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December 15

Fair use

If an actor, model, or other celebrity is dead, can we use an image of them taken from a magazine in the infobox for their article? Dismas|^(talk) 00:39, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Fair use images typically get deleted because they're replaceable with free alternatives. Unless someone with a free image comes along that is less likely for dead people and you can't go out and take one. You should be okay with fair use here. =Mgm|^(talk) 00:46, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
- Great, thanks. Dismas|^(talk) 01:01, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

However, fair use images create problems, because for example we cannot upload them to Commons to allow other language Wikipedias to use them. (While the English Wikipedia is the largest single Wikipedia, it only accounts for about one quarter of the total articles, and most of the other Wikipedias cannot use fair use images, as "fair use" seems to be legal quirk in the United States and few other countries. Very roughly speaking, for every user helped by a fair use image, perhaps three are inconvenienced.) One should only use a fair use image if all of the following are true:

An article really needs an image.
No freely-licensed image exists anywhere.
We don't care about maximizing the efficiency of the other language Wikipedias.

Commons already has millions of free images, many of them under-utilized on the English Wikipedia, on a huge variety of topics (but probably not the one you want, due to Murphy's law). It's often easier to browse through Commons to see what images are available, and look up articles to put them in, than to start with an arbitrary article and try to find images for it. After you spend lots of time on Commons, you might eventually find an image suitable for some article you were thinking about in the past. For example, in the course of some quasi-related image sorting on Commons, I recently found some images that are suitable for Wind power in Ohio, an article that I had thought about improving some months earlier. On Wikipedia the obvious approach is not always the most fruitful in the long run. Often it is easier to adjust the goal to fit the available resources, than to try to find the resources to advance a particular goal. Things often work better when we opportunistically pick the low-hanging fruit. So you might spend some time on image sorting on Commons, and keep the current frustrating image search on the back burner for a while. Later, you might discover more sources of free images, and find one that satisfies your original goal. --Teratornis (talk) 01:14, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

(edit conflict) I might add that Wikipedia could tighten (or, possibly, loosen) its rules for fair use images at any time. If you can find a free image, it is less likely to go poof at some future date when the rules change. (Wikipedia has made sweeping rule changes in the past as a result of problems resulting from content on Wikipedia, for example see: Seigenthaler incident. Wikipedia might be just one lawsuit away from banning all fair use images.) Also, the definition of what is OK on Wikipedia really means whatever is OK to whoever decides to edit an article next. Using a fair use image might set you at odds with some anti-fair-use crusader at some point. That is, just because the Help desk says it's OK doesn't automatically convince the other 47,814,410 users. Even if it is OK, you might still have to convince some of them. --Teratornis (talk) 01:37, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The death of the subject make no difference. The copyright belongs to the photographer, or whoever they assign it to, regardless. Andy Mabbett (User:Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 01:32, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The current policy is at Wikipedia:Non-free content criteria (which has the interesting shortcut: WP:FUC). --Teratornis (talk) 01:37, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks, but I've been through WP's legal/image mumbo-jumbo before and it's all Greek to me. I'm not a lawyer and I don't intend to be one. I just wanted to add some photos of dead Playboy Playmates to their articles. I wanted an explanation that a five year old can understand and that's what I think I've been given here and I thank you guys for it.

For a long time, I just gave up on images entirely. I didn't even upload movie posters and use them on the article for the movie because of the hoops that I had to jump through. I took a trip to Boston and uploaded some photos from that thinking that it would be easier because I was the photographer. That went poorly as well and one of my photos was nearly deleted.

So, now I've been told that I can add a small photo from a magazine of a dead person if I add the fair use template and fill out the information. Once I get it right on one image, I'll just copy, paste, and change the names. I realize that it will only be good enough for the English WP, but that's all I can handle right now. I don't have the days that it would take to comprehend even a page worth of WP image policies. /rant Dismas|^(talk) 01:51, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

So I can't figure out what this is called to look it up...the +/- thing

So I keep seeing things like this:

(diff) (hist) . . Talk:Imperialism‎; 03:35:07 . . (+96) . . Theeagleman (Talk | contribs) (→This article needs major revisions: thanks)

And I can't for the life of me figure out what the bolded part means. Who assigns those numbers? What do they mean? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Theeagleman (talk • contribs) 02:33, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Read Help:History and Help:Recent changes. --Teratornis (talk) 03:00, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

It's the difference in bytes between the new version and the previous version of the article, calculated automatically when the edit is saved. (+3) means somebody added a few letters, (+1,256) means somebody added a substantial amount of text, (-32,886) means somebody probably blanked the page... you get the idea. --Fullobeans (talk) 08:08, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Why is my page designated as "vandalism"?

Resolved

– ukexpat (talk) 02:45, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Dear Helpers at Wikipedia,

I added an article to Wikipedia including my bio and list of compositions. Although I do not see anything wrong with it I am getting the following message:

"Please refrain from making unconstructive edits to Wikipedia. Your edits appear to be vandalism and have been reverted. If you would like to experiment, please use the sandbox. Thank you."

I would like to know is there is something wrong with my article titled "'Ofer Ben-Amots (Composer)'" .

Thank you so much for your help.

Ofer Ben-Amots —Preceding unsigned comment added by Obenamots (talk • contribs) 04:11, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Please read WP:N, which explains our notability requirements. You do appear to be notable, but you need to assert that by providing links to reliable third-party news sources. I just did a Google News search and saw quite a few. Once you've added sources to confirm your notability, you should probably leave the article alone and let other editors work on it, since we discourage people from writing autobiographies due to the obvious conflict of interest. I'm sure the editor who warned you about vandalism assumed you were one of the many people who write fake articles every day, but sorry about that. Just read the links in this paragraph and act accordingly, and you shouldn't run into any problems. --Fullobeans (talk) 04:35, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I would like to thank Fullobeans for the above reply and also add this additional information:

It looks like you made a technical error, and someone thought you did it on purpose, that's probably why they called it vandalism. When you first made the new page, you erased an existing page at this location:

Osborne (computer retailer)

You can see the list of edits you have done on your "contribs" page, that you access by clicking the link the says "User contributions" in the left-hand navigation list that is visible when you view your user page. You can also see your contribs by clicking on this link: [1]

Because you erased information that had previously been in that article, it looked like you were doing "vandalism", even though in this situation, it was just a mistake it seems that you did not actually intend to replace the page that was there before.

Don't take it personally! There is much to learn about editing Wikipedia. Start at this page:

the Five Pillars

...to learn about the basic policies that guide the writing of the encyclopedia. Good luck with your editing, and feel free to ask more questions any time. --Jack-A-Roe (talk) 04:41, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Also note that the vandalism warning is from 31 July 2007.[2] I saw that by clicking the "history" tab. The editor should have signed the warning so the date appeared, but failed to do so. It was a few days earlier, 28 July 2007, you (probably by accident) replaced the content of Osborne (computer retailer) with your biography in this edit. It was reverted on 31 July in [3] by the editor who warned you 5 minutes later. PrimeHunter (talk) 13:36, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

To all of you guys, Thank you very very much! I am new to Wikipedia and I have absolutely no idea what I am doing and if it is correct of not. Thus, any help is greatly appreciated and if I keep making all kinds of errors please forgive me in advance :) , about the vandalism: I noticed one day in 2007 that my page was actually hijacked by some Osborne (computer retailer). This appears in the history of my original page. Additionally Osborne's page stated clearly that it was redirected from the Ofer Ben-Amots page. I also read that the Osborne page is not active anymore and maybe I was a bit too hasty but I went into my own page with my original password and re-edited it. I hope this is not vandalism but if it is, it was never meant to be. Another issue is the "autobiography" subject. I understand that there might be a conflict of interest and that it's better for a third party to do the editing. My intention was to forward the editing and maintaining job to a publicist but it was too early without any article whatsoever. I keep editing the page and adding sources and links to it. I am not sure how much is enough and what exactly is missing. I know for a fact that there is nothing offensive about the information provided, no copyright violations and that everything there, while not amazing and awesome, is at least accurate and factual. Again, many thanks for past and future help. I am not sure if this is the way to respond to this thread but I am going to save it anyway :) Obenamots (talk) 02:34, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

How does the average reader report VERY BASIC vandalism?

I've been looking for half an hour for a way to report a plain-old case of writing bad words down for fun, but I can't find a place to report it.

The entry, by the way, is THE GIVER. Which, I assume, is does NOT have a setting of "a fag utopia, where all possible steps are taken to eliminate phins gayness."

But perhaps that is an issue for the discusion board?

04:39, 15 December 2008 (UTC)~~ —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.97.56.223 (talk)

If someone writes nonsense, you can simply "undo" the change yourself to put the article back to the way it was before. You can click the "edit" tab at the top of the page, and then remove the extra words by editing the page, just like when you asked your question here.

To learn more about editing pages, go to this link: Help:Editing.

If the vandalism is repeated and becomes a problem, there are ways to report that, but for now you don't need to do that. If it turns out you do need to report it, you are welcome to post a new question here. --Jack-A-Roe (talk) 04:48, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

after undoing the vandalism, if you want to leave a warning on the vandal's talk page, you can find instructions for that here: WP:Warning. Sssoul (talk) 04:54, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I have reverted the vandalism ([4]). Thanks for bringing this to our attention. Icewedge (talk) 05:40, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

If you're trying to figure out what the original wording was, click on "history" (it's right next to "edit"); there you'll find a list of all the edits which have ever been made to that article, with the most recent edit listed first. Click on "last," and you'll be shown the difference between the most recent version and the one before that. And I believe The Giver was about a poop utopia, where all possible steps are taken to eliminate phins kelli wuz here.--Fullobeans (talk) 07:55, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Offering photographs to Wikipedia authors

I have a large archive of good quality photographs. I do not want to edit articles or contibute photographs uninvited, I want to offer my photographs to Wikipedia authors so that they can choose whether they want to use them. How do I do this? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 62.25.109.195 (talk) 05:50, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Go ahead, be bold, we like it when people are bold - we like to think that this is the encyclopaedia that anyone can contribute to so you don't need an invitation to jump right in. Probably one of the best things you can do is to upload them to Wikimedia Commons if you own them and are prepared to licence them freely. Once on Commons they can be included on articles on all of Wikipedia's language versions, like here on the English language Wikipedia. Wikipedians actively scour Commons for images to add to articles so it's a good way to contribute without feeling that you're stepping on anyone's toes. Also, images on Commons can be used by anyone for anything, potentially allowing anyone in the world to see them. For more information on Commons, see Commons:Project scope and Commons:Licensing. Nanonic (talk) 07:04, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I agree with Nanonic, Wikipedia and the Commons do welcome your photos and your contributions will be appreciated. But you should be aware that once you upload them, you will lose control of your photos and anyone will be able to use them for any purpose, even if you don't agree about it. You cannot change your mind and take back control later. By uploading them, you agree to the license that is used either here on Wikipedia (GNU Free Documentation License) or the license that's used on Commons (Commons:Licensing), depending where you upload them. Since you cannot take back control of your photos later after you do that, you should read the pages that describe the licenses and be sure that you understand them before you make your decision. --Jack-A-Roe (talk) 07:23, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Issue with an image

I don't think that the image on the Kathy Shower article is Shower herself. The editor that added the image claims to be the photographer. But why is this the image, that doesn't show the subject's face very well at all, being used here? And this is supposed to be a recent photo of a 55 y.o. woman? I don't believe it. What can/should I do to raise my suspicions somewhere? WP:PUI doesn't seem to apply since I don't doubt that the image is free. I just doubt its veracity. Dismas|^(talk) 06:47, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The article talk page would be a good spot. Personally, I don't think there's much reason to doubt the image accuracy. Based on the subject, it's not unlikely she had a few plastic surgeries done and if you look at her skin, an age of 45-55 isn't unlikely. As for the image not showing her face well. I'm guessing it's the best we've got. - 131.211.211.251 (talk) 08:35, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

(edit conflict) I think it's fair to be suspicious, and I'm surprised there doesn't seem to be an established protocol for such situations. I would think there'd at least be a Commons template, but no. I'd say comment on the talk pages for the image, the article, and the uploader (both here and on Commons), and/or ask at the Commons help desk. For the time being, I just removed the image and put up a less objectionable one, which was uploaded by the same editor but which looks more like a standard fan photograph. --Fullobeans (talk) 08:39, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

131.211.211.251, I'm guessing you were looking at the new image; this is the one Dismas was referring to. --Fullobeans (talk) 08:42, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

That anon was me. Yes, the original image was very suspect. I wish you put a not safe work warning up, though, I forgot the subject's topic... - Mgm|^(talk) 11:47, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
- Sorry about that. She wasn't really showing anything, so I didn't even think of it. Dismas|^(talk) 11:52, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

(undent) I can't vouch for the photo's veracity, but the Kathy Shower article claims the subject was a PMOY at age 33, which would mean she must have looked a dozen years younger than her age then. Considering that the PMOY is supposed to represent the most attractive woman who can be persuaded to disrobe for the camera in a given year, it's not out of the question to suppose the woman in the File:Kat barcelona 08.jpg photo could be that same woman 22 years later. Different people age at different rates, and a PMOY at age 33 is probably on a slower aging schedule than the average person. --Teratornis (talk) 20:40, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Self assessment of articles

There is a discussion on WP:SHIPS at the moment about self-assessing articles. As this is something relevant to all articles, it is deserving of a wider audience.

Q: Is self-assessment of articles allowed, allowed under certain circumstances, or not allowed at all?

My view is that self-assessment is OK for Stub class articles, and non-article classes such as List, Disambig, etc. Start/C/B class should be assessed by an independant editor who has not substantially contributed to the article (minor spelling/grammar changes are OK).

Comments please. Mjroots (talk) 12:35, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

As Wikipedia:WikiProject Ships/Assessment says (for instance), B, Start and Stub class "May be assigned by any reviewer". I see no problem in anyone assigning them to articles they have just been working on - it saves everyone effort. If a mistake is made, then anyone else can come along and correct it. It is not like B, Start or Stub are particularly sought-after honours (unlike GA, A or FA...) The Land (talk) 12:56, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Following on from the answer above, I would agree that self-assessment is fine. You may not review your own GA nominations, and FA nominations are reviewed and approved/rejected by FAC. But I personally have reviewed by own articles between "stub" and "B"; as long as you understand the criteria for each assessment level, you should be fine. If you can, look at your work with neutrality, and if you aren't sure, consult another user to look at it independently. Best, PeterSymonds (talk) 13:02, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

"It is not like B, Start or Stub are particularly sought-after honours" - I always feel it's been a job well done when an article I create gets an initial assessment of B class. Mjroots (talk) 13:05, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

posting some ones profile to wikipedia

hi i would like to post my profile to wikipedia how can i do this thanks charlie —Preceding unsigned comment added by Bonyem (talk • contribs) 12:59, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

What sort of profile were you hoping to post? Remember that Wikipedia is not anything like MySpace or your personal webhost. However, you may put information on you user page, as long as it doesn't break any of the requirements (listed on the linked page). If you want to write an article about yourself, please thoroughly read WP:COI, WP:BIO and WP:AUTO. Though it's not technically forbidden, it is strongly advised against, as it is hard for the subject to maintain a neutral point of view. Best, PeterSymonds (talk) 13:11, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Please don't. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, a tertiary source, which means our articles must be on subjects which have been already recognized by the world by being published about in independent (meaning wholly unrelated to you), reliable, secondary sources. A core content policy here, thus, is that information in articles must be verified by citation to such sources. For the vast majority of people and things in the world, that can't be done because the subject has not caught the world's interest, so no one has done such publication. Every day we get thousands of articles about companies, bands, people, etc. which exist in the world but have no claim that makes them worthy of being the subject of a reference encyclopedia and the article are deleted. There are additional policies and guidlesines involved such as our neutral point of view policy and our policy against original research. Please see Wikipedia:Autobiography for an overview.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 13:15, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

There options other than Wikipedia, such as Wikipopuli and Wikibios. – ukexpat (talk) 15:19, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

ApawkG

Somebody block ApawkG as a sockpuppet of UnrealSpiritX. Hairy Perry 14:51, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

This is the wrong venue. Please see WP:SPP or WP:AN, and remember to provide evidence. Best, PeterSymonds (talk) 14:55, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

This is, indeed, the wrong venue, but I'm familiar with this vandal so I've blocked User:ApawkG thru User:ApawkK. But Hairy, he's right, next time try WP:AIV and provide a bit of evidence so someone not familiar will be able to make an informed block. --barneca (talk) 14:59, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Changing my signature

Resolved

Help, please - what am I doing wrong? I want to move away from my usual signature to something else. I can get the first bit linked up to my user page, but the second bit (the "coming!" bit) has no link associated with it to my talk pafe. What am I doing wrong?.

