Editing Basics

From Embryology


Dr Mark Hill


Firstly, you have to be a contributor or current student to have an account, be able to log in on that account, and to edit this wiki. Once logged in you will also have your own page on this wiki, accessed by clicking your login name at the top of the screen. Students note that this is your personal page and is different from your group project page.

If you are not a student and would like to contribute Embryology content to this wiki, please contact e-mail me

To edit any wiki page, click the little 'edit' tab at the top of the page. (You should see in a row: Page, Discussion, Read, Edit, View history) Now Edit the content and when finished, then scroll down to click the Save button. You can save at any time during editing and before clicking on 'Save', give a brief reason for your changes in the Summary box. This helps others to quickly tell what has been changed and allows Embryology Wiki admin to track changes more easily.

We're going to concentrate on formatting for now, as your own page is an excellent place to play around with coding and get you used to it. Here, all the main formatting that come into editing a page can come into play, from emboldening or italicising text to creating headers and also adding in links to other pages. So let's get started!


An alternative is to prepare and format all your text in another word processing program and export into MediaWiki format, which can then be copy n pasted in the edit window (More? Open Office Tutorial



Creating headers is a very simple way of separating your page into different sections. If you're like me, you'll want your own page to have a section for your individual assessment, comments on the Embryology course, and any other information you would like to appear on your own page. Separating each of these sections into headed sections gives three fine advantages:

  1. Each section can be found easily



== Example Header ==
=== Example Sub-Header ===
===== Example Sub-Sub-Header ====
and so on.





  • Italics require two apostrophes
  • Bold text requires three apostrophes




Wiki Links



So we have:


Internal links



Examples of internal link formats

Description You type You get
Internal link
[[Main Page]]
Main Page
Piped link
[[Main Page|different text]]
different text
#REDIRECT [[Main Page]]
Main Page
Internal link to an anchor
[[#See also]]

The top of the page and Section Headings are automatically anchored.

Internal link to an anchor from different text
Setting an internal link anchor

Omit the "optional text" for invisible anchor.

optional text
Internal link to an anchor at another page
[[Help:Images#See also]]
Internal link to the current page's talk page
Internal link to the current page's edit page
Internal link to a subpage

Shortcut for [[Help:Links/example]].

Internal link to a subpage without the leading slash

Shortcut for [[Help:Links/example|example]].

Internal link to a category page
Internal link to an image or a file of other types



Internal link to the user's user page

Internet Links


[http://embryology.med.unsw.edu.au/ UNSW Embryology] links to http://embryology.med.unsw.edu.au/ with the link text 'UNSW Embryology'.


[mailto:example@someplace.com e-mail me!]



# This is the first line of a numbered list
# This is the second line of a numbered list



  1. This is the first line of a numbered list
  2. This is the second line of a numbered list


That's all there is to lists.


Tables can be a bit difficult the first time. Try reading the online Tables information to get yourself started with formatting.


UNSW Embryology Wiki supports the ability to include images in its wiki pages, see also Embryology - Image Tutorial.


Please note that this site contains student submitted materials for course project work. Anyone finding any image, text or content on the Embryology Wiki which infringes on another's copyright should immediately contact the website author (Dr Mark Hill) by email, identifying the materials location on the website and the original source material. All such identified content will be removed immediately.

Inserting an Image

To insert an image into a page on Embryology Wiki use the [[Image:filename]] command, where filename is the name of the file as it exists on the wiki.

For example [[Image:example.png]] to link to an image called example.png. You can also add caption text, set the image as a thumbnail (smaller version) and set its alignment on the page using the extended image code: [[Image:filename|thumb|alignment|caption]]. The pipes ('|') are used to separate each piece of information in the code in the same way as they do in links.

A thumbnail for the Early zygote test image, with caption.



Uploading an Image


  • Avoid non-descriptive or generic names, for example: figure1.jpg, fig1.jpg, image1.jpg, myimage1.jpg, project1.jpg, etc.
    • Rename the file you intend to upload.

Once uploaded, the file will become accessible for use in pages on Embryology Wiki. Please ensure that any files uploaded to Embryology Wiki are files you can actually use; i.e., you own the copyright or the file is in the public domain/released under GNU/etc.

Image Information


Remember the Course Handout information Academic Honesty and Plagiarism



Journal Images


  1. Include the original image legend text.
  4. If available, the direct journal link.
  5. Copyright information as shown within the article or review.
  6. Copyright policy of the journal.


