Wikipedia:Help desk/Archives/2013 June 30

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June 30

references help

The biography that I submitted has been turned down due to "footnotes" yet when I look at other similar biography post, I see nothing different in the way I have posted the information. In fact, we have more items than many. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Pointer22 (talk • contribs) 06:07, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

You haven't used any footnotes at all. You just have a bunch of links in a References section. You should read Referencing for Beginners to learn how to correctly use citations to support the facts in the article. There are a few other links in the rejection that might also help you, including a link to the AfC help desk. RudolfRed (talk) 06:21, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

Rudolf is correct. You need to identify which facts came from which references. Read the link he suggested. Dismas|^(talk) 14:17, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

chronology & geography section

hi

in the chronology & geography section table I find references as

Deussen (1000 or 800 – 500 BCE)

Ranade (1200 – 600 BCE)

Radhakrishnan (800 – 600 BCE).

I felt the date references are not correct. Searching for deussen,ranade & radhakrishnan existence, I find their period of living from 1800 to 1945.

please correct if necessary.

regards raman — Preceding unsigned comment added by 223.233.4.36 (talk) 09:15, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

I think this must be about the Upanishads article. The BCE dates given in the article are for the composition of the Upanishads, as proposed by various scholars. The much more recent dates you have given are for the lives of those scholars. Maproom (talk) 09:24, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

Write an Article for Wikipedia

Hi,

I just created an account here. I have to contribute a page to Wikipedia as part of my college project. Since topics are "grabbed" up by the minute, can I "reserve" a title while I am still in the process of writing the article, just so no one takes away the topic before I finish?

Thanks, Sri2907 — Preceding unsigned comment added by Sri2907 (talk • contribs) 13:09, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

You can not reserve a title. Anyone is welcome to start an article on any notable topic at any time. Before creating your first article, I would suggest you read Wikipedia:Your first article. GB fan 13:17, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

I don't know why you think topics are "grabbed up by the minute". I once decided to create an article on a certain topic, and did nothing about it for over two years. When I finally got round to creating it, the title was still unused. Maproom (talk) 14:03, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

There are many articles suggested all the time, surely not every one will be written in just a few months time. See WP:Requested articles for some inspiration. Dismas|^(talk) 14:14, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

hotcat not workng?

It appears that there is a problem with wp:hotcat. More here. Thanks in advance, XOttawahitech (talk) 13:14, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

This has been turned off by default - it was causing endless problems with new users attempting to communicate via categories. See WP:VPP#WP:HOTCAT on as a default. AndyTheGrump (talk) 13:20, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

You can turn it back on in the gadgets tab of your preferences. GB fan 13:22, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

<ec>You will need to enable it in your preferences rather than having it on by default. New users were seeing it as an editing interface and were creating paragraph-length categories in their attempts to communicate. However, it appears that the reversion to not-by-default has taken away HotCat from people (like me) who had it enabled. I just re-checked the Gadgets box and it came back. Acroterion (talk) 13:25, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

I had to turn it on initially - it was not turned on by default for me. Is this at all connected to the deployment of wp:visual editor? XOttawahitech (talk) 13:31, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

I don't think this has anything to do with visual editor. When it was shut off by default, everyone was shut off whether the editor turned it on or the software turned it on. There probably was no easy way to tell how the option had been turned on, so it was turned off for everyone. GB fan 13:39, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

Not connected to VE. A group of us got sick of the problems the other day and took it to the village pump and got it turned off by default. Too many new users thinking that is how you post and creating crazy categories, it was a problem. Expect a lot of people to ask about this for a while. Dennis Brown | 2¢ | WER 22:04, 1 July 2013 (UTC)

Student tax exemption

hi im 17 and i am starting a new job and my parents still claim me what should i claim on my W-4? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 208.54.36.210 (talk) 13:27, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

This page is a help page on how to use Wikipedia. We can not give advice on financial or legal matters. GB fan 13:34, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

