Wikipedia:Help desk

Welcome—ask questions about how to use or edit Wikipedia! (Am I in the right place?)

• For other types of questions, use the search box, see the reference desk or Help:Contents. If you have comments about a specific article, use that article's talk page.
• Do not provide your email address or any other contact information. Answers will be provided on this page only.
• If your question is about a Wikipedia article, draft article, or other page on Wikipedia, tell us what it is!
• Check back on this page to see if your question has been answered.
• For real-time help, use our IRC help channel, #wikipedia-en-help.
• New editors may prefer the Teahouse, a help area for beginners (but please don't ask in both places).

Ask a question

March 6

Wikipedia does not display correctly in my browser

I am using Firefox 3.0.7, and it simply doesn't display. I wonder if it is because I have some configuration unchecked.

George —Preceding unsigned comment added by 164.41.14.55 (talk) 18:50, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

TONY ALVA'S WIKIPEDIA

Hi there,

I handle much here for Alva Los Angeles and Tony Alva, I'm having trouble editing the external links, i'll edit it and a bit later it is deleted. This is what I would like my external links to look like:

• The Official Tony Alva website
• ALVA Official Myspace
• ALVA Official Twitter
• ALVA Official Facebook
• ALVA Official Wordpress
• ALVA Official Blogspot
• Skoundrelz Official website —Preceding unsigned comment added by Alva los angeles (talk • contribs) 00:01, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

I suggest that you read WP:ELNO, specifically items 5 and 10. The official-site link is OK in the Tony Alva article; but the next five appear to be to networking and/or commercial pages, and editors are correctly deleting them. (The Skoundrelz one appears to be a dead link.) Oh, and you should probably also read WP:USERNAME#Company/group names. —Deor (talk) 00:35, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Citation template trouble

Resolved

At Cimetidine, I tried to use the {{cite news}} template to format a malformed ref added by a new user (here's the diff). But instead of the title of the article appearing as a link to the cited page (i.e., Tagemet to Treat Herpes and Shingles), what shows up in the article is a linked url followed by an unlinked title, both enclosed in single square brackets—see footnote 3 in the article. I'm damned if I can figure out what I'm doing wrong. Can anyone enlighten me? Deor (talk) 00:15, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

I fixed it by removing a newline in the title. PrimeHunter (talk) 01:00, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Thanks. I was messing about with it while you were, and when I saw it display correctly, I thought that I had somehow fixed it! Deor (talk) 01:03, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Articles I would like others to take a look at

I often browse and make minor contributions to wikipedia, but occasionally come accross articles on subjects of which I lack specific knowledge, but which I believe are in urgent need of looking at. For instance I just came accross the article Olusegun Oni, which is in extreme need of wikification, assuming it meets notability criteria. Where is the best place to go to ask for help, when i would like somebody else to take a look at, or work on a specfic article? 79.67.228.216 (talk) 01:47, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

We encourage you to make any changes you think may help the article. I can't say I've ever run into a page where you can submit an article and say "can you fix this". As an all volunteer group of editors, we're kind of at the mercy of "who wants to work on this". Sometimes if you can find a category that the article may fit (see WP:CAT you could try to encourage some folks there to help. Also, if you are interested in doing some editing, sometime if you submit an article for peer review you can get some good feedback on what the article needs. Sorry I couldn't be more help than that. — Ched ~ ^(yes?) 02:31, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Many articles may be under the purview of a Wikipedia:WikiProject which may have people who are experts on the subject. I would suggest finding an appropriate WikiProject and notifying them of the article... --Jayron32.talk.contribs 02:37, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

You can also add maintenance tags to articles that need attention. Where a page needs wikifying, for example, you could add {{wikify}}. That lists the page automatically in the category Articles that need to be wikified, where people interested in that kind of work - including members of WikiProject Wikify - can find it.

There's also the {{Expert-subject}} tag, which when placed on an article includes it in lists of articles needing expert attention. If you replace the word "subject" in that tag with the article's subject, the template can sometimes suggest an associated WikiProject whose members might be able to help. Gonzonoir (talk) 09:04, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Mega Tribulus PM

What is the use of this Mega Tribulus PM for? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.98.195.46 (talk) 03:39, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Hello. This page is for questions about using WIkipedia. Please ask knowledge questions at an applicable section of the reference desk. However, Google is your friend (as is Wikipedia for looking up results once you find out stuff using Google, such as ingredients in supplements). A quick search that took a matter of seconds, shows this is apparently intended to be a dietary supplement containing tribulus as the main active ingredient which some claim to raise testosterone levels. Draw your own conclusions.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 04:17, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Live near SF and have an hour to help Wikipedia?

This link "Live near SF and have an hour to help Wikipedia?" sometimes appears at the top of pages. The link to it is "ethnio.show" that when I click, it does nothing because the javascript was badly designed and only works on maybe 1 web browser out of all the many varieties (this is very common that big companies do when they make javascript). I've noticed a trend where people who write webpages for large companies do not understand basic HTML, as proven by putting all simple a href links in javascript, and unfortunately now the problem of big companies has come to wikipedia which in the past has always had skilled web designers instead of the overpaid ones that do bad work. Well "ethnio" and anything related to "Live near SF and have an hour to help Wikipedia" do not appear in the HTML source, so it's hidden in one of the many style sheets.

Anyone know where the link "Live near SF and have an hour to help Wikipedia?" that merely goes to the nonfunctional "ethnio.show" is supposed to go? Are you ready for IPv6? (talk) 04:11, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

I must add to this point that I've also seen it and it appears only from time-to-time on the same webpage. At first I thought it would be an advertisement but it was just a dead link. Kazkaskazkasako (talk) 11:13, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Can you give an example of a page where it is or has been? PrimeHunter (talk) 11:31, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

It sometimes appears on about all pages when javascript is on, or it did last night. It says, "Live near SF and have an hour to help Wikipedia?" and then has a link that doesn't work. I live somewhat near san francisco and am interested in whatever the event was. Are you ready for IPv6? (talk) 20:59, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

I'll assume it's this? Could you provide a screenshot of the end-result? §hep^Talk 21:54, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

The banner you saw was indeed part of a central notice banner (as User:Stepshep mentioned) which integrates software provided by Ethnio, an online recruitment tool. Unfortunately our team has experienced a few small periods of time in which the banner was not completely functional, causing users to either get no response to clicking the "Lets do it!" button or receive errors when submitting the form which appears after clicking said button. At this point we believe these bugs have been worked out. We have tested the software on Windows, Mac and Linux in Firefox, IE, Safari and Opera where available, and have found the notice to be functional in all cases. The recruitment results so far have confirmed that the notice has been working on a large variety of browsers and platforms. Trevor Parscal (talk) 18:00, 18 March 2009 (UTC)

Please help! Another editor keeps reverting my corrected page.

I hope you can help me. I have been trying for days to get a corrected and expanded page on Kentucky author Gurney Norman posted, but another editor "Badagnani" keeps taking the page down and reverting to a previous page. The changes I am making are a result of an oral history interview with Prof. Norman at the University of Kentucky in February of this year. In that interview we specifically discussed the Wikipedia entry and he cited corrections, additions, and deletions (for personal reasons) that should be made. I posted the reference to the interview clearly on the page I posted but Badagnani took it down anyway. I don't know what to do. The changes made are strictly factual, confirmed directly by Prof. Norman. What else can I do? Is it necessary for Prof. Norman to contact you directly? At this point, it seems clear that if I repost the page, Badagnani will simply take it down again. I don't want to get into "edit warring," so I thought I would appeal to you for help before attempting to repost the page. What are the options here? Since Prof. Norman is a living person it does seem he should have the authority to correct biographical information on his page and remove personal information that he does not want revealed. This is my first experience with Wikipedia as an editor, and I'm really mystified. I would appreciate any help you can give me. Spudsparo (talk) 04:30, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Are you a journalist by any chance? Are you ready for IPv6? (talk) 04:48, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Click the "discussion" or "talk" link at the top of the Gurney Norman page. You'll see a link for "new section" appear. Click that. Explain the changes you want to make there. From what I can see, you are wiping the page and completely rewriting it without proper use of the references tags. Doing something in that fashion will normally get your edits immediately reverted (even if they are factually correct). -- kainaw™ 05:04, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

I'm sorry, I don't know what you mean by "you are wiping the page and completely rewriting it without proper use of the references tags." Isn't is okay to take out sentences that are incorrect? And to add additional information that is correct? I didn't change anything about the structure of the page. Can you help me understand a little more? Thanks

Your question is specific to the Gurney Norman page. Therefore, I directed you to the discussion page for that particular article where you can receive the help you are looking for. -- kainaw™ 05:25, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Am I correct in understanding that the interview has not been published? If so, it is original research and cannot be used in Wikipedia. Sorry, but all content in Wikipedia must be verifiable by a citation to a reliable published source. The threshold for inclusion in Wikipedia is not truth but verifiability. —teb728 t c 08:13, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

If you are new to Wikipedia, there are many basic concepts you must have before this site will make sense. Many of these concepts will seem alien because Wikipedia is unlike anything most people have experienced before. Consider that if you could go back in time ten years, you would not be able to convince anyone that a site like Wikipedia was possible or that it would work. The average person would ask "Do you mean that anybody can edit it?" and the conversation would stop there. What Wikipedia does by existing, and not turning quickly into complete garbage, seems like a miracle. Therefore it stands to reason that Wikipedia must operate on principles that most people cannot guess, but must rather learn. I strongly suggest you read Wikipedia: The Missing Manual, after which your experiences on Wikipedia thus far will make sense to you, and you will know what to do next. We can cite various policies and guidelines to you, but they may be difficult to understand in isolation, something like trying to grasp one narrow aspect of a foreign culture in a short time. To understand a foreign culture, one must immerse oneself in it for a while, and then the individual aspects of the culture will make more sense in the context of the culture as a whole. On Wikipedia, once you firmly understand the policies and guidelines that allow the site to thrive, the seemingly arbitrary actions of other editors who are following the rules will make sense. --Teratornis (talk) 09:21, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

One additional point, it's not your article. – ukexpat (talk) 14:42, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Adding a space in a template

