Wikipedia:Help desk/Archives/2020 December 18

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December 18[edit]

lack of information on??[edit]

I would like to know why you do not have information on John R. Gregg, Scholar and Professor. I know materials requesting a page on him have been submitted several times.


He is the author of 4 modern volumes which have caused great controversy because of their direct honesty and revolutionary gender approach

1.

Sex, The World History: Through Time, Religion, and Culture. 471 pages

2.

Sex The illustrated History :Through Time, Religion, and Culture, Volume 1/   Sex in the ancient World, Early Europe through the Renaissance and Islam.  339 pages

3.

Sex, The Illustrated History: Through Time, Religion,. And Culture, Volume II/ Sex in Asia, Australia. Africa, The South Pacific and the Indigenous Americas. 274 -pages

4.

Sex, The Illustrated History: Through Time, religion, and Culture. Volume III/   Sex in the Modern World, 17th to 21st Century, Europe and Colonial North and South America, World Slavery, Trafficking, Church Abuse, Bisexuality, LGBTQ History.   267 Pages


Are the works to controversial for you because they give ample evidence that Most human cultures have been bisexual?? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2601:647:CB03:7F60:6027:8A0C:78B:44C1 (talk) 00:11, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

It's possible that he doesn't meet Wikipedia's general or academic notability guidelines, or no one has taken the initiative to start an article about Gregg. —Tenryuu 🐲 ( 💬 • 📝 ) (🎁 Wishlist! 🎁) 00:18, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Wikipedia pages are created by unpaid volunteers, each of whom does whatever work they wish to do. Unless someone (you, perhaps?) wishes to create an article for John R. Gregg, the article will not be created. Furthermore, unless the subject is notable by our definition, the article should not be created, and it if is it will be deleted. Our criteria for notability are based on primarily on articles in "reliable sources", mostly the general press. Sadly, many worthy academics do not attract enough attention to become notable by our definition. -Arch dude (talk) 05:55, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Why do bots not leave all new IP users a welcome template with links?[edit]

I recently encountered a new IP user who edited my talk page inappropriately, for unknown reasons and without a cogent edit summary. Looking at their talk page and many contributions, it was apparent that they didn't fully know how Wikipedia works. After leaving a string of messages on their talk page, I noticed that they had no welcoming message and no clue, so I added one. Now their talk page is riddled with warnings from several users, when this might have been averted. Does anyone know why a prolific and enthusiastic IP editor doesn't trigger a welcoming template on their talk page? Where is the best place to bring this up?--Quisqualis (talk) 01:36, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Pinging Jtmorgan, operator of HostBot (which does the Teahouse invites), who may have input. —[AlanM1 (talk)]— 05:56, 21 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Quisqualis, AlanM1 English Wikipedia decided in the distant past that welcome bots are bad. It's probably still explained in the Bot policy somewhere. I assume that if welcomes for all newly registered users was seen as a bridge too far, then welcomes for IPs would be truly beyond the pale. Other languages do send welcomes to all newly registered users (if you visit one of these wikis for the first time while logged in to your account, you might get a welcome--even if you don't edit). There was a lively debate about this when HostBot was approved (HostBot is an invite bot, not a welcome bot, but some folks feel that's a distinction without a difference). The Wikimedia Foundation's Growth team has been designing better new editor onboarding tools for the past couple years, but only for Wikipedias that want them. Ultimately, we would need to demonstrate a broader consensus to make a change like this. It would be an epic RFC. J-Mo 21:57, 21 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I'm sure you are right, J-Mo, about the epic RFC. Meanwhile, that user seems to have departed in a huff, my warnings having nothing perhaps a little to do with it. Ah well.--Quisqualis (talk) 00:32, 22 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Monaco-Monte-Carlo station[edit]

Hi,

If you look at the bottom of Monaco-Monte-Carlo station, you can see that there is a red link for Moscow Belorussky, although there is a page Moscow Belorussky railway station. Can someone fix this by adding the link please? Thanks.