This is the code I am using: '''[[User:StephenBuxton|Stephen!]]''' <sup><small>''[[User talk:StephenBuxton|Coming]]!''</small></sup>

Thanks! Stephen! ^Coming! 16:59, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Don't worry about it - it does work fine. I was just trying it out on my talk page - of course the link won't work. D'oh! Stephen! ^Coming! 17:01, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

(edit conflict) Your signature appears to work for me (i.e. the "Coming!" does link to your talk page). However, if you were testing it on your talk page, the link would not appear to work. TN‑X-Man 17:01, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Uploading Photos Correctly

Hello, I need help with uploading photos correctly to the Siena College wikipedia page. I am a representative for the College and therefore own all of the rights to the photos. So far I have uploaded the photos to Wikimedia Commons three separate times but each time all of the photos have been deleted with the reasoning being that they "violate copyright" and are "unfree". I need to know where to upload them and what information to supply on the upload page so that they will not be deleted. The problem isn't that they aren't valid, it's that I don't know the proper information to supply on the upload page. It is important that the photos are uploaded to the College's wikipedia page in order to complete the article. If you could provide me with the way to upload photos correctly that would be much appreciated. Thanks. User: Siena4

Hi there. You will need to email permissions-commons@wikimedia.org with the evidence that you own the photographs, and that you are willing to license them under Creative Commons. An OTRS representative will then verify this and tag the pages. In the meantime, please re-upload them and place {{OTRS-pending}} in the upload form, and then send your immediately as soon as possible. Best, PeterSymonds (talk) 18:23, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Citations in infoboxes

Is it acceptable to use the <ref> tag in an infobox? I seem to remember seeing that this was frowned upon, but I don't know for sure. Thanks, Hermione1980 18:44, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

yes, perfectly acceptable to use a ref. Personally, if the info is repeated elsewhere I think it looks better if the ref is in the main body of text, but that's just my preference. 18:56, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

I totally agree with whoever posted before me. If you can put it in the main text, it's probably better, otherwise it's better to reference something in an infobox rather than leaving it unreferenced. - Mgm|^(talk) 21:54, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Okie dokie. Thanks again, Hermione1980

How do I

How do I input a space when before my comment when posting an answer. I see this ":" a lot. Is this how? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Davidbhoy2805 (talk • contribs) 18:57, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Yes that's it! DuncanHill (talk) 18:58, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Yeh, the ":" is inserting an indent. Two of those "::" will put in 2 indents, 3 does 3, and so on. flaming lawyer^cnever for get 19:00, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you guys! —Preceding unsigned comment added by Davidbhoy2805 (talk • contribs) 19:01, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

But don't overdo it otherwise...

...you end up way over here! – ukexpat (talk) 19:49, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

(outdent) Or just do this. — neuro^(talk) 02:19, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

POV Vandalism

This guy keeps making sectarian POV edits to the "War against Islam" page. Here's his link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:BoogaLouie - —Preceding unsigned comment added by 124.123.138.217 (talk • contribs)

This isn't the appropriate page for this. — neuro^(talk) 02:19, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Assistance regarding a controversy

Dearest Wikipedians,

This may or may not be the correct location to talk about the issue I'm going to discuss and ask for the assistance but I followed this link from Jimmy Wales user info of Wikipedia for any complaints but still I do apologize in advance for any inconvenience this may cause. I truly agree and appreciate the level of promptness and correctness of the articles, Wikipedia maintains. But I've a suggestion regarding a semi locked article. Recently, I visited the article "Muhammad" (pbuh) and saw a controversial conversation in the 'Talk' about removal of the image Maome.jpg. Wikipedia admins are having a strong view point that only 'fundamental islamists or extremists' are against the removal of the image; the image depicts a better understanding of the article; the image has been moved to the bottom of the article as a favor and the admins suggest to configure browser to not to display the image, if the readers don't want. But in fact, that's totally not correct. Let me explain a bit about it. In Islam, there is no picture of Prophet Muhammad. Muslims do love valuer and respect Prophet Muhammad above all things utmost and any of the images of the Prophet exhibit a lack of respect regarding virtuousness and pureness of divine and devout faith. Thus these show disrespect and are discourteous of course!

Now about the image, I'm not sure on how and where it came from and why it was added to the article (there are not solid proofs to believe that it was from the scripture of Abu Rayhan Biruni as there are no images of the Prophet in the all history of Islam). Neither does it show any subtitles nor it has any sort of descriptive information printed by the calligrapher (which as per your article is Abu Rayhan Biruni) and so it is not required to be included in the article. No Muslim will create a picture not any image of the Prophet as this will hurt the Muslims' emotions. In real, I strongly believe that this picture is of one of several 'Sufis' or saints (check for Sufism at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sufi) that has been irrelevantly referred to the Prophet Muhammad. I've seen a lot of such pictures which describe saints preaching religion in a few calligraphic exhibitions. So, this image Maome.jpg should be in 'Sufi' article.

So, here by I request Wikipedia super moderators to please assist me in this regards by removing the image Maome.jpg from article entitled "Muhammad". In case if you strictly abide by your rules and you cannot remove the image (though I hope this is NOT impossible as the article is semi protected) then please remove the citation below the picture.

Hopefully, you'll assist.

Many Thanks.—Preceding unsigned comment added by Bashukhan (talk • contribs)

It's not going to happen. Removal of such images has been discussed ad nauseam. The decision of the community is not to delete them as Wikipedia is not censored. If you want to discuss the caption, please do so on the article's talk page. And by the way, there are no moderators on Wikipedia. – ukexpat (talk) 20:29, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

"Wikipedia is not censored" because users are given freehand and anyone can give suggestion based on good-faith. If that has been discussed extensively in your community being 'ad nauseam' please consider the points I mentioned in my earlier post. The discussion is useless as there are no images of Prophet Muhammad in the history of Islam! —Preceding unsigned comment added by Bashukhan (talk • contribs) 20:55, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia servers are located in Florida in the United States, so it's the law of that state and the US Federal Law Wikipedia should follow. Also, Wikipedia is visited by millions if not billions of non-Muslims. It's not fair to push restrictions on them when neither their country's law nor their religion prohibits showing the image. -- Mgm|^(talk) 21:47, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

At Talk:Muhammad and Talk:Muhammad/Images there is some information on why the images have been kept by consensus, as well as a way for you to block the images so that you personally don't have to look at them. (In particular look at the "Frequently Asked Questions" section up the top.) Confusing Manifestation(Say hi!) 21:57, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

question about contributors to a page

I just have one quick question and I have looked all around without success to see if it was already answered.

On any given page, is there a way to see a list of who all the contributors were to that specific page? thanks —Preceding unsigned comment added by Quietreef1962 (talk • contribs) 20:40, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

As far as I'm aware, the only way to see that is to click the "History" tab at the top of the article. Hermione1980 20:42, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

If I remember correctly. The leftmost external link at the top of the history page links to a tool that turns it into a nice list of editors sorted by their number of edits to that page.- Mgm|^(talk) 21:32, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

That's a neat tool. I never even saw that. Learn something new every day, it seems. Hermione1980 21:55, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

When you say "were to," do you mean "edited" or "visited?" To see the edit history, click history. (captain obvious strikes again!) Fortunately, there's no way to see who's visited a particular page. flaming lawyer^cnever for get 21:34, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Since they specifically said contributors, I took it to mean edited. Visitors don't contribute anything. - Mgm|^(talk) 21:50, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Transcluding My Subpage

Hello! I recently installed a Javascript status changer. Everything is working fine except for the fact that my user page (where I've transcluded my /Status page) doesn't display the update until I edit my user page. I have tried clearing my cache and nothing has happened. Thanks, Genius 101^Guestbook 21:14, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

See Wikipedia:Purge and Wikipedia:Editor activity indicator. PrimeHunter (talk) 00:49, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

WP:QUI > WP:STATUS. It's a fact. ;) — neuro^(talk) 02:17, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

server crash by deleting the sandbox?

When Scientizzle deleted the sandbox, why did it crash the servers? It seems to have no correlation to me. flaming lawyer^cnever for get 21:19, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The sandbox had a history that was particularly large and the server couldn't handle the request to delete all the revisions properly. A patch has been put in place to stop this sort of thing from happening again. - Mgm|^(talk) 21:36, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The offending bug is tracked here. —Noah 21:41, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

December 16

Assessing articles

How does one assess an "unassessed" article? I have asked a reputable editor this and he does not know the answer. I know it's probably something that only, like, admins can do or something, but if not, how do I? --timothymh (talk) 01:45, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Anyone can assess, but if an article is within the purview of a particular WikiProject, that project's criteria should be considered. For more see WP:ASSESS. – ukexpat (talk) 02:05, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Articles can assessed from stub class all the way to B class. There are specific processes for Good Articles, A class articles, and Featured Content. Cheers! TN‑X-Man 14:59, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

But I still don't understand HOW to assess an article. For instance, on the Cabot, Vermont article, there is no button that says "assess" or anything. I understand about the order that the ranks come in and what criteria they need. timothymh (talk) 21:11, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Ah, I see. Go to Talk:Cabot, Vermont. Click on "edit". You should see templates (which look like this: {{WPCities}}). Add |class=B (or whatever class you would like to assess the article as) into the template right before the closing brackets. TN‑X-Man 21:22, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Infobox problems

I'm trying to insert a relevant source in the Pakistan article, but for some reason whenever I remove the 1st reference (after official language: English) in the infobox it messes up the format. It doesn't seem to be an anchored cite. What am I doing wrong? Copana2002 (talk) 01:01, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

It worked fine when I removed the link. Perhaps you didn't select the entire citation thing (<ref> tag to </ref> tag)?--Max Talk (+) 01:13, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks, I guess I am just challenged when it comes to infoboxes. Copana2002 (talk) 01:20, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Question about portal/template

Resolved

— neuro^(talk) 05:14, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Does anybody know why "{{{text}}}" is there at the Portal:Tibet (picture)? I can't get rid of it. Thx. Davin (talk) 02:28, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

And I don't know how to center it. Could you look please? Davin (talk) 02:29, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

According to Portal:Tibet/Selected article/Layout it is a parameter for adding the image caption. – ukexpat (talk) 02:42, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

If it is bare, it means it is not an optional parameter, and the parameter does not have a specified value. As a quick fix you could put something like a non-breaking space, but otherwise someone needs to look at the template and make it optional (if required). — neuro^(talk) 03:42, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you both. I'm still not able to fix it. Above, under "Did you know" is {{{1}}} which I cannot remove either. I need some sleep now. I someone could fix it for me, I would wake up very happily tomorrow! Otherwise, I'll have to watch tomorrow again. Thanks again! Davin (talk) 04:02, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Fixed. Issue was use of the parameter "caption", it wanted "text". — neuro^(talk) 05:14, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you very much. Davin (talk) 12:58, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Geobox - River - Using _type for coordinates

This request was placed originally on the Geobox/Legend talk page; see the talk page entry. A {{helpme}} request was made subsequently on my own talk page.

Can more detail be given on how to use the _type field for coordinates? I am using the Geobox river version, and would like to add the parameter "region:CA-ON" to the mouth coordinates in addition to the "type:landmark" which seems to be automatically generated. I have tried adding an additional line | mouth_type = _region:CA-ON, but the parameter does not seem to get passed. Only the "type:landmark" alone is passed. I am editing the page West Highland Creek. Looking at the West Highland Creek page, I can see that using the code | mouth_type = _region:CA-ON changes the word "Mouth" in the infobox to "_region:CA-ON". I have also tried deleting the leading underscore from the mouth-type parameter value, which produces no change.--papageno (talk) 03:19, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

That's certainly a complex template. Can you describe how you would like the displayed text to appear? For me at least, it would be easier to work backwards from what you want to display rather than starting with the template parameters. —Noah 05:38, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The Template:Geobox/legend#Coordinates section seems to suggest that the _type fields can contain parameters that are passed to the coord template. The Geobox template already seems to generate automatically the type:landmark parameter for river source and mouth coordinates. I would also like to pass the parameter region:CA-ON. Update: I have just been playing around, and the field mouth_coordinates_type = region:CA-ON and source_coordinates_type = region:CA-ON seems to work. Weird though, that did not work previously. Also, right now, the type:landmark parameter is not being passed. Perhaps someone is editing right now as I edit? Anyway, have made changes on West Highland Creek, so one can see the good code in action. --papageno (talk) 16:48, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'll respond on your talk page. —Noah 16:51, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The discussion continued, and the matter is resolved for me personally. However, an outcome of the discussion was a suggested change to the Geobox documentation in the Template:Geobox/legend#Coordinates section, where it is suggested an update be made (bold = suggested addition): "For every location type which can be described in coordinates, there exist two additional fields

_coordinates_type (named coordinates_type for the main location), which can contain any paramteres…"

An expert involved with the Geobox should comment on / review the suggested change.--papageno (talk) 19:31, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

madison pettis

what happen to Madison Pettis's mom and Her dad? does Madison pettis have her own grandparents? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.194.214.9 (talk) 05:12, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

This page is for Wikipedia related questions. You want WP:RD. — neuro^(talk) 05:16, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Article referencing

Would it be appropriate if a highly reliable source is stated as the only major reference link in an article, e.g. if I want to start a list article regarding the awards recieved by a certain musician, would the award list on his homepage be a sufficient reference to base the whole article? Leif edling (talk) 08:42, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

No, it's possible for people to conflate(sp?) the awards on their userpage. Most noteworthy awards will be covered at the sites of the awards themselves or in the press. It's better to include those as sources and only use the homepage as a backup. - Mgm|^(talk) 10:51, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

If you take a look at our verifiability policy, you'll see that "articles should rely on reliable, third-party published sources with a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy." A person's own website is self-serving—the very opposite of a third party source, and in most cases, has no reputation whatever for fact-checking and accuracy. That policy also has a section specifically addressing self-published and other questionable sources, which this would fall under.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 12:22, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Using photo threads on forums to reference

I have to reference the uniform and the vehicles of Lebanese Commando Regiment, and there is no article that explains their uniform and equipment. So i was thinking, can i reference a photos thread on a military photos forum which has photos for this military unit?? --Zaher1988 (talk) 15:29, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Forums and blogs are not considered reliable sources; hoaxes and misinformation are not unheard of in such places. --Orange Mike | Talk 16:45, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Of course, if the blog happens to be maintained by an expert (and it can be proven to be this person and not an impersonator) it would be an acceptable source. -- Mgm|^(talk) 17:26, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'm speaking about photos in a thread not text, I mean you look at the photo you will see that this solider is actually a commando regiment soldier, thus this will be a reference for the uniform, moreover, the thread has photos for their vehicles with their insignia on them and painted with their camouflage etc..., do these still make a bad reference???? --Zaher1988 (talk) 21:34, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

In this era of Photoshop and CGI, I'd say that this means these are still bad references (although Mgm has a point). --Orange Mike | Talk 14:04, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The thread has around 2000 posts, not only couple, some posts have a series of photos from the same event. So if there is something wrong, well it will be obvious and the members on those forums will be saying that. --Zaher1988 · ^Talk 22:56, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Printing Color

Is there a way to print comparison tables with the colored shading, i.e. "Comparison of remote desktop software"? The Print version command & Print Preview using two different printers on my pc do not show the shading will be printed and it isn't. Other color for icons & screen images does appear! Thanks, 70.217.13.84 (talk) 16:13, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I know there is, but I can't think of what it is. There is some setting somewhere - anyway, here is a quick fix I whipped up for you. :) — neuro^(talk) 17:16, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

You need to set your browser to print backgrounds. Under FireFox, it is File > Page Setup > Print Backgrounds. --—— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk - 19:15, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Ask a question

I want to start a discussion on the meaning or origin of the word, "brand" in the phrase "brand new." How do I post that question for general discussion? Pburri (talk) 17:16, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I think you may find the answer to your question at wiktionary:brand new. Cheers! TN‑X-Man 17:22, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Or you could ask your question at the Reference Desk Chemical Weathering (talk) 13:28, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I think you'll find that the explanation given here is more reliable than the Wiktionary entry. Deor (talk) 14:33, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

DEFAULTSORT Conflict With Listas Parameter

I am slowly cleaning up the Biography pages without the listas parameter and on Xavier Suarez got an error that it conflicted with the DEFAULTSORT. So I went to the article page, found the only DEFAULTSORT on the page, copied the name, went back to the Talk page, looked in vain for a DEFAULTSORT on the page and pasted the name after listas=. I still got the error message.

When I went to the Category:Pages with DEFAULTSORT conflicts I found a couple of thousand pages. The first biography, Abraham Izak Perold, is listed under "A" and nothing I have tried will force it into "P".

Is something not working right or do I not understand what I am seeing?

JimCubb (talk) 18:47, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

My guess (and that's all it is) is that there is a conflict between DEFAULTSORT and the listas parameter. Have you tried removing the listas to see if it corrects the problem? TN‑X-Man 18:59, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

OK, here's what I discovered by editing Xavier Suarez. Removing the listas and re-adding the DEFAULTSORT removes the warning message. The article is listed last-name first in the categories in the article. However, it is listed first-name first in the Bio Wikiproject (the categories on the talk page). TN‑X-Man 19:08, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The problem at Talk:Xavier Suarez was that listas was specified on {{WPBiography}} but not on {{WPFlorida}}. Like many project templates, WPFlorida sets DEFAULTSORT to the page name if listas is not specified—thus creating a conflict. —teb728 t c 22:20, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Where was it? I have gone back through the Talk Pages and can not find the word listas, DEFAULTSORT, or his first name followed by his last name. The listas belongs in the Project Bio template but was not there before I appeared on the scene.
Dr. Perold's talk page do not have his name or anything that would resemble his name anywhere on it. The article has, surrounded by double braces, DEFAULTSORT:Perold, Abraham Izak. When I put listas=Perold, Abraham Izak in the project template, I get the error message.

