Help:Special page

This is one of Pikmin Fanon's help pages and is meant to aid users by improving their ability to positively contribute to the wiki. Expanding pages such as this with additional information is always welcome.

A special page is a page generated by the software on demand for special purposes, usually related to project maintenance. They are found in the Special namespace, a virtual namespace whose pages lack corresponding talk pages. They are not written in wikitext and cannot be directly edited; but elements of their pages can sometimes be edited through corresponding pages in the MediaWiki namespace. If you make a normal redirect to a special page, the redirect will not be immediately followed, and directly creating any pages beginning with the Special: prefix is also not possible.

Special pages often take parameters. Sometimes these can be supplied after a slash (as in Special:Log/block); in other cases, an index.php call is used; for example https://pikminfanon.com/w/index.php?title=Special:RecentChanges&days=3&limit=10. Also, the content of most special pages depends on preferences that have been set by the user, e.g. classic or enhanced Recent Changes, the number of titles in Recent Changes and the watchlist, etc.

A directory of special pages available for the current user can be accessed from Special:SpecialPages, which is found in the sidebar of every page on the wiki in the Tools section.

Available special pages

General information

• Special:SpecialPages: a list of most special pages currently available to all users.
• Special:AllMessages (System messages): displays all pages in the MediaWiki namespace.
• Special:Statistics: total number of pages and users in various categories.
• Special:Version: shows the version of the software the site is currently running and lists the extensions, skins, and libraries currently installed.

Page listings

• Special:AllPages: allows the user to access a portion of an alphabetical list of all Pikmin Fanon pages in a specified namespace. A starting point can be given as a parameter, e.g. Special:AllPages/T (pages in the main namespace, from "T"), Special:AllPages/Template: (pages in the Template: namespace, from the start).
• Special:Categories: shows an alphabetical list of categories, with numbers of members.
• Special:CategoryTree: displays categories in a tree structure.
• Special:ListFiles (File list): list of images and other files uploaded; can be sorted by size or date. Special:ListFiles/Example lists files uploaded by User:Example.
• Special:ListRedirects (Redirects): lists all redirects.
• Special:PagesWithProp (Pages with a page property): lists pages that use a particular page property.
• Special:PrefixIndex (All pages with prefix): similar to AllPages. Lists all pages of a specified namespace beginning with a given prefix. Useful to find subpages, for example: Special:PrefixIndex/User:Example.
• Special:ProtectedPages: lists protected pages.
• Special:ProtectedTitles: lists titles that have been protected to prevent pages from being created there.

Tools

• Special:ApiHelp: MediaWiki API help.
• Special:ApiSandbox
• Special:ComparePages: to compare two pages (diffs between two pages).
• Special:Diff: e.g. [[Special:Diff/85000|<text>]] gives diff between version 85000 and the preceding version of the same article, or [[Special:Diff/48999/72000|<text>]] gives diff between version 48999 and 72000, not necessarily of the same article, e.g. Special:Diff/15999/30000.
• Special:Export (Export pages): produces an XML file containing the wikitext and metadata of either the current version only, or all revisions, of one or more pages, specified in the form of a list; the XML file is in the format required for Special:Import; exporting is typically done either in preparation of applying the latter at another MediaWiki project or for searching within old page revisions. See Help:Export.
• Special:Gadgets: lists gadgets that users can enable in their preferences.
• Special:MIMESearch: filters files for media type.
• Special:MovePage: for moving (renaming) a page (see Help:Moving pages). The page must be given as a parameter.
• Special:Random: redirects to a random page from the main namespace which is not a redirect. Other namespaces can be specified as a parameter, e.g. Special:Random/Talk.
• Special:RandomInCategory (Random page in category): redirects to a random page within the specified category (can be from any namespace).
• Special:RandomRedirect: redirects to a random redirect page.
• Special:RandomRootpage: redirects to a random root page, that is, excluding sub-pages. Some wikis, such as Wikibooks, use a sub-page hierarchy. This function can be used there as a substitute for Special:Random, so it can be used to show "random books" in Wikibooks, instead of random pages.
• Special:Search: for searching pages around Pikmin Fanon. See Help:Search.
• Special:Upload (Upload file): upload a file to the wiki.
• Special:WhatLinksHere: enables listing all pages linking to a given page (including transclusions and redirects). The target can be specified as a parameter, e.g. Special:WhatLinksHere/Dwarf Red Bulborb.

Latest changes

• Special:Log (All public logs): combined display of various logs. The type of log, user, and page affected can be specified. Parameters "block", "delete", "protect" and "upload" are available. e.g. Special:Log/block displays the block log directly. For more information, see Help:Log.
• Special:NewFiles (Gallery of new files): gallery of newly uploaded files.
• Special:NewPages: newest pages with creation date and time, current size, the user who created the page, and the first edit summary, in reverse order of creation.
• Special:RecentChanges: lists the latest edits in the project. Changes to watched pages appear bold. See Help:Recent changes.
• Special:RecentChangesLinked (Related changes): enables listing of the most recent changes in pages linked from a selected page, or belonging to a selected category. Changes to watched pages appear bold. The page can be supplied as a parameter, e.g. Special:RecentChangesLinked/Red Bulborb. See Help:Related changes.
• Special:Tags: lists the tags with which edits may be marked. See Help:Tags.

