How to Maintain a Category

Maximize the potential of Questions and Answers

Hundreds of thousands of people ask questions and contribute answers here. All it takes is one person to multiply the usefulness of their contributions.

Q&A grows naturally over time. Someone asks a question, someone else answers it, someone else adds more information, etc. It's a powerful process but it gets messy and disorganized. The wild growth needs a human touch.

A little bit of simple & easy editing goes a long way.

First choose a category you're interested in. If you don't see one that perfectly fits your interests we could start a new one.

Start at the top of your section with the most popular questions. These are the ones that get seen the most.

• Are any questions misplaced? You can move questions from one category to another with the Recategorize link in the left menu. (As with many of the more powerful functions you will need to be signed in.)
• Can you think of additional ways to ask a question? Click Edit Alternate Wordings under Advanced Tools in the left menu. Alternate wordings prevent duplicate questions from being created. When someone asks the question using your alternate wording they will automatically see the existing page. That can save contributors a lot of time and it instantly helps the person asking the question.
• Some questions aren't duplicates but they're closely related and are likely to help the same people. Use the Edit Related Questions function to link related questions together.
• Are there valuable outside resources that will help answer questions? Add them with the Edit Links function.
• You can customize the headlines of answers. The default headline for answers is "Answer" but that's not very informative.
• You can improve any answers or make minor spelling and grammar changes.
• You can also improve question wording. We want every question to be "FAQ style" i.e., one simple question that asks one thing. It should be specific enough to be answerable but general enough to apply to as many people as possible. It can be hard for people to write their questions like this so it's an area in which contributors can really help.

For advanced contributors, here are Editing Tips.

As you can see, growing a category can mean a lot of different things. Do whatever is fun for you. There's never a shortage of improvements to be made, and there is such a wide variety of things to do that anybody can help.

If you have questions e-mail us at WikiAnswers @ Answers.com (remove spaces).