Wikipedia:Help desk

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April 4

Flagging a page for deletion

How do i flag a page for deletion, specifically White House Office of Political Affiars, note the incorrect spelling. I have altered all the links and blanked the page but I don't know how to flag it for deletion, and I can't seem to find the answer, which I know is somewhere but I am too lazy to carry on looking Benny45boy (talk) 16:12, 14 April 2009 (UTC) Ignore question, I have found out how to do it Benny45boy (talk) 17:05, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

My talkpage TOC formatting disaster

Hi. My talkpage was getting too short, so I manually added a table of contents. However, since I have a hidden list at the top, the A-Z (1-26) are taking up too much room in the TOC! Is there a way I can make the TOC so that the hidden list does not show up? Thanks. ~AH1^(TCU) 01:41, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

I'm seeing a TOC that says "You clicked my blue A..." etc., which appears to be a box. Is this the TOC you're talking about? I'm asking because your talk page and mine look very different - but I'm using a particular skin. I don't see any lists that go from A-Z. How does a page get too short? I'm confused!LeValley (talk) 02:35, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

I would suggest that instead of a hidden transclusion of User:The Transhumanist/List of country outline government sections that you link to it. That way you could visit it when you want, but its sections would not appear in your TOC. As it is, the TOC is doing what it is supposed to. —teb728 t c 04:59, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

If you don't mind if they're not actual headings, and just want the look & feel of them, you could also always use ;A or <big>A</big> instead of ==== A ====. hmwithτ 21:13, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

I've changed the template to a link, and to visit my talkpage, please click the "T" and not the "A". ~AH1^(TCU) 01:15, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

To write with International Phonetic Alphabet

Resolved

ZooFari 21:06, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

I don't know if this is the right place to ask. Does somebody know how to write "Steinway & Sons" and "Steinway" with the International Phonetic Alphabet (Wikipedia:IPA)? Fanoftheworld (talk) 02:20, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

Based on WP:IPA for English, wiktionary:stein and wiktionary:way, I would go for {{IPA2|ˈstaɪnweɪ}} (IPA: [ˈstaɪnweɪ]), or perhaps IPA: [ˈʃtaɪnweɪ] if you feel the initial S should take the Germanic "sh" sound. Personally I would not bother explaining the "& Sons" part in an English encyclopaedia, but it would be IPA: [ˈstaɪnweɪ ænd sʌnz]. I am no IPA expert, so corrections are welcome. Certes (talk) 14:09, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

Thank you very much for helping! Fanoftheworld (talk) 22:12, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

Style on Wikipedia

Resolved

ZooFari 21:06, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

Is it against the rules to make the lead paragraph of an article somewhat interesting, as opposed to an etymological/linear entry? I'm not being facetious or rude, I hope. Specifically, I'm talking about entries in very broad categories, like Anthropology or...well, lots of other topics. I know everything is supposed to be verifiable, but as a copyeditor, we're asked to pay attention to tone. People often say the "tone" of the article is too dry and, while informative (in my example, the reader learns that "anthropos" is Greek for "human being" early in the article), may linger too long on less interesting stuff. Anthropologists study modern and ancient cannibals, using everything from mythology to mtDNA to fossilized feces (coprolites). That's interesting and truthful - but apparently we're supposed to lead with..."The ancient Greek root..." (except that of course the word wasn't invented until way after the Greeks lived - along about the 18th century...in use by 1781 when Kant used it...(etc.) Is all that dry stuff about Greeks and Kant necessarily first? Or are there degrees of freedom in editing Wikipedia? I am in favor of some sort of "happy medium," but I also think the "medium" would be different, based on article topic. Anthropology is broad and interesting, inviting various kinds of leads whereas an entry on "centimeter" or "Ionian mode" isn't quite the same. Oh - and if someone can direct me to where discussions like this are already taking place, that would be very helpful. LeValley (talk) 02:31, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

The instructions for the lead section can be found here. There is no 'order' that the information is presented in, but we should use common sense to determine the most suitable way to present the information. Unless there is an established format for the articles at WikiProject Anthropology, this should be ok. But make sure you don't use unnecessarily decorative language (no peacock or weasel words etc). I suggest you try at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Anthropology if you need a more detailed answer, since the people interested in this subject area would know about this more. Cheers. Chamal ^talk 02:49, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

Check Category:Anthropology for other articles relating to anthropology that might be better suited for emphasizing whichever aspects you care about. I'm not familiar with our anthropology articles, but I know that in other topic areas, a common misstep is to try to pile everything into the top-most article for the topic area (such as Solar energy), instead of breaking out subordinate ideas into the many related subordinate articles. (See WP:SPLIT and WP:SUMMARY for guidelines on how we divide up large topics into several articles.) If you have some new take on anthropology that Wikipedia doesn't already cover, you might be able to start a new article about it (although starting new articles and getting them to stick can be difficult). The top-most article in a topic area usually gets the most views and the most edits, which can make it much harder for getting your edits to "stick", since so many other editors might have a different idea for the article. Look at the article's history to see the frequency of edits - an article that gets edited every few minutes becomes harder for any individual editor to reshape. If you want to do something major to an existing article, discuss it with other editors first on the article's talk page. If you want to rewrite an article completely, you can make a user "sandbox" page to practice (almost) anything you like by clicking here: User:Levalley/Sandbox. That can be helpful for showing other editors what you have in mind, with less chance of someone deleting it out from under you. In general, the more of Wikipedia's articles you read in a given topic area, the more indications you may see that other editors did not necessarily read all the related articles - you may find contradictions, redundancies, and absences of informative links. Before editing the Anthropology article, it helps to be very familiar with what's in the related articles. Wikipedia often has extensive coverage of major fields, so it can take some study just to catch up to what's here, before you are in good position to break new ground. --Teratornis (talk) 07:57, 5 April 2009 (UTC)

Thanks, guys. I have read every page in the Anthropology project that I can find, and talk pages of many of the editors. I am thinking of trying to rewrite the article completely or substantially in my sandbox, this time. Anthropology is meant to be a pgae on anthropology-in-general (which in a sense, doesn't exist, but which is always a goal in the field), there are dozens of pages that represent various subfields in anthropology, to which that page should be linked. I am indeed finding contradictions, redundancies, etc - no one's fault, just part of the process. It's exciting to try and fix it. I'll stop editing bit by bit and try my sandbox.Levalley (talk) 19:05, 5 April 2009 (UTC)

How to set up disambiguation

As noted in the talk page about The Grail Movement, there is a need for disambiguation, and I'm unclear about how to go about this. The Grail Movement that is portrayed in the article is neither the only or the first Grail Movement. There is one that precedes it that is a women's organization not characterized by the inflammatory charge on the page. I would like to disambiguate the two different Grail Movements (they are completely unrelated). I can't find directions that help me to do that.

Here is verifiable information about the Grail: http://fore.research.yale.edu/religion/christianity/projects/grailville.html

02:43, 4 April 2009 (UTC)Prairiefyre (talk) 02:43, 4 April 2009 (UTC)prairiefyre

This page has the instructions for disambiguation pages. Please feel free to come back here if you need further help with this. Chamal ^talk 02:52, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

tags

What do these tags do:<noinclude>, <includeonly>, {{DEFAULTSORT}}?—SV 03:36, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

The noinclude and includeonly tags are used in transcluding a page. See here for the details. The defaultsort is a magic word used in adding an article to a category with a different name than the page name. More about that here. Cheers. Chamal ^talk 03:49, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

about the place

I am a volunteer from india working in indonesia, flores island, ruteng, would like to add information about ruteng, i live here more than a year, i can provide information about social, culture, entertainment, touristic places , food, staying etc., hope right now there is nothing about Ruteng, i can update information, which will be very useful for tourists when they want to visit this place. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Raviridwi (talk • contribs) 04:10, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

Information included in Wikipedia must be published in reliable sources. Unfortunately information based on unpublished personal knowledge cannot be included. —teb728 t c 04:27, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

However, if you can provide written sources for the information, please do contribute. We don't have much about Ruteng; indeed, our coverage of the whole area around East Nusa Tenggara in general is poor. Please examine other articles to see the kind of information we seek, which should be neutral in point of view, not the kind of advertising calculated to attract tourists. See WP:CITE for rules on citing your sources of information in verifiable publications. --Orange Mike | Talk 04:30, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

If you want to start a new article, see Wikipedia:Your first article. —teb728 t c 05:31, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

There is one major exception to the "no original research" rule: you are allowed (and encouraged) to take photographs and add them to Wikimedia commons, and then add them to articles in Wikipedia. We consider Photographs to be their own reliable sources, since someone else could actually go to the location and verify them (in theory.) Please take some pictures for us. If you need help adding them to commons and thence to Wikipedia, please come back and ask -Arch dude (talk) 15:55, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

For more information about uploading images to Commons, see Commons:Commons:First steps. If you upload images from your area, you can categorize them in Commons:Category:East Nusa Tenggara. If you find Commons difficult to figure out, you can upload your images to Flickr and license them as CC-BY-SA which makes them relatively simple to upload to Commons from there. (I suspect Flickr may be somewhat easier for more people to figure out because it has about 3 billion images compared to the 4 million on Commons.) See the Indonesian Wikipedia which may have some information that nobody has translated to the English Wikipedia yet. If you are bilingual, you might consider helping with translation. --Teratornis (talk) 07:35, 5 April 2009 (UTC)

How to write my something to WIKIEPEDIA?

Hello guys, I am new and confused. Can someone tell me how to add my definition into the WIKIPEDIA world, as well as description of that definition so everybody can search for it? Thanks —Preceding unsigned comment added by AlexanderMoroz (talk • contribs) 04:18, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

By "my definition" do you mean something new, a neologism or something you just created? Because Wikipedia is not for things made up one day. We are a reference guide to things already notable. --Orange Mike | Talk 04:24, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

Even if you are talking about the definition of an established word, Wikipedia is not generally a place for definitions of words. The related dictionary project (for established words) is Wiktionary. —teb728 t c 04:35, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

If you want to start a new encyclopedic article, see Wikipedia:Your first article. —teb728 t c 05:33, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

If you can find an existing article where your definition of the word fits in (as part of or an improvement to an existing definition), that's always good. If you want more help, leave a note on my talk page - I'm a newbie too, but I've gotten a few articles up, sometimes we n00bs are good coaches for each other.Levalley (talk) 21:56, 19 April 2009 (UTC)

Request copies of files: File: Outline map metro and rail Brussels.svg and File: Metro Brussels.svg but with new lines

Hello, Is it available to copy the files: File: Outline map metro and rail Brussels.svg and File: Metro Brussels.svg but changing the lines? Why? Because on Saturday, 4 April 2009, the STIB changes its lines. Metro lines 1A, 1B and 2 give them up to 4 lines. If you do not know the new subway lines, it is these 4 new lines following:

• 1 Gare de l'Ouest - Stockel (purple color)
• 2 Simonis (Leopold II) - Simonis (Elisabeth) (orange color)
• 5 Erasme - Herrmann-Debroux (gold color)
• 6 Roi Baudouin - Simonis (Elisabeth) (steelblue color)

Info: 4 color lines such as the example of Modèle:Métro de Bruxelles (in French). Note: In addition, the station Simonis has changed its name: Simonis (Leopold II) is the station on the upper level of the station Simonis (formerly served by the line 1A), and Simonis (Elisabeth) is the station's lower level of Simonis Station (where the terminus of line 2 done). TravauxSTIB

I think the best place to discuss this would be on the Brussels metro talk page. The editors there should be more aware of the situation and the best way to approach the images. TNXMan 12:30, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

How do I bring up an alphabetical list of each article I have have edited?

Resolved

I did this yesterday, and it was very easy to do, but I can't seem to duplicate it. Its very frustrating. Any help would be appreciated. Thanks. KevinOKeeffe (talk) 12:21, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

Try this tool which shows the articles you've created. Not sure if this is what you were looking for, but you can access this from your contributions page. The link is at the bottom of the page. Cheers. Chamal ^talk 12:55, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

If your acount is set up (in preferences) to add every page you edit to your watchlist, an alphabetical list is available by clicking My watchlist > View and edit watchlist. --Kateshortforbob 16:36, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

You can also see your most edited articles using this tool to see your most edited articles, but that's the closest tool of which I'm aware. If you do remember one that lists every page, let me know. hmwithτ 20:53, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

Template:Campaignbox Pakistan attacks

Pl correct this [1].yousaf465

I don't see any obvious problem with the template. What do you want us to do? Chamal ^talk 16:29, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

I wanted to add the latest attack.It's o.k.--10:32, 5 April 2009 (UTC)~~

main logo in upper left of every page ...

why is the wikipedia logo blurry?—Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.15.11.44 (talk) 16:44, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

It looks fine to me. Is it a browser problem or display error, perhaps? Try purging your cache. tempodivalse [☎] 17:44, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

nope, just blurry. cache purged, different monitors and display resolutions ... all blurry. seems to be a theme on this site ... compared to sites like google or yahoo! this site has blurry images/logos (user uploads not included/excluded from this observation).

TROY DOUGLIN

Troy Douglin did not work for Charlton Athletic Academy in the USA he worked for BE Soccer Academy in Seattle USA.

Thanks

Stewart Brown BE Soccer Aacademy Director (phone number removed) (email removed) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 90.208.229.132 (talk) 19:17, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

I have hidden the OP's phone number and e-mail to deter abuse. NonLeagueDaily and Rushall Olympic think Troy Douglin was with Charlton. Could he have worked for both, perhaps in different years? Certes (talk) 19:33, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

If you have reliable sources stating that he did work for BE Soccer Academy, please add it to the article. hmwithτ 20:45, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

Where should I ask for removal of full protection?

