Wikipedia:Help desk/Archives/2015 August 8

= August 8 =

Including computer output in a page
Hi. Someone has suggested including a sample computer program output on a page (Diehard randomness test). It directly relates to the page topic as it would be an example of that tool's usage. I second the call. Thing is, the output is approx. 20 KBytes, and you really need all of it to get a proper picture. What can be done please? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Cossoft (talk • contribs) 02:38, 8 August 2015 (UTC)


 * I can't think of any legitimate reason why an encyclopaedic article would need to include 'sample computer program output' on such a scale. Instead it needs to summarise what reliable sources have to say about the properties of such output. AndyTheGrump (talk) 05:00, 8 August 2015 (UTC)


 * Just a guess that they are referring to the last comment at Talk:Diehard tests, now two years old, and the in its article, four years old. &#8213; Mandruss   &#9742;  05:09, 8 August 2015 (UTC)


 * Yes, I was trying to figure out what the question referred to, and that seems to be the only relevant article. If so, I would note that it lacks any significant secondary sourcing to establish that the subject even meets our notability guidelines - it cites nothing but a link to the tests themselves, a link to an alternative set of tests, and a 1953 article by Alfréd Rényi which clearly cannot be about software written in 1995. AndyTheGrump (talk) 05:23, 8 August 2015 (UTC)


 * I see that you added the notability template. We call this the Help Desk Backfire Effect. ;) &#8213; Mandruss  &#9742;  13:20, 8 August 2015 (UTC)

Listed buildings in Birmingham
Please help with Listed buildings in Birmingham I couldn't get the table right. South Birmingham OK (talk) 11:16, 8 August 2015 (UTC)
 * , did fix the problem?—  Vchimpanzee  •  talk  •  contributions  •  20:55, 12 August 2015 (UTC)

Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge
Before my wife can edit this page - why are there "pending edits"? Confused and we need an explanation please, Thanks — Preceding unsigned comment added by 101.182.217.169 (talk) 05:43, 8 August 2015 (UTC)
 * See WP:Pending changes. Rojomoke (talk) 05:46, 8 August 2015 (UTC)

Wildlife, fauna, flora
These areas are currently a mess in Wikipedia. There is a huge inconsistency. For Canada, there are 3 separate articles on Wildlife of Canada, Fauna of Canada, and Flora of Canada. For United States, there are Fauna of the United States and Flora of the United States, but Wildlife of the United States redirects to Fauna of the United States. Fauna of China redirects to Wildlife of China. Fauna of Cyprus redirects to Wildlife of Cyprus. Wildlife of Indonesia redirects to Indonesia and so on... While some countries have fauna and wildlife as different articles. And some countries have fauna redirects to wildlife while others have wildlife redirects to fauna. And some countries do not have any redirect involving those articles at all. This is way too confusing. I see no reason for those redirects, and the redirects are very inconsistent themselves anyway. 14.169.206.102 (talk) 07:16, 8 August 2015 (UTC)
 * Welcome to Wikipedia, a project with no overall management structure – and probably the better for it, all things considered. Maproom (talk) 07:37, 8 August 2015 (UTC)
 * Well, I was suggesting to delete those redirects. It is a simple way to fix the inconsistency. If the articles have not been created then so be it. I see no reason to hide the lack of articles in Wikipedia behind those redirects. Let all be real here. Lastly, another benefit of that is if someone (any reader, which is a lot!) found a page without any information in it then there is a chance he/she may create it. Most readers have no knowledge of the inner-working of Wikipedia, so they would assume that the redirect (potential article) co-exists with another article somehow. That would kill the needs for article creation even if they wanted to create one. The way things are right now is that a bunch of "potential" articles are in disguise as redirects, which would hinder article creation and improvement of Wikipedia as a whole. This is utterly stupid. Any argument saying redirects serve to help readers point to the right direction is irrelevant (the readers can search up the information themselves without the redirects), and the minimal benefit of that is outweighed by the benefit of article creation opportunities. To sum it up, the problems of this are: messy inconsistency, and hindrance of article creation and improvement of Wikipedia as a whole. 14.169.206.102 (talk) 08:41, 8 August 2015 (UTC)
 * I think the better place for it is Village pump (idea lab), and I have transferred the problem to over there. Anyone who is interested to the following-up discussion is welcomed to go over there. Hopefully, this would improve Wikipedia somehow. 14.169.206.102 (talk) 09:13, 8 August 2015 (UTC)

