Wikipedia:Help desk/Archives/2012 October 19

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October 19

User page

How does X work?

I am new to Wikipedia, and I was wondering how to format your user page. I believe I messed mine up, and I don't see any way to edit it. Thanks,FatBaker (talk) 00:03, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

What is "X"? I removed a leading space in your post because it causes special formatting. It's the same at User:FatBaker. Click the "Edit" tab at top of the page to edit it. Please don't repeat your posts. If you don't see your saved edit then bypass your cache. PrimeHunter (talk) 00:08, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

Are you trying to center the text at the top? If so, use <center></center> around the stuff you want centered.

I also can assist you with your user page if you want. –– Anonymouse321 (talk • contribs) 00:22, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

"How does X work" is a copy+paste from the documentation page for {{Help me}} -- John of Reading (talk) 10:18, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

Rear blood types and % in each countries

I have arear blood type and would like to know the answer to my type of blood kind. I have A1 Rh NEGATIVE. What is the % of people living in each countries and world wide ? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 114.74.196.49 (talk) 02:31, 19 October 2012 (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. RudolfRed (talk) 02:38, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

(I'm guessing you mean "rare".) See Blood type#ABO and Rh distribution by country. That doesn't break down the subgroups of A; but ABO blood group system#A1 and A2 says 4/5 of As are A1, so you can adjust at least roughly. —Tamfang (talk) 05:27, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

Confirm my account

Please confirm my account. I may be the only person who has proof/evidence of this band. I have the first two album covers as well as pictures of the band members. This is not a joke. Please approve my request. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Slarsons (talk • contribs) 02:55, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

Your account should already have become autoconfirmed since you made this post (1 deleted edit is also counted). But if you may be the only person who has evidence of a band then it doesn't sound like it satisfies WP:BAND. PrimeHunter (talk) 03:30, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

But are you saying you want to upload the pictures to verify content in the article? Pictures are of no use for that. Content can be verified only by published reliable sources. And even then verification that the the band exists or existed is not a reason for article; the subjects of articles must be notable. —teb728 t c 17:58, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

Proposing content for the landing page

I'm wondering how editors can suggest or write the content that is featured on the homepage. Is there any guidance on this somewhere? What can I do to recommend something for the featured article, "In the News," or "Did you Know"? Thanks in advance. Keihatsu (talk) 03:54, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

See the box at top of Talk:Main Page. PrimeHunter (talk) 03:57, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

Aha! Thanks. Keihatsu (talk) 04:29, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

How to insert an image of the brand into a wikipedia page

I want to insert an image of the organisation/newspaper available on http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soan_Meeraas besides it how can i insert other pictures related to it into the said page location.I tried once but after few days it was deleted automatically. Please help with with this issue. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 117.254.218.221 (talk) 06:13, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

If the new image you are asking about is the official logo of Soan Meeraas you could tag it with {{non-free logo}} and use {{non-free use rationale logo}} for the required non-free use rational. As to the deleted pictures, we might be able to help you if you told us the exact name of the deleted file (or perhaps the account that you uploaded them from). —teb728 t c 09:31, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

Reinstate the list of Verizon FiOS TV Channels

Pretty please — Preceding unsigned comment added by Wakywakywakywaky (talk • contribs) 06:41, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

There has never been an article by that title. I assume there was such a list recently that was deleted, but it's very hard to locate a page's deletion detail without the exact title, including original capitalization, and without locating it and seeing exactly why and by what process it was deleted, it's very hard to comment substantively on its restoration.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 08:03, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

List of Verizon FiOS channels was deleted at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of DirecTV channels (2nd nomination). PrimeHunter (talk) 12:28, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

Actually, this is being addressed in detail at the proper place: Requests for Undeletion. --Orange Mike | Talk 15:57, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

Corrupt/Missing file from upload.wikimedia.org. How to fix?

