Wikipedia:Help desk/Archives/2009 October 29

= October 29 =

Grammar Improvements Seen As Contributing Nothing?
I keep getting reverts everytime I try to proofread some of these articles, such as pentagram and Halloween 4 to name a few, that have accurate concepts presented in poor style, grammar, and spelling. I've received thank-you's from more than one user for catching their mistakes, but now I'm getting all of these revert warnings from Wikipedia and the revertbots, and I've decided that, although expression of an idea is essential to clearly conveying it to other readers, I don't HAVE TO contribute ANYTHING to help make language more clearly express concepts, and all of you can wallow in your inarticulate confusion, and I can keep my clarity to myself, and laugh at your best efforts to use your so-called English! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.190.57.236 (talk) 02:13, 29 October 2009 (UTC)
 * If the warnings you refer to appear on the talk page for an IP address, note that IP addresses can be shared by multiple users. Maybe someone else made unconstructive edits under the same IP address. You can prevent this confusion by creating an account. This will stop other people's edits from looking like yours. There is nothing wrong with correcting errors of spelling and grammar on Wikipedia. You should not have received warnings for that. I've been making corrections for years with no problems. Most likely someone else is vandalizing Wikipedia from the same IP address you are using. Note that you may be making the logical error of inferring too much from what you saw on your screen. The talk page of an IP address should display a message box that explains how the shared nature of IP addresses means you should not assume the system is necessarily talking to "you". --Teratornis (talk) 03:48, 29 October 2009 (UTC)
 * In this case the edits (proofreading) most probably belong to this IP. I have restored the IP's edits at Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers, I think they were reverted by mistake. Creating an account is a good idea, and certainly proofreading is a highly valued contribution. If you go the the "history" tab at the top of an article you can see who reverted your edits. In most cases it is a user, not a bot. You can discuss the problem with the user (as User:Intelligentsium has done on your behalf here) or on the talk page of the article. With Pentagram one set of your edits was reverted due to too many {fact} tags being added.--Commander Keane (talk) 04:07, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

It is also helpful to use an edit summary, this will show other editors what you changed and keep your edits from being mistaken for vandalism. -- Kraftlos  (Talk | Contrib) 04:55, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

Contradiction between two articles
The Joe Morgan article says he was awarded the "NL Comeback Player of the Year" award in 1982. The linked article, the MLB Comeback Player of the Year (one to an NL player, one to an AL player) indicates that the award wasn't invented until after the year 2000. I don't know anything about baseball, which is why I was using wiki as a reference for it in the first place. Is there a template or something to indicate tension between two wikipedia articles? If so, should it go on both pages? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Downfall2209 (talk • contribs) 00:14, 29 October 2009 (UTC)


 * I don't know anything about baseball either but it appears Joe Morgan received The Sporting News Comeback Player of the Year Award and not the Major League Baseball Comeback Player of the Year Award. See Contradict-other. PrimeHunter (talk) 00:28, 29 October 2009 (UTC)
 * I have piped the link to the right award. PrimeHunter (talk) 00:36, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

Script to show diffs in watchlist
Is there a script that would allow you to view diffs in your watchlist without visiting the article page? Lupin's Anti-vandal tool does this but it is based on real time changes. I'm not sure if the "auto-expand" feature in wikiWatch does it as the script failed to work for me (non-responsive script) and it is not in active development. --Dodo bird (talk) 03:39, 29 October 2009 (UTC)
 * Try using popups. All you have to do is to put your mouse over diff.   Btilm  03:41, 29 October 2009 (UTC)
 * Ah. Thanks.--Dodo bird (talk) 04:01, 29 October 2009 (UTC)
 * No problem!  Btilm  04:03, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

login says I don't exist
So I try to create a login using the name that doesn't exist Brian8wiki  I then get the error that it is two close to a name that already exists. I searched the entries that name made, and it is me who made the edits at Brian8wiki. I've asked for a password to be sent to my email, but it hasn't happened. What oh what can Brian8wiki do, aside from reregister and become a new user?

thank you, Brian  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.16.84.82 (talk) 04:55, 29 October 2009 (UTC)


