Wikipedia:Help desk/Archive 5

This is an archive of the help desk. Please do not edit this page. To ask a new question, go to this page.

Improving search results

I've been working on the page for "Spotted Skunks" and thought the page should also show up when searching for "Spotted Skunk." Similar problem if searching for "skunks" rather than "skunk."

Is there a correct way to fix this?

Thanks.

--Sperch 04:30, 19 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Hi Sperch. First of all, according to Wikipedia:Naming conventions the article belongs at the singular, that is, Spotted skunk. The plural should redirect to the singular. Redirects are a very good way of addressing exactly the issue you mention. moink 17:13, 19 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Edit link on Template:The Beatles

Hey guys- I think that the "edit" link on this template is non-standard, is unnecessary, and frankly looks kinda weird, but a previous author wants to keep it. How can this be resolved? Is this edit link at all standard? If so, it should be placed on all of the other links at Wikipedia:Template_messages. - DropDeadGorgias (talk) 14:23, Jul 19, 2004 (UTC)

I am in favor of an edit link on many or perhaps even all templates. The whole principle of a wiki is that you can edit the page; this should include the template part. It is more convenient this way, and otherwise newbies would not even know how to do it.

On a very small one like {{a}}, giving ā, it is perhaps not practicle: if unlabeled, like {{A with edit link}}, it would be confused with a link to a page that explains the character. Besides, it puts too much emphasis on it, and may underline it.--Patrick 12:01, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)

It is beginning to be standard, see [1], and there are others not using Template:Ed.

However, I would put it at the bottom right, that seems more standard.--Patrick 23:03, 19 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Undoing someone's change by accident

A few days ago, I made an edit to the Religious Music category, moving it from World Music to Music proper. Today, I checked the history and it turns out that it'd only been moved into World Music a few days earlier.

Is there some etiquette about undoing someone's change, assuming it wasn't a deliberately destructive edit? Do we have to battle it out in a duel?

Strib 14:26, 19 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Dueling is discouraged. :-) Messy, you know, and not productive. If you follow the link to the article's discussion page (it'll be named Category talk:Religious Music in this case; in other cases, you'll find article discussion pages at Talk:The Article's Name), you can discuss the issue there -- most of these disagreements are fairly easily solved. Some people do get grouchy, of course, when you undo an edit of theirs -- try to stay calm and friendly, and if necessary, follow the advice at Wikipedia:Staying cool when the editing gets hot. Invite editors you know and trust to look at the edits you're making and solicit their opinions -- hopefully they can give good advice, and offer a useful third perspective, which often helps people reach a satisfactory conclusion. Good luck. Jwrosenzweig 19:51, 27 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Claiming an update

I made an update to a page before I created an account. Now that I can an account, can I 'claim' that update? What I mean is, can I change it from being contributed by my IP to being contributed by my username?

See Wikipedia:Changing attribution for an edit. Ambarish | Talk 21:37, 19 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Can't access "What the Bleep Do we Know?!"

I'm having difficulties accessing the article on What the Bleep Do We Know?!, presumably due to the unique punctuation at the end. It comes up in a search for ramtha and has a size of 4203 bytes, so there's got to be -something- there.

That's a little bizarre. I guess for some reason the last two characters are being stripped off before the page is accessed, so instead of going to What the Bleep Do We Know?!, you instead go to What the Bleep Do We Know. With a little URL trickery you can bypass the bug though, hence What the Bleep Do We Know?!. Most odd. - 11:22, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC) Lee (talk)

Requesting old versions by date/time

Is there a way to request old versions of a page by date/time, without going through the history page, and without knowing the numeric value of "oldid"? Is there a query that allows a parameter like "oldtime=yyyymmdd.hhmmss"?

For example, suppose I want a copy of the [[Wikipedia:Votes_for_deletion_archive_May_2004] page as it existed at 00:00 UTC on 2003-07-02. I could get http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=Wikipedia:Votes_for_deletion_archive_May_2004&oldid=1379136, but how would I learn the correct value of "oldid=1379136"?

I could go through the history page at http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=Wikipedia:Votes_for_deletion_archive_May_2004&action=history, but it's very difficult to use the history page to go so far back in the past on a page that has thousands of history entries. I could use a query like http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=Wikipedia:Votes+for+deletion+archive+May+2004&limit=50&offset=30000&action=history, but how would I guess that "offset=30000" is an appropriate value?

Also, history queries that use large "offset" values take a very long time, or simply fail. If I change "offset=30000" to "offset=31000" in the above query then it takes longer than 15 minutes and eventually returns a page that reports some kind of internal server error (I didn't write down the details).

