SoFWiki

Hi Folks,

Welcome to the instructions page for building your own wiki. A wiki is a particular kind of website, that's easy to edit and made to share. It's a web space that's made up of different pages. As a first step, listen to me (Al) talk a bit about what a wiki is, what wikispaces is and why you might want to build or use a wiki. Look at me when you've read this and you're ready to listen.

Setting up your wiki
There are 5 things you need to learn how to do in order to create and edit your wiki. I've listed them below. That list are links -- you can click on each one and go to the section you want to learn.
 * 1) Create an account
 * 2) Choose a theme
 * 3) Edit your homepage
 * 4) Add and edit further pages (including adding links to your new pages)
 * 5) Use your navigation pane

Let's start by creating an account

1. Creating your account
Here is a step-by-step set of instructions for creating your account. Call me over if you need help with any step
 * 1) Open another tab (or another window) in your browser and go to the wiki spaces homepage. You can do both by clicking on this link: http://www.wikispaces.com
 * 2) Click on the "I'm a Student" button in the middle of the page
 * 3) In the middle of the page that opens, click on the "Sign up and start your wiki" button
 * 4) Enter a username, password, and email address to create a new account. You should use your SoF email to create the account and make your username some part of your email (for instance, my email address is alsylvia@yahoo.com. I would make my username alsylvia).
 * 5) Click on the "Yes" button underneath the "Make a Wiki?" question
 * 6) In the right column that appears, give your wiki a PROFESSIONAL name (Remember, you may be using this wiki for presentations and such. You'll want to put in a name you are NOT embarrassed to type in front of everyone).
 * 7) Leave the "Protected" radial button pressed. Don't make yours a public wiki
 * 8) In the "Wiki Type" pull down menu, highlight //K-12 Education (Primary and Secondary)//
 * 9) A new checkbox will appear under "Educational Use." Certify you are a student by checking the box.
 * 10) Before you click the "Join" button at the bottom, open a new browser window and get to your email. Email your advisor your username, password and wiki name exactly as you've entered them on this page
 * 11) Go back to the page and click the "Join" button in the bottom, left corner
 * 12) Your new wiki homepage along with a "Getting Started" page will open

Congratulations! You have a wiki! Now, let's personalize it!

2. Choose a theme
Here is a step-by-step set of instruction for choosing a theme. Call me over is you need help with an step. > > 1) The Banner runs along the top. It should be green and have your Wiki Name on it > 2) The page is the big white space on the left just underneath the banner. It should say "home" in the upper left hand corner and have an "Edit" bar on the right. > 3) The navigation pane: It's the grey box on the left that has white links in it. The links are "Wiki Home" and "Projects" and "Pages and Files," etc. >
 * 1) You are now looking at your new wiki homepage. Please identify the three areas of the homepage that are important:
 * 1) To choose your theme, you are going to need to find the "Manage Wiki" link in your navigation pane. Find that and click on it.
 * 2) Notice that the banner and the navigation pane have stayed the same, but the page area has changed. That's the way of wikis. When you travel to different pages, the banner and the navigation bar will stay the same. But the page will be different.
 * 3) On the "Manage Wiki" page, notice the headings down the left side. Find the one that says "Settings." Under "Settings" click on the link labeled "Look and Feel," it is under the icon of the paint brush and color palette.
 * 4) On the page that appears, click on the "Themes and Colors" link
 * 5) On the page that appears, choose a theme. There are 14 Themes to choose from. Please pick a theme and color. Please do NOT create a custom theme at this time. You can aways go back and change it. For now, just choose one of the stock themes.
 * 6) PLEASE NOTE: You must know where your banner and navigation pane are on your new theme. Make a note of them.
 * 7) Click the "Apply" button underneath the color choices.
 * 8) Find your navigation pane and click on the "Wiki Home" link

You have now chosen a theme and colors. Don't fret if it's not exactly what you want. You can go back to manage this wiki and change the theme at any time. You can even customize your wiki using your own material. Please do that on your own, though. For now, it's time to add some content to your wiki.

