User talk:Reefswaggie

Welcome

Hello Reefswaggie, and Welcome to Wikipedia!

Welcome to Wikipedia! I hope you enjoy the encyclopedia and want to stay. As a first step, you may wish to read the Introduction.

If you have any questions, feel free to ask me at my talk page – I'm happy to help. Or, you can ask your question at the New contributors' help page.

Here are some more resources to help you as you explore and contribute to the world's largest encyclopedia...

Finding your way around:

Table of contents

Department directory

Need help?

Questions – a guide on where to ask questions
Cheatsheet – quick reference on Wikipedia's mark-up codes
Wikipedia's 5 pillars – an overview of Wikipedia's foundations

Article wizard – a Wizard to help you create articles
The simplified ruleset – a summary of Wikipedia's most important rules
Guide to Wikipedia – a thorough step-by-step guide to Wikipedia

How you can help:

Contributing to Wikipedia – a guide on how you can help

Community portal – Wikipedia's hub of activity

Additional tips...

Please sign your messages on talk pages with four tildes (~~~~). This will automatically insert your "signature" (your username and a date stamp). The or button, on the tool bar above Wikipedia's text editing window, also does this.

If you would like to play around with your new Wiki skills the Sandbox is for you.

Reefswaggie, good luck, and have fun. – Ser Amantio di Nicolao^{Che dicono a Signa?}_{Lo dicono a Signa.} 05:26, 5 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Any time. I don't believe there's a way to set a preference for what kind of articles you can find. Is there any particular area of biology you're interested in? My own suggestion would be to plunge in with a particular species, or a particular genus, and look around to see what's available. Wiki Project Biology would be another place to ask around and have a look; most WikiProjects have their own sets of rules that may be a bit different from others', so you can get a feel for what they do and how they work.

As for editing - just go to the article you want to edit. If you click on any of the "edit" links on that page - at the side, at the bottom, within the article depending on what skin you're using - they'll let you edit the article. Like, say, Biology...go to the links that say "edit this page".

That help? --Ser Amantio di Nicolao^{Che dicono a Signa?}_{Lo dicono a Signa.} 19:06, 5 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Also...looking at your edit history, I see you're getting the hang of things. That's what I'd recommend, too...just look at a few things and edit as you go along, if you see anything you think needs changing. That's how I got started, way back when. :-) --Ser Amantio di Nicolao^{Che dicono a Signa?}_{Lo dicono a Signa.} 19:08, 5 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not sure about citing yourself, honestly...it's the sort of thing that could be dicey. Personally, I wouldn't have any problem with it, as long as your sources are accurate and they're not the only thing you rely on. I'm not sure others would feel quite the same, though. I'd recommend waiting a bit with that; get settled in as an editor first before doing something like that. Say a few months - give people a chance to get to know you

As for me? I'm not a science-y type in the least; I studied art history in college. Now I work for a US government contractor in Washington, DC, which is where I grew up. (Well...just outside DC, really. But nobody knows Hybla Valley, Virginia.) I'm sort of an editor-of-all-trades; I'm what they call a WikiGnome, doing little bits and pieces to make things run smoothly. It's great fun; makes me feel I'm doing something useful with my downtime.

Ser Amantio di Nicolao is a fairly minor operatic character, in Puccini's Gianni Schicchi - I wanted something operatic, as a huge opera fan, and loved his name enough that I adopted it. What about you? I can guess the "reef", but what about the "swaggie" bit? --Ser Amantio di Nicolao^{Che dicono a Signa?}_{Lo dicono a Signa.} 05:44, 6 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Reefswaggie, you are invited to the Teahouse

Hi Reefswaggie! Thanks for contributing to Wikipedia.
Be our guest at the Teahouse! The Teahouse is a friendly space where new editors can ask questions about contributing to Wikipedia and get help from peers and experienced editors. I hope to see you there! Technical 13 (I'm a Teahouse host)

Visit the Teahouse

This message was delivered automatically by your robot friend, HostBot (talk) 01:15, 6 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Hooray! You created your Teahouse profile!

