Wikipedia:Help desk/Archives/2023 November 20

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November 20

Citing author names

Dear helpers, if I may call you so with all repect due, I have recently been challenged in my habits of how I describe authors when using Template:Cite book, Template:Sfn, or Template:Harvnb. On 6 November 2023 the venerable Trappist the monk intervened on the article 1st Irish Parliament of King Charles I and changed "{{Cite book|last=Mountmorres |first=Hervey Redmond Morres, Viscount" to "{{Cite book|author=Lord Mountmorres". We discussed this edit on his talk page and he convinced me that books' authors should be cited more or less as they appear on the book's title page, hence "Lord Mountmorres". Perhaps it should have been just "Mountmorres" as he also tells me to omit honoraria. This sometimes leads to results that might surprise. For example George Edward Cokayne appears as G. E. C. on the title pages of his many publications. He should therefore be cited as "G. E. C." and ranked under G rather than under C. Sometimes the author name is found at the end of a prefatory section, e.g. Carte's The Life of James Duke of Ormond has no author on its title page but "Tho. Carte" appears at the end of the dedication. I think it might be allowed to use this. Diaries often have the author's name in the title whereas an editor appears on the title page, e.g. Philippe de Courcillon appears in the title of his work Journal du Marquis de Dangeau as he also is Marquess of Dangeau. This simplifies to "Dangeau" as we omit honoraria. Similarly "Sir James Balfour Paul Lord Lyon King of Arms" reduces to "Paul, James Balfour", stripping the honoraria before and after his name. Sometimes I feel that we lose information when we strip in this way. We might expose ourselves to confusions with another James Paul who is not a Sir. Sometimes I do not know what to do when there is no author on the title page, e.g. Mémoires de la vie du comte de Grammont (1713), which I left under "Antoine Hamilton", even if the title page does not name him. I cite later editions where his name appears. See the article Antoine Hamilton where I have updated the source list according to these instructions. I should of course change author names in many other articles where I have put them wrongly.

Trappist the monk was quite sure of what he said but could not cite a guideline or Wikipedia instruction for it. Since then I found the excellent text WP:WikiProject Military history/Academy/Citations and references, which prescribes to use the title page saying: "Identifying the author of a work is essential for locating the work, and for identifying credibility. In all cases use the byline of the work, or the title page of the book." Unluckily this is not a Wikipedia guideline. Perhaps "use the byline or the title page" could be added in WP:CITE. It might have prevented me from taking unallowed liberties with author names.

Another change I probably need to make is to use "Cite encyclopedia" rather than "Cite web" for all the references to the Dictionary of Irish Biography, which I usually cite from the web page rather than from the print book.

With many thanks and best regards, Johannes Schade (talk) 22:13, 19 November 2023 (UTC)

@Johannes Schade: Hi there! Help talk:Citation Style 1‎ is the primary place to discuss these templates and their documentation. Trappist the monk is very active there. GoingBatty (talk) 22:32, 19 November 2023 (UTC)

I don't know that WT:CS1 is the place to discuss the peculiarities of aristocratic naming conventions and how such names should be cited. One can cite such authors without using cs1|2 templates. I stand by my primary position that author-names in citations should reflect the names as given on the title page of the cited work and generally, honoraria should not be part of the name. That is not a hard-and-fast-rule (nothing on wikipedia is); hence my choice of 'Lord Mountmorres' instead of simply 'Mountmorres'.

Yes, {{cite encyclopedia}} for Dictionary of Irish Biography even for the online edition. I'm rather surprised that there isn't a {{cite Dictionary of Irish Biography}} template...

—Trappist the monk (talk) 23:35, 19 November 2023 (UTC)

I would just like to throw in Lord Dunsany as an additional datum. {Ther poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 51.241.161.192 (talk) 05:19, 20 November 2023 (UTC)

Dear Trappist the monk, I am glad there is no template Cite Dictionary of Irish Biography. Do we need wrapper templates around {{Cite encyclopedia}} for all dictionaries of national biography. I do not know how many exist (such as American, Belgian, Dutch, French, German, UK, Welsh), but there are 195 countries on earth and many more languages and ethnies (e.g. the Basques, Catalans, and Cherokees) that possibly have or could create one or several such dictionaries. Thanks for replying here and best regards, Johannes Schade (talk) 08:06, 20 November 2023 (UTC)

You mean, like Template:GEC, for the Gran Enciclopèdia Catalana? Very useful. Mathglot (talk) 02:12, 22 November 2023 (UTC)

@Johannes Schade:Templates like {{DNB}} come into existence when someone thinks they will be useful, not as a matter of policy. We used {{DNB}} because we had a project to add all relevant DNB articles to Wikipedia. The template allowed us to do all sorts of neat stuff while working on the project. If anyone decides to make a project of adding some other encyclopedia to Wikipedia, a template makes sense. Otherwise, it's more trouble than it's worth. -Arch dude (talk) 21:19, 20 November 2023 (UTC)

