Wikipedia:Help desk/Archives/2012 September 23

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September 23

Overriding magic words

bsd this is a somewhat advanced question: is there a way of overriding magic words, maybe by tweaking the url? specifically, i need to override the _NOGALLERY- tag, without editing the page. thanks,--Ben Stone 01:36, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

Try asking at WP:VPT.— Vchimpanzee · talk · contributions · 20:27, 28 September 2012 (UTC)

Brochure request

how could,im recieve free brochres? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 108.23.243.221 (talk) 01:48, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

I added a section header for your question. This page is for asking questions about how to use Wikipedia. We don't have brochures. You'll need to contact whichever company or organization you're interested in directly. RudolfRed (talk) 02:20, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

Confused about city former names

Leningrad = St. Petersburg, Danzig = Gdansk; Konigsburg != Kaliningrad, Constantinople != Istanbul. Where is this inconsistency comes from? ibicdlcod (talk) 04:02, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

Editors make individual choices and these seem logical to me. St. Petersburg was always a Russian city. They renamed it to Petrograd (1914), Leningrad (1924) and then back to St. Petersburg (1991) without changing the population. A Petrograd article about 10 years of the city history would be odd, and a St. Petersburg article with a hole 1914–1991 would be silly. Danzig/Gdansk are more like different spellings than different names. Both, or similar spellings, have been used for around 1000 years. See Gdańsk#Names. The German name of Kaliningrad was Königsberg. The surviving Germans were expelled by the Soviet Union so in many respects (population, culture, language, country) Kaliningrad was a new city at the same location. Same with Constantinople: The surviving Christians were deported and everything changed when the muslims took over. PrimeHunter (talk) 04:52, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

WP:BOLD is relevent here. There is only one article on the History of Saint Petersburg, and its pretty cruddy. If someone wanted to write a decent article for the time period when it was known as Leningrad, (1924–1991), they could. That's certainly a large enough time period to write a decent history of. Just take the Leningrad redirect, turn it into a full, well written, and well referenced article on that time period, and I don't think anyone would object. After all, as the OP notes, we have multiple articles on Byzantium and Constantinople and Istanbul, but that's only because someone took the time and care to create good articles about each of them. I don't see why, if someone wanted to, they couldn't make a good Leningrad article. They haven't yet, but there's nothing stopping someone from doing so. However, until that happens, the redirect makes more sense than anything else. --Jayron32 05:09, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

Perhaps our guidelines on naming conventions would be of some help.    → Michael J Ⓣ Ⓒ Ⓜ 05:59, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

Stop the chinglish today!

50 Cent Party this name is a typical chinglish phrase. it should be "50 cents", not "50 cent", although cents in chinese should be "mao". someone should change it today. --Bgggongfei (talk) 05:07, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

It's not chinglish. When used in adjectival form, standard English wouldn't have the "s". One speaks of a "five dollar cup of coffee", but one would never say a "five dollars cup of coffee". The title is exactly as it should be in standard English. --Jayron32 05:13, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

Jayron32 is correct; this is known as a compound adjective. But the example should be written properly as a "five-dollar cup of coffee" (see MOS:NUMBERS#Unit names and Hyphens#Compound modifiers). I suppose one could argue for renaming the page to 50-Cent Party—I'm actually curious why our Olympic swimming articles don't follow this convention. Also, it takes 10 cents (fen) to make a mao. —Cheng ✍ 09:54, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

Those communist spies, minions get paid fifty cents for writing a pro-communist party message online. that is why they are called fifty cents party. this is not complicated english grammar discussion. of course, it should be changed to "fifty cents party". it is not a musical band's name.--Bgggongfei (talk) 10:41, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

Please explain why you think the action of these party members is more relevant than proper English usage? Jayron32's cup of coffee costs five dollars, but we still refer to the coffee as a five-dollar cup of coffee. —Cheng ✍ 10:57, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

Jayron and Cheng are correct. In the English-language version of Wikipedia, correct English should be used. "Fifty cents party" is not correct English, it is Chinglish.

