Introduction/Summary

DentonWiki is a community wiki, and as such it should represent the voices of the community. Check out how other articles are written, see what you like, and write to your heart's content.

Including humor is definitely fine, and so is including small details. Know something weird about a place? Include it!

DentonWiki is not Wikipedia, and we don't encourage revising to a neutral point of view (using NPoV to create new articles is fine). At the same time, we don't want a slew of f-bombs or savage attacks on certain groups of people, so do try to be civil.

Layout

DentonWiki article layouts should be typified by the Templates. Article formatting should match the layout of the templates whenever possible. New templates should be created for categories of articles which the existing templates don't fit well, and existing templates should be modified to match the most elegantly formatted articles in their respective categories.

Page Names

Opinions may vary about what this is, but in general pages should have the most intuitive name possible. Example: the page with information about bars should be called Bars. Note: It shouldn't be called "Denton Bars" because this is the Denton wiki—we can take for granted that the bars are in Denton.

Pages for specific things should use the correct, full name (unless it's a local geographic feature with a common name like The Metroplex), and excluding the initial definite article "the" (unless it's a proper name that requires the article to be coherent, such as The Square or The Metroplex). Example: The UNT page is University of North Texas (and not "The University of North Texas"). Common synonyms should be given pages with a redirect using the redirect button on the "Edit" page. Example: TWU redirects to Texas Woman's University.

Capitalization: The first letter of each word in the page name should always be capitalized unless it is an article, a preposition, or a form of the verb "to be". In these cases it should be capitalized if it is the first word, or if the official name always capitalizes that word by convention. Examples: "Is Denton the Awesomest?" and "Denton is the Awesomest of the Awesomes". Acronyms should have each component letter capitalized, unless it is conventional to do otherwise. Examples: UNT is all caps, but "Scuba" is not.

Tone

Here's what we have so far:

  1. The site needn't be neutral point of view. This is community run, so the perspective is generally just what we decide it should be - so everyone participate!

  2. What we are going for is the cumulative point of view of the Denton community. Try to provide point and counterpoint (or the nonbinary equivalent) when opinions are expressed, especially if those opinions represent a real divide in the community and not just the lunatic ravings of a depraved individual.

  3. Facts are certainly encouraged. This is the DentonWiki—facts about Denton belong here, even the little and silly ones!

  4. Humor is encouraged, but try not to be disparaging or use excessive profanity.

Feel we're missing something or could have said that better? Use this comments section or the talk page to suggest changes, or if it's something unlikely to cause controversy, just edit it yourself - we can always change it back, if there are problems.

See also

  • See the DentonWiki Guide if you have questions or want to learn more about editing. The videos are particularly helpful.

Comments and questions:

Hit Edit to add your questions!

2010-09-12 21:48:26   I don't think it should be entirely encyclopedic. This is a cross between wikipedia and a guide book. Like London A-Z. Think of it as writing a guidebook. —Users/RitchLudlow

2010-09-12 21:59:06   I agree with Ritch mostly. Neutral point of view isn't necessarily what DentonWiki should go for - it's less fun to read and write. Silly comments and opinions should be all right, especially on the less frequented pages. It gives the wiki personality.

At the same time we don't want to alienate people — we want this to be for everyone in Denton! — so disparaging comments and excessive profanity should be avoided. —Users/AndrewBroz

2010-09-12 22:01:45   Yeah. I mean, it should be "neutral", but we can allow comments like "Dan's Silverleaf is a bar with a silver leaf on top of it. I'm not kidding." It's not disparaging, its jocular, we're all happy. —Users/RitchLudlow

2010-09-13 02:07:55   Also, this is based on the efforts of the DavisWiki, the tone of which is best summarized in the captions for the photos of this article: http://daviswiki.org/Bike_Tunnels —Users/RitchLudlow

2010-09-13 18:53:55   DavisWiki calls itself "community owned media". That sounds good to me. We're like the media, but better, and community owned and produced. —Users/RitchLudlow

2010-09-14 20:44:56   Before you decide you want any kind of NPOV, perhaps you should read some of the discussion we have had about this on Davis Wiki. We've rejected NPOV and have been wildly successful. We've created the largest local wiki in English in the world. Not having NPOV has certainly resulted in more interesting content.

Of course, a community driven site needs to be driven by the community. It's all well and good to talk about what we've done in Davis, but ultimately the community needs to figure out what it wants to do. If you want to look at an example of a local wiki that has gone harder on the NPOV and is about as successful as the one in Davis, you might want to check out RocWiki. But yeah, figure out what works for you guys and tell the world. We can all learn from the experiences of others. —Users/WilliamLewis

2010-09-15 16:07:07   Is there specific html code that needs to be used on this Wiki or is all fair in love and war? —Users/seebirds

Do you mean HTML for the articles? The edit-able stuff? —Users/RitchLudlow

There is a guide to the wiki markup used by this software at the bottom of the page when you're editing.

2010-09-15 17:06:15   how to you edit the page titles? —129.120.207.131

Go click the "edit" button at the top of the page and find the "Rename" button.

Add tags