Wikipedia:Help desk/Archives/2012 November 24

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November 24

Lynette White Murder

I have no option but to complain again. It is plain that my work has been plundered for this article. I did not agree to be a source as you put it and find it highly disrespectful that you have not had the decency to credit my work properly in the main text or mention the impact of my book. The disrespect shown to me and my work by you is typical of the way I have been treated. You also ignore totally the work of The Fitted-In Project and have not mentioned my second book at all. The Cardiff Five: Innocent Beyond Any Doubt was published earlier this year. I expect you to redress the lack of proper credit given to my work.

Satish Sekar Author Fitted In: The Cardiff 3 and the Lynette White Inquiry The Cardiff Five: Innocent Beyond Any Doubt CEO The Fitted-In Project — Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.16.147.48 (talk) 00:34, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

IP 82 is referring to Murder of Lynette White. I will leave the content issue to more experienced editors, but IP 82 saying "I expect you to redress the lack of proper credit given to my work" seems to be on the verge of a legal threat. Although it's not relevant, there's no way at this point to prove that IP 82 is in fact the author cited in the article. To IP 82: Permission is not required to cite reliable sources, nor do we subjectively inject the "impact" of any subject into an article. We use reliable sources to support objective content. In terms of content that is NOT in the article, you are welcome to discuss it on the article's talk page, but please be aware of conflict of interest guidelines. If anything in the article has been done improperly, I am confident that very knowledgeable editors will address the matter appropriately. --76.189.101.221 (talk) 01:10, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

I would like to point out that there is no "you" that is responsible for editing Wikipedia. "We" edit Wikipedia, which includes you. Although the previously mentioned conflict of interest needs to be addressed, you can make reasonable edits yourself and explain your edits on the article's talk page. I noticed that Satish Sekar (1997) is used as a source, and is referenced many times in the article. The last substantive edit to the article was on 6 January 2012‎ and the publish date for the book: http://www.worldcat.org/title/cardiff-five-innocent-beyond-any-doubt/oclc/801031544 only states "2012" (no month or day) -- it is doubtful that the 2012 book was used as a source of article content. ~E:74.60.29.141 (talk) 01:51, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

It would be extremely difficult to produce any reliably sourced work about the Lynette White murder case without Satish Sekar's Fitted In: The Cardiff 3 and the Lynette White Inquiry: it is the definitive work. To the best of my knowledge the only other vaguely half-decent book about the murder is John Williams' Bloody Valentine: A Killing in Cardiff (1995). All other sources used are contemporary news reports found in newspaper archives. The article itself is still only about 25% complete; its construction stalled around the time of the collapse of the most recent perjury trial (January 2012). The events described in it are incredibly sketchy from around 1989 onwards, with noticeable gaps. A full and comprehensive version of the article would certainly discuss the impact of the Fitted-In Project and Sekar's journalism and dogged pursuit of justice. The current version is by no means "full and comprehensive", however. Even its present structure is somewhat jury rigged to make the narrative at least readable to a non-expert.

As mentioned above, there has been very little work done on the article since even before the release of The Cardiff Five: Innocent Beyond Any Doubt (published around March/April 2012). I wasn't aware of its existence until today, and although my first reaction was that it is essential reading for anyone interested in the case and interested in completing the article, I personally shall not now be bothering to purchase it. Given the sentiments raised above by the IP, I have no interest or desire in becoming involved any further in the article, in fact. Keristrasza (talk) 13:03, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

Second book wasn't launched until 5 September this year, not March/April as I initially thought. Keristrasza (talk) 00:22, 25 November 2012 (UTC)

All Wikipedia articles are essentially works-in-progress. As long as the existing content is worthy of inclusion and properly sourced, it's fine. IP 82's specific concerns have yet to be addressed by an experienced editor. --76.189.101.221 (talk) 19:06, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

The article contains 28 properly composed references to the book mentioned here. I am not sure what action needs to be taken. Rmhermen (talk) 19:11, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

Rmhermen, does IP 82's statement, "I expect you to redress the lack of proper credit given to my work", fall within the realm of a legal threat, particularly a perceived legal threat? That section says, "Rather than blocking immediately, administrators should seek to clarify the user's meaning". --76.189.101.221 (talk) 20:16, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