	Welcome to the Teahouse Badge
	Awarded to editors who have introduced themselves at the Wikipedia Teahouse. Guest editors with this badge show initiative and a great drive to learn how to edit Wikipedia. Earn more badges at: Teahouse Badges
Thank you for introducing yourself and contributing to Wikipedia! If you have any questions feel free to drop me a line at my talk page. Happy Editing! ~ Anastasia (talk) 19:26, 6 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Grise Fiord

Looks good to me so far. If you want to link to another wiki article, surround it with square brackets, like [[this]]. The reference looks fine, too...there's a tool, called Reflinks, which you can use to convert naked link titles into titled references, if you ever want. It's quite useful. --Ser Amantio di Nicolao^{Che dicono a Signa?}_{Lo dicono a Signa.} 14:42, 8 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Yes - certainly. Just look at the heading on this section and add one like it; you can do it as many times as you wish. --Ser Amantio di Nicolao^{Che dicono a Signa?}_{Lo dicono a Signa.} 12:36, 13 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Baird's Trogon

Check out this dif to show what happened; it appears to have happened thanks to VisualEditor, which I don't know anything about. (It's new; I never used it before, so I don't know what it's capable of. I should probably play around with it a bit.)

As for why the link is showing as "[1]", that's just because you didn't title it. The simplest way of formatting it would be thus: [http://www.birdlife.org/datazone/speciesfactsheet.php?id=1009 Species fact sheet] from birdlife.org or however you'd like to title it. (There are more formal and more complicated ways to title links, but this is the way I prefer to do it, honestly.) I've done it on the page so you can see how it looks. --Ser Amantio di Nicolao^{Che dicono a Signa?}_{Lo dicono a Signa.} 05:28, 19 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

For some reason, VisualEditor is placing "<nowiki>" tags around anything you're adding in. That's the problem - the "<nowiki>" tag overrides wiki syntax. Just remove it and you should be fine.

For the image: if you want to link to an outside image, I'd suggest not using the "<ref>" tags. Just start a new section titled "External links" and put the image link there, making a link like I showed you to do in the earlier reference. --Ser Amantio di Nicolao^{Che dicono a Signa?}_{Lo dicono a Signa.} 05:46, 19 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

That's odd. I'll have a look in the morning - I'm afraid I have to be off to bed shortly. You might want to mention some of your issues here - the coders might have an idea. At the very least, it would help to let them know what you're running into so they can maybe smooth out some of the bumps. --Ser Amantio di Nicolao^{Che dicono a Signa?}_{Lo dicono a Signa.} 05:54, 19 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

ok thanks for your help... I have written to them. Reefswaggie (talk) 08:54, 19 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

What I have found helps most of all in learning the ins and outs of Wikipedia is just to plunge in and start looking at edits. I learned most of the syntax just by opening up pages, but not editing them; I'd just take a look at the formatting and see what I could learn. It's a great way to become familiar with what can be done.

As for talkpage etiquette, there really aren't any rules - everyone has a different way of doing it, depending on what you feel comfortable with. --Ser Amantio di Nicolao^{Che dicono a Signa?}_{Lo dicono a Signa.} 06:27, 20 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

That worked a treat - I was able to see how articles were referenced and a bit of copying and pasting allowed me to duplicate the format and add references to articles. Reefswaggie (talk) 05:46, 22 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

jellyfish issue

Ok i deleted the offending section, explained why on the talk page and am waiting with baited breath to see if I get slammed by the other editors for it. will let you know how i go :) Reefswaggie (talk) 09:44, 2 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]

IRC

I'm afraid I'm not very much help when it comes to IRC, as I've never used it. Sorry.

On the jellyfish venom issue, there are a number of ways you can handle it. If you don't find any supporting information online that doesn't link back here, I think it's safe to remove the information, so long as you identify what you're doing in your edit summary. You can also open a discussion on the article's talkpage. What I'll sometimes do if I run into suspect information in an article is to try and trace it - open the article history, and see who added the information. That usually gives me grounds to decide how I want to proceed.

And thanks - happy new year to you, too! --Ser Amantio di Nicolao^{Che dicono a Signa?}_{Lo dicono a Signa.} 05:54, 2 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]

February 2014

Hello, I'm BracketBot. I have automatically detected that your edit to Hypercompe ocularia may have broken the syntax by modifying 2 "[]"s and 2 "{}"s likely mistaking one for another. If you have, don't worry: just edit the page again to fix it. If I misunderstood what happened, or if you have any questions, you can leave a message on my operator's talk page.

List of unpaired brackets remaining on the page:

ditrysia/noctuoidea/arctiidae/arctiinae/hypercompe/index.html Hypercompe at funet]</ref>, [[Peru}} and [[Ecuador]]. This is a cloud forest species found at elevations between about 200-1000m.

Thanks, BracketBot (talk) 08:25, 3 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Hello, I'm BracketBot. I have automatically detected that your edit to Viral pathogenesis may have broken the syntax by modifying 1 "()"s. If you have, don't worry: just edit the page again to fix it. If I misunderstood what happened, or if you have any questions, you can leave a message on my operator's talk page.

