Wikipedia:Help desk/Archives/2008 February 20
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February 20
[edit]Euphemisms
[edit]Hi, I was just wondering if anyone could tell me what the Euphemism policy is on Wikipedia. For example, should say in an article that someone "died", or "passed away" (the latter being a euphemism)? Thanks, --Christopher (talk) 00:26, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- Since Wikipedia is not censored, so I assume that "died" would be a more appropriate term. Vivio TestarossaTalk Who 01:21, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- The relevant guideline (not a policy) is in: WP:AVOID#Sadly, tragically. (I'm rather impressed with how relatively easy it was for me to hunt down that guideline consideringly how vaguely I recalled having read it some months ago. Wikipedia has great internal documents, with so many links just the way one would expect, that even starting from the completely wrong page as I did, I stumbled to the right one in less than half a dozen clicks.) --Teratornis (talk) 07:53, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
unable to access some articles
[edit]i can't seem to open some articles. i get an unidentifiable mime type "application/x-gzip-compressed" error - can you point me toward a fix? this is the link i was trying to access "wiki.riteme.site/wiki/Richard_Feynman" this has happened to me before. thanks, ken Ekenphillips (talk) 01:38, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- What browser are you using to access the page? It seems to load fine for me. Vivio TestarossaTalk Who 01:43, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
internet explorer 7 (7.0.5730.13) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Ekenphillips (talk • contribs) 01:46, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- What a strange error. It sounds like a problem in the browser rather than Wikipedia. Perhaps try using the secure server, which gets around some problems. E.g., https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Richard_Feynman. • Anakin (talk) 14:24, 21 February 2008 (UTC)
- Thanks, Anakin, that worked, I will check on the browser. ken —Preceding unsigned comment added by Ekenphillips (talk • contribs) 02:58, 22 February 2008 (UTC)
Userpage help
[edit]I am trying to add User:PGPirate/Articles to my User:PGPirate/Header page. The problem is for some reason the pictures are not showing up. If this isn't making sense, please feel free to write on my talkpage. PGPirate 02:54, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- I think they're there, but covered up by your transcluded "Title". If you delete the title, then you can see them. I hope this helps. (I don't know why your little green symbols are so high up on the page.) --Coppertwig (talk) 03:04, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
Some kind of database corruption?
[edit]Where do I report database corruption (or what looks like it)? I made a very small change to the Saddam Hussein article, just changed a wiki-link. But if you compare my latest version with the second-latest version it looks like I made a mess of several paragraphs. (If you compare the latest version with the second-latest version it looks better.) There seems to be something wrong. --RenniePet (talk) 03:22, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- I have seen faulty diffs reported at Wikipedia:Village pump (technical) in the past. See Wikipedia:Village pump (technical)/Archive 18#Bad diffs? for an example which I just checked and saw was no longer faulty. PrimeHunter (talk) 12:46, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- Thanks. I've reported it at Wikipedia:Village pump (technical), as you suggested. --RenniePet (talk) 20:03, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
Userboxes?
