Wikipedia:Help desk/Archives/2012 February 15

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February 15

downloading books i created

I followed the directions and hit the Pdf button. Will it download to kindle fire? Other files do. I cannot find it. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Honeysma (talk • contribs) 03:50, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

Try Help:Books/Feedback.Vchimpanzee · talk · contributions · 20:44, 17 February 2012 (UTC)

Does logging in again affect one's edit?

I have just spent several hours extensively editing an article and found that I must have been logged out during that time because when I looked at the History page I saw that my IP address was quoted on the page instead of my user name. If I find myself in a similar situation in future, will it be safe to log in again before making the final save to the edited article or will I lose all my edits and have to start again?

Freeman501 (talk) 04:35, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

No, you'll lose the edit window. You need to log in each time if you want to make sure your edits correctly attribute to your account. If you "catch" yourself having forgotten to log in and having put a lot of text in the edit window, but before saving it, the best thing to to would be to copy the text from the edit window and paste it somewhere while you log in, then add it back to the edit window once you are logged in. However, once you have "saved" an edit while logged out, there's nothing you can do to rectify the problem. --Jayron32 04:53, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for your reply. I had logged in before starting the edits. I suspected I would lose the edits if I tried to log in again and believe that I actually did much as you suggested. I opened a second tab in my browser, logged in to Wikipedia, went to the unedited, live version of the article and opened the edit window. Then I went back to the first tab that had the edit window containing my edits, copied the entire text with CTRL+C, returned to the second tab and pasted my text over the original unedited text. I could see my user name at the top of the page in the second tab, so I saved the article. I then went back to the first tab and was careful to make sure that I exited Wikipedia without saving. I returned to the second tab where I could see that the article had updated with my edits. However, the History tab did not show my user name, even though I was still logged in. Do you have any idea what sort of time limit I might have to impose on myself to complete editing before I get logged out?

Hmm... That's interesting. The same thing has just happened when I tried to post this comment. My IP address came up in my signature instead of my user name. I had to log in again and repost. I wonder what is going on. Freeman501 (talk) 13:21, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

Do you click the "remember me" box when you log in? You might just be getting logged out super fast if you don't have that clicked. - Purplewowies (talk) 19:13, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

See more at Help:Logging in. PrimeHunter (talk) 21:33, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

Thank you, Purplewowies and Prime Hunter, for your helpful suggestions. They are greatly appreciated.

I have not been in the habit of clicking the "remember me" box at log-in and will try this. I somehow managed to miss the Help article on logging in when I searched FAQs before first posting. My excuse is it was 4.30 am and I had to get some sleep… The (well-written and informative) article mentions cookies and the firewall as possible sources of difficulty and I will investigate these.

It now occurs to me that there may be another possibility, which I mention here in case others encounter a similar problem. I have recently upgraded my Internet connection to a faster speed and subsequently have been intermittently unable to log in to my e-mail host. Each time, the log-in screen alleges that the account password is incorrect, which is nonsense. I have established with my ISP that they are logging periodic upload errors on my connection. Their suggested remedy is that I should replace all the cables, filters and the phone socket between the incoming phone line and the modem-router. As all this kit is either new or relatively new, mass replacement seems an unlikely solution, but I’ll have to bite the bullet and try progressive replacement or the ISP will probably not offer further help.

I think that it is reasonable to assume these two areas (e-mail and Wikipedia log-in) are linked. It remains to be seen whether the cause is software or hardware-related. I will post the outcome when I get to the bottom of the problem.Freeman501 (talk) 17:41, 16 February 2012 (UTC)

Shogun page appears to have been deleted.

The content for the "Shogun" page (historic rulers of Japan) appears to have been deleted. I am not qualified to update/ fix this. Are you able to restore it? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.20.238.2 (talk) 04:55, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

 Done it has been fixed. GB fan 05:49, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

In fact, you are qualified to reverse the problem. Anyone can! At the top of the article is a tab which may say "History" or "View History" (for help with this, see Help:Page history). Click on that and find the last good version of the article (the number of bytes is a clue), click on the date and time, click "edit this page" at the top of the screen, and click on "Save page" at the bottom of the screen, using an edit summary such as "rv vandalism" or "rv unintentional removal of content". In many cases where this happens, you can simply click on "undo" to the right of the last edit. This case was one where several edits led to the page as you found it, so it wouldn't have been that simple.Vchimpanzee · talk · contributions · 20:55, 17 February 2012 (UTC)

