User:Toomai/Wiki tips and tricks

If this kind of thing would do better elsewhere, go ahead and move it.

If you've got a tip or trick to add, go ahead and put it.

General

 * Always use the preview button. One wrong key can cause an entire page to go out of whack.

Tables
!make it red|put text here!!make it yellow|put text here
 * ALWAYS preview before saving! Mistakes in a single place can make tables look horrendous, especially if you've got merged cells.
 * Putting  in a table's header (that is, right after the  ) will allow users to sort the table. This doesn't work if cells are merged, however.
 * Generally, things in a table look better when they're centered. Putting  in the header will center all the text in every cell.
 * Use  instead of   when starting cells that are headers. However, you still need to use a   to seperate parameters (such as colouring) from the cell's content. Example:

Images

 * Normally, clicking an image leads to the image itself. However, by adding the  parameter, you can make images at just like normal links. Usually, it's best to leave images as linking to themselves, since linking them forces people to look at the source to find out where an image came from. However, there are cases where linking them is better (such as the Tier list templates).

Formatting

 * Formats have to be closed in the opposite order they were opened. Otherwise, odd stuff happens.
 * While adding colour can sometimes be distracting, there are times when it can have a positive effect. Here are some simple colours:

Templates/Infoboxes

 * Use if statements to prevent errors when something's not specified. For example, if you want "Unknown" to be displayed if the  parameter is unspecified, use

^          ^       ^         |           |       |        parameter  if true   if false
 * If you need to put a  somewhere, but its location causes things to mess up, use.