As I'm about to go on vacation (real life, not just online :-) I decided to put {{Vacation3}} on my talk page, along with a short message. However, the message isn't displaying properly: there's no space between the end of the default message and the beginning of the extra one — the wording reads "He may pop in now and then from an available online source.And don't worry...", with no space after "source". I looked at the template, but I don't know how most template coding works, so in this case it would be foolish rather than bold to make a change. Can someone please recode the template so that it has proper spacing? Nyttend (talk) 05:52, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

• Often templates ignore leading spaces. I re-coded it. - 131.211.211.150 (talk) 08:25, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Question

Why do some users move pages without explanation and some admins protect page from creation without explanation. 78.144.172.188 (talk) 08:25, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Asking an editor to explain something he or she did is more likely to be productive than asking uninvolved people on the Help desk to speculate hypothetically on why some unidentified person did or did not do something to some unspecified page. See Wikipedia:Talk page and Wikipedia:Talk page guidelines. It would be nice if everyone left understandable edit summaries, preferably with links to the policies and/or guidelines which informed their edits, but lots of people care more about saving their own effort than saving other people some effort. I wonder if any of the uncommunicative editors you have in mind have spent much time writing our friendly manuals, or writing tutorials for new users, or answering questions on the Help desk? Of course on Wikipedia, everyone who edits an article is sharing their knowledge about the article's subject, but there is also meta-knowledge of how Wikipedia works - the mechanics of editing and so on - that fascinates some of us right along with the content of articles. I think the process by which we build Wikipedia is even more remarkable, wonderful, valuable, etc., than the encyclopedia itself. Because if we can build the largest encyclopedia in history this way, what can't we do this way? --Teratornis (talk) 09:36, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

unreadable font

Dear Sirs,

with thanks for your all efforts and help,i would like to tell you i used to visit Wikipedia in good format.but its been days that the font has been changed and its difficult to read.i have to choose Larger Font from IE toolbar but the font is not easy to read.PLS help —Preceding unsigned comment added by Mehdieliot (talk • contribs) 09:20, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

We have a hard time helping with font problems because all such problems are in the user's Web browser. Nobody here can see what your browser is doing, or why. You can see Wikipedia:Browser notes and search the Help desk archive for: font difficult read. When a problem has something to do with Wikipedia itself, then other people can look at whatever problem you are seeing, and figure out the problem. If you want to mail me your computer, I might be able to puzzle out what is going on, but I can't do it from around the world. If you can't figure it out by Googling for clues and so on, you might have to find a knowledgeable human in your locality who can look at your computer. --Teratornis (talk) 09:41, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Teratornis is absolutely right: this will be about your browser or other local settings. But a few quick suggestions you might try: if you're using IE7, go to Tools > Internet Options. At the bottom of the General tab you'll see an "Appearance" section; click Fonts. Choose "Latin based" from the dropdown next to "Language script", "Times New Roman" for "webpage font", and "Courier New" for "Plain text font." Press OK. If the font still looks small, try pressing CTRL and + a few times to increase the size. This will apply to all webpages, though, not just Wikipedia. If these don't help, as Teratornis says, your best bet is to find a tech-savvy person locally to take a look. Gonzonoir (talk) 09:54, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia tells your browser to use its default sans-serif font for most text. For IE, this is generally Arial. Unfortunately, because IE is broken, it sometimes randomly switches to another font as default, which is often difficult to read. Even more unfortunately, IE (being broken) doesn't allow you to easily change the default sans-serif font. There are fixes for this; the easiest is to switch to a browser which is not broken. Algebraist 10:00, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

AARGH! Purge!

I have set to lowest cache and deleted my internet temp files. Project talk pages which were altered last week still do not show me the current version...!? What am I doing wrong? When I look at my watchlist it seems to be up to date every day but many other wiki pages do not correspond to the history. Probably a Windows or IE8 problem but maybe a lot of people had it? (most people i know are still using IE5 or 6 why i don't know) Anyways, if you can shed light here please do, thanks. ~ R.T.G 11:11, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Is this happening now? Wikipedia:Village pump (technical)#Lots of outdated revisions shown today? says there were problems two days ago. PrimeHunter (talk) 11:21, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

I didn't see this reply until I pressed "edit" so it is a bit impossible. Yeah the link is about the same thing. It happened to me once before but is more persistent now. ~ R.T.G 11:31, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Note: When it happened before I deleted my internet temp files and it corrected itself ... that's why I would imagine it is more likely to be an IE (Internet Explorer) problem ..? ~ R.T.G 11:33, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

about hartley oscillator

sir, i want to know about hartley oscillator.what is the minimum and maximum frequency we can used in this hartley oscillator.And also the application of hartley oscillatir. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Jannat mai (talk • contribs) 13:01, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Hello. I suspect, based on your question, that you found our article on Hartley oscillator, and thought that we were directly affiliated in some way with that subject. Please note that you are at Wikipedia, the online free encyclopedia that anyone can edit, and this page is a help desk for asking questions related to using the encyclopedia. Thus, we have no inside track on the subject of your question. You can, however, search our vast catalogue of articles by typing a subject into the search field on the left hand side of your screen. If that is not fruitful, we have a reference desk, divided into various subjects areas, where asking knowledge questions is welcome. Best of luck. Zain Ebrahim (talk) 13:02, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

How to archive a GA review

How do I archive an old Good Article review? I'm specifically trying to archive the incredibly long Talk:Pride & Joy (comics) first GA review. -- A ^talk/_contribs 14:10, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

• Wikipedia:Archiving talk pages? GA reviews are simply transcluded on regular talk pages, you can archive them like any other message assuming they're not ongoing or too recent. = Mgm|^(talk) 16:43, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia looking strange

Resolved

 – Algebraist 19:00, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

I was just on WP last night and it looked fine. But this morining I get on it and the infoboxes are at the top of the article, not to the side. But the position of the code hasn't changed it just looks different when not in edit mode. There are some other strange things to. Has something changed and made everything look wierd or is this from my computer?Ltwin (talk) 16:35, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

If infoboxes are in the wrong place, that's probably related to CSS. Have you changed your wikipedia preferences in any way? What browser are you using? Have you tried bypassing your browser cache? Are any browser features/addons installed that could be blocking CSS from en.wikipedia.org (such as Adblock Plus, for example)? Algebraist 15:38, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

to Algebraist: why would Adblock Plus be blocking WP CSS? Calvin 1998 ^(t·c) 15:39, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Because the user told it to, possibly accidentally. I mentioned it simply as something in common use which I know can block specific CSS. Algebraist 15:42, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

The only thing different I did was download a Java update. I thought that might have caused it so I uninstalled Java then reinstalled it but it still looked the same. Thats the only thing I can think of. Ltwin (talk) 16:35, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Anyway when I got back on my computer it looked normal again so I guess my computer just had a brain fart or something. Thanks. Ltwin (talk) 16:38, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

RfC Template Help

I tried to do an Request for Comment (RfC) on the Wikipedia:List of Wikipedians by military branch. I copy and pasted the RfC template but it was not clear as to where it should go and when I did paste it, the wikilink showed up as the color red, so I must have mistyped the information and/or location where it should go. There is a discussion in progress between myself Signaleer and Vsmith, please see Wikipedia talk:List of Wikipedians by military branch. -15:50, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

I'm having this same problem at Wikipedia_talk:Notability (web); the RFC bot is messed up at the moment and all the RfC instructions say is to ask at the help desk for the correct topic no. (something I've never heard of). Why can't they just list it there? AHGHH! --Kraftlos (Talk | Contrib) 20:31, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Sorting Wiki pages

I'm trying to get an album article on a greatest hits record up to GA status and want to look at some articles that are already there. Is there a way I can sort articles by category and status or similar? I'm guessing probably not but it's worth an ask! Cavie78 (talk) 16:23, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

It may be possible with CatScan or some other tool under WP:EIW#Cat, but I suggest looking first on the relevant WikiProject page (perhaps Wikipedia:WikiProject Albums). The various WikiProjects often maintain tables that show the number of articles under their purview that have attained various class rankings (stub class, start class, etc.). --Teratornis (talk) 19:43, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

What does it take for a new page to stay up?

There are two articles that I would like to start new Wikipedia posts on: "The Adobe Flash Ecosystem" and "Flash Alternatives". What do I have to do (content, etc) to make sure these pages stick online? I've heard so many stories about pages being taken down after one day... —Preceding unsigned comment added by Dbkreiss (talk • contribs) 16:41, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Standard template message follows:

Before creating an article, please search Wikipedia first to make sure that an article does not already exist on the subject. Please also review a few of our relevant policies and guidelines which all articles should comport with. As Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, articles must not contain original research, must be written from a neutral point of view, should cite to reliable sources which verify their content and must not contain unsourced, negative content about living people.

Articles must also demonstrate the notability of the subject. Please see our subject specific guidelines for people, bands and musicians, companies and organizations and web content and note that if you are closely associated with the subject, our conflict of interest guideline strongly recommends against you creating the article.

If you still think an article is appropriate, see Help:Starting a new page. You might also look at Wikipedia:Your first article and Wikipedia:How to write a great article for guidance, and please consider taking a tour through the Wikipedia:Tutorial so that you know how to properly format the article before creation..