Request move listing

I made a request move for the Ninja Turtles 2012 series article and I was wondering why the request hasn't been listed for February 14? Sarujo (talk) 05:01, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

The bot listed it after you posted here. I don't know whether this delay is normal. You could perhaps ask User:RM bot's operator. -- John of Reading (talk) 07:55, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

blacklisted but don't know why or how to correct

Commission Breakthrough program has suggested adding web page link to Wikipedia. I've researched topics, found appropriate place to add external link, to a website that l have written general content, information on regarding E Commerce. When attempting to add the link as instructed, l was imformed that this site was blacklisted. l wish to know why or how to correct. Thanks. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Whocsme (talk • contribs) 05:53, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

Wikipedia suggest you don't add web page link to Wikipedia. This isn't E commerce. This is a scam. It is blacklisted as a scam. There is nothing to correct. AndyTheGrump (talk) 06:07, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

Is there a way to hide the "my sandbox" link in the links at the top of the page?

I think this link is new, but I can't find any discussion about it. (I'd love if someone could point me to the discussion that took place, if it exists.) I will probably never use that link, and I feel it kind of clutters the list of links, especially since I'm not going to use it. My userspace subpages use more descriptive names, and if I need a sandbox (which is rarely), I either use the public sandbox or I test it by previewing my userpage, depending on what exactly I'm trying out. I made a sandbox before as a test of page creation when someone was having issues creating pages after the blackout and they posted here. I've since had it deleted. If I want to recreate it, I don't need the link, as I know where and how to make a sandbox in my userspace. Is there a way to remove the link? - Purplewowies (talk) 06:50, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

There's a new checkbox at Special:Preferences - Gadgets tab - Appearance section. -- John of Reading (talk) 07:47, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

Ah, thanks! I've unchecked the "show sandbox link" box. - Purplewowies (talk) 07:57, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

Help

Dear Wikipedia,

I am frequent Wikipedia reader. Am not well aware about technical things about your page (Eg. how to save a page from being deleted). I tried searching for an answer on your site without much success. I m worried about this particular page on your site. link - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Masulkar_colony. It is a well written article, but a warning on that page concerns me. It says - 'the page will be deleted...' I am a resident of that area, and every information provided on that page is true. Hence I wish to save this page from being deleted. I Request for your help on this.

Thank you. Gaurav Salvi

Gaurav3010 (talk) 07:01, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

This article appears to be about a block of flats/apartments. A complete lack of references gives weight to the idea that the building is not notable enough to sustain an article. Does the building have any official status as a historic building? Currently, the article is extremely unlikely to survive a debate at WP:AFD. Mjroots (talk) 07:34, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

It seems to be a suburb. Population of around 10 000. "The colony is full of residential and a few shopping complexes." Definitely not an apartment block. If it really is a notable place I think WP:WikiProject India is the right place to go for help to "save" this article - which is nowhere near "well written". It's not enough that you know that "every information provided on that page is true" - there must be references to reliable sources that back up the information. Roger (talk) 07:52, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

HOW DO I ADD TO OR DELETE MY UNIFIED ACCOUNTS?

The process of finding answers to the way the site works is extremely long-winded - you wouldn't believe how long it's taken to reach this page. I'll have to save it in my bookmarks!

For all account options, or anything else that requires a checkbox or radio button, wouldn't it be worth a brief explanation provided by hovering over the options? In some cases, as for the subject of this, there's no obvious way to find out at all.

Rather than just the general FAQs at en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:FAQ, there need to be separate FAQs for each subject.

I don't speak German, and yet de.wikipedia.org has appeared in my list of unified accounts. I'll never log in to it. I could do with a list of all possible unified accounts, complete with a brief explanation of what they are, and to be able to check a box next to each.

Having to type words like 'checkbox' brings me on to the subject of 'real' English (British English)! The whole of en.wikipedia.org has phrases in American English, and sometimes you have to think twice about what's meant. Perhaps a British English version could be created - just by automatically substituting Americanisms for British English, should the user opt to use British English. What do you think?

For now, it's the 'unified accounts' question that's the most pressing. Thanks for any help you can give.

