> I never edit articles on Wikipedia, so I just looked up how it is done there.
I think you've misconstrued how edit conflict resolution works. There is no "locking" involved.
If two editors both open the same revision of a page and save changes, the second editor to submit changes may encounter an edit conflict. In most cases, conflicts are resolved automatically by the wiki engine. If this isn't possible, the second editor is prompted to merge their changes manually, or to reapply their changes.
This is not a locking mechanism. Having an article open for editing does not lock it for future changes; it just records the revision that you started with to help resolve a conflict, should one arise.
I think you've misconstrued how edit conflict resolution works. There is no "locking" involved.
If two editors both open the same revision of a page and save changes, the second editor to submit changes may encounter an edit conflict. In most cases, conflicts are resolved automatically by the wiki engine. If this isn't possible, the second editor is prompted to merge their changes manually, or to reapply their changes.
This is not a locking mechanism. Having an article open for editing does not lock it for future changes; it just records the revision that you started with to help resolve a conflict, should one arise.