Resolved

Thanks! —Pgecaj (talk) 21:12, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

WP:RPP. – ukexpat (talk) 21:18, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

Question on IP block vs account

Resolved

ZooFari 21:24, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

Most of the time on Wikipedia, I am on a public network with a shared IP. I have decided to create my own account instead of anonymous IP editing. Today at some point, the IP on this network was blocked for editing. But it seems that my account is ok. Does this IP block in any way affect my account that is currently in good standing?Ivtv (talk) 21:44, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

No, you should still be able to edit via your account. As long as you didn't cause the block on the IP using the account is perfectly acceptable.  GARDEN  21:59, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

No, I do not vandalise which is why I created the account to begin with. Thanks for clarification.

Ivtv (talk) 22:02, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

If you still can't login, try seeking an Wikipedia:IP block exemption.Smallman12q (talk) 13:22, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

Deletion of Comment to Article

Can you tell me why my edit to an article ws deleted? Isn't it appropriate for the administrator to give a reason?≈≈≈≈Grandparent

This was already addressed at User talk:Grandparent. —C.Fred (talk) 22:23, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

April 13

help with "if" condition

Why doesn't it work?
{{#if:{{{something}}}=="hello"|abc|{{#if:{{{something}}}=="hi"|aaa}}}} and so on...
Thanks, 79.180.111.133 (talk) 00:04, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

I'm not good with wiki-markup, so I can't answer your question, but perhaps Wikipedia:Conditional tables might tell you what you want to know. tempodivalse [☎] 00:09, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

ahh.. sorry but I didn't find what I need there.. :/ 79.180.111.133 (talk) 00:18, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

Have a look at this page which explains how to use #if and other related parser functions. Tra (Talk) 00:20, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

Or failing that, please ask over at the technical section of the Village Pump. – ukexpat (talk) 00:23, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

huh? I just want to do that condition... what is so difficuly? :/ 79.180.111.133 (talk) 00:26, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

It appears that you need to use the {{#ifeq: string 1 | string 2 | value if true | value if false }} form. The {{#if: string | value if true | value if false }} form only checks for a non-empty "string", so it doe not evaluate the "==". The {{#ifexpr: expression | value if true | value if false }} form is also a possibility, but I don't know if it works with string values. (It does not.) -- Tcncv (talk) 00:57, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

I think you want the #switch: function; see mw:Help:Extension:ParserFunctions#switch:. --Gadget850 (talk) 00:59, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

Kevin Musker >> article appears to be made up

Resolved

 – Kevin Musker has been deleted. PrimeHunter (talk) 13:08, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

I thought that I spotted some vandalism at the bottom of the article entitled "Kevin Musker".

However, I then began to look at the article more closely.

I can't find any record of this person ever existing.

I looked at the Amazon.com view of the one source book Civil War High Commands, but the person's name is not listed in the index. I don't have access to the actual book.

I checked my Civil War book which appears to contain a public domain source of all Civil War generals along with their promotion dates.

He is not listed as a major general of the US army, a brevet major general of the US army, a major general of volunteers, a brevet major general of volunteers, a brigadier general of the US army, a brevet brigadier general of the US army, a major brigadier of volunteers, or a brevet brigadier general of volunteers. This name is not listed.

This website (http://sunsite.utk.edu/civil-war/wpclasses.html) lists all the West Point graduates who became Civil War generals. The name still cannot be located.

The story about a leg injury sounds familiar.

• • • • • I finally uncovered the similar story. That story along with the exact date of birth and death appear to have been taken from the article about Charles Ferguson Smith.

I am more than 99% sure that this article is fictional. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.133.171.51 (talk) 01:28, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

It appears to be a hoax. I checked this guy out on Google, and the only things I get are Wikipedia mirrors -- not mentioned anywhere. I will nominate this article for deletion, as such. Thanks for pointing this out. tempodivalse [☎] 01:31, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

Broken Links in External links

Resolved

 – tempodivalse [☎] 23:19, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

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

The above link has few broken External Links. How do I correct those as below?

Wrong USA Rajapalayam Rajus - http://www.rjpmrajususa.com/

Correct USA Rajapalayam Rajus - http://www.rajapalayam.us/ Bangalore Rajapalayam Rajus - http://bengalururajus.org/ —Preceding unsigned comment added by Sjsubash (talk • contribs) 01:36, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

Be bold and edit the article to change the links. – ukexpat (talk) 01:41, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

Rajapalayam is semi-protected so you must have an autoconfirmed account to edit it. I have updated the external link. PrimeHunter (talk) 13:06, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

I created a second account

Resolved

 – illumi (talk) 18:35, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Gah... I created a second account while visiting Wikinews cause I couldn't seem to login to my Wikipedia account there (I must have gotten my password wrong) I figured it needed a separate account and created User:Modred11 on there, and then I went to wikipedia and I was logged in as him still. I'm wondering what the procedure here is, should I request he be deleted or what. --illumi (talk) 02:42, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

• Unless you did a lot of work with the account, I recommend just abandoning the account. - Mgm|^(talk) 09:48, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

I wanna play a game

I am a very peculiar individual. I enjoy laying puzzles. I was interested in making a sort of treasure hunt through Wikipedia, by posting questions at the end of certain articles and having the participants look for the answers, I do admit that is not the purpose of this page but I think it would be very fun, especially taking into account this is what most high schools students like myself use for research. --207.150.172.54 (talk) 04:01, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

Even puzzles (such as "secret pages") in the userspace are very controversial; tolerated to some extent, in certain circumstances, but highly frowned upon. Wikipedia is not Myspace. However, any sort of puzzles inserted in the main namespace where articles are written is simply not appropriate, would be quickly reverted, and would be considered vandalism if persistently added.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 04:11, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

You might be able to start your own wiki at Wikia which could be about playing games. Something like this might already exist. Did you try searching the Web? --Teratornis (talk) 20:01, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

Diff abiogenesis

Is there a way to to see a diff view for the first edit to an article? I do not mean the difference between the creation edit and the second edit but the actual first edit. I imagine such a diff, if possible to view, would show nothing on the left side, and all the material in green as new on the right. The specific issue is that I want to use {{Split-to}} on a certain page, but the template calls for the following parameters:

{{Split-to
|page = name of page material was copied from
|diff = url of diff of copying the material
|date = date and time material was copied
}}

The diff parameter seeks the first diff when the material was added, but in the case I want to use it for (as I imagine would often be the case when this template would be used), the split point is the first edit to a newly created page where the material was split to without proper GFDL attribution, showing the material being added. I guess I could just use the permanent link to that earliest edit, but I wanted to explore finding a way to follow the actual template parameters first.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 05:00, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

You can view a diff of the first edit to the page by going to the earliest permanent link then replacing oldid= in the address bar with diff= but you get a page like this which is technically a diff page but which does not show any changes. Tra (Talk) 10:06, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

Thank you Tra. Simple enough. I will update the documentation subpage of the template to explain this.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 12:24, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

7th Rib Surgery for Cancer

Resolved

 – Wikipedia can't provide medical advice, please see the medical disclaimer. Thanks, tempodivalse [☎] 18:09, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

Please respond, as already have surgery scheduled for the 21st of this month.

I have Breast Cancer, that went into my 7th rib. Started in Sept 2006, rec'd 2nd opinion at City of Hope and at that time they suggested I have the Cancer on my 7th rib removed. The docs here did not act on that recommendation. However, now, the Oncologist has decided I should have the Cancer on 7th rib removed.

The doc that will be doing it, has never done this procedure before - he is a heart doctor. Is this doc ok to do this surgery, or should I go to City of Hope?? Please respond...thank you!! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.27.237.35 (talk) 05:10, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

Sorry but Wikipedia cannot give you medical advice. —teb728 t c 05:15, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

7th Rib Surgery for Cancer

Question for medical advice removed. We cannot offer medical advice. Please see the medical disclaimer. Contact your General Practitioner. --Jayron32.talk.contribs 05:23, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

Admin user account User:Jersey_Devil invalid blocking

Resolved

 – Wrong venue, duplicate post of Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents#Admin_user_account_.5B.5B108.5D.5D_invalid_blocking. Please direct all discussion there. tempodivalse [☎] 17:19, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

[duplicate post removed] Onetwo1 (talk) 06:44, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

This is a duplicate post. See this discussion. Tra (Talk) 11:13, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

Semi-protected article on helicopter

Resolved

 – per asker's talk page ZooFari 03:05, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

I've just established an account with Wikipedia for the first time and am anxious to contribute to the project.

I'm writing a children's book on helicopters and have a reference I think should be added to the bibliography section of the article [helicopter]. However, the article is listed as "semi-protected" and there is no "Edit This Article" tab at the top of the page. How do I get permission to add a bibliography citation (and a couple of additional pieces of information on early helicopter models) to this article.

Thanks for helping a newbie.

Bryan Johnson Yamamoto333 Yamamoto333 (talk) 08:13, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

You'll have to wait to get autoconfirmed status before you can edit the article. That means 10 edits after four days (usually). Or you can post on the article's page and request someone add the relevant information. Zain Ebrahim (talk) 08:49, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

• The page Zain is referring to is the article talk or discussion page. - Mgm|^(talk) 09:43, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

Footnotes in Harvard Style

Resolved

 – Manuel-aa5 (talk) 15:20, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

In Wikipedia, standard footnotes are formated in superscript (e.g. ^[1] ^[2] and so on). Is it possible, to switch footnote formate to Harvard Style? Example:

   "In history (Klein, 2005) was nothing, but than modern times started (Feldon, 1998).

I mean, that superscript blows up the linespacing. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Manuel-aa5 (talk • contribs)

Surely, i can use Harvard Style without the Wikisyntax < revf > </revf> But then I miss the hyperlink-functionality of the references.

The line spacing looks fine in Firefox; it's been a long time since I've used anything else for more than a few minutes at a time, though. Aside from that, yes, it is acceptable to use Harvard citation, but, if an article already has an established and consistent style of referencing, you should stick to that. If you do use Harvard citation, you can use {{harv}} and related templates to link to the appropriate full citation, but note that only {{citation}} generates the appropriate anchors automatically; if you use the "cite" family of templates ({{cite web}}, {{cite news}}, etc.), you will need to add the correct ref= parameter manually for hyperlinking from {{harv}} to work. — TKD::{talk} 10:48, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Converting citation styles should not be done without first gaining consensus for the change on the article's talk page. For information on implementing this style, see Wikipedia:Parenthetical referencing. Wikpedia uses some CSS code to fix the line height when using superscript or subscript, but Internet Explorer 7 it has problems with the line-height CSS selector. --Gadget850 (talk) 10:53, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

Resolved

 – Dpro1 (talk) 17:42, 18 April 2009 (UTC)

== Google map link is out of date: how to get the most recent edit appearing??? ==

On Googlemaps the [[2]link] to my school has a Wikipedia entry which is old (and illiterate!). The current W page is what should appear but doesn't: can someone please advise? Thanks very much. Dpro1 (talk) 11:38, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

Well, this sounds like something to ask at the Google forums instead of here, as Wikipedia doesn't have any control over what content Google puts up at its website. My explanation would be that Google hasn't yet updated its Wikipedia mirror, so it's showing an old version of that page. tempodivalse [☎] 17:15, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

What can I do when an entry is wrong?

Resolved

 – Mistake redirectedZooFari 03:00, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

I have just found an entry that I know to be wrong ... Knoll sofa. It never was 'Knoll sofa' but "Knole". I can't even edit to make it correct and the title is incorrect ... is there anything I can do? 12:32, 13 April 2009 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Pixiecoo (talk • contribs)

I have redirected Knole sofa to Knoll sofa. Both spellings are used according to for example [3] and [4]. You can suggest another title at Wikipedia:Requested moves. PrimeHunter (talk) 12:57, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

Research

Resolved

 – Wrong venue, please ask your question at the Humanities reference desk. Thanks, tempodivalse [☎] 17:17, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

Good Morning. I am trying to research past law decisions in the N.J. court system regarding defendants DUI cases that were dismissed due to improper police procedure. Can anyone guide me in this search? Thank You. EugeneFailla —Preceding unsigned comment added by Funzone2 (talk • contribs) 14:38, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

Have you tried Wikipedia's Reference Desk? They specialize in knowledge questions and will try to answer just about 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. – ukexpat (talk) 14:45, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

The Humanities reference desk seems to be the correct venue for your question. Cheers, tempodivalse [☎] 17:17, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

Naming convention

Resolved

 – Zereshk (talk) 03:58, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Why is the article University of California, Los Angeles not named UCLA as its main title per "the most recognizeable name" convention? Same question for "MIT" vs "Massachussettes Institute of Technology". Isn't "MIT" a more popular name?--Zereshk (talk) 15:11, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:Naming conventions#Prefer spelled-out phrases to abbreviations. I don't think they are almost exclusively known only by their abbreviation. PrimeHunter (talk) 15:20, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

(e/c)There's a convention of using educational institutions' full names. See the discussion at Talk:University of California, Los Angeles#Requested move. --AndrewHowse (talk) 15:22, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

Looking for Wikipedia Guru's to Share Knowledge at Microsoft

I work at Microsoft and we are creating our own internal Wikipedia. We have some basic ideas of the Wikipedia framework but want to learn more from the experts. I would like to reach out to Wikipedia guru’s that can give me insight on the “behind the scenes” of Wikipedia. Specifically, Wikipedia’s governance and community model.

