GuildWiki:Archiving help

Once you have been on the wiki a while, you'll find that your talk page may be very long. You probably have already seen archives on other people's talkpages, and are reading this now to find out how to do it yourself. Or maybe you want to archive a long community page such as Request assistance or GuildWiki talk:Community Portal.

You can add archives to any talk page on GuildWiki if you follow these instructions and consider our suggestions on what to avoid.

When to archive
Archive your talk page when you feel it is too large or cluttered. (When the wiki warns you about the size, definitely consider getting an archive for it.)

Don't archive a discussion that is still ongoing: if people continue it, they will either copy the old content from the archive (not what you want) or resume the discussion in a new section, thus splitting it. As a rule of thumb, wait at least three days past the last post to a discussion before archiving it.

Choosing a name for the archive
The most common way to name archives is to simply add a numbered "/Archive #" to the end of the original page name. Example: The archive pages for User talk:Entropy are User talk:Entropy/Archive 1, User talk:Entropy/Archive 2, User talk:Entropy/Archive 3, etc.

Sometimes archives pages are named by date, for example, the Game Updates archive to e.g. Game updates/20080513 for single updates and e.g. Game updates/2008 May for the monthly list.

How to archive
There are two methods:

Cut & Paste

 * 1) Make an empty page that is to become your archive.
 * 2) Cut the content from your talk page and paste it into the archive.
 * 3) Add a link to the archive page on the talk page.
 * 4) Add a link to the talk page on the archive page.


 * Advantage: You can archive just the old parts of your talk page.

Move

 * 1) Use the move button to rename your talk page to the archive page.
 * 2) Make a new page where the old talk page was. (You may need to click on the name where it says "redirected from" below the page heading).
 * 3) On the new page (with the old talk page title), put a link to your archive page(s).
 * 4) On the archive page, place a link to the new talk page.


 * Advantage: The page history moves to the archive as well.

Templates
We have templates that help you make your talk page look more professional.
 *  {{subst: Archive box{{))}} places a box with a filing cabinet on your talk page and lets you add a list of your archive pages.
 * Placed at the top of your archive page, {{((}}subst:Talkarchive{{))}} will notify your readers that they are visiting an archive that should not be edited.

Tips

 * When you do the archive, write "archiving" into the edit summaries so the RC patrol knows you're not vandalising the talk page (even if it is your own).
 * Archive complete sections, don't split a section in a "current half" and an "old half" - that will probably confuse your readers.
 * If you find an discussions wants to "live on" in the archive, you can simply "unarchive" it by cutting and pasting it back to the talk page it came from. Don't discuss in archives.
 * Don't archive talk pages for other users unless they asked you to - even if they're big huge. You might politely point out that the page is becoming hard to work with and offer your help, however.