User talk:John Foster

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Revision as of 19:12, 11 May 2010 by imported>Milton Beychok (→‎Very good start by you!!: new section)
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Welcome Page

Welcome, new editor! We're very glad you've joined us. Here are pointers for a quick start. Also, when you get a chance, please read The Editor Role. You can look at Getting Started for other helpful introductory pages. It is essential for you as an editor to join the Citizendium-Editors (broadcast) mailing list in order to stay abreast of editor-related issues, as well as the mailing list(s) that concern your particular interests. It is also important, for project-wide matters, to join the Citizendium-L (broadcast) mailing list. You can test out editing in the sandbox if you'd like. If you need help to get going, the forums is one option. That's also where we discuss policy and proposals. You can ask any constable for help, too. Me, for instance! Just put a note on their "talk" page. Again, welcome and thank you! We appreciate your willingness to share your expertise, and we hope to see your edits on Recent changes soon. Milton Beychok 15:25, 11 May 2010 (UTC)

Welcome

John, please note that the bottom of your user page has tags to the effect that you are a User and Editor in the Physics and the Geography Workgroups. As we have already discussed via email, you are free to add addition User tags for any other Workgroups that you desire. Simply go to the Edit page of your User page and add additional tags like those for Physics and Geography.

Please read the above blue bar "Talk Page Etiquette" and sign your comments and/or responses as indicated, namely by simply typing Milton Beychok 15:53, 11 May 2010 (UTC) (4 tildes).

Have fun! Milton Beychok 15:53, 11 May 2010 (UTC)

Thanks, Milton, for getting me off to a good start! John Foster 21:09, 11 May 2010 (UTC)
John, I noted that you trimmed your User page. It would be nice if you expanded it a bit ... at least what country you are in, your education and what you are interested in. After all, the User page is your introduction to people with whom you will be collaborating.
Just to let you know, if you would prefer a different "look" for the Citizendium pages, there are number of "skins" (i.e., choices on how the pages look). Click on the "Preferences" at the top of this page (or any other page), then click on "skin" and you will find 9 choices, each of which you can preview before making a selection. My favorite is "Monobook". Whatever you select, can always be changed later, if you wish. Milton Beychok 21:23, 11 May 2010 (UTC)
One more thing, if you would like a private "sandbox" in which to practice writing articles or in which to draft articles, let me know and I will fix you up with one. Milton Beychok 21:26, 11 May 2010 (UTC)
Hi, John, welcome to Citizendium! As Milt says above, we really do require that every Member have at least a 50-word biography on his User page. Thanks! Hayford Peirce 21:46, 11 May 2010 (UTC)

Some ideas for contributions

Hi John, welcome aboard CZ. Milton and Hayford have already given you some hints as to how things work here in general, and I wish to add some more practical suggestions on what possibilities you have to contribute. For a start, I just took some of the keywords from the information you supplied upon registration, and display below the current state of related CZ articles (for icon documentation, see Template:Rpl/Doc):

In order to find articles dealing with similar topics, it's also worth looking at the Related Article subpages of such an article (or the [r]).

Furthermore, in case you are involved in homework assignments, please consider doing so via Eduzendium articles.

Finally, you can help future newcomers by giving your feedback on the above suggestions. To do so, please leave a note on my talk page.

Looking forward to fruitful collaborative editing, --Daniel Mietchen 22:14, 11 May 2010 (UTC)

Rocky Mountain Institute

Welcome, John!

You'll see I started an article on Rocky Mountain Institute. While there's very little in the article page proper, note the Rocky Mountain Institute/Related Articles page, where I'm playing some shortcuts to get the Board members into our system. Once the name is connected, we can start seeing people's social networks, which at the national organization board level, tends to be informative. We don't have real tools as yet in this area, but, for example, you can trace back a Council on Foreign Relations member to see who she knows... Howard C. Berkowitz 22:16, 11 May 2010 (UTC)

Very good start by you!!

John, you've made a very good start by initiating two article in your first day at CZ!! It appears obvious to me (but I may be wrong) that you have contributed at Wikipedia at some time. Be that as it may, one of the primary differences between us and Wikipedia is that a CZ article is accompanied by five or more auxiliary "subpages" and the article plus the subpages is called a "cluster".

All of the cluster pages must have as their topmost line this template: {{subpages}}. That holds true for the main article page and five default subpages, namely the "Talk subpage", the "Definition" subpage, the "Related Articles" subpage (meaning related CZ articles that takes the place of Wikipedia's "See also" list), the "Bibliography" subpage, and the "External Links" subpage. The Definition subpage must also include the transclusion tags around subpages template, thus: <noinclude>{{Subpages}}</noinclude>. The reasons for these points will become clear after you've been here a while. The Talk and definition subpages must be created when you create a new article. The other subpages can wait until you have the time or someone else creates them.

There is also a Metadata template that must be filled out when a new article is created. That is very important! You will be prompted to fill it in whenever you start a new article. Just click where prompted to do so and then fill in these items:

  • pagename = Renewable energy (for example)
  • abc = Renewable energy ... or Energy, renewable (if you would like it alphabetized in that manner in article lists)
  • Variant = AE for American English or AU for Australian English or BE for British English
  • cat check = yes or no (do you want someone to check your selection of categories?
  • Status = External (import from WP without any revisions or improvements, lowest status) or 3 (a stub) or 2 (a developing article or 1 (a developed article ready to be nominated for being an Approved article)
  • cat1= Select an appropriate Workgroup category, such as Engineering
  • cat2= Select another appropriate category
  • cat3= Select another appropriate category (Three categories are maximum)

The click on "Save".

That completes my short course on how to create a new article cluster. Note that Howard Berkowitz added subpages and the Metadata template for Amory Lovins and I did the same for Renewable energy, for which I selected Engineering and Physics as categories. If you want to change those or add another, access the Metatdata template from the link in the blue subpage banner at the top of the Edit screen of the Talk page. It would be a good idea for you to look at the Edit screens of the Metadata templates created by Howard and by me to see if you agree with our choices.

I know this is a big mouthful, but I hope it is helpful. Don't worry about making mistakes, we all did when we were new to CZ. Milton Beychok 00:12, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

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