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Help talk:Contents

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I feel certain that most people associated with W3C activities have been using wikis so long that it all seems straightforward, but as a novice, I see numerous questions on how to proceed.

For example, when first I entered this wiki and wanted to find what had been done, I had a difficult finding my way to the Activities section. Once there, the question of how to make a new page arose. How much html can we use? Etc.. etc. There are probably references on how to use wikis -- there are probably bad references too.

Like most of the W3C culture I've observed, there are rules of the road that while specified in the documents we all are supposed to have read and understood, have not yet become second nature. When do we want our footprints to become semi-permanent but practically irretrievable (as in the email logs) and when do we want them to be a part of the official statement of consensus of the group? Some of that would be predicted to change as a function of the cultural norms of the group. Ours is rather a new group and constituted, rather, outside the formal umbrella of normal W3C activity. I suppose we are inventing our group norms as we go, but much of that cultural expectation will be derived from the parent organization, and the rest from our knowledge of one another through writings and face-to-face meetings.--Ddailey 00:49, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

I agree there are some things that have to be learned, and that it may be intimidating. Would it help if I stated that I appreciate any participation at this point? :) It also may help to learn that I haven't had any formal participation with the W3C up until this point either - so I prefer the philosphy of 'jump in an make my own culture'.
As for the technical details: This wiki is run on MediaWiki software (same as Wikipedia), so really the best help pages are over there. Please feel free to edit the Help page with links from there that you find useful. Also, please feel free to make it easier to find the Activities page, the philosophy behind a wiki is for its readers to participate in the edit process where possible. Here's a quick cheat sheet:
  • Links within the wiki are done by surrounding a page name with two square brackets
  • Links to external sites are done by surrounding a URL with single square brackets
  • New pages are created by linking to pages that don't yet exist and then clicking that link.
  • All pages are housed at Special:All pages, which is linked to from the "Special pages" link in the toolbox on the left
  • I've found that very little actual HTML markup is needed unless you're making complex tables or specific styles.
  • Signing discussions with your name (four tildes) is a good policy on Talk pages, as you've already done.
  • Viewing the wiki source of pages (the "Edit" button/tab) should help in learning other tricks
FYI, I'm no MediaWiki expert myself. Jeff schiller 04:39, 8 September 2008 (UTC)