Content deleted Content added

Inline

Revision as of 11:08, 4 September 2008

Help Page Patrollers are a group of Wikipedians who patrol the help desk and help users who have placed the {{helpme}} template on their talk pages. The patrol is an optional service. Patrollers can come and go, and there is no official sign up process.

Regular patrollers may add {{User HPP}} or {{user help desk}} to their user page:

This user is a help page patroller

This user volunteers at the
Wikipedia Help Desk.

What helpers can do

Make sure all messages are formatted correctly,
Answer questions,
Check the Help Me Category and answer questions from users,
Check archives

Patrollers

Add yourself with

#~~~ (Joined ~~~~~)

and if you are not using the userbox, add yourself to the Help Desk Patrol Category.

List

Levonscott User talk:Levonscott User:Levonscott (Joined 07:38, 21 August 2011 (UTC))[reply]
StewieGriffin! • Talk 07:04, 4 June 2008 (UTC) I'm Back Founder of the HPP[reply]
RyRy5 (talk) (Joined 00:20, 31 May 2008 (UTC))[reply]
Hersfold ^(t/a/c) (Joined 21:41, 19 April 2008 (UTC))[reply]
Soxred93 | talk bot (Joined 19:57, 19 April 2008 (UTC))[reply]
...... Dendodge.Talk^Help (Joined 09:34, 20 April 2008 (UTC))[reply]
Alexfusco⁵ (Joined 14:32, 20 April 2008 (UTC))[reply]
Bauani (talk) (Joined 22:31, 20 April 2008 (UTC))[reply]
Kerotan ^{Leave Me a Message} Have a nice day :) (joined 06:27, 21 April 2008 (UTC))[reply]
::Manors:: talk to me (Joined 15:10, 22 April 2008 (UTC))[reply]
Sunny910910 ^{(talk|Contributions|Guest)} (Joined 02:21, 4 May 2008 (UTC))[reply]
Teratornis (talk) (Joined 06:37, 5 May 2008 (UTC))[reply]
Calvin 1998 ^(t-c) (Joined 01:54, 13 May 2008 (UTC))[reply]
Mr. Green^{Hit Me Up}Userboxes (Joined 16:13, 16 May 2008 (UTC))[reply]
Josh Powell (talk) (Joined 14:18, 23 May 2008 (UTC))[reply]
-- ShinmaWa^(talk) (Joined 19:47, 28 May 2008 (UTC))[reply]
-- Natalya 22:45, 28 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Active earlier this year, hope to regain that. Rudget (Help?) 13:23, 1 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
ChristopherJames2008 (talk) (Joined 13:35, 1 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Iamzork (talk) (Joined 11:22, 6 June 2008 (UTC))[reply]
Cedarvale1965-08 (talk) (Joined 02:30, 15 June 2008 (UTC))[reply]
:-) Stwalkerster [ talk ] (Joined 16:12, 15 June 2008 (UTC), but have been doing this for ages)[reply]
–thedemonhog talk • edits (Joined 18:13, 15 June 2008 (UTC); made twenty-three edits to the help desk page prior to joining the patrol)[reply]
IaM7DeadlySins (talk)
Scottydude _talk (Joined 02:09, 14 July 2008 (UTC))[reply]
TermyJW - The One and Only (Joined 13:41, 14 July 2008 (UTC))
Eric (mailbox) (Joined 04:53, 23 July 2008 (UTC))[reply]
Etineskid (talk) (Joined:18:32, 23 July 2008 (UTC))[reply]
ukexpat (talk) (Joined 15:01, 26 August 2008 (UTC))[reply]
Lego K^ontribs T^alk M (Joined 00:51, 12 September 2008 (UTC))[reply]
Chamal ^talk _work (Joined 15:20, 16 October 2008 (UTC), but have been contributing to Help desk long before signing up here.[reply]
Genius 101 ^Guestbook (Joined 22:28, 18 October 2008 (UTC))[reply]
Excirial^{(Contact me,Contribs)} 06:46, 19 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]
-Porchcrop ^{(talk|contributions)} 04:29, 28 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]
$\xi ri\pi i\vartheta \alpha \xi$ (Joined 09:34, 1 August 2009 (UTC))[reply]
Unionhawk ^Talk ^E-mail 18:16, 4 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
LbB (Joined 14:33, 5 October 2009 (UTC))
Mysdaao ^talk (Joined 15:50, 18 November 2009 (UTC))[reply]
Enti342 (talk) (Joined 21:30, 20 January 2010 (UTC))[reply]
-- PhantomSteve/talk|contribs\ (Joined 07:04, 3 April 2010 (UTC))[reply]
œ ^™ 23:08, 12 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Bobby122 (talk) (Joined 15:17, 27 June 2010 (UTC))[reply]
Sainsf--Sainsf<^> (talk) 15:58, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Imagine Wizard (talk • contribs • count) Iway amway Imagineway Izardway. (Joined 13:43, 27 August 2010 (UTC))[reply]
John of Reading (talk) (Joined 22:01, 4 November 2010 (UTC))[reply]
—ASPENSTI—TALK—CONTRIBUTIONS (Joined 17:38, 2 March 2011 (UTC))[reply]
Goswamir14- www.rohangoswami.webs.com (Joined 00:33, 12 April 2011 (UTC))
Vibhijain (Joined 11:34, 15 April 2011 (UTC))
Electriccatfish2 (talk) (Joined 16:58, 22 June 2012 (UTC))[reply]
Creeper jack1 (talk) (Joined 21:09, 27 January 2013 (UTC))[reply]
—Prhartcom (talk) (Joined 02:27, 22 September 2013 (UTC))[reply]
Denver C. (talk) (Joined 16:36, 9 May 2015 (UTC))[reply]
Masssly (talk) (Joined 18:12, 12 June 2015 (UTC))[reply]
MarkYabloko (Joined 07:45, 11 November 2015 (UTC))[reply]
Boomer Vial^{Holla! We gonna ball!} (Joined 20:50, 24 February 2017 (UTC))[reply]
TheDoctorWho (talk) (Joined 02:46, 13 January 2018 (UTC))[reply]
Sam Sailor (Joined 21:49, 6 April 2019 (UTC))[reply]
Kichu🐘 ^Discuss (Joined 11:08, 3 March 2021 (UTC))[reply]
Jack Reynolds (talk to me!) (email me!!) (Joined 12:30, 1 April 2021 (UTC))[reply]
Kk09771 (talk) (Joined 17:21, 27 January 2022 (UTC))[reply]
ThatOneWolf ^{(talk|contribs)} (Joined 23:03, 9 November 2023 (UTC))[reply]

August 30

Non-Notable Site

How do you make an article notable, or how is it determined. I created an article about a site that I do not own, it was not an ad, nor biased but it was denied. It is a well known site in my area, and I was not even given the chance to discuss with a moderator. I posted a talk page and added the hang on tag, but it was deleted within minutes anyways. Also, I referneced the site directly, like there about us page for refernece, so it was verifiable. Just looking for some guidance or assistance.

BeigeLamp (talk) 16:05, 30 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Website notability is hard to pin down. Which site was it? You may also want to read WP:WEB, that may give you an idea of what notability means in regards to websites. Also remember that Wikipedia isn't really for things well-known in your area, it's for things well-known all over the world, or at least are very notable. --Alinnisawest,^{Dalek Empress} (extermination requests here) 16:59, 30 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Of course, if you haven't already, you may want to begin by simply taking a look at WP:N. Miquonranger03 (talk) 06:59, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

All Mixed Up

Here is a sentence from the article Devon Island. The numbers in this sentence are going in circles.

"The highest point is the Devon Ice Cap at 1,920 m (6,300 ft)6,299 ft/1,920 metres which is part of the Arctic Cordillera."

What should appear? metres followed by feet, or vice versa?

Thanks, Wanderer57 (talk) 00:41, 30 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Well, generally you'd want to follow the same format in the rest of the article. In this case, it appears the the other measurements have metric first, then American measurements. So I'd say it should be just 1,920 m (6,300 ft). --Alinnisawest,^{Dalek Empress} (extermination requests here) 00:53, 30 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I have removed the duplicate height.[1] PrimeHunter (talk) 00:55, 30 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Relisting AFDs

How do I relist AFDs? Schuym1 (talk) 01:10, 30 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

It depends on what you mean by relist and what has already happened to the AfD. Which AfD do you have in mind and what do you want to happen? PrimeHunter (talk) 01:21, 30 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I mean relist AFD nominations so that concensus can be reached. I want to know how to do it so I can relist AFDs in the future Schuym1 (talk) 01:24, 30 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

If an AfD has been listed for a full five days and there is not enough discussion to form a consensus (e.g. only one person commented), then it will be relisted for another five days by an administrator. However, if you are talking about Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Dinosaur Island (2002 film), that was closed as "no consensus" - that means there was a sufficient amount of discussion but no clear consensus to delete the article. Re-listing the same article after a recent AfD on that article has closed as "keep" is not a good idea. Xenon 54 01:35, 30 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I wasn't talking about that. I was talking in general. I didn't know that only admins could do that. Thanks for the response. Schuym1 (talk) 01:37, 30 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

How to undo an archive?

How do I undo an archive? A talk page I have been involved in has been edited recently to include an auto-archive setup for MiszaBot, and the bot has come along and done it's archive thing. However, the article is about a TV channel which closed a couple of days ago and I believe the level of activity on this page doesn't really warrant an archive at all (only about 19000 bytes were moved to the single archive). Is there a simple way to reverse the effect of the archive (ie. put the archived discussions back in the main talk page and delete the archive sub-page)? Astronaut (talk) 01:26, 30 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Well, yes. You can revert the page to the version before the bot was added (this version), manually add in the two subsequent edits by User:Hmr (these edits), and ask for the archive page to be deleted by tagging it with, for example, something like

{{db|CSD G6: archive created by bot, but was unecessary and the archiving has been reverted so the archive page is superfluous}}

. However, there is no hurry to do this. I think a better course of action is to first talk to the user who added the archive bot request to the page, Andrewcrawford, and discuss the matter with him. Many users would see such action to reverse something they had done, without at least a polite note first, as rude. Cheers.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 02:12, 30 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

User contribs

I have a few questions about using this;

Can you view how many edits a user has made by just looking at the contributions list instead of having to manually count? (I know this is available for your user account at Special:Preferences)
Can you check a user's milestone edits (e.g. their first, hundredth, millionth, etc.) without having to manually count?

♫Death gle an er 03:15, 30 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, here's a link to several edit counters that are available. If you view the "user contributions" page for a user, there's also a block at the bottom of that page with links to some of the more useful/popular of these edit counters. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 03:25, 30 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

regading my health

i do not know whether i am having pile problem or not. i got checked up with surgeon doctor but he is saying no. but sometime blood is going while passing stool. kindly advise . —Preceding unsigned comment added by 121.243.0.130 (talk) 05:33, 30 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Like it says at the top of the page: "...we cannot, under any circumstance, provide medical, legal, or any other sort of advice that is normally regulated by governmental authorities." The best advice is to go to your doctor. Doctors have had many years training at med school and therefore are people you can trust, rather than the non-expert opinion of us Wikipedia volunteers. Astronaut (talk) 09:47, 30 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

See also Wikipedia:Medical disclaimer. PrimeHunter (talk) 15:17, 30 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Wanted to create new article and could not ...

Hi - I wanted to create an article about an American astronomer, Paul Herget, who was a pioneer in the use of computers in astronomy. There are several existing references to Herget on Wikipedia - I did a search on his name, followed one of the links to the page for the Minor Planet Center, then clicked on the red "Paul Herget" link. This took me to a "Paul Herget" page which read, in part:

"Wikipedia does not have an article with this exact name."

From there I followed the "Start the Paul Herget article" link, and landed on a page called "Unauthorized" which read

"This page is currently protected, and can be edited only by administrators."

