Wikipedia:Help desk/Archives/2009 September 26

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September 26

Book Fees for public education

What states in the USA charge book fees for public schools?

Have you tried the Humanities section of Wikipedia's Reference Desk? They specialize in answering knowledge questions there; this help desk is only for questions about using Wikipedia. For your convenience, here is the link to post a question there: click here. I hope this helps.

Table sorting

Resolved

In List of districts of Sri Lanka, the three area columns do not sort properly. It was suggested at the FLC that this may be because it is not sorted numerically. The problem must be with the {{km2 to mi2}} template, since the other columns are sorting correctly. Any help on fixing this problem would be much appreciated. ≈ Chamal ^talk ¤ 00:25, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

I had a similar problem with the lists at List of numbered roads in Kawartha Lakes, Ontario where the image code made the roads and highways sort oddly. You can fix this by placing {{ntsh|#}} before any text or other items in the coloumn that is giving you trouble, replacing # with numbers. The coloumn will sort the numbers rather than considering what is actually in the cell, and the ntsh tag will make the numbers invisible to the reader. - ʄɭoʏɗiaɲ ^τ _¢ 01:09, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

W00t! It works. Thanks a lot Floydian :) ≈ Chamal ^talk ¤ 01:51, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

Missing text

Carbonation, in the "effervescence" section, text is missing prior to the chemical equation for AlkaSeltzer. I'm having trouble finding the revision and I'm not sure how to fix it. Mjpresson (talk) 01:37, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

This was just fixed by user Vary. Thanks! Mjpresson (talk) 01:45, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

:) If you're familiar with the topic, it might be an idea to check the restored text for accuracy. Chemical reactions are not really my thing. -- Vary | (Talk) 01:46, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

How to Rename a Category?

Resolved

 – Thaejas (talk)

How to rename a category? Thaejas (talk) 02:01, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

You need to establish consensus first at Wikipedia:Categories for discussion. Xenon54 / talk / 02:08, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

Thanks --Thaejas (talk) 03:48, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

What should I do about photos that don't show on my screen?

Resolved

 –  – ukexpat (talk) 15:33, 28 September 2009 (UTC)

Sometimes I find pages where one or more photos don't show - only a box with the caption in it and a short vertical line in the middle above the caption and a small box which, if clicked, takes one to the page fo0r the image. I find that if I shrink their size they show up all right - but I wonder if I should be doing this? My computer is a Lenovo notebook with a 15.1" screen running Windows Vista Business. Is there anything I can do to make them show up without shrinking the size? Can you help, please? John Hill (talk) 02:07, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

Could you provide a link to a specific image that is causing you trouble? What do you mean by "shrinking the size?" It sounds to me like purging might help, but a bit more information is needed. Xenon54 / talk / 02:13, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

Hi, thanks for your speedy reply. One such article is the 14th Dalai Lama where I cannot see several photos, just the following captions: "house where the 14th Dalai Lama was born", "Lhasa's Potala Palace, today a UNESCO world heritage site, pictured in 2006"; Abandoned former quarters of the Dalai Lama at the Potala. The empty vestment placed on the throne symbolizes his absence"; and: "The Dalai Lama's main teaching room at Dharamsala"

I reduced the number of pixels on the following two photos, captioned: "The Dalai Lama and fellow Nobel Peace Prize laureate Archbishop Desmond Tutu share a joke" and "Dalai Lama at Tibetan Children's Village Dharamsala, 1993", and they now show up on my screen just fine.

I have run into this same problem on other pages in the past and have, at least a couple of times, reduced the number of pixels of the photos until they showed up. However, it occurred to me today that perhaps there is some other problem here (and that maybe I should not be reducing the size of the images) - as I know I have been able to see these photos on the page of the 14th Dalai Lama previously with no difficulties. Hope this helps you work out what the problem may be. Many thanks, John Hill (talk) 05:34, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

I can see those pictures with no difficulty. Are you still having the problem? If you are, you should purge each thumbnail that you are having trouble viewing; instructions are on the linked page. Xenon54 / talk / 11:39, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

Thank you very much for your help. The page is looking fine on my screen this morning and now I know how to "purge" if I have further difficulties. I really appreciate your patient and helpful assistance. Cheers, John Hill (talk) 00:58, 27 September 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia Speech Posted?

