Help:Wiki-style forums/set up

Follow the steps below to set up Wiki-style forums on a community.

Initial setup

Note: On some communities, the "Forum:" namespace is in an archived state, due to past or present usage of the Forum feature. An admin can contact FANDOM staff to have the archived state removed.

Setting up a new wiki-style forum involves copying a set of pages to your wiki. This page describes a basic set-up that adds two forums. Many aspects of this can be customized, but this set-up gives a good place to start.

• Copy the following pages to your community (all pages below are on the Demo Wiki):
  1. Forum:Index
  2. Forum:Help desk
  3. Forum:Watercooler
  4. Template:Forumheader/Help desk
  5. Template:Forumheader/Watercooler
  6. Template:Forumheader
  7. Category:Forums
  8. Category:Help desk
  9. Category:Watercooler
• If your community has customized CSS, ensure that the following CSS is in the local MediaWiki:Wikia.css (for the default skin) and MediaWiki:Common.css (for the Monobook skin).

/* Forum formatting - Algorithm & Splarka */
.forumheader {
    border: 1px solid #AAAAAA;
    background-color: #F9F9F9;
    margin-top: 1em;
    padding: 12px;
}
 
.forumlist td span {
    display: block;
    padding-left: 10px;
    font-size: smaller;
}
 
.forumlist td span a {
    text-decoration: none;
}
 
.forumlist td span.forum_author {
    padding-left: 30px;
}
 
.forumlist td.forum_edited a {
    text-decoration: none;
}
 
.forumlist td.forum_title a {
    padding-left: 20px;
}
 
.forumlist td.forum_title span a {
    padding-left: 0px;
}
 
.forumlist td.forum_title a.forum_new {
    font-weight: bold;
    background: url(http://images.wikia.com/www/images/4/4e/Forum_new.gif) center left no-repeat;
    padding-left: 20px;
}
 
.forumlist td.forum_title a.forum_new:visited {
    font-weight: normal;
    background: none;
    padding-left: 20px;
}
 
.forumlist th.forum_title {
    padding-left: 20px;
}

• Save File:Forum new.gif to your hard drive, and then upload to your local community with the same name.
• Add a link to Forum:Index to the wiki navigation.

Testing the setup

To test the forums, you can add welcome messages for each section, similar to those at Welcome to the help desk and Welcome to the watercooler.

See more

• Help:Wiki-style forums

Further help and feedback

• Browse and search other help pages at Help:Contents
• Check FANDOM Community Central for sources of further help and support
• Check Contacting FANDOM for how to report any errors or unclear steps in this article
• Learn how to use Fandom in FANDOM University: short how-to videos for all levels of experience