Please also take a look at The Missing Manual. – ukexpat (talk) 16:47, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Note that your proposed article titles do not follow Wikipedia's WP:TITLE#Lowercase guideline. Have you read every article we already have in Category:Adobe Flash? The type of article you seem to be describing is what we call a list, for example see List of wiki software, Comparison of wiki software, List of web browsers, List of word processors, and for lots more: Special:PrefixIndex/List of. Starting new articles on Wikipedia is an advanced task. Your contributions show four edits on your account so far. When you have at least 1000 edits, you should know enough about Wikipedia to be able to create new articles that have a reasonable chance of sticking. You've heard stories about Wikipedia; read Wikipedia: The Missing Manual to get the real story. Please tell everyone who tells you a story about Wikipedia to read it too, to keep their stories straight. As you know from the telephone game, when people hear and repeat stories, the stories tend to evolve toward nonsense. At least you did get the correct message that Wikipedia deletes a lot of articles, and aspiring article creators need to understand how to avoid that fate, even if the stories you heard provided no useful information as to how one might get an article to stick. --Teratornis (talk) 19:04, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Citing Magazine

Would you use the cite news template to cite a magazine interview? Queenie 16:45, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

I believe so. The page for {{Cite magazine article}} redirects to {{cite news}}. TNXMan 16:47, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Thanks. Queenie 16:49, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

No problem. Best, TNXMan 16:49, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Wait! {{Cite magazine}} redirects to {{Cite journal}}. And in the intro it says it's for citing magazines and academic journals. This is better, isn't it? Queenie 16:55, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Ah-ha! Agreed, this is the better template. This raises questions: Why is there a {{cite magazine article}}? Should it be redirected to {{cite journal}}? Where would we discuss a change? Why can't I stop asking open-ended questions? TNXMan 17:16, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

I suppose if there was an article in a magazine it would usually deal with something in the news, while a simple magazine interview is different. Possible? Queenie 17:21, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

You know, I don't think there was ever a discussion on the {{cite magazine article}}. The template's history shows one edit (possibly by a confused editor) and then the creation of the redirect. This was almost two years ago. There is also nothing on the template's talk page. I would be in favor of changing the redirect to {{cite journal}} to save future confusion. TNXMan 17:26, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Seconded. Queenie 17:39, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

 Done I've redirected the template to {{cite journal}}. TNXMan 17:51, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Product label

Just a quick question; is a candy label (wrapper) a sufficient source for a wikipedia article? thanks Ottawa4ever (talk) 17:41, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

In what context? TastyCakes (talk) 17:57, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

On a candy page to describe the flavours or ingredients Ottawa4ever (talk) 18:00, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Depends on what you mean by "describe"; none of the advertising-type language is acceptable, of course. --Orange Mike | Talk 18:01, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Ill give a few examples of what im trying to figure out; basically if its mentioned like a list ie; starch, sugar then thats clearly not advertising. but if it says its in blue wrapping as 55g bags like another product is that advertising? thanks Ottawa4ever (talk) 18:10, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

I'm totally confused. --Orange Mike | Talk 19:21, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

I think Ottawa4ever wants to use the wrappers as a source to back up information about the product such as the nutritional information. You can't use those sources to establish notability but I don't see a problem with using them to verify those kind of facts. Zain Ebrahim (talk) 19:25, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

That's one possibility. Unfortunately the question is too vague to answer with certainty. To Ottawa4ever: please tell us the name of the candy, and exactly what you want to write about it. Feel free to create a user subpage such as: User:Ottawa4ever/Sandbox and type in enough of the article text you have in mind so we can understand what you want to do. On Wikipedia there are so many rules and possibilities and exceptions that we need more information to give opinions on what you have in mind. The information on a product label might also be available on the vendor's Web site, which would let you cite it with {{Cite web}}. I don't think we have a "Cite candy wrapper" template. Such a wrapper might be an example of ephemera, but I'm not sure. --Teratornis (talk) 19:37, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for trying to clear it up a bit for me. I actually dont want to use the wrappers as a source at all. Basically im working on an article on the skittles list of products page List of skittles products(recently the company has made the skitles wikipedia page their home page, so ive been doing some work to downplay the advertising and moved the list off the main page to form its own page) and Im trying to sort out what is a source and isnt on the page. The candy's wrappers are used to describe the product as a source quite frequently on the page. I understand that the wrapper can identify ingredients, but it appears the list looks like they are advertising by sourcing the colour of the package, the size of the packages and the relation to other products. But Im unsure, so Ive left it the way it is for now. Im just hoping someone can basically determine or tell me if packaging can be used as a valid source Ottawa4ever (talk) 19:49, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

I see it's already being used as a reference in List of skittles products. Have you tried using google to find a better source? Zain Ebrahim (talk) 19:55, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

"recently the company has made the skittles wikipedia page their home page" - good grief, what were they thinking? It almost looks like their site got hacked or something. --Teratornis (talk) 20:00, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Isn't that a breach of the reuse terms?  – ukexpat (talk) 20:12, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

All they're doing is acting as a proxy between you and Wikipedia. IANAL, but Google (and others) do this sort of thing all the time, so I assume it's legally unproblematic. In any case, they're complying with the GFDL, so the only issue would be the (copyrighted and trademarked) logo. Algebraist 14:17, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

database administrator in canada

i want to know the list of university that offer data base addministrator in canada —Preceding unsigned comment added by 41.219.205.76 (talk) 18:34, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Have you tried Wikipedia's Reference Desk? They specialize in knowledge questions and will try to answer just about any question in the universe (except how to use Wikipedia, since that is what this Help Desk is for). Just follow the link, select the relevant section, and ask away. I hope this helps. Algebraist 18:39, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

language

Why Gujarati language is not being seen in wikipedia. You might have more then 10 million users who know and want to have this language.

shailesh shah —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.143.226.245 (talk) 18:37, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

The Gujarati Wikipedia is here. Algebraist 18:40, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

There is also an article on the Gujarati language. —teb728 t c 21:44, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

FPC, sort of...

Is there anywhere on WP that I can go to find out what needs to be fixed with this photo to make it FPC worthy, without actually nominating it?
Thanks! WiiWillieWiki 19:25, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Have you read Wikipedia:Featured picture criteria? Doesn't give you tailored advice for that photo, but it should tell you everything you need to know. --Fullobeans (talk) 19:36, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Wikimedia Commons also ranks photos, as "featured", "quality", and "valued". I moved the image to the right so it would stop messing up our paragraph indents. --Teratornis (talk) 19:52, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

You can also see Picture peer review to get advice and reviews for a photograph to be nominated at FPC. ZooFari 03:42, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

Quoting a letter

In Conclusion of the American Civil War#Disbanding of Mosby's Raiders (April 21) I am quoting a letter in a quote box. Is the best way to do this, or should it not have a box? Should the wording in the letter be italicized (and in or out of a box)? What is the best way to present this letter? --Doug Coldwell ^talk 21:22, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

See WP:MOSQUOTE and WP:QUOTE. To see examples of Wikipedia's best practices, look through the featured articles. Unfortunately I don't know a way to efficiently search the featured articles for examples of extended quotations. --Teratornis (talk) 05:03, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

COI resolution

I declined a speedy on an article, Thomas Monroe Campbell, and went ahead and did some minor work on the article. Reviewing it today, the original prod'er added a {{coi}} without an explanation.

How does this get resolved? Can I remove the COI tag, which I believe ise unjustified? Will it be admin reviewed?

TIA.

Vulture19 (talk) 21:26, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

It's a content dispute and should be discussed on the article's talk page. – ukexpat (talk) 21:32, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

My bad, I used the specific article in question to get a more general understanding of the process. Reading WP:COI doesn't really indicate how the issue gets resolved, or give an indication of "good form" (i.e. should the tag be placed without an explanation, who should remove it, etc...). Let me review the question and attempt to clarify. Vulture19 (talk) 21:52, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

That article was one of a big batch created by a spammer for the Alabama Cooperative Extension Service, who created articles for everybody who'd ever headed it (or even worked for it, it almost seems). The original spammer has been blocked, but the articles still carry a taint of spam (and an ACES template created for the spammer's project). --Orange Mike | Talk 21:34, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

I see. Thanks for clarifying this situation. I question (not you, Orange, just in general) how the subject of this particular article could be spam. I'm reasonably sure he would survive an AfD discussion. Vulture19 (talk) 21:49, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

More Than Warmth and Judith Meeker

What to do with these two pages? They are almost identical. Should they be merged, and if so, which way? Or deleted? And the notability tags? RenegadeMonster (talk) 22:03, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

I have redirected Judith Meeker to More Than Warmth. – ukexpat (talk) 22:14, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

print friendly version

Is it possible to have a print friendly verison for Wikipedia? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Tinagzh (talk • contribs) 23:08, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Try 'printable version' in the left sidebar. Algebraist 23:09, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Also try the new create a book option, and let us know whether it works for you. --Teratornis (talk) 23:34, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

If you have anything like a modern browser that supports CSS, then simply printing will apply the CSS print stylesheets automatically. The printable version is for previews and browsers without CSS. --—— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk - 23:43, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

March 7

Linking to a Windows file share

Is there a way to set an external link to a Windows file share (file://)? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Vallanced (talk • contribs) 00:00, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

No, because file:// (the file URI scheme) is not suitable for general Internet use; it is meant for local access and does not specify a protocol (a way to transfer files). — TKD::{talk} 00:23, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

How to upload pics

can u please tell me how to upload pics onto a artical???????????

While I'm not an expert in this area - I was able to find Wikipedia:Uploading images which may help. — Ched ~ ^(yes?) 03:19, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

What article do you have in mind? Do you want to upload pictures you took yourself, or pictures by someone else? See Help:Wikipedia: The Missing Manual/Formatting and Illustrating Articles/Adding Images (but note that the section about creating a separate account on Commons is already out of date, as we have single sign-on now). I'm not an expert with images either, but I'm trying to impersonate one, by creating an Editor's index to Commons. It's amazing how complicated copyright issues can be, especially when we consider that copyright is a purely manufactured problem, i.e. a problem that humans have no fundamental need to create for themselves. --Teratornis (talk) 03:41, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

You must be a user to upload images. If it is for an article, you must create username at Wikimedia Commons or use a unified user (found in your preferences). To see instructions clearly, see the link Ched provided above. ZooFari 03:43, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

Depending on the article, suitable photos may already be available on Wikipedia or on Wikimedia Commons. --Teratornis (talk) 03:45, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

lupin spell check

Is there a way to force the lupin spell checking tool to display the proposed diff above the edit box? Perhaps through one of my .css or .js files? I've made the mistake before of accidentally changing something in a cite, or perhaps quote (aka [sic]), and was wondering if there was a way to speed up the checking procedure. Thanks. — Ched ~ ^(yes?) 02:54, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

Congratulations - you appear to be the latest winner in the game called "Stump The Help Desk". It might help if you linked to a page that describes this tool. I'm guessing maybe User:Lupin/Live spellcheck might be it. There seems to be some discussion on User talk:Lupin/Live spellcheck despite the screaming red banner that says to discuss the tool on another page instead. My advice would be to find a page where people discuss the tool you have a question about, and ask there. On the Help desk there might not be enough users to insure we have some people who know about every tool. There are probably hundreds of tools, and maybe only dozens of people reading the Help desk, although some people probably know about more than one tool. Whatever the mathematics, you may need to ask elsewhere. --Teratornis (talk) 04:31, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

