Do you want to focus on a specific demographic (such as women, people of color, or people with disabilities? By publishing changes, you agree to the Terms of Use, and you irrevocably agree to release your contribution under the CC BY-SA 3.0 License and the GFDL. Most of these conditions are easy to spot e.g. Wikipedia is a live collaboration differing from paper-based reference sources in important ways. And that’s it – you’re ready! Note: Do not sign the edit summary line with your ~~~~ signature, as it does not work there. This is a great way to keep track of progress during the Edit-A-Thon – I usually enjoy sharing final statistics at the end to share the impact the Edit-A-Thon attendees have made in the day. Wikipedia is a wiki, meaning anyone can edit almost any[1] page and improve articles immediately. But, some of them are going to remain “protected.” There are restrictions that apply, such as only one edit per twenty-four hours. They take about an hour each. Wood started editing Wikipedia pages about seven years ago. Decide what the focus of your Edit-A-Thon will be. Overall, I hope that this Sister guide will help you navigate and make contributions to the online encyclopedia more easily. Wikipedia Basics This site is designed to help you get started with editing Wikipedia. In short, the topic of an article must have already been the subject of publication in reliable sources, such as books published by major publishing houses, newspapers, magazines, peer-reviewed scholarly journals and websites that meet the same requirements as reputable print-based sources. It's pretty easy to learn the basics. The editing process can involve correction, condensation, organisation, and many other modifications performed with an intention of producing a correct, consistent, accurate and complete piece of work. Choosing a Subject, References and Sources and Images. Unless you submit your draft for review, you’re welcome to expand and revise your draft (for up to six months) until you’re ready to submit it for review. Our Expert Wikipedia Page Creators, Writers and Editors for hire help you to get Custom Wikipedia … For example, if they have a strong track record of publications, I’ll look them up on Google Scholar to report their h-index, number of citations and to create a selected bibliography of their top five cited papers. My main recommendation is to complete Wikipedia’s three modules regarding running an Edit-A-Thon. Before creating an article, please search Wikipedia first to make sure that an article does not already exist on the subject, and please also review the article titling policy for guidance on what to name the article. Editing is the process of selecting and preparing written, photographic, visual, audible, or cinematic material used by a person or an entity to convey a message or information. To be clear, you can edit Wikipedia without a user account. English: A complete beginner's guide to editing Wikipedia using the visual editor to add information, add a reference source in a citation, and then add an edit … You’ll want to cite sources where there’s some form of editorial control i.e. Edit warring (repeatedly overriding or reimplementing contributions) is highly discouraged. An encyclopedia is, by its nature, a tertiary source that provides a survey of information already published in the wider world. This can take up to two hours, but this training will carefully walk you through the logistics involved in hosting such an event. Wikipedia is formatted using its own language called Wiki markup, also called Wikitext. It is only available to registered logged-in users through an opt-in choice available through personal preferences, see the VisualEditor user guide for more information. No, I can’t cite these pages, but they’re good starting points to find a list of the individual’s achievements and then track down reliable sources to verify these facts. but instead struggle with finding or judging whether a source is reliable enough, which is why I recommend partnering with local libraries. This is a good place to remember one of the five pillars: to always assume good faith and civility from editors. Why Edit Wikipedia?, Using the WikiD Guides and Getting Started. The VisualEditor option is intended as a user-friendly, "What You See Is What You Get" (WYSIWYG) editing aid allowing one to edit pages without the need to learn wikitext markup. content is fact-checked and verified. It is better to start practicing your edits on an article that nobody really cares about. 7% of English Wikipedia’s biographies, Creating a Wikipedia user account is easy, Wikipedia’s policy on conflict of interests, complete Wikipedia’s three modules regarding running an Edit-A-Thon, request an exception to the limit for your IP address a least a week in advance, request an upgrade to your Wiki user status, You can also insert templates, such as an, This is possibly the most important feature: the. Wikipedia does not publish original research. The next question you may have is: what pages should you edit? It’s perfectly acceptable to go about editing Wikipedia using your common sense. Screenshot showing the same article in VisualEditor. You’ll go through a series of prompts (reminding you of notability, conflict of interest and to cite reliable sources), will be asked to type in the individual’s name, and then directed to a blank canvas. This is a “What You See Is What You Get” type of editor – similar to Microsoft Word or Google Docs. To edit a page, look at the top right-hand side of a Wikipedia page. Wiki markup editing is chosen by clicking the Edit tab at the top of a Wikipedia page (or on a section-edit link). Here’s something to keep in mind: only six user accounts can be created at a single IP address. Where can I turn to find more sources? So it isn’t entirely Wikipedia’s fault that it has a gender and racial bias. When you have finished editing, you should write a short edit summary in the small field below the edit box (pictured below). [1][2]) to a particular item in a collated, numbered list of footnotes, found wherever a {{Reflist}} template or tag is present, usually in a section titled "References" or "Notes". Usually, I’m most inspired to edit Wikipedia when I read a news article about an individual’s achievements but find that they don’t have a Wikipedia page. These are key ideas that editors need to be familiar with in order to be comfortable with navigating and editing Wikipedia. Before editing or creating a Wikipedia page, take care to ensure that there is no conflict of interest present. Here are a few tips from my own personal experiences. It involves a number of HTML tags, a lot of brackets and pipe symbols…and I don’t enjoy using it. If you're satisfied with what you see, be bold and press the "Publish changes" button. In all of my past Wikipedia Edit-A-Thons, I have partnered with different libraries, and invited a guest speaker to discuss sources (e.g. Begin by simply clicking the Edit button at the top of any editable page! For an example of the latter, the Wikipedia citation tool for Google Books converts a Google Books address (URL) into a filled-out {{cite book}} template ready to be pasted into an article. Introduction and Guide 1: Getting Started! When I go about expanding or creating Wikipedia pages, I generally start off by looking up the individual’s departmental web page or lab website. Learning Wiki markup—the syntax that instructs the software how to render the page—may appear daunting at first, though the recent implementation of a new editing toolbar has made this easier, and usability development is ongoing. A file that is already hosted on Wikipedia or the Wikimedia Commons can be inserted with the basic code [[File:FILENAME|thumb|DESCRIPTION]]. Unlike the wiki markup display, VisualEditor will show the text being edited almost as if it were already published. Once I’ve tackled the basics, I’ll search their name again in quotations, but in the regular Google search engine, to see if there are any other sources I’ve missed – perhaps a government website reporting their achievement, a feature in a magazine or academic journal, and so on. Wikipedia's concept of notability applies this basic standard to avoid indiscriminate inclusion of topics. If you do it your own way, the likelihood of your edits being reedited may be higher. Guide 2: Selecting and Researching a Topic/Subject. Tone and Style, Content and Structure, Building an Argument, Precedents and Article Titles. Individuals belonging to equity-seeking groups are less likely to be nominated for leadership opportunities and awards, or be reported in reliable sources – such as a newspaper article – making it difficult to meet the notability criteria. In this case, saving your draft does not mean it is published on Wikipedia. Devices only need to have an internet connection and some form of text input in order to be able to edit Wikipedia. This ensures that they have a good first experience with editing the free encyclopedia. All you simply have to do is point your cursor to the paragraph you want to edit…and that’s it! 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