Andrew — Preceding unsigned comment added by State Of Completeness (talk • contribs) 07:41, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

Sorry, but user accounts can not be deleted. And don't worry, the unified login feature is simply for convenience and completely optional. You might want to upload a picture in Wikimedia Commons for example, or do a minor correction in one of the other language Wikipedias, Wikisource, Wikibooks, Wikiversity, Wikimedia etc. A unified login means you won't have to register again, you keep the same passwords, and no other user can reregister under your account name. It applies to ALL the projects under the Wikimedia Foundation.

That said, you can safely ignore all of them except your English Wikipedia account if you want to.

As for the English varieties, please see WP:ENGVAR. The preponderance of American English is the result of a majority in American users. In general, articles that pertain more to subjects more relevant to countries that use British English will use British English. Subjects that pertain more to subjects relevant to countries that use American English use American English. There are other national dialects as well like Irish English, Canadian English, Australian English, Jamaican Standard English, Philippine English, New Zealand English, etc. But these are dialects, not different languages. Creating separate Wikipedias for them is out of the question. It can not be automated either. A task like that is monumental for a very trivial reason. We're all volunteers and time and effort is better focused elsewhere. After all, you do understand the articles don't you?

Also, if one or the other is already used within an article, do not change it. Doing so can be considered disruptive. Follow the precedent to keep the article consistent.

And lastly, a tip. When searching for guidelines and project pages, use the Wikipedia searchbox and use an approporiate prefix so you don't end up in article space. For example this page is the Wikipedia:Help desk . It uses the shortcuts WP:HD, WP:Y, and WP:HELPDESK, which shorten the prefix of Wikipedia: to WP:. If you type this words into the searchbox, it will take you here. Different pages have different prefixes. See Wikipedia:Namespace and Help:Page name. It's intuitive, such that when you're looking for help, you can type WP:HELP; when looking for help in using references, you can type WP:CITATION or WP:REFERENCES; when you want to know more about talk pages you can type WP:TALKPAGE, etc.

Take note of the names on top of each page and you'll get the hang of it soon enough.-- OBSIDIAN†SOUL 08:44, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

If you have normal cookie settings in your browser and you are logged in to a Wikimedia wiki and visit any page at another Wikimedia wiki then your unified account is automatically registered there without having to log in. This must have happened for your dewiki account at http://toolserver.org/~quentinv57/sulinfo/State+Of+Completeness. de:Spezial:Logbuch/State Of Completeness shows it was created 43 minutes before your post here. Once created, it cannot be deleted. PrimeHunter (talk) 21:23, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

I see you've requested a change in username, which, if granted, will disconnect this account from the rest of the global accounts you have (you'll have to request a username change on your other global accounts). Also, it's possible your contributions could get pulled to another wiki. I edited the page on Allisyn Ashley Arm here, and somebody got my contribution itself (as if it was submitted by me and everything) onto dewiki before I'd ever made a real edit of my own there. Even if you never plan to use it, you might end up doing so, but if you don't ever use it, just pretend it's not there. - Purplewowies (talk) 21:39, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

Group shot

Greetings,

I'm currently working on revising an article that lists characters in a fictional work. The original creator of the characters and their copyright holder never produced an official group shot of the them collectively in a single image, which I'd like to add to the article to illustrate to readers their appearances. Because I have been unable to find such an image, I was thinking of creating my own, defined in WP:IUP under "Collage and montages". Which license would be most appropriate for such a work? Valce Talk 08:29, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

Try asking at WP:MCQ, which is a noticeboard designed for exactly this kind of question; though I suspect that "none" is going to be an answer; such a collage may possibly not be compliant with Wikipedia's WP:IUP. The section you note states "The components of a collages or montage, as well as the collage or montage itself, must be properly licensed; and (as with galleries) fair-use components are rarely appropriate, as each non-free image used in the creation of the montage contributes towards consideration of minimal use of non-free images." (bold mine). So, you cannot create a collage of copyrighted works and then use it in a Wikipedia article, even under the guise of "fair use". Of course, you can always get a second opinion at WP:MCQ. --Jayron32 21:25, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

