Help:Hints

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There are several practical tips you can implement to make to easier to stay organized as you write and edit articles. Here are just a few hints.

Use separate browser windows or tabs

Using separate windows can really help you keep organized. If you use a browser with tabs, like Firefox or iCab (most modern browsers have tab capability; you may have to set your preferences to turn on the function), that works even better: Use the tabs to help you keep your work separate. Keep your the page you are working on as your basic, most left-hand tab, and open other tabs (or windows) for other jobs, like:

• Google, for basic research.
• State ballot measure websites
• Merriam-Webster, to check your spelling
• Categories to check to see which category would fit the page your are working on.

You might wish to learn how to open pages in new windows or new tabs on your computer's browser. (On a Mac, this usually involved clicking a link while holding down the command key; but you may need to set your browser's preferences.)

Try a text editor

You may also find that keeping a text editor open, to do some of your work off the Web browser help page. (This can be especially helpful for doing mass replaces of bad characters or repeated spelling errors.) Be careful, but this can work well.

But caution: Do not use Word or other word processor UNLESS you have turned off special characters and auto-replace functions. It is important to use ASCII characters only. These are the characters your computer's keyboard enters into Ballotpedia's editing windows without using special keys like Option or Alt or Control or what-have-you.

Notepad is the default text editor under Windows; Textedit is the default under OS X (but it is an RTF editor that can also read Word documents -- consider BBEdit for Macintosh use).

Keep notes

If you find yourself working on more than a page at once, you might want to keep notes, on a piece of paper, a text editor, or a spreadsheet. Write down the project you are on, and cross off (or mark off) each item completed.

One advantage of keeping notes of what you have done is, after you are finished, you can look at the notes and gain just a bit of satisfaction.

Checking back to the notes can help you if you have forgotten to do something, too.

Put your ego in brackets!

A wiki like Ballotpedia is no place to claim a lot of credit, or aim for glory. (Note: Although others may heap glory upon you. It is a place where you contribute to a communal project where you give and take without putting your name out there. Or your picture. Or a picture of your dog, or kids. Indeed, it's considered good Wiki Manners to let other editors link to you. Never to yourself. That's one way to remain "objective."

It's not as if you do not have an ego, it's like the philosopher Husserl put it, you put it in brackets, you "bracket it out" for consideration while you are working.

Of course, literally putting [[ego]] in brackets leads to a link on Ballotpedia!