Wikipedia:Help desk/Archives/2009 March 12

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March 12

AFD history

I'm trying to fine-tune some language for the BLP policy and I'm wondering if there's an easy way to generate a list of AFD's that have referenced or involved WP:BLP1E rather than trying to sort through all of the "what links here" on the unredirected WP:BLP1E page. SDY (talk) 00:40, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

This search might be useful. I tried using Google first using this search but I must be doing something wrong (or does Google not index pages in the wikipedia namespace?).--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 01:34, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

I vaguely remember a decision a while back to noindex all AFD subpages. Someguy1221 (talk) 01:40, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

bugzilla:4776 removed them from indexing by editing our robots.txt at http://en.wikipedia.org/robots.txt. PrimeHunter (talk) 01:57, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

That first search is helpful, thanks. SDY (talk) 04:22, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Anytime.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 04:30, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Problem with another editor

I hope I'm asking this in the right place (It's a little overwheleming navigating Wikipedia:Community portal). This is my first time on Wikipedia and I seem to have got off on the wrong foot. I noticed today that an editor was removing a number of "dead links" from pages dealing with mobsters. I thought I'd finally have a go at editing and I double checked the websites on Wayback Machine to see if there were any archived versions. I was successful in replacing 14 articles but these were reverted as vandalism by the same editor. I was careful to explain that in my first edit summery and undid several of these edits explaining these edits weren't vandalism but that I'd replaced the websites with archived versions.

At this point, the editor seemed upset that I'd been reverting his edits. I tried to talk to him on his talk page and we briefly discussed the issue on my own talk page. It was my understanding based on his edit summaries that the link he removed were "dead links" and I had simply replaced them. It was his opinion that the majority were "personal websites" which violated WP:EL. While I have read WP:EL and understand its guidelines, I pointed out there were a number of removed websites which do not fit this criteria. One of these was the official website of Waukesha, Wisconsin and I asked if he could list a specific "personal website" which violated WP:EL. I also brought up the news and magazine articles which were removed, but he didn't really answer my questions. The conversation seems to gotten a little hostile and I was wondering if someone could help out.

For the record, I originally made 15 edits. Of these, 4 websites were being used as cited references while 12 others were used as external links. My edits to Arnold Rothstein and Charles Birger removed vandalism/blanking. 72.74.209.246 (talk) 00:43, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

I have asked the editor in question to slow down a bit and consider taking the dispute to dispute resolution rather than edit warring. He was certainly mischaracterizing your edits as vandalism, and we should always assume good faith. I will make no comment on the merits of the websites you are trying to link, so don't think that I am endorsing one side or the other in this. You are both involved in an edit war and each of you may be blocked if it continues. My advice is to disengage from editing the articles. Just because one can make instant changes does not always mean it is in the best interest of all involved to do so. Often, you end up rapidly reverting each other, which is disruptive. So let me give you the same advice I gave him. There are lots of venues at Wikipedia availible to resolve disputes like this. Two that may work here are Wikipedia:Third Opinion and Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard. Start a thread at one of those noticeboards, and see if uninvolved editors can help adjudicate the problem. Good luck! --Jayron32.talk.contribs 01:10, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

That certainly wasn't my intention and I left a note at his talk page as soon as he began reverting my edits. I honestly thought the editor had overlooked by edit summery or that I'd simply restored the old links. I did stop editing the articles in question so I could try to sort things out with him but now he seems to believe I'm stalking him. All I was doing was trying to help and frankly this has been a troubling experience. 72.74.209.246 (talk) 01:25, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

In that case, if you are still concerned, I recommend bringing in outside people to help resolve this dispute. If you try the noticeboards I left above, and leave a message there, they are patrolled by people who tend to be good at resolving disputes and mediating problems. --Jayron32.talk.contribs 01:34, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

