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March 9

Centering an image in a table

Dear experts, In the article Port Pirie (Ellen Street) railway station I have placed an expandable panel titled "Port Pirie's six stations and the "multi-gauge muddle". I would like to centre the timeline graphic in the panel. I have searched extensively on how to do it, but I haven't succeeded. I'd appreciate your advice. Best wishes, SCHolar44 (talk) 00:01, 9 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Does this edit do the trick? --David Biddulph (talk) 00:09, 9 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Indeed it does, David. Thank you for helping me past another mental block ... :-/ Best wishes, SCHolar44 (talk) 00:12, 9 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

March 2020

I do not like it that HaeB is reverting my edits every month. It is not fair for the user. 68.195.141.2 (talk) 04:00, 9 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

It appears that multiple experienced editors disagree with many of your edits. Please start a discussion with one of them on their talk page to get details. You basically never adequately explain what you are trying to do, and I cannot figure it out. You should probably create an account and then create a user page where you can tell us what you are doing. It's possible that your contributions will be valuable if they are added in a different manner: I can't tell. -Arch dude (talk) 04:54, 9 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Remove my name and content about me on Wikipedia. Jim kahr

I do not accept this artist bio or photo page showing about myself. REMOVE the bio entry entirely and confirm. Jim kahr — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jimkaa (talk • contribs) 05:36, 9 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

(edit conflict) @Jimkaa: Hello, please provide a link to the article you refer to. The English Wikipedia does not appear to have an article in the name Jim Kahr. However, there is one at the German Wikipedia at [1]. Please note that Wikipedia is an encyclopedia which reports on what has been written about a subject in independent reliable sources. An article will be be very unlikely to be removed because the subject does not like it, with the proviso that the content must be properly supported. Eagleash (talk) 06:01, 9 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

@Jimkaa: we do not have an article named "Jim kahr". What article are you referring to? -Arch dude (talk) 06:02, 9 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

@Jimkaa: Are you referring to the article in German Wikipedia? I'm sorry, but if it is the case then we can't intervene in the German Wikipedia, and you might like to go to the German Wikipedia. If you knew German, you might consider suggesting ways to improve it. Besides, it really isn't that well sourced. If it were in the English Wikipedia it would probably be deleted as per the Biography deletion policy, but this is in the German wikipedia, which has its own rules. I went through the policy pages, and there does not seem to be a page about BLP PROD. That page cites only your webpage and therefore is considered unreliably sourced (and would probably fail the deletion process). What would you think can be improved? You might want to voice it out at the German help desk. If you don't know German, you might want to contact one of these editors. Thanks for coming! tLoM (The Lord of Math) (Message) 07:27, 9 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

@The Lord of Math: *rofl* Deleted by Biography deletion policy... Engwiki never ever would delete the article Jim Kahr so it was on Engwiki. YMMD. --Jack User (talk) 15:07, 11 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

@Jimkaa: You might also want to upload a better picture if you do not like that one. The picture must be licensed by the copyright holder (the photographer, not you) under the CC-BY-SA license. This requirement is why we have so many amateur pictures (like yours) instead of higher quality pictures. If you wish to pursue this, come back here when you have the picture on your computer and we can help with the rest of the process. -Arch dude (talk) 17:57, 9 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

O.k., I certainly cannot speak on behalf of the German Wikipedia, but since I have done my bit of editing there in the past and do think I understand the general rules, I'll give it a shot. @Jimkaa:

Generally, an article can be written on any person who is considered to be relevant through their achievements. So, you might even call it an honor that you are considered to be relevant.

Now before someone can be considered relevant, sufficient sources about this person must already exist. A Wikipedia article should not make any claims without being able to support them with a reliable source. This means that anything that will be said about you in this article has already been published elsewhere. Wikipedia will not publish private data, as you insinuate on your talk page.

There must be reliable sources to support any claims that are made in an article, the more so for an article about a living person. We have strict privacy rules for that, and if you find that unsourced private data has actually been published, please address one of the admins, and they will delete not only that information but also the versions of the article which include that private information.

