Girly Brains

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Can someone advise please? I think I may have unwittingly 'de-linked' the footnotes in the following paragraph on the Wikipedia article for Yahoo! Answers at:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yahoo!_Answers#Top_Contributor

(Footnotes 11, 12 and 13)

This has had an effect on the footnotes list and notes 11 and 12 appear to be duplicates:

See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yahoo!_Answers#cite_note-10

Also, any note arrived at displays a number lower by one in its URL (as above - Although, this seems to be the case on any Wikipedia page!)

I have done the error check, in edit, and it did, indeed seem to find this. But I was not confident to 'save' the page.

(Huge learning curve, all this! I have done the Tutorial, and kept its URLs in my browser folder for Wikipedia, but I will need to do it again and again)

Many thanks for any help.

I've restored the "de-linked" references by rescuing them from the page history, and then tidied some of the duplicated references. I recommend Help:Footnotes as a simple introduction to the magic that makes the footnotes work. -- John of Reading (talk) 20:13, 21 July 2011 (UTC)

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Just seen your reply too, John. Many thanks for that, John. (I'm sure I would have got around to it soon, but I haven't time at the moment and I didn't want things to look like I'd made a mess).

Many thanks for all your help. I will definitely investigate all your and Novangelis' links. Girly Brains (talk) 01:54, 8 April 2013 (UTC)

Reusing references

I was typing the content below, and have not revised it since I saw you were requesting help. I just got called away from the computer so I will give you what i had typed. I won't be back to review for several hours.

I have noticed that you have been inserting structures such as "[11]". To reuse a reference, it needs to be named. In the first instance, you would use the code:

<ref name=uniquename1>The formatted reference goes here.</ref>

Each time you reuse that reference, the code is:

<ref name=uniquename1 />

There's more about the structure of references/inline citations: here and here. I'd also like to take this moment to remind you that the criterion at Wikipedia is Verifiability. It's not enough to be right, but claims should be traceable to a reliable source. I haven't been over the article in a while. When I do, it may seem like a wrecking ball has gone through. While I try to find references, the odds are that I won't succeed. While I am more likely to flag rather than something innocuous, I could be more brutal on speculation that read like a how-to manual, something Wikipedia is not. I hope you enjoy editing and that I have not scared you unduly with this forewarning.Novangelis (talk) 19:48, 21 July 2011 (UTC)

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Thanks, I too will be away for a day or two.

I was not trying to add or reuse a citation, I had simply unwittingly de-linked other people's superscript at footnotes 11, 12 and 13 in the paragraph, and wanted to rectify this. (As you say " inserting structures such as "[11]" "). In attempting to rectify it I had started to get the hang of the markup to which you refer, though, each time I tried, it simply duplicated the actual footnote, in the footnotes list. And yes, thanks - I find editing very interesting indeed. I have great regard for Wikipedia and the Open Source movement generally.

I will watch this space! Thanks for your help.

(BTW I kept an rtfd copy of the whole article before attempting to edit. Just to be on the safe side.)

Regards, Girly Brains (talk) 21:43, 7 April 2013 (UTC)

---

Your caution is admirable. Fortunately, Wikipedia is backed up, revision by revision.

• Your first edit by "diff": http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Yahoo!_Answers&diff=prev&oldid=439375958
• The most recent article history: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Yahoo!_Answers&action=history

Never let the formatting scare you. Every mistake is fixable and help is never far away. Your response reflects the principle here: "WP:Be bold" without evidence of foolhardiness. Content can be polished, but polish can't be contented.Novangelis (talk) 22:07, 21 July 2011 (UTC)

April 2013

Hello, I'm Moriori. I wanted to let you know that I undid one or more of your recent contributions to James Cook because it didn't appear constructive. If you think I made a mistake, or if you have any questions, you can leave me a message on my talk page. Thanks! Moriori (talk) 21:25, 6 April 2013 (UTC) ______________

Hello Moriori,

No, that's absolutely fine (I should have reverted the three little changes myself otherwise!) Thanks for your message. I'm still very new to the website - as an 'editor' - so it's good to know I can contact you to explain. Now, how do I do that correctly?!

The reason for my little change was to prove a point to a friend. He is highly educated, well read and a government officer so should know better! The thing is he simply cannot get his head around the fact that a knowledge source that has potentially millions of eyes on it is vastly more reliable than one with but a handful, so belligerently insists that the only reliable sources of knowledge and information are printed books, and Wikipedia, precisely because it can be edited, is fundamentally suspect.

For a long while, therefore, I have challenged him to alter a page on Wikipedia by inserting erroneous information ... and see just how long it stays there!

He would not take up the challenge. So I did it for him on the James Cook page and your intervention - virtually within seconds - provided stunning support for my position! Superb! And thank you very much indeed for that! Most impressive!

As I say, I would have reverted the page within a few hours myself otherwise. And the 'change' was carefully thought out - James Cook was for a large part of his naval career and in particular during his (arguably most famous) 'transit of Venus' voyage in the Endeavour, indeed, a lieutenant.

Sorry for being a bit naughty and thanks again for your spectacular vindication of my claim that the more eyes there are on a knowledge source, the greater the chances of its being reliable.

Regards, Girly Brains (talk) 21:12, 7 April 2013 (UTC)

(I hope I do this reply correctly!)

You have disclosed here that you vandalised Wikipedia by deliberately inserting erroneous information, which compromised the integrity of the project. You can be blocked from editing for vandalism so it is in your own interests that you don't do it again. Moriori (talk) 23:23, 7 April 2013 (UTC)

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Vandalism is deliberately defacing or damaging a thing in order to permanently disfigure it.

As I said: the edit was temporary and not entirely erroneous.

My interests are entirely unconnected with the internet or any of its websites including Wikipedia. My interests are, among other things, to resist fascism and Stalinism.

Regards Girly Brains (talk) 01:18, 8 April 2013 (UTC)

You stick with your definition of vandalism if you like, but Wikipedia will stick with WP:VAN. If you again deliberately vandalise the project you will find that WP:VAN trumps your belief, and you will be blocked. Moriori (talk) 01:37, 8 April 2013 (UTC)

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And then the World will end and we will all die. Wikipedia will stick with rationalism, not Anal retentiveness thank god.Girly Brains (talk) 01:46, 8 April 2013 (UTC)

Ships

Hi GB. Since you are a fairly new user, I thought you might find the project Wikipedia:SHIPS of interest. Normally the Marine Accident Investigation Branch has details of UK related sinkings though not as far as I know for the Derbyshire nor for the most important safety related sinking since the Titanic - MV Estonia which still needs a lot of work. Finally, you might find Wikipedia:Sandbox useful for showing people how Wikipedia works. There are also details of how to create your own. Regards JRPG (talk) 10:18, 18 November 2013 (UTC)