Help:Contents

From questden
Revision as of 19:31, 6 June 2011 by LionsPhil (talk | contribs) (Howto: Adding threads, Character portrait list, tweaks)

How do I...

...edit anything at all?

You need to be logged in, and to get an account you need to request one to fend off spambots. If we're being really slow at approving you, try asking in the wiki thread on the board.

...create a page for a new quest?

  1. In a separate tab, type the quest's full title, ideally as given by the author, into the search box on the left and hit enter or "Go".
  2. Assuming it doesn't already exist (and you don't see it in the search results under a slightly different name), click the "Create the page" result at the top of the list.
  3. Open Typo/Minimum Standard Template in a separate tab and copy-paste everything to your new quest page.
  4. Fill in the gaps and remove the marked lines.
  5. Extra credit: fill in the Infobox nicely. See Template:Infobox for documentation and examples on how.

(There is a bigger, older template at QuestpageTemplate.)

...add a picture to a quest's Infobox?

  1. Edit the page, and add a line specifying an image name to the Infobox under the author, like this:
    |image=MyQuestTitle.png
    If this is an image already on the wiki, you're done. Else, make sure the file extension matches what you're going to use, and preview before you save to make sure you've picked a unique name (it helps to include the quest title in it).
  2. Save the page, and click the red "250px" that shows up below the quest title in the Infobox.
  3. Fill in the blanks in the image upload form that appears. It can be helpful to include the source of the image in the description, e.g. a link to the thread it came from.

You don't need to reduce the size of the image: the wiki will do it for you. It displays images at a width of 250px, the same as the board for the OP post of a thread.

...add a new thread to a quest's Infobox?

Most of the time, you just need to copy the last |thread= line in the infobox and change the numbers. The |thread1= numbering is important to the template and these numbers must be unique and in order, but if the quest numbers things differently you can use thread names, e.g.:

|thread2=5678 |thread2name=Chapter 2
|thread3=6789 |thread3name=Chapter 2 ''(cont.)''

Some quests might do really weird things with their threads that need special trickery. You can look up what each parameter does and how to use it at Template:Infobox. Remember to preview!

...make a list of characters with portraits?

For each character, you want something of the form:

[[File:BobQuest Bob.png|thumb|left]]
==Bob==
Just some guy.
{{-}}
  • The [[File:…|thumb|left]] line includes an image, put on alongside the text. You can either upload pictures in advance, or save the page with missing ones as placeholders to upload later (in which case make sure the extension matches when going to upload).
    • Either way, please try to include something like a short version of the quest title in the filename to make it unique.
    • You don't need to shrink the pictures, but you might want to crop them to best fit the character.
  • ==Bob== is a heading. Above all the characters you probably want a top-level heading called =Characters=, and maybe you want to break them down into groups. More equals signs mean a deeper heading.
  • Include whatever prose about the character you want.
  • Finally, {{-}} forces everything below this on the page to be put below the image if the prose is shorter. Without it, all the characters will bunch up together in a trainwreck.

You can use the same technique for a list of chapters with subtitle images.

...rename a misnamed page?

  1. Click the "Move" link at the top of the page, next to "Edit".
  2. Fill in the new page name and why you're changing it.
  3. If you get told you can't move the page, there might be something in the way. Ask for help in the wiki thread.

Don't just copy and paste the content to the new page. Using the move feature preserves all the history and sets up redirects so old links keep working.

...delete a page made by mistake?

You can't, but you ask to have a page deleted by putting [[Category:DELETE ME]] in it.

Reference material

Wiki markup

This wiki uses Mediawiki, so the full documenation is here. More usefully, Wikimedia offer:

Useful templates

Templates are invoked by putting just their name in {{braces}}. So to use Template:Stub, you add {{Stub}} to the page.

  • Template:Infobox is used to do the nifty panel on the right with the quest details at a glance and links to its threads.
  • Template:Stub is used to flag pages as being at an early, incomplete stage and in need of more content, like a plot summary or character list.
  • Template:- is what {{-}} in pages invokes: it forces the next part of the page to be pushed down below any floated-to-the-side images. This is used to make character descriptions line up with their portraits rather than bunch up together.
  • Template:Spoilers marks a page as having spoilers. Since even new readers may want to visit a quest's page to get at its list of threads, try keep the introductory paragraph spoiler-free and put this somewhere below it.
  • Template:Citeq can be used to make a small inline link to a thread when you want to support some fact on the wiki with a post on the boards. For example, murder mystery quest The Last Flight of the Sparrow made extensive use of these to help ensure our summary of the situation was accurate.
  • Template:NSFW marks a section of the page as full of smut. So you're probably going to end up using it on a fanart gallery sooner or later.
  • Template:Todo lets you put little visible markers in a page that something in particular needs doing, as a reminder for later or others.