Would you be interested or know of folks that may be interested?

It would be great to get some of the Wikipedia guru’s to share their knowledge and perhaps present at Microsoft.

I look forward to your response.

Simone —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.112.89.198 (talk) 15:25, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

• Wikipedia is the name for this particular website. What you probably mean is that you'd like to have your own internal wiki for work-related materials. If you like our software you want MediaWiki (the article should have a link to the site with the software. If you like experts about the internal workings to present, you should have a look at m:Developers. If you want more of an overview on how to use the software there are some editors who give that type of lectures regularly, but unfortunately, I'm drawing a blank on names at the moment. - Mgm|^(talk) 15:40, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

I know that Durova has written articles online about Wikipedia before and I believe that Elonka has given talks on the subject. TNXMan 15:45, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

• What software are you using for Microsoft's Enterprise wiki? Microsoft's own SharePoint software, or MediaWiki (which powers Wikipedia), or something else? I suspect the specific software you choose will impact the governance model which evolves on your wiki (wikis inevitably evolve, because they are inherently bottom-up organizations). What we do on Wikipedia has been strongly influenced by what the MediaWiki software makes easy to do. If we were running on different software, we might have a somewhat different governance model.
  • If you plan to use MediaWiki, see mw:Enterprise use of MediaWiki.
• You might contact some of your business partners at Intel and ask them about Intelpedia. I would imagine Intel's experience would be relevant to Microsoft, given the business overlap.
• Read everything linked from {{Wiki topics}}, in particular Enterprise wiki and Personal wiki.
• If you want your wiki to look and feel like Wikipedia, then you want to run the MediaWiki software. While MediaWiki is great software, its designers built it to run the world's largest free content encyclopedia. Thus it lacks some features that enterprise wikis need, such as fine-grained access control. However, a company with Microsoft's programming talent could easily customize its own version of MediaWiki to do whatever it needs.
• If you have a big budget and you want to bring in some heavy hitters, Clay Shirky and Yochai Benkler have interesting insight into collaborative editing and Commons-based peer production. Or you could just read their books and watch their videos on YouTube. Both have studied Wikipedia among other systems. I don't know whether they would have the depth of insight specific to Wikipedia that you might want, but I am sure you will learn many useful ideas from them.
• Perhaps the largest and most visible collection of Wikipedia-specific expertise on public display is Wikimania.
• See WP:EIW#Research for links to people (mostly academics) who study Wikipedia.

Good luck. If you have any detailed questions, you could leave them on my talk page. --Teratornis (talk) 19:18, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

New Individual

I am a scientist of repute with two US Patents in biotechnology and one in heavy metal extraction chemistry. I am also the inventor of BioSparge technology, which has been used by every branch of the Armed Services, many states, Canada and Mexico. I am also the discover of Angular Chronology and my work is cited within several contexts during Google searches. I do not appear on Wikipedia, however. How do I create and post my Biblio? Thank you for your assistance in this matter. Michael M. Hobby —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.180.83.42 (talk) 17:13, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

Well, people are discouraged from writing their own articles because of the inherent conflict of interest. The best thing to do is to request that someone else write the article, either at requested articles or articles for creation. Remember that all articles must be written neutrally and supported by independent reliable sources. TNXMan 17:17, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

External Links

It seems another admin has deleted my external links. I was wondering why? I have already had this problem before and another admin suggested that the only way I could use my external references was to refer directly to the page instead of the web sites themselves, otherwise it seems as I am trying to promote them, so that is what I did. I would really like to include my references because they have much more information for those that are interested in learning more about nanoindenters. There is far too much information to put on that page itself.The other admin said that would be fine. Please tell me how I can add my external links/references without you all, always deleting them. I have already read all the rules and guidelines on external links, so I dont see the problem. Volvera215 (talk) 17:46, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

That EL doesn't jsut give information about nanoindenters in general, it really promotes Micro Star nanoindenters, specifically. It's too promotional. hmwithτ 17:54, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

(edit conflict) For others interested, this is the EL: http://www.microstartech.com/index/NANOINDENTERS.pdf. hmwithτ 17:57, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

What do you suggest I do, so that I may include such references for others that are reading the article and are interested in learning more, as far as what other types of nanoindenters exist and so forth? Volvera215 (talk) 18:18, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

We need verifiable well-formatted references to the original publication of information by impartial, reliable sources. --Orange Mike | Talk

19:05, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

In reference to the article on nanoindentation, at the bottom of the page, they have one external link which goes directly to a maufaturing website. This article has been on wikipedia since March of 2007. My question is how does that EL differ from the one I created on nanoindenter? Volvera215 (talk) 20:52, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

You make a good point. I've removed the other link as well, it does not seem to be appropriate. TNXMan 01:12, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

Sortable table from Excel

Resolved

 – TNXMan 01:11, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

Hello, I'm trying to make a sortable table from one I've made in Excel. In the past I've used this tool for Excel to wiki conversion, but that doesn't make a sortable table. Is there a similar tool to make the generated wiki-table sortable? Thanks in advance. TastyCakes (talk) 17:55, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

I'm assuming your table is laid out the standard way, with the column headings at the top and each row appearing underneath that. Generate the wikitext the normal way with Excel, then at the first line of wikitext, replace class="wikitable" with class="wikitable sortable". If that doesn't work, please link to the table you're trying to make sortable. Tra (Talk) 18:38, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

Perfect, thanks a lot. TastyCakes (talk) 20:02, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

using sandbox

Resolved

 – Alethe (talk) 17:33, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

with thanks.

I tried sandbox for the first time today, to start a new stub. I don't know how to get back to it to, and I have less than 12 hrs before the work is lost. I don't see in yr instructions on sandbox how to return to it once one's saved a version. Quick help much appreciated. Thanks Alethe (talk) 18:11, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

Nothing that is ever saved in the Sandbox is ever lost, it is just a bit harder to find when removed. Is this the version you are talking about? tempodivalse [☎] 18:18, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

(e/c) I moved the content you entered there to User:Alethe/sandbox. The main sandbox gets turned over rather quickly, but the page in your userspace will be less volatile. --AndrewHowse (talk) 18:20, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

Editing in the main sandbox is like building a sand castle on a public beach, except that as the above responses illustrate, Wikipedia saves the history of every edit by every user (that is, assuming you do not make some edits and then cancel them before saving). Your user space functions more like your own semi-private beach, except that you don't actually own it. Other editors will generally leave your userspace alone, by convention, but we have rules to govern user space as well, and if you violate them, another editor might eventually change your work there. --Teratornis (talk) 18:40, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

Weight gain/loss

How long does it take for weight gain/loss to show up on the scale? I've heard that if you eat poorly it can take up to two weeks for it to show up on the scale and others have said that it takes a few days. Same with losing weight, my question is how long will it take before you can see your efforts on the scale?

Have you tried Wikipedia's Reference Desk? They specialize in knowledge questions and will try to answer just about 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. Algebraist 18:55, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

A person's rate of weight gain (or loss) depends on their daily calorie excess (or deficit), much like the way your checking account balance rises or falls, depending on the sizes of your deposits and withdrawals. You could watch Super Size Me for one example (SUPER SIZE ME presented by Cinetic on YouTube). --Teratornis (talk) 19:58, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

Layout problems

Resolved

 – Sam 14:26, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

I've just put a large table with details of all the Bristol councillors on the Politics of Bristol page, but I can't get the text to the right of the table to go under the table- it just stays in its awkward place to the right no matter what I do.

Can someone give me some hints how to get it to behave- or even better, do it for me? :P —Preceding unsigned comment added by SamUK (talk • contribs) 19:05, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

SamUK and I have both had a try at this. Can you please check that I've not accidentally changed any content? Certes (talk) 20:13, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

On second thoughts I have reverted my change as it breaks the table formatting. Picking the best bits of each version should do the trick. Still unresolved. Certes (talk) 20:19, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

Another approach would be to take some existing templates instead of building a table from scratch. See members of Category:Political party colour templates for examples? --AndrewHowse (talk) 20:40, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

Those templates are already correctly used within the cells. The table layout has now been improved and looks right to me but may look wrong for some readers. I've posted a hint from Help:Table at Talk:Politics of Bristol but can't try it out on my system as I can't reproduce the fault. Certes (talk) 11:22, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

It's working now! Thanks for all the help. Sam 14:26, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Deleting an uploaded image

Resolved

 – Editor's only image upload deleted Skier Dude (talk) 20:17, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

How can I delete an image that I have uploaded in error? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Eightiesnr (talk • contribs) 19:16, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

Tag the page with {{db-author}}. TNXMan 19:51, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

override collapsed state when transcluding a template made with Navbox?

Resolved

 – tempodivalse [☎] 20:38, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

I want to transclude the writing guides template, in its uncollapsed state, onto a user page. However, that template uses the Navbox template with autocollapse state, so if there are any other similar boxes, it is automatically collapsed. Is there a way to override this behavior? Thanks, Baccyak4H (Yak!) 20:05, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

I wish there was a way to make some properties inheritable, that would prevent that sort of problems. I'm not quite sure there is a way to do what you want here, apart from writing your own template with the behaviour you like of course. Equendil Talk 20:15, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

Change the template:

|state = {{state|autocollapse}}

This keeps the current setting as the default, but allows it to be changed with |state=. Discuss it on the talk page. --Gadget850 (talk) 20:27, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

Wow, that appears to work. Thanks! Baccyak4H (Yak!) 20:36, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

You might write a documentation subpage for the template, per WP:DOC. If you do, you could put the {{Collapsible option}} template on the documentation subpage to document the state option:

<includeonly>{{collapsible option}}</includeonly>

See for example the documentation for this template: {{Peak oil}}. --Teratornis (talk) 21:18, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

how do i write a page

i was wondering how to write a story or biography on something or someont, can you help me. —Preceding unsigned comment added by NBallerA (talk • contribs) 20:51, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

See: WP:FAQ#CREATE, the first FAQ entry. --Teratornis (talk) 21:20, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

If your story is original, see WP:NOR. Guidelines about biographies are in WP:BIO and WP:BLP. Note: the mechanics of creating new articles are relatively straightforward, but it's more difficult for the new user to add content which will "stick", because Wikipedia deletes thousands of articles for violating our policies and guidelines. --Teratornis (talk) 21:25, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

Hide Images

Resolved

 – Bac5665 (talk) 15:15, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Is there a way to turn off images on a page?

For example, to read about spiders without an photos being displayed. Is there a way to do this? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Bac5665 (talk • contribs) 20:58, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Options to not see an image. --Teratornis (talk) 21:22, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

My Categories Deleted Unfairly

Two of my categories were nominated for deletion, and they were deleted without the slightest hint of why. The reasons why sounded too ridiculous and unusual. Their reasons for deleting them were totally irrevelant. It was not overcategorization, and those two categories were indeed characteristics. They were categories for Title tracks released as singles, and Singles released from compilation albums. There are plenty of categories that would have been much longer than them, and since there were much longer categories, and that not every title track was released as a single, and not every single was released from a compilation album, I feel that they were totally unfair deletions, as well as being totally ridiculous, and this is a very serious problem. Please help me out. Ryanbstevens (talk) 22:30, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

You may want to review WP:DELETE, and the related page on deletion review, as the category appears to have been deleted as a result of Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2009 April 7#Category:Singles released from compilation albums. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 23:09, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

I see you participated in the discussions at Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2009 March 30#Category:Title tracks released as singles and Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2009 April 7#Category:Singles released from compilation albums. There was clear consensus to delete and I think there were valid concerns about the categories. Singles cannot have separate categories for every property associated with a subset of singles. Other editors didn't think these two properties of singles were worth a category. I'm afraid you will just have to accept that. You can see Wikipedia:Why was my page deleted?#What you can do about it, but I don't think there is anything to do in this case. On a collaborative project like Wikipedia you must expect to win some and lose some. PrimeHunter (talk) 23:26, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

I believe it was Winston Churchill who said "We will never surrender". See Wikipedia:Categories, lists, and navigation templates - there are two other methods of grouping links to articles that you might explore. You might attract the unkind attention of deletionists with them as well. But maybe not exactly the same deletionists with the same views, and the criteria for categories, lists, and navigation templates are slightly different from each other. If you don't succeed in the article space (with a list), nor in the Template: namespace (with a navigation template), other options include:

• Make a list as a subpage in project space, for example maybe under Wikipedia:WikiProject Albums or something similar. The various WikiProjects have methods of grouping articles for their own maintenance efforts.
• Make a list in your user space.
• Find an alternative outlet.
• Learn about Semantic wiki technology which might someday render Wikipedia's present category system obsolete and allow for extremely flexible, user-selectable article grouping. Maybe someday if semantic wikis catch on, these "one size must fit all" battles about which categories to keep may seem somewhat silly in retrospect.

--Teratornis (talk) 01:26, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

April 14

mesin diesel

semua hal mengenai pneumatik governor??? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 222.124.211.178 (talk) 02:04, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

I'm not sure what you are trying to ask. This desk is for questions about using Wikipedia, if you have a specific knowledge question, you may want the reference desk. TNXMan 02:10, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

And you'll need to communicate in English. This is the English-language Wikipedia. --Orange Mike | Talk 02:49, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

I think that's Indonesian. Try id.wikipedia.org. --AndrewHowse (talk) 03:01, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

Or if you can read English, you may be able to learn a little about pneumatic governors at Governor (device). —teb728 t c 03:05, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

Copyright infringement?

