Wikishire:Editing Guide

Generally

Wikishire is a freely-editable wiki. We do ask that before you set forth to add and edit information that you please familiarise yourself with Wikishire's policies.

Editing existing articles

To edit an article which already exists, click on the 'Edit' tab at the top of the screen and begin editing. If the page does not exist then you can add it by typing the page name in the box below:

Beginning a new article

Before adding an article, please check whether it is here already, with the "Search" box on the left hand side of this page.

After clicking the 'Create Article' button, you will be re-directed to a page with some instructions for adding your article.

There are two main ways to start a new article:

• If you search for an article and it is not found, Wikishire will invite you to create it; click on the words "create this article" and begin.
• If an existing article has a "redlink" (where it tries to link to another article which does not yet exist, so the link appears red), then click on the redlink and the editing screen for your new article will appear.

Specific guides for certain types of article

See:

• Guide to county articles
• Guide to town and village articles
• Guide to church articles (churches)

Creating a new article

If an article you wish to see is not already in Wikishire, create it. Use the "Search" box on the left-hand side of the screen to see if the article is here already (perhaps under another name), but if it is not there, Wikishire will invite you begin it: click on "create this article" and off you go.

If an article contains a "redlink" (a link which is trying to connect to an article which is not yet here), then likewise clicking on the redlink will begin the new article.

If however the article is here already but the redlink was anticipating it under a different name, change the redlink or created the article as a "redirect": #Redirect[[Article name]].

Do consider though the relevant policy on Article management

Editing generally

In general, just type text into the edit screen. Always leave a line space between paragraphs.

This Guide is a general guide to the most commonly used editing elements, but the best way to become familiar with the techniques involved in producing a good-looking article is practice and investigating exiting articles.

Specific elements

Headings

Level 1 headings are done with two equals-signs either side of the name, level 2 headings with 3 and so forth. These will automatically generate an index at the top left of the article after the introductory paragraph, if any.

Bold and italic text

Bold text is done by adding 3 apostrophes each side of the text ('''Kent''' becomes Kent)

Italic text is done by adding 2 apostrophes each side of the text (''Kent'' becomes Kent)

Bold italic text is done by adding 5 apostrophes each side of the text ('''''Kent''''' becomes Kent)

Links between articles

A link from one article to another is done by placing [[ ]] around the name of the linked article, for example:

'''Little Wilbraham''' is a small village in [[Cambridgeshire]].

- produces:

Little Wilbraham is a small village in Cambridgeshire.

A link need not put the linked article's name into the text: [[Cambridgeshire|The county]] will appear as "The county" but link to "Cambridgeshire".

Bulleted lists

For a simple bulleted list, add an asterisk, "*", at the beginning of each item, and there is then no need to have a line break between the paragraphs.

A "level 2" list within the main list is possible too: for those items add two asterisks, "**", at the beginning of each line.

Pictures

When you wish to add a picture to the article, please do not upload it to Wikishire. Wikishire uses the free image library at Wikimedia Commons. Simply give the file name it has on Commons and it will appear.

If you would like to add a picture or any other media to an article but it is not already on Commons, we invite you to upload that picture to Commons (and add whatever information and categories are relevant there)

In text

An image has several properties:

• the image file itself,
• its width in pixels ("px"),
• its placing as "left" or "right" or "center", with American spelling
• whether it is to have a frame and caption ("thumb")
• the caption

The required coding is "[[File:", followed by the name of image file and the other properties separated by pipe characters "|".

For example if the article contains:

"[[File:Jonathan Trott.jpg|right|80px]]", then the result will be:

To add a caption beneath an image, add the code "|thumb|" and your text.

Thus if the article contains:

Cwmbran

"[[File:CmwbranTownCentre.JPG|80px|right|thumb|Cwmbran]]", then the result will be:

In an infobox

Some standard infoboxes, for example Infobox County, Infobox Town and Infobox parish, already have the coding for a picture at a standard size. In that case simply give the name of the image, for example:

|picture=ISH WC WimbledonCommon2.jpg |picture caption=Wimbledon Common

or

| map=SurreyBrit5.PNG

Outside links

To link to an outside website (usually done in references or lists), add a single set of square brackets ([ ]) around the web address (include the http://) and its name or description (leaving a space after the web address).

Templates and Infoboxes

Various Templates are used within Wikishire, which are marked {{name}}. These are more advanced and it may take a while to become familiar with the commonly used templates.

Infoboxes, such as those appearing on the top right of county and town articles, are a form of Template. Guidance may be available separately for each type of infobox: see #Specific guides for certain types of article above.

Stubs

If an article is marked as a "stub" but your edits make it into a substantial article, please remove the code "<nowik>{{</nowiki>stub}}"

Other help

For other hints, see MediaWiki Help pages