As far as I know "proper credit" is a moral obligation, not a legal one - unless you are using direct quotations (or close paraphrases) which are copyrighted. I don't have access to the book in question - someone in the UK might want to check our article against it. There appears to be only a single copy held by a library in North America. Rmhermen (talk) 22:45, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

I have a copy of the book on my desk as I type. Every time that information from the book is used Satish Sekar is referenced and the page numbers supplied. He is also name-checked as an investigative journalist with an interest in the case. To address comments above, I don't think that this should be seen as a legal threat, rather it should be viewed as I outlined in my previous comment: if the article were completed, it would explain the importance of this journalist's endeavours in exposing the miscarriage of justice. It appears that this is the thrust of the complaint - the book is used as a source but does not yet give credit to the author for the role it played in the subsequent events. The article has never reached that stage. I note that the IP has not yet responded here since making the complaint in the wee hours of a Saturday morning. I am now loathe to be involved in advancing the article to a position where Sekar's investigations are discussed purely because I strongly object to the perceived chilling effect that the IP's comments have introduced. Keristrasza (talk) 00:09, 25 November 2012 (UTC)

I find this complaint puzzling. The murder of Lynette White is notable mainly for the miscarriage of justice that followed it. I assume that Satish Sekar has devoted a lot of effort to it, and written two authoritative books about it, to expose this miscarriage of justice. So why complain that one of his books has been extensively cited (27 citations, though this may have changed since I counted) in a Wikipedia article, which gives further exposure to the miscarriage of justice? Maproom (talk) 22:19, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

Keristrasza, through their chilling effect reference, is now the second editor to allude to a perceived legal threat. I think an administrator needs to directly address IP 82 regarding their comment, "I expect you to redress the lack of proper credit given to my work". "I expect you" or what? I feel this needs to be clarified before any further discussion occurs, and in fact should have been done originally. And although we have no reason to doubt it, we have no proof at this point that IP 82 is indeed the author Satish Sekar, as they are claiming. However, it's irrelevant in terms of our editing guidelines. --76.189.101.221 (talk) 00:50, 25 November 2012 (UTC)

I think that this has reached an impasse. Satish Sekar's first book is used as a source but is correctly cited. The importance of the book has not yet been discussed but there is no obligation to do so. I shall bite my tongue and as a matter of courtesy do some work on the article to address this. I have just kindled the 2nd book mentioned by IP82 and will read it today as I work on the article, so no doubt it will end up being cited also. IP76 is correct, there is no reason to doubt the identity of IP82, so I will also reach out off-wiki to the author and see if we can't nail down any specific issues or better yet open up some dialogue on the article's talk page. Keristrasza (talk) 12:58, 25 November 2012 (UTC)

Beacon Elementary School

Why can't I find the article that I created? Was it deleted? If so, why? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Montskim (talk • contribs) 01:55, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

Your submission in Articles for Submission is still around (Wikipedia talk:Articles for creation/Beacon Elementary School), but the page you created in the article space (Beacon Elementary School) got redirected to Harper Woods School District. The edit history shows why it was redirected. The Anonymouse (talk • contribs) 02:04, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

Yep, because of the redirect here's what your article looks like now. :p --76.189.101.221 (talk) 02:15, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

I'm new at this so please excuse my ignorance, but I'm still confused as to what happed to the information that I submitted. You mentioned that it had been redirect to the Harper Woods Schools article but it still is not appearing on the page. Why is that? Is it going to take some time for it to appear? Do I need to resubmit the information? .... — Preceding unsigned comment added by Montskim (talk • contribs) 15:02, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

No problem, we understand this process is new to you. Yes, Beacon Elementary School was redirected to the school district's article, but no content (text) in the article was transferred. As explained in the edit history ("nn primary/middle school redirected to district/town"), BES is not notable and therefore doesn't qualify to have it's own article. The "nn" stands for non-notable. The reason it was redirected, instead of just completely deleted, is because if someone searches for Beacon Elementary School it will automatically take them to the Harper Woods School District article, where BES is mentioned, instead of just returning no results. Hope this helps. One final thing, whenever you enter comments on Wikipedia you should always sign your comments. You can do that easily by simply clicking on the blue pencil icon to the right of the B (bold) and I icons at the top of the edit box. Or you can type four tildes. This is a tilde: ~ --76.189.101.221 (talk) 19:22, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

mathematics problems solutions

hi i am getting trouble to find a vedic mathematics problems solutions. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 1.22.116.102 (talk) 02:07, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

