Practical Electronics/Manual of Style

The aim of this section is to lay down basic rules for the systematic and organised construction of this book.

Image Formats
All diagrams in this Wikibook should be in SVG format. PNGs are acceptable only if it is not practical to make an SVG image. If you do not have the software to make SVG diagrams, then get it. Inkscape is a small, effective program for making SVG diagrams and is easy to install and use. Not having the software is not an excuse to submit diagrams in inappropriate image formats.

Please see the page on SVG Conventions for information about how to make SVG render correctly on Wikibook servers. See the page on pinouts for information on creating pinout diagrams.

JPG images are almost never acceptable for diagrams, as they tend to make thin lines look untidy, and cannot be easily changed.

Colours
Image backgrounds should be white or preferably transparent (for PNG and SVG formats).

Most detail in diagrams should be black (such as lines and component outlines). Many images in this book use the "Tango" colour scheme, which is included with Inkscape. If you use this scheme, your images will match the other images on this book much better.

Image Sizes and Scaling
Images should be made in "px" as this is the standard used to set the sizes on Wikibooks. Always use a round number for the width, and aim for a multiple of 50 is possible. This makes it easier to specify the sizes of the picture.

For example, an image that is 143x212 px is not good, whereas an image that is 150x200 is good.

When drawing a diagram, draw it at the size you will put it at on the page. So, for a circuit diagram that you will make 500px wide, make the original file 500px wide. If an image is going to be used as a thumbnail, aim for a size of 200-300 px, as this is the normal size of a thumbnail.

Normally images are sized by width - you specify the width, and the image height is automatically calculated. Therefore, it is not so important that images are at round height, as this will not usually be specified by people using the image.

Photographs
Photographs should be in JPG format, with the quality set as high as is practical. Please do not submit low-res images or image that are blurred, suffering from compression artifacts, etc.

If you only have a blurred image of a common component or item, leave a message on the Commons graphic lab. If you really want, upload your blurred image and ask someone to try to take a similar picture.

Uploading
Photographs and diagrams should be uploaded to Commons, unless they are fair use, then they must be put on Wikibooks.

They should always be put into a category. Put the images in categories as deep as you can get them.