Wikipedia:Update/2/General style guidelines, July 2009 to December 2009


 * Accessibility
 * Added text to WP:ACCESS; it previously said only "See Colours."
 * In WP:ACCESS, added: "Avoid putting links in section headings. Some screen readers, such as versions of JAWS prior to 7.1, have significant difficulty correctly rendering such headers. Additionally, special characters such as brackets ("[") and curley brackets ("{") are invalid characters in HTML, which causes section headers to be invalid as HTML anchors. Using wikitext in section headers makes it more difficult to link to them internally as well."


 * Avoid peacock terms
 * In WP:PEACOCK, added an example
 * In WP:PEACOCK, added "foremost"
 * Removed section: WP:PEACOCK.


 * Citing sources
 * WP:CITE was changed from this, WP:CITE was changed from this, and WP:CITE was changed from this.


 * External links
 * In the introduction, added: [... it is not Wikipedia's purpose to include a] "lengthy or" [comprehensive list of external links ...]
 * Made changes to WP:EL


 * Layout
 * In WP:Layout, added: [In the rare cases when it is useful to sub-divide these sections (for example, to separate a list of magazine articles from a list of books), most editors prefer to use] "either definition list headings (Books) or" [bold-faced text ("Books") instead of level 3 headings (===Books===).]


 * Lead section
 * In the introduction, changed: [... the notability of the article's subject should] "be established in the first sentence of the lead, if possible." to: "usually be established in the first sentence."


 * Linking
 * In WP:Linking, added: "where a link to a significant related topic occurs embedded in the text of an article it may be useful to have a duplicate link in a "see also" section to make it easier to find."


 * Manual of Style
 * New subsection: WP:MOS
 * In WP:MOS, added: [These extra spaces will not affect the appearance of the heading, except in the edit window.] "Note, however, that some common bots are programmed to remove them."
 * In WP:MOS, removed: "When referring to a section without linking, italicize the section name (italicize the actual section name only if it otherwise requires italics, such as the title of a book); for example, Section management but the current section is called Section management."
 * New subsection: WP:MOS
 * In WP:MOS, changed: "exclamation points" to: "exclamation marks/points"
 * In WP:MOS, added: "Exceptions are occasionally made where the item involves a spaced surname (Seifert–van Kampen theorem)."
 * In WP:MOS, added: [Dates in the format YYYY-MM-DD ... may be useful in long lists,] "references," [and tables for conciseness and ease of comparison.]
 * In WP:MOS, added: "Gender-neutral third-person singular pronouns other than "he or she" should not be used in article text; this includes made up words like zie and hir or Spivak pronouns."
 * In WP:MOS, changed: "In general, this means that shades of red and green should not both be used as color codes in the same image." to: "Any information conveyed via shades of red and green should also be conveyed in some other way."


 * Manual of Style (dates and numbers)
 * In WP:MOSNUM, added: [one should not replace since the start of 2005 with because some information (the start of 2005) would be lost;] "instead, use either the plain text or a more advanced feature of  such as  ."
 * In WP:MOSNUM, removed two subsections
 * In WP:MOSNUM, added: [Spelled-out two-word numbers from 21 to 99 are hyphenated (fifty-six), as are fractions] "used as adjectives ..."
 * In WP:MOSNUM, added examples


 * Manual of Style (text formatting)
 * New section, WP:MOSTEXT


 * Manual of Style (writing about fiction)
 * In WP:WAF, added: "However, please note that real-world perspective is not an "optional" quality criterion but a general, basic requirement for all articles."


 * Self-references to avoid
 * In WP:SELF, changed: "However, there are exceptions. An article that is still in its initial development or under dispute often will include stub, npov, refimprove or other maintenance tags, to help editors further develop the article and the text in these templates include self-references." to: "The templates that render self-referencing graphics for the maintenance needs of developing articles, like stub, npov, and refimprove are unavoidable, but articles should normally avoid self-referencing templates such as shortcut and the others."


 * When to use tables
 * In WP:WTUT, added: "Also, when compared with wikimarkup, wikimarkup is more flexible, easier to use, and less exoteric than tables when used for desktop publishing/page elements and page orientation & page positioning."