 * Usernames are case-sensitive. Your username is not Brian8wiki, it's Brian8Wiki. See if putting the correct capitalization in lets you login or get sent a new password. Someguy1221 (talk) 05:18, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

Image logs
Why are we now unable to look at the logs of deleted images? jc iindyysgvxc  (my contributions) 08:30, 29 October 2009 (UTC)
 * You still can see logs of deleted files: For example this lists your uploads, including deleted files; clicking on File:Chistmort.jpg will take you to the deletion log for one of them. I think searching used to take you to the deletion log, but searching for File:Chistmort.jpg now takes you to a page that says 'You may create the page "File:Chistmort.jpg"…', but you can still get to the log by clicking on that link. —teb728 t c 08:53, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

in which link of here that can put my article?
Hello.In which link of wikipedia can we put our translation of one article from wikipedia from English to Persian(or spain. Italiano…)?my mean is that I translate one article from here from English to my native language,now I want to place it in persian in wikipedia How can I?in which link of here I can put ? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.38.13.68 (talk) 08:35, 29 October 2009 (UTC)
 * If I understand correctly, you're saying that you read an article on English Wikipedia and wrote a translation into Persian. In that case, your Persian-language version of the article belongs on the Persian Wikipedia - http://fa.wikipedia.org. When you have created the page there (instructions in Persian on how to do so are here), you can add an interwiki link from the corresponding article here in the English Wikipedia. Does that answer your question? Gonzonoir (talk) 08:51, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

Spate of edits using a single source
I'm not sure where this issue should go, so I'm posting it here. If it belongs somewhere else, please move it and just let me know where it ends up.

One editor made a series of edits to multiple articles, citing a single source that opines about the sexual orientation of various cartoon characters. Here are the diffs:. I don't see how, on the basis of a single source, these theories deserve weight in the articles. As far as we can tell, this is one guy's opinion. This opinion seems to be based entirely on subtext, as homosexuality is either rarely or never mentioned in these cartoons. In some cases, this one person's opinion is receiving substantial weight in the article, in something of a bizarre way. I think it would be wise for this kind of discussion to happen in one place, rather than on six different talk pages. Croctotheface (talk) 09:21, 29 October 2009 (UTC)
 * Hmm, this is definitely a valid issue, but I don't think this is the correct place to be raising it, as the Help Desk is really more for questions about using the site itself. As you correctly point out, this does undoubtedly require some discussion. I'd recommend that you bring this issue up at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Television. Glass  Cobra  14:03, 29 October 2009 (UTC)
 * Extensive use of research articles is not a good idea in general, and it's not clear that this Journal of Popular Film & Television is a peer-reviewed source. Plus there is the extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof rule and these claims to seem to me to be pretty extraordinary. Some of the changes seem to be starting edit wars and some sort of consensus building should be done, the TV project seems as good a place as any to do it. You might check WP:NPOV.--RDBury (talk) 15:18, 29 October 2009 (UTC)


 * Thanks guys--I suspected that this was the right place, but I figured that not knowing where to put it might have been a question for here even if the question itself was not. Moving the above three comments to the TV project. Croctotheface (talk) 18:58, 29 October 2009 (UTC)
 * As the person who originally posted the single source edits, I also responded on the WikiProject talk page. Crocototheface is not arguing that there is a POV expressed in the edits, he said that the information may not be important enough to note. I posted more explanation on the project page. WhisperToMe (talk) 00:57, 30 October 2009 (UTC)
 * http://www.ulrichsweb.com/ulrichsweb/Search/fullCitation.asp?navPage=1&tab=1&viewItemIndex=0&serial_uid=48311&&cxxhs=045035950986488 - The journal is peer reviewed, and it is not extraordinary to claim that Dennis, the author of a peer reviewed journal, said this stuff, so I guess that's the end of that. WhisperToMe (talk) 00:18, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