Template code

Are there pages that list the code used to make templates like Template:Tree list or Template:Tree chart?
I would like to study them to make my own versions on my webserver.
Blocky44 (talk · contributions · sandbox) 03:01, 20 November 2023 (UTC)

The pages that you linked to? If you click on Edit or View source, you can see what was done. There may be some Lua modules involved for some templates, so you'd have to look at those too. —Tenryuu 🐲 ( 💬 • 📝 ) 04:56, 20 November 2023 (UTC)

Regarding Aubri Ibrag

Hello, I initially attempted to open a RfC discussion on Talk:Aubri Ibrag but decided to redirect my question here as the issue is not big enough to warrant that, at the recommendation of another user.

Copied:

An unregistered user (I assume it's the same user, but there are two IP addresses) keeps deleting this part of the Career section and with it, multiple sources.

Ibrag uploaded her first YouTube video, a makeup tutorial, in September 2015. Known for her beauty content, her YouTube channel gained over 500 thousand subscribers. She also signed with Chadwick Models. Ibrag deleted her YouTube videos in September 2021. In 2022, the Herald Sun named Ibrag one of Victoria's top social media influencers.

I think it should be on the page as it is all public information and includes a citation from The Herald Sun that bolsters the subject's notability. I feel like if I put it back up, it will just be taken down again. I don't quite know how to proceed while avoiding getting into an edit war and because the user in question is unregistered. Thoughts?

Thank you so much! I just felt slightly lost and wanted advice.

Starklinson (talk) 03:44, 20 November 2023 (UTC) Starklinson (talk) 03:44, 20 November 2023 (UTC)

The Herald Sun is a tabloid, and if it your lone source for something, especially a superlative, subjective sentiment like "top XYZ", there's a very good chance that it's WP:UNDUE and shouldn't be included, even with the inline qualification of the source. The other parts, I don't see a problem with, and they shouldn't be removed without further explanation. Remsense聊 03:56, 20 November 2023 (UTC)

References

I found possible content change without agreement in Hydrogen

A user named Grendon84 has tried to change the content inconsistently, in his recent disruption, he changed the phrase 'it has', to 'with' without seeking consensus. Can anyone attempt of restoring the good version back? I would care to receive feedback quickly from @Hoary, @Tenryuu, @ColinFine, and many more else remaining in this community. 2001:EE0:4BC7:CC30:B58E:E5C:90B0:54BE (talk) 11:45, 20 November 2023 (UTC)

There is no content change. There is a minor change to the wording. If this is important to you, then bring it up in a new thread at the foot of Talk:Hydrogen. -- Hoary (talk) 12:02, 20 November 2023 (UTC)

@Hoary, but anyway, it doesn't follow the consistency of an encyclopedia, though it is online or offline. I'd better suggest you and someone look through carefully and make changes wisely. Thank you. 2001:EE0:4BC7:CC30:B58E:E5C:90B0:54BE (talk) 12:09, 20 November 2023 (UTC)

I agree with Hoary. A project the size of Wikipedia is never going to be consistent. If you care about this and want to work on it, that's great; and if you can enrol some other editors to work with you, that's even better; but you're only going to do that by finding people who share your particular concern, not by saying "I suggest that somebody do something about this". ColinFine (talk) 12:32, 20 November 2023 (UTC)

Not me. It fails to interest me. Again, if the matter concerns you, then bring it up at Talk:Hydrogen. -- Hoary (talk) 12:20, 20 November 2023 (UTC)

@ColinFine, @Hoary, thanks for bringing it up. Far I have a deep research on this matter. But I'm up to this help desk to seek your points if you care about. Anyway, take care. 2001:EE0:4BC7:CC30:B58E:E5C:90B0:54BE (talk) 13:16, 20 November 2023 (UTC)

Any recommendation can be justified and revised. So no worries about it, guys. I only have a purpose of intending to collect your opinions if you are interested in. 2001:EE0:4BC7:CC30:B58E:E5C:90B0:54BE (talk) 13:19, 20 November 2023 (UTC)

Some consistency across articles would be good. But the effort of bringing it about would exceed the benefit – unless there's someone who would actually enjoy the work. Maproom (talk) 15:20, 20 November 2023 (UTC)

We do have consistency in this aspect for the lead sentence of what are a set of GA and FA on the elements. See the discussion after previous posts by this IP editor. I have restored the agreed consensus and would ask that if User:Grendon84 wishes to alter this then a proposal need to be made at WT:WikiProject_Elements. The IP editor should make any future requests about this sort of issue on my Talk Page, since I am aware of the background. Mike Turnbull (talk) 15:37, 20 November 2023 (UTC)

How do I change the title of an article?

