Open Computing/Project planning/Style guide

This style guide, adapted from the OER Handbook style guide and the CCNC Module 3 style guide, provides design guidelines for use in creating learning materials for the Open Computing project.

Hierarchy, Structure and Headings

 * Develop and use a custom navigation template on each page of the learning material. Examples:
 * "What is Audacity" pages in Using Audacity
 * "Database Concepts" pages in Database Management in OpenOffice 2 Base
 * Use the template to display a user friendly title on every page.
 * Note: This main page header is effectively a Level 1 heading and will be printed as a Level 1 heading in the print version.


 * Always include some text between headings.
 * Don't have two headings follow each other without intervening text -- this is unprofessional. So for example at the top of each page we should have a paragraph before starting with the first heading.


 * Include Template:ContentInfobox on the main page, providing relevant metadata in the available fields. See example above, from the code.

Terminology and Titles

 * Use the following terms as defined, except in situations where the specific audience or learning material requires a different usage.
 * Command: an instruction or directive to be executed by the computer software program.
 * Application: a type of computer program that allows you to perform a particular task. Application is preferred over the terms software or program because application is term used in Ubuntu (the preferred operating system).
 * Add additional terms and definitions here.


 * When the content includes commands to the computer software program, bold each specific command and include the greater than symbol, >, between levels of nested commands, e.g., Select Insert > Picture > From file...)
 * When providing instructions for text to be entered from the keyboard, put the text in quotes, e.g., ...enter "=4+9" in cell A7.
 * When including the names of menus, tools, fields, in dialog boxes, etc., italicize the name of the item, making sure to type the name exactly as displayed in the application.
 * In the first use of a new term, considered important knowledge for understanding upcoming content, format the term in bold.

Visual Design
Some thoughts to maintain a constant grid for visual design:
 * For images, use the thumbnail type, at 400px wide; right or left justification at the discretion of the visual designer for balance.
 * For large portrait images, use a minimum size of 700px, centred without wrapping the text.
 * For best viewing, create screenshots to be close to 400px wide.
 * When displaying function button image in-line with text, create screenshot of button to be the size of the highlighted button.
 * Use only images that adhere to Wikieducator copyright requirements. [need a page reference for this]
 * Use only images with complete Template:Metadata information.
 * Adjust text as needed to improve flow and visual balance of the images and text.
 * Use Template:FA (Flickr Attribution) whenever included images are free content images from Flickr.

Other Wiki Markup

 * Use the   tags for all external links (e.g., ...)
 * Use the    code to keep page formatting crisp and to keep photos from overlapping with content

Other Formatting

 * Frequently check that page is well formatted as pdf.
 * Include internal links for words and phrases that are described in earlier modules/topics/sections.
 * Include an image of a toolbar button when text indicates to select a toolbar bar button(see Editing tracks) in Using Audacity for an example).
 * Include all relevant category links on the main page, for example,

Move Pages

 * Use "Move" function whenever moving pages to maintain the Talk pages.

Copied from CCNC Module 3 Style Guide -- Not sure what these mean
''' tag in it
 * Try to keep sections all at the same level so the page TOC is narrow.
 * Create a template for the module TOC and have only a '''
 * Create a template for the module TOC_print and have the module TOC in it for printing to the page
 * this template should appear next to the photo to describe the contents of the module
 * Create a print template with the same name as the navigation menu