Wikipedia:Help desk/Archive 14

Sidebar Editing
I'd like to change the left sidebar with the Community Portal, Current events, etc. links (I run a Wiki). I'm not sure where in the files it's stored, however.

--67.65.114.80 22:47, 23 Feb 2005 (UTC)

A message from a CONCERNED CITIZEN
PLEASE REMOVE THE IMMUNE SYSTEM PAGE. IT IS FULL OF FACTUAL ERROR. IT IS COMPLETELY MISGUIDED AND WRONG ON MOST POINTS DISCUSSED. READ A GOOD IMMUNOLOGY REFERENCE TEXT TO START AGAIN.


 * You could always edit the article yourself to improve it, especially if you're an expert on the subject. That's part of what makes Wikipedia so great! --Darkwind 03:26, Feb 19, 2005 (UTC)

A message from an anonymous lurker
(Moved question to bottom of page.)

Wikipedia Birthdates: New Style? Old Style?
Wikipedia Birthdates: New Style? Old Style? George Washington's birthday is often given as Feb. 11, 1732, Old Style (Feb. 22, 1732 New Style).

Can anyone tell me if the birthdates listed with the older biographies in Wikipedia are New Style or Old Style, when neither style is specifically stated?


 * The answer is complex, so see Manual of Style (dates and numbers) for a detailed explanation. 68.81.231.127 19:39, 27 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Image to delete
Could someone please delete the Picture jeju_Crate.jpg? I loaded a better Version with higher Resulution on the Wikicommons named Halasan.jpg. Thank You Richardfabi 19:16, 26 Jan 2005 (UTC)


 * This should be listed at Images and media for deletion first. Angela. 20:03, Jan 26, 2005 (UTC)

Importing Project Gutenberg texts
Is there a quick way to format and upload Project Gutenberg texts on to Wikisource? I would like to format the text to Charles Dickens' Great Expectations. Is there a script I can use (perl, python, etc)? I use Linux, but I do not know how to program. The raw text has been uploaded here: Wikisource:Great Expectations: Gutenberg Source. Andrew pmk 20:51, 26 Jan 2005 (UTC)


 * What format are the texts in? If they're in HTML, there are a couple of decent tools listed at Tools that can do the HTML->wiki markup conversion. Of course, I'd suggest, but then again I'm a bit biased ;-) --David Iberri | Talk 21:08, Jan 27, 2005 (UTC)

"Floating" images
Before someone moves this to the Reference Desk, read on. Images placed in Wikipedia pages appear to "float" to the left/right of text. I wanted to know how this had been done, so I looked at the source - there are tables and divs and all sorts of stuff there. Most importantly, there are things labelled with a  tag. Now, what I want to know is: where is this class defined? I've looked in several of the .css files, and I can't find it. Alphax (t) (c) (e) 08:30, Jan 27, 2005 (UTC)


 * MediaWiki uses divs, not tables, to float images. For example, right-floating images are surrounded with a div with a  attribute, while right-floating thumbnails images are in a   div. In the CSS these divs are given   among other declarations.


 * The  attribute is given to anchor tags used to link images, e.g.,  . It doesn't look like there's a rule set for   though. I suspect it's only provided for extensibility. Best, David Iberri | Talk 21:40, Jan 27, 2005 (UTC)

Changing title of page without breaking links
Hi:)

The page called

"Prabhat_Ranjan_Sarkar"

Should in fact be called

"Prabhat_Rainjan_Sarkar"

wich is the actual name of the person to whom the text refers to. Is it possible to change this without breaking the eventual links to this page?

Maybe one of these: 1) making the title apear "Prabhat Rainjan Sarkar" while the link remains the same 2)  changing the page link and updating any eventual links in wikipedia to this page 3) creating new page with correct name spelling and redirecting the existing one to the new one

Thank you!

Pedro


 * Basically, your ideas 2 and 3 are how this is done. First, click on the "move" button at the top of the article (right next to "edit") to move the article to a new name; this function will also automatically create a redirect from the old title to the new one. Then, click on "What links here" to see which articles still link to the old title and edit them accordingly. -- Ferkelparade &pi; 11:29, 28 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Are templates cached?
If Template A is called from Template B, and Template B is called, how many database requests does this require? Are templates cached? (In which case only one database query is required, as Template B already exists.) -- Itai 16:10, 28 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * I may be wrong, but I think you can't call a template from another template. All pages on Wikipedia can be cached, and AFAIK that includes templates. You need to clear your cache for the page the template is included on so everyone sees the new info. Mgm|(talk) 21:39, Jan 28, 2005 (UTC)
 * Templates can call other templates. I was referring to templates like Template:Message box and Template:MetaPicstub. How many server queries are required to generate them? (Assuming the page's server cache is obsolete, but neither template has been changed.) -- Itai 23:12, 28 Jan 2005 (UTC)

accessing a region of wikipedia that was found last fall.
I seem to be having a problem locating within the site, the area where chem. formulae are displayed (i.e., the one footer i printed of last fall was www.en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sodium_Hypochlorite.) this area gives the B.P., bonding arrangement, derivations, density, etc. I have not yet been able to return there. Thanks. OpusV


 * I don't know of an area on Wikipedia that's used as a repository of chemical formulas, but I suppose the folks at WikiProject Chemistry and its decendants might be of some help. Many articles on compounds have a "chembox" that probably covers much of the information you're looking for. See sodium bicarbonate and potassium chloride for examples. And that sodium hypochlorite article is at sodium hypochlorite. (The English Wikipedia is case-sensitive for the most part.) Cheers, David Iberri | Talk 18:23, Jan 28, 2005 (UTC)

redirecting to a category
List_of_checksum_algorithms is a list which I'm trying to redirect to a category. I've tried the category name with and without the preceding : character.

I'd expect the redirect to take the user to a page which lists the contents of the category being redirected to. However, it simply lists the text of the category, and not the list of pages. Please help?

Ojw 19:41, 28 Jan 2005 (UTC)


 * Please don't redirect to categories. I have made the list a member of the category, so that the category can be accessed by clicking the cat link.  You should also consider whether it is worthwhile having both a list and a category: one of them is likely redundant.  In this case the category is probably redundant, because the list provides currently unfulfilled links.  Noisy | Talk 20:48, Jan 28, 2005 (UTC)


 * I disagree; I believe there is room for both. Anyway, lists probably should not redirect to categories (although it is reasonable to assume they would), and discussion regarding whether one is excessive belong on either Talk:List of checksum algorithms or Category talk:Checksum algorithms. -- Itai 21:22, 28 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Tables Help
Is there a table tutorial (similar to Picture tutorial) anywhere? I haven't been able to find one, but I'm trying to work out the table syntax. Currently I just copy-paste and adapt other people's tables, but I'd like to be able to change them further or make my own from scratch. Thanks -- AlbinoMonkey (Talk) 05:24, 29 Jan 2005 (UTC)

I don't know of a tutorial as such, but there are help pages at How to use tables and meta:Help:Table. Angela. 05:53, Jan 29, 2005 (UTC)
 * Grazie. AlbinoMonkey (Talk) 06:13, 29 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Date that Phenix City, Alabama was named an All American city

 * The AAC site lists "Phoenix City, Alabama" as a winner in 1955. (C.f. All-American City Program) Is that what you wanted? &mdash; RJH 23:54, 7 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Test wiki
Does anyone know what happened to the test wiki? It seems to be down or somthing. BrokenSegue 22:41, 29 Jan 2005 (UTC)


 * With a lot of experimental code that doesn't get looked over as closely
 * or as quickly as we might all like, I'm not willing to run a CVS
 * HEAD-based test.wikipedia.org on our main servers anymore. I've
 * discovered too many holes in code weeks after it went up on test to be
 * comfortable leaving unvetted code running on our production servers.


 * At some point we may set up a separate test wiki on one of the
 * non-main-cluster "test" boxes.


 * -- brion vibber (copied from wikitech-l by Angela 23:08, Jan 29, 2005 (UTC))
 * Thanks BrokenSegue 13:06, 30 Jan 2005 (UTC)

One article under two headings
Dear Friends:

I am a new enthusiastic contributor to Wikipedia and I have two queries.

1. Yesterday I signed in under "Wynhill" at wynhill@bigpond.com. Today I realised I would rather keep things under my personal name: "John Hill" at wynhill@bigpond.com, and, therefore, signed in again, but under this name. I wonder if you would be able to transfer the edits I did yesterday under "Wynhill" and put them with the rest under "John Hill"? I can't find out how to do this. Many thanks.


 * You can apply for the edits to be combined under one account at Changing attribution for an edit, but there is a very long back-log and no guarantee this will ever be done. Angela. 02:51, Jan 30, 2005 (UTC)

2. I did an article for the heading "Charles William Beebe" yesterday (under "Wynhill"). Today I realised that nobody ever referred to him as "Charles William" - he was generally known as just "William Beebe" or "Will". So, I created a new file under the name "William Beebe" today (and changed a couple of links so they would take the reader there). Now, I wonder how I can get rid of the article called "Charles William Beebe" - I don't think it should remain as no one will be likely to look for William Beebe under "Charles William Beebe"?

Many thanks (and it's a real honour and pleasure to be "aboard"!)

Cheers,

John Hill
 * Make the one redirect to the other more commonly used named by replacing the text with #REDIRECT foo where foo is the article title. Rmhermen 02:42, Jan 30, 2005 (UTC)
 * I've now moved Charles William Beebe to William Beebe. You may want to change the links that point to Charles William Beebe, although there is a redirect, so users will be taken automatically to the right one anyway. Angela. 02:51, Jan 30, 2005 (UTC)

Racist article - how do you complain?
I have found an article which I consider to be racist and I have found no information on the help features as to how to get this deleted. Asking for it to be deleted will result in members voting either to delete or keep it. This may result in racist members voting to keep it, thus swaying the vote in favour of the article. Please advise.

Two recommended choices:
 * 1) Raise your objections on the Talk page for the article. Those most interested in the article will respond to your concerns.
 * 2) If you feel that those responding and editing (those already most engaged with the article) are not responding to your liking, put a note at Requests for comment. You will have to specify the article of concern of course and why you are concerned.

Two other tips:
 * 1) Your concerns will be taken more seriously if you make an account (takes about 1 minute, free, and actually masks your IP address and identity more completely). Anon criticisms are often given as much respect as drive-by shootings.
 * 2) As any American over the age of 22 can tell you, reasonable people can disagree as to what constitutes racism, as well as the degree and appropriate response. Be prepared to defend your views with arguments rather than insults.

Welcome and good luck. alteripse 16:04, 30 Jan 2005 (UTC)


 * It also helps if you make a complaint with some substance. Saying "there's an article that's racist" doesn't really tell us much. -- Cyrius|&#9998; 22:52, 30 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * You could also slap a "Controversial" template at the top of the page to raise attention to the issue. (See Template messages/Disputes.) &mdash; RJH 23:58, 7 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Heading format for See also and External links
So. Should the sections be headed in Title Case: or should that be in Sentence Case:
 * == See Also ==,
 * and == External Links ==,
 * == See also ==
 * and == External links ==?

I've seen both. Is there a nice help article I should read?