3. Edit your homepage
Once you've got your theme chosen and the look you want, it's time to add text to your homepage. Here's how you do that: > **B** = Bold (highlight some text and bold it) > //I// = Italics > __U__ = underline > T = Format the text (change the size, color, alignment, etc.) > Normal = styles. There are 7 different header styles you can use. > 1,2,3 = create a numbered list > • = create a bullet list > --- = put in a horizontal line > Link = put in a hypertext link to another webpage > File = upload and insert a file > Widget = insert a small program > Table = insert a table > Comment = add a comment > arrow left = Undo > arrow right = redo > Preview = see what the page will look like when you are done > Cancel = stop editing and revert back to a previous version of the page > Save = save the page and exit editing mode
 * 1) On your "home" page, notice the bar in the upper-right corner that says "Edit"
 * 2) Click on the word "Edit"
 * 3) Notice how your banner and navigation pane have all gone dim and a new editing bar has appeared over the top of the page. You are now in the page editor and are ready to edit. The page editor works just like other word processing apps. You can click anywhere on the page and edit the text (the words).
 * 4) The editing bar at the top allows you to format the text (that means you can make it bigger, smaller, different colors, etc.) The bar also allows you to include links to other websites, or to other pages in the wiki. Here is a description of each button
 * 1) Change the text on your homepage. Make sure you try to bold, italics and underline some words. Try changing the text color and adding at least one heading
 * 2) When you are through, hit "Save"
 * 3) Notice how the editing bar disappears and your banner and navigation pane come back to full illumination.

Congratulations! You have just edited your homepage! You may return to it at any time, but for now, we're going to add pages to your wiki and link them to your homepage.

4. Add and edit further pages
If you've gotten this far, you have an account, chosen a theme, and edited your homepage. Now we're going to add pages to your wiki.

Let's say that you are using your wiki to build the portfolio you will be showing at exhibition. You are going to want to have at least one page for each class -- you don't want everything all jumbled up. You also might want a cool page for an introduction, plus other pages to hold stuff from other special classes, projects or parts of your learning life that you want to show off. So let's start making other pages
 * 1) In your navigation pane, click on the plus sign (+) that is next to the "Pages and Files" link.
 * 2) You are now on the new page generator box. Give your new page a one-word name (for now just put English) in the "Page Name" box
 * 3) You can skip the "tags" box; that's for complex wiki's. Hit the "Create" button at the bottom of the box
 * 4) You are now on your new page. Feel free to put in some text just to try it out.
 * 5) Hit the "Save" button on the editing bar.
 * 6) Now we need to go back to your homepage and put a link to your new page. Click on the "Wiki Home" link in your navigation pane
 * 7) You are now on your home page. Click on the "Edit" button on your home page
 * 8) Somewhere on the page type in the words "Click Here for my English page"
 * 9) Highlight the words "Click Here" that you just typed in
 * 10) Click on the "Link" button on the editing bar
 * 11) You have now opened up the "Link" box. This box has 3 different pages. They are listed on the left column: Wiki Link, External Link and Anchor. We're going to be creating a Wiki Link -- that's a link to a page within your wiki. On the left, you can see the "Link Text" box already has the words that you highlighted before clicking the link button: "Click Here." You can also see the name of your wiki in the "Wiki" box. You need to alter the "Page Name" box.
 * 12) Click on the "choose an existing page" link directly below the "Page Name" box.
 * 13) Pull down the arrow that appears next to the "Page Name" box and highlight English
 * 14) Click the "Add Link" button.
 * 15) Click "Save" in the editing bar

Congratulations, you have now linked your English Page to your homepage. Click on the "Click Here" link and watch it open up your English page. You can also add links to other websites. Buy using the "External Link" portion of the "Link" box, you can easily link to webpages anywhere on the internet. Now you can add as many pages as you'd like and can link them to your home page. But now, we have to make it easy for folks to navigate around you wiki once they've left the home page. Let's use your navigation pane next.

5. Use your navigation pane
Using your navigation page to get around is simple. Look at the pane now.
 * 1) There is an "All Pages" link at the top of the pane. Click on the arrow at the left of that link
 * 2) All your wiki pages will appear below the arrow, including the home page. Click on any of those links to go to any of your pages

It's that simple. You can alter your navigation pane if you'd like. Editing it is like editing a page. At the bottom of your navigation pane is a little link. It is in gray and it says "edit navigation." Use that link to edit the pane.

That's all for now, folks. If you have any questions or problems that you or your advisor can't answer, feel free to email me at alsylvia@yahoo.com