I'm not saying you did anything wrong, but note that external links are in most cases inferior to footnote citations. See Wikipedia:Spam event horizon and WP:LINKFARM. It's best to think of external links as being merely a temporary list of sites that editors should eventually work into footnotes. Therefore, I'd focus first on getting the other editor to agree about the status of the four footnotes in dispute. You're probably on firmer ground with those, as long as they qualify as reliable sources and support some claim(s) in the article(s). In general it's best not to be too aggressive when you see a large number of edits by another editor that you want to revert. The methodical and considerate approach is to first make a list of all the things you'd like to change, pick the one or two that you believe you can make the best argument for, and discuss them with the other editor before acting. That way you get an idea of how strongly the other editor feels before you act. Realize that reverting another editor is an aggressive act, even if the other editor was also being aggressive. Aggression is intrinsically a part of collaborative editing - we cannot really avoid stepping on other people's toes as we go around changing things - but that doesn't mean other people are going to be any less reptillian about it. Also note that by editing as an unregistered user, you automatically bias many other users against you, because a glance at any article history tends to show many vandal edits by unregistered users. From your comments above, you don't sound like you belong to the vandal class in any way, but anyone who has been reverting I.P. vandals for years on Wikipedia will tend to make that negative association. So my advice is to distance yourself from the vandals by creating an account. And yes, Wikipedia's instructions are overwhelming at first. Wikipedia is unlike anything most people have ever experienced before, and what Wikipedia does would have been considered impossible by virtually everyone just ten years ago - a free encyclopedia that anyone can edit, and it becomes the world's fifth-most-visited Web site? Since Wikipedia is doing the seemingly impossible, it must be operating on principles that the average person simply cannot guess, but must learn by reading lots of manuals. Wikipedia's policies and guidelines are, I believe, a kind of breakthrough in the technology of organization, and you will not regret any amount of time you invest in studying how they work. You may wish to read Wikipedia: The Missing Manual which explains the basics that every new Wikipedia user should learn, in a logical order. --Teratornis (talk) 03:54, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

How do I print an article

Resolved

How do I print an article —Preceding unsigned comment added by 209.158.19.27 (talk) 01:19, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Click on "Printable version" under the "toolbox" heading on the left side of the page. You can now print an article just as you would any other page. Xenon54 (talk) 01:21, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

How can I find articles in Sicilian? On the left there are so many languages but not Sicilian.

Resolved

How can I find articles in Sicilian? On the left there are so many languages but not Sicilian. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.229.41.179 (talk) 02:25, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

The Sicilian-language Wikipedia is here. Algebraist 02:30, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

The interwiki links in the left sidebar of a page are to articles corresponding to that page. So Sicilianu is not listed on this page because Sicilian Wikipedia (presumably) does not have a Help desk forum. But it is listed in say English language and links to scn:Lingua ngrisa. —teb728 t c 07:08, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Search for untagged words

Ok, I am in the process of categorising Trinity College, Cambridge alumni. I have already found the "what links here tool" which allows me to filter all articles which contain the tag Trinity College, Cambridge which has been quite useful for finding uncategorised alumni. Now I am wondering if there is a way I can search for all articles containing the words "Trinity College, Cambridge" untagged?? seems a long shot, but it would be kinda useful for what i'm working on. Thanks. 79.75.158.188 (talk) 03:01, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Use Google. Type in: Trinity College site:wikipedia.org -- kainaw™ 03:33, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Or use the Wikipedia search function over on the left there... – ukexpat (talk) 03:39, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

For the Google search place en. before wikipedia.org to limit it to the English Wikipedia and this string, -inurl:wiki-User -intitle:Talk -inurl:wiki-Wikipedia -inurl:wiki-WP -redirected-from, should basically limit the search to just articles and avoid redirects.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 04:06, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

To expand on that I'd also put Trinity College in quotes, but even doing all that only cuts the results in half; it's still finding almost 10,000 articles with numerous false positives. Hmmm. Maybe adding some term that many biographies would have that other articles would not. "Early life" is a common biography section heading, as is "biography" itself.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 04:44, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Put "Cambridge" somewhere in your search term too, to sift out all the many other colleges by that name. Gonzonoir (talk) 09:32, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

stub types

I'm familiar with Wikipedia:WikiProject Stub sorting/Stub types - is there a separate list of stubs to tag articles that are lists.. boy I hope I got that worded rightly. — Ched ~ ^(yes?) 07:41, 12 March 2009 (UTC) (forgive the poor humor at the end)

They exist, but they're not really in a list, and there aren't that many of them. Category:List notification templates. Someguy1221 (talk) 07:46, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Notice About Orphaned Images

The images are being linked to in an article as a reference. To get past this at first, I made a gallery inside the article to display them but someone removes this gallery saying it's a Non-Free Gallery. The screen captures for this show support an item I documented inside the article since I kept having someone challenge that the information wasn't valid. I scree grabbed it to prove this item existed in this series.

