Wikipedia:Help desk/Archives/2024 April 21

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How do I get to be writing for Wikipedia?
Writing for Wikipedia 197.231.239.48 (talk) 06:34, 21 April 2024 (UTC)


 * You may be looking for WP:HOW. HansVonStuttgart (talk) 08:28, 21 April 2024 (UTC)


 * I am just a regular user of Wikipedia, i.e. I have no official role or any special authority. That said, before you get too involved in figuring out how to navigate the process of either creating a new article or making significant revisions to an existing article, I'm going to suggest you follow on right here at the Help Desk, looking over questions from others interested in acting as an editor.
 * You will commonly see requests for how to go about creating a new article. Frequently, these requests will come from people who are acting on behalf of the subject of the article they are interested in. While this can be done (assuming the notability requirement is met), it often doesn't work out as hoped.
 * In addition to looking at the requests currently posted and watching for new questions that come in, you could also look back in the "archived discussions" portion of the Help Desk archives (probably best to change the sorting order to sort by edit date). Reading over these questions might save you, from incorporating content that doesn't have a neutral point of view or from writing an article for which the subject does not meet the specific notability requirements imposed by Wikipedia.  (Many people feel very confident that the subject of their article is notable and merits an article, they write an article, and then they're told that no, it doesn't meet these criteria.)  I'm not so much trying to discourage you as to help to set your expectations. Fabrickator (talk) 18:18, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

Srila Prabhupada
There are sincere experts and followers of srila prabhupada correcting, please allow them to do their duty. They find inconsistencies and correct them however wikipedia then rejects. Allow them to do their duty. chant and be happy!all glories to srila prabhupada!2601:201:897E:A530:652E:877D:6651:BFE5 (talk) 06:44, 21 April 2024 (UTC)


 * Is this request about A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada? 126.205.254.12 (talk) 07:01, 21 April 2024 (UTC)


 * I guess it's about 's recent whitewashing of A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada.  Maproom (talk) 07:48, 21 April 2024 (UTC)
 * If the followers are editing WIkipedia, then their duty is to follow Wikipedia policies. What their duty may be to some other authority is irrelevant to Wikipedia. ColinFine (talk) 17:55, 21 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Actually, I'll say a bit more: if a Wikipedia editor has a duty to some outside authority that affects their Wikipedia editng, then they have a conflict of interest, and shoould declare that openly, and follow the guidance in the page I just linked to.
 * If their duty to the outside authority prevents them from following Wikipedia's policies when they edit Wikipedia, then they should not edit Wikipedia. ColinFine (talk) 17:59, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

Fixing typos on a protected page
Should I request on the talk page, or should I request elsewhere when I find a typo? It feels weird doing it for a single comma. 75.142.254.3 (talk) 07:00, 21 April 2024 (UTC)


