Difference between revisions of "How do I create a new article"

Create A New Article

Creating new articles is a relatively simple job at AboutUs.org! But before we head out to do that, let's look further into the wiki definition of the word 'article': there are generally two types of articles in this wiki, articles about specific website, and articles that are snippets of information about other topics.

Articles about specific websites

The current system has been populated with articles about many websites, but clearly not all of them -- after all, there are 92 Million or so domain names currently registered! But we've tried to get a lot of the more popular ones.

You can add pages to our system, see below.

Articles about general topics

You can create topics in this wiki about anything at all. For example, the site would benefit from an article on the topic of "Orchids", which could then be attached to sites that sell flowers.

To create a general topic article, first search the site to see if there is already an article on the subject. If you use the "search box" and have spelled the name the same way as an existing article, it will bring up that article. If it is similar, you may find the article you are looking for under "title matches" or "page matches". If there is no similar article, then go ahead and create one!

There are two ways to create a new article on any subject:

1. When you search for a term that doesn't exist, you land on "Search results" with "no page title matches". At the top of this page, select the link titled: "create an article with this title". That link takes you to a new "edit page" on which you should enter the information (description) that makes up the article. Please write it in English though.
2. The second way is to create a "dangling link" on another page and then click the link! See Automagical Linking for more.

Add a missing domain

If you have searched for a given domain name such as "SnapNames.com" and it was not already in the system, then you may ask the system to create a base page by entering the name in the "search" box at the top of your screen.

Note: when searching for a name, if you enter the name with capitalization that matches what is in the system, the domain should come right up. If not, you will have to select the name from the resulting search menu.

Add a missing subdomain

Subdomains (e.g. xyz.com/wxyz or xyz.uvw.com, etc.) currently must be added manually. To do so, the easiest method is to add the name in the URL listing of your browser. So that it reads:

http://www.aboutus.org/xyz.uvw.com

or

http://www.aboutus.org/xyz.com/wxyz

This will give you new page with no text, click the "edit this page link". Once you're in the edit window, copy in the following:

{{subst:Subdomain}}

and hit save. Edit the resulting page, just like any other wiki page on AboutUs. Please note: while the "thumbnail" technology works on top-level domains like "SnapNames.com", sometimes it doesn't work for subdomains. If it doesn't, you can always remove it in the "Edit" mode near the top of the page, between the <thumbnail> and </thumbnail> tags.