As far as I can see, all the information in the article has already been published on your own website anyway. So to tell the truth, I can't quite see the reason for this commotion. What kind of "data privacy" do you expect for data that you yourself have published on your website for the whole world to see? --87.150.4.104 (talk) 22:49, 9 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

@Jimkaa: In my own opinion, I believe that "courtesy deletion" exists in (English Wikipedia) under the assumption that not much "encyclopaedic content" is lost. However, what are you dissatisfied with in the German page as it currently looks? I am against the deletion of that page, since relevant encyclopaedic material (and sources) are provided, but then you might raise it in accordance to the deletion policy. Keep in mind, there's a good chance it won't be deleted, but at least you'd have a chance to say what's wrong. Thanks. tLoM (The Lord of Math) (Message) 01:16, 10 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I am not aware of any "courtesy deletion" policy on the German Wikipedia. Things would obviously be different if the article contained libelous or slanderous material, but there is nothing of that. The article has independent sources by now, and it is written in a neutral style.

It did in fact sould like an advertising brochure when it was first written by a user who claimed to be Jim Kahr's web designer. So maybe it's the neutrality itself that the artist dislikes about the article? I am sorry but I am sure the English and the German Wikipedia agree that Wikipedia is not a platform for self-promotion.

As for the content, people should really think what they put out there in public before they put it out there. If you want your data to be private, don't publish it!

@Jimkaa, it would certainly be more helpful if you would participate in this discussion instead of keeping on deleting sourced material in the article. This is not going to get you anywhere. --87.150.4.146 (talk) 08:16, 10 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

The user has apparently changed his account name. Not sure how to send a global "ping" so he will find this discussion? --87.150.4.146 (talk) 13:10, 10 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

searching for specific non-alphanumeric characters

I am trying to perform a search for the superscript 2 character (²). Until someone edits it, this character is found in Template:Infobox Canada electoral district. Wikipedia style prefers this character be replaced by <sup>2</sup>. But before I fix Template:Infobox Canada electoral district, I was thinking, where else is this character? Based on Help:Searching#insource: it seems that the search string should be insource:/regexp/² or maybe insource:/regexp/\², but neither of those, and neither of insource:/² or insource:\² give any useful results. Is there a way to perform this search in Wikipedia, and if so, how? —Anomalocaris (talk) 07:05, 9 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

@Anomalocaris: I think the correct syntax would be insource:/²/, but that's not working for me. The search indexer may have been told that the ² character isn't important enough to be indexed. I've run a small part of an AWB database scan on a copy of Wikipedia from a week ago, and have placed the results at User:John of Reading/Sandbox. I guess the full list would have about 50,000 entries. Most of the matches seem to be km² or similar units. If you'd like to see the full list I can let the scan run and post the results for you. -- John of Reading (talk) 07:29, 9 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

John of Reading: Thanks for the info and for the database dump. —Anomalocaris (talk) 08:06, 9 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

@Anomalocaris: Note there are other mis-used characters out there, including: ³ ¼ ½ ¾ © ® ™ №, as well as the dreaded MOS:CURLY quotes.

—[AlanM1(talk)]— 08:17, 9 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Amrow Hijazi

Dear Support,

I wrote an article about myself Amrow Hijazi but it says it has a conflict with my post also.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Amrownu

Can you please advice because i want to publish it

Regards ...Amrow Hijazi... — Preceding unsigned comment added by Amrownu (talk • contribs) 09:06, 9 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

It is not allowed to use Wikipedia for personal advertising. JIP | Talk 12:59, 9 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

@Amrownu: Since that material is inappropriate for Wikipedia (see WP:NOT), you might want to find another venue on the web. See WP:OUT. -Arch dude (talk) 18:18, 9 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

HOW DO I PUBLISH MY BIO ON WIKIPEDIA

Dear Sir/Madam,

I would like to publish my biography on Wikipedia.