A similar construction is "I would not touch that with a ten-foot pole." Using "ten-feet pole" would be wrong. (If you are interested in the history of this grammatical form, the "foot" in "ten-foot pole" is not a singular, it is an example of an otherwise obsolete genitive plural.) Maproom (talk) 11:35, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

See also: Three Mile Island.--Colapeninsula (talk) 14:13, 24 September 2012 (UTC)

If "50 Cent Party" is a translation of a Chinese term, it should be translated to correct English: "Fifty-Cent Party" if it is though of as a proper name of a group, or "Fifty-cent party" if it is a description but not a proper name. On the other hand, if the people using the term write both English and Chinese, and generally use the name "50 Cent Party", then that is correct. The correct spelling, punctuation, and capitalization of a proper name is whatever the name-giver says it is. Jc3s5h (talk) 14:48, 24 September 2012 (UTC)

Judging from Google prevalence, both "fifty-cents party" and "fifty-cent party" are out there, but "fifty-cent" seems to be more common. The WP article originally used both forms without distinguishing between them.--Robert Keiden (talk) 22:53, 26 September 2012 (UTC)

Geomedical Engineering updated article

Hello, I have tried to put inline citation for and updated references in Geomedical engineering article. I am sorry. I am unable format them in proper format of Wikipedia. Would you please help to link inline citations with the references and terminologies to wikipedia to be opened by clik. Thank you very much. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Atteequr (talk • contribs) 11:01, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

The article is geomedical engineering. It needs changes, internal links to Wikipedia and external links to references are both wrongly formatted. I have corrected two of the internal links. Maproom (talk) 11:42, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

Geomedical Engineering need support to get formatted

Hello, Thanks for correcting two of the arongly formatted links. Still there are references and internal and external links need formatting. I have already put them in the article at appropriate positions. Just need to be formatetd in correct way. I am a new user and donot understand how to do it. Would you please be knid enough to correct all of them for me. Thanks in anticipation. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Atteequr (talk • contribs) 12:11, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

I have a life, I have other things to do. I suggest you look at other Wikipedia articles to learn the correct way to use references. Maproom (talk) 13:39, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

Or read WP:Referencing for beginners.--ukexpat (talk) 16:58, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

Page moving policy

Is there a guideline or policy on page moves? Wikipedia:Moving a page seems like an info-only item. Is there a policy? Thanks. History2007 (talk) 12:45, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

WP:TITLECHANGES is part of the policy Wikipedia:Article titles. Wikipedia:Requested moves is a process page with no guideline or policy designation but it has some relevant information. PrimeHunter (talk) 13:58, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

Thanks, I suggested a policy change on WP:TITLECHANGES based on that. History2007 (talk) 15:38, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

Wikipedia page for Mary Garofalo

Hello:

My name is Mary Garofalo and I have been the subject of repeated vandalism on my Wikipedia page. Someone with the user account a bot operated by Anomie (talk) has issued the following:

"This article includes a list of references, but its sources remain unclear because it has insufficient inline citations. The neutrality of this article is disputed. (June 2012) This article appears to be written like an advertisement. (June 2012)"

The person I believe is responsible is a former fellow employee who is actively and maliciously altering and challenging anything written on my Wikipedia page. I am a public figure and I would like to see my account protected or please remove my the page all together. Thank you very much. My email address if you wish to contact me is [address deleted] — Preceding unsigned comment added by 174.118.7.229 (talk) 12:56, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

Wikipedia policy is against your publishing your email address here, so I have deleted it.

I know nothing about you, or the field you work in, so I am not going to take sides in this discussion. But the edits I see to the article Mary Garofalo don't look to me like vandalism. You should read Conflict of interest editing on Wikipedia before editing an article about yourself; then, if you believe the article contains false information about you, you should not delete it, but mention it on the article's talk page. Maproom (talk) 13:37, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

AnomieBot, which is an automated program, merely added dates to those tags: the tags were actually added by an IP (i.e. not logged-in) user, and those were the only edit from that IP address, so it is possible that this was done by a former colleague: we have no way of knowing. However, the tags are entirely appropriate: the article contains not one single inline citation, and only one independent source, and it contains unencyclopaedic peacock terms such as "tenacious".

