Wikipedia talk:How to edit a page/Archive2

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This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

improving the how to edit a page instructions

Hi all. I am fairly new to wikipedia. It would improve the main page a hell of a lot if actual diagrams were placed within the text of how to change a webpage. as a new user, it is very difficult to keep track of suggestions like 'click on the sandbox' etc. or click on this buotton. it woudl be much eaiser if ther was a screen dump showing those buttons exactly. I think this is vital for new users to quickly become accustomed to how to properly edit.ToyotaPanasonic 12:59, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

How to add your photo to a wiki article

My apologies if this is not the best place for this but I know a helper will direct me to a more appropriate forum. I would like to help others and to help myself by being able to write the article on How to add your photo to a wiki article. I can compress an image, and upload it, but at the moment that is as far as I can take it. This is for images from cameras which people are prepared to place in the public domain. I have read and tried but to no avail. The furthest I got was to create a link to my photo; it did not get imbedded in the article. I know the instructions are there somewhere, deep in the many pages of detail. I would like to have and write (or provoke the writing of) the BRIEF SPECIFIC INSTRUCTIONS for embedding a picture in a wiki article. I look forward to being experienced and useful and being a helper myself. Garrison Roo

Don't worry, Garrison, because by having uploaded the image and verified its public-domain status, you've already done most of the work. The actual step of embedding an image in an article can actually be quite simple. For a simple image of, say, Gustav Mahler, one would take the Mahler.jpg image that had been uploaded to Wikipedia and insert the tag [[Image:Mahler.jpg]] where desired. Here is an example of the tag in action:

Different formatting options are also available for the placement of the image in the article and the making of captions to go along with the image. There's a lot to go over when doing this, so I'd suggest that for all of the more complicated operations, you should refer to the image section of the general markup tutorial and the Extended image syntax article. Take care. Batman Jr. 02:28, 29 September 2005 (UTC)

Archive

Archived old stuff. Maurreen 23:46, 27 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Where? --Ben Brockert < 01:22, Dec 30, 2004 (UTC)

Never mind, found it, and moved it to Wikipedia talk:How to edit a page/Archive. --Ben Brockert < 01:37, Dec 30, 2004 (UTC)

Ack! I just noticed that you "archived" the page by copy and pasting it into another page. That is bad, as it does not conform to the GFDL. It would have been better to just blank the page, or better yet to move it to a new location. I'm blanking the other page and linking it to the revision of this page before you copied it. --Ben Brockert < 01:54, Dec 30, 2004 (UTC)

Wiki Markup?

I really like using wiki markup. Even moreso than HTML. Are there any places I can write in wiki markup other than the metawiki websites? As a graduate student, I have to cite stuff all the time. In editing my work, things get all sorts of messed up in regards to the citation numbers. Is there a way for word or dreamweaver or open office to save things in wiki markup?

New approach to section headings example

Upon reading the following in Wikipedia:Section:

Sections in a template do not appear in the TOC of the referring page. The automatic section numbering restarts with 1 at the beginning of a template, and continues with the section numbering of the referring page itself after the template.

I hit on this idea to display the section headings example in the table:

{{Section headings example}}

Benefits:

• Shows section headings exactly as normally rendered (no kludges).
• TOC not screwed up.
• Template can be used anywhere this example appears (as in Wikipedia:Section).

Drawbacks:

• Looks a little weird.
• If Template:Section headings example changes, still need to edit the "what you type" column in Wikipedia:How to edit a page (and any other page containing similar instructions).

The last drawback could be fixed (I assume) by using a second template containing <nowiki>.

- dcljr 20:22, 1 Sep 2004 (UTC)

With the template, just as with the bare wiki-style ==Headings==, the TOC included references to the example headings. With the template, the section edit links were messed up even worse than with the wiki-style headings. So I converted it to use font changes and bolding instead of real headings. —AlanBarrett 20:39, 19 Sep 2004 (UTC)

By the way, {{msgnw:Template:Whatever}} includes the content of a template, and wraps that in a nowiki context. —AlanBarrett 20:39, 19 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Hmm. That feature must have been changed because it actually did work back on Sep 1st. Now my edit of 01 Sep 2004 doesn't render properly! I've commented out the remark on Wikipedia:Section that I quoted above since it no longer seems to be true. - dcljr 17:54, 7 Oct 2004 (UTC)

I added in-line CSS styles to the article's raw text to display the heading examples identically to the Monobook skin. In-line CSS is a simpler solution than templates to this example display matter. Simple is good. As long as Monobook is the default skin this may be good enough. --Roger Chrisman 05:56, 27 May 2006 (UTC)

Categories

How can I put the article Cheetah to the Category:World_records and so as there it will printed something like "Speedest Animal"? (sorry for my English), thnx.

Setti 22:02, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

It seems like some introductory material should include information on puting articles in categories. I'm not asking how to do it, I'm suggesting that people not need to learn about categories by accident, and wondering where might be the best place to put such information. Maurreen 23:51, 27 Sep 2004 (UTC)

I think that m:Help:Starting a new page would be a good place to explain:

1. How to decide what categories your new page belongs in;
2. How to place your new page into those categories.

—AlanBarrett 17:23, 2 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Horizontal rules

I've reverted some changes by J23wu that replaced ---- with <HR>. While I understand the idea behind it (you can use HTML attributes if you use an HTML tag), I don't think it is appropriate or necessary to encourage use of HTML tags over wiki syntax:

• Not mentioning the wiki syntax at all is confusing, because users will see it all over the place already.
• The syntax exists so that the software can determine exactly what to make it mean; it may be that, in the future, there will be a way of accessing wikipedia that doesn't involve HTML - in that case, ---- would be made to do something else, and there's no reason to require it to "understand" <HR>.
• The use of a width attribute confuses the purpose of markup in Wikipedia: it is not to define the exact look of the page, but to tell the software roughly what it is that the content consists of; I can't think of any valid uses for such specific markup.
• ---- is far easier for anyone not familiar with HTML to remember - and recognise - than an HTML tag; the software will even recognise ----------------------- as meaning the same thing!

All that being said, you are of course entitled to your own opinion, so feel free to counter these points howsoever you wish. - IMSoP 00:38, 30 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Strange content

Why do I see a load of stuff about some indian chap when I look at the 'How to edit a page' page? There doesn't seem to be anything there at all about editing pages!

That was a vandalized version earlier today - if you still see it there must be something wrong with your/our cache, but the current version of the page is again the correct one. andy 15:55, 6 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Blockquote

Why isn't there some form of block quote??? I don't understand how this hasn't come to exist yet. - Omegatron 00:11, Nov 9, 2004 (UTC)

What exactly do you mean by block quote? Most HTML commands are available in addition to Wiki markup, so most anything you can do in HTML you can do on the Wikipedia. One way of doing that is with <pre></pre>:

This
       is
   preformatted
                    text

Another way is to start each line with a space, which is the Wiki markup way:

Each line of
this block of text
has been started with
a space. Hit
edit to see what I mean.

Or, if you're just looking for the HTML markup <blockquote></blockquote>, you can just use it.

This text is being quoted with blockquote. Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation or any nation so conceived and so dedicated can long endure. We are met on a great battlefield of that war.

