Wikipedia:Help desk/Archives/2008 April 12

Help desk
< April 11	<< Mar | April | May >>	April 13 >

Welcome to the Wikipedia Help Desk Archives
The page you are currently viewing is an archive page. While you can leave answers for any questions shown below, please ask new questions on one of the current Help Desk pages.

April 12

Monitor recent changes in real time

Resolved

Is there some kind of tool or application that can be used to automatically display the diffs of all Wikipedia recent changes in real time? It would be easier to spot vandalism that way... -- Cambrasa 00:19, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

Lots! WP:Counter-Vandalism_Unit#Tools. I personally use WP:Huggle. AL_LOCKE|^talk 00:22, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

Account merging

Resolved

I remember reading somewhere that it's possible to amalgamate my accounts on meta wiki/wiki commons/etc. - can anyone confirm this, and tell me how? My accounts all have the same username. Thanks in advance, any help is greatly appreciated. AL_LOCKE|^talk 00:19, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

Single user login is not available yet, but admins are beta testing it now, so it should be coming our way soon. Paragon12321 (talk) 00:29, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

Thanks Paragon, I feared as much. AL_LOCKE|^talk 00:32, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

LaTeX

I have no idea what's wrong with LaTex but if you look at my talk page you will find under ==Math== that the LaTeX isn't looking very LaTeXy. Also, the ×3 isn't showing up. What's wrong?!? --Nick4404 yada yada yada 03:21, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

LaTex requires special codes for each element; see Help:Displaying a formula. I have layed out the correct way to format the equations you wanted in the table below. -Icewedge (talk) 04:15, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

code	output
<math> 1/3 = 0.333... </math> <math> * 3= </math> <math> 1 = 0.999... </math>	$1/3=0.333...$ $*3=$ $1=0.999...$
<math>\frac{1}{3} = 0.3333...</math> <math>\times 3 = 1 = 0.99999...</math>	${\frac {1}{3}}=0.3333...$ $\times 3=1=0.99999...$

The preferred LaTeX way would be:

${\begin{array}{lrcl}&\displaystyle {\frac {1}{3}}&=&0.333\cdots \\(\times 3)&1&=&0.999\cdots \end{array}}$

x42bn6 Talk Mess 04:35, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

Article on Hugo Diaz

I wrote an article on Hugo Diaz, an Argentinean harmonica player. I can find the article by using Go but not if I'm doing a Search What I have to do to have the article available when doing a Search.

Gustavo Cragnolino 05:30, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

I bolded his name in the article, that might help. Also, you need to add reliable sources to show why Diaz is notable for an entry on Wikipedia. Hope that helps you. AgnosticPreachersKid (talk) 08:21, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

There is nothing you need to do. The search function will start finding the article after Wikipedia has indexed the article, which may take some time. Meanwhile, I just checked and Google has already indexed the article, which is a far more critical funnel point to the article than Wikipedia's internal search. Cheers.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 08:57, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

Using Wikipedia in Iternet Explorer 7's Instant Search box

I have set up Wikipedia as a Search provider in Iternet Explorer 7's Instant Search box.

It doesn't work as well however as using the main Wikipedia search page. AM I doing something wrong.

If for example I search in the Instant Search box for Bill Clinton, I get no hits. If I serach for Clinton I get the result I am expecting.

As far as I can see, this happens with all names.

Any suggestions please.

Ta

Colmac99 (talk) 07:14, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

I don't know that anyone can diagnose the problem from the information you have provided thus far, as you have only told us very generally that you set up the search and it's not working. However, using Wikipedia to search Wikipedia is not the way to go in any case. It is well known that other search engines search Wikipedia much better than we do; most notably Google. You can set up IE7 to search using Google and you can plug in limiters to make it search just Wikipedia, or sections of Wikipedia. For example, to search all of Wikipedia, just add to the search "site:en.wikipedia.org", or you can use {{Google custom}}. You will find documentation on the template page about other search limiters, and take a look at the see also section for other dedicated Google search templates. Cheers.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 08:44, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

