Help:Editing Guide

The Editing Guide is a resource for those who are unsure of what they should do to contribute to the Wings of Fire Wiki. It helps editors to understand the fundamentals of what is necessary for the articles within the Wiki, and allows users new and old gain a better understanding which articles currently need the most work. Our goal is to provide readers with clear, concise, and factual information regarding the Wings of Fire universe.

What to edit

Although users are more than welcome to edit anything they like, there are currently a few common sections within articles that need the most work.

Biographies

• Many Biography sections are in need of revisions or complete rewrites.
• Information within the Biography sections can also be factually or chronologically incorrect. 
• General grammar is always in need of work in the Biography sections.
• A great way to ensure that the Biography sections are factually and chronologically correct is to have the respective book nearby so that you can rely on it for reference.
• Do not make Biography sections extremely lengthy. Biographies are intended to be a summary of a character's actions in respective book(s); avoid adding irrelevant or necessary scenes and most dialogue. 

Appearances

• Several Appearance sections are currently lacking proper citations. Platypus the SeaWing has created a document containing all, excluding Darkstalker, physical character descriptions and book appearances with citations; feel free to use it as a reference while editing. 
  • Yellow = mentioned; green = appeared in the appearance document.
• You can add a citation in Visual Editor mode by selecting the Insert tab and clicking Reference in the drop box. In the text box that appears, type the book's title in italics, followed by a comma (,) and page number. (Example: The Lost Continent, page 34)
• You can add a citation (in source mode) by typing: {{Ref|book initials|page number}}. (Example: {{Ref|TLH|32}})
  • When citing prologues or epilogues, add "p" or "e" after the book title and ignore the page number parameter. (Example: {{Ref|DSLp}})
• Do not delete appearance citations unless they are incorrectly cited.

Galleries & images

• Fanart is allowed, but any artwork of non-canonical characters, items, locations, etc. is not to be posted in the Galleries and will be removed. 
• When posting your own or someone else's artwork, credit the correct artist and provide a link back to the image's original post. You do not have to provide a link to the image's original post if it is artwork that you have created, but you must still credit yourself. When crediting either others or yourself, include the artists' full username. (Example: Qibli Portrait by FishWarrior536 is acceptable; Qibli Portrait by Fish is not). 
• When posting artwork, it is sometimes acceptable to keep the artwork's original title. If the title is appropriate and on topic it is alright to keep. (Example: a piece of artwork of Glory with the title "In the Jungle") is acceptable. However, if the title is inappropriate or not on topic (Example: a piece of artwork of Glory with the title "I did this drawing in three hours") is unacceptable. 
• Please ensure to correctly capitalize the image's description. If the image has a title, capitalize all words except for "by", "a", "an", "and", "the", "for", "nor", "but", "or", "yet", "so", and all prepositions. The only exception to this rule is when one of the above words is the beginning word in a title. (Example" the word "the" in the title "The Jungle" should be capitalized). 
• Images that are irrelevant to the article are not to be posted and will be removed.
• Generally inappropriate images including NSFW, explicit dark humor, curse words, mature themes, or attempts to dismiss specific people or groups of people are not only to be removed from Galleries but from the Wiki's image library altogether. Please report any inappropriate images to an administrator or content moderator. 
• Do not remove or replace infobox images. 
• Ensure that, when adding images to an article, to place them in their correct galleries. Fanart and fan-made content belong in the Fan Art Gallery, while canonical images belong in the Canon Art gallery. Images will be removed if placed in the wrong Gallery.

Quotes

• Quotes are to be cited with proper book titles and page numbers. To properly cite a quote, first type a dash (-) and explain who the character is speaking to. Then type the book in which the quote was spoken within in ^superscript. Lastly, include the book's page number on which the quote was spoken on. (Example: - Sundew to Blue ^{The Lost Continent, page 43}).
  • To type superscript in visual editor, click the underlined capital A and select superscript in the drop box.
  • To type superscript in source editor, type wrap the text with <sup> and </sup> tags. (Example: <sup>''The Lost Continent'', page 43</sup>)
• Do not intentionally change a character's quote while writing. If you wish to shorten a quote, however, please use three dots in square brackets. (Example: "That's why I'm going to take the throne tomorrow. [...] I'm doing this for the missing RainWings - and for you, so that you don't have to spend the rest of your lives looking over your shoulders and thinking, Our friends are still lost...and we could have saved them.")
• Only quotes that serve a purpose, such as being humorous, conveying character development, or including commentary on something relevant in the character's life, should be added. (Example: "Look out!" is not an acceptable quote.)