User Page
Can someone fix the formatting of the committed identity box on my user page so the box is just around the text and not on the whole background of the page? Thanks  The Editor of All Things Wikipedia  《Talk》 08:08, 8 August 2015 (UTC)  — Preceding unsigned comment added by The Editor of All Things Wikipedia (talk • contribs)


 * - See Template:Clear - NQ (talk)  08:57, 8 August 2015 (UTC)
 * thanks so much! NQ — Preceding unsigned comment added by The Editor of All Things Wikipedia (talk • contribs) 09:03, 8 August 2015 (UTC)

James William Middleton
The "Business" section of this page seems to have been vandalised with a whole lot of "citation needed" when in fact the articles have all of the references in them. This vandalism is also evident on the "Donna Air" page - all of the references have the information presented clearly in them. There is no need for all of the citation captions. Please amend if you are able. Thanks — Preceding unsigned comment added by 101.182.217.169 (talk) 10:07, 8 August 2015 (UTC)


 * I see no vandalism. If the statements can't be supported by citations, they should be deleted. Maproom (talk) 10:33, 8 August 2015 (UTC)
 * , to be fair, almost all of those statements are supported by sources already cited in the same paragraph, although not in the same sentence. I don't think this was vandalism, but i do think that the placement of the cn tags was over-zealous. I have edited to make the citations a bit clearer, and remove most of the CN tags. The bit about Middleton's companies having won awards i have left tagged. While this is mentioned briefly in one of the cited sources, that source is an interview, and so this amounts to a WP:PRIMARY claim. There really should be an independent source for such a statement, and i am confident one can be found. OP, note that this is all just normal editing, which you or anyone else could have done. It didn't require any special permissions. DES (talk) 10:52, 8 August 2015 (UTC)

Sacred Heart Catholic High School, Newcastle Upon Tyne
I meant to say that Sacred Heart Catholic High School, Newcastle upon Tyne was the page I needed help with earlier (Not the Donna Air page) that CERTAINLY has an over zealous use of "citations needed". As far as we can see, all of the information is already in the references. Thanks — Preceding unsigned comment added by 101.182.217.169 (talk) 12:13, 8 August 2015 (UTC)
 * Some of the info was already in the references, but much is, as far as i can see, not there. I have removed the superfluous CN tags. However, ALL of the current references are to the school's own website, or to the sites of sponsoring or partner organizations. There are no independent sources cited. Articles get deleted for not having independent sources to demonstrate their notability. If you can supply such independent sources, please do so. DES (talk) 14:48, 8 August 2015 (UTC)
 * The Newcastle Local Authority website and the Ofsted Report would be useful sources to add.   D b f i r s   20:11, 8 August 2015 (UTC)

Comparison of DNS blacklists article completeness
Just came across your article Comparison of DNS blacklists

At Micronica we have been operating since 2005, yes 10 years, a free publically open and readable downloadable IP Address and Domain Name blacklist called AntiSpam! whioch is updated several times a day.

This DNS Blacklist is somewhat unusual compared to other Blacklists as its freely readable not secret and each offending spam source incident is notified individually to the Domain Name owner and IP Address Owner responsible to make them aware of the incident and their spam offence. The blacklist is in plain text and structured to be compatible with the popular sendmail and and compatible with most other email systems.

Information: http://micronica.com.au/spam Continuously updated Blacklist: http://micronica.com.au/support/spam2.txt

So i hope you might add the Micronica Blacklist to your article for everyones benefit. And in the good ongoing fight against the biggest problem on the internet...Spam, Scams and Viruses. Regards Edward Jozis Technical Support Micronica 8/8/15 123.243.51.27 (talk) 15:14, 8 August 2015 (UTC)


 * Hello, Edward. If there are independent reliable published sources which discuss Micronica, then it may be added to the article, but you should not do it, because of your conflict of interest. If you can find such sources (they must be truly independent of Micronica, not just based on press releases or interviews, and need to be more than just mentions in a list) then you are welcome to post your suggested changes, with references, on the talk page Talk:Comparison of DNS blacklists. Since there is no recent traffic on that talk page, you might add request edit to your suggestion, to bring it to people's notice. --ColinFine (talk) 16:48, 9 August 2015 (UTC)

