Wikipedia:Help desk/Archives/2014 August 31

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August 31

Help! Edits not showing up!

After I make the edit, and,am prompted to give a reason and then save, I do so...but the edit is NOT then saved to page. Help? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Johnsgirl84 (talk • contribs) 10:30, 31 August 2014 (UTC)

What page are you having difficulties with. You have made many edits to John Belushi and they are showing up. GB fan 11:43, 31 August 2014 (UTC)

Hi Johnsgirl84 If the edits in question are those you made to John Belushi, per above, then the issue may be that you are not seeing the successful changes after saving because you're being shown a cached version. To fix this, to the extent relevant, try bypassing your cache. Best regards--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 14:33, 31 August 2014 (UTC)

@Johnsgirl84: One of your edits added a line of text inside a pair of <ref>...</ref> tags. The text you added is showing up, but it is down in reference 14 where you may not have expected it. -- John of Reading (talk) 16:56, 31 August 2014 (UTC)

Permanent link to a reference

To get the full effect please read through this before you click on any of the external links. The Asuilaak (or Inuktitut) Living Dictionary is used as a reference about 83 times on Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special%3ALinkSearch&target=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.livingdictionary.com. The problem is that most of them do not lead to the correct term. If I go to List of mammals of Nunavut there is a link to the start page of the dictionary. At Igloo (reference 1) and Inuksuk (reference 2) there are links to the term on the dictionary. However, clicking on those links will lead me to the start page on the dictionary and not to the word.

If, using "iglu" as an example you enter the site and type in iglu and search you get http://www.livingdictionary.com/search/viewResults.jsp?language=en&searchString=iglu&languageSet=all which has one English result and 156 Roman Inuktitut results. Click on the Roman Inuktitut link and then the first link that reads "iglu - [Roman Inuktitut] translates to: house house habitation snowhouse igloo sod house" and you are finally at the correct place. Now if you go back to inukshuk and click on reference 2 and you now end up on the correct page. And as far as I know most references to that site will now go to the correct page.

Next follow the "http://www.livingdictionary.com/search/viewResults.jsp?language=en&searchString=Muktuk&languageSet=all is linked from Muktuk" from Wikipedia's External links page above. It should give you the page for muktuk. Once you have done that go back and recheck the iglu and inukshuk and one of two things will happen. You will either get the correct page with muktuk in the search page. Or you get the Roman Inuktitut page, with muktuk in the search box, which has no entries. The English one has the entries.

By the way restarting the browser seems to reset all the links back to the opening page.

So, and about time I know, is there any way to link to the correct page on the dictionary each and every time and not being sent to the start page? CBWeather, Talk, Seal meat for supper? 14:27, 31 August 2014 (UTC)

I'm not seeing that at all, the links always go to the correct page for me. The term in the search box is irrelevant, that just sticks on the last term you entered (or was in the url of a link to a search results) until you do a new search. It has no effect on pages that are linked directly with an item id number. Can you give an example without any ifs or alternatives, just a list of exact actions that are guaranteeed to produce the wrong result? I suspect you may be having caching issues with your browser, see Wikipedia:Bypass your cache. SpinningSpark 15:35, 31 August 2014 (UTC)

OK. I started from scratch. Rebooted the computer (Windows 8) and following the instructions at Wikipedia:Bypass your cache#Cache clearing and disabling to clear the cache for both Firefox and Chrome. I then opened up the Inuksuk and Igloo pages followed the links in the references and got the dictionary start page. I closed one of the start page tabs and used the other to take me to http://www.livingdictionary.com/search/viewResults.jsp?language=en&searchString=iglu&languageSet=all. I then followed the Roman Inuktitut link to get to the iglu page and then to the correct page, which I then closed. I then reopened the igloo and inuksuk pages and followed the references and in both cases ended up at the correct listing. I then went to http://www.livingdictionary.com/search/viewResults.jsp?language=en&searchString=Muktuk&languageSet=all which sent me to the muktuk listing. I then went to http://www.livingdictionary.com/search/viewResults.jsp?resultsId=1195324950343ri and http://www.livingdictionary.com/search/viewResults.jsp?resultsId=1195320738343ri both of which returned me to the muktuk page.