Secret page game

I understand that there is some sort of "game" people play where they hide a "secret page" in their user space and see if their friends can find it. Is this a violation of policy, and if so, which admin noticeboard is the proper place to disposition it? KuyaBriBri^Talk 07:09, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

This is a matter that caused a lot of controversy recently. Editors are divided in opinion here about whether it's a violation of WP:MYSPACE or not. See this discussion at WP:AN. If you want to discuss this further, WP:AN would be the place, but please see if your concerns have been raised and addressed at this discussion first. Chamal ^talk 07:22, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

That game sounds too easy anyway: If they created the secret page while logged in, it would show up in their contributions page, Special:Contributions. If they created it as a subpage of their users page, players could find it with Special:PrefixIndex. —teb728 t c 21:09, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

If the game stays easy, it will probably burn itself out pretty quickly. Special:PrefixIndex, although obvious to wikidemigods, is probably a revelation for the MySpace folks, and if this game teaches them something about MediaWiki's advanced capabilities, that might not be a bad thing. A hypothetical danger is that someone might get clever and think of some potentially dangerous or destructive way to conceal a page, creating a WP:BEANS situation. --Teratornis (talk) 05:10, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

Request for Administatorship

I would like to know, how do i request to be an Administrator? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Policyofmankind (talk • contribs) 15:39, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

You may request adminship here. — Aitias // discussion 15:40, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

But be aware that you have no chance whatsoever of receiving it at present. You'll need to wait a while and make a great many more edits before it becomes a possibility. Algebraist 15:42, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

I would like to be an admin

I still cant figure this out. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Policyofmankind (talk • contribs) 15:47, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

Go to WP:RFA LetsdrinkTea 15:48, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

You are warned that your RFA, if you figure out how to file one, is pretty much guaranteed to fail, as you don't have nearly enough experience. Adminship isn't to be taken lightly, as the power you have will greatly affect the encyclopaedia. Imagine someone, who has never driven a car before, trying to drive on the Pennsylvania Turnpike, or the West Virginia Turnpike - two of the most dangerous roads in the US. It's pretty much guaranteed they'll crash within the first few miles. Now you're the driver, and adminship is one of those turnpikes. Rack up a few thousand more edits and then try for adminship. Xenon54 (talk) 16:01, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

A good idea is to look at some of the more recent RFA's that did not succeed. That will give you an idea of what the community looks for in an admin. A link to such candidacies in chronological order can be found here. A link to successful requests can be found here. Best of luck! TNXMan 16:06, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

Until you know enough about Wikipedia to figure out how to become an administrator, you don't know enough about Wikipedia to be an administrator. I recommend that first you should answer at least 500 questions on the Help desk. See Wikipedia:Help desk/How to answer. Answering questions on the Help desk will teach you how to figure things out on Wikipedia. Then you will have absolutely no problem figuring out how to become an administrator. You will also be a better administrator because you will have helped 500 people already - you will understand the kinds of problems that new users routinely smack into. And when you stand for an WP:RFA, you can point to your track record on the Help desk to demonstrate your knowledge of Wikipedia. Also read Wikipedia: The Missing Manual for a basic understanding of Wikipedia that I hope every administrator has. --Teratornis (talk) 19:33, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

It's also advisable to wait for someone else to nominate you for adminship. That is, you should have done enough excellent work on Wikipedia to attract notice from at least one other established user who will consider you a good candidate for adminship. Consider that many if not most of the candidates on WP:RFA are getting nominated by other users (currently I see three out of four are being nominated by others). Self-nomination does not automatically kill your chances, but it raises a big question right away. People will ask, "Why can't this user motivate one other user to nominate him or her?" --Teratornis (talk) 19:43, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

Now that i have requested for adminship, what next?

I just figured out how to make the request, what should i be expecting next? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Policyofmankind (talk • contribs) 16:07, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

Since you have filed the request incorrectly, you should expect nothing much. If you do successfully file a request, you should expect it to fail very quickly. This might involve you being laughed at. Algebraist 16:11, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

What you should do now is go away and edit Wikipedia for another 6 months, do some anti-vandal work, make it clear you understand our policies and guidelines, etc. Do take a look at some successful RFAs as mentioned above and see what those editors have done in the past. What you should not do is keep asking the same question over and over, and you certainly shouldn't actually file a request. dougweller (talk) 16:13, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

Well, the user has actually gone ahead and done so. I've moved the request to the RFA page (from the mainspace). TNXMan 16:18, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

Thats not the way it is or should be

I believe the Adminship shouldnt be based on number of edits but instead, it should be a notation of Achievement. Do you know what i have done for the Wikipedia foundation even without editing any article? Try to see my History and Search the web for my name (Olusegun Feyisetan) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Policyofmankind (talk • contribs) 16:20, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

You obviously don't know what adminsip entails. It is a position of maintenance, not of celebrity and importance. Admins know Wikipedia inside and out, and are willing to give their time to enforce rules and clean up the place. Admins are the force that keeps Wikipedia running smoothly: dealing with vandals, resolving disputes, deleting and protecting pages, the list goes on. You have to come to the terms with the fact that you aren't going to be an admin now or in the near future, and you're not going to get a free ride because you wrote an editorial about vandalism. Sorry. Xenon54 (talk) 16:35, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

This illustrates the problem with taking a faith-based approach to Wikipedia, that is, when a new user shows up and assumes he or she already knows what Wikipedia is or how it should be. In reality, Wikipedia is unlike anything most people have experienced before, so the faith-based approach almost always fails. Instead the new user should take the empirical approach, emptying his or her mind of preconceptions about Wikipedia, and learning about it by reading the friendly manuals and the friendly Missing Manual. Wikipedia tends to be a harsh environment for people who have not yet learned how to think critically or who can only do so under direct supervision. --Teratornis (talk) 04:22, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

The other thing to recognize is that Wikipedia resulted from years of ongoing development, reflecting lots of good ideas by lots of smart people, along with lots of compromises between conflicting goals. There are many other wikis having different styles of organization, but Wikipedia has become more successful than any of them. This suggests that Wikipedia, despite all its flaws, may be close to optimal, which means it is difficult to change Wikipedia in a way that causes a net improvement. Most of the possible changes to Wikipedia's organization would move it away from the optimum, causing it to become worse on balance. This does not mean it is impossible to improve Wikipedia, only that to do this you have to be smarter in some way than all the thousands of smart people who built Wikipedia the way it is now. Some really smart people have shaped Wikipedia, so the bar is set pretty high. Almost certainly we can say nobody is going to improve Wikipedia unless they first become an expert in how Wikipedia is right now. --Teratornis (talk) 04:42, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

Terminator Salvation

The official posters have credited Termiantor Salvation as 'Screenplay by John Brancato & Michael Ferris, Jonathan Nolan and Anthony E. Zuiker. Story by John Brancato & Michael Ferris.' - your page is filled with outdated and discarded drafts (Paul Haggis/Shawn Ryan) whose names have officially been taken off the project. I tried to edit it so the wikipedia did not link to rumors and outdated info - tried to put the new writers up, but you reverted my changes as 'unconstructive' ... —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.219.36.232 (talk) 16:36, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

Do you have several reliable sources -- newspaper, magazine, website articles -- to back up your claims? "I work on the movie" or "My friend who works on it told me" or "I read it on a blog" won't fly, we need fact-checked stories from reputable organisations. Your edits will get reverted every time unless you provide sources because that section is already very well sourced. Xenon54 (talk) 16:43, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

You provided no sources for your edits, so as far as anyone could see you just removed a lot of cited and sourced material and replaced with with unsourced material, an action that will just result in instant reverting. This was your first edit, so obviously you have only just begun to enter the murky world of wiki editing, that 'warning' is really just a request to view the linked welcome page as a guide to contributing to wikipedia. Fell free to edit pages, but make sure you provide reliable references for any major changes magnius (talk) 18:14, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

• Official posters could be a good source, but you'd have to make sure it's the real deal. Unfortunately, there are some people who take pride in spreading fake posters. Also, even if those people no longer work on the project, the fact they did is still worth mentioning in the production section of the article. - Mgm|^(talk) 17:27, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

editing articles by the subject of the article

The person who is the subject of an article wishes to edit and make correction to that article. How can that be accomplished. What has to be done on that persons part? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.49.93.210 (talk) 16:47, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

The relevant guidelines are at WP:COI#Editors who may have a conflict of interest. Algebraist 16:59, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

• They should discuss the changes (and make it clear who they are). If the changes can be backed up by reliable sources not linked to them there shouldn't be any trouble. If the article contains some widespread misconception, it's a better idea to talk to the press first, so we can cite a resulting article. - Mgm|^(talk) 17:24, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

See our Wikipedia:Biographies of living persons policy, in particular:

• We must get the article right. Be very firm about the use of high quality references. Unsourced or poorly sourced contentious material about living persons—whether the material is negative, positive, or just questionable—should be removed immediately and without waiting for discussion.

And see the section Wikipedia:Biographies of living persons#Dealing with articles about yourself. --Teratornis (talk) 05:17, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

Rollback rights

Can those be applied to alternate accounts if the main account has them already? Thank you for the response. ESpublic013 (talk) 17:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

Rollback rights can be given by any admin, so all you have to do is find one who thinks your alternate account deserves them. Algebraist 17:20, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

• Assuming your alternate account is a legal one with a clear link to your main account, there shouldn't be any trouble. - Mgm|^(talk) 17:21, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

author of article

who wrote the information about edward albee, im doing a research paper and i need to know the author for my citations for the paper.

See Wikipedia:Citing Wikipedia. --Teratornis (talk) 19:26, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

May I translate?

Hello, I am an user of the italian Wikipedia. I want to ask if i can translate an english article to an italian one. There is a type of copyright? Thank you for the help. --Domyinik (talk) 19:28, 7 March 2009 (UTC) In any case, good luck with your Wikipedia, very nice. Sorry for my errors, I'm not very good in english.

There shouldn't be an issue with translating to the Italian Wikipedia. There is a template we use here if the original material was translated from another Wikipedia, which can be found at {{translated}}. The equivalent page on the Italian Wikipedia can be found here]. TNXMan 20:09, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

See WP:EIW#Translate for links to lots of pages about translating articles between the various Wikipedias. The text of articles on the English Wikipedia is under the GFDL, so you have no worries about translating the text. Some of the images, however, may be under a fair use condition and probably not acceptable on the Italian Wikipedia. This is why editors on the English Wikipedia should refrain from using non-free images in articles, and only use images from Wikimedia Commons which are under free licenses, and are therefore suitable for all the Wikipedias. --Teratornis (talk) 04:11, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

www.truthorfiction.com

I would like to know if you have any information on the truthorfiction site, who runs it, how it's run, how reliable is their information, etc .