 * Words to avoid
 * In WP:AVOID, added:
 * While music journalists and music critics refer to certain musicians as "legendary" and call certain albums "classic" or "seminal" in their published reviews and articles, Wikipedia editors should not independently add these adjectives unless their use is supported by a reputable source (e.g., "According to the Penguin Encyclopedia of music, John Smith was "a legendary guitarist whose classic 1980s albums are considered to be seminal roots rock records".


 * Avoid neologisms
 * In WP:NEO, added: "On the other hand, in some cases a concept has sufficiently widespread coverage to be notable, and a fairly newly coined term may be the simplest and most natural way to refer to the concept. In this case it that newly coined term may to be the best title for the article, provided the use of the term is verifiable."


 * Avoid peacock terms
 * In WP:PEACOCK, added: "Note that it is OK to use these words in direct quotations."
 * Added examples: "freedom fighter", "grueling", "passionate", "respected", "thriving"


 * External links
 * In WP:EL, changed: "For albums, movies, books, and other creative works, links to professional reviews that have not been used to verify information about the critical reception of the work or that contain information that cannot be integrated into the Wikipedia article." to: "Repealed. (Professional reviews should instead be used as sources in a "Reception" section.)"
 * In WP:EL, added: "Two maintenance categories list all tagged articles that need attention to remove spam and non-compliant links. They are:" Category:Wikipedia external links cleanup and Category:Wikipedia spam cleanup, containing about 2000 articles.


 * Layout
 * In WP:LAYOUT, added: "If placing [InterWikimedia links] in the External links section results in a long sequence of right-aligned boxes hanging off the bottom of the article, consider using the in-line versions: ."


 * Lead section
 * Added nutshell: "The lead should define the topic and summarize the body of the article with appropriate weight."
 * In WP:LEAD, removed: [The article should begin with a] "short" [declarative sentence, ...]


 * Manual of Style
 * New subsection, WP:MOS
 * In WP:MOS, added: "... similarly, between 1939 and 1941, not between 1939–1941."
 * In WP:MOS, added: "... a raised dot" [is never used in this role]
 * In WP:MOS, added: "An option such as " " resizes the image to the specified width in pixels ..." Added: "... a user's preferred width (180 pixels for those on the default setting, soon to increase to 220px)"
 * In WP:MOS, changed: "In general, this means that shades of red and green should not both be used as color codes in the same image." to: "Any information conveyed via shades of red and green should also be conveyed in some other way."


 * Manual of Style (dates and numbers)
 * In WP:MOSNUM, removed [... articles on the modern U.S. military] "often" [use day before month ...]
 * In WP:MOSNUM, changed: "... imperial units for some measurements such as road distances and draught beer ..." to: "... imperial units for measurements such as road distances and personal height and weight."


 * Manual of Style (spelling)
 * In WP:SPELLING, added: "aluminium vs aluminum: aluminum is the prevalent spelling throughout North America, however in scientific literature aluminium should be used, as recommended by the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry."


 * Manual of Style (text formatting)
 * Removed the WP:MOSTEXT subsection, and imported related examples from WP:MOSTITLE


 * Manual of Style (titles)
 * Made significant changes throughout since October


 * Profanity
 * Added: "Occasionally, the edit filter will block anonymous users and newly registered accounts from adding profanity to an article. This happens because such users add profanity as vandalism much more often than as a constructive change.  An user affected by false positives should edit unrelated articles for about a week to establish himself as a serious contributor."


 * Writing better articles
 * In WP:BETTER, made significant changes to the paragraph on first-person perspective, and added a paragraph: "Gender-neutral pronouns should be used where the gender is not specific; see Gender-neutral language, Quest for gender-neutral pronouns and the related discussion for further information."


 * Accessibility
 * In WP:ACCESS, removed:
 * Avoid putting links in section headings, unless the link text is the only text in the title. Some screen readers, such as earlier versions of JAWS, will stop reading the heading title when they encounter a link, and if the link is the first part of the heading title, they will only read the link text. For example, a heading title of " The chimpanzees invade the sewer system " may be read as "The", and a heading title of " Boxes in popular culture " may be read as "Boxes".