There is also the {{Google wikipedia}} template which is more specific than {{Google custom}} and thus has a shorter syntax when one wants to search on Wikipedia. Presumably Colmac99 is looking for a URL to paste into Internet Explorer somewhere. As I have not set up any searches in Internet Explorer I don't know exactly how to do that. However, the URL to search Wikipedia with Google's custom search feature is the following (right-click this link and select "Copy link location"):

• Search Wikipedia with Google

--Teratornis (talk) 23:39, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

For example, try this search: Search Wikipedia with Google for: Bill Clinton. That finds the Bill Clinton article as the top result, and other related articles such as I did not have sexual relations with that woman (which, sadly, I can truthfully say in far too many cases, making me quite different than the former President). --Teratornis (talk) 23:42, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

Ventilation system in hydro project tunnels

i would like to know the ventialtion system about tunnel —Preceding unsigned comment added by 61.2.23.19 (talk) 07:35, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

Have you tried the miscellaneous section of Wikipedia's Reference Desk? They specialize in answering knowledge questions there; this help desk is only for questions about using Wikipedia. For your convenience, here is the link to post a question there: click here. I hope this helps.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 08:47, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

GEORGE STEPHENSON

WHEN WAS THE FIRST LOCOMOTIVE BUILT?

PLEASE TELL ME THE DATE ANDPLACE OF INVENTION

THANK YOU SIGHNED MISS E H PARK —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.151.25.196 (talk • contribs)

Read Locomotive#Origins. AgnosticPreachersKid (talk) 08:12, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

userbox

Ugh, I've seen the "this user has made X mainspace edits" userbox a million times on various userpages, but now I can't locate it. A user that likes to inform people of his edits (every 50 or so mainspace edits he leaves messages on people's talk pages to let them know) has asked me to locate the userbox for his userpage so that this will stop occurring. (I told him having this userbox will let him "show off" his contributions in a more appropriate manner) If someone has the code, so I could give it to him in order to stop these needless notifications, I'd appreciate it. Thanks. AgnosticPreachersKid (talk) 08:11, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

Hi. Please see {{user Count}}, {{user contrib}} and others in Category:Edit user templates. Cheers.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 08:25, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

Thanks, but those are for the generic contributions userboxes I think. I'm looking for the one that says contributions to mainspace. AgnosticPreachersKid (talk) 08:27, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

NM, I see it now. Thanks. AgnosticPreachersKid (talk) 08:35, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

Logging on

Hi,

I hope you accept this a question about "using" Wikipedia as that's what I want to do! However I cannot sign up! the emails from Wikiapedia are not reaching me. The user name I created was jethou and I used my hotmail email address, but nothing has come in from Wikipedia, even though it said it was sending me a new password.

I could not find help in the FAQ, or anywhere else on this,

Regards Colin. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.244.84.59 (talk) 09:39, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

First, have you checked your bulk/spam folder? Many times I wondered why I hadn't received an email only to check these and find it was "filtered" by my email client. The only other possibilities I can think of are that you haven't waited long enough, or that you made a typo in the email address when setting up your account.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 09:50, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

See Help:Email confirmation. If you don't know your password and cannot receive a new one then you can create a new account. If you have a working password then you don't need email confirmation to edit. It's only needed to use email features. PrimeHunter (talk) 13:10, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

Search through a user's contributions

Is it possible to search for the word or phrase X in all contributions user Y has made to Wikipedia? -- Cambrasa 09:57, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

I don't think that the contribs interface is so advanced yet. There could be other ways to do it though, like querying the database I guess. Maybe a developer on the village pump could answer you more thoroughly. -- 213.152.52.38 (talk) 10:30, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

See WP:EIW#Query. Something in there might help. --Teratornis (talk) 18:32, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

Rationales

Do people usually use substituted templates to include rationales on images? (I ask because I don't suppose that they write them themselves each time but then again I can't identify the template.) -- 213.152.52.38 (talk) 10:22, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