I quoted it as a reference and it has a link inside the article, but apparently the system wants the actual image thumbnail to appear in the article and not just a link? Why aren't links inside the article to the item being seen as a "File link"?

Cringer (talk) 07:49, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Is the article Fangface? --Teratornis (talk) 08:17, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

You can link to an image without displaying it like this: File:FangfaceOrangeHat.jpg. Personally, I don't like non-free images. They make life harder for people who want to translate or reuse content from the English Wikipedia, since many countries have no fair-use provision like the U.S. You could try writing to the copyright holder of the images and ask for permission to redistribute your screen captures freely, and follow the procedure at commons:COM:OTRS. If you can upload actually free images to Wikimedia Commons, you will silence your editwar opponent. Or at least force him or her come up with another argument. --Teratornis (talk) 08:22, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Note that it is possible for the English Wikipedia community to decide at any time to get rid of fair use images, or to change the rules to get rid of many of them. If you can get free content it's better all around. If the copyright holder does not want to release any free screen captures, then I think you should stop using a free encyclopedia to give that information hoarder free publicity. Wikipedia is part of the free content movement. It makes sense for us to preferentially promote other people and organizations who share our values, over people and organizations who want to prevent information from being free. --Teratornis (talk) 08:27, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

If you merely link to a non-free image, and no article shows it, the image will be deleted as orphaned. On the other hand, non-free images may be shown only under Wikipedia's highly restrictive non-free content policy. —teb728 t c 08:38, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Yes, it was Fangface. Sorry, I didn't think to mention the article. I used it as a cite link to show that an item existed in the show that I placed into the article since someone had erased other content I listed saying I didn't site a source. If you can tell me another way to prove that the name of an Arcade or a character existed in a single episode of the series, thus making the information about that which is factual, then I an open to suggestions.

This is an example of a file that was flagged as an orphan on the page: File:FangfaceArniesArcadeSign.jpg It's used as a <ref> link at the top of the article page. Below is the exact item from the top of the article page.

In the episode Don't Abra When You Cadabra, it is revealed that Fangs has an uncle named Arnie and that he runs a video arcade called Arnie's Arcade.

Both references items in those links appear in the Notes area but are shown as orphaned on the "File links" area for that file, which doesn't make sense to me. Yes, I'm aware that copyright law sometimes are weak or non-existent in other countries. As for getting permission, I wouldn't know whom to ask permission from as far as this goes. What would I need to ask them and how exactly would one represent screen captures to them to get permission to redistribute them? Fair-use is how I've used images of this sort on my fan page since it existed all these years.

I am also beginning to feel like I am wasting my time with the entire Wikipedia as a whole. So many people are on this "You must link to a source link". The problem with that is, what if there isn't an online link for a source to this item. What if the source is something in your possession? For instance, I have a board game, yet I was told that it had to be sourced before I could included information I typed directly off the front cover of the box. I finally got the person not to erase the content, but they still have a problem with the fact that my source was a scan of the front cover of the box. I can't figure out what the problem is exactly. How does someone source the information off the front of a board game box? I can't link to it, since there is no official page for it. The board game is 30 years old and is very scarce, so finding it anywhere except EBay, is pretty impossible. Also, linking to EBay is not a very good linking source due to have often they remove links. Comments welcomed. Thanks Cringer (talk) 08:58, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Forgive me for pointing out what may be obvious.. but why source with an image when you can source to the episode itself? {{Cite episode}} was designed for this. As for sourcing information off of a box (ignoring original research etc) what's wrong with perhaps using {{Cite manual}} or even {{Cite video game}} (that probably has enough fields to be able to be used for board games too e.g. Mattel (2009). Scrabble (Board Game) (Deluxe ed.). We're bonkers about letters)? Nanonic (talk) 10:08, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