I disagree with Maproom on one point: since nothing whatever in the article is referenced, anybody, including Mary Garofalo, may remove anything from it. If there were information which was reliably sourced then it should be removed, especially not by the subject of the article. --ColinFine (talk) 21:52, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

As User:Vchimpanzee points out on my talk page, I meant "then it should not be removed. --ColinFine (talk) 22:54, 28 September 2012 (UTC)

504 ERROR WITH TOOLSERVER

Please fix toolserver- if you click on any article that has a GPS coordinate it cycles for a long time and then reports a 504 Gateway Time-out error instead of bringing up screen to export geo info. I have tried multiple browsers and cleared caches, this is a server issue on your end.. please please fix! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.189.250.33 (talk • contribs)

It's reported at Wikipedia:Village pump (technical)/Archive 120#Toolserver Gateway Time-out error. Some things can take longer on Sundays. PrimeHunter (talk) 14:02, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

guru meditation

On some pages like wikt:bof and Pudding Mill Lane DLR station I have the message

Service unavailable 503

Guru meditation:

XID: (number)

Varnish Cache Server

It doesn't go away upon reloading but sometimes the number changes. This seems unrelated to Guru Meditation. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.33.110.47 (talk) 14:50, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

It's unrelated to the existance of the article Guru Meditation but it's very related to the subject of the article. Our servers use Varnish (software). As Guru Meditation mentions, this error message is used by Varnish, and the quoted error message even mentions Varnish. I don't have problems with the pages you link. At #Varnish cache server error message: What does it mean and what can I do about it? it was suggested to report the error at WP:VPT. There are no reports so far. That may be a sign that the error is affecting relatively few users. PrimeHunter (talk) 16:00, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

align="center" no longer working?

I have had a toolbox on my user page for years and years that was centered with align="center". Recently the toolbox has become left aligned. Any idea what's causing this?--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 15:54, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

Probably the update to HTML5. Let me look at this. ---— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk 16:12, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

 Fixed cellpadding and cellspacing are also obsolete— they will still be supported by browsers, but will generate validation errors. ---— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk 16:20, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

Thank you Gadget. Good stuff. In light of this, I'm wondering if there are various help/how to pages, template documentation and so on where updates are needed because of the technical changes.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 16:31, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

I have been considering something on that order. We now have so many validation errors due to obsolete markup that it drowns out real issues. ---— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk 23:30, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

If there was a clear description of what needs to be fixed and how or what to look for in documentation and what to change it to I would help, but I am technically out of my depth.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 04:06, 24 September 2012 (UTC)

A problem with establishing a Fast Forward page

Dear Wikipedia – I have tried everything and now am in need of your advanced feedback please. Here's the situation:

My name is Fast Forward (first name Fast last name Forward). I am a professional composer for 30+ years who lives in NYC. I have attempted (and others for me) to establish a profile for myself on Wikipedia but never been 'allowed' or it simply has not been acknowledged. I am not sure why, but I do see that a wealth of other Fast Forward related profiles have been established. At this point it seems amiss for me not to be listed on Wikipedia. I have travelled the world with my compositions, performed at the Whitney Museum, Paris Opera and Museums of Modern Art throughout the world. This is my long-standing website http://www.mrfastforward.com

Please feel free to read my biography and peruse my accomplishments. Can you help me getting listed on Wikipedia? I would be very grateful. Thank you

Fast Forward

Mrfastforward (talk) 17:18, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

You need to be "notable". Read the guidelines at WP:N to understand what that means. After that, you can ask for an article to be created at WP:RA. RudolfRed (talk) 17:30, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

Establishing notability (or lack of notability) generally begins with a Google search. But for someone called Fast Forward, it's not going to be so easy. Maproom (talk) 20:51, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

I don't want to be rude, but this is an encyclopaedia, not a business directory. It doesn't have "profiles", and for you to be concerned with whether or not there is an article about you very much suggests that you are wanting to use it for promotion. This is forbidden. --ColinFine (talk) 22:00, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

Cannot Edit Table

List of Star Trek: Enterprise episodes

I clicked the link to edit the "Season 1" table and the table isn't there for editing. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Rdnicholson (talk • contribs) 18:03, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

Quick answer: you can edit Star Trek: Enterprise (season 1).

Longer answer, with explanation that may not be very relevant to you right now:

In the section of List of Star Trek: Enterprise episodes that you were trying to edit, there's this line:

{{:Star Trek: Enterprise (season 1)}}

That means that the page Star Trek: Enterprise (season 1) has been transcluded into the page. Inside that page, the section with the list has been marked as includable in other articles – such as the one you mention – using the <onlyinclude> tag. – Hex [^t/_c] 18:43, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

No visible stub message

When I add the {{spacecraft-stub}} tag to Comparison of satellite buses, it gets put into the right category but the stub message doesn't appear in the article. The template seems to work OK on other articles eg Aalto-1.

