Help desk
< November 11	<< Oct \| November \| Dec >>	November 13 >

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.

November 12

t

like to correct Elvis Presly's pilot not Davis , email me please thankyou , ^{[details removed]} — Preceding unsigned comment added by Hotdiesel80 (talk • contribs) 00:56, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Could you please indicate where we can read about this correction you wish to make, that is, if anyone wanted to check the correct information, where could we read it? --Jayron32 01:58, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

NNDB appropriate as ref?

I know that there are some sites which simply aren't appropriate as references, where would I find whether NNDB is considered one of them? I tried looking up nndb in the wikipedia namespace, and most of the links I see are for negative things, but I can't find anything specific...Naraht (talk) 02:02, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

General consensus is no, (see this discussion, more here). Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard is probably a better place to ask about sources. Scarce2 (talk) 04:44, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

See this link [1]. Not even remotely a reliable source... AndyTheGrump (talk) 04:47, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you. I've got some work to do on Secret Service codename it seems. I consider this question answered, I just don't remember what the template is to add to the question to indicated it is completed.Naraht (talk) 11:15, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Resolved

Category:Adultery in fiction: new subcategories

Hi, I just wonder, can the administrators help recategorizxe all the pages within this Category:Adultery in fiction to these subcategories, Category:Adultery in films and Category:Adultery in novels? I'm kinda busy lately, so I can't finish it myself. Thanks.--NeoBatfreak (talk) 02:55, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

You don't have to be an admin to re-categorize articles. I've done about 60 of them in the last half hour using HotCat. You can too. Dismas|^(talk) 03:31, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Hosptial Police

Please add the Metrohealth Police Department to the police department agencies — Preceding unsigned comment added by 169.240.130.50 (talk) 03:11, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not sure which article you want it adding to, but at present Metrohealth Police Department does not have an article, and so should not appear in any list articles (and cannot appear in any categories. If you think that it should have an article of its own, please look at WP:Your First Article, or make a case at articles for creation; but be aware that any topic must meet Wikipedia's notability guidelines for inclusion. --ColinFine (talk) 12:39, 13 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Redlinks and nonlinks can certainly appear in Lists - in fact that is part of the point of them. Rmhermen (talk) 14:19, 15 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

────(♥)(♥)(♥)────(♥)(♥)(♥) __ ɪƒ ƴσυ'ʀє αʟσηє, ──(♥)██████(♥)(♥)██████(♥) ɪ'ʟʟ ɓє ƴσυʀ ѕɧα∂σѡ. ─(♥)████████(♥)████████(♥) ɪƒ ƴσυ ѡαηт тσ cʀƴ, ─(♥)██████████████████(♥) ɪ'ʟʟ ɓє ƴσυʀ ѕɧσυʟ∂єʀ. ──(♥)████████████████(♥) ɪƒ ƴσυ ѡαηт α ɧυɢ, ────(♥)████████████(♥) __ ɪ'ʟʟ ɓє ƴσυʀ ρɪʟʟσѡ. ──────(♥)████████(♥) ɪƒ ƴσυ ηєє∂ тσ ɓє ɧαρρƴ, ────────(♥)████(♥) __ ɪ'ʟʟ ɓє ƴσυʀ ѕɱɪʟє. ─────────(♥)██(♥) ɓυт αηƴтɪɱє ƴσυ ηєє∂ α ƒʀɪєη∂, ───────────(♥) __ ɪ'ʟʟ ʝυѕт ɓє ɱє.

Ireland

In the first of the article it says that Ireland is "east of the larger island of England". Someone needs to change that to west. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.218.192.220 (talk) 04:53, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Nope, what it says is "To its east is the larger island of Great Britain, from which it is separated by the Irish Sea". Geographically correct - and note that England isn't an island. AndyTheGrump (talk) 05:00, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Please vote. Anagrams inclusion/non inclusion when it comes to non-straight text

Reaching a process of consensus is not a straight-forward thing. If a negative proposal it put forward then a number of people test its validity from a variety of positive standpoints. If a positive proposal it put forward then people test its validity from a variety of negative standpoints. It actually makes no difference if lots of people are saying no or yes - as in either case initial validity testing doesn't not reflect a consensus. If it did then WP could be very easily manipulated, although there does seem to be a Wiki The Shadow effect happening when editors assume they have the power to read (or cloud?) people's minds, or express impatience with a relatively simple and logical process. Some editors even seem semi-abusive about it, sadly.

