Wikipedia:Help desk/Archives/2008 April 14

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April 14

Show/hide.

Does anyone know how to get a show/hide feature working? It's for the notes in this user-subpage. · AndonicO ^Engage. 00:09, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

{{hidden}} perhaps? Pyrospirit (talk · contribs) 00:13, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

(ec)

This is how

Well, you know what to do :) - Milk's favorite Cookie 00:14, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

- Milk's favorite Cookie 00:14, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Okay, thanks. · AndonicO ^Engage. 00:27, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

All images missing!

Please help, my browser is hiding all images from Wikipedia! They will load, I can see them for a half second, and then they all disappear and the page's text fills in the space. This applies to every image on the site, including images in articles, the one-click buttons above the editing window for signature et alli, images in the absolute position on userspace, and even the big globe on the top left corner. The layout of the rest of the page looks fine, I still have the tabs at the top of the page, I can edit pages, etcetera. I'm using the default monobook skin, although I had it set to green text on black background when it first went wrong. Did I accidentally change some preference here, and if so, how do I change it back? Images on other websites are showing up fine. If it matters, I'm using Firefox for Mac. --Arctic Gnome (talk • contribs) 01:05, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

• I also have Firefox for the Mac. Sometimes it won't load the images if the program's running low on memory — try quitting and re-opening Firefox. Ten Pound Hammer and his otters • ^{(Broken clamshells•Otter chirps)} 01:07, 14 April 2008 (UTC)
  • That worked, thank you. I should have tried that right off the bat, but I was very confused. --Arctic Gnome (talk • contribs) 01:08, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

password and new e-mail address

I have lost my password. I'm sure that I was still with my old ISP I need to reset my password. Please help me with this.

Thank You

rtorbett

If you've forgotten your password, you can click the "email new password" button when you try to log in. If you can't access the email account you gave, then there's actually nothing we can do, as there's no way to prove you are the owner of the account. Sorry. Someguy1221 (talk) 04:01, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

search history

Is there a way to find my search history from before I became a member? Could my ip address be used to find my search history? Thank you.Npys3 (talk) 03:54, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia doesn't maintain records of articles you've searched, although your browser history probably does over some timeframe. As for articles you've edited, you can search for [[Special:Contributions/User:<Your IP here>]]. Depending on how dynamic your IP address is, it may or may not reveal what you've edited, or may even display what someone else has edited. Someguy1221 (talk) 03:59, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Internal links

If there is an article called ABCD, is there any advantage in coding [[ABCD|ABCD]] instead of just [[ABCD]]  ?

Thanks, Wanderer57 (talk) 05:02, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

The line in the middle there allows you to link an article, but not necessarily to that article's name. For example, if I wanted to link a specific word to a specific page, then the line makes that possible. Also, it's useful when trying to link a word to its article when the word is being used in a different tense or number. Hope this answers your question! GlassCobra 05:09, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

To answer the question directly, no there is no added benefit to link [[ABCD|ABCD]] instead of just [[ABCD]] . The pipe (i.e. the | character) is used in links, like what GC said, when you want to link to an article but for one reason or another you want a different name to appear other than the name of the article. Hope this helps! « Gonzo fan2007 (talk ♦ contribs) 05:12, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

WP:PIPE should help. George D. Watson (Dendodge).Talk^Help 07:37, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Changing Case in article title

Hi,

I have created a page and the the title consists of 2 words. The first starts with a capital letter and the second start with a lowercase letter. I have decided that i want them both to have uppercase letters. How can ido this?

Thanks —Preceding unsigned comment added by Brookbanks (talk • contribs) 09:12, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Click the "Move" tab at the top of the article page to move it to the proper spelling. However, I'm not sure what the point is. You created three articles, Yak Hunt, Yak hunter and Yak Hunters, with no content. I don't see why you'd need three separate articles on the same topic. -- Kesh (talk) 09:22, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

I cant see a move tab? i only have

discussion edit this page history watch —Preceding unsigned comment added by Brookbanks (talk • contribs) 09:34, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

To move a page, your account needs to be four days old ("autoconfirmed") first. Xenon⁵⁴ 10:37, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Please help me to know "the infetious rate of Japanese B encephalitis in bat...

Dear Sir or Madam,

I am a student in Viet Nam.I am going to have the report in class about the subject: " janpanese B encephalitis in bat". I read lots of material about this. Athough I can find more useful information about this suject on the Internet, I can't find an especial information that is " the infectious rate of Janpanese B encephalitis in Bat".

