Star Trek Expanded Universe:Policies and guidelines

This page is part of Star Trek Expanded Universe: Policies and guidelines.
Please read this to familiarize yourself with our common practices and rules. If you have questions, suggestions, or complaints, post them on the talk page.

Like any wikipedia, Star Trek Expanded Universe has policies, rules and guidelines.

Please read through the policies on this page to familiarize yourself with our common practices and standards. If you have any questions, suggestions, or complaints, please post them on the [[Talk:Star Trek Expanded Universe:Policies and guidelines|talk page]].

Bear in mind that no rule is absolute and policies may be subject to change. Our policy changes informs members about all new suggestions and clarifications incorporated into our policies. Add that page to your watchlist to be kept up-to-date.

General policies

Remember above all else: This is an encyclopedia. Star Trek Expanded Universe is a community devoted to the development and expansion of the Star Trek fan-reference database; it is not a chat room or discussion forum. Talk pages are used specifically for discussing the writing of articles. Our general forums are used to discuss issues concerning the overall wiki. These venues should be used for those purposes only.

The following general policies concern our goals and functions:

• Editing policy: A guide on how to edit articles, and how to style them.
• Naming conventions: How to name new articles.
• Disambiguation: For potential article title conflicts.
• Image use policy: Rules for uploading images.
• Copyrights: That unavoidable legalese...
• Etiquette: Useful advice when disagreements arise.
• Deletion policy: When deleting pages becomes necessary.
• Canon policy: What we accept and don't accept.
• Spoiler policy: Let the reader beware!
• Redirection: Rules for using redirects.
• Bot policy: Bots on STEU.

See also: Common faux pas and appropriate content for useful information pertaining to newcomers, and policy changes for what might recently have been changed, discussed or updated.

Enforcement

For day-to-day operations, enforcement can be handled by the general membership. Simply pointing out each other's mistakes (politely) is generally sufficient.

For problem cases, administrators may intervene and enforce a policy, or temporarily lock a page to let things cool down.

In extreme and unusual cases, admins will block or ban a user who has proven unusually disruptive.

See also: Protection policy.

Specific guidelines

General

• Contribute what you know or are willing to learn about (and create stubs responsibly).
• Be bold in updating pages.
• Strive for community solutions.
• Make omissions explicit.
• What links here?

Behavior

• Sign your posts on talk pages.
• No personal attacks. (Move personal debates to email.)
• Log in before making drastic changes to existing articles.
• Usernames
• Bans and blocks
• Don't protect pages unless necessary.
• Be considerate to new members and each other.

Content

• Use appropriate content.
• Define and describe.
• Establish context (instead of presuming too much knowledge).
• Explain jargon.
• Deal appropriately with patent nonsense.
• Use correct point of view.
• Check your facts.
• Cite your sources (and use proper references).
• Make articles useful for readers (and consider the audience in writing).
• Avoid blanket statements.
• Inform and entertain.
• Describe external links (but use internal links whenever possible).
• Don't use external links where we'll want internal links.
• Avoid and fix stub articles.
• Use category sort keys.
• Use templates when appropriate.

Style

• Obey the Manual of Style.
• Don't include copies of primary sources.
• Avoid making your articles orphans.
• Fill summary fields.
• Follow highlighting conventions.
• Balance parts of a page.
• Do not use subpages.
• Consider writing articles in news style.

Miscellaneous

• Your user page
• Dealing with vandalism
• Editing the main page
• Editing MediaWiki namespace text