Wikipedia:Help desk/Archives/2007 June 24

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[edit] June 24

[edit] Good Article Icon

I seem to remember an icon that was placed in the top right corner of good articles, the same way the featured article star is. Did we get rid of it, or did it never exist and I don't know what I'm talking about? --(Review Me) R ParlateContribs@ (Let's Go Yankees!) 00:06, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

Apparently so... Look at WT:GA. I think they are trying to re-do it. Apparently, it was stopped because the GA system was broken, but now there's an assessment/backlog clearing drive to improve it. Evilclown93(talk) 00:12, 24 June 2007 (UTC)
Look at this [TfD debate]. Evilclown93(talk) 00:14, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Deleting a Line

I noticed a line in an article that (in my opinion) does not speak about the topic. Is it better to ask for a concensus in the talk page first or to just go ahead and delete it with an editing summary?

Well, I always think its best to delete first only if you think it won't cause much controversy. If you think your change will be reverted, starting an editing war, or if you aren't sure, leave a talk page message to be safe. Charlie-talk to me-what I've done 00:30, 24 June 2007 (UTC)
Thanks for the quick responseZ1720 00:32, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Overly technical information

I think I remember seeing this in the past, but is there a policy/guideline detailing what to do with over specialized information? (For example: highly detailed, technical information on a subject that the average reader would not understand and just confuse them) Michael Greiner 00:58, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:Make technical articles accessible. You can add {{confusing}}. PrimeHunter 01:42, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] WikiProject Pokemon

How do I contribute to Wikiproject Pokemon? (LatiRider 03:47, 24 June 2007 (UTC))

Edit any Pokemon article constructively. You could also formally join WP:POKE by adding their category to your user page or adding your name to their members list if they have one. --tjstrf talk 03:49, 24 June 2007 (UTC)
See Wikipedia:WikiProject Pokémon. -- Kesh 03:50, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] @@

I noticed on the Phione article that there is a @@ right below the links may I remove it or shold it be there? (LatiRider 03:53, 24 June 2007 (UTC))

I've gone ahead and done that. Probably just a typo. -- Kesh 03:55, 24 June 2007 (UTC)
Yep, that shouldn't have been there. By the way, you can feel free to be bold and remove anything you think is a simple error on a page. If it turns out it wasn't, someone can always revert you. No need to ask us about every change you want to make. --tjstrf talk 04:07, 24 June 2007 (UTC)
It was added by a bot [1] but I agree it looks like an error. I will inform the bot owner. PrimeHunter 04:14, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Saving

Am I allowed to save pictures of wikipedia and use them personaly (eg. MS Paint)? (LatiRider 04:04, 24 June 2007 (UTC))

No, images uploaded are only for use with Wikipedia. See WP:NOT#WEBSPACE. -- Kesh 04:07, 24 June 2007 (UTC)
I think Kesh misunderstood your question. Nobody is going to stop you from saving images off of Wikipedia and using them for your forum avatar or whatever. (What Kesh says is correct, but it relates to using Wikipedia to host your personal images, like you might use Photobucket or something. You shouldn't do that.) --tjstrf talk 04:10, 24 June 2007 (UTC)
Right, I may have misread the question. -- Kesh 04:14, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] How to add copyrights for pictures

How do I add the copyrights for my pictures? Also I have contacted the man from whom I received the pictures, which I added. --Seantkane 04:23, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

Thank you for uploading images here, you need to choose an appropriate copyright tag among those listed at Wikipedia:Image copyright tags/All. Please see also Wikipedia:Image copyright tags#Guidelines for detailed instructions. Peacent 04:23, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Help Desk on Navigation

Could You put a link to the Help Desk on the navigation box to the left so people could directly link to this page if they had a question? (LatiRider 04:16, 24 June 2007 (UTC))

I certainly can't. If there is a way, you'd need to be an administrator at the least and possibly a developer to make the change. As is, we link to Help:Contents, which I assume is where most people get to this page from. Good idea though. --tjstrf talk 04:28, 24 June 2007 (UTC)
Which navigation box are you referring to? Is it the one below the Wikipedia logo at the top left of all pages? PrimeHunter 04:33, 24 June 2007 (UTC)
He might be on a different skin. --tjstrf talk 04:35, 24 June 2007 (UTC)
LatiRider has changed right to left.[2] No answer to which navigation box so I guess it was the one below the logo (a lot of pages have additional navigation boxes within the page text). There are people who are able to edit that box, but I think the "Help" link to Help:Contents in the interaction box below it is sufficient. PrimeHunter 05:19, 24 June 2007 (UTC)
The Help link is sufficient for users who have enough experience to use it properly. Perhaps a skin for new users who intend to edit could add a toolbox link: "Ask for help with editing this page" which would open an edit window to the Help desk pre-filled with a link to the originating page, and four tildes to generate the user's signature. That would address the two most essential items most new users omit from their Help desk questions. (There could also be a skin for new users who only intend to read Wikipedia, with extra features to support that.) --Teratornis 16:06, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Rotate images

How do I rotate images. I posted 3 images to wiki, they were properly oriented on my computer but wiki went with an old file and has em upside down?

wiki upload help was NO Help. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.81.77.117 (talk)

Hmm... did you save the images on your computer after you had rotated them? Charlie-talk to me-what I've done 05:24, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Bot?

