Wikipedia:Help desk/Archives/2014 December 21

= December 21 =

"Insert citation" button on editing toolbar not working for me
Hi all,

I'm using the Vector skin, using the latest version on Firefox (I dunno what it is, the bubbles just pop up to say to update it and I do what I'm told), Win XP. Just yesterday, the "Insert citation" button on editing toolbar stopped working for me. I'm looking at a toolbar with the icons

B I (globe) (chain link) (picture) {book} {signature), then drop-downs Advanced, Special characters, Help.

When I click on the "Insert citation" button, instead of presenting the various referencing templates, nothing happens. Is this a know issue, or something?

Pete AU aka --Shirt58 (talk) 04:23, 21 December 2014 (UTC)
 * I am on firefox and vector skin and its working for me.-- TRPoD aka The Red Pen of Doom  05:32, 21 December 2014 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the reply, TRPoD. I've tried other browsers, but same thing happens. Must be some setting on my computer, rather than something in the Wiki software. --Shirt58 (talk) 08:45, 21 December 2014 (UTC)
 * I'm still on XP as well, which as you probably know Microsoft have stopped supporting, so until we pay them for a newer Windows or go open-source, we have to accept that things will start to degrade. For Wiki editing my HotCat and my CharInsert (both enabled in Preferences) have gone, and off-wiki Flash player has stopped working Noyster  (talk),  12:03, 21 December 2014 (UTC)

How do I resize an image on wiki?
I've uploaded a couple of jp files, but never png files so I'm not sure how to resize this png file seen on my userpage. Could anyone help me please? Thanks in advance.--Taeyebaar (talk) 05:50, 21 December 2014 (UTC)


 * The practice is the same for PNG and JPG files. I've made a change here.  You can find more about that at Picture tutorial.  Dismas |(talk) 06:24, 21 December 2014 (UTC)

I have lost myself
1/ What happened? I cannot access or find my edits. My User Page Niehorster User:Niehorster

2/ On my User Page Niehorster  User:Niehorster, when I click on my name Leo Niehorster,  it now redirects to List of historians by area of study (Was initially like this: http://www.wikipedia.or.ke/index.php/Leo_Niehorster ) Niehorster Information not passed on is lost. 10:47, 21 December 2014 (UTC)


 * Here it is: . As you can see there, it was proposed for deletion, no objections were received, and it was replaced by a redirect to the list you mention. If there had been an objection, it would still have been deleted, as it provided no evidence of its subject's notability. Maproom (talk) 12:05, 21 December 2014 (UTC)


 * Also note that http://www.wikipedia.or.ke/index.php/Leo_Niehorster is not a Wikipedia website nor a compliant mirror, see .--ukexpat (talk) 19:47, 22 December 2014 (UTC)

Partial archiving
I recently asked an admin about changes an editor could make to their Talk page. In answering the admin said this: "As far as I know, with certain restrictions to do with warnings and not changing other editor's contributions (WP:OWNTALK, WP:REMOVED, and WP:TALKO) among others) you are free to do partial archives and delete other sections as you wish." I looked at those help pages. Some days ago I asked the same admin but did not receive an answer to this question: how is "partial archving" done?  Can you help, please?  I thought archives could not be added to, as per the note at the top of archives, "Do not edit the contents of this page".  P-123 (talk) 10:57, 21 December 2014 (UTC)


 * I am not an admin, but I will try to help.
 * Archives can be added to, by the archiving process: if there were no way to put stuff in an archive, it would be useless. However, the contents of an archive (at least, of an official archive – I guess you can do what you like with your own user-space archives) should not be edited.
 * I do not know what you mean by "partial archiving". But you can create an archive in your user space, and move stuff into it. Alternatively, you can somehow (don't ask me) set up a bot to do it for you. Maproom (talk) 12:10, 21 December 2014 (UTC)
 * I obviously misunderstood "edited". I thought adding threads to an archive counted as editing. I do not  know what is meant by "partial archiving".  That is why I asked what it was.  P-123 (talk)

The "do not edit the contents" is to not continue conversations, you can add additional closed conversations whenever you want. -- TRPoD aka The Red Pen of Doom  12:17, 21 December 2014 (UTC)
 * Thanks. P-123 (talk) 14:42, 21 December 2014 (UTC)
 * There are several automatic archiving processes for user talk pages. The one below works well for me. It archives each thread after 42 days, but you can change this and the other parameters at will. You insert the following code at the top of your current talk page:




 * Noyster  (talk),  12:24, 21 December 2014 (UTC)


