h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Welcome to the guide
I'm Dastardly, a guardian angel, meaning that I look after newbies, and 'adopt' anyone who wants extra help.
I see that Bob's already given you a list of links, so I wont' bother. I'll just mention that if you click on a smiley you get taken to the smiley page, so you can make your own.

If you need a hand, then just ask me, and if you'd like to visit the angels we're here
http://www.bbc.co.uk/h2g2/guide/A467606

The best advice I can give is to explore, but if you need help, shout.

Hello!

It's the first chance i've had to reply really, i'm only just getting to grips with the 'personal space' bit. I was away so long it seems i got squatters, and you were one. Cheers for the offer of help, it's much appreciated.

The only real questions i have are:

Is there any way i can reset my preferences so that the most recent messages in a thread come up first?

If i make a journal entry can i erase it later, or alter details if they turn out to be untrue?

Squatter? Daaarhling, squatting is so last century. I hover.

First question- 'fraid not. But when you see the thread title like this

"Hello (last posting; 1 hour ago)"

if you click on the bit that tells you how long ago it was (in this case the 1 hour ago bit) you will at least be taken to the most recent page, which is handy if there are loads of pages.

As for the journal bit, well on your page there's a button by the entry saying 'click here to remove this journal entry from your space'. Which is exactly what it does. The entry won't be gone forever-all conversations stay in the archives- but it won't be on display which is the important bit.

As for editing- no can do I'm afraid. You'll have to delete the old entry, and write a new correct one. Sorry.

Cheers m'dear.

OK - so i don't really know the score with the morderation / discussion of guide entries, what is peer review, i've looked at several entries and made my own little comments, but how do you get things altered or ammended? Once an entry becomes an entry is it then too late? Are entries solely owned by one researcher?

OK - so i don't really know the score with the morderation / discussion of guide entries, what is peer review, i've looked at several entries and made my own little comments, but how do you get things altered or ammended? Once an entry becomes an entry is it then too late? Are entries solely owned by one researcher?

And how do i actually make a guide entry?

Having read the contribute section im still a bit in the dark as to
A: how i reference other articles, and
B: what happens next - how i update the entry

You're writing an article eh? Great

Right, this'll be a long post, sorry.

There should be a button on your page somewhere allowing you to contribute. If you use goo it'll be right at the bottom under the unedited entries, if you use alabaster(bleurgh) it's down the lefthand side at the top of the most recent entries column. Just press it and up comes the place to type your entry.

Within a day or so a moderator will look at it and decide whether it breaks the rules. If it doesn't, nothing'll happen. If it does, the entry will get removed and you'll get an email inviting you to make changes so it's within the rules. If the moderator isn't sure they'll refer it, meaning it gets pulled with a 'pending moderation' message, until the editors get round to checking it- a few days.

Every entry you write is part of the guide and can be found on the search engine. However, it will be part of the unedited guide. The EDITED guide is the bit that counts for most people, since it's the one presented to the public on the front page. To get an entry into the edited guide it has to go through Peer Review(there's a link to it at the top of every page). This is where you submit your entry to the forum at the bottom of the PR page and people comment on it at the forum. Three's no obligation for the author to make any changes his/her peers ask for, but if they'll improve the article it's a good idea to make the changes requested. Then hopefully a scout comes along and recommends it- scouts are the people who look for entries good enough for the guide.

After that it's weeks and weeks, but eventually it will be edited and appear in the guide

Updating; if the entry is unedited (and, of course, you wrote it) then you can edit it as much as you like- there'll be a nice 'edit entry' button on the right hand side under your name. If however, it's edited you lose the power to make changes; then you have to ask the editors to change it for you. This is so no researcher can put unsuitable stuff into the edited guide at a moments notice.

Referencing other entries; I'm not entirely sure what you mean. If you're talking about linking to them,it's pretty simple. You'll have to write your entry in Guide ML ( http://www.bbc.co.uk/h2g2/guide/C801 )and then use a link tag, which is also explained in the link above.

If there's something I haven't made clear then ask.

I've tried to add an entry on contemporary Chinese cinema, and i wanted to do a couple more on the key directors and cross reference them. The article is a broad cultural overview, and the individual ones would be more like reviews. I tried to contribute it but i don't think it worked. I'll add a filmography to it too if poss. How do i find it again now i've entered it?

You can find all your entries under the recent entries column, the article is here;
http://www.bbc.co.uk/h2g2/guide/A635113

In future I owuld suggest writing the entry on a porgramme like notepad, saving it so you'll always have a copy, and then copying it and pasting it to a guide entry. Seems a hassle, but it's nothing compared to when you're almost finished on an entry and the computer crashes

Sorry about the typos

BTW your Guide ML doesn't seem to have worked very well. Did you use all the right tags?

I don't think i used any tags, I was going to write the thing in word, but you get all that hassle with the punctuation don't you. So i did it in notepad as you suggested. Then cut and pated it into the form and that's what i got.

I spotted the link to it in my personal space as soon as i'd sent you the message. How do i improve it then?

Sorry, busy few days

Right, if you're after improving the content, the best place to go is the Writers Workshop
http://www.bbc.co.uk/h2g2/guide/Writing-Workshop
People ought to be able to give you some nice friendly advice there, but be prepared to wait a while for replies- it's incredibly slow. I would help but it's not my area of expertise, while at the WWS you'll find people who know what they're talking about.

As for the Guide-ML thing, the minimum you need to do is include the tag at the start of every paragraph, and the tag at the end. Also, you shouldn't use the < or > signs except for tags because it confuses the computer and other tags won't work.

Bye

Right. Nice one. Got it.




I think...

Can you help me out a little further on Guide ML i thought i'd got it figured out and then the infernal machine wouldn't accept my changes, kept telling me "Bad closing element BODY expecting P". It seems i have an incontinent entry. What do i do?

You closed your tags wrongly- you need NOT

That should sort your problems out, there aren't any other errors that I can see.

Doesn't seem to have made any difference. Guess i must have missed one...

Got it! Hooray. It actually looks quite nice, i'm a bit pleased!

Looking good. And I see you've put it into Peer Review