--AlanBarrett 12:04, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Chemical structure diagrams

Which programs have been used to make the chemical structure diagrams on Wikipedia? --Eequor 15:38, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)

The basic version of chemlab is free. [2] Alteripse 00:26, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I have used PPCHTeX with Latex, to create ones like nicotine. There might be better methods, though. [[User:Sverdrup|❝Sverdrup❞]] 11:54, 13 Aug 2004 (UTC)

old phonograph records

How do I find out the value of some old phonograph records
I have some records the have the DECCA on the label?
(please answer me at kaybritt@hiwaay.net)

How do you make a category?

How do you make a category? Please give me better help i'm only a second grader. --Patricknoddy 21:26, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)User:Patricknoddy User talk:Patricknoddy 17:35 July 20, 2004 (UTC)

Hey Patrick- You can create a category simply by editing any article and adding the tag [[Category:NAME OF CATEGORY]] (replace NAME OF CATEGORY with your category name) and saving that article. Now, the category will show up at the bottom of the page you just edited as a red link. You can then click on that link to edit the category and put in a description. Hope this helps, you can ask me further questions on my talk page if you need anything clarified. - DropDeadGorgias (talk) 18:18, Jul 21, 2004 (UTC)

You should also give the new category page you have made a category of its own. gracefool 07:02, 27 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Can I link to a printable version of a page without being logged in?

I think this was possible a short while ago by linking to e.g. http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=Financial_instruments&printable=yes Now it seems that ths only works if I am logged in.

User talk:Mervynl

I've forgot both my username and password! Can somebody help? Thank you.

Your best bet is probably just to create a new account. No worries. Best, [[User:Meelar|Meelar (talk)]] 15:32, 2004 Jul 21 (UTC)

Is it TomS by any chance? The IP address who posted this also added a comment signed that on Talk:Karantania. Obviously, I can't tell you what your password is, but if you filled in an e-mail address when you first logged in, you can have a new password sent to you. - 16:01, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC) Lee (talk)

Thank you guys, I've fixed the problem!!

:-)

: TomS 14:49, 25 Jul 2004 (UTC)

How do you make your own skin?

I notice that that in the prefrences there's something called 'MySkin', I'm guessing this is for constructing your own skin. If this is possible could someone explain how, or direct me to the Wikipedia page that shows you how.

I'm sorry if this has been asked before or if the answer is evident.

--Aaron Einstein 17:55, Jul 21, 2004 (UTC)

I read the source code and found that '/standard.css' from the user page is being '@import'-ed. Try editing User:Aaron Einstein/standard.css. Knowledge of CSS required. Rajasekaran Deepak 10:31, 2004 Jul 25 (UTC)

Comprehensive information is at meta:User styles. Rajasekaran Deepak 10:44, 2004 Jul 25 (UTC)

How do I report a user that's been making bad edits?

67.52.70.242 has been making inappropriate comments on various pages and even changed the caption on a picture of Stephen Hawking to say "Playing with himself in Star Trek: TNG"...how would I go about reporting such a user?

The best place in the future is Wikipedia:Vandalism in progress. And of course you can revert him yourself as well; see Wikipedia:How to revert a page. HTH, [[User:Meelar|Meelar (talk)]] 23:17, 2004 Jul 22 (UTC)

Reporting problems with Special Pages

Hi,

How do I leave comments about semipermanently protected pages, or report problems with them? I have some questions about http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=Special:Userlogin , but there isn't a "Discussion" link or an "Edit this page" link or anything.

This isn't really a "semipermanently protected page". If you have an issue, you would propbably need to bring it up at Meta or even SourceForge depending on what the issue is. Rmhermen 04:53, Jul 30, 2004 (UTC)

Sarajevo Satellite Image

I'm wondering whether Image:SarajevoSatelite.JPG is alright by wikipedia standards. I did a google search on "Russian Satellite Sarajevo", and found the link: http://www.llnl.gov/csts/publications/gupta/pd.html

On that page under Russia it said: "Although images have reached the public domain, requests for lists of available images and image orders have been denied, delayed, and canceled in the name of national secrecy."

So it says Russian satelite images had reached the public domain but lists of available images weren't available. On a footnote for that part it said:

"The author's attempts to obtain KVR-1000 images of the nuclear facilities near Yongbyon in North Korea, the city of Sarajevo, and the Chinese nuclear test site near Lop Nor all failed on the grounds of national secrecy. Bureaucracy also hampered the process. For an anecdotal account of the search for KVR-1000 data, see Vipin Gupta and Philip McNab, "Sleuthing From Home," The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, Vol. 49, No. 10 (December 1993), pp. 44-47."

