Help:Preferences

The preferences page is a special page that allows logged-in users to view their basic account information, change appearances and settings for their custom appearance of the site, and etc. In the upper right corner of each page, the "Preferences" link will display unless you are logged out. The preferences page will present you with the "User profile" section, as well as a bar of tabs across the top for changing other types of settings.

Change password
To change your password, click on a rectangular box that says, "Change password". Once clicked, you will be asked to verify your identity. When verification is complete, you will be transferred to the "Change credentials" page, and two fields will appear, the first asking you to type in your new password and the second asking you to retype it. If you want this site to remember your login, check Change credentials. Note that this function requires you to have cookies enabled in your browser and if your cookie is cleared or expires you will no longer be remembered.

Internationalisation
From your preferences, you can select what language you would like the interface to be in. Only the buttons like 'edit' and 'talk', in addition to a few pages in the sidebar, will be affected. The main text of the pages will not be changed by this for the vast majority of pages, although there are a few pages where it will.
 * Languages
 * How do you prefer to be described?
 * More language settings

Signature

 * Your existing signature
 * Example ( talk )


 * New signature
 * Treat signature as wikitext (without an automatic link)

Email options
If you have supplied an email address, you will need to click the verify address button in order to use these functions. You will receive an email; simply open it and follow the link to enable the following functions.
 * Email confirmation:

Skin
Here you can choose the skin you want to use. You can preview the available skins before choosing them, by clicking on the "Preview" link next to each skin. Please refer to MediaWiki's Help:Skins for more details.

Date format
The following is normally rendered depending on preferences:
 * No preference (selected by default)
 * 00:00, January 1, 2020
 * 00:00, 1 January 2020
 * 00:00, 2020 January 1
 * 2020-01-01T00:00:00

Files
Here you can determine how images will be displayed. Images displayed by direct pasting of a URL (if the wiki has it enabled) will not be affected by this setting.

Diffs

 * Do not show page content below diffs
 * Don't show diff after performing a rollback

Advanced options

 * Link underlining:
 * Skin or browser default
 * Never
 * Always
 * Show hidden categories
 * Auto-number headings

Editing
These are the settings to control editing pages, including whether to automatically watch pages that you have edited or created.

General options

 * Enable section editing by right clicking on section titles
 * Edit pages on double click

Editor

 * Edit area font style:
 * Monospaced font
 * Sans serif font
 * Serif font
 * Mark all edits minor by default
 * Prompt me when entering a blank edit summary (or the default undo summary)
 * Warn me when I leave an edit page with unsaved changes
 * Enable the editing toolbar
 * Temporarily disable the visual editor while it is in beta

Preview

 * Show preview on first edit
 * Show preview before edit box
 * Show previews without reloading the page

Advanced options

 * Group changes by page in recent changes and watchlist
 * Use non-JavaScript interface Loads RecentChanges, Watchlist, and similar pages without the filtered search or the highlighting functionality.

Changes shown

 * Hide minor edits from recent changes

Watchlist
These are the settings to control the behavior of the watchlist (See Help:Watchlist). Most of these options are also available on the watchlist display itself, but by setting them in your preferences, you control the default behavior of the watchlist i.e., it will perform the same actions every time you visit the page.

Edit watchlist

 * Edit entries on your watchlist:
 * View and remove titles from your watchlist
 * Edit raw watchlist
 * Clear your watchlist

Advanced options

 * Expand watchlist to show all changes, not just the most recent
 * Add direct unwatch/watch markers (×/+) to watched pages with changes (JavaScript required for toggle functionality)
 * Use non-JavaScript interface Loads Watchlist without filters search or highlighting functionality.

Changes shown

 * Hide minor edits from the watchlist
 * Hide bot edits from the watchlist
 * Hide my edits from the watchlist
 * Hide edits by anonymous users from the watchlist
 * Hide edits by logged in users from the watchlist

Watched pages

 * Add pages and files I edit to my watchlist
 * Add pages and files I move to my watchlist
 * Add pages I create and files I upload to my watchlist
 * Add new files I upload to my watchlist

Token

 * Watchlist token

Gadgets
A gadget is a Javascript program and/or a CSS that can be enabled simply by checking an option in your preferences. The gadget's function is provided by the MediaWiki extension Gadgets. Gadgets are usually developed and maintained by our local interface administrators, they can also edit the definitions and descriptions of available gadgets, where you can see the source code of each gadget.

Editing

 * HotCat a category management tool that allows users to easily add, change or remove a category on a page. A brief demonstration of the gadget is shown here.