Help:Rich Text Editor

Welcome to Wikia's rich text editor (also called the visual editor, WYSIWYG editor, or RTE), which aims to make editing wikis friendly and simple to work with.

The rich text editor is the default editor for all logged out contributors, and it is only available in the Wikia (also called "Oasis" or "New look") skin, not in [ Monobook].

Currently, almost all formatting can be done via the rich text editor, including images and templates. If you feel there are important abilities missing please contact Wikia.

What does this editor do?
The visual editor allows you to use a "word-processor" type toolbar to format an article in the following ways without touching any wikimarkup:


 * Basic formatting - including bold, italic, underline and headings
 * Lists, with bullet points or numbers
 * Links, including both interwiki and external links
 * Images, using the Add Images editor
 * Videos, using the Video Embed Tool
 * Table creation and editing
 * Templates, using a built-in template selector and editor
 * Add or edit article categories using CategorySelect

When in the default mode, the article will appear in the edit box almost exactly as it will on the saved page, like an instant preview.

Creating and editing templates
Templates (and other types of advanced code) are represented in the editor by a puzzle icon. Hovering over this gives you more information about the object.

If the object is a template, it will give you a preview of the template itself and a "delete" link. If the template has parameters, it will also give you an "edit" link.

This visual editor also provides links to quickly add some commonly used templates.

Note, you can customize the list of templates available on the templates dropdown menu via MediaWiki:Editor-template-list.

Switching to source mode
Users can switch to "source" mode to view and edit the article using wikimarkup (also called wikitext). To get to this mode, click the "source" button at the top of the editing area. (Some pages with especially complex code will start in this mode immediately.)

Using wikimarkup in rich text mode
The editor allows the typing of basic wikitext in WYSIWYG mode, both to help users transition and to provide shortcuts for common functionality.

You can convert wikitext you have typed into rich text without saving the page by clicking Preview or switching to/from source mode.

What does this editor not do?
The editor is active for almost all pages, including articles, user pages and talk pages. However, due to their inherent complexity, MediaWiki and Template namespace pages use the old wikitext editor.

You can view, but not directly edit, templates, parser functions, and references. These elements will still appear in edit mode but will be marked by a puzzle icon. You can change template parameters by hovering over the puzzle icon and clicking the edit link at the bottom right of the preview. To edit parser functions, you must switch to source mode.

In a few specific cases, the new editor cannot be turned on at all. In these cases, the old editor will be used.

When this happens, you'll see the error message:
 * Source mode required
 * Rich text editing has been disabled because the page contains complex code.

This will happen if:


 * There are HTML comments in the text that do not begin a line.
 * The magic word  has been used on he page.
 * Some other specific cases of very complex wikitext.

How do I turn on/off the new editor

 * To disable this editor for yourself, go to Special:Preferences and select the "Editing" tab. Untick the option to "Enable visual editor".
 * To disable the new editor on a specific article for all editors, you can use the special word . The new editor system will still be loaded, but will be locked to 'source' mode.
 * You can also use parameters to enable and disable the new editor for a specific edit - add one of the following to the end of an editing URL:
 * (forces old editor),  (forces rich text editor),   (forces rich text editor, starting in source mode)
 * For example,  would force MediaWiki to use the old editor.

Feedback

 * If you have general feedback about the new editor, please email Wikia staff using Special:Contact or visit the Central Forums to ask others users for aid.
 * Bug reports: If you have a bug to report, please contact staff through Special:Contact/bug, making sure to include details such as browser name and version, plus where and exactly how the issue occurred.

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