Wikipedia:Help desk/Archives/2008 September 20

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September 20[edit]

Is there an error in the Wikipedia list of soundtracks featuring Nina Simone?[edit]

I use Wikipedia constantly, and was suprised, recently, to see a new addition to the list of films featuring Nina Simone's singing. The addition was 1992's "America Me." I went to Amazon.com to find the film, looked at the CD for the film, and nowhere is Nina Simone listed.

I would buy the soundtrack if Nina Simone were featured, and I wondered if the experts at Wikipedia wanted to check out this potential error.

Thanks... —Preceding unsigned comment added by Wellmanswellman (talkcontribs) 00:56, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Listing American Me (1992) at the start of Nina Simone#On soundtracks appears to be wrong. I have found conflicting sources but most indicate that the movie has Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood#The Animals version. I guess other sources misunderstood it because the original version is by Nina Simone. PrimeHunter (talk) 10:33, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

uploading images[edit]

I'm a member of a forum for an artist and another member told me to upload a picture of the artist to her page, but I don't want to go through the whole email process. Shouldn't I just be able to upload it and stick her name next to it since there isn't a defacto copyright? Grk1011/Stephen (talk) 01:16, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I think I'll have her upload it to flickr under an acceptable license. Its easier that way lol. Grk1011/Stephen (talk) 01:45, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Please don't just upload any old image to flickr then try to bring it here. You must be the owner of the image to begin with, or the image has to be under a free license to begin with. Corvus cornixtalk 20:26, 21 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Article Is Spam?[edit]

Hello, I tried to add an article about a popular website a while back and it was regarded as spam. What exactly was the determining factor behind this decision? Google and other large sites have articles here on wikipedia. Wikipedia only will allow a site to be featured in an article if it is deemed to be a MASSIVE site? So the popularity of the site is what determines whether its allowed to be featured? I mean, I could understand if it was some person who owns some brand new, cheap little webpage trying to get traffic... but I do not own the site in question and I am not affiliated with the owners of the site. I'm just a member of the site and have seen it being talked about quite a bit all over the net. It is quite popular as chat sites go. Although its not nearly as popular as Google or Facebook.... but that shouldn't be a reason to accept or decline an article about a site. It was not a spam attempt and I simply wanted to add to the large informational database of wikipedia. My article was legitimate and I feel that it was unfairly discarded of. I feel that my article was discriminated against. I would really appreciate it if someone in charge would take another look at the article and reconsider it's status. Here is the link...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:TellYou

Regards, Drew —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.91.17.150 (talk) 01:34, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

  • Looking at the Deletion Log for that page, it was deleted under section G11 of the Criteria For Speedy Deletion. It states, "Pages which exclusively promote some entity and which would need to be fundamentally rewritten to become encyclopedic. Note that simply having a company or product as its subject does not qualify an article for this criterion." You can request the content of a deleted article by contacting one of the admins on this page. Matt (Talk) 01:48, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Please read WP:WEB. If you think the site meets the requirements listed on that link, then you can nominate the article for undeletion at WP:DRV. Corvus cornixtalk 20:27, 21 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Myriapoda has sprouted legs (or at least edit section links)[edit]

Someone recently made a very very small edit to article Myriapoda, but which however triggered the inclusion and display of the [edit] links for the preexisting sections.

Which would be fine, except that now the combination of... the pictures (?) and the new edit links are causing the [edit] links to be bunched together, instead of on each section header line as expected! At least this is true in FF3 and Opera 9.52, but not IE7!

Check if you see what I see. Look at each version of the article:

Depending on text/font size, the [edit] link for section "Centipedes" starts moving down the page, eventually aligns alongside the link for the section below "Millipedes" and then they together migrate down the page. At a small enough text size you get four links together, for the four sections from "Centipedes" down to "Pauropoda", pushed down into the references area!

I have to wonder whether the images all bunched together before this set of sections have anything to do with the problem. But in preview mode I can't cause the problem, even with unmodified source, so that limits experimentation.