After that I went to work and using one of the work computers on Windows XP with Firefox and Opera ran through the above with exactly the same results. As far as I know I have never used the work computer to vist Wikipedia or the dictionary and certainly not in Opera.

My laptop was at work so I followed the same steps as in the first secion using Firefox and Chrome on Windows 7. Another reboot and on Ubuntu 14.04 again with FF and Google. In both case the results were the same as above. Along the way I remembered User talk:BluesBlackDream#Nanook. They had made this edit to try and fix the problem. But it didn't work and they noticed that here. The problem can be duplicated and has be observed by at least one other person. CBWeather, Talk, Seal meat for supper? 04:34, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

Cookies. Living dictionary sets a cookie that identifies to it which font it should use when sending pages to your browser.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 11:30, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

Does that mean there is no way get directly to the page you want from here? CBWeather, Talk, Seal meat for supper? 17:44, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

It would seem so, at least until you have reset the cookie by clicking "Enter site". It seems the cookie is set to rapidly expire (session cookie). It would be possible for the site to remember the page you had requested while the font was being set but that is a problem for them to fix, not us. SpinningSpark 09:07, 2 September 2014 (UTC)

New page

How long does it take before a new page is published? I made a page, but it's still a draft?

It's this page: Draft:Kristina Shapran

Thank you! — Preceding unsigned comment added by LaraSophia (talk • contribs) 14:31, 31 August 2014 (UTC)

You didn't submit the draft. Try pasting {{subst:submit}} to the top of the draft. You might want to read about bare urls. --David Biddulph (talk) 14:38, 31 August 2014 (UTC)

changing my user

how can i change my user. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Iuliacirstea (talk • contribs)

@Iuliacirstea: Your user what? Username? If so, see Wikipedia:Changing username. Dismas|^(talk) 15:28, 31 August 2014 (UTC)

...or considering that you have made only three edits, create a fresh account. --Fauzan^{✆ talk}_{✉ mail} 06:44, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

Edit requests

I have a particular edit-request scenario which I can't find a template for.

We're working towards a consensus on an article and the proposed change would require adding a column to a very large table. The change would be tedious to complete as a manual edit and I'm sure someone, somewhere has an automated tool(s) to complete that type of edit more efficiently.

There are templates for requesting edits in situations where the page is protected or when an editor has a conflict of interest, but I can't find anything for edit requests in this situation. So, how do you make a request for an edit to a page in a case where you don't have the skills/tools/inclination to make the edit yourself? Sparkie82 (t•c) 20:20, 31 August 2014 (UTC)

First of all, this desk is not always the best place for technical requests, WP:VPT might be better. Adding a new column to a table is just a matter of adding an extra pipe character to each row. Most of the effort is in typing in all the data. How were you envisaging presenting the data to the automated process? At some stage the data has to be created by typing; you may as well type it straight into the table. If the table in question is the one in List of current United States Senators that is not so big. For a larger table and a pre-existing data set to incorporate, I might work on it in excel with formulas or macros, but for a small task like this it is more effort than it is worth. It is probably more effort than it is worth just to search for some pre-existing tool. Certainly a request template is inappropriate (even though it would be dead easy to make one). That is just asking someone else to do the work for you. SpinningSpark 10:15, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

I'm sorry, I didn't mean for this to sound like a technical question -- it's more of a general question about facilitating the division of labor when working on an article. Some editors are more skilled at certain tasks or prefer doing certain things. I may like reorganizing or rewriting articles, whereas someone else is really good at tables, or grammar. I have gone through each row of the table and researched a specific aspect of the content in one of the columns for each row because I like doing that and I'm good at it. Now it looks like the table needs a new column. I could manually go through the whole table to add the column, but there is probably someone else on WP who could do it more efficiently and who really likes to work on tables. The question is, how do I flag the article (or any article in this kind of situation in the future) for that type of request? The talk page is not viewed very frequently, so just placing a specific note there probably wouldn't work. Is there a template that says something like, "Hey, this article has a table that needs work, if you're good at table work..."?