If you researched "the infectious rate", please help me to find it or you can help me how I can find it on the Internet.

Or you can send this information to my email : <removed>

Thanks you very much!!( This websites is useful for many student to learn more, I think that).

Maya —Preceding unsigned comment added by Maya2312 1986 (talk • contribs) 09:28, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Have you tried Wikipedia's Reference Desk? They specialize in knowledge questions and will try to answer just about any question in the universe (except how to use Wikipedia, since that is what this Help Desk is for). Just follow the link, select the relevant section, and ask away. I hope this helps. Xenon⁵⁴ 10:38, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Do your own homework. George D. Watson (Dendodge).Talk^Help 11:17, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Adding page to category

I want to know how you can make a template automatically add a page to a category. IngerAlHaosului (talk) 11:11, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Put the category in the template, like [[Category:Max Bygraves albums]]. George D. Watson (Dendodge).Talk^Help 11:16, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

If you don't want the template itself to appear in the category then put the category inside <includeonly> tags as in <includeonly>[[Category:Max Bygraves albums]]</includeonly>. See WP:Includeonly. PrimeHunter (talk) 12:47, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

wikipedias to survive

would wikipedia continue to survive if jimbo and whoever else finances and runs wikipedia where killed or died somehow? what contingency plans are in place to ensure wikipedias longevity?

Wikipedia is funded by volunteers and Jimbo's role could easily be filled. George D. Watson (Dendodge).Talk^Help 11:41, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

If somehow the Wikimedia Foundation ceased to exist, went bankrupt, or became corrupted, it would still not mean the end of Wikipedia. The Wikimedia Foundation only owns the servers where Wikipedia is located. The software and the content of Wikipedia is free, and mirrored on multiple locations on the internet. Somebody would very soon resurrect a Wikipedia fork where it would continue to grow. A strict adhesion to GPL and GFDL is the only contingency plan wikipedia needs. Remember that this is not a top-down project - is it mainly the users who determine Wikipedia's fate, not the Wikipedia managers.

But even if Jimbo and other people managing Wikipedia died, that would not stop Wikipedia from functioning, since it is funded by donations from tens of thousands of people, and other volunteers could take Jimbo's place. Cambrasa 17:52, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Publish articles

Hi,

My uncle is a retired professor in Ecology and had many published and unpublished articles on the subject, which he wants to place online in Wikipedia to disemminate the knowledge. There are few artciles in the form of books which he wants to scan and make them available online. Other articles are in MS- Word format.

Please suggest me in this regard.

Thank you, Srikanth —Preceding unsigned comment added by Srikanthban (talk • contribs) 11:36, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

I'm not sure we could accept them unless he is willing to release these works under a free license or into the public domain, and be willing to allow them to be used on all sites (not just Wikipedia) and also for commercial purposes. Even then, I'm not sure they would be entirely useful as we strive to include originally-written material, that is not copied directly from open-content sources. It might be more beneficial to expand our currently existing articles on those subjects and provide references to your uncle's work. Hersfold ^(t/a/c) 12:27, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Take a look at Wikibooks. They accept original works. As Hersfold mentioned though, publishing the articles there would make them free for other people to use, for whatever purpose they want. His published articles, though, may be very useful as citations in existing articles here about those subjects. -- Kesh (talk) 19:00, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

If you want to just mail a published book somewhere to be scanned and made available widely and forever, you might try Million Book Project or books.google.com. MS word documents can be easily uploaded to documents.google.com, and made publicly available if desired. -- Quiddity (talk) 23:25, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Edit count

Which is my true edit count? The one in my preferences, over 4,000, or Interiot's Wannabe Kate tool, about 3,900? George D. Watson (Dendodge).Talk^Help 11:39, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Probably the one in your preferences - I think Interiot's tool only counts those in Special:Contributions, whereas preferences also includes Special:DeletedContributions, which Interiot's tool can't see because it's an admin-only page. Not that it matters, though. Hersfold ^(t/a/c) 12:22, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Thanks, it's just for the box on my user page. George D. Watson (Dendodge).Talk^Help 12:30, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

