Help:Magic words

Check Help:Magic words on mediawiki.org for an up to date overview of Magic words by default in the MediaWiki software. The page below is currently kept for things not yet merged to mediawiki.org or for Wikimedia Foundation-specific documentation.

MediaWiki Handbook: Contents, Readers, Editors, Moderators, System admins +/-

This is an organized index of Magic words used in MediaWiki.

A "magic word" is a symbol recognized by the MediaWiki software and which when seen in the non-commented text of the page, triggers the software to do something other than display that symbol, or transclude a page with that name, but instead to use the symbol directly.

A magic word can be:

• a behavior switch, called using an upper case word, preceded and followed by two underscores, e.g. __NOTOC__
• XML-style tags, preceded by "<" (and for the end tag "/") and followed by ">", as in <nowiki>...</nowiki>
• a parser function: similar to a template, a word preceded by the symbols "{{" and followed by "}}", and optionally parameter definitions between pipe characters, except that the part before the first pipe (or without pipes, the text between the braces) contains a colon (":"), e.g. {{ns:3}} and {{#ifexpr:{{{1}}}>3|large|small}}
• a variable: similar to a template without parameters, a word preceded by the symbols "{{" and followed by "}}", except the word used is in all upper case, e.g. {{CURRENTDAY}}
• a template modifier
• an image modifier

If a page in the template namespace has the same name as a magic word, the magic word will be invoked instead. If you discover you absolutely have to define a template with the same name as a magic word, prefix the name of the template with "msg:" or the name of the template namespace ("Template:"). See below for further details if you need this feature.

Variables

For details see Help:Variable

Page names and related info

Word	Example		Explanation
	This page	"User:Anonymous user/sandbox/my page" page
		"User talk:Anonymous user/sandbox/my page" page
{{PAGENAME}}	Magic words	Anonymous user/sandbox/my page	Returns the name of the current page, including all levels (Title/Subtitle). This does not include the name of the namespace.
{{PAGENAMEE}}	Magic_words	Anonymous_user/sandbox/my_page	More URL-friendly percent encoded special characters (To use an articlename in an external link).
{{BASEPAGENAME}} {{BASEPAGENAMEE}}	Magic words Magic_words	Anonymous user/sandbox Anonymous_user/sandbox	[MW1.7+] The basename of a subpage ("Title/Other" on "Title/Other/Subtitle"), see Help:Link.
{{SUBPAGENAME}} {{SUBPAGENAMEE}}	Magic words Magic_words	my page my_page	[MW1.6+] Name of the current page, excluding parent pages ("Subtitle" on "Title/Other/Subtitle") in namespaces supporting subpages, see Help:Link.
{{NAMESPACE}} {{NAMESPACEE}}	Help Help	User User	Returns the name of the namespace the current page resides in. Note that this returns an empty string for the main (article) space.
		User talk User_talk
{{FULLPAGENAME}} {{FULLPAGENAMEE}}	Help:Magic words Help:Magic_words	User:Anonymous user/sandbox/my page User:Anonymous_user/sandbox/my_page	[MW1.6+] Shorthands for NAMESPACE+PAGENAME
		User talk:Anonymous user/sandbox/my page User_talk:Anonymous_user/sandbox/my_page
{{TALKSPACE}} {{TALKSPACEE}}	Help talk Help_talk	User talk User_talk	[MW1.7+] Name of next odd namespace (e.g. 4 => 5)
{{SUBJECTSPACE}} {{SUBJECTSPACEE}}	Help Help	User User	[MW1.7+] Name of last even namespace (e.g. 5 => 4)
{{ARTICLESPACE}} {{ARTICLESPACEE}}	Help Help	User User	[MW1.7+] An alias for SUBJECTSPACE(E)
{{TALKPAGENAME}} {{TALKPAGENAMEE}}	Help talk:Magic words Help_talk:Magic_words	User talk:Anonymous user/sandbox/my page User_talk:Anonymous_user/sandbox/my_page	[MW1.7+] FULLPAGENAME in its TALKSPACE
{{SUBJECTPAGENAME}} {{SUBJECTPAGENAMEE}}	Help:Magic words Help:Magic_words	User:Anonymous user/sandbox/my page User:Anonymous_user/sandbox/my_page	[MW1.7+] FULLPAGENAME in its SUBJECTSPACE
{{ARTICLEPAGENAME}} {{ARTICLEPAGENAMEE}}	Help:Magic words Help:Magic_words	User:Anonymous user/sandbox/my page User:Anonymous_user/sandbox/my_page	[MW1.7+] An alias for SUBJECTPAGENAME(E)
{{REVISIONID}}	3670147	N/A	[MW1.5+] The unique identifying number of a page, see Help:Diff. Note that when editing a page, this value is null.
{{REVISIONDAY}}	21	N/A	[MW1.8+] The day on which the page was last modified.
{{REVISIONDAY2}}	21	N/A	[MW1.8+] The day on which the page was last modified, but with a leading zero (01 .. 31).
{{REVISIONMONTH}}	04	N/A	[MW1.8+] The month in which the page was last modified.
{{REVISIONYEAR}}	2012	N/A	[MW1.8+] The year in which the page was last modified.
{{REVISIONTIMESTAMP}}	20120421160611	N/A	[MW1.8+] ISO 8601 time stamp, indicating when the page was last modified.
{{SITENAME}}	Meta		Value of $wgSitename.
{{SERVER}}	//meta.wikimedia.org		Value of $wgServer
{{SCRIPTPATH}}	/w		[MW1.5+] $wgScriptPath
{{SERVERNAME}}	meta.wikimedia.org		[MW1.5+] $wgServerName

Image modifiers

For details see w:en:Wikipedia:Extended image syntax.

