Wikitext
Encyclopedia
Lightweight markup language
A lightweight markup language is a markup language with a simple syntax, designed to be easy for a human to enter with a simple text editor, and easy to read in its raw form....
used to write pages in wiki
Wiki
A wiki is a website that allows the creation and editing of any number of interlinked web pages via a web browser using a simplified markup language or a WYSIWYG text editor. Wikis are typically powered by wiki software and are often used collaboratively by multiple users. Examples include...
websites, such as Wikipedia
Wikipedia
Wikipedia is a free, web-based, collaborative, multilingual encyclopedia project supported by the non-profit Wikimedia Foundation. Its 20 million articles have been written collaboratively by volunteers around the world. Almost all of its articles can be edited by anyone with access to the site,...
, and is a simplified alternative/intermediate to HTML
HTML
HyperText Markup Language is the predominant markup language for web pages. HTML elements are the basic building-blocks of webpages....
. Its ultimate purpose is to be converted by wiki software into HTML
HTML
HyperText Markup Language is the predominant markup language for web pages. HTML elements are the basic building-blocks of webpages....
, which in turn is served to web browsers.
There is no commonly accepted standard wikitext language. The grammar, structure, justification, keywords and so on depend on the particular wiki software used on the particular website
Website
A website, also written as Web site, web site, or simply site, is a collection of related web pages containing images, videos or other digital assets. A website is hosted on at least one web server, accessible via a network such as the Internet or a private local area network through an Internet...
. For example, all wikitext markup languages have a simple way of hyperlink
Hyperlink
In computing, a hyperlink is a reference to data that the reader can directly follow, or that is followed automatically. A hyperlink points to a whole document or to a specific element within a document. Hypertext is text with hyperlinks...
ing to other pages within the site, but there are several different syntax conventions for these links. Many wikis, especially the earlier ones, used CamelCase
CamelCase
CamelCase , also known as medial capitals, is the practice of writing compound words or phrases in which the elements are joined without spaces, with each element's initial letter capitalized within the compound and the first letter either upper or lower case—as in "LaBelle", "BackColor",...
to mark words that should be automatically linked. In MediaWiki
MediaWiki
MediaWiki is a popular free web-based wiki software application. Developed by the Wikimedia Foundation, it is used to run all of its projects, including Wikipedia, Wiktionary and Wikinews. Numerous other wikis around the world also use it to power their websites...
, this convention was replaced with the
Different Wiki
Wiki
A wiki is a website that allows the creation and editing of any number of interlinked web pages via a web browser using a simplified markup language or a WYSIWYG text editor. Wikis are typically powered by wiki software and are often used collaboratively by multiple users. Examples include...
programs may support use of different sets of HTML element
HTML element
An HTML element is an individual component of an HTML document. HTML documents are composed of a tree of HTML elements and other nodes, such as text nodes. Each element can have attributes specified. Elements can also have content, including other elements and text. HTML elements represent...
s within wikitext. In some cases, permitted HTML elements may be configured by individual wiki sites. MediaWiki supports many common HTML tags.
Standardization
CreoleCreole (markup)
Creole is a lightweight markup language for formatting wikitext, aimed at being a common markup language for wikis, enabling and simplifying the transfer of content between different wiki engines....
is an effort for a "common wiki markup language to be used across different Wikis". There are several wiki engines that have implemented Creole. Version 1.0 of the specification was released in July 2007. It is not supported by MediaWiki.