Help:User page

From UBC Wiki

A user page is a page about a UBC wiki user; someone who registered on the wiki, and is (most probably) a contributor.

If you have registered, you can create your own user page. Your user page is linked in the top right. More importantly, others will see links to your user page from various places which assist wiki collaboration. This includes the “Recent changes” and “page history” displays (See Help:Tracking changes). You can also link to your user page within text of a wiki page, which is mainly useful on talk pages when you sign your name.

Using an Alias on the UBC Wiki

By default, the your UBC Wiki username and user page corresponds to your CWL username. If you would prefer to use an alias on the UBC Wiki, you can send an email to lt.hub@ubc.ca requesting that your username be changed. Please include a link to your current user page and a preferred alias if you have it (otherwise one will be randomly generated). You username will then be changed - please note that this change is universal and will apply to all work you have done on the UBC Wiki, including edits in the past. If you are using the wiki for course work, please let your instructor know what your alias is.

What to put on your user page

User pages are just as flexible as any other wiki page, and it's a page all about you, so generally people will leave you to freely write your user page in whatever format you like. It's a feature to help other people know who you are, and to bring the online community closer together. Think of it as a “profile” page. You might like to mention where you are from and what your job is. You can also state what your main areas of interest are in relation to the topic of the wiki, and describe contributions you have made or areas where you are interested in contributing.

User subpages

You can add subpages to your user page using the following syntax:

User:YourUsername/SubpageName

Your user pages are your own space. You can add any type of content as a subpage and it's a great space on the wiki for adding pages about your personal research, projects, presentations, etc.

Other people's user pages

As mentioned above, you will see links to other people's user pages, in various places throughout the wiki.

User Contributions

When viewing another person's user page, an additional link “user contributions" appears in the “tools” of the sidebar. This takes you to a list of all of this user's wiki edits. Use this to get an idea of how prolific a contributor somebody is, or to track down edits made by a user who is causing trouble/making bad wiki edits.

Editing someone else's page

It's generally considered bad etiquette to rewrite or reword another person's user page. Editing is not disallowed, but you should avoid adding information (or especially opinions) which might be misinterpreted as coming from that user, in situations where this could potentially cause upset. Some types of edit are widely acceptable, and unlikely to cause upset:

  • Fixing internal links, when a page has been moved or deleted
  • Fixing broken external links
  • Categorizing or fixing categories of user pages.

User talk pages

Every user page has an associated talk page; a "user talk page". This is a special kind of talk page, for leaving messages directed at a particular user. See Help:Talk pages#User talk pages.

Link to a user page

To create a link to the user page of the user that clicks that link, use Special:MyPage.