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• Hide

To center text, use [[center:Text goes here]]:

Text goes here

To right-justify text (for example, to support languages and scripts like Arabic or Hebrew that require the opposite of the usual left to right text flow), use [[rtl:Text goes here.]]:

Notice that the punctuation will be mirrored accordingly.

Bullet lists are made by placing asterisks at the left margin. More asterisks increases the level of bullet.

• First-level list item
  • Second-level list item
    • A third level item
• Another first-level item

Indentation beyond third-level is almost always in violation of Example Indentation rules (and the very few exceptions can be reformatted to use no more than three levels anyway) and is frequently a sign of Natter, so the wiki software forces indentation beyond third level back down to third level whenever loading a page to edit.

Text following a %% tag, up to the end of the line, is not displayed and will be visible only in the editing markup. Using this tag at the start of the line will make the entire line hidden from view. It doesn't work in headers.

Any word surrounded by percent signs — e.g. %comment%, %rem%, or so on, will also be treated as a comment marker and text following it (until the end of line) will not be displayed.

Examples:

This editor has been %Unpersoned!%

This editor has been !

%%This editor has been Unpersoned!

Alternatively, an entire comment block can be created by utilizing a side-effect of the "numlist" block discussed below, where no lines that do not start with # are displayed.

Definition lists are made by placing colons at the left margin:

:term:definition of term
::second-level item: definition of 2nd-level item

becomes

term

definition of term

second-level item

definition of 2nd-level item

This effect can be replicated by using "->", where each additional "-" increases the indent. Font size is decreased for lines prefixed in this manner. Note: insert a dummy comment line before each indented line (-- and higher) to ensure that all indents show.

->term 
%%NO COMMENTO 
-->definition of term 
%%NO COMMENTO 
-->second-level item 
%%NO COMMENTO 
--->definition of 2nd-level item 
%%No comment?

becomes

definition of term

second-level item

definition of 2nd-level item

• If you want to embed a YouTube video in a post on the forums, use the following the markup (without the spaces in the middle):
• [[youtube : VideoID]]
• "VideoID" refers to the string of characters at the end of the video's URL. For example, to embed the video located at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YjyvOFgnstM, you would include "YjyvOFgnstM" in place of "VideoID".
• Please note that timestamps^note the "?t=##" string located at the end of a URL to view a specific portion of a video do not work with this markup.

• Use doubled single-quotes (''), i.e., two apostrophes, for emphasis (usually italics)
• Use tripled single-quotes ('''), i.e. three apostrophes, for strong emphasis (usually bold)
• Use five single-quotes ('''''), or triples within doubles (five apostrophes), for some other kind of emphasis (usually bold italics)
• Use pairs of doubled at-signs (@@monospace@@) for

  monospace

  text.
  • Note: the two pairs of at-signs have to be on the same line of markup text, and they cause line breaks. This can be worked around with the "double backslash and line break" method shown above.
  • The equivalent of <pre> is to put double at-signs at the beginning and end of each line.
• Emphasis can be used multiple times within a line, but cannot span across markup line boundaries (i.e., you can't put a paragraph break in the middle of bold text).
• Little note about potholes and emphasis: the single-quotes need to go outside the brackets in order for it to work properly. For example, ''[[PotHole this]]'' is the right way, and gets you this. On the other hand, [[PotHole ''this'']] is the wrong way, and leaves you with ''this''. In order to bold/italicize only part of a pothole, you need to make a separate one; ''[[PotHole like]]'' '''[[PotHole this]]''', for instance, to get it like this.

Anything placed between [= and =] is not interpreted. This makes it possible to easily have CamelCase without it being interpreted as WikiWord syntax for making a link, and turn off other special formatting interpretation. For another example, escaping the slash in "Anti-Hero/Anti-Villain" avoids having AntiHero/ misinterpreted as a namespace for the latter trope.

The [= and =] can span multiple input lines, allowing effects to be applied to multiple input lines. This is useful when combined with monospace markup: for a computer program listing, surround lines with @@[= and =]@@ to be monospace and uninterpreted.

