Wikipedia:Help desk/Archives/2008 December 11

= December 11 =

Account deletion

 * I have created an account in error (0 edits) and would like to delete it so I can create another, with a similar name (this is not possible while the original remains in existence). Can this be done? Bastie (talk) 00:48, 11 December 2008 (UTC)
 * Account deletion is not possible, but changing username is possible. It seems that is what you really want. —teb728 t c 04:57, 11 December 2008 (UTC)
 * Looks like the OP made a post on a user talk page of an account that is registerd with no edits. Usurpation is probably possible.  Grsz  11  05:04, 11 December 2008 (UTC)
 * ^^ that was my first choice for a new name but it has been taken. The account I'm asking about here is completely different. Bastie (talk) 05:48, 11 December 2008 (UTC)
 * The fact that it has been taken doesn't mean you can't usurp it. That's just what usurpation is. —teb728 t c 05:59, 11 December 2008 (UTC)
 * Oh, I see, thanks for your help. Bastie (talk) 07:25, 11 December 2008 (UTC)

avoiding a bot
I am trying to add an external link, but a bot keeps removing it.

How can I prevent the bot from removing my link? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Mercurye (talk • contribs) 02:41, 11 December 2008 (UTC)
 * Your links are blacklisted, as they are inappropriate to be linked to. I can't comment much more than that, but I'm sure somebody else can.  Grsz  11  02:44, 11 December 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the reply, but actually my specific site isn't blacklisted. However, my server also offers blogs, and there appears to be a sweeping blacklisting of the blogs and everything else from that server.

I received an automated Wiki note that I could "revert the bot," but I have no idea how to do that. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Mercurye (talk • contribs) 02:53, 11 December 2008 (UTC)
 * Please read our guidelines for external links. Wikipedia is not a collection of links. I have reviewed your links, and I believe they are inappropriate. They add little if any value to the articles; they are just on the general subject of ventriloquism. The fact that you add the same link to multiple articles is a pretty clear indication that you are spamming. In answer to your question of how to avoid removal of your links: don’t add them in the first place. —teb728 t c 04:48, 11 December 2008 (UTC)

envci sci
what would it take to human development to be truly sustainable? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 202.84.115.240 (talk) 02:43, 11 December 2008 (UTC)
 * This forum is for help on how to use Wikipedia. In order use Wikipedia for general questions like that, ask at the Reference desk, or search for information in articles. —teb728 t c 04:18, 11 December 2008 (UTC)
 * Be sure to make it a meaningful question, by specifying for how long. Human development is almost certainly sustainable for the next ten minutes. Maybe even for the next ten years. Beyond that, who knows. If humans continue to evolve like other mammal species, then human development is probably not sustainable for more than a few million years, because few mammal species persist that long. One thing is for certain: if human population continues to grow exponentially at the current rate, that growth is not sustainable for more than a few thousand years, because at the current rate of population increase, the mass of humans will exceed the mass of the observable universe by then. Even with super-duper space travel technology, we'll just run out of atoms that we can convert into more people. Unless maybe someone figures out how to start colonizing parallel universes. --Teratornis (talk) 09:19, 11 December 2008 (UTC)

First Post
how do i make a post on wikipedia??? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Suzie0520 (talk • contribs) 04:21, 11 December 2008 (UTC)


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


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


 * If you still think an article is appropriate, see Help:Starting a new page. You might also look at Your first article and How to write a great article for guidance, and please consider taking a tour through the Tutorial so that you know how to properly format the article before creation.. -- k a i n a w &trade; 04:23, 11 December 2008 (UTC)

Re-inserting deleted article
If my article was deleted, and I did some changes to fit the post criteria, how can I re-insert it ? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Marcoulises (talk • contribs) 12:37, 11 December 2008 (UTC)
 * I presume you're referring to EKN which was deleted by User talk:Akradecki as "blatant advertising". To get it into article namespace again, you need to move it but I would recommend leaving a note at the deleting admin's talk page first. Zain Ebrahim (talk) 12:42, 11 December 2008 (UTC)


 * To avoid having it deleted again, the best course of action would be to put the new version on a subpage of your userpage like User:Marcoulises/Sandbox and ask a more experienced editor to doublecheck to make sure your work truly meets the criteria. After that, you can move it to the right place (if you're autoconfirmed (4 days, 10 edits)) or an experienced user can move the page for you after they checked it. - Mgm|(talk) 12:44, 11 December 2008 (UTC)

Unified Login with Wiktionary removed editing privilege
A few weeks ago I unified my Wikipedia login with Wiktionary. I did not realise that Wiki login is case senstive and used login 'MonoApe' instead of 'Monoape'. My 'new' login does not have editing privileges for semi-protected pages, even though I unified several weeks ago. How can I fix this, please? —Preceding unsigned comment added by MonoApe (talk • contribs) 13:32, 11 December 2008 (UTC)
 * You have had this account for more than a month, but autoconfirmed status requires that you also make at least ten edits. Since you have now done this, you should now be able to edit semiprotected pages (assuming you do not use TOR). Algebraist 14:23, 11 December 2008 (UTC)


 * Typical! I wasn't aware of the 10 edit limit and it just switched over.  Thanks for your help. MonoApe (talk) 16:38, 11 December 2008 (UTC)

Template Pages
Are there Template: pages where the content is like yada yada yada and thingamabober?

