Introduction

So you want to create a category of things to rate and recommend? Great! This page explains what that means and how to do it. It's a bit more complicated than creating a thing, but well worth the little bit of learning required.

If you haven't yet rated things (see RateThisPage) or created new things (see any category page, like Restaurant), please go and try doing those things first. Then this will make more sense.

If you just want to go crazy, here is a CreatePage box that will let you create a new category page. Fill in the page name, and click the button. Make sure to leave the stuff it puts in there on its own line in your new page.

If you want to learn more about what you're doing, read on.

What is a category?

A category is simply a collection of things. In this system, a thing is represented by a page. (For more information about things, see RateThisPage.) Thus, a category is a collection of pages. In particular, a category is also represented by a page, and its page shows the pages in its category. Those other pages get in the category by linking to the category page. I know, you just read the word "page" about 14,000 times. Don't worry, let's do an example.

Thing pages have a category

If you create a page (say, Chipotle) you can set its category to another page (say, Restaurant) that is already a category. You set a category using the "Change category" button at the bottom of every page.

This has a very exciting implication: ANY page can be a category page! Just change its category to "Category".

Multiple categories for a page

A page can only be in one category for now.

Category page boilerplate

One more detail: there is a writeup on a category page that explains how to see things in the category, how to add new things in the category, etc. This writeup exists in order to be friendly to newcomers, but it's boilerplate on every category page. Thus, to make it easier to add this boilerplate, there is an easy way to add it: add the CategoryPage plugin. See below.

The CategoryPage plugin

<?plugin CategoryPage ?>

It has to be on its own line. It is finicky about syntax, e.g. no space between the < and ?. For your convenience, here is a box that let's you create a page that already has this category boilerplate on it:

How do I create a category?

1. Create a page
2. Drop the CategoryPage plugin onto your page.
3. Change the page's category to "Category"

*OR*

• Use the CreatePage box on this page to create a page.

That's it!

NOTES:

• If you have a page that already exists, you can just drop the CategoryPage plugin onto it. Remember, PhpWiki is finicky about syntax, so you might consider cutting and pasting, either from the example, or from the source of another existing page that you know is working.
• If you want people to see your category right away, consider editing the text of the HomePage to put it on the list.

Advanced topics

Subcategories

What if we wish to create subcategories? Currently there is no direct support for subcategories (though we'd like to do it).

Summary: exciting news about categories

• It's easy to create categories.
• ANY page can be a category page! That means you can subcategorize, too.
• A thing (page) can be in multiple categories. Simply refer to each category in the page.