JimCubb (talk) 19:52, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The listas parameter is part of the {{WPBIO}} template. From what I understand, it functions much the same way as DEFAULTSORT. The two parameters appear to conflict with each other. TN‑X-Man 20:03, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Also, reading the template documentation, listas is supposed to do for talk pages what DEFAULTSORT does for the main articles, but it appears to cause a conflict. TN‑X-Man 20:07, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I finally the original discussion for this. The problem is being discussed at Template_talk:WPBiography#DEFAULTSORT_conflicts. That's where you need to go. Cheers! TN‑X-Man 20:11, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

template

How do i create one? Wilkos (talk) 20:18, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Go to {{Yourtemplatename}} (replace with the title) and create away. However, please familiarize yourself with Help:Template beforehand. Cheers! TN‑X-Man 20:23, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

It's often best to practice first with a user subpage as your sandbox, for example: User:Wilkos/Sandbox, which you can transclude with: {{User:Wilkos/Sandbox}}. That way you don't have to worry about someone coming along and deleting your template before you get it working. Also see WP:DOC for instructions on how to document your template properly. For your template to be useful to other editors, they must easily be able to figure out how to use it. Rather than start your template completely from scratch, first search the Template: namespace to find an existing template that is close to what you want. Copy that template to your sandbox page and modify it. --Teratornis (talk) 21:39, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Redlinked image related to moving from wikipedia to commons

Resolved

I uploaded Image:AcroLawnmower.gif to wikipedia awhile back. Later, someone else moved it to wikimedia commons and deleted the image from wikipedia. The image still appears properly in acro dance (on my computer anyway, although I'm not sure whether it's a locally cached image). A determined editor keeps deleting the image from acro dance, presumably because he sees it in the redlinked images list. What's going on here, and how can I keep the image out of the redlinked list? Lambtron (talk) 20:31, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Having your image moved to Commons is fine, and does not effect the way the article appears in the article. The editor in question is removing the image for some other reason, presumably because he/she does not feel it belongs in the article. The proper thing to do is discuss the image's inclusion on the article's talk page, and see if some understanding/consensus can be reached. -Seidenstud (talk) 21:09, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the reply, Seidenstud. The image was removed from the article twice by the same editor. The editor in question has not replied to my query about this, so I have formulated a hypothesis based on the known facts. The edit summary for the first removal was clean up & rm redlinked image, removed Image:AcroLawnmower.gif. No edit summary was given for the second removal, so I assume the same reason. When I click on the image in acro dance I am taken to a page that states This page does not currently exist. You can search for this page title in other pages or create this page. Also, the image is listed as redlinked, probably because it "doesn't exist." Instead of repeatedly explaining all of this—after the fact—to every editor who removes this "non-existent" image, I would prefer to learn why the image doesn't exist and how I can make this problem go away forever. Does anyone know how to resolve this? Lambtron (talk) 21:55, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

commons:File:AcroLawnmower.gif is in a weird state. It has a file but no image description page history. I have never seen an image like that. —teb728 t c 22:06, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I thought I might try creating the image page and/or uploading the image again, but I don't want to make things worse than they already are. Ideas, anyone? Lambtron (talk) 22:18, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

It was redlinked because the uploader didn't properly copy the information along with the file. I fixed that now, so it should be good. - Mgm|^(talk) 23:36, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

- The Commons file is lacking a copyright tag. Did the Wikipedia file have one? —teb728 t c 23:48, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I originally released it to Public Domain, but I don't know how to restore Public Domain status to the commons image. Can someone advise? Lambtron (talk) 00:33, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Edit Commons:File:AcroLawnmower.gif and add {{PD-self}} —teb728 t c 00:45, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Article was deleted and replaced with useless info

I was looking for an article about the Inuit people; however, the article must have had all of its content deleted as all that was in it were the words "inuits are cool". This annoyed me and I was wondering why someone would replace useful information with an irrelevant remark. Would it be possible for the article to be changed back to what it used to be before it was, and I use this word loosely, vandalized? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.223.78.2 (talk) 21:00, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The vandalism has been reverted by J Delanoy and you can see the difference now at Inuit. Thank you for reporting it! TN‑X-Man 21:04, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

For more information see Help:Revert and WP:VANDAL. In the future, you can fix vandalism to unprotected articles yourself, but if the instructions are too tedious to figure out, just report the vandalism here and another user will revert it. As to why Wikipedia allows (even tacitly encourages) this nonsense, see Wikipedia:Perennial proposals#Prohibit anonymous users from editing (I find the arguments there surprisingly weak for a foundation issue) and User:Jimbo Wales/Statement of principles. Of course Wikipedia has to make numerous exceptions to the let anybody edit anything rule, because some edits (e.g. to high-use templates) are so efficiently destructive that not even Jimbo's idealistic faith in the goodness of adolescent males overrides the need to restrict access. --Teratornis (talk) 21:28, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Logging into my alternative account

After several attempts, I'm unable to log into my alternative account (Juliancolton Public (talk · contribs)), and I'm not sure what's wrong. –Juliancolton ^Happy ^Holidays 21:46, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

What is the specific error you get? — neuro^(talk) 23:24, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Upon clicking the log in button, it brings me to the main page. –Juliancolton ^Happy ^Holidays 01:25, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

What happens if you try to click this link rather than the one on the interface? - Mgm|^(talk) 05:41, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Want to copy articles on wikipedia onto my website

Hi I want to start a website on the Western Front WW1. I'm I able to do so so that I don't land in trouble.

I'm no writer so really it's a website that will have all information, battles, maps etc... in one place. Can I copy the Wikipedia article on the specific battle articles for example also use maps and so forth.

Many thanks,

James —Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.109.146.39 (talk) 22:40, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

See Wikipedia:Copyrights, specifically the Reusers' rights and obligations section. Basically, you have to license your website under the GNU Free Documentation License and properly credit the authors of the article you're copying, plus provide a link back to the original article. Xenon 54 (Frohe Feiertage!) 22:46, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

December 17

Writing a bibliography about wikipedia?

I need to know either the sight editor,page author, sight compiler, or sight compiler for writing a bibliography. Where do I find that? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.48.175.139 (talk) 23:48, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Do you mean generally? If so, to cite a book, you would format it like this:

Surname, First name (Year). Title. Publisher's location: Publisher. ISBN ISBN number. {{cite book}}: Check |isbn= value: invalid character (help); Check date values in: |year= (help); Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)

Best wishes, PeterSymonds (talk) 23:54, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

If you're asking about citing Wikipedia specifically, there's a link on the left side that says "Cite this page"; try starting from there. HTH, Hermione1980 23:57, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

For citing Wikipedia there is more information and advice at WP:CITEWIKI. —teb728 t c 00:08, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Help displaying text onto a project page

I signed up for a project on this page : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WikiProject_Ancient_Egypt/Members, yet it does not show up on the page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WikiProject_Ancient_Egypt under participatants while all the other signers show up there, can you help me? Zuzzerack 02:17, 17 December 2008 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Zuzzerack (talk • contribs)

It's displaying fine. I suspect that you are seeing the version of the page stored in your computer's cache memory, and simply need to bypass your cache, which is done on many computers by clicking control+F5. Cheers.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 04:31, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

OKay, thanks, I see it now. Zuzzerack 22:30, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

How do I submit an article?

Wikipedia is awesome. It's also a little overwhelming. Please explain to me specifically how to submit an article to be displayed Wikipedia. I can info on how to edit an article, but not how to submit an article. Please advise. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Wrpittman (talk • contribs) 04:55, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

There are more or less two ways to create an page;

you can either follow a link to a page that does not exist (e.g. example link) and then fill in the edit box, then click save, or
you can enter the title of the article that you want to create in the search bar and press go, then fill out the edit box you see there and click save.

Hope that helps :)Icewedge (talk) 05:00, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia:Your First Article should help you get started.- Mgm|^(talk) 05:37, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Warning I.P.

Can somebody please tell me if there is a template I can use for warning an I.P. for vandalism?.--intraining ^{Jack In} 06:12, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Yes - they are listed at Template:TestTemplates. DuncanHill (talk) 06:15, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Or better yet, the full list is at WP:UWT. As a better idea, you don't really need a template. Tell the IP to stop vandalising, and let them know they can be blocked if they continue. Templates are not required, but they can make it easier if you choose. --Jayron32.talk.contribs 06:21, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Question on columns in Portal

Resolved

Does anybody know how to solve that the two columns in Portal:Himalaya region are beside each other in stead of above each other? Thx. Davin (talk) 10:20, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Fixed, someone vandalised Portal:Himalaya region/Intro back in September and no-one noticed. Nanonic (talk) 10:58, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you very much! Davin (talk) 11:12, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Very Simple English

Would it be possible to set up a "Very Simple English" language.

I am an English native speaker, I currently live in France and teach English to 7-11 year olds.

I would like to update / refine / adapt wikipedia articles so that the 7-11 year olds I teach English to (and any other young learners of English world-wide) could go on line and find information written in very basic English.

Eg a biography for Harry Potter's author, JK Rowlings.

I could write/update the Simple English entry, but Simple English is a definited language. It permits things like subordinate clauses which are too difficult for my students. So if I update an entry, someone else may well later "upgrade" it within simple English making it inaccessible to beginners in English.

I couldn't work out a better place to post this suggestion, so the real question I need answering is "who do I make this suggestion to?" —Preceding unsigned comment added by 90.13.57.217 (talk) 10:58, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Have you already looked at the Simple English Wikipedia? Xenon 54 (Frohe Feiertage!) 11:10, 17 December 2008 (UTC

Yes.

You can propose a project at meta:Proposals_for_new_projects. Arthena^(talk) 11:33, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you I'll look into doing this.

You meant JK Rowling (without the s). :) Do you have access to a computer network at the school you teach? - Mgm|^(talk) 13:00, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

There tend to be a few computers the children could use one after the other to look-up things on the internet. One school has something approaching an IT equipped room which I can use. On the whole IT provision in French Primary schools is light years behind what we have in the UK.

I asked because if you have a network, you could ask the systems administrator to install a local MediaWiki installation and write a local copy entirely for your students. Since that doesn't appear to be an option, have you considered other wikisoftware? There are free online versions which would be perfect. - Mgm|^(talk) 17:06, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I was looking at Wikimedia Foundation in reference to another question and I noticed that it mentioned Wikibooks and Wikijunior (a project within Wikibooks; also see the Simple Wikibooks project). One of those projects might be suitable for editing the documents you want. --Teratornis (talk) 05:03, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you. I have looked at wikijunior and simple wikibooks: these will be great if /when I'm teaching older (ie more competant) English users. The kids I teach really do need something much more basic, not much more than subject / verb / object and restricted to the present / continuous present tense.

My wanting to do this in wikipedia is motivated by thinking that it might as well be available to all the other Primary English teachers world-wide, rather than wanting a computer solution per se. I can certainly just take / make existing Wikipedia articles in Simple English, edit or write them in Very Simple English either within the wikipedia framework (when I reckon my very simple version is an improvement in content terms) or off-line when it isn't...and just distribute the information to the children on paper.

Similarly, as we move to languages being compulsory in all UK primary schools from 2010, a very simple French and very simple Spanish language within Wikipedia might be very useful.

The children would get a real buzz from using English to find things out. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 90.33.147.179 (talk) 06:44, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Apostrophe immediately following italics markup

So, I'm trying to use a title (say, "High School Musical") as a possessive, as in "High School Musical's". I did it here with HTML tags, but how do I do it with wiki markup? The obvious route comes out as "High School Musicals". Powers ^T 12:04, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Type ''High School Musical'''s, which will produce High School Musical's. No need of those Apostrophes after the "s". The italicizing ones are already closed. Cheers. Chamal ^talk 12:21, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

''High School Musical'''s didn't work for me, and still won't because of this little problem:

''High School Musical'''s [[Corbin Bleu]]; ''Hannah Montana'''s [[Miley Cyrus]]

comes out as:

High School Musicals Corbin Bleu; Hannah Montanas Miley Cyrus

I need to be able to use this construction twice in the same paragraph. Powers ^T 12:26, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The wiki parser is seeing ''' as a start bold token inside the already set italics state instead of seeing it as an end italics state followed by an apostrophe. To work around the problem you need to force the wiki parser to change its token parser state with a "nul" token. To do this use an empty "no wiki" tag pair, that is <nowiki></nowiki>. For example, "''[[High School Musical]]''<nowiki></nowiki>'s", which will result in "High School Musical's". Peet Ern (talk) 12:31, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

PS: So you will get:

High School Musical's Corbin Bleu; Hannah Montana's Miley Cyrus

Peet Ern (talk) 12:43, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks! Powers ^T 13:33, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

A simpler fix is to put the 's in curly brackets, like so: {{'s}}. That should render

High School Musical's Corbin Bleu; Hannah Montana's Miley Cyrus

(I love templates.) Hermione1980 15:26, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

So do I normally, but that requires a page load for the server instead of in memory processing, and potentially a template for all possible apostrophe letter combination? Peet Ern (talk) 02:33, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

{{'}} apparently has superceded {{'s}}, Peet, which would solve at least your latter concern. Thanks for the tip, Hermione. I figured someone had to have figured out a way to handle this at some point, but my searches were in vain. Powers ^T 13:35, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

depth problem

What is depth in wikipedia. certain wikipedia like hindi wiki has depth 6 while german wiki has 81 what does it signify? how is it measeured? as being an active user of hindi wikipedia what i can do to increase its depth?--Munita Prasad (talk) 14:45, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not quite sure to what you are referring. If you mean depth as defined by WP:Depth, the best thing you can do to improve it is to add articles. Out of curiosity, where did you find the numbers to which you referred? TN‑X-Man 14:49, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

thank you, but i am talking about the last column of List of Wikipedias on meta wiki. I went there from bottom most entry/link of main page of english wiki,--Munita Prasad (talk) 15:01, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Ah. In that case, here is the link for which you are looking: meta:Depth. Depth is a rough indicator of a Wikipedia's quality, defined as ((Edits/Articles) × (Non-Articles/Articles) × (Stub-ratio)). Cheers! TN‑X-Man 15:30, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Archiving

I got my first archive up, but how do I get my second one on there? Hairy Perry 15:08, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not sure what you mean. Do you mean how do you get your second archive to display in the box on your talk page? TN‑X-Man 16:11, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, I'm getting ready to need a second archive. Hairy Perry 16:15, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The {{Archives}} template, as you have it on your talk page (with the auto=yes parameter), automatically detects the archive pages and displays their links accordingly. See the documentation. – ukexpat (talk) 16:42, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

(edit conflict) I believe that the archive should appear automatically as soon as it is created. At the moment, I don't see an actual page with your second archive. Cheers! TN‑X-Man 16:43, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Ok, so this means what? Hairy Perry 16:49, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

As soon as you put something in your second archive, the link to the second archive will appear on your talk page. TN‑X-Man 17:30, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks I got it now. Hairy Perry 18:13, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Did you know

Hi! I have tried to do a nomination to Did you know in 2 hours now. Still i cant. So, please cant someone fix a self nom, 5th expansion nomination for me? Valery Kobelev is the article and the hook is that: Kobelev has performed the worst ski jumping crash ever. The Rolling Camel (talk) 23:18, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Never use an edit summary like that again. --Rschen7754 (T C) 23:20, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry, i just feel a little stressed. The Rolling Camel (talk) 23:22, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Stressed that your DYK nomination isn't working? Give me a break. "HELP NOW!!!!!!" is NOT the way to do this. Tan | 39 23:23, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

No, but if you are stressed your brain does not work as it uses to do:) The Rolling Camel (talk) 23:26, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Well, okay, enough of that. Can anyone help this guy? I don't ever work in DYK. Tan | 39 23:28, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

<chimes> Hi there. Currently, the article is ineligible for DYK, as there are no inline citations (footnotes), and therefore no way to verify the accuracy of the hook. In order to make it eligible, you will need to put those in. See WP:DYK for instructions, as well as those at the top of T:TDYK. Use reliable and verifiable sources, and get it nom-worthy within the next couple of days. Best wishes, PeterSymonds (talk) 23:37, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

But, i dont understand. When i tries, (see my sandbox) its just a small 1 that is unable to do something with. The Rolling Camel (talk) 00:01, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Ah, yes. You have to tell the MediaWiki software to display the references by putting either {{reflist}} (preferable) or the old-fashioned <references/> under a references or notes section. That will force the references to appear. Best, PeterSymonds (talk) 00:06, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you, Is my other example for Valery at my sandbox ok? The Rolling Camel (talk) 00:09, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The article is currently not long to be eligible for DYK (you need min. 1500 characters, but we only have 1438 now). Also, you might want to hurry up a bit since it was created on the 11th, and DYK is only for articles created or expanded within 5 days. 11th is already out of that margin, but if you hurry, you can still get it done. Adding some more refs won't hurt either ;) Chamal ^talk 00:56, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Now it passed evrything. Can someone please fix it now? ~~ —Preceding unsigned comment added by The Rolling Camel (talk • contribs) 01:29, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'm afraid the article doesn't pass the five-fold expansion requirement. It was at 1,201 bytes on December 12 and is at 2,856 bytes at the moment. --PeaceNT (talk) 12:02, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Also please note that the reference list should give the specific URLs (i.e the direct links of the online articles, not only the links of the online newspaper). --PeaceNT (talk) 12:05, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Mmm... no, it would go as a newly created article if it is going to be nominated and not as a 5x expansion. Some December 12 hooks are still there (as expiring noms) on the suggestions page so you can still get it if you hurry. Chamal ^talk 12:15, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I see the expiring noms stretch to Dec 7, huge backlog so it seems. ;) But I was under the impression that the day an article is suggested on T:TDYK must not be over five days away from the day of creation. (?) Otherwise it would fall under expansion. --PeaceNT (talk) 12:34, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Is it better now? The Rolling Camel (talk) 15:18, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

December 18

WikiTravel

Is [5] owned by Wikimedia Foundation, Inc? 206.72.25.210 (talk) 00:08, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

According to their about page http://wikitravel.org/en/Wikitravel:About, they are owned by "by Internet Brands, Inc., an operator of consumer information Web sites." — Sebastian 00:11, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

A list of all projects owned/operated by the Wikimedia Foundation can be found at m:Template:Sisterprojects. flaming lawye r^c 06:21, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The trademarks, branding, and servers are owned by Internet Brands; the content is owned by its contributors, just as on Wikipedia. =) Powers ^T 13:40, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

How to edit the bugzilla guide?

