Wikipedia:Help desk/Archives/2011 August 1

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August 1

List of past titles?

For any given article, is there an simple way to see all of the past versions of its title and when they were changed? RandomCritic (talk) 01:04, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

Title changes (more correctly termed "page moves") are logged automatically. To visit a list of logs for a given page, click the "view logs for this page" link at the top of the article's revision history page. There you can filter the results to only show page move logs. Happy editing, hajatvrc with WikiLove @ 01:15, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

(edit conflict) similar to the above answer

Yes; on an article page, first go to the "History" - if you are using the default skin, that's at the top-right, "View history", next to the search box.

Then click on the small link View logs for this page - which is near the top, just under "From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia".

That will show all logged actions for the page; if there are too many other actions, you can use the drop-down to just show "Move" entries.

You can also go directly to Special:Logs, and put the page name in there.

For example - for the article Kate Middleton, you'd get this.  Chzz  ►  01:19, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

Where do I submit a request for an article?

I seem to be going in a circle trying to find the correct link to take me to area where I can submit a request for an article. I can find submitted requests, pending requests, etc., but not a link to a form to submit a request.

Thanks! 69.205.199.92 (talk) 02:03, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

If you can write a draft, with some appropriate references, the easiest way is to use WP:WIZARD and, at the end, choose to "Submit for review".

If you just want to put in a request for anyone to write an article, it's Wikipedia:Requested articles...but, it has an enormous backlog. So it's better to have a go yourself. See also WP:FIRST.  Chzz  ►  02:07, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

Can someone help me create an article?

There was a real person called Dlasta that Xena:_Warrior_Princess character Velasca was based on. I have a source about the person right here: http://www.sacred-texts.com/wmn/ama/ama07.htm Can someone help me make an article on Dlasta please? Thanks! Neptunekh2 (talk) 03:22, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

See the section immediately above: If you cannot create an article yourself, the place to request an article is Wikipedia:Requested articles. —teb728 t c 03:50, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

Also see WP:RS to determine whether the source you linked to is reliable, and WP:BIO to determine whether Dlasta meets the notability requirements for people. You might find it easier to leave a comment on Talk:Velasca where you might find other editors interested in writing about Dlasta. --Teratornis (talk) 03:56, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

If memory serves, Neptune was asked not to create any new articles since they create a poorly written stub and then come here asking for people to clean it up. At least two editors have attempted to take Neptune under their wing. IMO, Neptune needs to deal with those two editors since they seem to be willing to take on the task of helping Neptune. Dismas|^(talk) 04:00, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

Dismas is right - Neptune is under a restriction to create articles only in her sandbox so that they could be checked. --Elen of the Roads (talk) 13:17, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

Table help

Hi, does anyone know how I create a table with rounded borders? Thanks, Magister Scienta^talk (1 August 2011)

It's non-standard, won't work in all browsers, and can cause unexpected results. It certainly shouldn't be attempted on articles.

One way to achieve it is, using a "border radius" style; This page explains it a little. An example;

{| style="border:1px; background:#bbbbbb; border-radius: 2em;"
|-  
|This might have rounded corners. It depends on your browser.
|}

This might have rounded corners. It depends on your browser.

There is also a template, {{Round corners}} - see that page for an example.  Chzz  ►  04:10, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

FYI using Google Chrome v12.0.742.122 the rectangle above does not have rounded corners. CaptRik (talk) 11:28, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

Thanks everybody, all your assistance is really appreciated, Magister Scienta^talk (1 August 2011)

That should work in Chrome 4.0 and above. What about the example at {{Border-radius}}? ---— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk 13:08, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

I am running Google Chrome v12.0.742.122 also and the example above has square borders but {{Border-radius}} is rounded. In Firefox 6 both have rounded borders. GB fan please review my editing 13:22, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

Agree with GB fan, {{Border-radius}} is rounded for me. CaptRik (talk) 14:13, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

The example above was using the Mozill specific -moz-border-radius, so it only worked with Firefox. I updated it to use {{Border-radius}} so it will work with all browsers that support the CSS selector. ---— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk 17:30, 2 August 2011 (UTC)

Re. the change to the example [1] - yes, with that change, it will work on more browsers - but by no means all. That's why I used the example - to highlight that it won't work on all browsers, and thus we need to be cautious in using it. (plus, to show the code, and explain it with the link)  Chzz  ►  03:18, 3 August 2011 (UTC)

X

I am pissed. I wanted to just say, somewhere, how much I like WIKIDAMNPEDIA. I feel it is the only true source of information, however nieve and manipulatable that may seem. I now despise the internet with its constant wastes of time when I, a vulnerable single mother, though uniquely bright, am searching for L I T E R A L L Y vital information.