89.200.10.216 (talk) 02:06, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Looks like the template automatically generates the wikilink and it assumes the wikilink will follow a particular naming scheme. Hopefully another editor can figure out how to generate the wikilink to the correct page. RudolfRed (talk) 02:27, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I've gotten it to turn blue.--Quisqualis (talk) 06:12, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
It’s sadly still red for me ActiveContributor2020 (talk) 18:26, 19 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Muting thanks.[edit]

I just got a thank from a user who I have muted in the notification section of my preferences. Muting is supposed to stop thanks, right? Or is there another setting I missed? --Guy Macon (talk) 04:34, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Hey Guy Macon. Hmm... was the notification actually about a thank? I ask because I noticed your recent interaction at your user talk page, from the muted user (since you identified the user in that way upon your revert); muting should stop actual notification "thanks", but edits to your talk page from anyone, muted or not, are going to generate a notification. See mw:Help:Notifications#Muting users. Could this be that, and not an actual notification system "thanks"?--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 04:52, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I have two "thanks" in my notification alerts that say "Kire1875 thanked you for your edit on User talk:Guy Macon."
I double checked, and he is indeed muted.
The thanks are for these edits I made: [1][2] (the second one was after I specifically asked him to stop thanking me for my edits [3])
So it looks like a muted user can thank me for edits I make to my own talk page.
Would someone please temporarily mute me so I can try thanking you for something you posted on your own talk page? --Guy Macon (talk) 05:21, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Going to go mute you now.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 06:01, 18 December 2020 (UTC) Done.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 06:04, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Just got a thank from you... yup, the muting's not working. Try thanking me for an edit to an article or something, see if that also gets through.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk)
I thanked you for 4 edits; one on your user page, one on your user talk page, one on another user's talk page, and one on an article. As I expected, all looked like they went through on my end (muted users are not supposed to know they are muted). I guess I am just in a thankful mood today! :) --Guy Macon (talk) 06:17, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Testing ping: @Fuhghettaboutit: / User:Fuhghettaboutit. --Guy Macon (talk) 06:19, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Got only the one notification, of the thanks for the edit to my own user talk page, including nothing from your ping above. So maybe on the mw page I linked, when it says "You will still receive notifications if a muted user writes or participates on your user talk page..." they actually mean this--that any type of notification, if it's specific to your own user talk, will not be muted, but I certainly interpreted it to meaning actual edits to that page.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 06:22, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Posted another test on your talk page. --Guy Macon (talk) 08:13, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
@Guy Macon: Sorry, I unmuted you after the first series of tests, so the last one you did later (after I went to bed), the edit to my talk page, wasn't done while you were still muted. However, I don't think that test was relevant. I think the one thing we do know is that actual changes to a person's talk page, by edits, are not muted, per the language I quoted from the mw page. What's quite suprising is that a thanks that regards a person's talk page, as we learned, is also not muted. Certainly the language at the mw page needs to be clarified.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 13:31, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
It could be an oversight that Phabricator could take a look at. —Tenryuu 🐲 ( 💬 • 📝 ) (🎁 Wishlist! 🎁) 17:54, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
@Tenryuu: Good idea. See T270533.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 23:54, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

(OT) @Fuhghettaboutit: Is there a significance to the very small (65%) font used in your pings above? —[AlanM1 (talk)]— 06:04, 21 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Hey Alan. In my view, pings don't need large in-text intrusion. All the facility comes from the notification provided, the red number in the interface informing of a message, who it's from, where it is, and a link to the location – its chief function, to provide the notification – not for others to read @NAME on the page. So I prefer as small a footprint as possible (but a step up from using a {{Hidden ping}}).--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 08:11, 21 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

How to get a list of editors according to their bytes on a particular pages?[edit]

