Wikipedia Formatting for Beginners
Andrew Cross
Copyright 2011 by Andrew Cross
Smashwords Edition
One of the keys to getting any Wikipedia article published is formatting. No matter how good the content is, if the formatting is suspect, your article won’t get anywhere. Rarely, other editors will offer some suggestions or help format your page for you. In most cases, though, your page will be flagged or even removed altogether.
This eBook serves as a beginner’s guide to understanding the wiki formatting behind one of the world’s most popular websites – Wikipedia.
‘’’bold’’’
Triplicate single quotation marks before and after a word give it bold formatting. Bold format is typically reserved for the title word of the article or for title names if they need to be clarified (e.g. Marilyn Monroe, born Norma Jeane Mortenson). Do not use bold formatting merely to emphasize a word or phrase within the body of text.
~~~~
Adding four consecutive tildes after any line appends your signature, which consists of your Wikipedia username with a link to your Talk page. This shouldn’t ever be used in the text of an article; rather, you should sign posts you make on an individual’s Talk page or on an article’s Discussion page. That way, everyone else can follow the back-and-forth of the conversation.
‘’italic’’
A pair of single quotation marks on either side of a word italicizes the word.