I hope this helps. --Ben Brockert 23:40, Nov 9, 2004 (UTC)

Oh. I meant for literal block quotes. I guess <blockquote></blockquote> works. It should be mentioned on the main page? - Omegatron 21:10, Dec 29, 2004 (UTC)

I have also looked for a way to do blockquotes, missed this entry, and finally found it in the source code for an article. So I have just added the technique to the table in the Sections, paragraphs, lists, and lines section. --Blainster 23:17, 3 Jun 2005 (UTC)

What about a short quote (from an article or a previous Talk entry)? Should we use <blockquote> or italics or what? —Frungi 03:06, 11 July 2005 (UTC)

In some sense, the wiki markup for blockquote is the ":" (colon). Paragraphs (i.e. lines) starting with ":" are displayed as blockquote. However, an explicit newline (hitting "return" or "enter" key) ends it (just like it ends a list item, in contrast to the HTML tag "LI"), and the following text has again to be preceded by a ":" (or multiple ones) to remain indented. (I hope this helps.) — MFH: Talk 16:19, 20 September 2005 (UTC)

Shouldn’t there be a Wiki markup for blockquotes? (I don’t mean <dd> indenting, I mean actual blockquotes.) I would think IMSoP’s argument for ---- over <hr> (see above) applies equally here. —Frungi 02:44, 24 September 2005 (UTC)

There has to be functional code for multiline blockquotes. The following is three separate paragraphs, separated by a new line each in standard wiki style. Using the HTML blockquote, it all runs together. Watch:

This sentence is one paragraph. This sentence is another paragraph. Why am I following that other line??? I'm a separate paragraph too. If anyone has a solution for this, please contact me: http://bemweb.com/contact/

What I actually typed:

<blockquote>This sentence is one paragraph.

This sentence is another paragraph.  Why am I following that other line???

I'm a separate paragraph too.  If anyone has a solution for this, please contact me:

http://bemweb.com/contact/</blockquote>

Since we can use HTML, why not use the
line break code in between? --Jasilvasy 01:38, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

Er... to wikify?

I'm confused. As far as I remember, "to wikify" meant to format an article in the Wiki code and add wiki links. But pointing the "wikify" page to "How to edit a page," seems a little confusing. Many of the articles on the "Articles to be Wikified" category already /have/ wiki links. So I think we need to clarify what the "wikify" category means and/or work on cleaning it up. (i.e.- There are too many pages on that list that are already wiki linked, so either folks aren't removing the "wikify" boilerplates, or the intention is that something else needs to be done to those articles, in which case we need to specify what that is.) --Wolf530 20:56, Nov 22, 2004 (UTC)

I agree. I searched for wikify, because I'm new here and wanted a definition and got this. I cannot find a proper defintion of the term anywhere on Wikipedia. My understanding of the term is similar to yours, but it needs to be defined by someone who knows better (at wikify instead of it redirecting here).

-Joe Llywelyn Griffith Blakesley 09:59, 2004 Nov 29 (UTC)

Definitions???? I don't think they exist. I've been actively working since Feb. 05 and I keep looking for definitions of terms like wikify and redirect. All the instructions deal with are procedures. For example: a redirect is a page with a redirect on it! Don't define a word by using the word. This little annoyance is getting to me as I try and learn more complex functions. It would be nice to have some real defined functions here. Can we answer the questions: What is this? and then Why do we use it? as well as addressing the how? WBardwin 09:27, 26 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Edit summary description?

Would it be possible to have an addition describing what an edit summary should look like?

• Try this: Edit summary--Atlantima 23:01, 12 August 2005 (UTC)

Spaces in section titles?

I like to put a blank between the = and the section title text (as I see others do too), but in the examples, they are squashed together like ==The Section Title==. Yes, it's a minor point, but which would you prefer? I think a blank as separator is more readable, and I'd like the examples show this. jae 23:26, Dec 28, 2004 (UTC)

I prefer the blank as well. - Omegatron 21:13, Dec 29, 2004 (UTC)

the software automatically inserts spaces when you use the new section link, so it could be argued to be the default. It doesn't really matter either way; do what you prefer, but don't edit pages just to insert the spaces. --Ben Brockert < 01:22, Dec 30, 2004 (UTC)

A note

I think a note either on this page or on the actual edit page would be useful, strongly encouraging anons to put an edit summary justification of their change if they change a small factual detail, like changing kB to MB, or changing a single digit of a physical constant, or changing a year, or whatever, so that people don't have to labor trying to find proof that the change is valid and not a malicious edit. - Omegatron 21:13, Dec 29, 2004 (UTC)

Definition lists

There is markup for Definition lists, but I've never seen an article that uses it.

Questions:

• Are definition lists useful? What I'm asking is, by way of an example, sections are useful because Tables of Content are built off of them. Is there anything like that for definition lists? Is there a reason to use a definition list over, for example, creating a section called ==Definitions== and putting a table in it?

• Are there conventions for definition lists? Do they go at the top or at the bottom?

DanielVonEhren 17:59, 1 Jan 2005 (UTC)

I think it's just that a definition list isn't a common feature of an encyclopedia article. The utility of it is that the user-side rendering of a properly formatted definition list could be changed in future software upgrades, or even user preferences, unlike a table. I have seen the markup used, but only to make an entire line of text bold (by starting the line with a semicolon). --—Ben Brockert (42) UE News 19:25, Jan 1, 2005 (UTC)

Bring back the markup examples?

Can we please, please, please bring the markup examples back to this page? I know that when I first started editing Wikipedia, I found the markup examples about 100 times more useful than everything else on this page. -- Walt Pohl 08:25, 14 Jan 2005 (UTC)

They were split off into Wikipedia:Wiki markup by Dan100, without any notification or discussion beforehand. I'm still tempted to merge them back in. —Ben Brockert (42) UE News 16:13, Jan 14, 2005 (UTC)

More on Wiki markup

Why, oh why does Wiki markup redirect here? argh... I am hoping that that particular redirect was before they were Wikipedia:Wiki markup and WP:HEP were split in two. I am assuming this is so and fixing the redirect to go to Wikipedia:Wiki markup instead. But I can also see the argument that you might want all newcomers (i.e. people who might actually type Wiki markup rather than Wikipedia:Wiki markup) to come to this page first no matter what. So should all newbie redirects come here? Or is it okay to fix the redirect to head over there instead? Instead of doing nothing, I'm going to take initiative and fix the redirect. But if others disagree, they should change it back. Eric Herboso 21:27, 18 Jan 2005 (UTC)

I'm merging the markup back into this article; Dan100 can discuss it in talk if he thinks it is bettor off on his own page, since no one else does. Any admins who come across this, please don't undelete the article in the next few minutes. —Ben Brockert (42) UE News 03:10, Jan 19, 2005 (UTC)

Of course, I can't delete it. He didn't actually move the history, and there haven't been many edits to the new page, so I guess I'll be satisfied with a cut and paste. —Ben Brockert (42) UE News 03:15, Jan 19, 2005 (UTC)

Talk from Wikipedia talk:Wiki markup

Abu ari wrote:

The 'What you type' column of this page is too narrow to be readable when printing from Opera or Firefox. OK on screen, and in Internet Explorer, the print is also OK.

superscripts

The discussion of superscripts in the section of the page on Character formatting suggests use of ⁿ, or &#nnnn, or &sup1;, &sup2;, &sup3; for those special cases. On the other hand, the special character table shown when editing a page provides literal characters for ² and ³. According to Meta:Help:Special characters#Unsafe characters superscript 2 and 3 are unsafe characters and should not be used. Should the edit template be changed to NOT provide these literals (and, BTW, where is the meta edit page - admin only special page perhaps)? -- Rick Block 16:14, 23 Jan 2005 (UTC)

If the edit template includes these, then it should insert &sup1;, &sup2;, &sup3;, not the literal. I don't know where that is controlled from, but I'm pretty certain this can be done. -- Jmabel | Talk 21:12, Mar 31, 2005 (UTC)

That &sup2 and other stuff looks terrible in all Macintosh browswers (Safari, Firefox and Explorer). The <sup> is the only one that works properly. -- Kjkolb 18:15, August 31, 2005 (UTC)

Printing from WIKI?

Is this possible? If so how is it done?

There's no fancy way to do it; use your browser's Print facility (e.g., File:Print). Elf | Talk 14:00, 4 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Document Object Identifier (DOI)

I think it could be usefull to reference articles with the Document Object Identifier (DOI) which can then analog to ISBN-numbers crosslinked to http://dx.doi.org/myDOINumber, e.g. like

• R. Lahana: How many leads from HTS?. Drug Discovery Today, 1999, 4, 447-448. DOI: 10.1016/S1359-6446(99)01393-8.

