Help:Editing
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BattleTechWiki is a wiki, meaning anyone can edit nearly any page and improve articles immediately. You do not need to register to do this, and anyone who has edited is known as a editor. Small edits add up, and every editor can be proud to have made BattleTechWiki better for all.
Editing articles[edit]
Content style and policies[edit]
An encyclopedic style with a formal tone is important: straightforward, just-the-facts, instead of essay-like, argumentative, or opinionated. The goal of a BattleTechWiki article is to create a comprehensive and neutrally written summary of existing canon knowledge about a topic. BattleTechWiki does attempts to not publish original research, unless it needs too. An encyclopedia is, by its nature, a tertiary source that provides a survey of information already published in the wider world. Ideally, all information should be cited and verifiable by reliable sources. Sourcing requirements are significantly stricter in articles on real persons.
Edit screen(s)[edit]
Editing most BattleTechWiki pages is simple. BattleTechWiki at the moment uses only one (of two) interface methods: classic editing with the SourceEditor through wikitext (wiki markup).
Wikitext editing using the Source Editor is chosen by clicking the Edit source tab at the top of a BattleTechWiki page (or on a section-edit link). This opens an editable copy of the page, showing all the wikitext used there, and the Source Editor toolbar offers simple menu options to add or change the formatting. Wikitext is used extensively throughout BattleTechWiki for such things as hyperlinks, tables and columns, footnotes, inline citation, special characters and so on. The Source Editor lets users toggle on 'wikitext highlighting' which uses different colours to help differentiate article text from wikitext.
The BattleTechWiki community has developed style guidelines to make articles and facts appear in a standardized form, and BattleTechWiki easier to use as a whole. A basic list of wikitext can be found on the cheatsheet. An "edit toolbar" is provided just above the edit box (pictured below), which allows logged-in users (by selecting the option in personal preferences) to automatically place and format various aspects of wiki code. See Help:Wikitext for more information, remember that you can't break BattleTechWiki, and, although there are many protocols, perfection is not required.
When you have finished editing, you should write a short edit summary in the small field below the edit box (pictured below). You may use shorthand to describe your changes. To see how the page looks with your edits, press the "Show preview" button. To see the differences between the page with your edits and the previous version of the page, press the "Show changes" button. If you're satisfied with what you see, be bold and press the "Publish changes" button. Your changes will immediately be visible to all BattleTechWiki users.
Summary:
☐ This is a minor edit ☑ Watch this page
If you do not want your writing to be edited mercilessly and redistributed at will, then do not submit it here.
You are also promising us that you wrote this yourself, or copied it from a public domain or similar free resource.
Cancel
Note: Do not sign the edit summary line with your ~~~~ signature, as it does not work there.
Minor edits[edit]
A check to the "minor edit" box signifies that only superficial differences exist between the version with your edit and the previous version: typo/grammar corrections, fixing a formatting problem, etc. A minor edit is a version that the editor believes requires no review and could never be the subject of a dispute. Marking a change as minor does not mean that the edit is unimportant.
The "minor edit" option is one of several options available only to registered users. Editors are never required to use this button. When in doubt, consider your work to be a normal edit.
Major edits[edit]
All editors are encouraged to be bold when improving articles, but there are several things that a user can do to ensure that potentially disruptive edits are performed smoothly. Before engaging in a major edit, a user should consider discussing proposed changes on the article discussion/talk page. During the edit, if doing so over an extended period, the {{in use}} tag can reduce the likelihood of an edit conflict. Once the edit has been completed, the inclusion of an edit summary will assist in documenting the changes. These steps will help all to ensure that major edits are well received by the BattleTechWiki community.
A major edit should be reviewed to confirm that it is consensual to all concerned editors. Therefore, any change that affects the meaning of an article is major (not minor), even if the edit is a single word.
There are no necessary terms to which you have to agree when doing major edits, but the preceding recommendations have become best practice. If you do it your own way, the likelihood of your edits being re-edited may be higher.
When making particularly large or complex changes, you may want to copy the article to your sandbox, so you can make changes without being interrupted by other editors. It is also a good idea to publish changes frequently, so that a browser crash or electrical failure will not result in you losing all of your work.
Adding references[edit]
Generally, sources are added directly after the facts they support at the end of the sentence and after any punctuation. BattleTechWiki permits editors to use any citation system that allows the reader to understand where the information came from and strongly encourages the use of inline citations to do so. Common methods of placing inline citations include footnotes, shortened footnotes and parenthetical references.
Inline citations are most commonly placed by inserting a reference between <ref> ... </ref> tags, directly in the text of an article. The reference is a footnote, appearing as an inline link (e.g. [1][2]) to a particular item in a collated, numbered list of footnotes, found wherever a {{reflist}} template or <references /> tag is present, usually in a section titled "References" or "Notes". If you are creating a new page or adding references to a page that didn't previously have any, don't forget to add a references section with this display markup.
Adding images, sounds, and videos[edit]
A file that is already hosted on BattleTechWiki or the Wikimedia Commons can be inserted with the basic code [[File:FILENAME|thumb|DESCRIPTION]]. (Image: can be substituted for File: with no change in effect; the choice between the two is purely a matter of editorial preference.) Using thumb generates a thumbnail of an image (the most common placement option), which is typically sized differently from the original image. The Wikimedia Commons' File Upload Wizard and BattleTechWiki's Basic File Upload will guide you through the process of submitting media. There are various file formats available.
Article creation[edit]
Before starting a new article, please understand BattleTechWiki's notability requirements. In short, the topic of an article must have already been the subject of publication in reliable sources, such as books published by major publishing houses, newspapers, magazines, peer-reviewed scholarly journals and websites that meet the same requirements as reputable print-based sources. Information on BattleTechWiki must be verifiable; if no reliable third-party sources can be found on a topic, then it should not have a separate article. BattleTechWiki's concept of notability applies this basic standard to avoid indiscriminate inclusion of topics.
Talk pages[edit]
File:Editing basics - Talk pages.webm Every article on BattleTechWiki has a talk page, reached by clicking the "Talk" tab just above the title. There, editors can discuss improvements to the content of an article. If you ever make a change that gets reverted by another editor, discuss the change on the talk page! The BOLD, revert, discuss cycle is a popular method of reaching consensus. It is very important that you conduct yourself with civility and assume good faith on the part of others. Edit warring (repeatedly overriding or reimplementing contributions) is highly discouraged.
Most other types of pages on BattleTechWiki also have associated talk pages, including the User page each editor is assigned once they sign up. When other editors need to contact you, they will usually do this by leaving a message on your talk page. When someone has left you a message that way, you will see a notice the next time you log in or view a page on BattleTechWiki.
- Sign your contributions to a Talk page by using four tildes (~~~~), which produces your username and a time/date stamp.
Protected pages and source code[edit]
Some pages are protected from editing. These pages have a "View source" tab instead of an "Edit" tab.
Policies and conventions[edit]
Policies, guidelines, and formatting norms are developed by the community to describe the best practices, to clarify principles, resolve conflicts, and otherwise further our goals. Make sure that you submit information that is relevant to BattleTechWiki's specific purpose, or your content might be deleted. You can always use the talk pages to ask questions or check to see if your idea will be accepted. Please make note of which license will cover your contributions.
See also[edit]
- Helpful tips
- Naming and moving
- Style and layout
- Tools
Related
- BattleTechWiki:WikiProject: if you are writing an article about something that belongs to a group of topics, check here first!
- BattleTechWiki:Glossary: a glossary for BattleTechWiki editors