CNUpedia:Tutorial
From CNUpedia, an IEEE Innovation.
Contents |
Contributing to CNUpedia
Almost every page can be edited on this site. Merely click the 'edit' link located at very top and start writing. And unless you've disabled it, there is a toolbar to help with basic formatting of text. It is very easy to contribute.
This page contains helpful advice to make sure you can figure out how to do what you want. This article does not concern itself with what constitutes a well-made article but with how to get things done with wikis. For stylistic advice and etiquette guidlines, please refer to Wiki Etiquette and Guidelines.
Wikitext Markup: What is and how to use it
It is possible to merely enter text, performing the typical tasks of separating paragraphs, capitalizing, and the like, without attending to larger issues of formatting-- and perhaps this is satisfactory for a few users. But most people will agree that not only is raw text rather rugged, there are certain ideas that are difficult to express without the help of details such as figures or tables. Also, what should you do if you are editing a page in which someone else has used wikitext? You wouldn't want to necessarily remove or ignore it.
Wikitext Markup is a simple and understandable way provided to give writers deeper control over the format and appearance, not to say logic, of their contributions. It is code because it consists of instructions for the wiki site to interpret, and the which are not directly visible to normal viewers. It is not meant for programmers, but to be suitable for as wide an audience as possible. No special background knowledge is needed- one needs only learn how to apply them.
This page documents some of the most important markups available and how they work. In order to practice them, one can go over to the Sandbox, which is specifically set up for this purpose. Feel free to write whatever you want into it (no vulgarity or the like, though, of course). :P
Before we begin, remember:
- The best way to learn is to view how other people have made their pages.
- Another tutorial may be found at the site. Be warned: It doesn't separate levels of difficulty.
Basic formatting
Think about when you might have used some kind of program to write on the computer. You have probably heard of Word, and very likely you have used it. No doubt you saw that text could be underlined, italicized, and made bold (that is, bigger and more noticeable). You also probably could change the size of text. Here's how to do that kind of a thing in Wikis.
| Underline | Suppose we want to underline I am a happy person. Then we enclose it in u tags like so: <u>I am a happy person</u>, producing I am a happy person. Notice tagged text should always have two tags: At the beginning and at the end. Important: The ending one differs from the beginning one because it has a slash at the front of its name. |
| Italic | To italicize, enclose the text in two single-quote marks on both sides (I gave you the harder one first!). For example, ''The Book which Must not be Read'' produces The Book that Must not be Read. |
| Bold | To make text bold, enclose it in three single-quote marks on both sides. For example, '''Radicalism is for square roots''' produces Radicalism is for square roots. |
| Smaller | Use the small tag. For example, <small>I am a young sentence.</small> produces I am a young sentence. |
| Teletype | Use the tt tag. For example, <tt>I am straight-laced</tt> produces I am straight-laced |
Logical Formatting
Bulleted List
To make a bulleted list, place an asterisk in front of each list item:
* remember to brush your teeth
* get the groceries
Numeric List
To make a numeric list, place a pound sign in front of each item:
# Achieve world dominion
# Punish your antagonists
# Secure a failsafe escape strategy for when the hero eventually avenges your terrible brutality from the previous step.
Table
Making a table is a little more difficult. But an example should serve to give the basic idea:
{|
|-
| 1st row
| 2nd column of first row
|-
| 2nd row
| 2nd col of 2st row
|-
| hi
| bye
| a third column!
|}
This produces
| 1st row | 2nd column of first row | |
| 2nd row | 2nd col of 2st row | |
| hi | bye | a third column! |
In case you didn't understand what as going on, one starts a table with {| on a line by itself, and ends the table with |} in like manner. A new row is started by using |-, and | moves right one column on the row in use.
Keep in mind that one has to be very careful to separate the wikitext properly for tables.
Connecting Pages
Wiki pages have the advantage that they exist on computers, so isn't necessary for humans to page through them to find crossreferences: That is, if one has specified these connections. Humans specifying them makes it possible to emphasize only the important ones, so the teamwork between man and technology is a nice combination.
- To create a link to an existing wiki page do [[Page Title]].
- To create a link to a wiki page, but using a non-canonical name, do [[Page | my_title]]
- To use anchors, do [[Page#anchor_name]]. (advanced)
- To create external links use formatting like [http://www.example.com link title]
Images and Other Media
To display images in CNUpedia, the file must first be "uploaded" onto the site. CNUpedia has to have a copy of the image. Look at Special:Imagelist to see a listing of all such images.
If you wish to upload an image, log in as a registered user (register if you have to), and then click the link saying "Upload file", probably to be found on the left side of the screen. Save the picture to the computer you are working on, if you haven't already. Use the interface to specify where the file is on your computer, write in a name for it (that you will use when editing these pages), and describe it. Then tell it to copy the file to CNUpedia.
Suppose you named it BirdNestNearSantoro.jpg. Then when you want the image in a page, next to the other text that your're editing, type in
[[Image:BirdNestNearSantoro.jpg]]
Formatting and arranging images is rather arcane. But this is a start.
Note to hacker-types like me
Yes, it is possible to directly write the image into the wikitext encoding. Please don't ;-).
Restrictions
There are certain actions not authorized for ordinary users on CNUpedia. These include
- Editing pages that have been frozen by the administrators.
- Deleting pages or media
