Wikipedia : The Missing Manual

Want to be part of the largest group-writing project in human history? This guide explains how you can contribute to Wikipedia the popular user-generated online reference that has become serious competition for the Encyclopedia Britannica. Wikipedia has more than 6 million entries in 250 languages -- 1.5 million articles in the English language alone. Each one is written and edited by an ever- changing cast of volunteer editors. With the guidelines in this book, you can become one of them. Wikipedia: The Missing Manual gives you practical advice on how to create articles and collaborate with fellow editors, how to improve existing articles, and how to work with the Wikipedia community to review new articles, mediate disputes, and maintain the site.

John Broughton has been a registered editor at Wikipedia since August 2005, with more than 15,000 edits by the time he wrote this book. His biggest Wikipedia endeavor was to build the Editor's index to Wikipedia (just type that in the "search" box at the left of any Wikipedia page). This index lists every important reference page on Wikipedia, as well as hundreds of off-Wikipedia Web pages with useful information and tools for Wikipedia editors. John's first experience with programming computers was in a 1969 National Science Foundation program. Since then, he's held various computer-related management positions in the headquarters of a U.S. Army Reserve division, worked in internal audit departments as a Certified Information Systems Auditor, and was the Campus Y2K Coordinator at U.C. Berkeley. A Certified Management Accountant, John has B.S. in Mathematical Sciences from Johns Hopkins University; an M.B.A. from Golden Gate University; an M.S. in Education from the University of Southern California; and a Masters in Public Policy from the University of California at Berkeley.

The Missing Credits	p. xi
Introduction	p. xv
Editing, Creating, and Maintaining Articles
Editing for the First Time	p. 3
The Wikipedia Way of Editing	p. 3
Practicing in the Sandbox	p. 4
Starting, Previewing, and Saving Your Edit	p. 5
Dealing with an Edit Conflict	p. 11
Wiki Markup: From Edit Box to Screen	p. 14
Editing Article Sections	p. 18
Editing the Lead Section	p. 20
Editing for Real	p. 21
Documenting Your Sources	p. 25
Documentation Guidelines	p. 25
Adding an External Link	p. 30
Citing Sources	p. 31
Creating Footnotes	p. 33
Advanced Citation Techniques	p. 40
Setting Up Your Account and Personal Workspace	p. 45
Why Register?	p. 45
Picking a User Name	p. 48
Registering	p. 50
Setting Up Your User Page	p. 53
Personal Subpages	p. 56
Creating a New Article	p. 61
What Makes a Good Article	p. 62
What Articles Don't Belong on Wikipedia	p. 66
Tutorial: Creating a New Article	p. 69
Ideas for New Articles	p. 78
Resources for Writing Articles	p. 78
Who Did What: Page Histories and Reverting	p. 81
Understanding Page Histories	p. 81
Reverting Edits	p. 90
Advanced Techniques	p. 96
Monitoring Changes	p. 99
The User Contributions Page	p. 99
Wikipedia's Standard Watchlist	p. 101
Multiple Watchlists	p. 115
Real-Time Monitoring Alternatives	p. 117
Dealing with Vandalism and Spam	p. 121
Lines of Defense	p. 122
Reverting Vandalism and Spam	p. 122
Issuing Warnings	p. 130
Requesting Assistance of Administrators	p. 133
Don't Get into a Revert War	p. 138
Collaborating with Other Editors
Communicating with Your Fellow Editors	p. 143
Identifying Yourself	p. 143
Article Talk (Discussion) Pages	p. 145
User Talk Page Postings	p. 156
Communicating via Email and IRC	p. 162
WikiProjects and Other Group Efforts	p. 165
WikiProjects	p. 165
Collaborations	p. 175
Less Formal Working Groups	p. 177
Resolving Content Disputes	p. 179
Why Editors Disagree	p. 179
Avoiding Content Disputes	p. 181
Reviewing Content Changes: A General Plan of Action	p. 184
Resolving Content Disputes Informally	p. 188
Resolving Disputes with Assistance	p. 191
Handling Incivility and Personal Attacks	p. 195
Enforcing Norms of Conduct	p. 195
Dealing with Incivility and Personal Attacks	p. 200
When You Get Irritated (or Worse)	p. 210
Lending Other Editors a Hand	p. 213
Answering Questions	p. 213
Showing Appreciation for Other Editors	p. 218
Reviewing Articles and Images	p. 219
Coaching Other Editors	p. 223
Helping Resolve Disputes	p. 223
For Experienced Editors	p. 227
Choosing Where You Want to Help	p. 228
Formatting and Illustrating Articles
Article Sections and Tables of Contents	p. 233
Getting Sections Right	p. 233
Getting Headings Right	p. 242
Improving the Table of Contents	p. 245
Creating Lists and Tables	p. 253
Creating and Editing Lists	p. 253
Editing and Creating Tables	p. 26
Adding Images	p. 271
Uploading Images	p. 271
Finding Images	p. 284
Placing an Image in an Article	p. 284
Questions or Problems with Images	p. 287
Uploading a Non-free Image	p. 288
Building a Stronger Encyclopedia
Getting Readers to the Right Article: Naming, Redirects, and Disambiguation	p. 295
Naming and Renaming	p. 295
For Old Names and Bad Spellers: Redirects	p. 303
For Multiple Meanings: Disambiguation	p. 313
Categorizing Articles	p. 323
Fundamentals of Categorization	p. 323
Category Links in Articles	p. 324
Category Pages	p. 331
Building Out Categories	p. 335
Discussing Categories	p. 336
Categories, Lists, and Series Boxes	p. 336
Better Articles: A Systematic Approach	p. 339
Avoid Surprises	p. 339
Don't Suppress or Separate Controversy	p. 342
Reorganize and Edit Existing Content	p. 343
Don't Take Article Scope as a Given	p. 346
Improve the Citation of Sources	p. 348
Build the Web	p. 351
Look for Guidance and Examples	p. 352
Add Sourced Content	p. 353
Remove Cruft and Duplication	p. 355
Get the Wording Right	p. 356
Make the Article Look Appealing	p. 357
Deleting Existing Articles	p. 359
Responding to Problem Articles	p. 359
Alternatives to Deletion	p. 362
Three Ways to Delete an Article	p. 363
After an Article is Deleted	p. 379
Customizing Wikipedia
Customizing with Preferences	p. 383
User Profile	p. 383
Skin	p. 388
Math	p. 390
Files	p. 391
Date and Time	p. 391
Editing	p. 393
Recent Changes	p. 395
Watchlist	p. 395
Search	p. 395
Misc	p. 397
Gadgets	p. 399
Easier Editing with JavaScript	p. 401
Setting Up Your Browser	p. 401
Adding and Deleting Scripts	p. 402
Fixing Problems	p. 409
Resources	p. 410
Appendixes
A Tour of the Wikipedia Page	p. 413
Reader's Guide to Wikipedia	p. 427
Learning More	p. 447
Index	p. 457
Table of Contents provided by Ingram. All Rights Reserved.

What is included with this book?

The New copy of this book will include any supplemental materials advertised. Please check the title of the book to determine if it should include any access cards, study guides, lab manuals, CDs, etc.

The Used, Rental and eBook copies of this book are not guaranteed to include any supplemental materials. Typically, only the book itself is included. This is true even if the title states it includes any access cards, study guides, lab manuals, CDs, etc.

FREE SHIPPING

Amazon no longer offers textbook rentals. We do!

Wikipedia : The Missing Manual

Summary

Author Biography

Table of Contents

Supplemental Materials