Please see the attached.

Please feel free to contact me on <e-mail address redacted>.

Thanks. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Dapow (talk • contribs) 11:07, 9 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

The advice against that is at WP:Autobiography. --David Biddulph (talk) 11:18, 9 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Problem acocunt

Hello, I have stumbled upon a newly made account that, based on its username and user page, is solely an advertising account. Can someone please look into this when they get a chance. The account is User:Investingwebsite. Thanks, EDG 543 (talk) 15:59, 9 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

EDG 543, I've tagged the user page for deletion, and reported the user at wp:aiv for being a promotional account. ~~ Alex Noble - talk 16:07, 9 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Hello (again). I stumbled upon yet another spam account: User:Yashikaaa. Can it please be removed? Also, is there a way I can deal with this besides this help desk? I feel like I might be doing this a lot in the future. Thanks, EDG 543 (talk) 16:33, 9 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

EDG 543, enable twinkle - it's in the gadgets section of your preferences.

This allows you to report to the noticeboards, and issue speedy deletion tags.

The instructions are at Wikipedia:Twinkle ~~ QRA: Alex Noble - talk 16:35, 9 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

@EDG 543: The correct place to report is WP:AIV. Twinkle makes that a bit easier, but is not required. —[AlanM1(talk)]— 00:11, 10 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

When are conflicts of interest declarations needed?

I noticed this recent edit at Anthropology [diff], which seemed to be trying to narrow the description of what falls within medical anthropology. The username matches a medical anthropologist, who has her own Wikipedia page (Alexandra Brewis Slade) and the account has only made three edits: the one above, one last October to the Alexandra Brewis Slade page, and just now to List of anthropologists.

The past edit was reverted long ago. My question concerns the two recent edits. I think the edit to Anthropology was done to more narrowly limit the description of medical anthropology to the research Dr. Brewis Slade undertakes. And, certainly, including one's own Wikipedia article on a list page is better done by request (even if accurate), no? Do both of these cases constitute a conflict of interest?

If so, should the list edit be reverted as well?

(Apologies for forgetting my sig!) --Pinchme123 (talk) 17:27, 9 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

@Pinchme123: In my opinion an explicit COI declaration by Alex Brewis Slade is needed, and the editor should be following the COI rules WP:COI, if the user is in fact Alexandra Brewis Slade. If the user is not this person, then the user must not use that user name (see WP:username -Arch dude (talk) 18:55, 9 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

@Arch dude: Thank you! I have added a note to their talk page stating as much ([diff]). --Pinchme123 (talk) 19:46, 9 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Need to edit page German Blue Max

Need to add Franz Buchner 40 victories. Aug 17 to wars end. Reference Wikipedia page on Franz Buchner.

I have his matchbox cover with his name cut into the medal. I would like to add a picture of this personal item he carried to his bio page. Can you help? Thanks (contact info redacted) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 173.186.229.178 (talk) 18:13, 9 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I don't have time to address this question, but I stumbled across this in passing, and have redacted some personal contact info. Just a note of explanation for why your contact info was removed: This is often unwise on a public page on Wikipedia, and we generally would never reply by email/phone. Someone will be along to answer your question here, on Wikipedia, in a while. --Floquenbeam (talk) 18:19, 9 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

You may take a picture of the matchbox cover and then upload it to Wikimedia Commons, (click "upload file" on any page or click Wikipedia:File Upload Wizard to start this process) and follow the instructions. license your picture under CC-BY-SA. You can then add it to the article. -Arch dude (talk) 18:38, 9 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I added Franz Büchner to the list in Pour le Mérite. -Arch dude (talk) 18:48, 9 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Farr's Law

I don't want to violate any Wikipedia rules, but shouldn't Farr's Law be an entry in Wikipedia? Farr's Law states that an epidemic usually follows a symmetrical curve that rises before subsiding. This paradigm has been used to map and study epidemic outbreaks such as AIDS, smallpox outbreaks and cattle disease.

