Help:Editing
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Overview
The first thing you need to know is: have no fear: you can't break these pages! In other words, even if you have no experience with anything on the web, give it a try. The whole idea of a "wiki" web site is to make it as easy as possible for people to contribute to building the web site. So by all means, give it a try.
And you really can't break anything. In the worst case scenario, a page can always be deleted or even "rolled back" to a previous version of the page (to exactly how it looked before your changes). More likely, though, only minor changes will be needed - formatting fixed, style altered to keep it in line with other pages, errors corrected. And anyone can do that - any changes you make can be further changed until the web site is accurate and up to date. That's the beauty of a wiki-based web site.
This guide itself can be edited by anyone. If you learn how to do something cool, take the time to explain it here to others. I expect this guide to grow. Use the table of contents to find what you're looking for.
The Mechanics of Editing (the Edit page)
When you use this website, you are either looking at a page someone wrote, or you are editing a page (that someone else wrote, that you wrote, or that you are creating for the first time). The top of the page will say "Editing:" followed by the name of the page you are editing. The page will show the Edit Toolbar:
the Edit Box (a large text box you can type in), and a few other elements below the Edit box.
The Edit Box
In general, whatever you type in the Edit box will appear on the page. You can create a useful, helpful web page just by typing what you want in the Edit Box and hitting Save page - and then, the whole world can read what you've written.
Of course, most web pages you see on this site also have a bit of formatting. Anything you see on a page other than plain text is formatted in some way. Pages usually have Headings (which appear in the table of contents), text in bold or italics, links to other pages (lit up in blue or red), images, tables, and other things. In order to acheive these effects, you use a little bit of "code". As an example, if you want a phrase to appear in bold, you surround the phrase with 3 apostrophes on either side, like this:
Surround '''some words with''' apostrophes
- = Surround some words with apostrophes
Okay, so that's how you do bold - what about the other stuff? We'll deal with some of the other stuff later in the guide. If you want to know more, here's some suggestions:
- Use the Edit Toolbar (see next section).
- Read guides available on wikipedia (see External links section)
- Find a page on this site you like and hit the Edit button. You don't need to really edit the page - just look at the text in the Edit Box and see if you can figure out how it was done.
The Edit Toolbar
The easiest way to do simple formatting is to use the editing buttons, shown above. (For some functions, you might want to highlight text before you click a button). Below is a list of what the buttons do, in order of their appearance on the button bar.
- Bold - make your text bold.
- Italics - make your text italicized.
- Internal link - link to a page on the Elia Family Project web site. If you want to do it without the button, do something like this [[Main Page]]. This will show up as Main Page. CaSe MattErS!
- External link - link to a web page not part of the wiki you are editing. If you want to do it without the button, do something like this [http://www.google.com Google Homepage]. This will show up as Google Homepage.
- Create new section within the page.
- Insert image from this wiki. Note: To insert an image that is not on this page, just insert the url, for example, http://example.com/image.jpg. You can also upload an image by clicking on the upload file link in the toolbox.
- Link to a media file (sound or movie). If your video file is not on the internet already, you can host it on one of the websites listed here. Editthis.info does not allow you to upload files (although you will be able to with a Premium account).
- Mathematical formula Help:Math
- Ignore wikipedia formatting - what was used to show http://example.com/image.jpg in plain text instead of as a picture.
- Your signature - only if you are signed in (you don't have to register or log in to edit this wiki, but you can).
- Horizontal line - use sparingly.
Below The Edit Box
Below the Edit box is a text box marked "Summary". It is not necessary to use this space; if something is shown here by default then leave it as is.
Below the Summary box are two checkboxes: This is a minor edit and Watch this page. It can be helpful if you check the minor edit box for small edits (particularly if you are fixing a small mistake you made after Saving an edit) - this can be very helpful if it is ever necessary to roll a page back to an earlier version. Watch this page allows you to track changes on your "watchlist" (an advanced function that you can learn about if you are doing a lot of contributing to the web site.
