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This page is a guideline for using SporeWiki.
It is a standard that all users should keep in mind, though it is not a rule. Comments or input are always excepted on guidelines which should reflect consensus among editors When editing this page, ensure that your revision reflects consensus. When in doubt, discuss first on the talk page. |
The SporeWiki community encourages users to be bold in updating articles.
Wikis develop faster when people fix problems, correct grammar, add facts, make sure the language is precise, and so on. We expect everyone to be bold.
It's okay. It is what everyone expects. How many times have you read something and thought, "Why didn't they write about that piece of information?" SporeWiki not only allows you to add, revise, and edit the article — it wants you to do it. It does require some amount of politeness, but it works. You'll see.
If someone writes an inferior article, an article stub, or outright patent nonsense, don't worry that editing it might hurt their feelings. Correct it, add to it, and, if it's total nonsense, replace it. That's the nature of a Wiki.
Also, of course, others here will boldly and mercilessly edit what you write. Don't take it personally. They, like all of us, just want to make SporeWiki as good as it can possibly be.
New users in particular are often entranced by the openness of SporeWiki and dive right in. That's a good thing. But please note: 'be bold in updating pages' does not mean that you should make large changes or deletions to long articles on complex subjects with long histories without carefully looking at your edit.
If you would like to edit an article on a page with a long history, it's a good idea to first read the article in its entirety, read any comments on the talk page, and view the page history to get a sense of how the article came into being and what its current status is. It's also worth reading around some related articles, as what you thought was a problem or omission may vanish after you have followed a few links.
Note too...[]
Note too that while being bold in updating articles can be a fine thing, being bold with changes to categories and templates can sometimes be a bad thing. Category changes - and even more so template changes - can affect a large number of pages. In the case of templates, changing code on one that is very widely used can cause problems for SporeWiki's servers. It is usually worth proposing any changes to templates and categories as above, on talk pages, prior to making any change.
See also[]
- {{sofixit}}