A picture (specifically this one: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/0/09/Flag_of_South_Korea.svg/22px-Flag_of_South_Korea.svg.png) seems to be missing or corrupt, and it's not showing up on Wikipedia articles. I tried searching on Wikipedia commons, but the file won't show up at all. How can I fix this? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Unbal3 (talk • contribs) 07:01, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

I think you're looking for either File:22px-Flag of South Korea.svg.png (File:22px-Flag of South Korea.svg.png), which you've commented on at its deletion discussion, or File:Flag of South Korea.svg (). The url you used would be for an image with the name File:Flag of South Korea.svg/22px-Flag of South Korea.svg.png, which as far as I can tell has never existed here or at the Commons.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 07:55, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

There appears to be confusion as to how SVG images are rendered— I commented on the FfD page. ---— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk 10:06, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

Unbal3's url is correct. [[File:Flag of South Korea.svg|22px]] produces with that url. I personally see the image but many others don't. I have posted links to some of the discussions at Wikipedia:Files for deletion/2012 October 13#File:22px-Flag of South Korea.svg.png. PrimeHunter (talk) 12:25, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

Yesterday, it showed as a gray bar, now it appears properly for me. ---— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk 12:21, 20 October 2012 (UTC)

Images

Where can i find all wikipedia image files (not wikimedia commons)? Is there any such URL? Pass a Method talk 07:14, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

Hi Pass a Method. See Special:ListFiles and Special:AllPages (for this second one click on Namespace: and choose "File"). Cheers.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 07:39, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

Change Picture - violating our company rights

Dear Sir or madam,

the following picture is violating our company rights:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:BuLi-bottles.jpg

Please delete this. Thank you. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Collogial-1 (talk • contribs) 07:56, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

In any deletion discussion or request, you would need to be far more transparent than that and I think the reason why will be obvious to you if you give it some thought: Any anonymous person could then go to any image and say the same. You need to be specific about what rights are being violated. Are you/your company the owner of the copyright of the image? Who took it? Where was the image taken from? Etc. In any event, the image is no longer on the English Wikipedia, but is hosted at the Wikimedia Commons, a sister website. For deletion there, see Commons:Deletion policy, Speedy deletion and Commons:Deletion requests.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 08:23, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

Uploading images

When you upload an image, is it preferable to upload to commons or wikipedia? Pass a Method talk 08:21, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

It depends on the nature of the image and intended use. In general, if an image is in the public domain or under a free copyright license compatible with ours (see list of compatible licenses here and also this) it should always be uploaded to the Wikimedia Commons so all projects have access to it – once uploaded there it can be used here or at any other language Wikipedia or other project natively, using the same markup for local files, e.g. here, [[File:Name.XXX|thumb|caption text]]. However, if the image is non-free or incompatibly freely-licensed, it may be able to be used here as fair use if it meets some very strict conditions for the same and complies with the listing standards to evidence those conditions. Such images must be local; no non-free images can be uploaded to the Commons.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 08:35, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

Another class of images that must be uploaded locally is images that are in the public domain in the United States but not in the country of origin. —teb728 t c 18:12, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

Anonymous IP editor delete/wipe warnings on own talk page

Are IP editors allowed to wipe warnings on their own talk page? Are the warnings required to stay up for a period of time, or are they considered purge-able after reading? WP:UP#CMT suggests that they can as long as they leave shared IP templates alone. Is there a definitive answer to this question? I've searched everywhere and can't find anything concrete. (Looking at [1] in particular.) czar · · 10:04, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

There was a considerable furore about this at ANI not so long ago - the consensus seemed to be that, with the exception of IP templates and notices relating to active blocks and sanctions, IPs are allowed to blank talkpage messages in the same way as other users. I'll see if I can find the ANI thread for you. Yunshui 雲‍水 10:34, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

It was AN rather than ANI; the discussion is here. Yunshui 雲‍水 10:42, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

Thank you. I appreciate it. czar · · 16:18, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

My Username

Hi! I just created an account for myself yesterday, and I'm beginning to think my username is a little strange. Is there any way I can change my username and still keep my account? Thank you, FatBaker (talk) 14:35, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:Changing username. PrimeHunter (talk) 14:47, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

(I have removed the leading space from your question, which was causing it to display wrongly.)