I would be surprised if anyone who edits on Wikipedia doesn't wonder at least once whether they are wasting their time. There are roadblocks and restrictions and gotchas everywhere you look, and on top of the persnickety rules there are many users who don't even know the rules. Depending on the subject that interests you, Wikipedia may or may not be the best wiki to use. See Wikipedia:Alternative outlets. Pop-culture topics in particular can lead to tough sledding on Wikipedia, due to the rigorous requirements for reliable sources (not always easy to find when it comes to fancruft), and the fact that the entertainment industry has the most repressive intellectual property attorneys outside of Microsoft (and Microsoft is getting into the entertainment industry too). That is why fans of various pop-culture artifacts have started their own wikis, e.g. Wookipedia, WoWWiki, etc. Editing on Wikipedia has its advantages, such as the highly-developed infrastructure of manuals, tools, templates, and this Help desk. But Wikipedia does not want various sorts of content. Thus to maintain one's wiki-joy it is essential to learn about all your wiki options. Maybe for certain kinds of editing, you will find it easier on some other wiki. But be aware that other wikis may have different problems. That's probably why so many people write on blogs where they can write anything they want without having someone else second-guessing everything they do. But most blogs are garbage that hardly anybody reads, so there's no free lunch here. --Teratornis (talk) 18:15, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Hey

Thanks. How can i access female sex tourism and find there members? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Nastykenyan (talk • contribs) 07:55, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

I suspect, based on your question, that you found one of our over 6 million articles and thought we were affiliated in some way with that subject. Please note that you are at Wikipedia, the free online encyclopedia that anyone can edit, and this page is for asking questions related to using or contributing to Wikipedia itself. Thus, we have no special knowledge about the subject of your question. You can, however, search our vast catalogue of articles by typing a subject into the search field on the upper right side of your screen. If you cannot find what you are looking for, we have a reference desk, divided into various subject areas, where asking knowledge questions is welcome. Best of luck. —teb728 t c 08:06, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

We have a female sex tourism article, but it doesn't have members per se. --Teratornis (talk) 08:11, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

How do I delete a Wikimedia commons picture that I uploaded?

I want it gone because it gets to be on top of the google list when I want the data from another wiki to show up. 125.212.86.99 (talk) 09:46, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

What picture are you asking about? —teb728 t c 09:58, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

See Commons:COM:EIC#Del for links to pages about deletion on Wikimedia Commons. Start with Commons:COM:D. If you uploaded an image yourself, and no projects are using it yet, you can request a Commons:COM:D#Speedy deletion by putting Commons:Template:Speedydelete on your image. You might be able to change the order in which the image appears in Google search results by changing the name of the image (which basically means deleting the image and re-uploading it to Commons under a different name). However, in general it is a fool's errand to try to game the Google results. Google can and does change its PageRank algorithm on occasion, so all your efforts to game Google can come to nothing. --Teratornis (talk) 18:54, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Television introduction

When did television arrive in Perth, Western Australia —Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.34.16.162 (talk) 10:00, 12 March 2009 (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. Zain Ebrahim (talk) 10:04, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

What is the definition of NPT,BSPF,orPT124.195.194.1 (talk) 10:28, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

WHAT IS THE DEFINITION OF NPT,BSPF OR PT124.195.194.1 (talk) 10:28, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

You're probably better off asking at the reference desk, but it looks like they're different gauges of thread on the port of a valve in e.g. plumbing. See also British standard pipe thread Gonzonoir (talk) 10:39, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Signature

Can someone please help me develop a fancy signature please? I don't even know where to start! CUTKD (talk) 11:34, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

You should start by deciding what you want your signature to look like. A desire that it be 'fancy' isn't much to go on. Algebraist 11:48, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Well I can be more specific ;) I'd like the "CUTKD" part to be white, with a black horizontal stripe through the middle. I would then like links to talk and contributions as superscript capital T and C respectively, the former in blue and latter in red. Thanks for your help... CUTKD (talk) 11:53, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

You want your name to be displayed in white? You know most people view Wikipedia on a white or near-white background, right? Algebraist 12:05, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

LOL!!! Sorry I haven't explained myself very well at all. There's a font (don't know what it's called though) where the letters are slightly enlarged, almost like a caricature, where the writing is white but with a black outline. That's what I'm hoping for, but with a black stripe through the middle. CUTKD (talk) 12:25, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Some of the info you're looking for can be found at Wikipedia:Signatures - then it's a matter of html markup. If you see a sig that is close to what you want, do an edit on that section or page - and see what the editor has used. You'll most likely need to check the box to "Use raw signature" in your preferences. — Ched ~ ^(yes?) 12:33, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

