Wikipedia:Help desk/Archives/2022 November 13

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November 13

ing if you knew when it would be possible for me to edit semi-protected pages?

Thank you so much beforehand and hope you're having a wonderful day,

Lisa OSINTsparrow (talk) 02:33, 13 November 2022 (UTC)

Autoconfirmed requires 10 edits and 4 days' time. You registered ~2 days ago. —Jéské Couriano v^_^v ^{a little blue Bori} 02:35, 13 November 2022 (UTC)

Oh okay, thank you for confirming. Is it at all possible, or is there any process where I can appeal to be given access earlier? OSINTsparrow (talk) 03:57, 13 November 2022 (UTC)

@OSINTsparrow: You could technically apply for confirmed at WP:PERM/C (confirmed has the same userrights as autoconfirmed, but can be granted manually), however, it is unlikely that that would succeed. Victor Schmidt (talk) 07:32, 13 November 2022 (UTC)

[Edit Conflict] Wikipedia has no deadlines. If something seems so urgent to you that you want to be granted an unprecedented exception to the normal rules (which will not happen), it seems quite likely that you have a Conflict of interest in the subject concerned.

Instead, open a new section on the Talk page of the article in question, and place an Edit request for someone else to make the edit(s) you desire. Someone will then evaluate them and perform them, or not, as they judge appropriate.

Be sure to specify exactly what addition(s), change(s) or deletion(s) you are requesting, and provide one or more WP:Citations to Reliable sources to verify them. Good luck. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 5.64.163.219 (talk) 07:43, 13 November 2022 (UTC)

Oh okay, thank you. I understand. It was a topic on international law and it's related to noncombatant immunity. It's a controversial issue but it could be helpful to people in the international community given the current situation of security issues all over the world. OSINTsparrow (talk) 10:47, 13 November 2022 (UTC)

Irish Flag

The incorrect flag is showing for Irish Soccer players, it links you to the Northern Irish Soccer team. How would this be rectified?

Thanks — Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.16.120.100 (talk) 09:38, 13 November 2022 (UTC)

Please provide examples (linked) where you can see an issue. Note; that the flag can indicate the national team a player represents, which may not be their country of birth. (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.). Thank you. Eagleash (talk) 10:05, 13 November 2022 (UTC)

This may be connected to Template:Country data Ireland, where the history shows redirects earlier today, which have now been reverted. If you are still seeing the wrong flag you may need to bypass your cache or purge. - David Biddulph (talk) 10:50, 13 November 2022 (UTC)

Vandalized page :

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2004_Nazran_raid has spurious & fake rubbish about OHIO, USA on the top right-hand side column. 49.224.203.254 (talk) 19:34, 13 November 2022 (UTC)

Already dealt with. You can also undo vandalism yourself, by going to the page history tab, finding the offending edit, and clicking "undo". ■ ∃ Madeline ⇔ ∃ Part of me ; 19:37, 13 November 2022 (UTC)

IP address

If--for instance--, I edited Wikipedia without making an account, making my IP address visible. Could someone COPY THAT and figure out my exact geographic location or coo-ordinates? 79.79.114.74 (talk) 20:35, 13 November 2022 (UTC)

Hello. Please read Internet geolocation. Cullen328 (talk) 20:38, 13 November 2022 (UTC)

Your IP address geolocates to Sheffield in the UK. Cullen328 (talk) 20:41, 13 November 2022 (UTC)

NO!!!!!!! DELETE YOUR MESSAGE 79.79.114.74 (talk) 20:43, 13 November 2022 (UTC)

UK IP address geolocation tends to be fairly inaccurate. Particularly if it changes regularly. Mine is sometimes off by a couple of hundred miles. Though if you are really concerned about divulging such information,, you should note that any website you visit will get your IP, it is nothing unique to Wikipedia. AndyTheGrump (talk) 20:46, 13 November 2022 (UTC)

Time to quit the internet.

Dezhny. 79.79.114.74 (talk) 20:52, 13 November 2022 (UTC)

That's true, but not all websites use the IP as a user ID and make it publicly visible like Wikipedia does. This is one of the reasons that people are advised to make an account before editing on Wikipedia. CodeTalker (talk) 01:58, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

I suspect the OP was asking merely if the thing is possible, not requesting that somebody actually do it. Yes, anybody who knows how could have done it, but there are a lot of people who don't (I don't). But that's still a few steps away from having the information slapped up onto a Talk Page, so User:Cullen328, maybe that wasn't exactly cricket (as they say "over there"). Uporządnicki (talk) 17:01, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

AzseicsoK, when anyone clicks on an IP address, Wikipedia itself provides a handy one-click tool to geolocate the address. This is not a secret. As AndyTheGrump pointed out above, that could be as much as a couple hundred miles off. The solution is simple: anyone who edits Wikipedia and does not want their general physical location to be known should register an account, which only takes a few minutes and is free. And then never mention where they live. Personally, I do not care and freely disclose that I live in the beautiful and historic Gold Rush town of Grass Valley, California. Cullen328 (talk) 17:13, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

Well, it might not be a secret, but neither is every user informed of it. I had no idea until I read this, and now that I've read it, I have no idea what that one click might be (and I don't propose to find out). Uporządnicki (talk) 17:26, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

I sometimes find it useful here to guess what a post is about when it just says "the constitution" or something like that (it's usually American IP's who don't specify their country). PrimeHunter (talk) 21:38, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

a

how do I become an interface adminstratour Persura (talk) 21:06, 13 November 2022 (UTC)

Obviously you (as a brand new account) don't. Details are available at Wikipedia:Interface administrators. - David Biddulph (talk) 21:13, 13 November 2022 (UTC)

Really?...

