User:Cullen328/Tips for new editors

Tips for new editors
Tips for new editors:

It can be intimidating trying to edit your first Wikipedia article. Don't be afraid, because you can't do any permanent damage to this encyclopedia. Your efforts are likely to improve the Wikipedia, and if you do something wrong, the mistake can be fixed very easily. Be bold and try things. You will learn through experience, and there are plenty of helpful people around. Feel free to ask me questions at any time. Just visit my talk page User talk:Cullen328, click "New section" at the top, and ask your question. I will do my best to help. Lots of other experienced editors will do the same. My starting assumption is that you have the expertise and the knowledge needed to write an encyclopedia article, but need help formatting and preparing your article to Wikipedia's standards.

Discussion of how to do the basic research and writing necessary to create a useful encyclopedia article is beyond the scope of this essay, although I have lots to say on that subject as well. Please click on What is an article? for basic information. Feel free to ask me questions on my talk page, and I will be happy to elaborate. For the purposes of this essay, I am assuming that you already have that basic academic skill set.

What follows are my basic tips on learning to navigate the Wikipedia editing process:

Creating BOLD text
An article on Wikipedia should begin with the name of the article in BOLD, or it can be a longer, more formal version of the article name. An example of a longer name would be a biographical article called "Jack Smith", if that is the commonly known name for the person. The bold text, for example, might be the person's full name, John Martin Smith, Jr..

Please click the "Edit" tab at the top of this page to view the editing code for this entire page. Or, click on "edit" next to any section heading to see the code for just that section.

You can see that bold text can be generated simply by placing three single quotes before and after the text that you want to be rendered bold.

Here's how the code looks:

BOLD

Here is the result of that code:

BOLD

Italics
A similar technique is used to create italic text. Instead, you put two single quotes before and after a word (or group of words). The result is some words in italics. Here's how the code for that looks:

some words in italics

Bold italics take five single quotes before and after. Here's how the code looks:

Bold italics

Sections
For ease in reading Wikipedia articles, they should be organized into sections. In the editing code, all you have to do is add two equal signs before the section name, and then two equal signs after the section name. The Wikipedia software will then create a new section of the article for you. Here's how the code looks:

==Sections==

Table of contents
Once you have created a few sections, the Wikipedia software will automatically create a Table of contents for the article, and will update it automatically if you create new sections or subsections. It will also create a clickable "edit" function for just that section. You don't have to read the editing code for the entire page to make editorial changes, but only the code for that specific section of the article. Click on "edit" for this section to see the code for this particular section.

Wikilinks
There are several types of links available in Wikipedia coding. Links to other articles on Wikipedia are among the most important, and these are commonly called Wikilinks. In a hypothetical article, let's say that I want to mention "George Washington", and let's say a reader in Bangladesh doesn't know very much about George Washington. When I write the Wikipedia code for the article, all I have to do is put two square brackets in front of the name "George Washington" and two square brackets after the name "George Washington". I've actually done that here: George Washington. You can't see the square brackets, but instead, you see the name in blue. If you click on the blue George Washington, you will be transferred to his biography. If you click on the highlighted blue colored word "blue", you will be transferred to the article about the color blue. Here's how the codes looks:

George Washington

blue

The text inside of the double square brackets has to correspond to the name of a Wikipedia article (or a "redirect" or established alternate name for that article). Otherwise, it will show as a red link instead of a blue link. You can use this red link technique to indicate that an article should be written, but has not yet been written. An editor who sees a red link may decide to write an article about that topic. Here's a red link: Cullen328. Wikipedia really doesn't need an article about my username, and this is just an example.

Piping
Sometimes, a Wikipedia article name is too long or unwieldy for the flow of your prose. Let's say, for example, that you are writing an article that will mention various cities of the San Francisco Bay Area. Because San Francisco is a distinctive city name known world-wide, a simple link to San Francisco works fine. The dominant meaning of "San Francisco" is the city in California. However, a link to just Berkeley takes me to a "disambiguation" page. That's because the word "Berkeley" has many possible meanings, and the city in California is not the dominant meaning. I can link to the article about the California city by putting the double square brackets around the full name of the article for the city Berkeley, California. But, if I am mentioning many Bay Area cities in my article, all those extra "Californias" will clutter the prose. I can deal with that by using the character "|" in the link. On most computer keyboards, this character is on the same key as the backslash "\" character. This procedure is called "piping".

I start with the double square brackets, then type (or cut and paste) the full, accurate name of the article. Now add the "|" character, and then type the name as you want it rendered. In this case, I want just "Berkeley" instead of "Berkeley, California", so that what I type. Close the link with double square brackets. Here's what the coding looks like:

Berkeley

This is the result:

Berkeley

Although the link is rendered as one word: "Berkeley", it takes the reader to the article for "Berkeley, California" rather than the disambiguation page Berkeley. This is more efficient and unambiguous for the reader.

