This is a Wikipedia project page for those interested in the topic of allowing named references in VisualEditor.
Currently, VE automatically adds numeric ref names with a colon prefix, i.e., ":0", ":1", ":2", and so on. There has long been interest in having VE support meaningful named references. The goal of this page is to be a central location which summarizes, or links to, all information of interest on this topic.
The main project page for VisualEditor is Wikipedia:VisualEditor, which has numerous subpages. There are similar pages on MediaWiki, starting with mw:VisualEditor. In general, the set of MediaWiki pages are more up to date, and WMF members tend to look at and possibly respond at the pages there more than at Wikipedia.
RefRenamer – this script places a link in your Tools sidebar, and when clicked while on an article page, opens a dialog box containing all VE-style numeric references on the page, along with proposed Lastname-YYYY replacement names. It knows how to disambiguate collisions, and you can override to any named reference of your choice. A powerful tool, able to change hundreds of numeric references on a page. Presents a preview pane with diff, and if all looks good, you can Publish the changes.
You can use an advanced search to obtain a list of articles with VE-style numeric references in need of adjustment. The following link will generate a search result page containing up to 50 articles with VE numeric ref names:
Click any result, to view an article that could use improvement with RefRenamer. Purge this page to generate a different list of articles from the link, every time you purge.