Note that some markups—if left complete within the escape sequence—are interpreted. These include redirect markup and HTML character entities. For these, you will need to escape in parts, like just the brackets or just the ampersand.

Floatboxes are mainly used for listing relevant Useful Notes pages or subcategories on a trope index or an artist's influences:

[floatboxright : Influences:
+ Creator/Artist1, Creator/Artist2, Creator/Artist3]

The genre box was a floatbox in work pages that can be used to show a work's Format and Genre. It worked with a ~~FIRSTNAME, SECONDNAME~~ markup, where the FIRSTNAME shows the format and SECONDNAME the genre. This markup is outdated; please remove it wherever you see it.

Headings are made by placing an exclamation mark (!) at the left margin. More exclamation marks increases the level of heading. For example:

! Level 1 Heading

!! Level 2 Heading

!!! Level 3 Heading

Level 1 Heading

Level 2 Heading

Level 3 Heading

There are also thinner headings, chiefly used on Wild Mass Guessing pages. These can be made with [[WMG:text]] or [[header:text]], thus...

Four or more hyphens (----) at the beginning of a line produce a horizontal line.

URLs ending with .gif, .jpg, or .png are displayed as images in the page and float left, allowing text to appear on the right if there is room.

Making an image caption: [[caption-width:number:some text]] will place an enclosed box under the image. Setting the number parameter to the width of the image will make the caption line up nicely with the image.

To shift an image and text to the right:

For images: [[quoteright:Number:Image URL]]

For text: [[caption-width-right:number:some text]]

Please only embed images hosted on TV Tropes. Hotlinks to other sites will be blocked.

Adding [[index]][[/index]] markup will autogenerate an index tab at the bottom of the bulleted or numbered wikiworded pages inside the markup. Note that putting multiple entries in a bullet/number in the list will only affect the first entry for each. For example:

* WikiWord1 
[[index]] 
* blah blah WikiWord2 blah blah WikiWord3 
* WikiWord4: blah blah WikiWord5 
* blah blah blah WikiWord6 blah blah blah WikiWord57 
WikiWord8 
[[/index]] 
WikiWord9

Will give WikiWord2, WikiWord4, and WikiWord6 a navbox to each other and to the page with the index. Note that the index tabs only update when their entries are updated.

Leaving [[source:En:WikiWord]] at the bottom of a page allowed connecting pages of the TV Tropes Translation Project despite having different titles, but this is no longer functional and it's now done by making redirects both ways.

• Join capitalized words (Wiki Words) to make references to other pages on this Wiki. Custom titles and/or spaces between the words will be automatically applied.
• Links with arbitrary text labels ("piped links") can be created in double brackets as [[url text]] or [[WikiWord text]]. Text can be an image URL, in which case the image becomes the link to the remote url or WikiWord. In TVTropes parlance this is a Pot Hole.
• Curly braces {{ }} will convert just about any word or phrase (excluding punctuation marks) into an article link by the same name. Note that this is the only way to link to articles with single-word titles (such as Plot), because there's no way to WikiWord them.
  • Text added to the outside of the brackets can be included in the link. This is useful for pluralizing links; for example Administrivia/{{wiki word}}s links to the WikiWord page but looks like wiki words.
  • If you want the inverse of that, use the | character: For example, Administrivia/{{Renamed Trope|s}} displays "Renamed Trope" while linking to Renamed Tropes.
  • Note that this markup does not automatically apply spacing or custom titles — the spacing and capitalization will be rendered exactly as-is. This can be useful for some articles with nonstandard spacing (e.g. {{MacGuffin}}), although we've got most of them covered by the custom-title system already.
  • Curly braces can be included in piped links, e.g. [[{{article}} phrase text]]. This is the only way to create piped links to articles with single-word titles.
• URLs can be placed in double brackets [[url]] when the URL itself is not important to the text. For example, [[http://www.google.com/]] will appear as [2]
• Troper handles: They all go in the Tropers/ namespace. You can reference one by typing @/{{Tropername}} or @/TroperName.
• To prevent a CamelCase word from being linked when you don't want it to, use the "Escape sequence" demonstrated here: [=CamelCase=]

All internal references by default point to "Main." To link to a page in a different namespace, put it in front of the wiki word:
Test/{{Trope}} gives Trope.