For example (forgive me if I'm out of line here TnXman) [[User:name|<span style="color:darkorange;">TN</span>]]<b>[[User talk:nameTalk|<big style="color:midnightblue;">X</big>]]</b>[[Special:Contributions/nameContribs|<span style="color:red;">Man</span>]] — Ched ~ ^(yes?) 12:37, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Then ... for the font - [[User:CUTKD|<span style="font-family:Lucida Handwriting Italic;color:#9B30FF">'''CUT'''</span>]][[User talk:CUTKD|<span style="font-family:Lucida Handwriting Italic;color:#63B8FF">kd</span>]] ... so you would end up looking like - wait for it ..........................................CUTkd

• hope that helps (doubtful about a white line through the middle though. — Ched ~ ^(yes?) 12:48, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Awesome! Thanks for the help. Once I've gotten the code I'm gonna use, where do I dump it so it becomes my signature? CUTKD 14:11, 12 March 2009 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by CUTKD (talk • contribs)

Go to "My preferences" at the top of the page. Make sure "raw signature" is checked and paste the info into the signature box. TNXMan 14:23, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

in your prefrences - on the User Profile tab where it says signature. Glad I could help. — Ched ~ ^(yes?) 14:26, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Toolserver help

Many pages of sites listed on the National Register of Historic Places in the USA use {{GeoGroupTemplate}}: most sites have coordinates given by the Register's official database, so it's helpful to be able to plot all of them on a single map. Not all lists of sites are in this format; the project is in process of converting from a simple list of names to a table that includes the coords: compare the South Dakota (without table) and Cleveland, Ohio (with table) lists to see what I mean about coords and template. Because adding a table expands the page size greatly, the process of adding tables means that we have to split out individual pages: for example, the Utah list I recently converted to a list-of-lists. However, I've found that newly-created lists don't seem to work with the GeoGroupTemplate: although Carbon County, Utah displays properly, I know that there are several other pages (can't give any examples at the moment) that say basically that such a page is not at the Toolserver. Is there something that I have to do to get the Toolserver to recognise or otherwise work with the page? Nyttend (talk) 13:38, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Whenever you tackle something new and complicated you should take good notes. Record links to the manual pages you are trying to follow, note the commands you try, and copy the exact text of any error messages you receive and (if possible) how someone else can reproduce the error. Otherwise, when you have a problem, you will only be able to "basically" report the error. Imprecise reporting reduces the pool of people who can answer the question to those who by some coincidence are already familiar enough with the problem to decode the imprecision. By such a coincidence, just yesterday I saw something on the Toolserver that mentioned XML dumps (yes, that is a sloppy reference on my part). But I retained just enough of a clue to hunt for more clues. Wikipedia:Toolserver leads to m:Toolserver. The lead section of that page summarizes the database replication on the Toolserver cluster and tells how to determine the date of the last replication. I would guess there is nothing you can do to influence the replication schedule. In the meantime, you can try to recall a page for which you previously saw the message about not being on the Toolserver, and see whether the page existed at the date of the last Toolserver database replication. If the page looks like it should have made it into the last replication, then you have a problem to investigate further. Otherwise, you just have to wait for the next replication. Other places to look for information or ask a question might include: Wikipedia talk:Toolserver, the toolserver wiki, and the links under m:Toolserver#Contact. In my experience with using tools, I have found a low correlation between the two seemingly distinct abilities to (a) build tools, and (b) document them coherently. You can help with this problem by improving whatever documents you find yourself being victimized by as you struggle to learn a poorly-documented tool. If you don't have access to the original document(s), you can write your own how-to guides in your userspace, and then move them to the Wikipedia: namespace. --Teratornis (talk) 17:58, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

So it was simply the basic workings of the Toolserver? I assumed that there was something that I had to do to get it to work, so I wasn't attempting to report an error. Nyttend (talk) 22:58, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Just now getting this message at National Register of Historic Places listings in Boulder County, Colorado, which I copy:

File not found at http://toolserver.org/~para....[line break]Suggestions:[line break]Make sure the URL is spelled correctly.[line break]Make sure the file exists.