So the city of sarajevo failed. But this was in 1993. I found the picture on a message board, posted by a Russian user. Since he had the picture in his posession and was posting it freely I'm assuming that it's reached public domain now. I've sent him a message asking where he got the image or what satelite/program it's from today... he hasn't responded but it's about 5 in the morning in West Russia right now. Would it be o.k. by wikipedia standards to post the image on the Sarajevo page? Maybe a Russian user could help, expecially once I learn from what sateltie/program the picture was obtained. Asim Led 01:06, 23 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Assuming that something posted on a message board is public domain is not a safe thing to do. -- Cyrius|✎ 06:25, 23 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I get the image of MiGs attacking a Wikipedian over a copyright dispute. Isn't Russian copyright law somewhat infamous in its weakness, anyway? --Eequor 19:39, 23 Jul 2004 (UTC)

We should be able to get a copyright-free U.S. government picture to replace it if it is a concern. Rmhermen 04:42, Jul 30, 2004 (UTC)

Wikipedia editor keystrokes

Hi,

I was trying to use my browser's search function while I was editing an article, by hitting "Control+F" (I'm using Mozilla Firefox). However, that just moved the cursor forward in the edit box. I clicked on "Editing Help", to try to find a list of key commands in the Edit Mode, but I couldn't find any. Is there a list somewhere? Is there a way to search the text currently in the edit box, or another easy way to "find my place" when I'm trying to correct a typo in the middle of an article?

Thanks.

Creidieki 02:52, 23 Jul 2004 (UTC)

This is an issue with Firefox, not Wikipedia. Ask in http://forums.mozillazine.org/index.php?c=4 . Rajasekaran Deepak 10:51, 2004 Jul 25 (UTC)

Forgotten summary fields

I recently edited a page, and forgot to fill in the summary field. I think that the change I made could be considered controversial (I added a note about Jerusalem and Tel Aviv to the List of multiple capitals), so I really wanted to include a summary field. What should you do after you've accidentally saved a page with no summary, and the change was substantive? Creidieki 03:46, 23 Jul 2004 (UTC)

You could make a note of it on the article's talk page, if you like. -- Cyrius|✎ 06:25, 23 Jul 2004 (UTC)

You could re-save and fill in the summary field this time. Salasks 02:39, Aug 2, 2004 (UTC)

Adding material about equipment used in an activity

I've contributed to Everything2 in the past, and am considering changing my focus to Wikipedia since the bent is more factual here. There is an article here about hang gliding, and I have a somewhat extensive e2 write up about hang glider types and construction, etc. that I'd like to put here. What's the best way to go about it? Add a subsection or create a separate topic?

Answered on your talk page. [[User:Meelar|Meelar (talk)]] 14:41, 2004 Jul 23 (UTC)

Interlanguage Image Links

I'm trying to link this image from Kurdish Wikipedia into this article in English Wikipedia. Is there any way I can do so without actually cutting the image across? I've tried [[Image:w:ku:Abudullah_Öcalan.jpg]] and [[w:ku:Image:Abudullah_Öcalan.jpg]] and neither of them work!

You mean ku:Image:Abdullah öcalan.jpg. You can link, as you see, but not embed, but conversely (image here, embed there) is possible. See [3].--Patrick 12:15, 23 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I understand disabling the embedding function for non-wikipedia links from a high-bandwidth use site like English wikipedia - but I don't see the logic for links between the various wikipediae!

I agree. The software could check for a given URL whether it is in domain wikipedia.org (perhaps some more, like wikimedia.org, wikibooks.org, etc.), and if it is, allow embedding. That does not look very difficult to program (but we may overlook some difficulties?).--Patrick 22:38, 23 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Oh and, sorry, forgot to sign my post above! Gerry Lynch 14:03, 23 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Hiding sections

Is there a way to prevent sections appearing in the table of contents? Invisible section headers can be useful, as they provide an [edit] link without cluttering the article, but at the expense of cluttering the table of contents.

For example, this section can be edited separately from the preceding text. --Eequor 19:24, 23 Jul 2004 (UTC)

A side note: this section's name is invalid as the name of an internal link, so the table of contents links to it incorrectly. --Eequor 19:29, 23 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Discussion page feature

When I click on "Discussion" and there has been none, I get a message: "Wikipedia does not yet have a page called ......" There is in fact a page by that name, it is the Discussion page that does exist. To eliminate confusion for new users I would like to suggest reprogramming this feature to read" "Wikipedia does not yet have a discussion page named ..... You can start one here"

A History of Wikipedia

I would like to see a webpage on your site dedicated more to your history. Is this in the making? I posted an entry on Prince Buu Chanh of Vietnam and discovered tons of other information which have proven very helpful. Great job! I am sure people would like to see more about the history of the site and biographical sketchs concerning the authors of Wikipedia.