I think it is difficult, or impossible, to change a username. But I see that none of your edits so far have been to actual articles – so why not just start again with a new one? Maproom (talk) 14:51, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

It is neither difficult nor impossible, but rather easy and convenient (which is pretty much the opposite of what you said). File a request at Wikipedia:Changing username, it will be added to the queue, and when one of the Bureaucrats gets to it, probably a day or two, it'll be changed. --Jayron32 18:04, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

Hacienda, CA

After a recent trip, I would like toadd rthe following:

Hacienda, CA is a vacation-home, unincorporated area on the Russian River. It is at the junction of River Road and Westside Road (38, 30', 31.2 N; -122, 55', 39.3 W; 19 mi east of Jenner, CA and 5 miles east of Guerneville, CA). Features if interest are the Hacienda Bridge across the Russian River, Barry's Market and a sand/gravel beach with delightful swimming. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 108.193.5.252 (talk) 17:45, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

Removed duplicate question --ColinFine (talk) 17:55, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

You are very welcome to improve the article Hacienda, California. But you should make sure that all the information you add is referenced to independent reliable sources: unreferenced information is liable to be removed. Also, remember that information should be written in a neutral manner: evaluative words like "delightful" should not be used unless quoting an independent source. --ColinFine (talk) 17:59, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

Here's a curiosity: the article is a stub about a ghost town in Alameda County, but it has coordinates for an apparently non-ghostly settlement of the same name in Sonoma County. —Tamfang (talk) 18:18, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

Sovereign Grace Baptists

I was noting on your page concerning 'Sovereign Grace Baptist' that you neglected to mention the Sovereign Grace Baptist Fellowship (USA). Information can be found at SGBF.com. The organization was founded in 2001 and is made up of churches from San Antonio, TX to Mechanicsvill, VA. 18:04, 19 October 2012 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 184.41.6.15 (talk)

If you have information that can be backed up by a neutral source, go ahead and add it. —Tamfang (talk) 18:59, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

A link to the official website for an organisation is one of the external links permitted by WP:EL. --ColinFine (talk) 22:42, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

BMO Bank

Im on the social media commitee for my bank - BMO - and we're looking at creating a Wikipedia page for our Corporate Finance Division. Can we set it up so that only certain people can make edits/contributions to it or is that not possible?

And would BMO qualify as a large enough company to write an article/page for?

Thanks — Preceding unsigned comment added by 198.96.180.245 (talk) 18:44, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

Please go read WP:What Wikipedia is not. —Tamfang (talk) 19:00, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

As to the second question: are you talking about BMO Harris Bank? —Tamfang (talk) 19:02, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

More likely the parent company Bank of Montreal. There is already a pretty extensive article about it at Wikipedia. Also, since you have a conflict of interest, you should tread lightly when editing the article: Because Wikipedia wishes to be a neutral source of information and not a vehicle for advertising, we ask that people who have an interest in promoting their company to avoid directly editing the article about it and instead make suggestions at the article talk page. In this case, suggestions for changes, with links to appropriate sources of information, can be made at Talk:Bank of Montreal (or the talk page of whatever Bank this is) and they will be incorporated if appropriate. --Jayron32 19:07, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

(edit conflict) For your first question, no. No one owns an article or decides who can edit an article or not (n.b. there are such things as protection locks that will prevent certain groups of people from editing but those are only because of reasons such as severe vandalism). For your second question, you should read Wikipedia:Notability (organizations and companies) to see if your bank would meet our notability requirements. Also, I suggest that you read WP:COI before creating such an article. SassyLilNugget (talk) 19:03, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

You may be under the misapprehension that Wikipedia is a Social networking service. It is not. --ColinFine (talk) 22:47, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

Is it an Orphan?