I just happened to have seen this post. My "my preferences" count is 130 less than my Interiot count. Why is this? Grk1011 (talk) 12:46, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Per the above. The "my preferences" tool is a server count, including delete contributions. Interiot's tool simply scrapes from "my contributions". The "my preferences" one will therefore be higher than Interiots. As above, not that it matters! Pedro :  Chat  13:05, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Grk1011 said the "my preferences" count is lower than Interiot. PrimeHunter (talk) 13:54, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Yes, and i cant figure out why. Grk1011 (talk) 19:50, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Possibly just an error. Either Interiot double-counted something, or Preferences isn't counting something that you used to have edits in. Either way, it's not really important. -- Kesh (talk) 19:53, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

plagarism

Either the article A Separate Peace copies off of the following website: http://www.answers.com/A%20Separate%20Peace) , or vise versa. --AtTheAbyss (talk) 12:56, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Answers.com mirrors us. --Orange Mike | Talk 12:59, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Oh okay.--AtTheAbyss (talk) 13:12, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

where can i report a bad admin?

user:barneca has been real horrible to me, and other users, and i think it's time they sacked him from admin duties. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 79.77.199.61 (talk) 13:52, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Considering your personal attacks and vandalizing of barneca's userspace, don't expect any sympathy. PrimeHunter (talk) 13:58, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Complaints about administrators can be made at WP:ANI. --Cameron (t|p|c) 14:13, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

PS:Complaints about this admin have been made before. --Cameron (t|p|c) 14:14, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

PPS: Every admin gets complaints. Woody (talk) 14:21, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

This anonymous user appears to be harassing Barneca from dynamic IP's. I don't want to read complaints like [1]. PrimeHunter (talk) 14:23, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Or this. George D. Watson (Dendodge).Talk^Help 18:54, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Template Problem

A problem has recently appeared with the template Template:Panorama simple - it is not respecting the height parameter (as can be seen on Buckingham Fountain), which means it is showing up huge on all the pages that it is used on. Neither me or the original creator can figure out why, does anyone know what the problem is? Thanks guiltyspark (talk) 13:55, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Not sure, but I created sandbox and testcases subpages to work out a fix. Links are at the top of the documentation. --— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk - 14:13, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Look at Template:Panorama simple/testcases. Is this how it is supposed to work? If so, it is because you were missing "px" at the end of the height. There was a recent change to the MediaWiki processor to fix how px was handled. --— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk - 14:24, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Fixed. It seems that the mediawiki software no longer excepts image sizes with a unrounded values. --TheDJ (talk • contribs) 18:28, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Looking for others to reduce unnecessary conflict and drama at source

• I'm looking for others that are interested in improving wikipedia policy, guidelines and other documents to increase harmony among editors and reduce or remove unnecessary conflict.
• The idea is to reduce conflicts arising in the first place.
• It occurred to me there might already be such a team or wikiproject already.
• If your interested please let me know, if there is already something like this, let me know that also. :)

Best regards SunCreator (talk) 14:37, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

People have tried and failed. WP:Concordia seemed like just what you're talking about, and WP:Esperanza did something similar and look what happened to them! George D. Watson (Dendodge).Talk^Help 20:11, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

• Dendodge, thanks for those links. If I understand correctly from my brief reading of those projects, neither of those projects are what I desire, as both of them seem to deal with people rather then aim at the policies, guidelines and other documents. SunCreator (talk) 22:52, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

I don't know if there is an organized team, but lots of people have been editing Wikipedia's guidelines to codify consensus and reduce conflict. Basically, to reduce conflict, we should try to make editing on Wikipedia as straightforwardly algorithmic as we can. To see how far we've gotten with that, read everything linked from the Editor's index. I would say if you took any two people who both had a very deep knowledge of Wikipedia's policies and guidelines, they would probably argue a lot less with each other than two relatively new editors who don't yet know much about Wikipedia. Which is to say, we probably already have guidelines to resolve most disputes; the challenge is to get that information to people and make them aware before they start fighting. I don't think we need vastly more instructions, so much as to use the instructions we have more efficiently. That's why I became interested in the Editor's index project last year and helped out a little with it. That's also why I've worked on coming up with more ways to search Wikipedia, such as the {{Google custom}} template. If everybody could get really good at looking up the instructions to cover every situation, we'd have hardly anything to fight about, expect maybe a few remaining cases we haven't documented yet. --Teratornis (talk) 21:35, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

• To quote you "the challenge is to get that information to people and make them aware before they start fighting. I don't think we need vastly more instructions, so much as to use the instructions we have more efficiently." this is my thinking also. Hence the post here. Who updates Editor's index, I mean it there any focus to it, or just random passing editors?. SunCreator (talk) 22:52, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