Background - This discussion started on the help desk 8th November. The anagram is a cogent one that has intrinsic verifiability (just as a math statement is). The book is a spiritual puzzle book packed with this sort of stuff. Do I need to cite a reference showing this exact anagram, or is it enough to already have established notability on the point that the book "is scattered through with riddles", as one author put it? Please read the points for and against inclusion on the archived page before you vote. If you have any extra points to add on the matter that have not already been discussed then please make them on the archived thread and keep this section for plain voting.

Please vote a simple:

Yes - to favour its inclusion on the Book's Wiki Page. No - if you don't favour it inclusion on the Books Wiki Page.

And thank you all for your participation in a time honoured process of reaching consensus in the most thorough way possible. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Dara Allarah (talk • contribs) 07:54, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia:Help desk/Archives/2012 November 8#Please clarify that anagrams are not regarded as original research?

On looking through that discussion, I think that the consensus is already clear. -- John of Reading (talk) 08:04, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

You may find WP:!VOTE and WP:CAN helpful. The discussion in question is not a straw poll, and canvassing in this way is unlikely to alter the advice you have already been given. - Ka renjc 09:08, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Napkin PC

Hi.

I've spent quite a bit of time making an article about a concept, the Napkin PC.

It has a bunch of references, and I need an experienced editor to review it and add any appropriate templates.

Thanks, Mackatacka12345 (talk) 09:58, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I am doubtful about the value of an article about a product which has never been manufactured, and probably never will be. But I'll leave that to others to consider.

You say "I've spent quite a bit of time making an article", so I wonder if you are the same person as Macka77, who created the article. If you are, you should read Wikipedia:Username_policy#Using_multiple_accounts. Maproom (talk) 19:13, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Nikola Tesla - Nicolae Tesla

Buna ziua,

Va rog sa luati in calcul si originile romanesti ale lui Nicolae Tesla (prezentat doar sub numele de Nikola Tesla, pe Wikipedia). Mai jos, va ofer un articol informativ, preluat de pe site-ul Antenei 3. http://www.antena3.ro/romania/ei-sunt-romania/romanul-care-a-stabili-primul-contact-cu-extraterestrii-si-a-inventat-sistemul-de-comunicatie-wireless-191682.html

Va multumesc,

Madi Dragan — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.127.113.150 (talk) 11:55, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Google Translate translates this as

Hello,

Please take into consideration the Romanian roots of Nicholas Tesla (presented only as of Nikola Tesla, Wikipedia). Below, we offer an informative article, taken from the website of Antena 3.

Thank you,

Maproom (talk) 12:45, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia's article Nikola Tesla states that he was "Serbian-American", and cites three sources which all agree that he was born in Croatia to Serbian parents. The source cited by Madi Dragan claims that his father was Romanian, and was originally named Draghici. Maproom (talk) 12:57, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

The Romanian Wikipedia article on Tesla states "Tesla era etnic sârb", that is, "Tesla was an ethnic Serb". Maproom (talk) 13:04, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Search and replace function in edit window

Resolved

Moved to Wikipedia:Village pump (technical)/Archive 139 § Search and replace function in edit window

– -- Toshio Yamaguchi (tlk−ctb) 07:42, 13 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I am pretty sure in edit mode there used to be a function called something like Search and replace where you could search for a specific string of characters and replace them with something else. Where exactly in the edit window is this again, somehow I can't find it anymore. -- Toshio Yamaguchi (tlk−ctb) 14:11, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Actually I could swear it was located in the top right corner of the edit window. However it's gone now, at least for me, I have no idea why though.... -- Toshio Yamaguchi (tlk−ctb) 07:34, 13 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

First article

Hi,

I'm writting my first article about PSA oxygen generators (Psa oxygen generator). Can I use foreign (French speaking) sources for referencing? What do you mean about my article? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Rifair (talk • contribs) 14:33, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