[edit]How do I put userboxes on my page? RJRocket53 (talk) 04:21, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- See Wikipedia:Userboxes. Basically you just include the relevant template. Bovlb (talk) 05:00, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
Guideline template
[edit]The Guideline template does not have a sort key parameter. I note the subcat guideline template does. Can someone modify the Guideline template to have the sort key parameter? (I don't yet understand wikitext enough to do it myself.) This will help fix odd sorting at Category:Guideline. Thanks! Libcub (talk) 07:05, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- In the cruel world of Wikipedia, one has to know a fair amount of wikitext markup just to be able to ask questions on the Help desk that other people can understand, and thus answer. You can make questions such as this easier to answer by linking all the pages you mention explicitly or allude to. When I tried to look up the pages you mentioned, I ran into a problem. While we do have the templates: {{Guideline}} and {{Subcat guideline}}, there seems to be no Category:Guideline page (notice that the link is red), and following the red link shows no pages in that category. This suggests you may have been looking at another category page. Please go back to that page, look at the title at the top, and copy and paste it back here so we can see what you are talking about. (Do you mean Category:Wikipedia guidelines?) You might also look at Help:Category#Sort order to see how sort keys work. However, if the category links you refer to are coming from a template, then you are looking at a kind of death zone for new users, as template coding on Wikipedia is extremely arcane. Some template coding problems are so hard that not many Help desk volunteers can solve them. But if you can tell us the page with the problem, we can probably figure out who to ask if we can't fix it ourselves. --Teratornis (talk) 19:43, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- Sorry--I guess I was more tired than I thought. Yes, the category page I meant to reference is Category:Wikipedia guidelines. I did read Help:Category#Sort order, and have successfully changed sort keys on other pages. But it seems that most (all?) of the pages categorized as a Wikipedia guideline do it via one of those templates, not via direct categorization. Another user noticed some odd sorting, which I was looking into to fix. What I was hoping for is that the sort key parameter feature of {{Subcat guideline}} could be ported to {{Guideline}}. Thanks. Libcub (talk) 01:31, 21 February 2008 (UTC)
- The newfangled style for documenting templates is to document them on /doc subpages (I guess Wikipedia:Template documentation documents this, but I haven't gotten around to reading that friendly manual page yet), and that's where the category links go too. This makes those links extra-hard for new users to find, in keeping with the death zone nature of template coding. I aimed my expert (cough, I wish) eye at the respective /doc pages to see their category link sections:
- {{Guideline/doc}}
- The newfangled style for documenting templates is to document them on /doc subpages (I guess Wikipedia:Template documentation documents this, but I haven't gotten around to reading that friendly manual page yet), and that's where the category links go too. This makes those links extra-hard for new users to find, in keeping with the death zone nature of template coding. I aimed my expert (cough, I wish) eye at the respective /doc pages to see their category link sections:
- Sorry--I guess I was more tired than I thought. Yes, the category page I meant to reference is Category:Wikipedia guidelines. I did read Help:Category#Sort order, and have successfully changed sort keys on other pages. But it seems that most (all?) of the pages categorized as a Wikipedia guideline do it via one of those templates, not via direct categorization. Another user noticed some odd sorting, which I was looking into to fix. What I was hoping for is that the sort key parameter feature of {{Subcat guideline}} could be ported to {{Guideline}}. Thanks. Libcub (talk) 01:31, 21 February 2008 (UTC)
<includeonly> <!-- ADD CATEGORIES BELOW THIS LINE --> [[Category:Policy and guidelines header templates|Guideline]]
<includeonly> <!-- ADD CATEGORIES BELOW THIS LINE --> [[Category:Policy and guidelines header templates|{{PAGENAME}}]]
- More information about {{PAGENAME}} is in Help:Magic words#Page names and related info. The change you want to make looks pretty obvious (I italicized what looks like the culprit). I think you want to replace the
Guideline
with {{PAGENAME}}. I don't see anything obviously dangerous there, but templates can be tricky things. You may have to purge the Category:Wikipedia guidelines page, and/or purge all the pages that transclude the {{Guideline}} template, to get Wikipedia to re-sort the links on the category page. --Teratornis (talk) 08:14, 21 February 2008 (UTC)
- More information about {{PAGENAME}} is in Help:Magic words#Page names and related info. The change you want to make looks pretty obvious (I italicized what looks like the culprit). I think you want to replace the
- I'm not talking about the category that the template itself is in, but the categories that the template assigns to pages it is used on. Libcub (talk) 17:33, 21 February 2008 (UTC)
- Oops, I guess you need to compare these code snippets in the includeonly tags:
- {{Guideline}}
- Oops, I guess you need to compare these code snippets in the includeonly tags:
<includeonly>{{{category|[[Category:Wikipedia guidelines|{{PAGENAME}}]]}}}</includeonly>
- {{Subcat guideline}}
<includeonly>[[Category:Wikipedia {{lc:{{{1}}}}}s|{{{2|{{PAGENAME}}}}}]]</includeonly>