This page is for questions about editing Wikipedia. Please consider asking this question at the Reference desk. They specialize in knowledge questions and will try to answer any question in the universe (except how to use Wikipedia, since that is what this Help Desk is for). Just follow the link, select the relevant section, and ask away. You could always try searching Wikipedia for an article related to the topic you want to know more about. I hope this helps. Algebraist 20:39, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

For questions like these, it is usually easier to go to the site in question, where you often find a page like this. -- kainaw™ 21:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

Pictures in Article

A user inserted a gallery of pictures in the article Ankur Sharma. These pictures are all low-quality photos of newspaper articles, presumably sources. Moreover, the text of the articles are too blurry to read. The pictures should be removed from the article, right? Should the picture files themselves be deleted too? They're practically useless. (btw if you're willing you could also assist me in cleaning up the article, converting the external links and incorrectly-formatted references to correctly formatted references where appropriate) ~EdGl (talk) 21:27, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

They all appear to be copyvios: All but the last are photos of recent newspapers and magazines. The last is a photo of a letter with a logo in the letterhead. I have tagged them as copyvios on Commons. —teb728 t c 22:45, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

Extension:VariablesExtension

Is the VariablesExtension available on en:wikipedia. If not how likely is it that it will be loaded in the near future. --DRoll (talk) 22:41, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

It is not currently installed. As to whether it might be, bugzilla:7865 contains the relevant discussion. Algebraist 22:47, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for the info. Oh well. --DRoll (talk) 02:58, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

March 8

How do I fix this rectangle?

Please, how do I remove that long black rectangle off to the side?

There are currently 17 comics-related articles which are Featured articles, meaning they belong to the best articles of the entire Wikipedia. The articles are listed below. Dates refer to the date when the article was the Wikipedia Main Page article. Template:FAstar 300 (film) - February 13, 2009 Template:FAstar The Adventures of Tintin - January 5, 2007 Template:FAstar Anarky - March 8, 2007 Template:FAstar Aquaman (TV program) - June 10, 2007 Template:FAstar Batman - May 7, 2004 Template:FAstar Bone Sharps, Cowboys, and Thunder Lizards - March 21, 2008 Template:FAstar Calvin and Hobbes - August 7, 2004 Template:FAstar Captain Marvel (DC Comics) - December 22, 2005 Template:FAstar Fun Home - September 3, 2007 Template:FAstar Halo Graphic Novel - February 17, 2008 Template:FAstar Krazy Kat - June 5, 2006 Template:FAstar Megatokyo - September 5, 2006 Template:FAstar Roy of the Rovers - August 13, 2006 Template:FAstar Sinestro Corps War - January 27, 2008 Template:FAstar Superman - March 31, 2004 Template:FAstar Superman (film series) - October 31, 2007 Template:FAstar V for Vendetta (film) - November 5, 2006 Template:FAstar Watchmen - August 23, 2006

I removed an empty table. - Erik Baas (talk) 01:28, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

Thank you very much. -- A ^talk/_contribs 01:31, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

Searching Watchlist Pages

Is there any way I can do a search limited to only those pages on my watchlist ?

For example, suppose I have 1,000 pages in my watchlist and I want to search for any of those containing the text string {{coord missing}}. Can I do that ? Thanks. - Grogan deYobbo (talk) 01:50, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

If anybody knows how to do this, I will give that user a barnstar. See WP:EIW#Search for the most complete list of links related to searching Wikipedia that I know of. Restricting search to pages on your watchlist would probably pose a special challenge for the third-party search tools, since I would not expect other sites to have access to your watchlist. However, it is possible with Google Custom search to specify a list of URLs to search, but this would require you to manually transcribe the list of pages on your watchlist into whatever input format Google Custom accepts. Figuring out how to do that could burn up ridiculous amounts of time, but in the long run it might be useful to have mastered the technique. In the case of the specific example you mention, searching for {{coord missing}}, I don't understand why you would want to restrict the search to pages on your watchlist. You could just as readily work through the backlog of pages under Category:Articles missing geocoordinate data by country, putting in the coordinates for as many as you like. If an article needs coordinates, how does it matter whether the article is on your watchlist? Fixing a problem in one article is as good as fixing the same type of problem in another. Wikipedia needs more people who will just fix problems, rather than spend time hunting for some particular problem to fix. In the time it takes to figure out how to search for certain types of articles that are missing coordinates, you could probably add coordinates to a dozen articles that don't require any searching to find. Imagine going to a starving country with a truckload of food, and driving around endlessly looking for certain people to save. It would be better to just feed the first starving mob you find. Wikipedia is like that, a world filled with crying needs everywhere we look. --Teratornis (talk) 04:06, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

OK, thanks. Apologies if my question has touched a nerve - I assure you it was quite innocent. I will check out the resources on the link you gave and report back if I find an answer. - Grogan deYobbo (talk) 05:43, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

Considered myself as vandalizer- OOPS

I previously used twinkle to revert some vandalism on Harriet Tubman, but I made a goof and reverted my earlier revision and used the vandal button. Everything is fixed now, however, is it a big deal that I used the vandal button? Does this stay in my record (OH PLEASE SAY NO!)? ZooFari 03:05, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

I can't see why, you realized your mistake and fixed it. All admins have done this at some time (if they don't admit it they are lying). Sometimes the best way to learn is by making an error.--Platnuimblonde (talk) 03:10, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

Don't worry about it. I've had to revert myself (using the normal rollback button, omg!) a few times. It's one of those "oops, messed up" moments, but you fixed it, so there's nothing to worry about. Cheers, Hermione1980 03:17, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

It does stay in your edit history and is visible to anyone, but it's not a big deal; it's just a mistake and nobody's going to hold it against you. You reverted youe own edit, just imagine how embarrassing it is to revert someone else's edit by mistake (something that happens very often to vandal fighters) :D Chamal ^talk 03:31, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

Mistakes happen. I once accidentally unscheduled a featured article of the day, "identified as vandalism", for a few seconds. Some admins have accidentally blocked themselves. — TKD::{talk} 04:53, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

It can always be worse. You could always delete the Main Page. TNXMan 05:02, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

That's not the worst to have been deleted. Deleting the Sandbox shut down Wikipedia. The Destroyer of the Wiki Barnstar was created for the occasion.[1]. Here is another editor saying OOPS: [2]. PrimeHunter (talk) 14:02, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

BOOK / OLD / RARE

PLEASE HELP ME WITH MY BOOK.. I HAVE A BOOK WITH THE MAP OF AFRICA ON FRONT AND ALSO THERE TRIBEL IMAGE'S ON FOUR CORNER'S ON FRONT OF BOOK .. IT'S LEATHER OR RAWHIDE ONE ?? WE HAVE PIC'S . I SHOWE'D MY BOOK TO A BLACK BISHOP HE WAS VERY INTERESTED .. TOLD ME TO FIND OUT ABOUT THE BOOK THAT HE HAD NEVER SEEN ANYTHING LIKE IT IN HIS LIFE.. I LIVE IN LENOIR NC 28645.. AND I NEED HELP WITH THIS BOOK.HOW DO WE SEND PIC'S SO U MAY SEE?? Honeytcb (talk)

Was the book written by Wikipedia? Sorry, but this is not the location to ask these questions. Perhaps you should contact the publisher (which I'm pretty sure it is no Wiki) ZooFari 04:37, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

Did you read our Book collecting article? You can try asking on the Reference desk, but first please try to formulate a specific question. You want to "FIND OUT ABOUT THE BOOK", but you did not specify what you want to find out. For example, do you want to find out who wrote it? When they wrote it? Who printed it? Who may have owned the book before you? What the book means? Whether the book might be worth something? What the book says? The last question is easy to answer - just read the book. If you have pictures of the book, you could possibly upload them to a consumer-grade photo sharing site such as Flickr. I do not recommend that you try to upload pictures to Wikipedia or Wikimedia Commons, because you are months of serious study away from being able to do that. Probably your best option would be to visit a book dealer, who could tell in one glance whether you have something, although only an honest dealer would tell you what he or she actually knows. An unscrupulous dealer might tell you the book is worthless, offer you a low price, and then flip it for millions of dollars. Of course the odds of that being a possibility are probably lower than the odds of being struck by an asteroid. --Teratornis (talk) 04:58, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

Oops, I misread (hard to read capital letters with texting-style phrases). I had thought the question was about the book. I agree, if you are interested in sharing images, you can do what was specified above without uploading to commons. I encourage you to communicate with the book authorities, which will infinitely answer your questions. ZooFari 06:16, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

cree language

what is the cree name for mother

This page is for questions about using Wikipedia. Please consider asking this question at the Language reference desk. They specialize in knowledge questions and will try to answer any question in the universe (except how to use Wikipedia, since that is what this Help Desk is for). Just follow the link and ask away. You could always try searching Wikipedia for an article related to the topic you want to know more about. I hope this helps. Xclamation point 06:01, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

Reading Wikipedia to a Blind person

An elderly friend is blind and does not use a computer. Is there any equipment or a service that can access Wikipedia and convert the text to speech? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 138.88.251.25 (talk) 07:05, 8 March 2009

There are some articles where a spoken word version is available. See Wikipedia:Spoken articles for the list of articles that have a spoken version. Not all Wikipedia articles have this, though. Cheers. Chamal ^talk 07:09, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

See WP:EIW#Ability for example there is a WP:JAWS. --Teratornis (talk) 07:29, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

Moving to Commons

Hi there, I was wondering if someone could move File:West island.png to the Commons, that I can use it for the de.Wikipedia. I have no idea how to do that properly. Thanks in advance and regards from Germany, Yellowcard (talk) 13:12, 8 March 2009

The easiest way is to use CommonsHelper. See this page for instructions. Xenon54 (talk) 13:22, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

