Wikipedia:Help desk/Archives/2009 October 11

= October 11 =

blockcalc
blockcalcHow to user this tools?--219.77.84.98 (talk) 09:04, 11 October 2009 (UTC)
 * It's a tool to help administrators who wish to block a range of IP addresses because of vandalism. See here for a more detailed explanation.  Unless you're an admin, it's no use to you.  Ka renjc 09:34, 11 October 2009 (UTC)

Nari
In the article Nari, there is a "may refer too..." and one of them is Nari (creature), that redirects to Nari! Now I haven't been on Wikipedia in awhile, (It may seem I've never really been active but this isn't my main account, I forgot my password for it) So I really wanted to make sure that this is okay, it seems confusing. A link on Nari, redirects to Nari! Thanks for your help, Programmer101 (talk) 14:15, 11 October 2009 (UTC)
 * Well spotted - someone redirected to the wrong target. I've fixed it now. DuncanHill (talk) 14:23, 11 October 2009 (UTC)


 * Alas! I thought I had gone crazy! I checked it again and it was fixed! I checked the history, nothing! then I realized that maybe I should go through adoption again because I was checking the history of Nari, not Nari(creature)! I'm so stupid, Thanks! Programmer101 (talk) 14:27, 11 October 2009 (UTC)

Probable homework question about zoos
advantage and disadvantage of keeping animals in zoo —Preceding unsigned comment added by 195.229.237.38 (talk) 15:52, 11 October 2009 (UTC)
 * See Zoo, Captivity (animal), In Defense of Animals, PETA, etc. And dyoh. --Teratornis (talk) 18:44, 11 October 2009 (UTC)

Categories
How do I create categories? Joe Chill (talk) 15:58, 11 October 2009 (UTC)
 * By putting an article into one (i.e. adding to a page). The category will appear as a redlink until you put something on the "category page" - text that appears above the list of articles. Xenon54 / talk / 16:26, 11 October 2009 (UTC)
 * You can also create a category page by adding a parent category to it. PrimeHunter (talk) 11:01, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

recent changes in wikipedia for the last one month
hi, I need the recent changes in the last 1 month. Through "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:RecentChanges" page I am unable to see the recent changes for the last one month. Can any one help me regarding this? Nishanthiiit (talk) 16:01, 11 October 2009 (UTC)
 * I don't think it's possible to do exactly what you ask. Recent changes are just that - recent, and only the 500 most recent edits can be displayed by Recent Changes. But...
 * You can specify a starting date. http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:Recentchanges&from=yyyymmddhhmmss will give you a list of changes starting from a date you specify.
 * If you are looking for a specific change by a user, then go to Special:Contributions and type in their username (e.g. Nishanthiiit) in the User: box.
 * If you are looking for a specific change to an article, then go to the article and click "history" at the top of the page. Xenon54 / talk / 16:32, 11 October 2009 (UTC)
 * Just as an order of magnitude estimate, the number of edits to Wikipedia in a single month runs into 6 digits. Basically there are too many to display and it would give your internet connection a good workout just to download them. So the search has to be restricted either by user or article or to a very short time frame.--RDBury (talk) 20:54, 11 October 2009 (UTC)

attribute translator in "cite...." template
Is there a "translator" switch in the Template:cite... citation families? I find multiple authors, multiple editors, but not a translator. This is for a book originally written in Cuban-Spanish in 1940, then translated and republished in English in the early 1990s. The book had its own importance before the translation, and now that it is translated is becoming "required reading" among educational circles.

Long story short: how do you attribute translators using the "cite..." family of citation templates? NDCompuGeek (talk) 16:15, 11 October 2009 (UTC)
 * This might be a good question to ask on Template talk:Cite book.
 * The example given in Template:Cite book/doc cites the original book and provides the  parameter, but doesn't say whether the book is translated (i.e. where the translated title came from). You could also put (trans. John Smith) in one of the other author fields. Xenon54 / talk / 16:38, 11 October 2009 (UTC)


 * Xenon54, Thank you very much. Not the answer I wanted, more like the answer I feared... In any case, I will take your advice and take it up on the talk page and see what happens from there.  I think, until a "better" solution is found, I'll just do like you recommended: put Mr. West-Durhan into an author field and just suffix his name with (Trans.).  Or, I guess I could type it out longhand, but it won't have the metadata shtuff....  Bleargh!
 * Anyway, again, Thank you very much!!!NDCompuGeek (talk) 17:26, 11 October 2009 (UTC)

Drop-down search bar
How does Wikipedia's drop-down search bar select its top result.

For example, if I type in 'Cha', Character appears before Chairman.