Any clue as to "bunched together [edit] links"? Shenme (talk) 02:04, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

See WP:BUNCH. --Teratornis (talk) 04:18, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Why is information I've added being automaticly deleted?[edit]

I've recently been editing minor spelling errors as well as false information present in the Final Fantasy VII wiki page. The information I've added was completely legitimate and derived from personal experience playing the game. Every time I edit a mistake, my content is not present when I return to the page minutes later. What I have added is in no way inappropriate and considerbly more truthful than some information present in the ariticle now. I was under the impression anyone could edit and save information on your articles, and this is confirmed in your FAQ. So why is my information being rejected after spending all that time typing it? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.158.108.234 (talk) 04:19, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Looks to me like your changes to the article took just fine, though someone subsequently edited some of it. Can you be more specific about what you think was "rejected"? I wonder if it be a problem with the cache on your web browser? Crypticfirefly (talk) 04:54, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Actually someone reverted all of your edits here, with the edit summary, “Reverted good faith edits by 67.158.108.234; Info in parentheses unnecessary;” —teb728 t c 07:17, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
"personal experience playing the game" is considered original research, and that's not acceptable, due to its being unsourced. Please provide reliable sources for your edits, and then they can be kept. Corvus cornixtalk 20:30, 21 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

enlarging the font of gileki wikipedia[edit]

hi, i am Amin Sanaei, gileki wikipedia adminstorator. in gileki wikipedia, font of pages is very small and people can not read it!. if anbody can change it, please do that. the largest of font of farsi wikipedia is good for our gileki wikipedia. i try to do that but can not do that!.--AminSanaei (talk) 06:30, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

This could be a difficult question for users of the English Wikipedia to answer. Usually when someone reports a font size problem with the English Wikipedia, the problem is actually in their Web browser. See Wikipedia:Browser notes for information about that. When I browse to Gileki Wikipedia, amazingly I can see a font (instead of square boxes I often get for foreign scripts). I cannot read the characters, since I don't know this language, but they look just large enough to be legible if I could read them. When I press Ctrl + in Firefox 3.0.1, the font enlarges. I can step it up several more increments to a reasonably large size. Thus the only problem I see is that I would probably want to enlarge the font in my browser. I don't see a problem on the site itself. You might put an instruction on the main page telling users how to enlarge the font in their browsers, if you can't figure out how to change the default font size in your default skin. --Teratornis (talk) 19:53, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I see that you also posted your question at the Media Wiki Help discussion page - that's probably the best place to ask, as they are the guys most closely connected with the creation of the MediaWiki software. – ukexpat (talk) 01:19, 21 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Copy-pasting tables from Excel[edit]

I want to create a table of all the plant species in a certain country. The number is over 2000 species. Is there any quick algorithm for copy-pasting the table from Excel, without working separately on each and every row? Thanks, Gidip (talk) 07:11, 20 September 2008 (UTC).[reply]

Try the Excel-to-Wiki Converter. --—— Gadget850 (Ed) talk - 10:55, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

strange duplication[edit]

An hour ago or so i crated this account on de.wikipia.org. I read a German artikel bout Pleomorphismus and switchted to the correspondiente English lemma. Suddenly a window popped up and informed me about a database error. Immediatle afterwards this new Account was created on en.wikipedia.org. What the heck happened exactly? -- Shareyourknowledge (talk) 07:20, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Your account here was created here automatically by the Unified login process. You also got a database error, which happens every so often. There was no connection between these events. Algebraist 09:20, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Understood. Thank you. Shareyourknowledge (talk) 06:11, 21 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The famous photo returns a 404 error. The two old versions of the image are also inaccessible. —teb728 t c 07:26, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

For your info, I have asked here about this because it's such a significant image.--82.148.54.182 (talk) 13:46, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

{{helpme}} needs a fix[edit]

Could someone technically minded please make {{helpme}} still work ok in all namespaces per Template_talk:Helpme#Namespace_restriction. Cheers, --Commander Keane (talk) 08:11, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

James Taylor discography[edit]