The "Show preview" button is a very helpful button during editing. If you want to know what your edits will look like to a reader, hit this button. You can use it as many times as you like. You could also, of course, "Save pages" to see what your edits will look like, but it is better to only save your changes at the very end. If ever it becomes necessary to revert to an earlier version of the page, it is easier if only one version is created per edit, rather than several.
Save page will make your edit the new version of the page in question. Think carefully before you overwrite or alter someone else's work, but don't feel shy about doing so when you are altering a page for the better.
Show changes is useful if you want to compare the current version to the most recent version.
Cancel obviously cancels any work you've done since the last Save. You can also cancel by closing the browser or hitting your browser's Back button.
Editing help, as you probably know, opens this guide.
Style Guide: The Elia Family Project
In this section, we cover stylistic issues. Ideally, all of the pages on this site will have a certain editorial style and a particular formatting. That is not an easy thing to acheive when anyone can add content to the pages. But that's fine: content is the most important thing.
Links
A wiki works best when links are provided. Links are phrases highlighted in blue or red that takes the reader from one page to the next. To create a link, wrap the word or phrase in double brackets:
Creating a link to [[Rose Modica]] is easy.
- = Creating a link to Rose Modica is easy.
Creating the link is easy - but deciding if you should create the link can be more complicated. One should obviously create a link when an Elia's name is mentioned, but what about for other things? If one types that Tony Elia enjoyed golfing at Canasawacta Country Club, does one make a link for the country club?
The answer is: it is up to your judgment. Canasawacta Country Club housed many Elia events, including reunions and weddings. It might indeed be a nice idea to have a page dedicated to that place. On the other hand, such a page would clearly be a low-priority page for someone to make, edit, and maintain. In this case, there's no clear right answer.
Names of Elias and dates should always be linked (see subsections below). Place names should usually be linked (cities, colleges, etc.). Names of spouses should be linked, but in a special way (see below). Names of non-Elias should probably not be linked (i.e., you can certainly mention the names, just don't surround them with double brackets to create a link).
Links: Names
A link will only "work" if it specifies the correct name of a page. Rose Modica is the name of the Rose Modica page, so typing:
Creating a link to [[Rose Modica]] is easy.
works just fine. But if you were to type:
[[Rose Elia]] was the first daughter of...
then the user would not be taken to the Rose Modica biography, but to a Rose Elia page, which doesn't exist. If you want to use a name one way in a sentence, but link to a page with a different name, use the pipe symbol (|) to separate the page name from the text you want the user to see:
[[Rose Modica|Rose Elia]] was the first daughter of Maria and Nicola Elia. [[Rose Modica|Rose]] fell in love with Mario Modica and became [[Rose Modica]]
- =Rose Elia was the first daughter of Maria and Nicola Elia. Rose fell in love with Mario Modica and became Rose Modica
(All 3 of these links go to the Rose Modica biography.)
One also must be careful with spouse names. Spouses are not given their own page, but instead appear on the biography page of the Elia they are married to. So if one were to mention Mario Modica in a sentence, a link should be provided, but to the Rose Modica page:
[[Rose Modica|Mario Modica]] enjoyed the poker games at family reunions.
- =Mario Modica enjoyed the poker games at family reunions.
(Goes to the correct page - the page called "Rose Modica" which contains both Rose's and Mario's biographies.)
Links: Dates
The Elia family site contains both Calendar pages and Almanac pages. There are 12 Calendar pages, one for each month. The page for a month collects all of the birthdays, anniversaries, and other important dates for that month. Therefore, any time a month name appears, it should provide a link to the appropriate calendar page:
The family reached America in [[June]].
- =The family reached America in June.
When a month and day are given (the usual case), both should be included in the link, but the link is to the approprate month page:
She was born on [[July|July 10]].
- =She was born on July 10.
(Both July and 10 are included in what is highlighted, but clicking July 10 takes the reader to the July page - not a nonexistant July 10 page.)
Almanac pages exist for every year and collect all of the significant events over that year (in timeline fashion). So any time a year appears, create a link for it (by putting double brackets around it):
He graduated in [[1969]].
- =He graduated in 1969.
Links: Cities
Only cities should be included in city links (not city, state or city, country):
She was born in [[Norwich]], New York.