Underneath that there is this not-very-helpful text

"The page title you have tried to create has been protected from creation. The reason given is: go away. You may also wish to check the deletion log."

As this page suggests I checked the linked "protection log" and found

05:01, 21 February 2008 East718 (Talk | contribs) protected Paul Herget ‎ (go away [create=sysop])

The deletion log contains

   * 05:01, 21 February 2008 East718 (Talk | contribs) deleted "Paul Herget" ‎ (csd g3)
   * 09:10, 15 February 2008 Fram (Talk | contribs) deleted "Paul Herget" ‎ (G3: Vandalism)

I guess I can piece together what happened, but am confused why a page about a fairly obscure scientist would be the subject of this kind of lockdown. Perhaps there is another Paul Herget? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Lesonyrra (talk • contribs)

The deletion log has the answer - someone created a page with that title (twice). It was considered vandalism both times and deleted. To prevent further vandalism the page name was protected so that it could not be re-created. You can request unprotection at WP:RFUP and when unprotected and assuming your account is autoconfirmed, you can then create the article about the astronomer. Before you do create it, please read WP:BIO and WP:YFA. – ukexpat (talk) 14:55, 30 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Both deleted versions were a crazy made-up biography starting "Paul David Herget (August 5, 1989 - August 5, 2036) was elected President of the United States of America in 2036." I guess the author is or knows somebody non-notable called Paul Herget. The page name was protected to avoid further recreation of this nonsense, and "go away" must have been aimed at the creator. I have unprotected it so you can create Paul Herget now. PrimeHunter (talk) 15:09, 30 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Colons in links

Am I correct in thinking that using a colon in a link will prevent that link from showing up in the "What links here" list? e.g. [[:Foo]] Dismas|^(talk) 16:29, 30 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

It appears not. I just went to Special:Orphanedpages chose one at random, Abbasov, and threw it onto my talk page, first linked as [[Abbasov]], and then removed and linked as [[:Abbasov]. In both cases, checking Special:whatlinkshere/Abbasov returned positive results. So it appears that, with and without the comma, it makes no difference. Moreover, the link above to Abbasov I displayed using a colon; clicking on the preceding whatlinkshere link, now that I have removed the test from my talk page, I expect will show this page as a sole link, as further confirmation.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 16:41, 30 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Yep:--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 16:42, 30 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Okay, so what does it do then? Dismas|^(talk) 16:46, 30 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

It makes sure that a link is displayed instead of something else happening in certain cases. For example, [[:Image:Name]] creates a link to the named image instead of displaying the image, and [[:de:Name]] creates a link to the German (de) Wikipedia article in that place instead of adding an interlanguage link in the languages box. There is no difference between [[:Abbasov]] and [[Abbasov]] when Abbasov is an article. PrimeHunter (talk) 17:54, 30 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

See more at Help:Link. Another example is category links. PrimeHunter (talk) 17:56, 30 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The colon wikilink trick only works for media (don't display/play) and categories (don't place page in category). --—— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk - 18:01, 30 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

- And interlanguage links. PrimeHunter (talk) 18:07, 30 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

And templates. --—— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk - 01:52, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Another example of leading colon trickery (but inside curly braces) is to transclude a page in the main (article) namespace as a template, rather than looking for a template page in the template: namespace. See Help:Template#General. --Teratornis (talk) 20:51, 30 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks all. None of these responses explains what I saw though. I went by some user's talk page today and saw that the previous section heading had something like ==[[:History of Iran]]== I think it had been added by a bot but I can't remember for certain. Having not seen the colon used like that, I asked here. Guess I should have bookmarked the page or something. Dismas|^(talk) 01:37, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

If that's really what you saw, I don't think it does anything. Algebraist 01:47, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I have seen it before, but it does not do anything. I suspect some editors may think it suppresses the backlink, but it does not. --—— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk - 01:52, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I have mainly seen bots do it. If you always want to make a normal link then it's easier to make a bot which always adds the colon whether or not it changes anything in a given situation. PrimeHunter (talk) 01:59, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

See Special:Contributions/CSDWarnBot for an example of a bot which always adds the colon to a reported page name, whether it's needed (as for images) or not. Many warning templates do the same. PrimeHunter (talk) 02:39, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you! The explanation about bots adding a colon whether it be an image link or not clears up my confusion. It would just be easier to code for the bot owner. Thanks again, Dismas|^(talk) 02:50, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

It doesn't have to have been a bot. Many templates contain automatic sections headers and those almost all use the colon because the subject may be a template or image or other thing which must not display. For example, most of the warning templates contain an option to place an automatic section header by using the parameter |header=1. For example, {{subst:uw-test|example}}. --Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 11:56, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

how can I delete the editing history from a Wikipedia page

how can I delete the editing history from a Wikipedia pages, as it contains senstive material or personal information already deleted from final article. Akpantue (talk) 19:10, 30 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

You can't, but admins can. If it's really sensitive, you should probably make a request for oversight, which will leave the information invisible even to admins. Algebraist 19:12, 30 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Downloadable/Static Help Section?

I've already been answered about the sandbox, and have it set up (see EXE Sandbox above), but I also want all of the help pages so that I can actually read to learn about the stuff, and have a reference...

My main problem however is that I have WOS installed (looking back WAMP seems a little easier, but heh...), and I'm not sure how to go about getting the help pages in there (I don't want the rest, just help... —Preceding unsigned comment added by Pyrofyr (talk • contribs) 19:25, 30 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

See the links under WP:EIW#Download, WP:EIW#Export, WP:EIW#Mobile, WP:EIW#Research, WP:EIW#Mirror, and WP:EIW#Query. The odds may be low that anyone who is answering questions on the Help desk just now has actually done what you are trying to, and would have the necessary experience to tell you an efficient way to copy all the Help pages from Wikipedia. What you mean by "all the help pages" is not clear. Wikipedia has (at least) two large sets of help pages:

The MediaWiki Handbook, which focuses on what is common to all or most wikis that run on the MediaWiki software.
The Wikipedia: (Project:) namespace, which contains many pages that document things specific to Wikipedia.

What you want depends on what you are trying to do. If you are trying to set up your own wiki, you would focus first on the MediaWiki Handbook. If you are trying to learn how to edit specifically on Wikipedia, then you need all the Project: stuff too. The MediaWiki Handbook itself says you can import the Handbook into your own wiki, but it only links to generic instructions in mw:Help:Import. mw:Data dumps describes the dump files you can download. You might find it easier just to buy a book, such as Wikipedia - The Missing Manual. --Teratornis (talk) 21:11, 30 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

And note: this Help desk is for questions about using Wikipedia. The appropriate place to ask questions about running the MediaWiki software on your own computer or server is mw:Project:Support desk. See the links under WP:EIW#SingleSignon to get your account to work over there. --Teratornis (talk) 21:32, 30 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Hoping this is still seen despite being a bit up here now. In any case, I am looking for generic wiki information/help. It's mostly for syntax and the more advanced stuff, so that I can learn at my own pace. 65.11.205.172 (talk) 21:55, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

How do I do signatures?

I tried making one using Wikified HTML, but the link just came up as the whole lot as a link, with (talk) afterwards – as you will probably see when I tilde this. Basically, I would like small caps and a HTML Unicode entity (does this work for U+10000 and beyond?). [[User:Nonmuscascapto|&66030;]] [[User_talk:Nonmuscascapto|<small>NMC</small>]] (talk) 22:14, 30 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Check the 'raw signature' box in your preferences. Algebraist 22:19, 30 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Do you want to save this file, or find a program online to open it?

Resolved

When I try to open the Subaru Legacy wiki entry (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subaru_Legacy) in IE7, I get a pop-up window titled "File Download - Security Warning", with the message "Do you want to save this file, or find a program online to open it?". The options or Find, Save, or Cancel. There is a help desk entry for "EFSA" which describes a similar problem, but with no resolution. Any advice would be appreciated. 68.116.199.190 (talk) 22:39, 30 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Is there a file name? Does it only happen on that page? The mentioned help desk entry is Wikipedia:Help desk/Archives/2008 July 17#EFSA. I have never had this problem with IE7 at Wikipedia. Try restarting your computer and clicking http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subaru_Legacy or Subaru Legacy. PrimeHunter (talk) 23:21, 30 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I believe the file-name was "en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subaru_Legacy" or similar, I can't tell for sure because I can no longer reproduce the problem after the following procedure:

1. Created Wikipedia account and logged in

2. Opened Subaru Legacy page (no pop-up window appeared)

3. Logged out

4. Opened Subary Legacy page (no pop-up window appeared)

It's possible that something on the Subaru Legacy page changed in the interim that solved the underlying problem, but I can no longer reproduce the reported behavior. Rebooting and returning to the page (via search or entering URL) had no effect when the problem persisted.

I found two additional references documenting the same problem, one of which was on de.wikipedia.org. Neither reference included a working solution.

IE7 version is 7.0.5730.1100 and OS is Windows XP Professional SP3. 68.116.199.190 (talk) 23:28, 30 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I meant whether there was a file name for the file the pop-up window asked you about, but never mind now. I suspect this is an occasional browser problem and not Wikipedia's fault. PrimeHunter (talk) 23:41, 30 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

August 31

Correct placement/categorization of an RFC?

Hello there,

Typically RFCs are responded to quicker, I am wondering if my placement or categorization of this issue is correct? Do I need to change something?Yeago (talk) 01:35, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Well I requested the page protection, and that is in place to stop from the constant reverting. In addition to the RFC you may want to contact relevant wikiprojects to get their members to comment. In addition to WikiProject Mammals and WikiiProject Cats, you may also want to contact Wikipedia:WikiProject Internet culture. -Optigan13 (talk) 20:16, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Didn't notice you've been blocked. I've contacted the three projects I mentioned above to get some outside input. -Optigan13 (talk) 20:31, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

That's excellent, thank you so much. The issue has now gained the attention I was looking for.Yeago (talk) 23:16, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Where do I go from here?

I'm trying to move Where Do We Go From Here? (movie) to Where Do We Go from Here? (film) to bring the title in line with current guidelines, but it says the target page is protected. What's up? Clarityfiend (talk) 05:15, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not sure why the page is protected from being created. It may be that at one time someone repeatedly created an article by that name that was vandalism or inappropriate in some way. Pages can be protected from recreation to prevent persistent vandalism. You can request the move at Wikipedia:Requested moves, where an administrator can carry it out.--Beloved Freak 11:06, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I couldn't see a problem with my admin account and moved it. PrimeHunter (talk) 11:33, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I think I capitalized "From" when I tried. It's correct the way it is now, so thanks. Clarityfiend (talk) 17:59, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

How to Contact Gerry Marr!

Hi,yesterday I wrote an artical named "How to Contact Gerry Marr!. Before I wrote this I had to register to which I did, the automatic spam filter informed me I had to confirm my email to which I did. Can you please tell me where my article went to? Can the article be retreived? Can it be shown on the site?

