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I recently edited a tag wiki and it was rejected. I accept that the wiki did not explain when to use the tag and I could have done better.

But one of the reasons given for rejecting the edit was addition of bullet points.Another reason was that it contained a link to documentation page of an open source project(firebug).I have referred the tag wiki guidelines but I wonder

  • What is wrong with using bullet points in a wiki?
  • Any guidelines on links that should be given in the tag wiki

Please share your views.

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I've rejected a number of your tag edits recently, for various reasons, including:

  • Unnecessary bullet points.
  • Poor quality / missing description of what the tag is about.
  • Not concise enough.

Here are my reasons:

Bullet points
Bullet points in tags are rarely necessary for tags, outside of the full tag wiki. They look bad in the popout, and should only be used if you're listing things. There's no reason to use them to format your entire entry. Instead, use proper paragraphs.

Poor quality / missing description
Tag summaries are meant to concisely explain what a term means, and in the case of potentially ambiguous terms, when they should be used. In some cases, you neglected to mention what the tag actually meant at all. In others, you only half explained it and added needless cruft to bulk out the entry.

Not concise enough
The tag wiki guideline says the following:

The tag wiki excerpt is a brief plain text introduction to the topic that the tag represents. It is shown at the top of tag question lists, and as a tooltip wherever the tag appears. Complete this first!

Some of your edits went into detail about tools, different types of attack / recon, detail around projects involved in the subject, etc. This is just too much for an excerpt. It should contain a simple, short explanation of what the term means, and what the tag should be used for if there is any confusion. Adding links to projects and other such formatting is useless in the excerpt, and often leads to link-rot in the full tag wiki.


All in all, I rejected or heavily edited 5 of the 7 tags edits I reviewed, due to problems such as the above.

I applaud your efforts to improve our tags, because it's an area that many people don't focus in, but making poor quality edits often results in more work for reviewers. If you stick to the tag guidelines and keep things short and sweet, without unnecessary formatting, your tag edits would be much more likely to be accepted.

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    Thanks very much for your inputs.I will definitely keep these things in mind the next time i make an edit. Just one thing, the links to projects and type of attacks were not added in the excerpt. Correct me if I am wrong but I think you are confusing the wiki-excerpt with the wiki.
    – Shurmajee
    Commented Apr 8, 2013 at 9:22
  • My apologies if I rejected an edit for only that reason - I may well have mixed them up. However, if I remember correctly, that one was still entirely bullet-pointed.
    – Polynomial
    Commented Apr 8, 2013 at 12:20
  • yes i have a habit of using bullets everywhere.anyways I will definitely try to come up with better edits.Thanks again
    – Shurmajee
    Commented Apr 8, 2013 at 12:26

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