- That's some interesting code. It looks like {{Subcat guideline}} allows the calling page to specify a sort key (which appears as that {{{2...}}} stuff). So, maybe at this point I finally understand your question. It looks like the two templates were coded by different people. You might look in the history to see who coded that line in {{Subcat guideline}} and ask him or her if he or she could edit the corresponding line in {{Guideline}}. I'm not going to suggest a change myself because clearly at this point we can see I don't know what I'm talking about. --Teratornis (talk) 23:49, 21 February 2008 (UTC)
Thanks for looking into this for me. I'll post my request at Template talk: Guideline next. If that doesn't pan out, I'll try finding the person who coded Template:Subcat guideline like you suggest. Libcub (talk) 02:45, 22 February 2008 (UTC)
Autodisplaying templates
[edit]Is there a way to auto-display a custom template (like the ones at the bottom of a page)? The template normally autodisplays but if you have more than one template they will auto-hide, and I would like to override this. Gatoclass (talk) 09:16, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- I guess you refer to collapsible boxes made with a template. In some cases you can add a state parameter. See Template:Navbox#Other. See [1] for an example where a state parameter was put into a template which used {{Navbox}}. PrimeHunter (talk) 12:21, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
FA stars and GA plusses at top of user page
[edit]![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/f/fb/Yes_check.svg/20px-Yes_check.svg.png)
I have noticed small Featured Article and Good Article symbols at the top of user pages (like the penguin and love heart on mine), how do people get these? I've tried clicking edit page on pages with them on but I can't find anything that it could be. I have significantly contributed to 2 FAs, 1 GA and 1 DYK. Thanks, George D. Watson (Dendodge).TalkHelp and assistance 11:31, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- They can be made with {{Click}}. See for example User:BQZip01 or User:Blnguyen/Top. Some users transclude a subpage with this onto their user page. PrimeHunter (talk) 12:30, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- Thanks, I've done that but how do you get them across the top? Thanks, George D. Watson (Dendodge).TalkHelp and assistance 12:47, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- See User:Soxred93/icons. Soxred93 | talk bot 13:00, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- I've done it with your help. Thanks, George D. Watson (Dendodge).TalkHelp and assistance 14:20, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- See User:Soxred93/icons. Soxred93 | talk bot 13:00, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- Thanks, I've done that but how do you get them across the top? Thanks, George D. Watson (Dendodge).TalkHelp and assistance 12:47, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
Can I link to an article on Wikipedia, and can I use the WIKIPEDIA logo to do so?
[edit]I would like to link to an article on Wikipedia from my website, and I would like to display the plain text WIKIPEDIA logo beside the link - am I legally allowed to do this?
Where can I seek permission for this? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.159.151.37 (talk) 12:00, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- You're allowed to link to Wikipedia but the logo's a bit shaky. I'm not sure about its licence, I'll just check. Thanks, George D. Watson (Dendodge).TalkHelp and assistance 12:05, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- As it stands, you can't use the logo but maybe with Jimbo's permission you could. Thanks, George D. Watson (Dendodge).TalkHelp and assistance —Preceding comment was added at 12:08, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- Do you mean "Wikipedia - The Free Encyclopedia" written with a normal font? A logo is a graphical element while the text could be called a slogan. PrimeHunter (talk) 12:36, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- If you're in the United States, you can almost certainly use the Wikipedia logo under the fair use doctrine. There should be no need to ask permission to use it to make a link to Wikipedia. If you're referring to only the "WIKIPEDIA: The Free Encyclopedia" part (as opposed to the puzzle-piece globe), that probably isn't even copyrightable. I am not a lawyer, though. —Bkell (talk) 13:20, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- My Mum is and you can copyright any piece of text over a length of 3 words (in the UK) but Wikipedia has not done this to 'Wikipedia - the free encyclopedia'. You MUST use that when linking to Wikipedia but you need permission for the logo. As I said, speak to Jimbo. Thanks, George D. Watson (Dendodge).TalkHelp and assistance 14:23, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- It would be nice to cite a policy page for an authoritative answer. My superficial glance at the Editor's index finds Wikipedia:Reusing Wikipedia content which talks about some related issues but does not mention using the Wikipedia logo. That page mentions Wikia which has several wikis that re-use Wikipedia content. Presumably whatever method Wikia uses to link to Wikipedia would have a better chance of being correct because Jimmy Wales started Wikia. That doesn't necessarily mean everyone using Wikia is doing it the way Jimmy Wales wants them to, yet (I have no knowledge of how strict the policing is, but I doubt Wikia operates like a police state), but presumably there is more oversight on Wikia than on some Joe Random's Web site. --Teratornis (talk) 19:21, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- My Mum is and you can copyright any piece of text over a length of 3 words (in the UK) but Wikipedia has not done this to 'Wikipedia - the free encyclopedia'. You MUST use that when linking to Wikipedia but you need permission for the logo. As I said, speak to Jimbo. Thanks, George D. Watson (Dendodge).TalkHelp and assistance 14:23, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- The main issue here, it seems, is the logo. According to the copyright tag of Image:Wikipedia-logo-en.png: (emphasis added)
© & ™ All rights reserved, Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.