Also, is it better to use == External Link ==, or == External Links == when you have only one link to add? &mdash; Dizzley (Peter H) 17:17, 30 Jan 2005 (UTC)


 * The lowercase is preferred: "See also" and "External links". See Manual of style (headings). "Link" vs. "links" more debateable (see the talk page), so use your judgment. (BTW, I corrected this section heading :). 68.81.231.127 18:08, 30 Jan 2005 (UTC)


 * Thanks for the link. Manual of style (headings) also states:
 * "'Please do not vary the wording or capitalisation of these headings, except for removing the plural 's' where there is only one link/reference/footnote.'"
 * - So that is the latest opinion? Dizzley (Peter H)


 * I also think a lot of that kind of house style could be handled in the code by CSS these days. I venture that even Wikipedians use such features very broadly without noticing. It can make the author's life easier which is core to Wiki-ism. Dizzley (Peter H)


 * It's the latest edit :). Wikipedia is driven by being bold, but controversy is resolved by consensus. Look at the edit history and the talk page: that line has been added and removed a couple time lately, and the last discussion of "External link/External links" didn't arrive at a consensus. You can always bring it up on the talk page again, but in the meantime use your judgment. 68.81.231.127 22:06, 30 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Dhundhiraj Sastri
Dear Sirs, thank you very much for setting up this wonderful project. My name is Sanjay Kumar, and I am a PhD candidate in Hinduism discipline at McGill University, Montreal, Canada.

I would appreciate if you could provide me the tiltle of Sastri's book that your project is inspired by. I found the following information at the Indologist discussion list.

"Sofia, Jan 14th, 2005 - Yoga-darsana, The Philosophy of Yoga, is the most important Indopedia project, inspired by the classical work of pandit Dhundhiraj Sastri (1935) and officialy started today."

Thank you very much,

Sanjay


 * We are Wikipedia, not Indopedia. I think you'd have better luck asking them for information on their projects. -- Cyrius|&#9998; 23:02, 30 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Vandalism?
Can anyone help. Something very odd has happened to the Copyright notice on my Image Description Page. I type:  . What I get is complete nonsense: '' This image has been (or is hereby) released into the public domain by its creator, User:{BlaiseFEgan}. This applies worldwide. '' How has BlaiseFEgan done this and how can I correct it? It began happening some time today (Sunday). The same rubbish comes up on every one of my Image Pages. With thanks for any help - Adrian Pingstone 22:25, 30 Jan 2005 (UTC)


 * PS: To see what I mean, just click on my name here, then on my picture and you'll see! - Adrian Pingstone 22:28, 30 Jan 2005 (UTC)


 * BlaiseFEgan edited the Template:PD-user, but Goplat has since fixed it. It may be vandalism, but it may also be a newbie mistake. (See Vandalism and Assume good faith.)68.81.231.127 22:36, 30 Jan 2005 (UTC)


 * Thanks - Adrian Pingstone 09:06, 31 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Fonts used in Wikipedia
What fonts are used in Wikipedia (e.g. the article about planets, the article about moon, the article about Greek alphabet)? I can't see the characters. Thanks. --Eleassar777 09:58, 31 Jan 2005 (UTC)


 * Wikipedia uses your browser's default sans-serif font. To make the Green characters display properly, you need to install and use a Unicode font capable of displaying the Greek glyphs. Try a search for greek font unicode and maybe have a look-see at . --David Iberri | Talk 00:06, Feb 1, 2005 (UTC)

pages which give misinformation? (and I can prove it)
Hello,

What's the correct course of actions if the page gives misinformation?

I'm *not* entering page authors' reasons for doing this now. This is kind of political and the dispute is not new.

Now, I can provide some proofs on content being false with nothing on the other side while I'd warrant there'll be nothing on the "other side".

Due to the nature of wikipedia, there can be a problem here. Who'll find time to read into this? Who'll decide?

So, do I just edit "them" and "they" edit me, ad infinitum?

Or something more rational can be possibly done? Parallel articles, perhaps? (NOT one article seconding another!)

regards, Yury Tarasievich.
 * If you provide proper references and explain your edits, the info you're entering is unlikely to be removed. You can ask more people for their opinion in a content dispute RFC or here. Forking articles (making a new article where another one already exists) is discouraged. You should attempt to correct the info in the existing article if you can. Good luck! 131.211.210.157 13:57, 31 Jan 2005 (UTC)

See also Replies to common objections for an extensive discourse on the general issue. 68.81.231.127 14:23, 31 Jan 2005 (UTC)


 * Thanks for replies and directions! That'd be section "Partisans", right? Yes, I can provide references and sustain objective discussion (though I say so myself :). Okay, let's see how it works out. Thanks all!


 * I guess you could also insert an &#123;&#123;NPOV&#125;&#125; tag or a &#123;&#123;DISPUTED&#125;&#125; tag to the article itself. Any thoughts?  64.50.192.206 00:35, 10 Mar 2005 (UTC)


 * So long as there's an explanation on the Talk page. npov headers with no explanation are generally deleted.  RickK 00:39, Mar 10, 2005 (UTC)

hardware requirements to host Wikipedia
Hi, I am brand new to wikipedia. Are there any specific hardware requirements ( # of CPUs, memory) etc to host apache server and start using wikipedia on an Unix box?

muchas gracias, lonem


 * Google is usually a great place to start answering these sorts of questions. You'll likely end up at the Apache website and meta:Help:Installation, which address your question in detail. Best, David Iberri | Talk 23:34, Jan 31, 2005 (UTC)


 * You seem to have confused MediaWiki with Wikipedia. MediaWiki is the software behind the Wikipedia site (and many others).


 * MediaWiki's requirements are a unixish operating system with Apache+PHP and MySQL servers. Hardware requirements depend only on traffic to the site. -- Cyrius|&#9998; 23:46, 31 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Disambiguation, Stubs and Leave Red-Linked?
Not sure where to put this, so I'll put it here. I originally put it in my talk page, but I figured no one would ever see it. Perhaps this is more Village Pump material or RFC? I dunno...I'm still figuring the community out.

Anyway, I've noticed that a subject I've done some contributing to is lacking its own article. Cable television red-links to digital telephone service. General Communications, Inc. red-links to digital cable telephony (I created that one).

If I were king of the world, I would create an article called digital telephony and make both of the above-mentioned red-links redirects to it. Or perhaps I would create a disambiguation page that links to digital cable telephony, digital fiber-optic telephony, VoIP and other similar articles (some of which don't exist yet.

Alas, I might be king of the world — or at least have editing power in the Wikipedia — but I don't have the time or knowledge to create an entire article about it. What should be done? Should I (or someone else) create a stub and redirect both?

I'm just afraid that someone will create an article under one entry but it won't be tied together with another entry, and there will forever be a dichotomy...or at worst parallel universes in which information is not shared between related subjects.

Are my fears unfounded? Should I just leave it be and let it evolve on its own? cluth 11:41, Feb 1, 2005 (UTC)


 * In general, there's no problem in letting articles develop seperately. But is it really necessary to have all the red links? I'm pretty sure some can be removed if they're about practically the same subject anyway. Mgm|(talk) 13:05, Feb 1, 2005 (UTC)


 * Sounds good. I changed the links to refer to one article, so if someone creates it, it'll be there for all of them. cluth 18:48, Feb 1, 2005 (UTC)


 * Cluth, the answer is usually to be bold. Create the frameworks for the article(s) in the way that you think best, to the best and fullest of your ability (i.e., it's okay to leave stuff out if you don't know it, but not out of laziness); create the links between related articles in a way that seems most logical and easy to navigate (don't forget to add categories).  Leave a note on the talk page(s) to indicate what needs to be added.  Find experts/enthusiasts to help you (examine the history pages on related subjects to find those who seem to be knowledgable, and drop a note on their User_talk pages), or invite someone outside Wikipedia to contribute.  Then, over time, do research and start filling in the blanks yourself -- it's one of the best ways to get others to collaborate with you.  And aside from that, just trust the process -- if someone think's you've done it incorrectly, they'll change it (in a polite way, one hopes); if you disagree, you'll have the opportunity to debate the issue with someone else with an interest in the issue, and a better article will result.  Best of luck! &mdash; Catherine\talk 22:04, 1 Feb 2005 (UTC)

external links sans arrow
Is there a way for the editor of a page to make external links appear without the external-link arrow? (I know I can, as a user of WP, set my preferences to not see them, but I want to know whether they can be turned off for one specific page.) (See User:msh210/catstub &mdash; it's quite ugly as is, and I'd like the arrow gone.)  &mdash;msh210 16:19, 1 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * You can use class="plainlinks". Wikipedia is shown as Wikipedia rather than Wikipedia. Angela. 18:27, Feb 1, 2005 (UTC)
 * Thanks much!  &mdash;msh210 19:33, 1 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * Of course that previous code should be put in a personal monobook stylesheet and not in the code of an article. :) Isn't there a standard option for that? Mgm|(talk) 19:34, Feb 1, 2005 (UTC)
 * Nope; that is HTML code, not CSS. It'd have to go in the article itself, not in monobook.js. --David Iberri | Talk 23:51, Feb 1, 2005 (UTC)
 * I guess that shows how much I know :( Just don't go putting it in every page. :) 131.211.210.157 09:18, 2 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Category moving
I'm guessing there isn't, but is there a quick way to move all the items in a category into another? Wikiproject Cricket has decided that we want a capital 'T' in Category:English test cricketers and its ilk. Is there a quick way to change this (without a bot)? Smoddy | &epsilon;&iota;&pi;&epsilon;&tau;&epsilon; 22:08, 1 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * No, there isn't. There's some proposed solutions, but nothing's materialized. -- Cyrius|&#9998; 23:26, 1 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Nice-looking tables
Having written an article (for the French wikipédia) that requires some nice-looking tables, I've taken a look at all the main pages here on creating tables. However, I have yet to figure out a way to make the (html) table (posted on my discussion page) into a wiki table -- I want something that looks professional, and I'm in over my head now. Please take a look at my html table and try to help -- The article (on Kreyòl verb tenses) is much more comprhensive than anything else on the web to my knowledge, and I'm not even done yet.Zantastik 02:21, 2 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * The table might look nice to you, but consider what it could end up like in alternative browsers. If you keep anywhere near that amount of styling in the table, it is going to be very difficult for anyone to edit, which makes it unwiki. I would advise that you don't attempt to have 3D effects on the borders, but just go for a simple table which anyone can edit. If users want to see tables styled in a way like the one on your user page, they have the option of adding this to their own style sheet. Here's a simplified version of your table:

Angela. 06:18, Feb 2, 2005 (UTC)

Password
Is it possible to retrieve a forgotten password without having supplied an e-mail address when originally creating the account?


 * Not really, no. -- Cyrius|&#9998; 04:56, 3 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * For obvious reasons, we can only give a password to the owner of an account. Unfortunately, without the password or an email address, you can't prove that the account is yours.  Catch 22.  And that's why we recommend that you enter an email address when you create an account. Sorry. Hope you'll stick around though. Isomorphic 22:14, 3 Feb 2005 (UTC)

I'll think of a nice new, even cooler username then. How about Phyron? Jesker? Or, for a joke, Pedio?