Is the bugzilla guide not a wiki? I just read https://bugzilla.wikimedia.org/docs/html/voting.html, which talks about some settings related to voting, but not about how to actually do the voting itself. When I eventually found that at Wikipedia:Bug_reports_and_feature_requests#Voting), I wanted to copy it to the guide, but there is no edit button. — Sebastian 00:09, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

It seems to be a regular old HTML page. Xenon 54 (Frohe Feiertage!) 02:11, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

All I see with a weak search attempt is Bugzilla, the above-mentioned Wikipedia:Bug reports and feature requests, and mw:Bugzilla. Possible strategies:

Use Bugzilla to report your suggested document changes, as a bug. Consider searching on Bugzilla to see if anyone has done this before. Maybe that is actually the method for submitting document change requests (I have no idea).
Track down some users who may have contributed to Bugzilla's documents, and ask them how they did it. (Maybe they had to check out HTML files from a CVS or Subversion repository and edit them with an editor program, just like how most Open Source software projects handle their source code. It's like a much less integrated implementation of what the MediaWiki software makes completely simple.)

--Teratornis (talk) 04:56, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Deleting User Subpages

Is it possible for me to delete my own subpages? If so, how? Kortaggio (talk) 02:18, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

If you put {{db-user}} on them, they will show up at CAT:CSD, and an admin will delete them for you in a short while. --barneca (talk) 02:24, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks! --Kortaggio (talk) 02:42, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Requesting an IP Address Block

How do I request a temporary block on an IP address? User:124.186.84.120 has been doing subtle vandalism to a number of pages, inserting spam links to bogus, official-sounding pages (presumably domains which he is cyber-squatting on). He is doing it quite subtly (usually in 2 edits, so that the most recent one looks benign), so I don't think he deserves a warning. Wikipedia:Blocking IP addresses talks about it but doesn't say how to request it. Peter Ballard (talk) 06:29, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

You can report vandalism at WP:AIV. However, you should only report vandals there if they have had sufficient warnings, have vandalised after a recent final warning. There are a number of warning templates you can use at WP:MLT. Always start with the lowest (i.e. Level 1), if they have never been warned before. Stephen! ^Coming... 10:21, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

"sufficient warnings" on the IP's talk page are indeed part of the process, but it's not essential to "always start with the lowest level" and then slog through all the levels. you can use your discretion about what warning level(s) are appropriate and when to file a block request. Sssoul (talk) 10:49, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Recruitment/Vacancies

DEAR SIR/MADAM

I HAVE COME TO SOME SOURCES REGARDING RECRUTIMENT /VACANCIES IN UK THROUGH WINS.

THE AGENNT IS IN MUMBAI I.E WORLDWIDE IMMIGRATION & NATURALIZATION SERVICES, UNIT 233, B WING 2NFLOOR, OSHIWAR IND. ESTATE, OPP.OSHIWARA BUS DEPOT, LINK ROAD, GOREGAON (W) MUMBAI 400 062.

I WANT WHETHER HE IS REGISTERED ANGENT IN INDIA FOR RECRUITING PEOPLE IF YES GIVE ME THE DETAILS LIKE, REG./LIC. NO., CONCERN AUTHORITIES & THEIR BRANCHES

WAITING FOR YOUR REPLY.

[redacted]

REGARDS GANHES K. SAVARDEKAR —Preceding unsigned comment added by 61.95.226.18 (talk) 11:49, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

This page is for questions about Wikipedia. Please visit the reference desk instead. Also, it's not recommended to put personal contact details on this page since this page is very visible across the internet. - Mgm|^(talk) 12:27, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Note also that typing in all capital letters on the Internet is considered shouting and I don't think you meant to shout. Many people will ignore any post that is in all caps as a matter of course.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 12:33, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Adjacent tables

I was wondering how to make seperate tables adjacent to each other on a page. My tables have 2 columns and approx 20 rows. There are 4 different tables i'm trying to make adjacent. Any help would be greatly appreciated, as I would rather not have these long tables one on top of the other, making the page longer than it really needs to be. Thanks Devin5801 (talk) 15:48, 18 December 2008 (UTC)Devin5801[reply]

If you change the style of the table to inline, it will act like an image. A better way, if you want stricter control of how they line up, is to place each table inside a data cell of a table. So, you have a table that contains a bunch of tables. -- kainaw ™ 16:10, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

How do I go about putting each table in a data cell of a table?? Can you just give me like a real short clip of the beginning of what that code would look like? I know this is asking for a lot but I can't seem to figure it out, i've tried a few things. Thanks Devin5801 (talk) 16:49, 18 December 2008 (UTC)Devin5801[reply]

I guess what I really need to know is how to have one cell of the table span across two columns of data. For example, have a cell that says 2005 (my title cell) and underneath it have two columns, one saying City and the other saying Dates. Then underneath those i'm going to put the data for cities and dates in there. Devin5801 (talk) 17:04, 18 December 2008 (UTC)Devin5801[reply]

Add colspan=2 to the title cell's attributes. Help:Table provides examples (search for "colspan"). Powers ^T 18:01, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

You can use {{Col-begin}}; see the documentation for use. This actually creates a table that your tables are wrapped into. --—— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk - 19:51, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Submitting an English version of an existing article on another language Wikipedia site

I am in the process of translating a French website into English where an article from the French Wikipedia site has a featured (and cited, with link) article that I consider perfectly adequate. To maintain consistancy, I would like to simply translate this article and include it on the English site. A very brief, few lines on the English site exists, entitled "Gard" departement in France, that correspond with introductory parts on the French site (which seems to have a copyright problem at the moment). I presume it would be useful to submit my translation to Wikipedia when I've finished it. Does that involve simply editing the existing English one? How do I credit the original?Smbt (talk) 15:53, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I don't know a whole ton about this, but this page might be of use. Rtyq2 (talk) 16:05, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Just mention that it's a translation of the French article in the references section or on the talk page. I don't think there's a standard manner for this. - Mgm|^(talk) 18:39, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

See the {{Translated}} template. – ukexpat (talk) 18:42, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Where to put?

My question is not related with wikipedia only. I'm from the malayalam wikmeia projects. My doubt is ,which is the place for Natanpatu's? I am no sure about the exact english word for it. I think its folk(NATan) song(pAttu). They are the songs people used to sing while they were working in the fields, fishing etc. They were passed to younger generation verbally. Many of them have never been published in books or something. So which wiki project is suitable for these? I know it is not wikipedia. (The malayalam wiki community is not sure about this. Thats why I asked here.) Thanku :)--Abhishek Jacob (talk) 16:41, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

This might be good for Wikisource. (I don't know very much about other Wiki projects, but that looks like the best place to me.) You might ask around over there. Hermione1980 18:00, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

If they are in an audio file form and are copyright free, Commons may be the best place for them. – ukexpat (talk) 18:44, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

See the article Sea shanty for an example of work songs from the maritime tradition. --Teratornis (talk) 04:58, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

clarification of wp:outing

hi everyone, i'm looking for some help regarding wp:outing. what confuses me is whether an accusation of sockpuppetry, where the suspected sockmaster has already been outed, would constitute outing? it's probably clearer if i give an example. let's say user:x's real life identity is already known as mr bloggs (either through some previous outing or through his own admission) as is the fact that mr bloggs is in a rock band that we know the name of. i see another user, user:y, making edits about this rock band that lead me to suspect them of being a sock of user:x.

wp:outing says "Posting another person's personal information...regardless of whether or not the information is actually correct...is harassment". so does this mean that if i:

a) accuse user:y of being mr bloggs or somebody else linked to him or his band

or even

b) accuse user:y of being a sockpuppet of user:x, based on the fact we know who user:x is, and avoid naming any names

that i myself could be accused of "outing" user:y? Jessi1989 (talk) 17:42, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Hmm, tricky, I thought I had an easy answer, but if you can't call someone a sockpuppeteer because they're outed that would protect an unconstructive editor rather than the good of the project. Personally, I'd throw the rulebook out the window the moment sockpuppetry or vandalism is involved (assuming said link is proven with a checkuser) - Mgm|^(talk) 18:48, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
- hi, thanks for replying so fast. i would like to agree with you about throwing out the rulebook, but outing seems like a pretty serious offense which can potentially cause problems in real life, not just on wikipedia. i'm not sure i get what you mean about checkuser, because we wouldn't know checkuser results until after the accusation has been made. thanks Jessi1989 (talk) 19:16, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

There are all sorts of arguments one could make. On the pro-outing side, one could say that the user has already been outed. Outing the sock doesn't make the outed user any more "out." If someone chooses to continue editing on Wikipedia after being outed once, they have to be at least somewhat aware of the possibility that they could get outed again. Particularly if they make a point of leaving a trail of gigantic clues. On the other hand, if you incorrectly out the sock, then you may create trouble for a person who is innocent of whatever the outed user was guilty of. So I would say if you are going to out someone, don't be wrong. On the no-outing side of the argument, one could point to the irreversibility of outing. Once you out someone, you cannot then un-out them (I'm tempted to mention the obvious analogy with virginity but I don't want to lose the family audience). Since this step is irreversible, you would want to proceed on a solid footing if possible. That's why you asked on the Help desk, of course, but we are mostly generalists. Depending on how much you think is at stake here, I would advise doing some further research if possible. Read everything under WP:EIW#Sock and try to find some past case histories to study. (For example, you could repeat your question on the talk pages of users who have contributed extensively to the sock-related pages, to see if they have any experience with a situation like this.) Wikipedia is so huge that one would think this sort of scenario has played out at least once before. If there are no clear rules to guide you, at least try to find some clear precedent. Is the situation some sort of ticking time bomb, or do you have time to reflect before pulling the trigger? --Teratornis (talk) 04:31, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

thanks for getting back to me. actually this relates to a present case on wikipedia but i wanted to be very careful not to name any names or bias the question with my own opinions on the matter. do you mean that outing is acceptable if it later turns out that the outing was correct and that the outed user has been breaking wikipedia's rules? i feel that outing is something to be taken very seriously because it relates to things in the real world. i mean, if the outing is correct, this could lead to malicious actions taken against the user in real life. another possibility is that this suspected sock is actually someone with malicious intent against mr bloggs. they could leave an obvious trail so that they get "outed" and their talk page gets filled with accusations saying that they are mr bloggs. then if they go and make a load of offensive edits suggesting they have extremist views or something which, if someone the real mr bloggs know were to see them, might cost mr bloggs his career/marriage/friends/etc. Jessi1989 (talk) 12:16, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

To answer the first question, I am not saying outing is "correct," I'm saying that if I were making the rules I would not consider outing an already outed editor to constitute much of an additional injury. However, I don't make the rules, and I don't know what the rules are in this case, so I gave some suggestions on how to find out what the rules are, if any rules exist. Wikipedia's rules exist in two forms: explicitly codified rules (the obvious kind), and implicit rules embodied in the established practice of relevant groups of editors (the tricky subtle kind). Despite the misconceptions in the WP:CREEP guideline, an important subtask on Wikipedia is to codify all the implicit rules into explicit rules (because There is no common sense).

You recognize the potential harm in an incorrect outing; me too, that's why I mentioned it. (Although I have to say, if someone's marriage depends on his ability to conceal his Wikipedia edits from his wife, the marriage sounds too delicate to survive the normal stresses that eventually strike most relationships. Marriage is an inherently difficult job for many if not most people, which is why the institution supports a vast industry of marriage counselors and divorce attorneys to deal with the routine failures.) However, if someone is masquerading as a mr bloggs sock, and doing a good job of it, then the harm may already be done, unless somehow you are the only person who can connect the dots. It seems to me that your outing would not be very convincing unless the connection was sufficiently obvious for others to be making the same connection already. If you are the first person to say what many other people are already thinking, it's not clear how much additional damage you did.

I can understand why you omit details from your question, but this makes the question harder to answer. Unless Wikipedia has an explicit rule already worked out for such cases, you'll have a hard time eliciting a good answer from someone else who doesn't know everything you know about the situation. Speaking hypothetically can only convey so much. So you'll have to do your own research. Fortunately on Wikipedia there is a vast amount of information to mine, since everything we do here we do in writing.

But since speaking hypothetically is all I can do, here's something else to consider. Why do you want to out this suspected sock? Wikipedia allows unregistered editors to edit, and since IP addresses lack a one-to-one mapping between humans (addresses may vary randomly or be shared), Wikipedia can only function if it does not require all users to have stable identities or pseudo-identities. Wikipedia has a "foundation principle" of Jimbo Wales that anyone can edit Wikipedia without having to register any sort of stable identity. An IP address is very much like a sock puppet, since the same person can edit under many different addresses. Wikipedia is able to deal with this ambiguous identity problem by having a set of rules complete enough to allow other editors to evaluate any particular edit on its own merits, without regard to the editor. The ability to associate edits with a particular editor is not necessary on a well-constructed wiki, it is merely a labor-saving convenience. When we view the history of a page, we know we should scrutinize the edits by unregistered users more carefully than edits by respected users we are familiar with. But no edit is exempt from scrutiny. Therefore, what would you expect to gain by outing the suspected sockpuppet? If you have some disagreement with some edit(s), can't you make your case without reference to the identity of the editor? An edit is either good or bad. It doesn't matter who made it. A "good" editor may make some bad edits, and a "bad" editor may make some good edits. (I am asking you to describe your goal, not your step.) There must be something you would expect to gain by outing the sockpuppet - what is that, and could you gain it by some other approach? --Teratornis (talk) 18:40, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

My opinion: Do not mention "Mr Bloggs" ever, in any new discussions: that would constitute a new "outing." Now, the rules for accusing a sock allow you to say "I think user y is a sock of usr x." But if user x is already outed as Mr. Bloggs, you are concerned that you are in effet outing user y. Your concern is laudable. I do not think you should mention the sockpuppetry if user x is no longer editing as user x. However, if user x is atill active adn usr y is supporting user x or continuing behabior that has already been censured, then you should raise the sock issue, but start by contacting user x via e-mail or at least on the user x talk page rather than on a forum. If x denies the sock take the isuse privately to a checkuser and request the checkuser to contact x privately if y is x. only if all else fails and after x has been warned, the checkuser can affirm that x is y publicly: This is not a second outing: it is a consequense of the inital outing and of subsequent behavior by x. -Arch dude (talk) 01:38, 20 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

thanks for all your input, it's very helpful. :) Jessi1989 (talk) 05:07, 21 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

New Account Email Confirmation

Forgot to "Unblock" wikipedia.org on my "Do Not Block" Email list. How can I get WIKIPEDIA to RESEND my "Confirmation Email"?

Thank you and Happy Holidays!! —Preceding unsigned comment added by Charlotte1218 (talk • contribs) 18:36, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Go to Special:ConfirmEmail. – ukexpat (talk) 18:45, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Pages not loading completely

Is there a reason why Businesses and organizations in Second Life cuts off midway through ref #70 even though there's more to the page beyond that? It does this every time, and purging doesn't help. My browser (latest FF) seems to always choke on {{reflist}}'s over a certain length. Ten Pound Hammer and his otters • ^{(Broken clamshells • Otter chirps • HELP)} 20:31, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'm using FF and it looks fine, unless I'm missing something. Is a screenshot possible? Rtyq2 (talk) 20:35, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'm using Safari, and it also looks fine for me. Could it be just the browser you are using? – RyanCross (talk) 20:38, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Here's a pic. Note that when I click edit, it shows a couple more refs, a template, and a category, which don't show up for me when I just view the page. Ten Pound Hammer and his otters • ^{(Broken clamshells • Otter chirps • HELP)} 20:39, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

It showed up just fine when I logged out, but when I logged in again it was still b0rked. Maybe HotCat is to blame? Ten Pound Hammer and his otters • ^{(Broken clamshells • Otter chirps • HELP)} 20:44, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Can someone PLEASE take a look at this? I've tried purging, logging out, disabling HotCat, etc. and nothing works. I've seen this show up on other pages too, but only sporadically. Ten Pound Hammer and his otters • ^{(Broken clamshells • Otter chirps • HELP)} 20:52, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Hmm... maybe try clearing User:TenPoundHammer/monobook.js entirely and load the page again, and see if there is still a problem. It could be something in your monobook, but we don't know exactly what it is in there, so just blank the page and see. No harm in trying. – RyanCross (talk) 21:06, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

It appears there was a conversation about this at Template talk:Reflist. I didn't see a solution there, though. :( TN‑X-Man 21:08, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Have you tried Template:Reflist#Disabling multiple columns for your account? PrimeHunter (talk) 21:56, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Blanking my Monobook.js seems to have worked. Ten Pound Hammer and his otters • ^{(Broken clamshells • Otter chirps • HELP)} 22:36, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Good to hear, TPH. :-) If you still want to use gadgets, add whatever was in your monobook one-by-one and keep checking to see if the effect starts to occur again. If it starts happening again after you added a gadget, then whatever you just added must be the cause. – RyanCross (talk) 23:29, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Editing the actual title of an article....

