Editing Help:Archiving a talk page (section)

==== Archive link boxes ====
{{Anchor|Archive box}}
On regularly archived talk pages, it is useful to have an "archive box" template. Common usage is to place the archive box below other header templates and before the first section heading so that the box appears to the right of the [[Help:Section#Table of contents (TOC)|table of contents]]. If the page already has a manual archive box, add the link to the new archive page to it. If there is no archive box yet, you may want to set one up.

The most common archive box template is {{Tl|Archives}}. It has a significant number of options. The <code>auto</code> option causes the box to automatically find your archive page list. If <code>auto=yes</code> or <code>auto=short</code> the links are shown as "<code>1, 2, 3</code>". If <code>auto=long</code> the links are shown as "<code>Archive 1, Archive 2, Archive 3</code>"). If the archives do not follow the standard naming scheme (/Archive #), or date labels are desired a manual list can be inputted in the first unnamed parameter as seen in example 2 below. There are also options which show a search field, permit the box to collapse/expand, start the box collapsed/expanded, etc. Many of these are shown in example 4 and all of them are explained in more detail at [[Template:Archive/doc]]. 
;Example 1
{{archives|root=Help talk:Archiving a talk page}}
For a box with an automatically generated archive list with a search bar. {{tl|Archives}} can be used without any extra parameters. 
{{clear}}
;Example 2
{{Archives|*[[Help_talk:Archiving_a_talk_page/Archive_1|2003–2006]] 
*[[Help_talk:Archiving_a_talk_page/Archive_2|2006–2007]] 
*[[Help_talk:Archiving_a_talk_page/Archive_3|2007–2009]] 
*[[Help_talk:Archiving_a_talk_page/Archive_4|2008–2014]] 
*[[Help_talk:Archiving_a_talk_page/Archive_5|2014–2019]]}}
For a box with a manual archive list and a search bar {{tlp|Archives|''List of archives''}} can be used. For the box to the right the code is: 
<br><syntaxhighlight lang="wikitext">{{tlp|Archives|
*[[Help_talk:Archiving_a_talk_page/Archive_1|2003–2006]]
*[[Help_talk:Archiving_a_talk_page/Archive_2|2006–2007]]
*[[Help_talk:Archiving_a_talk_page/Archive_3|2007–2009]]
*[[Help_talk:Archiving_a_talk_page/Archive_4|2008–2014]]
*[[Help_talk:Archiving_a_talk_page/Archive_5|2014–2019]]}}</syntaxhighlight>
{{clear}}
;Example 3
{{Archives|auto=long|'''Archive box archives''':<br>[[Template talk:Archive box/Archive 1|Archive 1]], [[Template talk:Archive box/Archive 1|Archive 1]]|root=Template talk:Archives}}
For a box with both an automatic and manual list {{tlp|Archives|auto=long|''List of archives''}} can be used. The example below for [[Template talk:Archives]] where the archives for the old {{tl|archive box}} template are shown use the following code:
<syntaxhighlight lang="wikitext" inline>{{Archives|auto=long|'''Archive box archives''':<br>[[Template talk:Archive box/Archive 1|Archive 1]], [[Template talk:Archive box/Archive 1|Archive 1]]}}</syntaxhighlight>
{{clear}}
;Example 4
{{archives
| auto        = short
| search      = no
| root        = Help talk:Archiving a talk page
| collapsible = yes
| collapsed   = yes
| style = background-color:#FFAAAA; width:140px
| title       = These are the archives!
| image       = File:Crystal Clear app file-manager.png
| image-size  = 60px
| bot         = Lowercase sigmabot III
| age         = 1
| units       = year
}}
This template just demonstrate a lot of the parameters. Most of them are quite self explanatory. <br>
<syntaxhighlight lang="wikitext">{{archives
| auto        = short
| search      = no
| root        = Help talk:Archiving a talk page
| collapsible = yes
| collapsed   = yes
| style = background-color:#FFAAAA; width:140px
| title       = These are the archives!
| image       = File:Crystal Clear app file-manager.png
| image-size  = 60px
| bot         = Lowercase sigmabot III
| age         = 1
| units       = year
}}</syntaxhighlight>
{{clear}}