This isn't really the place for that kind of proposal; try the appropriate section of the Village pump or one of the mailing lists. —Ben Brockert (42) UE News 03:55, Feb 10, 2005 (UTC)

OTOH try this template:

• Template:doi (links, talk)

which is probably good for the time being. Applying this to your example (i.e. {{doi|10.1016/S1359-6446(99)01393-8}}) gives:

• R. Lahana: How many leads from HTS?. Drug Discovery Today, 1999, 4, 447-448. doi:10.1016/S1359-6446(99)01393-8 .

OK, it's in lower case but hey, it works :-) (I changed it to upper-case) HTH HAND --Phil | Talk 16:01, Apr 4, 2005 (UTC) (UTC)

Broken unicode rendering

Special characters, like greek letters and math symbols, wikify to unicode entities, like &945; However, my browser (FireFox 1.0) renders most of these unicode entities in some pseudo-latin font that I would describe as 20-point black crayon bold. They look like big, badly scrawled letters.

If I download the page source from WikiPedia to my local hard drive and display it from there, all the greek letters and math symbols render correctly--beautifully, in fact.

I'm guessing that something in one of the style sheets is causing the problem, but most of the style sheets appear to be generated by PHP code, and I don't know how to look at them.

Swmcd 04:54, 2005 Mar 2 (UTC)

The greek/math symbols render correctly under FireFox on Windows:
Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.2; rv:1.7.3) Gecko/20041001 Firefox/0.10.1

The bad rendering happens under FireFox on Linux
Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686; en-US; rv:1.7.5) Gecko/20041107 Firefox/1.0

Swmcd 18:46, 2005 Mar 3 (UTC)

I have the same problem with Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686; en-US; rv:1.6) Gecko/20040115.

The greek symbols disappear if I set Preferences / Appearence / Fonts : Sans-serif: "serif" (and uncheck "allow documents to use other fonts").

But then everything else looks "ugly". I presume that thousands of visitors have the same problem, but in spite of my searches, I did not find an adequate bug fix. Anybody who knows more about this, please let us know! Thanks in advance — MFH: Talk 13:08, 21 September 2005 (UTC)

Link test request

Can someone please check this link? I'm sure it works but Niteowlneils says it doesn't. I've cleared my cache and everything but it still works for me. Please check it here: (Flash Movie?)This request made by user:80.229.152.246

Seems to work OK for me. Be aware that it takes a while to load up, even over a fast connection. --Phil | Talk 10:31, Apr 22, 2005 (UTC)

Thanks Phil. I know it takes a long time to load, unfortunately that can't be helped. I think I can safely put the link onto the article without Niteowlneils deleting it (the link has changed a bit, I renamed the file). Once again, thanks for your help. --80.229.152.246 18:07, 22 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I still can't hit anything at www.myfilehut.com from any of my computers, but I was able to hit it from a computer at the Sunnyvale library, and my brother can hit it. Niteowlneils 22:48, 22 Apr 2005 (UTC)

This link seems to be currently broken. 142.169.202.4 23:36, 25 May 2005 (UTC)

Useless discussion?

Is it OK to remove useless discussion from the discussion page of an article? Where should one draw the line for useless?

The specific example I'm looking at is a guy who is asking for help with writing a paper, but has neglected to leave any kind of date stamp, handle, or contact info. I figure it's a sure-shot, but more info on the issue would be much appreciated.

--
Nosforit
29.04.05

Page Deletion

Is it possible for a normal Wikipedia user to delete a page or is this power only given to the moderators. Take a look at this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tim_Glomb
This should have been removed as soon as it was created but it's still there. What should be done about this? User:RThaiRThai

Fixed, and explained about speedy deletion and VfD at User talk:RThaiRThai. andy 12:38, 7 May 2005 (UTC)

Keeping headings out of the Table of Contents (bug)

The advice given in this section (use <h3> instead of ==) reveals a bug in the software. This tactic messes up the section borders when editing by section. The software treats the header tag as a section break. To see this, go click the "edit" link next to the title "Keeping headers out of the TOC"-- you won't see the text between the header tags, nor will you see any of the text below it. AdamRetchless 02:06, 20 May 2005 (UTC)

Possessive apostrophes and italics

I found a problem that can result when using two possessive italicized words in succession. Perhaps these instructions can be placed somewhere on this article as a reference:

''Fargo'''s visuals are bright, but ''Fargo'''s story is quite dark.

Shows up as:

Fargos visuals are bright, but Fargos story is quite dark.

Two ways to fix it:

1. Use the <nowiki> tag.

 ''Fargo''<nowiki>'</nowiki>s visuals are bright, but ''Fargo''<nowiki>'</nowiki>s story is quite dark.

2. Use the decimal code to make an apostrophe.

''Fargo'''s visuals are bright, but ''Fargo'''s story is quite dark.

The end result:

Fargo's visuals are bright, but Fargo's story is quite dark.

--Poiuyt Man ^talk 02:27, 25 May 2005 (UTC)

redirects to sections don't work, but are used frequently

The Wikipedia:How_to_edit_a_page article states: Note that, while it is possible to link to a section, it is not possible to redirect to a section. For example, "#REDIRECT United States#History" will redirect to the United States page, but not to any particular section on it. This feature will not be implemented in the future, so such redirects should not be used.

For example, the wikify page is a redirect which dumps you at the top of the wikipedia glossary, whereas a link to Wikipedia:Glossary#Wikify (or wikify for neatness) will take you to the section you actually want to read. For some articles a brief "disambiguation" page of sorts would appear to be more useful, to me, even if it just says something extremely simple like:

• wikify is contained in the Wikipedia Glossary.

Yes, it requires one more click, but it seems more user-friendly because it will take people to the exact place they want to go. I think that this suggestion should be made in the Wikipedia:How_to_edit_a_page article at the same place that the warning about redirects to sections is located. Ideally as a bullet point immediately following. Thoughts?

Alternately (additionally?), the glossary should begin with some sort of header caveat which states that if they were redirected to this page, they will have to manually locate the term they are looking for.

If I don't get any feedback for a couple days I'm just going to do it and reference this section in the edit notes. -Jared81 01:37, Jun 6, 2005 (UTC)

Title attribute in Links

When coding in HTML, I can use the following:

<a href="http://www.whatever.com/" title="Whatever.com. It's... whatever!">Best site ever.</a>

Can I do something similar in wikicode (or whatever it's called) to customize title="bla bla"? --handisnak 09:40, 2 Jun 2005 (UTC)

This is explained very well in the Links and URLs section of the table. Instead of http://www.whatever.com/ you put the desired title "Blah Blah" separated by one space inside the brackets like this [http://www.whatever.com/ Blah Blah] yielding this: Blah Blah. --Blainster 23:48, 3 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Can I do the same thing for [[wikilinks?]] --handisnak 06:06, 7 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Different syntax, but sure...[[wikilink|different linking text]]. -ChristTrekker 14:09, 17 August 2006 (UTC)

Oops. How do I change a title?

I accidentally mistitled the new article Monsieur hulot, and am not sure how to go back to capitalize Hulot. Any help? Cheers!

What about mojAhedin-e Khalgh?

For over thirty years, I have written many critics of MojAhedin-e Khalgh Organization, from the time of Hanif-Nejad to the present. Before the Revolution, I wrote critics of the works of mojAhedin's founders, works like ShenAkht (Theory of Knowledge) and eghtesAd (Economics) but I also condemned that part of MojAhedin M.L., who committed atrocities against Sharif Vaghefi and others.

