Help:Editing FAQ: Difference between revisions

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{{shortcut|H:hFAQ}}

This page is meant to accompany [[Help:Editing]].

These questions and answers have been culled from some of the talk pages of the various editing-related Help: pages. If you see a useful answer there or anywhere else, please add it here.

==Editing==

===Q: How do I sign the content I edit?===

Three consecutive tildes (<ttkbd><nowiki>~~~</nowiki></ttkbd>) will insert a link to your user page. Four (<ttkbd><nowiki>~~~~</nowiki></ttkbd>) will insert that link and the save time and date. Five (<ttkbd><nowiki>~~~~~</nowiki></ttkbd>) insert just the time and date.

===Q: Can I link to a specific section header if there are multiple section headers of the same name? If so, how?===

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If you don't know how many times a given header has already appeared on a page (and thus the number to use), there are two ways to find out.

#Use the table of contents.

#:If a table of contents appears on the page, click on the header whomthat you wish to link to. The page will jump to that header. Now, look at the [[en:Uniform Resource Locator|URL]]. At the end, it will show the ID of the header in question. An example of a URL whothat has just been linked to a header, whosenamed name"Foo" that has already appeared twice (and so is the third instance), and whose name is "Foo:"

#::<ttkbd><nowiki>http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Example_article#Foo_3</nowiki></ttkbd>

#:The header link at the end of the URL shows that to link to this header, you would use <nowiki>[[#Foo 3]]</nowiki>.

#Look at the source.

#:While looking at the source, first find the section you're looking for, and then look at its ID tags. It will show the number in that tag. An example for a header, whosenamed name"Foo" that has already appeared once (and so is the second instance), and whose name is "Foo:"

#::<ttkbd><nowiki><p><a name="Foo_2" id="Foo_2"></a></p></nowiki></ttkbd>

#::<ttkbd><nowiki><h3>Foo</h3></nowiki></ttkbd>

#:The ID and name tags (the ones that say "a name=" and "id=") show that this header can be linked to with <nowiki>[[#Foo 2]]</nowiki>.

===Q: How do I upload and make available PDF files?===

PDF files may uploaded and made available using the "File upload wizard" and "Embedded Image" button if they are image data as opposed to textual data, for example: [[Image:ExamplePDFPlotAsImage.pdf]]

In the case of PDF files this does not actually embed the image, as you can see above, but rather gives a link to the uploaded PDF image.

If your PDF file does not consist primarily of image data, please use standard Wikipedia textual input instead.

==Miscellaneous==

===Q: How do I get a page deleted?===

See [[Wikipedia:Deletion policy]]. The simplest case is where an editor has created a sub-page of their user page and wishes it to be deleted. Put the code <code><nowiki>{{db-user}}</nowiki></code> at the top of the page, and save; an [[WP:administrator|administrator]] will then delete the page for you.

For example, if I'm done fooling around with some sandbox pages created as sub-pages of my Wikimedia user page, how do I get them deleted? The Help mentions "contacting an administrator", but if there is a '''list of admins''' somewhere, I was unable to find it. The wikipedia "VfD" approach does not seem to be implemented on Wikimedia, so I'm at a loss.

===Q: How do I uploadarchive andmy makeUser availableTalk PDF filespage?===

A: [[Meta:Deletion_policy]]

Various possibilities are laid out at [[Help:Archiving a talk page]]. A convenient method, automatic once it has been set up, is to let a [[WP:bot|bot]] do the work. Copy the markup displayed at [[User:lowercase sigmabot III/Archive HowTo#Example 2 - incremental archives]] to the top of your user talk page, replacing the word "example" with your actual user name.

A: The list of admins is here: [[Meta:Administrators#List of administrators]]

===Q: How do I archive my User Page?===

A: Four possibilities are:

#move talk page to page like User:a/b (history is now in this archive)

#move page contents to such a page (history is still in the regular talk page)

#just delete content (it is still in the history, but one can less easily search in that text) -- [[User:Patrick|Patrick]] 14:32, 24 Jun 2005 (UTC)

#Use a link to an earlier version of the page in its history. It does not require creating "sub pages" for archives. You can see an example at [[wikibooks:Talk:Wikijunior_Solar_System/Solar_System|wikibooks:Talk:Wikijunior_Solar_System/Solar_System]].

#*Click on the history tab

#**Click on the first version listed there

#**Copy the URL from the address bar. Let's say it is <tt><nowiki>http://meta.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?User_talk:a&oldid=12345</nowiki></tt>

#*Edit your talk page.

#**Delete all the stuff you want to remove from the current version of your talk page.

#**Link to the archive version as <tt><nowiki>[http://meta.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?User_talk:a&oldid=12345 Sept 2005 archive]</nowiki></tt>

#**Save the new version of your page.

===Q: Can I put preformatted text inside a numbered list?===

A: Not Quite. It used to be possible until version 1.5.7. As of 5 September 2006, this is no longer possible without disrupting the flow of the numbered list.

It used to work by using the &lt;nowiki> and &lt;pre> tags as follows:

<table border="1" cellpadding="2" cellspacing="0">

<tr>

<td>

# one

# two<pre><nowiki>

here is a line

of preformatted text

</nowiki></pre>

# and the numbering

# would not start over

</td>

<td>

<pre><nowiki>

# one

# two&lt;pre>&lt;nowiki>

here is a line

of preformatted text

&lt;/nowiki>&lt;/pre>

# and the numbering

# would not start over

</nowiki></pre>

</td>

</tr>

</table>

===Q: Can I generate a frame-like structure on a Wiki page?===

(I have a chart generated dynamically in Bugzilla and I would like to display it within my Wiki page.)

A: ???

"Technically, you can do this with html div's and inline css styles, i.e. use a div with height and width set and overflow set to scroll"

--[[User:68.170.246.50|68.170.246.50]] 01:11, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

: A good suggestion, but that won't work for the originally requested use case. You can't make your DIV pull external content from Bugzilla, like frames do. You can only lay out the wiki page content in a frame-like design. [[User:82.200.65.190|82.200.65.190]] 09:37, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

:: The last comment was from me, I wasn't logged in. -- [[User:Alexey Feldgendler|Alexey Feldgendler]] 09:39, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

===Q: Can I display only so many lines of text?===

I want to set up a template that pipes in 'n' lines of text to a page, and then provides a link to the rest of the article. Can I do this?

: Not in the current version of MediaWiki, as far as I know. -- [[User:Alexey Feldgendler|Alexey Feldgendler]] 09:43, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

===Q: How can I place a note underneath and to the right of an image (but keeping the image by default to the left of the page)?===

--[[User:168.202.82.178|168.202.82.178]] 09:53, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

A: ??

==Tables==

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</td>

<td>

<syntaxhighlight lang="wikitext">

<pre>

{|style="background:white"

|- style="background:lightgrey;"

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|- style="background:lightgrey;"

| jkl || mno || pqr

|}</presyntaxhighlight></td></tr>

</table>

Line 132 ⟶ 57:

===Q: Can I make a link to open in a new page?===

seeSee: http://metawww.wikimediamediawiki.org/wiki/Manual:Opening_external_links_in_a_new_window [[User:VoskampM|VoskampM]] 08:38, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

==Starting a new article==

===Q: How do I start a new article that has not been mentioned or put into any other articles?===

Tell me