How do you start to write an article?
Ive been trying to figure out how to create an article. I know how to submit one.67.4.162.72 (talk) 17:17, 8 August 2015 (UTC)
 * I suggest reading Your First Article and The Golden Rule. Then make sure you have found reliable sources to work from, including independent sources, and make use of the article wizard which will help you get started. DES (talk) 17:25, 8 August 2015 (UTC)

See also: Category:People educated at Strathallan School
I have been updating my old schools alumni at Strathallan School today, the following link appears not to be working - !? I have looked at other schools' pages and they appear to have the same problem. Can someone please explain..... Thanks, Gomach (talk) 18:48, 8 August 2015 (UTC)


 * The link works for me and goes to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:People_educated_at_Strathallan_School where I see around 100 people listed. What happens for you? PrimeHunter (talk) 19:00, 8 August 2015 (UTC)

I'm referring to the link already in place, directly beneath the Notable alumni section, on the Strathallan School page. The link is there but is not appearing on the live page.Gomach (talk) 19:03, 8 August 2015 (UTC)


 * The link seems to work OK for me, too, giving an alphabetical list that includes the two names you added. What happens when you click on it?    D b f i r s   19:44, 8 August 2015 (UTC)

I still have the same problem.Gomach (talk) 19:50, 8 August 2015 (UTC)


 * What happens when you click on the link? Perhaps your browser is still displaying an old page?    D b f i r s   20:00, 8 August 2015 (UTC)

The link has been in place for many years. It's only in the last 24 hours that I noticed it had disappeared from my version of the page.Gomach (talk) 20:09, 8 August 2015 (UTC)


 * Both at Strathallan School and in this section I see the text "See also: Category:People_educated_at_Strathallan_School", where the whole text is in italics and "Category:People_educated_at_Strathallan_School" is a link to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:People_educated_at_Strathallan_School. Maybe you have the same problem as Village pump (technical)/Archive 139. Do you not see any of the text "See also: Category:People_educated_at_Strathallan_School"? "See also" is not part of the link but the whole text has the hatnote class which something may be hiding from you. Does it make a change to log out? Are you viewing the mobile version of the site? What is your browser? What is your skin at Special:Preferences? Here are three lines where I see A, B, C, with B in italics and further to the right:
 * A
 * B
 * C
 * Do you see all three or only A and C? PrimeHunter (talk) 20:51, 8 August 2015 (UTC)

I still don't see the link on the live version of the page, only on the edit page. Logging out makes no difference; I am using Windows Vista on my home Fujitsu laptop. Can you explain your last question further? ThanksGomach (talk) 21:36, 8 August 2015 (UTC)

Success! - removed and replaced with:
 * See also Category:People educated at Strathallan School ...seems to be working. Thanks for all your help! Gomach (talk) 23:01, 8 August 2015 (UTC)


 * We shouldn't stop using see also just because a few users don't see it. You keep saying you don't see the link but please say whether you see "See also:" which is not part of the link. Here are three lines where I see the letter "A" on the first line, "B" on the second line, and "C" on the third line:
 * A
 * B
 * C
 * Which of the three letters do you see? Is it the same logged out? Try to clear your entire cache. PrimeHunter (talk) 10:31, 9 August 2015 (UTC)

No, I do not see "See also:"....nothing appears on the live page. I have just checked some other articles I created and NONE of the see also or main tags are working; see Gavin Vernon and Ian Quayle Jones.