It's hard to say what people "usually" do here, or whether that would apply to the images you happen to be viewing. Different people do different things, so what you see depends on where you happen to look. You might be able to identify a template by searching the site containing the image for a phrase with Google. If you had mentioned a specific image, I could show how to do this search with {{Google custom}}. But since you did not, you will have to read the documentation for {{Google custom}} and figure out how to construct the search you need. Or you could tell us an image you have in mind and the exact text you suspect might have come from a template, and we can set up the search. Another possibility is to search the history for the image and see whether a user may have followed instructions properly when substituting a template (Help:Substitution#Documenting substitution). That is, when a user substitutes a template, he or she is supposed to identify the template in the Edit summary. However, any system that depends on human vigilance and awareness of all the rules is certain to fail routinely, so the absence of such a summary is no proof that the user did not substitute a template. I consider it a design defect of the MediaWiki software that template substitution leaves no automatic record in the history. I would think the GFDL would require the placing of such records. --Teratornis (talk) 18:49, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

References and redirects

How do I make a redirect page and how do I set up those reference/footnote things to work the way they do in articles? Thanks in advance--Jaeger123 (talk) 10:48, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

You can make redirect pages by creating a new page and leaving it with a #REDIRECT [[name_of_article_to_redirect_to]]. You can make references/footnotes by using <ref>reference here</ref> (more info available in the links) and placing them at the bottom by using a template such as {{reflist}}. -- 213.152.52.38 (talk) 11:13, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

Ah, right, thanks :-)--Jaeger123 (talk) 11:34, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

finding deleted articles

how can i locate a deleted article from wikipedia? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.188.235.11 (talk) 11:01, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

You can't, if it has been deleted. I think the admins can un-delete deleted articles though.--Jaeger123 (talk) 11:05, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:Why was my page deleted? What was the article name? Only administrators can see and restore deleted articles. I'm an administrator. PrimeHunter (talk) 13:04, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

Coloured world map

I want an SVG file with all countries of the world in a specific colour. I might contain lines like these:

<path id="France" fill="red" d=".....

The idea is that anyone can easily modify the file, by changing the colours, to indicate the properties of countries. The result can be used for various topics.

Is such a file available? HandigeHarry (talk) 11:14, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

Maybe you'd like one of the maps here. -- 213.152.52.38 (talk) 11:21, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

Yes, I think I can do a lot with that, although it requires some changes. HandigeHarry (talk) 11:32, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

To state the blindingly obvious, you will probably want to use an SVG editor such as Inkscape to perform your manipulations. If you really want to generalize this to use a text-based control file, you may wish modify the SVG mapfile in some way and then write a simple script that somehow incorporates your control file into the generic template file to produce a specifically-colored svg result file. SVG is very powerful and general, but it's a file format, not a program. Your script would be a simple program that manipulates SVG files. (This comment is not directed at HandigeHarry. It is an explanation to non-programmer readers of the help desk.) -Arch dude (talk) 23:23, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

trying to contact an administrator with a request but can't find a talk option

An administrator Kingboyk removed an article I wish to discuss with him but I am new to Wikipedia and have tried many times to find a way to start a discussion on his home page but it has been fruitless. How do I go about this? I've read everything but there seems no way to contact him. How do I go about starting a dialogue to address this deletion? Thank you. Willow wren (talk) 12:32, 12 April 2008 (UTC)willow_wren

Every user has a talkpage. At the top of each page you will see a tab saying article or userpage, next to it is one called discussion. You can click on that and it will take you to the discussion page. For Kingboyk it is User talk:Kingboyk. Woody (talk) 12:36, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

By the way, which article was it? Your account hasn't made any edits. Woody (talk) 12:40, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

The deletion log says: "... deleted "Clark Gesner" ‎ (CSD A7 (Bio): Biographical article that does not assert significance)". If you follow the link to CSD A7 (Bio) you will see it says: "An article about a real person, ... that does not indicate why its subject is important or significant...". If you ask Kingboyk, you might be able to get the page restored so you can add more information to establish that importance or significance. Astronaut (talk) 13:21, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia Toolbar IE7: changeíng language