 * Avoid weasel words
 * In the nutshell, changed: [Avoid using phrases such as "some people say", or any variations of the sort,] "without providing sources." to: "except in direct quotation."
 * Some changes to the introduction, including changes to the definition of "weasel words"
 * Added just after the examples: "The main problem with weasel words is that they interfere with Wikipedia's neutral point of view; but they give rise to other problems too"
 * The "general examples" were moved down, with the addition of two more, "possibly" and "probably"


 * Citing sources
 * In WP:CITE, replaced "(See Layout for exceptions.)" with specific mention of the exceptions.


 * External links
 * In the introduction, added: [No page should be linked from a Wikipedia article unless its inclusion is justifiable] "according to this guideline and common sense. The burden of providing this justification is on the person who wants to include an external link."
 * In WP:EL, added: [For albums, movies, books, and other creative works, links to professional reviews] "that have not been used to verify information about the critical reception of the work or that contain information that cannot be integrated into the Wikipedia article."
 * In WP:EL, changed: "Any site that attempts to surreptitiously install malware onto a visitor's computer." to: "This item has been moved (i.e. a placeholder created so as not to not disturb numbering of the remaining items.)" Added: "Mirrors or forks of Wikipedia should not be linked."  Added: "Links to websites of organizations mentioned in an article – unless they otherwise qualify as something that should be linked or considered."
 * In WP:EL, added: [... all links to YouTube videos should,] "if applicable", [indicate that Flash video software] "or a web browser supporting H.264" [is necessary to see the content.]
 * In WP:EL, removed: "In contrast to official links, personal links contain content predominantly about the individual's personal life, family, and friends, and they are not included under this rule. For example, an official website for an artist will present information about the artist's work, not about the artist's grandchildren."


 * Layout
 * In WP:LAY, added: "In the rare cases when it is useful to sub-divide these sections (for example, to separate a list of magazine articles from a list of books), most editors prefer to use bold-faced text ("Books") instead of level 3 headers (===Books===)."
 * In WP:LAY, added: [... that do not appear elsewhere in the article] "and were not used to verify article content."


 * Lead section
 * Made significant changes to the WP:LEAD subsection and its sub-subsections


 * Linking
 * In WP:LINK, changed: "This may include" [plain English words ...] to "including"


 * Manual of Style (capital letters)
 * Made significant changes to WP:MOSCAPS


 * Manual of Style (dates and numbers)
 * The WP:MOSNUM subsection is no longer transcluded. (It was formerly transcluded so that just that section could be full-protected.)


 * Manual of Style (spelling)
 * A few changes in the examples


 * Manual of Style (text formatting)
 * Changes to the WP:MOSTEXT section
 * New subsection: WP:MOSTEXT
 * In WP:MOSTEXT, changed: "Italics are generally used for proper titles of longer works (books, films, etc.)." to: "Italics are generally used for proper titles of major works such as books, epic poems, films and names of ships. There are exceptions."
 * In WP:MOSTEXT, added:
 * "Scientific names of organisms are formatted according to normal nomenclature, with genus and species (and subgenus and subspecies if applicable) in italics (see the main section). For example: "The largest carnivore in family Tyrannosauridae was T. rex itself" but "Unicorn was an album by the band T. Rex".
 * New subsection: WP:MOSTEXT
 * In WP:MOSTEXT, removed:
 * The following are proposed guidelines regarding the use of various style devices to show emphasis:
 * Italics are used for emphasis, but sparingly.


 * Manual of Style (trademarks)
 * Added example: Alien 3


 * Manual of Style (writing about fiction)
 * In WP:WAF, added: "Strictly avoid creating pages consisting only of a plot summary."


 * The perfect article
 * Added: "[Each image should have an explanatory caption ] "and ALT text."


 * Accessibility
 * In WP:ACCESS, removed: "Do not place left-aligned images directly below third-level headings, as this can disconnect the heading from the text it precedes, when read with larger fonts. Instead, either right-align the image, remove it, or move it to another relevant location."  Also removed an example.


 * Avoid peacock terms
 * Removed examples: "long", "mediocre", "short", "worst"
 * Added to WP:PEACOCK: [If you find an article making use of peacock terms, and you do not want to fix it yourself,] "or are not sure how to fix it ..."


