Wikipedia:Help desk/Archives/2008 July 12

= July 12 =

Rock of Love 2 - edit information
Hi, I want to edit some info under Additional Cast - Rock of Love 2. How do I do that? Thank you. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Tlalana (talk • contribs) 01:18, 12 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Simply press 'edit this page' at the top of the article. See How to edit a page and Help:Contents/Editing Wikipedia for some more info. For more help (if needed) place help me on your userpage. An editor will gladly help you out. Happy editing! Scottydude talk 01:52, 12 July 2008 (UTC)


 * Rock of Love 2 redirects to Rock of Love with Bret Michaels (Season 2) which is semi-protected. See Protection policy. You cannot edit semiprotected pages currently because your account is not autoconfirmed. You can suggest changes at Talk:Rock of Love with Bret Michaels (Season 2). PrimeHunter (talk) 02:52, 12 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Oops, my fault Tlalana. I didn't think to check the page. Very lazy of me. Sorry! Scottydude talk 12:49, 12 July 2008 (UTC)

Prime Factorization
I didn't know where to post this but I'm having a competition to factor this number. Melab-1 (talk) 02:52, 12 July 2008 (UTC)
 * What do you mean by competition? It takes a fraction of a second for many programs, for example http://www.alpertron.com.ar/ECM.HTM. PrimeHunter (talk) 03:26, 12 July 2008 (UTC)

Possible Link Spam?
User Harris Feldman has spent the last few days editing celebrity biography articles, either adding one particular celebrity gossip website to the external links section, or adding bits of information that use this website as a citation. I discovered when I was trying to decide whether to edit or remove an addition to one of the pages I watch. I would be highly surprised if the user was not an employee/agent of the website. The site itself, along with the added biographical material are of questionable encylopediac merit - I say questionable because some users might think, for example, that it is notable that Courtney Cox and Jennifer Aniston are still friends or that Bruce Willis is really serious about his latest girlfriend. I thought about just reverting everything this user has done, but as a relatively inexperienced user, thought I would ask for advice. What is the best way to deal with this? Revert everything, or let the usual editors of these pages make the call? If revert all, is there an easy way to do this? Thanks in advance for advice. CAVincent (talk) 03:30, 12 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Revert and point the user to our external links policy. &mdash;  The Hand That Feeds You :Bite 11:10, 12 July 2008 (UTC)

Liverpool and Manchester articles
I was just looking at the article on Manchester, UK, and noticed that this article is protected agaist editing by un-registered users etc...but when I checked the Liverpool article, there is no such protection for this page. Can anyone help to protect Liverpool too. The Liverpool article has been the subject of persistent vandalism in the past. (Richie wright1980 (talk) 06:11, 12 July 2008 (UTC))

One other thing I noticed in the List of English districts by population page was that the population figures quoted are highly questionable. In the latest UK census in 2001, for example, The City of Manchester's official population was 392,819 (see UK Government 2001 census statistics online, and in 2001, Liverpool's population was 439,473 (see ). Yet the populations quoted on this page suggest that Manchester's population has overtaken Liverpool's in 7 years.  And it also suggests that Liverpool's population has fallen since 2001, while Manchester's has risen.  The data is, therefore, highly questionable and misleading. (Richie wright1980 (talk) 06:32, 12 July 2008 (UTC))
 * To request semi-protection of Liverpool, go to Requests for page protection. With regard to the population statistics, according to the article, it takes its population statistics from the Office for National Statistics as of 2006, which is the executive office of the UK Statistics Authority. That seems to me a very reliable source, though I am no authority on English bureaucratic agencies. So the questions then become, is the agency reliable, or should the article rely on some better source? And a fundamental question which editors often overlook is whether the article is accurately reporting what the source actually says. If the answer to both of those questions is yes, your quibble is not with the article's numbers but with the figures of the agency. To me it doesn't seem unreasonable for a city's population to increase by 60,000 (Manchester) over five years (2001 to 2006), and certainly not for Liverpool's to change by a de minimis 3,000 people. You state the one's increase and the other's minor decline and go directly to: "The data is, therefore, highly questionable" without stating any intervening reason why the given population changes are unlikely. I don't see anything on the face of these numbers that suggests this. Maybe you know these cities well personally that leads you to this conclusion but if so, you haven't stated it here.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 08:58, 12 July 2008 (UTC)

