Malazan Wiki:Manual of Style

Malazan Wiki Policies
Manual of Style • Layout Guide
Spoilers • Rules

This is a work in progress. Please make changes as required or discuss ideas/proposals on the talk page.

Layout guide

Main article: Malazan Wiki:Layout Guide

Display those sections required for the article in the following order

Title tag – Usually not required. Used to alter title (e.g. to italicise it).
Maintenance templates - for example work in progress note
Icon templates - for example spoiler safe icons
Infobox – See Category:Infobox templates for examples.
Opening quote – A simple quote about the subject of the article.
Summary – A short introduction about 'page name'. Avoid blatant spoilers. See here for spoiler guidelines.
Main article – Main body of information - sub-divided under book-headers
History - Historical information about pagename
Trivia – For supporting 'trivial' information for example background info from interview
Speculations – For speculations which are well founded or widely publicised.
Cover gallery – See Gardens of the Moon#Cover gallery for an example.
Appearances – If you want to list publications where this person, item, place, etc has appeared or been mentioned. Not generally in use - for characters see DPs for appearance info
Notes and references – Should have the {{Reflist}} template in it.
See also – For related articles that are not otherwise linked to in the article.
External links – For linking to relevant information that is not on the wiki.
Navigation box – See here for a list: Navigation templates.
Category – See here for a list: Malazan Wiki:Category index
Interwiki links – Such as links to the article in other languages.

Variable layout applies:

Additional layout info:

Maximum widths

Because of the limitations of the Oasis skin, there are constraints on how wide inserted items can be on various parts of the page.

Text

Maximum widths of text, tables, divs, etc on a page is 650px. After that it will start to overlap other parts of the page or, in the case of tables, a horizontal scroll bar will appear on the table.

Images general

Maximum widths of individual images is 680px as they can be slightly larger without creating a problem however, images of that size are used only in exceptional cases. For images on article pages that need to be large (e.g. diagrams) set a maximum width of 450px
The IOTW has a maximum height of 600px
Slideshows on artist's pages are set to 600px
Infobox images are automatically set a maximum width of 270px

Images within content pages

Add the thumbnail code thumb to all images
In addition, for portrait images add a width code of 140px

Using only thumbnails will automatically set a maximum width of 250px, which is ideal for landscape images, however, in some cases due to image properties, you may need to add an individual width code ?px, to adjust to other images on the page. See editing history for Silchas Ruin for examples of standard thumbnails. Where there are only one image one or two images on a page, they may be set slightly larger but not exceeding 300px.

Writing style

Accurate

Our main aim is to accurately reflect the information given in the books. Edits need to be presented as factual and objectively as possible. For example, if the book is ambiguous about something the edit needs to also reflect this. Choose your words carefully - the phrase 'were able to do something' implies a lot of things which the phrase 'did something' does not.

On topic

Every sentence should have some direct connection to the topic of the article. For example if the topic is 'Darujhistan' then 'was the largest, most influential and last of the Free Cities on Genabackis' is on topic. Adding 'the other ones being X Y Z' would be going off on a unnecessary tangent as 'Free Cities' should be linked and that info would be found there.

Referenced

NEVER add information based just on memory. All edits should be made based on the editor having just read the relevant information in the book. Add a minimum of book and chapter reference to your edit - if unsure about formatting a ref, add the source in brackets.

See Help:Referencing

Impartial

Do not use emotional language not contained in the writing. Avoid using expressions like 'luckily', 'sadly', 'unfortunately' etc. when they are your own evaluation of a situation. For example use 'a large battle' rather than 'the largest battle ever' unless it is a case of 'character X described the battle as the largest ever'. Rule of thumb - if it isn't in the book, don't make it up for the Wiki.

Spelling

Both authors of the Malazan world are Canadian therefore Canadian English will be used as the baseline language of this wiki.

Tense

Articles are generally written in past tense because there is no omnivalent present time in the Malazan world from the various readers' point of view. However, for real World articles, which include authors pages, as well as all book and chapter summaries, present tense is used. Within those book/chapter summaries, past perfect progressive is used where a characters recollect events of another past (see NoK Chapter 1 for example). Other than that, we write like historians in the future of the Malazan world writing about its past.