List of unpaired brackets remaining on the page:

The replicated viruses must spread to target organs (disease sites) throughout the body, and (

Thanks, BracketBot (talk) 13:56, 7 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Teahouse talkback: you've got messages!

Hello, Reefswaggie. Your question has been answered at the Teahouse Q&A board. Feel free to reply there!
Please note that all old questions are archived after 2-3 days of inactivity. Message added by Yunshui 雲‍水 14:43, 3 February 2014 (UTC). (You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{teahouse talkback}} template).[reply]

WikiProject Gastropods

Welcome!

A very big WELCOME to WikiProject Gastropods for you, a new member! We are delighted that you decided to join the Project! Thank you .........

JoJan (talk) 16:05, 3 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the warm welcome. I am still finding my way around and learning how to edit (a steep curve!) Reefswaggie (talk) 23:30, 3 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]

I've been contributing for almost 10 years and I still encounter every now and then some difficulty. The easiest way around is to watch how others have done it and then copy their method or templates. The most difficult part is the taxonomy and finding the most recent version of it. For sea snails we have WoRMS, an authoritative database (but even then I have to send to them regularly a correction of their data). But there is no such definitive database for land snails. You will have to search for the latest views of the taxonomic experts (if you can get by the paywall). There is still a lot of work to be done in our project. I've done it with pleasure and I hope you'll be able to say the same. Cheers. JoJan (talk) 14:49, 4 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Per WP:MEDRS

We typically use secondary sources such as review articles for medical content. Best Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 01:52, 8 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Disambiguation link notification for February 8

Hi. Thank you for your recent edits. Wikipedia appreciates your help. We noticed though that you've added some links pointing to disambiguation pages. Such links are almost always unintended, since a disambiguation page is merely a list of "Did you mean..." article titles. Read the FAQ • Join us at the DPL WikiProject.

Viral pathogenesis (check to confirm | fix with Dab solver)

added links pointing to Replication, Dispersal, Implantation and Shedding

It's OK to remove this message. Also, to stop receiving these messages, follow these opt-out instructions. Thanks, DPL bot (talk) 09:06, 8 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Welcome to The Wikipedia Adventure!

Hi ! We're so happy you wanted to play to learn, as a friendly and fun way to get into our community and mission. I think these links might be helpful to you as you get started.

--

Mission 1	Mission 2	Mission 3	Mission 4	Mission 5	Mission 6	Mission 7
Say Hello to the World	An Invitation to Earth	Small Changes, Big Impact	The Neutral Point of View	The Veil of Verifiability	The Civility Code	Looking Good Together

Get Help

About The Wikipedia Adventure | Hang out in the Interstellar Lounge

Disambiguation link notification for January 17

Hi. Thank you for your recent edits. Wikipedia appreciates your help. We noticed though that when you edited Hapljapyx, you added links pointing to the disambiguation pages Antennae and Cerci. Such links are almost always unintended, since a disambiguation page is merely a list of "Did you mean..." article titles. Read the FAQ • Join us at the DPL WikiProject.

It's OK to remove this message. Also, to stop receiving these messages, follow these opt-out instructions. Thanks, DPL bot (talk) 09:14, 17 January 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Sunshine for you!

		Sunshine!
		Hello Reefswaggie! Anastasia [Missionedit] (talk) has given you a bit of sunshine to brighten your day! Sunshine promotes WikiLove and hopefully it has made your day better. Spread the sunshine by adding `{{subst:User:Meaghan/Sunshine}}` to someone else's talk page, whether it be someone you have had disagreements with in the past or a good friend. In addition, you can spread the sunshine to anyone who visits your userpage and/or talk page by adding {{User:Meaghan/Sunshine icon}}. Happy editing! Anastasia [Missionedit] (talk) 18:22, 17 January 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks! Sunshine is always appreciated. :) Reefswaggie (talk) 00:41, 19 January 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Disambiguation link notification for January 24

Hi. Thank you for your recent edits. Wikipedia appreciates your help. We noticed though that when you edited Ahaetulla prasina, you added links pointing to the disambiguation pages Interstitial and Sacral. Such links are almost always unintended, since a disambiguation page is merely a list of "Did you mean..." article titles. Read the FAQ • Join us at the DPL WikiProject.