Same template more than five times in a page
I seem to recall that a single template cannot be used more than five times in a given page. However, I recently saw a page which (I think) breaks that rule. Is that rule gone? If so, is it permanently gone, so that I can include a template multiple times without fear?  &mdash;msh210 16:22, 3 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * Actually, let me try it: 1  1  . See: it works. Is this permanent?   &mdash;msh210 18:50, 3 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * Why would you ever want to have the same template more than five times on a page? My first inclination would be to say that if you're doing that, you're probably using templates for something they aren't intended to do. Isomorphic 21:52, 3 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * Some use templates to produce automatic links to external references. Template:OMIM and Template:PMID (deprecated) come to mind (see Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Clinical medicine). Btw, the limitation was fixed in 1.4 . --David Iberri | Talk 00:27, Feb 4, 2005 (UTC)
 * Template PMID will be deleted as Wiki recognizes PMID as inline coding. Petersam 01:34, 9 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Thanks for your informative answer, David. Isomorphic, see the NYCS templates; e.g., NYCS 1. This is used to refer to the New York City "1" subway line, and it's a lot easier to use than trying to do the same with no template. This way, if the "1" ever becomes colored, e.g., green, one can just change Template:NYCS 1 to green and the color changes on pages everywhere. Wouldn't you agree that that's an appropriate use of a template? Yet, there certainly may be more than fiev times "1" is used in a page! Another appropriate use of the same template multiples times is on a user page; e.g., a template that looks like ] (talk) or the like.  &mdash;msh210 17:48, 8 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Page for requested topics?
Is there a page for requesting articles when the request is a general description rather than a specific title? I removed the following request from the requested articles page because it doesn't belong there, but I don't know where to move it to.


 * I would like an article to produced for the Austrian football star of the 1930s who defied the Nazi regime by refusing to play for Germany after the Anschlus. Because of his Jewish heritage he is a symbol of defiance. He was killed in a concentration camp.

It sounds like a legitimate subject for an article, but without a name where should the request go? MK2 21:22, 3 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * Could that be Matthias Sindelar? Scroll down in this BBC News article or use Google to find lots of hits (mostly in German). --Plek 21:04, 4 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Many people, at least when trying to find out basic information, such as names, for the subject of an article, seem to ask questions on Reference desk. Seems that, and similar places, are best for raising something into the communal eye. Although it would be great if you wrote the article. Tim Rhymeless (Er...let's shimmy)  07:32, 7 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Meta-stub help
Would there be a way to have a variable multiple times in a template? I want to alter templates to allow multiple stub categories to be insertyed with a synatx like  Is there a way to sccomplish such a thing? --Circeus 22:15, Feb 3, 2005 (UTC)


 * How about taking a few minutes to expand the article a little bit, so that it is no longer a stub? -- Netoholic @ 22:35, 2005 Feb 3 (UTC)


 * Actually, I am trying this to help the work at WikiProject Stub sorting. I myself can do little most time I meet articles that enter twin categories. --Circeus 22:58, Feb 3, 2005 (UTC)


 * Why isn't there a WikiProject Stub improvement? -- Netoholic @ 01:24, 2005 Feb 4 (UTC)


 * No idea. Our goal is to implement a better organization of stub categories and make sure as many newly created stubs are categorized correctly as possible. --Circeus 01:30, Feb 4, 2005 (UTC)


 * Oh, I understand the goal, I just think its a massive waste of resources and time. -- Netoholic @ 01:37, 2005 Feb 4 (UTC)

Commercial related content/articles poilcy?
I work in a specialized field producing television commercial donuts. As most people don't know what this is I thought I would see if there was an article on wikipedia that I could link them to. I found that there was no such article and not much pertaining to the television advertising industry as a whole. I am not sure what your stance is on commercial content, I did not see much so I assume it is forbidden, but I did not find any statements to that effect.

So my question is should I create an article on television commercial donuts, and if I do should I include a link to our company website (http://commercial-ads.com) which produces and markets these?


 * Yes to the first - by all means, create the article. But no to the second - why should your company be linked and not some other company? --Boco XLVII 18:48, 4 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * Uh, when you say "commerical content", that's a bit of a vague term. Generally, for a thing to merit an entry in Wikipedia, we want it to be "encyclopedic" or "notable" in some way. While these standards are admittedly subjective (so there are always conflicting opinions on this subject), I do not think many people would find that either 'television commerical donuts' or 'commercial-ads.com' meet this criteria. On the other hand, we always welcome contributions to our articles on the advertising industry, and it sounds like you could bring an interesting perspective to them. &rarr;Raul654 18:51, Feb 4, 2005 (UTC)


 * I wold consider "encyclopedic" to be anything that describes a particular concept/thing/idea. For which I would think "television commercial donut" applies.  It does not really have much relevence to the average person though and would only really be of interest to those wanting to purchase/produce television advertising.  So should articles published here be limited to subjects which are of general interest?


 * On a related note I am somewhat amazed that this has not been overrun by content-spam (and I greatly appreciate this)... has this not been a problem? I suspect as popularity increases it will become more of an issue, is there a related discussion/article on this topic?--Bhoult 19:13, 4 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * We have Votes for deletion, which is an ever increasing nightmare (I avoid that page like the plague - it has caused innumerable problems and user conflicts). Spamming (for instance, going around and linking the same website from 20 articles) is likely to get you blocked, particularly if you are editing anonymously or have not been here long. Spammers are not treated with kid gloves. &rarr;Raul654 19:17, Feb 4, 2005 (UTC)
 * I agree with Raul. Television commercial is an article, and you could probably add some information there. However, I suspect that if you consider something "commercial content", we probably don't need it here. Also, "television commercial donuts" isn't clear to me, but if you mean advertising donuts on television, that's a bit too specific for Wikipedia. Isomorphic 19:19, 4 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * OK, so I googled, and I feel like an idiot now. There's something in advertising called "donuts", although I can't tell what they are.  I'm now of the opinion that an article on them might be good, since I at least would learn something from it. Isomorphic 19:23, 4 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * Ahh... that is the dilemma a "television donut" is a specific type of television commercial product completely unrelated to pastries. I would be happy to make an article describing what it is if the consensus is that I should do so... and to that end are the people commenting on this authoritative in arriving at a consensus?  As to the link to our website, it contains examples which are informative, but would server to promote our company which I assume is in bad taste and so should be left off.
 * We aren't authoritative, but Raul and I have been around Wikipedia a long time, and we can give you a good idea of how most Wikipedians feel. I think an article on donuts sounds good, but I can't say very much without knowing what they are.  So, I have an idea:  Write a short rough draft of the article (just explain what donuts are) at User:Bhoult/Donut draft.  If it looks good, we can move it into the encyclopedia at donut (advertising) or advertising donut, or whatever would be the best title.  Isomorphic 19:45, 4 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * Isomorphic is correct. First, if this 'advertising donuts' phenomenon isn't related to pastries (I too assumed it was) but an actual industry phenomenon, then it sounds encyclopedic (technical terms usually are). As far as linking, generally, it's a good idea to link to the most relavant sites. So if you are writing about a specific industry (such as banking), you'd want to link to a page that described the industry itself (such as A short history of British banking) rather than any one bank in particular (such as chase.com). But, if you happen to find industry information on a particular company's page, then that would be fine to link to. &rarr;Raul654 19:55, Feb 4, 2005 (UTC)


 * Ok... I have produced a draft as you described... not sure about the process of submitting it.--Bhoult 21:01, 4 Feb 2005 (UTC)

IP Addr for logged-on user?
Is there a way of determining the IP Address(s) used by a logged-on user? For a particular edit? (One might want to, for instance, to check for sock-puppets.)
 * Sorry, this is not possible at the moment and not likely to be possible any time in the future due to privacy concerns. At the moment, there is some debate about making encrypted hashes of users' ip addresses available to administrators, but that is a very controversial issue. If there are serious concerns about sockpuppetry, developers with database access can look up users' ip addresses - it's probably best to report such cases at the Vandalism or Requests for Comment pages to let th community have a look at the situation. -- Ferkelparade &pi; 21:00, 4 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Subpages don't work
I have been planning to move the alphabetical lists of music videos into subpages of article List of music videos by name. I moved List of music videos by name: A but it didn't become a subpage. I edited another page and tried to make /Sub links to a new subpage, but the links pointed to a page that started with a froward slash. I have succesfully made subpages in the past. Is this a bug or have the feature been disabled without telling the Wikipedians? -Hapsiainen 00:03, Feb 5, 2005 (UTC)


 * Subpages only work in pages in the Wikipedia: namespace, and in Talk: namespaces. Goplat 00:28, 5 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * Then I misunderstood what Wikipedia namespace means. I thought that the articles are the Wikipedia. Thanks for help, now I have to think up another organizing method. -Hapsiainen 01:35, Feb 5, 2005 (UTC)


 * I'm confused. There currently is a subpage to this list, called List of music videos by name/A. It's a redirect to List of music videos by name: A, but I see no reason why the subpage couldn't be edited. In fact, I just created List of music videos by name/B, and it worked just fine. --Plek 09:57, 5 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * I moved the would-be subpage back to its original place. No, they are not real subpabes. There must be a link to the parent pages in the top of a subpage. And it must be possible to make /Subpage link on the parent page. See some real subpages and parent pages at List_of_images/Nature.


 * Another subpage problem. I can't create a link to a subpage inside an image gallery, if it uses gallery markup. You can try this at List of images/Nature/Animals/Reptiles. Outside the gallery tags the links work as expected. -Hapsiainen 13:58, Feb 5, 2005 (UTC)
 * It is a bug which has been reported. Now I have nothing left to ask about subpages. -Hapsiainen 14:58, Feb 6, 2005 (UTC)

fixing a screwup (bad entry) in the history?
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Cog_%28television_commercial%29&action=history

Yeah, so I mis-spelt my name :) ~ender instead of ~ener

Who can correct that?


 * In theory, a developer could change this in database. In reality, they're not likely to have time to do that unless the edit summary was highly offensive to another user. Angela. 16:36, Feb 5, 2005 (UTC)


 * How about reverting to previous and then reverting to the desired revision using the editor's correct name to preserve authorship? hydnjo talk 19:22, 5 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * That wouldn't change the edit summary, though... --David Iberri | Talk 19:50, Feb 7, 2005 (UTC)

Deletion Timestamps
I have been helping out on the VfDs but can't seem to find a quick way to include UTC timestamps with the post. Any suggestions?


 * Type ~ to get a "default" signature which includes date and time (possibly localised to the reader's timezone?) Ojw 21:40, 5 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * Thank you very much Chotchki 21:42, 5 Feb 2005 (UTC) ;)

Getting images working with wikipedia database dump
I am trying to setup wikipedia to test some hardware configs. I have run into a problem linking the upload.tar to the db dumps. I can't seem to find the sql that populates the imagelinks table. How do you use the en.upload with the en.cur?

Thanks for any help.

Should piped links be used to avoid redirects?
When polishing up an article, I've gone through the process of changing plain wikilinks to piped ones to avoid redirect pages. For instance, I've replaced The Netherlands (The Netherlands) with The Netherlands (The Netherlands). That way, every link points to the canonical name of the subject. I kinda remember reading about this in a policy article, but I can't seem to locate it anymore.

So my question is: should an article's wikilinks be cleaned up to avoid redirect pages, or is it okay to leave them as it is? Thanks! --Plek 10:51, 6 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * We prefer to avoid redirects, but it's not a really dire necessity. &rarr;Raul654 14:11, Feb 6, 2005 (UTC)
 * When writing your own pages, avoid redirects. It's probably not worth your time and effort to correct it on existing pages. Isomorphic 19:40, 7 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Miniature Postcards of Portland Maine
I am moving your question to the WP:Reference desk alteripse 00:21, 7 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Translate into another language
Hi there,

What's the way to start when I want to translate a page into another language, for example Dutch?

