Editing the wiki

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Uncle Jesse
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Joined: Wed Apr 21, 2004 3:00 pm

Editing the wiki

Post by Uncle Jesse »

Seems like a lot of folks are nervous about how difficult it is to edit the wiki. I'm trying to dispel this idea.

First, it's really easy. Not much more difficult than posting in the forums.

Second, even if you screw up, or leave the formatting wrong, anyone can fix the errors or even roll back an edit to a previous version. It's pretty simple.

Third, adding content or rearranging for flow and logic, or even fixing grammatical errors are all huge contributions to the ever-evolving-and-improving wiki.

Of course, you need to register an account first and I need to approve it.

To show how easy it is to edit a basic page, here's the http://homedistiller.org/wiki/index.php/Wild_yeast page on wild yeast in the wiki, as it appears when you hit "edit".
Any mixture of the thousands of [[yeast]] strains which may be airborne or on the [[fruit]], exclusive of the cultured yeast deliberately added to a [[must]] or [[wort]]. [[Grape]]s, fruit and the air often contain spoilage bacteria, molds or yeast which can destroy a [[beer]] or [[wine]]'s quality, but if no spoilage yeast or bacteria are present in the must the [[fermentation]] can produce an acceptable product. Due to the risk from spoilage organisms, prudent winemakers treat their must with an aseptic dose of sulfite to kill non-yeast organisms, stun wild yeasts into temporary inactivity, and thereby allow their own choice of cultured yeast to dominate the fermentation.

[[Category:Fermentation]]
[[Category:Yeast]]
[[Category:Glossary]]
As you can see, the hyperlinks are created with brackets. Really basic. You can highlight any word and hit the "internal link" button (labeled Ab) and the brackets will be put into place for you.

Things get a bit more difficult when you add images or create tables, but in reality it's not all that difficult overall.
If only the best birds sang, the woods would be silent.
Opdog
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Re: Editing the wiki

Post by Opdog »

I’m an idiot. If I can figure it out so can you.

Once you get used to how to type it up, it is really easy. I type up the text part in Word, paste it into the wiki, then edit the links. Once you do it once or twice you get the hang of it. If you need help with tables or formatting there are several of us who have figured it out. Feel free to PM us if you get stuck.
I've stopped fighting my inner demons. We are on the same side now.
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Single Malt Yinzer
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Re: Editing the wiki

Post by Single Malt Yinzer »

The Wiki is a great place to help people learn about our hobby. And as UJ and Opdog both said it's easy to learn. The rest of the editors will have your back. We help each other out. And the best part is: You never have to worry about making a mistake. The system has a feature that allows us to reset an entry to any previous edit. So no matter how bad your think you messed up you can always reset it and start over from the previous entry. I've done than a couple times. And there's a preview button so you can see how things look before you save it for good. Sadly I didn't realize that at first as you'll see the first entries I made we done like 6 or 7 times over. :)

Me: I am a horrible speller with horrible grammar. But the other editors clean up my entries when needed. So it's all good.

And if you have any questions on how to do things you can ask in this forum or PM one of the other editors.

Sharing knowledge is the most helpful thing you can do. The Wiki makes it simple!
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