WikiIslam:Talk Pages: Difference between revisions

This page contains a summary of the general policies and guidelines concerning talk pages (accessible via the "discussion" tab).

Primary Points

1. Participants should remain civil to one another.
2. Discussions should be kept on the page they were initiated.
3. Messages should be signed and properly indented.
4. Talk pages are for improving articles, not debating.

Etiquette

To maintain a cooperative atmosphere on the site, it is required for all editors and administrators to maintain civility, not be unnecessarily aggressive and assume good faith while communicating with others; newcomers in particular. Edit summaries and log comments are also required to follow these rules.

Do not remove or alter another user's message (unless it clearly violates talk page guidelines), do not use profanities and do not personally harass other users or the site.

For continuity of discussion, comments should be kept on the same talk page where they were initiated. All new discussion topics should be given a relevant heading and created at the bottom of the page, below all previous discussions. Each new message should be signed and follow the rules concerning indentation.

You should avoid excessive emphasis and be concise; capital letters are considered shouting, and long, rambling messages or SMS language may be difficult to understand and will be ignored.

To maintain a collegial atmosphere between editors of different faiths and backgrounds, it is suggested to not make comments critical of other religious beliefs or the lack of belief in any religion. Depending on the situation comments containing hate speech or extreme views may be removed. Users may freely remove comments from their own talk pages.

Failure to comply with these guidelines may result in the offending messages being edited or removed or your user account being blocked from editing WikiIslam, depending on the severity of your actions.

Topics

The purpose of a talk page is to provide space for editors to discuss changes directly relating to its associated article or project page. WikiIslam is not a social networking site. All discussion should ultimately be directed solely toward the improvement of the website.

Acceptable topics for discussion include concerns directly relating to the page, such as inaccuracies, formatting, renaming, merging and suggestions for further improvement. They are not there for debating the content of the article or for general attacks on the site or users of the site.

If your comment does not directly relate to improving the article, it may be deleted without a response, or moved to the appropriate location. Comments that do get a response may be deleted from the page after some time.

The reason for this rule is to not create disruptions on talk pages, and to not take up our editors time. Debating can be time-consuming and is not what this website is here for.

If you would like to debate issues concerning Islam, please use a forum, e.g. the FFI forum (you will have to create a separate account there if you do not have one already). For questions about how to use or edit WikiIslam, leave a message at the Help Desk. And for general inquiries/suggestions, use the relevant Discussions page.

Signatures

Signing comments on talk pages, both for the article and non-article namespaces, is good practice, and facilitates discussion by helping identify the author of a particular comment.

Signing Posts

Editors can sign their own posts by:

1. Clicking the signature button in the edit toolbar (
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   ), or
2. Typing 4 tildas (~~~~) manually.

This will produce a signature and timestamp automatically.

Other Users

In the case of another user not signing their comments, the "unsigned" template should be used and the editor should be politely reminded to insert their own signatures in the future.

To insert a signature for a user who may have forgot to sign, type: {{subst:unsigned|###|###}}

The first parameter is the username or IP address of the editor. The second parameter is optional and contains the time and date of the edit (this information can be copied from the edit history).

Occasional forgetfulness is understandable but if certain editors continually ignore requests to sign their comments, any new comments by them should be reverted and a discussion should be initiated on their user talk page.

Customized Signatures

Customized signatures must include at least one direct internal link to the editor's user page, user talk page, or contributions page; this allows other editors easy access to their talk page and contributions log.

Signatures can be customized with a nickname or with custom formatting, or both, in the following way:

1. Click on Preferences
2. In the Signature field, type in a nickname and/or the HTML code for the desired output. Customizing signature this way makes it possible to include links to user pages, talk pages and contributions pages.
3. In the preferences panel, make sure Treat signature as wikitext (without an automatic link) is checked.
4. Save the preferences

Now when the signature button or the 4 tildas(~) is used, the formatted signature will appear automatically in place of the standard signature.

