Help:Introduction to the Manual of Style/1
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 | This page in a nutshell: The Manual of Style exists to provide a clear, consistent and stable standard with which to format written Wikipedia articles. |
The Manual of Style, sometimes abbreviated as MoS, is a long guide that provides standards on how to format written Wikipedia articles. Because there are so many articles out there, it is important to follow it as a guideline as best you can; this is so that your contribution can remain clear, consistent and stable. The simplest way to do this is just to find a well written article and copy its formatting.
This introduction provides a light gloss of some of the most important features of the Manual of Style that will help in getting you around.
Links
Linking through hyperlinks is an important feature of Wikipedia. Internal links (or 'wikilinks') bind the project together into an interconnected whole. Links provide instant pathways to locations within the project that are likely to increase our readers' understanding of the topic at hand. You can read more about how to add them here.
For how many internal links to include in an article, you want to ask yourself, "Would a reader of this subject be interested in that other article? Does it help explain concept that is only briefly described in this article?". Typically, the first instance of an important word should be linked to the relevant article on that topic.
External links (to other websites other than Wikipedia) can be added in the 'External links' section along with a short description. These should only be included if highly relevant or provides more detail than the article has space for. Websites used as references to the article's content should in stead be put in the 'References' section.
See also: