Guidelines

= Welcome! = You found your way to the Repair Wiki! This is where anyone can post repairs on electronic devices, so it's all in one place.

= Louis Rossmann's Repair Video Project = A project is underway to transfer information from all of Louis Rossmann's repair videos onto this wiki.

To avoid duplicating effort, we are using Google Sheets. Please mark videos as 'Done' when you have added their contents to the wiki, or confirmed that they are already on the wiki.

Searching through captions
You can find captions by video URL here

Ctrl+F and paste the part of the URL after. For example: QnowcxcO2-0

Viewing schematics and boardviews

 * Search for schematic and download a .pdf file
 * Search for boardview and download a .brd file
 * Open the .brd file in a Schematic viewer

= Walkthrough =

Talk pages
Click on  in the top left to leave a comment, then add   to insert a user signature, like so:

It is probably easier to just use the Discord, but it's good for writing notes.

If you have suggestions for how to improve the wiki, you can leave them on Talk:Repair Wiki

Response
When responding to someone in the talk pages, do it on a new line and prefix your message with  to give it indentation.

This is the OP speaking. Patrolin (talk) 02:43, 5 May 2021 (PDT)
 * This is a response to OP. Karar (talk) 02:57, 5 May 2021 (PDT)
 * Here I've used double colon punctuation  to respond to the message above. Patrolin (talk) 03:00, 5 May 2021 (PDT)
 * Another response to OP. Karar (talk) 02:57, 5 May 2021 (PDT)

Shortcuts

 * double { - add a template
 * double [ - add link
 * CTRL + K - add link

See the dropdown menu with the word  in it for more

= Format =

= Content =

New
To write a new article; enter the article title in the box below to create a page with a preselected boilerplate. Make sure to include the full device name & model number in the title when appropriate. (Example: A2159 2019 13" MacBook Pro) If you don't finish it, insert  at the top of the page to signify it's a work in progress.

Move
If a page has an incorrect title, you can move it:


 * 1) Mouseover the   tab in the top right and click.
 * 2) Give the page a   and click.
 * 3) For normal pages, don't change the default namespace (Main).
 * 4) Note that if you move a category page, pages belonging to it will need to be recategorized manually.

Delete
Ask one of the [ wiki admins] in the Discord.

Other options:

 * If you don't want to have it truly deleted (to come back later to work on or archive it), or can't wait, then give the page a title that's not in use nor will be found. Just be sure to add the link of the page in the  tab of the place it got moved from, so people know it's still there if it was decided on being moved.
 * You can also add it to the Stub category by inserting  at the top of the page too for the off-chance someone else can grow it. Visit Stub Pages to help out those with the most need of contribution.

Minor changes
Once on a page, click  or   (recommended) in the top right of it to begin editing.

Everyone starts small! If you want to add some information, fix typos or add a few links, go ahead.

Copyrighted Materials
Your articles may not contain or link to copyrighted materials as this puts the Wiki at risk of being litigated against and taken down.

This includes, but is not limited to, patented schematics, instruction manual PDFs, other people's images, plagiarized problems/solutions from online articles etc.

Only original material or material for which you own the copyright and are consenting to release under the appropriate open-source licence may be posted to Repair Wiki.

If you make a new page, you don't need to ask for permission, but make sure to list your sources and ask them for permission as-needed. You can even give yourself or someone else credit by inserting

Code text:
A highlighted blue box around text that's inside it.

Source editor: type in

Result:
Visual editor: copy/paste from text that already has it.

Warning:
Watch out for writing before and after the box, because they might get mixed into the box itself, when it shouldn't.

Result:
Donate to the GoFundMe , for 3 tabs:

From the tab:
Right to Repair fundraiser

Result:
Right to Repair fundraiser

From the tab:
After highlighting the text to use, use the hyperlink symbol or CTRL + K to add a link.

Internal Links (Repair Wiki)
Main Page

Standards page

Result:
Main Page

Standards page

If the link is red, either the link is wrong, or the page doesn't exist yet.

However if you want a page to redirect to another page, you can use the following:
 * 1) REDIRECT Target Page

Italic & Bold Font
Don't be scared to use bolded text frequently in your articles, such as highlighting crucial steps of the repair process or safety warnings. It helps the reader find what they're looking for faster.

Source Editor:

 * italic text
 * bold text
 * bold italic text

Result:

 * italic text
 * bold text
 * bold italic text

Line breaks
Arrows in the editor indicate a single line break. Characters following line breaks will be inserted on the next line.

You can add them in the source editor by typing

Put line breaks on a new line, so people know they're there.

Use  for line breaking all elements, including images.

