GoTeachInternal:Maintainer Training

Structuring

Page

• "Specialpages": Automatically generated content; "Maintenance lists"; "Manager interface"
• "Contentpages": User generated content; versioned changes;
  • "Wikipage"
  • "File description pages": Hybrid page
  • "Cagetory pages": Hybrid page
  • ...

Namespace

• Avoid naming collisions
• Used for access restrictions
• A page can only be assigned to one namespace
• Can be identified by a prefix in the page name
  • Exception: "Main namespace", aka "(Pages)"
• Special predefined namespaces, like "File", "Category", "User", "Template", ...
• Custom namespaces: E.g. for "Documenttypes" or "Organisational structuring"
• "Talk" namespaces: Associated namespace, like "User_talk", "Template_talk", ...
• Certain functions of the wiki can be activated/deactivated based on namespaces

Category

• "Tagging" mechanism --> Multiple categories for a page
• Namespace independent
• Part of the content --> Everyone that can edit a regular contentpage can also create categories
• Category pages can be categorized --> Treelike catgegory structure

Subpage

• Path indicated by "/" (=forward slash)
• Example: "Product:N52000786-2/Technical notes"
  • "Product:" => "namespace prefix"
  • "N52000786-2" => "root / parent pagename"
  • "Technical notes" => "subpage name"
• Recommendation: not more than two levels
• When to use?
  • "strong association" of pages
  • "avoid naming collisions"
• When not to use?
  • Knowledge base-like content

Content and formatting

Templates (=Text-templates, Text-blocks)

• Include contents
• "Transclusion" => Transfrom + Include
• Dedicated namespace "Template"
• Can take parameters
• Example: {{Infobox|London}}

Page templates

• Only used then a new page is created
• Prefill mechanism

Wikitext

• Simple to learn
• Effcient to create
• Easy to compare
• (Inline) formantting like bold, italic, underline, ...
• Structuring (markup) like lists, tables, headings, ...
• Special functionality like "Tags", "Hidden comments", ...
• Subset of HTML
• UTF-8 enabled

Functions

Redirects

• Abbreviations
• Synonyms
• Plural / singular
• After renaming/moving a page

Behavior switches

• Aka "double underscores"
• Example: __NOTOC__
• Influences the particular page it is used on

Variables

• Placeholder for a value that gets filled by the wiki system
• Example: {{PAGENAME}} --> "Maintainer Training"
• Automatically set
• Context sensitive

Parser functions

• "scripting / programming language" for wikitext
• Used to add "logic"
• Mainly used within templates

Tag

• NOT RELATED TO "Category"
• Example: <smartlist />
• Placeholder for complex output
  • e.g. user interface
• Customisations

Interface customizing

• Coloring can be adjusted via CSS on MediaWiki:Common.css
• Text messages can be changed using regular wikipages in the "MediaWiki" namespace (e.g. MediaWiki:Permissionserrorstext-withaction)
• Main (left) navigation menu can be changed in MediaWiki:Sidebar

Books

• Structure of a book is defined in a wikipage within the "Book" namespace. E.g. Book:GoTeach Manual
• Within a "chapter-wikipage", the book needs to be referenced: <bookshelf src="Book:GoTeach Manual" />
• Every book should have its own namespace
• Books can be copied using the Special:BookshelfBookManager
• Shared contents between books can be managed by using "transclusion" (e.g. {{ GoTeachShared:{{PAGENAME}} }})
  • GoTeachShared:Introduction/Ralf_Dürrwang,_Christoph_Selig
  • GoTeachManual:Introduction/Ralf_Dürrwang,_Christoph_Selig
  • GoTeachPub:Introduction/Ralf_Dürrwang,_Christoph_Selig