So in the Template: page, it would look something like:

yada yada yada thingamabober

96.53.149.117 (talk) 15:11, 11 December 2008 (UTC)


 * I don't understand your question, please clarify – ukexpat (talk) 15:18, 11 December 2008 (UTC)


 * If you mean whether a template can use other templates then the answer is yes. PrimeHunter (talk) 16:16, 11 December 2008 (UTC)

Please answer
--Treanna2011 (talk) 15:28, 11 December 2008 (UTC)How do you add a search???
 * I have no idea what you are asking. Please clarify your question. Algebraist 15:29, 11 December 2008 (UTC)
 * Maybe Searching is of help. PrimeHunter (talk) 16:10, 11 December 2008 (UTC)
 * This is probably the most vague request ever. Zain Ebrahim (talk) 06:48, 12 December 2008 (UTC)

Album cover images in discographies
The discography at Bardo Pond includes album cover images. I've seen other discographies where these have been removed because they are deemed not to be fair use in galleries. So I think this should be done for the album cover images in this article too, although I don't want to do it myself. --Richardrj talkemail 16:20, 11 December 2008 (UTC)


 * I have tagged it for the moment. The applicable guideline is Non-free content.


 * All the images are used in other articles, except for Amanita and Batholith. Amanita needs to be added to the album article; there is no article for Batholith, so if the image is deleted from Bardo Pond it is going to be orphaned and deleted.


 * --—— Gadget850 (Ed)  talk  -  17:52, 11 December 2008 (UTC)


 * Hi Richardrj, you're entirely correct - the images should be removed in order to comply with the non-free policy. PhilKnight (talk) 17:58, 11 December 2008 (UTC)


 * I added the Amanita image to the album article and updated the rationale. --—— Gadget850 (Ed)  talk  -  18:48, 11 December 2008 (UTC)

WikiAdmin?
Hi there. I know this is only for using wikipedia, but I've no idea where this might go. A few minutes I deleted a suspect email that supposedly came from 'WikiAdmin', and an unfamiliar email address. The language was foreign, and not one I was able to trabslate through babelfish very well. It mentioned my username and had several links to tr.wikipedia. I don't know what tr.wikipedia is, and suspect that the email was a hoax trying to get my password. But can anyone help me out - anyone experienced this before, or know what tr.wikipedia is? Would I ever get an email from a 'WikiAdmin'? Skinny87 (talk) 19:33, 11 December 2008 (UTC)
 * tr.wikipedia is the Turkish Wikipedia. I don't know about that one, but some of the smaller Wikipedias automatically send emails to anyone who creates an account, which includes merely visiting them if you have a global account (visiting could be accidentally clicking on an interwiki link). Or it's just a hoax, or some wierd canvassing. Do you know the sender of the email? Someguy1221 (talk) 19:39, 11 December 2008 (UTC)


 * (after EC)There are a number of possibilities... Either you created a universal login, and thus had an account at the Turkish wikipedia created for you, or someone is hoaxing that event. Did you create a universal login?  Now that you know its Turkish, perhaps you could use Babelfish or InterTran to translate it for you?!?  --Jayron32. talk . contribs  19:41, 11 December 2008 (UTC)


 * Yes, I did just create a universal log-in. I'll translate the email through babelfish. Thanks for the help! Skinny87 (talk) 19:43, 11 December 2008 (UTC)
 * Also sometimes emails are sent when someone leaves a message on your talk page or changes a page you have on your watchlist.  Matt  (  Talk  )   23:11, 11 December 2008 (UTC)
 * I started getting similar e-mails after I set up a single sign-on account. Google language tools was able to translate them semi-coherently. They are just welcome e-mails from the various language Wikipedias that I have been visiting in the course of following Interlanguage links. (Incidentally, it would be nice if the single sign-on feature had some way to automatically inform the other language Wikipedias of your language preference. It's easier to navigate on a Wikipedia whose language you don't read if you set your language preference to a language you know, which causes the standard navigation links to become readable, but it's a little difficult to do that because you have to find your way to your user preferences in that other language. You kind of have to navigate by selecting buttons, tabs, and links according to their position, by referencing a Wikipedia you can read. The automatic welcome e-mails should also be in your language preference, if possible.) I've been looking to see what some other language Wikipedias have about some topics I am interested in. I created a Translate wikipedia template which simplifies generating machine translations of them into somewhat readable English. See the template page for examples. --Teratornis (talk) 23:29, 11 December 2008 (UTC)
 * While we're on the subject of other language Wikipedias, has anybody tried moving images to Commons from a Wikipedia whose language you do not read? I moved some images from the English Wikipedia, and it was pretty easy with CommonsHelper. CommonsHelper looks to be usable from any language Wikipedia, but I'm a little hesitant to move images from a Wikipedia whose language I don't speak, just in case I mess something up and I can't tell what devastation I'm wreaking over there. (I don't want to be a stereotypical ugly American, although that's probably unavoidable in my case.) --Teratornis (talk) 23:41, 11 December 2008 (UTC)