Help Using the Course Wiki

Quick Links: FormattingRules, WikkaDocumentation, OrphanedPages, WantedPages, TextSearch.

This document outlines some basic help and policies for using the wiki. As you encounter problems and learn new things, consider adding what you've discovered to this page.

Wiki?

For those of you new to wikis, you might want to start by reading the Wikipedia article on wikis. Essentially, though, a wiki is a website whose pages can all be edited. Because of the nature of the course website, though, only the instructor can edit the course policies page. But most other pages can--and should--be edited.

Public/Private

All new pages created on this site are, by default, only viewable by registered users--and only members of the course have the password to register. However, if you follow the Edit ACLS link at the bottom of each page, you can allow unregistered users to read or even comment on and edit pages. Search engines will pick this site up readily, so please be judicious about opening pages for public viewing, and do not allow anonymous users to edit pages.

At the close of the semester, all pages will be reverted to viewing by registered users, with only the pages in the top navigation remaining public.

Creating New Pages

This wiki belongs to everyone in the course; you are therefore free (and encouraged) to create and edit pages. If you're creating pages for your own use, please preface them with your username; e.g., JaneF might want a page for class notes, which she could call JaneFClassNotes.

All page URLs should use CamelCase, or capitalizing the first letter of all words: e.g., CourseTopicList. To create a new page on the wiki, you can either link to it from an existing page, or write the new page's name in the address bar.

Stylisticallly, all pages should have as their first line a H1 header. This replaces the URL name (e.g., WikiHelp) with something more meaningful (Help Using the Course Wiki) in the address bar.

Signing Pages

Everyone should create an hCard to sign pages with (see template and instructions). Use these whenever you have created or made a significant contribution to a page.

Licensing Content

The core course pages--the Course Policies and Calendar, for example--are licensed under Creative Commons, allowing other people to re-post and modify the content however they wish, so long as they give attribution to the original author and share their work under the same or similar license.

If you would like to license any of your content, simply add {{license}} to the bottom of any pages you create.