Cite Error

I am trying to create my first page - on the British sculptor George Halse. When I started on this I followed the instructions to create the references first so added one - Farningham, Elizabeth, George Halse Sculptor 1826-1895, Doncaster, 2002 ISBN 0954237919. I got an error message when I hit save but then thought I had dealt with the problem. So I then went on too enter the article with references embedded in the text using the wiki tools. However when I tried to save the page I again got the error message and my article text seems to be lost. Can you tell me what I am doing wrong? And how I can modify the page so that I can put up the article? The message below is what I am currently seeing on the George Halse page: Cite error: <ref> tags exist, but no <references/> tag was found

Hope someone can help! Gunx Girl

I've fixed it up some and you can find the page at George Halse (I moved it to the correct capitalization). Whenever you list something between a <ref> and a </ref> tag, you need an additional template to display the reference. I've added a {{reflist}} to help with that. However, there doesn't appear to be any other content listed and another editor has requested the article be deleted. If you want to start adding content, I'll be happy to help you with any questions. TNXMan 14:54, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

Many thanks Tnxman307 for the speedy response and explanation, I'll see if I can now add the fuller text and get back if I need more assistance. Gunxgirl

(edit conflict) The error message was displayed because the page had no <references/> tag or {{reflist}}. See for example Wikipedia:Referencing for beginners. References should be sources for the article text and an article must not consist solely of a reference. If you are unable to save the page with more text then maybe it is because you try to include external links without being autoconfirmed. You should become autoconfirmed after making one more edit. However, before becoming autoconfirmed you should be able to save external links after answering a CAPTCHA. By the way, you add an article to a category by editing the article and not the category, for example placing [[Category:Old Paulines]] at the bottom of George Halse to add it to Category:Old Paulines. You can read about this and more at Wikipedia:Tutorial. You can also try out things in a personal sandbox like User:Gunxgirl/Sandbox. PrimeHunter (talk) 15:13, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for this additional info about my mistake. I will make a note of this for future reference. I have since been able to add the text I wanted to put in about George Halse - it needs further improvements and additional links. Many thanks all. Gunx girl

See Help:Cite errors. I'm going to start a discussion on the talk page there about making this message more useful. --—— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk - 18:06, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

You can take notes on your user page: User:Gunxgirl or on a user subpage such as: User:Gunxgirl/Notes. Many experienced Wikipedia editors rely on their user pages to keep track of what they are doing, and to inform other editors. Please read Wikipedia: The Missing Manual - it explains most of what a new user needs to know about Wikipedia, and how to find out the rest. --Teratornis (talk) 18:25, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

Could someone review my first article before I submit?

My very first article became a spam :) so it would be a big help, thnx, Balazs Csorjan dr.

It appears your article has already been deleted as advertising. The best place to start would be Wikipedia's policy on advertising and promotion. Basically, Wikipedia does not allow advertisements. All articles must be written from a neutral point of view and must be supported by independent reliable sources. TNXMan 15:13, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

Tnx Tnxman, I did it and rewrite my article - but could somebody review it before action?

We can review your article, but it does not appear to be posted anywhere. The best idea is to post your article in a sandbox first, make improvements, and then move it to the mainspace. You can create your own sandbox by clicking on this link: User:Csorjan/Sandbox. It's a redlink at the moment, but as soon as you put some content there, it will be blue. Also, don't forget to sign your posts on talk pages by typing four tildes (~). TNXMan 15:53, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

wiki page

can i make a new wiki page

Before creating an article, please search Wikipedia first to make sure that an article does not already exist on the subject. Please also review a few of our relevant policies and guidelines which all articles should comport with. As Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, articles must not contain original research, must be written from a neutral point of view, should cite to reliable sources which verify their content and must not contain unsourced, negative content about living people.

Articles must also demonstrate the notability of the subject. Please see our subject specific guidelines for people, bands and musicians, companies and organizations and web content and note that if you are closely associated with the subject, our conflict of interest guideline strongly recommends against you creating the article.

If you still think an article is appropriate, see Help:Starting a new page. You might also look at Wikipedia:Your first article and Wikipedia:How to write a great article for guidance, and please consider taking a tour through the Wikipedia:Tutorial so that you know how to properly format the article before creation. Zain Ebrahim (talk) 17:13, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

Additionally, you have to be autoconfirmed to create an article. Alternately, you can request the article to be created at Articles for Creation. Hermione1980 17:19, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

Actually, creating articles does not require autoconfirmation. Once you've created an account, you can create articles right away. Autoconfirmation is required to move pages, upload images, and mark pages as patrolled. TNXMan 17:54, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

Oops. My bad. Hermione1980 19:58, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

I'm always mixing those up too. It's hard to keep track of the creeping erosion of our sacred principle #3. --Teratornis (talk) 03:23, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Watchlist limit

Hi. Why is it that, when I manually enter a time period limit in the 'days' parameter in my watchlist, I cannot go back more than 30 days? I do not want to use the other alternative, which is to view *all* of my watchlist, because that would comprise of more than 3,500 entries (including talk pages). Does anyone know a way around this barrier, or why it's in place? Thanks. ~AH1^(TCU) 18:32, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

Clicking "all" on the watchlist only gives 30 days. See Help:Watching pages#Watchlist. PrimeHunter (talk) 23:54, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

save my image!

I uploaded an image:

File:Wikiert.jpg

and it says there is no copyright status and it will be deleted in a week if there is no copyright image tag added... How do I add it after I've uploaded it? Somebody respond quickly please... My image's days are numbered! Wikiert ^{T S C} 18:40, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

Image policy isn't my thing, but I think everything will be fine if you just edit the image page to add the template {{GFDL-self}}. Deor (talk) 21:06, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

Add the provided code above me. ZooFari 23:12, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

Documenting current state of research

I'm writing an article about virtual camera systems and I would like to incorporate to it the current state of research in that domain. I know that original research is not allowed, however the academic papers I will base myself on are well known and cover a period of about 10 years. I also think that this section will help understand what a camera system is and how it works. So are these kind of things allowed on Wikipedia? (just prefer to make sure before I start writing). Thanks. Laurent (talk) 19:50, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

If you are using peer-reviewed academic papers as reliable sources, then your article might not be original research. I say "might not be" because it is possible to synthesize multiple published sources into new conclusions which do not explicitly appear in any of the individual articles. It's impossible to answer your question because it is not specific enough. The only way we can tell what you mean by "these kinds of things" is to see your article, or enough of it to see where the rest is heading. We already have a rather poor-quality Virtual camera article. Is that what you have in mind? Read Wikipedia: The Missing Manual and especially Help:Wikipedia: The Missing Manual/Editing, Creating, and Maintaining Articles/Creating a New Article before starting a new article. Something like half of new articles get deleted, and the risk is inversely proportional to an author's knowledge of Wikipedia. --Teratornis (talk) 03:20, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

user talk pages - can I tell them about another wiki?

Hi - I have scoured the WP policies, and don't see much relating to guidelines on what you can write on a users talk page. I have started a how-to wiki on growing plants. Can I tell users who are part of the wikiproject plants here about the wiki, and see if they'd be interested in that project as well? There is good reason to think they may be, but I want to see if there's a clear policy saying I shouldn't. Thanks, --RaffiKojian (talk) 20:07, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:Alternative outlets and Wikipedia:WikiProject Cycling#Similar wikis for examples. Obviously Wikipedia has a direct interest in informing its users of alternative outlets for content that Wikipedia does not want. This helps prevent much wasted time, when users add content that doesn't belong on Wikipedia, and then people have to waste more time deleting it and arguing about it. Every Wikipedia user needs to be fully aware of what belongs on Wikipedia, and what sites will accept what doesn't belong on Wikipedia. WikiProject pages are excellent places to list alternative outlets which specialize in content relating to the WikiProject, but which does not meet encyclopedic standards. This is just my opinion. There might be other users who believe we shouldn't even tell people about other wikis, but obviously I disagree with the belief that keeping people ignorant makes Wikipedia stronger. I would, however, advise against indiscriminately broadcasting a message to large numbers of user talk pages. One entry on Wikipedia:WikiProject Plants should suffice, or you could individually tell those users who have already asked about alternative outlets. Some might say that because you started this wiki, you have a conflict of interest, but COI applies to articles rather than project pages. --Teratornis (talk) 20:20, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for a very thoughtful reply, I am glad you agree that there is value in sharing wikis housing related, but different content than WP. I would like to ask about your reference to canvassing, though. The link you included seems to refer to a very different issue - that of "sending messages to multiple Wikipedians with the intent to inform them about a community discussion". The whole page focuses on that alone, so I wonder if there's another reference that is broader? Either way, thanks for the reply! --RaffiKojian (talk) 21:38, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

WP:CANVASS explicitly addresses the most common type of canvassing on Wikipedia. But see the first entry under WP:CANVASS#Notes and references:

• Any kind of solicitation may meet this definition, including, for example, a custom signature to automatically append some promotional message to every signed post.

In general on Wikipedia it's best to interpret guidelines broadly rather than narrowly, because you can be sure someone among our 48,162,552 users will interpret them as broadly as possible. Wikipedia's guidelines are not an absolute prescription for our behavior, but rather a way to predict how other editors may respond to what you do. Probably a significant number of Wikipedia editors would be bothered by poorly targeted promotional canvassing, even if it does not meet the strict definition that the WP:CANVASS page primarily addresses. In other words, one must tread lightly on Wikipedia when one has any sort of cause to push. (Everybody has causes to push. Would you be interested in hearing about mine? And everyone else's? Imagine if everybody with a cause put it on your talk page.) In general, it is best to target your communication as precisely as possible, by looking for people who have already expressed a clear interest in what you have to offer, or who would almost certainly have an interest in reality, not in your optimistic thinking. See my next comment below for a possible class of people who might fit the second definition. --Teratornis (talk) 00:42, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

• The WikiProject Plants may also have a newsletter you could use. Just make sure whoever runs the thing agrees. - Mgm|^(talk) 22:23, 8 March 2009 (UTC)
• Wikipedia:What Wikipedia is not#Wikipedia is not a soapbox also covers talk pages and mentions recruitment and advertising. It appears your goal with user talk posts to wikiproject members would be to advertise your wiki and recruit editors. If you wouldn't make such posts to discuss somebody else's wiki then you probably shouldn't make them about your own. It sounds better to mention a site as a possible alternative outlet for material unsuited for Wikipedia on Wikipedia:WikiProject Plants. PrimeHunter (talk) 23:45, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