Thanks —Preceding unsigned comment added by Gerryfmarr (talk • contribs) 07:53, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

What was the article about? If, as it seems, it was about you, or how to contact you, then basically it was deleted because that is not what Wikipedia is for. It's an encyclopaedia, not a business directory or an advertising service. If it was an article about you, please note that you are very strongly discouraged from creating articles about yourself or things that you have a personal connection to. (See Wikipedia:Autobiography) This is considered a conflict of interest, and if you are notable enough to be the subject of an article here, you should wait for someone else to create it.--Beloved Freak 11:13, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Your account has not many any edit before posting here. PrimeHunter (talk) 11:21, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Article traffic

Does anybody know if there's a way to find out how much traffic an article gets? I used to go to http://stats.grok.se/ but they haven't updated since June. Apparently there exists a function that can count article traffic, but it's just not active because...ehm, well, because suppressing the free flow of information is the fundamental principle upon which Wikipedia is built...? Lampman (talk) 09:45, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

It's disabled to avoid blowing up the servers, as explained at WP:FAQ/Technical#Can I add a page hit counter to a Wikipedia page?. Algebraist 09:52, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Ok, last time I checked the rationale was that it was disabled to prevent vandalism to the least visited articles. Anyway, that wasn't really my question: now that grok isn't updating, is there any place - external or internal - to find article traffic count? Lampman (talk) 10:41, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Google has a way to track traffic to any page, I believe it's called Google Analytics RayvnEQ (talk) 12:23, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Which is not going to be enabled here because it would cause significant problems with the Privacy policy. Titoxd^{(?!? - cool stuff)} 18:26, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Reporting abuse

I've noticed that User:Khuttger has vandalised two articles. What do we do when this happens? Rogwan (talk) 10:23, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

OK, I've put on a vandalism template on his/her user Talk page and think I've done it right... Rogwan (talk) 10:23, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

If he continues to vandalise following a level 4 warning, you can report him to Wikipedia:Administrator intervention against vandalism.--Beloved Freak 10:57, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

How would I see this? I noticed that he vandalised one of the pages I watch and went to his Talk page and saw he'd done it to another one. Is it just for other people to notice and report? Rogwan (talk) 11:11, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

If you want to keep an eye on him you can check Special:Contributions/Khuttger, and if he vandalises again, add a level 4 warning. If he vandalises after that, report him. It may be that it is an account created merely to vandalise Wikipedia. When people realise they can edit pages, I guess it provides some short term entertainment for some people to vandalise them. There are many constructive editors that started out like that though, so he should be given a few chances to contribute properly. If you're not interested in keeping an eye on him, don;t worry - there's no burden on you to make sure he doesn't do it again. There are many, many vandals around, and there are many editors who dedicate their time to combating them, who patrol RecentChanges. If he continues to vandalise, he'll get blocked eventually.--Beloved Freak 11:20, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Database syntax error

Hi am I the only one experiencing this at present? Its taking my four or five times to save a page. Everytime I go to save an edit and my work it comes up with a database sytax error. Could somebody explain to me why this is and how long it is likely to last The Bald One ^{White cat} 10:19, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, this is happening to me too. Have no idea why. Beloved Freak 10:54, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'm being affected by it as well. The code is:#

A database query syntax error has occurred. This may indicate a bug in the software. The last attempted database query was: (SQL query hidden) from within function "ExternalStoreDB::store". MySQL returned error "1030: Got error 136 from storage engine (10.0.2.107)".

--Diniz (talk) 10:55, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Yes thats it exactly. I tried to save this page and the Schwatz article page at least twenty times and no luck. It must be wikipedia server trouble. We often get problems with database lag too. Perhaps its time they upgraded the hardware The Bald One ^{White cat} 11:05, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Others are reporting this at Wikipedia:Village pump (technical)#Database error where some tech people hang out (but not necessarily on a Sunday). PrimeHunter (talk) 11:09, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Account creation

In my watchlist, it says

(User creation log) . . "User1" (Talk | contribs) created new account "User2"

(I've replaced the actual names). "User1" is an account with about 5 edits, and not an admin. I thought only admins could create new accounts for other people. What exactly has happened here? --Beloved Freak 11:48, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

User1 was logged in when they created User2. There are several reasons why they could do this - they could be unaware that they already created an account, they could be creating an account for a friend, or they could be creating a sockpuppet. Xenon 54 11:54, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Non-admins can also create accounts for others, but are limited to 6 per day if they don't have the accountcreator flag. PrimeHunter (talk) 11:55, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Ok, thanks. Yeah, I thought that was the case PrimeHunter, but couldn't find the relevant page.--Beloved Freak 12:18, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

WTF?

Can anybody tell me what the hell this is and how it can be fixed please??? biool (talk) 13:24, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

What is wrong with it? --—— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk - 13:38, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The whole page was black, the navigation at the side and the the edit button at the top etc were missing. There was a big picture of a cross in the middle of the page and some creepy message. Someone's fixed it though. biool (talk) 13:51, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Actually one of the templates used on that page was vandalised and so the vandalism transluded onto the article. Like you said, someone has already reverted the vandalism. AngelOfSadness talk 14:04, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Sounds like the Zodiac struck again. --—— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk - 14:23, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, on {{Infobox animanga/Header}}. The used IP has been blocked. PrimeHunter (talk) 14:50, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Heading structure broken

The heading structure on every page appears to be broken. There is an H1 (the page title) immediately followed by an H3 ("From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia"); and the page ends with a bunch of H5s ("Views", "Personal tools", "Navigation", "Search", "Interaction", "Toolbox") with no parent other than H1 (and the last headings in the article, which are not meant to apply to it). I realise that this is not the place to ask for help resolving the matter; my question is - where should I do that? Andy Mabbett | Talk to Andy Mabbett 14:49, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

It looks fine to me. Are you referring to the html of the rendered page? If it renders incorrectly for you then try clearing your entire cache. PrimeHunter (talk) 14:54, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you. Since it apparently looks fine for you, please can you tell me what H2 you see, between the first H1 ("Wikipedia:Help desk)" and the first H3 ("From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia"); assuming you can confirm that you see those as H1 and H3 respectively? Andy Mabbett | Talk to Andy Mabbett 15:04, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

There's no header between that h1 and that h3. Why should there be? Algebraist 16:41, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I mean the rendered page looks fine to me with appropriately sized text. I don't care whether the html source says H2 or H3. The important headlines seem to me to be those in the article text. Note that placement, look and other details of things like Navigation, Search, Interaction, Toolbox depends on the used skin, and most readers will see them in a separate column to the left. I don't know the proper place to discuss them. PrimeHunter (talk) 22:25, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

←Headings should follow a strict hierarchy H1 > H2 > H3 and so on. WCAG says:

3.5 Use header elements to convey document structure and use them according to specification. [Priority 2]
For example, in HTML, use H2 to indicate a subsection of H1. Do not use headers for font effects. ([2])

and:

Since some users skim through a document by navigating its headings, it is important to use them appropriately to convey document structure. Users should order heading elements properly. For example, in HTML, H2 elements should follow H1 elements, H3 elements should follow H2 elements, etc. Content developers should not "skip" levels (e.g., H1 directly to H3). Do not use headings to create font effects; use style sheets to change font styles for example. ([3])

On further reflection, "From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia" isn't even a heading, and should probably be parked up as a paragraph. Andy Mabbett | Talk to Andy Mabbett 16:48, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Hm... I think compliance with web-design principles such as this one should be discussed over at the Technical Village Pump. Calvin 1998 ^(t-c) 22:30, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you: Wikipedia:Village pump (technical)#Heading structure broken Andy Mabbett | Talk to Andy Mabbett

Already there: Template:Bug, raised on 12 September 2004 - just short of four years ago! Andy Mabbett | Talk to Andy Mabbett 22:02, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Anti-vandal tools comparison?

Hello there. I have recently been trying out various semi-automatic Wikipedia tools designed to fight vandalism, but was wondering whether there is any Wikipedia page which offers a definitive review of all anti-vandalism tools (WP:TW, WP:HG, WP:VandalProof etc.), or a comparison of them, or a list of their strengths and weaknesses or something similar? If you know of such a page, or, alternatively, if you are willing to give me a review and / or comparison of Wikipedia's anti-vandalism tools here, please do so!

Thanks in advance.

It Is Me Here (talk) 15:46, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I don't know of a page that directly compares the three tools you mentioned. As someone who has used all three at one point or another, I found it the most useful just to try them out and see which one I find easiest to use. In my opinion, Huggle is the best for rapid recent changes patrolling, while Twinkle is best for new page patrolling and article deletion tagging. Pyrospirit (talk · contribs) 18:02, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

If there is such a page, it should either already have an entry in the Editor's index, or someone should add an entry for it. See WP:EIW#Vandal, and the subentry: WP:EIW#VandalTools. When you want to research some aspect of Wikipedia's technology, start with the Editor's index. --Teratornis (talk) 18:41, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Alright, thanks guys! It Is Me Here (talk) 09:13, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

edit bots

i wonder, how can i make a bot that can work for me? for example, ral has his ralbot, there's the cluebot, can i make a btzbot? Btzkillerv (talk) 16:12, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Please check out Wikipedia:Bot policy. As you can see there are bot requirements and a bot approval process. As to how you can actually go about the process of making a bot, please see Wikipedia:Creating a bot.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 16:27, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

More information: WP:EIW#Bot. You need to know (or learn) a programming language, although you don't have to write an entire bot from scratch, because other users have written bot frameworks you can use. --Teratornis (talk) 18:38, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Image moved to commons

What should happen if an image i created is uploaded on commons by another user (not related) wih author still acknowledged? Will the one originally on Wikipedia be deleted? Also on Commons would i have to edit the image to show that i was the original creator? Simply south (talk) 16:26, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

As long as the Commons upload correctly identifies you as the creator in its description, and satisfies the requirements for hosting on Commons, then yes, the local version will be deleted. Confusing Manifestation(Say hi!) 23:58, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Can't read text on Wikipedia

i cannot read any of the text on wikipedia. it shows up as an illegible series numbers and lines, that looks sort of like chinese. i can only read some of the headlines. i never had this problem before i downloaded the new firefox update, which my computer recommended. help! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.83.64.231 (talk) 18:34, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'm using the latest version of Firefox right now, and I've never seen any problem like what you describe. Are you using Firefox 3.0.1? Also, is your character encoding set to UTF-8? If it's not, try setting it to that. If that doesn't work, try restarting Firefox in Safe Mode, which will use the default settings and temporarily disable all extensions; if the problem is caused by an addon or by your settings, it will show up fine in safe mode. Pyrospirit (talk · contribs) 18:56, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

There was a report of this problem a few days ago, so I did a Google search at that time where I found other reports of this type of problem (also appears to impact some pages of Slashdot and Craigslist - among others). I found this suggested solution: "disable the Helvetica Fractions font in Font Book". Please post back and let us know if this works, assuming you can read this text that's suggesting how to resolve the problem. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 22:33, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Featured picture has a wrong link to its candidate page

Image:Tartan Ribbon.jpg I corrected (added, really) the first one by piping Tartan Ribbon.jpg into the FeaturedPicture template, linking the word identified to Wikipedia:Featured picture candidates/Tartan Ribbon.jpg, but below it is another template which says "This is a featured picture on English Wikipedia and is considered one of the finest images." Considered is linked to Wikipedia:Featured picture candidates/Image:Tartan Ribbon.jpg which is wrong, but I can't find the template on the page. Balsa10 (talk) 19:20, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The template is in commons: Tartan Ribbon.jpg But I don't know what would be the proper course of action to fix it... fetofs ^Hello! 19:25, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

There was an "ennom" parameter to the commons template, hope it's fixed now. fetofs ^Hello! 19:42, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Aha! Thank you! I found the ennom once you pointed me to Commons and was going to change it myself, but a Unified Login problem presented itself.

The accounts named "Balsa10" on each of the following sites have been automatically attached to the unified account: commons.wikimedia.org en.wikipedia.org

But when I go to commons, it says "Log in / create account". Eh? Balsa10 (talk) 19:49, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

So you've got an account on commons, but you're not logged into it right now. Just go to commons and log in.

Isn't the point of Unified Login that you login to one place rather than having to login on each project? My successful WP login page says "Logging you in to Wikimedia's other projects [...] On the same page, you may also see a row of icons for other Wikimedia sites. They are to show you that you have also been automatically logged in to those sites by means of unified login." Commons is one of those icons, but going to Commons shows I'm not logged in there. It's not a huge deal, since it's the second time I've tried using SUL, but it seems it doesn't work for me for some reason. Balsa10 (talk) 19:32, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

.ogg's?