I need help changing the title of my article to 2023 Port Phillip Bay Mid-Air Collision

User:Scammmy/Sample page Scammmy (talk) 11:46, 20 November 2023 (UTC)

Scammmy, guessing that Port Phillip Bay midair collisions are rare, I moved it to Draft:Port Phillip Bay midair collision. Hope that's OK with you. -- Hoary (talk) 12:07, 20 November 2023 (UTC)

Thanks mate (: Scammmy (talk) 20:45, 20 November 2023 (UTC)

Account recovery

I have been trying to log into my account for a number of times but can not login, please can you assist. 2A00:23C7:B080:F001:5B9D:96C1:1226:1262 (talk) 15:07, 20 November 2023 (UTC)

If your password is not working, and you did not have an email address in your account preferences, you will not be able to regain access. You may create a new account and identify it as a successor to your old account on its user page("I am User5678. I was previously User1234 but lost access"). 331dot (talk) 15:12, 20 November 2023 (UTC)

Any way to know where (sanitized) page hits come from?

I was adding a category to an article I had written some time ago and for some reason clicked on the statistics. This revealed a rather surprising and enormous uptick in page views late last year and earlier this. This is a page that got a few hits a day to one that was getting several hundred. Some might be attributed to Remembrance Day, as they started in October 2022, but the hits just kept coming for months.

Needless to say, I am kind of curious as to what happened. Perhaps an internal link from another popular article or "today in history" here on the wiki, or perhaps it was linked to in a story somewhere out there on the interwebs. Is there any sort of useful statistics, suitably sanitized, that might clear this up? Maury Markowitz (talk) 16:25, 20 November 2023 (UTC)

Maybe a document circulated within the Canadian Army? (I've tried Google and found nothing). Maproom (talk) 18:27, 20 November 2023 (UTC)

That was what I was thinking, maybe it was part of one of the courses at RMC or something. Maury Markowitz (talk) 19:15, 20 November 2023 (UTC)

@Maury Markowitz I saw something similar with one of "my" articles awhile back. I checked the edit history for someone who had made an edit during the spike, and thought I could always ask. It worked, turned out the answer was a reddit thread. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 18:33, 20 November 2023 (UTC)

I love trying to figure out what causes spikes. I've been seeing big upticks related to a topic appearing in the NYT's Connections game. Valereee (talk) 18:59, 20 November 2023 (UTC)

Compare Desktop and Mobile views. Desktop has a huge increase in a very specific period. Mobile remains very low with no spike in that period. Outside the period mobile has a typical ratio of total views. In the period it drops to around 0.1%. This is strong signs of non-human views from something on a desktop connection. It has happened to many articles. Some process or program somewhere keeps requesting the same page for whatever reason. PrimeHunter (talk) 20:53, 20 November 2023 (UTC)

Ah, Cleopatra. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 09:27, 21 November 2023 (UTC)

Oh, very interesting, both! So while tamarind appeared as a clue yesterday on Connections: spike at Tamarind, at least part of it might be caused by non-human views? There are a lot of hint sites, maybe that's part of it? The spikes tend not to be as big on the more-familiar words, though, and those are still included at the hint sites. Valereee (talk) 13:08, 21 November 2023 (UTC)

Tamarind has similar spikes for desktop and mobile views, and the size of the spike is plausible. It looks strongly like human views. PrimeHunter (talk) 15:06, 21 November 2023 (UTC)

Error on creating Template

I created a template - you can see it at the bottom of 68th Army Corps (Russia) - only I made a mistake with it, I cannot edit it as it "does not exist", I think I may have set it up with a different name so the edit link does not connect to it and have no idea how to fix it. Can anyone help ? Ânes-pur-sàng (talk) 17:32, 20 November 2023 (UTC)

@Ânes-pur-sàng: Fixed with this edit to the template's "name" parameter. -- John of Reading (talk) 17:52, 20 November 2023 (UTC)

Thanks Ânes-pur-sàng (talk) 17:57, 20 November 2023 (UTC)

List of Italian dishes

Can someone help me make the Italian dishes on this page italicised? There are really too many. JackkBrown (talk) 18:07, 20 November 2023 (UTC)

I can help you with this. I've already done a section of it. ThatOneWolf ^{(talk|contribs)} 18:17, 20 November 2023 (UTC)

@ThatOneWolf: thanks, with two people in ten minutes we can do it. JackkBrown (talk) 18:27, 20 November 2023 (UTC)

Unless you get into an edit conflict. Sungodtemple (talk • contribs) 18:30, 20 November 2023 (UTC)

@ThatOneWolf: please only edit the Italian part, and not the English part ("bacon" should not be rendered in italics). JackkBrown (talk) 19:05, 20 November 2023 (UTC)

Can we italicise Chocolate-covered bacon? That is quite alien. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 19:25, 20 November 2023 (UTC)

And it is with great pleasure that I announce the correction of the entire page; if you find any small errors left, please do not hesitate to correct them, thank you. JackkBrown (talk) 22:25, 20 November 2023 (UTC)

@JackkBrown: Yet again you are not showing the competence you claim on your talk page to possess:

1. Not all of the words you have italicised are considered non-English (e.g. ragu, pesto, panettone); and
2. You have been told several times on this Help Desk that the requirement for non-English words is to insert them in a {{lang}} template, not to simply italicise them as you have continued to carelessly do.

