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

... and welcome to h2g2.

I see you're entering into the spirit of a British site by mentioning the weather.

I'm one of the <./>ACEs</.> (Assistant Community Editors). We are a team of volunteers who try to help new researchers for the guide find their way around. You can click on the link I made with that acronym in order to find out more. To find out more about anyone, click on the link made by their nickname (eg at the top of any conversation postings) to go to their personal space. Lurking is quite acceptable on h2g2.

One thing h2g2 has a lot of, as well as researchers, is these <./>Smileys</.>. You can use them in your personal space and other articles, conversations and journal entries. You just type the shortcut text and they appear as if by magic on preview or posting. For example: we even know where our towels are (< towel > without the spaces becomes ) though the lemon-scented napkins have yet to arrive.

You expressed a particular interest in Douglas Adams. If you look at the URL in your browser, you will see a small tribute to him in the naming of this area of the BBC's site as DNA. You probably won't be surprised to find his personal space at U42 (just click on the link made by that number) - though it has been updated since his death. However, he left a welcome message of his own on the site here: <./>Welcome-DNA</.>.

Here are a few more links you might like to try. A660340 is a list of "Clubs and Societies" on h2g2. You will find more cellists at U150368, the Musicians Guild. <./>Askh2g2</.> and <./>MiscChat</.> are good places to start or join a random conversation. You could use the infinite improbability drive on the "Front Page" if you don't know where you want to go or <./>search</.> if you do. There are already some articles on astronomy under life, the universe and everything. See the guide entries too important to be merely a number at <./>NamedEntries</.>.

Above all, have fun and don't panic. If you do find yourself tempted to panic, click the "h2g2 Help" link on the left. It may help.

Now, if you'll excuse me, there are probably other things I should be doing, but I'll be back if you call for help (ie reply to this message).

I have a few questions for you on how to post Guide entries, and what can be done with them.
1) Can you put pictures and diagrams in entries? If so, how?
2) Can any other type of multimedia be put into an entry?
3) Can links to websites be put into entries?
4) Can links to other entries be added to entries?
Thanks.
-Bill

Guide entries can be in plain text (like conversation posts) or Guide-ML (see the options at the bottom when you edit your page). Guide-ML is like HTML. So if you've met that you've got a head start. See <./>DontPanic-GuideML</.> or the new Guide-ML for beginners at A985773.

1. In plain text you can only use smileys, but see the <./>GuideML-PictureLibrary</.>.

2. No, though you can link to it on an external site.

3. Yes as long as you are not then just making an advert page for something commercial (very non-BBC that). In plain text just typing something such as http://www.bbc.co.uk will automatically get you a link made by the parser. Guide-ML requires more effort but allows greater flexibility.

4. Yes and this is very common. Links you make also show up in the right hand panel of a page. Again in plain text just typing the U-number or A-number will do it (as I did above) but Guide-ML requires the LINK tag etc.

Thanks alot for your help. If I need to talk to you again, how should I contact you?

Well you can continue to reply to this message. I don't unsubscribe from conversations where I've ACEd someone, just in case they do need more help. Otherwise you can click on the link made by my nickname on any of these posts to get to my personal space and then click on the link there to "leave a message".

There are lots of other <./>ACEs</.> and Gurus you can ask if I'm not around. Just follow those links to the volunteer pages and pick one or leave a message on those pages. Any time you ask a question on one of the help or support type pages I might be the one to pick it up and answer. Actually I'm more likely to be one of a whole pile of people who leap in and try to answer.