Project:Warming Up/English

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= How To ...= The MPDL CoLab wiki is a MediaWiki installation. This section will give you a short introduction on how to create and edit pages with this software. For further information visit the Cheatsheet at Wikipedia or for a deeper and structured insight the MediaWiki Handbook.

Please respect our editing policies.

... create a new page
Before creating a new page, please make sure that there is no existing page with the same or a similar name that might serve your purpose. Do this by either searching for your desired page name using the search field in the side bar on the left or by checking the alphabetical list of All Pages. The latter way is recommended since you will more likely find articles with similar titles as well.

Please note the following naming conventions and choose the name of your new page accordingly:
 * All pages created in this MediaWiki installation start with capital letters. If you try to create a page starting with a small letter, the page will be created, but the system will change the first letter to a capital one automatically.
 * Creating CamelCase articles is possible, but not required. You can also choose a name with blanks or hyphens.
 * The slash / is reserved to the creation of subpages. Example: There is a page named "Page" and a subpage named "Page/Subpage".

Basically there are three common ways to create a new page or article: following a red link to a nonexistent page, searching for a nonexistent page, or entering the desired name of the new page into the address bar:

Following a red link
MediaWiki displays internal links to nonexistent pages in red letters. Following such a link will lead you directly to the edit view of this article. You can enter your content there and click "Save page" at the bottom of the window. This will automatically lead you to the article view. You have created a new article.

Searching for a nonexistent page
Enter your desired article name into the search field and click "Go". If the article you want to create really does not exist yet, the search results will offer you to "create this page" in red letters. Click on this link and you will be lead to the edit view of this article. You can enter your content there and click "Save page" at the bottom of the window. This will automatically lead you to the article view. You have created a new article.

Entering the new page name into the address bar
The URL format of articles in this wiki installation as displayed in the address bar of your browser is http://colab.mpdl.mpg.de/mediawiki/ Pagename. Whatever page you are visiting you can replace the Pagename in the URL with the name of the to-be-created page. Entering this into the address bar, you will be lead to the edit view of your desired article. You can enter your content there and click "Save page" at the bottom of the window. This will automatically lead you to the article view. You have created a new article.

Whatever way you choose: When creating or editing a page, please enter a short summary in the summary line below the edit window. You can read here why this is important.

Headings
If you mark a string with one or more equals signs "=", you define it as a heading. Headings that are defined like this appear in bigger and bolded characters and thus help structuring the text. The syntax looks like this: Furthermore those headings appear in the table of contents that is displayed automatically on top of a page if there are three or more headings defined in the text.
 * = first level heading = (appears very big and bold and with a horizontal line underneath)
 * == second level heading == (appears pretty big and bold and with a horizontal line underneath)
 * === third level heading === (appears big and bold but without a horizontal line underneath)
 * and so on...

Table of contents
The table of contents (TOC) is displayed automatically on top of each article page that has four or more headings defined. The TOC lists all these headings in a hierarchical way by adding indentions and enumeration (1, 1.1, 1.2, 2 ...). From the TOC you can navigate to the marked sections in the text, what is very helpful especially for long articles.

There are some "magic words" to influence the appearance and position of the TOC:
 * If you don't want the TOC to appear, type on top of the page.
 * If you want to force the TOC to appear even though you have less than four headings defined, type on top of the page.
 * If you want the TOC not to appear at the top of the page but anywhere else, type at the position where you want it to appear.

Unordered and numbered lists
Starting a line with an asterisk * will start an unordered list with bullet points. Typing more than one asterisk will create deeper levels. Example:

you write * first item of level 1 * second item of level 1 ** first item of level 2 *** first item of level 3 ** second item of level 2

and you get


 * first item of level 1
 * second item of level 1
 * first item of level 2
 * first item of level 3
 * second item of level 2

To produce a numbered list, just replace the asterisk with the number sign #.

you write
 * 1) first item of level 1
 * 2) second item of level 1
 * 3) first item of level 2
 * 4) first item of level 3
 * 5) second item of level 2

and you get


 * 1) first item of level 1
 * 2) second item of level 1
 * 3) first item of level 2
 * 4) first item of level 3
 * 5) second item of level 2

Formatting letters

 * Writing in bold letters is done by adding three apostrophes: ' ' ' bold letters ' ' '.
 * Writing in italic letters is done by adding two apostrophes: ' ' italic letters ' '.