Someone very kindly has created a wikipedia article for me BUT they have used my married rather than professional name (I'm a writer). How do I delete that one word from the title of the article? —Preceding unsigned comment added by SteakTartare (talk • contribs) 20:51, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

What's the article? I'll move it for you. Ten Pound Hammer and his otters • ^{(Broken clamshells • Otter chirps • HELP)} 20:52, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Ohh yes please - I have left details on your talk page - many thanks —Preceding unsigned comment added by SteakTartare (talk • contribs) 21:08, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Just an FYI: Once your account has been active for four days and made at least ten edits, your account will be autoconfirmed. You'll see a "move" tab at the top of Wikipedia pages, which will allow you to move articles to a new title, provided the destination name doesn't already exist. Cheers! TN‑X-Man 21:12, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Nominate for DYK

I have tried very much to nominate an article for DYK (Did you know) but it isnt working! I have tried to nominate Valery Kobelev and in the 5th expansion criteria. The Rolling Camel (talk) 22:29, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

How is it not working? Ten Pound Hammer and his otters • ^{(Broken clamshells • Otter chirps • HELP)} 22:34, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

something like this:

(==Valery Kobelev==

{{{{{article1111}}}} {{{{{hook}}}}}}

|Valery Kobelev has "performed the worst ski jumping crash ever.|expansion=The Rolling Camel... The Rolling Camel (talk) 22:41, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Where are you putting it at? It's supposed to go at T:TDYK. Ten Pound Hammer and his otters • ^{(Broken clamshells • Otter chirps • HELP)} 22:44, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

User:Gracenotes/rollback.js will not install

I cannot get this to work. I have set my browser cache to 0MB AND restarted it. -- IRP ☎ 23:08, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

That does not clear your cache. Try holding shift or Ctrl while refreshing a Wikipedia page. – ukexpat (talk) 02:25, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

December 19

External links question

WP:EL mentions that external links to MySpace should not be used, but what if the MySpace page is also the person's official website (which are inclusive according to WP:ELYES)? Copana2002 (talk) 03:34, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

That situation is covered by the footnote at the recommendation against social networking sites (such as MySpace). Click the footnote link looking like ^[1] at the MySpace remark to see the footnote which says "a link to a social networking site may be included when it is the official website". PrimeHunter (talk) 03:50, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Yep, featured articles "Weird Al" Yankovic and Opeth both link to Myspace. As long as the myspace page is official, it should be fine. Rtyq2 (talk) 03:51, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Consensus appears to be as Rtyq2 states it. See Wikipedia talk:External links#Linking to multiple official sites and social networking sites for some discussion of a broader topic which also comments on this, if slightly obliquely.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 03:57, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Ira Hayes

I recently placed on Discussion Tab my discussion about Ira Hayes. I have not seen it published as yet. I did find it difficult to access discussion domain. How can I access Discussion about Ira Hayes.

(email address removed for your security) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 124.185.36.166 (talk) 04:18, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

If you refer to Talk:Ira Hayes, note that Wikipedia's talk pages are for discussing how to improve the associated articles, not for general discussion about the subjects of articles. See Wikipedia:Talk page guidelines. If you are new to Wikipedia, note that Wikipedia confuses a large number of first-time editors, because Wikipedia is different than anything most people have experienced before. For starters, Wikipedia uses its own markup language, with fantastically complex editing rules. You can practice editing by using what we call the sandbox and by taking the tutorial. Keep the cheat sheet handy as it briefly lists the most common markup codes. As to why Wikipedia is the way it is, that is not possible to explain concisely, but the Wikipedia article is a good start. --Teratornis (talk) 04:51, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Subdirectories

I've got several pages (mostly userboxes) under my user page. But I can't always remember all that I've made. I feel like this is a stupid question, but how the heck do I get a list of subdirectories or subarticles or whatever below any particular directory/article? In other words, I want to know everything beneath User:Mqduck. --MQDuck 05:14, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Use Special:Prefixindex/User:Mqduck/. -Seidenstud (talk) 05:16, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Question added by User:Johntcullen

Could you please delete me as a member? Thanks. User=Johntcullen —Preceding unsigned comment added by Johntcullen (talk • contribs) 07:21, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Hello. What do you mean by "delete [you] as a member"? Is there a specific WikiProject you were associated with? If so, you can just delete your name from their user list to leave the project.

If by this you mean to drop your account from Wikipedia, note that this is not possible. You have the right to vanish or to retire and no longer use your account, but your account cannot be canceled. We love editors on here; please consider staying. If you do decide to leave, I hope you enjoyed your time at Wikipedia, and we'd love to have you back in the future. Hope this answers your questions; cheers! ←Signed:→Mr. E. Sánchez ^{Get to know me!} / _{Talk to me!}←at≈:→ 08:16, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Password-protected pages as sources

Do we have a policy/guideline on accepting sources from pages that require registration or login in order to read the source? I understand the editor's intentions in providing this information, but (s)he went and placed his/her account login and password on my talk page. (I guess that's another question o_O). Any information is helpful. Thank you. ←Signed:→Mr. E. Sánchez ^{Get to know me!} / _{Talk to me!}←at≈:→ 08:11, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

If registration is required to read a source, the link to that source should indicate that is the case:

Some online source (registration required)

-- Mgm|^(talk) 08:26, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

You should probably delete the login information you got. - Mgm|^(talk) 08:27, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I deleted it as best as I could. There's always the history. Thing is, that page seems to be a private website. Visiting the webpage prompts you for the login but the actual domain scares you off with threats. Doesn't seem like there's any registration. Some blog of sorts, perhaps? ←Signed:→Mr. E. Sánchez ^{Get to know me!} / _{Talk to me!}←at≈:→ 08:30, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

How to edit title of a page?

I created a page but I have a typo in the title, how can I fix it? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Rainbow1360 (talk • contribs) 08:18, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

People who have been around for four days and made at least ten edits will get a move tab on the top of the page. I see you created a duplicate, so I'll delete the old one. _ Mgm|^(talk) 08:24, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I CSD'd the new one in case that one wanted to be moved, but it matters not. :) Best, PeterSymonds (talk) 08:26, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

About admission in Class V from Class IV in same School under Govt. of West Bengal.

Halloh, I want to know about the admission procedure in Class V from Class IV in the same School under WBBSE after passing annual examination in Class IV. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Susise (talk • contribs) 09:09, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Have you tried Wikipedia's Reference Desk? They specialize in knowledge questions and will try to answer any question in the universe (except how to use Wikipedia, since that is what this Help Desk is for). Just follow the link, select the relevant section, and ask away. I hope this helps.- Mgm|^(talk) 09:15, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I want to update a picture on an article

Resolved

Rockhampton, Queensland is the article i would like to edit the picture i would like to replace is the one under the sub-title "Economy" and update the "Crane" photo —Preceding unsigned comment added by Dannhaha (talk • contribs) 10:03, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Reply given on talk page; user waiting on autoconfirm for upload. — Manti core 10:20, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Table sorting

Hi guys, would someone mind looking at my "Help request" here please, cheers. Ryan4314 (talk) 10:21, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I don't see any sorting problem in the table in User:Ryan4314/Sandboxes/Signatories. Every column appears to sort the way I expect. Please describe exactly what problem you are seeing. --Teratornis (talk) 18:03, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I can't get the dates to sort properly, it seems the dates sort by the 1st number in the cell (the day), not in actual chronological order. Ryan4314 (talk) 19:34, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I looked at it before and you had Xs in those fields. You can create a sortkey for those date fields using {{dts}}. --—— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk - 19:41, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Yea sorry, at first I thought I'd have "X"s but now I wanna use the dates. So will that DTS thing sort them it then? Ryan4314 (talk) 09:53, 20 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Watchlist RSS feed for Google Reader

Is it possibel to generate an RSS feed of my watchlist which I can view in Google Reader? I have tried various methods on Wikipedia:Syndication but none of them work for me. If I click on the feed link then I get the feed in Google Reader but it says: "Error (wlnotloggedin) You must be logged-in to have a watchlist". Any ideas or work-around for this? Thanks Andeggs (talk) 13:32, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Template

I need a template that says that I will be sporadically editing from now on. Can somebody help me. Hairy Perry 15:02, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Try {{busy}}, which can be customized, or {{Semi-retired}}. --—— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk - 15:10, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

There's also {{vacation}} and {{user broken wrist}} (for the more unfortunate among us). TN‑X-Man 15:54, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Saving references

Is there any wiki portal to save files, for example to save a sourced web-page, PDF-file or anything else so it won't get lost? --Nicoliani (talk) 15:08, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I think Wikisource may be what you are looking for. It's a library of free-content publications. Cheers! TN‑X-Man 15:47, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Not sure, I remember when first reading the help files (although I can't now locate it) it had a external web-link where you could save a reference web-page in case the original URL in some feature time would disappear. --Nicoliani (talk) 15:52, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

It sounds as though you're thinking of WebCite, Nicoliani. Deor (talk) 16:06, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Yes probably, thanks. --Nicoliani (talk) 19:49, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

So now when using WebCite for a particular web-source, how should the note be displayed. Example should it be: '1. ^ WebCite query result. www.webcitation.org. Retrieved on 2008-12-21'. Or should I use the original source code '1.^ origins. members.tripod.com. Retrieved on 2008-12-21', but link the URL to the webcitation permalink? --Nicoliani (talk) 20:03, 21 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Use the |archiveurl= & |archivedate= parameters of the {{Cite web}} Template and it will automatically do the formatting for you. For example,

...he hopes to reclaim the $21 million dollars he paid the company over a two-year span.^[1]

^ Klotz, Irene (2008-11-26). "Grounded space tourist wants $21 million refund". Yahoo News. Archived from the original on September 26, 2008.

-- GateKeeper^(X) @ 21:27, 21 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Can someone fix Infobox ski area?

The ski area Infobox has a place to insert coordinates. They work find in the infobox, but some switch has been left on that means they also appear at the top of the page. Since the infobox is at the top of the page, this is not only redundant, but ugly.

Can someone that understands templates fix this?

Maury Markowitz (talk) 16:17, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

{{Infobox ski area}} uses {{coord}} with display=inline,title. If you look at the documentation for coord, you will find "{{coord}} is used by tools which parse the raw Wikipedia database dumps, such as Google Earth. To ensure that the coordinates are parsed correctly display=title must be used." If you still have an issue with this, take it up at Template talk:Infobox ski area. --—— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk - 17:11, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Picture related formatting errors

I get picture related formatting errors on some pages such as Uruguayan Air Force Flight 571. What I mean by that is that sometimes where a picture appears correctly the text will leave a big gap sometimes between the section heading and the starting text. I am not familiar with the wiki on other computers so is this normal? Do I need to correct my browser or the page in question? Only occurs on some pages but several at least. ~ R.T.G 17:51, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I don't see exactly the problem you are describing (I'm using Mozilla Firefox) but I do see bunched up edit links. See WP:BUNCH for instructions on how to fix that problem. --Teratornis (talk) 17:59, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

No not that. Let's say we added a thumb picture to the right of this section and the headline was at the top of the picture area but the part that says "I get picture..." didnt start until the bottom of the picture leaving a big gap between. Have you any gaps in text on the page Uruguayan Air Force Flight 571? My browser is Internet Explorer (it is the IE8 beta2 but I am sure this occurred while on IE6). Hopefully I can at least establish if anyone else has these gaps in text (without calling round anywhere xD) ~ R.T.G 19:19, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I still don't understand. Can you post a screen shot so we can see what you are referring to? Thanks. – ukexpat (talk) 19:50, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I don't see any gaps either. I've thrown a couple of {{clear}}'s in there, but nothing significant has changed. It may be something with your browser. TN‑X-Man 20:26, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I see the gaps. I use IE6, and it is set full screen with small text. For example, the group photo straddles the first section header, and there is a gap between that section head and the text under it, the text is pushed down to match the top of the map. (The reason for the straddle is that the lead section and TOC has less hight than the infobox and the group photo.) If I set the screen to half width I get only one gap. That in the “The mountain rescue” section, where the photo at the very bottom of the preceding section pushes the text down to match the photo of the wreckage. —teb728 t c 01:20, 20 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Yeah it must be a mismatch between Internet Explorer and the Wiki software. It is particularly bad (in an artistic sense) on that Flight 571 article because the pics are quite long and numerous hence long gaps in text. It occurred to me to ask because there is mention of Good Article on that artice but with the gaps an article may subconsciously lose a point or two on review. Anyway it is quite rare. (The new IE8 beta2, teb728, has lots of little gadgets although some glitches) Sorry Expat, no screenshot software and the last time I tried one it hijacked my search engines. ~ R.T.G 04:15, 20 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Actually the gaps only occur twice on that page and is most notable under the "Mountain Rescue" section heading ~ R.T.G 04:28, 20 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I managed to fix that by moving the "[[image:" entry to below the text ~ R.T.G 13:52, 20 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

What is the art work you see if a page loads slowly?

Once the page has loaded, it is still on the top of the page and part of the left side.Vchimpanzee · talk · contributions · 21:37, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not sure what you mean. Was there a specific page to which you could point? TN‑X-Man 21:39, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Do you mean the book? That's just the normal monobook background. Dendodge Talk^Contribs 21:40, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

It's the book in File:Headbg.jpg. PrimeHunter (talk) 23:12, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

inline template forcing line breaks in one article only

Resolved

This is weird. The {{respell}} template is an inline formatting and pronunciation key link. (It's rather crude; I'd appreciate any suggestions on how to trigger an internal {{sm}} format on specific cells, rather than just the penultimate one.) However, in the article List of names in English with counterintuitive pronunciations, it forces a line break on every instance, whether one uses FF, Safari, or IE (look under US place names), though this is not apparent from the edit preview window. I haven't seen this behavior on any other article. kwami (talk) 22:04, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

FWIW, it's broken in the preview window too, as long as you edit the article, not just the section. Algebraist 22:15, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I removed a linebreak from {{respell}} and it now seems to be behaving reasonably. Still not sure why it wasn't breaking reliably though. Algebraist 22:21, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks! Since it wasn't breaking reliably, I'd assumed in was a general bug w Wikipedia. kwami (talk) 23:22, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

It probably is, just a very subtle one. Algebraist 02:00, 20 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

December 20

How to correct errors and upload photos?

I am a writer and historian, and wish to correct errors when I find them in some of your articles.

I also have a photograph for one of your articles, but when I try to upload I'm basically told to get lost.

What exactly do I have to do to provide you with a photo?

What exactly is the procedure for correcting factual errors in your articles?

You seem like some sort of secret lodge with all these levels and titles!

Thank you. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Lauzerte (talk • contribs) 01:31, 20 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Welcome to Wikipedia. I see on your talk page that someone has welcomed you. In that message are links to some of Wikipedia's policies, which I strongly encourage you to become familiar with; following that, be BOLD in editing pages! About the images: you have to have, I believe, 10 edits and have had an account for four days before you're allowed to upload anything. Hope this helps, Hermione1980 01:36, 20 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Yes. But if your image is free, you can upload it to Commons. See our image policy for more info. Cheers.Chamal ^talk 01:48, 20 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Red banner at bottom of article.

Hi. Under the external links of an article, I saw a red banner that said: "Preview (based on VirtualReferences.js by :de:User:ParaDox):". What is this for? Is it only visible to registered users, and why is it there, I've been missing out on things recently such as the switchover from Image: to File:? Thanks. ~A H 1^(TCU) 01:44, 20 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

What article? Algebraist 01:48, 20 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

If you're talking about the thing on Megatsunami, my guess is it's part of some javascript-based way of always appending a reference list to previews for use while editing sections. Actually ending up in the article seems to be the result of a bug. Algebraist 01:55, 20 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Confirmed. It's from User:FT2/scripts/previewrefs.js. Algebraist 01:58, 20 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

And the reason Paradox name is on it is probably so people will contact him first when noting problems i.e. also contact Paradox in case he/she can fix it or their username is being used falsely. Nobody will fix or confirm the glitch without a link to the page. ~ R.T.G 03:52, 20 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Information is found to be incorrect

the structure of Bortezomib is not corect in your page

plz edit that one

thanks & Regards <name and email removed> —Preceding unsigned comment added by Nareshvemula (talk • contribs) 02:09, 20 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Go ahead and fix it. This is the encyclopedia that anyone can edit, which means anybody can fix something that they see is wrong. See here for help on editing. If you need anymore help, please ask here or from an experienced editor around here. And BTW, 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. Cheers. Chamal ^talk 02:16, 20 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Editing an image is not that straight forward. I've contacted the creator of the image. - Mgm|^(talk) 12:14, 20 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Hungarian passports from the 1930s

I wanted to ask about http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:14_year_old_Aranka_Siegal.jpg. What license should this be under? I have looked at it and would almost suggest public domain as it is a passport photo from a government agency. Guroadrunner (talk) 04:21, 20 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The passport may have been a government document, but I see no evidence the government actually took the photograph. Also, Recent stuff by the US government is in public domain, but that doesn't neccesarily carry over to other governments especially when it is so long ago. I'd check to see the length of copyright in Hungary. - Mgm|^(talk) 12:09, 20 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

archives search

What is the best place to find a dead link http://www.cantonrep.com/index.php?ID=318935 which is footnote 3 at Four Freedoms (Norman Rockwell)? Rosenkrantz, Linda (2006-11-13). "A Norman Rockwell Thanksgiving". Canton Repository. The Repository. Retrieved on 2008-04-07. — Preceding unsigned comment added by TonyTheTiger (talk • contribs) 04:40, 20 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The resource exchange wikiproject should be able to help with so many details given about the source. I've got a link to it on my userpage (second pull down menu on the right, second item). - Mgm|^(talk) 12:06, 20 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
- What is the resource exchange wikiproject?--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:LOTM) 00:02, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Universal notability?