Hi, I'm placing this question here because I don't really feel like wading through all the help files to find the correct spot... I'm working on bringing the article protein back up to GA status by sourcing the material and adding inline citations, and during my Googling, I discover that the book Biotechnology, written by Christopher Lewis and published by Global Media, has huge swaths of text that are identical to the article I'm working on, including figures and figure captions. Turns out this book was "written" in 2007, which is later than when protein was last GA. The textbook, can be found here at Google books. Sasata (talk) 05:20, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

I tracked the earliest revision of the "nutrition" section more or less identical to a section in that book preview, and it appears to have been written on Wikipedia on 25 August 2006 [5], definitively prior to publication of that book. I expect that book is in serious breach of the GFDL. Equendil Talk 07:42, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

Why AfD frustrates me

Resolved

 – Antivenin 07:34, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Not really resolved, but I can't go against consensus. Antivenin 07:34, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

I've got a question on Wikipedia policies. More specifically, about how they're applied to AfDs. I'd like to direct your attention to this AfD. The nominator suggested that Susan Boyle does not satisfy notability guidelines as she's just another contender on a TV show. I agree with that, as contenders do not merit their own article. Then came a flurry of 'Keep' arguments stating that as she sang so very well and the judges gave her a standing ovation right after she sang the first note, she deserves her own article. Youtube was also being used as a deciding factor about whether she was notable or not. From my understanding of policy, Youtube should not / cannot be considered. Strong Keep over 250K youtube views already amongst well over 50 videos (edit: now over 350K on one vid alone and While I always strive to maintain a NPOV, I must point out the sheer quality of her performance... standing ovation from the judges, the entire crowd, after just the first vocal left her lips. were some of the arguments used. Also, if she is notable (which I doubt), it would be because of a single performance. Wouldn't that come under WP:ONEEVENT or WP:BLP1E? All the news paper articles talk about that one performance too.

So that is my opinion up there. And yet, I must be wrong. As Looie496 pointed out, 31 people wanted to keep it, 5 people wanted it deleted. So he closed it (non-admin closure). I was rather looking forward to an admin closure, as that admin would decide whether (1) Youtube can be used as a measure of notability, (2) WP:ONEEVENT can be ignored by zealous fans, and (3) whether AfD is really a !vote process or a vote process.

So I want to get your opinion on this. What do you guys think?

On a lighter note, here are some of the more amusing !votes:

Keep - it belongs here because I looked for it here on Wikipedia.

VERY STRONG KEEP - This article NEEDS to be on wikipedia. Without it, wikipedia would be a terrible place! Please, please, please keep it!

Keep (no, that's not a typo). ...

Oh yea, and since I'm posting this anyway, I question the relevance of WP:SNOW in AfDs. It's all very well in RfAs where a minimum % of supports are required, but AfDs require consensus. A hundred people could repeat the same wrong argument and it would still get closed by WP:SNOW. Not fair.

(Also posted at the village pump) Antivenin 08:16, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

Arguments based on "I like it" responses should be ignored. See Wikipedia:Arguments to avoid in deletion discussions for more. --Gadget850 (talk) 09:33, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

There is a case to be made here that Wikipedia is not a bureaucracy, ultimately, the question asked on AfD is: is the encyclopedia better off or worse off including article X. It is worth noting that this particular article adheres to the more fundamental principles of Wikipedia: verifiability, NPOV, no breach of copyright, etc.

If we'd like to indulge in wikilawyering, notability guidelines are only guidelines, inherently blurry and far from being universally followed. WP:BLP1E does not imply that notability derived from a single event is a criteria *against* inclusion, mostly it invites editors to think twice about it and whether the event or the person are to be covered. Worth remembering also is that Wikipedia is not a paper encyclopedia, we do not aim to limit the volume of articles. Also Wikipedia:Arguments to avoid in deletion discussions is just an essay.

Another note here, in the spirit of Wikipedia not being a bureaucracy, if something does not require admin tools, then it does not require an admin. Makes no difference if an admin or a non admin closes an AfD discussion with a "keep" or "no concensus" result.

Finally, on the AfD process, and more generally on the idea of "concensus", I would argue that "decision by concensus" is a pipe dream. Sometimes it works: get people to sit around a table and exchange ideas, eventually strong arguments are made, people rally behind those and lo and behold, a concensus was built. Sometimes it does not, and you are left with several set of opinions. No concensus was established, yet a decision has to be made. In a professional environment, decision might be taken in a despotic way, by the project manager or whatever. In a purely collaborative environment, the decision making process would naturally take the form of a majority, absolute majority or supermajority vote. I think we are a quite hypocritical about it on Wikipedia, calling "concensus" what is often merely a supermajority opinion or even that of an absolute majority. The hypocrisy of it does not go unnoticed, which is why people frequently joke sarcastically about "!vote". The Afd process, in my opinion, mixes characteristics of a (super)majority vote, despotism (the closing admin gets to decide which arguments hold weight), though occasionally, a real discussion develops and a true concensus is established. One fault of the AfD process is that it attracts people more interested in having something to show for a future RfA nomination (an even more blatant example of a supermajority vote) than in building a concensus, casting !ballots hurriedly and never revisiting the discussion. I'm starting to rant, so I'll stop now. Equendil Talk 11:26, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

The status of Arguments to Avoid and the notability guidelines isn't really relevant, but document common practice and not following either because they're not labelled policy is exactly the sort of wikilawyering that should be avoided. When an admin closes a debate, they should do so based on the strength of the comments each of the comments the original poster mentions are forms of WP:ILIKEIT or big numbers that don't actually prove anything. Occasionally people vote to keep something with the reasoning it has thousands of google hits. (These are often bad hits because the searcher failed to use quotation marks, but even if they do, it's the content of the pages that matter, not the volume). Unless the deletion is clear-cut with no one disagreeing (apart from the nominator or creator), a debate should be closed by an administrator. (Mgm, who's about to go and thus logged out) - 131.211.210.206 (talk) 12:45, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

(Note that this reply does not come after reviewing the AfD, I'm on my way out the door, sorry) It sounds like you have a valid point, Antivenin. I would suggest putting this case up for review at DRV to see if the closure was handled correctly. TNXMan 11:51, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

Antivenin, Hi. I don't want to bite, but several things come to mind as I read this post. The AfD is actually the place to make these arguments that you're making to delete this article. Some editors may see this type of posting to the Help Desk (for getting help on how to use Wikipedia), and the Village Pump (for discussion of ideas concerning Wikipedia) as Forum Shopping. Arguments such as I LIKE IT work both ways (see I DON'T LIKE IT). You may also remember seeing WP:NOTPAPER in your travels, we are not constrained by a limited amount space for our articles. I think the actual AfD is the better place for this discussion. Best of luck — Ched :  ?  13:31, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

It's a little hard to do that when the Afd has been closed, rightly or wrongly. – ukexpat (talk) 14:07, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

I'd say re-open it as an inappropriate non-admin closure. --Orange Mike | Talk 14:20, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

I'd agree with that, but I think reopening the debate so soon after closure (whether proper or improper) runs the risk of being labeled disruptive and pointy. As I mentioned above, DRV is probably the best venue. TNXMan 14:28, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

Just wanted to note here that since this discussion started, the AfD was reopened...and has since been speedy closed again, this time by an uninvolved admin. --Onorem♠Dil 14:32, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

Well it does certainly appear that this isn't one of those items that will fade quietly into the night. ;) — Ched :  ?  14:41, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

@ukexpat at the time I started typing my reply it was open - by the time I finished, it was closed, I'm guessing we'll need a calculator before it's over ... lol ;) — Ched :  ?  14:43, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

Open again. I reopened it because of the recent change to AfD that said to quit with the "snowball keeps" and let them run a full 7 days. (I previously !voted to keep, so I'm not trying to get the result to change.) --SarekOfVulcan (talk) 15:07, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

Note: Due to a cross-posting, this is also being discussed at VPM: Wikipedia:Village pump (miscellaneous)#Why AfD frustrates me. – ukexpat (talk) 14:53, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

I wonder how long before it's an AN/I listing. — Ched :  ?  15:11, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

And....cue ANI: Afd now reopened per discussion at WP:ANI: Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents#WP:Articles for deletion/Susan Boyle again. – ukexpat (talk) 15:12, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia User Name error

Resolved

 – tempodivalse [☎] 14:14, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

My Wikipedia User Name is mis-spelled. How can i change it? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Ashoka rajalingam (talk • contribs) 09:15, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:Changing username. --Gadget850 (talk) 09:35, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

Yep, Wikipedia:Changing username is the correct venue for this. tempodivalse [☎] 14:14, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

However, as you only have one edit (your message above), it might not be worth going through that rigmarole. Just abandon your current user name and create a new account with the correct name. – ukexpat (talk) 14:16, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

We want to start a wiki for our webshow.

Resolved

 – No, sorry, per WP:ADS

Ok, so, we have started a web show based on the anime Death Note. We want to make it a wiki entry so that it canbecome more known. We already have abou 50 fans.Would we be able to do that?

Our youtube channel is

youtube.com/user/AkaMayProductions

Thank you for your considerations:

Akamayproductions (talk) 13:51, 14 April 2009 (UTC)Emily and Heather of AkaMayProductions.

You might, but I suggest you read the information on what web-content articles need and this guide on writing your first article. TNXMan 14:01, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

Sorry, but no is likely to be the answer. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia with articles about things that are notable. We have strict polices against advertising or promoting things via Wikipedia I'm afraid and a 50 memember webshow is certainly not going to meet our standards for inclusion. Pedro :  Chat  14:04, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

(e/c) Hate to disagree with Tnxman but in my view your idea is in direct conflict with Wikipedia's rules prohibiting the use of Wikipedia for advertising or promotion. Your user name has also been blocked because it contravenes the user name policy. – ukexpat (talk) 14:05, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

I don't think that Wikipedia can accept this article, for reasons listed above; specifically, it doesn't seem that your article meets our criteria for notability. Also, as I see your username, I would advise you to read our conflict of interest policy. Thanks. tempodivalse [☎] 14:08, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

I guess I should clarify my response. :P Is it likely that an article can be created for this web show? Not really. Is it possible? Sure. Given coverage in one or two reliable sources, there might be a stub in there somewhere. TNXMan 14:10, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

Given that the intent is "to make it a wiki entry so that it canbecome [sic] more known", I doubt it will pass the spam test. – ukexpat (talk) 14:18, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

Yup, a bad case of WP:UPANDCOMING from an s.p.a. role account. --Orange Mike | Talk 14:23, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

Just to be contrarian, I will point out that if all 50 fans of the show are Wikipedia editors with 10,000 or more edits each, I believe they could find a way to make an article stick. ("Notability" is not an intrinsic property of a thing, but is entirely socially constructed, and a sufficiently motivated and resourceful group of partisans could manufacture notability for just about anything.) However, the odds that the show would have such representation on Wikipedia are probably remote, because the questioner needed to ask the question here (instead of simply asking the fans), in which case I would have to go with the negative outlooks above. --Teratornis (talk) 21:02, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

I'd like to believe that if all 50 fans happened to be tenured Wikipedia editors they'd know that the the show would fail our guidelines, and have the honesty and integrity to not even begin to steamroll such an option. Maybe I'm a little naive, but still. Pedro :  Chat  21:05, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

In a way, I admire idealism, it makes me a bit nostalgic for those magical days before I became jaded and world-weary...but the guidelines are themselves the result of prior steamrolling. For example, consider how far Wikipedia has strayed from the Dear Leader's opinion of userboxes. However, I refer above to the actual construction of notability, for example by promoting the subject to enough journalists to create a few dozen reliable sources about it. No steamrolling would be required, if the partisans knew how to massage the subject into compliance with Wikipedia's policies and guidelines. If the article would even come up for deletion, that would constitute failure. There are lots of journalists looking for stories. Look at how the Westboro Baptist Church has attained notability despite having fewer than 100 members. --Teratornis (talk) 21:16, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

Indeed. Idealism and realism may be sides of a coin - or sides of a cube in Wikipedia world. Pedro :  Chat  21:19, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

Looking for a Challenge?

Resolved

 – DanielPenfield (talk) 14:08, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

After the recent death of the article's subject, the WP:SPA User:Peterluger seems intent on turning the article Stephen Minarik into a memorial by pasting the reactions of multiple public officials into the article (compare yesterday's ambitious edit to today's more modest edit). However, none of the Category:Standardised user warning templates apply and the WP:NOTMEMORIAL only explicitly deals with article creation, not with content. Furthermore the statements appear to be properly sourced.

Anyone care to try to guide User talk:Peterluger along the path of true enlightenment?

-- DanielPenfield (talk) 15:11, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

The spirit of WP:NOTMEMORIAL still applies, as does WP:UNDUE. I have removed the excessive tributes and will leave a message for User:Peterluger.. – ukexpat (talk) 15:30, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

How to make a page

how do you make a new wiki page? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Mr.Prime Time aka Nick (talk • contribs) 15:26, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

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. TNXMan 15:28, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

Parse first three letters of an article name?

