Wiki Help Simplified

This page is to help me keep track of various Wiki related attributes and capabilities while I learn how this thing works. I am attempting to organize and simplify the wiki help pages.
Constant changes by DErik (talk)
First: A link to my test page: DErik's Test Page (which is redirected to DErik's Test Page Renamed). Then a TOC of what's here:

Terms and Concepts

interface message

? page in the MediaWiki namespace, per a description in Manual:Interface/Sidebar. But that same section later has the following example:

"** Special:RecentChanges|Recent changes" links to Special:RecentChanges, since there is no interface message of that name and that is not a valid URL.

which confuses me as to what an interface message really is, because the page Special:RecentChanges does exist, within the wiki domain. (Or does it? It might be dynamically created on demand only.)

text message

?

target text

? the text of the link reference itself, such as

http://someServer.someDomain/somePageInTheDomain

or simply

My Wiki Page

link text

the text the user sees for a link. For example, in

[http://someServer.someDomain/somePage | My Page In The Domain]

would have "My Page In The Domain" displayed for the user to click on to see the page. But later it says:

link text The link text can be the name of an interface message (page in the MediaWiki namespace) or plain text. If the link text is the name of an existing or default interface message, the content of that message will be used. MediaWiki will check for localized versions; for example, if the current language is fr (French) and the link text is the interface message "forum", it will check for "forum/fr" before using "forum". Otherwise, the link text is used as the target as-is. Notice that the link text is not optional as in normal wiki links. If the link text is missing, the item is ignored. Examples:</translate> ** Homepage|mainpage uses MediaWiki:Mainpage (which contains "Main Page"). ** Special:Recentchanges|Recent changes uses "Recent changes", since there is no interface message of that name.Example

which just further confuses me.

• wiki page: any page in the domain of the wiki, not just any page on the web
• wiki domain: a wiki should occupy its own domain on the web, and have nothing in that domain that isn't directly related to the support of the wiki itself or a page that users of the wiki can view and edit. However, it appears this need not be a separately registered domain on the internet, nor does it need to be a sub-domain. It seems it can simply be in a directory within an already established domain (as this one is).
• internal link: a link from within a page within the wiki domain to another page within the same wiki domain
• external link: a link from within a page within a wiki domain to a page outside that particular wiki domain. It appears that this need not be to any other internet domain either, or even to another sub-domain of the internet domain; just not in the same directory structure as the current wiki domain
• interwiki link: ? a page in some other wiki

Links to various Help and Admin type pages.

These are links that may be of particular value or frequently used.

• Special:AllPages: To get a list of all the pages in this wiki.
• Special:Upload: Help page for uploading files.
• Special:ListFiles: To see what's been uploaded.
• Help:Formatting: For basic explanation of the editing icons at the top of the "edit" or "edit source" page.
• Help:Images Describes how to put images, full-size or thumbnails, in the page. Includes sizing and positioning. Also captions, but for thumbnails only.
• Manual:Configuration_settings Provide a one-line description of all the configuration parameters. These parameters are typically placed in the LocalSettings.php file.

See also:

• MediaWiki:Sidebar, and help for it at Manual:Interface/Sidebar
• MediaWiki:Monobook.js The Javascript file to put extra Javascript for the Monobook skin
• User:DErik/common.js A place to put Javascript that applies only to a user (DErik in this case). I have put function ModifySidebar( action, section, name, link ) in there now in an attempt to modify what is placed in the sidebar; but it doesn't seem to have any affect.
• Category:Extensions Help on finding and creating extensions
• Special:MyPage goes to my Bio

Questions I still have:

• What are "messages" in a page reference?
• References to "interface message" in the Manual:Interface/Sidebar. -- Need to research this.

MediaWiki Installation

The first thing you need to be aware of when searching for answers and help here is that this is an "instance" of a MediaWiki site. That is it may have some pages that appear to be MediaWiki pages, but are in fact pages created during the installation of the MediaWiki application that are referenced like MediaWiki pages to support some of the MediaWiki functions and capabilities. Many of these are the "Special" pages, and some of those are generated "on demand", that is you get a brand new version of it every time you ask for it.