Resolved

Could someone attend to the anon's request at Talk:James Taylor discography, preferably after checking a source. Cheers, --Commander Keane (talk) 08:14, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Looks like User:Mah00s already sorted it on the 19th. Sources[1][2] confirm. Karenjc 10:50, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Special pages histories[edit]

Generally, is there any way I can view the histories (and possibly source code) of special pages? Are those changed from the MediaWiki: namespace or is it integrated in the software? -- Mentisock 12:16, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

It depends on the special page. Some have text in the Mediawiki namespace (to find out where, go to Special:AllMessages and use your browser search). Others are defined in the software. Which are you interested in? Algebraist 12:26, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Special:Statistics - can the two not be distinguished? -- Mentisock 12:31, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The footer is at MediaWiki:Statistics-footer, and has a history like any other page. The rest of the page is, I believe, generated by the software, and has no page history as such. Algebraist 12:41, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks. I was wondering whether they can correct statistics there like the amount of stewards (since the steward list isn't on enwiki it's zero, but that's incorrect). -- Mentisock 13:42, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I wondered why {{NUMBERINGROUP:steward}} always returned a zero. --—— Gadget850 (Ed) talk - 15:53, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
That's because the steward bit is given to users on Meta, not on en.wiki. The list of stewards is here. Algebraist 16:21, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

wrong info[edit]

someone keeps adding not nice things to topics about our local town and businesses, and i am wondering if there is anyway of stopping it. I have changed it a few times as some things about Shildon in County Durham were stupid and wrong. Is there anything that can be done?

91.106.112.105 (talk) 13:05, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Leave a note on their talk page asking them to stop (see WP:WARN for some templates). If they don't stop after several warnings then you can report them to WP:AIV. Zain Ebrahim (talk) 13:21, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I recommend you create an account. Wikipedia:Why create an account? --—— Gadget850 (Ed) talk - 15:56, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
If you refer to the text you edited here, then please note that Wikipedia is not an advertising medium; see WP:ADVERT and WP:COI. Thank you.Andy Mabbett (User:Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 18:11, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Internal error[edit]

I keep getting a lot of these when I try to edit at the moment. Example:

Unable to store text to external storage

Backtrace:

  1. 0 /usr/local/apache/common-local/php-1.5/includes/Revision.php(724): ExternalStore::randomInsert('?Xmr?8???S??5?L...')
  2. 1 /usr/local/apache/common-local/php-1.5/includes/Article.php(1501): Revision->insertOn(Object(DatabaseMysql))
  3. 2 /usr/local/apache/common-local/php-1.5/includes/Article.php(1355): Article->doEdit('[[Image:Lenton ...', '/* Biography */...', 98)
  4. 3 /usr/local/apache/common-local/php-1.5/includes/EditPage.php(1013): Article->updateArticle('[[Image:Lenton ...', '/* Biography */...', false, true, false, '#Biography')
  5. 4 /usr/local/apache/common-local/php-1.5/includes/EditPage.php(2366): EditPage->internalAttemptSave(false, false)
  6. 5 /usr/local/apache/common-local/php-1.5/includes/EditPage.php(454): EditPage->attemptSave()
  7. 6 /usr/local/apache/common-local/php-1.5/includes/EditPage.php(339): EditPage->edit()
  8. 7 /usr/local/apache/common-local/php-1.5/includes/Wiki.php(494): EditPage->submit()
  9. 8 /usr/local/apache/common-local/php-1.5/includes/Wiki.php(59): MediaWiki->performAction(Object(OutputPage), Object(Article), Object(Title), Object(User), Object(WebRequest))
  10. 9 /usr/local/apache/common-local/php-1.5/index.php(93): MediaWiki->initialize(Object(Title), Object(Article), Object(OutputPage), Object(User), Object(WebRequest))
  11. 10 /usr/local/apache/common-local/live-1.5/index.php(3): require('/usr/local/apac...')
  12. 11 {main}

Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philip_Marc"