Dr. C. E. Magnus Lindgren American Military University

There's a short history at History of Wikipedia. -- Cyrius|✎ 05:14, 24 Jul 2004 (UTC)

You can find lots that's been written about us in Wikipedia:Press coverage. As for biographical sketches, many Wikipedians (as we call ourselves) maintain a user page. Some user pages have biographical info, some don't, but all will give you insight into the types of people we have here. You can also find out a lot about us by poking around in project pages, which are the "backstage" of Wikipedia. Isomorphic 05:53, 24 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I accidentally deleted some stuff...help...

This was my first time using the encyclopedia, and we have been discussing the Mitochondrial Eve theory in class, so I decided I wanted to add in a line or two of my own. However, when I went to edit it and hit preview it looked fine, but when I hit save page, the picture and almost all of the credits are gone! So i go to history, and i see my IP address as the last change, and now I don't know what to do!! Is there a way to revert it back to the way it was, or will a server administrator do that??? Woops....oh, yeah, the article is about Mitochondrial Eve if you didn't pick it up before! Sorry!!!

Don't worry. Someone has fixed your error. If it happens again, all you need to do is click the "Page history" link at the top of the broken page. You will see a list of edits, the last of which (at the top) will be yours. Click on the line below this to open the last good version of the page. Then click "Edit this page", and save it again without making any changes. You have now restored the page.

Don't let this experience put you off. Your contributions are welcome, even if you mess up occasionally (as we all do). -- Heron 21:17, 24 Jul 2004 (UTC)

using content in a discussion forum

I run a UK Discussion forum/online community. Within my forum I have subforums for each and every city/town in the UK. The forum is designed to be an interactive resource for the UK. However, I am in need of basic content to kick start these regional boards.

My question is: Can I use the content available here in my forum by posting it? If I can, what steps do I need to take?

Thanks

The content of Wikipedia is available under the GNU free documentation license (GFDL), meaning anybody can use it in any way (s)he wishes, as long as the result is also available under the GFDL. So, basic answer is: Yes, go ahead and use the content, as long as you don't claim copyright on the text, even if you change/modify the text. Additionally, we would be pleased if you could link to Wikipedia and credit us as a source. So add someting like "This article is licensed under the <a href="http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html">GNU Free Documentation License</a>. It uses material from <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page">Wikipedia</a>. " with links to GFDL and Wikipedia. Finally: Images are not always released under the GFDL, but may be other licenses that do or do not allow copying. Please check on the image page for the license. A complete discussion can be found on Wikipedia:Copyrights, section "Users' rights and obligations". Hope this answers your question -- Chris 73 | Talk 02:36, 26 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Disambiguation question

Hey all,

I noticed that a few pages relating to design patterns link to the disambiguation page Gang of Four. I was planning to create a new page for "Gang of Four (computer science)", but it occurred to me that the content of this page would be very limited (two or three sentences: "the GoF consists of a, b, c, and d. See x for more information on design patterns." -- that kind of thing).

Given that, is it still worth creating a page for this usage of "Gang of Four" and updating the relevant links to no longer point to the disamb page?

My feeling is that it's still worth doing, but I'm fairly new to WP, so I wanted to check with you folks first.

Thanks!

-- Neilc 09:26, 25 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Personally, I think that the gang of four are significant enough to have their own page. Their influence extends beyond the one book, and the stub could be fleshed out further. - DropDeadGorgias (talk) 18:31, Jul 28, 2004 (UTC)

Print stylesheet

Could you provide a print stylesheet (CSS) for Wikipedia? Rajasekaran Deepak 09:49, 2004 Jul 25 (UTC)

Found the print stylesheet being included for print media. Rajasekaran Deepak 10:35, 2004 Jul 25 (UTC)

Advertising material

Could you provide advertising material for Wikipedia as a webpage or as printable material? Rajasekaran Deepak 09:59, 2004 Jul 25 (UTC)

I could not find anything suitable from the Building Wikipedia membership page. Rajasekaran Deepak 10:10, 2004 Jul 25 (UTC)

Can someone fix copy and paste on Battle of Klendathu?

Can someone either delete the page Battle of Klendathu (that I created) so I can revert and move Battle of Klendatheu, or fix the copy/paste I did without thinking? Thanks! - Kenwarren 16:28, Jul 25, 2004 (UTC)

Fixed. -- Cyrius|✎ 17:51, 25 Jul 2004 (UTC)

How close is too close (re:copyvio)?