Thanks


 * Well, each langugage has its own Wikipedia. To translate an English page into, for example, Dutch, you would first go to the Dutch Wikipedia (which is at nl.wikipedia.org) and check to see if there is already an article about the subject.  In that case, if there's any information in the English article that isn't in the Dutch article, you can add it.  If there's no article, then create a new article at an appropriate title, and write your translation there.  Afterward, make sure to add interlanguage links to the English and Dutch versions. Isomorphic 19:38, 7 Feb 2005 (UTC)

greek letters
how can i add the greek letter digamma to a text? other letters work when you type in the name but not this one


 * According to Greek alphabet,  should do it. That's contrary to most other HTML entities for Greek letters, which are simply named after the letter itself (e.g. ,  ,  ). HTH, David Iberri | Talk 19:29, Feb 7, 2005 (UTC)

Edits in user page
If someone else edits my user page, does the system warn me of this? JoaoRicardo 23:22, 7 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * No, but it does if your talkpage is edited. However, you can put your user page on your watchlist... Shimgray 00:26, 8 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * Yes, I have done it. I was just wondering in case I missed it in my watchlist. Thank you! JoaoRicardo 01:12, 8 Feb 2005 (UTC)

On several occasions where I recently made changes to articles (usually adding an external link), those changes were removed soon after by a user named Pavel Vozenilek. This user treated my link suggestion as spam. Problem is, when I clicked on the username each time, it read: i didnot do this! This looks fishy to me. What can this be? Tibetibet

Watch categories
Is there a simple way to add all the pages in a given category to my watchlist at the same time? JoaoRicardo 23:25, 7 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * No. -- Cyrius|&#9998; 03:47, 8 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * But you could submit that as a Mediawiki feature request. Offhand I don't remember where to do that... Isomorphic 17:45, 8 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * Thank you both. I will try to submit this request later. JoaoRicardo 01:44, 9 Feb 2005 (UTC)

E-mail change
I've changed my e-mail address, then I tried sending myself an e-mail through Wikipedia, no luck so far. - RoyBoy [ &#8734; ] 03:29, 8 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * Did you change your email address listed on Wikipedia in your account settings? Did you spell it correctly? Mgm|(talk) 09:56, Feb 8, 2005 (UTC)
 * Yes on both counts if my account means in my preferences. It is a hotmail account which I pasted from the website. (I did check for extra spaces.) - RoyBoy [ &#8734; ] 00:41, 9 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * Maybe hotmail is putting Wikipedia messages in the unwanted messages folder? Mgm|(talk) 12:25, Feb 9, 2005 (UTC)
 * An excellent tact, but nay; nothing in junk. I even tried going back to the original hotmail account (which worked when a user e-mailed me)... but alas nothing there as well. :'( - RoyBoy [ &#8734; ] 09:14, 10 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Image maps
Is there a way to use image maps in wiki? Is this recommended? I think image maps make a page more interactive, so their use should be encouraged. Pgan002 10:35, 2005 Feb 8 (UTC)


 * Image maps aren't currently supported. While image maps would definitely make pages more interactive, there are some implementation details to work out. See this thread on wikipedia-l. There's also talk about supporting geographical maps in Wikiatlas. Magnus and others have been discussing this on wikitech-l recently . --David Iberri | Talk 09:34, Feb 9, 2005 (UTC)

Want to copy text WITHOUT linked material
Whenever Web searching takes me into some Wikipedia page, any text that I highlight and copy (Windows clipboard) gets me a bunch of extra baggage from nested links. I have not found the way to make it act normally.


 * Hmm...what program are you pasting to? Your best bet would be to paste the article text into a text-only editor (I just tried notepad), that should ignore all extra formatting and links. Pasting into a WYSIWYG editor like Word will cause the pasted text to retain al the links (and probably convert most of the formatting to garbage) -- Ferkelparade &pi; 17:29, 8 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Spelling Error
Just a question about updating a page with a spelling error. I clicked on the Edit link, but I got a page for editing external links. There is a spelling error on the following page, in the fourth paragaraph, equipment is spelled incorrectly. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reasonable_and_Non_Discriminatory_Licensing)


 * I think what must have happened is that you clicked the "Edit" link at the end of the heading line "External links". You can use this method to edit any section of an article, but not the first section, which has no heading (so far as I know). To get that part, you edit the whole page, by clicking the "edit this page" link above the article (where it goes article ; discussion ; edit this page ; ...). Notinasnaid 19:46, 8 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * I'm of the humble opinion that the [edit] section box is rather counterintuitive, appearing as it does above the line delimiting the section which would be edited. (I know that the section heading also appears above this line, though I don't consider this to be an excuse :-). Would greater clarity be possible here? nsh 20:33, Mar 1, 2005 (UTC)

copyvio
Hi !

I posted two articles Khawaja Shamsuddin Azeemi & Azeemia. In the articles I posted text from their site, b/c they R open source. They also offer a lot of their books for free. So there is no copyright infringment, b/c there is no copy right. So tell me what should I do. Should I ask them to come here & rewrite the articles or should I do something else.

Thanx


 * Look at the bottom of the page you copied the text from. I belive it says, &copy; Copyright 2005, Muraqaba. All rights reserved.  Therefore, this text cannot be incorporated.  However, if you want to write the articles without the copied text, please do. Smoddy (t) (e) (c) 22:17, 8 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * You have two options -- first, and probably best, is to use the text in question as a source to write your own article. The facts are not copyrightable, but the specific words they use are -- for instance, if they say "On February 8, the moon was blue", you can write a sentence in your own words which says "There was a blue moon on February 8", but you cannot copy their sentence exactly as they wrote it.  Better yet, cite your source by saying "According to John Smith in Some Book, there was a blue moon on February 8, 2005."


 * Your other option is to contact the authors and ask them to license this work under the GNU Free Documentation License. Since this allows others to use and modify their work freely, they should be sure to understand the license thoroughly -- it's not as simple as just asking permission to use their work on Wikipedia.  Best of luck to you &mdash; Catherine\talk 10:06, 9 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Create a new entry for someone with the same name as an existing entry...
Hello,

I was reading the page for Power Rangers when I clicked on the wiki link for the Black Ranger, actor Walter Jones, and it redirected me to the page for J. Walter Jones, an old-time Canadian politician.

I'm no fan of this Walter Jones guy, but he at least deserves a "red" link. How do I do that?


 * Disambiguation has instructions, but a page already exists for Walter Emmanuel Jones. Since there are a number of "Walter Jones", including at least 3 with articles, I converted the redirect into a disambiguation page. 68.81.231.127 01:57, 9 Feb 2005 (UTC)

How Can I Get Credit For Old Edits?
I just created an account at Wikipedia today. Is there anyway to get edits I've made over the past week or two added to my contributions? I've edited the Howard Dean page somewhat heavily the past two or three days, and created the Donald Fowler page. Thank you.


 * Hi User:Texasmusician. If you still have the same IP, Changing attribution for an edit has instructions &mdash; but it may take months and there's no guarantee (developers have far more important things to do). You can also just mention it on your user page. 68.81.231.127 05:07, 9 Feb 2005 (UTC)

[spunge]!!!
Hi. I've recently been contributing to the pages relating to the British band called [spunge] (bit of a fan here!). I have a couple of queries, one of them is fairly urgent.

First of all, is there any way that the title of the page could be changed from 'Spunge' to '[spunge]' as that is the style that the band prefer their name to be displayed in.

Secondly, I find it very difficult to link other pages to the main band page, because the format used to link to another Wikipedia page is text. So clearly, I have alot of trouble with linking the word [spunge]. I tried [spunge] but that really did not work, and eventually I settled on a way that links the pages correctly and displays all of the []'s, but for some reason the ] on the right hand side of the word is not linked to anything (it's black rather than blue).

Could somebody please take a look at the spunge pages and see if they have any answers for me (and hopefully rename the page?)? Thanks in advance.
 * Sorry, that's a limitation of the Wiki software - some special characters (like the brackets) cannot be used for article titles, the reason being exactly that it leads to strange behavior when trying to link to the article. You could always slap a wrongtitle on the article and change all links leading to the article to [spunge]  (ugly, but works :P ) -- Ferkelparade &pi; 14:55, 9 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Okay, will do. Cheers very much mate!

Printing an article
Where are the directions for printing an article located? I searched through a couple dozen help, howto, etc. pages but found nothing. Rmhermen 16:40, Feb 9, 2005 (UTC)


 * I'm not sure a page is needed on this, just do it as you would any other Internet page. I have Internet Explorer so these instructions are for that browser.
 * Click on PRINTABLE VERSION at the top of the article.
 * Make sure the article fits the printer page by clicking on FILE/PRINT PREVIEW then CLOSE.
 * Set up your quality and paper type with FILE/PRINT PREFERENCES.
 * Finally OK/PRINT and with any luck your printer will burst into life and deliver the article. It works for me! - Adrian Pingstone 17:29, 9 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * If you're using the Monobook skin (which is the default), then just print normally. (Adrian's directions are for a different skin apparently.) There's no need to click "printable version" (indeed, Monobook doesn't even have that option). There's a print stylesheet that gets loaded and takes away the Wikipedia logo, menubar, etc., leaving you with just the article. --David Iberri | Talk 17:36, Feb 9, 2005 (UTC)
 * My local librarian asked me after being unable to print the table of casualties from 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake. I had no where to direct her to. The exact problem in this instance is that the software expands every external link making the table unreadable. I gather from further up this page that one solution is to paste the text into a "dumb" text editor like Notepad but I don't think that will work with a table. I do see a need for a page if solution differ. Rmhermen 19:00, Feb 9, 2005 (UTC)
 * I have the same problem. If I try to print a page with external links, all of them get expanded, and this does not look very beautiful. Eleassar777 22:00, 9 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * It might not look pretty, but it's practical. It prevents printed pages from having less information that their on-screen counterparts. See this post for a bit more detail.


 * I certainly sympathize with the URLs occasionally causing ugly table formatting. Copying &amp; pasting into Notepad wouldn't work, because as you said, the table formatting wouldn't be preserved. One possible solution would be to drop the following CSS into your user stylesheet ( User:Username/monobook.css ):

@media print { .urlexpansion { display:none !important } }


 * Then just print pages normally. This prevents URLs for external links from displaying. Hope that helps. --David Iberri | Talk 23:53, Feb 9, 2005 (UTC)
 * While I could do this, it hardly helps the casual reader or anonymous user. I think someone should do a how-to page for printing if it is this difficult. I still haven't managed to get more than the first column of the tsunami casualties table to print. Rmhermen 00:15, Feb 10, 2005 (UTC)

What is a subst:?
What is subst: as opposed to a template? Such as, why do we use instead of  when both display the same thing? I can't find any description of what this means... -Goldom 03:45, 10 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * When you add "subst:" to the front of a template, it includes the exact text as it's in the template at the moment of your edit. If you don't use it, the wiki engine will render the contents of a tag like every single time it is loaded. Mgm|(talk) 08:19, Feb 10, 2005 (UTC)
 * Just to expand this - the idea is to reduce the number of times the template needs to be called. This reduces the strain on the WP servers.  I think the subst: is an abbreviation for "substitute". Smoddy (t) (e) (c) 16:48, 10 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * Hmmm... I shudder to think of all the (and the couple of ) tags I used. --Deathphoenix 05:29, 14 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Editing
Please advise how to type exponents e.g. 10 to the power whatever, such as 10 squared (instead of 100).
 * Take a look at TeX markup, it explains how you can put math expressions in Wikipedia pages. For an exponent, use the ^ character like so: $$a^2$$ shows up as $$a^2$$. Rhobite 06:15, Feb 10, 2005 (UTC)
 * Also try HTML special characters such as 10&amp;sup2; = 10&sup2;, 10&amp;sup3; = 10&sup3; for simple maths. Ojw 18:30, 10 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * WikiProject Mathematics has some discussion of such things. Isomorphic 18:37, 10 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Please note: I am trying to type in 10 to the power 'minus 7'. I have tried Ojw's suggestion, and it did not work. The suggestion of Rhobite was partly successful in giving the minus sign in supscript. However, the 7 was still 'normal', i.e. not in superscript. Please advise where I go from here...! Duncan.france 21:57, 10 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * I fixed it. I had to but braces around the exponent: 10^{-7}. Also note that if you use HTML, SUP and SUB are tags, not entities. Tags have angle brackets around them, no ampersands. To write 10^-7 in HTML, you'd write 10&lt;SUP&gt;-7&lt;/SUP&gt;. For simple expressions like this, either HTML or TeX is fine. Rhobite 22:03, Feb 10, 2005 (UTC)

Double listing in category
I created an article Krant medium fighter and categorized it to "Wing Commander spacecraft". However it appears that it is double-listed. Why did this happen? How does one correct this? Also the "what links here" on the Krant medium fighter says nothing links to that page, but there is, e.g. Wing Commander technology and vehicles. 129.177.61.124 12:00, 10 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * Apparently Krant medium fighter now realizes that there is a link to it... this page! The double listing in the category is still there though. 129.177.61.124 15:28, 11 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * You probably clicked submit twice, creating two articles within the category. I'll go and fix it if someone else hasn't already. Mgm|(talk) 08:19, Feb 11, 2005 (UTC)

link in wrong position
I've just posted an external link to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Mountains_of_Spain

However, it is showing far too prominently at the top of the page instead of atthe bottom.

