Wikipedia:FAQ/Contributing - Wikipedia

Wikipedia:FAQ/Contributing - Wikipedia
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WP:COFAQ
WP:COFAQ
This page of frequently asked questions is devoted to answering those questions commonly asked by contributors to Wikipedia.
Getting started
How can I contribute?
Shortcut
WP:COFAQ#HOW
WP:COFAQ#HOW
For how to volunteer, see
Help:Introduction
For how to donate, see
m:Donations FAQ
Why would I want to contribute?
Shortcut
WP:COFAQ#WHY
WP:COFAQ#WHY
See
why on Earth would I want to contribute to a wiki
Do I have to register to edit pages?
Shortcut
WP:COFAQ#REG
WP:COFAQ#REG
No.
Anyone
can edit without any kind of registration (except disruptive users who have been
blocked
).
What, then, is the point of getting an account?
Shortcut
WP:COFAQ#WHYREG
WP:COFAQ#WHYREG
There are many reasons: see
Wikipedia:Why create an account?
Is there a minimum age requirement to contribute or register?
Shortcut
WP:COFAQ#AGE
WP:COFAQ#AGE
No.
Anyone
of
any age
may edit articles or register. Wikipedia does not even require that users disclose their age when registering!
Note that users who identify themselves as minors (generally those under 16 years of age) are encouraged, and will be required, to protect their identities via safe practices where the posting of personal information is concerned. See
Wikipedia:Protecting children's privacy
Do I have to use my real name?
Shortcut
WP:COFAQ#NAME
WP:COFAQ#NAME
No. Real names are not required; some Wikipedians use real names, some don't: see
Wikipedia:Username
How do I change my own username?
Shortcut
WP:COFAQ#CHNGUSER
WP:COFAQ#CHNGUSER
See
Wikipedia:Changing username
What does that word mean?
Shortcut
WP:COFAQ#TERM
WP:COFAQ#TERM
On talk pages and in the edit summaries of a page history, you will often see editors using terminology and abbreviations which are unique to Wikipedia.
rv
or
revert
, usually in an
edit summary
, indicates that the page has been reverted to a previous version, often because of vandalism.
NPOV
means working towards a
Neutral point of view
, whilst its opposite,
POV
, is used to suggest that an edit was biased.
To
Wikify
means to add internal links and other formatting to an article which was mostly plain text.
dab
means a small touch, and can also be short for
disambiguation
, or improving a link so that it goes straight to the relevant article.
For a more comprehensive list see
Wikipedia:Glossary
What is the difference between a page and an article?
The term "page" encompasses all the material on Wikipedia, including encyclopedia topics, talk pages, documentation, and
special pages
such as
Recent Changes
. "Article" is a narrower term referring to a page containing an encyclopedia entry. Thus, all articles are pages, but not all pages are articles. See
Wikipedia:What is an article
for more.
What is an "orphan"?
Shortcut
WP:COFAQ#ORPHAN
WP:COFAQ#ORPHAN
An
orphan
is an article that no other article links to. Such articles can be found on Wikipedia, but it is preferable that another article should link to each article. You can find a list of orphans at
Category:Orphaned articles
What is a stub?
Shortcut
WP:COFAQ#STUB
WP:COFAQ#STUB
A stub on Wikipedia is a very short article, usually of one paragraph or less. For a more comprehensive explanation, please refer to
Wikipedia:Stub
What is disambiguation?
Shortcut
WP:COFAQ#DISAMB
WP:COFAQ#DISAMB
See
Wikipedia:Disambiguation
What is a minor edit? When should I use it?
Shortcut
WP:COFAQ#MINOR
WP:COFAQ#MINOR
When editing a page, a logged-in user has the option to flag an edit as "minor." You should flag an edit as minor
only
when you believe it is an edit that no one would object to, such as fixing spelling or grammar.
This feature is important because users can choose to
hide
minor edits in their view of the
Recent Changes
page, to keep the volume of edits down to a manageable level.
See also:
Wikipedia:Minor edit
Are there any rules or guidelines I should be aware of?
Shortcut
WP:COFAQ#RULES
WP:COFAQ#RULES
Yes. See
Wikipedia:Policies and guidelines
. There are a lot, but you'll get the hang of it!
What is "Recent Changes", and what do the abbreviations used there mean?