I was thinking of making recordings of the names of Portuguese towns, add them to the respective articles. Would .ogg be the most adequate format for the sound files? If so, any suggestions on which program should I use for the recordings? Thanks. Húsönd 23:20, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

.ogg is preferred, yes. Not sure what program to use for the recordings though :/ Calvin 1998 ^(t-c) 23:24, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'll direct you to this. Don't know how useful it is, though, as I've never tried recording an ogg file. I c eUnshattered ^{[ t ]} 23:40, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I think ogg is the only format you can upload, or embed. I may be proven wrong, though. Confusing Manifestation(Say hi!) 23:48, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

We can also handle .OGV (Ogg Vorbis) files. See Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2008-08-11/Technology report --—— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk - 02:57, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I hear Audacity works in creating ogg's, but I've never used them. bibliomaniac 1 5 05:30, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The "N" word used in description of Kwanzaa

I just (Sunday, August 31st 2008, 6:50 pm CST) looked up the Wikipedia definition for Kwanzaa and noticed the "N" word used to describe it. Could you please have someone delete it from the intial title section ASAP. Thank-you, sincerely Melvin T. Hargrett (<email redacted>) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.141.119.91 (talk) 23:55, 31 August 2008 (UTC) It's probably WP:VAND. I'll check that it's been rv'ed. The smart way would be to revert the edit and warn the vandal (if you can identify him) with the methods described here. I c eUnshattered ^{[ t ]} 00:04, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Later- I think this is what you were referring to. As you can see, the vandalism was reverted. Thanks for your concern, but vandalism does not need to be reported here. Repeat vandals should be reported at WP:AIV. I c eUnshattered ^{[ t ]} 00:06, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

It was indeed vandalism, and it has been reverted by User:Oxymoron83. Thank you for bringing it to our attention. Confusing Manifestation(Say hi!) 00:06, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Forgot my email/password

Hi! I'm trying to unify my logins across wikipedia but when I input "lanika" and ask Wikipedia to send a new password nothing comes to my email account and I can't remember if I used a different email account to register at Wikipedia, it was some years ago... I created a second account, username "Lanika Moon", but would like to recover the user Lanika so I can have one login across pt.wikipedia, en.wikipedia, wikimedia etc. Is it possible? Can I at least know the email where the password is being sent? Lanika/Lanika Moon —Preceding unsigned comment added by 201.42.197.209 (talk) 00:07, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

So you don't remember all your email accounts and still have access? I guess not. Have you checked your spam/bulk folder? Many users who think they aren't getting Wikipedia email are, but it gets filtered as spam. There is no way to provide you the password other than for you to retrieve it on your end through email. In any event, you could try usurping your old account name. You meet some of the prerequisites: the old account has no edits nor are there any significant logs associated with it. However, usurpation is normally only granted for reasonably well-established users. You have 4 edits total so you will probably need to stick around for a while under this name and make some decent contributions before you'd be eligible.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 05:17, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Indeed, I made most contributions to Wikipedia in english while not logged in but am reasonably active in the portuguese Wikipedia. Unfortunately there's no emails going to spam/bulk folders in my active email accounts, but I've old email accounts at hotmail and other services that are not in use anymore, so if wikipedia is sending email to them I'm unable to retrieve it. Thus the reason I wish I knew what email account is linked to the Lanika username. I have normal access to the Lanika Moon user account, and will see that I stay logged in during future contributions. I think my case specifically is more of Changing username/SUL than Usurpation per se, can anyone confirm if this is the best path to follow? Lanika/Lanika Moon —Preceding unsigned comment added by 200.136.27.3 (talk) 15:22, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

September 1

Unsigned signed edits

Many of my posts on Talk pages keep showing up with things like "--TCav 23:37, 30 August 2008 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by TCav (talk • contribs)" at the end. I sign my posts, yet your robot seems to pop up and add the 'unsigned' part.

What can I do to prevent this from happening? I'm using the four tildes. What am I not doing? --TCav 01:36, 1 September 2008 (UTC)

The signature should link to your user page User:TCav and/or talk page User talk:TCav. One way to do that is to uncheck "Raw signature" at Special:Preferences and leave the signature field blank. PrimeHunter (talk) 01:53, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

See also Wikipedia:Signatures#Internal links. PrimeHunter (talk) 01:57, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

So a signature can't just be a signature? If it isn't a link to a user page, a 'bot comes along and labels it as inappropriate? It doesn't happen every time, but it does happen often. --TCav 00:34, 3 September 2008 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by TCav (talk • contribs)

It's not an official guideline/policy, but the bot (SineBot, operated by User:Slakr) assumes that a signature must have a.)a link the the user's userpage b.)a timestamp. You may want to change your signature so it includes the link to your userpage. Calvin 1998 ^(t-c) 00:39, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia:Signatures#Internal links has guideline status and says "At least one of those two pages must be linked from your signature, to allow other editors simple access to your talk page and contributions log." That makes sense to me. If you don't like the normal blue link color then you are allowed to change it. The large majority of SineBot signings (at least of those I see) are to edits with no ~~~~ signature at all and the message was probably formulated with that in mind. It's impossible to say whether ~~~~ was used and I don't think the message should be something complicated like "Preceding comment was either unsigned or signed in an unrecognized way ...". Note User:SineBot#Opting out is possible. PrimeHunter (talk) 00:58, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Text overlaps picture box

I dont know how to fix this problem. I have a resolution of 1680pixels width and when its full screen the paragraph that starts "On September 22..." some of its text overlaps the picture box. I tried to use the br syntax but it doesnt solve the problem.

Link [[4]] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Collapse_of_the_World_Trade_Center#Site_cleanup

Thank you ----Diensthuber (talk) 02:25, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Check now. It overlapped for me, too, at 1440 width. I added the {{clear}} before the section, and now it looks fine on my monitor. — Twas Now ( talk • contribs • e-mail ) 02:52, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

(силе) Helping the (рдин) encyclopedia wikipedia edit?

I am new to your encyclopedia wikipedia потому что for the editing for сиздерден ? (new article helping)

Я хочу учить английский.

I wish to edit article please? --Danskovskiv (talk) 10:38, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I can only read the English parts of your post. See meta:List of Wikipedias if you want to find a Wikipedia in another language. If you want to edit here in English then write all of it in English and see for example Wikipedia:Tutorial and Wikipedia:Your first article. PrimeHunter (talk) 12:17, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I can edit article --Danskovskiv (talk) 12:36, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

If you are asking for permission to edit articles then it's not required. Go ahead and be bold, but try to satisfy rules like those at Wikipedia:Simplified ruleset. PrimeHunter (talk) 12:59, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

what is god

hjlkhj otkhjokh tohtjh —Preceding unsigned comment added by 59.94.130.189 (talk) 12:59, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

There are a lot of different opinions about God. Have you tried the Humanities section of Wikipedia's Reference Desk? They specialize in answering knowledge questions there; this help desk is only for questions about using Wikipedia. For your convenience, here is the link to post a question there: click here. I hope this helps. PrimeHunter (talk) 13:03, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

God is an imaginary being many people believe is real which is used to provide a non-explanation, explanation for the mysteries of life, and to provide comfort against and inject meaning into, death and other perceived "unfairnesses" of a capricious and indifferent universe.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 14:41, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Now that is WP:POV if I ever heard it!! Some people do believe the above (they're atheists), whereas some people believe in God as the creator/supreme being of the universe (the theists, imaginably enough!). --Alinnisawest,^{Dalek Empress} (extermination requests here) 14:55, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Can we not have this discussion on the helpdesk? Algebraist 15:01, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Technically that is a POV but I believe in this case it still achieves the goal; this person simply speaks a different language, and the explanation will help him if he is sincere in the question.

On the other hand, if he is not sincere and is trying to insinuate a debate on the help desk, then the OP is wrong in the first place so it doesn't matter what responses are given to an invalid question, as long as someone somewhere says that it is invalid.Rayvn (talk) 17:23, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Wouldn't 'Ethereal' be a better choice of a word than 'Imaginary'? Also, referring to the Universe as 'capricious' seems to me to be anthropomorphizing, which would imply that Fuhghettaboutit simply wants to replace one ethereal (imaginary?) being with another. --TCav 14:32, 2 September 2008 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by TCav (talk • contribs) [reply]

As Algebraist mentioned earlier, this isn't the best forum for this discussion. TN‑X-Man 14:34, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, yes I was referring to the way it's seen. I should have inserted "seemingly" just before capricious. Ethereal is not a synonym for imaginary, and imaginary is exactly what I intended.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 00:07, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

'Imaginary' would be WP:POV, wouldn't it? And the definition of capricious[[5]] uses the terms 'impulse' and 'whim', which are human attributes. You're anthropomorphizing the Universe, whether you preface it with 'seemingly' or not. You refer to the Universe as a deity, much like ancient Egyptians referred to the Sun as Ra, albeit the Universe would be an indifferent one, while in the same sentance calling someone else's deity 'imaginary'. --TCav (talk) 01:03, 4 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

my 1st posting for encyclopedia wikipedia (европейско)

Cacky Bird Legs бсудить for my first posting, review? --Danskovskiv (talk) 14:37, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Looks like that article was speedily deleted, which was probably not the sort of review you wanted ! Seriously, reading the English Wikipedia may be a good way to improve your English (which I believe is your objective here), but writing in poor English about non-notable subjects is likely only to cause frustration both to yourself and others - and any new vocabulary you learn may be of limited use in polite company ! Gandalf61 (talk) 15:31, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Creating a New Userpage

I have changed my user name from Rich Guy to Genius101 Wizard. Am I allowed to create the User:Rich Guy userpage, and have it as a redirect to my page? Thanks, Genius101 Wizard (talk) 15:27, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Yes. You should probably also recreate the Rich Guy account (and not use it), to stop someone else taking the name and causing confusion (and getting annoyed that you've stolen their userpage). Algebraist 15:31, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Pagenames in templates

I tried to edit Template:Infobox UK Legislation (attempt 1 attempt 2) to link automatically to TheyWorkForYou's search page (e.g. Statute Law (Repeals) Act 2008. First I tried using {{PAGENAME}}, which only linked to the first word, like this. Then I tried using {{PAGENAMEE}}, which linked to the whole thing with underscores, like this, which their search engine doesn't understand. I'm out of ideas - I can't see anything else on Help:Magic Words that would work, and I can't think of anything else. Does anyone have any ideas? --HughCharlesParker (talk - contribs) 15:30, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

If you had managed to add it, the link would likely be removed by someone else per WP:ELNO "Links normally to be avoided ... #9 Links to the results pages of search engines, search aggregators, or RSS feeds." When appropriate to create an external link, it's better to go to a specific article rather than a search results page. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 15:35, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think this is the sort of page WP:ELNO is designed to address. The link is to a search page, but it's to the search page of a specific database - it provides a link to the Hansard records of discussions relating to an act of parliament, rather than to a search of the whole web. It's a link that'll clearly be useful in every article about UK act of parliament. --HughCharlesParker (talk - contribs) 15:47, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

In the search text, spaces must be encoded as pluses. Use the magic word urlencode:

http://www.theyworkforyou.com/search/?s={{urlencode:Statute+Law+(Repeals)+Act+2008}}

Which gives:

http://www.theyworkforyou.com/search/?s=Statute%2BLaw%2B%28Repeals%29%2BAct%2B2008

--—— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk - 17:22, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

How dare you send this to me

Resolved

– No question was asked and no action required. PrimeHunter (talk) 17:35, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

How dare you place such a slur against my name and reputation.

I have forwarded your message to the approbate body who in turn replied it was no surprise from someone such as you.

Don't bother contacting me as I would never return to such a site under any circumstances. It is both amatuer and so unprofessional and most information on the site is inaccurate anyway.

