Editing Incubator escapee wiki:Project namespace (section)

==Pages within project namespace==
{{anchor|PAGES}}
{{short|WP:PAGES}}
The project namespace pages are organized according to their function within the overall project schema. This includes Wikipedia official policies and guidelines, process pages, discussion pages, optional essays, maintenance pages, informative pages, and historical pages. 

For lists of pages in the project namespace, see:
* [[Wikipedia:Directories and indexes]] – a handy list of Wikipedia's directories and indexes.
* [[Wikipedia:Department directory]] – a list of the different administrative divisions of Wikipedia.
* [[Wikipedia:Editor's index to Wikipedia]] – an enormous list of the Wikipedia community, intended to help find anything not in the encyclopedia itself.

A main gateway for the project namespace is [[Wikipedia:Community portal|Community portal]]. The Community Portal includes categorized links to the more commonly used pages related to the project. A link to the Community Portal page is available in the [[MediaWiki:Sidebar|sidebar]].

===Policies and guidelines pages{{Anchor|Policies and guidelines}}===
{{short|WP:POLICYPAGES}}
[[Wikipedia:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]]  pages describe Wikipedia's best practice and clarify principles that are [[Wikipedia:Consensus|widely accepted by the community]] and have been through the [[WP:PROPOSAL|Wikipedia review process]]. These pages are marked with the {{tl|policy}}, {{tl|guideline}} or {{tl|MoS guideline}} template. For summaries of key policies, see  [[Wikipedia:List of policies|List of policies]]. For summaries of key guidelines, see [[Wikipedia:List of guidelines|List of guidelines]]. For summaries of guidelines about Wikipedia's house style, see the [[Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Contents|Manual of Style contents]] page. For information on editing policies or guidelines see [[Wikipedia:Editing policy#Edits to policies and guidelines|Edits to policies and guidelines]].
* [[:Category:Wikipedia policies]] – contains important rules that are widely accepted and procedures for important processes such as deletion; there are relatively few of those.
* [[:Category:Wikipedia guidelines]] – contains consensual rules-of-thumb that are not strict, but are considered by most editors to be useful most of the time.
* [[:Category:Wikipedia Manual of Style]] – contains style guidelines widely accepted among editors.

====Process pages{{Anchor|Processes}}====
{{short|WP:PROCEPAGES}}
Process pages help facilitate application of the policies and guidelines governing all Wikipedia pages (e.g., [[Wikipedia:Articles for deletion]]). See [[Wikipedia:Processes|Wikipedia processes]] for details.
* [[:Category:Wikipedia processes]]

===Information and discussions===
Many pages in the Wikipedia namespace have nothing to do with rules or implementation of those rules, and thus do not belong in the above categories. See [[Wikipedia:The difference between policies, guidelines and essays]] for more information.

====Discussion and noticeboard pages{{anchor|Discussion and noticeboard pages}}====
{{short|WP:DISPAGES}}
Some pages are designed for discussions, such as the [[Wikipedia:Village pump|Village pump]]s. Others serve as [[Wikipedia:Noticeboards|noticeboards]] to draw attention to discussions taking place elsewhere, such as the [[WP:centralized discussions|centralized discussions]] page and various [[WP:RFC|requests for comments]] pages. While many of these pages operate like talk pages, some of them have posting rules (at the top of the page) which may be administratively enforced, and they also have their own talk pages, usually about the management of the noticeboard or other process in question. To ask a question or make a request, see the [[WP:Request directory|request directory]]. For a listing of ongoing discussions and current requests, see the [[Wikipedia:Dashboard|dashboard]]. 

* [[:Category:Wikipedia discussion]]
* [[:Category:Wikipedia noticeboards]]
* [[:Category:Wikipedia requests]]

====Maintenance pages{{anchor|aintenance pages}}====
{{short|WP:MAINTPAGES}}
Maintenance pages are used to help facilitate the organization and [[Wikipedia:Cleanup|clean-up]] of articles to bring them up to [[Wikipedia:The perfect article|encyclopedic standards]]. These editor- and bot-generated pages typically contain articles and other pages requiring maintenance or attention. (e.g., [[Wikipedia:Dusty articles]]). The [[Help:Special page|Special namespace]] also contains bot generated maintenance reports (e.g. [[Special:UncategorizedPages]]). See [[Wikipedia:Maintenance|Wikipedia maintenance]] for details.
* [[:Category:Wikipedia maintenance]]
* [[Special:SpecialPages]]

