Wikipedia:Help desk/Archives/2008 December 17

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.

December 17

Help displaying text onto a project page

I signed up for a project on this page : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WikiProject_Ancient_Egypt/Members, yet it does not show up on the page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WikiProject_Ancient_Egypt under participatants while all the other signers show up there, can you help me? Zuzzerack 02:17, 17 December 2008 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Zuzzerack (talk • contribs)

It's displaying fine. I suspect that you are seeing the version of the page stored in your computer's cache memory, and simply need to bypass your cache, which is done on many computers by clicking control+F5. Cheers.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 04:31, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

OKay, thanks, I see it now. Zuzzerack 22:30, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

How do I submit an article?

Wikipedia is awesome. It's also a little overwhelming. Please explain to me specifically how to submit an article to be displayed Wikipedia. I can info on how to edit an article, but not how to submit an article. Please advise. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Wrpittman (talk • contribs) 04:55, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

There are more or less two ways to create an page;

• you can either follow a link to a page that does not exist (e.g. example link) and then fill in the edit box, then click save, or
• you can enter the title of the article that you want to create in the search bar and press go, then fill out the edit box you see there and click save.

Hope that helps :)Icewedge (talk) 05:00, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

• Wikipedia:Your First Article should help you get started.- Mgm|^(talk) 05:37, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

Warning I.P.

Can somebody please tell me if there is a template I can use for warning an I.P. for vandalism?.--intraining ^{Jack In} 06:12, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

Yes - they are listed at Template:TestTemplates. DuncanHill (talk) 06:15, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

Or better yet, the full list is at WP:UWT. As a better idea, you don't really need a template. Tell the IP to stop vandalising, and let them know they can be blocked if they continue. Templates are not required, but they can make it easier if you choose. --Jayron32.talk.contribs 06:21, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

Question on columns in Portal

Resolved

Does anybody know how to solve that the two columns in Portal:Himalaya region are beside each other in stead of above each other? Thx. Davin (talk) 10:20, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

Fixed, someone vandalised Portal:Himalaya region/Intro back in September and no-one noticed. Nanonic (talk) 10:58, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

Thank you very much! Davin (talk) 11:12, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

Very Simple English

Would it be possible to set up a "Very Simple English" language.

I am an English native speaker, I currently live in France and teach English to 7-11 year olds.

I would like to update / refine / adapt wikipedia articles so that the 7-11 year olds I teach English to (and any other young learners of English world-wide) could go on line and find information written in very basic English.

Eg a biography for Harry Potter's author, JK Rowlings.

I could write/update the Simple English entry, but Simple English is a definited language. It permits things like subordinate clauses which are too difficult for my students. So if I update an entry, someone else may well later "upgrade" it within simple English making it inaccessible to beginners in English.

I couldn't work out a better place to post this suggestion, so the real question I need answering is "who do I make this suggestion to?" —Preceding unsigned comment added by 90.13.57.217 (talk) 10:58, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

Have you already looked at the Simple English Wikipedia? Xenon54 (Frohe Feiertage!) 11:10, 17 December 2008 (UTC

Yes.

You can propose a project at meta:Proposals_for_new_projects. Arthena^(talk) 11:33, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

Thank you I'll look into doing this.

• You meant JK Rowling (without the s). :) Do you have access to a computer network at the school you teach? - Mgm|^(talk) 13:00, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

There tend to be a few computers the children could use one after the other to look-up things on the internet. One school has something approaching an IT equipped room which I can use. On the whole IT provision in French Primary schools is light years behind what we have in the UK.

• I asked because if you have a network, you could ask the systems administrator to install a local MediaWiki installation and write a local copy entirely for your students. Since that doesn't appear to be an option, have you considered other wikisoftware? There are free online versions which would be perfect. - Mgm|^(talk) 17:06, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

I was looking at Wikimedia Foundation in reference to another question and I noticed that it mentioned Wikibooks and Wikijunior (a project within Wikibooks; also see the Simple Wikibooks project). One of those projects might be suitable for editing the documents you want. --Teratornis (talk) 05:03, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

Thank you. I have looked at wikijunior and simple wikibooks: these will be great if /when I'm teaching older (ie more competant) English users. The kids I teach really do need something much more basic, not much more than subject / verb / object and restricted to the present / continuous present tense.

