Wikipedia:Help desk/Archives/2023 September 5

Welcome to the Wikipedia Help Desk Archives
The page you are currently viewing is an archive page. While you can leave answers for any questions shown below, please ask new questions on one of the current Help Desk pages.

September 5

Sorting of Dutch names

I'm Dutch and not a new(ish) enwiki editor. This might be the wrong place for these questions. If so, please let me know where to go.
In the Netherlands names are not sorted/indexed by preposition(s). (Example:Vincent van Gogh would be under G and not V.) Enwiki is well aware of this, see Tussenvoegsel, as well as here and here. Enwiki usually follows this convention (see for example Category:Dutch people stubs), though not always, as you can see there are a few de's under D and van's under V. Previously I have been editing those whenever I came across them. However, while this is the rule in the Netherlands, I have been unable to find a rule to this effect on enwiki. There is also this sentence However, Dutch names in English directories (e.g., reference lists of scientific papers) may be ordered on the full name including all prefixes (Van Rijn would be ordered under 'V'),... in the third paragraph here.
I am well aware of: wp:Ignore all rules. But still, I have a few questions:
1)Is this a rule somewhere on enwiki, or just a convention (that ought to be followed)? Or have I been editing wrong by mistakenly "fixing" this?
2)If it is a rule, could somebody point me to it?
3)Is it a rule/convention only on enwiki, or should it be followed across Wikimedia?
I'm asking this last question because I tend to roam fairly wide over the language projects, and when challenged previously I was able to convince editors over there. However, recently I wasn't on the Afrikaans wp when a university professor of Afrikaans Linguistics got involved. Which got me thinking and diving into this particular rabbithole.
Dutchy45 (talk) 09:14, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

WP:SUR doesn't touch on this specifically, but says that for special cases not covered in the guidance, Names of persons: National usages for entry in catalogue (1996) should be consulted, which (p. 160) recommends the same thing you do. Folly Mox (talk) 10:57, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

However if you're talking about the values of e.g. |author-first= |author-last= in a citation template, the thing to do – like almost always – is follow the sources. So if your source credits "van der Loon, Piet", you should do the same, and not alter the citation to read "Loon, Piet van der". Folly Mox (talk) 11:07, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

See bullet "Names with particles or prefixes" under subsection Other exceptions, which follows section WP:SUR. I take what it's saying as: for an article on a Dutch person 'van Surname' the Category sorting would be under 'Surname, First van', whereas for a Belgian or American person, sorting would use 'Van Surname, First'. Generally, the capitalization of the prefix in the title line of the article would track with whether the prefix comes first: upper case: yes, lower case: no. - R. S. Shaw (talk) 06:19, 8 September 2023 (UTC)

Generally, the capitalization of the prefix in the title line of the article would track with whether the prefix comes first: upper case: yes, lower case: no.
This is actually incorrect. Although I am Dutch, I live in Belgium and here quite a lot of names are indexed by a not-capitalised prefix.
I've read the WP:SUR part and I'm gonna bring this up on the talkpage over there, cause the info over there is at best incomplete and can wrongfoot editors.
Thanks for alerting me to this 'cause earlier I only went to the bibliography part of that page.
Dutchy45 (talk) 09:19, 8 September 2023 (UTC)

Why was the article on Anas Haloui taken down?

Hello! I've recently drafted an article on the Moroccan boxer, Anas Haloui, in French, but it was taken down because I was told I did not use resources that aligned with Wikipedia guidelines. Being a Wikipedia editor for quite a while, I have been using similar resources for my articles, all of which are web pages. The news article websites included Dailymotion, News Atlantic, Sky News Belgium, Book Times, and Medium. Therefore, I would like to know why was it taken down and what I can do for it to get published again. Thank you. ~~~~ Yara Elhawary (talk) 10:29, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

Hi @Yara Elhawary. The French Wikipedia is an entirely separate project with it's own rules and policies. This is the English Wikipedia, so unfortunately we can't help with French articles. Qcne (talk) 11:05, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

Hi @Yara Elhawary, you could try asking on the discussion page of the admin who deleted the article, ideally in French. TSventon (talk) 12:00, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

Thank you Qcne and TSventon for your kind help. I have responded in the discussion page, but without any luck. Although I believe it was because I drafted my request in English. Allow me to draft it once again in French. Thank you.

