Wikipedia:Help desk/Archives/2010 July 31

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July 31

Article not visible for edit : Syed_Mohammad_Inaamullah

I tried to view and contribute to the aforementioned article http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syed_Mohammad_Inaamullah but its not there anymore. Can any Admin help me?--Sonaris (talk) 22:20, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

The article is there for me. It was created in 2005 and has never been deleted. What happens when you click the link? Try to bypass your cache. PrimeHunter (talk) 22:29, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

It seems that all references to the name 'Mohammad' are being filtered in Pakistan. I have checked other pages which bear or include this name as they work when using proxies. Would it be possible for any Administrator to rename the said article to S. M. Inaamullah or Syed M. Inaamullah? I will take care of the rest. --Sonaris (talk) 00:45, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

That sounds like an odd type of censorship. Maybe they are afraid of images of Muhammad in uncensored Wikipedia articles. Does it include for example Muhammad Ali with 'u'? Do you have evidence that it's the same for others in Pakistan and not something local to your computer or Internet connection? I'm not sure we should be choosing article titles based on censorship in specific countries. PrimeHunter (talk) 09:01, 2 August 2010 (UTC)

Based on your suggestion, I will investigate this further and come back to you. Thank you for your interest and swift response.--Sonaris (talk) 20:51, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

Barnstar use: policy

Resolved

 – Kayau Voting IS evil 02:48, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

Question: Could someone please give me a link to a page where barnstar policy is discussed and/or suggested?
Reason: I occasionally come across cases where, for example, vandals award other vandals barnstars for their disruptive editing.
Thanks. --Kudpung (talk) 01:50, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

There is no policy - barnstars are part of Wikipedia culture. See WP:WPWPA. (And, just to show off, I made that shortcut. :P) Kayau Voting IS evil 02:01, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

(e/c) I believe that the barnstar page has deliberately been kept generic enough to keep up the "spontaneity" of awarding barnstars; in other words, to ensure that editors won't be afraid they will be breaking some sort of guideline by awarding a barnstar, there is no guideline in the first place. Essentially, the only thing the page says is "If you are sure the barnstar is appropriate, don't be shy!". Conversely, then, you can't really reprimand someone for awarding a barnstar unless it's clearly inappropriate or disruptive, as the case may be here. Because I'm not one to stick my nose where it doesn't belong, I would not worry about the frivoulous barnstar until the vandal is blocked -- and maybe not even after that -- because I believe that doing so would give the vandal further cause to vandalize pages (for example) in my userspace. Xenon54 (talk) 02:04, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

Really, I don't think anyone should care about vandals giving each other barnstars. Those are probably socks, anyway, or meatpuppets etc., and might know each other in real life. So, there's really nothing special about it to care about. :) Kayau Voting IS evil 02:11, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

Good thoughts. --Extra 999 (Contact ^me + _contribs) 02:13, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

Thanks. As I understand it then , there is no page that discusses or provides any policy or guidelines regarding the misuse of barnstars.
Query answered.--Kudpung (talk) 02:25, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

Strictly speaking, all you know is that none of the responders (and presumably, none of the many silent watchers of this Help desk) know of such a page. That isn't quite the same thing as being certain no such page exists, but at least we know any such page would have to be unusually obscure if it does exist. In theory, all the documentation about barnstars should be linked from the Editor's index (WP:EIW#Award), but even that depends on whether the editors of the index managed to catch everything. In general, it is easier to know that something exists than to know that something does not exist. You only need to find one example to prove something exists, but to prove it does not exist you would have to look at everything. See Russell's teapot. This may seem like hairsplitting, but Wikipedia is enormous with many nooks and crannies to hide odd bits. The surprises never seem to end. --Teratornis (talk) 04:24, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

Strictly speaking, a policy or guideline no one can find does not exist. Wikipedia is built on a consensus model, and all of its policies and guidelines exist solely because the community at large endorses their use and maintenance. If there was some hypothetical guideline page which exists, but which several long-time, highly active editors such as ourselves has never heard of and can not find after serious active searching; it does not exist. Wikipedia is not a legal system, and arcane rules which no one follows and no one knows exists do not have the force of anything. Written guideline and policy pages reflect existing practices, they do not establish them. The guidelines and policies follow from best practices, they never get in the way of best practices. See WP:IAR. --Jayron32 01:04, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

The original question asks for "a page where barnstar policy is discussed and/or suggested". Someone could have discussed or suggested this in lots of places that might be unknown to the people who happen to be reading this Help desk question - including other wikis, mailing lists, user talk pages, etc. Then again, I'm not sure what the value of a policy suggestion would be, if it didn't actually influence policy. As far as concluding that if we don't know about something, it doesn't exist, I'd have to go with Chad Ochocinco's disclaimer: we're reliable, like birth control. --Teratornis (talk) 07:23, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