Users

• Special:ActiveUsers (Active users list): lists editors who have performed at least one action in the last 30 days.
• Special:BlockList (Blocked users): blocked IPs and usernames.
• Special:Contributions (User contributions): enables listing of a user's contributions, or all new users' contributions. The user can be supplied as a parameter, e.g. Special:Contributions/Example. See Help:Contributions.
• Special:EmailUser: e.g. Special:EmailUser/Example. See Help:Emailing users.
• Special:ListGroupRights (User group rights): shows the rights assigned to user groups.
• Special:ListUsers (Users): lists all registered users. Can be filtered by group (e.g. administrators) and other criteria. Note that Special:ListAdmins redirects to Special:ListUsers/sysop.

Personal

• Special:ChangePassword, Special:ChangeEmail (Change or remove email address), Special:ConfirmEmail (Confirm email address) and Special:ResetTokens
• Special:Contributions (User contributions)
• Special:EditWatchlist and Special:EditWatchlist/raw: to edit your watchlist.
• Special:MyContributions: links to your contributions page. See Help:Contributions.
• Special:MyPage: links to your user page.
• Special:MyTalk: links to your user talk page.
• Special:MyUploads (File list): lists files you have uploaded.
• Special:Preferences: allows you to view and modify your personal settings. See Help:Preferences.
• Special:UserLogin (Log in): to log in to Pikmin Fanon. Special:UserLogin/signup (Create account) to create an account.
• Special:UserLogout (Log out): to log out of your account.
• Special:Watchlist: shows recent changes to the pages you are watching. See Help:Watchlist.

Maintenance

• Special:BrokenRedirects: lists redirects that point to a non-existent page. May contain false positives.
• Special:DoubleRedirects: lists redirects that redirect to another redirect. May contain false positives.
• Special:FileDuplicateSearch: check to see if a certain file has a duplicate.
• Special:ListDuplicatedFiles: see all duplicated files on Pikmin Fanon.
• Special:LongPages: pages in the main namespace, with size in bytes, in order of decreasing size.
• Special:MostLinkedFiles (Most linked-to files): lists images and other files linked from the largest number of pages.
• Special:ShortPages: pages in the main namespace, with size (of the wikitext excluding that of templates used) in bytes, in order of increasing size.
• Special:UncategorizedCategories: categories without category tags.
• Special:UncategorizedFiles: images and other files without category tags.
• Special:UncategorizedPages: pages without category tags. Note that after adding a tag to a page, refreshing this page does not immediately reflect the change.
• Special:UncategorizedTemplates: templates without category tags.
• Special:UnusedCategories: categories that are not tagged on any page.
• Special:UnusedFiles: images and other files that are not embedded on any page.
• Special:UnusedTemplates: templates that are not transcluded (however, they may be used for substitution).
• Special:WantedCategories: categories with members but no category page.
• Special:WantedFiles: missing image files and others.
• Special:WithoutInterwiki (Pages without language links): pages without links to other language projects.

Miscellaneous

• Special:BlankPage: a blank page.
• Special:BookSources: search sources for a book by inputting the book's ISBN number.
• Special:Captcha (CAPTCHA help): shows "Captcha" help.
• Special:Cite (Cite This Page): generates bibliographic citations, in several formats, for citing a Pikmin Fanon article as a reference.
• Special:ExpandTemplates: an extension used to produce expanded wikitext, i.e. templates, parser functions, and variables in the input text are expanded recursively. See also mw:Extension:ExpandTemplates.
• Special:FilePath (Redirect by file, user, page, or revision ID): returns the complete path for a file.
• Special:Interwiki (View interwiki data): view interwiki data.
• Special:LinkSearch (External links search): for searching for external links. See mw:Help:Linksearch.
• Special:Permalink/Oldid: for linking to a specific version of a wiki page. See Help:Permanent link.
• Special:Random: a random page.
• Special:Redirect (Redirect by file, user, page, or revision ID)

Restricted special pages

The following pages can be accessed only by users with certain privileges.

• Special:Block: available to administrators. Used to block or unblock users, IPs, and ranges of IPs.
• Special:DeletedContributions: available to administrators.
• Special:Import: available to administrators. See Help:Administrator's Handbook/Import.
• Special:LockDB and Special:UnlockDB: available only to developers. Used to switch the database between read/write and read-only modes.
• Special:Nuke: available to administrators.
• Special:Undelete: available to administrators. Provides one way to undelete a page.
• Special:UserRights: can be read by anyone, however only bureaucrats can use the page to assign and remove user access rights.
• Special:UnwatchedPages: available to administrators.

Inactive

The following special pages are updated on a less regular schedule.

• Special:AncientPages (Dormant pages): pages in the main namespace, in order of the last edit.
• Special:DeadendPages: pages without any outgoing links.
• Special:FewestRevisions (Pages with the fewest revisions): lists articles with the fewest revisions.
• Special:LonelyPages (Orphaned pages): i.e. articles with no links to them in the wiki.
• Special:MostCategories (Pages with the most categories): lists articles whose number of categories is the largest.
• Special:MostLinkedCategories (Most linked-to categories): lists categories with the most pages.
• Special:MostLinkedPages (Most linked-to pages): lists pages linked from the largest number of other pages.
• Special:MostLinkedTemplates or Special:MostTranscludedPages (Most transcluded pages): lists templates for which the number of pages in which the template is transcluded is largest, not counting transclusions through redirects.
• Special:MostRevisions (Pages with the most revisions): lists articles with the most revisions.
• Special:UncategorizedCategories
• Special:WantedPages
• Special:WantedTemplates
• Special:UncategorizedCategories