In a view history of any wiki article, we see lot of editors are there with bytes information beside. How to get a list of editors according to their bytes on a particular pages? Rizosome (talk) 06:23, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Rizosome. In the same view history page, click on the link for "Page statistics", at the top. It provides overall bytes added by the users it displays, among other information. The tool is this one, but accessing it from the history view is easier because it fills in the name of the page your viewing the history of automatically. Since the resulting statistics page provides so much information, to easily find what I'm talking about, you might use your browser's find function to search for "Added (bytes)". Best regards--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 06:34, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Is it possible to get a list of editors in same way for particular section of a wiki page? We have sections in wikipedia pages like in movie article, we have plot section, we have critical reception section etc. Rizosome (talk) 06:45, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think so – at least I know of none. For a manual surveying method—albeit one that is limited, as it will only find edits to sections if the user involved used section edit links, and kept in the default edit summary identifier of the involved section's name—but you could try opening up the history → clicking on 500 views → change the url where it says 500 to 5000 (thereby accessing many edits at once) → and then use your find function to search for the section header title (if the page actually has more than 5,000 edits, then click on older 5000, and repeat).

Of course, often a section is mostly written in one gulp, so it might be useful to take a few sentences from the interior of the section, and run each through the Wikipedia:WikiBlame tool, to see where and by whom they were added.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 07:01, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

@Rizosome: You may find Who Wrote That? helpful. It works for me. Thincat (talk) 10:30, 20 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Deprecated math tag[edit]

Hello, why is the expression

<math>\mathbb{C}^n</math>

valid here for any n, but deprecated for n = 7? What can be used instead to no longer fall into category Pages that use a deprecated format of the math tags? Thank you. --Turbojet (talk) 06:40, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

@Turbojet: That was odd. <math>\mathbb{C}^7</math> produced Category:Pages that use a deprecated format of the math tags as you say but not <math>\mathbb{C}^6</math> or other values. I tried <math>\mathbb{C}^{7}</math> which worked and after that <math>\mathbb{C}^7</math> also started to work. PrimeHunter (talk) 08:36, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Replaced with \Complex.--SilverMatsu (talk) 08:42, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you. --Turbojet (talk) 11:48, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
The problem seems to be a false positive, not a code problem. I'm sorry--SilverMatsu (talk)< — Preceding undated comment added 00:57, 19 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

This looks a bit odd, with a strange cacheing problem. The real deprecation error would be <math>\C^{12}</math>, now if you save a page with that power, and then change it to <math>\mathbb{C}^{12}</math> it should in theory clear the deprecation error. However, the output image is identical and somehow keeps the deprecation warning. If you start with a completely new formula <math>\mathbb{C}^{13}</math> you never get the error. For some pages you can clear deprecation warnings using a URL like https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hypercube?action=purge&mathpurge=true There is a phabricator task for reporting these issues T270530.--Salix alba (talk): 13:11, 19 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Wondering how to submit an article for review[edit]

Hi! I have been working on an article about Webshaka and wanted to submit it for review, but somehow bypassed that (and anyone can get there.) The link is https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Webshaka . I have submitted an article for review before, but apparently something’s different this time? Thanks! — Preceding unsigned comment added by Hermit7 (talkcontribs) 06:44, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Hermit7. You submit it by posting at the top of the page {{subst:submit}}. However, this does not appear to be a notable subject, or at least the draft does not yet cite suitable sources to demonstrate the topic's notability. I suspect any reviewer will tell you need to find and add more citations to reliable, secondary sources, that are entirely independent of the company, and write about it in substantive detail. I suggest reading also Wikipedia:Common sourcing mistakes (notability). If adequate sources don't exist, no suitable article is possible. You might instead add some of the content into the article on the product. (However, that article itself looks currently ripe for review for deletion, given its sourcing.) Best regards--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 07:15, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Hi! If the article probably doesn’t have enough references and neither does it’s product, where do you suppose I put the content? Thanks! Hermit7 (talk) 07:21, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Hermit7, your content may find a home on the Web in one of these alterntive outlets.--Quisqualis (talk) 16:08, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I made a Wikidata page on it. https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q104289180 Have yet to figure out how to add citations or references. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Hermit7 (talkcontribs) 20:48, 19 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Creating a wikipedia page[edit]

Hello,

I would like to create a wikipedia page for the professional soccer player 'Leandro José Ribeiro Tipote'.