Is it possible to change the language from english to german? If it is: what is to do, to realize it? Best regards —Preceding unsigned comment added by Rabwiki-en (talk • contribs) 12:43, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

There is the German Wikipedia if that's what you're asking, or do you mean the software? The Dominator^Talk_Edits 15:42, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

If you want the software in German, I know that if you stick &uselang=de after the url you can get it in German, I'm not sure how to get it permanently. The Dominator^Talk_Edits 19:05, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

How to question an article's nuetrality

--LukasCaldera (talk) 13:08, 12 April 2008 (UTC) I have seen on some articles at the top is says something like "Nuetrality of this article is questioned" I would like to get that put at the top of certain article. Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed is the article. How do I do so? LukasCaldera (talk) 13:08, 12 April 2008 (UTC).

See Wikipedia:Neutrality templates. You can click the "edit" tab at top of an existing article to see how it did something. PrimeHunter (talk) 13:12, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

Using Friendly (i think) I hit a tab on the top of the page that says "tag" if I want to tag a page like that, but that is a user script. The template it produces is {{npov}}. You could look into friendly here. Happy editing!~ DarkZorro 13:19, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

How to move an article to a page with a history

I hope this is the right place to ask this question. According to the Naming conventions (companies) the article Revision3 Corporation should be moved to Revision3 which is now a redirect page to the article. But I can't move the page because the redirect page has a history due to vandalism. In case the page needs to be moved (which I think it does) how can I do that, or can somebody do it for me? Thanks! Cyzor (talk) 14:27, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

I have made the move which required an administrator to delete the target page first. Another time you can use {{db-move}} to alert an administrator. PrimeHunter (talk) 15:28, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

Thanks I didn't know that! But can you also move the talk page? Cyzor (talk) 15:44, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

I forgot that. I see you learned quickly and used {{db-move}} to get it moved. PrimeHunter (talk) 18:54, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

Account Creation

cannot create account inspite of correct e mail address and password —Preceding unsigned comment added by 121.245.19.187 (talk) 15:49, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

Try WP:ACC. Harland1 (^t/_c) 15:57, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

Map Making

How can I edit/map a map? For example, the Dutch Empire map. (Red4tribe (talk) 16:48, 12 April 2008 (UTC))

You would have to download the map to your computer, make the changes then re-upload it Alexfusco⁵ 16:51, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

See WP:EIW#Maps for links that will get you started. The map page in question: Image:DutchEmpire.png lists some users who contributed to that map. You could ask them on their talk pages to tell you what software they used. --Teratornis (talk) 18:22, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

Anti vandal tools

I heard about these. I'd like one but I don't want to have to download anything. What sould I get?--Jaeger123 (talk) 17:58, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

WP:CUV - has links to a number of them. I personally favor WP:TWINKLE as it's user friendly. Wisdom89 _{(T / ^C)} 18:09, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

Also see WP:EIW#Vandal which has a Tools: subheading. --Teratornis (talk) 18:24, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

Hiding long item in talk page

Is there a way to hide a long item in my talk page so that the title is visible, anyone interested can open it out to read it, but it is normally closed up so that those not interested don't have to scroll past the full length of it? JohnCD (talk) 18:50, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

See WP:EIW#Collapsing. --Teratornis (talk) 18:54, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

(ec)You can use the {{Hide}} template. An example would be :

Comments by _______

Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipisicing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Duis aute irure dolor in reprehenderit in voluptate velit esse cillum dolore eu fugiat nulla pariatur. Excepteur sint occaecat cupidatat non proident, sunt in culpa qui officia deserunt mollit anim id est laborum.

