5. How Does It Work?

We tried to use the same text hints that are used on the Wikipedia, which came from UseModWiki. There are some differences between different Wiki systems, but most of them are quite similar to this one, and it has proved itself through use.

A blank line separates paragraphs, and there are other hints for making sections, bulleted lists, links, filenames, etc.

5.1. Sections


 

 
 =Introduction|intro=

 

creates a new top level section. See the pipe character followed by "intro"? Many hints provide for an "id", and this is how you supply it. For sections, the id will become the output filename (intro.html, in the first example), or the html "tag" used for intradocument linking.


 ==How Does It Work?|how-does-it-work==

 

creates a second-level section, and


 ===Why Would I Use It?|why?===

 

creates a third level section.

5.2. Lists

5.2.1. Numbered Lists


 #one

 #two

 #three

 

The "#" prefix says to make a numbered list. If you leave a blank line anywhere, the numbered list "ends", so hitting another "#" will begin numbering over again at "1". If you need to put blank lines (paragraphs) inside the list, you have to do your paragraphs manually.

Here is how the above block will appear in the final document:

  1. one

  2. two

  3. three

5.2.2. Bulleted Lists

Bulleted lists work almost the same, except you use the "*" hint, and you don't have to worry about renumbering issues:


 *one

 *two

 *three

 

Here's how the above block will appear in the final document:

  • one

  • two

  • three

5.3. Links

Use the square brackets to identify links, like this:


 [[http://www.linuxdoc.org|Linux Documentation Project]]

 

In this case, the text after the pipe character isn't an id, but the "title" of the link.

There are two special namespaces that you can use besides the standard "http:" and "mailto:" namespaces that you are probably famliar with. The first is the "ldp:" namespace. Look at the following link:


 [[ldp:Distributions-HOWTO]]

 

When you use the "ldp:" namespace, WikiText will look up the document that you named in the LDP database, and generate a link to it.

Note: we're still working on entering the correct "name" in all of our database records, so only a few are working. But don't worry. Just let us know if you need to use a link that isn't correct yet and we'll fix it right away.

The second special namespace is the "wiki:" namespace. It will generate a link to the article on the Wikipedia, an open source encyclopedia project. We hope to mirror some of the most appropriate articles from the Wikipedia right on the LDP. Wikipedia has many great articles on computer related topics that aren't the kind of information we do at the LDP, but which would complement our documents very well. For instance, there are articles on virtual memory, operating systems, and so on. For now, your link will go to the live Wikipedia site. Eventually, it will go to a mirror on our site, but with a link to the "real" site.

The following link goes to the article called "Operating System" on the Wikipedia:


 [[wiki:Operating System]]

 

Wikipedia is a great resource for all Netizens. Both the software they use and their content are open source.

5.4. Filenames

You can indicate filenames by wrapping them with a single set of square brackets ([]):


 [/etc/apache/httpd.conf]

 

which renders as /etc/apache/httpd.conf.

5.5. Emphasis

You can make certain words emphasized by wrapping them with three (3) single-quotes, like this:


 '''Wow!'''

 

That will render like: Wow!