English sources are preferred but non-English sources are perfectly acceptable. Judging from your user name, you appear to be connected with a manufacturer of such generators (http://www.rifair.com/) and therefore you have a conflict of interest. Please read WP:BFAQ and WP:BESTCOI.--ukexpat (talk) 15:22, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

The article is basically the same as Oxygen concentrator - it describes the same technolgy, the only real difference is that Oxygen concentrator is illustrated with small portable medical units rather than the large industrial sized machines in PSA oxygen generator. Small units are also used on aircraft to provide supplemental oxygen to the crew. It should be merged as a content fork. In addition the article Pressure swing adsorption also has a significant overlap. Roger (talk) 13:49, 13 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Navigation problems

I am able to access the home page and any topical item on the home page, but if I try to access any other item, nothing happens ?. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2.98.231.217 (talk) 14:54, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Since nobody else has reported this problem, as far as I know, the issue must be on your system. Have you tried with a different web browser (eg Firefox or Google Chrome)? --ColinFine (talk) 12:46, 13 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Try WP:VPT or the reference desk.— Vchimpanzee · talk · contributions · 22:08, 15 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Search Box

The search box used to provide suggestions below itself as I typed along. No more. After typing in something I could either click on the little spyglass or hit 'enter' and be taken to an article. No more. What has happened with the revered search box? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.41.48.169 (talk) 15:43, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

What browser do you use? I logged out and tested in Safari, Firefox and Internet Explorer 8 and the suggestions work, so at least in those browsers I cannot reproduce what you describe, so it's difficult to give more advice. -- Toshio Yamaguchi (tlk−ctb) 16:01, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Article merger

Yesterday I noticed that it's been proposed since July 2012 that these two articles be merged, Thomas Wharton (died 1572) and Thomas Wharton, 2nd Baron Wharton.

There's a History of Parliament biography of Thomas Wharton at [2], and it appears from it that the two Wikipedia articles relate to the same person, and that he's sufficiently notable to warrant a Wikipedia article.

My question is: What happens next? It seems the merger should go ahead, but who would or should do it? NinaGreen (talk) 16:36, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Well, you could be bold and do it yourself. I suspect "Thomas Wharton, 2nd Baron Wharton" is the better title, so move useful content from the other article, including the references, interwiki links, and so on. Then sort it all out in one article. Finally you can redirect the now "dead" article to the merged one. Astronaut (talk) 18:41, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks. I just wanted to be certain that I wasn't stepping on the toes of the person who originally suggested that the pages be merged. I agree that "Thomas Wharton, 2nd Baron Wharton" is the better title, and I've merged the content and references from the other article into it.

But now I have three additional questions. (1) I'm uncertain what interwiki links are, and don't know whether I might have missed those. (2) I don't know whether I'm supposed to delete all the content in the about to be "dead" article, or whether I can just leave it there. (3) I don't know how to redirect the about to be "dead" article.

After I've gone through this procedure once, I'll be able to "be bold" the next time I run across something like this.:-) NinaGreen (talk) 19:32, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

(1) An interwiki link is a link to an article on the same subject in another language wiki. There are none in either article.
(2) / (3) You should remove the entire content of the 'dead' article, and replace it with #REDIRECT\[\[Thomas Wharton, 2nd Baron Wharton\]\] (without the backslashes. I'm blanking on how to represent wiki markup). Rojomoke (talk) 19:57, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

<nowiki> </nowiki> —Tamfang (talk) 09:28, 13 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks! It worked perfectly. NinaGreen (talk) 20:26, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Sir Peter Hayman

Sir Peter Hayman (MI6 and "diplomat") has no entry, although he is mentioned extensively in your entry on Paedophile Information Exchange, Section 3, and backed up by several "notes & references". Neither is there a cross-reference to this article in your search tool. The least you could do is cross-refer people looking up "Sir Peter Hayman" to the "Paedophile Information Exchange", page, Section 3. Apologies - I am sure there is a way I could have done this myself, but I couldn't work out how, unless...you have made it difficult because Wikipedia been "got at" by MI6 and/or Messrs Carter-Ruck or other expensive lawyers to the rich or powerful? Would be VERY interested to know whether there ever was a page on him, or other more interesting references to him, and when, and by whom they may have been expunged. (Hayman was acknowleged to have worked under the pseudonym "Mr Henderson".) Many thanks, GB— Preceding unsigned comment added by Gabad (talk • contribs)