Bazza (talk) 22:31, 20 November 2023 (UTC)

@Bazza 7: it is humanly impossible to alone add the template you are talking about to about 5,000 food names. JackkBrown (talk) 22:44, 20 November 2023 (UTC)

@JackkBrown I hope you don't mind me inserting myself into this conversation, but I feel the need to say that it may be tedious and time-consuming, but it is not impossible. I don't know if it is desirable, but it is possible. Counterfeit Purses (talk) 00:00, 21 November 2023 (UTC)

@Counterfeit Purses: Well, how I take it as is he is saying that it is next to impossible to do that alone. While he didn't say next to impossible, that's basically what I'd take it to mean. It would just be way too tedious and time-consuming to do alone. ThatOneWolf ^{(talk|contribs)} 00:04, 21 November 2023 (UTC)

@Counterfeit Purses: fine, but who has the courage to do it? Not me, I have already done enough; the page was very bad before my intervention last evening and tonight. JackkBrown (talk) 00:06, 21 November 2023 (UTC)

Exactly. After all that work, you can't expect us to do even more. That's crazy and outrageous. ThatOneWolf ^{(talk|contribs)} 00:20, 21 November 2023 (UTC)

Idk it doesn't seem like that big of a task. You could copypaste each individual section into your word processor of choice, and do a global replace of * '' with * {{lang|it|, then all you'd need to do manually would be backspace over the closing apostrophes and type two curly brackets on each line before pasting it back into the source editor. You could setup a regex to do it in one go if you know the formatting. One section a day would be pretty easy to get through. Folly Mox (talk) 02:33, 21 November 2023 (UTC)

I have used regex to change all ''...'' to {{lang|it|...}}.[1] This assumes everything in italics is Italian. PrimeHunter (talk) 03:09, 21 November 2023 (UTC)

@PrimeHunter: yes, I can assure you that all the terms written in italics are Italian; I checked the whole page three times very very carefully. You have arrived at the right time, if you had arrived a short time ago you would have found problems. JackkBrown (talk) 03:26, 21 November 2023 (UTC)

Still needs checking though, I've removed {{lang}} from fried eggplant, i don't think either of these words are even assimilated Italian Jimfbleak - talk to me? 09:33, 21 November 2023 (UTC)

@Jimfbleak: Thanks. I've un{{lang}}ed quite a few words which are now common in everyday English; there may be more not so well-known in my version of English. And I've used English words for things not to do with Italy (other than as ingredients): WP:NOTDICTIONARY. Bazza (talk) 15:13, 21 November 2023 (UTC)

@ThatOneWolf This is a volunteer project. If you don't want to do something, don't do it. But if you do want to do something, I would hope that you would want to see it done correctly. And I would hope that if you do something incorrectly, you would help fix it. Counterfeit Purses (talk) 18:35, 21 November 2023 (UTC)

Can someone clarify something for me? I don't see anything wrong with @JackkBrown: asking for help, but this page is for questions about how to use Wikipedia. Where should someone ask for other editors to help them with something that is just a lot of work? Counterfeit Purses (talk) 18:39, 21 November 2023 (UTC)

@Counterfeit Purses: Honestly, I have no idea. ThatOneWolf ^{(talk|contribs)} 18:41, 21 November 2023 (UTC)

@ThatOneWolf I don't mean to be rude, but if you don't know the answer, why did you reply? Counterfeit Purses (talk) 18:51, 21 November 2023 (UTC)

Yea, I guess you do have a point. ThatOneWolf ^{(talk|contribs)} 18:59, 21 November 2023 (UTC)

@Counterfeit Purses I don't personally mind if someone asks such questions here in moderation, but alternatives may be related wikiprojects (per talkpage of article in question) or maybe Wikipedia:WikiProject Guild of Copy Editors. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 19:16, 21 November 2023 (UTC)

If this is brought to the GOCE, requesters are kindly reminded that they are allowed a maximum of two active requests at WP:GOCE/R. —Tenryuu 🐲 ( 💬 • 📝 ) 20:13, 21 November 2023 (UTC)