Help:Add New
From DucatiWiki
There are two ways to add content to the wiki:
- Modifying a page that already exists
- Adding a new page
Contents |
Modifying a page
To modify a page, simply click the edit tab near the top of the page. The page will change into a special edit mode, where you can modify the contents of the page.
This Wiki uses the same Wiki system as the famous Encyclopedia Wikipedia. Wikipedia uses a special formatting language, which is at the same time simple but yet provides a great wealth of formatting options. Please see wiki formatting codes for more information.
The toolbar above the edit window gives you access to the most frequently used editing commands.
Adding a new page
There are several ways to start a new page.
From the search page
Probably the easiest way to create a page is by using the Search box. Just type the name of the page to create, hit Go, and you'll either Go to that page if it exists, or to a message with an option to create it. (Note that this technique doesn't work if you use the 'search' button).
Using Wikilinks
MediaWiki makes it very easy to link wiki pages using a standard syntax (see Links). To link to an existing article, just enter [[article name]]. If you (or anyone else) creates a link to an article that doesn't exist yet, the link will be colored red, like this.
Clicking a red link, will take you to the edit page for the new article. Simply type your text, click save and the new page will be created.
Once the page has been created, the link will change from red to blue (purple for pages you've visited) indicating that the article now exists.
Categories
While not specifically required by a wiki, make sure pages get assigned to proper categories. This is done by entering [[Category:categoryname]] at the end of the page you are editing. Read on to find out how to figure out what categories are avaialble!
There are 3 major groupings of categories that you should attempt to assign an article to and those are:
- model of bike
- type of article
- bike components it covers
You can find all of the categories available under each of those groupings by clicking on the + signs on the menu at the left. For example, if you click on Ducati Models, you can see the 4 different models available. Likewise for Service and Browsing... The Components category goes one layer deeper as it groups items related to each different part of the bike. For example, if you click on the + next to Components then on the + next to Body, you will see the 4 related categories about the Body parts. When you enter a category for the Components, you only need to enter the final level (ie Fairing) and not the entire "path" to get there.
You can also create a category for you. Just add [[Category:Your Name]] at the end of an article and all of your contributions will be grouped in that category.
Finally, you can enter as many categories as make sense. For example, an article about paint codes might have the following categories at the end of the article:
[[Category:ST2]] [[Category:ST3]] [[Category:ST4]] [[Category:Paint]] [[Category:Parts]] [[Category:Specification]] [[Category:FAQ]]
Don't Duplicate Existing Info
Before you start an article, do a bit of searching to see if there are similar pages already in the wiki that can be augmented with this information. There shouldn't be multiple pages with overlapping info as that will make things hard for users to find.
It may make sense to add sub-headings like on this page to help organize the information when you're adding information to an existing page. Click here or the "edit" tab at the top of the screen to see how to create these sub-heads (hint; just enclose the subhead in 3 === signs like this === Subhead ===)
Uploading Files
If you need to upload a file, use the Upload file link in the toolbox (in the left side bar). When you upload the file, the Wiki will replace the spaces by underscores for you. Leave it as such, and the page and article will be automatically linked. Please name the uploaded file with the same name as the page, just with the "zip" extension. This will ease future maintenance tasks in the Wiki.
Formatting
Wiki formatting is slightly different than HTML although you can use some HTML, there are other ways to accomplish the same thing that are preferred. You can see some of it in action by clicking on the Edit or View Source tabs at the top of each page or look at the Formatting help page.
Images
There are many tools for managing images to be used in the wiki. Refer to Image Help for more information on using images. If you are going to upload a lot of images (like a ride report) and you already have those images uploaded on a server elsewhere, you can use links to those images rather than uploading to the wiki. Simply enter the URL to provide either a link:
[http://photos.aldonc.com/img/v0/p251455358-3.jpg Cactus flowers]
Results in Cactus flowers
Or the actual image
http://photos.aldonc.com/img/v0/p251455358-3.jpg
Results in the full size image being displayed:
Cleanup
Please help clean it up if you are able.
Sample Cleanup banner
If you are working on a page and it is incomplete or you know more should be added to it to be meaningful, include {{Cleanup}} at the top of the page. That will do 2 things:
- it will put a banner at the top of the page like you see on this one.
- it will automatically place that page into a cleanup category.
Those will be indicators to go back and do the additional editing required.
Create redirects to your new page
Don't forget to setup redirects when you create a page. If you think another person may search for the page you've created by using a different name or spelling, please create the proper redirect(s).
To create a redirect, the first line of the page should read #REDIRECT [[Destination]] where Destination is the page to which people should be redirected. This must appear as the very first line of the page.
Sandbox
You can try out your formatting and editing skills at the Wiki's Sandbox, a page specifically for testing and experimenting.