And after the Revolution and particularly after the 30th of Khordad of 1360, I have written extensive critics of mojAhedin's move to Iraq, state ownership in their program, the "Islamic" tag of the ideal republic in their program, the cult-like practices of their organization, and all other aspects of the program they have been advocating for future of Iran in the last 20 years :

What the heck is this stuff doing here? Are these two paragraphs the sort of vandalism mentioned earlier on this page? Wikipedia_talk:How_to_edit_a_page#Strange_content

Table of Contents

There is an example given of how to keep headings out of the ToC. However this heading ("This header has the h4 font, but is NOT in the Table of Contents") IS showing up in the ToC. I've not really noticed this before (though I haven't really looked), could it be caused by a bug in MW1.5? Or is this feature no longer supported? the wub "?/!" 30 June 2005 10:28 (UTC)

Example Page

A great help on how to edit page would be an example page containg all the codes and standards of how the pages should be edited. Rather than taking a long time searching on the documentation for how to to something, I could just see how it is in the example and do it equally. Simple and effective.--200.193.12.154 13:25, 10 July 2005 (UTC)

What would you suggest we include? All the codes involved in editing Wikipedia would be incredibly expansive, so what particular areas do you think would be helpful? -- Essjay · Talk 13:28, July 10, 2005 (UTC)

Great suggestion, actually. Even better would be to have an example page with a parallel column showing the code, side-by-side comparison. David L Rattigan 10 July 2005 1552 (GMT)

All, I mean all the codes and standards. if a code exists, or a standard, it should be there in the example. That is the principal utility of it, a centralized place to look up to.

Wikipedia:Annotated article, among the 'see also' links, has most of the basics. Did you find it, or should it be emphasized more somehow? Or did it not have enough 'codes'? Niteowlneils 16:30, 10 July 2005 (UTC)

I didn't get there indeed. Anyway, Annotated article lacks the reference section. Actualy that is what originated my need for an an example. Yes, not enough code. Because it is an real article, it doesn't need everything. That is why an example page just putting things for examples would be welcome. The keyword is altogether. --200.193.12.154 08:19, 14 July 2005 (UTC)

Sections embedded as List

I'm trying to include sections as a linked set of bullets on another page. For example:

• My Page
  
  • My Page#Section1
    
  • My Page#Section2
    
  • My Page#Section3
    

...

What I want is for that list to be auto-generated - i.e., based off of the sections in the target page, in much the same way that the target page's TOC is generated. Basically I don't want to have to maintain both the target page and the links on the linking page.

I've tried using a template, but AFAIK I'd still have to maintain the template and the target page - I'm not very good with templates so far though, so there may be a clever way to use them.

BTW, I'm a complete MediaWiki newbie - is this even the right place for this kind of question?

Suggestions, help, much appreciated. Davidjh 02:46, 13 July 2005 (UTC)

Major edits

I'm considering adding a section about Major edits, specifically highlighting things like the Wikipedia:Be_bold guideline, the {{inuse}} template, the importance of edit summaries, and the importance of the Discussion page. Ironically (or perhaps appropriately), I thought I'd check here first rather than just update the page directly. Comments? --Alan Au 06:30, 26 July 2005 (UTC)

Inconsistency in bold, italics, and underline

The article says to make text bold by using '''text''' and italic by using ''text'', but for underline, it says to use the HTML <u> tag. Why not just use the <b>, <i> and <u> tags for bold, italic, and underline instead of the wiki syntax for it which just outputs the same tags? IMHO using the tags would save bandwidth on the server. Or is there some browser that doesn't support <b>, <i> and <u>? --pile0nades^{talk | contribs} 00:32, 8 August 2005 (UTC)

Numbered Definition List?

Is it possible to have a numbered definition list? I want to make a list of a book series (with numbers), but have a quick summary of the book under each title as a "definition". I tried this on User:CanadaGirl/WorkInProgress in the list of Tom and Liz Austen books, but the numbers kept re-starting at 1. For now I've changed it to a bulleted list, but I do hope I'll be able to use numbers. CanadaGirl

Most Wikipedia articles currently lack good references?

Um...yeah. What was that last word supposed to be before some vandal messed with it?--Atlantima 22:57, 12 August 2005 (UTC)

• It was references. I fixed it. CanadaGirl

It got messed up again, I fixed it. --pile0nades^{talk | contribs} 16:39, 13 August 2005 (UTC)

Broken?

I've been trying to revert the article scam baiting for the past 5-10 minutes... kept hitting save, kept getting "This is just a preview" message and have given up. Someone please go revert, there's some vandalism (see last paragraph)

Don't skip section levels?

Don't skip levels (for example, second-level followed by fourth-level).

Um. Why not? Sometimes sub-sections are important enough to be distinguished, but aesthetically, it makes more sense to reduce the size of the section headers. Also, I've noticed a general aversion to using the first-level headers at all( complaints that they're too big). Since the automated ToC compensates handily no matter how many levels are skipped, I don't see the point or prevalence of this guideline -- WikidSmaht 08:05, August 28, 2005 (UTC)

regarding your comment to me

You wrote:

"If there is something in an article that you do not think belongs there you must seek agreement and consensus on the talk page rather than just repeatedly making your change. Jdavidb 22:20, 26 August 2005 (UTC)"

I don't know what you are referring to. Please explain. I do try to be polite.

ken 15:39, 30 August 2005 (UTC)kdbuffalo

links of other protocols

I'm trying to link onther protocols (aim: and ymsg:), but I can't get it to work, I tried

[aim:goim?screenname=tigertjader tigertjader]

and it displays as:
[aim:goim?screenname=tigertjader tigertjader]
what should I do?

REDIRECTS WILL NOT WORK

I can't get any redirects to work. For example if I put

#REDIRECT Table of mathematical symbols

as the only line on a page I am editing I get this:

1. REDIRECT Table of mathematical symbols

HOW DO I FIX THIS?!?!?!?

• That's right, but what is the problem? If you save the page and then type the name of the article redirect page in the search box and push the GO button, you will go to "Table of mathematical symbols". --None-of-the-Above 06:06, 17 September 2005 (UTC)

d

Line space within unordered (bulleted) lists?

I have a bulleted item. It needs a linespace between two paragraphs in the bulleted item. The second paragraph needs to indent the same amount as the first paragraph.

• Here is my first fascinating paragraph. It's got lots of info. It goes on for awhile. hfadjkhasdk askdhaskd akdhaskdh aksdhaskh aksdhaskdh aksdhjaskdh akdhjaskdh akdhaskdh aksdhaskdh akdhaskdh aksjdh askh askdjha sk. See how it wraps around nicely, with the same indent?

But then I need to have another paragraph that is separated by a line space, but still in the same bulleted indent. This paragraph should be indented as part of the preceding bulleted item. Houston, we have a problem with uncloseable tags.

• Then I move on to my next bulleted point.

I tried the colon, but that indents too far.

• Desperate Wikiwife.

Is there any way to do this currently, and if not, it there any process for suggesting (or creating) new Wiki markup?

Thanks

Update by original questioner: I've gotten a suggestion on the Help page to use HTML break tags. But that produces too much (two breaks) or too little (one break) vertical space in my browser (NS).

Qustion for Cohsion

Please answer these qustion in a concrete form,Cohsion.

• Where is "What it looks like" of "#REDIRECT [[United Nations]]" in the cell of "What it looks like"? --Rocky7 12:30, 23 October 2005 (UTC)
• Where is "What you type" of "#REDIRECT [[United Nations#International_Years]]" in the cell of "What you type"? --Rocky7 12:30, 23 October 2005 (UTC)
• Mr.or Miss.Cohsion, why are you in favor of cheating all human beings? --Rocky7 12:30, 23 October 2005 (UTC)
• Mr.or Miss.Cohsion, why do you cling to (your?) unkind and incorrect explanation? --Rocky7 12:30, 23 October 2005 (UTC)
• Mr.or Miss.Cohsion, do you think you should resign the administrator right now? --Rocky7 12:30, 23 October 2005 (UTC)

Spelling checkers?

PJTraill 22:10, 23 October 2005 (UTC)

N.B. This is a perennial proposal, as discussed at Wikipedia:Village_pump_(perennial_proposals)#Spell_Checker_at_Edit_Pages.

Would it not be possible to check spelling in the "Show Preview" function? This could be automatic or manual, according to the editor's preferences. It would need to be fairly tolerant, e.g. allow regional variations (or let the editor specify a dictionary for his contributions), and of course open: allow addition of new words.

