Oddworld Wiki:Article layout guidelines

This page contains the Oddworld Wiki's article layout guidelines. It describes the uniform style in which most articles should be structured where applicable.

Section order and naming
Below you can find a table that contains the standard article layout that is used across the Oddworld Wiki. Some sections are mandatory for each article while others are optional. It is good practice to create any sections that you think belong on a page, even if you don't intend to write them in that moment. In such cases the Section template may be used to ask for the help of other editors. | style="text-align: center;" | No | style="text-align: center;" | Yes | style="text-align: center;" | No {| class="article-table" ! style="width:12em" | Layout item ! style="width:5em" | Headline !Required ! Explanation | style="text-align: center;" | No | style="text-align: center;" | No
 * Delete template
 * style="text-align: center;" | No
 * style="text-align: center;" | No
 * style="text-align: center;" | No
 * Only used for pages that are nominated for deletion. See Template:Delete.
 * "For" template
 * style="text-align: center;" | No
 * style="text-align: center;" | No
 * No
 * Template:For is used to make a reader aware of other articles they may have been looking for that have a similar name.
 * Page management templates
 * No
 * No
 * Page management templates are used if you notice that something is out of order with a certain article or section and want to bring it to the attention of other editors or administrators. If the issue affects the whole article, these boxes should be placed at the top of an article; if only a section is affected, they should be placed just below the headline of the respective section. The only exception are stub templates; see Stub templates below.
 * Page management templates are used if you notice that something is out of order with a certain article or section and want to bring it to the attention of other editors or administrators. If the issue affects the whole article, these boxes should be placed at the top of an article; if only a section is affected, they should be placed just below the headline of the respective section. The only exception are stub templates; see Stub templates below.

For a list of page management boxes, please refer to our template overview. | style="text-align: center;" | Yes
 * Infobox
 * style="text-align: center;" | No
 * style="text-align: center;" | No
 * Yes
 * The purpose of infoboxes is to summarize data relating to the article. Ideally every article on the wiki should have an infobox of some description, though there are exceptions. Always add an infobox for characters, locations, items, cutscenes, species and levels.
 * Lead section
 * style="text-align: center;" | No
 * Yes
 * Articles should generally start with a lead section which is not more than a few sentences. Its purpose is to provide a short definition or overview of the article itself; after reading it, a reader should know what the article is about.
 * Articles should generally start with a lead section which is not more than a few sentences. Its purpose is to provide a short definition or overview of the article itself; after reading it, a reader should know what the article is about.

If possible, the article title should be the subject of the first sentence; alternative titles should be mentioned in the lead section as well. For information on writing the article itself, see our editing guidelines. | style="text-align: center;" | No | style="text-align: center;" | Yes | style="text-align: center;" | No | style="text-align: center;" | No  | style="text-align: center;" | No  | style="text-align: center;" | No  | style="text-align: center;" | No  | style="text-align: center;" | No  | style="text-align: center;" | No  | style="text-align: center;" | Yes
 * Table of contents (TOC)
 * style="text-align: center;" | No
 * Yes
 * The table of contents (TOC) will automatically appear in articles with a minimum of four headings, just above the first headline. This behaviour can be changed by using  or  .   forces a table of contents to appear wherever it is placed in an article, no matter how many headlines the article has.   results in no table of contents ever being shown.
 * colspan="4" style="text-align: center;" |Article content
 * colspan="4" style="text-align: center;" |Article content
 * colspan="4" style="text-align: center;" |Article content
 * Notes
 * style="text-align: center;" | Yes
 * style="text-align: center;" | Yes
 * No
 * Notes contain short bits of trivia and cultural references that don't have a natural place elsewhere in the article. These notes should always appear in the form of a bullet point list.
 * Appearances
 * style="text-align: center;" | Yes
 * style="text-align: center;" | Yes
 * No
 * A bullet point list of all official games, books or other media the subject of the article has appeared in, written in full with the Oddworld: prefix.
 * See also
 * style="text-align: center;" | Yes
 * style="text-align: center;" | Yes
 * No
 * The purpose of this section is to list links to related topics on this wiki which may not have been linked within the article content.
 * External links
 * style="text-align: center;" | Yes
 * style="text-align: center;" | Yes
 * No
 * Links to external (i.e. off-wiki) sites which are not references.
 * Gallery
 * style="text-align: center;" | Yes
 * style="text-align: center;" | Yes
 * No
 * The main place in the article to place related images. If the article has many images, consider breaking the section up in sub sections.
 * Videos
 * style="text-align: center;" | Yes
 * style="text-align: center;" | Yes
 * No
 * The main place to post related videos.
 * References
 * style="text-align: center;" | Yes
 * style="text-align: center;" | Yes
 * Yes
 * Ideally all articles should have at least one reference, and thus should always include a reference list.
 * Stub templates
 * style="text-align: center;" | No
 * style="text-align: center;" | No
 * No
 * Stub templates mark an article as being too short to provide more than rudimentary information about a subject. If you think an article could or should be expanded, place the stub template at the end below the references.
 * Navboxes
 * style="text-align: center;" | No
 * style="text-align: center;" | No
 * Yes
 * Navboxes are navigational aids which allow easy access to other articles in a group the current article belongs to. They should be placed at the end of an article, just below the references and stub template. The most article-specific navboxes should be highest and the least-specific lowest.
 * Copyright notice
 * style="text-align: center;" | No
 * style="text-align: center;" | No
 * No
 * If the article contains largely copyrighted content gotten from another source (level guides, interviews, etc.) the copyright template should be placed at the very bottom of the article to give the proper attribution and backlink to the original content.
 * }