It's OK to remove this message. Also, to stop receiving these messages, follow these opt-out instructions. Thanks, DPL bot (talk) 08:59, 24 January 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Ina Higgins

Thanks for adding some information about Ina Higgins. I wrote the original article and when it was emasculated because of supposed copyright violation I couldn't be bothered doing any more. After all, my original article was still at Obituaries Australia, and there was no way I was going to ask them for permission to use an article for which I already held copyright. I hadn't looked at the page for a long time and was surprised that you had only added the extra text a few days ago. Collywolly (talk) 07:54, 29 January 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Collywolly The article came up under random articles and had no references and a thing saying they were going to possibly take it off... when i looked her up was quite impressed by what she accomplished so added the extra text and citations. I hope they leave it up! Also great to hear something about an article I worked on. working for wiki is like peeing in dark pants... feels good, but no one notices :) so are you in australia? i usually edit biology articles... specialising in stubs on little known species where i can find enough information to fill it out... but some days i just hit the random article button till i find something interesting... like Ina! cheers, Reefswaggie (talk) 09:29, 29 January 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Reefswaggie, yes I am in Australia. You are spot on about working for Wikipedia being like peeing in dark pants. I have done a lot of stuff over the years, on and off, but haven't been back for a while. Perhaps I changed my pants to white shorts without realising it, because it stopped feeling good. I have mainly been interested in authors, explorers, and Australian places, but sometimes I pick up on other stuff. One article I did which I liked a lot was that of Edin Welch who found the sole survivor of the Burke and Wills Expedition. I saw a book written by him at Project Gutenberg Australia (http://gutenberg.net.au) titled "Dinky Darbison" (http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks13/1305841h.html) and when looked on the net there was very little about him. It turned out that the book was semi-autobiographical and follows some of his his life in Australia rather closely. I can't think now what got me interested in Ina. Collywolly (talk) 11:41, 29 January 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Collywolly I tried to look up the Edin Welch article and it's not there :(. Don't know how long i will last here either. If i am going to bother, would prefer to be paid to write. Are you in WA? I drift back and forth between FNQ and NSW Reefswaggie (talk) 05:46, 30 January 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Collywolly ok when i changed it to Edwin, I found him... interesting man, well written article. Reefswaggie (talk) 05:56, 30 January 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Reefswaggie sorry about the typo in Edwin Welch. I live in Sydney. I was born in Sydney and have lived at O'Connell near Bathurst, where we had a small property and at Wingham on the North Coast. I am retired from paid work and potter about with different things. I set up http://gutenberg.net.au in 2001 and have made hundreds of ebooks and have put online the books of many volunteers who have sent them to me over the years but I am a bit burned out with all of that now. If you would like to chat a bit you could contact me at http://gutenberg.net.au/contact.html. I notice that you have done some great work for Wikipedia and, from your profile, that you are are biologist and have done some programming. I was an accountant and also did some programming. Collywolly (talk) 09:26, 30 January 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Collywolly I tried to leave you a message via your gutenberg website contact form but it kept giving an error message. My email addy is meskeel@hotmail.com I tried writing books and self publishing them. Marketing them was the big problem for me. Wrote science articles for Helium which paid peanuts... but they went belly up. I still work part time as a teacher and programmer but am edging towards retirement. Love to write but don't know how to make it pay! On wiki i think my best effort was Viral parthenogenesis but i love adding info to stubs about little known critters (when there is info to add... not much available on a lot of little moth species). Reefswaggie (talk) 11:24, 30 January 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Drosera glanduligera

Hi! Thanks for your contributions to Drosera glanduligera. I did have to rewrite your work because you had lifted a few sentences directly from the source in a violation of their copyright. Please take note of this and be more careful in the future. For more information, see WP:COPYVIO. Cheers, Rkitko ^(talk) 13:17, 29 January 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry Rhitko I'm usually pretty careful about that. Must have been late at night.Reefswaggie (talk) 05:38, 30 January 2015 (UTC)[reply]

No worries. Happens to the best of us. Cheers, Rkitko ^(talk) 14:17, 30 January 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Explaining

I patrolled your page. I went through the enormously-backlogged list of newly-created pages and confirmed that your page was okay: not spam, not an attack page, not a copyright violation, not any of the other reasons for which I would delete someone's page without asking. Then I clicked "patrolled" to remove it from the list of "pages that have not yet been patrolled", and moved on to the next entry. That's all. DS (talk) 20:08, 20 February 2015 (UTC) Ok DS That's fine... just it was the first time it had happened and was curious about it. Thanks for the explanation.[reply]

Your submission at Articles for creation: R.T. Skip Wallen (March 10)

Your recent article submission to Articles for Creation has been reviewed! Unfortunately, it has not been accepted at this time. The reason left by Onel5969 was:

This submission reads more like an essay than an encyclopedia article. Submissions should summarise information in secondary, reliable sources and not contain opinions or original research. Please write about the topic from a neutral point of view in an encyclopedic manner.