How would I go about doing this? — Preceding unsigned comment added by NaseemKhan1682 (talkcontribs) 07:48, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

NaseemKhan1682, the best way would be to go through the Articles for creation process. Before you start, I strongly suggest reading Your first article, and ensure that the Tipote is notable by Wikipedia's standards, and that you have enough reliable, independent sources that provide significant coverage. Writing an article is one of the hardest things you can do on Wikipedia. —Tenryuu 🐲 ( 💬 • 📝 ) (🎁 Wishlist! 🎁) 07:59, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
NaseemKhan1682, determining soccer notability is quite technical, and you will want to follow Wikipedia:WikiProject Football/Notability. Good luck.--Quisqualis (talk) 16:04, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Larry the Cat[edit]

Hello

this is very confusing i am tryiing to get the Larry the Cat page updated to show my book beibg published in Feb 2021 - It is on Goodreads and Amazon in readiness I have a iSBN Number. Please can you help. I would like to know who has the final say as to this page being updated as this is a very valid add to the page x I have already had a write up in the Evening Standard ISBN 9781800461789 ElizabethR0304 (talk) 08:58, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

my best

EC Radcliffe

ElizabethR0304 First, please review conflict of interest. You should not edit about your conflict of interest directly, but you may make a formal edit request(click for instructions) on the article talk page, Talk:Larry (cat). 331dot (talk) 09:01, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Hi, and a big welcome to Wikipedia, we hope you'll stay and edit other articles. As you have probably noticed, users tend to be very concerned about edits from people with a conflict of interest because we do not want to become a series of adverts. However, if you have a review in the Evening Standard it is likely worthy of inclusion. If you could please provide a link to it, I will see what I can do about getting it in the article. As a new user, you may find better help on the Teahouse noticeboard. Best wishes, ~ El D. (talk to me) 16:18, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

AWB[edit]

Can I use AWB to fix links in semi-automatic mode? And I want to remove double https, can AWB help me? Владимир Меланхолин (обс) 09:54, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, you can. But presumably you didn't just want to hear that, but also how. If that's what you want, it would help if you described what exactly you are trying to achieve. Do you have examples? What do you mean by “double https”? ◅ Sebastian 12:27, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
@SebastianHelm: Wild guess: He means something like https://https://example.org However, I am concerned that there might be a bot out there that fixes double protocols (In the german Wikipedia, de:user:CamelBot does that, but that bot isn't active here) Victor Schmidt (talk) 14:51, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
@Владимир Меланхолин: There were only 24 articles in mainspace with this problem, which was caused by a brief bug (that has been fixed) in a bot, IIRC. I've fixed most of them now and should get to the rest in a day or two. In short, it's a rare problem and shouldn't require any ongoing attention. —[AlanM1 (talk)]— 08:10, 21 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks! If anything, I check every day, so you don't have to worry (already 50 fixes). Владимир Меланхолин (обс) 08:47, 21 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Historical pages on watchlist[edit]

I have several hundred historical pages on my watchlist. It's very unlikely that anybody will change them, but the possibility exists, and I want them to be protected against vandalism. So far I felt it didn't hurt to carry them around with me. But my watchlist has become unwieldy and I wish it were shorter. What's the best way to protect historical pages? I could change the protection level, but that's not intended by Wikipedia:Protection policy and the argument has been made that it should only be done as a last resort. I could move those page names to an external file which I will copy to the watchlist in regular intervals, but that's constant extra work and will add a delay in catching any vandalism. Or should I simply not worry about those old pages? ◅ Sebastian 12:23, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

