Help:Tracking changes

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Welcome to the FlightGear Wiki! This is a guide to some things you should know before creating your first wiki article. We'll explain some of the DOs and DON'Ts of writing an article, then we'll tell you how to create your article. Before you create your first new article, here are some tips that may help you along:

  1. Try editing existing articles to get a feel for writing and for using the mark-up language in use at the Wiki. Also, try reading some of our better articles.
  2. Search Wikipedia first to make sure that an article does not already exist on the subject, perhaps under a different title. If you find an existing article on your subject, it is best to redirect the name you were thinking of onto the existing article.
  3. Gather references to the source(s) of your information. Articles that do not cite reliable published sources are likely to be deleted.
  4. Please don't create pages about yourself or your friends (ofcourse you may post info about yourself on your user-page), pages that advertise, or personal essays.
  5. Be careful about the following: copying things, controversial material, extremely short articles, and local-interest articles.
  6. Gather references to reliable published sources. (Did we mention this one already?)
  7. Create a new page.
  8. List references to your sources. (We really mean it.)

Search for an existing article

The Wiki already has a lot of articles. Before creating an article, try to make sure there isn't already an article, perhaps under a slightly different name; you can search for it here;. If an article on your topic is there, but you think people are likely to look for it under some different name or spelling, learn how to add a redirect with that name; adding needed redirects is a good way to help the Wiki. Also, remember to check the article's deletion log in order to avoid creating an article that has already been deleted.

If a search does not find your article, consider broadening your search to find existing articles that might include the subject of your article. For example, if you want to write an article about a band member, you might search for the band and then add information about your subject to that broader article.

Gathering references

TODO

Things to avoid

TODO

And be careful about...

  • Organization. Make sure there are incoming links to the new article from other Wiki articles (click "References" in the toolbox) and that the new article is included in at least one appropriate category. Otherwise it will be difficult for readers to find the article.

How to create a page

In the search box left ot this text, type the title of your article, then click Go. If the Search page reports "No page with that title exists" then you can start a new article by going to this link: http://wiki.flightgear.org/flightgear_wiki/index.php?title=your title. Click the Edit button in the menu to start the new article.

After you have entered your article, click Show preview to check for errors, then click Save page.