Can you please give me some directions so that I can check your ABC question as I don't know where to look? Not keen on clearing my cache.Gomach (talk) 17:35, 9 August 2015 (UTC)

It has come to my attention that NO TAGS are working on wikipedia at the moment!Gomach (talk) 18:42, 9 August 2015 (UTC)


 * Please just say what you see between the horizontal lines here:

-
 * A
 * B
 * C

-
 * PrimeHunter (talk) 21:40, 9 August 2015 (UTC)


 * A
 * B
 * C

Exactly as you have described above.Gomach (talk) 22:56, 9 August 2015 (UTC)


 * Please stop removing the standard template just because you can't see its output. Have you reported this at WP:VPT?--ukexpat (talk) 19:50, 10 August 2015 (UTC)


 * I removed the standard template so that everyone can see a link that works. I am certain there are other users with the same problem. I have reported the fault to: Village pump (technical).Gomach (talk) 09:26, 11 August 2015 (UTC)
 * You may well have removed the standard template because you are certain that there are other users with the same problem but that is not a valid reason to remove it. The mobile app and an unknown number of third-party applications rely on that template to identify related pages. The problem is on your computer and that is where you should fix it, not on Wikipedia which is working as intended.--Anders Feder (talk) 15:28, 11 August 2015 (UTC)
 * My latest post at Village pump (technical) indicates that the problem originates here but only affects users with certain software. But no matter who is currently affected, nobody should start removing hatnotes due to this. We have hundreds of thousands of them and the problem will probably soon be resolved. PrimeHunter (talk) 23:16, 11 August 2015 (UTC)

Major change of article
Hi don't you think there should be some change of laws about editing articles? Many of the articles of Wikipedia were originally good but they have been degraded into bad articles.For example see these articles : Franklin Roosevelt, American Poetry , Jurassic Park (Film).Well the editors who have changed them may be don't possess the knowledge or capability to write articles on wikipedia. Now the law is you have to take permission from them to correct them.But they will not give the permission to change them.This is why there has been some stagnancy in Wikipedia and it has become impossible to improve the articles.I think you should give some freedom to the editors to change the articles : even to do major changes of the articles,or to completely rewrite the articles or to restore some old versions of the articles.I think you should give complete freedom to the editors to change all the Class-B or Class-C articles until they reach the best level.Otherwise it cannot go along like this.Arman ad60 (talk) 18:53, 8 August 2015 (UTC)
 * Any editor can change any article at any time with the intent of improving it. But then any other editor can undo the change. For major changes to major articles, representing the work of dozens or hundreds of editors, over a course of years in some cases, it is a good idea to discuss the changes first and try to obtain consensus. Failing that, if a major change is reverted (undone) then the editor who made it should discuss the matter, not simply reapply the change to which another editor objected, as per bold, revert, discuss. If agreement cannot be found easily on the talk page of the article, we have several methods of dispute resolution available.
 * I gather you were frustrated that your changes at History of Islam did not stick. You got good advice on your talk page to try making incremental changes. After all, there is only one article, and every interested editor can't decide separately how it should be. indeed as per WP:OWN no one editor can make that decision, only the consensus of interested editors can. DES (talk) 19:28, 8 August 2015 (UTC)


 * , "the law is" certainly not "you have to take permission from them to correct them. The policy is Edit boldly, Revert if you think an edit it not an improvement, and Discuss it if you disagree. --ColinFine (talk) 20:04, 9 August 2015 (UTC)

