Help:Automatic conversion of wikitext

Sometimes wikitext (the syntax used when editing a wiki) is automatically converted to something else when you save the page.



What is signature expansion?
A signature (a link to your user page and a timestamp) is automatically created wherever you type ~. Signatures can be highly customized.


 * See Help:Signature.



What is a substituted template?
Normally, a template named will appear to expand to whatever is at Template:Something when the page is saved, but if you edit the page you will still see  in the wikitext.

However, if you substitute a template, the text "" will actually be replaced with whatever is at Template:Something. If you edit the page again after saving, you will no longer see in the text.


 * See Help:Substituting templates.



What is the pipe trick?
By adding a pipe or vertical bar ("|") before the closing brackets in certain links, you can hide namespaces, clarifying words in parentheses, or words after commas.
 * Someone (author) is converted to Someone.
 * Help:Something is converted to Something.
 * Some City, Some State is converted to Some City.


 * See Help:Piped links.