E MAIL ADDRESS

HOW TO FIND EMAIL ADDRESSESS E.G. E mail address of NORTH EASTERN INDIRA GANDHI REGIONL INSTITUTE OF HEALTH AND MEDICAL SCIENCES, SHILLONG. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 14.98.163.84 (talk) 10:13, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

The easy way is to use a search engine to see if they have a website and then follow a 'contact us' or similar link. In this case, the website is http://neigrihms.nic.in/ and at the bottom of the page it says "E-mail: info[dot]neigrihms[at]nic[dot]in". People often use this kind of format to prevent their email address being read automatically and therefore open to a huge amount of SPAM. Simply replace the "[dot]" with "." and the "[at]" with "@" and you will have the email address. Astronaut (talk) 11:45, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

Please also remember that Wikipedia is no affiliated with any companies or organisations it has an article on. We cannot, therefore, provide you with contact information for a company, nor can we answer any queries you might wish to direct to a company. As Astronaut rightly said, the best way to contact a company is to find the contact details on its website. ItsZippy ^{(talk • contributions)} 14:47, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

Updating pages

I have been having a lot of trouble with updating a page for my employer Maney Publishing.

I understand there is conflict of interest so I have read through your help sections for ideas on what to do.

The information on the wiki is now outdated and in-acurate and we would like to see it updated.

I placed a comment in the talk section of the page asking this same question only for it to be deleted, I'm not sure why that is?

Any information you can offer would be extreamly helpful!

Laylarob (talk) 10:17, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

Maney Publishing (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

As you can see from the edit history of the talk page, you haven't put any comments there. And the last edit to the article hasn't been for over a month. So I don't know where you made this comment that you speak of. Could you please post your concerns at Talk:Maney Publishing so that we may find out what your specific concerns are? Thanks, Dismas|^(talk) 10:25, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

Thank you for your concern. Wikipedia is a volunteer run project, which means all contributions come from volunteers. If you think something needs to be updated, go ahead and update it. Make sure that what you add is supported by reliable sources, then update the page yourself. If you need help with editing, you can take a look at Help:Editing, or come back here if you have a specific question. I wish you the best of luck with the article. ItsZippy ^{(talk • contributions)} 14:45, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

Reference in info box?

I was adding references in Numansdorp and I noticed that at some towns/cities they add references at the info box concerning the population and stuff. I've been trying to add one about the population from the site of the municipal, but I get errors. :-s I got the information here: Link Some help would be appreciated. :-D--Dianafl (talk) 10:27, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

If you were getting an odd string of text starting with UNIQ, then see Help:Strip markers. ---— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk 11:38, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

Yes I did. I will read the artikel! Thanks!--Dianafl (talk) 15:29, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

Talk page new sections problem

Resolved

Hi, this has been going on for about 6 months I guess, when people start a new topic on my talk page it's always as a sub-heading of the previous topic and I can't figure out why, or where the setting is to change it back.

I just made a test edit as an IP to confirm this as a bug and not just user error [1]. Can anyone help? Cheers! CaptainScreebo ^Parley! 12:26, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

It was the level of your section headings. I've corrected it, hopefully. - David Biddulph (talk) 12:40, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

Hank Stickney wikipedia page

My name is Ken Stickney and there are some unsavory comments about "behavior not fitting a husband of 40 years old" on his page. This is slanderous, defamatory, and I would ask that it be removed. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 108.0.113.24 (talk) 15:32, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

I reverted the vandalism on the page. Reaper Eternal (talk) 15:35, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

First page

Hi,

I just finished my first Wikipedia page/edit yesterday and at the top of the page it says I can request feedback as to how I did. I'd like that. If you have the time please check out my page for "Tahiti Drink".

Thx, Gary Garysmith10 (talk) 18:02, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

Tahiti Drink (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

Here's the feedback, I have requested speedy deletion (G11) for this article as it is unambiguous advertising and non-encyclopaedic. Please see WP:NOTPROMOTION to understand why. You might also benefit from reading Wikipedia:My First Article. CaptainScreebo ^Parley! 19:16, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

By now you'll have noticed the thing's marked for "Speedy deletion". So apparently you did pretty badly. My minor improvement ain't gonna help you much, bro. If you're capable of making the thing adequately encylopedia-like, go to it. If not, brace yourself. — Preceding unsigned comment added by GeorgeTSLC (talk • contribs) 19:23, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

Portals

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:McKinseies/Portal:Ravidassia can you check this portal for mistakes and improvement with layout, design, text, formatting links and spelling and all — Preceding unsigned comment added by McKinseies (talk • contribs) 18:05, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

In the process of editing text (after at least one predecessor), I seem to have messed up the border I thought I saw when I first hit the page--but since that would probably be deemed inappropriate for an article anyway, I may have inadvertently done you a favor!

