User:Grayravenpaw/Template Tutorial

Hi all, this is Lightning writing an unofficial (or official, maybe, since I talked to Helix src =O) sequel to Helix's template tutorial.

So, first thing you need to know is what actually is a template. Say you need the same information for a lot of pages, instead of copying and pasting it everywhere, you create a template, and refer to it. Now, say you wish hundred users with a "Hello! How aer you?", not noting the spelling error in "aer", and copy paste it to their talk pages. Now, to correct it you'll have to edit one hundred talk pages. But if you create a template, say,. You use it on one hundred talk pages, and notice the spelling error. Now, instead of having to edit all those talk pages, you can simply edit the template to fix the error. As all hundred talk pages use the template, so since you change the template, you change all hundred talk pages without having to edit even one again. Useful, isn't it?

How
So, how to create and use a template? Easy enough. Say you want to create the above mentioned template. You create a page Template:Hello (note that this is purely hypothetical. No such template exists on the wiki), type in "Hello! How are you?", and publish. Now, to use this template on other pages, you type in

Note that it's not necessary to create a template in the template space. You can create one as a userpage subpage, for example, Special:MyPage/Hello (again, purely hypothetical. Such a page may or may not exist in your userspace) To use this, you type in, replacing USERNAME with your username, for example, Cloudskye would enter