I have another question, if I were to publish an article for this same boxer in English, using the following resources: The Borok Times and Dailyhunt (English sources), Dailymotion (one video), and News Atlantic and Sky News Belgium (French sources), do I have a successful chance of having my article published?

I look forward to hearing back from you. Thank you. Yara Elhawary (talk) 12:40, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

Hi @Yara Elhawary. Articles about sportspeople need to pass the WP:NSPORT criteria. Qcne (talk) 12:43, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

@Yara Elhawary, you have asked on your own discussion page, I suggested asking on the discussion page of the admin who deleted the article, as they are probably not watching your talk page. Their name is mentioned in the Annonce de suppression de page on your fr discussion page. TSventon (talk) 13:02, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

Page for my business

Hello there ! I hope you are doing well! I was wondering about how to create a page for my business name. Can someone help, please? Ivonajivkova (talk) 11:17, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

There are zero business pages on Wikipedia, we have articles on notable businesses. Theroadislong (talk) 11:20, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

@Ivonajivkova Newcomers with the ambition of creating an article for something where they have a conflict of interest nearly always fail. Writing acceptable articles is more tricky than it may appear. In addition, the WMF's terms of use insist that you would be considered a WP:PAID editor if writing about your own business and must declare that as explained at the link. In addition, you should read this and this. Mike Turnbull (talk) 11:59, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

speedy deletion

Please I need guidelines on speedy deletion for copyright violation on article"innovation Support Network" . Should I revised the older version to clean up the infringement. Please help I don't want the article deleted. Akwugo (talk) 11:27, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

@Akwugo I replied to a similar question of yours at the Teahouse. Please don't ask the same thing in multiple places as that just wastes people's time. Mike Turnbull (talk) 11:53, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

Links to Google Drive

I was nominating an article for deletion yesterday (Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Viossa) and realized that one of the sources was a link to a PDF uploaded in someone's Google Drive account. I did a search today and realized that almost 5,000 articles link to "drive.google.com" in their sources. What should be done about these? My gut assumption is that Drive links shouldn't be used because A) they aren't necessarily stable and B) there's no guarantee they're an accurate representation of the source they're trying to archive. Should these links be replaced with templates, or is there a better practice that I've missed? ThadeusOfNazereth(he/him)^{Talk to Me!} 12:25, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

This would probably be better discussed at Wikipedia talk:Link rot or Wikipedia talk:Citing sources. I didn't find a previous consensus about this with a brief search. Folly Mox (talk) 12:53, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

Internet Archive will archive publicly visible gdrive links, so apart from thing B they're not really worse than any other unstable URL. Folly Mox (talk) 12:56, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

It's also worth pointing out that the link is not the citation. The citation is the information about who and what and where and how the information was published. It's an author and a title and a publisher and other relevant information so someone can go find the original source. A link is a courtesy for when the source is also available online, but it is not mandatory that such links are used, especially for print sources. --Jayron32 16:20, 6 September 2023 (UTC)

References and punctuation

I remember seeing something about placing references after punctuation marks rather than before but can no longer find it. Where is what I saw? Mcljlm (talk) 13:12, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

@Mcljlm: MOS:REFPUNCT Bazza (talk) 13:15, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

Thanks. Mcljlm (talk) 18:43, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

I want to delete a page

Hello, I want to request a deletion of a page thet violates a rule of impersonating someone else. Pshakhasraw (talk) 13:15, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

Pshakhasraw, is this the draft you created? If so you can add {{Db-author}} to the top of the page to request speedy deletion. TSventon (talk) 13:32, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

Mentor?