Next you need to be aware that each installation of MediaWiki can be configured differently. And that pages in one instance of MediaWiki (which is what this is by the way) can be freely referenced from anywhere, but that the way those pages are displayed, and the information on them, is dependent on the instance of MediaWiki they are associated with. Hence, the display, and content, of some pages may be very different.

This becomes very important in one very important aspect: referencing "help" pages. Wikipedia is another instance of a MediaWiki site. So they are free to configure their site and pages as they see fit, and to create their own pages; and they obviously have done so. Some of those pages are "help" pages. This is fine, but it becomes very annoying and confusing, because MediaWiki itself has taken to referencing some of them. As an example, look at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Help:Contents and https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Help:Contents. Both are "Help:Contents" pages, but have very different stuff in them. This becomes important in that the information provided by the "wiki help" pages often applies to a specific "instance" of the MediaWiki installation, rather than to any installation. So when accessing a page, be very certain that you are accessing the correct version of it.

Making Links to MediaWiki Pages

See Link Reference in the Wiki.

The MediaWiki

MediaWiki: This is really the starting point for setting up a MediaWiki. It has links for downloading and installing MediaWiki, initial "Learn how to" pages, and developer help links. These are good links, but not nearly sufficient. They include the following:

• Help:Navigation: Learn how to navigate
• Help:Editing_pages: Learn how to edit a page
• Help:Contents: Learn more about reading, editing, and personal customization
• Developer hub: From the page itself: "This is a high-level overview of MediaWiki development, including links to the key documents, resources and tools available to MediaWiki developers. It is written for skilled LAMP developers who have experience using MediaWiki."
• Wikimedia Developer Portal: Not really sure if this is useful.

Help Pages Hierarchy

Help:Contents The main help page. From here you can get to:

Reading

I have to say that I did not find any of these very useful.

• Navigation: Describes the sidebar (a little bit), some of the tabs at the top, and some of the user links at the top right of the browser page. Does NOT get into putting links in your document.
• Searching: Mentions the Search box.
• Tracking changes: Just that you can use some pages to get info on other pages.
• Watchlist: Reasons for watching things. Click the "watch" button to add it to a list.

Editing

Some of these are a bit more useful.

• Help:Editing pages: Rules, conventions, formatting tips. Not much else.
• Help:Starting a new page: See the "Getting Started" section of our Wiki Usage and Editing page. It will be more useful.
• Help:Formatting: Some fairly useful stuff here. But you can use the editor's toolbar to do most of what's described here.
• Help:Links: Some useful info here. But also look at Link Reference in the Wiki.
• Help:User page: To quote them: "A user page is a page about a wiki user with an account on the wiki". Mentions the "talk" page as well.
• Help:Talk pages: Just conventions and examples.
• Help:Signatures: Useful info on adding your signature (uses your account username) to anything - pages you write or entries you make in a "discussion" or "talk" page. We suggest you do sign you work and comments.
• Help:VisualEditor/User_guide: Fairly extensive description of the editor's toolbar options. Worth a perusal.

Advanced Editing

• https|Help:Images: Fairly good descriiption of how to insert images. Includes examples.
• Help:Lists: Gives some useful info on how to create and manipulate lists. They are done similar to just including HTML, and in some cases, HTML would be better. But there are options that MediaWiki provides that are not standard in HTML.
• Help:Tables: Tables are done quite differently in Wiki than in HTML. Better check it out. But using the editor toolbar might be all you need.
• Help:Categories: Categories are going to be the main way we organize our articles. So making sure you place yours in at least one category is very important. But read the

====== More to come ======

Sandbox

• API:Main_page provides an overview of the MediaWiki Action API, represented by the api.php endpoint.
• API:Tutorial is where you can learn to use the Action API.
• Special:ApiSandbox provides an area where you can experiment with the MediaWiki APIs.

See Also

1. Wiki Usage and Editing
2. Link Reference in the Wiki
3. DErik's TOC Xprmnts
4. Other articles in the Category:Wiki Article Development

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• Don Erikstrup - Please use the discussion tab above to leave me a note or comment. Or leave a coment at DErik's talk page.