Help:BPG Help Wanted

Book and Paper Group Wiki > BPG Help Wanted

This page serves as a way for BPG wiki editors to put out a "call for help" on specific pages. These can vary from pages that need many small changes (such as typos or fixing/updating links) to a more general call for content.

If you would like to list a page, please place it in the appropriate section as part of the bulleted list, or create a section if it does not already exist. Also include a description of what kinds of editing help the page needs, such as "fixing typos", or "adding new content". Be as specific as possible. If you have any questions if your request fits, please email the BPG Wiki Coordinators at bookandpapergroup.wiki@gmail.com.

Copyright 2025. The AIC Wiki is a publication of the American Institute for Conservation (AIC). It is published as a convenience for the members of AIC. Publication does not endorse nor recommend any treatments, methods, or techniques described herein. Information on researching with and citing the wiki can be found on the Reference and Bibliography Protocols page.

Cite this page:

American Institute for Conservation (AIC). "Help:BPG Help Wanted." AIC Wiki. June 30, 2025. https://www.conservation-wiki.com/wiki/Help:BPG_Help_Wanted.

Minor/Entry-Level/One-Time Fixes

If you are interested in helping with the wiki and are willing to become an editor, please consider one of these projects. They can be worked on in small bites and require no long-term commitment. In general, you would be adding new information, rather than re-writing existing text. These updates are always welcome as new/improved information becomes available.

General

• Add Images: All of our pages could benefit from photos, especially images showing condition issues, techniques, materials, and equipment. With practice, adding a photo can be done in just a few minutes. Once you are logged in, follow the Upload File link (also found on the bottom of each page) and follow the directions here. There is more guidance for formatting photographs for BPG pages on the Wiki Templates and BPG Contributors' Toolbox pages.
• Add Terminology: The BPG Wiki does not need to become a glossary, but should link to existing glossaries. You can help define terms in the BPG Wiki by adding links to the online glossaries like the AIC Lexicon, CAMEO, and for books, the Ligatus Language of Bookbindings and Bookbinding and the Conservation of Books: A Dictionary of Descriptive Terminology."
  • When sources disagree on terminology, it is very helpful to describe the debate, as has been done in the Endbands Talk page. Other pages that would benefit from some terminology work include Endpapers, Sewing and Leaf Attachment, Book Boards, Board Attachment, and Media Problems.
• Suggest Improvements: All wiki users are welcome to edit the Discussion (or "Talk") pages for any BPG page. Please add suggestions for improvement, an interesting citation we missed, or a comment about the techniques. For example, if you have a suggestion for improvement on the Mold chapter, add your suggestion to the talk page for the Mold chapter. Please sign your name with the signature button in the toolbar above the editing box.
• The following pages welcome contributions from all BPG members - no special qualifications or content review is necessary.
  • BPG Materials, Equipment, and Tools
  • BPG Adhesive Recipes and Tips
• Add citations to important publications.
• Fix Broken Links after pages have been updated, moved, or replaced, or as necessary for external references.
• Translation: If you are fluent in another language and are interested in translating a page of the wiki, this is a great service to the international community. Translations will be vetted by a small group and then posted as a pdf to that wiki page.

Page-Specific

• Add identification images to Book Boards page
  
• Consolidate/reformat information on Bleaching page
  
• Add images to Foxing page
  
• Add images of Mending techniques
  
• Add images of common/famous examples to Watermarks page
  
• Update the Washing page to include information about the use of chelating agents. Currently the page says that "Their use in conservation is relatively rare..". This could be as simple as recommending some recently published articles. perhaps this one?
• Fix format of portal so it looks better and more even (check against variable screen sizes, browsers, pc vs. mobile)
• Add links from the BPG Wiki to CAMEO. For example, there are many materials listed on the Surface Cleaning page that should be linked to entries in CAMEO. Use the text "See also Eraser crumbs, in the CAMEO Materials Database."

Ongoing Projects

Historical Techniques and Materials

The time has come to address some of the historical treatment procedures on the Wiki. You may have read about some techniques on there and thought "Does anyone still do that?"

We would like to identify procedures that are no longer in use, and move them to a Historical Techniques and Materials section that we have created at the bottom of each of the Wiki pages that began as a Paper Conservation Catalog chapter. This section can also be used for procedures that predate the Catalog, but would be useful for people to know about.

The Alkalization and Neutralization page (written in 1985) has several outdated techniques listed. As an example, we have moved Diethyl Zinc to the new section on Historical Techniques and Materials with a brief comment about its history of use. Can you help us identify others?

Here is how you can help:

• Identify a paper conservation procedure that is no longer in use (there appear to be quite a few in the Wiki).
• Write a few sentences about how it was performed (existing text can be used) and why it is no longer used. It would be especially interesting to describe evidence of the treatment having been done that can be discovered during the examination of an object. Cite any relevant articles you are aware of, especially those that state the reasons why the treatment is no longer used.
• Send it to us at bookandpapergroup.wiki@gmail.com so that we can add it to the Historical Treatments section, and you will be credited as a contributor.

Bibliography Work

Help us link to online resources. Throughout the BPG Wiki, there are many citations to publications that are now online. Why not add a link? For a handy list of online Book and Paper Conservation resources, see Accessing Conservation Literature. See also our BPG Reference and Bibliography Protocols.

Proposed Projects

Some ideas for new pages or new topics that BPG members would love to see on the BPG Wiki are listed below. If you have any thoughts about them please feel free to list them here! Or contact the BPG Wiki Coordinators at bookandpapergroup.wiki@gmail.com.

• Examination and Photodocumentation with: ultraviolet induced visible fluorescence, reflected ultraviolet, false color ultraviolet, reflected infrared irradiation, false color infrared, transmitted infrared, raking illumination, transmitted illumination, specular illumination, and polarized illumination.

Book Conservation

There are several "partially-started pages" that are not claimed by any wiki editors that could use some focused attention.

• Book Boards: This page was intended as a description of the material used for stiffening book covers. It has never been fully developed, and would benefit from a focused literature review and the addition of photographs.
• BPG Parchment Bookbinding: This page originated as chapter of the Book Conservation Catalog, before it became part of the wiki. It was never fully developed. It should be entirely re-written (and renamed) to focus on Parchment Book Bindings and their treatment. Parchment as a material and the treatment of parchment documents is already covered in the well-developed Paper Conservation Wiki chapter on Parchment.
• Circulating Collections Repair: This page would benefit from the addition of citations and additional methods / techniques.
• The Book Decoration page is very disorganized. There are many terms with no definitions or images. Is there a better way to present this topic, perhaps with undefined terms off to the side as a "wish list"?

Paper Conservation

• Chelation and its Uses in Paper Conservation
• Enzymes and their Uses in Paper Conservation
• Conductivity Modified Washing
• Create section on Lamination under Encapsulation/ Historical techniques and Materials
• Collage and Composite Pieces