Problem with album template
Hi, first time in a while I've created an album article, and I can't get the infobox to work. Article is Music For Pleasure (Monaco album). What on earth am I doing wrong? Thanks! Grimhim (talk) 10:44, 29 October 2009 (UTC)
 * Fixed, you had only one "]" in one of your wikilinks. BencherliteTalk 10:53, 29 October 2009 (UTC)


 * Thanks so much. It was driving me nuts. I just couldn't see it. Grimhim (talk) 10:58, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

Rude people
Some people deleted a page that i created that mean so much to me and called it "a waste" but this is my youtube account and i want it to be well know but some RUDE people want to delete it. HOW WOULD THEY FEEL IF THEY LOST SOMETHING THEY LIKED THERE SO MEAN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 217.8.153.49 (talk) 12:44, 29 October 2009 (UTC)
 * Hello. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia. It may resemble a social networking site on first blush where anything can be posted, but it a specific type of reference work, with all that being an encyclopedia implies. You haven't provided enough information for me to see the content that was deleted or the reason, but from what you've said, it sounds like it was unsuitable content for an encyclopedia article. Please visit Why was my page deleted? for further information.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 12:53, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

I want to help
Im loving wiki and want to become a part of the force which makes it work. My area of expertise is mathmatics and my hobbie is barges. I have been to the backlog page to try and find some stuff to do but I would rather only work on maths and barging stuff. My question is how do I see the backlogs for specific subjects.Oliver Barge (talk) 15:23, 29 October 2009 (UTC)


 * The Maths Wikiproject would love to hear from you, I'm sure. There's a list of pages needing attention at Pages needing attention/Mathematics.  As for barges, they would probably fall under WikiProject Ships; I can't see anything specifically relating to barges at WikiProject Ships/Tasks (although I may have missed it in my ignorance) but I'm sure if you ask at the talk page of the WikiProject, someone will have some ideas.  BencherliteTalk 15:19, 29 October 2009 (UTC)


 * If you're a mathie then you'll probably want to get familiar with Help:Displaying a formula and MOS:MATH. Also if you're planning to be a regular contributor you'll much happier if you Create an account. The Pages needing attention is a good place to go for ideas but my approach is to pick something I'm interested in, do some research on it, and then add anything that's not already in Wikipedia to the appropriate article.--RDBury (talk) 15:40, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

Thank you both. Sorry I forgot to log in before my original question. I do actually have an account. I will be looking at the three links in detail and I hope to contribute using them. Thanks Oliver Barge (talk) 18:44, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

I'm confused
Hello Wikipedia. I'll get to the point, I like Wikipedia, I would like to help more with Wikipedia, but I must admit that it is one of the most confusing sites that I've seen in my life. I wanted to add my name to the list of people who can translate articles into English (in my case from Spanish), and I couldn't find a way to do so. Besides that, I wanted to edit an article and I was scared. I left immediately. It all looks so complicated. Anyway, I hope you can help me so I can help you. I know I have a lot to contribute. Thank you.

M —Preceding unsigned comment added by Macandal (talk • contribs) 15:30, 29 October 2009 (UTC)
 * Hello Macandal, welcome to Wikipedia! We're glad to have you here. :) We're always looking for more translators who can help us out. It looks like you've already added your name to Translators available, so you're on the right track. There's really nothing to be scared about when editing articles; we encourage our contributors to be bold and make any changes you see fit! If you have any more questions, you can go ahead and leave them on your talk page, User talk:Macandal, and type (with two curly brackets like that) afterwards. Good luck!  Glass  Cobra  15:42, 29 October 2009 (UTC)
 * Well first off, welcome back! Don't be afraid to edit, be bold and just do what you want to! If it seems complicated, just ignore everything except the edit you want to make. Every single edit made in good faith is more than welcome here, so please don't feel intimidated. As for translation, I'm not a particular expert on the topic, but you should also look at TRANSLATION. It gives some information on the topic, and also has a userbox you can add to put you in the relevant user category. That cover everything? Feel free to ask me more here or on my talkpage. ~ Amory ( u •  t  •  c ) 15:48, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