This is the message you sent

User talk:Efexor1 From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Jump to: navigation, search

Welcome to Wikipedia. We invite everyone to contribute constructively to our encyclopedia. Take a look at the welcome page if you would like to learn more about contributing. However, unconstructive edits, such as those you made to Mudcat Cafe, are considered vandalism and are immediately reverted. If you continue in this manner you may be blocked from editing without further warning. Please stop. Consider improving rather than damaging the work of others. ... discospinster talk 14:14, 21 August 2008 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Efexor1 (talk • contribs) 15:30, September 1, 2008

—Preceding unsigned comment added by Efexor1 (talk • contribs) 16:30, 1 September 2008

The message you received seems to me to have been phrased politely, and the edits you made to Mudcat Cafe were very clearly vandalism. I can't see what you have to complain about. I'm sorry you're offended, but unless you plan to make edits of a different sort, I can't say I'm sorry you're leaving. --HughCharlesParker (talk - contribs) 15:42, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Your two latest edits to Mudcat Cafe at the time you got the message were [6] which blanked the page and [7] which removed the references section that displayed 3 references (seen at [8]) with {{reflist}}. Deletion of content for no reason is usually considered vandalism. Your older contributions to the article did not look like vandalism to me (but looked inappropriate for other reasons per Wikipedia policies and guidelines like Wikipedia:Conflict of interest). Articles should give neutral verifiable encyclopedic information about the subject and not be written like a guide by the subject. Wikipedia receives a huge amount of vandalism and your two latest edits looked like frequent types of vandalism so I can understand somebody chose to give you a vandalism warning, but it looks possible that your removal of content was not intended like that. PrimeHunter (talk) 16:15, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Since he isn't coming back, can't we just delete this?Rayvn (talk) 17:25, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

People say a lot of things when they are upset. I linked it from User talk:Efexor1 and the link might be used. I see no harm in keeping the section but I have marked it resolved since no question was asked and no action required. PrimeHunter (talk) 17:35, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Template

Resolved

Can someone please make the "language" field optional on Template:Infobox ESC entry? Thanks. Grk1011/Stephen (talk) 15:39, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

So does anyone know how to do this? Grk1011/Stephen (talk) 16:41, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Hmm. Well, looking at the template, "Language" does not have #Required next to it and looks like it's already optional. Does it tell you it's required? TN‑X-Man 16:46, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

It's use here does I think. Grk1011/Stephen (talk) 16:48, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Think I've done it - might have to purge for it to work though. Dendodge|Talk^Contribs 16:54, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Hmm, it looked promising, but now it doesn't show up at all. Grk1011/Stephen (talk) 17:23, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Ok, all set, thanks. Grk1011/Stephen (talk) 18:10, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Oh yeah - I thought I'd gotten rid of those pipes when I first did it. Dendodge|Talk^Contribs 18:15, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Do I get paid yet?

I have made an edit, when do I get paid, and how much? Do I need to register my credit information? Many Thanks --Delta Proven (talk) 16:05, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

You don't. Wikipedia editors are volunteers. Xenon 54 16:08, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

(edit conflict) Actually, all contributors on Wikipedia are volunteers and do not get paid. I have a feeling our list of users would grow exponentially if we did get paid for editing. Cheers! TN‑X-Man 16:09, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Does that mean Jimbo Wales makes profit? How does he make a profit? --Delta Proven (talk) 16:19, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Through the Wikimedia Foundation, if I am correct. jj137 (talk) 16:23, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I suspect you didn't really expect to get paid for adding "very" to an article.[9] Wikipedia is run by the non-profit charitable organization Wikimedia Foundation. PrimeHunter (talk) 16:24, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Jimbo Wales does not get paid for editing Wikipedia, if that's what you mean. I believe he does get a salary for the other duties he performs as part of the Wikimedia Foundation. TN‑X-Man 16:25, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Ohh okay. What about Wikiversity? Can I get a diploma from Wikiversity? --Delta Proven (talk) 16:28, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

OK, enough. Stop trolling or you'll be blocked. --barneca (talk) 16:46, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Are you trying to tell me that Wikipedia is running an illegal University online that does not give qualifications? --Delta Proven (talk) 17:01, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Goodbye. --barneca (talk) 17:05, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Ouija-whatever again, no doubt... —Travis ^talk 17:21, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Err. people do get paid for making edits in wikipedia m:Philip Greenspun illustration project as, for the "our list of users would grow exponentially", there are many paid variations of wikipedia, non of them succesfull as, the problem is, who is going to maintain 10 million articles ? The volunteers leave the project...Mion (talk) 17:34, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

And there's the bounty board. Dendodge|Talk^Contribs 18:41, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Can I create a Page about....

I'm a member of a site called WrestlingRevealed.com and was wondering if it's against the rules for me to make a page about it. I've read the FAQ's and rules and it states that these pages can be done but from a neutral point of view and not to be promoting said website/ business. Is this OK for me to make? Thanks in advance. —Preceding unsigned comment added by JWC 12 (talk • contribs) 16:30, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

You can indeed create an article for the website, but remember, it needs to be neutral and supported by reliable sources. You may want to create a sandbox to work on the article first. Cheers! TN‑X-Man 16:37, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I don't believe the website is probably noteworthy, but if it is a large-scale website with thousands of members and millions of hits per day, then you can make an article about it, as long as you are not the owner.Rayvn (talk) 17:26, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thousands of members and millions of hits per day do not on their own make the subject notable. If those statistics are the subject of coverage in reliable sources, then it might be notable. – ukexpat (talk) 00:55, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Images

Hi, I use another Wiki but this one is different for uploading images, how do you do so?SirusG (talk) 16:47, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Wait four days and make ten edits (to get autoconfirmed status) and then go to WP:Upload. Or if the image is freely licensed, you can upload it to Wikimedia Commons instead. Create an account here and then upload here. Algebraist 17:01, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Editing conflicts (technical)

So, if I edit a page because there is a typo and some formatting errors, and while I am doing that, User Joe X adds a pargraph about geography and turns several "citation needed" notes into refrences and hits submit, and then I hit submit after that... aren't his edits going to be nullified? —Preceding unsigned comment added by RayvnEQ (talk • contribs) 17:29, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

No. You get an edit conflict. Algebraist 17:32, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Either that or your edits are added to his if they are in different paragraphs not causing an edit conflict. PrimeHunter (talk) 17:40, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Within how much time will the edit conflict page alert you? (For example, if Joe hits "submit" 15 minutes after I do on the same section, or an hour after, etc.) Or is the page good enough to track when the "edit" button was hit as well as the "submit" button so that the time frame is infinite? Reason i ask is, it may take me an hour - or a day - to complete a task on the internet. Right now I have 40 or so pages open - most Wikipedia, though the only edit open is this and my user page and the userbox template I'm making. When I have to alt-tab, I can't always find my way back right away.Rayvn (talk) 19:52, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

In case it wasn't clear, when I said "your edits are added to his" it means that his edits will still be visible. The software will "merge" your edit into his version so the result becomes different from the contens of your edit box when you saved. I have not heard of any time limit on an edit conflict, but I have heard that edit windows which are open for very long may not save (regardless of whether the page has been edited in the meantime). PrimeHunter (talk) 23:07, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Spam

would you please delete www.tvdata.ru from black list / spam. we never posted spam and I wanted to list it as a stock footage sourse ? Thank you —Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.243.166.230 (talk) 18:10, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Please go to MediaWiki_talk:Spam-blacklist#Proposed_removals and make your case. --—— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk - 19:58, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

How long does a db-move take?

I've done this before when radio stations changed their call letters and I took the responsibility for moving the article to the new letters. The problem was that an old article was still there and had to be moved, and I became familiar with the procedure.

I'm doing something similar now. Because WQOK (AM) had more contributors, it seemed like a better idea to move the information from the shorter WGVL article. I've detailed everything I wanted to do on the WQOK talk page, and no objections were raised there. On another site my plan was supported, and now I've moved the information from the WGVL page, making sure to list contributors, and replaced the text with {{db-move}}.

That was two hours ago.Vchimpanzee · talk · contributions · 18:15, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

This is interesting. I got a pink box here but not there. I went back and tried again and now I have pink boxes on the article and its talk page.Vchimpanzee · talk · contributions · 18:19, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

You had created the template originally by closing it with )) instead of }}

But, why not convert the page into a redirect instead of deleting it? --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 18:20, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Yes the page should be a redirect so that people who search for the old call letters will be taken to the newer ones. Scotty dude _review 18:23, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The new call letters are WGVL. But the WQOK article, which I was unaware of until several weeks ago, is longer and has many more contributors.Vchimpanzee · talk · contributions · 18:30, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Why do US radio stations use those dodgy letters anyway? We get Viking FM and BBC Radio 1 - they have names! Much more civilised =P Dendodge|Talk^Contribs 18:43, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The Call sign article explains the history. --Teratornis (talk) 18:49, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

We have names too, but the call sign is the licensed name of the station. Like Kiss 108 and Mike FM. We usually don't refer to stations by their letters. Grk1011/Stephen (talk) 18:50, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

This is not the place to discuss this. Why can I still not make the move?Vchimpanzee · talk · contributions · 18:53, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I think you should probably not move the article. The page should be about the history of the call sign, not the station. Grk1011/Stephen (talk) 18:57, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

But I've already moved the information. It gets confusing if you have a different article for every set of call letters. and besides that, nearly every article I've seen has been about the radio station from its first sign-on.

There has been no objection until now. It doesn't work to have a redirect to an outdated set of call letters. I'm leaving now, and no one can find an article on WGVL because I'm not getting any help on this.Vchimpanzee · talk · contributions · 19:02, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Administration Access

I am just curious, but can admin. get into other members' limited accounts? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Dale S. Satre (talk • contribs) 18:15, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

No. Algebraist 18:21, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

See WP:EIW#Admin. --Teratornis (talk) 18:45, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Who gets to decline speedies?

Do rollbackers get that privilege, or only Admins? ←Signed:→Mr. E. Sánchez ^{Get to know me!} / _{Talk to me!}←at≈:→ 20:55, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

If someone put a speedy tag on say, United States, then anyone can remove it. If the speedy was placed by a banned user or is obviously not in good-faith (such as just tagging articles created by one person because they don't like that person) then anyone can remove it. Other than that, only admins should make the decision to delete the page or remove the speedy. « Gonzo fan2007 (talk ♦ contribs) @ 21:05, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Warning for vandlism

Hi all,

I would like to know how i can report a user for warning who are constantly vandalizing the page with unsourced and information that is very much not true i have left them a message on there talk page but there ignoring it. The edits they seem to be doing are the ones they might have been doing as a ip user but have now registered. I really do not like having to use the rollback feature to undo the work as it makes me seem like a dictator :( but i am actively trying to prevent the article form being ruined--Andrewcrawford (talk) 20:59, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

According to Wikipedia:Vandalism, good-faith addition of unsourced information is not vandalism. Also, Wikipedia:Rollback feature states that rollback should only be used in articles for reverting blatant vandalism, which looking at the edits in question this seems not to be. Therefore, you should not use rollback at all in this case. Instead, discuss it with the editor making the changes rather than reverting everything he/she does. Pyrospirit (talk · contribs) 22:19, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I have already said the person is ignoring any attempts to talk to them, and although it is unsoruced i am siting watching the episode so i know it is untrue, and the final episode has not aired anywhere, the users is just guessing wanting it to happen. There is really no point to rollback then as blanet vandalism is usual done in one edit and undoing one edit is easily done without rollback--Andrewcrawford (talk) 09:29, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

k a s designs

our information/page has been flagged, please see the complaint below:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/K_A_S_Designs

This article has multiple issues. Please help improve the article or discuss these issues on the talk page. It needs sources or references that appear in third-party publications. Tagged since July 2008.

Its tone or style may not be appropriate for Wikipedia. Tagged since July 2008.

It may require general cleanup to meet Wikipedia's quality standards. Tagged since July 2008.

The external links in this article may not comply with Wikipedia's content policies or guidelines. Please improve this article by removing excessive or inappropriate external links. Tagged since July 2008.

Many of our accounts have clients that use your service to learn about the line and reference your pages to understand the products we offer, we dont intend to use this for anything more than an informative tool. therefore please let us know how we can edit the pages so the complaints are removed.