How can I fix this?

Nick
 * I can not undestand you. Where have you put the link? AnyFile 18:00, 10 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * Sounds like you're talking about this link you added and then removed . And I suppose the issue you're raising is that the external link is being displayed before the Articles in category "Mountains of Spain" section. AFAIK there's no way around this -- all the text you put in a category page will always be placed on top. FWIW, though there's no policy against adding ext. links to category pages, I prefer adding them to articles instead. For one, it puts the link in greater context -- category pages don't generally provide much descriptive information about the topic they're categorizing. Best, David Iberri | Talk 19:56, Feb 10, 2005 (UTC)

What to do with a merge gone bad
Suppose that there are two articles: let's call them HHeLiBeBCNOF and HHeLiBeBCNOF (mnemonic) for the moment. It is decided that the correct title is HHeLiBeBCNOF (mnemonic) and a tag is placed on each page. However, when the merge/redirect is complete, it is discovered that they have wrongly been merged into HHeLiBeBCNOF. Since HHeLiBeBCNOF (mnemonic) still exists as a redirect, preserving the edit history, is a copy/paste edit a valid way to move the page? Alphax (t) (c) (e) 02:31, Feb 11, 2005 (UTC)
 * In this case, I guess it would, just don't forget to put a redirect on the other page after the move. Mgm|(talk) 08:30, Feb 11, 2005 (UTC)
 * Excellent. Moving that particular page... Alphax (t) (c) (e) 02:55, Feb 14, 2005 (UTC)

Images in Firefox 1.0 for Linux
Some images are not displaying in my brower: Firefox 1.0 for Linux. Browser options are set correctly according to the Wikipedia FAX. An example is here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Differential_%28mathematics%29

In the sentence beginning "In the exterior algebra..." there are 2 image references. Displayed for that image is a character sized box with '03' over 'C9' which I assume is hexadecimal for the number visible in the html code specifying the image, &#969. If I click on 'edit this page', I can see that same sentence with &omega replacing &#969.

Thanks ahead for any advice on how to fix this.


 * The omega is not an image, it's just an HTML entity that displays a Greek character. If the character is not displayed, you are missing a font that can display Greek characters.-- Ferkelparade &pi; 09:03, 11 Feb 2005 (UTC)

copyrights
How do I find out whether or not an image has a copyright?


 * If it's an image on Wikipedia, first see if it's tagged with the info. Otherwise the best way to determine a pic's copyright status is to track down where it came from. If you need more info about it, I think asking User:Quadell may be a good idea. Mgm|(talk) 20:39, Feb 11, 2005 (UTC)

Why
I am trying to add facts to a certain article, why is it being removed?

I am moving this to the Help desk desk instead of the Ref desk. There are several possible reasons. Tell me what article and maybe I can tell you why. alteripse 19:48, 12 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * The user is User:68.103.178.157 | contributions | talk ]. Apparently RickK reverted several of his edits, citing them them as "vandalism" on the user's talk page.  I looked at them myself and don't see any examples of vandalism in his recent edits. &mdash; Brim 22:56, Feb 12, 2005 (UTC)

Question about banned ips and users with same #
I recieved this email today, and don't really know enough to answer it with any help, so I'm posting it here instead so someone else can help him...

--

>Hi > >I'm a registered user that has been blocked because of the one-day ban on IP #24.71.223.141 (the DDT vandal). If you check my contributions you'll see I'm far from a vandal myself. Anyway, on the talk page for 24.71.223.141 you mention that getting a username avoids this type of a situation. Actually, it doesn't work that way. Although it hasn't happened for awhile, I was being regularly blocked because of the IP number for awhile. Do you know of any way that my username can be divorced from the IP number? I called my ISP and was told that due to the way Shawcable works, the only way for me to get a new IP number is to change modems. "fvw" (again on that talk page) suggests turning off the proxy settings, but my version of Explorer offers no such option. Any ideas? > >Thanks! > >Alex (23skidoo)

--

-Goldom 23:04, 12 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * Changing modem would not change your IP number! What a silly thing has the ISP said

Sydenham (disambiguation)
I was wondering if on this page, it wouldn't be a good idea to put a link up to the Thomas Sydenham page.

Cheers, Miguel Albano


 * Welcome to Wikipedia, Miguel. Good idea.  In the future, you may want to be bold and make the change yourself.  I went ahead and added Thomas Sydenham to the disambiguation page.  &mdash; Brim 08:55, Feb 13, 2005 (UTC)

Flavour enhancer vs Flavor enhancer
In this Wikipedia edition, which should redirect to which? As it stands now, FlavOUr enhancer is the main article name and FlavOR enhancer is redirected to it. I don't have a dog in this but could't help wondering which is preferable. Thanks for your input. hydnjo talk 03:49, 13 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * There is no preferred style between American English and British English. Existing articles should be allowed to stand as is, with proper redirects between spellings.  Spelling should only be edited to remain consistent within a single article.  Spellings should also reflect the subject matter -- Labour Party in the UK, Labor Day in the US.


 * And where the HECK is the Manual of Style page on this? I can't find it anywhere, only this brief mention in the FAQ....  &mdash; Catherine\talk 05:17, 13 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * OK - That was a lot of help. So in future articles it seems to be writer's choice. True? hydnjo talk 05:33, 13 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * And so there is no guidance or preference as to whether my next article should be titled Colors of the rainbow or Colours of the rainbow. Strange.  hydnjo talk 05:53, 13 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * Yes, it's the writer's preference for new articles. I've added this to Naming conventions (use English). --David Iberri | Talk 18:57, Feb 15, 2005 (UTC)

Why doesn't my article show up in search?
I am a tyro at this, wrote my first short entry on Walter Willson Cobbett, amateur violinist and author of the Cyclopedic Survey of Chamber Music. All went well, but when I search for "Cobbett" in the encyclopedia, I only find the poet and activist William Cobbett. In order to find my Cobbett, I must enter his entire name - only then does Wikipedia oblige me.

What have I done wrong?


 * In fact, nothing. That's just how Wikipedia works. It shows the article only if the search entry is the same as the name of the article.


 * In this case, I would suggest making a disambiguation page with the name "Cobbett" or inserting the following text at the beginning of the article about William Cobbett: " :For the amateur violinist and author butterfly of the Cyclopedic Survey of Chamber Music, see Walter Willson Cobbett. ". Or vice versa if you like it so. --Eleassar777 17:35, 13 Feb 2005 (UTC)

superscript 2 and superscript 3
Can someone please respond to the question about superscripts posed at wikipedia talk:How to edit a page? The special character table shown when editing has recently been updated to include caron characters. When picked from this table, superscript 2 and superscript 3 still display the literal (unsafe) characters. Thanks. -- Rick Block 18:42, 13 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Somebody...anybody...help, please!
Can somebody add the article to Wiki? It is difficult for me to understand how to do it, sorry:)


 * Lu Yu (728/733 - 804 AD) of the Tang dynasty is respected as a Tea Sage for his contribution to Chinese tea culture. He wrote the Book of Tea "Cha Ching" or "Cha Jing" now known as "The Classic of Tea" with the following chapters:
 * Origin, Characteristics, Names, and Qualities of Tea
 * Tools for Plucking and Processing Tea
 * Varieties, Plucking and Processing Methods
 * Utensils for Making and Drinking Tea
 * Methods of Making Tea and the Water of Various Places
 * Habits of Tea Drinking
 * Stories, Plantations and Tea as a Medicine
 * Which Kinds of Tea Are Better in Different Locations
 * Utensils Which May Be Omitted
 * How to Copy This Book on Silk Scrolls


 * He was abandoned child, adopted by the Buddhist monk of the Dragon Cloud Buddhist monastery and had obtained the name Lu Yu from the Taoist classic "The Book of Changes" (I Ching): the surname Lu-"heights", the name Yu-"feather". After years of being a clown and a play writer for a group of traveling performers he settled and began to investigate the tea process and tea history in Zhejiang province. 20 years of his research resulted in a book published in 780 AD. Later he wrote a book on twenty sources for fine water. Lu Yu became known as the saint of tea.

Question: there is already an article about the chinese poet Lu Yu. Is this the same man? Do you want to add your new info to the existing article? alteripse 03:17, 14 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * I think this Lu Yu is different, judging by the dates. Either we change the current Lu Yu to Lu You (currently a redirect back to Lu Yu) and put this one at Lu Yu or we make a disambig. --Boco XLVII 20:51, 14 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * I just added Lu Yu. 4.250.201.74 21:20, 23 Feb 2005 (UTC)

User:MyName Page Protected?
Hello y'all,

Is my User:Niganit space suppose to be protected? I thought it was accessable only by me for editing. Can anyone, even though not logged on as me edit this page?

I was vandalized this day, Feb. 14th, supposedly the day to celebrate love!

Blessings, Rich


 * No, userpages are not protected unless they are subject to repeated and persistent vandalism. It's to do with wiki principles of being open to editing. If you don't want people to directly edit your userpage, you might consider posting a note to the top of that page to that effect and ask people to contact you here on the talk page if they'd like to see something changed. That way they can still edit it, and you keep control over your user page. Mgm|(talk) 18:27, Feb 14, 2005 (UTC)

need help please
I'd need some information about these sites, who makes them and when are they made? This is quite important because of a one big project I have and I need to get good details about all the pages I have used to learn about the subject I'm dealing with. I'd be very happy if someone helped me. Thaks!


 * I'm not entirely sure, but I think you're looking for Citing Wikipedia. -- Cyrius|&#9998; 07:08, 15 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Copyright status of a European Union website
Hi, I am unsure of the copyright status of this European Union website:

http://www.mondes-normands.caen.fr/angleterre/index.htm

It contains a fair amount of excellent material on Norman history that could be used on Wikipedia. It is sponsered by the European Commission and I wonder if it is like US Govt sites that are in the public domain. I see no copyright tags. Any help appreciated! --Stbalbach 08:14, 15 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * It is by no means a general rule that government publications are in the public domain. Not in the UK, for instance. Also, a key word is "sponsored". Sponsoring something doesn't change the copyright. So it would seem to belong to the town of Caen or whoever they employed to create the web site. Remember, copyright is automatic, copyright tags are just a reminder. As I understand it. Of course, the publishers might be willing to donate the material, but be sure they understand that they are not authorizing a reprint, but putting their material in the public domain... Notinasnaid 08:28, 15 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * Minor (but important) correction: The Wikipedia is licensed under the GFDL -- publishers or editors don't have to release their material into the public domain. They're frequently confused, but very different. See Boilerplate request for permission (and Copyrights for the core policy). 68.81.231.127 20:56, 15 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Still too new to want to be too bold...
Category:Dune

Me thinks it can be either an article, or a subcategory, but it can't be both. Right?

