Help:Introduction to the Manual of Style/5
From Infogalactic: the planetary knowledge core
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- Basic principles of MoS – consistency, stability, clarity and sourced material.
See also: User:Tony1/Beginners'_guide_to_the_Manual_of_Style, Wikipedia:Layout, Wikipedia:Writing_better_articles
Nuggets
- In general follow the style and format of the existing article for language (American vs British English, terminology), layout, referencing style, or seek consensus for changing first.
- The MOS goes into great detail for a great many cases, but one can often get a quick example of what to do by looking at a Featured article (especially one on a similar subject), as these must conform to all the style rules.
Importantly remember the MOS is a guideline only, designed to assist you setting out content when you aren't sure how to best display information and to stop protracted arguments about this if another editor disagrees. Writing content is far more important to Wikipedia than learning each and every intricacy of its guidelines. Other editors should be assuming good faith and not reprimand you for not knowing them all!
You should now have enough information to begin editing with some confidence! For more information, check out further introductions and help in the links below.
