help:Basic Navigation  

ZAM Network Wikibase articles can be linked or cross-referenced for ease of navigation though the wiki.

Where you see text like this, it means there is a link another article or Wiki page with further information if you need it. Holding your mouse over the link will show you where a link will take you. This means that articles do not need to cover common ground in depth; instead, you are always one click away from more information on any point that has a link attached.

There are other links towards the end of most articles, for other articles of interest, relevant external web sites and pages, and reference material. At the end of the article are relevant categories which you can search and traverse in an interconnected hierarchy for further related information in a field.

Front Pages and Main Pages

For each game on our site that has a database (and one that doesn't) there is a subdomain, such as http://eq2.zam.com or http://ffxiv.zam.com. Simply going to that URL will land you on the News Front Page for that game, showing news specific to that game and some gaming-world-wide news. This is for new and upcoming information but is not real good for finding older, more established stuff.

Each game in the Wikibase also has a Main Page, named the same as the proper name of the game. If you are on a subdomain for a specific game, the Wiki link on the menubar should take you to that game's Main Page. Given our News Front Pages some have questioned why we have Game Main Pages? The Main Page is where the Community Managers (CMs) for that game will place a menu of helpful links as well as links to articles that explore or expand upon recent content, such as the most recent expansion or Live Event. The News page moves pretty fast and may not have links to the content you are looking for if it is older than a day or a month.

Also, not every game here has a database and subdomain and the whole nine yards. Some are "pure wiki" and do not have their own News Front Page. http://aion.zam.com is the exception. It has its own subdomain but its a pure wiki, with no database.

Orientation

Within our Wikibase content is separated by namespaces, which appear before the page name, or (suffixes) which naturally follow after. For example, Editing is in the Help: namespace. game database articles will be in a game db namespace, such as EQ2 Mob: or FFXIV Item:. Another example is your user page which is in the User: namespace. Every page in the wiki also has a Discuss panel which works just like our Forum/Comment system. You can switch between content and Discuss pages using the View and Dicuss links at the top of the wiki content panel of every page (whether integrated with the db or a standalone wiki page.

So why use the suffixes at all? - The Wikibase may seem segmented into separate areas by game but this is an illusion. ALL Wiki content on this site actually lives in one, gigantic, wiki. All pages for a game must be in the Category created for that game, such as Category:Everquest II or Category:World of Warcraft, in order for our Search engine to show you only relevant pages for your game. Without this, a search for "Warrior" would get results for every game that has a Warrior class (in other words, all of them). We use Game Tag Templates, such as {{EQ2}}, to easily add the correct category to a page, as well as add the game logo and a spiffy little box.

Further, we have to have a way to keep those classes separate so we use the suffix to disambiguate the wiki. Disambiguation is just a big word that means "providing a way to tell Warrior in Everquest II from Warrior in Aion".

Category browsing

Every article has a list at the bottom of all the categories it belongs to. For example, in the Aion Wikibase, the page Poeta (Aion Zone) shows:

Categories: Zones (Aion) | Public Outdoor (Aion Zone Type) | Elysea (Aion Sphere) | Aion

Each of these categories can be browsed and is linked to related categories in an interconnected hierarchy.

Header (top)

Above each article are some standard options for navigation and interaction:

ZAM logo - will take you to the News page for the subdomain you are currently on, or the site main page.

Search box - allows you to search other articles across the whole of the Wikibase. By default the search is restricted to the game you are viewing (if any).

Subdomain Menubar:
This is different for each subdomain.

Top tabs (above the article)

Each page in Wikibase contains an article (what you see by default), and a discussion page (Discuss). The number of comments, if any, will display next to Discuss.

• View - display the pages normal view. This is helpful if you were on one of the other tabs and want to go back to the normal view.
• Edit - this is the key to contributing to the Wikibase. When you click this button, you change from viewing an article or discussion about an article, to being able to edit the article.
• History - All editable pages on Wikibase have an associated page history, which consists of the old versions of the wikitext, as well as a record of the date and time (in UTC) of every edit, the username or IP address of the user who wrote it, and their edit summary.
• Media - attach one or more images (.jpg or .png) to the page. After uploading the Image System Identification Number is displayed under the picture in a standard Image link so you can copy it, then Edit the page and add your image.

ZAM Network Wikibase™ Help