Please send your comments to <email removed>

Regards,

KAS —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.117.53.119 (talk) 21:07, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

In other words, you are specifically using Wikipedia as a marketing tool. Thanks for bringing this to our attention, I have nominated the article for deletion. Please see Wikipedia:Notability (organizations and companies) and Wikipedia's guidelines on conflict of interest. Corvus cornix_talk 21:17, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Article has now been speedily deleted per criterion G11. – ukexpat (talk) 15:13, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Graeme Macdonald Music section

Hi there I manage an scotish musician called Graeme Macdonald. Hey attempted to add a section to wikipedia himself sometime ago and add himself to the page about his hometown of Alyth. Unfortunatly this inforamtion was removed. No fault of his own though.

I was just wondering what can be done to add a section about this emering artist, I have read the guidelines and am still unsure as the only information which was given about the section graeme add himself was said to "not explain importance".

Any Help would be great

thanks —Preceding unsigned comment added by Graememac (talk • contribs) 22:17, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Please see WP:BIO, WP:MUSIC and WP:COI. There are notability requirements for biographies, information about musicians, and conflict of interest. If your client meets those guidelines, then surely someone else will find him worth posting about. Corvus cornix_talk 22:19, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Moving pages

A vandalizing editor, MoHasanie, has moved the page Dania Ramirez to Majja Ramirez. I have no idea how to move it back. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Copana2002 (talk) 23:44, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

No explanation was given, and the original name is that used on the subject's website, so I've moved it back (you could have done this yourself, btw: just click the 'move' tab at the top of the page). Algebraist 23:55, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

September 2

How to refer to a specific section within a Wikipedia article?

I would like to make a referral or reference or wiki-link to a specific section within a wikipedia article. How do I do that? — Ayapota (talk) 00:16, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Append a hash, then the section name, to a normal link. For example, Wikipedia:User access levels#Developers. Xenon 54 00:32, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

(edit conflict) See Help:Section#Section linking - or just see how I made that link! PrimeHunter (talk) 00:35, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Yes! That works, PrimeHunter. Thank you. Thank you. - Ayapota (talk) 01:04, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

an error

Hi, My name is Greg DePaul. I'm a screenwriter and the original writer of BRIDE WARS, an upcoming movie starring Kate Hudson. The writing credits on the movie as listed on your site are incorrect. The Writers Guild of America is the sole determiner for screen credits for this movie. The Guild recently ruled that the screen credits for screenwriting shall read:

Story by Greg DePaul Screenplay by Greg DePaul and Casey Wilson & June Diane Raphael.

It may take some time for the credits to be changed on other websites, such as IMDB, but they will change.

And the movie poster will list the credits as I just did above.

You can confirm credits by contacting the WGA(west).

Sincerely,

Greg DePaul —Preceding unsigned comment added by 96.225.31.122 (talk) 02:46, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

You could be bold and go change the information yourself. Don't forget to source it it you can by putting your source in <ref></ref> tags. NuclearWarfare ^{contact me}_{My work} 04:02, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

You have been added to the article.[10] Wikipedia content should be based on published reliable sources and this seems to be what is verifiable at the time. PrimeHunter (talk) 01:59, 4 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Use of Wikipedia for Commercial Research

I am in the early stages of developing a new (commercial) product that will include questions and answers. I would like to use Wikipedia as a research tool to help me gather this information (which I would then validate with additional verifiable sources). I would not be reproducing any part of any article.

Is there any copyright issue with my plan? Is there any legal or ethical reason that I should not do this?

FranMC (talk) 07:08, 2 September 2008 (UTC)Fran[reply]

If you use only the information in Wikipedia and not the presentation, there would be no copyright issue. There may be an accuracy problem, however: Because anyone can edit Wikipedia, it is possible that some of the content is accidentally (or even intentionally) incorrect. But since the information in Wikipedia is supposed to be referenced, you could use it for references to more reliable sources. —teb728 t c 07:21, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Password request

I have asked twice to getmy password replaced and I have received no email.Please can you email me: <removed>

Thankyou, Rod —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.170.159.84 (talk) 07:50, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Unfortunately, the "email new password" is the only way to receive a new password for an account. It will send an email to whatever address you gave when the account was created, or any address it was changed to in your preferences. It may be the case your email was never confirmed, and you could look through your email history for this. But if your email address was not attached to your account, then I'm sorry to say that it's lost forever, unless you remember the password. Someguy1221 (talk) 07:54, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Please do not include contact details in your questions. We are unable to provide answers by any off-wiki medium and this page is highly visible across the internet. The details have been removed, but if you wish for them to be permanently removed from the page history, email this address. Dendodge|Talk^Contribs 08:13, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Removing large amounts of white space?

I know there are various Wikipedia projects and groups who try to de-orphan articles, or add references to them, or fix broken links, but where do I go to report articles with (seemingly random) large amounts of white space in them? See here, for example. Or, alternatively, how do I fix those sorts of problems myself? Thanks in advance. It Is Me Here (talk) 09:18, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

We don't seem to have a specific whitespace project, group, taskforce or template. As for how to fix it, that depends on the cause of the whitespace; I removed some here by moving images around. Algebraist 09:24, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I see. I'm afraid to say, though, that there is still quite a lot of white space in that article; is there any way to completely remove it? It Is Me Here (talk) 19:47, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

What browser and browser version are you using to view pages? The white space shown may also vary depending on which web browser you're using. For example, Internet Explorer v6 would frequently insert white space where newer browsers would not. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 20:24, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'm using IE7 with whatever the latest update is, installed. I daresay that would apply to most readers, if not editors, of Wikipedia, and so this is something that is worth looking into. Also, I looked at Water cooler using both IE7 and FF3, and white space occurs in both renditions of the article, albeit in different places. It Is Me Here (talk) 06:42, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

What is your screen resolution? I see whitespace in IE6, but very little in IE7 or FF3. But a different screen resolution might also explain the difference. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 14:15, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

1680 * 1050 px; 32 bit. Hope that helps. It Is Me Here (talk) 16:15, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

How does this Harvard citation work?

Looking at Note 22 ("Ellis 2005, pp. 106–111") at Degrassi: The Next Generation, when you click on the "Ellis 2005" link you get jumped down the page and you see the correct reference highlighted in blue. How does this work? Although I am familiar with <ref>s I can not work out how the note is associated with the book.--Commander Keane (talk) 09:47, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

{{citation}} (in the references section) creates an anchor 'CITEREFEllis2005' which is linked to by {{Harvard citation no brackets}}. To make it work, you need to use both templates, and ensure the author surname and year information are the same in each. Algebraist 09:55, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Ahh ok, thank you! A follow up question, should I stop using {{Cite journal}} (and the book, and news variations) and start using {{Citation}} or are there some advantages with staying with {{Cite journal}} and friends?--Commander Keane (talk) 10:03, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Both methods are in use on Wikipedia. There's some discussion of the merits of each at parenthetical referencing#Pros & cons, and probably elsewhere. Algebraist 10:13, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Does the {{Citation}} method work even if you have two sources from the smae person on the same year, eg 1997a, and 1997b?--Commander Keane (talk) 11:01, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

As I said, the templates create a link and an anchor from the author's surname (or authors' surnames) and the date. The links will work as long as the relevant template parameters match exactly. So if {{harv}} and {{citation}} both have the year set to 1997a, it will work. Algebraist 11:08, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Unable to save page after edit

Starting a few minutes ago, I cannot save any page that I edit. I get a red warning message "Sorry! We could not process your edit due to a loss of session data. Please try again. If it still does not work, try logging out and logging back in." I have logged out and back in, and get the same result. Anyone know what's going on? Thanks. Truthanado (talk) 14:10, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Interestingly, it let me edit and save this help page. Truthanado (talk) 14:11, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

It's working okay now. Guess the servers were on a wikibreak. Truthanado (talk) 14:13, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I see this if I leave an edit window open for a long time. When I get this message, saving the page again usually works. --—— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk - 14:35, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

What's the cause of these messages popping up at times anyway? -- RyRy (talk) 04:45, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Multiple reference styles

Hi. There are quite a few pages with two different tracks of footnotes due to multiple reference styles. E.g. Woodstock Festival. The ones I have noticed will have one series of citations using the "ref" tag, mixed in with a different series of citations using a pair of single brackets "[]" with a url. This results in an unsightly and confusing system, where one footnote number will yield two completely different results.

In other words, you can click footnote number 1 on the Woodstock page, and you will get a citation in the references section at the bottom of the page; you can click on a different footnote number 1, with a completely different subject matter and reference, and be forwarded to a non-Wikipedia web page.

(Although I see only one overlap on the Woodstock page, I have seen pages where there are a lot of them.)

First question: Should these be cleaned up?

Second: Is there an easier way to clean these up than going through the entire article, identifying each use of single brackets, and adding "ref" tags instead?

Third: Is there a way to prevent this systematically, perhaps by not numbering the single bracket references?

TYAI Apollo (talk) 15:18, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, this needs to be cleaned up, as this is a mix of footnotes and in-line links. The links need to be placed in between <ref>...</ref> tags so they get properly numbered. The footnotes in the Woodstock article use citation templates, so the links should be updated. --—— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk - 15:25, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Poisson process article

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poisson_process gives me the error below. Shift-reloading the page does not help :-( Other pages load fine.

Our servers are currently experiencing a technical problem. This is probably temporary and should be fixed soon. Please try again in a few minutes.

You may be able to get further information in the #wikipedia channel on the Freenode IRC network.

The Wikimedia Foundation is a non-profit organisation which hosts some of the most popular sites on the Internet, including Wikipedia. It has a constant need to purchase new hardware. If you would like to help, please donate.

If you report this error to the Wikimedia System Administrators, please include the details below.

PHP fatal error in /usr/local/apache/common-local/php-1.5/includes/Skin.php line 1622: Call to a member function escapeFullURL() on a non-object

--Masatran (talk) 16:05, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I would recommend waiting a few more minutes and then try again. Try bypassing your browser's cache also. ṜέđṃάяķvюĨїήīṣŢ ^{Drop me a line} 16:08, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Are you able to view the article, or do you too get the error message? Please let me know. --Masatran (talk) 16:17, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I see no error on the page. -- kainaw ™ 16:59, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Same. No error. Does the screen still show up for you? I have seen this screen before, but it goes away rather quickly. ṜέđṃάяķvюĨїήīṣŢ ^{Drop me a line} 17:19, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

English Wikipedia Internal Account Creation Interface

Hi guys! I'm trying to create an account on the English Wikipedia Internal Account Creation Interface. I entered in all of the information, clicked the second checkbox, skipped the signature box, and hit submit. I got something that looked like:

"Query failed: INSERT INTO acc_user (user_name, user_email, user_pass, user_level, user_onwikiname, user_secure, user_welcome, user_welcome_sig, user_welcome_template) VALUES ('NuclearWarfare', 'EMAIL WAS HERE BUT I REMOVED IT', 'HASH WAS HERE BUT I REMOVED IT', 'New', 'NuclearWarfare', '0', '0', , 'welcome-personal'); ERROR: Unknown column 'user_secure' in 'field list' "

Can anyone tell me what is wrong? I've read Wikipedia:Request an account/Guide over and I can't see what's wrong. Thanks for your help! NuclearWarfare ^{contact me}_{My work} 16:22, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Might want to post at technical village post. Woody (talk) 18:07, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Or file a bug report at : https://jira.toolserver.org/browse/ACC or contact a developers at: http://stable.toolserver.org/acc/team.php Gtstricky^{Talk or C} 18:09, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I am looking for a job

Resolved

– The troll has been blocked. TN‑X-Man 18:04, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Hello I just finished school and I am looking for a job . I live in New Zealand but I can work on Wikipedia or Wikiversity. I can be a professer on Wikiversity or an admin on Wikipedia. I am looking for around $300 NZD an hour for 6 hours a day? Pleae get in touch and I will send you my CV. Many thanks. Trevor Beltsford. --WellingtonUnemployed (talk) 16:59, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia and Wikiversity are written by volunteers, not paid staff. -- kainaw ™ 17:00, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Can I get a paid role? Surely a few people must be paid, as Wikipedia and Wikiversity cannot run for free. --WellingtonUnemployed (talk) 17:02, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

They are hosted by WikiMedia. -- kainaw ™ 17:05, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Then can I work for Wikimedia? I have a secondary school qualification in English , Grade C. I need to pay for a apartment. --WellingtonUnemployed (talk) 17:08, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia is not WikiMedia. You need to go to WikiMedia and ask. Basically, this is like calling up the show Jeopardy and asking if you can get a job at CBS. I seriously doubt anyone at WikiMedia is willing to hire someone who is unable to figure that out. -- kainaw ™ 17:10, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

(ec) Probably not - I don't know of any current vacancies. I suggest finding another job and editing Wikipedia for fun - that's what we do! Dendodge|Talk^Contribs 17:11, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

(whisper: I do know they have current open positions. I just wanted to see if the guy could figure out the extremely easy job of going to MediaWiki's website.) -- kainaw ™ 17:14, 2 September 2008 (UTC) [reply]

What about Wikiversity? Can I go to that? What diplomas do they offer? --WellingtonUnemployed (talk) 17:18, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Is this another Ouija-whatever again?