====How-to and information pages{{Anchor|Wikipedia how-to and information pages}}====
{{Shortcut|WP:INFOPAGES|WP:HOWTOPAGES|WP:SUPPLEMENTAL}}
Informative and instructional pages are typically edited by the community; while [[WP:Local consensus|not policies or guidelines themselves]], they are intended to supplement or clarify Wikipedia guidelines, policies, or other Wikipedia processes and practices that are communal norms. Where [[#Essay pages|essay pages]] offer advice or opinions through viewpoints, information pages should supplement or clarify technical or factual information about Wikipedia impartially. In comparison to policies and guidelines, information pages, like essay pages, have a limited status, and can reflect varying levels of [[WP:CONSENSUS|consensus]] and [[WP:CONACHIEVE|vetting]]. These pages are typically marked with the {{tl|Information page}}, {{tl|Wikipedia how-to}}, or {{tl|Supplement}}{{efn|The {{tl|Supplement}} template used for "explanatory essays" is intended as a separate "supplement" banner used for pages derived from policy improvement conversations. The template does not indicate a "higher status" within the community  for an essay, but is used to denote that the essay in question has wide acceptance to be linked from said policy or guideline page. See [[Template:Supplement]] for more information. }} template.

There is a large amount of overlap between the [[Wikipedia:Help namespace|Help namespace]] (which provides mainly technical information) and the Wikipedia namespace (which provides mainly procedural information and interpretation). For this reason, [[Help:redirect|redirect]]s and [[WP:hatnote|hatnote]]s are often set up between these two namespaces. See [[Help:About help pages]] for more information. For a listing of how-to and information pages, see the [[Help:Directory|help directory]].
* [[:Category:Wikipedia information pages]]
* [[:Category:Wikipedia how-to]]
* [[:Category:Wikipedia supplemental pages]]

====Essay pages====
{{Shortcut|WP:ESSAYPAGES}}
Essays about Wikipedia may be written by anyone; some represent widespread norms, others only represent minority viewpoints. Essays can be long [[monologues]] or short [[theses]], serious or funny, informative or opinionated. Essays, like information pages, have no official status, and [[WP:CONLEVEL|do not speak for the Wikipedia community]] as they may be created and edited without overall community oversight. Essays are typically marked with one of the [[Wikipedia:Template messages/Wikipedia namespace#Essays|various essay templates]]. See [[Wikipedia:Essays]] for more information. For a listing of essays, see the [[Wikipedia:Essay directory|essay directory]].
* [[:Category:Wikipedia essays]]

====WikiProject pages====
{{shortcut|WP:PROPAGES}}
Pages of a [[WP:WikiProject|WikiProject]] are the central place for editor collaboration and organization on a particular topic area. Many  WikiProjects compose "[[WP:ADVICEPAGE|advice essays]]" about how to apply Wikipedia's policies and guidelines  to their specific subject area. Pages with <code>Wikipedia:WikiProject</code> prefix form a WikiProject pseudo-namespace. These pages are typically marked with the {{tl|WikiProject status}} or {{tl|WikiProject advice}} template. For a listing of projects, see the [[Wikipedia:WikiProject Council/Directory|directory of WikiProjects]]. For additional resources, or if you have any questions, please visit the [[Wikipedia:WikiProject Council|WikiProject Council]]. 
* [[:Category:WikiProjects]]

===Historical pages===
{{short|WP:HISPAGES}}
{{See also|Wikipedia:Policies and guidelines#historical}}
A historical page or process is one which is no longer in use, or is no longer relevant or consensus has changed about its content. They are kept as records of past Wikipedia processes to give context to historical discussions and to inform future discussions on similar topics. These pages are typically marked with the {{tl|historical}}, {{tl|superseded}} or {{tl|dormant}} templates. See [[WP:HISTORICAL|HISTORICAL]] for more details.

* [[:Category:Wikipedia history]]
* [[Wikipedia:Historical archive]]
* [[Wikipedia:History of Wikipedian processes and people]]