Wikipedia:Help Project/Guidelines

There are many types of help file, directed to varying levels of users expertise and many areas with there own unique style, so as variety is the spice and different each user have individual preferences these guidelines are only for general reference. The initial pages that users may first encounter, as in a single click from the main page are more pivotal and should be made as clear as possible with new users in mind. As the help is navigated into more depth onto subjects few editors will need to read or even technical details that only a rare admin might use the guidelines become less important.

All help Pages

Overlinking is common on help pages, it is an artifact of how we link articles, help files should stick to links particularly relevant to their subject. Tags should be limited to the talk pages - to avoid confusion, e,g, cleanup, split/merge/move.

Introductory Pages:

(Top Importance)

articles should be no more than 2 pages long (broad overview link was 3 pages)
don't link to anything that hasn't yet been covered from following the introduction thus far
links shouldn't be to pages that are too technical
articles should be visually appealing
there should be an obvious progression of where to go next
emphasis on simple and not overwhelming (somewhat subjective: discuss)
potential editors should be made to feel reassured and confident, not guilty for not having read the entire Help namespace.

New editor help

{High Importance)

It should be obvious when there is a simpler overview, or a more technical help article available
Access to a brief overview article, or a well written lead

Editor help

Features encountered by most editors (Normal importance)

Links to policies and guidelines clear for each help subject

Seasoned editor help

Any advanced features or help pages that are rarely used by fairly industrious editor (Low importance)

links to mediawiki or pure technical pages available
- perhaps an even better simplified rule set (between five pillars and individual articles)

Navigation aids/pages

{top importance}

Number and complexity of links should be relevant to their audience as with articles

Namespaces

This isn't set in stone either but following discussion recommended namespace for new articles, or a few obvious moves for clarity are:

Policies, guidelines, and processes firmly belong in the WP:Project namespace,
Instructions, how-tos and tutorials should be in the WP:Help namespace

Notes:

Essays: If an essay is technical and documenting uncontroversial practices, it could probably be relabelled as a "how-to" page and adopted into the help system (with the creators consent).
Most how-tos currently reside in the Project namespace and as with the other types of article, a Rfc would be in order before any mass moves.