Help:Editing primer
 | This page serves to assist editors in understanding how to use and work with the MediaWiki software. Nothing on this page relates to the mechanics or narrative of the war game. |
 | This page is currently under construction! Expected information may be missing, sections may be empty, prose may cut off abruptly, etc. |
This guide is aimed at people who are completely unfamiliar with editing on MediaWiki sites (if they even know what that means), but are familiar with traditional editing systems like WordPress, any sort of word document, and so on. This should hopefully knock out a lot of quick vital differences between the 2 systems to allow an easier learning curve.
For information on how the markdown of MediaWiki pages work, see Help:Formatting.
Terminology
So that we share the same language, please commit the following terms to memory.
| Term | Definition |
|---|---|
| Wiki | A website that has a system in place to allow collaborative editing rather than a central authority dictating content, such as a blog. Think the Zelda Wiki, or Fandom itself. |
| Wikipedia | More properly known as the English Wikipedia, it is the online encyclopedia that everyone can edit that everyone knows of.[1] |
| Wikimedia | A non-profit foundation that performs the administration and systems upkeep of the various language editions of Wikipedia. |
| MediaWiki | A free and open source software that is designed to provide a wiki-style of editing to a website. This software is what runs this very website and the English Wikipedia. |
Renaming pages
Unlike traditional word processing software, MediaWiki is unique in that every edit is logged, along with the information on who did it and when, and every version of a page after every version of an edit is also logged. This makes such websites incredibly resilient as, unless a user is making use of advanced permissions, it is nigh impossible to break anything. Almost every edit can be reversed with a button press.
The above, alongside the fact that the primary purpose of the MediaWiki software is to facilitate the editing of content released under a Creative Commons copyright license — which requires proper attribution of edits to individuals — renaming pages on a whim is simply not feasible. To MediaWiki, page names are not cosmetic, they are crucial database identifiers. Thus, to rename a page, in MediaWiki's language, you move the page to a new page name. This specific process results in all of the metadata, edits, and page history being moved to it's new name.
Due to the setup of the wiki, it is ill advised to move pages unless you are a regular contributor with an intimate understanding of the wiki's construction. Otherwise, please consult Sirdog (sirdog3355) or a known seasoned contributor, that way the navigation of information is not disrupted. To provide perspective, were the page Bogatyr renamed to, say, BogaTyr, all links that lead to Bogatyr would break. As of November 1, there are 7 different pages linking to it. That is a lot of tedious work. This risk is doubled for templates. Were Template:ActionTemplate to be moved, 50 pages would be impacted, and the information on company pages would be completely unreadable.
This risk is mitigated by redirects, but that's entering a "not-getting started guide" level of detail.
Hiding unwanted / sensitive content
 | The information in this section is crucial to understanding how to avoid undesirable or sensitive information remaining public if accidentally published. Do not skip this section! |
It is possible that, at some point, content is fully published to a page that should not be public. This may be a link to a Google form or spreadsheet (and you somehow missed the warning designed specifically to mitigate this risk), you accidentally copy-and-paste your password in a change you made, or your little brother decides it's funny to add your phone number to an edit while you weren't looking.
Regardless, it is not sufficient to simply edit the undesirable information out. This is because, as detailed in the previous section, every version of a page after an edit is logged. These logs are visible to the entire internet since this website is publicly accessible. For example, this edit is how the main page looked on October 16, 2024.
As a result, if the above happens, you should still remove it by editing it out, but then you must alert a site administrator (Sirdog (sirdog3355) is a safe bet) immediately so they may delete the edit from public visibility. For more details on how this is done mechanically, check out Manual:RevisionDelete.
Categories
All pages should receive a category; a special kind of page that easily groups pages together for ease of navigation and classification. A list of all categories the website holds is available at Category:Categories. If making a new page, please place it in the most specific category. For example, if creating a template for a war game action, place it in Category:Actions rather than Category:Game mechanics.
If completely unsure, at least place it in Category:Categories and alert known wiki editors so they may better categorize it.
Adding a category is done by clicking the three horizontal bars button next to the pencil in Visual Editing mode. In markdown mode, add the text [[Category:<category-name>]] anywhere on the page. For stylistic reasons, it should be at the very bottom.
Page protection
You may notice that certain pages on this website cannot be edited. Instead of seeing Edit or Edit source, you may see View source. An example would be File:EDCLogo.png. This means a page has been protected by a site administrator from editing. Very few pages are given this treatment, since editing is already by it's nature selective, given user accounts must be requested manually.
This is typically reserved for templates or other kinds of pages that could cause things on the website to break or appear broken. While these errors are not always hard to correct, it may cause panic or confusion among readers and newer editors.
Regardless, if you find such a page and need it to have some kind of edit done, notify a site administrator.
Permissions
While few in number, there are a couple of permissions that are not given to all users:
- Administrator — Numerous additional functions for easy site administration. Most notably include blocking users, protecting pages, and deleting pages and logs from public visibility.
- Bureaucrat — Can assign and revoke permissions, edit user accounts, and create new accounts.
- Interface administrator — Can edit pages which dictate the look of the website (e.g MediaWiki:Editnotice-0-War game rules, which dictates the message shown to all editors that edit that page) and import pages from other MediaWiki instances to this wiki.
For an exhaustive list of all user permissions, and what each permission can explicitly do, see Special:ListGroupRights.
Any user with an account may request one of the above from Sirdog of whom may approve or deny such requests at his discretion. Those with prior history editing Wikimedia projects are considerably more likely to receive such permissions, though the biggest factor is level of editing activity, knowledge of wiki construction, and willingness to learn.
Fleff, due to his nature as the gamemaster and curator of the game this wiki is dedicated too, is entitled to all above permissions at his request. He is also capable of vetoing any request for advanced permissions and ordering the disabling of any user's account. He is also, at his request, able to receive the Endurance War Game specific permission labeled "gamemaster" which allows the protection of pages from editing to even site administrators.