When I wrote my first article, I searched up “how to save an article you are writing” and found this:
https://www.wikihow.com/Back-Up-a-wikiHow-Article
But yesterday, when I was writing another new article, I saw that there is an option to switch to “advanced editing” even when you are creating an article.
When I clicked on it, the title was still “Create Article - _____” but there was a “Save Draft” thing like there is when you edit an article. So question is, if you can save drafts like that when you are creating a new article, why do we add {{inuse}} tags?
The draft system is pretty old and doesn’t always work properly - it’s entirely possible to lose parts of your edit if the draft didn’t save for whatever reason. They can be difficult to find for new editors, especially if it was for a new article that hasn’t yet been published. Drafts also delete themselves after a year, which can be a problem for chronic procrastinators
{{inuse}} tags give other editors the heads-up that someone else is currently working on the page - if you’re editing a preexisting page but haven’t tagged it as {{inuse}}, nobody knows you’re editing the page and it’s possible for someone else to edit the page in the meantime (which causes an edit clash when you go to publish your edit). The tag also keeps new articles from entering NAB until you remove it, so you can publish something that’s not quite finished yet without worrying about it getting demoted or NFD’d before you’re done with it.
If you want to save something as a draft, it’s a better idea to use something like Word or Google Docs so that you know for sure that your work is being saved. You can also just publish something with {{inuse}} on it so that you have an intermediate revision up and don’t lose any of your edits.
Thanks for the info @Batreeq