The Village Pump discussion also includes suggestions to simpify integrating spell-checking into one's browser.

Should this article provide a definitive chart of markup element types?

Some features of wiki markup look like XML elements, (e.g. <math>, <gallery>, and <nowiki>). These are in addition to the HTML elements editors are specifically encouraged to use, such as { <blockquote>, <br>, <center>, <code>, <small>, <s>, <u>, <tt>, <sub>, <sup> }, and those it is slightly against or agnostic about { <table> (and its related elements <tr> etc.), <b>, <i> }. And that's just the ones I can think of or find quickly. Where are these listed? Shouldn't that list be easily and obviously available from within the Wikipedia:How to edit a page#Wiki markup section? 66.167.139.76 04:38, 14 November 2005 (UTC).

I agree with the above. When this get's done don't forget to include the Time formats (or aren't there any?) like 2:00pm - 14:00 hrs, etc.--Demerzel 13:15, 18 November 2005 (UTC)

Strange text

The text eloooooooooooooooooo appears in the Major edits section. This does not look like it belongs. Mancomb 15:35, 15 November 2005 (UTC)

Pls. help a newbie coming from Wikipedia:Introduction_2

I'm a newbie trying to learn to do what's right here. I arrived at this page via the (nearly) top-level (e.g., http://en.Wikipedia.org) "Welcome to Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia that anyone can edit." Wikipedia:Introduction_2 links.

After following the italicized "etiology" info at the top of this & following pages (& after learning a little about transclusion), I ended up finding what I was looking for (italics/bold/etc. examples) at meta:Help:Wiki_markup_examples.

This basic info seems missing from *this* "high profile" page; (I'm also a little confused about how/why the redirects/etc...). Should I (or someone) add the simple, basic italics, bold, + links, etc. examples) to this page now, or, is this a work in progress as things become more standardized via transclusion with info from http://Meta.Wikimedia.org ??

Thanks.

-- Curious1i 23:45, 27 November 2005 (UTC)

Template Syntax

Where can I find the explanations of template-related syntax? Like cellpadding="2", cellspacing="1", margin: 0 0 1em 1em, and border-collapse: collapse?

I agree that this needs clarification. Upon a cursory look through the wiki and its 'man pages,' it doesn't seem if there is much on advanced wiki markup. From my experimentation thus far, I have found that where Wikipedia does not have an overriding fuction (such as its unique way of hyperlinking) it will default to standard HTML markup. This may proove to be not 100% accurate for some obscure tags, but that is what the 'Show Preview' button is for! Creating a definitive list of wiki markup vs. HTML is in my to-do list, but for the time being, I would invite all to go to basic HTML tutorials for cells, tables, frames, and other common tags. Juan Banana 21:16, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

Edit this page Error

Off late I am getting this message and not being allowed to edit any pages. Is this a issue being faced by me alone or has there been any change in the policy?

When I click on the button "edit this page" I get a pop-up for download. I am using Windows 2000 as the Operating system and Internet Explorer 5.5 as the browser. It would be great if I could get some help on this.

I can edit sections, however if an article has only one section I am not allowed to edit that.

--avnp* 06:51, 12 December 2005 (UTC)

confused newbie can't find the "+" tab to add a new section, where is it?

I can't find the "+" tab mentioned below, or any other "tabs":

"You can also click on the "Discussion" tab to see the corresponding talk page, which contains comments about the page from other Wikipedia users. Click on the "+" tab to add a new section, or edit the page in the same way as an article page."

Maybe it's because I'm using Firefox 1.5? I see the "Discuss this page" and then "edit this page" or "post a comment" but I can't find any "+" sign. I know those of u who see it are probably laughing at this point, but I'm serious. Is the "+" function the same as posting a comment or editing the page? If so, I can just use those to add my comments or edit the page.

Thanks, Jim 15:29, 12 December 2005 (UTC)

I am also using Firefox 1.5. The "+" is to the right of "edit this page" at the top. Here is a screen capture. Hope this helps - Tεxτurε 16:24, 12 December 2005 (UTC)

It only appears on talk pages -- that may be the confusion. Yes, it's essentially the same as editing the page, it just puts in a section header for you. rspeer 08:17, 15 December 2005 (UTC)

Thanks for the screen capture, I can see it very clearly there. Also, I see that, as rspeer says, it only appears on the talk pages for some reason. In my case, I assume others too, I only see it on the talk pages when I am NOT logged in. When I am logged in all those tabs at the top of the page completely go away, I know not why. I like to be logged in so I guess I'll have to live without the tabs and the "+" sign, which is ok by me. It would be nice if the interface were a little less busy and more consistent throughout. Maybe I can change my settings or skin or something and that will help. Thanks for the help though, --Jim 22:07, 15 December 2005 (UTC)

Discussion/Talk pages and ~ query

Is there a reason that Discussion pages are not called Talk pages? The Discussion tab displays "Talk" information. Was this a conscious decision? There is enough Wiki terminology and acronyms around already. Why not label the Talk pages with Talk tabs?

...always remembering the time stamp now... Msass 19:48, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

Which brings up another point. why should I have to use a character that requires a SHIFT key, in order to supply the name/timestamp. Where were the designers heads when they thought that up. "Please oh please add your name/timestamp (you're are naughty if you don't), but let's make it a little harder by requiring an upper case character that is really hard to find and reach on the keyboard." clever, oh so clever. Once more, Msass 19:48, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

What do you propose as a suitable substitution? I personally can't think of a unique, unambiguous group of letters meaning 'timestamp and username,' especially sans SHIFT, that would be easier to rememeber than four tildas, but maybe I am limited in imagination. Let's see what you have in mind! Juan Banana 21:05, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

Line breaks Markup

The example markup:

You can break lines<br/>
without starting a new paragraph.

I feel this can be revised as the forward slash ('/') in the tag is unnecessary. Although the stated version does seem to work properly, its omission gives the same results. My proposed change:

You can break lines<br>
without starting a new paragraph.

This new representation gets rid of an atypical shift from the HTML foundation of the Wiki markup, as well as eliminating repetative extra characters.

I do understand the need to apply the forward slash in programming languages in order to preserve proper text formatting of special characters, so if this is the case (or if there is some other reason) please feel free to contact me as to why I should not make this edit. Thank you!
Juan Banana 20:55, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

No one has given me any objections, so I am making the change. Juan Banana 04:53, 15 December 2005 (UTC)

Thanks for doing that; this is how it should be. <br> and <br/> are made equivalent by the Wiki software anyway.

I'll point out that in real HTML, in its current incarnation (XHTML), <br/> is correct and <br> is not. This is because the slash indicates that the tag is empty, ending as soon as it begins, without spanning any text. It's a shorthand for <br></br>. The closing tag is important now that web pages do things with XML and CSS.

But the nice thing about Wiki is not having to worry about that kind of thing, so I agree that the simpler version is better. rspeer 08:15, 15 December 2005 (UTC)

Very good point about XHTML. I guess I'm showing my age a bit ;-) Juan Banana 23:39, 16 December 2005 (UTC)

<centre>

Wikipedia should be modified to allow both

<center> and <centre> tags

--J7 06:39, 16 December 2005 (UTC)

Flaw in the syntax

There is something complete wrong in either the wiki syntax or its usage:

Everyone uses colons to indent text, especially on talk pages.

: this line is indented

So far, so good, but when you look at the generated HTML code, it looks like this:

<dl>
 <dd>this line is indented</dd>
</dl>

This means that definition lists are abused for styling purposes. This is fundamentely wrong.

excerpt from the HTML 4.01 recommendation:

We discourage authors from using lists purely as a means of indenting text. This is a stylistic issue and is properly handled by style sheets.

--Joris Gillis 17:19, 7 January 2006 (UTC)

Adding Movies

Can movies be added to Wikipedia? I'm not talking about copyrighted work but work that is made by the person who's uploading it.