Preformatted Text
These are typically used for displaying coding in a way that's separated from the rest of the content on a page, but technically anything can be added to these content boxes. To create some, go to the dropdown menu with the word  and select. From there, type in what you would like to see into the blue box that just got created. If you ever want to edit it, click on the box created and click  and then   when finished. here is an example

Uploading & Embedding Files
Click Upload File in the sidebar to upload files.

Once uploaded, insert either of the following at the top of the page:

or

Example:


Make sure to reference the image in the solution text, ie. "See Fig. 1".

You can search for images in the public domain here.

Tables
To add a classic Problem & Solution table, fill in the template named "ProblemTable" or copy / paste the following into the source editor:

Result:
To add a new row, simply define as many  and   parameters as needed.

Templates
You can create your own template or find what's already created here Category:Formatting templates. Boilerplate templates are portions of information that get copied/pasted. If you edit the original, all the copies will change accordingly.

Transclusion
You can include a page inside another page with.

Make sure to use  to not duplicate too much content (search engines don't like it).

Note:
Make sure the page or Template you're transcluding has its categories inside noinclude tags:

if you want to link to a category instead, colon symbol in front of it:

= Layout =

Repair Wiki
This wiki uses MediaWiki Formatting. (Also known as Wikitext - there's a link to general help about MediaWiki / Formatting in the sidebar.). It's the same as what's used for Wikipedia, which is also a good reference for learning format here.

Major changes involve changing the entire format of the website. Usually, it's best to go with the format of the website and not make large changes if there's not much wrong. If there is, it'll be best to update it. While you can make the changes on your own, if you're hesitant, explain your ideas in the Discord, so that others can comment on it beforehand.

That can be very important for when formatting's inconsistent or doesn't exist. People will see your changes in the  tab, but they won't know the format: add in the layout in the   tab. Also beneficial is explaining what you did and where you put the information into the main page of Discord for faster sharing, so others can adapt what you did and also might be interested in participating in their role in the change: like documenting or developing it on their end.

It's really good to consult the people whose work's being changed on the Repair Wiki, they worked hard on it and have it there for a reason - so they might not know it's happening and can defend keeping it if there's a valid reason that others aren't aware of.

Table of Contents
Table of Contents (TOC) is inserted automatically on articles with more than three section headers.

You can move the TOC somewhere else by inserting  on the page in the source editor.

To align the TOC to the right, insert the Template  instead at the top of the page.

To disable the TOC on the page, insert

From the tab:
Section headers are added by using equal signs. Each indentation to a new level gets an extra equals sign surrounding the name (i.e. Level 2 gets 2 equals signs on each side, Level 3 gets 3, etc.). Level 1 headers should not be used (i.e. =Example=).

Level 3 header
Text

From the tab:
Click on the dropdown menu with the word  in it. There you can see the hierarchy of section levels. The order goes (from highest to lowest):  ->   ->   ->. To change content to that level, highlight the text, click on the dropdown menu, and make a section. It's also possible to use the shortcuts listed to the right of them to change to them after highlighting.

Source Editor
The source editor is recommended in general, but especially for adding categories. Simply add  at the bottom for your product page.

If you're using the page creation box, you will see  preloaded in the editor. Replace "Name" with your own category.

Visual Editor
To categorize a page using the visual editor, go to, then the triple stacked bars (i.e. page options) and click on. Under, start typing in the category you would like to see this page under. If the category already exists, select that one. If not, you can create a new category (which will have its own, unique URL for this). If you want it in a subcategory, type in the category that is a subcategory.

When you're finished, click on the name of the category. To add another category, type another one in and repeat. There's no limit to the number of categories a page can be under. To delete a category created, click on the category name. There will be a trash can icon to click on. Click  once done. To see the page under the category, go to the category URL and it will be seen under. This will be separated from the subcategories (as pages aren't categories, only categories are).

Hierarchy
The standard category format is  .

Only add one or two categories per page, and make sure a relevant category doesn't already exist before you create new ones.

All product type categories should be a subcategory of Category:Product Repair Guides.

Say you're making a repair guide for the new MacBook Pro, you'll want to add the article to the   category.

But since Apple has many lines / series of laptops, you'll want to specify further by adding the   category as well.

If a brand does not have a wide product stack, further categorization is not necessary.

If your article applies to more than one or few products, it likely belongs in Category:Board Repair Guides.

If it's even more general than that, it belongs in Category:General Repair Guides.

Notes:

 * Once you save a category, changing it becomes cumbersome, so make sure you get it right. New subcategories can be added however.
 * Often a category will have a separate gateway article with links to specific products. Check the URL to make sure you're on the right page.
 * If a link to your page doesn't show up, try clearing the cache: Firefox / Safari: Ctrl-R (⌘-R on a Mac) Google Chrome: Ctrl-Shift-R (⌘-Shift-R on a Mac)