I know that mw:Extension:StringFunctions is not implemented. But, is there some other way in which to parse the first three letters of an article name? In particular, I'd like to parse "USS" from every article on every USN ship. This is in support of a template modification. --Hammersoft (talk) 15:52, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

There's the horrible hacky templates for string manipulation. Algebraist 19:05, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

Deleting User Account

Resolved

 – I'm assuming this IP won't come back. ZooFari 02:34, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

hi, basically how do i delete my old, never used anymore, user account: 'User:William Dady'? im guessing there is probably a page explaining it but i cant find it. thanks, --84.68.216.105 (talk) 16:51, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

We can't "delete" an account, that is impossible due to technical restrictions. Your best option is probably simply never to use that account anymore. tempodivalse [☎] 16:54, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

You might also consider your 'right' to vanish, though that's probably going to be more hassle than it's worth. - Jarry1250 ^{(t, c)} 16:57, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

Can't revert vandalism on Windows 7 page

Resolved

 – Vandalism reverted. Thanks for the heads-up. tempodivalse [☎] 19:07, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

The Windows 7 page has been replaced by vandals with Ubuntu content, but I am not able to revert it since links in the previous revisions are triggering the spam filter. Please help. --Ray andrew (talk) 17:23, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

It appears to have been fixed. The anti-vandal bot accidentally undid an edit that reverted vandalism. Thanks for the heads-up. tempodivalse [☎] 17:25, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

Tabloid

Is there a Wikipedia tabloid? Soxwon (talk) 19:01, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

I don't believe so. However, there is the Signpost, which is a weekly update on happenings around the Wiki. You can have automatically delivered to you, if you'd like. TNXMan 19:05, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

Oh I'm subscribed, I just thought it would be amusing to start one that printed absolute rubbish as long as the stories were funny/interesting and as long as it was understood the subjects of said articles would not be offended. Soxwon (talk) 19:10, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

Oh, you mean this! </humor> Actually, if there were one around here, I'd sign up for it. TNXMan 19:20, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

uncyclopedia. -Arch dude (talk) 20:21, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

• Conservapedia --Gadget850 (talk) 20:39, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

Actually Arch Dude, I was thinking of focusing on wikipedians than stories. Where would I go about setting this up? Soxwon (talk) 22:56, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

We could tell you, but then we would have to ban you. See Category:Wikipedia humor and Category:Wikipedia Cabal Decrees. -Arch dude (talk) 23:06, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

You might find something in WP:EIW#Community or WP:EIW#News. The Wikipedia Signpost has articles about Wikipedians, among other people and things. --Teratornis (talk) 02:32, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

I think the WP:EIW#News was what I was looking for, who is in charge of it? Soxwon (talk) 14:54, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

That depends on what you mean by "it". WP:EIW#News is an entry in the Editor's index to Wikipedia, which any Wikipedia editor can edit. However, the index itself is just a reference work; it doesn't actually "do" anything itself. Presumably you refer to one of the links under that entry. How to find out who is charge of a particular linked item would depend on what the item is. If it is a page somewhere on Wikipedia, you could check its history to see who is editing it, and/or ask on its Talk page. If a link points to something else, such as a mailing list, then you might have to look or ask on the mailing list to figure out who runs it. If you want to set up something completely new that is like something you saw under WP:EIW#News, the procedure would depend on what you want to set up. Note that lots of people set up lots of things on Wikipedia that fail to catch on. It's easier to start things here than to make them work. The odds of success tend to improve if more than one person wants to make something happen. --Teratornis (talk) 22:24, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Delete my edit

Resolved

 – TNXMan 19:41, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

Someone deleted my edit! Valerian456 ^{Hush, Rush} 19:34, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

Unfortunately, I cannot determine to which edit you are referring. Was there a specific one you had in mind? TNXMan 19:36, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

I was add a speedy deletion tag to the Vtrim article. Valerian456 ^{Hush, Rush} 19:37, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

nevermind. Valerian456 ^{Hush, Rush} 19:38, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

Catandica exact meaning.

Resolved

 – Wrong venue. Please see Wikipedia:Reference desk/Humanities, that is the correct place to post your question. tempodivalse [☎] 21:38, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

Just out of interest, my husband want to name our 4 days old daughter, Catandica. I only know that there is a villa de Catandica in Manica. He is so much attached to it coz his youngest brother died in gairezi coming from Villa de Catandica fromcollecting weapons before zim independence. So i want to know the meaning. i know it originates from a brave son of a local chief. Please help me as soon as possible.

thanks —Preceding unsigned comment added by 41.213.56.153 (talk) 20:38, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

Hi, this page is for questions about using Wikipedia. Please consider asking this question at the Humanities reference desk instead, as this page is intended for asking questions about using Wikipedia only. Just follow the link and ask away. You could always try searching Wikipedia for an article related to the topic you want to know more about. I hope this helps. tempodivalse [☎] 20:46, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

Double vision...sort of

Resolved

 – Thanks! Xenon54 (talk) 22:05, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

I logged on Wikipedia this afternoon and discovered that there are now two UTC clocks in the user navigation bar. Here's a picture. I would like to keep the one on the left, with the bigger text, but can't figure out how to remove the one on the right. I don't seem to have checked anything and Modern.js is blank. Thanks, Xenon54 (talk) 21:22, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

The righthand clock is part of friendly, which you have in your modern.js (note lowercase). The lefthand clock appears to be that produced by the UTC clock gadget, which you presumably have enabled in your preferences. Algebraist 21:30, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

April 15

How to speedy delete?

Resolved

There are two pages which should be deleted (or redirected to Wiktionary): Oversleep and Oversleeping. Both are search terms at Wiktionary, with an adequate one line definition.

These two were both redirects to Hypersomnolence, which is absurd. Thank you, Hordaland (talk) 00:25, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

They have both been deleted. Xenon54 (talk) 01:27, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Thanks! - Hordaland (talk) 01:45, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Speedy

I am new here and it said in my first article, The Legend of Spyro: Dark Revelation, that it will be speedy deleted. Why? I don't see anything wrong with it and I did read the "your first article" article. I don't want ti to be deleted. Whats wrong with a fanfic? This is for one that I'm making. And if it gets deleted then whats the point of me doing another? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Wargeris (talk • contribs) 01:22, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia is an encyclopaedia - a collection of fact, not fiction. Please take your fanfics elsewhere. Xenon54 (talk) 01:26, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

See WP:FANCRUFT, WP:NOR, and WP:WWMPD. Lots of new users read our instruction page: Wikipedia:Your first article, yet some of their articles get deleted anyway. Deletion on Wikipedia is an extremely complex subject. There isn't any good way for a short instruction page for new users to explain all the different ways to violate Wikipedia's policies and guidelines. Perhaps I will start a discussion on Wikipedia talk:Your first article about beefing up the warnings a little. One really good piece of advice that isn't on the page is for the new user to ask on the Help desk about whether the article they want to write is likely to survive on Wikipedia. It's better to get some expert guidance before sinking hours into editing that might prove to be futile.

As far as what is "wrong" with fan fiction, nothing is wrong with it. It just doesn't belong in an encyclopedia. The fact that Wikipedia excludes something does not make it "wrong". See Wikipedia:Alternative outlets and search on WikiIndex for other wikis that accept fan fiction, even treasure it.

As to why you might want to continue editing on Wikipedia even after your initial unpleasant experience, only you can decide what site you like best. Wikipedia is a very good place to work on encyclopedic content. If you want to collaborate on an encyclopedia, Wikipedia is the best venue in the world for that. Wikipedia is an extremely well-developed wiki, with large numbers of smart and skilled users, who constantly solve problems and add clever new features. If you learn to edit on Wikipedia, that is to make edits that stick, you will have learned lots of valuable things that might not be learnable anywhere else. What's happening on Wikipedia is really special, and most of the world is coming to regard Wikipedia as important. Millions of people turn to Wikipedia every day to look up information, but maybe fewer than 100,000 serious editors have a deep understanding of how this place works. If you become one of us, you will have joined a kind of exclusive club that's just really cool to be part of. Editing on Wikipedia is not always easy, but you won't regret any time you spend studying how Wikipedia works. --Teratornis (talk) 02:10, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Image license question

Hey folks. So Image:Wii Light Gun.jpg is currently tagged as being fair-use as a 3D work of art, which I'm pretty sure is the wrong license given that other images of Wii remotes are under various free licenses, and the image in question is self-created by the uploader. The problem is that it's not my image, and I therefore can't release the rights. So, that begs the question, what do you do for an image that is incorrectly tagged as fair-use but isn't actually fair-use? I'm sorry, but I don't think I've ever encountered this issue before. Thanks in advance! --fuzzy510 (talk) 02:03, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Lots of interesting material is in Commons:COM:EIC#Copyright. For example, see:

• Commons:Commons:Derivative works#Isn't every product copyrighted by someone? What about cars? Or kitchen chairs? My computer case?

If the pictured device is a "utility object" rather than a "work of art", then a photograph of it is not a "derivative work" and the copyright therefore belongs to the photographer, rather than the vendor which made the utility object. That's my non-lawyer understanding, anyway. If you think the license of an image file is wrong, you can discuss it on the talk page. Possibly you can convince the uploader who took the photograph that he or she actually owns the copyright to it and is therefore entitled to license it under a free license such as CC-BY-SA. Since you do not own the copyright, I don't think you can be bold and change the license yourself. I guess. --Teratornis (talk) 02:20, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

I've left a message on the uploader's talk page, but I'm not optimistic, because they haven't made a contribution in more than a year. If the image isn't actually fair-use, but is incorrectly tagged as such, I assume that we have to abide by the fair-use rules for it? --fuzzy510 (talk) 02:29, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

I guess the user did not enable e-mail, either. I have no idea what you can do about the incorrect license. However, if the depicted object is not rare, you might find something usable on Commons (File:Wii Gun WIth Rubber Bands.JPG looks somewhat similar) or you could search on Flickr with {{Flickr free}}:

• Search Flickr for images with the keywords: Wii Gun under these licenses: cc-by or cc-by-sa

which finds this image that you could import to Commons with Flinfo. See Commons:COM:EIC#Flickr. --Teratornis (talk) 02:47, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Nikolay Motovilov

I corrected the spelling of his wife's name

from Melnikova (incorrect)

to Meliukova (correct)

My reference is the book St. Seraphim of Sarov, by Valentine Zander, published by St. Vladimir Seminary Press, 1975

When I went back to check, my correction was not absorbed. What to do?

signed Helen M.M. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Helen M.M. (talk • contribs) 02:27, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Nikolay Motovilov has not been edited since January 2009. Are you sure you clicked the "Save page" button when you made your edit? – ukexpat (talk) 03:53, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Don't you think...

I'm clarified of the subject I started. Thanks to all that helped. I wanted to make a standard of editnotices regarding the 
spelling of the article.

Resolved

 – TudorTulok (talk) 14:45, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

that we should post on each article, on the top of the page about the international variety of English. Users should know in what variety of English the article was written (American English, British English, Australian English, etc.). It takes some time to find out how the subject of the article is related to a variety of English, and I see lot of users (new to the article) doing spell checking to be reverted because of this, and their work was in vain. The banner would link you here Wikipedia:Manual of Style (spelling) before writing in the banner (as a suggestion): The subject of this article is related to British English and the spelling of it is the same. You should respect this policy as it makes it more reasonable to be written in the native langauge. See also Wikipedia:Manual of Style (spelling). Thank you. Hope it makes you understand why it is needed. --TudorTulok (talk) 06:12, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

An article's talk page is a more appropriate place for information of interest to Wikipedia editors. For example, that is where the WikiProject templates go. Clues about the national variety of English would be available if one of the WikiProjects had an obvious national affiliation, such as Wikipedia:WikiProject United Kingdom. --Teratornis (talk) 07:04, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

I've seen such banners before but I forgot that they are on the talk page, I should reconsider this thing by talking about a small banner on the main page of the article sounding like this: Before starting editing this article you should look at the talk page. It sounds absurd but this is the way you are obligated before editing to see details about the article, because lot of peoples (including me) starts editing before reading the talk page. TudorTulok (talk) 07:22, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Rather than a banner, it might be better to put it in the edit notice. Personally I would love to see a technical fix to this wherein the users could select their prefered style. I should also note you can bring this sort of proposal over to the village pump for discussion. --TeaDrinker (talk) 07:29, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

i agree that the village pump seems the right place for the suggestion, and that edit notices might be worth a try. as for the "technical fix": if you mean what i think you mean, the differences among varieties of English run deeper than spelling & vocabulary, and it pains me to even imagine anyone attempting a "technical fix". variety is educational; broad horizons are grand; and this isn't the place to argue it, so ... over and out 8) Sssoul (talk) 07:48, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

In articles that get a lot of this sort of "correction", I've seen users add a hidden note at the top of the article text, so that it's visible in the edit window. There's one in C. S. Lewis, for example. I donn't know whether ayone notices them, though. Deor (talk) 13:41, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

"Technical fix" sounds like mw:Localisation applied to article content. This probably won't be feasible until natural language processing technology has advanced to the point where we are talking to our computers as if to people. I hope I live to see that. Of course the ramifications of such technology would extend far beyond Wikipedia. --Teratornis (talk) 18:22, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

I don't know how to use an edit notice that demands you to read the talk page, before starting editing the article. I've seen the hidden note at the top of the article text as Deor said, at the C. S. Lewis article, but if you start editing a section of the article that note it's useless. --TudorTulok (talk) 07:34, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

