With the MediaWiki software, it's possible to sort articles into categories. In order to ensure that these categories will be useful to users of the wiki, categories should be suggested and discussed before creation so that a clear category tree can be maintained and the correct sort keys can be added.
Policy
Because it is a labor-intensive process to remove or alter a category name once it exists, categories must be orphaned to be deleted as they cannot be redirected, all categories must be suggested and approved by a user consensus. The process is pretty straightforward:
- Category suggestions should be listed on the category suggestions page before being created.
- Suggestions without any opposition after at least 7 days are considered approved and can be created. The suggestion discussion should then be moved to the new category's talk page.
- Suggestions with supporting votes after at least 4 days are considered approved and can be created. The suggestion discussion should then be moved to the new category's talk page.
- Suggestions with opposition will be removed to the archive after at least 2 weeks of inactivity.
- After a suggested category has been approved, don't expect anyone else to actually create it for you! Anyone can create an approved category, and while someone is bound to come along eventually, it won't happen as quickly as it would if you did it yourself.
Before suggesting a new category, you should browse our existing categories and the discussions related to them. Remember that we also want to categorize the article with the correct sort keys.
Categories
There are two general types of categories, a list category and a locational category. List categories generally just list articles that are the name of the category, while locational categories generally contain articles that are related to the name of the category.
While the overall category structure is a work in progress, these categories are a good place to start browsing.
Note that this is just a small sample of the categories that are currently in use. For a complete list, see the full category listing or tree.
In-universe categories
These categories are used on in-universe articles, and are named to maintain Memory Alpha's point of view.
- Category:Planets
- This is a list category (a category for instances of planets). This means that every planet may, and should, be included in this category. Don't include moons, planetoids, asteroids or other celestial bodies, colonies, cities, lists of planets, or other articles related to planets. If the name of the planet contains a Roman numeral, use a sort key in which this numeral is replaced by a double-digit (Example: [[Category:Planets|Rigel 07]] for Rigel VII).
- Category:Qo'noS
- This is a locational category. Anything (species items, terms) relating to Qo'noS or Klingons, who are native to Qo'noS, should be listed here.
- Category:Delphic Expanse
- This is a locational category. Anything (species, planets, terms) relating to the Delphic Expanse area should be listed here.
- Category:Mirror universe
- This is a locational category for anything relating to the mirror universe. Only articles directly talking about "mirror universe items" should be listed here.
- Category:Sectors
- This is another list category. Include all sectors, but nothing else - no quadrants, zones, areas, regions, systems, no lists of sectors or other articles related to sectors.
- Category:Starships
- List category for individual starships.
- Category:Starship classes
- List category for all starship classes.
Production POV categories
These categories are used on production articles, which are written from the real world POV.
- Episodes
- List categories for episodes of all the series and films.
- Category:TOS episodes
- Category:TAS episodes
- Category:TNG episodes
- Category:DS9 episodes
- Category:VOY episodes
- Category:ENT episodes
- Category:DIS episodes
- Category:PIC episodes
- Category:LD episodes
- Category:ST episodes
- Category:PRO episodes
- Category:SNW episodes
- Category:Star Trek films
- Performers
- List categories for all performers in the series and films.
- Category:TOS performers
- Category:TAS performers
- Category:TNG performers
- Category:DS9 performers
- Category:VOY performers
- Category:ENT performers
- Category:DIS performers
- Category:PIC performers
- Category:LD performers
- Category:ST performers
- Category:PRO performers
- Category:SNW performers
- Category:Film performers
Maintenance categories
We also use categories to help with the regular maintenance task of listing specific articles somewhere ("attention needed", "featured article" etc.) by creating a category and adding it to the relevant template. The prefix "Memory Alpha" is used for all maintenance categories that are included via a template.
- Category:Memory Alpha images
- main category for "images" uploaded on this site.
- Category:Memory Alpha audio files
- main category for "audio files" uploaded on this site.
- Category:Memory Alpha orphaned categories
- maintenance category for all "uncategorized categories".
- Category:Memory Alpha featured articles
- category for all featured articles. Use via template {{featured}} only.
- Category:Memory Alpha pages needing attention
- supercategory for "special" PNA categories - also category for PNAs that don't belong on those subcategories. Use via template {{pna}} only.
- Category:Memory Alpha inaccurate articles
- category for "inaccurate" PNAs. Use via template {{pna-inaccurate}} only.
- Category:Memory Alpha incomplete articles
- category for "incomplete" PNAs. Use via template {{pna-incomplete}} only.
- Category:Memory Alpha unformatted articles
- category for "unformatted" PNAs. Use via template {{pna-unformatted}} only.