This page is for questions about using Wikipedia. Please consider asking this question at the Mathematics reference desk. They specialize in knowledge 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. The Anonymouse (talk • contribs) 02:10, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

Quick User Friendly Template

Is there a quick user-friendly template that I can go to & simply backspace the template info & place the info for my article? I see "template" options, but they are not exactly what I would consider a simple "plug & play". — Preceding unsigned comment added by Aoife Harley (talk • contribs) 07:00, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

I've left you some "getting started" links on your talk page. The "Article wizard" can help with the basic formatting of a new page. One thing you could try is to go to an article similar to the one you want to write, click "Edit" at the top, and grab a copy of the entire page to use as the basis of your new page - but to avoid confusion, be sure to remove all the irrelevant text and coding. -- John of Reading (talk) 10:26, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

How long to wait for discussion to end at Wikipedia:Requests for comment/User conduct?

Regarding Wikipedia:Requests for comment/User conduct, how long must one wait before moving on to a more advanced step, and what should that step be? The editor in question disputes the claim and wants a different move taken, something involving an Administrator. Yours, GeorgeLouis (talk) 10:16, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

Can't edit semi-protected

I think I satisfy the criteria to be an autoconfirmed user (300+ contributions since 2005), but I can't edit the semi-protected article Plants (I see the grey padlock instead of the Edit link). Why might that be? Thanks. Buster79 (talk) 11:06, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

Can you edit other semi-protected articles? Ruslik_Zero 12:43, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

No. Buster79 (talk) 13:09, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

I changed your user rights to "confirmed" from "autoconfirmed" - which is the same set of rights but might change something. Try again and see if it works now. Rmhermen (talk) 14:50, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

Everybody see the grey padlock, also administrators like me. You should still see an "Edit" tab and be able to click it. Do you see a "View source" tab instead? Try clicking it and see if you can edit. PrimeHunter (talk) 16:35, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

That's it. I failed to notice that the Edit tab reappeared when I logged in (was looking at the top left instead of the top right). Thanks all. Buster79 (talk) 16:50, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

I just donated, but the banner is still there!

The only reason why I donated was to get rid of the damn yellow banner. Why is it still there! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.23.250.24 (talk) 11:26, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

You can "X" it out. --76.189.101.221 (talk) 20:05, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

You can also register for a username and it will disappear when you are signed in.— Vchimpanzee · talk · contributions · 21:22, 28 November 2012 (UTC)

Rare Ramayan handwritten on handmade paper circa 1700 AD

Dear Sirs,

My grandfather who was a landlord in Jhansi, UP, Bundelkhand, India, was a Persian language scholar . It was from his land that the grass for the British Cavalry was bought during the British reign. He, being an avid reader and collector of books, had a rare Ramayan in his collection. This is hand written on handmade paper and dates back to around early 1700s. I realised that this sort of rare book needs preservation for posterity and therefore, I have donated it to the Government Museum, Jhansi- where the family lived for three generations.

But this, I feel, shall be only limiting the information. In case someone from any part of the world wants to see this rare Ramayan or do research on such rare books or history of that era he must find it on the net and come to know about it. For this there couldn’t be anything better than Wikipedia.

I wish to make a page of this book and my grandfather, my family and the Museum at Jhansi along with its location and the pictures of the donation programme and a few pages from the book for ready reference. This I wish to do so that anyone can contact us or the Museum and the related people there.

This shall, also, I am sure ,enrich Wikipedia further.

Kindly advice how can I do this.

Many thanks,

Yaarkumar (talk) 13:45, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

Unless there is extensive press or academic coverage of this manuscript, it is unlikely to be notable enough for a Wikipedia article. For a typical article on a rare manuscript, see Codex of Santa Catarina Ixtepeji. Remember, always, that Wikipedia is not here to promote anything, but rather to share already-extant knowledge. --Orange Mike | Talk 17:33, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

Wikisource hosts versions of old (and new) books and documents, so long as they are within its scope.

Some people also seem to upload scans of parts of old documents of interest to Wikimedia Commons. --Demiurge1000 (talk) 17:51, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

Hi Yaarkumar. We definitely would need information from already-published sources in order to start an article. If it there have been any newspaper articles about it, or if academic papers have been published about it, then it may well qualify. Even if it doesn't, then a high quality photo of one of the leaves might be a good addition to our article Ramayana (although it is not possible to give an absolute guarantee than it will be included).