 * Yes, requesting on the talk page is correct (it's perfectly fine, and encouraged, even if it's just a comma). You can place an edit request template in your request manually (list is at WP:MAKINGEREQ), or use the edit request wizard, which will do that automatically, in order to draw attention to the request. Tollens (talk) 07:05, 21 April 2024 (UTC)
 * (alternatively, you could describe the issue right here since that's probably easier now.) Tollens (talk) 07:06, 21 April 2024 (UTC)
 * It was a comma on an article: World Central Kitchen drone strikes
 * "Update - Last sentence of diplomatic fallout section.
 * From: On 6 April Wong stated that she and Minister for Defence Richard Marles had written to their Israeli equivalents calling for further action to be taken against the individuals responsible for the attack.
 * To: On 6 April, Wong stated that she and Minister for Defence Richard Marles had written to their Israeli equivalents calling for further action to be taken against the individuals responsible for the attack.
 * Reason: A comma should be after the word April in this case."
 * Already posted it there by using an earlier request as the format. Maybe in the future I'll just look for 3 or 4 typos before making the request?
 * 75.142.254.3 (talk) 07:10, 21 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Fixed now. You could look for more if you'd like, but there's no harm in making a request for something minor, requests like that are made all the time. Thanks for catching the error! Tollens (talk) 07:13, 21 April 2024 (UTC)
 * In the UK, children are taught that commas like that (following a fronted adverbial phrase) are necessary. Every decent style guide I've ever read says that they're optional however - use them or don't, it's a stylistic choice. Many of our Featured Articles are written without them, please don't go around adding them willy-nilly to content someone else has written. Girth Summit  (blether)  09:14, 21 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Ah, thanks! I had no idea. I guess it's more than just the UK. It looks like that article is split roughly 50/50 with regard to using or not using the comma. Looking through the paragraph that change was in, there is another instance which doesn't, so I'll self-revert. Tollens (talk) 09:39, 21 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Without the comma it is possible to read that April Wong made the statement. Martin of Sheffield (talk) 09:48, 21 April 2024 (UTC)
 * I don't have any problem with the addition in this case. I've just seen situations where someone starts dropping punctuation bombs on FAs that have just been through a lengthy review because they disagree on the stylistic choices made by the authors and half-dozen reviewers. I typically use them myself when I'm writing, but if the only reason for adding a comma is because a fronted adverbial phrase and they must be followed by a comma, I would urge people not to bother. Girth Summit  (blether)  10:39, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

Cite error at Lalu Prasad Yadav
Can anyone remove red link from the citation number 55 and 67. Admantine123 (talk) 09:55, 21 April 2024 (UTC)
 * If you use Cite journal you MUST include the journal parameter. Temporarily I've changed the Cite journal to Citation to get rid of the red, but knowledgeable input is required to select the correct Cite XXX template. Martin of Sheffield (talk) 10:10, 21 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Can you fix it, I tried myself but wasn't successful. Admantine123 (talk) 10:11, 21 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Follow the doi link to the journal publisher and oddly enough you will find the journal title. In these two cases, someone thought it a good idea to concatenate the journal title onto the article title.  Don't do that.  Also, in both cases, the values assigned to first and last were swapped.  Don't do that.
 * Changing to  just to rid yourself of a meddlesome error message does not serve the readers who consume our citations using the metadata.  In this case, the missing journal causes  to render a book-style reference and book-encoded metadata; both of which are wrong.  Don't do that.
 * —Trappist the monk (talk) 11:53, 21 April 2024 (UTC)
 * —Trappist the monk (talk) 11:53, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

Stable and shorter URL's
Hello, I was wondering, and hoping, that Wikipedia has some sort of provision to shorten very long URLs Not long ago I tried using an online resource that shortens, and presumably stabilizes, incredibly long urls, but when I attempted to post this source, with the shorter URL in an article's Bibliography, a warning message resulted, in bold red letters, saying that this shortened url is blocked. Is this always the rule? Presently I am trying to list a book source, but its url is 360 (!) characters long, and is no doubt very unstable. Any help along this line would be greatly appreciated. -- Gwillhickers (talk) 19:36, 21 April 2024 (UTC)


