Editing basics

Note: Easy editing - The Wiki editors welcome users to create an account and edit an article about themselves or general knowledge articles. Experience has shown many site visitors are not comfortable with the two programs which allow article editing. 
The first is Visual Editor, which is much like editing a Word document. It is the most intuitive, but does not allow for easy editing of photographs, videos and more complex formatting of pages. The second program is called Source Editor, which uses a simplified html code format. Editors and administrators use this program. It allows for format continuity between the over 1,700 separate articles on this wiki. Not to worry about making unsuccessful edits. All articles are easily reverted to their original format. Administrators are quickly notified when any article modification takes place. 
A much easier approach to adding information to the Wiki, is to email the Wiki administrator with content changes and additions at paul@solarcookers.org. Changes will primarily involve modifying text and adding photographs and videos, and creating new articles. Videos are best sent as YouTube links.
==Getting started==
If you can type and click, you can edit most pages on this wiki.
#Create an account by clicking the face icon in the lower left bottom of every Wiki page. This helps us see who is making changes.
#Find a page to improve. (If you want, you can practice in the Sandbox first. It's there for "practicing", or experimenting with almost anything. It's a good place to get used to how the wiki works.)
#Click "Edit".
#An "edit box" will open - type your new sentences or corrections
#Click the "Publish" button
#You're now a Web Publisher. Welcome to the team!
==More detail== 
Please note: The instructions below are valid only when editing in "source mode". In normal mode, you edit just like you would in Microsoft Word.
you have created an account and logged in, you can edit any non-protected page on this wiki. Your changes will be visible immediately. Just click the "edit" link that appears near the top of every page.
Explain your edit in the "Summary" box between the edit window and the save and preview buttons. eg: "typo" or "added info on xyz".
You can mark an edit as minor by checking the This is a minor edit box to let people know your edit is not something substantive.
To try editing, open a new window and go to the Sandbox (which is an editing test area), and then click the "edit" link. Add something and click "Publish".
==Formatting==
This information only pertains to editing in "source mode."
Most text formatting is usually done with wiki markup, so you don't have to learn HTML.
===Bold and italics===
Bold and italics are added by surrounding a word or phrase with multiple apostrophes ('):
*italics is rendered as italics. (2 apostrophes on each side)
*bold is rendered as bold. (3 apostrophes on each side)
*bolded italics is rendered as bolded italics. (2 + 3 = 5 apostrophes on each side) 
===Headings and subheadings===
Headings and subheadings are an easy way to improve the organization of an article. If you can see two or more distinct topics being discussed, you can break up your article by inserting a heading for each section.
Headings can be created like this:
*==Main heading== (2 equals signs) 
*===Subheading=== (3 equals signs)
*====Another level down==== (4 equals signs)
*=====Another level down===== (5 equals signs)
If an article has at least three headings, a table of contents (TOC) will be automatically generated. Try creating some headings in the Sandbox and see the effect on the TOC.
===Indenting===
To indent text, place a colon (:) right at the beginning of a line. The more colons you put, the further indented the text will be. A newline (pressing Enter or Return) marks the end of the indented paragraph.
For example:
This is aligned all the way to the left.
::This is indented slightly.
:::This is indented more.
is shown as:
This is aligned all the way to the left.
:This is indented slightly.
::This is indented more.
===Bullet points===
To insert a bullet, use an asterisk (*). Similar to rectal indentation, more asterisks in front of a paragraph means more indentation.
A brief example:
:*First list item
:*Second list item
:**Sub-list item under second
:*Isn't this fun?
Which is shown as:
:*First list item
:*Second list item
:**Sub-list item under second
:*Isn't this fun?
===Numbered lists===
You can also create numbered lists. For this, use the number sign or hash symbol (#). Using more #s will affect the level of indenting.
Example:
:#First item
:#Second item
:##Sub-item under second item
:#Third item
Shows up as:
:#First item
:#Second item
:##Sub-item under second item
:#Third item
==Links==
Links are important on wikis to help readers navigate your site.
===Internal links===
You can extensively cross-reference wiki pages using internal links. You can add links to existing titles, and also to titles you think ought to exist in future.
To make a link to another page on the same wiki, just put the title in double square brackets.
For example, if you want to make a link to, say, the Main Page, it would be:
:[[Main Page]]
If you want to use words other than the article title as the text of the link, you can add an alternative name by adding it after a pipe "|" divider (SHIFT + BACKSLASH on English-layout and other keyboards).
For example, if you wanted to make a link to the Main Page, but wanted it to say "home page" you would write it as such:
:View the [[Main Page|home page]]...
It would appear as:
:View the home page...
When you want to use the plural of an article title (or add any other suffix) for your link, you can add the extra letters directly outside the double square brackets.
For example, you would write:
:Add questions to the Wikia for [[quiz]]zes.
It would appear as:
:Add questions to the Wikia for quizzes. (the link will be red like this if this page does not yet exist)
===Interwiki links===
To link to another Wikia, you can use its title followed by a colon and the article name, instead of using the full URL.
For example, the Creatures Wiki home page is at Creatures:Main Page, which can be typed as
:[[Creatures:Main Page]]
:rather than as http://creatures.wikia.com/wiki/Main_Page
This style of link works for any wiki in the interwiki map, not just for Wikia. See the Central Wikia page at Wikia:Help:Interwiki link.
===External links===
If you want to link to a site outside of Wikia, you may just type the full URL for the page you want to link to.
:http://www.google.com/
It is often more useful to make the link display something other than the URL, so use one square bracket at each end, with the alternative title after the full URL address, separated by a space (not a pipe). So if you want the link to appear as Google search engine, just type:
:Google search engine
===Redirects===
To redirect automatically from one page to another, type #REDIRECT and then put in brackets the name of the page to be redirected to. 
For example, you could redirect from "Cats" to "Cat". That way, anyone typing either version in the search box will automatically go to "Cat".
==Wiki variables and templates==
Use {{SITENAME}} to see the current Wikia. For instance, {{SITENAME}} on this site prints out as .
That and a few other templates are common to MediaWiki sites.
Check the [/index.php?title=Special%3AAllpages&from=&namespace=10 current list of all templates on this Wikia].
You can create templates. After you create the page Template:XXX, using the command {{XXX}} will include that content in your current page. So, if you have something that needs to be included on many other pages, you might want to use a template.
Most templates available on the Central Wikia can be used on individual wikia with just "wikia:" prefixed to the name. See the help page on Central at Wikia:Help:Shared templates.
Editing
==See also==
*Style Guide