How much does a text have to be reworked to not be considered copyvio? The text of a new article Guido Borelli by an anon is extremely close to the text found at two different web sites: [4] and [5]. It isn't an exact copy of the other text, but it is too close for my comfort. Anyone? SWAdair | Talk 10:18, 26 Jul 2004 (UTC)

• True indeed!
  But as it happens to be his life and his biography written by Guido himself, I'm afraid it would be rather difficult to be too different, don't you agree? ;-) In any case, I've tried to change the text a bit and for sure Guido wouldn't raise any problems on the copyright of his biography!
  You can ask Guido directly.--E-worker 13:17, 14 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Disambiguation page instead of existing page.

Hi. I've read through some help pages and just want to know if I'm getting things right.

There is a page Play_(Album) which refers to Moby's album. However, there is also an album by Bobby McFerrin and Chick Corea of the same name. Now, I want to rename the original page to Play_(Moby_album). Then I guess I should copy the old, Play_(Album), page's history to the new pages talk and manually change all links the original page, before I create a disambiguation page instead of the redirect. Of course, there will be a new page Play_(Bobby_McFerrin_Chick_Corea_album).

Is there anything else that needs to be done - an easier way to do this?

--doerfler 10:49, 26 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Yes. All you have to do is click "move page", as long as you're logged in; it should be either to the side of the screen, or on top. This will automatically move the history from Play (album) to Play (Moby album), leaving a redirect. You can then click on that redirect and make it into a disambig. The links to it do need to be changed by hand however. Hope that helps. Best wishes, [[User:Meelar|Meelar (talk)]] 14:04, 2004 Jul 26 (UTC)

Honorifics

This is probably buried in the Manual of Style somewhere, but I thought I'd see if anyone had a clue first - what's the policy on honorifics? Is it inappropriate to call someone "Sheikh" or to refer, e.g., to Gandhi as "Gandhiji", or call a king His Royal Highness, etc.? Graft 22:09, 26 Jul 2004 (UTC)

CalRis 10:26, 27 Jul 2004 (UTC): Hello, Graft: The subject matter is a tad too complex to give a simple answer. But there is a HowTo dealing with monarchical titles which should be appropriate. Have a look at Wikipedia:Naming_conventions_(names_and_titles). Bye, CalRis.

Category issue

So, although not a new user, I am playing with Categories for the first time (damn work taking up all my time!). As such, I decided to start with the Ballet sections, as they are terrible articles with little to no categorization. I have been moving articles around, and wound up creating a sub category Category:Ballet Companies to put all the various listed companies in. Several articles were already in Category:Ballet so I changed the links in moved them over to ballet companies. Unfortunetly, although they show up on Category:Ballet Companies, they also still show up on Category:Ballet, and I cannot figure out why. One example of this is the article Royal_Winnipeg_Ballet. Any ideas? Lyellin 08:41, Jul 27, 2004 (UTC)

Your change has already taken effect. So you only see a caching problem. Try to reload the Category:Ballet again. Pjacobi 10:32, 27 Jul 2004 (UTC)

That was my assumption yesterday... although I did try clearing cookies/TIFs/Etc, and restarting, I still saw it. After coming back from lunch today, the change is there, so I will assume something about my network was what was causing the caching issue. Thanks for the confirmation :-) Lyellin 11:17, Jul 27, 2004 (UTC)

article

how to send article

How to use Unicode-characters

CalRis 10:20, 27 Jul 2004 (UTC): I want to use the unicode-character 0186 (an inverted C). Is it possible to do so in Wikipedia? Thanks in advance for any help. CalRis.

Yes, you can use the HTML syntax "&#x0186;", like this: Ɔ. However, not every user has this character in their standard font. I had to switch from Times New Roman to Arial Unicode to see it. -- Heron 10:28, 27 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Messages on special pages

What means "# Feed: rss atom" at the special pages?

Pèrez 20:20, 27 Jul 2004 (UTC)

See RSS (protocol) and also Atom (standard). As I understand it, this allows you to watch the recent changes on a special software as soon as they happen. (sort of the running text with info about the stock market at the bottom of some news shows). Never done it myself, though (yet). -- Chris 73 | Talk 05:46, 28 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Uploading trouble

I'm having trouble uploading an image. Every time I try, I simply get "page not found". I think it might be something to do with my firewall at work. Any chance someone could do it for me? It's the public domain image at [6], which should replace the existing image on Palm Sunday Tornado Outbreak (the same picture, but very low res). Cheers! -- ALargeElk | Talk 09:00, 28 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Done. Salasks 02:58, Aug 2, 2004 (UTC)

CD or DVD release?

Hello

I'm just wondering if you guys plan on releasing Wikipedia on CD or DVD, I'm sure thousands of people would buy or download copies. I'm surprised this is not in the FAQ.