 * Avoid weasel words
 * Reworded with no significant change in meaning


 * Citing sources, Previous selected version.
 * Removed from introduction: [sources should be cited ...] "when checking content added by others ..." Also removed: "Citations are usually presented within articles using one of the methods described in the How to present citations section of this guideline."
 * Added to WP:CITE: "Follow the punctuation style established in the article. The most popular style is to place ref tags immediately following punctuation marks."
 * Added to WP:CITE: "Full citations for individually authored chapters in books additionally include: *the book's overall editor, *the title of the chapter, *the page numbers for the chapter". Added: [Citations for newspaper articles typically include: name of the newspaper in italics] "(required)", [date of publication] "(required) ...", "city of publication, if not included in name of newspaper", [the date you retrieved it if it is online],  "invisible to the reader:  ". Also added: [Citations for World Wide Web articles typically include: ... the date you retrieved it] "(invisible to the reader if the article has a date of publication:  )"
 * Added to WP:CITE: "An inline citation should appear next to material that it supports; if the same material occurs more than once the citation should be next to at least one of the occurrences."
 * Added to WP:CITE: "Some names require straight quotation marks, and it is never wrong to use them."
 * Added to WP:CITE: "Embedded links should not be used to place external links to websites in the body of an article. External links are those websites and other links that are not used to verify article content, but instead to direct readers to other websites. For example, do not spam links to companies' or organizations' websites in article text, like this: "Apple, Inc. announced their latest product..." Only links to pages that directly support claims made in the article should be embedded as links, and those embedded links should follow the formatting shown in the previous paragraph."
 * Added subsection: WP:CITE


 * External links
 * Added to the introduction: "For specific cases where you would like to seek input from the community or may be able to help, see the external links noticeboard."
 * In WP:EL, changed "The official site should typically be listed first." to "See Official links below."
 * In WP:EL, added: [Very large pages,] "such as pages containing rich media files," [should be considered on a case-by-case basis.]
 * Under the WP:EL anchor, removed footnote: "Note that under WP:External links, a link to a social networking site may be included when it is an official website for a business, organization, or person. However, Wikipedia does not provide a comprehensive web directory to every official website, and more than one official website should be listed only when the additional links provide unique content and are not prominently linked from other official websites."
 * In WP:EL, added: "For example, all links to YouTube videos should indicate that Flash video software is necessary to see the content."
 * Added new section: WP:EL


 * Layout
 * In WP:LAY, added: "Please refrain from adding links to pages that do not yet exist (red links)." [A brief annotation may be necessary when the link's relevance is not immediately apparent, when the meaning of the term may not be generally known,] "or when the term is ambiguous."
 * In WP:LAY, changed "An image should not overwhelm the screen; 300px may be considered a limit, as this is approximately half Wikipedia's text space's width on a 800x600 screen. It is a good idea to try to maintain visual coherence by aligning the width ..." to "An image that would otherwise overwhelm the available text space on a 800×600 window should be shrunk, or formatted as a panorama. It is a good idea to try to maintain visual coherence by aligning the sizes ..."


 * Manual of Style (capital letters)
 * In WP:MOSCAP, added: [Capitalize only those prepositions that are] "five letters long or longer ..."


 * Manual of Style (dates and numbers)
 * In WP:MOSNUM, added: "such as by" [using commas every three digits ...]
 * In WP:MOSNUM, added: [The number of decimal places should be consistent within a list or context ...] "except if the quantities were measured with different precisions."
 * In WP:MOSNUM, changed "for the UK Imperial units for some topics and metric units for others, and a mixture of units for others ..." to "for the UK, they usually are metric units for most measurements, but imperial units for some measurements such as road distances and draught beer ..."
 * In WP:MOSNUM, changed "Fully identify a currency on its first appearance (AU$52);" to "Use the full name of a currency on its first appearance (52 Australian dollars);" Added: [The exception to this is in articles related entirely to US-,] "EU-" [or UK-related topics, in which the first occurrence may also be shortened ($34, €26, and £22, respectively), unless this would be unclear,] "and in places where space is limited such as tables, infoboxes, and parenthetical notes. When there are different currencies using the same symbol, use the full abbreviation (e.g. US$ for the United States dollar and AU$ for the Australian dollar, rather than just $) unless the currency which is meant is clear from the context."  Added: [Conversions should be in parentheses after the original currency, rounding to] "avoid excess or false precision (one or two significant digits are usually enough, as the exchange rates can vary significantly) and noting the conversion as approximate," [with at least the year given as a rough point of conversion rate reference; e.g.,] "Since 2001 the grant has been 10,000,000 Swedish kronor (approx. US$1.4M, €1.0M, or £800k ), not (US$1,390,570, €971,673 or £848,646)."  Removed: "... some editors consider it unnecessary to link the symbols of well-known currencies, but doing so can often be helpful to readers, as many countries use dollars or pounds as their base currency, and not all readers are familiar with the euro."