She was born in Norwich, New York.
Subheadings and Tables of Contents
Subheadings help break up long articles into shorter segments. Use them whenever you can (biographies have a particular style requiring particular sections; see the style guide below). Subheadings are made by enclosing the section title with double equals signs:
== This Renders As A Subheading ==
Sections of an article can also have subheadings. Three equals signs shows a subheading within a section. (In this article, "Links" is the name of a section heading (two equals signs) and Links: Names is a subsection (three equals signs). Try not to use subheadings unless you'll have at least 2. Likewise, don't break a section into subsections unless you have at least 2.
If an article has more than 3 divisions, a table of contents is automatically generated (like the one at the top of the article). If you don't want a table of contents to appear, place the following at the beginning of a page:
__NOTOC__
For example, the table of contents is suppressed like this on the calendar pages.
Style Guide: Biographies
Biographies are one of the main kinds of pages on the site. They should be written in third person (even if they are autobiographies) because any one can contribute. They can contain whatever content you'd want.
Biography Sections
A biography should have, at most, 4 sections. The first section heading should be the full name of the Elia being written about, and the section should contain the biography. The second section should be the full name of the spouse of the Elia (if appropriate), and the section should contain the spouse's biography. In general, the first section will likely be longer and more detailed than the second, but both sections can be as long as desired. These sections can contain any number of subsections if desired. The third section is "Synopsis of Dates" and should contain a list of birthdays, anniversaries, dates of death, and any other relevant dates if desired. The fourth section should be "External Links" which can include links to the person's personal web site, their office, or whatever might be relevant.
Biography Photos
If possible, a photo cropped to 161px x 150px, which includes both the Elia and their spouse, and is named fmlast.jpg (f = first initial, m = middle initial, last = last name), should be uploaded to this site (see the Upload file menu item to the left). If you need any help editing photos, send them to Steven St. John.
Biography Sidebar
Every biography should contain a sidebar (see the Marie Barbarossa biography for an example). The sidebar contains the Elia's name, the photo, the date of birth, the lineage name, the parent (the Elia parent), siblings, and children. To make this template appear, copy the following into the top of the edit box:
{{FamilyTree|
name=x|
photo=x|
dob=[[m|m d]], [[y]]|
lineage=[[x]]|
parent=[[x]]|
siblings=[[x]]<br>[[x]]|
children=[[x]]<br>[[x]]|}}
Next, replace all of the x's (or m, d, and y) with the appropriate information. Photo will be the file name of the photo that you uploaded (e.g., Mcobarbarossa.jpg, or "no photo on file"). For dob, enter the date of birth by replacing m with the month name, d with the calendar date, and y with the year. Under lineage, type the Elia line (e.g., Angela Ocello Lineage, Angelo Elia Lineage, etc.). For parent, the biography page of the parent. For siblings, the biography page of the siblings (or "none" for no siblings). If multiple siblings, separate with the "br" code as shown. For children, enter the biography page for all children, separated by "br" code if necessary.
An example from Marie Barbarossa's page is given below:
{{FamilyTree|
name=Marie Barbarossa|
photo=Mcobarbarossa.jpg|
dob=[[December|December 16]], [[1923]]|
lineage=[[Angela Ocello Lineage]]|
parent=[[Angela Ocello]]|
siblings=[[Francesco Ocello]]<br>[[Josephine Benedicto]]|
children=[[Angela St. John]]<br>[[Michele Hansen]]
<br>[[Debra Dorward]]<br>[[Mary Jo Barbarossa]]|}}
Biography Category
End all biograpies with the following notation:
[[Category:Biography|Last Name, First Name]]
This will show up on the page as a link on the bottom that goes to the Biography "Category" page - a big index of all biographies on the website. After the pipe, put the person's name in last, first format, like this: St. John, Steven. This ensures that biographies will be alphabetized in a useful way.
External Links
This guide scratches the tip of the iceberg for editing information. These links provide much more:
MediaWiki User's Guide - a User's Guide for the software running this site
Wikipedia FAQ - especially the Editing FAQ
Wikipedia Help:Editing - Wikipedia's version of this page