I'm quite sure that this is the same message as I received otherwise. Nyttend (talk) 04:45, 13 March 2009 (UTC)

Footnotes

Can someone help me with these footnotes in Pope John Paul II and Judaism ? I did not create the footnotes, I was trying to re-arrange them, but they are rather complicated. Thank you ! ADM (talk) 14:46, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Was this article split out of another? It looks as though there are <ref name> tags defined in another document. If you let me know which, I can do some cleanup. Gonzonoir (talk) 15:11, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Yes, I split it from Relations between Catholicism and Judaism and Pope John Paul II. You're welcome ! ADM (talk) 15:17, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

What you will need to do then is go back and find the original full <ref name = XXXX> tags and copy over the whole reference into the new article, replaceing the first use of that reference in the new article. There's no magic trick to it, it's just a matter of taking the time to find, copy, and paste the right refs to the right locations. --Jayron32.talk.contribs 15:41, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

There you go, that's done, sans magic tricks. As a next step, the article's lead needs a bit of attention. Gonzonoir (talk) 15:46, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

How can I delete an article I created in error?

Is this possible? WAT (talk • contributions) 15:24, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

It is. If you're the only contributor, you can mark the article with {{db-G7}} (author requests deletion). TNXMan 15:26, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

(edit conflict)Assuming you're talking about 70.159.19.242, mark it with a CSD, G7 tag (author requests deletion) and you'll be fine. It's already marked with a G2 (test page) tag, which will probably adequately do the trick. Evan ¤ Seeds 15:29, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

And now its gone. In the future, if you don't remember all of the esoteric db-codes, you can always use the basic {{db|''reason here''}} template, and explain why you want the page deleted. If its something simple like "i just made this as a test, and now want it gone", just write that for the reason here and it will be deleted shortly. You can also find a full list of the db-codes at WP:CSD. --Jayron32.talk.contribs 15:37, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Pulling a Ripper

"Pulling a Ripper" (pronounced Pool-ing a Ri-pah)

When two (2) individuals agree to take on a new challenge, or engage in an activity together and one of the two individuals decides not to go thru with it in the middle of transition, leaving the other one alone.

The expression "pulling a Ripper" can be used at different tenses: "...he really pulled a Ripper on him" "I think I am going to pull a Ripper on tonight's dinner"

The expression is usualy used in the context of moving from one place to another, or a massive change of plans that may disrupt career plans. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 151.191.175.230 (talk) 15:37, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Perhaps you're looking for Urban Dictionary? Evan ¤ Seeds 15:41, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

(edit conflict) It appears you are trying to submit an article. However, Wikipedia does not accept articles about neologisms. If you have reliable sources that support your article, you can try submitting it at articles for creation. Alternatively, you can create an account and create the article yourself. TNXMan 15:42, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Working on New page

Hi

I am working on new page. Is it possible for me to save my work, come back tomorrow after couple of days and continue before publishing it? I do not want to get it deleted. Please let me know how can we save our work without publishing

Regards Adarsh —Preceding unsigned comment added by My3ada (talk • contribs) 16:13, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Your best bet is to work on the article in a sandbox in your userspace. If you click on this link (User:My3ada/Sandbox) and add the content there, you can save it and come back later to work on it. Be aware, though, that this sandbox exists in your userspace and not in the main article space. When your article is ready to be put in the mainspace, you'll need to move it. TNXMan 16:16, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Misspelled title

I have just created the page http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NATO_Research_and_Technology_Organization_(RTO), but I have misspelled the Organization (should be organisation), which is not coherent with the rest of the text (and the offcial definition of it) so I would like to change it to the proper spelling. I have been banging my head against the commands but I cannot really make it. Can anybody help me?

Also I have noticed that the term "organization" is also misspelled in at least a couple of other pages.

Beside going into each one of them and correcting it, is there a way to make them link to the page just created. Thanks! —Preceding unsigned comment added by Agobruceonwiki (talk • contribs) 17:42, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

 Done Moved the page to NATO Research and Technology Organisation (RTO). Next time, you can just go to WP:Requested moves. For more information about British & US spellings of words, organization in particular, see WP:Manual of Style (spelling)#International organizations. hmwithτ 17:48, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

I don't think the parenthetical RTO is required, it should be moved again to NATO Research and Technology Organisation. – ukexpat (talk) 18:19, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

 Done. – ukexpat (talk) 18:23, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

