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Chalo Chatu:Writing better articles: Difference between revisions
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Chalo Chatu:Writing better articles (view source)
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Third, on contentious pages, people often get into edit wars over the lead because the lead is the most prominent part of the article. It's much harder to argue constructively over high-level statements when you don't share common understanding of the lower-level information that they summarize. Space is scarce in the lead, so people are tempted to cram too much into one sentence, or pile on lots of references, in order to fully state and prove their case—resulting in an unreadable lead. In the body, you have all the space you need to cover subtleties and to cover opposing ideas fairly and in depth, separately, one at a time. Once the opposing ideas have been shaken out and covered well in the body, editing the lead without warring often becomes much easier. Instead of arguing about what is true or what all the competing sources say, now you are just arguing over whether the lead fairly summarizes what's currently in the body. | Third, on contentious pages, people often get into edit wars over the lead because the lead is the most prominent part of the article. It's much harder to argue constructively over high-level statements when you don't share common understanding of the lower-level information that they summarize. Space is scarce in the lead, so people are tempted to cram too much into one sentence, or pile on lots of references, in order to fully state and prove their case—resulting in an unreadable lead. In the body, you have all the space you need to cover subtleties and to cover opposing ideas fairly and in depth, separately, one at a time. Once the opposing ideas have been shaken out and covered well in the body, editing the lead without warring often becomes much easier. Instead of arguing about what is true or what all the competing sources say, now you are just arguing over whether the lead fairly summarizes what's currently in the body. | ||
== Use color sparingly == | |||
If possible, avoid presenting information with color only within the article's text and in tables. | |||
Color should only be used sparingly, as a secondary visual aid. Computers and browsers vary, and you cannot know how much color, if any, is visible on the recipient's machine. Wikipedia is international: colors have different meaning in different cultures. Too many colors on one page look cluttered and unencyclopedic. Specifically, use the color red only for alerts and warnings. | |||
Awareness of color should be allowed for low-vision viewers: poor lighting, color blindness, dark or overbright screens, and the wrong contrast/color settings on the display screen. | |||
== Other issues == | |||
; Honorifics : Do not use honorifics or titles, such as Mr, Ms, Rev, Doctor, etc. | |||
; Inappropriate subjects : If you are trying to dress up something that doesn't belong in Chalo Chatu—your band, your Web site, your company's product—think twice about it. Chalo Chatu is not an advertising medium or home page service. Wikipedians are pretty clever, and if an article is really just personal gratification or blatant advertising, it's not going to last long—no matter how "important" you say the subject is. | |||
; Integrate changes: {{anchor|Integrate changes}}When you make a change to some text, rather than appending the new text you would like to see included at the bottom of the page, if you feel so motivated, please place and edit your comments so that they flow seamlessly with the present text. Chalo Chatu articles should not end up being a series of disjointed comments about a subject, but unified, seamless, and ever-expanding expositions of the subject. | |||
; Avoiding common mistakes : It is easy to commit a Chalo Chatu''faux pas''. That is OK—everybody does it! Nevertheless, here are a few you might try to avoid. | |||
; Make a personal copy : Suppose you get into an edit war. Or worse, a revert war. Therefore, you try to stay cool. This is good. Congratulations! However, what would be great is if you could carry on working on the article, even though there is an edit war going on, and even though the version on the top is the evil one favored by the other side in the dispute. | |||
:So, '''make a personal copy''' as a subpage of your user page. Just start a new page at [[Special:MyPage/Article name]] (it can be renamed in the URL address to start a page with a different article name), and copy and paste the wiki-source in there. Then you can carry on improving the article at your own pace! If you like, drop a note on the appropriate [[Chalo Chatu:talk page|talk page]] to let people know what you are doing. | |||
:Some time later, at your leisure, once the fuss has died down, merge your improvements back in to the article proper. Maybe the other person has left Wikipedia, finding it not to their taste. Maybe they have gone on to other projects. Maybe they have changed their mind. Maybe someone else has made similar edits anyway (although they may not be as good as yours, as you have had more time to consider the matter). | |||
== Notes == | == Notes == | ||
{{reflist}} | {{reflist}} | ||
{{Template:Chalo Chatu}} | |||
[[Category:Chatu how-to]] | [[Category:Chatu how-to]] | ||
[[Category:Chalo Chau essays on building the encyclopedia]] | [[Category:Chalo Chau essays on building the encyclopedia]] | ||
[[Category:Chalo Chatu editor help]] | [[Category:Chalo Chatu editor help]] | ||
[[Category:Chalo Chatu essays about editing]] | [[Category:Chalo Chatu essays about editing]] | ||
[[Category:Chalo | [[Category:Chalo Chatu page help]] | ||
[[Category:Chalo Chatu]] | |||