(outdent)... an edit notice wouldn't need to "demand that you read the talk page" - it could simply state what needs stating (eg This article uses UK English). and/or those "hidden messages" that are only visible in the edit window can be added to each section - that's done in some articles i work on, and some people do notice them, plainly. really i'd encourage trying the edit-notice route, since it's higher visibility than the "hidden notes" without cluttering the main article page. Sssoul (talk) 07:51, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Andy Fairweather Low

Please would it be possible to find out his actual place of birth more specific than Ystad Mynach, i.e Where in Ystrad Mynach (street or house number)It appears he may have been born in a close friend of mines house and accross the street from myself we are keen to find out if the rumour is true many thanks Gareth.Iamcoocoo123 (talk) 09:32, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Have you tried Wikipedia's Reference Desk? They specialize in knowledge questions and will try to answer just about 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. Zain Ebrahim (talk) 09:48, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Something strange

When you edit User:XLinkBot, it says that it is protected when it isn't...? How is this? Valerian456 ^{Hush, Rush} 10:29, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

It is protected. The protection log entry is under the previous name SquelchBot. Algebraist 10:36, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

it is showing only web adress whwn iam trying to copy anything from ie to word

it is showing only web adress whwn iam trying to copy anything from ie to word,how can i solve this issue —Preceding unsigned comment added by 213.130.122.146 (talk) 10:34, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

How are you trying to copy the page? Zain Ebrahim (talk) 10:36, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Have you tried the Computing section of Wikipedia's Reference Desk? They specialize in answering knowledge questions there; this help desk is only for questions about using Wikipedia. For your convenience, here is the link to post a question there: click here. I hope this helps. Algebraist 10:36, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

can't save anything, though if this works, I'm wrong about that, too

Problem from Internet Explorer; switching now to Firefox to see if that solves the problem. If you see this entry, I still have an issue with IE settings, though, and would appreciate input on solving: I make an edit, hit the preview button as usual, no problem. Then I hit the save page button, and get a blank screen. Been going on ever since my last edit. Trying now to edit the Methods of Divination page with this addition:

• enthusiasm: speeches by those supposed to be possessed by a divine spirit 71.231.213.253 (talk) 12:58, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

I'm not sure what your issue was, and you can report problems to WP:Bugzilla. In the meantime, TheEditrix2 added the information to the article. hmwithτ 14:19, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

How do I release a draft article created in my user page?

I have created a new article on my user page. Now I want to make it public (so that Wikipedia visitors can access and read it via the Search field). How do I do that? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Johser001 (talk • contribs) 13:32, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

If you mean ComActivity AB, you already have. Grsz¹¹ 13:34, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

...after he made the post above. Actually not. Zain Ebrahim (talk) 13:35, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

(e/c) Nope, he moved it before he made the post :) Anyway, if you mean using a search engine like google, you'll have to wait a while until your page is found by them. Nothing we can do to speed that up. If you mean using the Wikipedia search facility, it can be searched already. You might want to create some redirects so that people have a higher chance of finding it whatever they type. Chamal ^talk 13:39, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Additions Deleted

I recently made some additions to the Simpsons episode "Homerpalooza" in the cultural references section. I know that my additions were accurate but some idiot deleted them soon after I posted them. This is not the first time this has happened. The management should look into this. There is no point in making additions if some moron is just going to delete them a hour later. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Earl237 (talk • contribs) 13:57, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Your edits were removed because you didn't back up your statements with reliable, third party sources. One of Wikipedia's core policies is that everything we write must be written and documented somewhere else, so it can be verified. I suggest you take a look at our how to source your statements guide to find out how we cite things. Hope this helped. tempodivalse [☎] 14:02, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

In addition, referring to other editors as "morons" is not going to make you any friends. – ukexpat (talk) 14:07, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

The "moron edit" is perfectly acceptable by our rules and guidelines, btw. Unsourced addition of material is usually reverted, particularly if they appear to be original research. It's clear now that you made the edits in good faith, but we can't know that. There are a lot of people vandalizing Wikipedia and we have to make sure that there's no rubbish in our articles. That's why we need to make sure that everything here is verifiable. Please make sure that the information you add is backed up with references as explained above. Also, as it says below the editing box, "If you don't want your writing to be edited mercilessly... do not submit it". What you post here is not likely to remain the same, it is likely to be changed or even removed by others when improving the article. Chamal ^talk 14:15, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

On a side note, you can sign your posts by placing 4 tildes at the end of your comments: ( ~~~~ ). I'm Just saying; cause it is a common practice. — Ched :  ?  14:44, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia is like a MMORPG where the objective is to add something that other editors will not change. As with any game, the key to success is a thorough mastery of the rules. You might want to read WP:TMM, which introduces you to the rules in a logical order. We try not to call other editors "morons" even when they actually do something stupid (which wasn't the case here), because that isn't civil. Instead, if you see another editor violating some rule, all you need to do is cite the rule they violated and explain their transgression. There is no need to digress into irrelevant commentary about the editor's IQ. There is no known method by which a person can significantly raise their IQ, but almost anyone can eventually learn to follow our rules, and those who can't or won't follow our rules usually get frustrated and leave. --Teratornis (talk) 18:09, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

I apologize if I offended anyone, I was just mad about seeing my hard work deleted, I will try to provide sources for my posts in the future. Earl237 (talk) 22:13, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Note that your edits are still in the history. The deleting editor left the Edit summary: "Source?" which suggests that presumably your edits would be OK if you can find a reliable source to support them. The claims you make in your edit sound plausible to me. See WP:FOOT, WP:CITE, and WP:CITET for instructions on how to add footnote citations. Try to remember how it feels to have your work deleted; it's easy to forget as you gain more experience, become a "hardened" editor, and find yourself deleting other users' contributions. --Teratornis (talk) 22:34, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

2 column legend

Resolved

 – tempodivalse [☎] 14:31, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Hello, could anyone tell me if there is a way to make the legend in a picture's caption go in two columns rather than just one? The picture in this article looks weird because the legend is so long. TastyCakes (talk) 14:16, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

See Help:Columns. I've done it in the article. Hope it's OK. Cheers. Chamal ^talk 14:28, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

It's perfect, thanks a lot. TastyCakes (talk) 14:29, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Formatting problem

Resolved

 – Mumiemonstret (talk) 09:17, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

I was trying to improve the layout of the page on Strain gauge by adding a "|left|" tag to the image at the bottom, but this corrupts the reference section. Why, and can it be resolved? Mumiemonstret (talk) 14:58, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

What do you mean by 'corrupts'? Can you post a screenshot? Algebraist 15:01, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

I see what you mean. Moving to the image to the left causes the References header to move to an odd location. You can fix this by adding a {{clear}} at the bottom of the section with the image in it. TNXMan 15:06, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

IMHO {{clear}} sometimes creates too much white space. In this situation why not leave all the images on the right? – ukexpat (talk) 18:04, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

I agree that it is preferred to have all images to the right but in this case the formatting gets ugly when the browser window is wider than some 1400 px so the paragraphs above become too short. Mumiemonstret (talk) 09:01, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

I tried {{clear}} both at the actual paragraph and the paragraph above it and noticed the excessive whitespace in the latter case but found a left-aligned picture followed by the clear tag quite agreeable in this case. Thanks for introducing me into some of the aspects of Wikipedia formatting! Mumiemonstret (talk) 09:17, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

how to include a company?

hi guys, i wanted to know how to include a company in wikipedia? i have seen a lot of companies on wikipedia and they have those boxes on the right with all the company info and their detials. i would like to create something like that for a company. how do i do it? thanks in advance —Preceding unsigned comment added by Evileyes 247 (talk • contribs) 16:29, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

• You sound like you haven't written an article before, so I'd recommend you read "Your first article" and WP:CORP. If you're somehow related to the company, you should read WP:COI and WP:SPAM first. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.211.75.45 (talk) 16:46, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

• Have a look at the source for Imperial Chemical Industries:

Imperial Chemical Industries

[[File:Fair use image removed in this example; not proper fair use on this page--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 20:08, 15 April 2009 (UTC)|frameless|upright=1]]
Company type	Subsidiary
Industry	Chemicals
Founded	1926
Headquarters	Slough, England, UK
Key people	Peter Ellwood (Chairman) John McAdam (CEO)
Products	Paints & speciality chemicals
Revenue	£4,845 million GBP (2006)
Operating income	£502 million GBP (2006)
Net income	£295 million GBP (2006)
Owner	Akzo Nobel
Number of employees	29,130 (2006)
Website	www.ici.com

{{Infobox Company
| company_name = Imperial Chemical Industries
| company_logo = [[Image:ICI.svg|180px]]
| company_type = [[Subsidiary]]
| foundation = 1926
| location = [[Slough]], [[England]], [[UK]]
| key_people = Peter Ellwood (Chairman) <br>John McAdam (CEO)
| industry = Chemicals
| products = Paints & speciality chemicals
| owner = [[Akzo Nobel]]
| revenue = [[Pound sterling|£]]4,845 million [[GBP]] (2006)
| operating_income= [[Pound sterling|£]]502 million [[GBP]] (2006)
| net_income = [[Pound sterling|£]]295 million [[GBP]] (2006)
| num_employees = 29,130 (2006)
| homepage = [http://www.ici.com www.ici.com]
}}

Start by copying that into your page, then changing anything you need to change. Delete any line that is not applicable.

For more information, see The Template Documentation.

Murkee (talk) 16:52, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

I strongly suggest that you create your article first in a user subpage and then ask that it be reviewed by other editors before being moved to the mainspace. Company articles are fraught with issues around notability, spam, non-neutral POV etc. – ukexpat (talk) 16:55, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Start your article by clicking this link: User:Evileyes 247/Sandbox, and then post a message here when you have something for us to examine. (On Wikipedia, a "sandbox" page is a page we use for practice edits.) We can then tell you if you are on the right track, and offer specific guidance on what you will need to do to make your article stick. While you're reading all the other kajillion instruction pages we mentioned, also see WP:BFAQ. --Teratornis (talk) 17:59, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Secure Server Login

Good afternoon,

I like to use the secure server to login, and after a bit of clicking around, I ineveitably stumble from https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/ onto http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ - it may be that I've gone to a related wiki and back, or that I've gone to wikipedia via another site, whatever - I continue to browse without really noticing.

The issue is that I then need to do a 'logged in' activity - and find I've been logged out for a while.

I would love it logging on to secure.wikimemia.org/wikipedia would in some way tell en.wikipedia.* to forward the page - heck, I'd even put the rule into my browser (if I could work out how) to redirect any traffic going to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ to the https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/ address instead.

It's a real pain - for ages it simply looked like the secure login was being forgotten, but it's that whatever is going on behind the scenes isn't clever enough to see that I'm logged in if I show up at a non-logged in URL - manually replacing the http:// with https://secure.blah.blah sees me still logged in - but that's a real pain.

Any bright ideas? Murkee (talk) 16:41, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

• I use Firefox on the Secure site. Clicking a link for the normal site is treated by FFx as a new site, which I have set to open in a new Tab in the browser. Thus I stay logged in on the secure site, and the normal site links are segregated into a different tab, so it takes a conscious effort to switch off of the secure site. Works for me anyway, hope it helps! Arakunem^Talk 17:02, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

• That's the thing - you end up with a mix of logged in and not-logged-in, which is exactly the issue. Why go to the hassle of logging in when following links leads to the not-logged-in page, which you then have to jump through hoops to edit using the already logged in secure server? The work-round is to simply log in on http:// - but that rather defeats the point! I understand that some may want to keep the 'dual' behaviour - but it really is causing me to tear hair, and I'd love it if I could find some way of saying 'if I'm logged in, use the secure server' - even to the extent of seeing if I can re-write the URLs! (no, not easily is my answer to that so far!)

Murkee (talk) 17:42, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

How to create a new Wikipedia page?

Hello Wikipedia Help desk:

I would like to create a Wikipedia Web Page for a former NFL athlete who performed on the SF 49ers Super Bowl XVI championship team. It seems like a rather simple thing. But, I can't seem to find instructions on how to create a new Wikipedia Web page. Could you please advise on how to create and save a new Wikipedia page?

Thank you.