Creating a list of references
A Wikipedia article should have references in order to verify that the information comes from reliable sources. There are several ways to create references, but here, I will explain the most basic way, using a mock source. Let's say I want to reference a book, and it is called "How to reference Wikipedia articles". For the sake of discussion, this imaginary book was written by John Jones, and published in 2010 by ABC Publishers in New York.

First, I have to create a "References" section for the article. It could be called "Footnotes" or something else, but I prefer "References", as do most Wikipedia editors.

I create the section as described above, by typing two equal signs, the "References" section title (without the quotes), and then two more equal signs. The code looks like this:

==References==

Keep this section towards the end of the article. After the title of the section, you need to add some code that instructs the Wikipedia software to create the list of references. There are several variations. For beginners, use the "<" symbol, then the word "references", then the slash symbol "/" then the closing ">" symbol. Click on the "edit" command of the "References" section below to see the actual code. You can cut and paste the code into your own articles. It looks like this:

Look for that section at the end of this article.

Formatting an individual reference
As mentioned above, there are many ways to format a reference. Some are semi-automated, and some are even more automated. Here's the version for beginners:


 * Where you want to add a reference, type this code:

Here's how the final code looks:

And here is the actual reference:

You can also add ISBN numbers, page numbers and other information to your references. You can Wikilink to articles about the author, book, journal or publisher within your references. This can help establish the credibility of your references. For example, if you use a reference written by a notable author, and you link to the article about that author within the reference, then any reader can verify that the source was written by someone with a solid, reliable reputation.

Linking to another website
It can often be useful to link to another website, either to an online reference, or an external links section for further reading. The first step is to type a single square bracket "[". Then cut and paste a specific web page URL, for example, http://www.google.com/. Now, leave a space, and then type some identifying text, such as "Google home page". Finish with a closing square bracket: "]"

Here's how the code looks:

Google home page

Here's how it is displayed:

Google home page

Your watchlist
Your watchlist is a way for you to keep track of ongoing developments in the areas of Wikipedia that you care about the most. It is a list of recent activity on a list of articles that you create and manage. If you create a new article, it will automatically be added to your watchlist. You can click the "Watchlist" link at the top of your work space at any time, and the all recent changes to articles on your list will be displayed. You can see what other editors have done to those articles, and look for any interesting changes, positive or negative. You can see if someone malicious has vandalized articles you care about, and you can then correct the vandalism. You can also see improvements to articles, and perhaps communicate and collaborate with productive editors who share your interests.

You can add any page to your watchlist by clicking the white star at the top of the page. The star will turn blue to let you know that page is now on your watchlist. When you edit a page, there is a check box that says "Watch this page" near the "Save page" button. Checking that before saving adds it to your watch list.

I suggest that you check your watchlist each time that you log on to Wikipedia.

Wikipedia policy
Wikipedia is based on five principles, called the five pillars. You should read them and do your best to understand them. The guideline on notability governs whether or not a topic should have an article on Wikipedia. The general guideline is that "If a topic has received significant coverage in reliable sources that are independent of the subject" it is worthy of an article.

Wikipedia jargon
There are many shorthand links to policies, guidelines and essays that offer guidance to editors. These serve as a sort of jargon used by experienced editors, and are commonly used on talk pages. Here are just a handful of the most common examples:
 * WP:RS - Reliable source Explains which sources are considered reliable.
 * WP:AGF - Assume good faith Act as if other editors are trying to improve the encyclopedia, even when you disagree with their actions, unless you have proof of malicious intent. Treat other editors with respect.
 * WP:BLP - Biographies of living persons There are enhanced requirements for these articles, because of the real potential of damage to people's reputations. Take extra care with these articles.
 * WP:OR - No original research Explains that Wikipedia reports on what reliable sources say, not on research done by Wikipedians themselves. Don't draw your own conclusions.
 * WP:COI - Conflict of interest Explains that people should avoid writing articles about themselves, their employers or their pet projects, and requires disclosure of potential conflicts of interest.
 * WP:MOS - Manual of style Guidelines about how to write articles in a consistent way for the ease and comfort of our readers.
 * WP:OWN - Ownership Explains that no one "owns" a Wikipedia article, even an editor who has done most of the work to date.  Any editor is free to edit any article at any time, in accordance with policy and guidelines, and through a process of consensus when there is disagreement.

When engaging in discussion and debate, it is best to spell out the full name of policies, rather than using the shortcuts. This is more friendly and helpful to newer and less experienced editors. Link to the appropriate policies.