I listen to BBC/NPR daily. I also have friends who are off the grid. Which is better? I am in a flux. Help would be good. But making easier access for user compliments, let alone comments would be a good start.

Thanks for wasting my time tonight, and thank you even more for you original, brilliant and dangerous idea. It has to work. I will do whatever it takes to support it. by the way, i plan to graduate with a ba in psych in may 2012, just in case you have any openings for a weird, overlooked, think tank, multi-tasker type.

ADIOS AMIGOS — Preceding unsigned comment added by 204.16.169.164 (talk) 04:41, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

Could this be User:Since 10.28.2010? He recently lost talk page access and this seems to be of a similar writing style. Ryan Vesey Review me! 05:18, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

Mum's the word. (Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned.) --Dave ^{♠♣♥♦™№1185©♪♫®} 08:43, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

Forced addition of dot in middle initial?

Resolved

I am looking at the template Template:LDS70pres and I am running into a problem with Mr. Goaslind. Even though the entry in the table has [[Jack H Goaslind|Goaslind]], when I mouse over it or click on it, it goes to the page for Jack H. Goaslind (note with period), which then redirects to Jack H Goaslind. This means that when the template is displayed on that page, it still contains a link. I'd like to make it not redirect, so that the entry in the template correctly is shown in black on that page. Any ideas on why the initial link is to the one with the period?Naraht (talk) 05:13, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

Works for me - ie, on Jack H Goaslind, if I look at the "Presidents of the Seventy..." navbox, the word "Goaslind" is in black.

It's probably a cache issue; the redirect - on the template - was fixed with this edit at 08:29, 29 April 2011. It's hard to spot, but in that edit "[[Jack H. Goaslind]]" is changed to "[[Jack H Goaslind]]". That happened after the page was renamed [2] 10:58, 28 April 2011.

I guess you're seeing an outdated version of the page, from some cache somewhere along the interweb pipes. Please purge both pages, by going to;

• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Template:LDS70pres?action=purge

and

• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_H_Goaslind?action=purge

If that doesn't fix it, try clearing your browser cache. And, finally, it's always worth trying a reboot.

If it still fails...can you check if it's the same if you are logged out, not logged in? Please let us know.  Chzz  ►  05:50, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

Goaslind appeared on the page twice and the period remained in one of the links. I assume that when you clicked on the link you chose the one with the period but when you viewed the source information you saw the one without the period. I removed the period and the duplicate Goaslind and it works now. Ryan Vesey Review me! 06:07, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

Ooh, well spotted, I missed that! Thanks!  Chzz  ►  06:30, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

Thank you!!!Naraht (talk) 11:12, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

What do you do when someone joins Wikipedia to edit to promote his own agenda?

New user User:Ebenezercore has just added his own name to Kinetic Sculpture Race even though he is notable for nothing other than what his father did. From personal experience with this individual, I know that there is little understanding of the concept of fair and unbiased reporting. This person has caused so many lawsuits and problems that even the local papers have begun to take note [3]. What do we do when someone joins only to self-aggrandize and probably to rewrite pages to suit himself? Is there a watch program for this? Please help. Ellin Beltz (talk) 10:32, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

I've undone the edit - because the person named is not a public figure, and because it was unreferenced. And I have cautioned the user about our conflict of interest policy [4].

If you have further concerns, see Wikipedia:Conflict of interest/Noticeboard. Cheers,  Chzz  ►  11:06, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

Need to edit a page, but option is no longer available.

I would like to add/amend some content on the article about "Mehdi Hasan". However, there is no longer an edit option available on that page.

What can I do to edit the page?? Thanks

2yyiam (talk) 11:04, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

The page has been protected from editing by new users, due to repeated violations of our biography policies.

You can, however, put an edit request on the discussion page - go to Talk:Mehdi Hasan, create a "New section", put in a heading, and put {{editsemiprotected}} - just like that - followed by your request. (You'll see a previous request that you made in May 2010 on that page).