I noticed in one of my question's answers that someon said a bot placed something, although it was removed. Anyway, what is a bot? PS:sorry for asking so many questions. (LatiRider 04:38, 24 June 2007 (UTC))

No big deal. Take a look at WP:BOT. ~ Wikihermit 04:41, 24 June 2007 (UTC)
You might see also Internet bot, perhaps the article could give you a clear definition. Peacent 04:44, 24 June 2007 (UTC)
For even more details: User:John Broughton/Editor's Index to Wikipedia#Bot. --Teratornis 13:29, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Prounciation

Could you add a prounciation to some names? LatiRider 05:01, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

We are creeping up on 2 million articles. Quite a number provide pronuciations for names and words; others don't. If you find a name that you think needs pronunciation guidance, you can add that detail yourself as this is the free ancyclopedia that anyone can edit and all the content is added by volunteers just like you. Please see Wikipedia:Manual of Style (pronunciation) if you have the ability and desire to add this material yourself. If not, and you want to request this for a particular article, go to that article's talk page and suggest it.--Fuhghettaboutit 05:41, 24 June 2007 (UTC)
Wiktionary has pronunciations for some words. You can easily link a Wikipedia article to the corresponding Wiktionary article (if one exists) by placing the {{Wiktionary}} template in the Wikipedia article's External links section. For example, see this in action in: Hospital#External links. --Teratornis 13:26, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Page history

It is really strange because my past few edits are not showing up in the page history. I've reverted some vandalism on Talk:Main Page, (thought I did anyway) warned the user only to find there was another warning for the same vandalism I thought I reverted. Checked the page history, there was no edits by Spebi. Any ideas what is going on? +spebi ~ 05:27, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

Someone probably beat you to the punch. If two editors revert vandalism at the same time, whoever got in first gets the History note. The second revert doesn't go through, as it's already completed. This happens a lot on frequently watched pages (like Main). Had it happen to me twice today while monitoring Special:Recentchanges. -- Kesh 05:29, 24 June 2007 (UTC)
Ahhhh, all clear now. Thanks ;) +spebi ~ 05:32, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] sound card

my souond card didn't work in red hat 7.what is do?

The Wikipedia Help Desk is only for asking questions about Wikipedia only as stated at the top. Ask your question at the reference desk for computers here. Thanks. --Hdt83 Chat 06:37, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] any engineering subject

I NEED SOME INFORMATION ABOUT THIS FIELD. PLESE SEND ME ALL THE INFORMATION BY E-MAIL.(<email removed>)

Hi. This is an encyclopedia so we have lots of articles on engineering topics. Please see Category:Engineering. We don't email people with information and it's a bad idea to publicly post your email address here unless you love receiving spam. If you have a specific engineering question, please ask it at the reference desk. This page is for questions about how to use Wikipedia.--Fuhghettaboutit 07:28, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Changing the name of an article

The name of the page I created is "Doctor of nursing practice" but I want it to read "Doctor of Nursing Practice" with the n in nursing and the p in practice capitalized. How do I change this?

Thanks, (<email removed>)

You need to move the page to a new title "Doctor of Nursing Practice". Click the "move" tab next to edit, history, and follow the instructions there. - Zeibura (Talk) 09:56, 24 June 2007 (UTC)
1.) If you're not logged in or just recently opened your account, you may not be able to move an article at all.
2.) In the case of this article, there already exists a redirect from Doctor of Nursing Practice to Doctor of Nursing Science. So you can either work at the article on Doctor of Nursing Science (and whoever enters "Doctor of Nursing Practice" will be redirected to your work). Or, if you believe that "Doctor of Nursing Science" and "Doctor of Nursing Practice" are actually not the same (as also stated in the article) and (!) should be dealt with in two articles, then you can enter an article onto "Doctor of Nursing Practice"; it's not just possible to "move" the article you created onto an existing redirect--please either ask an administrator (e.g., you can do this on this page), or more simply, since you have been the only author so far, you can also just copy-paste your article onto the redirect (see before); in this case, please also adapt the "Doctor of Nursing Science", indicating that there is a separate article for the Doctor of Nursing Practice. - Either way, the original article "name" (lemma) without the capitalized letters [namely Doctor of nursing practice] should be deleted if you've finished moving your text: You can request deletion by placing {{delete}} into the article text; please make sure to explain that you've relocated the content.
Generally, I would also like to recommend the articles Wikipedia:How to write a great article and Wikipedia:Tutorial to you; they may give you a few new ideas about formatting etc. Hope this helps! :o) --Ibn Battuta 10:35, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] delete image that claims to be "fair use"