• Unfortunately, there is not enough information on Wikipedia about US tax form W-4 to answer your question - hopefully someday someone will expand this area to provide a bit more information on this topic. Thanks for asking. XOttawahitech (talk) 19:07, 30 June 2013 (UTC)
  • @Ottawahitech: Actually, hopefully editors will continue to follow WP:NOTHOWTO and will let other websites handle the type of practical, detailed question asked above. -- John Broughton (♫♫) 01:47, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

I want to add a reference to the Wiki I am working on but it has been submitted for review/ used cite tool and cant use reference

I want to add a reference to the Wiki I am working on but it has been submitted for review/ used cite tool and cant use reference — Preceding unsigned comment added by Mark david lloyd (talk • contribs) 15:04, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

The article Mark Lloyd has not been submitted for review. Even if it had been, this would not prevent you from adding references to it. Maproom (talk) 16:16, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

Huge impediments to casual contributors

I do not understand why it has to be so difficult for casual contibutors to Wikipedia. I am sure I am not the only person who would like to make a small correction or contibution and runs into the huge impediment of the dearth of assistance and help info on simple editing let alone anything complex. I found it quite telling and sad that I had to do a google search for an external site to find out how to add a simple footnote to a Wikipedia article.

Those of us that are not frequent editors need easy access to the "how tos" of editing. However, on the edit pages there is not a single help link. The "talk" link does not count - you have to be familiar with wikipedia editing to know that the "talk" link leads to help pages. So I ended up spending a couple of hours on something that should have taken five minutes. Really was a waste of my time and not a good inducement to contribute.

ArtKocsis (talk) 15:48, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

I'm sorry that you've had a bad experience, and if only you'd waited about 2 days for the Visual Editor software to be enabled, it may have gone smoother. Since you're logged in, if you go to your preferences at the top, go to "gadgets" and select the "use visualeditor" checkbox and save it, you'll be able to use it. Hopefully that'll help you contribute easier :) Charmlet (talk) 17:41, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

All Wikipedia pages have a "Help" link in the left pane. The linked page includes: "see how to edit a page." PrimeHunter (talk) 22:51, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

Help is also linked at the button bar on top of the edit window and next to the buttons for save, preview, show changes at the bottom of the edit box. so three times on the edit page. Rmhermen (talk) 16:55, 1 July 2013 (UTC)

Jean Jack Russo

He was born in the Ermenoville, Armenian village and was called " crazy Armenian" by the people in the neighborhood . This is a well known fact of him being of Armenian descent. Please make changes to include this information as well in the wiki article. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2600:1012:B023:AB8D:D0F4:4DD:3A85:5A4 (talk) 18:06, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

I assume you mean Jean-Jacques Rousseau? If you know of any reliable independent sources confirming this version of events, please either add it to the article yourself, or leave a note, like you did here, on the talk page for the article. Thanks. Rojomoke (talk) 18:16, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

(ec) There isn't an article Jean Jack Russo, so which article are you referring to? Also, additions to Wikipedia need to be backed by reliable sources, doubly so if the person is still alive. If you can provide a source to support your changes, please leave a note on the article's talk page. RudolfRed (talk) 18:18, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

(edit conflict) You can request a specific edit or change by adding {{edit-semiprotected}} to your request on the article's talk page. Mlpearc (powwow) 18:21, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

Is the help documentation explaining the gadgets/preferences?

This is in regard to an earlier question. The advice given was to turn back on hotcat in the gadgets tab of ones preferences. I am leary of doing that since there is no way to isolate only the hotcat button without possibly changing other settings.

Is there documentation somewhere explaining the dozens different gadgets? Thanks in advance, XOttawahitech (talk) 19:00, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

Many of the gadgets at Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-gadgets have a link to documentation, for example "HotCat". PrimeHunter (talk) 22:40, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

I don't understand what you mean by "there is no way to isolate only the hotcat button". There is a specific checkbox that turns it on or off - nothing else is connected to that specific checkbox. Roger (Dodger67) (talk) 10:48, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

?