If you list those pages as wikilinks on a subpage of your user page, you can use Special:RecentChangesLinked to see any recent changes to them. For example, I currently have a bunch of articles listed at User:John of Reading/X2, and this link shows which have been edited in the last 14 days. If I remembered to use that link every week or two, I'd effectively be watching them without cluttering my watchlist. -- John of Reading (talk) 13:23, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you, John, that's a reasonable compromise. (I even did that fifteen years ago but forgot about it!) ◅ Sebastian 13:53, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Hey Sebastian. I'm wondering: is this more a matter of aesthetics when viewing the raw watchlist – than actual unwieldiness? I ask because I currently have 19,374 pages on my watchlist. Now, that's probably not advisable. My watchlist at this point really is somewhat unwieldy, because when I view it I do get a somewhat (self-inflicted) "unwieldy" number of changes to scroll through. However, many thousands of those pages are ones I either deleted, tagged for deletion, or was involved with in some manner prior to deletion, and many others are historical or rarely edited. Those types, the same ones you're here about regarding removal from your watchlist, are exactly the types of pages that don't add to the unwieldiness (at least as I define it), because they don't get edited often. (And having them, exactly as you observe in your question, is very useful for vandalism protection [and for me, catching sock-/meat-puppets and seeing G4-able recreations, and the like]). So I don't really understand why the one type of pages I have on my watchlist that don't seem to add to the problem of having too many, are the type you're thinking of removing as too many. Just thought this might provide some perspective. Best regards--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 14:02, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Good considerations. For me, the starting point was that I had many (that is, by my standards, not by yours) pages on my watchlist for which I don't remember why I was ever watching them. (Mostly because by default I set my preferences to “Add pages and files I edit to my watchlist”). So I went through the list and found some interesting changes I had missed (mostly replies on talk pages), and felt it would be useful to do that again from time to time, For that, the historic pages do add unnecessary ballast. Another consideration was that pages span a wide range of time horizons: For some (such as this one) a day is plenty, while for others a year can be too short. The public watchlist John recommended allows me to choose that suitably. ◅ Sebastian 14:35, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

What is the correct way of asking for opinions from users who speak a foriegn language/live in a particular country?[edit]

Hi, I have recently seen a number of sources on WP:RSN either go unresponded to or fail to get a clear consensus partially because they were in a foreign language or based in a particular country and as a result, no one on RSN knows what to do about them. I feel that the best way of resolving this would be some system whereby users on RSN could notify foreign language speakers or residents of a particular country when a source in their language/country is being discussed. Is there any system like that on Wikipedia? I know that Wikiprojects exist, is there any way of notifying a particular Wikiproject and would that be helpful here? ~ El D. (talk to me) 15:56, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Hello, El komodos drago. There is Category:Wikipedians by language: any editor who puts language Userboxes on their user page will automatically be added to an appropriate subcategory. In many cases there is also an appropriate WikiProject, where you will find people intersted in that country or language. I'm sure there are other resources which are more to your need, but I don't know what they are. --ColinFine (talk) 16:33, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks but randomly pinging users just because they have a particular userbox on their page feels like asking for trouble. Am I wrong? ~ El D. (talk to me) 16:35, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Posting a brief note on the talk page of wikiprojects asking members to chime into a discussion elsewhere is often done. ~ ONUnicorn(Talk|Contribs)problem solving 16:49, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Seems reasonable. I was just wondering whether there was some sort of official mechanism. ~ El D. (talk to me) 17:02, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

My edits are not being posted![edit]

I just opened a Wikipedia account a few weeks ago. My edits were posted with no problem. NOW I can no longer edit! Even though it says my edits have been saved, my edits are NOT posted on/in the articles I edit. I cannot think of ANY rules I have broken. Will you please correct this problem? Thank you. Jmr012 (talk) 17:07, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

@Jmr012: This is the only edit I can see from your account. Were you logged in when you made the other edits? RudolfRed (talk) 17:12, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I just opened a Wikipedia account a few weeks ago. My edits were posted with no problem. NOW I can no longer edit! Even though it says my edits have been saved, my edits are NOT posted on/in the articles I edit. I cannot think of ANY rules I have broken. Will you please correct this problem? Thank you.