Please check the submission for any additional comments left by the reviewer. You are encouraged to edit the submission to address the issues raised and resubmit when they have been resolved.

If you would like to continue working on the submission, go to Draft:R.T. Skip Wallen and click on the "Edit" tab at the top of the window.
If you need any assistance, you can ask for help at the Articles for creation help desk or on the reviewer's talk page.
You can also get real-time chat help from experienced editors.

Onel5969 (talk) 14:13, 10 March 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Your submission at Articles for creation: R. T. Wallen has been accepted

R. T. Wallen, which you submitted to Articles for creation, has been created.
The article has been assessed as Start-Class, which is recorded on the article's talk page. You may like to take a look at the grading scheme to see how you can improve the article.

You are more than welcome to continue making quality contributions to Wikipedia. Note that because you are a logged-in user, you can create articles yourself, and don't have to post a request. However, you may continue submitting work to Articles for Creation if you prefer.

If you have any questions, you are welcome to ask at the help desk.
If you would like to help us improve this process, please consider leaving us some feedback.

Thank you for helping improve Wikipedia!

Onel5969 (talk) 23:26, 29 March 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Your submission at Articles for creation: Yehudi Cohen (July 6)

Your recent article submission to Articles for Creation has been reviewed! Unfortunately, it has not been accepted at this time. The reason left by Sulfurboy was:

This submission's references do not adequately show the subject's notability—see the guidelines for academics and the golden rule. Please improve the submission's referencing, so that the information is verifiable, and there is clear evidence of why the subject is notable and worthy of inclusion in an encyclopedia.
What you can do: Add citations (see Wikipedia:Referencing for beginners) to secondary reliable sources that are entirely independent of the subject.

Please check the submission for any additional comments left by the reviewer. You are encouraged to edit the submission to address the issues raised and resubmit when they have been resolved.

If you would like to continue working on the submission, go to Draft:Yehudi Cohen and click on the "Edit" tab at the top of the window.
If you need any assistance, you can ask for help at the Articles for creation help desk or on the reviewer's talk page.
You can also get Wikipedia's Live Help real-time chat help from experienced editors.

Sulfurboy (talk) 18:49, 6 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]

ArbCom elections are now open!

Hi,
You appear to be eligible to vote in the current Arbitration Committee election. The Arbitration Committee is the panel of editors responsible for conducting the Wikipedia arbitration process. It has the authority to enact binding solutions for disputes between editors, primarily related to serious behavioural issues that the community has been unable to resolve. This includes the ability to impose site bans, topic bans, editing restrictions, and other measures needed to maintain our editing environment. The arbitration policy describes the Committee's roles and responsibilities in greater detail. If you wish to participate, you are welcome to review the candidates' statements and submit your choices on the voting page. For the Election committee, MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 17:02, 24 November 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Draft:Yehudi Cohen concern

Hi there, I'm HasteurBot. I just wanted to let you know that Draft:Yehudi Cohen, a page you created, has not been edited in 5 months. The Articles for Creation space is not an indefinite storage location for content that is not appropriate for articlespace.

If your submission is not edited soon, it could be nominated for deletion. If you would like to attempt to save it, you will need to improve it.

You may request Userfication of the content if it meets requirements.

If the deletion has already occured, instructions on how you may be able to retrieve it are available at WP:REFUND/G13.

Thank you for your attention. HasteurBot (talk) 00:17, 2 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]

ArbCom Elections 2016: Voting now open!

Hello, Reefswaggie. Voting in the 2016 Arbitration Committee elections is open from Monday, 00:00, 21 November through Sunday, 23:59, 4 December to all unblocked users who have registered an account before Wednesday, 00:00, 28 October 2016 and have made at least 150 mainspace edits before Sunday, 00:00, 1 November 2016.

The Arbitration Committee is the panel of editors responsible for conducting the Wikipedia arbitration process. It has the authority to impose binding solutions to disputes between editors, primarily for serious conduct disputes the community has been unable to resolve. This includes the authority to impose site bans, topic bans, editing restrictions, and other measures needed to maintain our editing environment. The arbitration policy describes the Committee's roles and responsibilities in greater detail.

If you wish to participate in the 2016 election, please review the candidates' statements and submit your choices on the voting page. MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 22:08, 21 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]