If for some reason you want your link to show the namespace, you can use a period instead of a slash:
Test.{{Trope}} gives Test.Trope.

A note lets you hide some text behind a JavaScript link. The reader has to click the link to expand the text in-place. Somewhat similar to the spoiler tag, but for non-spoiler information, and unlike spoiler text, it takes up almost no room until expanded. Very useful for collapsing a tenuously related or humourous aside, or additional explanatory text that would otherwise be cluttering up the trope description.

This is an example of a note. [[note]]tenuously related or humourous aside[[/note]]

This is an example of a note. ^note tenuously related or humourous aside

You can also use [[labelnote]] to change the label of your link. You can use anything you want as the thing to click so long as it doesn't contain a WikiWord or other markup (and if you don't have anything to say in the label, regular [[note]] markup is preferred):

[[labelnote:Don't click me!]]Click the example below to see the real text.[[/labelnote]] 

^{Don't click me!} We call that Schmuck Bait here at TV Tropes.

Please be careful with [[note]][[/note]] markup. There is a bug that causes the entire page text to disappear if the tag is not properly closed. Preview your edits when adding notes. [[labelnote]][[/labelnote]] can similarly make parts of a page disappear if not properly closed.

Please also don't put notes within spoiler tags. They become unreadable and defeats the point in having notes.

You can notify tropers about a forum post they might be interested in by putting ~@/NameOfTheTroper or ~@/{{Handle}} in your forum post. Upon hitting "Send", this automatically sends the troper in question a private message, calling their attention to the forum post.

This only works in the forums, and only in the add post function; you can't send a message that way by editing the markup into an already existing forum post.

Numbered lists are made by placing number-signs (#) at the left margin.

1. Prepare the experiment
   1. Unwrap the pop-tart
   2. Insert the pop-tart into the toaster
2. Begin cooking the pop tart
3. Stand back

The starting number can be changed by putting [numlist:START_NUMBER] at the beginning of the list and [/numlist] at the end, where START_NUMBER is the number you want the list to start at. Inside this block, all lines that do not begin with "#" are treated as comments and are not displayed; nested lists are not supported here, either.

21. Prepare the experiment
22. Unwrap the pop-tart
23. Insert the pop-tart into the toaster
24. Begin cooking the pop tart
25. Stand back
26. If cooking bacon at the same time, make sure to not back towards the stove unless you're wearing a shirt. And pants.

• Do not indent paragraphs.
• Words wrap and fill as needed.
• Use blank lines as separators.
• Use \ (backslash) at the end of a line to join the next line to the current one.
• Use \\ (two backslashes) at the end of a line to force a line break while keeping the same level of indentation.
  This is an example.
  In order for this to work, the second slash must be the last character of any kind on the line. This includes a blank space: if a space follows the backslashes, then the next line will not have the same level of indentation. If for whatever reason you want the page to display a new line, but have the source be a single line, you can use [softreturn], like this.
  Note: softreturn cannot be escaped. It generates a line break anyway. It can be commented out, though. In the unlikely event that you should need to write "[softreturn]" somewhere, write "&#91;softreturn]", which renders as "[softreturn]", instead.
• Use \\\ (three backslashes) at the end of a line to force a paragraph break (a blank line) with the same level of indentation,
  
  like in this example. Like the double backslash, in order for this to work, the third slash must be the last character of any kind on the line. This includes a blank space: if a space follows the backslashes, the next line will not have the same level of indentation.

Useful only on the forums, since the markup doesn't work in the main wiki. It can be practiced in the Sandbox forum.

[[quoteblock]] Text that you want to quote [[/quoteblock]].

In order to keep the wiki looking crisp and clean, we prefer standardized formatting for quotes across the entire site. The formatting can be a little bit complicated at first glance.