Between me and my predecessor(s), we MAY have sufficiently edited down your repetitive exuberance. But feel free to adjust the text further.

Note that you DO need to pay attention to the 'bot's complaint about getting your citation handled by some appropriate template. GeorgeTSLC (talk) 19:27, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

Uploading pictures

I'm new here, and I would like to know how to upload images. Be Lad So Mon En Tu (talk) 18:17, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

Oh, Im new too. I asked this question too. To upload images, you need to become an Autoconfirmed user, and to become one, you need to be editing for four days and you needed to have made atleast ten edits. After four days, type in "Special:Upload". Ruler of Coasters  Talk  18:21, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

However, if (and ONLY IF) you know the file you want to upload is free (uses a license that allows it to be freely distributed or is in the public domain, etc.), you can upload it to Wikimedia Commons, where you don't need to be autoconfirmed to upload a picture. - Purplewowies (talk) 19:27, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

Changing a title / adding a redirect

The title of an article makes a common misspelling of the person's given name. The right thing to do is have the entry with the misspelled name redirect to the correct name. How does one go about addressing this ? Does one create a whole new article by copy-and-paste, and then purge the original article? Or is there an easier way? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Kromholz (talk • contribs)

Do not copy-paste. It breaks our license by not keeping the page history at the new title. Use the move function instead. PrimeHunter (talk) 21:37, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

If the article is moved, a redirect from the former title to its next destination is automatically simultaneously created, and left until such time as RfD'd or edited to become a useful title for a correctly spelled subject. Dru of Id (talk) 21:40, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

A couple image issues

I've noticed a couple odd image issues and I'm not sure how to deal with them. First, File:SRI Air Pollution study 1949.jpg is correctly included on SRI International#Early history, but the image isn't showing up. Second, I put File:SRI Hewitt Crane Pen Input Computing.jpg onto Hewitt Crane, but the thumbnail is oddly dark. Thanks :) Disavian (talk) 22:56, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

I don't see a thumbnail for the second picture you mentioned at all. - Purplewowies (talk) 23:56, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

I have converted the second image to grayscale from CMYK. That should have fixed the display problem. – ukexpat (talk) 15:15, 16 February 2012 (UTC)

Thanks! Disavian (talk) 22:03, 16 February 2012 (UTC)

For the air pollution study image, I noticed that any other image size works (except for the default 220px) - I probably just need to upload a new version of the image. Disavian (talk) 17:22, 17 February 2012 (UTC)

Category-generating template is broken?

This is actually a template on commons, but hopefully someone can answer here more promptly! I'm in the process of coding a template for inaccurate paleoart on commons so that it users globally are aware when someone finds (and now, labels) an incorrect dinosaur/etc depiction. Because the WP:DINO folks like having a variety of categories for these artworks (see the hierarchy at commons:Category:Inaccurate paleoart, I have a variety of ifeqs going to automatically categorize images correctly based on the template. I applied my template to File:9162 - Milano, Museo storia naturale - Camptosaurus dispar - Foto Giovanni Dall'Orto 22-Apr-2007.jpg to start, and it looks nice and generated the right category on the image page based on the specified parameters. But when I go to the category itself (commons:category:Inaccurate mounted dinosaur skeletons) the image isn't there. What's wrong and how do I fix it? Thanks, Calliopejen1 (talk) 23:20, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

I see the image there just fine. In fact, it's the first image in the category. - Purplewowies (talk) 23:53, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

The file is listed in the category now. If a category is added by a template but wasn't added by the template at the time of the latest edit to a page using the template, then it's possible for the page to display the category without the category listing the page. This can be fixed with a null edit (or any other edit) to the page (not to the category). Note that a purge of the page is not enough to update the category page. PrimeHunter (talk) 23:59, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

Thanks! Calliopejen1 (talk) 00:09, 16 February 2012 (UTC)