YES I WAS LOGGED IN WHEN I MADE MY FIRST EDITS. I HAVE AT LEAST 10 EDITS. Jmr012 (talk) 17:16, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I combined this response to go with the original question. RudolfRed (talk) 17:19, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
@Jmr01: Special:Contributions/Jmr012 shows your only saved edits at the English Wikipedi is posting here. You have edits at two related projects commons:Special:Contributions/Jmr012 and wikidata:Special:Contributions/Jmr012. If you tried to edit the English Wikipedia then maybe you only saw a preview and overlooked a step. PrimeHunter (talk) 17:22, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Can you provide a link for me to see PrimeHunter? It might be because the page is protected. TigerScientist Chat 17:34, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

@TigerScientist: I don't know what link you want. I found the accounts at Special:CentralAuth/Jmr012. If the page was protected then the user had no reason to think they saved an edit. There is no logs of attempts to edit protected pages. PrimeHunter (talk) 17:46, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

What happened. Just ignore my mention please and move on. I meant to mention someone else. TigerScientist Chat 17:49, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

When asking for donations[edit]

After you receive a donation can you please stop asking the same person for more immediately after they gave their donation? In the past after I donated I wouldn’t be bothered for a while but now I’ve been continuously harassed for more money immediately after as if I never donated in the first place. And being told I’ve been asked five times. Which is weird that you can keep track of how many times you’ve asked me but not when I’ve actually donated. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2604:3D09:A97B:7900:8C41:3731:DDC9:BD6E (talk) 17:39, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

If you create an account, you can disable the fundraising banners. Comments/suggestions/complaints about fundraising should go to donate (at) wikimedia.org RudolfRed (talk) 17:40, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
The software cannot tell who is at the other end of an IP address. Please create an account. Go to your Preferences, navigate to the Gadgets tab, and check the "Suppress display of fundraiser banners" box. For additional concerns please contact the Wikimedia Foundation at this email address: donate@wikimedia.org. —Tenryuu 🐲 ( 💬 • 📝 ) (🎁 Wishlist! 🎁) 17:51, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Is WikiProject Palestine asleep?[edit]

I posted a request for advice to WT:WikiProject Palestine a few days ago and have had no response yet. I find this deafening silence rather odd as I was expecting this particular project to be quite well watched and busy, given the nature of the topic, and all the dire warnings of eternal doom to editors daring to enter that particular minefield. Which I am intruding on for the first time in over a decade as a Wikipedian. Roger (Dodger67) (talk) 18:58, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

@Dodger67: The project has about 106 members and the last talk page discussion was in October. Just be patient. RudolfRed (talk) 20:37, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Minus sign in html math is failing to appear in some cases[edit]

For example, q-1 or {q-1} inside of html math shows as or (it shows as q 1) . However (q-1) works: . Rcgldr (talk) 19:26, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Rcgldr, I'm a little confused. They all appear as to me. Maybe it's a preferences thing on your side? —Tenryuu 🐲 ( 💬 • 📝 ) (🎁 Wishlist! 🎁) 19:28, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I'm getting space instead of minus sign. It's failing with Chrome and Edge. What preferences could I be setting? Rcgldr (talk) 19:30, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I should clarify, it works in other cases such as n-k: Rcgldr (talk) 19:32, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
and it works for n-1 or (it shows as n - 1). So it fails for q-1, but works for n-1 on my system. Rcgldr (talk) 19:42, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
In your Preferences → Appearance, what radio button is "Math" set to? Mine is set to " MathML with SVG or PNG fallback (recommended for modern browsers and accessibility tools)". Do you have any extensions running that could be impairing display? —Tenryuu 🐲 ( 💬 • 📝 ) (🎁 Wishlist! 🎁) 19:44, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
It is working OK in Internet Exlporer, failing in Chrome and Edge. I'm running Windows 7 Pro 64 bit. I don't have any extensions on Edge as I rarely use it. I don't understand how any setting would affect "q-1" but not "n-1". Rcgldr (talk) 19:48, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
My preferences are also set to " ... MathML with SVG or PNG fallback" Rcgldr (talk) 19:50, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Changing preferences to "... PNG images" seems to be working. Rcgldr (talk) 19:53, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
This is phab:T269222: "Minus signs not displaying in Math formulas (on certain zoom levels in Chrome browsers)". PrimeHunter (talk) 21:04, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for the Phabricator ticket, PrimeHunter. So it appears to be an issue with zooming and font renders? —Tenryuu 🐲 ( 💬 • 📝 ) (🎁 Wishlist! 🎁) 21:48, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Note that the issue with "certain zoom levels" includes the default 100% size. Rcgldr (talk) 16:45, 20 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Extended Confirmed User Question[edit]