Is there a problem with the servers? SpinningSpark 13:59, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I just now left the same problem at the village pump: apparently I'm not the only one experiencing this problem. Nyttend (talk) 14:04, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Same problem here when trying to edit A456 Jenuk1985 (talk) 14:07, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
same intermittent (seems to work for very small edits)--mrg3105 (comms) ♠♣ 14:24, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
See http://en.wikiversity.org/wiki/Wikiversity:Colloquium#Wikimedia_Server - I've had the same problem as well as another user who had similar message including yours. Dark Mage 20:29, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Seems to be okay now. Gary King (talk) 20:38, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Has to be notable for more than one thing?[edit]

So far, I heard two users that said that an article's subject has to be notable for than one thing. Where the heck does it say that? Schuym1 (talk) 15:24, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia:Notability will tell you what you need to know. Sunderland06 (talk) 15:26, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Specifically, you probably want WP:1E Algebraist 16:17, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Question on Internet[edit]

how does the internet work? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 118.95.74.74 (talk) 15:50, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

You might find what you are looking for in the article about Internet. If you cannot find the answer there, you can try asking your question at Wikipedia's Reference Desk. They will be glad to try to answer questions about anything in the universe (except about how to use Wikipedia, which is what this help desk is for). I hope this helps. Algebraist 16:16, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Also look for this illustrated book:
  • Gralla, P. (1998), How the Internet Works, Que, ISBN 9780789717269
which I looked up with this search: how the internet works. --Teratornis (talk) 17:28, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Fountain of the Mermaid of Lleida[edit]

Hi!

I want that in the Wikipedia in english the article Fountain of the Mermaid of Lleida.

Here in spanish: http://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuente_de_la_Sirena_de_Lleida

Also in french, catalan and italien.

Thank you. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.52.72.83 (talk) 16:53, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

See Wikipedia:Translation for how to request translations. All Wikipedia versions are made by volunteers who can choose what to work on. PrimeHunter (talk) 17:04, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
If you are happy with a machine translation, you can use the {{Google translation}} template. For example:
Type this To get this What it produces
{{Google translation|en|es|http://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuente_de_la_Sirena_de_Lleida|Translate Fuente de la Sirena de Lleida to English}} Translate Fuente de la Sirena de Lleida to English Translate es:Fuente de la Sirena de Lleida to English
The result is somewhat readable in English. The instructions at the top of this Help desk page tell you to search the Help desk archives before asking a question; for example: search the Help desk archives for: translation, which finds similar answers to several previous questions about translating Wikipedia articles. --Teratornis (talk) 17:42, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Create the article, please. I am not registred. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 88.14.242.98 (talk) 17:27, 21 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I see you have created Talk:Fountain of the Mermaid of Lleida with a machine translation (maybe slightly edited). Unfortunately machine translations often produce low quality results so Wikipedia requires manual work on a translation before creating an article. See Wikipedia:Translation#What to remember when translating. PrimeHunter (talk) 17:44, 21 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Already this changed. Now create the article, please. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 88.14.242.98 (talk) 18:11, 21 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I'm afraid I cannot in good conscience create a translated article with English at this level. You can request translation from editors more familiar with English. See Wikipedia:Translation for the procedure. But another serious problem is lack of sources to satisfy Wikipedia:Verifiability and Wikipedia:Notability. Talk:Fountain of the Mermaid of Lleida has no sources and I just saw that neither do any of the 4 linked versions in other Wikipedia languages. I cannot find any English sources and I don't know Spanish or other languages there might be sources in. PrimeHunter (talk) 22:10, 21 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Talk:Fountain of the Mermaid of Lleida has now been deleted because Wikipedia does not make talk pages for non-existing articles. I can give you a copy of the latest version if you want. PrimeHunter (talk) 13:17, 22 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Here in spanish http://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuente_de_la_Sirena_de_Lleida here in catalan http://ca.wikipedia.org/wiki/Font_de_la_Sirena_de_Lleida here in french http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fontaine_de_la_Sir%C3%A8ne_de_Lleida here in italien http://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fontana_della_Sirena_(Lleida) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 88.23.224.26 (talk) 13:21, 22 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I know those links. I meant that as an administrator I have access to the contents of deleted pages in the English Wikipedia. You made edits to the deleted Talk:Fountain of the Mermaid of Lleida. If you haven't saved it elsewhere and would like a copy then I can provide it. PrimeHunter (talk) 13:32, 22 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Here

This fountain can be found in the Park The Champs Elysees of Lleida.