Also, what about wikipedia for use in schools, though I'm sure censorship (or even flagging articles as having adult content) is a debate sparking topic. Here in the UK I doubt there would be any problem with adult content reaching kids that are over 15 years old. I'll happily copy hundreds of wikipedia CDs and send them to each school, college and university in the UK, not only in the name of educating the children of my country, but also to bring the knowledge of teachers to the wiki. The majority of teachers love teaching, which is not much different from writing public texts on their favourite subjects. Science, photography and art students could provide much needed GPL'd pictures. But it has downsides, like vandalism.

Any thoughts on this?

Bitplane

We're actually looking at both a CD release (I believe, though it might be DVD) as well as a paper edition. Needless to say, this will entail a significant change from current procedure; see User:Jimbo Wales/Pushing To 1.0 for a quick summary, or sign up for Wikipedia:Mailing lists. Best wishes, [[User:Meelar|Meelar (talk)]] 13:57, 2004 Jul 28 (UTC)

P.S. You can sign your name on talk pages with 4 tildes, like this: ~~~~

Thanks for the quick reply :-)

I didn't even think about the legal problems with selling the wiki, thanks for the info. I don't agree with the idea of a paper version though, Wikipedia's strength is that it can be massive with many many cross linking pages. The youth of today know the power of search engines and hyperlinks, paper indecies are laughable already, and won't even be funny in five years time.

Thanks again Bitplane 15:19, 28 Jul 2004 (UTC)

No problem. The reason to do a paper version is to achieve greater penetration. Jimbo's goal, AFAICT, is to distribute this paper version to schools in the third world, free of charge; it's a charitable thing. Best wishes, [[User:Meelar|Meelar (talk)]] 15:29, 2004 Jul 28 (UTC)

international characters (in particular, phonetic ones)

Does Wikipedia have a means of downloading character sets used on its pages? I work on an English-language system, always at one of dozens of computers at a commercial internet cafe chain in the UK (easyInternetcafe), so there's no way for me to retain character sets from session to session. Certain sets generally come up (most Cyrillic, most Thai, etc), but most aggravating (as I am studying linguistics) is that no phonetic characters (like from IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet)) display properly in any of the language information sections. Most are displayed as a series of little boxes. Have I missed a section on Wikipedia to download these characters, or does one not exist? Please help!

Only bad news from me: AFAIK all methods of embedding fonts into the documents are very broken, very browser specific and very out of fashion (except for some sad cases, where they are considered the only option). For these reasons (AFAIK again) this was never an option for Wikipedia. So installing the necessary fonts in the system used is the only option left, which will give you some trouble at an internet cafe. (If installing fonts is O.K., you should take a look at SIL's font page). Strangely enough, sometimes IE won't use IPA fonts, even when they are installed and even when other browsers use them all fine.

If you aren't disturbed by some german, have a look at these recent browserbrowser check results using test pages in ISO-8859-1 [7] and UTF-8 [8].

Pjacobi 18:34, 28 Jul 2004 (UTC)

User subpage?

What is a user subpage, and how do you create it?

You go to your user page (that's [[User:YOUR USER NAME]]) and edit the page to create a subpage. For example, to create one called "Foo", it might look like this:

My views on Wikipedia policy are best laid out in this subpage, [[/foo]]

Then, to link to it from external pages, type [[User:YOUR USER NAME/foo]].

HTH. [[User:Meelar|Meelar (talk)]] 17:50, 2004 Jul 28 (UTC)

P.S. In the future, would you mind signing your edits on discussion pages like this one? To do so, you can type four tildes, like this: ~~~~. Thanks.

Big Problem With Categories

Sorry to bother you, but right now, whenever I access any categories they do not display their links. There is usually a blank screen between the title and the catergory's category links. Its possible this is just me, but it happens on all categories and is quite worrying. There doesn;t seem to be any mass vandalism, either. Could you check it out?

(Someone's just confirmed that it is not just me).

-Erolos 18:23, 28 Jul 2004 (UTC)

All categories I found that were broken have been fixed, and I can't find any new ones. However, there are so many that there may well be more out there and I'm not going to be able to find them all. So assistance is welcomed/needed. Also, if they really are all fixed, could Tech support give me a confirmation?

Ones that have been fixed since I mentioned them = (Category:Films by year), (Category:Celebrities), (Category:Feminists), (Category:Ballet), (Category:Antenna teminology), (Category:Clear Channel radio stations), (Category:Clear Channel Communications), (Category:Mosques), (Category:Sportspeople), (Category: Fictional Jews), (Category:Fictional gays and lesbians), (Category:Islamic mythology), (Category:Christian music), (Category:Aliens), (Category:English athletes), (Category:Environmental law), (Category:English actors), and (Category:Campaign settings). -Erolos 12:57, 30 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Also Category:Ballet Lyellin 12:23, Jul 29, 2004 (UTC)

Thanks Lyellin. Added to the ever-increasing list. -Erolos 12:32, 29 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Yeah- I noticed that categories are all messed up, too. what's the deal?? Kzzl

Wikipedia search

I did a search (right) for Oldest Person and was told no such entry exists above entries giving details of the oldest persons!