  The Editor's index was mostly created by User:John Broughton circa 2006, and inspired him to write the O'Reilly published book, Wikipedia: The Missing Manual (see Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2008-03-03/Book review). -- Quiddity (talk) 23:43, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

One way to learn Wikipedia's instructions is to read the Help desk a lot, and eventually start answering a lot of questions here. You'll notice almost every guideline contains links to various Wikipedia instruction pages. We seem to have instructions to cover everything that comes up. When we don't, we write them. Also, if you're tired of fighting with people, help out on the Help desk for a while. This is about the most harmonious part of Wikipedia, I think. Everybody helps each other and there's lots of positive reward all around. --Teratornis (talk) 21:38, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

• This last section confuses me a little because the challenge is not to have 'experts' on wiki policy who are reading the 'Help desk', but rather to get simple clear policy documents that newbies and none newbies are encouraged to read and clear up many mistakes before they happen. SunCreator (talk) 22:52, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

• Since my top post, I've made a Wikiproject proposal here. SunCreator (talk) 23:00, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

  The place to discuss thing like policy creation, with all the different conflicting personalities represented, is the Wikipedia:Village pump (policy) (Things discussed there, get more feedback than things discussed in any other corner of Wikipedia, especially a newly-created empty-corner). Apart from that, the talkpages of each policy/guideline/essay are full of discussion. Always join something existing, if you can, instead of creating a new process/project - new processes and projects/talkpages should only be needed when the first location is getting too big or growing too fast. -- Quiddity (talk) 23:43, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Infobox width

Hello, could someone set Template:Infobox Lost character (example of usage) so that it is only 250px in width? Thanks, –thedemonhog talk • edits 21:51, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

• You might want to make a request on the infobox's talk page before changing it. Others may not like the change. Ten Pound Hammer and his otters • ^{(Broken clamshells•Otter chirps)} 21:59, 12 April 2008 (UTC)
  • Others will be fine with it. Less than a month ago, it was, but then we converted to the infobox template. –thedemonhog talk • edits 22:08, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

Is there a way to make Wikipedia display serifs?

Hi, I was wondering if there is a way to use serif fonts in articles. The reason I ask is that a cursive gamma with serifs is pretty common to transcribe a certain letter of the traditional Mongolian script (see here for some examples), but the non-serif version (γ / γ) is definitely too easy to confuse with y, and the latin gamma (ɣ/ɣ) seems to look strange on certain browsers, like firefox. What I want is a way to display a cursive greek gamma with serifs.

While I am at it, what do I have to do to request ө and ү to be included in the "Cyrillic" section of that group of characters under the edit box (that thing that starts with "Insert: – — … ‘ “ ’ ” ° ″ ′ ≈ ≠ ≤ ≥ ± − × ÷ ← → · § Sign your username: (on talk pages)" and then

"Wiki markup: {{}} {{{}}} | [] [[]] [[Category:]] #REDIRECT [[]]  

" etc.) ?

Yaan (talk) 15:14, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Do you mean like Times New Roman? You might also want to look at {{Cyrillic alphabet navbox}}— you could copy and paste from this.. --— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk - 15:31, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Although Georgia or Courier New might look nicer. --— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk - 15:38, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Thanks, this helped me a lot. Re. cyrillic, it would be nicer if one could just click on the respective characters while editing an article. Yaan (talk) 16:41, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

WP:VP might be able to help you there. George D. Watson (Dendodge).Talk^Help 20:09, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Found it: MediaWiki:Edittools gives you the edit characters. You can discuss changes on the talk page. --— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk - 13:53, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Adding A Photo

I recently edited (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johnny_Crypt) and would like to include a photo of when Johnny Crypt was a member of RIPPER. The photo is of excellent quality and reveals a little bit of history about the man that alot of people dont know...Everything I submitted is true and documented, through www.ripperrizen.com, www.blackwidow.it, www.texasmetalunderground.com(photo archives) and www.myspace.com/tombztonerizen. Johnny and I go way back and I feel his fans would certainly get a big kick out of seeing him as a former and early member of RIPPER! Thank you for your time and consideration!

