Help:Wiki markup

Get Involved in Wiki > Help:Wiki Help > Help:Editing the Wiki Get Involved in Wiki >> Help:Wiki Help >> Help:Editing the Wiki

Wikitext' is the coding you use to format a FamilySearch Wiki page.

Links and URLs
The following characters are used to create links:, [ ],  , as denoted by the following sections:
 * Article link


 * Renamed link


 * Blend link


 * Other page link


 * Section link


 * Example renamed links


 * Create page link


 * Signing comments


 * Redirects


 * Wikimedia link
 * Linked and why


 * User edits


 * Categorize


 * Category page link


 * External links


 * Wikimedia text link


 * Book sources


 * RFC number


 * “As of” tag


 * Media link


 * Edit links

What it looks like

What you type

Article link

United States has Cemeteries. (Article link)  United States has Cemeteries.
 * A link to another Wiki article.
 * Internally, the first letter of the target page is automatically capitalized and spaces are represented as underscores (typing an underscore in the link has the same effect as typing a space, but is not recommended).
 * This an internal link to the article on US Cemeteries.
 * A red link is a page that doesn't exist yet but they can be created by clicking on the link and typing something in the edit box.
 * A link to the page you are on will appear only as bold text.

Rename link

California also has cemeteries. (Renamed link)

 California also has cemeteries.
 * Same target, different name.
 * The target ("piped") text must be placed first, then the text to be displayed, second.

Images
Only images that have been uploaded to FamilySearch can be used. To upload images, use the upload page. You can find the uploaded image on the image list.

See the Wikipedia's image use policy as a guideline used on Wikipedia.

For further help on images, including some more versatile abilities, see the picture tutorial.

Lists
Bullet or numbered lists can be created using Wiki text.

Help:Formatting

Section headings
Headings are used to split articles into sections.

Help:Section

Text formatting
You can format your text using wiki markup.

Help:Formatting

Special characters
Symbols and other special characters can be inserted using Wiki text.

Help:Special characters

No or limited formatting
—showing exactly what is being typed A few different kinds of formatting will tell the Wiki to display things as you typed them — what you see, is what you get!

Invisible text (comments)
It's uncommon, but on occasion acceptable for notes to other editors ( see MOS ), to add a hidden comment within the text of an article. These comments are only visible when editing or viewing the source of a page. Most comments should go on the appropriate Talk page. The format is to surround the hidden text with '' and may cover several lines, e.g.:

Table of contents
When a page has at least four headings, a table of contents (TOC) will appear in front of the first header (after the lead). Putting anywhere forces the TOC to appear at that point (instead of just before the first heading). Putting anywhere forces the TOC to disappear. See also Compact TOC for alphabet and year headings.

Tables
There are two ways to build tables:


 * in special Wiki-markup (see Table)
 * Using HTML elements: &lt;table&gt;, &lt;tr&gt;, &lt;td&gt; or &lt;th&gt;.

For the latter, and a discussion on when tables are appropriate, see When to use tables.

Templates and Transcluding Pages
Templates are segments of Wiki markup that are meant to be copied automatically ("transcluded") into a page. You add them by putting the template's name in. It is also possible to transclude other pages by using.

There are three pairs of tags that can be used in Wikitext to control how transclusion affects parts of a template or article. They determine whether or not wikitext renders, either in its own article, which we will call "here", or in another article where it is transcluded, which we will call "there".


 *  : the content will not be rendered there. These tags have no effect here.
 *  : the content will render only there, and will not render here (like Invisible ink made visible by means of transclusion).
 *  : the content will render here and will render there, but it will only render there what is between these tags.

There can be several such section "elements". Also, they can be nested. All possible renderings are achievable. For example, to render there one or more sections of the page here use   tags. To append text there, wrap the addition in   tags above, within, or below the section. To omit portions of the section, nest   tags within it.

If a page is transcluded without transclusion markup, it may cause an unintentional categorization. Any page transcluding it will contain the same category as the original page. Wrap the category markup with   tags to prevent incorrect categorization.

Some templates take parameters, as well, which you separate with the pipe character.

Variables
Variables are supported. They are often used in creating templates. See a list at Help:Magic words.

HTML
Many tags can be used in in Wiki markup, see Help:Formatting for a list.