Cropping

Resolved

 – Kayau Voting IS evil 02:48, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

Can anybody crop it more: --Extra 999 (Contact ^me + _contribs) 02:10, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

 Done. Kayau Voting IS evil 02:16, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

In the future, WP:GL can do it. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Mono (talk • contribs)

Thanks. --Extra 999 (Contact ^me + _contribs) 04:26, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

Reference

Resolved

 – Kayau Voting IS evil 10:12, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

I need help with refernce on my page im working on,Koji Gyotoku. How do you add information for the bareurls? Spongie555 (talk) 05:59, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

Nvm it was resolved Spongie555 (talk) 07:19, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

Wikipedia on Facebook

How do you make a wikipedia article appear on facebook as a fan page? I have seen many pages on facebook that have a wikipedia tab and say powered by wiki and it has all the same information on facebook as on the wikipedia article and you can like the page. —Preceding unsigned comment added by WestCoast31 (talk • contribs) 06:48, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

That's a question you should ask at Facebook, not Wikipedia. By the way, this site is called Wikipedia, not wiki. A wiki is any website using wiki software; there are thousands of them. Kayau Voting IS evil 08:37, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

Searching the Facebook help pages for Wikipedia finds some results that mention "Community Pages". To the extent that I have looked at the help on Facebook, I find it far inferior to Wikipedia's help. And ordinary Facebook users cannot improve the Facebook help by editing it. Incidentally, Facebook should in my opinion not limit its community pages to content from Wikipedia, since Wikipedia deletes most useful content of purely local interest. Facebook should also draw content from City wikis which cover local content in much more depth than Wikipedia. Many if not most people have local interests that do not meet Wikipedia's notability requirements. --Teratornis (talk) 19:02, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

Updating references

Resolved

 – Kayau Voting IS evil 10:13, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

There's a page that has some wrong information. I want to correct it and delete the old reference/cite or whatever they're called, which links to a missing web page now anyway, and put two new references. Yet I can't figure out how to do this without red text appearing at the bottom of the article saying that I've broken the refs or something. I gave up reading the manual, I can't make head nor tails of it. Could somebody tell me simply and clearly so an idiot can understand, how I can do this? -OOPSIE- (talk) 08:43, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

WP:Referencing for beginners. Kayau Voting IS evil 08:48, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

Visual inline citation guide

Formatting references using inline citations

All information in Wikipedia articles should be verified by citations to reliable sources. Our preferred method of citation is using the "cite.php" form of inline citations, using the <ref></ref> elements. Using this method, each time a particular source is mined for information (don't copy word-for-word!), a footnote is placed in the text ("inline"), that takes one to the detail of the source when clicked, set forth in a references section after the text of the article. In brief, anywhere you want a footnote to appear in a piece of text, you place an opening <ref> tag followed by the text of the citation which you want to appear at the bottom of the article, and close with a </ref> tag. Note the closing slash ("/"). For multiple use of a single reference, the opening ref tag is given a name, like so: <ref name="name"> followed by the citation text and a closing </ref> tag. Each time you want to use that footnote again, you simply use the first element with a slash, like so: <ref name="name" />. In order for these references to appear, you must tell the software where to display them, using either the code </references> or, most commonly, the template, {{Reflist}} which can be modified to display the references in 2 or 3 columns using {{Reflist|2}} or {{Reflist|3}}. Per our style guidelines, the references should be displayed in a separate section denominated "References" located after the body of the article.
Inline citation code; what you type in 'edit mode'	What it produces when you save
Two separate citations.<ref>Citation text.</ref><ref>Citation text2.</ref> Multiple<ref name="multiple">Citation text3.</ref>citation<ref name="multiple" /> use.<ref name="multiple" /> ==References== {{Reflist}}	Two separate citations. Multiple citation use. References_________________
Templates that can be used between <ref></ref> tags to format references {{Citation}} • {{Cite web}} • {{Cite book}} • {{Cite news}} • {{Cite journal}} • Others • Examples

Kayau Voting IS evil 08:51, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

There's a page that has some wrong information. I want to correct it and delete the old reference/cite or whatever they're called, which links to a missing web page now anyway, and put two new references. Yet I can't figure out how to do this without red text appearing at the bottom of the article saying that I've broken the refs or something. I gave up reading the manual, I can't make head nor tails of it. Could somebody tell me simply and clearly so an idiot can understand, how I can do this? -OOPSIE- (talk) 08:59, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

Can you link to the article? Kayau Voting IS evil 09:03, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BTR-60 -OOPSIE- (talk) 09:12, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