I wrote a speech on how Wikipedia should be allowed as a credible source. Is there any way to post it under any of the Wikimedia Sites as not for editing? Quintus314 (talk) 03:54, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

Well, none of the Wikimedia sites are for posting speeches... you might want to look at a blog, hosting site, or another wiki. You could, on the other hand, post it as an essay, but I daresay there are already several on your subject, and there is no way to prevent editing (unless prompted by vandalism or the like). Calvin 1998 ^(t·c) 04:20, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

problem with juiced 2

my game juiced-2 hot import nights does not start. it says to select smaller resolution.

Have you tried the computing section of Wikipedia's Reference Desk? They specialize in answering knowledge questions there; this help desk is only for questions about using Wikipedia. For your convenience, here is the link to post a question there: click here. I hope this helps.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 06:27, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

Lost word document

How can i retrieve a lost word document. Is there a way i can view all word documents i have been working on? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 195.202.72.137 (talk • contribs) 09:37, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

This page is for questions about using Wikipedia. Please consider asking this question at the Computing reference desk. They specialize in answering computer questions and will try to answer any question in the universe (except how to use Wikipedia, since that is what this Help Desk is for). Just follow the link and ask away. You could always try searching Wikipedia for an article related to the topic you want to know more about. I hope this helps. -- PhantomSteve (Contact Me, My Contribs) 10:21, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

Cheap laptop

what is the cheapest laptop in india

It is not the responsibility of the Help Desk to answer questions unrelated to Wikipedia. Either do the research yourself or ask at the Reference desk. Xenon54 / talk / 13:20, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

See OLPC XO-1 and Netbook for general information. It could be difficult to determine exactly what would be "the cheapest laptop in india" as this could be different for different people in India, depending on what part of the country a person is in, one-time closeout sales, whether you qualify for charitable programs such as One Laptop per Child, the ongoing progress of Moore's law which pushes prices downward every year, etc. --Teratornis (talk) 17:56, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia for kids

My daughter would like access to information that is suited to her age (8). Current pages, such as the ones about autism, are full of words she does not understand and she ends up getting frustrated and confused. Is there a child-friendly option? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.27.242.88 (talk)

You might like to take a look at the Simple English Wikipedia. The main page can be found at http://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page ≈ Chamal ^talk ¤ 14:59, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

The article on that Wikipedia is here -- PhantomSteve (Contact Me, My Contribs) 16:48, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

The simplest link from here is: Simple:Autism. --Teratornis (talk) 17:50, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

Way to make it confusing for the mom who probably doesn't care about the difference between pipe links and links guys. I have half the mind to make a link to something naughty.Cptnono (talk) 09:53, 27 September 2009 (UTC)

Do we know that the original questioner is confused? Do we know that the original questioner is a mom? The question only indicates that the original questioner is a parent. --Teratornis (talk) 01:40, 28 September 2009 (UTC)

LAW

what is the different between the positivist and naturalist approach is to be prferred and why?

You are going to have to be more specific as to what you want to accomplish with this question. Note that Wikipedia will not do your homework for you. Xenon54 / talk / 16:32, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

The help desk is for questions on how to use Wikipedia. For Humanities-related questions, such as yours, please use the Humanities reference desk. Intelligentsium 23:51, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

Image alignment and missing table lines in Mozilla Firefox

Resolved

Since I updated to the latest Firefox version, I have two problems with Wikipedia pages:

1. All images are displayed Without flowing text.
2. Some horizontal or vertical lines in tables are not displayed. I could not discern a pattern for that behavior.