User Freindly Wiki

Is there a software that lets you edit wiki in a non-code format, like Microsoft Publisher or Macromedia Dreamweaver?

Text Colour

Is it possible to change the colour of text in a table from black to white?

Changing the viewing font of Wikipedia

Hi,

Does anyone know how to change the viewing web font of Wikipedia? I currently have it set on the default template but for some reason all text within the Wiki site are set on a font called LMF Title (see image below). It's so hard to read and i've been tearing my hair trying to find out how to change it to a normal readable font like Arial.

Can anyone help?

TIA

Cat

Image:Helppplz.jpg

mixed lists

Gack! I like the wiki markup but it doesn't nest properly in some cases:

blah

blah is good

blech

blech is better

wham

wham is the best for these reasons:

1. It begins with W
2. It rhymes with ham and spam
3. It's onomatopoeic (which is a better word than wham)

zoom

almost as good as wham

;blah:blah is good
;blech:blech is better
;wham:wham is the best for these reasons:
#;initial letter:It begins with W
#;rhyme:It rhymes with ham and spam
#;general sound:It's onomatopoeic (which is a better word than wham)
;zoom:almost as good as wham

Why don't the phrases "initial letter", "rhyme", and "general sound" appear as definitions? :(

Or this:

• I
• Like
• To
• Bullet

  Everything

  definition needed

  Under

  another one

• The
• Sun

*I
*Like
*To
*Bullet
*;Everything:definition needed
*;Under:another one
*The
*Sun

It looks like definitions conflict both with bullets and numbered lists. But definitions override bullets, and numbered lists override definitions.

Is this a known bug? Arghman 23:34, 16 February 2006 (UTC)

separating visual subject heading from logical subject heading

Hyperlinks let you specify a visual hyperlink and a logical hyperlink with the pipe | symbol.

Is there any way I can do this with a section, e.g.

ZARK (Zoos Are Really Keen)

Zoos

See #ZARK.

That didn't work but this does: See #ZARK (Zoos Are Really Keen)

===ZARK (Zoos Are Really Keen)===

===Zoos===
See [[#ZARK]]

That didn't work but this does: See [[#ZARK (Zoos Are Really Keen)]]

I want to include an explanatory note in the visual title (and table of contents, probably) but not in its logical anchor.

Same thing also for article pages themselves. If I want an article with a URL called ZARK but I want its title to say ZARK (Zoos Are Really Keen), can I do this?

Is there a style guide for how to handle acronyms like this? Arghman 23:42, 16 February 2006 (UTC)

Linking from an Image

Is there/will there be any way to link from an image to something other than the image file? I want to use images instead of text links for children's pages in Wikijunior. Thanks. --Barry Desborough 18:02, 22 February 2006 (UTC)

I too was wondering about this, because I want to use it in a user box I'm working on. Thanks. RMS Oceanic 10:11, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Why is this transcluded in Help:Editing?

Help:Editing now includes two tables for Wikitext reference: this one and Help:Wikitext quick reference (replacing Help:Wiki markup examples). This is highly redundant. How did things get this way, and can we merge them somehow while maintaining the automatic copying of the help pages from Meta? rspeer 05:43, 28 November 2005 (UTC)

• Everything here that is also in Help:Editing should be removed, and only Wikipedia-specific content should remain here. Some of that work has already been done, but there is more to do. Be bold. Uncle G 06:50, 28 November 2005 (UTC)
• See Template:Ph:Contents for further explanation. Uncle G 15:19, 28 November 2005 (UTC)

Adding titles to links

There was a brief scetion on this, but I didn't understand it. I'm trying to take, let's say, this link: [[1896 Summer Olympics|1896]] and add a title box to it that says: Athens. Currently, that little yellow box will say "1896 Summer Olympics" and the link will read "1896" but I want the yellow box to say "Athens". Could someone give me the script I would use for this? --J@red ^[T]/_[+] 00:09, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

Multi-line <pre> sections in lists

I want to document a process (in a private Wiki), but whenever I have a multi-line <pre> section, it resets the list count and/or allows some of the <pre> text escape from the box:

1. Sit down carefully on your chair
2. Set up some things in a two-line PRE section on the next line:

export FOO=bar
export BAR=foo

1. Use some things in a two-line <pre> section that starts on THIS line:

   tickle $FOO
   

tickle $BAR (but allows this line to escape from the box)

1. Now use them in a one-line <pre> that starts and ends on this line:

   echo $FOO $BAR
   

2. There's a similar issue with tables:

1. Stand up and walk away

Is there any way to do something like this, without the numbering going wrong? Or am I just using the wrong thing? It seems that if the <pre> appears at the end of a line (or immediately after the line, without a blank line), that should indicate that the writer wants it to be part of that item, not to end the list.

Thanks. -- SleekWeasel 12:24, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

You may have to use HTML instead of wiki:

<ol>
  <li>Sit down carefully in your chair</li>
  <li>Set up some things in a two-line PRE section on the next line:
    <pre>
      export FOO=bar
      exportBAR=foo
    </pre>
  </li>
  <li>Use some things in a two-line <pre> section that starts on THIS line:
    <pre>echo $FOO $BAR</pre>
  </li>
  <li>Ther's a similar issue with tables:
    <table border="1">
      <tr>
        <th>Tickles</th>
      </tr>
      <tr>
        <td>Tackles</td>
      </tr>
    </table>
  </li>
  <li>Stand up and walk away</li>
</ol>

One of the biggest weaknesses of wikitext is that it interprets linebreaks to mean closing tags--which is fine for most simple encyclopedia writing but can be complicated when we're talking about complex formatting.

Karl Dickman ^talk 23:00, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

This page is too wide.

It's because there are mistakes on it.

I wasn't able to find them all. Spent

a lot of time trying to get it back to

normal too. ——The preceding unsigned comment was added by 4.241.18.49 (talk • contribs • WHOIS) . 23:35, 3 May 2006(UTC).

Centering

( This page is too wide. ) This talk page and its article are badly "centered" or "too wide".

Peter Horn 03:48, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

Broken Links

At the end of the main article, in the section "More information on editing wiki pages," the last item Wikipedia:Style and How-to Directory links to an outdated page. Should we just remove this item? --- Markspace 18:11, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

Major edits reinclusion

I added a "Major edits" section in Sept. 2005, but it was removed by an anon in early Dec. 2005. I'm thinking about reinserting it. Comments? --Alan Au 08:04, 5 May 2006 (UTC)

You should reinsert it as soon as possible. --Siva1979^{Talk to me} 08:41, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

Images in other wikipedia sites

In the manual it is not said that if I wish to include an image from another Wikipedia (Italian, French, German, ...), I have to use the language prefix. For example:

[[it:Image:colosseo.jpg]]

However, if I do, how do I prevent from having that link in the navigation bar, among other languages?

• If you want to have a link to the image use [[:it:Image:colosseo.jpg]]. If you want to have the image you have to reappload it here or on commons. This is beacause different wikis have different copyright policies abakharev 07:47, 1 June 2006 (UTC)

View counters?

Has anyone taled about adding hit counters to articles on Wikipedia? I wonder about how many people have read my articles. I think it might be encouraging for editors to be able to see that their articles are actually read. --Howdybob 05:18, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

How to hide Title?

Has anyone know how to hide Title that located on top of this page? this page is titled "Wikipedia talk:How to edit a page" how can i hide it? Thank you --125.162.131.175 08:09, 9 June 2006 (UTC)Lusiano

The <tt> and <code> examples are inconsistent

In the How_to_edit_a_page#Character_formatting section, the example showing <tt> and <code> on the left side of the table contains the formatting code for the "code", but not for "tt". Probably the "code" example should be changed to make them consistent (i.e. int main() rather than <code>int main()</code>). --Michael Richters 15:49, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

hiding categories

Hello, I know that it is possible to hide the table of content on a wikipedia page, but is there a similar code to hide the "categories" bloc ?