Wikipedia Contributor —Preceding unsigned comment added by Danaudick (talk • contribs) 17:29, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

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. Algebraist 17:30, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

10 off the air

how long is 10 going to be of the air. it hs ben 2 days now —Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.119.53.210 (talk) 18:39, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

We have no idea, have you asked them? Checked their website? – ukexpat (talk) 18:43, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Which Channel 10 do you mean? When you ask a question here, you are writing to people all over the world. --Teratornis (talk) 23:23, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Request copies of files: File: Metro Brussels.svg but with new lines

Hello, Is it available to copy the files: File: Metro Brussels.svg but changing the lines? Why? Because on Saturday, 4 April 2009, the STIB changes its lines. Metro lines 1A, 1B and 2 give them up to 4 lines. If you do not know the new subway lines, it is these 4 new lines following:

• 1 Gare de l'Ouest - Stockel (purple color)
• 2 Simonis (Leopold II) - Simonis (Elisabeth) (orange color)
• 5 Erasme - Herrmann-Debroux (gold color)
• 6 Roi Baudouin - Simonis (Elisabeth) (steelblue color)

Info: 4 color lines such as the example of Modèle:Métro de Bruxelles (in French). Note: In addition, the station Simonis has changed its name: Simonis (Leopold II) is the station on the upper level of the station Simonis (formerly served by the line 1A), and Simonis (Elisabeth) is the station's lower level of Simonis Station (where the terminus of line 2 done). TravauxSTIB

Did you see the previous answer to this question? If you want to edit the SVG files yourself, see Commons:COM:EIC#Inkscape. --Teratornis (talk) 23:19, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Editing Help, Userspace

Resolved

 – Alex Barrow (talk) 00:03, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

This may not be the correct place to post this but after searching, it was the closest relevant space I found. Anyway, can anyone help me with the coding on my userspace, it should only take a second, I am attempting to create a gallery of my pictures that are featured in articles for quick reference and access as well as a little self motivation. I would like it at the bottom of my userpage but I can't seem to get it to go there, I am new to CSS and HTML and Wiki Markup in general. Thanks! --Alex Barrow (talk) 20:24, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Actually, you may find more help at this page. TNXMan 20:57, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

I'll help with that one. Will communicate through the talk page. Equendil Talk 20:58, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Page http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frog_%26_Frigate

I was just wondering why this page was deleted. It's a page about a pub in Southampton, that had been there for a while, and I'd visited before. I tried to look at it and was presented with the fact of its deletion. I tried following the steps in the advice to find why, but it is not mentioned in articles for deletion log etc. So in summary, why was this page deleted? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 62.56.72.72 (talk) 20:41, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

It was proposed for deletion and that deletion was uncontested for five days. If you would like the page restored, ask the deleting administrator (although it was a long time ago now so you may have to refresh their memory) and ask for an overturn. I'm sure they'll accept, but if not, try deletion review as a last resort.  GARDEN  20:46, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Using Wikipedia

Hello,I'm trying to find a one stop source for everything,so to speak.and I have to write an Essay on different aspects of Government,Will I be able to find all I need here?{Topics I have to Cover}One Person,One Vote,Minority Rights,Federalism,Communism,Theocracy,Popular Consent,Exclusionary Rule,Political Machine,Political Action Commitee.

   I am new to all this so please bare with me,I hope I have asked the right question and given you the info you need.

..Thanks a lot!23:43, 15 April 2009 (UTC)~~ —Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.104.142.125 (talk)

Nobody is going to do your homework for you and it is never a good idea to use anything as a one stop source but why don't you start by looking at the articles for all of the topics you mentioned: One person, one vote, Minority rights, Federalism, Communism, Theocracy, Popular consent, Exclusionary rule, Political machine, and Political action committee--Alex Barrow (talk) 00:10, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

April 16

aweazing

This word should be in the dictionary. It is amazing and awesome put together so it means amazing and awesome. ex) This book is aweazing. So instead of saying This book is amazing and awesome you just say aweazing —Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.139.210.6 (talk) 02:12, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

And this applies to an encyclopedia how, precisely? --Alinnisawest,^{Dalek Empress} (extermination requests here) 02:19, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Even our sister project, Wiktionary (which is a dictionary, unlike this encyclopedia), would not likely accept such a word for an entry as I don't think it would meet their Criteria for inclusion. That policy requires evidence of widespread usage, use in an refereed academic journal, or other bases of "attestation." A policy you might find instructive by analogy is Wikipedia is not for things made up one day. Though geared toward addressing encylopedia material that is not suitable, and this is not even that, all Wikimedia projects adhere to similar policies.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 02:36, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Coding Your Tag

How do you code your tag so it is multi-coloured or different like I see on some of the more veteran users of Wikipedia? CanadianNine (talk) 02:21, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

you'd want to work on the "my preferences" page, and use the <span style="color:#000080"> tags. If you see a signature that is similar to what you're looking for, click and edit that section (you don't actually have to edit), and see how another editor formated their sig. Once you put the for tildes in and save ( ~~~~ ) the wiki pulls that code into the page. For general guidelines, see: WP:SIG — Ched :  ?  02:39, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

(edit conflict) If by "tag", do you mean the username and timestamp that appear when you type four tildes in a reply? If so, there are many tips for customization at this page. TNXMan 02:40, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Thanks a lot for the advice. CanadianNine (talk) 02:41, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Please see also Wikipedia:How to fix your signature and User:Smurrayinchester/Tutorial/Signature.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 02:48, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

printing

I find that with most wikipedia articles I open, they are complete but when I try to print them one or two pages refuse to print even when I select that individual page for printing. Any suggestions? 70.75.8.217 (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 02:24, 16 April 2009 (UTC).

Hm, I'm not familiar with this particular issue. If you think it's a bug, feel free to report it to WP:Bugzilla. hmwithτ 05:26, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

• Are you using Internet Explorer? Other users in that browser encountered a problem recently. User:Gadget850 described a solution at Help:Printable#Blank pages in Internet Explorer. Hope that helps. Gonzonoir (talk) 08:12, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

SAGE edits - timeframe for changes to show?

Dear WikiHelp: I did not log in to my Wiki account when I last made changes to an entry http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Study_on_Global_Ageing_and_Adult_Health_%28SAGE%29 (on 14 April 2009). I subsequently logged in and see that the changes have been logged, but the public viewing of the Wiki page remains the old version.

Have I done something wrong with logging the edits, or does it take a bit of time for the edits to show up? Thanks, Paul —Preceding unsigned comment added by 158.232.3.98 (talk) 02:50, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Your changes are visible to me. Perhaps you need to refresh the page? tempodivalse [☎] 02:54, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

User Contribs and Search

Resolved

 – TNXMan 11:58, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Suppose I am viewing a user's User page. How do I view his/her contribs?

Also, more generally, how can I search for a user by name?

Ordinary Person (talk) 02:59, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Whenever you are on a user's talk or user pages, there is a link for "User contributions" in the toolbox (the second menu under the search field) on the left hand side of the page. To search for user names, go to Special:ListUsers. You can also search using Special:PrefixIndex and set it to the user space. Finally, you can search users on all Wikipedias using Special:GlobalUsers--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 03:10, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

And read Help:User contributions. --Teratornis (talk) 03:30, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Thanks.Ordinary Person (talk) 03:33, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Template:Geobox Settlement third map parameter needed quickly

I need to add a third map to the code for {{Geobox Settlement}} so that I can add File:Snyder, New York map.png to Snyder, New York. The article is scheduled to be on the main page as part of the DYK in about 6.5 hours. Can anyone fix the code quickly?--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:LOTM) 04:21, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Are you sure you no longer need any advice? hmwithτ 05:24, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

log in password confusion (fairly sure I am the one confused)

hello and I want to first say I am amzed at how complex all this can get and this is good it needs to be organized as it is waaaay more powerful than the dictionaries and encyclopedias I had to use as a kid - as such I am adicted to wikipedia nad go here everday for almost everything but the news

my problem is I can't log in and I am sure I used the email address and password I gave when joining, I also am a member whereby you sign something and you are allowed to make changes to articles but of course there is some safety guards in there -- so for months if I wanted to edit a page I could without loggging on I guess I was always logged on I figured it had to do with security and the verizon and all that as I had agreed you knew my ip address so everything is on the up and up

so today I wanted to communicate a message to somone about something I think needs to be added to wikipedia and also I hoped to learn the answer to my question about the subject as I had directed access to talk groups I could enter if I could only log on

the only thing I can see different is perhaps I am using firefox - does using firefox keep one from logging onto the wikipedia website even if you use your right name and password? also I guess while I have your ear and again I much appreciatte it - what happens if you have a laptop and are at some other ip address or doesn't that even matter anymore? maybe firefox does something different but I am not using internet explaorer becasue it won't let me watch videos and I love youtube and it apparently is so confusing to fix the problem I just switched to fire fox and it took me about ten seconds to download and click a couple of the old legal stuff and presto video

my name is william morley my email address <email addresses redacted>

but when I click on the send me my password it just says (on your website/wikipedia) that I must log in and that there is no williammorley I tried all ways and there's no challenege question? sorry maybe I am tired so sorry to ramble if you could help it would be appreciatted

p.s. I just got all these warnings and more links about all this and that andended back wher I started from - there is no way that I cansee to contact a help desk via email so if you say it is really scary to have my email address in the message how are you supposed to know how to contact me to answer my question? again I must be tired, I need the answer so I guess Iwill have to get lot of spam and put them in the blocked senders list —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.184.255.113 (talk) 05:30, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

I removed your email addresses. We don't respond to Help desk requests by email - we do so here on this desk so I hope you get this. I see we have a User:William morley so try logging in as William morley (i.e. with a space between the names) and see if that works. Zain Ebrahim (talk) 08:44, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

(ec) If you are still having problems, perhaps you could try here — Ched :  ?  15:58, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

problems nominating a category for renaming

Resolved

could some kind and patient help-desk denizen have a look at my attempt here: [6] ? it seems like the "add entry" bit should be removed now that i've added the entry on the page it links to, but i can't figure out how to do that without messing up the whole template. thanks for any assistance (i did try to wade through the instructions at "categories for discussion" but they made my eyes glaze) Sssoul (talk) 07:19, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

I removed the "add entry" bit from that page, but the problem here is that our procedures for nominating articles for deletion/merge/rename/wathever are 1) way too complicated, 2) lacking consistency from one procedure to another, 3) Sometimes unclear/badly documented.

Never used a CfX template before, but apparently, the 'add entry' link is supposed to make the procedure easier (click the link, copy/paste the rest), but it does not seem to be documented, and adds yet another step to nomination since that bit should be deleted so as to not confuse people, and that part is not documented either. Meh.

I think the whole nomination thing should be automated so it can be done with just one edit with a bot to take care of the notices, creating discussion pages, adding the entry to logs and whatever is needed. That's for the village pump though. Equendil Talk 08:34, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

thank you kindly, Equendil - both for the deft assistance and for confirming the eye-glazing effect of the CfX instructions. the whole process really does need a major overhaul. thanks again Sssoul (talk) 10:38, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Tea Cultivation

what is the maximum or minimum number of tea bushes per hectare in an actual tea garden —Preceding unsigned comment added by 210.212.10.130 (talk) 08:31, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Have you tried the Science section of Wikipedia's Reference Desk? They specialize in answering knowledge questions there; this help desk is only for questions about using Wikipedia. For your convenience, here is the link to post a question there: click here. I hope this helps. Zain Ebrahim (talk) 08:35, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Plagurism

Resolved

 – ukexpat (talk) 15:06, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

I'd like to use information from a book that is out of copyright, namely this one (published 1806) as a basis for a new article, not that I can create yet, but I'm unsure how to credit the text, would be largely lifted from this work (me having no alternative or additional source for a particular passage). How can I do this? Thanks, Grandiose2 (talk) 11:18, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Just cite the book as you would any other. Instructions will be found at WP:CITE.--Orange Mike | Talk 13:38, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

It's not so much citing as quoting large passages directly out of a non-copyrighted work. I've noticed that some pages say they have material for the 1911 En. Britannica; presumably there must be some direct quotations (see below) otherwise there wouldn't be a need for such measures (?). Of course, I could paraphase/etc. but I'm worried I'd lose the actual detail and some accuracy. (BTW, it was published 1804.) More confused :( Grandiose2(me,talk,contribs) 14:09, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

(Just to say, by 'direct quotation' I meant a quotation that doesn't have quote marks, indents, but is part of the article text.) Could I use ref tags with text like Taken from XXX, by XXX, page XXX - a sort of source acknowledgement and citation in one? Grandiose2 (me,talk,contribs) 14:21, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Well, I'd just put a little note on the bottom small and in italics like this, saying something like, "Some of the initial content of this article was taken verbatim from THISHEREBOOK, which was published in 1804 and is in the public domain." --Orange Mike | Talk 14:23, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

• You could make a template like Template:DNB to do the job for you. DuncanHill (talk) 14:26, 16 April 2009 (UTC)
  • In fact, here is one I have made for you. Just add it at the bottom of the article Template:Noble. DuncanHill (talk) 14:30, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Thanks! Grandiose2 (me,talk,contribs) 14:50, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Need help with tables

Hi, is there something in wikipedia's css - or whatever might make tables that behave fine in pure html behave strangely when loading a webpage - that sets a minimum row height for tables in Internet explorer?

The problem I am having is illustrated on the right. I created a table that is supposed to hold one row of images with different heights, with no blank spaces between the images. This apparently works fine on Safari and Firefox. It works reasonably well on IE if the size of the images is big enough (see upper example). It also works fine on IE if you copy the html code of the page you are just watching into a new .htm file on your computer and then open this file with IE. It does not work if you want to use the table on normal wp and with small images (see lower example, if you use IE).

The problem seems to be that every row of the table has a fixed minimum size. Is there any way to get around this? Yaan (talk) 15:16, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Can I get my name spelled correctly?

