Hello there. My name is Steel1943. I have been registered on Wikipedia since December 2006, but did not perform my first edit until October 2011, and ironically enough, the edit was a request on an article's talk page to edit a semi-protected article ... and then, my second edit was not until June 2012. It was a slow start, but since then, I have amassed over 60,000 edits. Why do I edit and help Wikipedia? Honestly, it's for the knowledge, and attempting to understand how one of the most viewed web sites in the world is able to run as efficiently as it does. I now know that due to the efforts of volunteers who dedicate the time out of their lives to bring forth knowledge that can be viewed by anyone, Wikipedia has flourished into the mass of encyclopedic-grade articles that it has become today.
I remember when Wikipedia was just starting out during the beginning of the millennium when I was just an "IP."; a Wikipedia reader with no intent to edit (and didn't edit) who saw the value of Wikipedia, and watched it grow into the site that it is today. I even recall the "old days" of underscores and CamelCase. I hope to help the knowledge on this site grow, as well as make sure that no good information is lost ... but, at the same time, not waste time trying to protect something where insurance measures have been put into place for lost material; thank goodness that the ability to revert most deletions of material exists as a function here!
I used to have a whole list of goals listed in this section. However, due to my interests in helping Wikipedia constantly changing as time progresses, I removed it. Essentially, what I mainly do randomly revolves around these points:
Page |
Description |
Wikipedia:Article titles |
Explains naming conventions for titles of articles in Wikipedia. |
Wikipedia:Articles for deletion |
This page can be used to nominate articles for deletion, as well as add comments and votes for articles that are currently nominated for deletion. |
Wikipedia:Categorizing redirects |
Provides information about adding redirects into categories. |
Wikipedia:Criteria for speedy deletion |
Provides information for how to nominate articles and other pages that can be deleted without having to start a discussion on Wikipedia:Articles for deletion. |
Wikipedia:Disambiguation pages with links |
Explains how to fix links that unintentionally link to disambiguation pages. Also, this page lists a contest that happens every month for editors to have a friendly competition to see who can fix the most unintentional links to disambiguation pages. (For example, making a link towards Programming link towards Computer programming instead.) |
Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion |
This page can be used to nominate redirects for deletion, as well as add comments and votes for redirects that are currently nominated for deletion. |
Wikipedia:Requests for page protection |
This page is used to request any page in Wikipedia for various forms of page protection. |
Wikipedia:Requested moves |
This page can be used to recommend pages for title changes that could be considered controversial (meaning that another editor might disagree with the title change.) |
Wikipedia:Requested moves/Technical requests |
This page can be used to request pages for title changes that could not be considered controversial. Some examples include title misspellings, commas placed incorrectly, incorrect capitalization, etc. |
Wikipedia:Requests for permissions |
This page is used to request additional user permissions (such as reviewer, rollback, file mover, account creator, autopatrolled, and confirmed.) |
Wikipedia:Service awards |
This page contains a list of awards that can be placed on your own user page, stating how long you have been a Wikipedian and how many edits you have done. (Yes, talking to you directly is intentional here.) |
Wikipedia:Template messages |
The general list of messages that can be placed via templates (also known as "canned" messages.) |
Wikipedia:Template messages/Cleanup |
Templates that turn into automatic messages that pertain to marking articles that need to be cleaned up in certain ways. |
Wikipedia:Template messages/Deletion |
Templates that turn into automatic messages that pertain to either deleting pages, or the history of a page being proposed for deletion. |
Wikipedia:Template messages/Redirect pages |
Templates that can be placed on redirect pages, most of which put the redirect into categorie(s). |
Wikipedia:Template messages/User talk namespace |
This list contains various automatic messages ("canned" responses) that could be placed on a user's talk page (such as notifying them that an article they have created is up for deletion, warning them to stop edit warring, etc.) |
Category:Infobox templates |
A category that contains several templates that are used for infoboxes. |
Category:People and person infobox templates |
A category that lists infobox templates that can be used for articles about people. |
Category:Wikipedia articles with an infobox request |
A category that lists articles that need an infobox. |
Special:BookSources |
A tool that helps locate books by ISBN. |
Special:Contributions |
A tool that is used to search for a list of an editor's contributions. |
Special:PrefixIndex |
A tool that lists all articles starting with whatever text is entered. |
Special:Search |
This tool searches for articles by name, rather than automatically going to the article that is typed in the search box. For example, if "Lady Gaga" were typed in the search box and enter was pressed, normally, it would direct automatically to Lady Gaga; on the Special:Search page, instead, it looks for any articles that might be related to the "Lady Gaga" text. |
Special:Log |
This tool searches an article title, and shows if an article at that title has been moved or deleted in the past. This tool can also display what user rights a user has, and when new user accounts are created. |
Template:Cite book |
This template is used when writing articles as a way to enter citations that come from books. |
Template:Cite web |
This template is used when writing articles as a way to enter citations that come from internet pages/web sites. |
Template:Compact ToC |
A template that can be used to create a custom table of contents on an article. |
Template:R template index |
A list of templates that put redirects tagged with them into certain categories. (Similiar to Wikipedia:Template messages/Redirect pages.) |
Template:TOC index |
Template that can be used to list a table of contents that can help alphabetize groups of index pages sorted alphabetically. |
Edit counter |
This tool helps count edits made. However, it loses a bit of its usefulness once more than 45,000 edits have been made. Right now, it's set up to look up my stats. To look up another user's stats instead, in the URL that appears when this link is clicked on, replace my name in the URL (Steel1943) with the name of the user that you would like to see's stats. |
Some sort of Class/Importance lookup tool |
This tool helps find what class and importance some articles have been assessed as on their talk pages. (I had previous called this link "Some sort of Class/Importance lookup tool.") |
MediaWiki:Help:Magic words |
This is a guide for "Magic Words" used in templates, or to do certain functions outside of templates. |
MediaWiki:Help:Extension:ParserFunctions |
This is an advanced guide on how to use parser functions in templates (functions such as "#if", "#ifeq", etc.) |
MediaWiki:Help:Formatting |
This is a brief explanation of formatting codes such as <code>, <span style>, and <nowiki>. |
Wikipedia:Lua |
Something I promised myself I would understand better some day ... basically, this is "How to Use Lua Code in Templates: the Guide"! |
My Subpages |
This link shows all of the subpages of this page (User:Steel1943). |
I'm here, and editing. So, enjoy your time here on Wikipedia. And don't worry, Wikipedians won't bite... well, most of the time. --Steel1943 (talk)