Shortcut
WP:COFAQ#RCENTCHNGS
WP:COFAQ#RCENTCHNGS
Recent Changes lists all the edits that have been made over a given time period. See
Wikipedia:Recent Changes
Are there any standard formats, for things like dates for example?
Shortcut
WP:COFAQ#FORMAT
WP:COFAQ#FORMAT
Yes. We have a
Manual of Style
that articles should follow.
What do I do if I find two articles on the same subjects?
Shortcut
WP:COFAQ#TWO
WP:COFAQ#TWO
You could
merge
them yourself if you are feeling
bold
. Pick the
most suitable page name
(which may not necessarily be one of the existing ones!). If you're not sure which name to use, or whether the two articles should really be merged, use the procedure at
Help:Merging
. You can also make a mention of the problem on the list of
Wikipedia:Proposed mergers
What is the ideal/maximum length of an article? When should an article be split into smaller pieces?
Shortcut
WP:COFAQ#SIZE
WP:COFAQ#SIZE
See
Wikipedia:Article size
Can we debate or talk about the subjects here?
Shortcut
WP:COFAQ#TALK
WP:COFAQ#TALK
No.
Wikipedia is not a forum
. Talk pages are for discussing improvements to the article.
I've found vandalism, or I've damaged a page by mistake! How can I restore it?
See
Help:Reverting
Which languages can I use?
Shortcut
WP:COFAQ#LANGUAGE
WP:COFAQ#LANGUAGE
On the English Wikipedia, use English, unless you're mentioning a name or a quotation that has no known English translation.
If you want to write articles in other languages, you need to do it in an edition of Wikipedia in that language. As of 2024, there are editions of Wikipedia in more than 300 languages, and their full list can be found at
m:List of Wikipedias
on the Meta site. If your language is not in the list, see the next section.
Can I create a new Wikipedia in my language?
Shortcut
WP:COFAQ#NEWLANGUAGE
WP:COFAQ#NEWLANGUAGE
Yes! If there is no edition of Wikipedia in your language yet, and you would like to change that, read the page
How to start a new Wikipedia
on the Meta site to find out how to create a new language edition of Wikipedia. This will require some work from you, but it's a great thing to do for the people who speak your language.
Should I use
American English
or
British English
Shortcut
WP:COFAQ#ENGLISH
WP:COFAQ#ENGLISH
The official policy is to use British spelling when writing about British topics, and American English for topics relating to the
United States
. General topics can use any one of the variants, but should generally strive to be consistent within an article. See Wikipedia's
Manual of Style
for a more detailed explanation.
Use of one English variety in article titles can cause a
in another variant to fail. In this case, it is recommended that you create a new article using the alternative spelling that
redirects
to the main article.
How do I check spelling on a page?
Shortcut
WP:COFAQ#SPELL
WP:COFAQ#SPELL
A spelling checker has been requested for Wikipedia, but has not been implemented yet, except as a
third-party extension
. Some common web browsers have a built-in simple spell checker for forms such as Wikipedia editing forms. You may also install a browser addon for more advanced spelling and grammar checking, such as
LanguageTool
, or use another online spelling checker. When editing a larger article, it may be more convenient to paste the text into your
text editor
or
word processor
first, to edit and check the spelling there, and then paste your corrected text back into Wikipedia editor to complete your contribution.
There is a
list of common misspellings
, which you can use to check if a listed misspelling is on any page in the database, although this process fails to identify any misspelled words not on that list.
Why are some links red?
Shortcut
WP:COFAQ#LINKS
WP:COFAQ#LINKS
A page with that name has not yet been created. You can click on that link and start a page with that name. But be careful: there may already be articles on similar topics, or an article on the same topic under a different name. It's pretty important to hunt around for similar topics first. See
Wikipedia:Article titles
for information on naming pages, and
Wikipedia:Red link
for more guidance on red links.
If you just registered, your username is probably shown as linking to a page that doesn't exist. Don't worry! This just means you haven't filled out your user page yet. Click on the link and tell the world all about yourself! See
Wikipedia:User page
for more information.
What about the pale blue links?
Shortcut
WP:COFAQ#BLUELINK
WP:COFAQ#BLUELINK
Those are external links; i.e. those that link to pages outside Wikipedia. They look
like this
What happens when two users edit a page at the same time?