I reached 500 edits recently but don’t have the extended confirmed user level yet. How long does it take to get the new user status after the minimum requirement is reached? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Squid45 (talkcontribs) 19:52, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Squid45, looking at your edit count, you've only made 488 edits. 12 more to go? —Tenryuu 🐲 ( 💬 • 📝 ) (🎁 Wishlist! 🎁) 19:59, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, there are different ways to count edits in some cases like moves. https://xtools.wmflabs.org/ec/en.wikipedia.org/Squid45 currently says 504 but Wikipedia:Tools/Navigation popups says 488 for me. That's probably also what you see at Special:Preferences. PrimeHunter (talk) 20:24, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
ah okay! That’s very helpful. Thank you for your help. Squid45 (talk) 22:17, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Donations to Wikipedia[edit]

I'd love to donate to wikipedia because I use it often for certain info, and in many cases it's an excellent source. However regarding the blue text asking not to scroll past and consider donating to wikipedia, here is a big screw you to wikipedia and your editors and those controlling the content. Wikipedia is like other platforms full of media bias. Your obvious liberal slant on the subjects of Trump russia collusion (which was indeed a fabricated hoax, that's a fact) and the Hunter Biden investigation (which you say has no evidence, which is blatently false, there is direct massive evidence of Hunter Biden's dealings with China and his father, this is a fact without question). The method in which wikipedia articles these subjects is blatently biased and flat out disgusting. You are no different than CNN, Facebook,IG, or any other biased source. So again, screw you to your request for a donation. You on account of your bias will not receive a penny from me. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 198.99.24.125 (talk) 20:19, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Donations do not determine content. You can discuss issues of any article at that article's talk page. Concerns/suggestions/complaints about fundraising should go to donate (at) wikimedia.org RudolfRed (talk) 20:29, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
The articles are all written by people like you and me. If you have opinions about what should be there, consider becoming an editor and helping to improve the content. Of course, you will need to back up any claims with reliable sources.--Gronk Oz (talk) 22:58, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • If you just want to be told what you want to hear, you don't need to be here to do it, you can stay in your bubble and get all the answers you must have to satisfy your world view. 331dot (talk) 23:13, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
You may want to send those pennies to Conservapedia. Presumably, their point of viewdoen't disgust you.--Quisqualis (talk) 18:27, 19 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Chicken and egg "copyvio" dilemma[edit]

In Araucaria, I noticed that the American Conifer Society's page on the genus matches Wikipedia word for word. Their website does not seem to be copyrighted. What is the best way to verify who copied whom?--Quisqualis (talk) 20:49, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

If you scroll down to the bottom of the page on the Conifer Society's website, you'll notice a line that says, "Attribution from: Wikipedia". In other words, they copied from us. ~ ONUnicorn(Talk|Contribs)problem solving 20:54, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Excellent. Thanks for spotting that.--Quisqualis (talk) 21:04, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
@Quisqualis: For future reference when you come across this issue, and there is no clear indicator like there was here, there are essentially two avenues for investigation. First, find some deep interior sentences from the text (that are duplicated as between our article and the external site), and find how they were added. You can do this through direct article history investigation but the wikiblame tool is excellent for this purpose. Once you do that for a few portions of the text, have located the addition points – look at the page history surrounding the additions; the diffs from that time; etc. You should be able to glean a pretty clear picture of how the text came about.