Can someone tell me what's the right procedure to request deletion of a "fair use" image without rationale of use? [The claim that those images will be deleted after 7 days is a pretty empty threat if we look around...] Which tag should I use? Do I have to put it somewhere up for deletion? (Where?) ...

I'm talking about this image, whose uploader has agreed to the deletion since the image was uploaded years ago when no free images were yet available (unfortunately, the comments are in German...). Today, we have enough free images on the Commons and further images on other Wikipedias, and the only remaining article that uses the image is postage stamp design--and there should likewise be plenty free images of postage stamps illustrating the same thing; consequently, a request for a rationale on the talk page of the article has not been answered for four weeks.

In short: I think there's no doubt that this fair-use image should be deleted because there are enough free images displaying the same, and I just wonder how to proceed from here. Thanks, Ibn Battuta 10:26, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

Sounds like you have a fair-use image than can be replaced by a free one. In this case, you should tag it with {{subst:rfu}}. See WP:IFD for more information. Charlie-talk to me-what I've done 10:33, 24 June 2007 (UTC)
Right on target--thanks a lot! --Ibn Battuta 10:41, 24 June 2007 (UTC)


[edit] Crossings Out

Just wondering why all the latest comments at Talk:L. Paul Bremer have a line drawn through them? I added a comment to the page querying this, and it too appeared with a line drawn through it! What's going on? Colin4C 11:17, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

Fixed it. Someone tried to strike out one word but didn't close the XHTML tags, so it struck out everything from that word onwards. - Zeibura (Talk) 11:22, 24 June 2007 (UTC)
Thanks! Colin4C 11:37, 24 June 2007 (UTC)


[edit] Articles for Creation

Hello, I am trying to help in AfC, but I do not quite understand the instructions for what to do in the case of nonsense or a personal attack. Could someone please help? Thank you very much, Neranei 13:17, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia talk:Articles for creation is probably the best place to discuss it. I have no AfC experience. PrimeHunter 19:27, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] <noinclude></noinclude> tags

What do <noinclude></noinclude> tags do? Hallpriest9 (Talk | Archive) 18:52, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

They are for templates - when someone creates a template, and they put it into a page, everything on the template page is put on the other page. However, if some of the template is put in those tags, it is not put on the page. Also, the <includeonly></includeonly> tags include something when it is put on a page (known as transclusion) , but not when it is viewed on the template page. Stwalkerster talk 18:57, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Colors on my watchlist

What do those green or red numbers on my watchlist indicate? Dragon Smaug 19:07, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

They mean the number of letters added or taken away from the article. (Red is taken away, Green added) :) Stwalkerster talk 19:09, 24 June 2007 (UTC)
Thank you. :) Dragon Smaug 19:21, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] question about citing same source multiple times

In many articles, the same source may be used to support sentences in different parts of the article and it is appropriate to reference each one. I can use WP:CITE but then each reference to the same book or article is listed completely as a separate number in the references section. For example see the refs 1 and 2 in puberty. I cannot find the method to make subsequent uses of the same citation simply refer point to ref 1 where it is listed in full. Just point me to an example of a page that does it right and I can figure it out. I am also asking this question on the talk page of WP:CITE and will watch both places for answers. Thanks. alteripse 20:12, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:Footnotes#Citing a footnote more than once. PrimeHunter 20:39, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

Thanks, that does it. alteripse 20:52, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Help me please!