Linking

The general rule is that the first time linkable text appears on that page it should be linked to and on each subsequent instance it is unlinked (infoboxes and navboxes are exceptions here).

Very short articles

A subject may have only a single piece of information about it that can be sourced from a primary reference. In this case it can still have it's own article. All named characters should have their own page.

Theme

Colours

Hex codes for theme colours
Main title	Subsequent titles	Background
#611E03	#8A3931	#EDD9C5

Links in titles need to be made white. Here is an example of how to do it: [[Gardens of the Moon|<font color=white>Gardens of the Moon</font>]]

New theme

Colour area	Hex code	Notes
Primary highlight	#BA7041
Secondary highlight	#7C7F83
Background	#E5E6E6
Parchment	#FFF9E6
Links	#45A174
Visited links	#804488
External website links	#428EBD
Visited external website links	#3C57AA
Red-links (empty pages)	#BA0000
Visited red-links	#A85858
Border lines	#AAA
Spoiler notices	#D00

Standard abbreviations

Linking codes and written abbreviations

Full Title	Linking Codes	Preferred Written Abbreviation
Gardens of the Moon	GM	GotM
Deadhouse Gates	DG	DhG
Memories of Ice	MI	MoI
House of Chains	HC	HoC
Midnight Tides	MT	MT
The Bonehunters	BH	tBh
Reaper's Gale	RG	RG
Toll the Hounds	TH	TtH
Dust of Dreams	DD	DoD
The Crippled God	CG	tCG
The Complete Malazan Book of the Fallen		CMBotF

Full Title	Linking Codes	Preferred Written Abbreviation
Night of Knives	NK	NoK
Return of the Crimson Guard	RCG	RotCG
Stonewielder	SW	SW
Orb Sceptre Throne	OST	OST
Blood and Bone	BB	BaB
Assail	A	Assail

Full Title	Linking Codes	Preferred Written Abbreviation
Blood Follows	BF	BF
The Healthy Dead	HD	tHD
The Lees of Laughter's End	LLE	tLoLE
Crack'd Pot Trail	CPT	CPT
The Wurms of Blearmouth	WB	tWoB
The Fiends of Nightmaria	FN	tFoN
Untitled 7th B&KB novel	??	??
Untitled 8th B&KB novel	??	??
Untitled 9th B&KB novel	??	??

Full Title	Linking Codes	Preferred Written Abbreviation
Forge of Darkness	FD	FoD
Fall of Light	FL	FoL
Walk in Shadow	WS	WiS

Full Title	Linking Codes	Preferred Written Abbreviation
Dancer's Lament	DL	DL
Deadhouse Landing	DHL	DhL
Kellanved's Reach	KR	KR

Full Title	Linking Codes	Preferred Written Abbreviation
The God is Not Willing	??	??
Untitled 2nd book	??	??
Untitled 3rd book	??	??

Using linking codes as written abbreviations is also acceptable (except for Assail). Using allcaps versions is also ok.

Edition abbreviations

Bantam

Edition Name	Preferred Abbreviation
Trade Paperback	UK TPB
Mass-market Paperback	UK MMPB
Hardcover	UK HC/HB

Tor

Edition Name	Preferred Abbreviation
Trade Paperback	US TPB
Mass-market Paperback	US MMPB
Hardcover	US HC
Science Fiction Book Club	US SFBC

Subterranean Press

Edition Name	Preferred Abbreviation
Numbered edition	Sub Press No.
Lettered edition	Sub Press Let.

PS Publishing

Edition Name	Preferred Abbreviation
Trade Paperback	PSP TPB
Mass-market Paperback	PSP MMPB
Various Hardcover editions	PSP HC

Night Shade Books

Edition Name	Preferred Abbreviation
Hardcover	NSB HC

Transworld

Edition Name	Preferred Abbreviation
Bookclub Association	UK BCA
Epub Edition	UK EP

Harper Voyager