After you've made a few more edits, you'll be autoconfirmed, and able to edit it directly.  Chzz  ►  11:10, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

Searching for Improper Latin replacements for Greek Letters.

I'm looking to make sure that all Greek-Letter Organizations (Fraternities and Sororities) have their names properly done in all Greek Letters. What I often see is (for example) instead of the proper ΛΧΑ, articles would have ΛXA. The first example is three greek letters (Lambda Chi Alpha), the second has a Lambda followed by a Latin Alphabet X and A. What I would like to have is the ability to search for any instance of a letter in the Greek Alphabet (Capital, no accents) directly preceding or following a letter in the Latin Alphabet (Capital, no accents) Does anyone have any ideas?Naraht (talk) 13:21, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

http://toolserver.org/~jarry/grep/?lang=en&wiki=wikipedia&ns=0 can search page names. I tried (Α|Β|Γ|Δ|Ε|Ζ|Η|Θ|Ι|Κ|Λ|Μ|Ν|Ξ|Ο|Π|Ρ|Σ|Τ|Υ|Φ|Χ|Ψ|Ω)(A|B|C|D|E|F|G|H|I|J|K|L|M|N|O|P|Q|R|S|T|U|V|W|X|Y|Z) and (A|B|C|D|E|F|G|H|I|J|K|L|M|N|O|P|Q|R|S|T|U|V|W|X|Y|Z)(Α|Β|Γ|Δ|Ε|Ζ|Η|Θ|Ι|Κ|Λ|Μ|Ν|Ξ|Ο|Π|Ρ|Σ|Τ|Υ|Φ|Χ|Ψ|Ω). Most results were redirects even though "Include redirects" was not checked. The only non-redirects I didn't already know to be valid were KhLΘG, WΔZ, Concerto for Piano and Concerto in G♯ΔA♭, Egaleo ΒC, ΔF508, ΦPHI Hi-Fi Innovation, but they may also be valid. I don't know a way to make the search for article content. PrimeHunter (talk) 14:42, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

(e/c) Slightly laborious but there's only 46 possible combinations (we do not need to search for chi followed by the Latin X) so ΑX ΒX ΓX ΔX ΕX ΖX ΗX ΘX ΙX ΚX ΛX ΜX ΝX ΞX ΟX ΠX ΡX ΣX ΤX ΥX ΦX ΨX ΩX XΑ XΒ XΓ XΔ XΕ XΖ XΗ XΘ XΙ XΚ XΛ XΜ XΝ XΞ XΟ XΠ XΡ XΣ XΤ XΥ XΦ XΨ XΩ.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 14:49, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

That only searches full words and not parts of words. PrimeHunter (talk) 14:53, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

Give me a few hours, and I'll use the Database scanner on my other computer. Disclaimer: my downloaded database is from early July, so some of the results will be wrong. -- John of Reading (talk) 16:32, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

(e/c)

To be more specific, I would need anything with a Greek Letter before or after a Latin letter that would be used by a lazy editor. So, for example, I don't need GΧ (G Chi) since G wouldn't be used that way. So the grouping for the Latin letters would be ABEHIKMNOPTXYZ and thus the "grep" would be [ABEHIKMNOPTXYZ][ΑΒΓΔΕΖΗΙΚΛΜΝΞΟΠΡΣΤΥΦΧΨΩ] and the two flipped. (I have seen something like a KΚΨ (first is a K, second is a Kappa - ugly), so doing "X Chi" would be useful.) I'm also ignoring F/Ϝ(digamma). I need parts of words since there are only a few cases where the latin letter and greek letter together would be the entire fraternity/sorority name (AΦ and ΔΥ are the only ones that spring to mind)

The typical situation is where University of Northern Wyoming lists their fraternities in the Student Activities with the greek letters after the spelled out letters so lines like *[[Alpha Phi Omega]] (AΦΩ) and the letter just after the left parentheses is an A where it should be an Alpha. Because of this, I expect multiple occurences on most pages where this occurs. Thank You!Naraht (talk) 16:36, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

Assuming you use Windows, the Greek characters can be typed by using alt codes alt+224 all the way to alt+235, as far as I know. For instance, you can type Σ by using &Sigma with a semicolon at the end, which produces Σ. Similarly, you can type a delta by using &Delta with a semicolon at the end, which produces Δ, so it should be the same for all the other letters. --Σ ^talk_contribs 00:29, 2 August 2011 (UTC)

I tend to use the ability to click on the greek letter entries in the wikied.Naraht (talk) 14:01, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

Value of card

i was wondering if you guys could help me ive got a 2010 presspass fourwide jeff gordan memorbilia card numbered 4 of 10 can you please tell me the value of this card please......thanks jamie h — Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.141.192.43 (talk) 16:09, 1 August 2011 (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. PrimeHunter (talk) 16:25, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

Anxious to help?