I believe an article to be an orphan, but can't be for sure. Does Wikipedia automatically flag these articles or do we have to manually do this? If the latter, is there a way to find if an article should be label as an orphan? Unknowntbeast (talk) 21:01, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

An article is usually considered an orphan if fewer than three other articles link to it (that is, if you click on "What links here" in the left-hand sidebar on the article page and the result shows fewer than three actual articles in the list—though there is a bit of room for interpretation). And yes, an orphan tag has to be added by hand, by inserting the template {{orphan}} at the top of the article. You can read all about it at Wikipedia:Orphan. Deor (talk) 21:19, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

problems with listing about refractive surgery

Dear Sir:

I am a prominent refractive surgeon in NYC. I received my MD from Columbia, completed my residency in ophthalmology at Harvard, and then did a Fellowship in Corneal Transplantation and Refractive Surgery at Emory under George Waring III, MD, one of the most famous refractive surgeons in the world, and Doyle Stulting, MD, PhD, the immediate Past President of www.ASCRS.org, which is the leading society of refractive surgeons in the world.

I am highly disturbed that there are numerous factual errors in your listing for laser vision correction. Your description of the various techniques is so incorrect that it is obvious that the majority of this information was posted by non-MDs.

While I do realize that "crowd sourcing" information may work well for an entry, on say, Lady Gaga, it is virtually impossible for laypeople to correctly report on the nuances of topics as technically complicated as LASIK, LASEK, PRK, epiLASEK, epiLASIK, CK, IntraLase, femptosecond laser, and ICL, for example.

In the past, I have spent time (like an hour) editing this listing to correct factual errors, only to find out a month later that some non-MD has edited over my work, and made parts of the listing again factually incorrect. Obviously, this is suboptimal, and doesn't exactly encourage me to do further edits, since they will probably be re-edited by non-MDs, making my effort a waste of time.

I am aware that there exists a mechanism whereby, for certain complex topics, you assign a "recognized expert" to police the listing, and prevent factual errors from cropping back up in said listing. If you do not currently have a MD who has completed a Fellowship in Refractive Surgery and is a member of ASCRS now serving in this function, I would be happy to volunteer for this position.

Although I specialize in LASEK, I have performed every possible refractive procedure myself that is available today and in the past (such as RK and AK), and pledge to keep this listing free from bias and editorial content. If you are not satisfied with my work, you can always remove me as editor.

I have had numerous Letters to the Editor published in the NY Times and other prominent publications, and received a perfect score on the English section of the GMAT, so you don't have to worry about my abilities regarding Standard Written English.

If you currently have a MD who meets the above criteria (which I feel are the minimum possible for responsible stewardship of this section), then please at least forward this email to him or her, so that I can hopefully collaborate with that MD to fix the many factual errors (e.g., where it says that in LASEK the epithelium isn't removed).

Today, over 1 million people per year are getting refractive surgery, and all are confused by the "alphabet soup" of possible procedures, and cannot determine the advantages and disadvantages of each, and look to your site to help them make an informed decision. It is a tragedy that they are now making such a vital decision in their lives with factually incorrect information.

Thanks, and I look forward to your hopefully positive response.

Sincerely,

Emil Chynn, MD Park Avenue Laser NYC 50.74.132.234 (talk) 21:03, 19 October 2012 (UTC) (this is a weird electronic signature; US law requires the last 4 of your SS #, btw):)