 * Manual of Style (text formatting)
 * In WP:MOSTEXT, changed: "If the article topic does not have a commonly accepted name, but is merely descriptive (e.g., history of the United States), the title does not need to appear in the first sentence, and is not bolded if it does." to:
 * If the title of the article is a non-trivial description, it is not bold in the text (and need not appear verbatim at all). For example, Electrical characteristics of dynamic loudspeakers begins with:
 * A dynamic loudspeaker driver's chief electrical characteristic is its electrical impedance versus frequency.
 * However, simple descriptions such as “History of the United States”, “List of Portuguese monarchs” or “Timeline of prehistoric Scotland” should be bold.


 * Self-references to avoid
 * In WP:SELFREF, changed: "The following is a list of self-references in Wikipedia's main namespace that are not encyclopedia-neutral. They should at least be acknowledged or marked as self-references, but not necessarily be deleted, as they serve their purpose here on Wikipedia." to: "Self-references in the main namespace are not encyclopedia-neutral. Please verify that any use of the templates in this list override the need for enclyclopedia-neutrality in the article. Also, please consider how rare it is that any of the categories in this list are ever needed in an encyclopedia-neutral article. Finally, please reword articles with the kinds of references to "Wikipedia" that are in this list."


 * Words to avoid
 * In WP:AVOID, added: [In legal cases, this will usually be] "one of the parties, such as" [a prosecutor ...]


 * Accessibility
 * Added to WP:ACCESS: [Create good link descriptions, especially for external links (avoid "click here!", "this"] "or (more...) as in "today's featured article" section of the home page)." Added footnotes: "G91: Providing link text that describes the purpose of a link, techniques for WCAG 2.0", "F84: Failure of Success Criterion 2.4.9 due to using a non-specific link such as "click here" or "more" without a mechanism to change the link text to specific text., Techniques for WCAG 2.0"  Added: "Do not use Unicode characters as icons, use an icon with alt text instead. For example, a character like "→" can not be reproduced into useful text by a screen reader, and will usually be read as a question mark."


 * Avoid peacock terms
 * Added to WP:PEACOCK: [ Show, don't tell ] "by asserting facts, not opinions and substantiating facts about opinions." Added example: "picturesque".


 * Avoid weasel words
 * In the introduction, changed "Weasel words are words or statements that ..." to "Weasel words are statements that are intentionally evasive, ambiguous or misleading. On Wikipedia, the term specifically refers to words or phrases that ..."
 * In WP:WEASEL, added example: "Alleged(ly)..."
 * In WP:WEASEL, changed "Weasel words are neither accurate nor informative." to "Weasel words are imprecise, often inaccurate, and usually uninformative."
 * In WP:WEASEL, added "In extreme cases," [the weasel tag can be added to the top of an article or section.] Added: "The weasel word tag  can also be used, although it may be less informative than Who?, Which?, and by whom? for readers and editors seeking to improve the text."


 * Citing sources, selected version
 * In WP:CITE, removed "All citation techniques require detailed full citations to be provided for each source used. Full citations must contain enough information for other editors to identify the specific published work you used." "in italics" and "within quotation marks" were added in several places.  For book citations, changed "The name of the publisher [... is] optional, although publisher is generally required for featured articles." to "name of the publisher".  For newspaper articles, changed "a comment with the date you retrieved it if it is online (invisible to the reader)." to "date you retrieved it if you read it on the Web, unless it is on a stable website that maintains its archive over the long term", and changed "page number(s)" to "page number(s) are optional".  For web articles, removed [the date you retrieved it] "(invisible to the reader if the article has a date of publication)", and removed "an optional short quote (used rarely, if the source is likely to be challenged)"
 * Moved WP:CITE down, with minor tweaks
 * Renamed WP:CITE to WP:CITE
 * Added to WP:CITE: "Short citations can be written manually, or by using the harv template."
 * Removed subsection: WP:CITE (July 31 version)
 * Added to WP:CITE: [If a dead link cannot be repaired or replaced,] "one option to" [consider] "is" reworking the article section so that it no longer relies on the dead link,] "though this is not required."