Help:Cite errors/Cite error included ref
I HAVE TRIED EVERYTHING TO EDIT ONE OF YOUR RIDICULOUS ENTRIES, AND YOUR HELP PAGE IS NOTHING OF THE GODDAMNED SORT, AND THIS IS SUCH A CLUSTERFUCK, I CAN SEE WHY YOU'RE NOT CONSIDERED A CREDIBLE SOURCE FOR ANYTHING, BECAUSE IF ANYONE ATTEMPTS TO PUT ANYTHING CREDIBLE AND NOT ONE-SIDED, THE PAGE IS LESS THAN SELF-EXPLANATORY, YOUR 'HELP' IS FUCKING WORTHLESS. I HAVE TRIED TO JUST GET RID OF MY ACCOUNT HERE, BUT YOU FUCKERS MAKE IT IMPOSSIBLE!!!! YOU MAKE THIS WHOLE FUCKING SITE IMPOSSIBLE! GO FUCK YOURSELVES, YOU WORTHLESS PIECES OF SHIT! MvskokeWoman (talk) 18:54, 8 August 2015 (UTC) 18:54, 8 August 2015 (UTC)18:54, 8 August 2015 (UTC)18:54, 8 August 2015 (UTC)18:54, 8 August 2015 (UTC)18:54, 8 August 2015 (UTC)18:54, 8 August 2015 (UTC)18:54, 8 August 2015 (UTC) HOW MANY OF THESE FUCKING TILDE FUCKERS YOU WANT?
 * , I am sorry you were frustrated, but shouting at those trying to help doesn't really improve matters. I have fixed the referencing issues on Blair Tindall that I think you were complaining about. Accounts cannot be delted once created because any edits must continue to be attributed to the account that made them. However, you have the right to vanish. This leaves your account in existence, but in no way associated with you personally. Or if you didn't link your real name or identity to your account, you can simply stop using it. the signature is FOUR tildes, by the way ( ~ ). I hope that helped a trifle. DES (talk) 19:18, 8 August 2015 (UTC)
 * I have removed your addition per WP:BLPREMOVE which starts: "Remove immediately any contentious material about a living person that is unsourced or poorly sourced". You wrote "Tindall's side of the story is not often heard", and then made claims ending with a link to an apparent reference, but the supposed reference doesn't actually mention your claims. Please do not add unsourced content to Wikipedia articles, and especially not negative claims about living people. If what you describe as Tindall's side of the story has not been published by a reliable source then it cannot be added to Wikipedia. PrimeHunter (talk) 19:40, 8 August 2015 (UTC)
 * Thank you, I should have double checked, not just fixed the citation markup. DES (talk) 20:49, 8 August 2015 (UTC)

la popalazione della sicilia
'''sicilia ''' — Preceding unsigned comment added by 184.146.218.149 (talk) 19:21, 8 August 2015 (UTC)
 * What is your question, please? DES (talk) 19:29, 8 August 2015 (UTC)
 * The header thraslates to "the population of sicily". Ill check it out and see if I can figure out what the issue is.  The Editor of All Things Wikipedia  《Talk》 23:28, 8 August 2015 (UTC)
 * They probably just want to know the population of sicily, which can be found in our article Sicily. Sam Walton (talk) 23:30, 8 August 2015 (UTC)

Notifications
How do I get email notifications if any of the articles I have contributed to are subsequently changed by other users? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Aembiricos (talk • contribs) 22:29, 8 August 2015 (UTC)
 * in your Preferences on the user profile tab (the first tab) in the "email options" section, there is a check box for " Email me when a page or a file on my watchlist is changed". However if your watchlist is large, it can quickly overwhelm your inbox. (My list is over 5,000 pages). DES (talk) 22:49, 8 August 2015 (UTC)
 * Other email notifications are on the "notifications" tab. DES (talk) 22:50, 8 August 2015 (UTC)
 * Hi, Welcome to the helpdesk. Please feel free to ask any more questions here or at my talk page. The closest thing that I know of, feel free to correct me anyone, is to click preferences in the top right corner. Then click the notificarions tab under preferences. There will be a list of events with two chckboxes next to each one. Look for the edit revert box and make sure the box to the far right under the column email is checked. If you are new, Welcome to Wikipedia! Thanks im  The Editor of All Things Wikipedia  《Talk》 22:51, 8 August 2015 (UTC)
 * , that is whree yoiu can get email notices for everything covered by WP:ECHO but for watch list changes the option is near the bottom of the first tab (as I said above), one may need to scroll down. DES (talk) 22:56, 8 August 2015 (UTC) DES (talk) 22:57, 8 August 2015 (UTC)
 * Ok but the pages he edits arent neccesarily on his watch list. I beleive he just wants to be alerted when someone reverts a recent edit. — Preceding unsigned comment added by The Editor of All Things Wikipedia (talk • contribs) 22:59, 8 August 2015 (UTC)
 * I guess both ways could work depending on what he is specifically looking for. Thanks  The Editor of All Things Wikipedia  《Talk》 23:01, 8 August 2015 (UTC)
 * The notificatiosn option will email about direct reverts, but the wiki software is pretty specific about what constitutes a "revert" I think A later sizable change that altered part of an earlier edit would not be counted as a revert i think. Each selection has its uses, and they do soemwhat different things. But to get "email notifications if any of the articles I have contributed to are subsequently changed by other users" in any way I think one would need to watchlist them and then use that preference item. To see only direct reverts the other item under notifications is better. DES (talk) 23:09, 8 August 2015 (UTC)