| abstract
| - Wiki "talk pages" are a very unique system, with very few similarities to be found among other internal site messaging systems across the Internet. Because of this, they can be very confusing to follow, especially "user talk pages", the pages where messages are left for individual users. The aim of this guide is to improve your own practices so that understanding talk pages is made easier for everyone.
* Sign your posts with ~~~~ (four tildes). The tilde key can be found at the top left of most modern computer keyboards. It's one of the first things new users on wikis are told, but the number of people who don't follow this or often forget is striking.
* Use indentation to separate your comments from the comments of the previous posted. The best way to follow this practice is to stop using the rich text editor, which is what pops up for all new users and anonymous users when they edit a page. After changing to using the wikitext (or "source") editor in your preferences, using indentation is simply a matter of typing one more more colons (:) before each paragraph comprising your talk page comment. The more colons used, the further away from the left edge of the page your comment is. If you're finding that your comment is too far from the left edge, then reset indentation by using no colons before your comment. A good example of a talk page where indentation is extremely consistently applied is my own talk page.
* Always post at the bottom of a thread. Never try to post "replies" to Person A's comment if Person B has made a further comment below Person A's comment. Instead, refer to Person A in your comment placed below Person B's comment. This makes the flow of discussion much easier to follow for people who try to enter it later.
* Archive your user talk page if it is too long. As a general guide, on this wiki, we consider a talk page over 60kb in length as too long. Long user talk pages take longer to load and cause scrolling and readability problems for the poor people with smaller screens (i.e. those with laptops, netbooks etc.). Requesting automatic archiving of your talk page by bot from me is the recommended way to do this, but if you're confident that you know how to archive your own, that is perfectly acceptable.
* Reply to user talk messages on your own user talk page. The practice of replying to messages from other users by posting on their talk pages is popular because it alerts them to the reply with "You have new messenger hawks". However, doing this makes the exchange much harder to understand later for both users when a reference to the archives is needed. Third parties also find it much harder to understand what's being said, and this can often be important, particularly in conflict resolution processes. The recommended way of using user talk pages is therefore to reply to any messages in the exact place where the first message was left. If you post a message for another user, you can check for their reply by "following" their talk page (click the button at the left of your bottom toolbar). If your own replies to messages on your talk page don't seem to have been read, you can always use {{newmessages<><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>}} to ping the sleepyhead on their talk page.
* Put your signature in a user space template if it is too long. If your signature is just that bit fancier, it's probably best to make sure you're not leaving lines and lines of code for every little post you make. If you're not sure how to make your signature a template, ask away.
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