Help:Starting a new page
From ManxWiki
Starting a new page is simple, however before you dive in please make sure that it, or a similar page doesn't already exist.
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Before you start
You must click 'Save' after editing or creating pages to publish your work. Always use the 'preview' button first then either cancel, edit more or save.
Do a search
Actually, do more than one. Keep your search simple first, there may be no references to 'railways', but 10 references to 'Railway'.
- If you are satified that no article exists about 'West Baldwin Railway' type it into the search box, click go and the Wiki will confirm it doesn't exist and invite you to create it.
Use Broken Links
Normally broken links are a bad thing as they lead to 404 error pages or to a page that has nothing to do with the link description. In wikis a broken link will appear in red, eg: Broken Links are red. Often these are created deliberately to highlight a subject worthy of creation as an article is being written, or it may be because they contain a spelling mistake (always preview before you save).
- If you see a red broken link you can use it to create a page, just click the link to be taken to an empty page.
- If you are editing a page, create a new broken link then save the page and click your own broken link to be taken to the empty page.
A list of broken links is available: Special:Wantedpages
Create your first page
Use the correct title
IOM Steam Railway, the steam railway and Isle of Man Railway are common names for the same tourism attracton so it could cause confusion and broken links if different people created each page. Manx Electric Railway comes under the umbrella of Isle of Man Railways (note the lettter 'S'), but it is a seperate entity from the Steam Railway.
For this reason, for this example, a Railways link is created that leads to an index page listing each of the types of railway and links off to each individual type. To avoid confusion from 'common' names, always use the official title, or if confusion may still exist add a word that is acceptably descriptive and understandable by most readers, eg: Isle of Man Steam Railway and Manx Electric Railway
To Capitalise or not?
Generally words such as 'of', 'the', 'and', etc. are not capitalised in Wiki titles, so even though IOM means Isle Of Man, in a title it would be written as Isle of Man. A page about 'high and low points in the Manx countryside' would be written as 'High and Low Points in the Manx Countryside'.
It is NOT a flogging offence to make a mistake with capitalisation!
Learn Wiki Code
A simple way to pick up basic WikiCode is to open an existing article then right click the edit tab or links so that you can skip back and forth between them and see how the text is affected by the code. The most common code is for Headings, Links and Images and the best way to learn them is to try them out.
A table of MarkUp Code is available: Help:Formatting
Whooops
If you make a mistake and haven't saved it you can cancel the page and start again. If you have saved it then don't worry as you can use the edit tab to go back in and correct the mistakes.