User Page
I have thought of an idea for my page. The only problem that I anticipate that it (might) have would be the number of MBs it (might) take up. Is there any guidance in this respect. Þjóðólfr (talk) 17:04, 29 October 2009 (UTC)
 * Could you be more specific? When you say "my page," are you referring to your user page, or an article that you're working on? While some users have very elaborate userpages, they are not intended to be the focus of anyone's editing. We are an encyclopedia first, not a social networking site. To answer your question, no, I don't believe there is a specific limit of size for userpages, but I am merely suggesting that if it's going to be a very time-consuming process, then perhaps you might be better off doing something else. Glass  Cobra  17:30, 29 October 2009 (UTC)
 * Lol, no one has ever suspected me of being social before. Yes I did mean my user page. Thanks for your input. Þjóðólfr (talk) 17:38, 29 October 2009 (UTC)
 * Guidance on what belongs and does not belong on user pages is at WP:User page, although there's no specific guidance about limits to page size in megabytes.  Ka renjc 19:52, 30 October 2009 (UTC)

I need MAJOR help starting up an article
I would like to put up a page for the company I work for. I have been told I am unable to do this. Can a Wiki Editor help me out please? Thanks!!!
 * Hi, I'd recommend that you take a look at FAQ/Organizations and Conflict of interest for more information about why we discourage employees of companies to write articles about these topics. You may consider putting in a request at Articles for creation instead. Glass  Cobra  18:10, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

Finding link rot
Someone reviewed a Wikipedia article and wrote:

Second, you have some link rot, and broken links--these are marked with templates. Please fix.

Please explain. How do I find link rot. Is there some secret link. For example, there's a "my contributions" link and a history of which editors edited how many times for an article. These are hidden unless you know how to locate them.

Thank you. Suomi Finland 2009 (talk) 18:30, 29 October 2009 (UTC)
 * Generally, link-rot means that when you click on some of the references, you find that you get a "page not found" error, or something other than was originally linked.-- SPhilbrick  T  18:40, 29 October 2009 (UTC)


 * We actually have a page on it as well, see Link rot. Always practical, being able to link a page with more details then i could possibly write down :) Excirial ( Contact me, Contribs ) 18:44, 29 October 2009 (UTC)
 * Look at Alamogordo,_New_Mexico. For some of the footnotes, e.g. 63 and 64, you'll see "dead link". If you try to access those links, you'll see the problem.-- SPhilbrick  T  18:47, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

Adding pictures
How do I add a picture to the image files, so I can add it to an article? 76.191.135.66 (talk) 20:26, 29 October 2009 (UTC)


 * First you will need to register a user account and log in with this account. In order to upload images you will need the autoconfirmed flag which will be added to your account 4 days after it is created - alternatively you can request confirmed status here. Once done, you can use WP:UPLOAD to upload your image.  Excirial ( Contact me, Contribs ) 20:31, 29 October 2009 (UTC)


 * Before uploading here you should find out what license the image takes. If you know the image is licensed under a free-license, upload it to the Wikimedia Commons instead, so that all projects have access to the image (sign up). Please also read Wikipedia's image use policy.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 21:26, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

External Link
How do I add an external link to this page under B?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Massachusetts_film_and_television

21:14, 29 October 2009 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Nujones (talk • contribs)


 * You cannot, and nor should you. Categories list pages with the category tag on them, and are therefor not meant for external links. Excirial ( Contact me, Contribs ) 21:21, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

So I'm not allowed to add my company (which falls into this category) alphabetically under "B"? Are you saying I have to add a link on the homepage of our website in order to be added? Thanks in advance. 14:45, 30 October 2009 (UTC)~ —Preceding unsigned comment added by Nujones (talk • contribs)


 * Categories can only list pages at Wikipedia, and it's done by editing those pages and not the category. See Help:Category. If your company has no Wikipedia article then it cannot be listed in the category. See also FAQ/Organizations. PrimeHunter (talk) 16:02, 30 October 2009 (UTC)

Help with Page
I want my page to show up under a search in an external search engine, under its acronym "OJEN". For example i can search WHO or world health organization and get its wiki page. i made a redirect page OJEN to Ontario Justice Education Network, but it doesn't show up in the external search engine under its acronym search. Is there a way to make the article show up externally when searched under its acronym and full name. like should i have moved it? Any help will be much appreciated.