Sample Signatures

Here are a few example signatures and their codes:

1. Ahmad ^talk contribs   Use code: [[User:Ahmad|<font size="3.5" color="green" face="Adobe Garamond Pro, Garamond, Georgia, Times New Roman">Ahmad</font>]] ^{[[User_talk:Ahmad|<font color="red">talk</font>]]} <small>[[Special:Contributions/Ahmad|<font color="black">contribs</font>]]</small>
2. Amina ^Talk    Use code: [[User:Amina|Amina]] ^{[[User talk:Amina|Talk]]}
3. AhmadAO ^Talk    Use code: <b>[[User:Ahmad|<font color="#330066">Ahmad</font><font color="#FF3333">AO</font>]] [[User talk:Ahmad|<font color="#483D8B">^Talk</font>]]</b>
4. Amina (talk . contribs)   Use code: [[User:Amina|Amina]] {{small2|([[User_talk:Amina|talk]] . [[Special:Contributions/Amina|contribs]])}}

Use of Images

Images should not be used in signatures as this may cause unnecessary server load. A suitable alternative is the use of Unicode characters. For example, & #9807; produces: ♏. A list of Wingding codes equivalents for Unicode characters can be found here, and a full list of Unicode characters can be found here and here.

Misleading Signatures

The following types of signatures are not permitted because they may be misleading in a way that disrupts the project:

• Signatures that impersonate other people or another editor.
• Signatures that give the impression that the account has permissions which it does not have, for example by containing the terms "administrator", "bureaucrat", "editor", "checkuser", "oversight", or similar terms like "admin", "sysop" or "moderator".
• Signatures which could be easily misunderstood to refer to a "bot" (which is used to identify bot accounts) or a "script" (which alludes to automated editing processes), unless the account is of that type.
• Signatures including phrases such as "wikiislam" that give the incorrect impression that the account may be officially affiliated with WikiIslam or one of its projects.
• Signatures which resemble IP addresses (as these are expected to designate non-logged-in users), timestamps or other names which would be confusing within the WikiIslam signature format.

Disruptive or Offensive Signatures

The following types of signatures are not permitted because they are disruptive or offensive:

• Signatures that blink, scroll, or otherwise cause inconvenience to or annoy other editors.
• Signatures that include large or small fonts or excessive use of superscript or subscript.
• Signatures that contain contentious material about living persons, or those that are offensive towards any race, religion or social groups.
• Signatures that are likely to offend other contributors, making harmonious editing difficult or impossible, for example by containing profanities.
• Signatures that contain or imply personal attacks.
• Signatures that seem intended to provoke emotional reaction ("trolling").
• Signatures that otherwise show a clear intent to disrupt WikiIslam.

Note that signatures that are inappropriate in another language, or that represent an inappropriate name with misspellings and substitutions, or do so indirectly or by implication, are still considered inappropriate.

Promotional Signatures

The following types of signatures are not permitted because they are considered promotional:

• Signatures that unambiguously consist of a name of a company, group, institution or product (e.g. AhmadsWidgets, MyWidgetsUAE.com, CairoMuseumofAntiquities).
• Signatures that include email addresses and URLs (such as "[email protected]" and "Example.com") to promote a web page and do not simply identify a person.
• Signatures that support political issues (e.g. SupportIsrael, FreeGaza, NotoImmigration).

Indenting

Good indentation makes prolonged discussions on talk pages easier to read and understand. It is a behavioral guideline that editors are expected to follow.

Replies should always be indented and placed beneath the last comment. Indents are achieved by typing one or more leading colon ":" characters at the very left margin, just before the new text about to be added. With every new comment added, the number of colons must be increased by one.

Examples

What is typed:

How it looks:

See WikiIslam:Signatures for help with signing comments.

Outdenting

A long discussion will cause indentation to become too deep, which can make it difficult to read in narrower browser windows. When this occurs, editors should consider resetting the level of indentation by outdenting their next comment. Outdenting can be performed by using the "Outdent" template; either by typing {{Outdent}} or clicking on it in the "User interaction" section of the lower Edit toolbar.

Examples

In the following example, the user adding the final comment has typed the characters of the template, including its "braces", at the left margin, below the preceding comment, and just ahead of the text she entered for her own comment:

What is typed:

How it looks:

This example has been exaggerated for demonstration purposes. A lot more indentations would be used before outdenting is required in an actual talk page discussion.

See Also

• WikiIslam:Assume Good Faith
• WikiIslam:Core Principles
• WikiIslam:Policies and Guidelines