Does Wikipedia have any policy towards the notability of foreign/non-English actors/models/entertainers? I've been browsing model stubs and have found a great deal of articles whose subjects have only a handful of dubious credits, all of which are non-English. Being that this is an English-language Wikipedia, I was wondering whether lesser levels of notability - i.e., the subject hasn't received noted international awards or been in major works recognized abroad - the subject might have in their home country automatically cross over (hence it's "universal"), or if criteria like a Google search bringing up no English-language reliable secondary sources nullifies it, being that the subject's notability is confined to their home country. Mbinebri (talk) 05:40, 20 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Just some thoughts: my understanding is that they come under they same criteria as any other entertainer, and while the presence of English sources makes it easier to work on the articles and to demonstrate notability, it isn't required. I look at this as the "Wikipedia written in English", rather than the "Wikipedia about English Subjects" - although naturally the bias would tend towards English subjects anyway. (Although there is a sense in which you could argue it is the "Wikipedia written for English-language readers", which would thus encompass more than language choice, but that would require judgements about what is of interest, when potentially anything could be). - Bilby (talk) 05:57, 20 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Nope, notable is notable, no matter where that notability is attained. And non-notable is non-notable. So if you're coming across questionable biographies, you should stick the appropriate template on the page and, ideally, notify any WikiProjects that might be interested. It's difficult to assess the notability of, say, a Turkish pop singer if you don't speak Turkish and the singer has received no non-Turkish press attention, so it's best to avoid nominating articles for deletion just because you can't personally confirm the reliability of the sources. It's worth taking the extra step to contact editors who speak the language and might be willing to help. But that's for referenced articles which seem possibly dubious. If the article is clearly non-notable, then by all means, nominate it for deletion! And give WP:NONENG and Wikipedia:WikiProject Countering systemic bias a read, while you're at it. --Fullobeans (talk) 07:41, 20 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The above two editors are correct. While it is preferable to have English language sources in an English language article, you can have sources in other languages as well if there is no alternative and the geographical area a person or concept comes from has no bearing on its notability - Mgm|^(talk) 12:04, 20 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Harry Meacher

Quite a few months ago when I was getting to grips with Wikipedia editing (my first draft was deleted because it followed the wording of a source too closely!), the very first article I initiated was on the British actor Harry Meacher. Several months ago it had a query for Notability placed at the head of it. It seems to me that the subject's notability is fairly well demonstrated by the article - without invidiously naming other subjects of articles, I feel: If this one is not notable, what the heck are X and Y doing on Wikipedia?? I really think the article should by now either be counted 'notable' or else deleted.

Rogersansom (talk) 12:52, 20 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Your article doesn't have any references, and is therefore unverifiable. If articles are not backed by reliable sources they are likely to be regarded as non-notable, and deleted. Please see Wikipedia:Verifiability & Wikipedia:Citing sources for more info. Cheers. Chamal ^talk 13:02, 20 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Cathodic protection

I wish to add a new article for the definition of "protección catódica" in spanish (cathodic protection in English), how can i do it?, the edit button only works to edit existing text but in this case there isn’t any text to edit.

the article I wish to upload is original material written by me.

regards. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Cantojordi (talk • contribs) 14:40, 20 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

We already have an article on cathodic protection; but please feel free to improve it. Andy Mabbett (User:Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 15:00, 20 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

If the intended edit was to the Spanish wikipedia which has only a reedirect to a subsection of Corrosión, then you need to edit the redirect and add the text there to start a new article. Rmhermen (talk) 16:48, 20 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Adding content

Is it possible for me submit an article about person/persons/companies etc to the site ?— Preceding unsigned comment added by Tuninghouse (talk • contribs)

Before creating an article, please search Wikipedia first to make sure that an article does not already exist on the subject. Please also review a few of our relevant policies and guidelines which all articles should comport with. As Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, articles must not contain original research, must be written from a neutral point of view, should cite to reliable sources which verify their content and must not contain unsourced, negative content about living people.

Articles must also demonstrate the notability of the subject. Please see our subject specific guidelines for people, bands and musicians, companies and organizations and web content and note that if you are closely associated with the subject, our conflict of interest guideline strongly recommends against you creating the article.

If you still think an article is appropriate, see Help:Starting a new page. You might also look at Wikipedia:Your first article and Wikipedia:How to write a great article for guidance, and please consider taking a tour through the Wikipedia:Tutorial so that you know how to properly format the article before creation. – ukexpat (talk) 16:05, 20 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Date of registration

How do you find out when a user registered with Wikipedia, even if they didn't edit until a few days later? 78.16.192.53 (talk) 16:33, 20 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Special:Log has logs on all kinds of things a user did, including the actual creation of the account itself. --fvw * 16:38, 20 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Note: testing it against my user name that system doesn't seem to have records earlier than 2004. Rmhermen (talk) 16:45, 20 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Okay, thanks. It seems that it also records if a user created another account (I assume that's worked out by IP?) 78.16.192.53 (talk) 17:08, 20 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

No, anything a user does when logged in is linked to their account with cookies. It's nothing to do with IPs.- Mgm|^(talk) 17:35, 20 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

It has nothing to do with cookies, MediaWiki just sees that the user is logged in and notes it. — neuro^(talk) 20:05, 20 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

My new articles

How can I find out which articles I have created (not just edited, but created altogether)? Special:Contributions shows this, but it doesn't give an easy way to filter for just the new ones. Ryan Reich (talk) 17:07, 20 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The toolserver appears to be suffering some difficulties at the moment, but when it is back up http://toolserver.org/~escaladix/larticles/ should be helpful. (It's better to keep a local manual backup and add an article to the list whenever you create one. That way you can properly sort them per topic area or per status (FA, GA, etc) - Mgm|^(talk) 17:33, 20 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Page restore query

Resolved

– --TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:LOTM) 00:04, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Can I request a page restoration just to figure out (for page history purposes) which Chris Young (it is now a dab) was deleted (as per its page log)?--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:LOTM) 17:48, 20 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

No need for a restoration, as shown here it was about an NFL player. — neuro^(talk) 20:04, 20 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The question is apparently about the deletion shown in [6]. It was unsourced and rather nonsensical, maybe a prank by somebody who knows a non-notable person by that name. Restoration would violate WP:BLP and Wikipedia:Attack page in case it's a real person although that is uncertain. PrimeHunter (talk) 01:10, 21 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia is archived by some companies like Google but only for a few months and somebody else in the know will have to tell you how to access it. ~ R.T.G 02:11, 21 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Neurolysis gave me my answer.--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:LOTM) 00:04, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think so if you referred to the version deleted 8 July 2005.[7] It contained lots of nonsense and nothing indicating the subject is a football player. It started "Chris young came into this world young, confused and surrounded my females. He grew chest hair by the age of four, got his first hernia at age six". And that was the most sensible part. PrimeHunter (talk) 00:32, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Content Editing help

Hello,

Where do I go to ask an editor for help with the content of an article that I am writing? It's been deleted twice for advertising (I re-wrote it before posting a second time on a subpage that I created). Any help would be greatly appreciated!

Thank you,

Lisa

Lizpabon (talk) 23:01, 20 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'll help, messaging on talk. — neuro^(talk) 23:13, 20 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

There's several things you can do:

Carefully read appropriate policy pages. Since you are the author of the book in question, you're right in asking others to review the entry before posting it. (WP:COI).
The notability guideline for books (WP:BK) should be taken into account.
The last version you wrote still suffers from non-neutral language. WP:NPOV applies here. Don't say how wonderful and amazing something is and don't try to promote it. Just state the bare facts.
Have a look at other articles about books especially any good articles and featured articles we may have. They show what a book article should say and more importantly should avoid saying.
If you're here primarily to promote your own book, it's best to stop trying, because that conflicts with Wikipedia's goals. - Mgm|^(talk) 23:19, 20 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Talk Page Template

I've seen on several talk pages a template that basically says: If you leave me a message here, I will respond here. If I leave you a message on your talk page, please respond there. I can't recall which pages I saw it on, so I was just wondering what the name of it was. Thanks, Genius 101^Guestbook 23:19, 20 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

{{Usertalkback}}. PrimeHunter (talk) 00:57, 21 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you! Genius 101^Guestbook 17:28, 21 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

You also use an editnotice. --—— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk - 12:31, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

December 21

List of WikiProjects

Is there a list of Wikiprojects? I am new and eager to join a few.--DocDeel516 (talk) 01:18, 21 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

It is divided into a lot of sub-lists, but I believe Wikipedia:WikiProject Council/Directory is what you are looking for. -Seidenstud (talk) 01:21, 21 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks. Just joined WikiProject Physics!--DocDeel516 (talk) 01:55, 21 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Requesting account reset/merge

Hi. It has recently come to my attention that I have two accounts, calmofthestorm and calmofthestorm7. I have control of calmofthestorm7, and would like to switch back to calmofthestorm. I request this based on the following verification:

An edit made by calmofthestorm to its own talk page includes the email address calmofthestormgmail.com. You can find it here: User:Calmofthestorm&oldid=16542806

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User:Calmofthestorm&oldid=16542806 If this is acceptable, email me a token or something to that address and we can work that out. If this isn't possible I understand, it's a pretty tenuous connection. I will simply begin using calmofthestorm7 and place a link and explanation on calmofthestorm's talkpage.

This looks even more sketchy since I just added a committed identity to calmofthestorm as an DHCP IP thinking I had access to the account, then removed it as calmofthestorm7 briefly thinking the account wasn't mine (until I saw the linked edit and remembered writing it). If the admins don't want trust it I understand, I am a sysadmin in my spare time;)

Alex —Preceding unsigned comment added by Calmofthestorm7 (talk • contribs) 01:22, 21 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Hi there and welcome back to Wikipedia. A password reminder was sent to the email address associated with calmofthestorm within the last 24 hours, hopefully you'll get that email and then you should be able to login to calmofthestorm. Matt (Talk) 03:23, 21 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

You may want WP:USURP as well ~ R.T.G 09:28, 21 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

And you really shouldn't be putting your email address on your user page unless you want a ton of spam. You can use the {{noSpam}} template like Matt.T did for you here, or better yet, let people contact you using the "Email this user" button. Franamax (talk) 12:06, 21 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I hardly get any spam thanks to SpamBayes adaptive filtering:-) But thanks for the warning, I was rather young when I wrote that page. I already tried the password reset mechanism, problem is it went to an old hotmail account I used at the time that has since been taken over by someone else. In other words, I believe the address registered to the account is different from that mentioned in the userpage history edited in by that account, and was requesting authentication based on the latter, not the registered address. (Why would the user himself add an address to his own page he didn't own?). From the sound of it, this isn't something the admins are willing to do which is fine. I'll update the account's userpage with a redirect to my new account and just consider that one deprecated. It shall serve as a lesson to me to be more careful with passwords in future. I suppose I could also probably guess the password in <50 tries, but that's more work than I really want to put in. Thanks anyway, it's good to see the articles I started four years ago in chemistry and physics are still around, though in far expanded, improved, and in many cases more correct form:-) Calmofthestorm7 (talk) 16:50, 21 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Requesting block of Hezzospike

I haven't requested a block before but, I've recently added a speedy delete tag on an article created by Hezzospike. I see on his talk page that he has had his final warning and he was warned that he would be blocked next. Can an administrator review this and block him if necessary? Thank you Didz93 (talk) 01:56, 21 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Go to WP:AN ~ R.T.G 02:06, 21 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you Didz93 (talk) 02:07, 21 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Problem with Chess article

I have tried several times to access the article "Chess (game)". Each attempt seems to load the page in Internet Explorer OK, but I then find that Internet Explorer is locked up. I then end up killing the task using Task Manager. Other large articles such as "Boeing 777", "United States" and "Australia" load without any problems. I have tried re-booting the PC, but the result is the same each time.

Internet Explorer v6. Windows XP Professional SP2. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Leigh-01 (talk • contribs) 04:15, 21 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Does the problem persist in a non-obsolete browser? Algebraist 08:34, 21 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Read wiktionary:obsolete. It's not obsolete just a tad old. If I were to try using IE 7 or 8 my computer would crash spontaneously and I do need at least one IE browser running for sites that don't seem to know other browsers exist. - Mgm|^(talk) 11:13, 21 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The problem is likely that the Chess article has a mozillion images on it. There are 17 board layouts shown, each with 64 little images, one for each square of the board. If your browser can't handle that, there's not much that can be done without completely redoing the images. I believe there's a way to turn off images, but not exactly sure what it is. Franamax (talk) 11:38, 21 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

You can test by editing the article directly [8], copying the text into your sandbox (or the system sandbox), then changing the instances of "Chess diagram small" to something else like "xx diagram small". Then you should be able to at least read the article, but without all the nifty diagrams. Franamax (talk) 11:53, 21 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

You could try disabling images in your browser settings. --—— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk - 12:25, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the suggestions. I disabled pictures in the browser (Tools/Internet Options/Advanced/Multimedia/Show Pictures). This allowed the page to load very quickly. By right clicking the missing picture(s) with the mouse and selecting Show Picture allowed the various pictures to be displayed as required. Leigh-01 (talk) 23:05, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Please help complete afd nom

Can someone please create <removed to avoid canvassing> and place the text there as follows:

{{subst:afd2 | pg=G<removed to avoid canvassing> | cat=M | text=Contested prod, which I had proposed on the basis that [[WP:CRYSTAL|Wikipedia is not a crystal ball]]. I have never understood the purpose of this type of article. It's normally not really about the subject at all; it's about the fact that the inchoate subject will exist. Once the thing exists, everything in article like this has to necessarily be changed from about it coming out, to about the album itself. It's really an entirely separate topic and not normally notable. If it was then the article should be named something like "Glad To Be Live release date announced" and that subject should be able to exist either as a separate article or as a subsection of the article once it comes out. But of course it can't. It makes no sense.[[Special:Contributions/71.247.123.9|71.247.123.9]] ([[User talk:71.247.123.9|talk]])~~~~~}}

Please leave in the five tildes, which will generate a timestamp at the time of creation. Thank you.--71.247.123.9 (talk) 05:44, 21 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Done —teb728 t c 06:39, 21 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks!--71.247.123.9 (talk) 06:52, 21 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Consumption of ink in Colour/Black cartridges in printer/copier/scanner

When I scan (scan only and not print)a color photoghraph in my HP All In One (Printer/Scanner/Copier), does it consume color and black ink in the cartridges. I only want to save the photograph in my PC —Preceding unsigned comment added by 122.164.125.50 (talk) 09:53, 21 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

No. Algebraist 09:55, 21 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Reference

I was looking at the article Fafnir, and made a Google search. I found the this [9]. I see it's a copy and past. Is it allowed to do copy and past without making it an own article? And if I want to put that reference into the WIKI article, how should the reference look? --90.224.52.177 (talk) 13:16, 21 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Actually, it appears that site copy/pasted their text from Wikipedia. This is evident in the same use of wikilinks. Lots of sites now mirror Wikipedia, about.com being one of the most well-known examples. Referencing it wouldn't be correct, because it would basically be citing itself. Nevertheless, see Wikipedia:Citing sources for more information about referencing. Best, PeterSymonds (talk) 13:23, 21 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

global turn off boxes at top of page

IN many pages, the various boxes (project, class etc) take up a lot of space. Eg, in this page (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Charles_Cantor) there are boxes for genetics, University of california, etc etc. Is there a global box suppressor >Cinnamon colbert (talk) 16:07, 21 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

There are boxes that contain show/hide functionality. Template:ArticleHistory is one of them. Template:Articleissues does the same for templates on the article itself. There's also one that combines different WikiProject tags, but I can't remember the name of that one. Try finding it at Wikipedia:WikiProjects. - Mgm|^(talk) 16:20, 21 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

When you have more than two project banners on a talk page, you can wrap them in {{WikiProjectBannerShell}}. --—— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk - 12:29, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Project to bring word like editing to wikisoftware?

Whatever the original goals and thoughts of wiki software, it is clear that the needs and desires of the users far outweight the sophisitication of the current software: people want something like ms word or open office writer, eg what people want is good page layout without markup. Is there a project to bring this sort of functinality to wikipediaCinnamon colbert (talk) 16:07, 21 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The subject of a WYSIWYG editor for wiki-markup is discussed here (along with why making and implementing one is difficult with the current setup). You may want to read that for more information. Calvin 1998 ^(t·c) 19:24, 21 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The Stanton Foundation recently awarded a grant to the Wikimedia Foundation to make the editing interface easier to use. I've written a draft for the Wikipedia Signpost about this: User:Hermione1980/MediaWiki facelift. Cheers, Hermione1980 19:31, 21 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Aside from the inherent difficulty (impossibility?) of building a WYSIWYG interface that captures the expressive power of a good markup language (notice that Microsoft Word does not also provide a markup language interface - it seems that simplicity and power cannot coexist in the current state of the editing software art), I strongly suspect that wikitext constitutes a desirable intellectual barrier to entry on Wikipedia. It forces people to read the friendly manuals, and screens out those who won't. Editing productively on Wikipedia requires far more than learning a comparatively simple markup language. One could argue that Wikipedia is already too easy for newcomers to start using, as evidenced by the thousands of new articles by new users we delete for violating our mind-numbingly complex policies and guidelines. Wikipedia is already easy enough to allow thousands of people to get in way over their heads, and then we clobber them after they do what the system seems to be encouraging them to do - plunge ahead before bothering to learn what the site is about. Should we make Wikipedia accessible to an even less competent group of potential users? To see what happens to quality when a system requires less competence to use, observe how the usefulness of email has steadily deteriorated over the past 20 years as it has become usable by progressively more (and thus necessarily less competent) people. However, even if my suspicions are true, that Wikipedia works well in part because it's hard for people with average and below-average IQs to function here (yes, I am an admitted and unrepentant anti-anti-intellectualist), we could still use some tools to amplify our wikitext-slinging ability, such as a WYSIWYG table editor, some database tools to efficiently manage citations, and further improvements to the search function. However, attempts to thicken the client introduce problems of their own. I suspect it would be very difficult to redesign Wikipedia's interface in a way that would lead to a net improvement. After all, Wikipedia did not become the most successful collaborative project in history by accident. We may already be pretty close to the current optimum design (with respect to the current limitations of technology and the distribution of human ability). By analogy, a violin is pretty difficult to play, but making instruments easier for the inept does not automatically lead to better music. What we really need is something we've never had: a way to actually increase human ability. --Teratornis (talk) 22:25, 21 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Edit counters