I created a redirect. Ruslik_Zero 19:15, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

JOHANN HARI

JOHANN HARI: You have a page devoted to this writer/journalist - I suggest you change this to writer/journalist/PLAGIARIST. In this page, a large proportion - at least 4 sections, including WIKIPEDIA EDITING, deals with his (or her!) dirty tricks including one line at the end of WIKIPEDIA EDITING, which reveals that he also uses the name David Rose (not the composer). You should have a reference to this Johann Hari page in the Disambiguation list for other people named David Rose, and a redirect to the Johann Hari page. I strongly suggest you also tell people using that page that Hari also writes under the name "David Rose" - I have attempted to amend myself the profile box containing his picture, but I don't know if I have done so successfully. It seems likely that "Hari" may somehow thwart attempts to amend his own versions of the truth. Thank you for your patience. GB — Preceding unsigned comment added by Gabad (talk • contribs) 17:43, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

The David Rose pseudonym is mentioned in the Johann Hari article (or at least it is currently). The article's talk pages has some lengthy discussion on the article contents. I suggest you make further editing suggestions there, including perhaps a proposal to link back to Hari's article from David Rose (disambiguation). Astronaut (talk) 18:15, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

The best place to discuss this must be the talk page of the Johann Hari article. Maproom (talk) 18:15, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Is there another way to retrieve a cached copy of a dead link?

Is there some service apart from the Wayback Machine where I could reasonably expect to find a cached copy of a dead citation link? I don't expect WebCite to have a cached copy (I was unable to check because the site is currently unreachable). If not, should I remove the link or should I leave it simply as is? The link in question is cite#11 in "Happy" in Galoshes. -- Toshio Yamaguchi (tlk−ctb) 17:47, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

User:Mr.Z-man/closeAFD

I can't get the User:Mr.Z-man/closeAFD script to work, can't find it on AFD pages I suppose. Where is it? Thanks, TBr and ley 17:57, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

User:Mr.Z-man/closeAFD#Installation suggests to bypass your browser cache. Does that help? -- Toshio Yamaguchi (tlk−ctb) 18:02, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I did that already. I can't see it anywhere, where it is located. Where is it? Thanks, TBr and ley 18:03, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Its working now. Thanks anyway, TBr and ley 18:06, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Good to hear :) I can't get it to work (maybe because I am using Safari, maybe because I am using Vector Skin, don't know), but I don't care about it as I don't want to use it. =P -- Toshio Yamaguchi (tlk−ctb) 18:15, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

File:Lamppost-singapore.jpg

A street lamp in Singapore showing the characteristic spangle

I added the following image to Hot-dip galvanizing but the image doesn't show up even though the image is on both Wikipedia and Wikimedia Commons. [3] gave this error:

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/usr/lib/python2.7/dist-packages/eventlet/wsgi.py", line 382, in handle_one_response
    result = self.application(self.environ, start_response)
  File "/usr/local/lib/python2.7/dist-packages/wmf/rewrite.py", line 368, in __call__
    resp = self.handle404(reqorig, url, container, obj)
  File "/usr/local/lib/python2.7/dist-packages/wmf/rewrite.py", line 197, in handle404
    upcopy = opener.open(encodedurl)
  File "/usr/lib/python2.7/urllib2.py", line 400, in open
    response = self._open(req, data)
  File "/usr/lib/python2.7/urllib2.py", line 418, in _open
    '_open', req)
  File "/usr/lib/python2.7/urllib2.py", line 378, in _call_chain
    result = func(*args)
  File "/usr/lib/python2.7/urllib2.py", line 1207, in http_open
    return self.do_open(httplib.HTTPConnection, req)
  File "/usr/lib/python2.7/urllib2.py", line 1177, in do_open
    raise URLError(err)
URLError: <urlopen error [Errno 111] ECONNREFUSED>

though [4] works. What's wrong? cmɢʟee ☎✉ 19:11, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I see your picture in the article. And I see the same thing at [5]] and at [6]. Maproom (talk) 19:17, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