They don't offer diplomas, just learning materials. Dendodge|Talk^Contribs 17:22, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

But it is a University. Where can I sign up for a Diploma in Sovietology? Who will be my professor? --WellingtonUnemployed (talk) 17:23, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

It's not a university, but a repository of learning materials. Dendodge|Talk^Contribs 17:25, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The troll has already been reported. No need to continue responding. -- kainaw ™ 17:28, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

:::: Then why call it Wikiversity? Why not Wikilearningmaterialsipedia or Wikirepositoryoflearningmaterialipedia? --WellingtonUnemployed (talk) 17:30, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Crime and rent prices in city articles

I was curious as to whether information about crime and rent prices are appropriate for Wikipedia articles about cities. A few editors in the Perth article have disagreed about the appropriateness of including such information.Black-Velvet 17:20, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I personally think that crime would be just fine to add, I don't really know about rent however. ṜέđṃάяķvюĨїήīṣŢ ^{Drop me a line} 17:30, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

(edit conflict) I don't know if there is a Wikipedia-wide consensus about it. Your best bet may be to establish a consensus on the specific article's talk page. Has/have the crime rate/rent prices been the subject of independent coverage? If they have, I would think they could be included. Cheers! TN‑X-Man 17:31, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

You may also want to ask at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Cities, as that WikiProject has the city articles as its main focus. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 18:02, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

(ec) Crime rates are quite appropriate, I'd think; there should be plenty of reliable sources that discuss the crime rates in most cities. Rent prices, maybe not so much unless, as noted above, they've been pointed out for specific reasons that make them stand out for some reason. Tony Fox (arf!) 18:04, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I heard about some other collaborative editing project outside Wikipedia which accumulates crime statistics on (I think) a Google Maps mashup. (Crime tends to be a very localized phenomenon, so the overall crime rate for a whole city may be about as meaningless as the average depth of a river. You drown, or not, depending on the depth of the river where you are. Thus you'd really like crime statistics on a fine spatial resolution.) If you can't find that project by {{Google}}ing for it, I could try to remember where I saw it. (Maybe I'm recalling that Clay Shirky mentioned it in one of his lectures on YouTube, and possibly in his book Here Comes Everybody.) Since Wikipedia is not a directory this type of detailed information for its own sake might be difficult to build consensus for on Wikipedia. --Teratornis (talk) 18:14, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

FWIW, there's a complete article on Crime in Sydney, from a historical perspective. Corvus cornix_talk 18:18, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

How do you create timelines?

I want to create a timeline in a "List of (Band) band members" article, as in List of Oasis band members, List of Slipknot band members and List of Dream Theater band members, but do not know how to start it. When I copy the basic outline from these articles, it malfunctions as I change the information. Help on this, please? Andre666 (talk) 21:39, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

One emerging method is to mark up text entries with hCalendar microformats (preferably through templating). ~~We'll then be able to create~~ {{UF-timeline}} is a template which will link to timeline services - like {{kml}} does to mapping services, for lists of coordinates - see the instance of KML on Tame Valley Canal. Let me know if you need help with that. hCalendar is in use on Band of Brothers and here's a simple timeline (not very exciting, for regularly-spaced weekly episodes; but it proves it's possible). Andy Mabbett (aka Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy Mabbett; Andy Mabbett's contributions 22:08, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The articles you listed make use of mw:Extension:EasyTimeline, you can also check out {{include timeline}}. Xenon 54 21:49, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Featured B&W

Hello, is there any way in the Featured Pictures section either here or on the Commons to have it only display such images that are in black and white/greyscale/other non-color variant scheme? Alternately, to only display images of a certain age? Thanks, 199.89.180.65 (talk) 22:57, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Not that I am aware of. It is either all or nothing. Gtstricky^{Talk or C} 02:37, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

How about a new category Category:Wikipedia images by color scheme? — Twas Now ( talk • contribs • e-mail ) 05:03, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Adding a navbox to a template

Is there any way to add a navbox to a template where the navbox will appear at the bottom of the page using the template? Or are navboxes usually added on a page-by-page basis? Louis Waweru Talk 23:04, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

There isn't a way to make the navbox show up on the bottom of the page (that wouldn't mess everything else up), so you must add them on a page-by-page basis. Calvin 1998 ^(t-c) 23:16, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Okay, thank you =) Louis Waweru Talk 23:31, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Double redirects

EEK HELP! DOUBLE REDIRECTS! I just merged five pages into asphalt (concrete, asphalt concrete, tarmac, sidewalk, and pavement (a disambig page) - concrete alone has over 500 double redirects, no way i can fix all of those, would take year,s any idea how to mass fix them?—Preceding unsigned comment added by Mrqwerty987 (talk • contribs) 23:15, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

A bot should do it some time soon. ...... Densock .. Talk^{(Dendodge on a public network)} 11:38, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Except that nonsense has been reverted. PrimeHunter (talk) 12:11, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

September 3

Justify text on the right side

Can somebody please tell me how to justify text on the right side of an article. With this article List of documentary films I would like to have a left right pattern instead of a one sided long list. I would like 0-9 to be on the left side then A to be on the right then B on the left and continue that left right pattern.--Theoneintraining (talk) 01:37, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

There is no way I know of to right-justify paragraphs in any easy way using wiki markup (except in a table). It probably could be done by making a change sitewide to the CSS for all skins (which is not going to happen). You might be able to do it very laboriously by faking certain elements. For example, asterisks format as bullets but only when placed on the left hand side of a page. You could indent each paragraph (using colons) and manually place bullet symbols (•) at the end by hand and through trial and error try to make the text line up. Even if you succeeded, it would only format correctly on some browers set to certain screenwidths, and not for others, meaning this would be a very bad idea. What I'm really getting at is that it would be an incredible pain in the ass and wouldn't really work. In any event, we want article formatting to be consistent across the encyclopedia. I took a look at the manual of style and though I didn't find anything in particular saying we prefer right text justification, I think the lack of guidance on this is more a reflection of the impossibility of doing it. In other words, if it could be done, we would likely have instructions against its general use. You can, however, stagger images right-and-left. While images default to the right of pages, you can add |left to the image code to override this. I think this would look strange in a list where the left-justified entries are prefaced by bullets.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 02:21, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I think the long list is actually preferred, although for what you wish to do, a multi-column thing or a table might work better than justification.

For example:

This is
on the left.

This is
on the right.

Although, as mentioned above, that's not really encouraged (as far as I know). Calvin 1998 ^(t-c) 02:33, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Yup... see Help:table. Probably your only option but since it is an active list I am not sure how easy it would be to maintain. Cheers Gtstricky^{Talk or C} 02:36, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I simply placed the some images on the left side so it kind of created the affect. Can somebody please have a look and tell me if it is suitable?.--Theoneintraining (talk) 03:08, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Because the list is rather long, you could also split it into two articles, similar to how the list of punk bands is split. — Twas Now ( talk • contribs • e-mail ) 04:37, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Use:

<div style="text-align: right; direction: ltr; margin-left: 1em;">TEXT</div>

...... Densock .. Talk^{(Dendodge on a public network)} 11:36, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Publishing my article with Wikipedia

I would like to know how can send you articles or working papers I wrote on trade policy issues. Thanks a lot, Best Regards, Rosaria Iorio. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 85.3.121.215 (talk) 08:23, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

You must create an account to start an article. Check Wikipedia:Your first article for info on creating articles! — Twas Now ( talk • contribs • e-mail ) 09:43, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Well, you seem to be talking about already existing articles by yourself. Let me therefore clarify that Wikipedia is not a publisher, but compiles articles in a collaborative manner. An example of such a topic would be trade policy that currently isn't a separte article, but certainly would need improvement by subject matter experts.--Tikiwont (talk) 10:20, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Also please know that Wikipedia does not accept original research. Information in articles must have been published already elsewhere. —teb728 t c 17:58, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Uploading Copyrighted image

Hello I would like to upload some coyrighted images but I can't find anything on the site on how to do that.

Could you explain me how to upload this images? I have contributed several articles already

Thanks! Salense (talk) 11:54, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

You can only use a non-free copyrighted image in an article if it complies with all of the factors at Wikipedia:Non-free content criteria (and also see the more general Non-free content guideline. As you can see there are very strict standards about allowing non-free media to be posted at all. See also Help:Images and other uploaded files and Wikipedia:Upload. Cheers.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 12:09, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Switching account names

I recently rediscovered this account after considering changing my other account name to this. Since my main account is not this one and this name I prefer is it possible to swap the two names around or at least change delete this account then swap my other accounts name over to this one, (since I'd quite like to keep my other accounts edit count and I haven't really done much with this one)? My "main" account is User:TheGreatZorko Gunrun (talk) 12:18, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Oh if someone could drop me a line on either of my talk pages that would be super but I guess I can just check back here next time I remember Gunrun (talk) 12:20, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

If I'm correct, you would like your main account to be TheGreatZorko? If that's the case, just be sure to log in using that account. You can redirect your Gunrun user/talk pages to TheGreatZorko account by placing #REDIRECT [[User:TheGreatZorko]] on the Gunrun user page and #REDIRECT [[User talk:TheGreatZorko]] on the Gunrun talk page. I hope this helps! TN‑X-Man 12:29, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

What I would like is for me to be able to change my login for TheGreatZorko to Gunrun and to erase this account, so I can log in using Gunrun and still keep TheGreatZorko's edit history and such. I know it is possible to change names but I'm not sure how or if I am allowed to do it with 2 accounts Gunrun (talk) 12:55, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

EDIT: Oh hey I found this - Wikipedia:Changing_username which should do me fine. Consider this resolved I guess Gunrun (talk) 12:57, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

journalism

what is the importance of communication in individual life,organization and in society? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 202.125.143.77 (talk) 14:53, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Please do your own homework. Welcome to the Wikipedia Help desk. Your question appears to be a homework question. I apologize if this is a misevaluation, but it is our policy here to not do people's homework for them, but to merely aid them in doing it themselves. Letting someone else do your homework does not help you learn how to solve such problems.
Please attempt to solve the problem yourself first. You can search Wikipedia or search the Web.
If you need help with a specific part of your homework, the Reference desk can help you grasp the concept. Do not ask knowledge questions here, just those about using Wikipedia.

You may find further information and resources in the article communication. --—— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk - 15:03, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

You might impress your teacher if you work the word semiotics into your report. Or not. Animal communication gives insights into the evolutionary precursors of human communication. --Teratornis (talk) 17:02, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Chop or crop?