*Kat* 11:02, Feb 15, 2005 (UTC)


 * Small defenitions of a term are common in cats, but this also contained see also links. I've removed them and categorized any leftovers. Mgm|(talk) 12:19, Feb 15, 2005 (UTC)

Accounting scandals
I noticed the accounting scandals during the period 2000-2003 were summarized here. Does anyone know where I can find those before the year 2000? Thanks a lot!


 * Accounting scandals would be a good place to start. Angela. 03:19, Feb 16, 2005 (UTC)

Requested moves
I think there's something odd going on at this page. I've been trying to get in to commment on Rastafarianism-Rastafari, but the edit button by the side takes me to a different discussion. I've tried clicking all the others in the general vicinity but none take me to the discussion I want, and none seem to be on the discussion that they are actually next to. I think they might all have got mixed up. Mattley 13:32, 16 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * I can get to it via the main edit tag at the top though... so not a problem. Sorry. Mattley 14:11, 16 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Multiple user accounts for different language article contrubution?
Hello! I don't found any answer of my question in Help:Contents section of Wikipedia, so I decided to put it here. Here is my question. I have user account and I write my articles in English. But, also I can contribute to enhance Wikipedia in another languages. I tried to write an article in Macedonian, but it seems that I can't do such a thing with my exixting account. Please answer me, do I have to open new account for every different language that I like to write in?! If not, what I have to do to write articles in different languages from one account? Thanks in advance for your answer.

DeeJay | Talk 14:37, 16 Feb 2005 (CET)


 * You have to create a separate account. There's been a lot of hand-waving about changing the software so you don't have to, but it hasn't happened yet. -- Cyrius|&#9998; 14:50, 16 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the answer Cyrius! --DeeJay 22:41, 16 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * Some people interwiki their user/talk pages if they have accounts in several wikipedias. Also, if you find it neccessary, say if you accounts on two different language wikipedias, to have a link from your lesser account/talk page to your greater account/talk page. Hope this is helpful. Tim Rhymeless (Er...let's shimmy)  07:47, 7 Mar 2005 (UTC)

How to cite an article?
How do I cite a Wikipedia article using MLA formaet in a works cited page for a paper I'm writing?


 * Citing Wikipedia. We really need to make an automatic "cite" thingy. -- Cyrius|&#9998; 03:25, 17 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Screenshot image, copyright, ???
I want to upload a screenshot of the OpenOffice.org toolbars for Toolbar but now I'm not sure what the copyright situation for that would be. OOo Help/About says: Copyright 2000-2004 Sun Microsystems Inc. This product has been created by Sun Microsystems Inc. based on OpenOffice.org using the LGPL. Does that mean I can/can't use it? MDCore 09:17, 17 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * Unless explicitly stated otherwise in the license agreement, screenshots should be fair use. --Boco XLVII 13:21, 17 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * hmmm. I'm still not convinced it's that simple especially after reading Image_use_policy. MDCore 06:27, 18 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * I'm puzzled by the way "XXX is fair use" is constantly quoted, especially on image pages. As well as being completely US-centric, what I have read in Fair use suggests that to just claim that something is fair use has no meaning unless it is qualified with exactly why, on legal grounds a particular usage is considered "fair use". I think that most claims of fair use I have seen are based on idealism rather than law. This is all very well, but Wikipedia can't afford to get sued based on its contributor's idealism. I have never seen it said that there is an automatic right to use screen shots, though software companies know enough about PR to, by and large, avoid pursuing it. And a screen shot might contain copyrighted media (e.g. if copying a particular photo from the web is not allowed, how could it be OK to publish a screen shot containing it). Logos and icons are subject to copyright. Here are Microsoft's rules; there are specific exclusions e.g. a Microsoft logo must not appear in the screen shot. Here are Adobe's terms of use; Adobe require a specific copyright attribution statement. Notinasnaid 08:53, 18 Feb 2005 (UTC)

When every contribution by a user is suspect...?
Every contribution by Bennyp is suspect, but I haven't been contributing long enough to know what I should do. Just reverting everything doesn't seem right.


 * I don't know, they look OK to me, in the few cases I can verify. Even the change to Hello Kitty seems to be verifiable. Perhaps you need to be more specific. Notinasnaid 09:44, 17 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * I guess additions to Dehomag disturbed me most. His changes all seem to be on the line of bad taste.  Making feces into a link, adding vibrators to the list of Hello Kitty items.  I'm fairly sure "GNU/Linux" is either redundant or wrong.  His E17 (disambiguation) entry obviously contains opinion.  But if everyone else is happy with them, I'm not going to change anything.


 * Well, he did not make up the calim about Dehomag and the Final Solution. I added a reference to the Dehomag page to an external source for this claim.  On the other hand, his addition to E17 (disambiguation) is a blatant advertisement and I've reverted it.  I'll check his other contributions one by one.  Johntex 04:11, 18 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * I found his edits to be a mixed bag. A few were definitely legitimate.  A few were questionable.  I fixed the ones I thought needed fixing.  I don't see anything other than the one advertising link that would merit any action against the user.  Johntex 05:24, 18 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Something wierd with taxo boxes
All animal taxo boxes seem to have the regnum replaced with this odd text about hippos:

"While it is agreed that the hippo can run faster than a human on land, the estimates of its actual running speed differ. Several web-sites claim variously 18 mph (30 kmph), 30 mph or 40 kmph.:"

I first noticed it on Japanese_spider_crab, but it seems to be on all of them.

Not sure if this is vandalism or some bizarre bug, but either way I'm not sure how to fix it!

--Stephenh 09:19, 17 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * Nevermind, seems to be fixed now --Stephenh 10:26, 17 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Preview
My Internet Explorer window crashed after I had previewed my work but, of course, before I saved it. Is there any way to recover it? Rmhermen 16:17, Feb 17, 2005 (UTC)
 * As far as I know, no. Some people, when making major edits, prefer to copy the source text to a word processor or text editor, then paste it back into Wikipedia when they're done. That reduces the risk of losing your work. Isomorphic 18:01, 17 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * Might I humbly suggest that you give the Firefox browser software a try. It offers many features which are almost universally considered better than Internet explorer not the least of which is far greater stability and protection from viruses and spyware. Also, there are firefox extensions available which allow you to automatically edit textbox contents in your favourite text editing program. nsh 20:57, Mar 1, 2005 (UTC)

Khosian languages
I cannot delete a comma in the first sentence of the third paragraph of the article "Khoisan languages". --Eleassar777 17:37, 17 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * It seems you have done. . Perhaps you're just viewing an outdated cached version of the page. If you don't see your change, try bypassing your cache. Angela. 20:22, Feb 17, 2005 (UTC)

Scheila Carvalho
I really don't know what to make of this. I don't have a problem with the article but I think one of the images is somewhat out of line. I over-reacted by trying to speedy-delete the entire article which was (correctly) reverted. So, my question is: how does one bring a vote to delete an image within an article without deleting the entire article? hydnjo talk 22:30, 17 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * Oops, I think that User:Thue has answered my question and has been dealing with this at WP:IFD (February 17) before I even asked here. hydnjo talk 23:08, 17 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Post a request for assessment of the Significance of a new article topic?
Hello,

I'm contemplating the creation of several articles which have some merit with regard to notability and general significance, but aren't a clear cut case. What would be the appropriate way to lay out a case for both inclusion and omission to obtain a community consensus prior to the initial creation of the article? Does such a venue exist?

My initial thought was to create a stub which brefly describes the notability and then submit to VfD. If there is a more appropriate venue for articles that are not already in existance, I'd prefer to go that route. Thanks! EggplantWizard 23:17, 17 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * No such venue exists, although you can get some sense of people's guidelines by looking at What's in, what's out. If you're truly concerned that an article isn't notable enough, this is as good a place to ask about it as any.  You could, perhaps, write a draft in your user namespace and then ask someone for comments on it.  Do keep in mind, though, that you are encouraged to be bold. Isomorphic 23:27, 17 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Proper way to link to a city
When creating an article that mentions a city in the United States and links to its article, should the link be one link or should there be a link to the city itself and the state its in? For example, "whatever is a blah in San Francisco, California" or "whatever is a blah in San Francisco, California"? And is it necessary to add USA after California?

--Octoferret 00:37, Feb 18, 2005 (UTC)


 * This is just my opinion so it will be interesting to see what other comments come out. I favor multiple links because it allows the reader more flexibility in choosing where they want to go next.  I  try to include the USA because I am not sure foreign readers would reconginze all 50 state names.  Johntex 00:40, 18 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * "U.S." is preferred over "USA" (see WP:MoS)... but yes, that is a very important detail. The country needs to be spelled out, at least once (see WP:Bias). How to link is more subjective. I personally prefer to just link to the city because it's the most important detail. If someone wants to know more about the general area, they can always click on the city link and then follow that to the state. But feel free to use your own judgment. 68.81.231.127 03:23, 18 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * I would not mention the country unless the context of the article leaves it unclear. It's not a matter of bias, just a matter of consiseness; I would say the same for any country. For example, if the first sentence of an article states that the subject is a Brazilian person, I assume all cities or regions mentioned in the article are in Brazil unless otherwise stated.  Also, remember that if a reader doesn't know where California is, they can always click the link, and the first sentence of the California article will tell them. Isomorphic 20:15, 18 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Internal Linking and Brackets
I'll labeling something in the RGM-79 GM page. But some of the serial numbers are labeled as, for example, RGM-79[G] GM Ground-Type. However, when I put the Internal link brakets around it, the link doesn't work. Any suggestions?
 * Yes, it's possible. You need to use piped links and nowiki-tags together like this (see code in edit window): RGM-79 [G] . What ever the first thing within brackets is, will be the article the link to. Be sure to include a note as to the correct spelling on top of the article you've linked to. Mgm|(talk) 14:08, Feb 19, 2005 (UTC)

Renaming an Article
Basically the person who created the article for Esteban Tuero, the Argentinian Formula One driver, spelt his name wrong. They've spelt his first name Estaban (article is Estaban Tuero and I don't know how to rename the article itself to fix the problem.


 * Given that you're logged-in, use the "move" tab at the top of the screen. We need to figure out why people have such trouble finding the move function. -- Cyrius|&#9998; 04:03, 19 Feb 2005 (UTC)

I think the answer to that is that people don't realise that 'Move' means 'Rename'. I didn't until I read this post. I would have never guessed that the tab is linked to the renaming of an article. Perhaps the tab should be changed to 'Rename' just to clear things up? Dragonfly888

Hi there. I was wondering...
...if you could install the Wiki software onto a free web service like Geocities or Angelfire, stuff like that. The reason for this is, I'm part of an IRC game, and I'd like an easily updatable database on everything in our game so...


