User:RTao/Syllabus
 | These are notes I wrote for my own reference. You can use it if you're not me, but it's not in any way official policy, guidelines, or even an essay. |
The purpose of these notes is to outline what to do to develop as an editor.
Best wishes from your past self, — RTao (talk • contribs) 20:07, 15 August 2024 (UTC)
Overview
[edit]Scope
[edit]Wikipedia is offered in many languages; each language is a separate project run by its own community. The Wikimedia Foundation provides technical and legal support and some governance. Everything from this point applies to the English Wikipedia.
Constitution
[edit]Read and reread the WP:5P. Remember the five pillars: encyclopedia, NPOV, free content, civility, no firm rules. Editors are here to create content for readers; everything else is secondary (but often important). If you understand and agree with the core purpose and are reasonably able and aligned, just be bold and edit.
Technical
[edit]Wikipedia runs on MediaWiki software. Many technical concepts apply to any wiki using MediaWiki.
Wikipedia is very big. You don't need to learn everything at once; you can learn topics as they come up by looking them up (usually in WP: namespace). But to get into "serious" editing, you need to spend time and effort. Look things up in Wikipedia:Glossary.
Content
[edit]There are no instructions for the actual work of writing; use your own ability and judgement. Policies and guidelines are just that; they aren't a how-to guide.
Surprisingly, there is no core policy on what content an article should contain, i.e. nothing analogous to WP:N within the article. Use own judgement on relevancy; keep in mind the goal of writing an encyclopedia, but Wikipedia is sui generis. Mergers and splits are always available later. Keep in mind WP:DUE, which is policy.
Vandalism
[edit]Redirects
[edit]Read WP:R and WP:RCAT. Should you create it? Browse WP:TMR for reasons. Browse WP:RFDO and WP:RFD for discussions.
Creation: create a new page "FROM TITLE" with #REDIRECT [[TO TITLE]]. (If you forget, use Visual Editor). At this time, also consider categorization; refer to WP:TMR#List of redirects by function.
Citations
[edit]A good deal of Wikipedia citations, including most template citations, are CS1. Nifty feature regarding date formatting:
Citation Style 1 and 2 templates, including this template, automatically render dates in all date parameters (such as |date=, |publication-date=, |access-date=, |archive-date=, etc.) except for |orig-date= in the style specified by the article's or template.
The relevant policy is MOS:DATEUNIFY.
Also recall For no date, or "undated", use
|date=n.d..
Comments: better to have an incomplete, imperfect citation (e.g. bare URL) than nothing because it makes the content verifiable. Someone else can add other details (e.g. author name) later.[1]
The actual function of the <ref> tag is just to move the enclosed text to the references section and create a number-in-bracket link to it. Any text can be placed inside it, e.g. explanatory footnotes (but use {{notetag}} instead).
Read WP:SFN.
List-defined references (WP:LDR) promote consolidation. However, they require editing in more than one section when adding new source and can't be edited in Visual Editor currently (if it is in a template like {{reflist}}).