You may also wish to consider uploading scans of the book to archive.org, but I would imagine this is something that should be done by professionals at the museum, in order to avoid damaging the book. Formerip (talk) 23:41, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

Couple of questions about citing books

I'm working on an article in which I want to cite a book, but annoyingly the book doesn't have page numbers. Is it acceptable to cite a book without citing the page number?

I'd also like to cite some essays I've found in books. In this case, in the reference, should I cite the title of the book and the book's editor(s), or the essay title and the essay author, or both? Popcornduff (talk) 18:13, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

WP:Page numbers, from WP:CITE, says: "Page numbers are not required for a reference to the book". --76.189.101.221 (talk) 19:47, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

Could site the chapter if you like.Moxy (talk) 19:50, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

I should clarify my original comment. As you'll read in WP:Page numbers, the full quote is: "Page numbers are not required for a reference to the book or article as a whole". (my emphasis added) --76.189.101.221 (talk) 19:55, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

On the second question, see the example "Citing a chapter in a book with different authors for different chapters and an editor" at {{Cite book}}, which also applies to an essay in an edited collection of essays. On the first question, it might help if you told us what the book without page numbers is; several possible solutions occur to me, but selecting one depends on the exact nature of the book. Deor (talk) 20:14, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

The book is Radiohead and Philosophy: Fitter Happier More Deductive. You can read some of it on Google Books here: http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=-zAoXofitGIC&printsec=frontcover&dq=Radiohead+and+Philosophy:+Fitter+Happier+More+Deductive&hl=en&sa=X&ei=XDKxUOuTEOPM0AW73oDAAw&ved=0CDIQ6AEwAA Popcornduff (talk) 21:39, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

Do you have a copy without page numbers? Amazon.com look inside shows page numbers.[1] Apteva (talk) 22:47, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

If you're citing an unpaginated e-book, I'd just use the form given in the {{Template:Cite book}} example I referred to above for the particular chapter and author. In place of a page number, you might use "Kindle version, unpaginated" or similar to indicate that you haven't just forgotten to include one in the ref. (If you use the cite-book template, you'd put it in the "at" field, using that parameter instead of the "p" or "pp" parameter. You could also use the "quote" parameter to quote the exact passage you're citing as a source, to help readers find it.) You might, of course, dig up a hard copy to find out what page the relevant passage is on in it (if the book has actually been published in paper and ink.) Deor (talk) 23:27, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

Include the best information you can (e.g. chapter number and section title).

As an aside, this book should be used sparingly in articles about Radiohead and not at all in articles about philosophy. Just sayin'. Formerip (talk) 23:56, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for the help, everyone. Apteva, your Amazon link is helpful - the copy I was using has no page numbers. Formerip, might I ask why you'd warn against using the resource in Radiohead articles? I'm not intending to base an entire section on it or anything, just dropping in a few quotes about songs. You can see the work in progress on my user sandbox, if you're curious.Popcornduff (talk) 00:49, 25 November 2012 (UTC)

I said it should be used sparingly - that's a glass half-full. Formerip (talk) 01:18, 25 November 2012 (UTC)

Then let me rephrase - I think a lot of people interpret "use sparingly" as "try not to use", so is there something about the source you're sceptical about, or are you merely pointing out that it shouldn't be the primary resource of an article? Just checking. Popcornduff (talk) 01:25, 25 November 2012 (UTC)

The California Dreams Tour by Katy Perry

I have a question about the article The California Dreams Tour which I have to ask here because the article is inactive and no one is answering anything. Anyway, someone changed the article's name from "The California Dreams Tour" to "California Dreams Tour". I think it should be "The California Dreams Tour" because the promotional image for the tour even says so. The say weird thing is that the first words of the article (which is in bold) says "The California Dreams Tour", shouldn't it have the same title as the title of the article? My last question is that there is a question on the talk page that needs to be answered. Please respond to these questions on my talk page Thanks! CPGirlAJ (talk) 22:18, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