I've managed (accidently) to mess up the references for Aqua (band) while adding some extra. I'm still quite new and I'm not used to the coding for citing sources. I've tried and it's gone wrong. Frankly, I don't know what to do. Please would someone who know how to do this take a look at the article and do it properly. Escape Artist Swyer | Talk to me | Articles touched by my noodly appendage 20:13, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

I fixed it. Whenever you add in text citations, always be sure to place a {{reflist}} in the references section to make the references show up in the article. --Hdt83 Chat 20:34, 24 June 2007 (UTC)
Thanks Escape Artist Swyer | Talk to me | Articles touched by my noodly appendage 21:35, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] More of a comment than a question

Has anyone else noticed this rather flattering phenonemom: a)A wikipedia article is written based on some good online sources such as government and city-run webpages, museums etc. b)In true wikipedia style, the article improves beyond its original sources as more contributors add more good information. c)Then one day a few months later, you go back and check the original government sources to see that they are not dead links and find that they have realized their topic/town is on wikipedia and that our article is better than their website and they have now copied it nearly word for word.CindyBotalk 20:23, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

Not trying to be a buzzkill here, but if a formerly reliable source has changed its content to be no longer independent of Wikipedia's content, then it might not continue to count as a source. That would be like the Wikipedia article citing itself, although one might argue that the officials in charge of the government sites should be qualified to vouch for the content. --Teratornis 03:50, 25 June 2007 (UTC)
I was half thinking that myself, which was why I made the comment. From now on I'll add an additional reliable source when I see that the one in current use is citing us after we cited them. I've only seen it two or three times, but I'll bet it will start to happen more often.CindyBotalk 04:58, 25 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Resolution reduction so image complies with Wikipedia's non-free content policy

What resolution is wise to use when you reduce the resolution of an image so it will comply with Wikipedia's non-free content policy?

Thank you Akiramenai 20:45, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

I suppose that'll depend, a bit. Wikipedia's default image thumb size is something like 200 to 300 pixels wide, I think, so perhaps that's a good starting point? – Luna Santin (talk) 21:08, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Page Creation

Hey!  :-)

I can't figure out how to create a page and I've looked all over but I can't find a link or anything to creating a page. Please tell me how? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Taytot1995 (talk • contribs)

Type the name of your page in the Search box, or click a red link in any article. Then click the red text "You can create this page". HandigeHarry 21:38, 24 June 2007 (UTC)
See also WP:VFAQ#How do I create a new article?. PrimeHunter 22:16, 24 June 2007 (UTC)
Be warned that Wikipedia deletes several articles every minute for violating various policies and guidelines. (Just in the time you probably took to find the Help desk and type your question, a whole bunch of new articles from users like you got deleted. Ouch!) I'm not trying to be insulting here, but if you're having trouble finding pages such as Help:Creating a new page, maybe you haven't spent enough time reading the lengthy manuals yet to know how to create new articles that "stick." You might end up asking Why was my article deleted?. Before you sink a lot of time into editing, you might want to tell us about the article(s) you want to write, so we can advise you on how to avoid falling prey to the deletionists. --Teratornis 02:33, 25 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Software suggestion

How to suggest a change in the wiki software?

What I want is this: In my watchlist preferences I ticked "Hide bot edits from the watchlist" and I unticked "Expand watchlist to show all applicable changes". The result is that manual edits are hidden when they are superseded by a bot edit. I cannot imagine that this was intended, so I suggest to modify the software. HandigeHarry 21:37, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

You'll want to take that suggestion to the WP:Village pump. This page is only for questions about how things work right now, but there's a section on the VP about suggestions for changing the software itself. -- Kesh 22:19, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Link colours

I have noticed that some internal links here appear to be external links, with respect to the colour, and also that, on several image pages, the word "image" on the tab at the top of the page is red. What are the reasons for these anomalies? Hallpriest9 (Talk | Archive) 22:49, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

It may depend on what browser you are using. Here is the difference between Google.com (Wikipedia article) and Google.com (external link to the actual website). I see a funny box and arrow after the second link but not the first. I don't know what you see.
The image tab could be red if the image was uploaded recently without source information. A red tab at the top of the page, for "article", "discussion", "user page", whatever, means that nobody has edited that page yet. It's possible for an image to be uploaded on Wikipedia but nobody has edited the image page yet. YechielMan 23:11, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Help finding categories

I have difficulty finding an easy-to-use list of categories. At some point I stumbled on a searchable list of categories, but I have been unable to find it again, and lost my bookmark. WP:CAT frankly baffles me, and even the talk page is intimidating. -- Rob C (Alarob) 23:18, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

Perhaps you mean [3]? To get here, go to "special pages", then "All pages", then select the category namespace. -- Rick Block (talk) 23:28, 24 June 2007 (UTC)
That's it! Thanks for showing me how to navigate there. -- Rob C (Alarob) 23:49, 24 June 2007 (UTC)
In case you don't know, it's possible to search in the whole category name by clicking Search below the normal search box to the left and then use the search box at the bottom with Category checked and the rest unchecked. PrimeHunter 00:27, 25 June 2007 (UTC)
You can also search Wikipedia categories with Google. You can remember useful search URLs by adding them to your user page (see mine at User:Teratornis#Useful searches). --Teratornis 02:15, 25 June 2007 (UTC)