Hey. I always used interiot's edit counter. Now I tried soxred93's and sql's edit counters. Whilst interiot's edit counter says I would have 21,829 edits in the mainspace, soxred93's and sql's both say that I have 19,259. Therefore I have to ask: Which edit counter is the most accurate one? Thanks. — Aitias // discussion 17:20, 21 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Could it be a result of the first one including deleted edits, while the second and third ones don't? Tan | 39 17:25, 21 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Well, as far as I can see, the first one does not include deleted edits, as it shows 41,788 total edits (if deleted edits were included, it would show 42,914 total edits). — Aitias // discussion 17:36, 21 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

My uContribs tool says 19,263, Kate/river says 19,261 (and you have a total of 1498 deleted edits). Franamax (talk) 19:46, 21 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Interiot says in the source code that he doesn't count deleted edits and his data comes from ~~the API~~ Special:Contributions. However, he does some funky stuff figuring out the namespace, which defaults to (main) unless he can figure out it's somethig different (see the code at 'my $subspace = "Mainspace";'. I suspect this ends up counting too many edits as mainspace and undercounting other spaces. This seems to be confirmed by comparing wannbekate and real Kate: the User talk space counts differ by 2542, pretty close to the extra mainspace edits Interiot is giving you credit for. Sorry, just like a bank, the lower figure is the correct amount in your account sir. :) Franamax (talk) 20:16, 21 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for the very competent explanation, Franamax. Very helpful. :) — Aitias // discussion 20:37, 21 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Conflict of Interest

Would it be a COI if I was to extend some of the articles relating to the Tyne and Wear Metro, because I use this service? Thanks, CTurnbull, just not logged in. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.0.225.187 (talk) 17:52, 21 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Not at all. Perhaps if you owned or worked for the company, but even then not necessarily. Just be sure to cite your sources. Tan | 39 17:54, 21 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The fact that you thought to ask whether you have a conflict of interest suggests that you have the intellectual capacity to edit objectively even when you have a conflict of interest. I suspect that the people most prone to making unconstructive edits as a result of having conflicts of interest are those who are least aware that they have conflicts of interest. (See: Dunning-Kruger effect.) The COI guideline is curiously unenforceable on its own because "the ability of anyone to edit articles without registering is a Foundation issue" (see: WP:PEREN#Prohibit anonymous users from editing). If we don't require users to identify themselves, then we are trusting users to comply with the COI guideline voluntarily, or perhaps unwittingly by revealing their affiliations before they understand the implications of doing so. The guideline may be least effective on the people most likely to edit unconstructively as a result of having conflicts of interest - those who are the most oblivious to the way their conflicts make them more likely to violate other policies and guidelines. Fortunately, on Wikipedia we have a sufficiently complete set of rules to enable us to evaluate any edit on its own merits, without regard to an editor's identity. Thus we can think of the COI guideline as merely a labor-saving device - editors should generally be more productive if they focus their efforts on articles where they don't have conflicts of interest. However, countering that tendency is the fact that people are more likely to develop expertise in subjects that matter to them. The most knowledgeable persons in a given subject area will usually have some sort of personal stake in it. A good example would be religion. How many articles would Wikipedia have about the various religions if we forbade adherents (or opponents) of a given religion from writing about it, and how good would those articles be? Religions are generally useless to people who don't believe in them (for example, if you don't believe in Animism, or you aren't actively opposing it, how useful is Animism to you, and why would you want to learn about it?); therefore, extremely few people will be motivated to learn much about specific religions unless they are trying either to promote them or destroy them. The fact that Wikipedia has vast and complete coverage of religion topics strongly suggests that we don't take the COI guideline seriously enough to get in the way of writing an encyclopedia. --Teratornis (talk) 21:33, 21 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Just to clarify; having an interest in or familiarty with a subject does not mean you have a Conflict of Interest, otherwise we would have no quality articles at all. That just means you have an interest in the subject. COI means that you have a direct stake in promoting the entity that you are writing the article about; wherein that stake is in direct conflict with Wikipedia's stated mission. Usually, if you are writing about your company to increase its exposure, or to promote it in some way, that is in conflict with Wikipedia's WP:NPOV policy, and thus you have a conflict of interest. If you are just some guy who uses a service, and you wish to add relevent, verifiable, and neutral information about that service to Wikipedia, but you don't have any stake in promoting that service, then there is no conflict. --Jayron32.talk.contribs 17:57, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Status template

I am looking for a status template to add to my page. There's one that looks very similar to the one StatusBot used in the past, except, you update it manually by clicking links under the status simple. It's a small box. Or, any other template. Maybe you can point me in the right direction. Thanks! ←Signed:→Mr. E. Sánchez ^{Get to know me!} / _{Talk to me!}←at≈:→ 21:36, 21 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Sure. Add {{Statustop}} to the top of your userpage, and

 importScript('User:Xenocidic/statusChanger2.js');

to your your monobook.js file. Cheers, Jake Wartenberg^talk 21:44, 21 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Getting out of "edit conflict" on ref. desk pages

Hi, What's the proper way to get out of an "edit conflict" page and saving both your own comment and whatever the other poster has put in? Right now I go back, copy my text, go back farther, reload the page, go to edit, paste my text and try to save again. If it's an active comment I may even have to give it 2 tries. It's a pain. Any easier way of doing it?? Thks. Also where do I request that we get all the wiki languages in the sidebar of the "search" page?76.97.245.5 (talk) 00:25, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The edit-conflict page has instructions on it. Note that there are two edit windows on the page: the top one contains the page version with the edit someone made while you were typing, and the bottom one contains the version with your edit. All you have to do is go to the bottom edit window, copy your edit, paste it in the appropriate place in the top edit window, and click "Save page." Easy, no? Deor (talk) 00:45, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

As for the second question, I don't know; having that toolbar is standard in computers. But for your first, maybe you should try to negociate with that editor. Or request help specifically from an administrator. If you aren't willing to go through the process, you aren't really willing to have your edit on the page.--DocDeel516 ^discuss 00:44, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I wasn't talking of the computer toolbar. For articles there's a box on the sidebar of the wikipedia page that contains a list of languages in which similar articles exist. (see e.g. Cat) I'd like such a box for the "search" page, so that it's easier to search for articles in other language wikipedia without having to go to their main page or some such first. That would make translating pages and linking languages a lot easier. I just don't know what desk/panel to ask for such a modification. I'll check again for those 2 edit windows, it may be that in scrolling up and down (small screen) I just didn't get it. 76.97.245.5 (talk) 01:15, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Take a look at WP:IL for help with interlanguage links. – ukexpat (talk) 02:11, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Couldn't find anything about getting a "languages" box installed at the search page, there. I'm not having trouble linking pages that I know are there. What I want is to be able to quickly search promising terms and related pages in various languages to find the right page to link to in that respective language. Right now there are 2 ways to get to foreign language searches that I know: go to a wikipedia page with lots of other language pages linked to it click on those language one by one and use the search box in their sidebar. or Note what letters go before .wikipedia.org for each language and then put those in the url. Both systems are unreliable. It would really be nicer if one could just click them on the sidebar at the search page and a full list would be provided there, who knows the page in "Català" or "Magyar" might have just the morsel of info that was missing. There are bound to be lots of languages one can't read, but if it's in the same language family as one that you know one can usually figure things out, or at least knows where and what to ask a question about. I often end up digging through several languages and end up with 3 more questions than I started off with. 76.97.245.5 (talk) 06:10, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The edit conflict thing worked like a charm. I really hadn't noticed what I was looking at before because of the scrolling. Thks. 76.97.245.5 (talk) 08:52, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Creating new WikiProject

Hello. I was hoping there'd be a WikiProject "Theoretical Physics", but there is none. Sure, there is Wikiproject Physics, but I wand a project with a specified scope. Is there the possibility of creating a WikiProject Theoretical Physics? Please answer me on my talk page, as I am most alert there.

Thanks. --DocDeel516 ^discuss 00:41, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

See here and here. Jake Wartenberg^talk 00:54, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I would also propose it at WP:Physics and Wikipedia:WikiProject Math. You would be sister projects, after all. — Sebastian 06:25, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

You might also consider a WP:TASKFORCE of WP:PHYSICS. Jake Wartenberg^Talk 18:57, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

December 22

Linking from an article to an userpage

On Wikipedia, are you allowed to link from an article to someone's userpage? I know you're allowed to link from the userpage to an article.. but I was wondering the other way around. I understand that with Jimmy Wales, it's linking to his userpage. I was thinking about the case where there's someone who wrote a huge list of rules or references on their userpage regarding the article topic, which may be useful for Wikipedians, but wasn't useful for people who are just browsing through Wikipedia for brief information. --staka (T) 01:36, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

If I understand your question, no. Cross-namespace links (say, to Wikipedia: or User: pages) from articles are generally frowned upon. Hermione1980 01:39, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Ok well is this why the link to his userpage is part of the external links in his article? --staka (T) 01:41, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

External links, okay. I didn't realize that was what you were asking. If the person is notable for their actions on, or association with, Wikipedia, it would be logical and perfectly acceptable to link to their user page in the external links. I thought you were talking about inline links - say, if I wanted to write, "User:Example is a prominent vegetarian" in an article about Example. That would be frowned upon. HTH, Hermione1980 01:49, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

But even for an external link, it should be directly relevant. For example, on Jimbo's page it wouldn't do to have a link to someone's page that works with him or something like that :) In this case, I'm not sure. Chamal ^talk 01:55, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I was kind of asking two questions.. both made clear now, thanks. --staka (T) 01:56, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

In the case you describe, linking to someone's userpage for information about an article's topic useful to Wikipedia editors, suitable places to add such links would be (a) on an article's talk page, or (b) on a page in an overseeing WikiProject. Some talk pages have to-do lists on them, with information for editors, and the to-do lists are sticky so they don't flow into the talk page's archive, but they stay on the talk page for continuous reference. An example is at the top of Talk:Wind power. See {{todo}} and Talk:Wind power/to do. --Teratornis (talk) 06:51, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Purchasing an image

Is it allowed that you can purchase an image from a website and post it on here? Rvk41 (talk) 02:42, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

If the purchase transfers the copyrights, then yes. Most do not, and most purchases probably also ban you distributing the image. So the short answer: no. You can, however, use fair use to justify posting a copyrighted image here. Calvin 1998 ^(t·c) 02:47, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia's policy on fair use, however, is much more restrictive than fair use law. Each use must conform to Wikipedia:Non-free content criteria. For one thing, the use of a non-free file must be highly significant to an article. —teb728 t c 08:15, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

A full delete of account?

What procedures must be taken to request a full deletion of a Wikipedia account? 75.75.106.183 (talk) 03:08, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Due to the fact that Wikipedia content is licensed under the GFDL, all edits must be kept for attribution purposes, and so your account cannot be deleted. You do, however, have the right to vanish, which you can exercise by (1) requesting your user page (found at Special:Mypage) and/or user talk page (found at Special:Mytalk) be deleted, by adding the {{db-userreq}} template to them; (2) requesting to change your username to something that is unconnected with you (possibly a random collection of letters and numbers); (3) never logging in to your account again. If you do this, you may not register a new username to continue editing Wikipedia as invoking your right to vanish is final. – ukexpat (talk) 03:47, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Apparently, this hasn't been addressed since I last asked it. Since when is the right to vanish final and non-reversible? - Mgm|^(talk) 05:35, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Since February, it seems. There's a little more recent discussion here. Algebraist 08:51, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I always thought (and maybe I was wrong) that if the community made it clear that someone was not welcome, the user could not return after invoking RTV. However, if someone invoked RTV for other reasons (on-wiki harrassment, outing, etc.), they could return as another user. TN‑X-Man 14:10, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

That's not really right-to-vanish (or, better termed "Right-to-storm-off-in-a-dramatic-and- attention-grabbing-manner"). What you describe is simply a valid use of multiple accounts. Many users, for whatever reason, change names or stop using old accounts, often to avoid harassment offwiki or whatever. RTV means the right to self-eliminate from the project in-perpetuity, and is reserved for cases when people REALLY want to disassociate themselves from the project; RTV specifically does NOT cover situations where people still want to contribute, but wish to distance themselves from an old account, for whatever reason. --Jayron32.talk.contribs 17:51, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Ah. That makes more sense. Thanks for the clarification. TN‑X-Man 17:54, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

My account doesn't exist anymore. What?

Hey! What happened to my account. I hadn't been back in a couple months, I go to log in, and it tells me my account does not exist. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.166.134.114 (talk) 04:29, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

What was the name of your account? ― Jake Wartenberg^{T M} 04:34, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

XB70Valkyrie —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.166.134.114 (talk) 04:47, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

We have an account with the name XB70Valyrie (without a "k"), so it appears as though you committed a typographical error (either when creating the account or now). —David Levy 04:57, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Ahhhh. No wonder I was able to get the name of one of the US governments fastest planes ever built as a account name. I'd typo'ed out the K. I should have known. Okay. I see. I'll change my "passwords" document at home to reflect the error, that or just start one with the correct spelling. Thanks! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.166.134.114 (talk) 05:18, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The new name is probably too similar to the old one, so you may not be able to create it. Go to Wikipedia:Changing username instead. — Sebastian 06:16, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Or just ask nicely. :) — neuro^(talk) 13:41, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Spliting Cells

Is there a way to split cells? Forexample, in Phonological history of the Scots language in the cell:

*knaw
 know
*knowe
 knoll
*knee
*knife and knock
Similarly with g before n, for example
*gnaw
*gnarl
*gnap
 snap at
*gnegum
tricky nature

I want to split it into 2. Is there a way to do that?96.53.149.117 (talk) 05:51, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

You need to insert a new column (or row, if you want to split horizontally), and then add "colspan=2|" (respectively "rowspan=2|") at the beginning of each cell that you do not want to split. — Sebastian 06:08, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I noticed, you already have rowspan in the first column. In this case, just increase the rowspan number accordingly there, and add it to the second column (presuming you only want to split the cell in the last column). — Sebastian 06:13, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

See also Help:Tables which contains MULTIPLE methods for splitting columns, including the one described above... --Jayron32.talk.contribs 17:46, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Is List of films shot in Sonora, California deletable?

As I was improving List of films shot in Sonora, California, I noticed some details of format that suggest it was copied from IMDb. Is that, combined with dubious encyclopedicity, enough to make it go away? I didn't get a clear sense from WP:Deletion policy. —Tamfang (talk) 08:01, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, it's a split off from the main article on the town, while a split off is not really neccesary. (If you split off material, material in the original should be shortened, but that doesn't really work for lists) Anyway, it could be reformatted in the main article so it takes up less space. Before you delete it in the main article, I suggest you try to find out if any other source besides IMDB (that doesn't copy IMDB) also says it was shot there. If you can't verify a subset of those films (take some well known ones) then it's likely deletable completely. - Mgm|^(talk) 08:23, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I've removed the list from the main article, and linked to the separate page. Andy Mabbett (User:Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 12:44, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

business growth.

1.what are the factors responsible for the growth and surviuval of business in NIGERIA? 2.What must nigeria do from a business perspective to experience globalization? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 41.205.173.116 (talk) 10:30, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Please read the notice on the top of the page. This page is for help with using Wikipedia. Factual questions are answered at the reference desk, but they too don't answer questions that look like homework.- Mgm|^(talk) 11:56, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Not legal

I have decided to faward this mail that was sent to me by connecting you in the process. I was able to reply such a mail and tater find out that is is 419 meaning not legal. I have also sent this mail to my account informing them about such a criminal way of clearing peoples money from their account.I was able to fullfll the criteria before sharing it with my office who told me about the process. If they try them they will be exposed

[spam mail and telephone number redacted]

—Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.226.231.132 (talk) 12:40, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

you know that it is a fraud, so what is it you want help with? --Cameron Scott (talk) 12:42, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Please also read the notice at the top of this page, and know that the Help Desk is for questions about using Wikipedia only. Thanks, ― Jake Wartenberg^{T M} 13:17, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

How to edit, update, or replace an image

I am editing the "Gini coefficient" page, and would like to replace/update the map image with a version of the map that I have updated. How can I do this? —Preceding unsigned comment added by VladJ92 (talk • contribs) 17:38, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

If you created the image entirely yourself, you may upload it by using the "upload file" like provided at the left in the "toolbox". If you don't see a link that says "upload file", it means that you are not yet autoconfirmed, however that happens automagically once you have been a registered user for 4 days and have made 10 or more edits. As an alternate idea, you could upload the image to Wikimedia Commons, which is better for everyone, since it means that the image can be shared among ALL Wikimedia projects, and not just English Wikipedia. Please consider joining Commons (it takes almost no time at all) and uploading the image there. Once you have uploaded it, it will appear for use in Wikipedia under the same name as it is at Commons. --Jayron32.talk.contribs 17:42, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Rather than overwriting the old image, upload the new one under a new name and replace the file name in the article. Also, it's probably a good idea to discuss the chance especially with the person who put in the original image. - Mgm|^(talk) 19:08, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

External links to non-http urls

How do you create an external link to a URL that does not start with HTTP? Without the HTTP, it automatically gets treated as a non-URL. MamaGeek ^{(talk/contrib)} 20:13, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

What's the URL? Andy Mabbett (User:Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 20:27, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

See the same question at Wikipedia talk:How to edit a page#Links not beginning with http added here below. I'll add a comment there that the question will be answered here to keep the thread together. – ukexpat (talk) 20:40, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Posted from Wikipedia talk:How to edit a page#Links not beginning with http: How do you add a link that doesn't begin with http? This doesn't really apply to Wikipedia, but my workplace just created an internal wiki, and we'd like to link to some filespace items, but can't figure out how. Can anyone here help? MamaGeek ^{(talk/contrib)} 17:06, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Are the filespace items that you mention on your internal wiki? If so, the way to link is [[File:Filename]]. – ukexpat (talk) 20:46, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

What protocol are you trying to use? It seems to recognize ftp://microsoft.com OK. (Microsoft won't let you access it of course.) —teb728 t c 00:17, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for replying, and sorry for posting the same question in two different places. I realized I hadn't added my first post to my watchlist, and I couldn't find it when I looked for a reply the next day. Please accept my apologies. The URL in question begins with file:// We don't want to upload to the wiki all our internal files, basically duplicating something we already have elsewhere, and using up precious disk space that is not unlimited. Linking to pdfs of design and other technical documents would be ideal, but [file://dir/design.pdf] doesn't work. MamaGeek ^{(talk/contrib)} 14:44, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'm pretty sure the file:// header in a URL indicates a local file on your local computer's hard drive. It doesn't exist on the internet, so Wikipedia (or anyone not using YOUR computer) will not find that file. You need to upload it to a file-sharing service first, and then link to it via the URL of the file location at the file sharing service... --Jayron32.talk.contribs 17:07, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

You can edit $wgUrlProtocols in LocalSettings.php to allow file:// paths. Nanonic (talk) 17:12, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Note also you can use UNC links as well once file:// is enabled by wrapping a \\server\directory\file.ext path inside a template, the creation of which is explained on the linked page. Nanonic (talk) 17:16, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks so much, Nanonic! MamaGeek ^{(talk/contrib)} 17:18, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Editing/Modifying "Musicians" Template.

