

Janelle Jenstad is a Professor of English at the University of Victoria, Director of The Map of Early Modern London, and Director of Linked Early Modern Drama Online. With Jennifer Roberts-Smith and Mark Kaethler, she co-edited Shakespeare’s Language in Digital Media: Old Words, New Tools (Routledge). She has edited John Stow’s A Survey of London (1598 text) for MoEML and is currently editing The Merchant of Venice (with Stephen Wittek) and Heywood’s 2 If You Know Not Me You Know Nobody for DRE. Her articles have appeared in Digital Humanities Quarterly, Elizabethan Theatre, Early Modern Literary Studies, Shakespeare Bulletin, Renaissance and Reformation, and The Journal of Medieval and Early Modern Studies. She contributed chapters to Approaches to Teaching Othello (MLA); Teaching Early Modern Literature from the Archives (MLA); Institutional Culture in Early Modern England (Brill); Shakespeare, Language, and the Stage (Arden); Performing Maternity in Early Modern England (Ashgate); New Directions in the Geohumanities (Routledge); Early Modern Studies and the Digital Turn (Iter); Placing Names: Enriching and Integrating Gazetteers (Indiana); Making Things and Drawing Boundaries (Minnesota); Rethinking Shakespeare Source Study: Audiences, Authors, and Digital Technologies (Routledge); and Civic Performance: Pageantry and Entertainments in Early Modern London (Routledge). For more details, see janellejenstad.com.

Joey Takeda

Joey Takeda is LEMDO’s Consulting Programmer and Designer, a role he assumed in 2020 after three years as the Lead Developer on LEMDO.

Mahayla Galliford

Project manager, 2025-present; research assistant, 2021-present. Mahayla Galliford (she/her) graduated with a BA (Hons with distinction) from the University of Victoria in 2024. Mahayla’s undergraduate research explored early modern stage directions and civic water pageantry. Mahayla continues her studies through UVic’s English MA program and her SSHRC-funded thesis project focuses on editing and encoding girls’ manuscripts, specifically Lady Rachel Fane’s dramatic entertainments, in collaboration with LEMDO.

Martin Holmes

Martin Holmes has worked as a developer in the UVic’s Humanities Computing and Media Centre for over two decades, and has been involved with dozens of Digital Humanities projects. He has served on the TEI Technical Council and as Managing Editor of the Journal of the TEI. He took over from Joey Takeda as lead developer on LEMDO in 2020. He is a collaborator on the SSHRC Partnership Grant led by Janelle Jenstad.

Navarra Houldin

Training and Documentation Lead 2025–present. LEMDO project manager 2022–2025. Textual remediator 2021–present. Navarra Houldin (they/them) completed their BA with a major in history and minor in Spanish at the University of Victoria in 2022. Their primary research was on gender and sexuality in early modern Europe and Latin America. They are continuing their education through an MA program in Gender and Social Justice Studies at the University of Alberta where they will specialize in Digital Humanities.

Nicole Vatcher

Technical Documentation Writer, 2020–2022. Nicole Vatcher completed her BA (Hons.) in English at the University of Victoria in 2021. Her primary research focus was women’s writing in the modernist period.

Tracey El Hajj

Junior Programmer 2019–2020. Research Associate 2020–2021. Tracey received her PhD from the Department of English at the University of Victoria in the field of Science and Technology Studies. Her research focuses on the algorhythmics of networked communications. She was a 2019–2020 President’s Fellow in Research-Enriched Teaching at UVic, where she taught an advanced course on Artificial Intelligence and Everyday Life. Tracey was also a member of the Map of Early Modern London team, between 2018 and 2021. Between 2020 and 2021, she was a fellow in residence at the Praxis Studio for Comparative Media Studies, where she investigated the relationships between artificial intelligence, creativity, health, and justice. As of July 2021, Tracey has moved into the alt-ac world for a term position, while also teaching in the English Department at the University of Victoria.

Bibliography

Alexander, Catherine M.S., andStanley Wells, eds. Shakespeare and Race. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000. WSB aab892.

Muat, Maria, dir. Twelfth Night. Shakespeare: The Animated Tales. Christmas Films, 1992. WSB cb22.

Orgography

LEMDO Team (LEMD1)

The LEMDO Team is based at the University of Victoria and normally comprises the project director, the lead developer, project manager, junior developers(s), remediators, encoders, and remediating editors.

Metadata

Authority title	Encode Reference Links
Type of text	Documentation
Publisher	University of Victoria on the Linked Early Modern Drama Online Platform
Series	Linked Early Modern Drama Online
Source	TEI Customization created by Martin Holmes, Joey Takeda, and Janelle Jenstad; documentation written by members of the LEMDO Team
Editorial declaration	n/a
Edition	Released with Linked Early Modern Drama Online 1.0
Encoding description	Encoded in TEI P5 according to the LEMDO Customization and Encoding Guidelines
Document status	prgGenerated
Funder(s)	Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada
License/availability	This file is licensed under a CC BY-NC_ND 4.0 license, which means that it is freely downloadable without permission under the following conditions: (1) credit must be given to the author and LEMDO in any subsequent use of the files and/or data; (2) the content cannot be adapted or repurposed (except in quotations for the purposes of academic review and citation); and (3) commercial uses are not permitted without the knowledge and consent of the editor and LEMDO. This license allows for pedagogical use of the documentation in the classroom.