Could this be connected with the table above it in the article, which is so wide that at my chosen screen settings I have to scroll it horizontally? PamD 19:49, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

Fixed with this edit. The navigation box was missing as well. – John of Reading (talk) 20:05, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

Thanks. I'm not familiar with the "<references group="note">" syntax – and it looks as if the page editor isn't as familiar as they should be, either! PamD 13:36, 24 September 2012 (UTC)

Retrieve Deleted Image?

Hello, an image was deleted a while ago on Wikipedia. The source to another image is the deleted picture. Is there any way to retrieve the deleted picture to see what the real source of the image is?--Dom497 (talk) 23:15, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

Yes. Apteva (talk) 23:19, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

How?--Dom497 (talk) 23:21, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

What is the file name? GB fan 23:30, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

File:Bolliger & Mabillard logo.svg. You can see that the source file has been deleted.--Dom497 (talk) 23:35, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

Still looking. I know the answer, not the best way to do it. You can post it at Wikipedia:Requests for undeletion or ask that it be e-mailed to you. It is noted that such request might not be made if it was a copyvio. If it is a fair use image it is common to keep the full image in the version history of the image and use a lower resolution of the image. Another way to get this is to post a request at WP:AN. Derivative works of copyrighted material are still copyvio's. In this case it is a replacement of a png, and you can not include another format in the file history, nor is there any reason to do that. You might get an admin to e-mail it to you. Apteva (talk) 23:36, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

I suspect that what you would find is not a photograph that it was derived from but a very similar image. Apteva (talk) 23:40, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

Ok, thanks!--Dom497 (talk) 23:43, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

Yes, it was a very similar 653 × 166 version of the logo, uploaded 2 minutes earlier by the same user. PrimeHunter (talk) 23:47, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

I believe I found the thumbnail of the deleted PNG image (from a mirror?). It has a filled white background that was removed in the SVG version. —Cheng ✍ 00:03, 24 September 2012 (UTC)

I believe this question has been adequately answered, no? Apteva (talk) 00:14, 24 September 2012 (UTC)

None of the previous responses explicitly answered what the difference between the two versions were. It's a legitimate curiosity and what, I believe, the question was about. If your objection is due to the copyvio, I'd argue the logo doesn't meet the threshold of originality. The original uploader may have simply mistagged the file. —Cheng ✍ 00:35, 24 September 2012 (UTC)

Dom497 is apparently only interested in the real source before it came to Wikipedia. I have answered at my talk page. Unsurprisingly, it originally came from the company website. PrimeHunter (talk) 00:43, 24 September 2012 (UTC)

I'm turning here because I can't find my answer anywhere else.

Stivemeister (talk) 23:25, 23 September 2012 (UTC)September 23, 2012 I have had a pending, recently corrected article awaiting acceptance since September 11th. It's been declined twice before and those items which cause this have been corrected. I'm now awaiting a new review of this article for (hopeful) acceptance. Could someone please read, review, and pass judgment on the article found with this link: Wikipedia talk:Articles for creation/Ward Morehouse III

Thank you for your time and attention to this.

Stivemeister (talk) 23:25, 23 September 2012 (UTC)Stivemeister

You haven't submitted it for review since it was declined 24 June. Click the link in the second box saying "When you are ready to resubmit, click here." PrimeHunter (talk) 23:36, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

Stivemeister (talk) 12:56, 24 September 2012 (UTC)September 24, 2012

Thanks for the information. However, I can't find any 'box' stating "When you are ready to resubmit, click here." Where is it? Is it to be found within the READ tab after the article there? THE EDIT tab after the article there? If so, I'm unable to locate it anywhere. Is it somewhere I'm not conversant? I've been editing and hitting save page with the impression that by so doing, it lines up for review. Please guide to this box so I can resubmit it. Many thanks in advance.Stivemeister (talk) 12:56, 24 September 2012 (UTC)

Stivemeister (talk) 12:58, 24 September 2012 (UTC)September 24, 2012

Never mind,. I found it! Thanks!Stivemeister (talk) 12:58, 24 September 2012 (UTC)

The article now contains two copies of all its contents. You should fix that before it gets reviewed. Maproom (talk) 22:59, 24 September 2012 (UTC)