Shortcut
WP:COFAQ#CONFLICT
WP:COFAQ#CONFLICT
This is called an
edit conflict
. You'll get a conflict screen that displays both versions in separate windows, along with a summary highlighting the differences, and instructions on how you should proceed. It's virtually impossible to lose any data.
What happens if my computer or browser crashes mid-edit, or if the server does not respond?
Shortcut
WP:COFAQ#CRASH
WP:COFAQ#CRASH
You may lose your edit. Some modern web browsers, as well as the MediaWiki software, may be able to recover your edits when you restart your browser, but it's not certain that it will succeed. To some extent, you can guard against this by editing in a text editor for major work (but note that with regard to a system crash this does not help, unless you save frequently to disk, use a cloud-based editor such as
Etherpad
or
Google Docs
, or an editor with automatic saving such as
Atom
).
When you get a time-out when you try to save, you might or might not lose your edit depending on your
web browser
. Some browsers (e.g.
Opera
and
Mozilla Firefox
) will recover the text you have tried to save if you use the back-button. In other browsers, you will lose your edit. You can protect against this by copying the text (at least to the clipboard of your system).
How do I learn about changes to certain topics without having to go there from time to time?
Shortcut
WP:COFAQ#WATCH
WP:COFAQ#WATCH
If you are a logged-in user, on every page you will see either a link that says "Watch this article", or a small five-pointed star next to "View history". If you click on it, the article will be added to your
personal watchlist
. Your watchlist will show you the latest changes on your watched articles.
What file formats should I use for pictures/videos?
Shortcut
WP:COFAQ#FORMAT
WP:COFAQ#FORMAT
For images, use
JPEG
for photographs, and
SVG
for drawings and logos.
PNG
can also be used. Use
GIF
for inline animations.
For video,
Ogg Theora
is currently the only recommended format. See
Wikipedia:Image use policy
for more.
What file format should I use for sound?
Shortcut
WP:COFAQ#SFORMAT
WP:COFAQ#SFORMAT
Multiple encodings are encouraged.
WAV
and
Ogg Vorbis
are allowed, but
MP3
is not.
One of the contributors is being unreasonable. Help!
See
Wikipedia:Etiquette
and
Wikipedia:Dispute resolution
I've made a suggestion on an article's talk page, but have not gotten any responses. How long should I wait before implementing my suggested change?
Shortcut
WP:COFAQ#WAIT
WP:COFAQ#WAIT
Per
Wikipedia:Be bold
, there's no need to wait at all. Simply make your change. If someone else disagrees with it, they can always revert the change, and then you can talk the issue out with that person.
Can I change the default number of contributions displayed in the "My contributions" list?
Shortcut
WP:COFAQ#DEFAULTCONTRIB
WP:COFAQ#DEFAULTCONTRIB
No. You can, however, change the setting
on the page
and bookmark the resulting page.
Why was the article I created deleted?
Shortcut
WP:COFAQ#DELETE
WP:COFAQ#DELETE
New articles are deleted for not following Wikipedia
policies and guidelines
. See
Wikipedia:Why was my article deleted?
Why was the edit I made removed?
Shortcut
WP:COFAQ#REMOVE
WP:COFAQ#REMOVE
There are a variety of reasons (some
common reasons
). The first thing you should do is look at the history page for the article you edited. This will tell you who changed it, when they changed it, and hopefully a short reason why they changed it. If it says something like
see talk
, then you should look at the
talk page
for the article. Also, you should look at your
own talk page
to see if you have a message there. If you don't find a reason that is satisfactory, politely ask in the article's talk page about your proposed change, and maybe you will get suggestions about changes that you can make so that your change will go in, or you may get reasons why your change should not happen.
Links: external and multilingual
Should I translate pages across the various Wikipedias?
Shortcut
WP:COFAQ#TRANS
WP:COFAQ#TRANS
Yes, it's a good idea to cross-pollinate. Please give credit to the contributors of the original article by noting that you have done so, with a link to the original, in the edit summary or at the article's talk page. See
Wikipedia:Translation
for further information.
What about using machine translation?
Shortcut
WP:COFAQ#MTRANS
WP:COFAQ#MTRANS
Machine translation
is useful for obtaining the general idea of a text in an unfamiliar language, but it produces poor translations and should not be used on its own. If you want to use machine translation as a translation
aid
and intend to edit the result, please go ahead if you think it would be helpful.