I recently added userboxes to my userpage, and although i find categories such as "User fr", "User en" very usefull, I don't like seeing them at the bottom of my userpage.

This is purely a design/aesthetic consideration, but does such a tag exists? And if not, is someone willing to add it? ^^

FiP ^{Как вы думаете?} 13:34, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

How can I create a link to edit mode?

The only way I know I can create a link to EDIT a page is to add to the page name the following prefix

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=

and the following suffix

&action=edit

It works, but the link is marked as an external link. Is there a way to do the same by an internal link? Anything like

[[pagename&edit]]

--Dejudicibus 21:17, 17 June 2006 (UTC)

Well, this might be a bit hackish, but you should be able to supress the external link arrow as described at meta:Help:Link#Arrow icon. --Tsuji 04:47, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

Isn't there anything that works here in place of the hard-coded domain name? --midorigin 01:33, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Thinner "No or Limited Formatting" section

No or limited formatting - showing exactly what is being typed

A few different kinds of formatting will tell the Wiki to display things as you typed them - what you see, is what you get!

<nowiki>
The nowiki tag ignores [[Wiki]] ''markup''.
It reformats text by removing newlines    
and multiple spaces.
It still interprets special characters: &rarr;
</nowiki>

The pre tag ignores [[Wiki]] ''markup''.
It also doesn't     reformat text.
It still interprets special characters: →

<pre>
The pre tag ignores [[Wiki]] ''markup''.
It also doesn't     reformat text.
It still interprets special characters: &rarr;
</pre>

Putting a space at the beginning of each line
stops the text   from being reformatted. It 
still
interprets Wiki markup and special
characters: →

Leading spaces are another way to preserve 
formatting.

 Putting a space at the beginning of each line
 stops the text   from being reformatted. It 
 still
 interprets [[Wiki]] ''markup'' and special
 characters: →

Help Question: What does [[da:]] do?

Hello, I was wondering what the [[da:article_title]] code on the bottom of pages does? I did not see an answer for it when I was looking at the help pages. Thanks. KSEA 01:23, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

It's a link to an article on the same subject on another language Wikipedia. The languages with linked articles are listed on the toolbox in the left column. IIRC, 'da' is Danish, but I'm not entirely sure. -- Donald Albury^(Talk) 01:36, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

How to put links?, help

How do I put Interwiki links to other community pages or policies guides of other wiki projects? How do I put interwiki links to other articles in other wiki projects in foreign languages? It isn't explained in How to edit a page. Thanks --> User:Atenea26 14:40, 28 July 2006 (UTC).

Putting external link in the body of a text

Is it possible to place an external link in the body of a text instead of placing it under the "external link" section?--Plin 19:02, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

It can be done, but should only be done to link to a source for a fact in the article. Just place the URL between square brackets, as in [http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Cite/Cite.php Cite.php], which displays as Cite.php. -- Donald Albury^(Talk) 22:25, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

Unblended linking?

I wanted to wikilink a part of a word (specifically, the prefix micro in the word microsecond), and wanted to avoid the wikilink auto blending feature as mentioned in Wikipedia:How_to_edit_a_page#Links_and_URLs.

Firstly, in the opinion of whoever has an opinion about this, is this consistant with wikipedia style?

Secondly, how would one accomplish this? --Tsuji 05:30, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

Re: 2nd question:

[[micro]]<nowiki>second</nowiki> gives microsecond.--Patrick 09:58, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

Excellent. Thanks. I've added a note about this to the article. --Tsuji 00:42, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Better article title

"How to edit a page" isn't really very descriptive of the contents of this page, which is more along the line of a "wiki markup guide". When one reads "How to edit a page" in a summary of possible pages, many people will not expect that it will contain what they are looking for - they are expecting a tutorial about "how to click the edit link, change stuff, add a summary and click save". I suggest we rename this page to more clearly reflect its contents and help users finding it more easily. Suggested new titles are "Wiki markup guide" and "List of wiki commands". Anybody against it? Peter S. 00:57, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

I believe that a new user who is not familiar with Wikipedia terminology will find the current title fitting. If somebody who wishes to edit an article doesn't happen to know the term markup or what a wiki command is, they would have a hard time finding it. I think people are more likely to search for "How to edit a page" if they are just learning how everything works. --Son0rouS 16:05, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

Printable Version

When you go to the printable version of this page in Firefox, the right column of the Wiki-Markup examples are contained in boxes with a horizontal slider. This causes the print off to truncate the right hand side of the "What you type" text. I'm not sure where the problem is located. --Son0rouS 16:00, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

Dont know if this should be put here

My template I made is really messed up. Theres something wrong in the code, if anyone could tell me whats wrong and fix it, that would be greatly appreciated.

Here it is {{Grace Jones}}

Sign ! ¡ ¿ [[ %7e%7e%7e%7e ]]

hopiakuta ; <nowiki> </nowiki> { [[%c2%a1 [[%c2%bf]] [[ %7e%7e%7e%7e ]] } ;]] 18:56, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

This

is some of what shows when a person edits:

Insert: – — … ° ≈ ≠ ± − × ÷ ← → · § Sign your name: ~~~~ -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Wiki markup: {{}} | [] [[]] [[Category:]] #REDIRECT[[]] <s></s>   <blockquote></blockquote> <ref></ref> <div class="references-small"> <references/> <includeonly></includeonly> <noinclude></noinclude> <nowiki> • (templates) Symbols: ~ | ¡ ¿ † ‡ ↔ ↑ ↓ • # ¹ ² ³ ½ ⅓ ⅔ ¼ ¾ ⅛ ⅜ ⅝ ⅞ ‘ “ ’ ” ¢ $ € £ ¥ Characters: Á á Ć ć É é Í í Ĺ ĺ Ń ń Ó ó Ŕ ŕ Ś ś Ú ú Ý ý Ź ź À à È è Ì ì Ò ò Ù ù  â Ĉ ĉ Ê ê Ĝ ĝ Ĥ ĥ Î î Ĵ ĵ Ô ô Ŝ ŝ Û û Ŵ ŵ Ŷ ŷ Ä ä Ë ë Ï ï Ö ö Ü ü Ÿ ÿ ß Ã ã Ẽ ẽ Ĩ ĩ Ñ ñ Õ õ Ũ ũ Ỹ ỹ Ç ç Ģ ģ Ķ ķ Ļ ļ Ņ ņ Ŗ ŗ Ş ş Ţ ţ Đ đ Ů ů Ǎ ǎ Č č Ď ď Ě ě Ǐ ǐ Ľ ľ Ň ň Ǒ ǒ Ř ř Š š Ť ť Ǔ ǔ Ž ž Ā ā Ē ē Ī ī Ō ō Ū ū Ȳ ȳ Ǣ ǣ ǖ ǘ ǚ ǜ Ă ă Ĕ ĕ Ğ ğ Ĭ ĭ Ŏ ŏ Ŭ ŭ Ċ ċ Ė ė Ġ ġ İ ı Ż ż Ą ą Ę ę Į į Ǫ ǫ Ų ų Ḍ ḍ Ḥ ḥ Ḷ ḷ Ḹ ḹ Ṃ ṃ Ṇ ṇ Ṛ ṛ Ṝ ṝ Ṣ ṣ Ṭ ṭ Ł ł Ő ő Ű ű Ŀ ŀ Ħ ħ Ð ð Þ þ Œ œ Æ æ Ø ø Å å Ə ə •

</nowiki>

Here is a proposal:

A page that would concisely list all of the same markup, in the same sequence, & the same sizes, with all of the appropriate explanations below.

This would, as well, be a good place f/ people to discuss what changes they might advocate.

This would simplify, & speed, the learning process.

Please note that what I am proposing would mean a page that would truly replicate what displays during an edit, as well as track & mimic the changes.

