Guide to contributing to the wiki

Welcome

If you're reading this then let me be the first to say congratulations! You are on the first step to being one of the many wiki contributors attempting to brave the endless onslaught of outdated and soon-to-be outdated information and keep the wiki up to date! But before you start your quest to keep NSV13's wiki squeaky clean of errors, you need to learn the basics of editing and where to coordinate with your fellow valiant knights of the Wiki code.

Wikicode

Wikicode is the strange syntax used by all wikipedias including this one. If you don't know it and are prepared to learn, you can read the internal wikicode page here, or read the Wikipedia page here. If you don't want to spend your life learning this markup, then fret not, you can still help.

What needs doing?

Coordination is key!

Although a page is present for coordinating assignments, one of the best ways to see what needs to be done urgently or what small tasks can be done to alleviate the workload for the other wiki maintainers, head to NSV13's Discord and inquire at #wikibus.

New pages

New content is constantly being added to NSV13 which needs tutorials and such. Before you start to write a page, search for it and if you can't find it, start one yourself. We welcome all contributions to the wiki and trust all edits to be made in good faith. As a recommendation if you wish to work on a page uninterrupted and not worry about other users edits while working, make it in your personal sandbox area or anywhere in your own pages. If you don't know wikicode, you can create a unformatted page and ask someone else to format it for you.

Content revisions

A list of pages which need revisions can be found here

Updates are frequent and we need people to update the information on the wiki. To do this simply edit the page with new information. If you don't know wikicode you can write the new, updated content on the discussion page without formatting.

Images

If you have relevant images then upload them and add them to the page they're intended for. It is appreciated if the pictures of items you add have a blank background and are in the .gif or .png format. The easiest way to add images of items is to download the source code, open the icons .dmi files and export images as .gif's or .png's from there.

Then upload them here: Special:Upload

Tabs

Any page can have tabs added to it through the <tabs> function. This function has the known problem of displaying correctly in a page edit preview, but incorrectly once an edit is applied. To fix this, the page's cache has to be flushed; This can be done by clicking the purge button along the top of the page.

Marking for revision and deletion

If a page is up to date when you read it, please put the following tag at it's top (with the correct date):

{{Lastrevision | date = 15. 1. 2012}}


If a page is out of date or doesn't have a reason for existing, add one of the following tags to the top of the page:

{{Needs revision}}
{{Needs revision | reason = Out of date.}}
or
{{delete}}

Talk Pages

When writing on a page or user's talk page (for example Talk:Main_Page), there are a few things you need to know.

Signature

Always end of your message with your signature, so everyone knows who wrote what (without checking the edit history).
This can be done easily by using ~~~~ after your message. You can customize your signature on your user preferences page.

Code:	Look. ~~~~
Result:	Look. - Deantwo (talk) 10:35, 30 November 2013 (CET)

Indentation

When replying to another user's message, be sure to indent your message so it is visibly a reply to the above message.
This is done by simply adding : at the start of the line will cause this effect.

Code:	Look. - [[User:Deantwo|Deantwo]] ([[User_talk:Deantwo|talk]]) 10:35, 30 November 2013 (CET) :At what? ~~~~
Result:	Look. - Deantwo (talk) 10:35, 30 November 2013 (CET) At what? - Deantwo (talk) 10:40, 30 November 2013 (CET)

Headline

If you are starting a new topic, add a headline with the name of the topic. If a talk page is used a lot, it can become confusing if the topics aren't separated with headlines. It also allows for section editing, which makes editing long talk pages a lot easier.
This is one of the most basic things on a wiki, and are used by typing ==Topic== on the line above your message.

Code:	==Look at this tutorial== Look. - [[User:Deantwo|Deantwo]] ([[User_talk:Deantwo|talk]]) 10:35, 30 November 2013 (CET) :At what? - [[User:Deantwo|Deantwo]] ([[User_talk:Deantwo|talk]]) 10:40, 30 November 2013 (CET) ::This tutorial I made. ~~~~
Result:	Look at this tutorial [edit] Look. - Deantwo (talk) 10:35, 30 November 2013 (CET) At what? - Deantwo (talk) 10:40, 30 November 2013 (CET) This tutorial I made. - Deantwo (talk) 10:45, 30 November 2013 (CET)

Jokes

Some pages are intended to be entertaining but when writing guides, remember that a newbie might not realize something is a joke or sarcasm, even if it's blatantly obvious to the rest of us. Think where jokes fit and where they don't. Also, if you're updating someone else's joke, think whether yours is actually funnier.

Guide to Writing and Revising a Guide

Always keep in mind what these guides are for; they're so newbies can quickly skim across them so they can have half an idea what they've just been selected for.

A good guide needs, by order:

• A brief one-two paragraph description of what the mode is.
• A bullet point list of short to the point key points of key mechanics, these should be no longer than two sentences each. And remember: key points means the important shit you need to know to atleast bumble fuck your way around at round start, you should be able to read and understand it within 5 minutes.
• A more meaty section detailing the game mechanics in depth (this is where you explain what all runes and talismans do, including the ones that are barely used), it should still be clear and concise.
• A summary of the key points, yes - one at the start and one at the end. Reiteration helps to hammer things home. This one will more or less be simple list to remind the reader of things, it wont explain them.
• Further reading - this is where you link to the pages that detail advanced strategies for fighting for and against the cult. No you don't put them on the main page because that will clutter it.
• Links! Remember to add links to game modes, antagonist roles, jobs, items and guides you mention! Simply do it when you re-read your content before submitting.

A bad guide is one that's a giant wall of text that's overly fluffed up and full of opinionated bullshit.
A newbie is going to take one glance at it and shit their pants out of fright, and advanced player is just going to go "Yeah.... I'm not reading someone's sperg page".

[At the moment]^{[Citation needed]} Security's guides are good. Space Law is unfluffed and tells plainly the basics of what a security officer needs to know to start patrolling and robusting greyshirts. The Guide to security is more fleshed out and explains things more in depth and lists strategies to counter antags.
Cult, Malf, and Traitor are bad because they're giant imposing walls of text that reads like a newspaper: squished up text that obscures the facts with needless opinions and blurbs that you don't need to know off the bat.

So remember:

• Facts good, opinions bad.
• Keep your facts clear of irrelevant fluff and other bullshit.
• Keep the basic guide basic, keep the advanced stuff on a separate page.
• Important stuff first, depth and explanation and unimportant things second.
• White space, tables, sections, and formatting are essential for ease of reading. We're not print media, space isn't at a premium so use it freely.
• Links!
• I just used the above template to write this guide.

Useful pages

Categories: Used, unused and wanted

Templates: Used, unused and wanted

Files: All, unused and wanted

All pages: All existing pages and Wanted pages

/tg/station wiki specific markup

To create a BYOND hyperlink, use the <byond> tags. The specific syntax is <byond server=servername.com port=4000>Link text here</byond>.

The wiki also supports the features of the ParserFunctions extension.

Contribution guides
General	Hosting a server, Setting up git, Guide to working with tgstation as an upstream repository, Downloading the source code, Guide to contributing to the game, Reporting issues, Game resources category, Guide to changelogs
Database (MySQL)	Setting up the database, MySQL
Coding	Coding standards, Understanding SS13 code, SS13 for experienced programmers, Binary flags‎, Getting Your Pull Accepted, Text Formatting
Mapping	Guide to mapping, Map merger
Spriting	Guide to spriting
Wiki	Guide to contributing to the wiki, Wikicode, Maintainer Assignments