Wikipedia:Identifying and using tertiary sources: Difference between revisions

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Problematic uses: ce; additional note
Exceptions: addl. point
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* Any tertiary source can be a primary source, when we are referring explicitly to the content of the source as such. For example, in a comparison of varying dictionary definitions, each dictionary cited is a primary source for the exact wording of the definitions it provides (e.g. if we want to quote them directly), while all of them would be tertiary sources for the meaning and interpretation of the term being defined, in a more usual editorial context.
* Some usually primary types of how-to and advice material, including [[User guide|user guides and manuals]], are tertiary (or even secondary, depending on their content) when written by parties independent of the subject, e.g. the in-depth computer operating system guides found in bookstores (as opposed to the basic one that arrived from the manufacturer in the box with the computer).
* An abstract prepared by the author[s] of a journal paper is a primary source, like the paper itself. A summary produced by a journal's editors is secondary. A machine-produced abstractdigest is not a source at all.
* Primary source material that is simply reprinted (even with some reformatting or digesting) in an otherwise tertiary or secondary source remains primary. This includes quotations.