My wanting to do this in wikipedia is motivated by thinking that it might as well be available to all the other Primary English teachers world-wide, rather than wanting a computer solution per se. I can certainly just take / make existing Wikipedia articles in Simple English, edit or write them in Very Simple English either within the wikipedia framework (when I reckon my very simple version is an improvement in content terms) or off-line when it isn't...and just distribute the information to the children on paper.

Similarly, as we move to languages being compulsory in all UK primary schools from 2010, a very simple French and very simple Spanish language within Wikipedia might be very useful.

The children would get a real buzz from using English to find things out. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 90.33.147.179 (talk) 06:44, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

Apostrophe immediately following italics markup

So, I'm trying to use a title (say, "High School Musical") as a possessive, as in "High School Musical's". I did it here with HTML tags, but how do I do it with wiki markup? The obvious route comes out as "High School Musicals". Powers ^T 12:04, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

Type ''High School Musical'''s, which will produce High School Musical's. No need of those Apostrophes after the "s". The italicizing ones are already closed. Cheers. Chamal ^talk 12:21, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

''High School Musical'''s didn't work for me, and still won't because of this little problem:

''High School Musical'''s [[Corbin Bleu]]; ''Hannah Montana'''s [[Miley Cyrus]]

comes out as:

High School Musicals Corbin Bleu; Hannah Montanas Miley Cyrus

I need to be able to use this construction twice in the same paragraph. Powers ^T 12:26, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

The wiki parser is seeing ''' as a start bold token inside the already set italics state instead of seeing it as an end italics state followed by an apostrophe. To work around the problem you need to force the wiki parser to change its token parser state with a "nul" token. To do this use an empty "no wiki" tag pair, that is <nowiki></nowiki>. For example, "''[[High School Musical]]''<nowiki></nowiki>'s", which will result in "High School Musical's". Peet Ern (talk) 12:31, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

PS: So you will get:

High School Musical's Corbin Bleu; Hannah Montana's Miley Cyrus

Peet Ern (talk) 12:43, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

Thanks! Powers ^T 13:33, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

A simpler fix is to put the 's in curly brackets, like so: {{'s}}. That should render

High School Musical's Corbin Bleu; Hannah Montana's Miley Cyrus

(I love templates.) Hermione1980 15:26, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

So do I normally, but that requires a page load for the server instead of in memory processing, and potentially a template for all possible apostrophe letter combination? Peet Ern (talk) 02:33, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

{{'}} apparently has superceded {{'s}}, Peet, which would solve at least your latter concern. Thanks for the tip, Hermione. I figured someone had to have figured out a way to handle this at some point, but my searches were in vain. Powers ^T 13:35, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

depth problem

What is depth in wikipedia. certain wikipedia like hindi wiki has depth 6 while german wiki has 81 what does it signify? how is it measeured? as being an active user of hindi wikipedia what i can do to increase its depth?--Munita Prasad (talk) 14:45, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

I'm not quite sure to what you are referring. If you mean depth as defined by WP:Depth, the best thing you can do to improve it is to add articles. Out of curiosity, where did you find the numbers to which you referred? TN‑X-Man 14:49, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

thank you, but i am talking about the last column of List of Wikipedias on meta wiki. I went there from bottom most entry/link of main page of english wiki,--Munita Prasad (talk) 15:01, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

Ah. In that case, here is the link for which you are looking: meta:Depth. Depth is a rough indicator of a Wikipedia's quality, defined as ((Edits/Articles) × (Non-Articles/Articles) × (Stub-ratio)). Cheers! TN‑X-Man 15:30, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

Archiving

I got my first archive up, but how do I get my second one on there? HairyPerry 15:08, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