Before she had a nymph, the nymph removed because was deteriorated a bit and put the mermaid in their place.

It's the year 1946.

It is the most famous figure is on the Champs Elysees.

After La Seu Vella, the fountain of the mermaid is the most visited in Lleida.

Perhaps, soon, it may buy as a souvenir of the Champs Elysees, a small statue of the mermaid. As already are La Seu Vella and Lo Marraco.

The mermaid is on top of a rock and the water gets on a conch. Around the mermaid there is a garden full of flowers. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 88.23.224.26 (talk) 13:44, 22 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Commons[edit]

Hello, would someone like to respond to my thirty-eight hour-old query at the Commons help desk? –thedemonhog talkedits 17:36, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Maybe nobody who is reading that Help desk has the specific knowledge to answer the question. Since you are asking about a particular template (commons:Template:Attribution-Ubisoft), I suggest looking at the template's history, and then you could go down (or up) the list of contributors, leaving requests on their user talk pages to look at your question. Ask them to take a look, one by one, until you get an answer. On the various Wikimedia Foundation projects, you can almost always get an answer, but you need to find the right people to ask, or in some cases find the documentation pages where they already wrote the answer. --Teratornis (talk) 17:47, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
To elaborate slightly: people who answer questions on the Help desks are generalists. We/they are pretty good at looking up things, but we/they don't know everything about everything. If generalists do not have personal experience with a particular subject, they will only know what they can look up about it. If you are pretty good at looking things up, and you already searched, then you may have already exhausted the resources available to the generalist. You may have to seek out some specialists. When you have a question that is so specific that it points directly to some specific people, then you might want to go ask those people, or read what they may have written on the subject. --Teratornis (talk) 17:58, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Another place to try might be Wikipedia:Media copyright questions. --Teratornis (talk) 18:01, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

== american radio personalities section inclusion == Bold text


John M Driscoll (born April 6,1949)a Top 40 and Adult Contemporary Music radio disc jockey who also programmed radio stations in several of the nations largest markets.And went on to become the image voice of several radio & tv stations as well as network affiliates .

Biography Born in San Francisco ,California as John Driscoll Moore, he attended Santa Monica High School and entered the communications class at Santa Monica City College in 1969 and he was selected as the host of a weekly friday show on KCRW FM .He subsequently worked at several radio stations, including KRUX and KRIZ in Phoenix,WMYQ Miami,WCFL Chicago,KIMN KYGO Denver,KSAN San Francisco,KSON San Diego, KTNQ ,KFI and KZLA in Los Angeles

in 1989 he was the Voice Over talent who was used on VH-1 the promote the Corvette Collection that gave away every model ever made to one VH-1 viewer, he also was the voice of TNT's NBA Power Pass, and went on to be heard on the newly created marketing unit of NBC known as NBC-2000 this was followed by stints at FOX Area 21 and Spike TV

In 1993 he was one of the first home studio equipped talents to have a prototype ISDN codec in beta test from IDB the unit was called 3D2, he also had the first website voiceover america that featured audio and video samples as well as a means of distributing client audio files online

John Driscoll is heard in Walmart stores worldwide at the checkout tv display, he also is the Jumbo-Tron voice of Tim McGraws 2008 Live your voice tour. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Johnd49r (talkcontribs)

Category:American radio personalities is a category. It displays existing Wikipedia articles which contain [[Category:American radio personalities]] in the article source. There is an article about another John Driscoll but apparently not about you so you can currently not be added to the category. And see Wikipedia:Autobiography which says "Writing an autobiography on Wikipedia is strongly discouraged". PrimeHunter (talk) 00:15, 21 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]