Oldest Person now redirects to Supercentenarian. --LumenSimus 19:01, 29 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Miura Aika

You have an article on Kawashima Azumi. Why don't you have an article on Miura Aika. For me, Miura Aika is as well-known as Kawashima Azumi, if we do not want to say thay Miura Aika is more popular than Kawashima Azumi.

Thank you for your attention and your prompt reply.

Hoang Pha

Good idea. If you known about Miura Aika, please write a paragraph or two about her. Thanks -- Chris 73 | Talk 22:33, 28 Jul 2004 (UTC)

How do I delete an article from a category?

I mistakenly added a category entry to an article I'm in the process of writing on a sub page of my user page, which I have subsequently deleted. But when I look at the category page my user sub page is still listed in the category. How do I delete it from the category Paul August 05:16, Jul 29, 2004 (UTC)

I checked and didn't see the problem. Is it a cache issue? Rmhermen 04:29, Jul 30, 2004 (UTC)

Yes when I cleared my cache, the categories looked correct. Thanks. Paul August 14:29, Jul 30, 2004 (UTC)

Specify css in referring URL

I would like to provide links to the printable versions of pages (this used to be possible with the old style sheet with printable='yes' in the URL). Is there a way to do this? E.g. by specifying the stylesheet in the URL. I want to create such links for non-logged in users as part of an eLearning package that point to pages without navigation sidebars etc. --Mervynl 15:51, 29 Jul 2004 (UTC)

RSS of "In the news" and "Did you know"

I would love to get a daily rss feed of the opening page "in the news" and "did you know" segments. would this be easy enough to implement?

Uploading a video

I have a video of historic interest (The first gastrointestinal endoscopy) How do I upload it and reference it? Steve Kd4ttc 01:40, 30 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Would it be better suited at Wikisource rather than Wikipedia? If it is less than 5MB, you can upload it using Wikisource:Special:Upload. Angela. 02:39, Jul 30, 2004 (UTC)

I think it would be useful here, on our article on the procedure. [[User:Meelar|Meelar (talk)]] 04:46, 2004 Jul 30 (UTC)

I wouldn't mind having it moved around after upload. Wikisource said it was for source texts. Video don't fit that unless the mandate for Wikisource was stretched. Is there an upload protocol for Video on Wikipedia? Kd4ttc 21:50, 30 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Tables

I got this table to not extend several pages sideways but there is still something wrong with it. Template:Wickes class destroyer Do we have any in-depth help page for tables? What is wrong with this one. Rmhermen 04:06, Jul 30, 2004 (UTC)

For starters, you're using incorrect table syntax. || is used to separate cells. -- Cyrius|✎ 04:31, 30 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I didn't create the table. But I have seen others using | that worked such as Template:USpresidents. Rmhermen 05:12, Jul 30, 2004 (UTC)

Jinian, the tables creator, fixed it. It appears a single missing | after a center was the whole problem. User:Rmhermen 04:11, 1 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Voting

Hi, could you please tell me who gets to vote on requests for adminship and bureaucrat...uh...hood(?)? From looking at the voting pages, I kind of get a general impression that all users get to vote for new admins, but only admins vote for new bureaucrats, is that correct?

Maybe this information is available all over the place, in which case I apologize for bothering you, but I just can't find it. (Perhaps having it at the top of the voting pages themselves might be a good idea?)--Bishonen 10:28, 30 Jul 2004 (UTC)

raise your eyes, please. :-) Oops. Forgot to write anything in the subject field there, sorry. Could you look just above my headline for my voting question, please? Stupid Bishonen 10:39, 30 Jul 2004 (UTC)

As far as I know anyone can vote either for admins or bureaucrats. There aren't very many votes to promote new bureaucrats, though, and they tend to be non-controversial. Isomorphic 04:04, 1 Aug 2004 (UTC)

minnan not showing up properly in "other languages"

Tropical cyclone has an entry for minnan amongst other langs:

[[cy:Teiffŵn]] [[da:Orkan]] [[de:Hurrikan]] [[eo:Uragano]] [[ja:台風]] [[ko:태풍]] [[zh-min-nan:Hong-thai]] [[nl:Orkaan]] [[pl:Huragan]] [[sv:Orkan]] [[zh:熱帶氣旋]] but it doesn't show up in the right place. Because its not 2-letter??? How is this fixed?

