Creating templates for Knowledge

A template gives every new article the same skeleton, which is how a knowledge base written by ten people still reads like one.

A template gives every new article the same skeleton, which is how a knowledge base written by ten people still reads like one.

Create one

1. Open the templates in Knowledge.
2. Add a template and name it for the kind of article it produces.
3. Build the skeleton: headings, a placeholder line under each, and any block that always belongs.
4. Save it.
5. Tell the people who write articles that it exists.

Three templates, not ten

Almost every article is one of three things: an explanation of how something works, instructions for doing something, or an answer to a question people ask. Those three cover the ground.

More templates than that and writers spend their thinking on choosing one.

Put the prompts in the template

Under each heading, a line saying what belongs there. "What the reader must have before starting." "The steps, one action each." Those lines get deleted as the article is written, and they are what makes a template teach rather than merely arrange.

What always belongs

If every article should open with who it is for, or close with related links, put that in the template. A convention nobody has to remember is a convention that holds.

Revisit it once

After a dozen articles, look at what writers consistently delete and what they consistently add. That difference is the template correcting itself, and it is worth acting on once rather than ignoring for a year.

See also

• Assigning and reviewing articles
• Creating and inserting a content block
• What Team Publishing is