Edit Page Help

A short reminder of what the page editor offers. In shortcuts, Mod means Ctrl on Windows and Linux and Cmd on a Mac. For the full guide, see Editing.

Start and save

• Choose Edit on a page to open the editor. You only see it if you have permission to edit.
• To make a page, use + New Article in the sidebar (shown when you are signed in), or link to a page that does not exist yet.
• Add a Change note to say what you did, then press Mod+S or choose Save. Cancel leaves without saving.
• The editor keeps a draft in your browser while you type, and offers to restore it if you come back.

Toolbar and keys

The toolbar also has heading, list, inline code, code block and table buttons. Type / at the start of a line for a menu of blocks such as tables, callouts and math.

Writing

• The editor takes Markdown. See TextFormattingRules for the syntax.
• Type [[ to search for a page to link, and [[Page# to link to one of its headings.
• Paste or drag an image into the editor to attach it, or use Attach.
• The side rail lists the page outline, backlinks and Unlinked mentions, with one-click linking.

Diagrams

A fenced code block whose language is mermaid renders as a diagram when the page is viewed. A plantuml block works the same way and suits deep class and activity diagrams; see Class and activity diagrams with PlantUML below. This Mermaid diagram is live:

flowchart LR
  Write --> Preview --> Save

To show diagram syntax as text instead of drawing it, add the word example after the language. The block below is written that way, so it appears as code:

flowchart LR
  Draft --> Review
  click Review "/wiki/EditPageHelp"

• To make a node open a wiki page, add a line click NodeId "/wiki/PageName". These links count as real page links, so they show up in backlinks, the Page Graph and broken-link reports.
• If a diagram has a syntax error, or is refused, the page shows its source together with the reason instead of a picture.
• The wiki refuses diagrams that contain %%{ ... }%% directives, a --- front matter block, click lines that call a function, links that are not http(s) or relative, or javascript: anywhere. Tooltips in click lines cannot contain a colon.
• Renaming a page does not yet update click links to it in diagrams, so check those after a rename.

Class and activity diagrams with PlantUML

Use a plantuml fence for class diagrams with deep structure, and for activity diagrams that need fork/join bars or swimlanes. Use Mermaid for everything else. This activity diagram is live:

@startuml
start
:Receive request;
fork
  :Check permissions;
fork again
  :Load page;
end fork
:Render response;
stop
@enduml

So is this class hierarchy, with an interface, an abstract class, a generic type and composition:

@startuml
interface PageProvider
abstract class AbstractProvider
class FileProvider
class Cache<T>
AbstractProvider ..|> PageProvider
FileProvider --|> AbstractProvider
FileProvider *-- Cache
@enduml

The example word works here too, so you can show the source as text:

@startuml
class Page [[/wiki/EditPageHelp]]
@enduml

• To link a shape to a wiki page, add [[/wiki/PageName]] after it, as above. These links count as real page links, so they appear in backlinks.
• @startuml diagrams are accepted, plus @startsalt wireframes and @startnwdiag network diagrams (which need their own start line). !include is refused except for <C4/...> libraries, images and {{ ... }} embedded sub-diagrams are refused, and a diagram can be at most 64 KB.
• A diagram that fails shows its source together with the reason, as Mermaid does.

Metadata

The Frontmatter tab edits the page's metadata (type, tags, cluster, summary and more) and checks it as you type. Save is disabled while an error is showing. See Frontmatter.

Conflicts

If someone saved the page after you opened it, you can overwrite their version, discard yours, or copy your text and reload.