I also added a link to NATO Research and Technology Organisation on the RTO disambiguation page. – ukexpat (talk) 18:43, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

LOL. Fail on my part. Thanks for correcting my move, Ukexpat. I wasn't even looking at anything else but the z/s. hmwithτ 20:25, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

SVG image corrupted

Resolved for the specific item. The General problem might still persist.-- ExpImp^talkcon 19:21, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

I made the following image ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Abrams_mirror_and_the_lamp.svg ) with Inkscape and everything was fine when i uploaded it. But now all the text has moved to the right, even though it is (according to the Image-Page) still my original version. Could someone tell me how this has happened and what i can do to prevent this from happening again? Thank you.-- ExpImp^talkcon 18:04, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

I have no idea, but the first thing to try is to download the image from Wikipedia and diff it against the original. The first branch in the troubleshooting tree is to determine whether the copy on Wikipedia is exactly equal to the copy on your local disk, which in turn determines whether you are having a problem uploading the file, or a problem getting the file to render correctly through the multiple steps to get from Wikipedia's server to your browser. Did you try viewing your local copy of the SVG file in a Web browser? --Teratornis (talk) 18:27, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

By coincidence, I'm thinking about learning to use Inkscape, so in my usual methodical way I began by collecting some links to read: Commons:COM:EIC#Inkscape. Something in there might lead you to a clue, or to someone else who has a clue, if you don't get a good answer here. And if you're looking for a challenge, see my list of SVG files I would like to create. I asked a friend who said he knew Inkscape, and he said those images would require "mad skilz". --Teratornis (talk) 18:33, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

The SVG was fine, but the PNG renderer had some problem. I solved the problem now, by reuploading it with a different font. My problem still is, that when I originally uploaded it (30 October 2007), the PNG renderer did work fine and showed the picture as it should. Someone seems to have changed s/th in the png renderer in the meantime.-- ExpImp^talkcon 19:21, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Hmm you're leaving it as text in the inkscape file? If I run into rendering issues I usually change all the texts to paths by highlighting them and clicking "Path" then "Object to Path". Kind of a work around I know, and I'm not sure if it would solve your problem. TastyCakes (talk) 20:32, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Incidentally, you can make arrows with colours other than black by using a similar procedure. To my knowledge it's the only way to make arrows with a different colour. TastyCakes (talk) 20:36, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

replacing factory sound system

I have no idea whay size my factory speakers are and I need to order new ones but there are 6 speakers in all and I just want to make sure I get the right size speakers, I have no owners manual so i have no clue how to find out how to find out the size. Can someone please get back to me asap.my email is <blanked> Thank You, Micah J Privett —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.173.124.194 (talk) 18:29, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

I think you need to spend some cash money to hire a qualified audio technician to look at your setup. Otherwise, you're looking for a mind reader, and not one of them has collected the Randi Prize which supports the hypothesis that mind readers are all frauds. --Teratornis (talk) 18:35, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Correction, the information you seek might not exist in any mind at the moment (perhaps the former installer has died), so you might really need a remote viewer if you don't want to pay for a technician to look at your setup. But remote viewers have not collected the Randi Prize yet either. So I still recommend hiring a technician. --Teratornis (talk) 18:40, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

I need to edit my own wiki account

Hi, why am i having such a hard time editing my own account? I have added to it, and now there are redundancies and i cannot edit the original content that i would like to..can someone please help me? thank you so much <blanked> —Preceding unsigned comment added by Rpwinc (talk • contribs) 18:37, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

A few points: first, it is not "your account", Rosalind Wiseman is an article about Rosalind Wiseman. Second, we only have your word that you are indeed Ms Wiseman - if you are, then you have a huge conflict of interest issue and you are strongly discouraged from editing the article. Third, the article is completely devoid of any references to reliable sources to support claims of Ms Wiseman's notability, one of Wikipedia's key inclusion criteria. One possible solution is for you to leave a message on your talk page declaring your COI, indicating the changes that you think should be made to the article and provide references to support notability. – ukexpat (talk) 18:51, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

See WP:WWMPD for some things you should do to prepare for the possibility that the article might get deleted. It looks like you inserted some text after the Rosalind Wiseman#External links section, most likely because you didn't see how to edit the lead section of the article (by clicking the "edit" tab at the top). You have a lot to learn about Wikipedia if you want your editing to be pleasant and productive here, so I recommend that you read Wikipedia: The Missing Manual to get a basic understanding of how things work. Also see WP:BLP for information about what you can do if you see incorrect information about yourself in the article. --Teratornis (talk) 19:01, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