Slow to update
Recently (I would guess in the past couple weeks or so), Wikipedia has been really slow to save or preview edits, often taking up to 30 seconds for a response from the server. That is, I click the button to save/preview, and the browser is "waiting for response from en.wikipedia.org" for that long. Simply reading pages seems to be ok. Is there an explanation for what is going on? Is this a temporary hiccup or is this something we should continue to expect as part of some new backend protocol? And, prophetically, this just happened again when I tried to submit this comment, which ultimately resulted in the browser returning a blank page. I had to re-submit to get it to stick. And now, again, twice. Ham Pastrami (talk) 07:36, 12 July 2008 (UTC)
 * My guess would be a problem with your internet browser or ISP, as I haven't had any problems. Do you have a broadband connection? D a R kA g E 7 [Talk] 08:12, 12 July 2008 (UTC)

Download Wikipedia
RushdimIDlike (talk) 07:54, 12 July 2008 (UTC)

hOW i DO THAT i WANT TO download as web mirror, or selective specified article download?

How do I only to dawnload articles??


 * You can download database dumps and static html pages here --Chris  09:53, 12 July 2008 (UTC)
 * More information and alternatives are at WP:EIW. --Teratornis (talk) 20:24, 12 July 2008 (UTC)

WP traffic patterns
I have just notices a remarkable pattern in traffic statistics. Hits to Deep_throat_(sexual_act), almost without fail seem to peak on Monday's; see here. I wonder what it is about Monday's which causes this? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 79.75.157.15 (talk) 09:10, 12 July 2008 (UTC)


 * I just checked a few random articles and they show the same pattern. I assume the real question, therefore, is what is it about mondays that people visit Wikipedia more? Just got back to work from the weekend, really bored...trying to waste time? Someguy1221 (talk) 09:16, 12 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Do you know what time zone they're using? Those Monday peaks could easily be (say) Sunday night in en.wikipedia's most popular areas. Algebraist 09:22, 12 July 2008 (UTC)
 * I think it might have to do with people goofing off at work on Mondays. -- ShinmaWa(talk) 03:52, 13 July 2008 (UTC)

Changing an article's name
I would like to know how to change an article's main name, for example, from "Example" to "Example (disambiguation)", as I am creating a page that is more major than the disambiguation page. Bugalugs13 (talk) 09:44, 12 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Pages are renamed by moving them to new target names. This procedure preserves the page's edit history. Please do not rename a page by copying/pasting its content to a new page name. If you have an account and it is at least four days old, you can move a page yourself, but please first review Naming conventions. If you still wish to rename the page, go to it and click the move tab at the top (near the history and watch tabs). You can then specify a new name for the article. The old page name will automatically become a redirect to the new page. However, if the desired target page name already exists, you will need an administrator to move the page for you, which can be requested at Requested moves. Hope this helps.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 09:49, 12 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Please bear in mind that by moving an established page to a new name, you are moving the destination of all the links that currently link to that page. Because the old page name remains as a redirect, most of those links will still function.  However, the ones that were already redirected on from elsewhere can cease to work, because your action has converted them into double redirects.  Please make sure you click on "What links here" after you have moved your page, and fix any double redirects your page move has created.


 * Please also note that links in Wikipedia should point at the relevant article wherever possible, and not at a disambiguation page. This is to make navigation straightforward.  Moves and renames involving disambiguation pages can sometimes leave large numbers of links pointing suddenly at a disambiguation page rather than at their proper target.  These have to be fixed manually, which is very time-consuming.  If your move involves a disambiguation page, please take this into account.  There's more information at Disambiguation pages with links.  Cheers!  Ka renjc 20:05, 12 July 2008 (UTC)

Museum
describe the museum in chennai —Preceding unsigned comment added by 59.92.27.109 (talk) 13:23, 12 July 2008 (UTC)
 * You are going to have to be more specific. Which museum? Does it have an article here? I don't think many people here have been to Chennai, so we may not be able to answer your question. Xenon54 13:46, 12 July 2008 (UTC)
 * I guess it's about Government Museum. See their official website at http://www.chennaimuseum.org/. Note that this help desk is for asking questions about Wikipedia. PrimeHunter (talk) 13:53, 12 July 2008 (UTC)

How to find a line number?
The Dif lists the Line # of the edit, but this does not seem helpful in finding the edit in the overall text. Is there a way to display the line numbers when viewing an article? Thanks for the help. Kilmer-san (talk) 17:13, 12 July 2008 (UTC)
 * The only way I know is to use an external editor. See: WP:EIW. --Teratornis (talk) 20:19, 12 July 2008 (UTC)

