finiki:Welcome to finiki

Welcome aboard! We're glad you wish to help develop finiki, and we hope you enjoy participating in this virtual community as much as we do. As a new contributor, you may feel a little overwhelmed ...

...but don't worry, things will become easier and clearer as you go, and if you have any problems, there will always be other finikians happy to help. There are some resources set forth below to help you get started. Good luck and have fun! -- The finiki Welcoming Committee


 * One of the best places to get started after reading this page is Wikipedia's Introduction.

If you haven't already read them, it is suggested that you review:
 * Help:Getting started
 * Help:Guide For Contributors


 * Tip: Sign your name on talk pages by adding four tildes ( ~ ) after your question; this will automatically produce your username and the time, aiding the flow of discussion.

As a wiki editor, you'll be able to do just about anything: create new articles, make additions and changes to existing ones, correct errors, add hyperlinks, improve formatting, etc. The Recent changes page is a great source of ideas. This is the heart and soul of the wiki for a wiki editor. It is analogous to the index of posts on the forum. A word to the wise, when someone has been working on a page, we tend to "pile on," trying to improve it or write related articles.

You don't ever need to worry about breaking anything, because all previous versions of each article are retained. Writing on the wiki is easy once you become accustomed to the markup. Generally all you have to do is type in your text, preview your work and save it to edit a page. Wiki syntax (for making links, headings, lists and type setting) is also fairly easy once you get the hang of it. We have a new toolbar that closely matches the toolbar on Word programs, so editing the wiki should be familiar to most of us beginners. If you need more assistance tryHelp:Wikitext examples. It is an excellent reference. If you can't figure out some formatting do not worry since someone else will be happy to beautify your page in short order. The wiki is a collaborative medium, and the forum ethos of helpfulness takes residence in the wiki as well.

We also have a "hidden forum" for discussing wiki issues. As a wiki editor you will have access to it. You will see this forum finiki lounge when you log into the forum.

We look forward to your contributions to the forum's wiki; every contribution, be it a new page or proofreading edits, is quite valuable and deeply appreciated. We are not as exacting as a finance journal or wikipedia when it comes to referencing sources, but experience has shown us that, when appropriate, adding some references saves everyone a great deal of time and effort when it comes time to update a page.

Here is a friendly and visual Welcome to Wikipedia in PDF form. They also have a copy of a published book, at Help: Wikipedia: The Missing Manual, if you would like to know a bit about how things are done. There is also a Wikipedia tutorial that can guide you step-by-step.

Preferences
Once signed in go to the My preferences tab. You can now change the password to your own individually selected password and you should be good to go. You should also make sure that you've provided a valid e-mail address, it will be helpful should you ever forget your password.