Help:Glossary

From Tolkien Gateway

This glossary provides a convenient reference for common words, terms, and acronyms that are used on Tolkien Gateway. If you find a word that isn't on the list, which you think should be, please add it.

0-9  A  B  C  D  E  F  G  H  I  J  K  L  M  N  O  P  Q  R  S  T  U  V  W  X  Y  Z 


Common acronyms[edit source]

BoLT/TBOLT
The Book of Lost Tales.
CT/CJRT
Christopher Tolkien
HoMe/HOME
The History of Middle-earth.
JRRT
J.R.R. Tolkien
LR/LotR/TLOTR
The Lord of the Rings
NoMe/NOME
The Nature of Middle-earth.


OVOTL
"Other versions of the legendarium"; a common section within the articles.
PE
Parma Eldalamberon
RoP
The Rings of Power TV series
UT
Unfinished Tales
VT
Vinyar Tengwar

0-9[edit source]

+1
A comment made to indicate agreement with the previous statement. Frequently used on talk pages.

A[edit source]

Admin, or Sysop, or Mod
An administrator. Administrators are experienced editors of Tolkien Gateway who are able to exercise certain technical abilities (such as deleting pages) whilst also being responsible for various "housekeeping" chores on the wiki. They are always happy to help, so please get in touch with them if you feel that you need assistance. See: Tolkien Gateway:Administrators.
Anon
An anonymous user. As they don't have a username, their edits show up under their IP address.
Article
An encyclopaedia entry. All articles are pages, but not all pages are articles.

B[edit source]

Blanking
Removing all of the content of an article. This differs from deletion, as the article link remains valid.
Ban (also block)
An action taken by an admin to prevent an IP or username from editing Tolkien Gateway. Usually exercised for spam or vandalism.
Bot
A controlled programme that makes automated or semi-automated edits to the wiki. See: Tolkien Gateway:Bots
Broken link
See Redlink.
Broken redirect
A page that redirects to another page which doesn't exist. Broken redirects should be avoided at all costs.
Bureaucrat
An administrator who has the ability to modify user rights. See: Tolkien Gateway:Bureaucrats.

C[edit source]

Canon
The legendarium as defined by J.R.R. Tolkien. Anything created by, for example, the The Lord of the Rings (film series) would likely fall under the realms of fanon.
Cat
Short for category. Every article is put into one or more categories so they can be easily found by users; categories are always listed at the bottom of the page. For instance, this article is in Category:Help.
Claimed
An article that has been claimed by an editor means that they are temporarily working on an article and request that no one else edit it until they've finished their work. See Category:Claimed.
Cleanup
See Category:Cleanup.

D[edit source]

Dead-end page
A page that contains no links to other pages.
Del
Short for "delete".
Delink
To remove a link on a page. Usually done to remove a redlink.
Defaultsort
By default, MediaWiki software sorts articles by their name. To over-ride that (for example, to sort The Lord of the Rings in "L" rather than "T") . Commonly seen in edit summaries when the defaultsort template has been added ({{DEFAULTSORT:}}).
Diff
Short for "difference." Used on RecentChanges and page histories to show the difference between two versions of an article.
Disambiguation (or disambig)
Resolving the conflict between two or more subjects with identical or similar titles. See our disambiguation policy.
Disambiguation page
A page solely intended to link to different pages with similar titles. See Category:Disambiguation for a full list.
Double redirect
Where an article redirects to another redirect. These should be avoid as they break after the first redirect. See broken redirect.

E[edit source]

Edit conflict
When two editors try to change a page at the same time.
Editor, or user, or gatekeeper
People who have signed-up to Tolkien Gateway to edit the wiki.
Edit summary
A small message that can be made when an editor makes an edit. It will be visible in recent changes and on the page's history. These are to be used for briefly describing the edits made and strongly encouraged.
Edit war
When two or more editors undo each other edits for disagreement.
Extensions
Additions to the MediaWiki software which customise and extend the functionality. See Special:Version and Tolkien Gateway:Technical To-do.
External link
A link to a webpage not on Tolkien Gateway. The opposite of an internal link.

F[edit source]

FA
Featured article. See Tolkien Gateway:Featured articles.
Fanon
Content not created by J.R.R. Tolkien. This content is not allowed on Tolkien Gateway except if it is derived from a licensed adaptation; in which case, it can be included in a "Portrayal in adaptations" section.
FQ
Featured quotes. See Tolkien Gateway:Featured quotes.

G[edit source]

Gatekeeper
See Editor.
GFDL
GNU Free Documentation License, the license under which all Tolkien Gateway articles are published. See Tolkien Gateway:Copyrights.

H[edit source]

History
All previous revisions of a page. Accessed by clicking on "History" at the top-right of the page.

I[edit source]

Infobox
A large template that goes at the beginning of an article which lists a number of key facts. See Category:Infobox templates for the full list.
Internal link
A link that goes to another page on Tolkien Gateway in contradistinction to an external link.
InterWiki
A link to another wiki.
Intro
Introduction of an article, the first paragraph(s).
IPA
International Phonetic Alphabetic, frequently used to indicate correct pronunciation.
IRC
Internet Relay Chat. See Tolkien Gateway:Chat
ISBN
International Standard Book Number.