Two pictures usually emerge. Let's start with the easy one. If you find that the text used to be different and was modified by various users, and/or added in dribs and drabs by a variety of people, and so forth, then it's almost certainly the case that the external site is copying from here (because if the text organically evolved in form, and was contributed to by many, it could not have been copied from the external site; the firm deduction is that it had to have developed through our editing processes).

The second scenario is less striaghtforward: if, on the other hand, you find that text was added in one or just a few gulps (often along with lots of other portions of verbatim duplicated text), then this does not tell you it was copied, but requires you to investigate further. Some users, of course, do add text in large swaths, that they polished before saving, but at least you now know when the text was added. With that in mind, run the URL of the external site's specific page with the duplicate text through the Wayback Machine.

If it was indeed preexisting, you can often find a snapshot of the page with the duplicate text from an earlier date than when it was added here . If you get that result, you know the external source was first. Unfortunately, if you've done this and don't find such a result, that doesn't affirm the consequent; doesn't prove it was not a copyvio, but at least you tried. You can also investigate the user's history for an if-there's-smoke-there's-fire type conclusion (check their talk page for copyright violation notices from other users, and similar, for example). And you can always send the issue for further investigation by others, such as through using {{Copyvio}}. Best regards--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 17:12, 19 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for outlining this protocol, Fuhghettaboutit. Will bookmark and apply it one day very soon.--Quisqualis (talk) 17:58, 19 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Fuhghettaboutit's approach can also be carried out adopted using Who Wrote That? for investigating the WP text provenance. Thincat (talk) 11:50, 20 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Linking Wikipedia Articles to Google Maps[edit]

I am trying to determine if the Marine Protected Areas can be linked to Google maps to educate people on the MPA borders. Specifically--73.162.110.155 (talk) 22:40, 18 December 2020 (UTC)--73.162.110.155 (talk) 22:40, 18 December 2020 (UTC) the Pillar Point State Marine Conservation Area ?--73.162.110.155 (talk) 22:40, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Hello, IP user. I'm not quite sure what you're asking; but in general we do not use Google maps in Wikipedia articles, because their proprietary licensing is incompatible with Wikipedia policies and purposes. We can use some other projects, such as OpenStreetMap. You may find the information you are looking for on WP:Maps for Wikipedia. --ColinFine (talk) 23:31, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
The article Montara State Marine Reserve & Pillar Point State Marine Conservation Area contains detailed boundary coordinates for the Pillar Point State Marine Conservation Area. Moreover, if one clicks on the coordinates at the top of the article and selects the OpenStreetMap, that map shows the boundaries of both the Montara and Pillar Point protected areas. Deor (talk) 18:17, 19 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Information panels on YouTube[edit]

Where would I submit an inquiry/question regarding an 'information panel' issue on YouTube? --2601:CD:C400:AF90:E918:4055:77DB:F0FE (talk) 23:06, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

If your question concerns a YouTube or Google panel, you will need to contact those respective websites. 331dot (talk) 23:15, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Vandalism to Page[edit]

I represent the subject of a BLP. As I am a paid professional working on their behalf, I represent a COI. Therefore, would someone be able to look at and repair an issue we are seeing on his Wikipedia page?

The page is: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/W._Mark_Lanier.

In the personal life section, someone has added a false claim as noted here:

[17] One of these children is Freddrick Lanier, a convicted sex offender.

The edit lists Freddrick Lanier, a convicted sex offender, as one of Mark's children. This is false. If you follow the citation listed, you can see that Freddrick Lanier is 65 years old. Mark was born in 1960, making him five years younger than Freddrick. Can you have this edit removed? Thanks for your help. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Zackattacks (talkcontribs) 23:25, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for disclosing and asking here, Zackattacks. I have removed the claim. I haven't investigated whether there is any truth in it - I acknowledge that you say it is a misidentification - because even if it is true, a contentious claim of that sort should not appear without a reliable secondary source. --ColinFine (talk) 23:38, 18 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]