Wikipedia:How to edit a page
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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This page is a how-to guide detailing a practice or process on the English Wikipedia. |
Wikipedia is a wiki, meaning that anyone can easily edit any unprotected page, and save those changes immediately to that page, making the alterations visible to every other reader. You do not even need to register to do this. After your first edit, you will be a Wikipedia editor!
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Editing
Editing most Wikipedia pages is easy. Simply click on the "edit this page" tab at the top of a Wikipedia page (or on a section-edit link). This will bring you to a new page with a text box containing the editable text of the original page. You can just type your text. However, also using basic wiki markup (described below) to make links and do simple formatting adds to the value of your contribution. Style guidelines can be found in the Manual of Style. If you follow these, your contributions will be more valuable as they won't need to be cleaned up later.
If you add information to a page, please provide references, as unreferenced facts are subject to removal. When you are finished with an edit, you should write a short edit summary in the small field below the edit-box. You may use shorthand to describe your changes, as described in the legend. To see how the page looks with your edits, press the "Show preview" button. To see the differences between the page with your edits and the previous version of the page, press the "Show changes" button. If you're satisfied with what you see, be bold and press the "Save page" button. Your changes will immediately be visible to all Wikipedia users.
Talk (discussion) pages
You can also click on the "Discussion" tab to see the corresponding talk page, which contains comments about the page from other Wikipedia users. Click on the "new section" tab to start a new section, or edit the page in the same way as an article page.
You should also remember to sign your messages on talk pages and some special-purpose project pages with four tildes (~~~~), but you should not sign edits you make to regular articles. In page history, the MediaWiki software automatically keeps track of which user makes each change.
Minor edits
A check to the "minor edit" box signifies that only superficial differences exist between the version with your edit and the previous version: typo corrections, formatting and presentational changes, rearranging of text without modifying content, etc. A minor edit is a version that the editor believes requires no review and could never be the subject of a dispute. The "minor edit" option is one of several options available only to registered users.
Major edits
All editors are encouraged to be bold, but there are several things that a user can do to ensure that major edits are performed smoothly. Before engaging in a major edit, a user should consider discussing proposed changes on the article discussion/talk page. During the edit, if doing so over an extended period, the {{Inuse}} tag can reduce the likelihood of an edit conflict. Once the edit has been completed, the inclusion of an edit summary will assist in documenting the changes. These steps will help all to ensure that major edits are well received by the Wikipedia community.
A major edit should be reviewed to confirm that it is consensual to all concerned editors. Therefore, any change that affects the meaning of an article is major (not minor), even if the edit is a single word.
There are no necessary terms to which you have to agree when doing major edits, but the recommendations above have become best practice. If you do it your own way, the likelihood of your edits being reedited may be higher.
When performing a large edit it is suggested you copy the code of the article you are working on and placing it in a text editor (preferably one without formatting, such as Notepad) periodically and before pressing save page. This ensures that in the case of a browser crash you will not lose your work. It may also be a good idea to save the page in stages as you add substantial amounts of work.
Wiki markup
Wiki markup is the extra information (apart from the text which will be displayed) you enter in the edit window which tells the servers how to display the page and the Wikimedia software how to process and categorize the article.
More information on editing wiki pages
You may also want to learn about:
Getting started
Policies and conventions
Make sure that you submit information which is relevant to the specific purpose of the wiki, or your content might be deleted. You can always use the talk pages to ask questions or check to see if your idea will be accepted. Please make note of the license your contributions will be covered with.
Helpful tips
Naming and moving
Style and layout
Tools
See also
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Meta has related information at: |
- WikiProjects, if you are writing an article about something that belongs to a group of objects, check here first!