These are image modifiers used in [[File:title.ext|modifier|...|modifier]] links. Some are mutually exclusive, and then the last specified wins. The last unrecognized modifier is used as caption for framed images or together with thumbnails. It's also used as description alt=text.

Size

Word	Usage	Explanation
framed frame enframed	[[File:Mediawiki.png|framed]]	Places an image in a frame with a description. Uses original size and stubbornly ignores width parameter if given. In general, far better to use thumb, as is only suitable for small images.
border	[[File:Mediawiki.png|border]]	Shows a 1px border around the image.
thumbnail thumb	[[File:Mediawiki.png|thumbnail]]	Modifies image size, sets it dependent on user's favorite thumbnail size in one's preferences, or on the given width parameter (see below).
thumb=xyz	[[File:Mediawiki.png|thumb=Wiki.png]]	Manualthumb: instead of displaying an automatically-sized thumbnail for Mediawiki.png, display the image Wiki.png.
width px 100x200px	[[File:Mediawiki.png|40px]] [[File:Mediawiki.png|100x200px]]	Scales image to given width  in pixels Scales image to no more than 100 pixels wide and no more than 200 high, but image scaled to retain its true aspect ratio within the boundary specified.

Position

For details see Help:Images and other uploaded files

The positions are mutually exclusive; the last specified wins. Template:Clear can stop floating. For inline images only modifier px (see above) is supported.

Word	Usage	Explanation
right	[[File:Mediawiki.png|right]]	Sets top of image to the right margin, text will flow from the left.
left	[[File:Mediawiki.png|left]]	Sets top of image to the left margin, content text will flow from the right.
none	[[File:Mediawiki.png|none]]	Image will be alone at left, content text will not appear with image.
center centre	[[File:Mediawiki.png|center]]	Like none with image centered.

Miscellany

Word	Example	Explanation
{{DISPLAYTITLE:xyz}}	no inline output	[MW 1.7+] Modify the page's title [1], enabled in Wikimedia projects since June 2007 ([2]). Also see $wgAllowDisplayTitle.
{{DIRMARK}} {{DIRECTIONMARK}}	‎ ‎	[MW1.7+] u+200E left to right or u+200D right to left mark
{{CONTENTLANGUAGE}}	en	[MW1.7+] code of the site's default interface language ($wgLanguageCode)
{{DEFAULTSORT:xyz}}	no inline output	[MW1.10+] Sets a default category sort key for the whole current page (also applying for category tags before this tag).
#REDIRECT	#REDIRECT [[target]] at top of source page	Creates a redirect to another page (to the target page).

Despite its name MAGICNUMBER is no magic word, the ISBN magic works only on the MediaWiki:Booksources page used by Special:Booksources, but talking about [[{{ns:4}}:{{int:Booksources}}|{{ns:8}}:Booksources]] in a way working on any MediaWiki installation is esoteric enough to be noted here.

See also

• ParserFunctions #expr:, #if:, #ifeq:, etc.
• mw:Manual:Magic words
• Source for Language.php
• Source for MagicWord.php
• Adding parser functions
• mw:Extension:Variables : MediaWiki extension to add new magic words

Notes and references

+/-

Links to other help pages

Help contents

Meta | Wikinews | Wikipedia | Wikiquote | Wiktionary | commons: | mw: | b: | s: | mw:Manual | google

Versions of this help page (for other languages see below)

Meta | Wikinews | Wikipediahttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Help:Magic_words | Wikiquote | Wiktionary

What links here on Meta or from Meta | Wikipedia | MediaWiki

Reading

Go | Search | Stop words | Namespace | Page name | Section | Backlinks | Redirect | Category | Image page | Special pages | Printable version

Tracking changes

Recent changes (enhanced) | Related changes | Watching pages | Diff | Page history | Edit summary | User contributions | Minor edit | Patrolled edit

Logging in and preferences

Logging in | Preferences | User style

Editing

Starting a new page | Advanced editing | Editing FAQ | Edit toolbar | Export | Import | Shortcuts | Edit conflict | Page size

Referencing

Links | URLs | Piped links | Interwiki linking | Footnotes

Style and formatting

Wikitext examples | CSS | Reference card | HTML in wikitext | Formula | List | Table | Sorting | Colors | Images and file uploads

Fixing mistakes

Show preview | Testing | Reverting edits

Advanced functioning

Expansion | Template | Advanced templates | Parser function | Parameter default | Variable | System message | Substitution | Array | Calculation | Embed page

Others

Special characters | Renaming (moving) a page | Talk page | Sandbox | Legal issues for editors