I'm not sure what you mean. Do you mean how do you get your second archive to display in the box on your talk page? TN‑X-Man 16:11, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

Yes, I'm getting ready to need a second archive. HairyPerry 16:15, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

The {{Archives}} template, as you have it on your talk page (with the auto=yes parameter), automatically detects the archive pages and displays their links accordingly. See the documentation. – ukexpat (talk) 16:42, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

(edit conflict) I believe that the archive should appear automatically as soon as it is created. At the moment, I don't see an actual page with your second archive. Cheers! TN‑X-Man 16:43, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

Ok, so this means what? HairyPerry 16:49, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

As soon as you put something in your second archive, the link to the second archive will appear on your talk page. TN‑X-Man 17:30, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

Thanks I got it now. HairyPerry 18:13, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

Did you know

Hi! I have tried to do a nomination to Did you know in 2 hours now. Still i cant. So, please cant someone fix a self nom, 5th expansion nomination for me? Valery Kobelev is the article and the hook is that: Kobelev has performed the worst ski jumping crash ever. The Rolling Camel (talk) 23:18, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

Never use an edit summary like that again. --Rschen7754 (T C) 23:20, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

Sorry, i just feel a little stressed. The Rolling Camel (talk) 23:22, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

Stressed that your DYK nomination isn't working? Give me a break. "HELP NOW!!!!!!" is NOT the way to do this. Tan | 39 23:23, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

No, but if you are stressed your brain does not work as it uses to do:) The Rolling Camel (talk) 23:26, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

Well, okay, enough of that. Can anyone help this guy? I don't ever work in DYK. Tan | 39 23:28, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

<chimes> Hi there. Currently, the article is ineligible for DYK, as there are no inline citations (footnotes), and therefore no way to verify the accuracy of the hook. In order to make it eligible, you will need to put those in. See WP:DYK for instructions, as well as those at the top of T:TDYK. Use reliable and verifiable sources, and get it nom-worthy within the next couple of days. Best wishes, PeterSymonds (talk) 23:37, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

• But, i dont understand. When i tries, (see my sandbox) its just a small 1 that is unable to do something with. The Rolling Camel (talk) 00:01, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

Ah, yes. You have to tell the MediaWiki software to display the references by putting either {{reflist}} (preferable) or the old-fashioned <references/> under a references or notes section. That will force the references to appear. Best, PeterSymonds (talk) 00:06, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

Thank you, Is my other example for Valery at my sandbox ok? The Rolling Camel (talk) 00:09, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

The article is currently not long to be eligible for DYK (you need min. 1500 characters, but we only have 1438 now). Also, you might want to hurry up a bit since it was created on the 11th, and DYK is only for articles created or expanded within 5 days. 11th is already out of that margin, but if you hurry, you can still get it done. Adding some more refs won't hurt either ;) Chamal ^talk 00:56, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

Now it passed evrything. Can someone please fix it now? ~~ —Preceding unsigned comment added by The Rolling Camel (talk • contribs) 01:29, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

I'm afraid the article doesn't pass the five-fold expansion requirement. It was at 1,201 bytes on December 12 and is at 2,856 bytes at the moment. --PeaceNT (talk) 12:02, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

Also please note that the reference list should give the specific URLs (i.e the direct links of the online articles, not only the links of the online newspaper). --PeaceNT (talk) 12:05, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

Mmm... no, it would go as a newly created article if it is going to be nominated and not as a 5x expansion. Some December 12 hooks are still there (as expiring noms) on the suggestions page so you can still get it if you hurry. Chamal ^talk 12:15, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

I see the expiring noms stretch to Dec 7, huge backlog so it seems. ;) But I was under the impression that the day an article is suggested on T:TDYK must not be over five days away from the day of creation. (?) Otherwise it would fall under expansion. --PeaceNT (talk) 12:34, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

Is it better now? The Rolling Camel (talk) 15:18, 18 December 2008 (UTC)