My configuration is Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.9.1.3) Gecko/20090824 Firefox/3.5.3 (.NET CLR 3.5.30729). — Sebastian 16:24, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

(For non-techies, that string of text says he's under Windows XP and using Firefox 3.5.3.) I think #2 is a known problem with Firefox and refreshing the page should fix it, but I'm not completely sure. I don't know about #1, though, and I don't encounter the issue on Firefox 3.5.2 under Ubuntu. Xenon54 / talk / 16:31, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

Try view > zoom > reset. ---— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk 21:59, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

Thank you - that fixed the table problem. But the image problem still persists. — Sebastian 21:27, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

Actually, this only occurs in en.WP, not e.g. in simple.WP. I'm wondering if that has to do with the skin. Ever since I tried beta once, my skin was reset. I didn't have a personalized skin, and when I went through all skins available, it looked like MySkin was what I had before. But now that I think about it, I also remember that the announcement for new messages on my talk page changed; it lost its orange background. Is there a skin that does that? — Sebastian 21:31, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

Try Special:Preferences > Appearance > Restore all default settings (very bottom) ---— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk 21:59, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

Thank you again. I wouldn't want to do that since I assume I can not undo it, and I have a number of settings that I wouldn't want to change. But I did switch the skin, and it went away. When I switched it back, it was just like before. I guess I should rename this section to "Skin disease" now ;-) Does anyone remember which skin shows the orange bar? I think I tried them all after I tried out beta, but I couldn't find any other that looked similar to what I had before. — Sebastian 22:24, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

I use the default (monobook) skin, which shows an orange bar when there are messages - I'm using FF3.5.3/WindowsXP with SP3.  Ronhjones  ^(Talk) 23:35, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

Thank you! That's not the skin I had before, but I'll just keep that for now. My original two problems are solved:

1. Image display: Change skin;
2. Table display: view > zoom > reset.

— Sebastian 14:20, 27 September 2009 (UTC)

How words in English of 自行車道 should be translated as?

Resolved

The zh:自行車道 in Taiwan has be faboulius in recent year, but it has no unified signing, even same one. Bikeway, Bikelane, Cycling paths, bike trail, cycle lane, ...????

If official translation is declared, we follow the official, but if it has no official translation, but has chinese phrase of "自行車道", how should be translated as? Thamk you.Tratra22395768 (talk) 16:55, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

That article already links to our article Segregated cycle facilities. There's a picture there that calls it "bike path", but there are other names discussed at Segregated cycle facilities#Terminology. If you have any further questions, please discuss it at that article's talk page, Talk:Segregated cycle facilities or at any of the WikiProjects listed on top of that page. — Sebastian 17:02, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

Activate My Account

Please can you activate my account. Prenticelu (talk) 20:24, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

Your account is working. I didn't know there was any sort of activation process... Xenon54 / talk / 20:58, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

All acounts are inherently active. You're good to go. --AndrewHowse (talk) 20:59, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

My guess is that you're trying to edit a semiprotected page? Or maybe upload an image? (I'm not sure about that once.) Your account will be fully active when you've been registered a few days and have made a few edits. There are some things that very new accounts aren't able to do, unfortunately, but you'll be able to do them soon enough. Sorry! -- Vary | (Talk) 21:04, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

For autoconfirmed status, see Wikipedia:User access levels#Autoconfirmed users. ---— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk 21:07, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

Your account is old enough to be autoconfirmed, but you need 10 edits. Right now you have 2 undeleted edits. (I am not sure if it counts the deleted edits on your deleted article.) BTW, Wikipedia does not accept promotional articles. —teb728 t c 22:19, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

More possibilities that the question might refer to:

• Your username is a red link because you have not yet created your user page.
• Go to Special:Preferences, User profile tab, scroll down to E-mail options. Make sure you have confirmed your e-mail address.
• You can activate your Unified login by going to Special:MergeAccount and following the instructions. Then your account will also be active on Wikimedia Commons, Wikibooks, Wikiquote, and the other language Wikipedias.

--Teratornis (talk) 00:45, 27 September 2009 (UTC)