Do not
paste a machine translation directly into an article.
How can I tell if an article exists in another language Wikipedia?
Shortcut
WP:COFAQ#OTHERLANG
WP:COFAQ#OTHERLANG
We try to build links between different language pages – that's one way of seeing if an article exists elsewhere. If you don't see the language links at the left of a page, go looking for the corresponding article(s) on foreign Wikipedias. If you find them, make a link both ways; if not, you can translate. Bear in mind that article may not be in one-to-one correspondence between Wikipedias. See
Wikipedia:Interlanguage links
and
Wikipedia:Multilingual coordination
for more information.
Is it ok to link to other sites?
Shortcut
WP:COFAQ#OTHER
WP:COFAQ#OTHER
External links are certainly allowed. Properly used, they increase the usability of Wikipedia. Keep in mind, however, that Wikipedia is not a
web directory
; external links should support the content of the article, not replace it. An article should be more than a container for external links, and the content should not require the reader to leave the site to understand the subject.
Do not place advertising links in Wikipedia. Commercial sites are obvious, but this prohibition
usually
includes links to fansites and discussion forums as well unless the site is a notable one in the field. As a general rule of thumb: if you wish to place the link in Wikipedia in order to drive traffic to a site, it probably doesn't belong here.
The current convention is to place external links in a separate "External links" section at the bottom of the article. Sites used as references for the article should be listed under a "References" section, or sometimes placed within the article as a footnote. See
Wikipedia:How to edit a page
for different ways to create external links.
See the
relevant guideline
for more examples on when external links are appropriate.
Shortcut
WP:COFAQ#BOOK
WP:COFAQ#BOOK
There are many templates that help to add formatted links to specific sites at
Category:External link templates
. For example, you can link articles about books to the online copies of those books on
Project Gutenberg
using the template
{{
Gutenberg
}}
Copyrights
I have, or can get, special permission to copy an image or article to Wikipedia. Is it OK to do that?
Shortcut
WP:COFAQ#IMAGE
WP:COFAQ#IMAGE
Unless the article you want to copy to Wikipedia is covered by
Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License
(CC BY-SA 4.0), a CC BY-SA-compatible license or is in the
public domain
, it cannot be used on Wikipedia. Images, too, must be public domain or licensed under one of allowed licenses at
Wikipedia:Image copyright tags
. You have to ask the copyright holder of the material to license it so it can be used. See
Wikipedia:Requesting copyright permission
. Under very limited conditions we can use copyrighted material even if it is not licensed compatibly; see
Wikipedia:Non-free content
for how and when.
The text of Wikipedia is covered by the CC BY-SA 4.0 and, in most cases, the
GNU Free Documentation License
(GFDL) (unversioned, with no invariant sections, front-cover texts, or back-cover texts). Images are covered by various free licenses (see the
Wikimedia Foundation Licensing Policy
).
I have an out-of-copyright image (or text) that is reproduced in an in-copyright book. Can I scan / type it into Wikipedia?
Providing they haven't altered the image then they can't claim a copyright on it. If it was in the public domain before they used it, it's still in the public domain afterward.
Does using a
GIF
image in Wikipedia violate its patent?
No. The patent of the
LZW
compression algorithm used with the GIF format has expired.
Miscellaneous
Can I really change whatever I want on Wikipedia?
Shortcut
WP:COFAQ#ALL
WP:COFAQ#ALL
Yes, you can on almost any page. There are some pages on Wikipedia that are
protected
, so that only
administrators
can modify them. This includes pages like the
Main Page
, which are permanently protected, or normal articles which are temporarily protected during the resolution of an
edit war
. Some pages are also
semi-protected
, so that anonymous and new users cannot edit them, to reduce vandalism. The vast majority of pages on Wikipedia are editable by anyone, at any time, and any changes made will be reflected instantly.
How do I get a count of my edits?
Shortcut
WP:COFAQ#COUNT
WP:COFAQ#COUNT
Your edit count, including deleted edits, is displayed when you enter
your preferences
There are a number of tools called
edit counters
that can display the total count of your edits as well as the number of edits in various namespaces.
How do I edit the Main Page?
See
Wikipedia:Editing the main page
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