You misunderstand how Wikipedia works. It does not "assign a recognized expert to police the listing", and it does not rely on the personal knowledge of its contributors. Instead, the basis of Wikipedia is verifiability by including references to published reliable sources. Hopefully the links here will explain the process to you.- David Biddulph (talk) 21:18, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Take a look at WP:OWN and WP:EXPERT. Experts are very welcome to edit Wikipedia articles and their contributions are valued, but on their own merits, not on the qualifications of the person who made them. Wikipedia has no way of checking whether you are you, and will not do so. Nobody gets special privileges to decide content, no matter how genuine and disinterested their motives - the article's talk page is the place to discuss improvements with other editors and reach consensus, and there is a dispute resolution procedure to follow if this proves impossible. Looking back to see why your edits might have been reverted, I found this which may give a clue to what went wrong on at least one occasion. By the way, you have effectively identified yourself and your IP address here. If you are concerned about this information being public, WP:OVERSIGHT has instructions about how to get it removed. - Karenjc 21:31, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

advice Needed

I started to edit an article on York TMD but decided to transfer it to my sandbox as I felt the article needed expanding. I have expanded it to cover all of York's engine sheds and works and am close to publishing. Should I:

• Completely overwrite the original article and rename it as 'York's engine sheds and works' (York TMD is not really an appropriate title for the whole article)
• Create my article as a new article and just leave York TMD (thus providing some duplication on Wiki as some of this material is covered in the article)
• Create my article as a new article and remove all text from the york TMD bar a re-direct link to the new page.

--86.183.63.68 (talk) 21:49, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

You should overwrite the current article with your rewrite, and perhaps rename the article if you think that's appropriate. I would not recommend blanking the current article and creating a new article because you will lose the history from the current page. Moving the page will not only give the page a new title, but it will also leave the current history in tact and will automatically create a redirect. Scarce2 (talk) 00:40, 20 October 2012 (UTC)

IP talk page message

Hi I have no idea why I have received this message (below). I understand what it says. I added a sentance about a British person's activity while he was in Germany. I do not believe there is a recognised German version of English - or is there? Wenn Sie dass mir erklaeren koennten, wuerde das mir sehr gefallen, danke! Please can you explain exactly what I have done wrong. I have made one minor and uncontroversial addition to an entry based on information I had from a reputable (published) source and I included the reference. I thought Wikipedia was a good idea but if this will happen every time I won't bother in future. Many thanks. Chris

User talk:88.104.153.180From Wikipedia, the free encyclopediaJump to: navigation, search In a recent edit, you changed one or more words from one international variety of English to another. Because Wikipedia has readers from all over the world, our policy is to respect national varieties of English in Wikipedia articles.

For subjects exclusively related to Britain (for example, a famous British person), use British English. For something related to the United States in the same way, use American English. For something related to other English-speaking countries, such as Canada, Australia, or New Zealand, use the appropriate variety of English used there. If it is an international topic, use the same form of English the original author used.

In view of that, please don't change articles from one version of English to the other, even if you don't normally use the version the article is written in. Respect other people's versions of English. They in turn should respect yours. Other general guidelines on how Wikipedia articles are written can be found in the Wikipedia:Manual of Style. If you have any queries about all this, you can ask me on my talk page or you can visit the help desk. Thank you. - Trevor MacInnis (Contribs) 00:53, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

---

— Preceding unsigned comment added by 88.104.153.180 (talk) 22:48, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

Which edit are you referring to? The only one I can see in your history is at Analog hole. When you made your edit, you changed the spelling of the word "analog" in several places to "analogue". The message you received is saying that you should respect the alternate spelling. RudolfRed (talk) 23:02, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

Just realized the obvious. Since you don't have an account, it is likely that someone else had your IP address before and made the edit. You can avoid that problem by creating an account. Then, all of your edits will be attributable to you alone. See WP:ACCOUNT RudolfRed (talk) 23:03, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

As your quote shows, the message at User talk:88.104.153.180 is dated 1 October 2008. It was made in response to this edit the same day. Just ignore it. The box at the bottom of User talk:88.104.153.180 explains that some IP addresses change periodically. If an editor is not logged in then we register the IP address. If you want to avoid messages about edits made by somebody else who had the same IP address at the time then you can create an account. PrimeHunter (talk) 23:46, 19 October 2012 (UTC)