(William M. Connolley 12:34, 30 Jul 2004 (UTC))

Questions for Help

1. Please, What is a troll in the discussions? 2. How about starting a glossary of Wikipedia-specific terms?

1. A troll is a person who makes an offensive or controversial comment that is deliberately intended to provoke an angry reaction from others. The troll might do this for amusement, or to expose what he/she sees as intolerance or oversensitivity in those who reply.

2. Excellent idea, but we already have one. See Wikipedia:Glossary. -- Heron 11:16, 31 Jul 2004 (UTC)

<span>

Why is the <span> tag not supported? --Eequor 22:56, 30 Jul 2004 (UTC)

There was a poll in which majority voters voted against it. See also discussion on that page. - Brona 18:55, 1 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Resizing Pictures

The picture tutorial indicates that I cannot make a picture larger than the origial source and editing confirms this. A few months ago I did this successfully to immages that were a little on the samll size, but I note now the pictures have reverted to their original size. Is this something that has changed in Wikipedia recently? additionally what is the reason for this? Dainamo

If it was allowed, people could go around resizing pictures up to tens of thousands of pixels. This kind of resize exits the realm of the merely annoying and enters the one of consuming server resources. -- Cyrius|✎ 17:03, 31 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Abbriviation problems

I made LSL a redirect to Linden Scripting Language without checking what other pages link to it. I cleared the text for now, but I have a feeling there's a better way to correct this type of problem Sgeo 14:56, 31 Jul 2004 (UTC)

About Tilde

On the welcome message I got in my talk page, it mentioned using '~' but I can't get it to work. What I want is basically the talk thing I see next to some people's names --Sgeo 15:12, 31 Jul 2004 (UTC)

tildes aren't used the way they are for users' homepages/home directories (like in bash, csh, or apache). Instead, to refer to a user's own page (called their "user page") you link to User:Sgeo or User:Finlay McWalter like that. The mention of tildes in your welcome message is just a shorthandy way of adding your own signature - three or four tildes expands to your signature. -- Finlay McWalter | Talk 16:32, 31 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Plus sign in internal link

Can anyone please tell me how to make a internal link with a plus (+) on the name of the page referred by the internal link? I have tried to make a link like+this but it won't work. Can anyone please tell me how to link like that? Thanks. 61.94.149.67 17:32, 31 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Unfortunately, due to technical restrictions, plus signs aren't allowed in page names. When it's unavoidable, the generally accepted solution is to spell out the "plus", for example, the page on C++ resides at C Plus Plus. Adding {{wrongtitle|title=CorrectTitle}} (remembering to replace "CorrectTitle") to the top of the page in question will add a standardised notice informing the reader. When linking to the page you should use a piped link to hide the incorrect page title, like this: C++ - 18:05, 31 Jul 2004 (UTC) Lee (talk)

reclaiming an old, unused user account

When I initially joined Wikipedia, I wanted to use the username "Joy", however, the software told me that it was taken already. Now that I look at it, I see that whoever registered it never made a single edit. Would it be possible for me to ask for this account? One of the administrators could move away the old account and let me have the name. I use the other nickname (almost) everywhere else and it seems a shame for it to go to waste when I could do it justice :) I suppose I wouldn't want to harass anyone to change my existing 8K edits (quite an SQL query that would be!), just letting me have the other account would be nice enough. --Shallot 21:33, 31 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I found meta:Changing username in the meantime, nm. --Shallot 12:16, 3 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Renaming without creating a redirect

The answer to my problem is doubtless presented succinctly somewhere in these pages, but after an hour of looking I still haven't found it, so perhaps someone will take pity on me and help me out.

I want to write an article entitled "Bill of lading". An article of that name already exists; however, it does not in fact deal with the term "bill of lading" (a shipping document) at all, but is instead a definition of the word "bill" meaning a statement of money owed.

Apart from some spelling mistakes the currently misnamed article is perfectly good in its own right, so I do not wish to delete its content, just rename the page.

However, as I understand it, if I do that a redirect page called "Bill of lading" will automatically be created -- so how can I then create my own "Bill of lading" page, the title already having been taken? -- Picapica 22:25, 31 Jul 2004 (UTC)

If you go to a redirect page, you'll get a little note saying "Redirected from whatever". If you click that link, it'll take you to the page title you were at, where you can edit as normal. Try visiting Wikipedia:Help Desk to see what I mean, it's a redirect on the capitalization. -- Cyrius|✎ 22:45, 31 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Many thanks, Cyrius. I've now been able to do what I wanted -- and everything seemed to work very well :-) -- Picapica 23:35, 31 Jul 2004 (UTC)