 * Sorry, but no. Mediawiki requires both PHP and a MySQL database, things that you're unlikely to find on your standard free web host. Wikicities offers free MediaWiki hosting for selected projects, but has inclusion criteria you may or may not meet. -- Cyrius|&#9998; 17:48, 19 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Glossarising A Large Internal Vocabulary (and more...)
I'm currently participating in an overhaul of the Wheel of Time pages, and I have a few questions about wikipedia conventions that require specific answers.

Since tWoT has a huge internal vocabulary, with an extremely large cast of recurring characters, it's going to require one hell of a specialised glossary. Is there any other WP subject with a comparatively large glossary that I can use as a guide?

I dislike the current system, which aggregates several characters & concepts on the same article, since many of these characters and concepts are deserving of their own pages, and have nominative titles (as in the case of Shai'tan) the meaning of which can better be explained if the recipient of those titles has his own page.

The main Wheel of Time sequence comprises 10 500-page novels already, so there's no shortage of source material...

Additionally, when discussing a subject with a large internal vocabulary, how does one prevent the article from becoming an irritating forest of links? Is the current state of The Wheel of Time document itself proper? The Confessor 16:44, 19 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * It sounds like you're trying to get overly detailed. While people like to cry out "Wikipedia is not paper", it's also intended to be a general reference work. Have you thought about creating a separate fan/enthusiast/detail lover site (perhaps on Wikicities), and letting the Wikipedia articles be for the average person wondering "what the heck is a wheel of time?" -- Cyrius|&#9998; 17:55, 19 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Article charged with copyright violation, but I'm the copyright owner and author!
Radiant charged my nurnie submission with copyright violation, which is the funniest thing I've ever read, since the site he claimed I stole from is MY OWN SITE! How can I steal from my own site?

Please release it from copyright violation status. I am the author of the article, the owner of the site radiant said the article was lifted from, and the author of all images in the article. Geez!

John Selvia http://homepage.mac.com/johnselvia/


 * You say it's funny. Were we supposed to automatically know that User:Ivanjs is John Selvia? The non-commercial restriction means that the images should be deleted anyway. -- Cyrius|&#9998; 01:17, 20 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Why is en.wikipedia not available on the downloads page?
Hi, I noticed that the en.wikipedia (curr and old) are not linked from the downloads, but if one manually types in what would be the URL one can download the english wikipedia sql database. is this intentional?

NPR listing
I just heard a story about Wikipedia on National Public Radio, and decided to check your entry for them. It has many errors in it; please update at your earliest convenience.


 * Hello, thank you for visiting. I didn't hear the story, but I hope it explained something about how Wikipedia works. There isn't any person in charge of making articles right, so I hope you will see that your message, by itself, won't achieve anything. If there are errors on a page, it is a good thing to visit the talk page of the article and point them out. Better still, you may correct the errors, since you may know more facts than the original authors. Be sure to explain your edits, so that other people understand why you are making these changes. You can explain edits using the Edit Summary, or by using the talk page. Enjoy! Notinasnaid 19:02, 20 Feb 2005 (UTC)

How much detail to go into?
I've been thinking about this for a while. Would it be silly to go into almost microscopic detail on certain subjects? Specifically, I would love to write pages for individual songs (every one on an album) where interesting notes on the song could be written, perhaps lyrics and maybe even guitar and bass tabs. It is the lyrics and tabs that I think would be exceptionally useful to many people (myself included) because sometimes it is damn hard to find anything resembling correctly spelled lyrics or tabs that sound anything like the song. Taking into consideration the standard of writing eloquence and spelling common in most Wikipedians, I think it would be possible to make Wikipedia a viable online lyrics/tabs resource to rival any of the major music sites already in existence (MXtabs is becoming silly now with so many different, usually incorrect, versions of songs). This might even draw a greater audience to the Wikipedia (and therefore more donations?).


 * It seems that song lyric copyrights are pretty stringently enforced these days (something that was nearly the demise of OLGA), so please don't post them. Tabs you've figured out yourself seem to be okay with the record lawyers, presumably because there was a degree of artistry needed in figuring them out (naturally tabs you downloaded from OLGA or newsnet or ones you transcribed from a printed book wouldn't legal).  I agree that a tab (etc.) wiki would be a good think, although I suspect many wikipedians would suggest it should be at wikibooks not wikipedia. -- John Fader 20:37, 20 Feb 2005 (UTC)

That's what I was worried about. I might post tabs on Wikibooks though... gotta get them written down perfectly first!

Complete English Dump [Urgent]
Hi Folks,

We're starting a metasearch engine with a host of exclusive features including 'word' search. There could no other source than Wiki for it.

We want a Complete database of wikitionary and wiki articles in english, that I believe, would be around 11GB uncompressed.

However, I reached 'http://download.wikimedia.org/archives/en/' finally, but I'm still unsure of which file to download for COMPLETE data, old and current.

Please help me find the correct file(s) of all listed at 'http://download.wikimedia.org/archives/en/'

Thanks.


 * You'd be better off just going to the top level http://download.wikimedia.org/ and clicking the links. By default it lists the various Wikipedias, links at the top of the page will take you to listings of the current dumps of the other projects. -- Cyrius|&#9998; 07:01, 21 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * Okay, what the hell, en's not listed! For the current dump of the cur table, you'll want 20050203_cur_table.sql.bz2, and for the old revisions, you'll need 20050203_old_table.sql.bz2. The images and links tables may make your life easier depending on what you're doing. -- Cyrius|&#9998; 07:05, 21 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Marathi Font Problem
Hi,

I downloaded the marathi font (raghu.ttf) from your website, but the font seems to be corrupted. I can't view the Marathi Web site.

Awaiting reply ASAP.

Regards

Mandar Khadilkar


 * I can't find this font for download in Wikipedia. Where did you find it? Notinasnaid 11:06, 21 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Request for Simple Editing Tools
I've tried to use your editing and formatting tools, but they are all oriented towards Programmers, and I am NOT a programmer. Is it too hard to create text editing tools that work like those found in word processors, or else make your program so that when I cut and paste text over to your editor, your editor will know how to handle the formatting put into place by the word processor? I spend more time trying to find specific tools, and learning how to use them than I do actually writing. To begin with, how about a simple Tabulator Key that will let me set up simple columed lists without having to do any programming. Further, your tutorial is of little help since it never has the information I am looking for. For example, whan I wanted to set up a columned list, I started with your table function, found the paragraph the explained that sometimes it works better to do a simple list, but then it failed to tell me HOW to make that list. I have a lot I want to add, but cannot take the time to do it when all my time is wasted figuring out your program.

Thank you. (question added by User:24.29.152.117)


 * That's something I agree with you completely. People would be much more prepared to contribute if the formating would not be so complex. Can someone give any advice/explanation? --Eleassar777 20:52, 21 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * Writing text editing tools that work like thos found in word processors is very hard, and doing so in the environment of a browser is harder still. Beyond the modest editor toolbar we already have, I don't think you'll see a WYSIWYG editor for several years.  What you are trying to do is currently difficult in the software (and doing it with smooth re-flowing of text from one column to another is impossible).  As a hack, you can try to copy the method used in Provinces of Iran.  But really the secret is to add the content you want to add, and not to worry or waste too much time with formatting.  Enter your data in a sensible enough simple way, and if you need fancy stuff done to it leave a request here or on the article's talk page. -- John Fader 21:13, 21 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Factually incorrect redirect
Currently, The Mentor redirects to Loyd Blankenship. There's some evidence that he's not the original +++TheMentor+++, and, in any case, you've got two different people using the name. How do you go about starting the process to get the two pages split to write about this?


 * If you go to that The Mentor link, you'll end up at Blankenship, but under his name it'll say "redirected from The Mentor". If you hit that The Mentor link, and edit it, you'll be able to delete the "REDIRECT" tag there and add the new info you want. -- John Fader 21:41, 21 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * Make sure that once you're done the new entry points to Blankenship and to whomever else you write about, and make sure all of the Mentor candidate link back to your main The Mentor article. -- John Fader 21:42, 21 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Can't post- "Internal Error"
The Subcommittee on East Asian and Pacific Affairs has 6 Majority Members and 4 Minority Members.

Lisa Murkowski, a Republican senator from Alaska, chairs the Subcommittee. Other majority (Republican) members are: Alexander, Lamar (TN); Hagel, Chuck (NE); Chafee, Lincoln (RI); Allen, George (VA); and Lugar, Richard (IN), Ex Officio, and Chairman of the entire Foreign Relations Committee.

On the minority side, John Kerry (MA) is the Ranking Member for the Democrats. Other minority members are: Biden, Joseph (DE); Feingold, Russ (WI); and Obama, Barack (IL)

For more information, see the Senate's Committee Membership list at http://www.senate.gov/general/committee_membership/committee_memberships_SSFR.htm

Can't post- "Internal Error"
Hello Wikipedians!

I wanted to know who the members of the U.S. Senate Committee on Foreign Relations' Subcommittee on East Asian and Pacific Affairs were. Wikipedia had a link for it, but no article. I found the info on the U.S. Senate website, wrote it up in paragraph form, and tried to submit it to Wikipedia- four times. Each time I got a screen saying "Internal Error".

Could someone post this for me? Thanks.

-Conrad Chaffee, conrad_chaffee@hotmail.com

The Subcommittee on East Asian and Pacific Affairs has 6 Majority Members and 4 Minority Members.

Lisa Murkowski, a Republican senator from Alaska, chairs the Subcommittee. Other majority (Republican) members are: Alexander, Lamar (TN); Hagel, Chuck (NE); Chafee, Lincoln (RI); Allen, George (VA); and Lugar, Richard (IN), Ex Officio, and Chairman of the entire Foreign Relations Committee.

On the minority side, John Kerry (MA) is the Ranking Member for the Democrats. Other minority members are: Biden, Joseph (DE); Feingold, Russ (WI); and Obama, Barack (IL)

For more information, see the Senate's Committee Membership list at http://www.senate.gov/general/committee_membership/committee_memberships_SSFR.htm


 * A reformatted version (so as to link the names easily) of the above is now up at U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Subcommittee on East Asian and Pacific Affairs; feel free to go and improve it now... Shimgray 23:46, 23 Feb 2005 (UTC)

How do you put a sign thingy above an article?
for example: This article is biased


 * Hi, 63.155.185.64! If an article is biased, the best solution is to be bold and fix it so that it conforms the neutral point of view policy. If you're not comfortable with being bold or knowledgable enough about the topic, there is a list of templates and instructions at Templates. Remember to explain why you're adding the template on the article's talk page so future editors know what problems to address, and try to avoid flames. 68.81.231.127 08:41, 23 Feb 2005 (UTC)

I'm a moron, how do I add links?
Just the other day I edited the word 'chain' to add chainmail to the mix, but I couldn't figure out how to link to chainmail. I wanted to add football moving the chains and human chains next. Someone was nice enough to add the link for me for chainmail, but I'd like to be able to do it on my own so I'm not creating more work for someone.

Thanks, nate


 * Hi Nate! (24.29.56.85) How to add a link to another article isn't obvious but it is easy: If you type in " chainmail " (surround it with two sets of square brackets), it will look like "chainmail" when you save the page. How to edit a page is a good place to start learning all the wiki-tricks. :) 68.81.231.127 08:41, 23 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * See also Piped link and Links for help with making other types of links. Angela. 19:17, Feb 23, 2005 (UTC)

UTC
Hi. Does anyone know how to change thw timestamp (this thing: --Hierarchypedia 20:55, 23 Feb 2005 (UTC)). So its says UTC, instead of GMT. On my wiki it says GMT, and a user in NZ has requested it changed to UTC like here on wiki.