Referencing has many possibilities. We have no way of determining what you do wrong from your post which doesn't even quote the red message. Try to make the wrong edit again but save it and then revert it if you don't want to leave the article in a bad state. Then we can see what you are trying to do in the page history. PrimeHunter (talk) 09:24, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

Okay, I just did the change on the page and left it there. You can see the red text at the bottom. I don't know how to fix it, sorry -OOPSIE- (talk) 09:41, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

Your edit [1] removed a named reference called "softland 1". It was used elsewhere in the article where it only said the name "softland 1" which had no associated reference text after your edit. I restored the text of the reference [2] in another place it was used. This system is briefly shown in a line starting with "Multiple" in the above reference description box, and in more detail at Wikipedia:Referencing for beginners#Same reference used more than once. I realize such things can complicate matters for new users but it's very practical to have when you know how to use it. PrimeHunter (talk) 10:01, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

Thanks everyone! -OOPSIE- (talk) 10:09, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

You're welcome. As you said, the external link in the reference doesn't work, so I have added [3] {{Dead link}}. The old text can still be seen at the Wayback Machine which is now linked at the reference. PrimeHunter (talk) 10:12, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

Looks like textbook...

Resolved

 – By Tnxman307 Acather96 (talk) 09:30, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

If an article looks more like textbook material than encyclopaedic content, (it is notable though), which maintenance tag should I tag it with? Kayau Voting IS evil 11:46, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

Probably {{textbook}}? :) TNXMan 12:27, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

Ooh, that should have been obvious. Thanks. Kayau Voting IS evil 12:29, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

Lines Under Categories

Resolved

 – By Algebraist and MilborneOne

Acather96 (talk) 09:32, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

In the article That '70s Show, if you edit the External links section, underneath the categories are lines like "lt:That '70s Show" (with surrounding double brackets). They don't seem to appear in the article itself. What do they mean, and what are they used for?--Bbb23 (talk) 15:46, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

They are interlanguage links. Algebraist 15:48, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

I read the page on the links, but I still don't understand their purpose at the bottom of the article. Some sort of editor cheat sheet because the article has references to other country programming?--Bbb23 (talk) 16:15, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

The code provides links to the same article in other languages and they (the links) appear at the bottom of the left hand navigation pane not at the the bottom of the main article. MilborneOne (talk) 17:18, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

Aaah, I never noticed, thanks much.--Bbb23 (talk) 17:31, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

Defamation of Living People

If a biography of a living person is being tightly controlled by non-neutral editors and is potentially defamatory due to omission (suggesting liability for the Foundation), what would be the proper course of action for the defamed individual, short of filing a lawsuit? ValkyrieOfOdin (talk) 16:14, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

Users can report alleged libel to Wikipedia in at least two ways. See WP:Libel (e-mail us) and WP:Contact us. However, if you believe something is libelous and you have trouble removing it, you should report it. For example, it would be helpful for you to identify which article is defamatory and why.--Bbb23 (talk) 16:40, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

As the page is locked, it is well-controlled. Naveen_jain is the item in question, and the content is barely a biography. The source of the article is largely a single-source series (about a company, not the person) in a Seattle Newspaper. Not only does this seem to raise questions of notability of the subject, the wikipedia content excludes positive information in order to present a negative POV. It smells strongly like WP:NOTBATTLEGROUND and WP:NOTSCANDAL. Furthermore, the act of excluding information and presenting an article that paints a subject negatively is defamation of character, and is a potential liability. ValkyrieOfOdin (talk) 17:12, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

The article isn't being "tightly controlled by non-neutral editors." It is semi-protected, apparently because of changes by anonymous users. Auto-confirmed users can still edit the article. Although the article has some contentious history and isn't very well-written, I fail to see any specific libel, by omission or otherwise. I suggest you raise your issues on the Talk page of the article.--Bbb23 (talk) 17:43, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

Ok. My concern was for liability of the Foundation. Since I didn't go to law school, I don't really feel qualified to make that judgement. I guess the Foundation legal counsel can sort it out if it comes to it. Given the subject and the history of that subject, it seems a very real possibility and a huge waste of Foundation resources. I respectfully disagree with regards to the issue of who is controlling the content (reading through the talk page makes it seem to be a grudge match to my eyes), but I guess the letter of control and the actual results are open to interpretation. ValkyrieOfOdin (talk) 00:00, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

If you have legitimate concerns, use the venues described above (WP:LIBEL and WP:CONTACT). No one answering here can give definitive legal advice on how to proceed. It is best to handle this through the proper channels. --Jayron32 00:47, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

I see you posted some of your concerns on the Talk page. That's a good start. If you're still troubled by the semi-protection block, you can contact directly the admin who placed it, EdJohnston. I agree with Jayron32's comments about legal advice. Good luck.--Bbb23 (talk) 00:52, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for all the input. Yes, I'm bubbling some issues onto the talk page, but I'm concerned about derailing it from the actual article talk. Still, maybe it will help get the article on-track. Thanks again, the issue is closed in regards to this page. ValkyrieOfOdin (talk) 15:34, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

Size of pdf pictures in thumbnail

I uploaded a pdf file with a picture (graph), previously cropped via Acrobat to minimize white margins. Horizontal and vertical size are nearly the same.

