General text guidelines

• Keep your text short and simple.
• Remember most members only speak/read English as a second language.
• Don't use abbreviations. E.g. write World Bank instead of WB.
• Keep it short:
  • Use no more than 3 lines per paragraph.
  • Never make texts longer than one screen.
  • Try to avoid using long sentences with commas.

Using Wiki codes for formatting

Below are some examples of Wiki codes. Be sure to read the part about email addresses!

• Text formatting
• Headlines
• Lists
• Links
• Email addresses
• Block quotes
• Tables
• Horizontal line
• YouTube video

Text formatting

//italic// becomes italic.

**bold** becomes bold.

**//bold italic//** becomes bold italic.

This is ^^superscript^^ text becomes This is ^superscript text.

Please try to limit using text color, as special formatting might mess up automatic feeds to other systems (such as RSS), or might not be preserved at all in the future.

Headlines

• Make headlines with a +
• One + gives a huge headline, 6 ++ gives a special headline
• Leave a space between the + and the text

+ huge headline

++ big headline

+++ headline

++++ subtle headline

+++++ bold headline

++++++ special headline

Lists

An asterix (*) or hash (#), followed by a space, creates a list.

Numbered list:

# one
# two
# three

becomes:

1. one
2. two
3. three

Bullet list:

* four
* five
* six

becomes:

• four
• five
• six

Adding spaces before the marking indents the list items. You can mix ordered and unordered lists.

# Main 1
 * subitem 1a
 * subitem 1b
# Main 2
 # subitem 2a
  * sub-subitem
  * sub-subitem
 # subitem 2b
  * sub-subitem
# Main 3

becomes:

1. Main 1
   • subitem 1a
   • subitem 1b
2. Main 2
   1. subitem 2a
      • sub-subitem
      • sub-subitem
   2. subitem 2b
      • sub-subitem
3. Main 3

Any line ending with " _" (a space followed by an underscore) forces a line break without breaking the element. So, use this to keep the next line within the same list item. But... unfortunately this formatting might be lost when you start to edit an existing article. So, check before saving!

# Main 1 line 1 _
line 2 _
line 3
# Main 2
 # subitem 2a line 1 _
 line 2 _
 line 3
 # subitem 2b
# Main 3

becomes:

1. Main 1 line 1
   line 2
   line 3
2. Main 2
   1. subitem 2a line 1
      line 2
      line 3
   2. subitem 2b
3. Main 3

Links

• http://www.bidchallenge.org becomes www.bidchallenge.org
• [http://www.bidchallenge.org The BiD Challenge website] becomes The BiD Challenge website
• [http://www.bidchallenge.org The BiD Challenge website target="_blank"] also becomes The BiD Challenge website, but opens the link in a new window when clicked.

((page number)), such as ((42996)) creates a link to an internal page: BiD Network Foundation.

Email addresses

mailto:me@example.org becomes

[mailto:me@example.org Mail me] becomes

These email addresses are not readable by spambots. To avoid spam, never include an email address without the mailto: prefix, like wrong@example.org. Though such text cannot be clicked, spambots will know how to find it.

Tables

|| Row1, Cell 1 || Row1, Cell 2 ||
|| Row2, Cell 3 || Row2, Cell 4 ||

becomes:

||< left ||= center ||> right ||
||< The quick brown ||= fox jumps over ||> the lazy dog. ||

becomes:

||~  header 1||||~  header 2 and 3 ||
|| data 1|| data 2|| data 3 ||
|||| data 1 & 2|| data 3 ||
||||= data 1 & 2|| data 3 ||
||||> data 1 & 2|| data 3 ||
|| data 1|||| data 2 & 3 ||
|| data 1|| data 2|| data 3 ||

becomes:

Beware: excessive spaces at the end of the line, will cause this to fail:

|| Row1, Cell 1 || Row1, Cell 2 || 

(which has an invisible space following the last two || characters) becomes:

|| Row1, Cell 1 || Row1, Cell 2 ||

Horizontal line

Four dashes on a line by itself will create a horizontal line:

----

becomes:

Block quotes

> “The beauty about the BiD Challenge is that it brings people, capital and
> knowledge all together. This is extremely important to increase the chance
> of success of entrepreneurs.” 
//**Jenneke Seegers** - Rabobank - screener and coach//

becomes:

“The beauty about the BiD Challenge is that it brings people, capital and
knowledge all together. This is extremely important to increase the chance
of success of entrepreneurs.”

Jenneke Seegers - Rabobank - screener and coach

YouTube video

See the details at Adding YouTube Video.