Sincerely, Rob Graves/RIPPER aka wisterlane —Preceding unsigned comment added by Wisterlane (talk • contribs) 16:27, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Before you get excited about a photo, you really need to ensure the article meets WP:Notability. In my opinion, it does not currently meet notability and will get deleted. It is incumbent upon you to show that this person is notable. --— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk - 16:33, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

www.ripperrizen.com appears to have no content beyond the main page image. www.blackwidow.it is a record label's site, which wouldn't be independent for any bands he was in under that label. www.texasmetalunderground.com appears to be a fan site, not a reliable source. And MySpace is absolutely not a reliable source. Plus, the article makes no citations to any sources… and your statement that you were a former member of one of his bands brings you into a conflict of interest.

Further, unless you took the photo yourself, the picture is likely copyrighted to someone else. You'd have to familiarize yourself with our Free use image policy.

I hope that doesn't sound too harsh, but it's usually best to study some other articles and edit them for a while until you're familiar with our policies and guidelines first. That'll help when you try to create a new article. -- Kesh (talk) 19:10, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Network

Would computers in the same network show up as the same IP? If not how can I prevent becoming accused of being a sock of vice versa? --Cameron (t|p|c) 17:01, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

If you are using a computer from home with broadband, then you have one IP that may change if you disconnect and reconnect. If you use a computer from work, library, internet cafe or hotspot, then you generally share one IP address to the internet. As to accusations of sockpuppetry, the simple answer is to not engage in actions that would tend to make folks think you might be a sock. --— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk - 17:07, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Only a Checkuser can check for socks by IP and they need a reason to do so, if editing patterns match they may decide to. George D. Watson (Dendodge).Talk^Help 20:31, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Lol, it is a home network only we seem to have so many PC's it's more like an internet cafe. So even if my brother comments in !votes the oughn't be any problems as he edit completely differenty areas to me? --Cameron (t|p|c) 20:50, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Insurance policy

I once had a copy of the Insurance Policy with the Hartford Insurance Co. I have not been able to locate it. Hopefully you can email a copy of the policy with his signature or can help me find a way to get a copy. Thanks for your help. Anita Davis —Preceding unsigned comment added by 209.247.5.43 (talk) 17:17, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Hi, Anita. This is the help desk for Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. You may have found our article on The Hartford and believed that this help desk was affiliated with them. We cannot help you; you will need to contact The Hartford directly. Leebo ^T/C 17:25, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Non-inline references

I don't like adding references to an article in-line, since it quickly makes the article horrible to navigate in the edit window. I prefer to add them at the end of the article. Is there a way of doing this apart from the "ref" and "note" templates? I don't like using those either because they don't automatically number the references. Cambrasa 18:10, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

The templates are nothing more than a method of forcing a standard reference format, and by no means do you have to use them. Personally, I never use them; I just format the reference myself in whatever way looks right. If you want to create a numbered list of references you can just use the # sign instead of * for a numbered list instead of a bulleted list. And if you're going to add references like that, you might want to create seperate sections for notes and references, or references and general references...You may also be interested in Harvard citations or shortened notes, neither of which will cause confusion in the edit window. Just keep in mind that shortened notes are meant for citations to specific pages of a general reference, and Harvard citations should not be employed in an article that already uses the standard in-line citations. Someguy1221 (talk) 18:27, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

I've tried using the # sign but then the numbers of the references don't match, unless you manually put then in the right order - this is tedious. Isn't there a way of automatically numbering the references, like when you use the reflist template? Cambrasa 20:50, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

I know you don't like them, but in-line citations are extremely important for verifying statements made in the article. -- Kesh (talk) 19:12, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

I tag articles that don't use them, aren't I supposed to then? George D. Watson (Dendodge).Talk^Help 19:38, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Yes, that's why we have the template. In-line references are needed so we can tell which statements are sourced, and to where.

Good, as long as I'm doing it right. George D. Watson (Dendodge).Talk^Help 20:08, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

No, you are misunderstanding me. I have nothing against in-line cititations. I simply want to avoid placing the entire reference in-line. I want to put the reference at the end of the article, and only add a short cut to the reference in-line. You know, the way it works in LaTeX - simple and elegant Cambrasa 20:34, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

You can name references. I can't remember the link to the page about how but Stephano (Shakespeare) has a couple of examples. George D. Watson (Dendodge).Talk^Help 20:37, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Naming references doesn't solve the problem either, because you still need to place the first instance of the reference in-line, and only for susequent instances can you use shortcuts. Or is there a way around this? Is there a way of putting the first instance at the bottom and preventing it from being displayed?Cambrasa 20:39, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