Specific articles

• When a new Wings of Fire book is released, there is an immediate need for new articles and expansion on existing ones. Since the newest addition to the series, Dragonslayer, was recently released, there is currently a great demand for new and existing articles to be created and expanded upon. An easy way to locate these articles is though the Dragonslayer characters category. 
• Even main character articles still often include errors.
• Side or supporting character articles are sometimes underdeveloped or contain incorrect information.
• If you are unsure of which article you'd like to edit, there is a 'Random Page' feature listed under the "Explore" tab.

How to edit

If you are looking for a general guide on how to edit any article on FANDOM, please refer to Fandom's official Help:Editing guide.

Good faith

Most importantly, all edits made on the Wings of Fire Wiki should be made in "good faith," meaning that they are done with the intention to improve or expand upon the Wiki. Editors are usually given the benefit of the doubt in good faith, but if users make an edit to an article that is clearly not in good faith, the edit will be reverted, and, in extreme cases, the user will be blocked for a period of time. 

Article structure

Here is the skeleton of how an article should be structured:

1. Quote
2. Infobox
3. Introduction
4. Appearance
5. Personality
6. Biography
7. Relationships
8. Family tree
9. Quotes
10. Trivia
11. Gallery
12. References
13. Categories

Tense

• Biography sections should always be written in past tense.
• Introduction, Appearance, and Personality sections vary between past or present tense depending on wether the character is alive or deceased. 
  • If the character is alive, the article (excluding the biography) is to be written in present tense. If the character is deceased, the article is to be written in past tense.

General grammar

Grammar is very important in articles; it helps establish an understanding between the editors and the readers of an article. Listed below are several solutions to common grammatical errors:

• When referring to a book or the series Wings of Fire, titles should always be written in italics. (Example: The Posion Jungle).
• In character, item, location, tribe, etc. articles, the first mention of the article's title should be written in bold. (Example: Prince Winter is a young male IceWing...)
• Names of characters and places should always be capitalized. Items are sometimes capitalized as well. (Example: Darkstalker's Scroll). However, if you are only referring to Darkstalker's Scroll as "the scroll," there is no need to capitalize the word "scroll".
• Add commas (,) and periods (.) where needed.
• Avoid conjunctions such as "he's" or "they're"; use "he is" or "they are" instead.

Links

• Characters should only be linked the first time they are mentioned throughout the article, excluding mentions in the infobox and the quote at the top of an article. 
• Formal titles, such as "Ex-Queen" or "Commander," should always be included in links.
• Unecessary punctuation in links is to be avoided. Do not include apostrophes, commas, periods, etc. in the links. (Example: Write Queen Coral's instead of Queen Coral's.) The only exception to this rule is when there is an apostrophe within a term to show ownership. (Example: Orca's Statue).
• Do not attach two links to a name unless necessary. (Example: the link Prince Winter should be used on both the words "Prince" and "Winter". Do not add the same link separately to both words).

Formal titles

• Formal titles include words such as "Queen" or "Prince." They can also include non-royal terms such as "General" or "Commander". Objects, such as Darkstalker's Scroll or Orca's Statue, also include the formal title of their owner's name.
• Formal titles, excluding formal titles of objects, should only be used once in each section the first time the said character or object is mentioned. (Instead of referring to the character Turtle as 'Prince Turtle' throughout an article, refer to him as 'Prince Turtle' once and refer to him only as 'Turtle' until the next section begins.)
  • In Biographies, a formal title may be used once a new book summary has begun. (Example: the formal title "Prince Turtle" may be used once at the beginning of the summary for Escaping Peril and also at the beginning of the summary for Talons of Power.)

Article creation

• Any article that does not revolve around the canonical books will be deleted and posted on the creator's Blog or Message Wall. 
• Do not create articles that are already existent. (Example: do not create an article entitled 'Dragon Queens', as there is already an article entitled 'Dragon Royalty.')
• Fan-made characters, items, locations, tribes, fanfictions, etc. are not to be made into articles. They are, however, welcome to be posted on Blogs, Message Walls, and the Roleplay/Fun and Games boards respectively.
• When new books are released, it is to be expected that some characters, etc. regarding it will not have articles created for them yet. If this is the case, please feel free to create one. However, less recent books usually do not need new articles for their contents.
• Please refer to the Article Structure when creating new articles.

Category creation

All users have the ability to make a category. However, like making a page, it's good to have an admin's permission before making a category, with the exception of new book-specific categories.

• Generally, a valid category should contain at least five articles.
• Before making a category, ask yourself: "Will the wiki benefit from this, or will it just be extra clutter?"
• Do not create unnecessary or irrelevant categories. (Example: while "Category:MudWings" is an acceptable category, "Category:Dragons with brown scales" is not.)
• Categories regarding fan-made content are not to be added.
• Do not create categories that already exist under a different name.