Thanks in Advance —Preceding unsigned comment added by Ojen1 (talk • contribs) 21:24, 29 October 2009 (UTC)
 * It can take up to 3 weeks before new pages in Wikipedia are found by Google. —Th e DJ (talk • contribs) 21:31, 29 October 2009 (UTC)


 * Also, the main article is found through Google searching for OJEN since the article does mention the acronym. It just isn't high in the search results. You can see this by searching for OJEN and restricting the search to Wikipedia.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 21:46, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

Redirects
I earlier got directed to a page about changing redirects and don't wish to sound thick but I don't grasp how it quite applies (though I did try to find the answer there before pestering you.) At any rate, I'd like to create a page for a person who, when you type in their name (Stately Wayne Manor), you automatically get sent to another page where it appears as part of the text. In other words, apparently a redirect was placed on the name (I think it may even be from a request I made quite some time ago), so one can't pull up the SWM page to edit it and delete the redirect.

I hope this makes sense. Any directions on how to counter this phenomenon would be greatly appreciated. —Preceding unsigned comment added by EJ Paolone (talk • contribs) 22:20, 29 October 2009 (UTC)


 * I am not entirely certain what the question is, but i assume that you no longer want Stately Wayne Manor redirected to the Power Slam page? Excirial ( Contact me, Contribs ) 22:24, 29 October 2009 (UTC)
 * Click on Stately Wayne Manor. That will redirect you to Power Slam. Look at the top of the page and you will see "(Redirected from Stately Wayne Manor)". Click on that link, and you will go to the redirect page. If you want to add an article on SWM, you can do it there. SPhilbrick  T  12:23, 30 October 2009 (UTC)

Finding articles that have been on both DYK and AfD
Hello, I'm trying to compile a list of articles that have been on both DYK and AfD. I've tried using Wikipedia search, Google, and Bing for talk pages that contain both oldafdfull and dyktalk, such as Talk:Christine Gambito, but it doesn't seem to work very well: Any ideas for getting a more exhaustive list? Thanks, Melchoir (talk) 23:08, 29 October 2009 (UTC)
 * http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special%3ASearch&search=oldafdfull+dyktalk&ns1=1 (No hits)
 * http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special%3ASearch&search=%22nominated+for+deletion%22+%22appeared+on+Wikipedia%27s+Main+Page%22&ns1=1 (1 false positive)
 * http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=site%3Aen.wikipedia.org+%22was+nominated+for+deletion%22+%22appeared+on+Wikipedia%27s+Main+Page%22 (At least this finds Talk:Air West Flight 612, but it doesn't find Talk:Christine Gambito)
 * http://www.bing.com/search?q=site%3Aen.wikipedia.org+%22was+nominated+for+deletion%22+%22appeared+on+Wikipedia%27s+Main+Page%22 (This finds Talk:Mzoli's and Talk:JetBlue Airways Flight 292, but not the other two mentioned above)


 * Basing yourself on a google or wiki search would never provide reliable data, as you can only conduct a text search which is prone to false positives. Similarly google may not have fully indexed pages or cached old versions thus again providing false positives and negatives. If i was to do this i would write a bot for this task which would load the all the pages listed in the Category:Wikipedia Did you know articles. After that i would set it to iterate trough all those pages, loading each pages contents and search for a string or strings which would identify an old AFD, seeing as these don't have a seperate category (Which is a shame, because otherwise it would just be cross referencing two lists). I think "oldafd" and "class="messagebox standard-talk oldafd" " are two reliable terms to search for to detect article removal, though there may certainly be more. Note that AFD templates are not entirely standardized which means you may miss some.