I will reply to this exact message the day I become an interface admin, and will let you know. We'll then see who's talking.

Hard work will pay off. Persura (talk) 21:20, 13 November 2022 (UTC)

@Persura: not without humility will hard work pay off. Quisqualis (talk) 21:35, 13 November 2022 (UTC)

Persura, in order to become an interface administrator, you must first become a regular administrator. That normally requires at least a couple of years of productive, helpful editing across the encyclopedia, tens of thousands of edits, and a solid record of writing encyclopedia articles. There are only 11 interface administrators and they are highly trusted members of the community. Cullen328 (talk) 21:51, 13 November 2022 (UTC)

Persura So far, at least at this account, your one contribution to an actual encyclopedia article here has been to create a link--and an arguably superfluous one as well (you created it in a photo caption; the term was already linked at the beginning of the article). I do have to give you this much--you know how to do a pipe trick in a link). Your question is a little like walking into an Army Recruiting Station and declaring you want to enlist as a general. Uporządnicki (talk) 13:56, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

@AzseicsoK pretty much yeah. keep in mind some editors have volunteered here for 10+ years and aren't even regular admins. Club On a Sub 20 (talk) 16:55, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

Some of us have been here long enough to know they don't stand the slightest chance of ever becoming an admin. ;) AndyTheGrump (talk) 17:06, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

Others of us think they could become admins if they wanted, but have never applied, because the work they want to do on the encyclopaedia doesn't require the janitorial tools that admins have use of. ColinFine (talk) 23:46, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

AndyTheGrump, you could change your username to "AndyTheNiceGuy", or something like that. Cullen328 (talk) 19:30, 16 November 2022 (UTC)

Indexing issue

Hi there, anyone got any ideas as to why Caleb Finn is not indexed on Google? Not only doesn't it show when Googling the subject, even if you Google "Caleb Finn Wikipedia" it does not show. Some sort of glitch is preventing this. Any ideas? MaxnaCarta (talk) 21:34, 13 November 2022 (UTC)

It is indexed in Google (with or without adding extra word Wikipedia). - David Biddulph (talk) 21:40, 13 November 2022 (UTC)

It comes up third for me on Google, right after his TikTok and Instagram accounts. Cullen328 (talk) 21:44, 13 November 2022 (UTC)

In general anything about a mainspace page not showing up on Google is explained by either not being patrolled/younger than 90 days or "Not our circus, not our elephants". This falls under the latter as it was patrolled in September. My guess is Google's caching is still loading old results for you. —Jéské Couriano v^_^v ^{a little blue Bori} 21:57, 13 November 2022 (UTC)

Does MOS:SURNAME count after the initial section?

Hello! MOS:SURNAME states "After the initial mention, a person should generally be referred to by surname only". I thought this meant that you use the surname once in the initial first line in the article, and every use after should be just the surname. My edit here was reverted with the message "the lead doesn't count", but I couldn't find anywhere in the MOS that stated this. I want to make sure I don't make any mistakes on this in the future, so I wanted to be clear on if my edit was wrong, please? Thank you so much, have a great day! HeyElliott (talk) 23:47, 13 November 2022 (UTC)

Hi HeyElliott. Even though SURNAME doesn't explicitly state as much, it is often interpreted as such by many different editors. The first mention in the lead as well as any mention in the infobox seem to be treated like "mention zero" (my way of referring to them) in that they are like a part of the title of the page, whereas the first mention in the body of the article is treated as "mention one". This could because it's a convention followed by many print encyclopedias. I too have been reverted for something like this in the past; so, even though I wouldn't say your edit was technically wrong, I wouldn't suggest it's something worth getting into a serious argument over. If you look at some biography articles which are WP:FAs and WP:GAs, you'll find something similar being done in many of them; so, it's not something that is universally considered to be wrong. -- Marchjuly (talk) 08:10, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

@HeyElliott: Also, Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Lead section says: "The lead should identify the topic and summarize the body of the article with appropriate weight." We don't always repeat everything from the lead in the body but if a person is known by their full name then it seems natural to also give it in the body, especially at their birth. In this case it says: "Harrie Stewart Wilson Massey was born in Invermay, Victoria, Australia,[note 1] on 16 May 1908, the only child of Harrie Stewart Massey, a miner, and his wife Eleanor Elizabeth née Wilson". I definitely support this statement since it shows how all his names are from his parents including one from his mother. PrimeHunter (talk) 18:57, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

Thank you both so so much, I really appreciate it. I figured this was the case and it was one of those unspoken rules - I'll remember this in the future! Thank you again both, I hope y'all have a great day! HeyElliott (talk) 19:31, 14 November 2022 (UTC)