Guidelines [FreeBSD WIKI]

This page is read only. You can view the source, but not change it. Ask your administrator if you think this is wrong.
===== Wiki Editing Guidelines =====

===== Introduction =====

In order to maintain consistency, existing wiki standards, conventions and patterns should be followed, whether explicitly documented or not.

Any convention changes should be made across-the-board (whole wiki) at one time, rather than on an ad-hoc (page by page) basis.

Be bold, but don't trample or create work for others.

==== The Basics ====

Familiarise yourself with [[/HelpOnMoinWikiSyntax|Wiki Syntax & Markup]] and [[/HelpOnEditing|Editing]]

Use Wiki markup wherever possible. Commonly forgotten examples:

  * Writing inline notes (Note: inline note), instead of ''%%<<FootNote("insert footnote")>>%%''
  * Direct use of URL's (''%%https://blahblah/url%%''), instead of ''%%[[<url>|link text]]%%''

Subscribe to pages you care about, or of teams and projects you are a part of. There's a link in the main menu on every page. You'll receive notifications of changes to these pages (except for ''%%[x] Trivial change's%%'').

Avoid adding [[/HelpOnAccessControlLists|Access Control List (ACLs)]] wherever possible. We're aiming to reduce use of these.

==== Editing ====

When editing, don't leave the **Comment** field empty. This helps people understand and review changes (example: [[/RecentChanges|RecentChanges]]) without having to look at diffs.

Write a Comment like a good commit log message summary/title. Start with an action word.

Tick ''%%[x] Trivial change%%'' to disable change notifications to people subscribed to that page. Use it for minor edits only.

Get into the habit of using ''%%[Preview]%%'' for every change. You'd be surprised how often humans make editing mistakes and this reduces churn and spam.

===== New Pages & Content =====

All pages, including new pages, should always be 'complete', even in their initial version. Place drafts or "pages-in-progress" under your [[/AccountName|AccountName]]/ namespace until they are ready for prime time.

Attempt and prefer to obtain content review before landing new pages in the main namespace.

===== Page Naming =====

Use ''%%StandardWikiName%%'' for page titles. For acronyms (eg: LTO), use the expanded full name ([[/LinkTimeOptimization|LinkTimeOptimization]]).

Everything in the wiki is about %%FreeBSD%%, so don't include %%FreeBSD%% in the page name. There are very rare exceptions to this.

Consider what people would search for and search engine optimization when naming pages.

Prefer shorter names over longer names, without losing meaning.

===== Page Hierarchy =====

Do your best not to go more than two ''%%Levels/Deep%%'' in the page hierarchy. We are actively trying to minimise and remove pages using more than Two/Levels/Deep

Try to find an appropriate //existing// namespace, rather than creating a new one.

===== Categories =====

Do your best to add relevant categories to pages, but don't over-categorize (signal:noise). List of categories: [[/CategoryCategory|CategoryCategory]]

----

{{tag>Wiki}}
{{tag>HowTo}}