A friend told me my name was mentioned in a Wikipedia article about the comic book "Tales from the Heart" but it (my name) is misspelled. I'm listed as "Saitu" Hayden instead of "Seitu". Can I change that? (I'm not sure how)Saytwo (talk) 15:23, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Fixed. Algebraist 15:28, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

The Rolling Stones

The name of the current band mumbers —Preceding unsigned comment added by Jsulaica (talk • contribs) 15:56, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

See our article on The Rolling Stones. TNXMan 16:26, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

mental problem- cleanliness

I am an Indian. One of my relative washes hands frequently with soaps and solutions and thinks that everything is dirty, and doesn't want to visit a doctor or take medicines. This problem slowly reached its peak (relative is suffering from this problem for the past eight years). Please reply

Unfortunately, Wikipedia does not give medical advice. Please consult a licensed physician. TNXMan 16:25, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Or possibly you want to consult a psychiatrist. You could read our article: Obsessive-compulsive disorder as long as you don't construe anything in the article to constitute medical advice. --Teratornis (talk) 18:18, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

For future reference, questions regarding real life information are better suited for the reference desk. This help page is only for questions about how to use Wikipedia. hmwithτ 18:38, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

But it bears repeating that we cannot give medical or legal advice in any forum. – ukexpat (talk) 19:03, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Talking smoke detector

was trying to find out when the firsr talking smoke detector was invented —Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.194.61.40 (talk) 18:06, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Did you try searching the Web: talking smoke detector finds United States Patent 6043750. --Teratornis (talk) 18:21, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Line numbers in edit diffs

A WP:diff displays the line number where a change begins. Is there a way to display the line numbers in the article? Finell (Talk) 19:00, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Hmm. I don't see where the line numbers are displayed. If you mean a number like this: [7], I think that refers to the external links already listed on the page. For example, the next external link listed on this page will be incremented by one. TNXMan 19:05, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

In the diff of this page that you linked, Line 562: displays above the old text and the new text, indicating where in the article the change begins. In a diff with multiple changes, like this one, a boldface line number appears above each. That would be very helpful in editing longer articles if it is possible to display the line numbers in the article. Is it? Finell (Talk) 19:20, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Oh! (Boy, do I feel dumb). I see the numbers to which you are referring. However, I do not know how to display them outside of a diff. Sorry for the confusion. :( TNXMan 19:28, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

It looks like the same question came up before:

• Wikipedia:Help desk/Archives/2008 July 12#How to find a line number?

I can't think of anything more to add to my answer then, which was to try using an external editor which could display line numbers. See: WP:EIW#EditSoft. I agree that it is peculiar for the diff to display line numbers when there is no obvious "go to line number" command in the article edit window. (Perhaps the line numbers are a now-largely-useless vestige left over from the diff command on Unix which undoubtedly inspired MediaWiki's eponymous feature.) However, I'm with TNXMan - I generally ignore those line numbers in the diff, because they seem to be as useless as mammary glands on a bull. When I want to jump to some text in the edit window, I use Ctrl+F to search for it. --Teratornis (talk) 20:27, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Seattle University

Resolved

 – Algebraist swiftly dealt with this one. – ukexpat (talk) 20:32, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Just wondering why you didn't refer ence Bruce Lee in the Alumni section?Bzmom62 (talk) 19:13, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

If you have a reference for that be bold and fix it! – ukexpat (talk) 19:20, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Because he never attended that university. He's mentioned in the List of University of Washington people, as he should be. Algebraist 19:21, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Referencing the same articles a/b style

Hi,

On the wiki page for Spotify, I've referenced two statements from the same source. However, there are two references in the reference section that are the same. Does anyone know how to edit the reference so it has a superscript 'a' and 'b' which jumps to the specific point in the wiki page where the article is cited, thus eliminating the need for two instances of the same link in the reference section?

I hope that is clear/makes sense...if anyone could help I would really appreciate it.

CheersWikiCamel (talk) 19:41, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

See Help:Footnotes. Algebraist 19:50, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Missing links in Waltheof, Earl of Northumbria

When I look at the current revision of that page, every wikilink on the page is missing (no text appears). I thought the page had been vandalised, but if I edit it and look at the preview, the links are all fine.

I don't see this on any other page, and I've never seen it before; but it's happening on both FF and IE. --ColinFine (talk) 19:57, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

This intermittent problem is being discussed at WP:VPT#My contributions bizarritude. Algebraist 20:00, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Persondata

Is there something wrong with Persondata today ?

I can't see it. Normally I can.

Is there anything going on ?

Thanks,

Tovojolo (talk) 21:21, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

I see you have posted to Wikipedia:Village pump (technical)#Persondata where somebody replied. PrimeHunter (talk) 23:18, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Help with WP:NOTE and WP:COI on Mike Signer page

I recently created an article for Mike Signer, who is running for Virginia lieutenant governor. I’m volunteering on this campaign and so I was especially cognizant of following WP:NOTE and WP:COI when I created the article. Another editor, however, tagged the article with these two notices. I believe that both of these tags are not warranted and wanted to ask for your help in resolving this situation.

With regards to the WP:NOTE tag, the rules state that “A person is presumed to be notable if he or she has received significant coverage in reliable secondary sources that are independent of the subject.” Signer has recently been covered by nearly a dozen newspapers, including the Washington Post and Richmond Times-Dispatch. To be more specific, the editor stated that WP:POLITICIAN and WP:BLP1E applied. Given the first, Signer should meet “Major figures in national or first-level sub-national political races,” especially as he had the most donors for the first fundraising period[8]. And while he is primarily notable for just this race, he was recognized in The Nation as Wesley Clark’s foreign policy adviser[9] so I think he is notable for more than this one event. He has also appeared on national cable news discussing foreign policy [10].

In the interest of making this more clear, I suggest adding this to the article:

== Lieutenant governor campaign ==

Signer officially announced his campaign for Lieutenant Governor on April 6, 2009 with a tour of 20 events across the state of Virginia. For the first quarter of 2009, Signer raised $250,000 from more than 800 donors. Signer has been critical of Lt. Gov. Bill Bolling for opposing a House of Delegates measure that would have used federal stimulus money to expand unemployment coverage by $125 million. He has received the endorsement of prominent rural strategist David "Mudcat" Saunders.

I am requesting that someone else add this also because of the COI tag on the page. The other editor suggested the tag could be removed after others had edited the page, so I am requesting someone else to look at the article and make these edits. With regards to WP:COI, I am a volunteer for the campaign, but I worked to avoid a conflict with interest. The guidelines state that a conflict of interest exists when the writer’s goals do not align with Wikipedia, but I think you will find the tone of the article is neutral and informational and I did not make any changes. For that reason also I believe the COI tag should be removed.

Thanks in advance for your help. --Patrickottenhoff (talk) 21:34, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

April 17

Question

Just a quick question here, Resurr Section (talk · contribs) has been going to articles about current events and removing the current event tag an he states "rate of edits does not justify current event tag" is that true or not because he has removed tags from several pages?--Cheers Kyle1278 00:53, 17 April 2009 (UTC)

I'm not sure what he means by "rate of edits does not justify current event tag"; however most of his edits seem to be okay, as he has been removing the {{currentevent}} tags where the event mentioned was over a week past, and no longer recent. You might want to tell him on his talk page that there's a discussion over here involving him, and invite him to give a response. tempodivalse [☎] 01:34, 17 April 2009 (UTC)

Don't worry about it. "current event" tags are only needed when the edit frequency is really high (one edit oper minute or more.) I tagged the Intel Core i7 article when the press embargo was realeased, but nobody cared, and normal editing sufficed. -Arch dude (talk) 03:09, 17 April 2009 (UTC)

Free/Fair use?

Alright, so I'm basically an idiot when it comes to using images. I'm currently working on GRB 970228. I would like to use this graph in the article. Should I email the authors of the article? Should I just call it fair use? Or free use? Should I try to recreate the graph myself? Yipe! Thanks. --Cryptic C62 · Talk 01:47, 17 April 2009 (UTC)

Copyright law is strange. It protects "creative elements," but not "facts." You cannot directly copy those images. You can ask the authors to contribute them to Commons under the appropriate licence. Alternatively, you can request their permision and then add the images to Commons on their behalf, but the "paperwork" involved is horrendous. You can also extract the factual information from the graphs into a table, and then create your own graph from the textual information: the resulting graph will not violate copyright, since facts cannot be copyrighted. If you choose to do this, you MUST carefully attribute your work to the orignal authors. Failure to attibute constitutes Plagiarism. Plagiarism is not a crime, but it is not tolerated on Wikipedia or in most academic and professional settings. It's clear from your question that you have not inention to commit plagiarim or to violate copyright law: my response an attempt to explain the situation, not to cast aspersions. If you would like help with this, pleae respond on my talk page-Arch dude (talk) 02:46, 17 April 2009 (UTC)

As long as you don't do it too much, limited use of external links such as this are OK. Policy expressly states that such links, which link to copyrighted information which is germaine to an article but which could not be directly included in the article, may be included as an external link in the "External Links" section of the article. See WP:ELYES, number 3. One hundred such links may be excessive, but one or two seems like a good idea. Just link to the actual graph in the External Links section, give a clear description of the link, and that should work for your purposes. --Jayron32.talk.contribs 03:15, 17 April 2009 (UTC)

The problem is that the image originally appeared in Nature. I believe that I am only able to access the image (and the article it appears in) because I have a subscription to the database through my university. Readers without such a subscription would not be able to view the graph unless it was uploaded directly. --Cryptic C62 · Talk 03:21, 17 April 2009 (UTC)

In that case you may have a problem. You may be able to create your own graph from Nature's raw data, and cite the Nature article as your original source; but that may be still considered a "derivative work" under copyright policy, and may not work. I am no expert in these matters, but the people who patrol Wikipedia:Media copyright questions usually are. If you ask this question there, and explain all of the details as you did above, they may be able to walk you through the finer points of copyright as it applies to this situation. --Jayron32.talk.contribs 03:51, 17 April 2009 (UTC)

Awesome, thanks mates. --Cryptic C62 · Talk 04:07, 17 April 2009 (UTC)

Editing my mother's article.

I tried to edit the entry on my mother, Dorothy Uhnak; tried to delete the word "reportedly" in re: her death. I am her daughter; I was there. Do I need to produce a copy of the coroners' report? —Preceding unsigned comment added by TracyElizaabeth (talk • contribs) 02:33, 17 April 2009 (UTC)

You need to cite a reliable source of some sort if you wish to include substantial information to the article. However, if you are a close relative of the person in question, I would advise not to edit that article at all, as our conflict of interest policy discourages that. tempodivalse [☎] 02:35, 17 April 2009 (UTC)

We are sorry for your loss. Our policies may seem a bit strange, but please bear with us. You are free to edit the article to correct or remove any unattributed assertion, without regard to your "conflict of interest." (WP:COI). However, if an assertion in the article has a reference to a "reliable source" (WP:RS,) then you must not change that assertion yourself. Instead, you should discuss the problem on the talk page of the article. If that does not work, Please come back here for help -Arch dude (talk) 02:57, 17 April 2009 (UTC)

Actually, if you cite a newspaper obituary, that should be reliable enough of a source. Per WP:WEASELWORDS, you may have stylistic reasons for not including such terms. Try rewording the sentance into more neutral terms, such as "According to their Anytown News obituary, they died from XXXX" and cite the actual obituary as described at WP:CITE. If you are having trouble with the technical aspects of doing so, leave as much information as you can at the article talk page, and a more experienced editor can help you out. Heck, if you contact me at my talk page, I'll see what I can do to straigten it all out. --Jayron32.talk.contribs 03:19, 17 April 2009 (UTC)

squamous interaepithelial lesion

Resolved

 – Wrong venue, consider asking your question at the Science reference desk. However, please be aware that Wikipedia cannot offer medical advice. Thanks, tempodivalse [☎] 03:03, 17 April 2009 (UTC)

How can a pap smear show squamous interaepithelial lesion is a low or high grade?Nadialittle (talk) 02:43, 17 April 2009 (UTC)

This page is for questions about using Wikipedia. Please consider asking this question at the Science 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 and ask away. You could always try searching Wikipedia for an article related to the topic you want to know more about. I hope this helps. Additionally We cannot offer medical advice. Please see the medical disclaimer. Contact your General Practitioner. --Jayron32.talk.contribs 02:51, 17 April 2009 (UTC)

ip talk page

My friend http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:173.79.58.33 needs help. 173 has been blocked for deleting their own user & disc pages. Ive dealt with jayron32 so I know how much of an ass he is; & jay32 continues to show it in his post on 173's page ( this is my personal opiinion though so I wont elaborate, but do read what jay wrote ). Anyways 173 want to communicate strictly thru wiki,(very strongly emphasized this 2 me, 173 doesnt want 2 be personally emailling any1) & since jay has overreacted & blocked ip isnt able to post on the arbitration page nor edit their own disc page. 173 wants the block reviewed & reverted so that 173 may still contact arbitration; as well as for jay to be talked to. 173 says how is editing their own page a disruption 2 wiki when wiki rules say that editing 1's own page is allowed. 70.108.62.201 (talk) 02:47, 17 April 2009 (UTC)

Need I mention now that the above IP has been blocked for block evasion, or is that obvious at this point. If the above user wishes to have their block reviewed, there is a list of email addresses listed at WP:ARBCOM. He may choose any arbitrator he wishes, type the email address into his favorite email program, and ask for a review of his block. --Jayron32.talk.contribs 02:58, 17 April 2009 (UTC)

Additionally, if he is concerned about email security, free throw-away email accounts are availible at http://mail.yahoo.com . --Jayron32.talk.contribs 03:08, 17 April 2009 (UTC)

Adding ISBNs

Hello community,

every scientific text starts with ISBN-searching. In most cases the author is so stupid, that his text is a summary of the ISBNs. That was traditional scientific work; but what's about Wikipedia? Its the same! Step 1 means to search ISBNs for {{unreferenced}} articles. This work is very cool, but these ISBN will never be deleted in future. Even if a very controversal author wants to start an edit war -- he will be using the given ISBNs to make his work much better.

I've read some guides to Wikipedia:Bots and found out, that searching for good ISBNs can't be done by robots. The maximum of machine intelligence is, to find articles without book-references or format a given ISBN into {{citation}} template. Consequence is, that ISBN adding for existing wikipedia-articles is a work for real man. Isn't it? --Manuel-aa5 (talk) 04:21, 17 April 2009 (UTC)