Using Templates

Templates are a way of reusing small pieces of content. Instead of writing a message twice, you can create and update it in one place, and then refer to it in other pages. The other pages will stay up-to-date with changes to the Template automatically!

What are Templates

A Template is just a special wiki page whose name starts with "Template:". It has all the features of a wiki page: it can be localized, it has a history, it understands wiki markup.

How to make a Template

1. Create a new KB article
2. Make sure the name begins with "Template:" - For example, Template:aboutconfig
3. Set the Category to "Template"
4. Continue writing the Template the same way you would any other Knowledge Base article.

How to include a Template in an Article

To use a template in a wiki page, all you have to do is "link" to the template. For example:

[[Template:Some Template]] or [[T:Some Template]]

Instead of creating a link, the content of Template:Some Template will be included into the current page. Any wiki markup in the template will be rendered.

Using arguments with a Template

Templates support passing in arguments, to let you reuse content that is almost the same.

Say, for example, you had a standard notice that told users that a document only applied to Firefox 4, and another version that said it only applied to Firefox 3.6. The text of those notices might be identical except for the Firefox version: a perfect time to use a template!

Template:OnlyVersionX:

{note}This document or section only applies to '''Firefox {{{1}}}'''!{/note}

Then, in one wiki page, you could do this:

[[Template:OnlyVersionX|4]]

And in another page, you could do:

[[Template:OnlyVersionX|3.6]]

You can use multiple arguments, or the same argument twice, too!

Template:XLikesY:

# {{{2}}} likes {{{1}}}.
# {{{3}}} likes {{{2}}}.
# Class! Nobody likes {{{2}}}!

Then to use it:

[[Template:XLikesY|Lisa|Milhouse|Janey]]

This would result in:

1. Milhouse likes Lisa.
2. Janey likes Milhouse.
3. Class! Nobody likes Milhouse!

Keeping track of all those numbers can get confusing, so you can also name arguments to a template:

Template:XPrecededY:

First comes {{{first}}}, then comes {{{second}}}.

And using it:

[[Template:XPrecededY|first=love|second=marriage]]

With named arguments, you don't need to worry about the order when you use the template:

[[Template:XPrecededY|second=marriage|first=love]]

Both examples of using Template:XPrecededY will have the same result.