 * Thanks, Noyster. Some more questions:
 * Once that automatic archiving is set up, is there any way to add threads to that archive manually if I wish to? (Am having problems with an editor and wish to remove those threads immediately to archive, but not delete them.)
 * Do deleted threads in a current Talk page show up once the page is archived? If I call up my archive 2, say, (I have 3) will any threads I deleted from the page before archiving it show up in archive 2?  (I have not done this before so cannot look to see what happens.)
 * In the code you have given, why does the parameter | minthreadsleft=6 have to go in? Why 6?
 * Apart from username and length (42 days here), what other parameters can be changed and why should they be?
 * P-123 (talk) 14:31, 21 December 2014 (UTC)
 * yes, you can manually archive at any time. no, the bot does not go back and find/restore threads that were previously deleted. -- TRPoD aka The Red Pen of Doom  14:51, 21 December 2014 (UTC)
 * minthreadsleft is the number of sections it will leave on your talk page even if they are older than the archiving date. -- TRPoD aka The Red Pen of Doom  14:52, 21 December 2014 (UTC)
 * once you put the coding on your page, when the bot runs it will look at your page and see if there are any sections where the last dated comment is older than the algo=old(Xd) parameter. If there are then it checks to see if there are more sections than the minthreadsleft=X parameter and if so it will take the old ones copy what is in the sections, place it in the archive and delete the contents from the talk page. -- TRPoD aka The Red Pen of Doom  15:00, 21 December 2014 (UTC)
 * Thanks, TRPoD aka The Red Pen of Doom .  I can see now why deletion of sections from user Talk pages is not liked, though it is not prohibited.  Deletion will clearly result in an incomplete record of a user's Talk page contents and I cannot understand why it is permitted.  I'm sure this loophole gets abused. Has this ever been raised as a problem?   P-123 (talk) 15:21, 21 December 2014 (UTC)
 * TRPoD aka The Red Pen of Doom : When manually archiving from a current Talk page to a non-bot archive a section that has some comments deleted from it, does the same apply, i.e. when archived, the deleted comments are not archived as well? I have never checked for this, and cannot, as I can't remember all the deletes I have made. Probably not many from sections already archived, as my habit of deleting has only started recently (troublesome editor problems.) I understand there is a way of copying edit history to archives.  That would then give a complete record of everything, wouldn't it?  How is that done? P-123 (talk) 16:22, 21 December 2014 (UTC)
 * Every edit ever made is still there in your page history . The "archive" is just a visible copy of the text moved out of the way, and is only as accurate as the content that is placed there. For anything "important" the WP:DIFFs are used, not the "archive", so "faking" an archive would have very little advantage. (for example, if I said "I never edited P-123's talk page, see, look in the archive  " and then someone presented , not only is my statement shown to be false, i am exposed as a complete manipulative liar liar pants on fire.) --  TRPoD aka The Red Pen of Doom  16:48, 21 December 2014 (UTC)

What I meant by "partial archives and delete other sections as you wish" is that a full archive contains everything, but P-123 has been selectively deleting some sections from user talk:P-123 and archiving some other sections. So the sections in the archive are only a partial archive of the talk page because some of the original content is not being archived (original post). As "partial archive" has proved to be confusing ,I will in future user the term "incomplete archive". -- PBS (talk) 16:37, 21 December 2014 (UTC)
 * That is true, I have been doing what PBS says. But it never crossed my mind that it could cause problems like this, with incomplete  records. P-123 (talk) 22:13, 21 December 2014 (UTC)
 * To archive a page with its history one moves the page using the move tab to an appropriate archive name. This used to be a popular way to archive talk pages with contentious content until bot archiving became widely available. If one lets a bot archive the page, then there will not be any disputes about how accurate the copy is, (although of course content can still be deleted from the talk page in which ase the bot will not archive it so bot archiving is not quite as copper-bottomed as moving a page with its history). -- PBS (talk) 16:37, 21 December 2014 (UTC)


 * I've found the best way to set up archiving is to simply put on the top of your talk page and let the system take care of the rest.  You can also set up 's (Original by ) OneClickArchiver (Original) script if you might wish to add a link to each section on your talk page to archive sections at will when you are done with them (and everyone has had a chance to read - maybe a day or two). Good luck and feel free to hit me up on my talk page if you want help. — &#123;&#123;U&#124;Technical 13&#125;&#125; (e • t • c) 17:59, 21 December 2014 (UTC)
 * Thanks, Technical 13. I don't think I can digest any more at the moment, but may come back to you on this.  It sounds like a good idea.  P-123 (talk) 22:13, 21 December 2014 (UTC)