 * See Timezone adjustments. Angela. 04:07, Feb 24, 2005 (UTC)

Intrusion into help instructions
I asked for help on the sidebar menu and received a couple of nasty replies, one of which somehow managed to insert an obscene link on the alternatives listed at the bottom of my sandbox menu. Wanting to unearth this culprit, I clicked on that link and now I'm told that my Wiki search engine is disabled for "performance" reasons. What can I do about that?


 * Hello, I don't really understand all of your question, but it isn't 'your' search engine. It's everyone's search engine, and this happens regularly (to everyone). It may be available again at a quiet time. If you want to find out who edited any page, just click on the History link at the top of that page, and you will get the whole story. That's how I found out who posted this question, and that you have never posted anything before with that login name. So I can't suggest what was the problem with your earlier work (though, if you can give references, I'm sure people will look into it for you). I don't really know what a sandbox menu is, but if you mean the Sandbox page, just remember it's there for everyone to play in, there isn't one each. So what you put there won't stay there for more than a few minutes. I hope this helps, and that if it doesn't, you'll let us know by replying here. Notinasnaid 14:56, 24 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Getting listed in a general search
question moved from Reference Desk -- Ferkelparade &pi; 15:42, 24 Feb 2005 (UTC)

When I enter Schneebaum and hit Search I get the "No article title matches" page. Under the "Page text matches" section, there is listed an article that mentions Tobias Schneebaum but not my stub titled Tobias Schneebaum. How do I get my article to show up under the "Page text matches" section? --Grika 15:32, 24 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * Just wait until the article index is updated - it can sometimes take quite a while until a newly created article shows up in Search -- Ferkelparade &pi; 15:42, 24 Feb 2005 (UTC)

image copyright question
Please see Wikipedia_talk:Copyrights, thanks, (Sam Spade | talk | contributions) 17:00, 24 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Proper linking to a disambiguation page
If a page links to a disambiguation page, but the topic isn't mentioned on the page, should anything be done about the link? For example, a page mentions the band Blitz, and links to the disambiguation page for Blitz, but there isn't anything mentioned about the band.


 * Ideally not; ideally the link should be direct to the disambiguated article. That said, sometimes that article doesn't exist yet.  Also there are times when the linked subject doesn't really deserve a link at all (i.e. there won't ever be a reasonable article) in which case the correct thing to do is to just unlink the word in the source article. -- John Fader 22:30, 24 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Editing a college page!
I've been working on the page for my alma mater, John Carroll University. I've been trying to figure out how to place the motto on the side, along with other info. Many colleges seem to have a box on the right with the motto and info. Could you please tell me how to do it? Thank you.

Blue Streak.


 * I cribbed the infobox from Sophia University into John Carroll University. Can you fill out the (numerous) fields I didn't know about? -- John Fader 01:06, 25 Feb 2005 (UTC)

I forgot my password, and the e-mail I have on file is an outdated one. What can I do?
I was trying to log in to wikipedia after a prolonged absence, and forgot my password.

I asked to have a new password sent to my e-mail, but one hasn't shown up. I think that there's a good chance that the e-mail I originally had associated with the account is one that I no longer subscribe to.

Is there a way for me to fix this? Is there someone I can talk to? an administrator perhaps?

any help is appreciated.
 * If you beg suffeciently, a developer can change the email address on the account in question to a newer email address of yours, and you can have a new password sent. &rarr;Raul654 03:33, Feb 25, 2005 (UTC)
 * If it's true that you no longer own the email address associated with your account, you're in a tough situation. You'd need to get a developer's attention, and then find a way to demonstrate to their satisfaction that you were the owner of the old email address.  You can check Developer for a list of developers. Unfortunately they're busy people. Isomorphic 18:33, 25 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Help!!
I am trying to report an article that is disgustingly racist and I keep getting lost in the maze of Wikpedia. How do I report this page? Its the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samoa page and it is one of the most offesnive things I have ever read. I really tried to go through the steps listed on Wikpedia, but they are very confusing, please help!!


 * The easiest thing, frankly, is to fix it yourself. Read how at Revert.  Alternatively, report it at Vandalism in progress. In this case I've reverted the vandal at Samoa.  Welcome to wikipedia, hopefully this won't jaundice you to the overwhelmingly high quality of wikipedia's articles and its contributors. -- John Fader 19:55, 25 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Category - Person's name shows up in wrong order
I'm a newbie here. This question probably is answered somewhere already, but I'm afraid I can't find it.

I was looking at the Category "American abolitionists" and noticed that the person John Woolman wasn't listed there. I found the article on John Woolman and tried to add him to the Category "American abolitionists". When I did that, the article became linked to the category, but in the *wrong order*. All of the other names (34 of them) are alphabetized by *last name* whereas Woolman shows up under the J's.

[]

So: 1. Would someone please fix this for me? 2. Would someone please add a FAQ or something, so that we can avoid errors of this sort?

Thanks, and my apologies for creating an error,

Carl 2/26/05
 * User:Everyking has fixed that for you. See Categorization. More help on categorization is available at Categorization. utcursch 11:41, Feb 26, 2005 (UTC)

Thanks! Looks fine now!

Carl 2/26 about 18 hours later

Messed up Template
Could some kind person restore the copyright template I use please. When I type: I get: This image has been (or is hereby) released into the public domain by its creator, Image. This applies worldwide. I expect: This image has been (or is hereby) released into the public domain by its creator, Arpingstone. This applies worldwide.

Thanks - Adrian Pingstone 16:10, 26 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * Should be fixed now. Lupo 16:41, 26 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * Ta! - Adrian Pingstone 20:34, 26 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Accessing Wikipedia English with Safari
I am having significant trouble accessing the Wiki English Main Page using my browser of choice. I am presently using Firefox to send this message.Sometimes I can access the main page, but no pictures appear. Is Wikipedia configured for Safari? If so, what must I do to access properly?


 * I believe it works fine under Safari. It's certainly intended to do so, and tested pretty regularly.  I've seen a couple of technical problems today that resulting in images not appearing, but that was unrelated to my browser (I'm using firefox) and apparently to ongoing slownesses inside our servers. -- John Fader 23:45, 26 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * I second the report that images were behaving weirdly today. -- Cyrius|&#9998; 03:38, 27 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Use of William Gottlieb images
I'm interested in incorporated some of the many great Jazz images at the Library of Congress by William Gottlieb (at http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/wghtml/wghome.html) into some articles but I am not sure about the legality of their use in Wikipedia.

Here is a section of the copyright conditions (from http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/wghtml/wgres.html):


 * The William P. Gottlieb Collection is made available online with the permission of Mr. William P. Gottlieb as the photographer and copyright owner of the images in this Collection. The Library of Congress is providing access to The Gottlieb Collection for educational and research purposes. The written permission of Mr. Gottlieb, other copyright holders, and/or other rights holders (such as for publicity and/or privacy rights) is required for distribution, reproduction, or other use of protected items beyond that allowed by fair use or other statutory exemptions.


 * Permission from Mr. Gottlieb is required through February 16, 2010 for commercial uses or uses exceeding fair use. Reproductions of the photographs in this Collection are not available from the Library of Congress's Photoduplication Service unless the Library is otherwise directed by Mr. Gottlieb in writing.

Perhaps they will qualify as fair use, otherwise I will try and contact Gottlieb, otherotherwise I will wait until 2010 when the copyright expires...

Bungopolis 20:40, 26 Feb 2005 (UTC)

copyright- mistaken violation
..an article I had submitted was suspected for copyright violation... I hold the copyright to the material in the article (and that which is found on the website from which it was based).. I followed the instructions (so I thought) to correct it, but I'm not sure I was successful- I'm new here, and still figuring out some of the navigation on my end... so, how can I get into contact with someone to correct this, or how can I correct this myself?


 * Comment: edit by --Plek 22:33, 26 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * Leave a message on the talk page of the article in question. The more information you can give about the permission in question (copy of email or futher contact info) the better. -- John Fader 22:17, 26 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * It would be helpful if you mentioned the name of the article in question. I don't readily see anything in your contribution list that seems to be related to a copyright violation, nor does it show which actions you have taken. Did you follow the instructions on the copyright violation notice? Did you state you are the copyright owner under the article's entry on the Copyright problems page? --Plek 22:30, 26 Feb 2005 (UTC)

..Thank you both for the replies and input- as I've said, I'm still new here, so I'm still getting used to how things work. John, I did put the e-mail in the post I made on the talk page... Plek- I THINK I stated it under the article on the Copyright problems page- at least, when I had gotten the notice, I followed both links (as instructed)... for the latter, it stated to note that I am the c/right holder under the entry for the article (Irminenschaft), which I had done.. but, perhaps I made that entry incorrectly (?)...

Editing edit summary
I made a mistake in an edit summary. Is there any way to change the summary of a commited edit?


 * Nope, it's "write once, regret many times". -- John Fader 23:35, 26 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * Can I ask a developer to change it?


 * You could always revert or undo your change, then make it again, with the corrected edit summary. Or you could leave a message on the article's talk page explaining that your edit summary was incorrect, and why.  I wouldn't fret too much about the content of edit summaries, though.  They're just to provide a short explanation and/or quick reference for the content of an edit.  The important thing is that the article is correct, and mistakes in the article can be changed.


 * I don't know offhand whether there's a procedure for asking a developer to change an edit summary, but even if there is, I would expect it to take a long time and not to be worth the trouble. &mdash;Triskaideka 18:18, 28 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Help in the discussing a page(California)
Hi Everyone,

When I added something to the discussion of a page(California) my text wrapped in a box and quite wide. So wide in fact, that to read what I say, you must scroll the page to the right to see it all. What can I do so what I write is the same normal size as everyone else's?

Thank you for your help,

JeremyCastle


 * Don't insert spaces before the beginning of lines. Then everything will look normal. -- John Fader 17:16, 27 Feb 2005 (UTC)

minor edits
If you come across a page, via random page or whatever, that needs a stub notice, substub notice, or a catagorized stub notice should it marked as aminnor edit? What if it has the wrong type of stub notice?Bawolff 04:09, 28 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * There's not really a set-in-stone-rule for what is and isn't minor. Usually, when you are removing or changing substantial or controversial info you should call it mayor, but changing or adding stub notices can be called minor I think. 131.211.71.50 08:25, 28 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * See also Minor edit, and WikiProject Stub sorting. 68.81.231.127 08:36, 28 Feb 2005 (UTC)

thanks Bawolff 19:23, 28 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Wikipedia sql dump
Hello,

I downloaded from http://download.wikimedia.org/archives/en/ 20050107_cur_table.sql.bz2

which is a 504Mb dump of the wiki database

I'm trying to put that in my local MySQL database

however when I run the sql script I get the error

ERROR at line 47 in file: '20050107_cur_table.sql': Unknown command '\''.

I checked the script

... This use of the word anarchy implies a broad definition: usually, any situation where there is no internationally recognized government is considered anarchic. The current political situation in Somalia, for example, is referred to as a state of anarchy using this definition, since it is in a state of chaos [http://www.cia.gov/cia/publicati ....

its an insert statement it is exactly at the "http://www"

its not a valid sql statement

how come??? & how can I import the data if the sql statment is wrong? is it becoz i'm using windows XP as my operating system??

pls help

My edits don't show up
Edits I make appear in the page history (see the history of the reference desk) but not on the page.--212.100.250.212 17:36, 28 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * It'll appear soon. Sometimes cache slowdowns and database synchronisation can make things not immediately appear.  Clearing your cache may help (or may not). -- John Fader 19:00, 28 Feb 2005 (UTC)

End of archive.