Creating tables
The MediaWiki syntax for creating tables basically uses these four characters: { | - }
 * Use {| to start a table and |} to end it
 * Use | to start a column
 * Use |- to start a row

Example:

This code:

produces this table:

For adding a nice border insert border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="5" style="border:solid thin black; border-collapse: collapse" after { |. It looks like this:

Importing tables from Excel
An easy way to import your xl-sheet to CoLab is to convert the table to Wiki code with this Copy & Paste Excel-to-Wiki Converter. Just highlight and copy your xls table and paste it to the offered box. After clicking "Daten absenden" your table converted to wiki syntax will be displayed below. You can just copy this code and paste it to your CoLab page. If you want the table to be formatted differently, just replace the { {table} } template in the first row by you desired style definition.

Exporting tables to Excel

 * select and copy all entries of the table
 * open a new sheet in Excel
 * select from "Edit -> Paste Special... -> Text" from the top menu

Internal links
Common usage:

Links to other pages within this wiki are idicated with double squared brackets [ [ ... ] ]. Example:

You write:

Main Page

and you get a link to the page named Main Page:

Main Page

Usage with alternative linktext:

It is also possible to display an alternative text instead of the real page name. This text is included in the squared brackets but separated from the page name with a separator |. Example:

You write: Link to Main Page

and you get:

Link to Main Page

Linking to nonexistent pages:

Internal linking works with nonexistent pages as well:

Foo and Bar Page

produces this link:

Foo and Bar Page

The red colour indicates that the link leads to a nonexistent page. If you click on it, you get to the edit view of this nonexistent page and have the opportunity to create this page right away. (Don't do this with our example page, please!)

Creating links to nonexistent pages in an article may seem pointless but can help to communicate and remember what other topics should be addressed.

... upload files
You can upload files of different formats in this Wiki and then link to them from articles. Note that all files regardless of type are called "Images" in the MediaWiki language.

Uploading files
What you do: To upload a file, use the link "Upload file" in the toolbox that is displayed in the sidebar on the left. To upload the file, you have to enter the source and name of the file as well as the desired name for the file within the Wiki. Simply follow the steps mentioned in the upload form.

What you get: If you upload a file, a separate page for your file will be created, containing the image description. All uploaded files are listed on the special page Special:Imagelist. Clicking on the name of a file in this list will lead you to the image description of the chosen file. From this page you can download the file.

Embedding files
If you want to refer to an uploaded file in an article, you have to link to its image description page. The name of this page equals the name that you gave the file, including its extension. Just add a link to the image description page in the edit view of the article like this:. You can also add an alternative text that you want to be displayed in the article view. Just enter in the edit view of your article.

... use the discussion pages
Every article page comes with a corresponding discussion page (aka talk page). This page can be reached by clicking the "discussion" tab on top of each page. Please use the discussion page if you want to comment a page or if you want to address a question to the page's authors. The discussion pages are edited in the same way as article pages. Please be sure to ...
 * ... indicate the article page's section or topic that you are referring to on the discussion page.
 * ... add your signature to your comment or question. This is done by adding four tildes ( ~ ) at the end of your contribution. This will automatically generate a signature with your user name and a time stamp after clicking "Save page". It looks like this: Tanja 09:14, 6 August 2008 (UTC)
 * ... use the watch functionality for the discussion page. Only then you will receive a system-generated e-mail when another user responds to your comment or question on the discussion page. This e-mail alert is activated by clicking the "watch" tab on top of the discussion page. Be sure to have added your e-mail address at "my preferences" correctly beforehand.

= References =