Another tactic for the original poster would be to find all the plant-related articles that Wikipedia has deleted. If other Wikipedia editors have already tried to write how-to articles about plants, and Wikipedia deleted those articles, then those editors would likely be interested in an alternative outlet which would welcome their work. I doubt those editors could feel more offended by a message that mentions an alternative outlet than they were offended by watching their work get blown off Wikipedia. The original poster should search Deletionpedia, which displays tens of thousands of Wikipedia's deleted articles. Anything there about plants (or anything else) is fair game. See WP:WWMPD#If all else fails, try another wiki. I don't think of discreetly promoting an alternative outlet (assuming it uses a free license) as being quite like promoting a commercial product, because alternative outlets meet a clear need. Wikipedia deletes a staggering number of articles, which clearly indicates we have a problem that alternative outlets can help solve. I think that (probably) every WikiProject should have one or more "side" wikis to house the unencylopedic content its topic enthusiasts tend to create on Wikipedia. If everybody could figure out when to use Wikipedia, and when to use an alternative outlet, we could avoid the massive waste of effort represented by WP:AFD. Is it not the height of absurdity that Wikipedia needs to have hundreds if not thousands of editors who specialize in deleting articles? --Teratornis (talk) 00:42, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

An additional comment about starting a wiki: my advice to the original poster is to concentrate on building up your wiki content by yourself before you try hard to recruit other users. A new wiki is in a very fragile state, because it lacks the massive infrastructure you see on a well-developed wiki like Wikipedia. Peruse the massive accumulated internal how-to knowledge on the Editor's index - and consider what this Help desk represents. Having comprehensive internal manuals, and a well-attended Help desk, can be the difference between a wiki that works and one that flounders. A new wiki has none of this structure initially, which means everybody who joins a new wiki is likely to go in a different direction. It's unlikely that random strangers will share your exact vision for the site, which means you could waste all your time trying to police them. According to Jimbo Wales, one of the key ingredients in a successful wiki is a shared vision. Everybody who participates, or at least a solid core group of participants, must share the same vision for what they want the wiki to be. If you start off by soliciting random strangers online, it would be miraculous if you found a group of people who share your vision. You would be much better off building most of the initial content yourself, or by recruiting some people you already know well, to help you build the initial content and structure. If you leave it up to random strangers to create the structure, your wiki is unlikely to succeed. In other words, you are unlikely to find a shortcut to avoid doing a lot of hard work. You might find it easier to concentrate on doing the initial work by yourself, before you introduce the massive complication of more users. --Teratornis (talk) 00:57, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Thanks Teratornis, Mgm, and PrimeHunter. Lot's of good advice and helpful information - and Teratornis, you really found the fine print on that page, that's the only part I skipped. Also, there are some good templates and an explanation of the goal of the site, versus what's on WP, so I think the site is now ready to handle some new editors, especially if they're familiar with Wikimedia. I certainly had no intention of writing to every Wikipedia editor, I was just thinking of contacting the ones who have themselves added their names to the plant-related projects. The suggestions were great, so I'll post on the project page, and a select few people who seem to be touching upon cultivation related information that is borderline how-to, or have had edits deleted/moved to deletionpedia, and check out this newsletter which I didn't know about... see how it goes. Thanks a lot! --RaffiKojian (talk) 03:58, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

March 9

Watchlist anomaly

Resolved

 – ukexpat (talk) 00:16, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

A page I started editing today - Sebastian Bayer - is on my watchlist, but when I use the 'my watchlist' special link to see recent edits of pages on my watchlist Sebastian Bayer does not show up, even though it has been edited at least five times today. Any ideas?? Thanks . . .--Fizbin (talk) 23:48, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

I just added Sebastian Bayer to my watchlist and it shows up. The most recent edit is currently a minor edit by a bot. Check the Watchlist tab at Special:Preferences. If "Expand watchlist to show all applicable changes" is not checked and the most recent edit falls under at least one category which is checked to hide then no edit for that page will show up on your watchlist (unless you click the relevant "show" link at the top of the watchlist). Note that if the most recent edit is hidden then it can "block" an older edit which would otherwise have been shown on the watchlist (this appears unfortunate to me). PrimeHunter (talk) 00:06, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Resolved - thanks. My preferences had 'hide bot edits' checked. Unchecking that fixed the issue. Thanks!--Fizbin (talk) 00:11, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Some weirdness is going on...

I'm logged in, but when I opened certain Wikipedia pages in separate tabs, I get the "You have new messages" banner. Assuming someone left me a message on my talk page, I click on the banner and instead I get taken to an IP's talk page with the new message being "Welcome to Wikipedia. Although everyone is welcome to make constructive edits, blah, blah, blah....". Why did that just happen if I'm logged in? And while I'm on the subject of IPs, the original reason I came here for, before I got distracted by the weird occurrence I just described above, If an IP address is registered here, what is the best SharedIP template I could use for it? --Whip it! ^{Now whip it good!} 00:33, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Maybe your login is sometimes not registered when you open a new tab. Is your user name displayed at top of the pages where you see the new messages banner? If you have problems staying logged in then see Help:Logging in for some tips. PrimeHunter (talk) 01:08, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

The problem was that I'm logged on the secure server, and the separate tabs I opened weren't. But what about my second question? --Whip it! ^{Now whip it good!} 03:29, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Overt or Covert Bias By Volunteer Administrators

Since I rely on Wikipedia as a starting point for some of my casual research and have occasionally contributed to articles, I am becoming concerned that Wikipedia may be overtly or covertly damaged as a source by the widespread (Drudge; print and broadcast pickups) taint of disallowing the addition of sourced entries under Barack Obama -- under the Controversy section. It seems to me that there is a controversy, fully sourced, on the subjects of Obama's citizenship; his past associations with controversial "thought" leaders and others who are notorious. I can understand the elimination of unsourced or unattributed items, but to be caught deleting well-written sourced material brings us to an ethics question. Should there be a higher appeal process available to contributors and if one does exist, where is that conversation? We need to keep Wikipedia honest, accurate and useful lest it become a disreputable source of rumor, inuendo and become totally unusable as a creditble source. Reference: WorldNetDaily.com http://wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=91114. 68.183.89.156 (talk)

This page is only for questions about using Wikipedia. You have a problem with how the page is being edited, take up your complaint at Talk:Barack Obama. --Whip it! ^{Now whip it good!} 00:46, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

We do have a "higher body" (not in the sense of "CIO < Manager < Employee") on Wikipedia called the "Arbitration Committee", these are elected individuals who serve to impose solution, on problems which the community cannot address on its own. They do not however make content rulings. Vivio Testarossa^{Talk Who} 00:52, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

If you haven't already then click "show" in the "Frequently Asked Questions" box near the top of Talk:Barack Obama. PrimeHunter (talk) 01:01, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Sorry about the categoration failure of this post -- It was meant as a generic concern and not specific to Obama. Anything which affects the credibility of Wikipedia is problematic to me. 68.183.89.156 (talk)

See WP:EIW#Dispute. Side comment: before I got an edit conflict with your followup comment, I was going to point out that your question appeared to conflate "Wikipedia" with the Barack Obama article. One should always distinguish between a problem with Wikipedia as a whole, vs. with one article in particular (or with a group of articles). Beware the Blind men and an elephant error. I have read some of the legion of bloggers who carry on about the problems with "Wikipedia" when they really refer to the narrow slices they happen to have focused on. There are many areas of Wikipedia where editing is surprisingly harmonious given the open nature of the project. Often these are in topics that the average person doesn't know or care much about (e.g., Mathematics). One would have to be very brave to get heavily involved in an extremely high-profile article on a polarizing subject which is simple enough for everyone to have an opinion. I can't imagine how one article on Barack Obama could make everyone happy; if Keith Olbermann liked it, Ann Coulter would probably hate it. As far as the "credibility" of Wikipedia goes, on political topics that term is unavoidably subjective. What Bill O'Reilly and Rush Limbaugh find credible is obviously different than what Al Franken and Rachel Maddow find credible. The right-wing folks might find Conservapedia credible. In any case, if you don't like something about the Barack Obama article, check back in six months. With the furious pace of editing, as well as Obama's evolving career, the article is bound to change. --Teratornis (talk) 02:49, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

That website hardly seems reliable with messages like "PETITION FOR PUBLIC RELEASE OF BARACK HUSSEIN OBAMA'S BIRTH CERTIFICATE", and "Where's the proof Barack Obama was born in the U.S. or that he fulfills the "natural-born American" clause in the Constitution?" when his birth certificate was released a LOOONG time ago[3]. and wikipedia even has a picture of it File:BarackObamaCertificationOfLiveBirthHawaii.jpg, so that's why if someone would post "There are doubts about his birth place" sourced to that news article no one would take it serious and reverted. chandler · 11:10, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Saving and sharing a book?

I was experimenting with the book feature last night. I went to save my book in order to add more articles later, as I remembered there was an box visible when the feature first was added that allowed you to save it to your userspace, but I found that said box was nowhere to be found. Help:Books#Advanced functions seems to back up my memory, as it indeed desribes how to save and share a book. So has the save feature been disabled, or has something simply gone wrong at my end? Xenon54 (talk) 00:59, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Help:Books says:

• As of February 26, 2009, the book functionality is in testing on the English Wikipedia.

In my experience with similar messages, the phrase "is in testing" is often a euphemism for "does not work yet". And once users get wise to that, the euphemism treadmill will have to crank forward another notch. Anyway, you can probably help with testing this tool, by carefully recording everything you do (for example on a user subpage like User:Xenon54/Books notes or whatever), and what results you observe, with enough detail to allow developers to isolate any bugs you find. See: Help:Books/Frequently Asked Questions#Where to report bugs and give general feedback? --Teratornis (talk) 02:59, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Multiple Sclerosis

How long does it generally take a Neurologist to get Multiple Sclerosis in remission

See also Wikipedia:Medical disclaimer. PrimeHunter (talk) 01:47, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Why is wikipedia editing out factual information about Barak Obama?

Based on the news article that came out exposing Wikipedia editors for taking off anything that would portray Lord Barack Obama as anything other than a God... I am thinking that you aren't even following your own model for information on your web site.