Article rating
Hi All,

Just wondering who is allowed to rate a article? Does it need ot be a admin or a special privilage user? Just i dnt want to change the class of a article i am workign on to B if i dnt have the rights to.--Andrewcrawford (talk) 17:42, 12 July 2008 (UTC)
 * In principle, anyone. In effect, WikiProjects organised around a particular topic area do the assessing. It's probably best to leave someone else evaluate your work, to avoid a perception of conflict of interest or bias. If you're sure you understand the assessment criteria, it's probably ok to go ahead and rate it, with an explanation on the talkpage. Regards, Skomorokh  18:47, 12 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the input, i know the work done justify it to go up one level it might justify it goign up a few levels but i believe i could be bias on giving it more levels than it deserves. But thank oyu again for clarifying.--Andrewcrawford (talk) 15:32, 13 July 2008 (UTC)
 * No problem. You could drop a comment of the WikiProject whose rating you want change asking for a reviewer, or simply ask someone here to review it if you're not comfortable doing it yourself. Regards, Skomorokh  02:54, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

How can I in an article make the Table of Content appear?
Here is the link to the article: Ginzburg-Landau theory. Please advice TomyDuby (talk) 18:47, 12 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Very near to the bottom of the article, when you go to edit it, is some text saying " ", which stops the table of contents from appearing.  Removing that should make it show up just fine, though you might want to see if you can figure out why someone would have added it in the first place. -- Nataly a  18:51, 12 July 2008 (UTC)


 * An editor just removed it. I don't see why the TOC would be supressed for this article. --——  Gadget850 (Ed)  talk  -  18:59, 12 July 2008 (UTC)


 * was added in when the TOC appeared just before the See also section because the article text had no sections. I suppose it was an improvement at the time but a better solution was to add section headings. PrimeHunter (talk) 19:16, 12 July 2008 (UTC)
 * It is common for new articles to not yet follow Wikipedia's layout guidelines, for example, by someone writing the whole article to consist of a lead section. I would recommend against using in an article that would be reasonably likely to improve, to avoid this very problem of the  becoming a confusing relic as the article gets additional proper sections. --Teratornis (talk) 20:16, 12 July 2008 (UTC)


 * Many thanks! TomyDuby (talk) 20:25, 12 July 2008 (UTC)

How to create pages?
So i have noticed that a certain song, with the lyrics as following: "and i was thinking maybe somewhere later down the road after all our stories have been told i'd sit and think of you the dear friend i once knew shot through my life like a shooting star"

Has no official artist, and therefore people can't find it. I've recorded it and wish to share that information with others, but i don't know how to create a page for the song, on which i would note that this song has no artist, but that you can find recordings of it in random places, such as http://www.myspace.com/morleymitchell and hopefully someone will step up sometime and perhaps give clues as to who wrote the song, which is somewhat well-known. If you could assist me with this task, it would be greatly appreciated -Mitchell Morley contact at —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.183.67.40 (talk) 21:08, 12 July 2008 (UTC)


 * You'll have to ask at WP:AFC because you don't have an account. Sceptre (talk) 21:12, 12 July 2008 (UTC]]

Liverpool gay quarter
Hi, I wanted to know how to re-name an article? It is currently named as Liverpool gay quarter, and I wanted to re-name it 'Liverpool Gay Quarter', as then the title will be capitalised. Also, to make it easier to find the article, I wondered if it is possible to set up a direct link to the page, for anyone that may type in 'gay liverpool', in the wikipedia 'find' field. (Richie wright1980 (talk) 21:17, 12 July 2008 (UTC))
 * Articles can be renamed by moving them, information about which you can find at Help:Moving a page. Do note that you must be an autoconfirmed user (user account in existance for 4 days, and having made at least 10 edits) to be able to move a page.  As for having someone type in "Gay Liverpool" and have it go to Liverpool gay quarter, you can use a Redirect to do so. -- Nataly a  21:23, 12 July 2008 (UTC)
 * I have moved Liverpool gay quarter to Liverpool Gay Quarter and created Gay Liverpool as a redirect to the latter. – ukexpat (talk) 00:33, 13 July 2008 (UTC)
 * It seems to me that MOS:CAPS would prefer the original title. —teb728 t c 01:38, 13 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Yes, the page belongs at the original title per MOS:CAPS. The |move has been made. Scottydude talk 02:34, 13 July 2008 (UTC)

Equation numbers
Is there a mechanism to number equations in an article for further use in the same article? Please advice. TomyDuby (talk) 23:44, 12 July 2008 (UTC)
 * There was a discussion of this a while ago, but I'm not sure if it came to anything. Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Mathematics is the best place to ask for more information. Algebraist 10:22, 13 July 2008 (UTC)