Wikisource:Open Mishnah Project/How to contribute

How to add new material
New mishnah and tractate pages can be created by copying and pasting code for two templates made for this purpose: Mishnah Page and Mishnah Tractate. The usage of these templates is documented at Open Mishnah Project/Mishnah Page and Open Mishnah Project/Mishnah Tractate, and is summarized below.

Note that all tractate indices can be monitored using "Related changes" (in the left sidebar) to the page Mishnah, and any change to each and every individual mishnah in a particular tratate can be easily monitored by clicking "Related changes" for that tractate's index page.

Contribute whatever you can
Important: If you want to contribute just a plain translation of a mishnah without full formatting, commentary, etc. - simply go ahead and do it! You or others can always add more to the texts later.

Code for any new tractate index
For a tractate that does not already have an index, click on the link to that tractate at Mishnah, and create the page using, for example:



See Open Mishnah Project/Mishnah Tractate for more details.

Code for each individual Mishnah
For a mishnah that does not already have a page, click on the link to that mishnah at the tractate's index, and create the page using, for example:



The code gives:
 * Links at the top of the page to the previous mishnah, next mishnah, Mishnah Index and Tractate Index.
 * Basic sections for the material on each mishnah. (You don't have to fill in all of the sections - you or someone else can add more later! See above.)
 * Finally, the code optionally gives the interwiki language links to the Hebrew Wikisource, which will appear in the sidebar. (Other inter-wiki links can and should be added where applicable.)

Only create a mishnah page when you actually plan on contributing to the text or translation of the mishnah. This way, it will be clear by looking at the red links on the tractate's index page which parts of the tractate remain to be contributed.

See Open Mishnah Project/Mishnah Page for more details.

Chapter pages
Chapter pages can be created by copying, e.g. Mishnah/Seder Nashim/Tractate Kiddushin/Chapter 1 and modifying it as necessary to fit the chapter being worked on. The chapter page "grabs" the English text from each mishnah page using a wiki-trick known as labeled section transclusion.

Honor copyrights
Warning: If you add text on a new Mishnah, make sure it is your own work, and not copied from someone else's! All published translations of the Mishnah, including those available on the internet, are copyrighted. If you get explicit permission to use someone else's translation, please document this fully.

Text quality markers
Effective September 25, 2006, we will be using text quality markers to keep track of our progress. A 'complete' page is a page which contains the following:
 * Introduction to the mishnah in question (if applicable).
 * English translation of the mishnah or mishnayot in question.
 * Analysis and explanation of the of the text of the mishnah.

A '25%' will be assigned to pages which do not exist yet or fail to satisfy the above guidelines for completeness in any way.

A '50%' will be assigned to pages which apparently satisfy the above guidelines for completeness but have not been reviewed for accuracy yet.

A '75%' will be assigned to pages which satisfy the above guidelines for completeness and have been reviewed. Ideally, a '75%' would also have a verbose analysis and explanation, including text from at least a handful of the major Mishnaic commentaries. A 75% also requires a vowelized version of the Hebrew text.

A '100%' will be assigned to pages which are entirely complete in every conceivable way, incorporating text from various major commentaries and having been reviewed by multiple users.

Needless to say, the ultimate goal is to get every page to 100%, but that is very far off at this time. When you create a new page or modify an existing one, evaluate if the article now deserves a higher quality marker and if so adjust accordingly.

Hebrew text style
Ideally, all Hebrew text will have vowels, but if this is not possible or available a text without vowels will suffice. If there is any ambiguity in the meaning of the words based on what vowels are used, the ambiguity should be noted and discussed in the explanation.

Also, we use English marks of punctuation wherever appropriate. While this is a construct that did not exist at the time of the Mishnah, it is indeed something we use today and can aid in the understanding of the text.