Adding Content

This page illustrates how SwinGame is structured, and provides links on how to work with the mediawiki software. Access to SwinGame is controlled, so if you want to be able to provide content please contact the site administrator for an account.

The MediaWiki Wiki Software
As SwinGame uses the mediawiki engine, knowledge of the wiki syntax is needed. Try some of the following external resources The cheatsheets/reference cards are particularly useful.
 * The wikimedia Help:Editing page
 * Magic Words page
 * Wiki Reference Card png
 * Cheatsheet and pdf download

Wiki Markup Examples

 * Level 2 Heading ==Heading==
 * Italic Emphasesed
 * Bold Strong
 * bullet list start with *
 * numbered (ordered) list start with #
 * image [[Image:File.jpg|frame|Text]] or [[Image:File.jpg|thumb|Text]]
 * Used template then click through to edit.
 * internal links are other page name or link text to show
 * external links are text to show
 * redirect to another page #redirect Document Object Model
 * to a category page Link text to show

Content Categories
Used to grouped related work. Current list of categories Special:Categories
 * Category names are plural. ie. "Programming Languages".
 * Add categories to the end of content pages.
 * The syntax is.

"Category Introduction" Pages
It is typical to use the Category: Category Name page (a special page in the "category" namespace) to give a brief "introduction" to the topic, rather than a using separate "Introduction" page as well as a category page.

For example, see Category:SGSDK_CORE which contains some introduction text, and then the automatically generated list of pages that belong to the category. See the links section above on how to link to special Category pages.

"Introduction" Documents
Intended for pages that introduce concepts or topics, not for detailed content that might be daunting for someone new to the area. Be sure to include links to the more detailed information (internal or external), but this is also available from Category links that should be added as well.
 * Use the introduction template with somewhere near the beginning of the page.
 * Note: the category is automatically included by the introduction template, but you should add other category links that are appropriate for the topic.
 * Example: OpenGraphicsWindow

"Quick Reference" Documents
Used as short, concise reference pages. Not intended for descriptions or excessive detail. Emphasis on "quick"!
 * Use an article title like " Topic Name Quick Guide".
 * Use the Quick Guide template somewhere near the start of the page.
 * The "Quick Guide" category is part of the "Quick Quide" template.

"How To" Documents
How To documents are primarily "walk-through" articles that can help the reader perform a specific task in a step-by-step manner.
 * Use an article title such as " Topic Name, How To".
 * Use the template somewhere near the top of the document
 * The category is included in the template, but you should add any other category tags that are appropriate for your How To document.

Block Level CSS Classes
The following classes can be used with div elements. Note that there are template that may be better suited to common "Tip","Note" and "Warning" boxes.

This is a class="callout-box". Makes an easy spot for side content. Use the if you need to clear a floated box.

bug or warning box class="tip" box class="note" box class="wrong" box class="side-note" class="side-note-right" (width 40%, float:right) class="side-note-left" (width 40%, float:left)

Inline Classes
Other classes for span application to text (inline)
 * span.highlightgreen
 * span.highlightred
 * span.highlightblue

Other templates

 * to show an easy message (searchable) ""
 * use to present a group of related topics.
 * eg.
 * eg.
 * (acain specalised hint reveal template)

Tables
There are two ways to create tables in this wiki; the wiki table syntax (not recommended) and normal HTML tables (strongly advised). There are also, and sections that can be used to enhance the logical structure of your tabular data.
 * Start with closing tag.

The CSS classes that are available (have a look yourself for the exact details) in the external style sheets are:

.standard-table 
 * collapsed border, 1px solid black.
 * heading cells bold, left aligned, padded left/right 5px;
 * data cells left+top aligned

.reference-table
 * standard + heading cells center aligned.
 * standard + width 100%;

.fullwidth-table
 * standard + width 100%

There are also .features-table, .mainpage-table and .topicpage-table classes. See the stylesheets for details.

Extensions
We have several mediawiki extensions used to help provide content on SwinGame

===

 Mind Maps and FreeMind .mm Files
Mind maps are a great way to represent a collection of concepts. We are using an extension by Dimitry Polivaev, that uses either flash (or an applet) to display .mm XML files, created by the tool FreeMind, in the wiki pages.

FreeMind .mm files are first uploaded, and then linked to with
 * Size and Title: flash|150px
 * Link and open in new window Description

+title Abbreviation Support
This is the Mozilla Developer Center extension to support the abbr element for abbreviated text. The full text is stored in the title attribute of the abbr start tag. The extension is available via CVS. For example MDC will give us MDC. Any other media wiki code will need to be outside the abbr tags. The id, class and lang attributes are also supported.

+cite+citetext Blockquote Support
This SwinGame extension supports the "..." element for a large block of quoted text and the supplied "cite" url value.

Blockquotes are a good structure for larger blocks of quoted text, especially when you have an accompanying URL that points to the source of the citation. The extension will display the cite attribute information in display.
 * ...
 * The title, id, class attributes are also supported as well as cite.
 * There is a custom citetext attribute. If set, the extension will automatically include a link to the cite URL with the citetext set.

Example: Normal quoted text here.... stop.

Results in: Normal quoted text here.... stop.