Those of you anxious to help editors, but are frustrated because Chzz seems to get to them first :) might check out Wikipedia:Requests for feedback/2011 August 1. I've responded to almost half, but could use some help.--SPhilbrickT 16:11, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

User name

The user name is on the top of my article and doesn't make sense there. I can't fix it. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Girlfromnarnia (talk • contribs) 19:43, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

You tried to create an article, but you wrote it on your userpage, which is supposed to tell us about you! I've moved it to User:Girlfromnarnia/Eliza Harris; but that draft wouldn't last long in its present form, since it provides no evidence that this person is notable enough to have an article about her in an encyclopedia (see WP:ACTOR for our standards). --Orange Mike | Talk 19:52, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

I think Orange Mike intended to refer you to WP:NACTOR for our notability standards. Beside that, your draft provides no citations to reliable sources to verify the facts asserted. —teb728 t c 20:14, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

help

I recently asked question about how to put a reference and I wanted to know about this in detail but unfortunately there were no answer given, however I would like to know what's wrong with the references those I published in the article of Syed Zakir Hussain Shah and is there any other problem please how I can solve that because This a famous who I put article about therefore I don't want this to be out of Wikipedia.

Thank You I hope you will understand. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 188.222.24.201 (talk) 20:22, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

Please take a look at WP:Referencing for beginners. Briefly, rather than list the sources at the end of the article, you need to cite them in the body of the text. This is particularly important in the case of biographies of living people where potentially controversial material not supported by reliable sources will be removed. In fact Syed Zakir Hussain Shah should probably be reduced to a stub until it is properly sourced. – ukexpat (talk) 20:36, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

...which User:Orangemike has now done. – ukexpat (talk) 01:25, 2 August 2011 (UTC)

I experiment in my sandbox

I created the article called Dlasta in my sandbox: User:Neptunekh2/Dlasta. Could someone tell me what think of my article and if it should be on wikipedia? Thanks! Neptunekh2 (talk) 21:16, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

Commented on your talkpage. I don't think this person passes our notability test - the only reference to her is in passing in Rothery's book. --Elen of the Roads (talk) 21:46, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

Worse yet, it is copied almost verbatim from http://www.sacred-texts.com/wmn/ama/ama07.htm. The slight changes do not remove the fact that it is a copyright violation. —teb728 t c 02:45, 2 August 2011 (UTC)

Congratulations Wikipedia User..

You are the winner for August 1st.

I received this and a choice of either $1000 gift certificate to Best Buy, $1000 towards and Ipad & something else. I chose the Best Buy gift certificate. Filled out a questionaire (no personal info was requested). But it it got stuck when I gave a phone number requested. (Cell Phone). Not sure if this is a legitimate prize. Please advise. I received this while searching on my BlackBerry. Thank you,

Brian — Preceding unsigned comment added by 166.248.1.220 (talk) 21:35, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

Dude, you got Spam --Elen of the Roads (talk) 21:47, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

This usually happens with squatted domains - i.e., you'll get a similar "survey" to win an Ipad if you go to http://wikiepdia.org instead of the correct address, http://wikipedia.org. ^Avic_ennasis @ 22:23, 1 Av 5771 / 1 August 2011 (UTC)

Another possibility is that your BlackBerry got infected by malware which directs searches to a bogus site. In any case, the message you saw was not from Wikipedia and we cannot help, other than I strongly suggest that you give no additional info and most definitely no money or card or account number to whoever is running this scam. PrimeHunter (talk) 23:44, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

Move multiple pages

Is there an efficient way to move an entire set of archive pages? Specifically I need to move all the Wikipedia:Wikiquette alerts/archiveN pages to Wikipedia:Wikiquette assistance/alertsN, (where N is an integer). Gerardw (talk) 21:55, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

If you move the top page, all the supages will follow automagically, I believe. Alternatively, if all the pages need moved, I can do it pretty quickly. :-) ^Avic_ennasis @ 22:25, 1 Av 5771 / 1 August 2011 (UTC)