General Formatting

Always bold the names of the people speaking in the quote, with a colon after their name. Do not italicize the text of the quote itself, except parts of it for emphasis. Don't use anything else to indicate emphasis (except all caps and bolding, used sparingly); don't use apostrophes, underscores, slashes, [i][/i], or anything of that nature. Don't enclose the dialogue in inverted commas or quotation marks. Stage directions and actions go in square brackets, italicized. For example:

->'''David:''' ''[deadpan]'' Maybe we should actually get some ''work'' done?

becomes:

Page Quotes

Page quotes (or quotes on a quotes page) work slightly differently from other quotes. First, use one hyphen for the indent, -> (see Quotes Indentation, below). If it's only one person speaking, then italicize the line with double quotes ('') and put it in quotes, and put their name in bold on the line below. On a related note, do not put trope potholes in a quote at the top of a page (see What to Put at the Top of a Page). For example:

->''"Not everyone can win."'' 
-->-- '''Alice''', ''Website/TVTropes''

becomes:

Note that the second line is given an additional hyphen to indent it further, two hyphens are added after the arrow to create an em dash, and Alice's name is bolded.

If it's more than one person speaking, then it becomes the same as the other quotes. Bold the names of the speakers with triple quotes ('''), and do not italicize the line or put it in quotes. For the last line, still indent it with two hyphens, but don't put the characters' names. For example:

->'''Alice:''' Not everyone can win.\\ 
'''Bob:''' Not all the time. 
-->-- ''Website/TVTropes''

becomes:

Note the use of backslashes. These are a text-formatting trick that tells the system to indent the line below at the same level. They are required for any multi-line quotes.

The use of backslashes allows for formatting to span multiple lines. For example:

->''This is the first line of a song\\ 
This is the second line of a song'' 
-->-- ''Website/TVTropes''

becomes:

Article Quotes:

Unlike page quotes, quotes in the body of the article itself do not need the context of having the name of the work in the line below; that is provided by the example it is listed under. Therefore, all quotes under examples, whether single-line or multiple, use the "multiple line quote" (so to speak) formatting. For example:

* In ''Website/TVTropes'', Alice drops a foreboding line at one point. 
-->'''Alice:''' Not everyone can win.

becomes:

• In TV Tropes, Alice drops a foreboding line at one point.
  Alice: Not everyone can win.

You'll also notice that the quote is indented farther than the page quote is. That is because two hyphens were used (-->), because otherwise it would look bad under the bullet indent. Always use one hyphen for your quotes, plus one hyphen for every bullet. So, page quotes get one hyphen (->), one bullet gets two hyphens (-->), two bullets get three (--->), and three bullets get four hyphens (---->). Note, however, that an example very rarely needs three bullets—see Example Indentation in Trope Lists for more on that.

If you need to continue a bullet point after a quote, you can use colon indentation (see Definition Lists above) to match the indentation level. The number of colons to use is "bullet level + 2" — so three colons for a first-level bullet, four colons for a second-level bullet, etc. For example:

* First point. 
--> "Obligatory quote." 
::: I, too, am indented.

becomes:

• First point.
  "Obligatory quote."

  I, too, am indented.

Literature Quotes:

Books are frustrating to quote at times. There are two ways to do it. If it's a straight quote, exactly what the character said, then just follow the rules above. For example:

->'''Charlie:''' That doesn't mean everyone always loses.

can be used to make

However, if you are lifting an entire passage of the book, then simply copy it directly, without adding the character's name or author's name in bold, italicizing the text, or adding any additional quotes. For example:

->Charlie scrunched up his face at his friends' fatalism. "That doesn't mean everyone always loses," he noted.

making

If you want a trope title to redirect to another trope with content (e.g. make Mario point to Super Mario Bros.), in Mario enter the following (but see Creating New Redirects first for guidelines!):

[[redirect:Franchise/SuperMarioBros]]

Note that redirects to single word titles (such as Handguns) must have the page title be surrounded by double curly brackets. Like so: {{Handguns}}

Caution: It can be difficult to edit a redirected article. Make sure you mean it! See Creating New Redirects for more information.

HTML special characters can be used ("named character entities"). There is a list of them here, and a longer list here.