(With regard to tools, I did a quick check before asking this question here and found some WYSIWYG table editors, but none that could insert a column, as you can in a spreadsheet. Your suggestion to convert it to a spreadsheet, work on it, then convert it back may be the best route to take, but for me to research and learn that sequence of tasks -- or any other semi-automated process would take longer than to manually edit the table, however, for someone who specializes in tables it would be a more trivial task.) Sparkie82 (t•c) 03:10, 2 September 2014 (UTC)

I did not reply directly to your request for a template because I don't think it is an appropriate thing to do. Maintenance templates are for highlighting something that needs fixing in an article, not for "I would like something added to this article but can't be asked to do it myself". The only template that is remotely relevant is the one that says this section should be expanded. You can of course create your own template; there are some generic notice templates that allow you to insert your own message. But as I say, I don't think it is a good idea to do it and I doubt very much that the template would get the result you desire. Most maintenance templates just sit there for years with no action. Asking for work on a table is a technical request. Another possibility is that Microsoft Word can be set up as your default editor or else there are tools to convert Word to Mediawiki. Word easily handles table operations of this sort. I don't know how well Word tables are imported into Mediawiki but I suspect that even if you had it all set up already there would still be more effort required in tinkering with the table appearance formatting to get that consistent than the effort required to enter the data directly in the first place. The task is just too small to interest anyone with the necessary skills. SpinningSpark 08:47, 2 September 2014 (UTC)

Edit reverted that I disagree with

See the last item on the Talk page for Tenure. I put it in originally with no documentation, it got reverted, I got it put back in with documentation, and it got reverted again by the same person. I don't agree with him and think that the documentation I cite supports what I wrote. Is there anything else I can do? Thank you. deisenbe (talk) 20:44, 31 August 2014 (UTC)

@Deisenbe: The thing that you DO NOT do is edit war so it is good that you came here.

While you have provided links in your proposed edit, you need to ensure that 1) you are accurately representing the sources, both in what they are presenting and the manner in which they are presenting it and 2) that the sites are authoritative sources for the claims they are presenting and 3) that any points of view being presented are in proportion with the mainstream academics views.

I see problems with all 3 points. in essence you are trying to place in the article as a fact in Wikipedia's voice, claims that have not been proven to be true and are still just theories, and are theories that are not widely held in the mainstream at all.

If my analysis is incorrect, then you should use the article's talk page to make your case and show why. -- TRPoD aka The Red Pen of Doom 03:24, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

Wikimedia Pageviews?

Is there a way to view pageviews for individual files uploaded to Wikimedia? I've uploaded a decent amount of photos to Wikimedia and I'd like to see if they are generating any activity. --Skarz (talk) 21:07, 31 August 2014 (UTC)

The process for seeing the pageviews for a Wikimedia file is the same as for a Wikipedia article. Go to the file's page, click on the "History" tab, then click on the words "Page view statistics". Maproom (talk) 21:32, 31 August 2014 (UTC)

However, the stats you get that way refer, it seems, only to direct accesses to the file's page on Commons. At least, that is my guess as to why the stats say that an article has had 200 hits in the last month, while the image at the top of that article has had only three hits. Maproom (talk) 21:38, 31 August 2014 (UTC)

Circular peridoc data charts

I am desperate to learn how to read circular periodic data chats and graph's. I've never seen a graph or chart like this I really need help in reading circular area peridoc data charts and graphs — Preceding unsigned comment added by 50.148.67.173 (talk) 23:06, 31 August 2014 (UTC)

This is the help desk for how to edit Wikipedia, not a tutoring service. You might try the reference desk to see if they can point you to some "charts and graphs for beginners" resources. -- TRPoD aka The Red Pen of Doom 03:15, 1 September 2014 (UTC)