And I observe that the details of the "spangle" are obscured by JPeG-compression artefacts. I wonder if you could upload the picture at a lower compression ratio? Maproom (talk) 19:43, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks, it seems to be fixed now. I didn't upload the photo, so don't have a higher-quality version, but it's the only lamp post showing the spangle at all. cmɢʟee ☎✉ 20:00, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Bullets in image summary

Any idea why the first asterisk under "other information" in the image summary is not converted to a bullet point? See File:Sir_Alan_Stewart,_1982.jpg. This is blowing my mind... thanks! -Brycehughes (talk) 19:23, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I've fixed it, using a method I've seen used elsewhere, but I will have to look in the archives somewhere to find an explanation of why it works. -- John of Reading (talk) 19:33, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

The parameter uses the #if parser function and http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Help:Extension:ParserFunctions#.23if says that a test string is always interpreted as pure text. My guess is that when one places an asterisk inside page markup, the MediaWiki software automatically converts it to a bullet point and that behavior seems to be disabled for characters used as arguments for the template parameters. -- Toshio Yamaguchi (tlk−ctb) 19:34, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Many thanks all! -Brycehughes (talk) 01:00, 13 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

WP guidelines on linking people to their social online presence.

Hi, the article about the Linux OS SolusOS mentions the developer Ikey Doherty. This person is active on the social platform Google+. Is it acceptable to link his name to his G+ public profile or is this discouraged? Regards. Gaba p (talk) 19:24, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Certainly not; if this person is not notable enough for there to be a Wikipedia article about him or her, we definitely won't include links to MySpace pages and the like: see our guidance on external links. --Orange Mike | Talk 20:05, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Great, that takes care of it then. Thank you Orange Mike! Regards. Gaba p (talk) 20:32, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Copyright - Maps, Real Estate Photos

My article is Elsie Paroubek. I have always wanted to put a map on the page showing her neighborhood. I assume that I can't use an image of a Google map for this purpose. I also found a picture of her house, which still exists and is for sale, on Trulia. What should I do?

Also, Google insists on showing the picture of Lillian Wulff instead of Elsie when you do a google search on Elsie. I have reported it several times. ??? --Bluejay Young (talk) 20:59, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Google maps are copyrighted so we cannot use them on Wikipedia. We can't use the Trulia image either as that site's content is also copyrighted (see the notice at the bottom: "Copyright © 2012 Trulia, Inc. All rights reserved."). As regards the misidentification of the image, that's a matter for Google and if they are not taking any notice of your reports, there is not much we or you can do about that, I am afraid.--ukexpat (talk) 21:17, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

A Google image search works by finding images that are linked online to your search text. Lillian's picture comes up when you search on the words "Elsie Paroubek" because the picture has been placed in the Elsie article - it's not a bug, and the search is not saying that the picture is Elsie. For another example, see this Google image search for "Albert Fish". The first result is an image of Grace Budd, his victim, because it appears in our article Albert Fish. - Ka renjc 09:17, 13 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Medal table

How do I create a medal table for an athlete on an existing page? Thanks. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 208.54.5.181 (talk) 22:26, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Medal tables are made with templates and can be tricky for new users. See Template:Medal templates documentation. You can also look for an article with similar medals, click the "Edit" tab, and copy the medal table code to get started. If you still have problems then give specifics about which medals you want to display on which page. PrimeHunter (talk) 23:10, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Missing editing tools

Since I uploaded IE 9 I lost a set of editing tools that look like

.

How do I get this set of tools that is on top of Google?--Doug Coldwell (talk) 22:41, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Those are IE menus and not editing tools. They are unrelated to Wikipedia. Press Alt to see them. Right click at the top and select "Menu bar" or something like that to see them permanently. If you have software problems unrelated to Wikipedia then you can ask for help at Wikipedia:Reference desk/Computing. PrimeHunter (talk) 23:01, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]