Guide to Wikipedia Editing

Wikitext editor

This is the standard Wikipedia draft page and editing interface. It requires you to manually insert formatting commands, such as the heading hierarchy, formatted lists and tables, using wikitext. 

Wikitext (also known as wiki markup or wikicode) is the syntax and keywords used to format a page. The Wikipedia cheatsheet explains how to
access this, outlines the commands used, how these will appear in the final page, and how to save and edit. You can preview the formatting, citations and inserted content of your draft article by clicking ‘show preview’ at the bottom of the draft page.

Visual editor

This alternative editor interface is a ’visual‘ or online rich-text editor that allows you to write an article as it will appear on Wikipedia. Refer to the Visual Editor: User Guide.

The visual editing mode for draft and existing articles is activated as follows:

1. Click ‘BETA’ in the top right corner of the page.
2. Tick ‘Visual Editing’
3. Save the changes.

Once visual editing is activated you can choose to edit using this or wikitext.

• Click on ‘edit’ to use the visual editor.
• Click on ‘edit source’ to use wikitext.

Follow these steps to create an article in the Article Creation Wizard.

1. Read the disclaimers. 
2. Click the blue ‘create new article draft’ button. This takes you to the ‘Create Draft: [article name]’ page, where you can save the page to create a draft.
3. Activate Visual Editing (if you wish to use it) using the instructions above.
4. To return to your draft, click ‘Contributions’ (in the top right corner of the page). Your draft you have just created will be at the top of the list.
5. Click on your article and select ‘edit’ in the tool bar. Paste in your text and use the tool bar along the top to add formatting.

Adding Citations:

It is important to properly cite all sourced information used to write your article. This helps establish the notability of the topic and helps to avoid plagiarism. Citations are semi-automated in the Visual Editing mode. In the Wikitext editing mode, you need to manually cite your sources and compile a reference list at the end of your article.
Adding citations in Visual editor

1. Highlight the text that you wish to cite and click the ‘Cite’ button in the toolbar.
2. Select one of the three options for adding citations: ‘Automatic’, ‘Manual’ and ‘Re-use’.

• Automatic uses the URL.
• Manual provides a list of source formats– including Website, Book, News, Journal and other via Basic form – which prompt you to add the relevant information before automatically generating a correctly formatted citation.
• Re-use is for citing sources that have already been added to the article – you simply select this from the list of existing references rather than resubmitting the details.

3. To insert a reference list for the citations, scroll to the end of your typed text and select ‘References list’ from the ‘Insert’ drop-down list in the toolbar.

To add citations in wikitext, refer to Wikipedia Referencing for Beginners.

For more citation information, visit the LibGuide at:https://researchguides.library.syr.edu/citationstyles 

Adding External Links:

In addition to citing information, it is useful to add external links within the body of your article.
Adding external links in Visual editor

1. Highlight the text that you wish to turn into a link and click the link icon on the toolbar.
2. Select the ‘external link’ tab, paste the URL address, then click done.

Adding external links in wikitext
To add external links in wikitext, refer to Wikipedia External links.

Adding Further Reading:

The ‘Further Reading’ list at the end of an article reading allows you to provide links to other websites relevant to the subject, that may or may not be included in the reference list.
For instructions on how to format a ’Further Reading‘ list, and criteria for suitable material, refer to Wikipedia: Further reading.

Adding Internal Links:

Internal links allow your article to be found on, and link to, related Wikipedia pages. It is important to link to as many Wikipedia pages as possible to avoid your article being disconnected from others.
Adding internal links in Visual editor

1. Highlight the text that you wish to hyperlink.
2. Click the ‘link’ icon from the toolbar. From here, you can search and select relevant Wikipedia pages and content based on the term selected.

Adding internal links in wikitext
For instructions on linking to another Wikipedia page in wikitext, refer to Wikipedia Manual of Style: Linking

Adding Images:

Images are an important complement to Wikipedia articles. To add an image to your article, you first need to upload it to Wikimedia Commons. Remember to ensure that you have copyright clearance on any image you upload.
Adding images in Visual editor

1. Click the ‘insert’ button on the toolbar and select ‘media’ from the drop down list.
2. Search using the title of the saved image.
3. Select the image and review it's details before clicking 'Use this image.'
4. Enter caption details and specify the format of the image in General and Advanced settings.
5. Drag the image into position. Clicking the image brings up the editing options if you wish to adjust the caption or format attributes.

Adding images in wikitext

To add an image in Wikitext, refer to Wikipedia Picture Tutorial.

Wikipedia is an ongoing project and everyone is encourages to edit existing articles, either to resolve ambiguity or to add to or correct existing articles.

1. Log into your Wikipedia account.
2. Search for the existing article.
3. Select ‘edit’ from the toolbar above the article.
4. Before making any change, open ‘page history’ to assess previous edits. If this has a lot of discussion between editors, the page may be considered ‘controversial’ – you should be aware of this before proposing further changes. If you are a new user, a less controversial article might be a better place to start.
5. If you wish to proceed, edit the article using the same approach as for new articles.
6. Use the edit summary to note the changes made. If you have undertaken a minor edit that could not be disputed (such as correcting a typo) you can just tick the ‘This is a minor edit’ checkbox rather than detailing the edit.

Check out the Wikipedia Editing Policy.