Some did but most of the archives didn't. If you have a way to do them in a batch I'd appreciate it. Gerardw (talk) 22:35, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

 Done all but one page, which will be moved once an admin handles this request. :-) Let me know if you need anything else. ^Avic_ennasis @ 23:18, 1 Av 5771 / 1 August 2011 (UTC)

 Done--SPhilbrickT 00:00, 2 August 2011 (UTC)

Thank you Gerardw (talk) 01:19, 2 August 2011 (UTC)

I added dalasta in List_of_women_warriors_in_folklore#Historical_Czech_Lands

Can someone tell me what they think since I added dalasta in List_of_women_warriors_in_folklore#Historical_Czech_Lands? I did it because User_talk:Elen_of_the_Roads said I should. Thanks! Neptunekh2 (talk) 22:47, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

I'm sure she didn't tell you to copy and paste copyrighted text though did she? I have reverted your edit on that basis. You may and should use sources as a source of information, but not as a source of sentences. This part is crucial: say it in your own words. Note also that just changing the sentence superficially is not sufficient to avoid copyright infringement. See Wikipedia:Close paraphrasing. Finally, if that text was not copied and pasted but your own, the main comment I would have made for improvement was that it was not cited to a reliable source that verified the information.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 01:12, 2 August 2011 (UTC)

I'll talk some more on your talkpage. I've reassured Fuhghettaboutit that there isn't a copyvio problem in this case, but we do need to look at the writing, then you will be able to put it back in. Incidentally, I had missed that Dlasta and Valasca are the same person, just variant spellings of the name. Ryan Vesey is rewriting your Valasca article here User:Ryan_Vesey/Valasca, so you needn't worry about the article. --Elen of the Roads (talk) 09:49, 2 August 2011 (UTC)

Spam protection filter

Hi i keep running into the Spam protection filter, i know how it works, but i'm not adding blacklisted links or titles. I get this even when the links are internal, if i hit back and publish again it works. I am an admin on the terraria wiki and this is conflicting with my ability to quickly edit pages. Is there some reason this is happening? And how do i fix it? Daking123 (talk) 22:59, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

Can you give us an example of an edit? ^Avic_ennasis @ 23:20, 1 Av 5771 / 1 August 2011 (UTC)

This was the first page i got the spam filter message, and i only added one link to the page and it was an internal to a category page. Daking123 (talk) 07:06, 2 August 2011 (UTC)

Are you referring to edits at Wikipedia or at http://terraria.wikia.com/wiki/Terraria_Wiki? This is a help desk for Wikipedia. Terraria Wiki may have other settings but it's possible somebody can help anyway if you quote the message you get. PrimeHunter (talk) 23:35, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

Yes i am referring to the wiki you mentioned, sorry i thought the protection filter was automated across all wikis. I get a page saying:

Spam Protection Filter

The page you wanted to save was blocked by the spam protection filter.

This is probably caused by a blacklisted link or pagename.

If you think this is wrong, please contact us here. Please, provide a copy of this message when ::reporting any problem.

On the Help:Spam page it says it should tell me the link that is bad but it doesn't provide me with anymore info than that. Could i get white listed on the Terraria wiki to avoid this problem? Any help would be appreciated. Daking123 (talk) 07:06, 2 August 2011 (UTC)

Where it says "please contact us here", is that a blue link to some kind of help page at Wikia? I suggest you explore that route; you'll only get guesswork from the Wikipedia help desk. -- John of Reading (talk) 08:21, 2 August 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia is run by the non-profit Wikimedia Foundation. Wikia is run by Wikia, Inc. We have no control over them or the thousands of other wikis which use the MediaWiki software. MediaWiki has lots of configuration settings and extensions which can vary between sites. It sounds like you got the message at http://community.wikia.com/wiki/Help:Spam_blacklist#What_is_the_spam_filter_message.3F (but without the link). The message says "If you think this is wrong, please contact us here". Follow the link on "here" to get help from Wikia. PrimeHunter (talk) 14:01, 2 August 2011 (UTC)

Help Link

I need help creating a link. I thought there was a template/magic word that created if I clicked it would link me to my page, and if you clicked it it would link you to yours. Is that possible? Majestic Pyre^{My Speech Bubble} 23:14, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

Special:Mypage. PrimeHunter (talk) 23:28, 1 August 2011 (UTC)