Problems and questions:

- Problem 1: in the thumbnail display in the article, the figure takes up only a small fraction of the thumbnail rectangle (as if the cropping were ignored) and is horizontally elongated. Question 1: how can the picture be made to fill the thumbnail format more completely and without changing the aspect ratio?

- Problem 2: recovering the picture in full size from the article requires two steps: clicking on the thumbnail, and clicking on the file that is opened by the preceding click. Question: how can the thumbnail be made to yield the picture in full size with just one click? Boute (talk) 16:29, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

I have re-uploaded the image to Commons, converting it to a png and preserved your licensing and attributed the image to you. Please see File:Plot of decibel and inverse.png. I am not an image expert, but I have read that this is the best file format for this type of image and it gets rid of all the problems you were having I think. If you have other pdfs that you want to convert and not have these problems, you can download (for free) GIMP. Cheers.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 17:20, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

Actually the SVG format is a far better option for this kind of diagram – I've converted the image (using pdf2svg) and uploaded to File:Plot of decibel and inverse.svg. AJCham 19:09, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

Special:Preferences

Hi, does anyone know the mediawiki pages designed to display the content on special pages such as this one? I may be requesting a few changes to some of them... :| TelCoNaSpVe :| 17:32, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

See Special:AllMessages. However, the prefs are deep down in the software, so good luck with that. —mono 19:11, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

.Formatting Problem I Can't Fix

Made some minor factual edits to sue Thompson page a few days ago. Must have made format error(s) because the display seems to include coding, making it not very readable. I can't seem to fix it or even return to the pre-edit display. Can you help with fix? Thanks's from Dan Keenan, Sue's official biographer.Dankeenan41 (talk) 18:01, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

 Fixed I have fixed the infobox for you, you were missing the ends of a few brackets, and also had mized up some of the lines. For future, it would help if you posted an actual link to the article as well though :) - Happysailor ^(Talk) 18:08, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

Upper/lower case letters in user name

Hi, I created an account entering as my desired user name "lucabombelli", ALL lower case. The account was successfully created but named "Lucabombelli", which I do not want to use; I guess there was a rule about the first letter having to be capitalized. So I tried to create a new account named "LucaBombelli", the second best option, but that was not possible, because it was too close to the existing "Lucabombelli". Is there any way to have the all-lower-case name, or both "L" and "B" upper? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Lucabombelli (talk • contribs) 20:47, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

The first letter of usernames and page names is automatically capitalized. You can request a change from Lucabombelli to LucaBombelli at Wikipedia:Changing username. Note that spaces are allowed so you can also request Luca Bombelli if you want - I don't know whether you can create it by yourself. PrimeHunter (talk) 22:21, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

No, he would need an accountcreator to create it for him. sonia^♫♪ 00:53, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

Need temporary authorization to upload photo

I need temporary authorization to upload a photo. There are no adequate photos on the web I could otherwise link to making the one I need to upload very unique and insightful to the reader. If you wish, I can email the admin the photo and they can upload it. Either way is OK. Thanks. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Multiplexusa (talk • contribs) 21:05, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

Can you tell us what the picture is or give us a link to it (if it's on the web)? TNXMan 22:26, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

Yes, knowing the topic of the photo would be helpful. However, please look at the image use policy, and think twice, as Wikipedia is not a respository. Otherwise, go ahead. I reccomend putting the image on a site such as TinyPic (link), and posting a message on my talk page with the link, and any other information about it.  A p3rson ‽ 02:00, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

Missing space

In the article Sepang there is a display problem where a space in the wiki source sometimes does not appear as a space in a browser nor in the page source. Examples:

• Sepangis a town (Should be: Sepang is a town)
• the Sepang International Circuitand as the site (Should be: the Sepang International Circuit and as the site)
• Bagan Lalangin Sepang district (Should be: Bagan Lalang in Sepang district)
• the Malaysian Grand Prixwhich is the (Should be: the Malaysian Grand Prix which is the)

For the first example the page source is:

     <p><b>Sepang</b>is a town    

The wiki source is:

     '''Sepang''' is a town      

Platform: Opera 10.53 and Firefox 3.6 (the problem appears in both browsers). Windows.

What is the reason and how can I fix it?

--Mortense (talk) 21:15, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

 Fixed It looks so much nicer now. I fixed the Infoxbox template.--Bbb23 (talk) 21:30, 31 July 2010 (UTC)