How can i protect wiki page of my company to be edited by other people than me?
How can i protect wiki page of my company to be edited by other people than me? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miss_World_Romania this is the page of my company. How can i protect this page to be edited by anybody? Is my company so i think is normal to not allow public edits, because they can write fake information. Also because i can not watch every day to check if fake info is written by the readers. office@missworldromania.com is my email. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.97.146.84 (talk) 12:01, 21 December 2014 (UTC)

Thanks! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.97.146.84 (talk) 11:55, 21 December 2014 (UTC)
 * You cannot, Wikipedia is an encyclopedia and not a free advertising platform to promote your company. In fact YOU shouldnt be directly editing any article for which you have a conflict of interest. -- TRPoD aka The Red Pen of Doom  12:08, 21 December 2014 (UTC)

How can i prevent then false information do be written about my company? Or some recent deletion of all information from the page? Somehow we must prevent people with bad intention to edit or delete information... all i want is to be real full information there for all readers, nothing else... i use wikipedia alot so i know how important is to find real and detailed information. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Miss World Romania Organization (talk • contribs) 13:15, 21 December 2014 (UTC)
 * You can provide reliably published sources with a reputation for fact checking and editorial oversight that will verify content by making edits to the article's talk page and having a neutral editor review the sources and add appropriate content. -- TRPoD aka The Red Pen of Doom  13:28, 21 December 2014 (UTC)

Can you put me in contact with a neutral editor to provide him on e-mail all the sources he need? I just saw that 90% of the information from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miss_World_Romania page was deleted, or just desapeared... TheRedPenOfDoom made this deleting, from what i saw with reason "unsourced"... i am new user just from today :) so editing and other stuffs i start just now to learn them... until today i was just reader... So please help me: 1. If i need to change my user name, which name i must put?

2. I wish that readers find on Miss World Romania wikipedia page real and detailed information about activity of Miss World, Miss Earth, Miss International, and anything was written before in Romania... all the deleted information can be found on internet so they'v been written from sources not from imagination :)) ...you can find sources or i can provide documents or anykind of sources you wish, or any editor wish just please put back the deleted information after you verify it.

3. This is the only way i can receive help, or i can speak also on e-mail with you aor any other editor? Thank you for your help! — Preceding unsigned comment added by Miss World Romania Organization (talk • contribs) 13:50, 21 December 2014 (UTC) --Miss World Romania Organization (talk) 14:29, 21 December 2014 (UTC)

Wikipedia Free Encyclopedia --
This is Wikipedia -- advertised as a free encyclopedia, I keep being asked for money - I can upload or change information to correct -- is this information now being paid for -, or are you charging people to look at information  other people have freely submitted -  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 122.57.222.231 (talk) 13:05, 21 December 2014 (UTC)


 * You may keep seeing a banner that asks for donations, but whether or not you personally decide to contribute, you still have fully free access to all content and will continue to have free access as long as enough people decide to donate to keep the servers running and the coders paid. The content is still generated by volunteer editors.-- TRPoD aka The Red Pen of Doom  13:13, 21 December 2014 (UTC)
 * If you wish to stop seeing the request, you can create an account (it is easy, free and more anonymous than editing by your IP) and then tell the popup to stop showing the reminder. -- TRPoD aka The Red Pen of Doom  16:41, 21 December 2014 (UTC)

Help:Cite errors/Cite error included ref
Hi.. I am Lubomyr Melnyk. I have corrected several errors in my WIK< presentation. You may use me as a cited source. After al, no one is better qualifited to give information about me than myself. Thank you for your help with this. I find it very annoying that incomplete and misleading information is being presented, even though it is based on what was once written about me .. several things written earlier are just wrong. LUBOYR MELNYK — Preceding unsigned comment added by 142.161.11.115 (talk) 13:34, 21 December 2014 (UTC)
 * The article in question is Lubomyr Melnyk. You have a conflict of interest in the article if you are Lubomyr Melnyk.  You are strongly discouraged from editing an article on yourself.  Instead, please request corrections to the article on the article talk page, Talk: Lubomyr Melnyk, citing reliable sources.  Robert McClenon (talk) 13:42, 21 December 2014 (UTC)


 * You may be qualified to give information about yourself, but a Wikipedia reader in the future has no way of checking that the information is correct (either originally, or that it has not been altered by somebody else in between), so information that is not cited to a reliable source is not permitted. Uncited information is (strictly) worthless. --ColinFine (talk) 10:34, 22 December 2014 (UTC)