L[edit source]

License template
A license template is a requirement on all files uploading to Tolkien Gateway. The template indicates under what grounds Tolkien Gateway is allowed to host the file.

M[edit source]

Main Page
The home page.
MediaWiki
The wiki software that runs Tolkien Gateway. Also, the namespace used for system and interface messages.
Merge
Turning two articles into one, usually performed by turning one article into a redirect and moving the content to the other article. See Category:Articles to be merged.
Move
When a page on Tolkien Gateway is moved to a different title, in essence renaming the page. A redirect is automatically created from the original page name to the new one.

N[edit source]

Namespace
A designated prefix for a segment of Tolkien Gateway that defines the purpose and jurisdiction of a page. A number of namespaces exist, such as Forum, User and Talk. The "Main" namespace, which includes all Tolkien Gateway articles, does not have a prefix. By default, when searching, Tolkien Gateway only searches articles in the Main and File namespaces.
NOTOC
No table of contents.

O[edit source]

Orphan
A page that has no other pages linking to it.

P[edit source]

Page
Any individual topic at Tolkien Gateway, regardless of namespace. Articles are those pages in the "Main" namespace.
Piped link
A piped link uses the | character to allow a link to show up differently than the page it is named after. E.g. [[Frodo Baggins|Frodo]] shows up as Frodo.
Portals
Pages which serve as a "Main Page" for a particular topic. See Category:Portals.
Project
A collaborative effort to improve certain aspects of Tolkien Gateway. See Tolkien Gateway:Projects.
Protection
An admin action to restrict the editing of a particular article from the public or other editors. This is usually done in order to prevent vandalism, or because a page is of such high importance/use that it shouldn't be changed.

R[edit source]

Random page
A link on the left-hand side which will take the user to a randomly-selected article. Used by editors to find new things to edit.
Recent changes
A location where the most recent edits to the wiki are displayed. Most of the frequent editors regard this as their "homepage" as it shows all the recent activity on the wiki.
Redirect
A link that exists only to point to another article. For example, "Imladris" redirects to "Rivendell". The code to do this is #REDIRECT [[Article name]].
Redlink
A link to a page that does not exist. This is discouraged unless you realistically believe the page will be created in the future.
Ref
A reference; a footnote. These are incredibly important in asserting the credibility of Tolkien Gateway and its articles. A general rule of thumb is to reference virtually all content on Tolkien Gateway articles. See Help:References.
Relink
To change which page a link goes to. Commonly seen in edit summaries, it is usually performed after a page has been moved.
Restore
An admin power that allows the instant resurrection of a deleted article.
Revert
See Undo.
Revision
Each version of a page. Every time a page is edited this creates a new revision.
RFA
Requests for adminship. The nomination and voting procedure whereby an editor can become an administrator.
Rollback
When an admin undoes an edit, reverting it back to its prevision revision. Admins can do this with one click and it is commonly performed against vandalism, fanon and unsourced statements.

S[edit source]

Sandbox
A place for you to test edits without putting them in an actual article. Some users ever have their own sandbox as a subpage of their user page. See Tolkien Gateway:Sandbox.
Sig or Signature

The text displayed upon typing ~~~~. You should sign all your posts on any talk or forum page. By default, this produces a username linked to your user page and a time stamp. Custom signatures can be made at "My preferences" by checking the "Custom signatures" option and entering your own code. See Help:Signatures.

Skin
The appearance theme of Tolkien Gateway, selected via Special:Preferences. The current default theme is "Mithilien".
Stub
A very short article. These articles need to be expanded. See Category:Stubs.
Subpage
A page associated with an article, usually as a subdivision of the subject in question.
Sysop
See Admin.

T[edit source]

Talk page
A page set aside for the discussion of an article or page.
Template
A piece of code that is essentially an abbreviation for a much larger piece of more complicated code. When in "edit mode", templates are denoted by curly braces. Hundreds of these are used on Tolkien Gateway, and all of them are located in Category:Templates.
TOC
Table of contents.
Tolkien Gateway
The world's best, and largest, Tolkien encyclopaedia.
Tweak
A minor edit.

U[edit source]

Undo
Changing an article back to a previous revision. Anyone can do this.
Userbox
Small boxes that display some information about the user; they are used to express an editor's personality and individuality. See Tolkien Gateway:Userboxes.
User page
Each user's personal page in the User namespace; for example, KingAragorn's user page is at User:KingAragorn. Editing other people's user pages is discouraged.

V[edit source]

Vandal
Someone who deliberately tries to undermine Tolkien Gateway. They will be banned.

W[edit source]

Wiki
Any website, usually encyclopaedic in nature, that allows easy creation and editing of content. Wikipedia is the most well-known example.
Wikicode
The programming language of MediaWiki website, including Tolkien Gateway. See Help:Editing.