See WP:FOOT. I believe you can put the complete named reference anywhere in the article. Short named reference tags can be forward or backward references. --Teratornis (talk) 21:23, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Yes, you can. See the third paragraph in this section:

• Wikipedia:Footnotes#Naming a ref tag so it can be used more than once

--Teratornis (talk) 21:26, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Thanks, but this paragraph still doesn't say how only to display only one instance of the named reference, namely the short one that is in-line. I don't want superscripts displayed in the "References" section, where the long instances are since I am already using the reflist template. Cambrasa 22:45, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

(undent) The only way I can think of immediately to hide the content of a ref tag that appears only once would be to create a new template which contains the reference information. However, that would be too horrible for words, since it would mean multiplying templates like crazy to handle all the references. And I'm sure any such templates would quickly get deleted. On the other hand, if you wanted to use the same reference in more than one article, having the reference in a template could save some typing. References are clearly an example of structured data, so there would be advantages to having a structured wiki that would manage the reference data in a separate database. However, the MediaWiki software that powers Wikipedia is not structured wiki software, so there may be no good answer for you. Personally, I don't have a problem skipping past the huge {{Cite web}} etc. templates in wikitext, as long as other editors are kind enough to format their citation text as in the examples in WP:CITET. When people join all the template parameters onto one line, then it becomes hard to see where a citation starts and ends. Obviously one solution would be to have an external editor that understands Wikipedia's markup, and has an option for collapsing ref tags. I don't know if any such editor exists. --Teratornis (talk) 04:13, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Deleted contributions

Resolved

I really should know this. What are deleted contributions? Are they contributions to deleted articles? George D. Watson (Dendodge).Talk^Help 20:15, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Yes, you should, and yes, they are. ;-) Hersfold ^(t/a/c) 20:17, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Yes, any contribution to a page (article or otherwise) that has been deleted. Leebo ^T/C 20:21, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Thanks, that's what I thought. George D. Watson (Dendodge).Talk^Help 20:30, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Question about citations

We recently received a lack of citation flag on the L'Occitane page and earlier today I went into the content and added citations to the flagged facts. Now that I have fixed the problem I thought that the citation flag would go away, but it is still there when we search our page. How and when will the citation flag be removed from our site? Csoc22 (talk) 20:55, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Well, you would have to manually remove the tag if it were cited, but what you need to do is add in-line citations. Here is an explination of how to do this. Once you think you have done a sufficent job, you can then remove the tag. ~ Bella Swan 21:00, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Kate Jackson

I am Kate Jackson, the Kate Jackson who is one of the original "Charlie's Angels" on television, etc. In the article on me, my legal name is listed incorrectly as "Catherine Elise Jackson". I was born, in fact, "Lucy Kate Jackson".I do not know where that other name came from, but not only is it incorrect, I HATE IT. I am listed with SAG as "Kate L. Jackson", which I had to do because when I joined over thirty years there was a "Kathy Jackson" and the SAG woman said "You have to change your name." I said, "Right now? Just like that? Change my NAME? That's who I am. I can't do that." So we compromised and she let me officially join the Union using the initial of my first name, Lucy" , as my middle initial, and keep my name "Kate Jackson". I have never been credited onscreen as "Kate L. Jackson". I have always used and been called "Kate Jackson". However, I was born "Lucy Kate Jackson" in honor of my father's (Hogan Jackson, Jr.) aunt Lucy. My maternal Grandmother's name was "Ruth Kate Taylor", hence my name, Kate Jackson. PLEASE correct this "Catherine Elise Jackson" thing. I HATE it.You may contact me through <address removed> for verification. The phone there is <phone # removed>. They can put you in touch with me. There are other things in the article that are not right, but I will only change them when/if you give me your blessing to do so. Thank you very much, Kate Jackson NOT CATHERINE ELIESE JACKSON...kind of tacky, don't you think? And by the way, I an NOT Katherine, my name is KATE, as was my Grandmother. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.41.180.186 (talk) 21:38, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

I have removed your contact information. Publishing this on a highly viewed website is likely to get spam and crank calls flooding your way. Our Wikipedia article on Kate Jackson is based on publicly available information. Do you know of any published locations that use your original name? If so, we can easily correct this. Otherwise, what you'll need to do is contact OTRS to find out how to verify your identity and get this information changed. I'm sorry we can't just change this for you, but we can't take the word of an anonymous post as the truth. -- (talk) 21:53, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