I've had to revert that article back to a version that is over a year old - every single new version was a copyvio. --Cameron Scott (talk) 19:10, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Please remember to link the jargon which the new user is unlikely to understand: Wikipedia:Copyright violations. --Teratornis (talk) 19:14, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Note, there is a similar discussion on WP:EAR, Wikipedia:Editor assistance/Requests#Hi i need to edit my OWN biography and i cannot – ukexpat (talk) 19:18, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

NB, Rpwinc has been blocked as a spam user name (the name of Wiseman's company). – ukexpat (talk) 20:23, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Enzo Farrari Coupe

What years were the Enzo Farrari Coupe produced? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.210.112.114 (talk) 20:49, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

You might find what you are looking for in the article about Enzo Ferrari (automobile). If you cannot find the answer there, you can try asking your question at Wikipedia's Reference Desk. They specialize in knowledge questions and will try to answer just about any question in the universe (except about how to use Wikipedia, which is what this help desk is for). I hope this helps. NanohaA'sYuri^{Talk, My master} 21:04, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Maintaining GFDL history on article split - what to do in this case?

I noticed the page Madoff investment scandal was split from Bernie Madoff, but the split wasn't mentioned in the edit summary as specified in Wikipedia:Splitting, which is a violation of the GFDL. I tried to tag the article to have the problem fixed, but the only tag I could find was one for articles that were moved, not split. Is there another tag I should have used, or is there another way I should have gone about trying to get the problem fixed (such as a place to report such problems)? Calathan (talk) 21:18, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

You could make a note on the talk page, or you could do a null-edit (something simple like taking out an extraneous space) and there make a note like "This article was split from Bernie Madoff on XXXX at XXXX UTC" or something. As long as it is clear where the article came from, it shouldn't matter that the note was made a few edits too late... --Jayron32.talk.contribs 01:28, 13 March 2009 (UTC)

How To Handle Possible External Link To Viral Site

I was checking out a link in an article and received a warning from the Avast virus protection system on my PC. How should I handle this? As Avast suggests - this may be a false positive. Is there a Wikipedia process editors can follow to report and have a site validated when a virus protection system gives a warning? What is the process, if a viral site is confirmed, for handling the external link? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Pknkly (talk • contribs) 21:24, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

What was it? --Cameron Scott (talk) 21:25, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

This site (click at your own risk). An inspection of the source code turns up basic HTML, but there's some suspicious-looking script at the bottom. Norton hasn't alerted me to any infections, and I am running a quick scan now and a quick scan turned up nothing. Obviously, if the site is poisoned, it should be removed immediately. Xenon54 (talk) 22:05, 12 March 2009 (UTC) edited 22:11, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

It looks like a one pixel by one pixel hidden iframe with some weird code in it. Since, however, the iframe's source is set to be http://url/ it generates an error - I'm running Safari on a Mac, and the activity window reports one error when it gets to that bit of the page. I don't think it's a virus, to be honest, probably more likely to be some sort of tracking thing (like those one-pixel images that used to be popular a few years ago) for monitoring website usage, but one that hasn't been correctly configured so doesn't actually do anything...pushthebutton | go on... | push it! 23:34, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

editing from a mobile

are we not supposed to edit wikipedia from a mobile device? i keep getting a message directing me to the mobile version of the website at the top of the page, but the mobile version lacks an edit button. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Mobile Writes (talk • contribs) 22:42, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

That doesn't mean you're not supposed to. Anybody can edit Wikipedia. I've edited on my iTouch on several occasions. If you're able to go to Wikipedia's actual website (en.wikipedia.org), then you should be able to edit it. From what you're saying, you're going to some sort of mobile version (perhaps something like m.en.wikipedia.org) Killiondude (talk) 22:54, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Try putting the browser in "mobile mode" and the top of every page will give you a notice saying you should go to the mobile version of Wikipedia. I simply left it in "desktop mode" and was fine, but I wanted to make sure I wasn't violating any rules. Thanks. Mobile Writes (talk) 18:15, 13 March 2009 (UTC)