It was moved per common name guidelines (WP:COMMONNAME). The tour was called "California Dreams". Therefore, it's The California Dreams Tour for marketing puproses, which includes logos, promotional images, t-shirts, etc. The common name, which Wikipedia uses to determine article titles, is California Dreams Tour. If you feel the article title should be changed, you can start a discussion on the talk page, where consensus would decide. And, no, the first words of the article do not have to match the article title. For instance, the first words in Katy Perry are "Katheryn Elizabeth Hudson", her birth name (not her common name, Katy Perry). However, an article title should match the infobox title. --76.189.101.221 (talk) 22:40, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

By the way, you are correct that the bolding of "The" in the opening sentence isn't needed. The move was done recently, so apparently it just wasn't noticed at that time. Similar examples are Wildest Dreams Tour, Vertigo Tour, HIStory World Tour, Believe Tour, Pink Friday Tour, and many more. --76.189.101.221 (talk) 23:26, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

See also WP:THE. Deor (talk) 23:32, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

Great reference, Deor. Therefore, I struck my comment regarding opening a discussion. --76.189.101.221 (talk) 23:39, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

Adding extra spaces between 2 words

In the Template:Four Worlds I would like to keep the present design, but allign the 4 numbers in a vertical straight line. To do this, I would like to add more than one letter-size space between the number and the word. If I could add eg. two or three spaces on line: "2<here>Beri'ah", then the aesthetic problem would be solved. I tried "span width=xpx/em" but it didn't work (nor did two space bars!). There is a standard method of going down a line (
). I'm looking for a similar mechanism to add a space-bar gap. Any ideas? April8 (talk) 22:50, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

A general way to add space would be to use &nbsp; But if you balanced it that way on your browser, it would be unbalanced on someone else's. The simplest way to fix it would be to get rid of centering. A more complicated way would be to use a table. —teb728 t c 23:42, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

Almost everybody will be looking at it in a proportional font, so letter spacing will vary, and cannot be used reliably for vertical alignment. --ColinFine (talk) 01:31, 25 November 2012 (UTC)

I made a few changes— see if that is what you want. <center> is obsolete, so I used {{center}} which uses CSS styling. ---— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk 12:27, 25 November 2012 (UTC)

Thanks a lot for your collective advice, and Gadget850's modification, which is a good improvement. Just a very minor perfectionism before I leave the issue (!): Gadget's improvement will sufice, unless someone else knows a way of listing the 4 numbers more or less vertically, but without the dots after the numbers, perhaps following my original line of enquirey (adding space bar gaps to the original format). How would teb728's suggestion of using &nbsp work? (in the original format) What is &nbsp and its code-method of use? Approximate vertical allignment, only, is sufficient - something better than my original. - Yes, I know, a very minor concern! I ask, just in case, to compare with Gadget's improvement. Otherwise, the present form will do fine! April8 (talk) 20:19, 25 November 2012 (UTC)

I've done it - found the &nbsp code (Template:Space). I think its great now - should be approx. vertical for all wikipedia users (I think/hope). Thanks a lot April8 (talk) 20:57, 25 November 2012 (UTC)

Not sure why you are hung up on the periods. Without being an ordered list, it will sound odd to our visually impaired using a screen readers. --— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk 21:33, 25 November 2012 (UTC)

Just aesthetics - it's a minor template anyway, so I doubt screen reading programs would be much of a problem. Wouldn't they read it, anyway, as "1 Atzilut, 2 Beriah..", rather unambiguous? I'll copy this whole thread discussion to the template's talk page, once it has run its course, for future reference - in case others disagree. April8 (talk) 21:56, 25 November 2012 (UTC)

I've seen sense and reverted back to your version, Gadget! Yours was actually aesthetically better, more alligned, and more compact - I needed to try all options before my mind was settled. But even more importantly, in my version, the vertical allignment of the list broke down in the template's placement on constituent pages...Each line moved all over the place! Result-Thanks. Now I can get back to more useful wikipedia work! Seeing as my version didn't work, there'll be no need for me to paste this discussion on the template's talk page. P.S. In relation to your name, do you know what a Widget is over here in England? It's an even better version of your name. April8 (talk) 22:52, 25 November 2012 (UTC)

Quick edits

I just edited the headline which mimicked the Chinese which said ... sorry... tired.. does it look good?

Which article?— Vchimpanzee · talk · contributions · 21:40, 28 November 2012 (UTC)

173.200.183.146‎, not sure how your question ended up here, but Portal:Current events/2012 November 27 still has your edit. Thank you.— Vchimpanzee · talk · contributions · 21:52, 28 November 2012 (UTC)