References this page will give specific information on how to insert references on your Wiki page.

Internet Images


  • Some educational sites may allow image reuse.

In all cases you must include:

  1. Any legend associated with the image.
  2. The image URL (internet link).
  4. The author of the original image.

Your Images


  1. A figure title.
  2. A full legend describing the image.
  5. A copyright statement:



Textbook Images

You cannot copy images from the online textbooks (Developmental Biology, Molecular Biology of the Cell, Molecular Cell Biology or The Cell- A Molecular Approach) to your project.

  • You can include the content as an external link.
  • Use an abbreviation of the journal title (DevBiol, MBoC, MBC, Cell) separated by a hyphen "-" and the figure title.


There is a separate page describing how to format reference links in project pages. References

An extension has been installed that allows automatic reference formatting if the PubMed ID number is known.

For More Information


See also the table below for wikicode and a display of the result.


Text formatting markup

Description You type You get
character (inline) formatting – applies anywhere
Italic text ''italic'' italic
Bold text '''bold''' bold
section formatting – only at the beginning of the line
Headings of different levels
=level 1=
==level 2==
===level 3===
====level 4====
=====level 5=====

An article with 4 or more headings automatically creates a table of contents.

Level 1
Level 2
Level 3
Level 4
Level 5
Level 6
Horizontal rule ----
Bullet list
* one
* two
* three
** three point one
** three point two

Inserting a blank line will end the first list and start another.

  • one
  • two
  • three
    • three point one
    • three point two
Numbered list
# one
# two<br />spanning more lines<br />doesn't break numbering
# three
## three point one
## three point two
  1. one
  2. two
    spanning more lines
    doesn't break numbering
  3. three
    1. three point one
    2. three point two
Definition list
;item 1
: definition 1
;item 2
: definition 2-1
: definition 2-2
item 1
definition 1
item 2
definition 2-1
definition 2-2
Adopting definition list to indent text
: Single indent
:: Double indent
::::: Multiple indent

This workaround may be controversial from the viewpoint of accessibility.

Single indent
Double indent
Multiple indent
Mixture of different types of list
# one
# two
#* two point one
#* two point two
# three
#; three item one
#: three def one
# four
#: four def one
#: this rather looks like the continuation of # four
#: and thus often used instead of <br />
# five
## five sub 1
### five sub 1 sub 1
## five sub 2

;item 1
:* definition 1-1
:* definition 1-2
;item 2
:# definition 2-1
:# definition 2-2

The usage of #: and *: for breaking a line within an item may also be controversial.

  1. one
  2. two
    • two point one
    • two point two
  3. three
    three item one
    three def one
  4. four
    four def one
    this rather looks like the continuation of # four
    often used instead of <br />
  5. five
    1. five sub 1
      1. five sub 1 sub 1
    2. five sub 2
item 1
  • definition 1-1
  • definition 1-2
item 2
  1. definition 2-1
  2. definition 2-2
Preformatted text
 preformatted text is done with
 a '''space''' at the 
 ''beginning'' of the line

This way of preformatting only applies to section formatting, and character formatting markups are still effective.

preformatted text is done with
a space at the 
beginning of the line


MediaWiki ignores single line breaks. To start a new paragraph, leave an empty line. You can force a line break within a paragraph with the HTML tags <br />.



Description You type You get
Strikethrough <del>Strikethrough</del> or <s>Strikethrough</s> Strikethrough
Fixed width text <tt>Fixed width text</tt> or <code>source code</code> Fixed width text or source code

text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text <blockquote> quote quote quote quote quote quote </blockquote> text text text text text text text text text text text text


quote quote quote quote quote quote

text text text text text text text text text text text text
Comment <!-- This is a comment -->

Text can only be viewed in the edit window.

Completely preformatted text

<pre>this way, all markups are '''ignored'''</pre>

 this way, all markups are '''ignored'''.
Customized preformatted text

<pre style="CSS text">this way, all markups are '''ignored''' and formatted with a CSS text</pre>

 this way for instance, all '''ignored''' markups take into account the navigator size, by automatically adding some carriage returns dynamically to it.

Other formatting

Beyond the text formatting markup shown above, here are some other formatting references:



Text on this page has been modified from Editing MediaWiki For Beginners and the Mediawiki help pages.

Glossary Links


Cite this page: Hill, M.A. (2019, April 26) Embryology Editing Basics. Retrieved from https://embryology.med.unsw.edu.au/embryology/index.php/Editing_Basics

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