 * How to copy-edit
 * In WP:COPYEDIT, removed: [Words and phrases such as] "whereas" [... are unnecessary in an encyclopedia; instead, use] "while ..." Removed: "Example: In American English, "whilst" is considered archaic or formal, while, in the United Kingdom, "whilst" is used nearly as often, in written and spoken form, as "while"."


 * Layout
 * In WP:LAYOUT, removed "Still, if the subject fits to be integrated into somewhere in the article rather than into a list at the end of it, it is preferred." Added "Portal links are usually placed in this section."


 * Linking
 * Made substantial changes throughout from the July 31 version


 * Manual of Style (capital letters)
 * Renamed WP:MOSCAP to WP:MOSCAP and made substantial changes from the July 31 version
 * In WP:MOSCAP, changed "Names of religions, whether as a noun or an adjective, and their followers start with a capital letter." to "Names of organized religions (as well as officially recognized sects), whether as a noun or an adjective, and their adherents start with a capital letter. Unofficial movements and ideologies within religions are generally not capitalized unless derived from a proper name. For example, Islam, Pentecostalism, and Catholic are capitalized, while evangelicalism and fundamentalist are not."
 * Renamed WP:MOSCAP to WP:MOSCAP, and changed one example to "Asimov is widely considered a master of the science-fiction genre."
 * Renamed WP:MOSCAP to WP:MOSCAP, and added:
 * Capitalize the first letter in the first and last words in the titles of English compositions (books and other print works, songs and other audio works, films and other visual media works, paintings and other artworks, etc.). The first letter in the other words is also capitalized, except for coordinating conjunctions, prepositions, and articles that are less than five letters long, as well as the word to in infinitives. More specifically:
 * Capitalize the first and last word.
 * Capitalize every noun, verb and adverb. This includes all forms of the verb to be (e.g., be, been, am, is, was, were).
 * Capitalize only those prepositions that are the first or last word of the title, are part of a phrasal verb (e.g., "Walk On" or "Give Up the Ghost"), or are the first word in a compound preposition (e.g., "Time Out of Mind", "Get Off of My Cloud").
 * With compound hyphenated terms, capitalize each word-part separately, according to the applicable rule.
 * Titles that include parentheses should be capitalized as though both the part inside and outside the parentheses are separate titles (e.g., "(Don't Fear) The Reaper")


 * Manual of Style (dates and numbers)
 * In WP:MOSNUM, changed "Wikipedia recommends the use of a non-breaking space ... when necessary ..." to "Use a non-breaking space ..." Added: [In some older browsers, quotation marks separated by a hard space are broken at the end of a line: ...] "Use   ("She said 'Yes!) instead."
 * In WP:MOSNUM, removed [19th-century painting ...] "when the adjective is hyphenated, consider nineteenth-century painting, but not when contrasted with painting in the 20th century"
 * New section: WP:MOSNUM
 * Made substantial changes to WP:MOSNUM from the July 31 version
 * Made substantial changes to WP:MOSNUM from the July 31 version


 * Self-references to avoid
 * In WP:SELF, changed "Articles in the main namespace may discuss topics passing Wikipedia's notability guidelines, exclusively. Lists of Wikipedia articles belong in the Portal namespace, as discussing Wikipedia contents." to "(even if an article itself becomes famous, it should not report this about itself)."


 * Technical terms and definitions
 * Added: [technical] "(scientific, medical, legal, etc.)"
 * Added: [Italic ... is used for: ...]
 * [Words as words:], "or  , whichever will be clearer in context (consider an article with many quotations, or an article full of italicized foreign terms).
 * Legal case names are always italicized: Plessy v Ferguson.


