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External links use URLs to link directly to any web page. External links are enclosed in single square brackets (rather than double brackets as with internal links), with the optional link text separated from the URL by a space (not a "|" as with internal links). When rendered, external links are followed by an external link icon. For example,
External links and references are two important elements of Wikipedia that newcomers sometimes find trouble with. This page is designed to cover only the technical aspects of linking and referencing; it is essential that editors also familiarize themselves with Wikipedia:External links, Wikipedia:Reliable sources and Wikipedia:Citing sources, as well as Wikipedia's various other policies ...
Linking through hyperlinks is an important feature of Wikipedia. Internal links bind the project together into an interconnected whole. Interwikimedia links bind the project to sister projects such as Wikisource, Wiktionary and Wikipedia in other languages, and external links bind Wikipedia to the World Wide Web.
Click the "Insert" button, which will add the required wikitext in the edit window. If you wish, you can also "Preview" how your reference will look first. Some fields (such as a web address, also known as a URL) will have a icon next to them. After filling in this field, you can click it to handily autofill the remaining fields.
It is always preferred to link to a page rendered in normal HTML that contains embedded links to the rich media. Where a link to rich media is deemed appropriate, either as a direct link or embedded within an HTML page, an explicit indication of the technology needed to access the relevant content must be given, as in the following example:
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However if you want to link to an outside website, or to certain specially generated Wikimedia pages (such as a past version of an article), it is necessary to provide the full URL. This is done using external link syntax. There are three forms of external link syntax:
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