Wikipedia namespaces
Understanding the concept of "namespaces" is important for editors who want to fully participate in Wikipedia. Please refer to WP:NAMESPACE for a detailed description of this concept. That says "A Wikipedia namespace is a set of Wikipedia pages whose names begin with a particular prefix recognized by the MediaWiki software (followed by a colon), or in the case of the main namespace have no such prefix."

The "main namespace" is the encyclopedia itself including all of its 3,612,183 articles. That is all that the average Wikipedia user ever sees, though that is a lot. However, each individual article has its own talk page, which can be accessed by clicking the "Discussion" tab at the top of the page. Any interested editor can discuss ideas for improving the content of the article about the topic there. The idea is to focus discussion on the article about the topic and how to improve it, rather than debating the topic itself. For articles on obscure, non-controversial topics, the discussion page is often blank, because no one is really interested in discussing the article, and may find the current article satisfactory. More significant articles, and especially articles on more controversial topics, may have enormous talk pages far larger than the article itself, where disputes about the wording of the article are debated endlessly.

Each user (often called an editor) has a user page, and an associated talk page. There is also the Wikipedia namespace, which contains the policies and procedures that govern the encyclopedia. Each of those pages has its own talk page, where changes to the policies and procedures can be proposed and debated. There are similar namespaces for categories, files (such as images), templates, and so on. Each has its corresponding talk pages.

In the main namespace, the prose should be measured, professional, considered and thorough. It should be the product of consensus, and should be written from the neutral point of view. High quality main namespace articles are the purpose and the goal of the project, and all of the other namespaces exist to support that goal.

Signing comments on talk pages (four tildes)
Any comment made on any talk page should be signed. All you have to do is type four tildes at the end of your remark. This is how it looks:

~

The Wikipedia software will automatically add your signature, and also a date and time stamp. You have to be logged in. Otherwise, your comment will be signed with an impersonal IP address.

Evaluating article quality
There is a rating system for evaluating the quality of Wikipedia articles, and here is a brief description of the hierarchy:


 * Featured article - Professional, outstanding, and thorough. There are currently 3,233 featured articles.
 * A-class article - Very useful to readers. A fairly complete treatment of the subject.
 * Good article - Useful to nearly all readers, with no obvious problems. There are currently 11,754 good articles.
 * B-class article - Readers are not left wanting, although the content may not be complete enough to satisfy a serious student or researcher.
 * C-class article - Useful to a casual reader, but would not provide a complete picture for even a moderately detailed study.
 * Start class article - Provides some meaningful content, but the majority of readers will need more.
 * Stub - Provides very little meaningful content; may be little more than a dictionary definition.

Featured articles and Good articles are evaluated by formal assessment panels. The other quality levels are assessed less formally by teams of volunteers, working mostly through subject specific WikiProjects.

Understanding a sandbox
A sandbox is a Wikipedia workpage intended to allow for experimentation, with no expectation of quality or perfection. There is an open sandbox that anyone can play around with, and each registered user can have their own sandbox pages that can be used to try out various techniques or to develop articles. You can find your own sandbox page by sinply adding:

/Sandbox

after your userpage name in the URL box at the top of the page. For example, my sandbox is located at

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Cullen328/Sandbox.

You can find it here. You will see a draft of an article I wrote recently about a Broadway song named "They Call the Wind Maria".

You can create many sandbox pages by simply adding another "/" after "Sandbox" in the URL, and then adding a descriptive term. For example, I am writing an unfinished article about an historic California ceramics company. That sandbox page is

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Cullen328/Sandbox/Gladding, McBean

You can see that article in progress here.

You can add images already on Wikipedia or Wikimedia to draft articles in your sandbox. I recommend that you don't add new images to draft articles in the sandbox. Wait until you have moved the article into main space, and then add new images.

Preparing to move an article into mainspace
Your article doesn't need to be "perfect", whatever that is, before moving to mainspace. However, I recommend that it be in halfway decent shape, with several good, solid references, before you move it to mainspace. If the article is in poor condition, and you try to move it to main space, there is a possibility that the diligent editors working on the New pages patrol will try to delete it, and you may have a fight on your hands.

Select the very best title for your new article. It needs to be a non-existent title. Ponder the title carefully, proofread it, and verify that there is no current article with that exact name.

Once you are ready to move the article into the main namespace, there are two simple methods available:

"Cut and paste" method
The easiest is click the "edit" tab for your sandbox, and copy all of the edit code text into your clipboard. Then, type your new article title into the search box, making sure there are no typographical errors. You will get a message saying "You can create an article "red link". You will see the name of your future article in red, indicating that it does not yet exist in the mainspace.  Click on that red link.  Paste your text into the edit box, and save it.  Your article is now in Wikipedia mainspace.  It is now a genuine encyclopedia article.