 * Changed "list" to "glossary"
 * Removed: "Some other markups are available but risky. Examples are teletype (edited as &lt;tt&gt;teletype&lt;/tt&gt;), underline (edited as &lt;u&gt;underline&lt;/u&gt;), and italic (edited as &lt;i&gt;italic&lt;/i&gt; or &lt;cite&gt;italic&lt;/cite&gt;). But the teletype (monospace) tag does not usually produce text sufficiently different from the standard Wikipedia font to be useful; the underline tag can create confusion with links; and the HTML tags &lt;i&gt; and &lt;cite&gt; are not differentiated by most common browsers. The Wikipedia italic, described above and edited as   italic  , is preferable to the HTML tags &lt;i&gt; and &lt;cite&gt;."
 * Changed "The markup "double-quoted" (edited as "double-quoted") is not risky ..." to "Wikipedia uses "double quotation marks" (and for quotations within quotations, 'single quotation marks'), regardless of English-language variant. “Curly quotes” are not used in articles."


 * When to use tables
 * In WP:WTUT, removed "Some articles include very long lists which might be difficult to edit if they were in table form."
 * Renamed WP:WTUT to WP:WTUT, and renamed several subsections
 * In WP:WTUT, removed [If a list is] "quite long". Removed "Long lists can be hard to maintain if they are inside a table".
 * In WP:WTUT, added: [Where a table is genuinely necessary and desired, use the preformatted  class="wikitable"  format,] "or one of the related formats, ..."


 * Words to avoid
 * In WP:AVOID, added "... happy, sad, ..." Added: "Human-interest writing often uses adverbs such as happily and sadly when the reader is expected to empathize with the subject's successes or failures. These are better avoided in encyclopedic writing, where the purpose is to neutrally describe events rather than to entertain the reader's sympathies."


 * Accessibility
 * Added to lead section: "For assistance with accessibility, see: Help:Accessibility"
 * Expanded WP:ACCESS from the June 30 version
 * In WP:ACCESS, moved some links to the footnotes. Also, added: "It can cause problems if cells that are not in the first row or column contain a colspan/rowspan. If the content of the joined cells does not actually apply to all of the corresponding cells in the first row or column, then the voice browser may incorrectly report the header that applies to those cells."


 * Avoid neologisms
 * In WP:NEO, added link: protologisms
 * Created WP:NEO: Wiktionary:List of protologisms


 * Avoid peacock terms
 * In the lead section, changed "- In Wikipedia articles, try to avoid peacock terms which merely promote the subject of the article without imparting real information. Examples include describing people as "important", "main" or "among the greatest" in their field without explaining why. Peacock terms often reflect unqualified opinion, and usually do not help establish the significance of a topic. They should be especially avoided in the lead section." to "In Wikipedia articles, forgo unsourced or unexplained peacock terms that merely promote the subject of the article without imparting verifiable information. Examples include describing people as "important", "main" or "among the greatest" in their field without explaining why. When you use these terms, make sure you have sources to support them, and that the reader understands why the person or subject is so regarded."
 * Added to WP:PEACOCK: "Their inclusion in this list does not mean they should be avoided, simply that they must be used appropriately." Words added to the list: "leading", "trusted".


 * Avoid weasel words
 * Some material moved from WP:WEASEL up to WP:WEASEL
 * Added to WP:WEASEL: "Uninformative. The purpose of an encyclopedia is to spread accurate and useful information. Weasel words are neither accurate nor informative."


 * Citing sources
 * Added to WP:CITE: "The original-language quotation aids readers in verification, and the translation makes the information accessible to readers that do not read the original language."
 * Added to WP:CITE: "Where no agreement can be reached, defer to the style used by the first major contributor."
 * Some endsection material was moved to WP:CITE
 * In WP:CITE, removed [Inline citations are mandated by ...] "(to a lesser extent) the good article criteria. They are particularly appropriate for supporting statements of fact ..."
 * In WP:CITE, removed: "Author-date references are the most commonly used citation style in the physical and social sciences (whereas author-title or author-page citations are the most commonly used style in the arts and the humanities). Author-date references are used in some of Wikipedia's articles on science and medicine."
 * Added to WP:CITE: "Template:Citation/core - is how the vast majority of citation processing occurs within medaiwiki."
 * Added to WP:CITE: Improving referencing efforts, Inline citation, List of sources


 * External links
 * In WP:EL, changed "include appropriate external links in an "External links" section at the end and/or in the appropriate location within an infobox or navbox." to "include appropriate external links in an "External links" section at the end of the article, and in the appropriate location within an infobox, if applicable."