I'm currently using a Musicians template to create a personal entry. So far, I'm running into a problem adding a heading to the Infobox. Underneath "Labels" I'd like to list of any Corporations I've been a part of, but after I add the code, it will not show the 'Corporate' heading I've added. It seems to only show what heading were a part of the template. The question I have is, how can I edit or modify a template to fit my needs? I want to add a corporate heading, but I don't know which template I can use that will allow me to add that information.

So far, this is how I've coded the page: Let me know if something is wrong:

I'm still in the editing process, so it's not yet complete.— Preceding unsigned comment added by Pauldavidwilson (talk • contribs)

As you have discovered, an ibox template will only display the parameters/fields that it is coded to display. So your options are twofold: 1. Ask on the {{Infobox Musical artist}} template talk page for these parameters/fields to be added, or 2. Copy the template code from {{Infobox Musical artist}}, into a subpage of your user page, edit the code to include what you want (not a task for a coding novice), then subst it to your user page. – ukexpat (talk) 20:59, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Where are you editing this? Your contributions show only this Help desk edit. If by "create a personal entry" you mean you intend to write an article about yourself on Wikipedia, see the rather buzzkilling pages WP:COI and WP:AUTOBIO. Note that creating new articles from scratch can be one of the most difficult tasks for a new Wikipedia editor. A musical analogy would be attempting to write and record a complete band arrangement from scratch before learning to play a single instrument. An easier way to break into Wikipedia is to start by making small edits to existing articles, which is like sitting in with a band whose other members know what they are doing. To get an idea of how much a Wikipedia editor needs to learn, see the book Wikipedia - The Missing Manual. The {{Infobox Musical artist}} template is (as the name suggests) an infobox template. As ukexpat implies, template coding is like the jazz improvisation of Wikipedia, as it requires the ability to synthesize on the fly from a broad base of knowledge of Wikipedia fundamentals, not something most students will master in their first lesson. But that is no reason not to try ("L'audace, l'audace, toujours l'audace!"). You can practice template coding on a user subpage such as User:Pauldavidwilson/Sandbox which you can then transclude onto your User page. As I imagine little of that previous jargon-laced sentence will make sense just yet, I will get you started by copying the necessary code onto those pages so you can experiment with it. --Teratornis (talk) 22:04, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The background parameter in {{Infobox musical artist}} can only take one of a limited set of values; in your case non_vocal_instrumentalist. Andy Mabbett (User:Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 17:28, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Attacks on an organization by a Wiki user

What recourse does an organization have when a user engages in an attack on an organization. When that user uses Wiki to forward an agenda against that organization? When the user is not improving Wikipedia, but attempting to use Wikipedia to forward an agenda? ~~ —Preceding unsigned comment added by Adexpertinlv (talk • contribs) 21:59, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

What page are you referring to? If the user is not following WP:NPOV, then they can be warned for it. However, if they're citing verifiable sources, without giving undue weight to the criticism, there's not much that can be done. It's hard to give you a solid answer without seeing what the problem is. — The Hand That Feeds You:^Bite 22:05, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The page is for R&R Partners. For the sake of full discloser, R&R is the company I work for. One of our clients is embroiled in controversy and we are wrapped up in it. One organization has taken to using Wiki to help forward their cause. An employee of NPRI and I are locked in this editing battle. I would love to know what rights we have to protect our identity within the rules of Wikipedia. ~~ —Preceding unsigned comment added by Adexpertinlv (talk • contribs) 23:38, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Please make yourself familiar with WP:COI. Andy Mabbett (User:Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 23:42, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

It is difficult to contribute to articles where you have a vested interest in the tone of the piece. All articles (including those about companies) must be written from a neutral point of view. Any claims, negative, positive, or otherwise, have to be supported by indpendent, reliable sources. Finally, if you have a concern with the way someone is editing an article, the best first step is to discuss your concerns with them. You can do that on the R&R Partners talk page or the editor's talk page. TN‑X-Man 14:16, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

December 23

Trying to get some help

I have been trying get some answers in the form of comments, suggestions, and even a peer assessment on the article Ofer Ben-Amots. However, nobody has answered in 5 days. The article has been throughly changed and edited to match the Wiki rules. It is now wikified and there are numerous references. in spite of the changes the warning box above the article remains the same. Am I still doing something wrong? Totally possible... However, I would like to know if it is better than the previous version. Any help is greatly appreciated-- Thanks (in advance!) Obenamots (talk) 00:07, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Feel free to remove the tags if the problems are fixed. I have removed the wikify and ref tags, but the problem with the lead is still there. And yes, the article is better now, but not perfect. A few more references would be good. Chamal ^talk 01:17, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you so much for the helpful tip! More references are up and coming... Obenamots (talk) 16:42, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

"this file has no extension"

I'm trying to upload an image (I shot it and own the rights) to "Chase Johnson". However, I've visited the "upload" page and filled out all the data. I "browse" and select the file. however, the next page says "this file has no extension".

I've resaved it in PhotoShop with PNG and GIF but no luck. I've saved it to folders and in my desktop, but still no luck. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Jockinmystyles (talk • contribs) 00:33, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

If it is a jpg file upload it to File:Chase Johnson.jpg. If it is a png, use File:Chase Johnson.png. Etc —teb728 t c 00:40, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

When you look at the file on your computer, does the name of the file end in ".gif" or ".png"? If not, it should. Dismas|^(talk) 01:53, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Some computers, I think Macs are particularly prone, don't actually add the extension which confuses the uploader. If you make it explicit, there should be no problem. Also make sure there's only one dot in the name. While operating systems may know how to deal with more than one of them, the uploader doesn't. - Mgm|^(talk) 13:04, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
- You are correct. The default on a Mac is to not show the file extension. Although you can change this globally or for a single file. To do it for just one file, Control-Click on the file (right click), select "Get Info", and uncheck the box that says "hide file extension". Dismas|^(talk) 06:46, 24 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  - However, since it's the Mac OS which is Unix-based (where file extensions are not necessary), the file extension might actually not be there - not just be hidden. In that case, the user will actually have to modify the file name to add ".jpg" or ".png" etc before uploading. But the easiest way to handle this, I think, is just to start uploading as is, but on the WP upload page, after the "source filename" is selected, change the "destination filename" field to include the file extension. That way, regardless of the presence of an extension on the computer, the file will upload properly to WP. -Seidenstud (talk) 07:04, 24 December 2008 (UTC)![reply]

misplaced "edit" button

Resolved

i've been renovating the Pop music article in accordance with a discussion on its talk page, and in the fray the "edit" button for the "History" section wound up in the "References" section. could some kind Help Desk Denizen please assist me in getting it back where it belongs? and if explaining how to do that isn't too much trouble, i'd love to know how. thank you Sssoul (talk) 07:30, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

My (semi-joking) solution is to not use that feature and disable "Enable section editing via [edit] links" in Special:Preferences and just make the Edit links go away entirely. The reason I do that is because those Edit links usually clutter up the page. Additionally, where there is a large right-hand side bar -- as there is on that page -- it can push the Edit links into places you don't want them. —Noah 08:15, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

(ec) I think that's a bug in the system, caused by the long infobox. I don't think it's fixable. If you go to preferences and click the editing tab, and check the box that says "Enable section editing by right clicking on section titles (JavaScript)" then you will be able to right click the History section and edit it. Garden. 08:18, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

thanks, people. i've reduced the size of the info box and rearranged a little more and it looks better now. Sssoul (talk) 08:36, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

For future reference, see WP:BUNCH. Algebraist 09:58, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I fixed it using {{FixBunching}}. Dendodge Talk^Contribs 15:16, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Indian Election - 2009

Sir,

Indian election - 2009 is just around the corner can wikipedia open a special site to help voters by putting up details of the candidates who are in the fray ? Wikipedia could give details of these candidates based on the area of contesting. Eg :Location is Chennai and 5 candidates named A,B,C,D,E,F are contesting election, if the following facts of these candidates are made available to the general public then the best from these could be selected, by public having access to wikipedia. The word of mouth would be fanatastic.

You should give these details :

Name Age Constituency Party Affiliation to other party Number of parties changed Whether national party If any criminal record If any educational background Does he / she have any clandestine activity Regards xxxxx —Preceding unsigned comment added by 116.68.103.187 (talk) 09:44, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Please see WP:NOT. Andy Mabbett (User:Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 13:39, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Election candidates are more than welcome to have a page about them, but there are some prerequisites. First of all, the person must have received significant coverage in independent reliable sources. Secondly, the article must be written from a neutral point of view and cannot promote or disparage a candidate. Finally, the person must be notable, which has a slightly different meaning on Wikipedia. If you have any other questions, feel free to ask. Cheers! TN‑X-Man 14:10, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Question

Why was "Image" changed to "File"? 60.230.124.64 (talk) 10:48, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Because not all Image:'s are actually images. Some are sounds, videos or even PDFs. Garden. 11:13, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

How do I go about deleting sections from an article

The Sierra Leone article has a section called "In literature and film". How should I go about deleting this section. Should I just delete it, or talk about it on the talk page first. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 124.171.186.168 (talk) 14:34, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

When in doubt, discuss first. Hermione1980 14:39, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Why would you like to delete this section? It seems to be an well-written (if undersourced) addition to the article. Cheers! TN‑X-Man 15:05, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

New photo

I have uploaded an updated and better photo of Tammy Leitner to go with her wikipedia page, but do not have access to upload it directly. I uploaded it to commons, but don't believe I did it correctly. It is a photo I took myself, so I own the right. Can anyone help? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Mgossie (talk • contribs) 16:03, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Commons is a different project altogether than Wikipedia is. What you need to do is ask directly at the Commons help desk, which is located here: [10]. Toodles! --Jayron32.talk.contribs 17:02, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

You uploaded it to File:Track3.JPG, which is not a very good name. Someone has proposed that a bot rename it to a more appropriate name like File:Tammy Leitner.jpg. You can access it at the original name for now, but the name may change. —teb728 t c 22:28, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Reliable sources

Hello. Is the magazine Teen Ink considered a reliable source for book reviews? I just finished reading WP:RS and I'm still don't know. Kaguya-chan (talk) 16:06, 23 December 2008 (UTC) Just realized that this isn't the place to discuss reliable sources. Sorry. Kaguya-chan (talk) 16:14, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I would think that yes, yes they are a reliable source for book reviews. They have been publishing reviews for going on 20 years now. Remember, however, that since reviews are essentially opinion pieces they can only be cited as a source for the reviewing editor's opinion on the work in question. Cheers. L0b0t (talk) 16:16, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Question Regarding Creating Infoboxes

I have a question.

How do I create an Infobox when I am creating an article on Wikipedia? Any answers would be greatly appreciated. I would like to create another article on here but don't know how to create an Infobox. Again, any answers would be greatly appreciated. Please Just visit my talk page and leave it. I will read it when I get the chance. Thanks in advance.Frschoonover (talk) 16:58, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

See Help:Infobox and Category:Infobox templates. PrimeHunter (talk) 17:10, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

military air force

Is there any AWAKS plane in INDIA? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 125.20.11.34 (talk) 17:43, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Please read the notice at the top of this page--you want the Reference Desk. Thanks Jake Wartenberg^Talk 18:00, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

(edit conflict) I'm not sure. Please be aware that this desk is for answering questions about using Wikipedia. You may want to ask your question at the reference desk or look at the Indian Air Force article. Cheers! TN‑X-Man 18:02, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Possibly, see Awacs#Operators and Airborne Surveillance Platform for more information. Nanonic (talk) 18:03, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Userbox Icon

There is a userbox Icon on my user page but it links to the page about the image itself, not my User:DocDeel516/Userboxes. How can this be corrected?--DocDeel516 ^discuss 21:40, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Here's the code that I've used for this sort of thing in the past:

{{click|link=User:DocDeel516/Userboxes|image=Crystal kthememgr.svg|width=50px|height=50px|title=My userboxes}}

Let me know if that doesn't work for you. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 21:50, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Hi

How does Jimbo Wales make an income? Where does he get his money from? --Front Disco (talk) 23:15, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I haven't examined it but maybe Jimbo Wales and Wikia can be of help. If you actually want to know how the cost of operating Wikipedia is covered then it's not financed by Jimbo Wales. It's run by the Wikimedia Foundation, a non-profit organization receiving donations. PrimeHunter (talk) 00:01, 24 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Remember that the Help Desk is only for questions about using Wikipedia. This question is better suited to the reference desk. Thanks, Jake Wartenberg^Talk 03:01, 24 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Linking my name

To Whom It May Concern: I am mentioned in two articles: one on Highgate Wood Secondary Modern School and one on Kiss 100 FM. How do I link my name to both entries? Many thanks for your help. Yours, Lindsay Wesker —Preceding unsigned comment added by Lindsay Wesker (talk • contribs) 23:46, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Somebody would have to create an article about you at Lindsay Wesker. But see Wikipedia:Notability (people) and Wikipedia:Autobiography. Having a red link on your name in Highgate Wood Secondary School is not an error. It just means there is no Wikipedia article and may or may not be one in the future. A former article was deleted and is discussed at Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2007 February 4. PrimeHunter (talk) 00:16, 24 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Also using your real name as your Wikipedia user name is probably not a good idea. Wikipedia users are known to be stalked from time to time. BE CAREFULL.--intraining ^{Jack In} 03:23, 24 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think that it is necessarily/probably a bad idea. But it is important for the user to understand the risks involved. Jake Wartenberg^Talk 05:49, 24 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Non-editable Footnotes section of an article

I have tried, in vain, to figure out how to edit the Footnotes section of the Design article; I see a spelling error that I wish to correct. I am able to get into the edit mode of other sections of the article. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Clarepawling (talk • contribs) 23:53, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

See Wikipedia:Referencing for beginners. You have to edit the section where the number linking to the footnote is located. PrimeHunter (talk) 00:04, 24 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

December 24

Biographies of living persons policy

I know there is an established Wikipedia policy regarding biographies of living persons (WP:BLP). Is there a similar policy for biographies of deceased persons? Or is "living persons" in this context meant to differentiate from fictional persons? KuyaBriBri^Talk 04:44, 24 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Nope, we only have WP:BLP. Fictional or deceased persons cant sue, so we don't care about them is more or less how it has gone down. Icewedge (talk) 04:48, 24 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I would challenge that. Biographies of deceased people still must comply with the fairly stringent policy of verifiability. They just do not have the extra-careful attention paid to them, and editors removing contentious content from them do not have the 3 revert rule exemption granted when doing so to a BLP. -Seidenstud (talk) 07:09, 24 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Hi

Hello, Is there a list of the most viewed wikipedia pages? Thanks --Interesting Drug (talk) 08:21, 24 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Here is one such tool that may suit your needs: http://wikistics.falsikon.de/latest/wikipedia/en/ -Seidenstud (talk) 08:41, 24 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Why thank you, you little charmer. --Interesting Drug (talk) 08:49, 24 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Donation

Hello,

I was trying to donate to wiki, however, the form requires a STATE in the US. Since I live in Turkey, I could not fill that part and also there is no COUNTRY entry.

Please modify the form to include all countries and provide a maens to skip STATE.

Regards,

<personal information removed>—Preceding unsigned comment added by Kerciyes (talk • contribs) 09:53, 24 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

There is no such entry in the form I get to by clicking the 'donate to Wikipedia' link on the left sidebar. What, precisely, are you doing to reach such a form? Algebraist 10:06, 24 December 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. Chamal ^talk 11:34, 24 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

browsing in my mother tongue-Tamil

I want to browse Vikipedia in Tamil Version. How to get it? Help me. Thanks. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 59.92.60.254 (talk) 10:25, 24 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Here. Algebraist 10:31, 24 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

How do I get a template?

I would like to make a template for my profile, but I don't know how to do it! Can you please help me? --S.C.Ruffeyfan 11:38, 24 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

If it's just for you, there's no point making a template (since the point of templates is to be easily reusable in lots of places). What exactly do you want to do? Algebraist 11:43, 24 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I would like it to link it to various pages I've created. --S.C.Ruffeyfan 11:44, 24 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

You presumably know how to make a link. What's the problem? Algebraist 11:46, 24 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I haven't made a template before. --S.C.Ruffeyfan 11:49, 24 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

[Klotz-1] Klotz, Irene (2008-11-26). "Grounded space tourist wants $21 million refund". Yahoo News. Archived from the original on September 26, 2008.

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