 * Still, keep in mind that the results you will get are not even nearly scientifically accurate. Some pages may not be marked, some pages may just use a noticebox template instead of an AFD template making it impossible to filter them, some may have custom wording in the templates, some pages could contain talk between users merely discussing a search term.... Either way, don't think you will get high quality data. A rough sketch is probably most you can get. Excirial ( Contact me, Contribs ) 23:34, 29 October 2009 (UTC)


 * CatScan at toolserver should be able to do basically what Excirial is suggesting, e.g., but it doesn't seem to return any results at the moment (quite possibly because it's taking too long). I'm not sure how CatScan is implemented, but I suspect it may be trying to intersect the category with the results of a "whatlinkshere" for the template (using the toolserver copies of the databases). Each of these are huge sets of articles.  You might ask over at WP:BOTREQ. -- Rick Block (talk) 00:22, 30 October 2009 (UTC)


 * Thanks Excirial and Rick! I don't think this is worth a bot, but the pointers are quite helpful. Melchoir (talk) 01:48, 30 October 2009 (UTC)

Something wierd
What happened in the history of the sandbox? It maked my broser crashLOL o__O —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.230.251.71 (talk) 23:18, 29 October 2009 (UTC)


 * I just checked with Internet Explorer, Chrome and Firefox, no crashes or slowdowns. Are you certain another tab didn't cause the crash? Or perhaps an addon or widget malfunctioned? Excirial ( Contact me, Contribs ) 23:40, 29 October 2009 (UTC)
 * I believe the questioner was asking about the black boxes in the history of the Sandbox, such as this. I believe it is either oversight or RevDel Intelligent  sium  23:48, 29 October 2009 (UTC)
 * ███████. I believe it is some form of ASCI character as revdel prevents the user from editing an old revision (It stripes it and removes edit functionality), while oversight actually even removes the mention of the revision. Excirial ( Contact me, Contribs ) 23:59, 29 October 2009 (UTC)
 * █ redirects to Block. Intelligent  sium  00:56, 30 October 2009 (UTC)
 * FYI (for the people who don't know) suppression looks like this . Jeffrey Mall (talk • contribs) - 01:15, 30 October 2009 (UTC)


 * Still no explanation as to what those black boxes are? 99.166.95.142 (talk) 17:50, 30 October 2009 (UTC)


 * They are U+2588 full block characters: &#x2588;. See List of Unicode characters. The editor simply filled the edit and edit summary with them. PrimeHunter (talk) 18:00, 30 October 2009 (UTC)

is there a way to post wiki badges linking to other wikis?
I just create a wiki on wikispaces and i want to see if i can post a badge on wikipeia to advertize it.Can i?

the site is wikiawsome.wikispaces.com if anyone is wanting to know so they can check it out. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Hman41 (talk • contribs) 23:36, 29 October 2009 (UTC)


 * Nope, wikipedia is not for advertising or spam purposes, and such article's are speedy deleted. I commend you for asking it first though, as most people just start spamming. Good luck with your wiki though :)  Excirial ( Contact me, Contribs ) 23:39, 29 October 2009 (UTC)


 * You can put a note on your user page about it (just don't make it TOO advertizing-like.)--Unionhawk Talk E-mail Review 23:42, 29 October 2009 (UTC)
 * I think you can have a link on your userpage if it isn't too obstructive. Just don't make it the sole purpose of your userpage and present it neutrally, such as "I also have a page on Wikispaces".  Them From  Space  00:30,

(undent) You can list your wiki at. What do you hope to gain by advertising your wiki? The kinds of people you want to attract (Readers? Editors? Editors with a particular interest or point of view?) would determine how you might appeal to them. Note that few people are likely to be interested in a wiki that just started. See wikiindex:Category:NeedsLove - there are lots of failed wikis out there. Establishing a viable wiki is harder than just announcing you have one. Your best bet is to write some compelling content yourself, or persuade some people you have some sort of relationship with already to help write content. Once your wiki has interesting content, it will start attracting people. --Teratornis (talk) 02:13, 30 October 2009 (UTC)
 * Incidentally, if your wiki needs photos, you can find lots of freely licensed photos on Flickr by searching with the Flickr free template. --Teratornis (talk) 02:26, 30 October 2009 (UTC)
 * For more instructions read Starting and Running a Wiki Website. --Teratornis (talk) 02:27, 30 October 2009 (UTC)