 * How to copy-edit
 * Added links in the lead section: copy-editing, fact checking
 * In WP:COPYEDIT, expanded and moved down: "See also notices should be in a section titled "See also" if relevant to most of the article. For notices specific to a particular section, use one of these hatnotes." Also added: [1980's commencement address was exceptional] "(Better: The commencement address of 1980 was exceptional)."
 * New section: WP:COPYEDIT: Copyedit, Copyedit-section, inappropriate tone


 * Layout
 * Added to WP:LAYOUT: "Related – this generates Related terms:"
 * In WP:LAYOUT, changed ""Bibliography" is occasionally used if the list contains only books." to ""Bibliography", "Discography", or "Filmography" are occasionally used where appropriate."
 * Expanded WP:LAYOUT from the June 30 version
 * In WP:LAYOUT, changed "Title: The most frequent choice is a "References" header. But other articles use "Notes" and "References" as headers for two sections, or "References" and "Footnotes" as headers for two sections ..." to "Title: The most frequent choice is "References"; other articles use "Notes", "Footnotes" ..."
 * In WP:LAYOUT, added [A bulleted list, usually alphabetized,] "of a reasonable number" [of recommended publications]


 * Lead section
 * Added to the lead section: [It should] "define the topic," [establish context, ...]. Also added: [the notability of the article's subject should be established in the first sentence of the lead,] "if possible."
 * Added to WP:LEAD: [In general, specialized terminology ] "and symbols" [should be avoided in an introduction.] "Mathematical equations and formulas should not be used except in mathematics articles."
 * Added to WP:LEAD: [The first paragraph of the introductory text needs to unambiguously define the topic for the reader,] "without being overly specific."
 * Added to WP:LEAD: Lead section TT first sentence content, Lead section TT first sentence format, Lead section TT text


 * Linking
 * Changed substantially from the June 30 version


 * Manual of Style (dates and numbers)
 * Added to WP:MOSNUM: "For instance, one should not replace "since the start of 2005" by because some information (the start of 2005) would be lost."
 * In WP:MOSNUM, removed "The prefix "giga-" and its symbol G should be limited to computing and scientific contexts."
 * In WP:MOSNUM, added "Generally," [use units consistently]. Also added: "Nominal and defined values should be given in the original units first, even if this makes the article inconsistent: for example, When the Republic of Ireland adopted the metric system, the road speed limit in built-up areas was changed from 30 mph to 50 km/h. (The focus is on the change of units, not on the 3.6% increase.)"
 * Shortened WP:MOSNUM from the June 30 version
 * Added to WP:MOSNUM:
 * "(When they form a compound adjective, values and spelled out units should be separated by a hyphen.)"
 * "the percent sign [is] unspaced".
 * [When unit symbols are combined by division, use a slash ...] "Exceptions include "mph" for the mile per hour, "psi" for pounds per square inch, etc."
 * [When dimensions are given, values each number [sic] should be followed by a unit] "name or symbol"


 * Manual of Style (text formatting)
 * In the lead section, changed "This is Wikipedia's style manual for text formatting. Use it for guidance on when to apply various formatting techniques, such as bold, italics and underlining." to "This page provides guidance on when to format text in articles ."


 * Manual of Style (titles)
 * In WP:MOSTITLE, changed "genera and species (but not higher taxa)" to "genera and all lower taxa (but not higher taxa)"


 * Manual of Style (trademarks)
 * In the lead section, changed "presentation" to "formatting"


 * Manual of Style (writing about fiction)
 * In WP:WAF, changed "is usually taken from secondary sources about the fictional world," to "is usually taken from secondary sources about the work of art or the fictional world contained therein,"
 * Added and deleted a few examples


 * Self-references to avoid
 * Added to WP:SELF:


 * The perfect article
 * Added to WP:PERFECT: "is not a dictionary article as it is not about a word and how it is used; it is about an idea, which it explores thoroughly."


 * Words to avoid
 * Added to WP:AVOID: "militant"
 * Added to WP:AVOID: "left his body"


 * General style guidelines, January 2009 to June 2009


 * General style guidelines, July 2008 to December 2008