Hi. Could someone please verify if this image conforms to our copyright policy and should be used in our articles? I see the author inserted "Faísca 2005" in the bottom right... Would it be okay to crop the image in order to harvest the author's signature? Húsönd 16:34, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

If it is truly CC-by-2.0 as claimed, you are free to adapt the work, which means that you can crop it - which would be nice since it would center the tree. -- kainaw ™ 16:41, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I've resynthesized away the text. Personally, I think the composition of the image is quite nice, and cropping it to center the tree would only make it worse. Of course, it depends somewhat on the intended use: if all you want to show is the tree and not the field, cropping could be warranted. —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 17:08, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you very much. :-) I agree that no further cropping is necessary. Both the tree and the field are important in the picture, which is meant to show the typical landscape of the Alentejo region in Portugal. Húsönd 17:30, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I have nothing substantive to add, but just wanted to say that that's a really startling and beautiful image.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 22:40, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Assistance required

I crafted a new article last week. After reviewing, editing and posting an image, I would like the page to be posted 'live'. I cannot seem to figure this out. Is there some sort of a review process that my entry must go through to get approved (I.e. it takes time to see live?)

I'm sure this is very simple but I'm frustrated with the way this works. Perhaps it's already live but when I do a basic search for the page, I still receive the note that their is no article with the term.

please respond to netsweeper123.

doug —Preceding unsigned comment added by Netsweeper123 (talk • contribs) 19:23, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Could you explain which article this is? It may have been deleted. --Alinnisawest,^{Dalek Empress} (extermination requests here) 19:30, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

It appears that you created the article on your user page. To actually create the article, copy the content to Netsweeper. Note that Netsweeper was deleted in 2006, since it was a copy of content from http://www.netsweeper.com/. Your version seems very similar and appears to be copied from the same source. Given your name, I suspect a conflict of interest. You need to read Wikipedia:FAQ/Business before continuing. --—— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk - 19:34, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Users with access to magazine archive

I've been working on an article where it looks like the NME published an article with interviews of the performer and producer back in July 2004. NME's website doesn't have the article, and neither does the online periodical archive I use. Is there a good way for me to find a user who'd have access to issues that far back? PiracyFundsTerrorism (talk) 19:48, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

It's unlikely that anyone with these issues would be reading the Help desk just now. Not impossible, but unlikely. Here are some other things you can try:

Ask again on the WP:Reference desk/humanities.
Look at the histories of the articles you mentioned: Some Girls (Rachel Stevens song) and NME to see the usernames of the other contributors. Maybe one of them has what you seek. It would be tiring to ask every single one of them on their user talk pages, so you might start by asking just a few of the major contributors. If they don't have what you need, they might know someone who does.
Look at the relevant WikiProjects. Some of the subject area enthusiasts might know where to find obscure information.
If you live in a civilized part of the world, you could ask a real live reference librarian at a bricks and mortar library. It's hard to imagine, but once upon a time people actually did go to libraries to look stuff up. Rumor has it, anyway.

Good luck in your search. You could also try e-mailing NME and ask about back issues. (For best results, read my reply in the voice of Stewie Griffin. I've been watching some Seth MacFarlane videos on YouTube. Amazing stuff.) --Teratornis (talk) 06:10, 4 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Las Vegas City Public Schools

I have called to explain that Las Vegas City Public Schools is actually called Las Vegas City Schools, not Las Vegas City Public Schools. Thank you for giving me the oppurtunity to tell you. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 63.229.160.121 (talk) 20:27, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Can you find an official source for this? On Wikipedia, sources and correct information are considered very important- if you can find an official source for this (from the school district itself, say), please post it here so we can rectify the mistake as soon as possible. Thanks! --Alinnisawest,^{Dalek Empress} (extermination requests here) 20:31, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Never mind; having gone to the website here, I guess that counts as a pretty good source! --Alinnisawest,^{Dalek Empress} (extermination requests here) 20:32, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Please stop creating sections on this; you're just clogging up the Help Desk. I've already responded and plan to move it. --Alinnisawest,^{Dalek Empress} (extermination requests here) 20:41, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Requesting wider participation in an RfD

The redirect deletion discussion[11] inherently brings those who support keeping the redirect since anyone immediately using the redirect is made aware of the deletion discussion. Is there a way to request wider participation in the RfD? I thought of Template:RFCpolicy list and perhaps some place on Wikipedia:Village pump, but I would appreciate help in zeroing in on a way to request wider participation in the RfD. Thanks. Suntag (talk) 20:31, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Those are good prescribed ways to get wider review. I suggest caution. See WP:CANVASS. Garycompugeek (talk) 21:30, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

External Links on User Pages

Can I add an external link on my user page that links to an article on the web that I wrote and that I hold the copyright to? Something like a photo album hosted by a common provider of such services, or a page or pages I wrote and host myself? —Preceding unsigned comment added by TCav (talk • contribs) 21:49, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The question is: how does it relate to your work on Wikipedia? See Wikipedia:User page. The community is fairly lenient on user pages, but you should keep it relevant. --—— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk - 22:39, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

For instance, I have a number of pages I host that deal with the War of 1812. I contribute to Wikipedia arcticles and talk pages on the subject. I also am an amatuer photographer, and host a number of my images on a popular photo hosting site. I contribute to Wikipedia arcticles and talk pages on that subject as well. Wouldn't links to those be appropriate for my user page. Would their contents continue to be protected by my copyright, even though I've included links to them on my user page? --TCav (talk) 22:53, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Four Level Interchange image

I found this image from a website and thought it will look cool. But I don't know how to upload it. I've try and got error notice al the time. I have no experience with uploading images.--I-405 (Free way) 23:06, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Since the images on that website appear to be under copyright, with no free license, and they don't fall within our non-free content criteria, you shouldn't upload them to Wikipedia at all. Algebraist 23:15, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

NE2 said the sign is wrong about pointing to I-110 South. We can have image of any freeway plates. I sa somebody upload Orange Crush Interchange image of i-5/SR/22/57 int. near Orange.--I-405 (Free way) 23:32, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

September 4

Is Wikipedia slow?

Has Wikipedia been horribly slow for the last several weeks, or is it only happening to me? Pages take 30+ seconds to load - if they load. About 25% of edits fail to save. Etc. Bubba73 (talk), 04:46, 4 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I've also noticed that pages take a while to load for me. It might just be our use of browsers. Asking at Wikipedia:Village Pump might help. Thanks, RyRy (talk) 04:54, 4 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Zooming articles problem

Ok, so my eyes arn't what they used to be. I use CTRL+Scroll Wheel to zoom just about every site i visit. But when i zoom Wikipedia it immediately causes the text to run off the monitor and i have to slide the page to read. It's not a problem if there are pictures on the right side of the page, as they help keep the text in bounds. Unless there is some way i'm not aware of to overcome this issue, i'd like to suggest wrapping text inside some sort of boundary so that it's not an issue for those of us who like to ZOOM. I'm using a 22" Widescreen so it's not a monitor issue. I'm sure i'm not alone as one who would benefit from some change made here. A quick example is Circuitcity.com site (happen to be there now) where you don't need to resort to sliding the page to read no matter how big you make the text. —Preceding unsigned comment added by RockJohny (talk • contribs) 05:03, 4 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Uploading image/logo

Hi,

I'm sure its an easy question but I'm not that tech minded and I find myself getting lost in Wiki looking for the answer. How do I upload an image? Can I drop and drag into the sandbox and then go live?

Thanks,

Simon —Preceding unsigned comment added by Simonking67 (talk • contribs) 05:30, 4 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Simon. I taught myself about images by finding an article with an image and then selecting "edit this page". If you do the same you will quickly see the text that accompanies the image. Copy that text and then paste it into the Sandbox or your User page or wherever you want it to go. Dolphin51 (talk) 07:01, 4 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia:Upload and Help:Images might be of help ... good luck! – Thomas H. Larsen 07:21, 4 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Language problem

I'm really sorry about this, as I'm sure there must be a glaringly obvious way to do this, but 15 minutes of searching hasn't helped: so - I live in Norway, and have hitherto always had English as the default when I hit my bookmarked wikipedia.org However, the last couple of days, the default is set to Norwegian, for some reason! How do I undo this? I want the default to be English. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 88.87.53.32 (talk) 09:42, 4 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Did you try changing your bookmark to http://en.wikipedia.org? That leads directly to the English site, while http://no.wikipedia.org goes to the Norwegian site. Xenon 54 10:01, 4 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Two requests, if possible

I gather this is unfixable?

And... does anybody know how to make this have an option allowing you to decrease the width etc.? Thanks. -- Menti sock 11:08, 4 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

@@ Line 821: / Line 821: @@
 I'm really sorry about this, as I'm sure there must be a glaringly obvious way to do this, but 15 minutes of searching hasn't helped: so - I live in Norway, and have hitherto always had English as the default when I hit my bookmarked wikipedia.org However, the last couple of days, the default is set to Norwegian, for some reason! How do I undo this? I want the default to be English.  <small>—Preceding [[Wikipedia:Signatures|unsigned]] comment added by [[Special:Contributions/88.87.53.32|88.87.53.32]] ([[User talk:88.87.53.32|talk]]) 09:42, 4 September 2008 (UTC)</small><!-- Template:UnsignedIP --> <!--Autosigned by SineBot-->
 :Did you try changing your bookmark to http://en.wikipedia.org? That leads directly to the English site, while http://no.wikipedia.org goes to the Norwegian site. [[User talk:Xenon54|Xenon]][[User:Xenon54|54]] 10:01, 4 September 2008 (UTC)
+== Two requests, if possible ==
+I gather [[Wikipedia:Help_desk/Archives/2008_August_13#Template:PGP_top|this]] is unfixable?
+And... does anybody know how to make [[User:Asenine/RfAhide|this]] have an option allowing you to decrease the width etc.? Thanks. -- [[User:Mentisock|<font color="#800080" face="courier new">Menti</font>]][[User talk:Mentisock|<font color="#000000" face="courier new">sock</font>]] 11:08, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

v t e Wikipedia help pages
*Visit the Teahouse* or the Help desk for an interactive Q & A forum. FAQs (?) Reference desks (?) Noticeboards (?) Cheatsheet (?) Directories (?)**
About Wikipedia (?)	Administration Purpose Principles Policies and guidelines What Wikipedia is not Disclaimer (parental advice) Making requests Who writes Wikipedia?
Help for readers (?)	FAQ Books Copyright Glossary Mobile access Navigation Other languages Searching Students Viewing media
Contributing to Wikipedia (?)	Advice for young editors Avoiding common mistakes Etiquette Simplified Manual of Style Simplified rule-set "Ignore all rules" "The rules are principles" Style-tips Tip of the day Your first article (article wizard)
Getting started (?)	Why create an account? Introductions by topic Graphics tutorials Picture tutorial IRC (live chat) tutorial VisualEditor user guide
Dos and don'ts (?)	Accessibility Biographies Biographies (living) Categorization Consensus Discussions Disambiguation Images Leads Links Lists References Tables Titles (of articles)
How-to pages and information pages (?)	Appealing blocks Article deletion Categories Citations/references Referencing for beginners Citation Style 1 Cite errors References and page numbers Convert Diff Editing Minor edit toolbar edit conflict Find sources Files Footnotes Image deletion Infoboxes Linking (link color) Logging in Merging Page name Renaming pages Redirect Passwords Email confirmation Reverting Simple vandalism cleanup Talk pages (archiving simple archiving) User contributions WP search protocol
Coding (?)	Wiki markup Barcharts Calculations Characters Columns Elevation Hidden text HTML Lists Magic words Music symbols Sections Sounds Tables Templates Transclusion URL Visual files
Directories (?)	Abbreviations Contents (Encyclopedia proper) Departments Editor's index Essays FAQs Glossary Guidelines Manual of Style Policies Tasks Tips Tools
Missing Manual Ask for help on your talk page (?)