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User:Proteins/Writing scripts for Wikipedia

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This is an old revision of this page, as edited by Proteins (talk | contribs) at 14:22, 30 October 2008 (brief introduction). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

Scripts are amazing. They give you nearly unlimited power to analyze Wikipedia articles, to modify their appearance and even to add new elements. For example, you can count the number of polysyllabic words (analysis), color the words according to their syllables (modification) and create interactive dialogs for the reader (addition). In general, scripts do not affect the underlying article, the one stored on the database, so that multiple people can view the same article according to their own preferences, by using different scripts.

Scripts are also not hard to write! You need to know some HTML tags, and you have to learn how browsers represent the HTML internally, in a so-called DOM tree. Once you've learned those things, and mastered a few commands in JavaScript, you can do anything. There's already a WikiProject devoted to scripts, but this essay was written in the hope that Wikipedians might appreciate a slightly simpler introduction to scripts. Please let me know if something is unclear or incorrect.

How to access the DOM tree in your browser

The DOM tree is created by the browser, and most browsers allow you to see it. The following instructions should allow you to see it in different browsers:

  • In Firefox 3, the best approach is to download an add-on known as "DOM inspector". Once added, it should appear under the "Tools" menu in the top bar of the browser, which is next to the "Bookmarks" menu". DOM Inspector can also be activated using the keycode Ctrl-Shift-I.
  • In Google Chrome, right-clicking on any part of the page summons a menu. At the bottom of that menu is the choice "Inspect element", which shows the position of the element in the DOM tree.
  • In Internet Explorer 7, the "IE Developer Toolbar" is used to show the DOM tree. This toolbar can be found at the far right, behind the double arrows that are to the right of the "Tools" menu, which is itself to the right of the "Page" menu.
  • In Safari, click on the "Develop" menu and select the choice "Show Web Inspector". The Develop menu is located in the topmost menu bar, between the "Bookmarks" and "Window" menus. If the Develop menu is not there, click on the "Edit" menu and select its last element, "Preferences". A window will pop up, on which you choose the last tab, labeled "Advanced". At the bottom of the Advanced screen is a checkbox labeled "Show Develop menu in menu bar." Clicking this checkbox should introduce the Develop menu in the menu bar.
  • In Opera, the equivalent DOM inspector can be turned on by clicking on the "Tools" menu in the top menu bar (sandwiched between the "Widgets" and "Help" menus). Under the Tools menu, click on the "Advanced" submenu, and from the resulting sub-sub-menu, choose "Developer Tools". This should turn on an analysis system at the bottom of the screen, which incidentally can also be detached into a window of its own. Within this analysis window, clicking on the "DOM" tab should reveal the DOM tree. One drawback of this inspector seems to be that it does not reveal the changes in the DOM tree after your script has run. Instead, it reloads the webpage afresh, always showing the original unmodified DOM tree.

The DOM tree of typical Wikipedia pages

Inspecting the DOM tree of Wikipedia articles will reveal a common architecture.

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