The disadvantage of this "cut and paste" technique is that the edit history of your new article before it was pasted into main space will not be visible to other users. If you wrote the whole article by yourself, this may not be much of an an issue. To the extent that your article was a collaboration, you may want to preserve the editing history, to document who made various contributions and changes.

"Move" method
The advantage of using the move technique is that it preserves the edit history of the article before it is moved from a sandbox to the mainspace.

At the top of each page, you will see a pulldown arrow between the star for your watchlist function and the "search" box. Clicking on the arrow from your article sandbox will enable you to activate the "Move" process. You will be asked to specify the new page name. You can also move the associated talk page, if one exists. If there has been any talk about the article, it should be moved also.

If everything has gone smoothly, you will get a message confirming that your article has been moved, and is now in mainspace.

Tending to your new article
If you've followed all these steps, your article in now available for anyone to read. Proofread it carefully on your computer. Print it out on paper, and proofread it again. Proofread it again the next day. Correct any errors, and make some notes about how you can improve your article. Tell your friends and family that you've written your first Wikipedia article. Congratulations!

I suggest that you add relevant categories to the page after it is in main space. A good way to find categories is at the bottom of articles on closely related topics. Add any original images, such as photos you've taken or graphics you've created.

Creating subsections
Did you notice that this section has subsections? They are easy to create. Simply use three equal signs before and after the subsection name. Take a look at the Table of contents to see how the subsections are listed. Here is the code:

===Creating subsections===

Did you know . ..


"Did you know..." (often abbreviated DyK) is a section of Wikipedia's main page that showcases interesting facts from new articles, or from articles that have recently undergone a major expansion. It is a way to gain recognition for a specific article, and for the editors responsible for creating or improving it. Articles are featured on the main page for a few hours, and large numbers of readers are exposed to these articles. Articles can be nominated by their main authors, or by any editor who runs across them when they are fresh.

The most important part of of a "Did you know..." nomination is the hook, a short, well-referenced fact from that article designed to attract reader's attention. The hook has to be referenced and verified.

An interesting image, such as the photo to the right of Harry Yount, the first National Park Ranger, can definitely attract readers to your article.

Here are my seven "Did you know..." articles to date:


 * Tom Frost
 * Mount Whitney Fish Hatchery
 * Chuck Pratt
 * Harry Yount
 * Cedric Wright
 * Barack Obama Tucson memorial speech
 * Rob Stone

I was the original author of some of these, and in other cases, I expanded an existing article or was the major collaborator working with other editors. I probably could have had quite a few more "Did you know..." articles, but in all honesty, when I finish a major article and move it into the main space, I tend to slack off from Wikipedia editing for a few days, and often don't get around to nominating my own article. You may well be more motivated than I am by placing an article in "Did you know...". If so, go for it.

If you look at the talk page for each article, you can see the hook, and the date the article appeared on the main page.

Uploading images
Any image used in a Wikipedia article has to exist as a file on Wikipedia or its sister project Wikimedia Commons. A comprehensive treatment of image use policy is beyond the scope of this introductory article, so please consult the relevant policies before uploading any images. Here is just a basic overview.


 * You can upload original photos that you take yourself, as long as they aren't of copyrighted works of art, and as long as you are willing to release them for use by others under an acceptable free license. You can then use those photos in your articles.  The same applies to graphic images you create yourself.  Anyone else will also be free to use these photos, as long as they comply with the terms of the free license you have chosen.  For example, you may choose to allow free use by others, as long as you are credited as the photographer.


 * You can upload copyright-free photos that you find online, or scan from books. Photos published before 1923 are presumed to be in the public domain, as are photos and graphics created at any time by most (but not all) agencies of the United States government.  Do not try to upload any copyrighted images unless you can provide a legally acceptable fair use rationale.


 * Images free of copyright restrictions should be uploaded to Wikimedia Commons, so that they can be used freely worldwide.


 * Certain copyrighted images can be used on a limited basis under a legal doctrine called fair use. Examples would be an image of an album cover used to illustrate an article about that album, or an image of a book cover used to illustrate an article about that book, or a company logo used to illustrate an article about that company.


 * You can click on any image you find on Wikipedia to see the source of the image, and the license that allows its use. When you upload any image, you will be asked to provide accurate information about the source of the image, its copyright status, and its licensing.  Copyright violations are considered a serious offense on Wikipedia, so be especially careful and honest when you upload images.


 * Here is the code used to generate the image of Harry Yount above:



Click on the Harry Yount image, and read the description carefully. You will find unusually detailed information about the history of the photo, and can find an in-depth discussion of this image on my talk page.