There are a few special markups on the wiki:

• [[noreallife]]: Designed for pages that are No Real Life Examples, Please!, it replaces the edit tips with a big red note saying not to add Real Life examples.
• [[invoked]]: When links to YMMV, Trivia or Flame Bait items are placed on work pages, they will display an icon beside them indicating that they should be either moved to the appropriate subpage (YMMV or Trivia) or deleted entirely (Flame Bait). Since In-Universe or Played With examples aren't really YMMV nor Trivia, this markup can be added to the examples to prevent the icons from showing up.
• [[#AnchorPoint]]: Creates a point on a wiki page for linking to, in the same way that headings on Wikipedia can be linked individually. For something with a lot of sections, put one of these in each heading with the same text as the heading itself for ease of navigation. Link by typing Namespace/PageTitle#AnchorPoint. Note that this will show as a Red Link even though it's valid.
• [[hardline]]: This acts like the ---- line, except it's invisible on the page. It's useful when messing with text around images.
• [[AATAFOVS:{{Sandworm}}]] or [[AATAFOVS:SandWorm]] give a box about Avatar and the Airbending Fellowship of Vampire Slayers, indicating Sandworm as the recapper of the episode in question.
• [[reviews:TitleOfTheFic]] generates a Reviews section for FanficRecs.Title Of The Fic, which allows giving more detailed opinion on a fanwork in Fanfic Recommendations without needing to make a page for it.
• [[thump]], the old thump markup for forums. Previously mods would append it to a rule-breaking post to hide it. Now it replaces the forum post with a random funny message (the original text is preserved). Tropers can use it to "self-thump" own messages they dislike.

Text which might give away spoilers can be enclosed in [[spoiler:Text to be hidden]]. The hidden text will be shown as a blank, and the text can be revealed (and hidden again) by clicking on it. For example "The choice of weapon suggested that it was the Butler who did it".

• Be sure to take note of the Spoilers section in the Tips Worksheet page.
• Also note points 2, 9 and 14 on the Tips Worksheet page.
• And please read Handling Spoilers
• Lastly, please don't put note tags within spoiler tags. The note becomes unreadable.

Table are defined by enclosing cells with '||'. A cell with leading and trailing spaces is centered; a cell with leading spaces is right-aligned; all other cells are left-aligned. An empty cell will cause the previous cell to span multiple columns. (There is currently no mechanism for spanning multiple rows.) A line beginning with '||' specifies the table attributes for subsequent tables.

||align=center border=1 width=50%
||Left || Center || Right||
||A || B || C||
|| || single || ||
|| || multi span ||||

Left	Center	Right
A	B	C
	single
	multi span

Please use colored text sparingly outside of the forums. It should be limited to quoting Rainbow Speak or for self-demonstration.

• Red Text = [[red:Red Text]]
• Cinnamon Text = [[cinnamon:Cinnamon Text]]
• Gold Text = [[gold:Gold Text]]
• Green Text = [[green:Green Text]]
• Forest Green Text = [[forestgreen:Forest Green Text]]
• Teal Text = [[teal:Teal Text]]
• Blue Text = [[blue:Blue Text]]
• Purple Text = [[purple:Purple Text]]
• Pink Text = [[pink:Pink Text]]
• White Text (White Text) = [[white:White Text]]
• Gray Text = [[gray:Gray Text]]
•    Evil Text    = [[evil:Evil Text]]
  • "Evil Text" can also be combined with any of the above colors,    for example    = [[evil:[[blue:for example]]]].

Note that colored text does not work within spoiler tagging, as seen here. The color tag should encompass the spoiler tag [[red:[[spoiler:like this]]]].

Note: Abuse of text effects may get your editing or forum privileges revoked.

• Big and Small caps: [[AC:Text]] (called AssCaps) for Text (as opposed to using [-...-] for ALL CAPS in smaller text)
• Superscript: [[superscript:2]] for ²
• Subscript: [[subscript:2]] for ₂
• Strike-through: [[strike:text]] will put a strikethrough line though your text. This markup is exclusive to the forums. It's disabled on the wiki proper.
• Reduce Text Size: [-text-] gives you text. More hyphens mean smaller text, such as [--text--] gives you text.