Thank You.

hopiakuta ; <nowiki> </nowiki> { [[%c2%a1 [[%c2%bf]] [[ %7e%7e%7e%7e ]] } ;]] 18:56, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

Image Tutorials

How come there are so many image tutorials. It's so confusing! :( Kassie 14:02, 23 October 2006 (UTC)

For JPGs you probably mainly need Wikipedia:Uploading images, Wikipedia:Extended image syntax, Special:Upload, Wikipedia:Galleries.

For SVG and Png, see Wikipedia:Preparing images for upload

Hope it helps, Dieter Simon 01:07, 30 October 2006 (UTC)

Infobox

OK I have an infobox on my user page but I wanna know how to make more lines on it?

Try Wikipedia:Infobox templates, it might be what you are looking for. Dieter Simon 00:34, 30 October 2006 (UTC)

References

Why is there nothing on this page on references, not even a link elsewhere? No wonder so few articles include them. Johnbod 23:50, 29 October 2006 (UTC)

All your questions are answered under the article Wikipedia:Citing Sources. As a future tip, most things you are looking for as guidance are preceded by "Wikipedia:" (without the quotes). In this case, had you entered Wikipedia:References, it would have redirected you to the right place. Dieter Simon 00:25, 30 October 2006 (UTC)

":"

i think this page forgot the ":" option

for spacing lines a little off the left--Lygophile 07:17, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

It's not for "spacing lines a little off the left". It's for definition lists. You're exactly right, though; it is missing from this page. Maybe if it were on the page, people would know what it's for. — Omegatron 02:59, 21 December 2006 (UTC)

Editing pane

Hi, how do you increase the height of the area that you type in when you edit a page? I find that it is annoyingly short. Thanks.

--Pro Grape 04:09, 8 December 2006 (UTC)

You can change it by going to your preferences (you can also find the link on the top right of your screen). On the "Editing" tab there should be an option to change the editbox dimensions. the wub "?!" 18:42, 15 December 2006 (UTC)

Redirect to a section

In the current version of Links and URLs section ([1]) it says: "[...] it is not possible to redirect to a section [...] This feature will be available in later versions of MediaWiki".

Redirect to a section is working now, see feature request 218. The developer said: "Added redirect to section feature. Use it wisely.". The page should be updated to reflect this change and specify the recommended usage of redirects to a section. Razvan Socol 08:20, 19 December 2006 (UTC)

This section was erroneously made a subsection of section 87. I fixed it by removing one set of equal signs from the section title (down from two per side to one per side). Jeff G. 20:59, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

Oldest page

Where do i find the Wikipedia page with the oldest article? Simply south 01:06, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:Wikipedia's oldest articles. You might also like History of Wikipedia for how it all started. --h2g2bob 01:22, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

This section was erroneously made a subsection of section 87. I fixed it by removing one set of equal signs from the section title (down from two per side to one per side). Jeff G. 20:58, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

Missing things

• Ordered lists
• Unordered lists
• Definition lists
• Blockquote tag

— Omegatron 03:00, 21 December 2006 (UTC)

This section was erroneously made a subsection of section 87. I fixed it by removing one set of equal signs from the section title (down from two per side to one per side). Jeff G. 20:57, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

Reversion of vandalism to How to edit a page

Simply south, I thought removing vandalism was supposed to be a minor change (per the last point on Help:Minor edit#When_to_mark_an_edit_as_minor) — maybe I am being over-sensitive? Jeff G. 20:21, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

Umm, why was this section nested below section 87 (as section 87.4) rather than added as section 88? Jeff G. 20:28, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

In relation to your above question, i think it depends on POV as partly

1. i feel it disrupts Wikipedia (who doesn't?)

Of course, vandalism disrupts Wikipedia (for all but the vandals). :) Jeff G. 20:49, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

1. i didn't know i was meant to mark it as a minor edit
2. i feel i might be a bit competitive

:) Simply south 20:36, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for sharing that. :) Jeff G. 20:49, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

The second question, i think that is how another editor set this talk page up and so ywes it doesn't really belong under here. Simply south 20:36, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

Thanks, more research needed, I think. Perhaps I'll have some time for that later... :) Jeff G. 20:49, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

Hah, fixed it by removing one set of equal signs from the section title (down from two per side to one per side). Jeff G. 20:55, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

Many other users\editors mark it as major. Nevertheless, i have decided to put this question up on the help desk. Watch Wikipedia:Help desk#Minor question (pun intended). Simply south 21:15, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

Thanks, I am watching. Jeff G. 21:48, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

"stylish link-title" needs explanation

The statement 'Include "| Link title" to create a stylish link-title.' is not self explanatory. Anyone who knows what it means care to add an explanation? Servalo 19:32, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

links to edits you can do to your user page... Like colour and Huge text

Hi! I'm looking to make the text on the top of my user talk:CyclePat Huge! But, I don't know where to find this information. I've seen some people do it and also make all the letters of a word diferent colours. I though it should be included on this project page. Can someone please also tell me where I can get this information. note: I started from the top help on the side bar... I tried WP:Text, WP:FORM, WP:Format... which all seem reasonable but they don't exist. THank you! --CyclePat 17:43, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

Tildes advice could perhaps be made more precise

I'm just starting and fated to struggle - however for what it's worth I interpreted:

"You should sign and date your contributions on all talk pages by typing four tildes: (Ndaniels 19:24, 21 January 2007 (UTC) = Username 19:36, 10 January 2006 (UTC))." [2]

to mean that I should type everything that is between the parentheses - the idea that automatic conversion and piping could require only the tildes is just not going to be the first thought that comes into the head of a naive user (hand up in air) so the presence of automatic conversion could perhaps be made explicit, and the fact that only the tildes are needed perhaps has to be explicity stated too, for the confused new user (hand still up.) Sorting this out through further help pages took a while, and I suspect some who lack a background in programming might not have sorted it out.

As a new user there's no way in hell I'm going to edit critical help pages, so I leave this to others.

Hope that's helpful, but no reply necessary if not - and feel free to delete this, if not.

(Ndaniels 19:24, 21 January 2007 (UTC))

Footnote difficulties, no mention of ref

Naive user's comment:

I wanted to get clear about how to footnote an article correctly, however my choice of search path (from Wikipedia_talk:How_to_edit_a_page) was perhaps unwise and I ended up at Wikipedia:External_links instead, as I think at least some others will.

But Wikipedia_talk:How_to_edit_a_page caused me problems as well. At first glance, I'm not sure that it (in respect to footnotes) isn't out of date or even actively misleading by now - it mentions 3 kinds of footnotes(ish), but not ref and doesn't indicate the existence of the Wikipedia:Footnotes page Wikipedia:Footnotes

I suspect it may cause confusion for new users or fail to encourage them to use ref tags.

At least some naive users as foolish as myself will come here to learn how to footnote, I'm sorry to say. It might be an idea to redirect them to the footnote page, and perhaps ref should be mentioned here as another reminder, since, logically (especially for the naive), footnotes are links, or often confused with them.

As a naive user, I don't fell comfortable editing critical pages such as this, however.

Ndaniels 19:33, 21 January 2007 (UTC)

Indenting <pre> tags doesn't work with multiple lines

If I try to indent a <pre> tag with a colon (:) it works as long as there is only one line.

Example:

Line 1

However, if I try multiple lines, only the first line is put inside the box.

Example:

Line 1

Line 2

I recently upgraded to mediawiki 1.9.0 from 1.5.0. I was able to do this in 1.5.0, but now a lot of my pages are messed up because it no longer seems to work. Any ideas?

Mruncie 21:40, 24 January 2007 (UTC)

Please see MediaWiki Support Resources. -- Jeff G. (talk|contribs|links|watch|logs) 12:57, 25 January 2007 (UTC)

Long URLs

Currently, when linking to external pages, the URLS cannot be broken to two lines of the editbox. This means, if I enter a very long url, it will make a horizontal scrollbar to appear on the bottom of the editbox. Is there a way to enter a URL on two rows and make wikipedia understand this? huji—TALK

Archiving this talk page

Would any body mind if I archive old discussions on this talk page? huji—TALK 13:56, 1 February 2007 (UTC)