 * @Gwillhickers, it is rare to need such a long url for a book. Can you give us an example of the one you are trying to use. There may be a more direct way to access it. StarryGrandma (talk) 20:03, 21 April 2024 (UTC)
 * — Yes, such a lengthy url for a book is rare indeed.The URL in question is for a PDF version of the book. I'm simply going to use the plain 'google book', with a practical url, (aprox 30 characters) and let the readers if they so chose to select the PDF file themselves This is the url in question
 * https://books.googleusercontent.com/books/content?req=AKW5QacfFtI0jPcRseeGF94PT6X-2lwXDqTFMbEV_SOvJpGrUT6kqtetpHujeiMhoKCuC8YZbJuZv5tyKTqgrDMlc3cK3iiyI9xJZjw4DJ1vvtwmzveejuWNm38TRqS0zVaC_4T8-O89ZZByFSdRc1HtC-OSrZFNjGbeqGNkuyOSJLlBM6vS6GtxRnGMTbouHSc2OOR5Yq8hLZG50y8OzVqplXxT59-wXEunFBmGLXxgWJv6VCzc8swR2vHophDlotBTV_11nCCcn8vSLcecPere-wjXPSw4BkLi9nBElJMjhatqXCE9ns8
 * In any case, it would be nice to know of a way to shorten URLs which can be used on WP with no issues. -- Gwillhickers (talk) 21:16, 21 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Hello, Gwillhickers. Note that in most cases, a URL is not an essential part of a citation, but a convenience for the reader. The important content is the bibliographic information like title, author, publisher, date, page etc. If you have given all that information, then if the URL rots, it should be relatively easy to find a working version (assuming the book is available on the internet at all). ColinFine (talk) 20:53, 21 April 2024 (UTC)
 * — In passing I've lost count of the times where a reviewer has made an issue about not being able to link to the source in question, which is the only way to determine if the citation is accurate for any given statement(s). GA's and FA's routinely have their sources with links included.  -- Gwillhickers (talk) 21:16, 21 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Url shorteners are disallowed in Wikipedia for good reasons. Do not use them even if you find one which isn't blacklisted yet. They do not stabilize links. They redirect to a fixed url. If that url stops working then the url shortener keeps redirecting to it anyway. Here are some of the disadvantages of using a url shortener:
 * The Spam blacklist could be bypassed by linking to a redirect at a url shortener instead of a blacklisted site.
 * Special:Linksearch and other tools cannot be used to find links to a site if they go via a url shortener. If a website moves or reorganizes their url's, we often use such tools to locate and fix all links to the site, so our links would become less reliable with url shorteners. If a website closes, we can look for alternatives.
 * If the url shortener closes or is down then the link is dead and you cannot see where it was supposed to go even if the original target still works fine.
 * Readers cannot see where they will end up if they hover over a link before clicking it.
 * Readers may be tracked by a company running a url shortener.
 * PrimeHunter (talk) 21:25, 21 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Thanks. Blacklisting, etc, is all I really wanted to confirm. -- Gwillhickers (talk) 21:32, 21 April 2024 (UTC)
 * The only URL shortener we allow is https://w.wiki (only usable for URLs on WMF wikis). —Kusma (talk) 21:37, 21 April 2024 (UTC)
 * And allowing it just means it's not blacklisted. It shouldn't be used in articles. PrimeHunter (talk) 10:54, 23 April 2024 (UTC)

Problems with another user
A user has labelled legitimate sources as "garbage propaganda", "left-wing", "dumb propaganda" and "absurd" I was wondering what the best course of action was? I have started a request for discussion for one of these issues on an article but under the block log they have previous for "Personal attacks or violations of the harassment policy" and I don't want to see a repeat. Most of the edit summaries they give are not helpful either. LouisOrr27 (talk) 21:08, 21 April 2024 (UTC)
 * — Yes, I've encountered such criticisms, from both the left and the right. Trying to claim that a source is not reliable simply by referring to it as "right wing", "left wing", extremist, exaggerated, etc, is only a superficial criticism. If it can be shown that a source is actually in error, etc, then that is the way to deal with any given issue. -- Gwillhickers (talk) 21:37, 21 April 2024 (UTC)
 * One criticism of the BBC is not, or anyway not directly (and certainly not solely), about its "wing", but rather its alleged propensity for "making up rubbish and telling lies". -- Hoary (talk) 23:52, 21 April 2024 (UTC)
 * The BBC is held as being a reliable source. Mjroots (talk) 09:14, 22 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Mjroots, perhaps I should have highlighted the word alleged . -- Hoary (talk) 09:39, 22 April 2024 (UTC)

This seems to refer to 2024 Women's Six Nations Championship. Andy Mabbett ( Pigsonthewing ); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 14:07, 22 April 2024 (UTC)