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Wikiwrimo:Guide
Welcome to the Wikiwrimo Guide! This page is designed to help you get the basics needed to edit a page.
Before getting started, check out the Help pages and FAQ. Ask any questions here or on the Question board or on your admin's talk page. Oh, and you haven't created an account, you should do that before going on.
The short version
- '''three single tick marks''' make bold
- ''two single quote marks''' make italics
- ==Equal signs== make a new header. The number of equal signs determine the header type. Use =one equal sign= sparingly, as this is equivalent to the page's title.
- * makes a bulleted list
- # makes an ordered list
- [[Article name|what you want it to say (optional, if different)]] Example: [[NaNoWriMo|the greatest thing ever]] becomes the greatest thing ever
- [https://yourexternallinkhere what you want it to say] Example: [https://nanowrimo.org the greatest thing ever] becomes the greatest thing ever
Congratulations, you now know about 90% of the stuff you need for editing! Keep reading for more...
Editing a page
- Help article: Editing pages
When you see a page you want to edit, be bold! Make sure you're logged in and click the Edit button. That's the third button along the top of the page. Then make the edits you want to make and preview your edits before saving.
Note: When adding an external link to the NaNoWriMo or Script Frenzy website, remove the /eng, /en, and www. parts of the link. For example, http://www.nanowrimo.org/eng/user/3542 becomes http://nanowrimo.org/user/3542. (That link goes to Sushi's profile, if you're wondering.) This prevents language embedding, so Wrimos who browse the site in a language besides English aren't forced to navigate the site in English. Note: While the NaNo site doesn't have www. or eng/ in the URLs as of 2015, many older links still use this. You can help by cleaning up those links when you see them in an article.
Creating a page
- Help article: Starting a new page
If you want to start an article but don't know what to write about, check out the scratchpad and Special:WantedPages. The first is a bunch of articles Sushi has thought of off the top of her head, while the second is a bunch of articles that have been linked to in articles. The first is more usable from a "I don't have to scroll through everything" standpoint, while the second tells you what articles are already linked to and are waiting to be created now. Unfortunately after the first page or two, you'll find a bunch of template stuff. Don't worry about creating those unless you really feel like wasting a whole afternoon tracking everything down. Just find an article and start creating.
If you already have an idea, search for the article first to see if it already exists. This is important because MediaWiki doesn't listen to different capitalizations too well; for example, according to MediaWiki, NaNoWriMo and Nanowrimo are two different articles. Even capitalization in multiword articles get messed up sometimes in redirecting to the proper article, though it appears to be in a way that no one has completely figured out yet. (This took me ages to figure out too.) If you've searched and the article doesn't exist, go ahead and create it.
Images
- Help article: Images
Images are awesome. Please upload them if they are relevant and if you have the legal right to do so; that is, if you own the image or if it's released under a license that permits free distribution and reproduction with or without attribution. The official NaNo and Script Frenzy icons are an exception; while they're not released under such a license, they were designed to be distributed. Make sure to give credit to the maker when you upload the image!
Templates
- Help article: Templates
Here are some templates we have so far that you'll probably want to use.
- Template:Stub: This goes at the end of an unfinished non-region article. Use {{stub}}
- Template:RegionStub: This goes at the end of an unfinished region article. Use {{RegionStub}}
- Template:Ollstaff: This goes at the end of an article for a past or present NaNo/OLL staff member. Use {{ollstaff}}
If you have template-creating skills and would like to create templates, please do!
Categories
- Help article: Categories
You can currently find all the usable categories (or at least all the categories I or someone else has remembered) in the category of categories. (Yes, this is a joke. If you get it, many cookies to you.) If none of the categories fit your needs, create a new one! Make sure it'll get enough use to justify its creation, though. Take a look at the uncategorized pages for a look at the kinds of articles that haven't been covered by any of the existing categories yet. If you think they are covered, add them in. If not, and you can think of a good category, create the category by adding it at the end of the article. See Help:Categories for more on categories in general.
Regional pages
Some regions have long histories and many traditions, while others are brand new. Whatever the case for your region, here are some things to get your brain going as you hit the edit or create article button.
- How did the region get created? When was it created? In the case of a region in a major city, the region may have been around almost as long as NaNo has. Some smaller regions may have been created from an ::Elsewhere region as an ML volunteered to lead the region. Ask around if you don't know the answer. Lots of regions have someone who has done NaNo for what feels like forever and could tell you, or you can tell them to edit the page themselves after you put up a draft version.
- On a related note, did parts of the region ever split into smaller region? This is more common in very large regions, mostly ::Elsewheres, whole countries, and major cities, but if you know the answer, it's worth mentioning.
- What's your regional culture like? Are there any traditions in your region? Maybe a mascot or something that happens every year? Maybe an in joke that has made its way to the wider NaNo community? Cliff Brooks and Book of Tim, I'm looking at you. What makes your region what it is?
- Who are the MLs? Who were the former MLs, if any? Besides mentioning them in the article, they're great resources for the questions you don't have answers to.
- What regions are nearby? List these, especially if your region plans events with these regions.
- Did your region do anything really bragworthy? A top word count or donation region, or a donation derby winner? A really cool NaNo-related project? Definitely include that!
- And finally, include any links to your region's online presence and of course, its NaNo regional lounge and that snippet that appears next to your region's name in the regional directory.
A few examples of particularly good regional pages: USA::Georgia::Atlanta, USA::Minnesota::Twin Cities, and Australia::Melbourne, and USA::Michigan::Lansing.
Each region appears on a subpage of the Region article, so for example, USA::California::East Bay (home of NaNo HQ) will appear on Region/USA/CA/East Bay. US states and Canadian provinces are abbreviated. Any page that is not a final destination region has the subregions listed on that page (examples: East Bay within California, along with San Francisco, Los Angeles, and the other California regions; Toronto, Thunder Bay, and the other Ontario regions on the Ontario page, et cetera).
Regions are mostly written according to the official NaNo regional directory.
If you want to create a page that falls in one of these branches, then use your good judgment. It can always be redirected later.
Resources
Sometimes you won't know the answer to a question, like how some NaNo tradition started. There are plenty of ways to find out.
- Search. You never know what you might find. Who knows, you might find the answer here. (Not speaking from experience at all...)
- The Wayback Machine is another great resource for going through old site versions.
- The current NaNo forums. Especially with recurring threads, someone out there is confused and will ask. Take advantage of that.
- Ask someone. Lots of Wrimos are willing to share their knowledge. Heck, if you don't know something, ask your friendly Wikiwrimo admin. If I don't know, I'll do my best to find it.
- NaNo's Facebook and Twitter pages. They've been very helpful in research endeavors past.
Handy Things That Don't Belong Anywhere Else
The Special Pages section contains most of the not-so-obvious stuff, along with a bunch of really handy stuff you never knew you needed until you found it. This includes stuff like Wanted Pages, Uncategorized Pages (please help out by categorizing things), and other nifty things.
The official MediaWiki FAQ. This is a more complete version of Mediawiki's FAQ.
Want to make clean citations? Here's how to cite pages. I'll add a page for this later, but for now, this is how you add footnotes to articles.