(ec) A previous edit (your edit?) to attempt to modify this was reverted, presumably as suspcted vandalism, because the same edit included the unreferenced claim that Kate Jackson was the actual creator of the show "Charlie's Angels". Wikipedia's Kate Jackson article has listed her real name as "Catherine Elise Jackson" ever since the begnning of 2005, yet IMDB.com has her actual name as "Lucy Kate Jackson" and also lists a different contact point. Astronaut (talk) 22:02, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

An Internet search shows the name in other websites, for example http://www.tvguide.com/celebrities/kate-jackson/159874 which says "Birth Name: Catherine Elise Jackson". See Wikipedia:Contact us/Article problem/Factual error (from subject). PrimeHunter (talk) 23:24, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Despite the best advice from Kesh and PrimeHunter, I notice you have gone ahead and made the change yourself. As I am unsure of the true facts, I am unsure whether to revert your changes or not, but it really is best to go through the official routes suggested to avoid the unpleasantness of continually having your changes reverted. Astronaut (talk) 13:11, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Change of User Name

Hallo, I'm Chris from Vienna, my user name currently is Goleador 69 and I would like to change it to Goleador. Can you please help me? --Goleador69 (talk) 22:16, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

WP:CHU :) Stwalkerster [ talk ] 22:20, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

User:Goleador was created two years ago but has no edits. You would have to request usurpation at WP:CHU/U. PrimeHunter (talk) 22:57, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Thank you for the information. --Goleador69 (talk) 10:51, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Old deletion discussion

How do you find a deleted article's discussion in the old deletion archives, when you only know its name, but not when it was deleted? Cambrasa 22:17, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Not sure if this is the most elegant method, but you could use google's advanced search, and have it search wikipedia.org for "Articles for Deletion" and the name of the article in question. --Bfigura ^(talk) 22:22, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Tried it; doesn't work. I have now tried this page which tells me that it was deleted on 20 June 2007, however it does not appear on the archive for that date, neither on any archives 10 days before. Cambrasa 22:31, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Hmm... was afraid of that. But I think I see why it's not showing up in the logs. It's at Impaled Nazarene. It's under consideration for deletion, but it hasn't been deleted yet. --Bfigura ^(talk) 22:34, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

You can get to the deletion discussion either from the tag on the page, or directly via this link. Best, --Bfigura ^(talk) 22:35, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Sorry, I provided the wrong link. The article I was looking for is Fried chicken restaurants in the UK [2].

In that case, it looks like the first version of the article was deleted via proposed deletion, which means there isn't a discussion. So aside from the logs, there won't be any information on wikipedia (unless you get an admin to send you the deleted version). Best, --Bfigura ^(talk) 22:41, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

That makes sense now - thaks very much! Cambrasa 22:48, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia excludes Articles for deletion from Google with our robots.txt at http://en.wikipedia.org/robots.txt which contains:

# Folks get annoyed when VfD discussions end up the number 1 google hit for
# their name. See bugzilla bug #4776
# en:
Disallow: /wiki/Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/

The former version of Fried chicken restaurants in the UK got the {{prod}} tag with the message "Original research, list of red-links". It was deleted 6 days later when nobody had objected. PrimeHunter (talk) 22:52, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Ah, that'd explain it. (Makes sense considering BLP.) Although... wouldn't this render courtesy blankings of AfD somewhat redundant? (Or is us just being really, really polite? :) --Bfigura ^(talk) 22:56, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Courtesy blanking of AfD is rare. Non-blanked AfD's can be searched with Wikipedia's own search, by first doing a normal search and then checking the "Wikipedia" box at the bottom and using the bottom search box. Google loves Wikipedia which is the first hit on many things. It makes sense that people searching information about something shouldn't get our deletion discussion, and I can understand it annoys people and organizations if that happens. PrimeHunter (talk) 23:03, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Linking to categories

Is there a way to link to categories without having to use this sort of syntax and have the link actually display inline rather than as a category? -mattbuck (Talk) 23:15, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Simply add a colon in front of the category name in the link, like so [[:Category:<category name here>]]. Calvin 1998 ^(t-c) 23:18, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Your example is at commons so it can be linked from here with commons:Category:Castle Combe Circuit, with no need for : in front. In a link from commons a : would be needed. PrimeHunter (talk) 23:31, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Thankyou very much. -mattbuck (Talk) 00:40, 15 April 2008 (UTC)