That's probably the easiest way to hide a large comment. You can also customize the colors and such. « Gonzo fan2007 (talk ♦ contribs) 18:58, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

• Thanks - just what I wanted. JohnCD (talk) 19:57, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

  I find it's easier to put {{collapse top}} at the top, and {{collapse bottom}} underneath the long comment; although then you can't control the colours and stuff I suppose. --☺Coppertwig (talk) 21:03, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

capitalization of "white" and "black" in chess

This is a style issue - when should "white" and "black" be capitalized when talking about chess? My understanding is that they should only be capitalized when substituting for a proper name, such as "... White played the queen...", and not otherwise, such as "the black pieces". Is that correct? Bubba73 (talk), 21:01, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

That sounds right to me intuitively, though that's just my opinion. ☺Coppertwig (talk) 21:05, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

I'd have to agree. Grk1011 (talk) 21:24, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

My teacher article deleted Wikipedia.

Excuse me.

There are no written about my teacher.(Wikipedia)

I can't written english.

below is my teacher article deleted Wikipedia. ( Please, Requested articles )

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yu_Hwang_Wu

Please, Can you help me.

I will help us forget the gratitude!

Always be happy!

Below is my teacher profile.

http://www.flickr.com/people/yuhwangwu/

My teacher Wikipedia love a fan.

--Stylescene (talk) 22:18, 12 April 2008 (UTC)stylescene

According to the logs, the article was deleted because it failed to indicate why the subject of the article was important or notable. You can find our standards for biographical articles here. Other steps that you can take are outlined here. Best, --Bfigura ^(talk) 22:21, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

If English is not your native language, check our List of Wikipedias for a Wikipedia in your language. --Teratornis (talk) 23:32, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

To help, but the answer is no.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Notability_%28athletes%29#Notability

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Wikipedia#Suggested_rename_of_this_WikiProject

--Stylescene (talk) 12:52, 13 April 2008 (UTC)Stylescene

SAPPORO

TO WHOM IT MAY CONCERN; MY SON HAS CELIAC DISEASE. WE WERE WONDERING IF THIS BEER IS GLUTEN FREE BEER. THANK YOU, CAROL

[ email removed for anti-spam reasons ] —Preceding unsigned comment added by 142.68.96.63 (talk) 22:54, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

Sorry, without specifying the name of the beverage, we cannot help you. Also, have you tried the reference desk? They specialise in knowledge questions, whereas we specialise in questions about how to use Wikipedia. Stwalkerster [ talk ] 22:57, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

Note that the help desk is for questions about using wikipedia. Factual questions belong at the reference desk. That said, you may find this link helpful. --Sopoforic (talk) 23:00, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

Also note that your use of the phrase "THIS BEER" suggests you may have read about something on Wikipedia (perhaps Sapporo Brewery) and mistakenly assumed Wikipedia has some connection with that subject. In most cases Wikipedia does not. We are an encyclopedia with 6,918,482 articles, most of which have nothing to do with Wikipedia itself. You will have to contact the vendor of the beer you have in mind to get more information about it. See {{Astray}}. --Teratornis (talk) 23:29, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

We cannot give medical advice. George D. Watson (Dendodge).Talk^Help 07:53, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Fair use

I'm sorry, I don't think that this is the best place for this cue, but I do not have intentional to propose for deletion the images. In Atomium, I believe that Image:Atomium by night.jpg and Image:TheAtomium2007.jpg may need fair use claim (I'm not a US citizen, so I can't do that). See Image:Atomium-sm.jpg and its talk for further information. Thanks--Trixt (talk) 23:31, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

The two images that you link to are licensed under GFDL and are being released by the uploader. I'm fairly sure that they do not require fair-use rationales as they are not "non-free". I'm not an expert when it comes to this stuff, but you can inquire about it at the image help desk. Wisdom89 _{(T / ^C)} 06:19, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

I think the point of the question is whether the photographs are derivative of the original sculpture. In the USA they would be, in the UK not; I don't know about Belgium. —teb728 t c 08:42, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

In Belgium non commercial purpose is mandatory (see Commons:Freedom of panorama#Belgium).--Trixt (talk) 21:59, 14 April 2008 (UTC)