The first in a series of Wiki Guides is now finished in its initial draft form.

If people could take a look at User:Steven/Roads, and comment, I'd appreciate it.

Things to think about include:

• Is it too long?
• Is it easy to understand?
• Does it explain things properly?

First suggestion. I would swap the introduction and route descriptions up to the top.

I know the routebox and dab box come first in the code, but whilst they are important they are also IMO a bit daunting to a non wikipedian/coder. Wheras the introduction and description are easier to do and more likely to be why a contributor is there in the first place - so I would say having those first is a good way to ease a newbie in gently. There is after all no reason why one should build up a page in the "right" order!

More when I digest it all.

Thats a cracking good starter for newbies, a good reminder to those of us who have been away for a while and worthwhile reminder for the more casual wiki roaders...

Thanks for pulling the guide together, it's exactly what we need.

What's missing ? Let me think on that, but perhaps some explanation of the structure logic might help, but that could be another large article.

I liked it, found it useful, used it the other week when I made a new article.

I think it could be a bit intimidating because of its emphasis on the various types of box.

When I read a page I mostly ignore anything in the boxes but look at the text. If I think I can improve the text I may do some work on it, but I leave the boxes to others. As far as I know, this approach is not disapproved of.

Maybe it would help to have a bit that says it's OK to do it that way if you want to.

Of course, there are some pages I've worked on, such as this one, where a table is the unavoidable essence of the page, and then I learn enough about the table notation to be able to make the changes I want to.

I approve, I don't think the routebox is too daunting (to be fair, once a blank template is copied in, fairly self explanatory, but perhaps the emphasis on the navbox is perhaps a bit much?

*looks at Ritchie a bit here*
I know your busy, perhaps one for lower down your todo list if you get a chance. Is an article creation tool feasible? I'm thinking a number of text boxes for the routebox fields, followed by a textarea for the main body, with a script to add in the rest of the templates and formatting after submitting?

If you want, I can create a the form, and generate the output wikicode, then perhaps leave it to you to actually generate the article from that output? As I'm not a developer any more, that's the furthest I could feasibly do it from my end.

I'll comment on these two together.

There isn't really an emphasis on the various types of boxes, it's just that those are the bits that need the most explaining as they're not instantly intuitive. I did think about splitting those up into separate articles, though there's already sub-articles (if you like) going into the deeply complex stuff. As long as people think that splitting the "simple help" pages off the main roads page, and then having a "complex help" off there is a good idea, then that might well be the way to go.

Bear in mind that Places, Bridges etc all will need their own "Routebox" pages if we split them off.

As for the order of the page, my starting assumption was that the help page would be used for both brand new pages (in which case people will put in what they can), and as a guide to expand pages. It's been commented in the past that improving an extant page is quite daunting as you click on "Edit" and are instantly greeted by the Routebox code, so I figured writing things in the order as they appear on the page would be sensible - which is why I've gone for a "chatty style" in order to at least make it a little more friendly.

Actually, it already says that:



The fact you've missed it means I haven't emphasised it enough, so I'll add it to the top paragraph too.

Adding photos ... what am I doing wrong on this page?

http://www.sabre-roads.org.uk/wiki/inde ... s_Junction

I've used the main upload page, copied and changed the image line from the Shannon Corner page, and followed Steven's instructions on his page, but still no result. Any ideas?

--------

I'm also trying to change the title name of the 'Esher - Hersham Bridge' on the A244 to its' real name of 'Albany Bridge'. How does one do that and then add it to the Esher page?

http://www.sabre-roads.org.uk/wiki/inde ... ham_Bridge

http://www.sabre-roads.org.uk/wiki/inde ... itle=Esher

http://www.sabre-roads.org.uk/wiki/index.php?title=A244

All help would be gratefully appreciated!

using "Scilly Isles sign - Geograph - 1079261.jpg" rather than "Approach to the Scilly Isles on the A309 - Geograph - 1079261.jpg" will make it work, given that it's the proper file name for this image: File:Scilly Isles sign - Geograph - 1079261.jpg
Click move, rather than edit, add the new page title.

Also, there's a name field in the {{Bridge}} template - change the name there too.

Putting [[Category:Esher]] at the bottom of the page puts it in the {{Navbox}} at the bottom of the Esher page. Editing the Esher page and putting a link in would get it into the body.

I'll get around to doing Wiki Guides for other pages soon.

I know I'm a bit late in replying, but here goes! Yes. I think that the easiest way to combat this is to remove the routebox section to a separate page and replace it with a para or two explaining routebox, Junction Box, Bridge, Place et al. with links to each relevant sub-page. Including an example of a routebox would be fine, but not going into all of the detail on the main page. This would also allow screen shots of finished articles to be comfortably added. At the end of the day, most new users are probably going to be editing existing pages initially, so seeing the code and finished article side by side with a little description should be enough to allow them to see what is going on without getting too put off (to bring together two points from above).

In an ideal world, the navbox section would also become a sub-page, but as this is common to all pages it is less easy to extract.

One final point here, we have quick links to create various boxes in the wiki editor. It would be nice if we had one for Routebox too, and better still if they came complete with {{navbox}} {{rating|1}} <--Categories--> and anything else that's needed underneath. Even I might be able to code such a thing if someone could point me in the right direction...

Very. I reckon my mum could follow it. Whether she'd want to is another matter
I haven't spotted any obvious mistakes or omissions yet, but I haven't read it all through in one go either - I was catching up on each new bit as you went along!

As an aside, there's an error in the "Esher" navbox on this page - some random text appears at the bottom:



I wouldn't know where to start to fix that so someone less likely to break anything could have a go...

That's covered in the Navbox section of the guide.

The error is in putting "cat=Esher" in the Navbox rather than asking it to display nearby junctions, which is "junctions1=Esher"

I've shrunk the section, by binning the over-large examples, and moved the page to its final location at Help:Wiki Guides/Roads.

Sorry, but it is too long. As someone who has only really worked on 1 wiki article,St Helena I have to say that I won't create another if that's the instructions, sorry.

I would say I'm reasonably computer literate, and know html quite well, but this is just too daunting.

The St Helena page was created by rileyrob for me (thanks) and from that I found it easy to update (correct), add, etc. Testing the principle of creating a new page I start with a complete blank and actually that's not helpful.


At the risk of being unpopular with those who aren't lazy (like me) and put a lot of effort into making Sabre work can I make some suggestions?

• On the instructions page it's great explaining about the routebox etc, perhaps a simple line saying you press the button to get the template up? it took me a fair while to realise I wouldn't have to type it from scratch and that there was a button (Route List, rather than Route Box) to get the basics in.
• when the routebox appears having pressed the button, perhaps some tips in the code eg.
  
  Code:
  {{Routebox
   | number        = <!-- eg 'A303' or 'B3133', could be 'A379 was A38' -->
   | type          = <!-- eg 'Primary' or 'Unclassified' -->
   | from          = <!-- eg '3 Lamps, Heavitree, Exeter' -->
  etc...
  
• How about another button or two for other things that are useful to be populated?

Oh and Rob, I didn't realise we had different parents - my Mum has no hope of following it.

I find it far easier to have it all on one page, in one place- that was the reason I used it- before I had to keep thinking 'now what page was that information on' and I was far to lazy to keep trying to find the correct page, so my new pages weren't maybe as good as they ought to have been. With the guide I found it far easier.