I'm using IE 8. Whenever I type http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/? into my browser, I'm sent to the Main Page instead of to ?, but http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=? takes me to the ? redirect just like it should. Any idea what's going on? I'm not sure whether to consider this a browser problem or a weird software issue here. Nyttend (talk) 19:33, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

I get it in Chrome and IE9 as well. I assume this may be a URL encoding issue with MediaWiki or something else software-side. If you use the URL encoding (which Chrome automatically produced when I went to the first title) of the ? character, it works fine with /wiki/%3F

You may ask at WP:VPT for more on this, I can't do much more than confirm the problem exists (I'm stupid at technical stuff). Charmlet (talk) 20:05, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for the input; I've reported it at VPT. Nyttend (talk) 20:21, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

Nah - it's normal. It's due to the way it MediaWiki formats URL's. Mdann52 (talk) 15:49, 1 July 2013 (UTC)

A Problem with words?

Hi i am a muslim and i am so sorry for west and americans editors and writers. you use a word"sunni islam" or "shia islam" this is compeletly wrong there can be a "sunni mulim" or "shia muslim"

other word need to change "islamist" it should be "islamic" i believe its west always believe they are right always but here they are wrong.

Thank you — Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.122.33.214 (talk) 19:38, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

"Sunni mulim". Got it. Cyphoidbomb (talk) 22:18, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

I don't know about Arabic or other languages but this is the English Wikipedia. Shia Islam and Sunni Islam are common English terms. And in English, Islamist has a meaning other than just Islamic. PrimeHunter (talk) 22:29, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

I am a cultural Christian, but I sympathise with 76 on this. Muslims express their belief in various ways, there are Sunni Muslims and Shia Muslims. But there is only one Islam. It is an error to qualify "Islam" with an adjective like "Sunni". I accept that this error is frequently made in English, just as people often write "loose" when they mean "lose". But it is better to avoid such errors. Maproom (talk) 18:41, 1 July 2013 (UTC)

If the reliable sources say "Sunni Islam" then Wikipedia will say it. Sorry. --ColinFine (talk) 20:55, 1 July 2013 (UTC)

Maproom: And even beyond the Wikipedia policy of following the usage of reliable sources, is there any logical difference between

1. distinguishing "Sunni Islam" from "Shia Islam" and
2. distinguishing "Catholic Christianity" from "Protestant Christianity", or as we usually say, "Catholicism" and "Protestantism"?

I don't think so. And as for "islamist/islamism", although the word has no unified definition, it pretty clearly means something distinct from "Islam", and many Muslim sources have used it. See the article. Thnidu (talk) 19:15, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

Hatnoting with template:about when you want to link to two articles?

Not sure how to explain this, but look at The Afghan Alphabet and you'll see what I mean. I want it to display like This article is about the 2002 documentary. For writing systems used in Afghanistan, see Persian alphabet and Pashto alphabet.-- Brainy J ~✿~ (talk) 20:49, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

 Done Charmlet (talk) 21:01, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

[edit conflict] Fixed. Go to Template:About and read its documentation; someone's written a wonderfully helpful documentation page that covers most or all of our hatnote templates. Fixing your problem took almost no time after I read it, even though I had no clue how to fix it until reading the documentation. Nyttend (talk) 21:09, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

Searching Backend error?

I noticed that if I start what I am searching for in the search box with a period (for example . abc)then the search returns "An error has occurred while searching: The search backend returned an error:" I know that this probably a case if "if it hurts when you do X, don't do X anymore", but that still seems wierd.

That does seeem wierd. I am not getting that error. If I search for .abc the search works and returns a page of results including .abc. RudolfRed (talk) 21:36, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

I get the error when there is a space after the period. It appears to happen when there is an isolated period anywhere in the search, for example . abc, a . b, abc . PrimeHunter (talk) 22:16, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

So who do I report it to, WP:VPT?Naraht (talk) 00:45, 1 July 2013 (UTC)

Yes, that's the place to start. RudolfRed (talk) 00:53, 1 July 2013 (UTC)

Thanx, I've posted there. (and just after I removed VPT from my watchlist. 1/2 :) ). Naraht (talk) 01:12, 1 July 2013 (UTC)