Editing Help:Categories

Categories are one of the ways we organize the articles on the site so that our readers and editors can find pages with similar content quickly. The category system we use is hierarchical, with [[:Category:Main]] on the top. Articles are placed in the best category possible, and occasionally multiple categories if the circumstances call for it. See the [[Help:Categories Overview|category hierarchy]] to see how they are organized.

==How to use Categories==
To place an article in a category, you simply add a link to the category on the bottom of the page you are editing, for exmaple:

 <code><nowiki>[[Category:Help]]</nowiki></code>

would add the page to a category named "Help", which is exactly what we have done on this page, you can see that at the bottom of the page a link to the help category has been added. Any number of category tags may be added to the page, it will be listed in all of them. (see [[Help:Categories Overview|Categories Overview]] for a list of existing categories). 

Note:
* Each page and each image should be labelled with at least one subcategory or one overall category. 
* Many of the [[Help:Templates|Templates]] used in the wiki automatically tag a page with the appropriate category.


==Sort order in the Categories==
Normally the page added to the category will be listed according to their page name. However, you can specify a "sortkey" that will dictate where the page will appear, alphabetically, within the category. This is achieved by using adding a second option in addition to the Category name from before, for example to add this page under 'C' for '''C'''ategory, rather than 'H' for '''H'''elp:Categories you would use:

 <code><nowiki>[[Category:Help|Categories]]</nowiki></code>

Note that we used 'Categories' as the sort parameter.  Without this the page would be listed under 'H' for 'Help:Categories', instead of under 'C', which is more useful.  Other situations where you might want to use the sort parameter is when you have articles about people that are titled as <code>FirstName LastName</code> but within the category you want them listed as <code>LastName, FirstName</code>.

Another way to sort the article in the correct letter without the namespace is

 <code><nowiki>[[Category:Help|{{PAGENAME}}]]</nowiki></code>

This is extremly helpful when using templates which include a category tag.

''Note: the {sort} parameter does '''not''' affect how the page title is displayed within the category listing, just how it is ordered.  In the above example, the link to this page will still be 'Help:Categories', and not 'Categories' as you might expect!''

==Creating a Category Page==
New category pages can be [[Help:Starting a new page|created]] like any other pages – by clicking on redlinks or entering the name in the search box and clicking "Go". If you intended to create the new category, add it to the page as if it exists, you will notice the category will show up in red. A category page can be edited like any other page. The article portion of the category is where the introductory text explaining the category contents is provided, followed by automatically generated lists of pages belonging to the category.

* Note: If you want to add or restructure some existing categories, it is best to discuss your plans with others working in the same areas, or at least to announce your intentions.

==See Also==
* [[Help:Categories Overview|Category hierarchy]].
* [[Wikipedia:Help:Category|Help:Category]]
* [[Wikipedia:Wikipedia:FAQ/Categorization|Wikipedia:FAQ/Categorization]] 

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[[Category:Help|Categories]]