I've just noticed in on my - relatively new - homepage that I've been assigned a mentor who has volunteered to guide newer people like [me] on how to edit - which is a nice gesture, except I've been here 14 years and have 37K edits to my name. What criteria is met to be assigned one, or does everybody get one, and they can just opt out? (No offence MR Mentor.) Chaheel Riens (talk) 14:23, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

@Chaheel Riens Anyone who opens the "newcomer homepage" feature, even as an experiment when fiddling with Special:Preferences (at the bottom) will be assigned a mentor. You can just ignore this as an experienced editor or go back into your preferences and uncheck the box for that feature. Mike Turnbull (talk) 14:30, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

@chaheel riens: this is the new homepage feature (see here for more info). every editor using it is assigned to a mentor, no exceptions. i'm not quite sure why you're seeing it, it's meant only for new editors. ltbdl (talk) 14:30, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

Mentors are assigned only to a subset of editors with Special:Homepage enabled, per Wikipedia talk:Growth Team features/Mentor list#50% of newcomers getting a mentor (up from 25% a week ago). Folly Mox (talk) 16:39, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

hm, not what i remember. ltbdl (talk) 16:45, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

Notepad and to-do list for users

I once saw on a user’s user page that they had created a notepad and a to-do list linked to their Wikipedia page. How would one created it?

Megabits13 (talk) 16:08, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

@Megabits13: you are allowed to create subpages of your user page, e.g. User:Megabits13/notepad and User:Megabits13/to-do list. Perfectly OK as long as they are there to help you build the encyclopedia. To create the page you first create a redlink (as I did here) and then click on the redlink and start typing. I usually put these redlinks on my top-level user page so I can later easily click on them to go to the subpages. -Arch dude (talk) 16:35, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

Add {{user subpages|Megabits13}} to (eg) your user page, and it will display an up-to-date list of all your sub-pages. -- Verbarson  ^talk_edits 11:24, 6 September 2023 (UTC)

Update Content getting Reverted

Mr.Ollie Reverted my changes. How to undo that?

Kalyan Jewellers Rakish (talk) 18:22, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

You can discuss the matter on the article talk page, explain your position, and see what the consensus among other people is. --Jayron32 18:23, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

Please review the article and check the Talk page. There don't appear to be any discussions, and I'm unable to provide an explanation. If possible, investigate the reason for the revert and consider undoing it. It seems that some administrative volunteers are restricting the edits of new users. Rakish (talk) 18:29, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

Rakish, I started a talk page section for you to reply to. In the future, you can start your own discussion using the "New section" button at the top of the page. Firefangledfeathers (talk / contribs) 18:32, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

Thanks. But, who will help me to undo the recent changes based on the review. Rakish (talk) 18:43, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

If the consensus of the discussion is in your favour, you can undo them yourself. Until then, you should not edit that part of the article. Maproom (talk) 19:53, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

If MrOllie reverted your changes, then they thought they were not improvements. You may be right, they may be right, both or neither may be right. Wikipedia works on consensus, and if you think the article should be changed, it is up to you to argue the case and persuade other editors. ColinFine (talk) 22:10, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

Updated Content reverted for Irrelevant Reason

MrOllie reverted my changes because I mentioned routine financial information like dividends. However, I included details about the first dividend in the company's history, which I believe is a significant historical milestone, not merely current news. I would like to draw your attention to the following article, which also includes dividend details as part of the historical record: The Coca Cola Company

I greatly appreciate MrOllie's time in reviewing my edit, but I would like to emphasize that the revert should not be solely based on the fact that I am a new user. I am committed to contributing positively to Wikipedia and adhering to its guidelines. My intention was to enhance the article with relevant and significant historical information.

link : Kalyan Jewellers Rakish (talk) 19:22, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

@Rakishgobi: Please continue to discuss this on the article's talk page to get consensus. WP:OTHERCONTENT may apply. Follow the guidance at WP:DR if talk page discussion does not work. RudolfRed (talk) 19:53, 5 September 2023 (UTC)