Farr's Law of Epidemics was first formulated in 1840, and it states that the graphs of epidemics have a tendency to rise and fall in a symmetrical pattern, resembling a bell-shaped curve. William Farr was the first to propose that the forces controlling epidemics can be understood through scientific inquiry, which then may be expressed in mathematical terms. In the early 20th century, application of the theories set forth by John Brownlee enhanced the mathematical aspects of Farr's theory and suggested the bell curve configuration. Farr asserted that epidemics proceed in a pattern where new cases rise to a crest, which is then followed by a constant deceleration period. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Winslow Peck (talk • contribs) 20:07, 9 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

@Winslow Peck: based on [[2]] I think the topic is notable, but am unsure if it would be better as a standalone article or a subsection of the William Farr article. You could first approach it as a subsection, and after finishing decide if there's enough to warrant a "carve out" aka a standalone article. (Please remember to sign your posts on talk pages by typing four keyboard tildes like this: ~~~~. Or, you can use the [ reply ] button, which automatically signs posts.) TimTempleton ^(talk) ^(cont) 20:59, 9 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Afghanistan—Venezuela

Hi, my question is plain simple. Two men took oath of office in Afghanistan just like in Venezuela. Abdullah Abdullah is the disputed one, do you think I could start an "Afghan presidential crisis" or I'd just waste my time to it be quickly deleted? THank you. --CoryGlee (talk) 20:08, 9 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

CoryGlee Hello and welcome to the Teahouse. It all depends on the number of independent reliable sources that you have. If enough of them discuss this matter, it would merit an article. If you have sources, I doubt it would be quickly deleted. 331dot (talk) 20:44, 9 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

CoryGlee those are good questions. what is the name of the other contender? that might help us to evaluate this as a topic. thanks. --Sm8900 (talk) 22:59, 9 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Sm8900 Hi friend, they're Abdullah Abdullah and Ashraf Ghani, I might be starting a page with sources as said above but my English is not the best. --CoryGlee (talk) 11:03, 10 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia page display

Greetings! I created a wikipedia page but discovered it's not ranking on Google search engine but the direct link is going through. What can I do? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Opeinoluwa101 (talk • contribs) 21:48, 9 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Opeinoluwa101 Your article (not just "page") must first be patrolled by a New Page Patroller and then search engines must index the page, this takes time. There's nothing you can really do about it. 331dot (talk) 21:51, 9 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Complaint/rant

Russian Wikipedia is not independent. It regularly publishes untrue information about Ukraine and blocks Ukrainians who is trying to make changes. If you compare Ukrainian and English Wiki with Russian (about fascism, nationalism, folk heroes, Kobzon, etc.) you will see contradictions. Unfortunately I can't trust Wikipedia anymore. Therefore, I do not want to donate money to support a previously good resource. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 188.209.84.194 (talk) 23:32, 9 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

This is the help desk for the English Wikipedia. The Russian Wikipedia is a separate project with separate administration. Complaining here won't change anything there. If you believe the English and Ukrainian projects are less biased than the Russian one, then don't trust the Russian one. If you don't want to donate to the Russian project, then don't donate to Wikipedia at all: we don't really need the money. There may be a mechanism to complain to the Wikimedia Foundation, but I do not know what it is. -Arch dude (talk) 23:45, 9 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Hello, anonymous user. Although English Wikipedia is the largest project it is not the co-ordinator of the other language Wikipedias, as Arch dude says. The Wikimedia Foundation is the owner of these projects and the Meta Wiki is where discussion of issues such as you raise happens. For example, there was a recent lengthy discussion about similar issues concerning the Croatian Wiki there. You can try posting the above to the Wikimedia Forum. If the editors there can't help you, they can tell you where is the best place to ask your question. I hope this helps. Eggishorn (talk) (contrib) 15:06, 10 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia:Help desk/Archives/2020 March 9

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