WikiWOOD:Guide for newcomers
From WikiWOOD
This "Guide for newcomers" is intended to help new editors find their way around and introduce some of the tools available to them, and point them to other guidelines for writing for WikiWOOD.
At first it may all sound very confusing, but don't worry; jump right in and make edits. If you make a mess, another editor will probably spot it and tidy it up. If you screw up a page really badly, your edit can easily be reverted; this is often done when pages are deliberately vandalised.
You may also be interested in reading ... Guide for newcomers, how to contribute with little or no wiki experience.
There are five menus that appear on most pages in this wiki. They are listed below along with brief notes about what they do and why they are important. The functions of the Editor Buttons is also described; this appears when you edit a page.
Contents |
Navigation box
The Navigation box can be found in the left-hand sidebar.
- Community Portal is a good place to go if you are looking for tasks that need completing.
- Recent Changes will list all the pages that have been modified recently. As well as providing a good read, it is a quick way of patrolling the site for vandalism, or checking on the work of new editors and lending them a hand if they need it. (see Help:Tracking changes)
- Categories takes you to the top level in the category tree. This is a good place to start when you want to find the best place(s) to categorize a new article. (see Help:Categories)
Help menu
The Help box can be found in the left-hand sidebar.
- Help takes you to a list of all the Help pages that deal with the technicalities of creating, formating and maintaining pages.
- Writing Quality Articles takes you to a page that deals with guidelines for the content of pages.
- Help Desk is a page where you can leave requests for help.
- Forum - no longer exists.
Page menu
These menu tabs can be found at the top of every page.
- Article displays the page fully formatted as most readers will see it.
- Discussion takes you to the article's Talk page. It is here that editors can discuss changes that are needed for the page. Discussion is seldom necessary - be bold and go ahead and make changes as you see fit. But sometimes issues arise and the discussion page is where editors can reach a consensus on how to proceed, or explain their reasoning in detail for making changes to the article.
- Edit allows you to make changes to a page. If you are viewing the Article or History tabs when you click the edit tab, the Article will be displayed for editing. If you are viewing the Discussion tab when you click the edit tab, the Talk page will be displayed for editing.
- History displays all the changes that have been made to a page. It shows you who has made changes and when. You can compare different versions of the page, and you can Undo edits. This is sometimes useful if pages have been vandalized.
- Move allows you to rename a page. (see Help:Moving a page)
- Watch allows you to add pages to your Watchlist so that you can easily keep an eye on pages of interest to you. If you already are watching the page, the tab will read Unwatch.
Personal menu
These menu tabs can be found at the top of every page.
- User name takes you to your own personal User Page (if you are logged in) where you can tell the world a bit about yourself (see Help:User page).
- My talk takes you to your own personal User Talk Page where other users can leave messages for you (see Help:User_Talk_pages).
- My preferences takes you to a page where you can set up your profile and change the way the wiki is displayed and behaves (see Help:Preferences).
- My watchlist shows changes that are made to pages you have flagged to Watch. Like the Recent changes page, it is a quick way of patrolling pages you are interested in.
- My contributions shows all the edits you have made.
Toolbox menu
The Toolbox menu can be found in the left-hand sidebar.
- What links here will show all the pages that link to the current page. This is useful for checking the context the page is being used in, and what readers may be expecting to find on it. If you plan on moving a page, this will show you all the links that will need to be changed to follow the move.
- Related changes lists the last changes on pages who are linked to the current page.
- Upload file lets you upload photographs and other files. (see Help:Managing files)
- Special pages links to many sub-pages that show information useful for maintaining the wiki. Some examples are Broken redirects, Dead-end pages, Gallery of new files, Long pages, Orphaned pages and Uncategorized pages. There are also many pages of statistics.
Editor buttons
These buttons appear when you Edit a page. They add some of the basic markup code to your text.
- Bold applies '''Bold text''' code which will look like this.
- Italics applies ''Italic text'' code which will look like this.
- Wiki link creates [[another page]] code which will link to another page in the wiki.
- External link creates [http://www.example.com link to another website] code which will link to another website.
- Level 2 headline creates == Headline text == code for a section heading. Add more = signs for lower level headings if needed.
- Embedded image creates [[Image:Example.jpg]] code to add an image. See Help:Images for extended syntax to format images.
- Media file link creates [[Media:Example.ogg]] code to embed other media.
- Mathematical formula creates <math>Insert formula here</math> code for a formula in LaTeX format. See Help:Displaying a formula. This function is not yet enabled on this wiki.
- Ignore wiki formatting creates <nowiki>Insert non-formatted text here</nowiki> code and is primarily used when writing Help pages and other documentation.
- Signature creates --~~~~ code which you should use to sign and timestamp your comments on Talk pages like this: --Toolrest 08:46, 29 January 2009 (CST)
- Horizontal rule creates ---- code to draw a horizontal line. Use this sparingly as it is easily confused with subheadings.
See also
- Community Portal - This is the place to find out what's happening on WikiWOOD. Learn what tasks need to be done and what groups there are to join.
- Help - covers all the technicalities of creating, formating and maintaining pages. TIP: if you can't figure out how to format something in a particular way, look for a page that uses the formating you want to achieve, and look at the code in the 'edit' screen.
- Writing quality articles - this is the starting point for learning all about article layout and content guidelines, writing style, wikification, and using templates.
- How to contribute with little or no wiki experience - We understand that many will want to contribute but have little time to learn all the in's & out's of the wiki.