I guess we add wikipedia to the list of biased media who are in the tank for a man who has no right to worshiped like he is. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.215.26.28 (talk • contribs)

This page is for questions about using Wikipedia. Please consider asking this question at Talk:Barack Obama, as that would be the more appropriate venue. TNXMan 01:30, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Click "show" in the "Frequently Asked Questions" box near the top of Talk:Barack Obama before starting a dicussion. PrimeHunter (talk) 01:46, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

And at least have the cojones to sign your messages. – ukexpat (talk) 02:29, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

It was the only edit by 98.215.26.28 and the post sounds like it's from somebody who has merely read about Wikipedia elsewhere. PrimeHunter (talk) 02:51, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

There are various bloggers and commentators who, for one reason or another, like to rile up their dittoheads over the evils of Wikipedia. This is pretty easy to do, as Wikipedia has articles about almost everything, with something to rile up just about everyone. --Teratornis (talk) 03:11, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

new article with same name as current article

Hi,

I would like to write an article about Pierre Woods, the model. There is already an article about Pierre Woods, the NFL player. I have never created a page before. How do I create a page with the disambiguation? Thanks for helping me walk through the steps. Becky543 (talk) 01:13, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

All you have to do is create a page with a "qualifier", such as Pierre Woods (model). Creating the page is otherwise the same as if the original didn't exist. Vivio Testarossa^{Talk Who} 01:21, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

If there are only two people with articles then a disambiguation page is not necessary. You can add a hatnote like this to the top of the existing Pierre Woods:

{{otherpeople4|the football player|the model|Pierre Woods (model)}}

It renders as:

Template:Otherpeople4

PrimeHunter (talk) 01:26, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Read Help:Wikipedia: The Missing Manual/Editing, Creating, and Maintaining Articles/Creating a New Article to reduce the chance that your new article will get deleted. It's a good idea to read the entire book. --Teratornis (talk) 03:03, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Censorship?

http://wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=91114 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Censorship http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hypocracy

No cencorship there, actually. If you look wayyy at the bottom of Barack Obama's article, you'll see a dropdown template titled "Public Image" that has links to massive and well referenced articles on the controversies. There are over a hundred articles on Wikipedia about Barack Obama, and it's not possible to give even one sentence to each subtopic and maintain a coherent article. So to maintain coherence, topics that aren't directly relevant to his biography are only given a link and are confined to more focused articles. Someguy1221 (talk) 04:25, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

The Obama article is somewaht of a whitewash. It doesn't even mention Ayers, which should be mentioned per WP:UNDUE. It's just how wikipedia rolls, though. Nothing to be done. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) (contribs) 04:29, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

The WND article is mentioned at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents#Barack Obama probation issue and is probably the cause of several recent sections here on the Help desk, but here is not the place to discuss it. As I have adviced others, click "show" in the "Frequently Asked Questions" box near the top of Talk:Barack Obama. There is an article about the Bill Ayers presidential election controversy and it's mentioned in other articles about the election. Barack Obama is a biography about his whole life and only has one section with limited space about the election. PrimeHunter (talk) 04:36, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

I just wanted to let the original poster know they're not crazy. Obama is my second favorite politician after Bill Clinton, but WP has a serious liberal bias. There's no solution until a content board similar to arbcom, or something else as drastic, is created. Se la vi. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) (contribs) 05:28, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Should a spaced em-dash in a proper name be preserved?

There are a small number of articles such as The Art Institute of California – Sacramento that have spaced em-dashes in their names. I know the MoS is pretty clear about not spacing em-dashes, but in this case (and a few similar cases) the organization's web site consistently uses a spaced em-dashes in their name. Is there any reason we should preserve that dash style in the Wikipedia article? My opinion is no. I have already renamed the article to use spaced en-dashes, but am having second thoughts and want to be sure this was the correct action. -- Tcncv (talk) 04:12, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

WP:DASH says, “If [dashes are] used in an article's title, there should be a redirect from the version with a hyphen.” I created The Art Institute of California - Sacramento —teb728 t c 06:39, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

I don't know if Wikipedia has any specific policy on this, but my experience is that this is the kind of small typographical point which is routinely changed to conform to house style, regardless of the preferred style of the entity in question. Algebraist 10:44, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

PatelShots account posting not getting shared with everyone

> Hello, > > I created / posted page that I want to share with everyone on Wiki. It is under the account "PatelShots". I made it as my page, how do I make that as contribution so that everyone can see it?

Let me know what I need to do different? I can be reached at <removed> > > Cheers, > Shiv > —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.196.212.28 (talk • contribs) 04:21, 9 March 2009

There is no account, User:PatelShots. Do you have a better clue on where to look for the page? —teb728 t c 06:24, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

• There is a User:Patelshots, but I would recommend against making that visible to the public as it violates some core Wikipedia policies. (WP:SPAM being the primary one) - Mgm|^(talk) 08:49, 9 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Deleted as blatant spam. --Orange Mike | Talk 12:55, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

FORGOT PASSWORD

ABOUT THE REGISTRATIONS OF WIKIPEDIA ACCOUNTS WHERE MY NAMED ON IT DUE TO ONLY FOR SUCH IN THE WORKS WHERE PUBLISH ONLY FOR REFERENCE THAT REALIZED I DIDN'T KEY IN THE EMAIL ADDRESS WHERE MY ACCOUNTS OF NAME NOW FORGOT PASSWORD.

USERNAME : LING MUN CHUNG

PROBLEM : FORGOT PASSWORD

CATEGORIES EMAIL ADDRESS : PREVIOUSLY DIDN'T KEY IN.

NOW MY EMAIL ACCOUNTS IS : <email removed>

The email account didn't key in is previous during the yahoo email accounts where problem weather during constructions works or relevant of such due to the email accounts are also free. Such technologies where suppose create by myself that being damages by such extremist in Security Council where robberies of revenue accounts and business with the issue of anti nuclear warhead and relevant of lack of discriminations of budgets in defence and relevant that only belongs to themslevs inhabitant and mutant family privately grew only where damages at me since years incident 13 May 1969 incident in malaysia and before such is also the damages at the Cantonese where from the preivous abuisve colonies where form the North near USA.

May I have back my password to put such articles in it due to the informations about the entire world extremist in robberies of Natural Resource including the damages at me and such human rights where they also abuisve in such budgets where develo9pment of formula or weapons where belongs to themselves and such making several of issues remain themselves in continue taking teh blind salary and intruding entire world to become their private world invasion only and abuisve severed of human rights including violates international policies with motif in robberies by productions and serviuce provider exports without justice and damages at all our abilities in build up such capita for ourself and our community.

Sorry but there is no way that Wikipedia can recover your old password, and if you didn’t enter an email address, there is no way that it can assign you a new password. So if you can’t remember your password, I guess you will have to get a new username. —teb728 t c 06:16, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Copyedit

I created the article Decretum de Judaeis from Nostra Aetate. What should I put in Talk:Decretum de Judaeis to indicate that the transfer of information is in conformity to the norms of Wikipedia ? ADM (talk) 11:04, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

• If you split an article (especially because of size reasons) you should leave a sufficient summary in the original article. Further, you'd have to do the same as with the target article leave a 'paper' trail that says where the info came from and where it went in both article's edit summaries. - Mgm|^(talk) 11:08, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

• Please use edit summaries. See Wikipedia:Splitting. Make a new edit to Decretum de Judaeis where the edit summary mentions it was created with content from Nostra Aetate. PrimeHunter (talk) 12:45, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Created page for The Poncherellos and it was deleted (of course)

Like everything else with The Poncherellos, the Wikipedia entry I created for them was deleted. While the entry was brief, it included a tremendous about of history with more to be added in at a later date.

Why was it deleted?

The Poncherellos have a long, rich history in the musical fabric that is Berkshire County MA. Granted they're not James Taylor or Arlo Guthrie, but they have ties to many well-known musicians including Dee Dee Ramone, Ena Kostabi and more. They've been a band on and off for over 15 years and have reached many milestones including Best Punk Band of 2008 voted on by the readers of My 411 Source, a large regional organization.

Again, why was it deleted? Because it wasn't a bunch of boring old hippies with acoustic guitars? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Andyponcherello (talk • contribs) 11:57, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

The Poncherellos was deleted under criterion for speedy deletion A7 because the article failed to indicate why the Poncherellos are important and significant. If you feel that the article prior to deletion did in fact indicate why the band are significant, then you should point this out to the deleting admin here. If you want to recreate the article, you should first read WP:BAND and make sure the article demonstrates that the band meets those notability criteria. Algebraist 12:14, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

• When you visit the The Poncherellos article, you can see a pink block of text which explains why it was previously deleted, with a link to explain what A7 means. - Mgm|^(talk) 12:31, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

ip addresses

Hi,

I would like to search wikipedia for ip addresses within a post. I do not want to search for a post from an ip address, but to see if the ip i am looking for is within the actual post. In other words if i do a straight search on lets say ip :198.0.8.2 i will get results for posts from that ip. However if there was a post that contained the ip within the words of the post i would like that post to show up in my search results. is there any special syntax i should be using to do this search thanks —Preceding unsigned comment added by 200.125.161.205 (talk) 11:59, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Just enter '198.0.8.2' in the search box and click 'search'. Algebraist 12:09, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Then click the namespaces you want to search in at the bottom of the page, and click the "Advanced search" button. PrimeHunter (talk) 13:09, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Should a new user be threatened with police action by a moderator for adding ane xternal link?

Hi

I don't have a Wikipedia account but wanted to add an external link to an existing page.

As the page [Java APIs] already contains external links I assumed that it would be ok.

After adding the external link it was immediately removed by a moderator who goes by the name "KS3 Maffs"

On trying to communicate with this person he/she replied:

"This is your last warning. The next time you vandalize a page, you will be blocked from editing Wikipedia. Blatant advertising. Stop it, or I wil call the police. KS3 Maffs (talk) 11:43, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Your link was unacceptable, please do not reinsert spam/commerical links into articles. Do you really want me to get in touch with your ISP?? KS3 Maffs (talk) 12:17, 9 March 2009 (UTC)"

I tried communicating with this person but they appeared to delete my text.

Should a user who attempts to add an external link to a page that already contains commercial and non-commercial external links be threatened with police action?

Should a user who attempts to add an external link to a page that already contains commercial and non-commercial external links be threatened with having their ISP contacted?

Does this moderator think they are god?

Who moderators the offensive moderators?

Graham

—Preceding unsigned comment added by 212.20.240.70 (talk) 13:20, 9 March 2009 (UTC)