What influences what appears and in the order that it does? Flosssock1 (talk) 18:20, 11 October 2009 (UTC)
 * This might be a tough question. See the links under WP:EIW. That leads to the terse mention in:
 * mw:User:Rainman/search internals
 * which doesn't directly answer your question, but might lead you to the people who could, if they were inclined to share what they know. Presumably all the code is available, and you could find the code and study it. (Programmers sometimes regard their code as a sufficient expression of their ideas.) Why do you want to know this? That is, are you trying to reach some goal, and would this information enable some path to the goal? --Teratornis (talk) 20:50, 11 October 2009 (UTC)


 * Why do I want to know? Because it's bu**ered at the moment haha. But thanks, I'll have a look. Flosssock1 (talk) 20:55, 13 October 2009 (UTC)

US Wiki Account
After posting to a German Wiki page (on Herta Müller) I tried to post to the same page on the English Wiki. However, it seemed like I was not able to post to the English Wiki without creating an account (even though I was logged in to the German Wiki). I did this and added to the English Wiki page on Herta Müller. Now the German Wiki people informed me that I am not supposed to have two accounts. Could someone help me with this: It makes sense that one account is the limit, but am I supposed to be able to edit pages on both Wikis, German and English, from within the same account? Thank you in advance! Mgrewe (talk) 19:46, 11 October 2009 (UTC)


 * As far as I'm aware the page "Herta Müller" has never been protected. In theory you should have been able to edit it, even if you were editing anonymously. And yes, the general rule is one person one account. Jeffrey Mall (talk • contribs) - 20:10, 11 October 2009 (UTC)
 * See Special:MergeAccount to create your unified login, if you have not already. Also note that the English Wikipedia is not specific to the United States, but to all English speakers. The servers are in the US but the users are from many countries. --Teratornis (talk) 20:42, 11 October 2009 (UTC)
 * You did make three posts to the article before posting here, but the first two were reverted. —teb728 t c 07:40, 12 October 2009 (UTC)


 * I tried Special:MergeAccount, but when I confirm the password for the other accounts, I get the message that the “login unification is not complete” and that “no accounts could be confirmed using this password”. It also says that accounts named “Mgrewe” on three sites (de-wp, en-wp and meta.wikimedia.org) have been attached to the unified account. (The same happens on the de-wp.) I know I can’t simply “delete” accounts”, but at this point I fear I have made a mess of things… Mgrewe (talk) 14:07, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

Linking from one Wikipedia to Another
I have a User Page on the English Wikipedia, where I've got thousands of edits. Assisted by a Spanish-speaking friend, I've just done my first few edits in the Spanish Wikipedia. I don't think I'll ever do any more, since I don't speak Spanish. I created a tiny user page in the Spanish Wikipedia, and I want it to include a link to my user page in the English Wikipedia.

What should such a link look like? (Feel free to put it in yourself, if that's easier for you.) Lou Sander (talk) 22:05, 11 October 2009 (UTC)
 * The most basic method would be es:Usuario:Lou Sander. Many users like to use a userbox, or a Wikipedia logo in the top right corner (like on my userpage) to indicate a userpage in a different language. Intelligent  sium  review 22:43, 11 October 2009 (UTC)


 * Er, I think that the above is incorrect; the user wants to link from Spanish Wikipedia to English Wikipedia.


 * Lou Sander, to do that, on your user page on the Spanish Wikipedia you would put, as 'en' is the interwiki link to English Wikipedia. The colon before it stops it appearing as an inter-language link in the side-bar. You could also put something like I have on French Wikipedia;

Please visit my talk page on English Wikipedia.

See fr:user:chzz  Chzz  ►  06:27, 12 October 2009 (UTC)


 * Thanks to all for the help. Problem solved. Lou Sander (talk) 16:44, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

"Choose character subset" section of edit page
For whatever reason, the selected option in this portion of the edit page seems to be functionally locked in the "Insert" section. Even when I change the selection, the characters displayed don't change. Is there any way to change the default settng here to "Wiki markup", which I would probably use a lot more often? John Carter (talk) 23:37, 11 October 2009 (UTC)


 * The edittools are MediaWiki:Edittools.js. You might try a purge and bypass. It could also be a JavaScript problem, although if JS is disabled, it should fall back on MediaWiki:Edittools. You might trty disabling/enabling or upgrading JS. Otherwise, ask on the talk page. ---— Gadget850 (Ed)  talk 23:52, 11 October 2009 (UTC)
 * Working now. Thank you. John Carter (talk) 00:30, 12 October 2009 (UTC)