User talk:Chrisj1234

To understand Wikipedia, it is easiest to think of this website as having two types of pages: pages that are part of the encyclopedia itself, and pages of the community (used by contributors to help build and operate the encyclopedia).

To find your way around the encyclopedia, either enter a term into the search box at the top-right side of the screen, or go to Wikipedia's table of contents. Clicking on links like this one will take you to relevant or related pages. If you know the name of the topic you are looking for, simply type it into Wikipedia's search box and press Go.

If you would like to look around Wikipedia to see what's on it, keep in mind that many major subjects have a root article on the Wikipedia:Contents/Overviews page and an outline on the Wikipedia:Contents/Outlines page.

There are some other "Tables of Contents" type pages on Wikipedia. They are:

• Wikipedia:Contents/Portals – portals are digests of excerpts and things to do
• Wikipedia:Contents/Lists – this is a list of item lists (like List of dog breeds)
• Wikipedia:Contents/Glossaries – alphabetical lists of definitions

Wikipedia also has an alphabetical index of all of its articles, and a categorical index of most of them.

Wikipedia's community pages include instructions, help contents, policies and guidelines, processes, discussion forums, places to make requests, pages to report problems, and user pages. These are all pages which we use to develop the encyclopedia and to communicate with each other in that mission. We even have an online newspaper, The Signpost, that reports on developments that affect the encyclopedia and its community, from within and abroad.

Directories

Some directories to help you find your way around the community are:

• Wikipedia:Department directory - what gets done where
• Wikipedia:Questions - where to go to ask questions
• Wikipedia:Community portal - Wikipedia's hub of activity. It includes announcements, news, ongoing projects, and task lists. This is where to find out where your help is needed most.
• The Signpost - discover what's going on in the Wikimedia community.

See also

• Wikipedia:Tips#Finding your way around Wikipedia and beyond

Collaboration groups

WikiProjects are social groups of contributors (anyone may join them), who work together as a team to improve Wikipedia. These groups often focus on a specific topic area (for example, women's history) or a specific kind of task (for example, copyediting). WikiProject are one of the central places for editor collaboration and the organization of specific topics. The English Wikipedia currently has over 2,000 WikiProjects and they all have a variety of tasks to get done (for example, Canadian articles to improve).

Wikipedia does not employ hard-and-fast rules and there is no need to read any page before editing. However, some standards and behavioural expectations may be enforced. Don't be afraid to contribute as you are encouraged to be bold in editing in a fair and accurate manner (See: Wikipedia:Core content policies for more information)

• Five pillars (a summary of our fundamental principles)
• Introduction to policies and guidelines and Simplified ruleset
• Policies and guidelines – Help page/Overview
• List of policies
• List of guidelines

If you've made a mistake and wish to undo it, revert it. Here's how: click history at the top of the page you made the mistake on. Then click on undo at the end of the first line which is your edit. Then publish changes. See more detailed instructions at Help:Reverting.

There are two main styles of help on Wikipedia: self-help and assistance...

Self-help involves reading the help and instruction pages around Wikipedia. Some very informative self-help pages are:

• Wikipedia:Contributing to Wikipedia - Help:Introduction (module tutorial)
• Wikipedia:FAQ - (Index)
• Help:Contents - (Index)
• Wikipedia:Tips - (Index)

When you get stuck, confused, or befuddled, assistance is available on Wikipedia's "desk" and "request" pages - use these when self-help hasn't provided you with an answer:

• Teahouse – A place to get help with editing for new editors.
• The Help Desk – For general questions regarding the usage of Wikipedia.
• If you place {{Help me}} "then your question" on your talk page, a volunteer will assist you there!
• Join the #wikipedia-en-help IRC channel for real-time chat. New to IRC? Click here to be connected instantly!

Almost anyone on these lists will help you as well:

• List of Administrators Categorized by Recent Activity
• Complete uncategorized list of Administrators
• Members of the Welcoming Committee

What are portals? "Doorways to knowledge." Wikipedia's coverage of subjects can be extensive (mathematics, for example, is covered by tens of thousands of articles on Wikipedia). Portals are an alternative entry to a subject (besides its main article), and to that subject's coverage in the encyclopedia, in a way similar to how the Main Page provides sample fare from Wikipedia as a whole.

Portals may include features such as Selected article sections, Selected image, news, points of interest (Did you know?, Anniversaries), and links to related Wikimedia. Portals are more diverse than the Main page, and may include features such as panoramic banners, slide shows, category trees, topics lists, and whatever else portal designers can come up with.

A secondary purpose of portals is to provide bridges between reading and editing, and between the encyclopedia and the Wikipedia community. They may provide links to the related WikiProjects, Wikipedia's Reference desk, and so on. Portals are a hybrid between encyclopedia pages and project pages, and occupy their own special namespace, the Portal namespace. Therefore, all portal titles are preceded by the prefix "Portal:"

The list of all completed portals is Portal:Contents/Portals. A list of all portals, including those under construction, can be found at Category:All portals. The Portals WikiProject is dedicated to collaboratively building and maintaining portals, and further expanding on the Portal concept, such as with automated features, and is always looking for new participants.