Help:Starting this wiki
From The weather Vane Wiki
Welcome to our TWV Help Page.
Everything is ready here for you to add content. There are some basic help and guideline pages to start off your community, and a basic main page as the entry point to our Weather Vane wiki. You can start adding pages now!
Here are some things you might want to start with to improve this wiki.
Contents |
Add a custom logo
The default logo on all pages can be changed for one specific to this wiki. The image should be no more than 135 pixels wide and 155 pixels high. Upload the file as wiki.png and it will appear on all pages in place of the default logo.
Add a custom favicon
Although it's a small thing (just 16 by 16 pixels) a custom favicon can help give a consistent theme to the wiki. Just upload a 16 by 16 pixel image at favicon.ico <instructions for people who can't make favicons>.
Improve your front page
Your basic front page is ready to use. You can improve it by adding content about this Wiki. Consider what visitors will want to see first. What are the starting points for anyone reading about your subject? Where should editors start and what are the most important things for them to work on? You may also want to include links to the help files.
Finding and keeping new editors
Invite your friends to help you edit. Communities you already belong to about the topic of your wiki are a good place to ask for people to come join you. Be careful not to spam, though! Think of the types of messages you would like to read and the types of messages you delete.
When you see someone new edit the wiki, leave them a nice welcome message as soon as you can! (If there are many newcomers you can use a template to save copying: see Template:Welcome.) It will encourage them to stick around. Wikis work when there is a community of people editing; try to keep in contact with the other people who show up to edit. One thing you might want to do is leave new editors a nice welcoming message on their User page once they have started their User page and have made their first edits. All you have to do is go to the new user's User page and type in the word: Welcome with two curly braces on either side of that word.
Add content!
Although this is a wiki, your first visitors are not likely to want to jump right in. They need some idea of what your wiki is about first. "Seeding" content is vital to get people interested and to show them what sort of content you want. You may need to add many articles before people start to join in and add with you.
Ask for help
The Weather Vane staff are here to help you succeed with this wiki. If you have problems at any time, or are not sure how to make changes to our wiki, then please ask us. You can email Jeb at jeb_ben_delbek [at] yahoo dot com, or you can write to one of the other staff members on their User:Talk pages. You will find a list of staff members at Special:Listusers. You can also contact Jeb over at his ScienceWeather Forums.
Categories: Browse | Help