This image (or parts of it) is copyrighted by the Wikimedia Foundation. It is (or includes) one of the official logos or designs used by the Wikimedia foundation or by one of its projects. Notwithstanding any other statements, this image has not been licensed under the GFDL. Use of the Wikimedia logo is subject to the Wikimedia visual identity guidelines and requires permission.
Wikipedia® is a registered trademark of Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.
- I realize that the logo is not licensed under the GFDL. However, anyone still has the right to use it in limited ways under the fair use doctrine of United States copyright law. I am not saying that anyone can use the logo however they like, of course: if you sought to gain commercial benefit from it, or if you used it in some way that harms the trademark held by the Wikipedia Foundation, then you would be in a legally risky situation. But if you were to use the logo in a noncommercial setting simply to link to Wikipedia, that would almost certainly fall under fair use, whether the Wikimedia Foundation likes it or not. It seems hypocritical that Wikipedia recognizes fair use and uses thousands of companies' logos without one bit of permission while at the same time telling people that they absolutely must get permission to use the Wikipedia logo in a similar manner. —Bkell (talk) 00:25, 21 February 2008 (UTC)
- Oh, by the way, this should not be construed as legal advice. —Bkell (talk) 01:18, 21 February 2008 (UTC)
Wikipedia not remembering password
[edit]Both my Wikipedia & Commons account names & passwords are the same. A few days ago Wikipedia stopped remembering my password when logging in, but Commons continues to remember it. I have done everything to fix this that I have been advised to do, including ensuring AutoComplete is ticked, but nothing works. Why should Commons login be different to Wikipedia? Can you please assist. Thanks.
Graham Bould —Preceding unsigned comment added by GrahamBould (talk • contribs) 16:00, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- They're seperate websites hosted on seperated servers with seperate code. As of late, I've been having problems with Wikipedia remembering my login and have needed to enter my password evertime I go on the website. I think it might be a bug, if it persists maybe bring it up at The Village Pump to alert the developers. Mr Senseless (talk) 16:06, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- This has been brought up many times - it's quite pervasive among Wikipedians, using both Firefox and IE. Wisdom89 (T / C) 16:18, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- And it's getting worse! I created a homepage link to go directly to a particular article because that page was remembering my login... as of today it is also having problems. It is spreading throughout the encyclopedia and I hope they fix it soon. Fyunck(click) (talk) 20:09, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- It actually seems like it's not remembering the password but it actually is, even though there's obviously something wrong. When you get in initially you will see the login option at the top right instead of your usual user links and username. When you click on login, the login page is presented where you are to enter the password. Instead of entering the password, look at the top right again and you see you're logged in already without the need of actually entering your password again. ~RayLast «Talk!» 21:09, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
Changing username
[edit]How do I change the username on my account?
Taniqlive (talk) 18:14, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- Hi there if you want to change your account to a different name please go to Changing Usernames and follow the procedure hope this helps. Terra Who are you? 18:17, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- Since your only edit with this account is this question, just stop using this account and create a new one. It would be silly to go thru the process of WP:RENAME when you can just start from scratch. --barneca (talk) 18:19, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
How did Matthias Hinze get back on Wikipedia? I remember creating it, but then it was deleted, ten almost 2 months later, it's on Wikipedia again, but the history still says I created it last December! When I found this out, I felt I had recieved a false message about the article being speedy-deleted. How did the article get back on Wikipedia? I've been wondering about that since I found out it was on Wikipedia again.Kitty53 (talk) 18:49, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- User:W.marsh removed the "speedy" tag, with an edit summary of "Per DRV", whatever that means; so it never got deleted. --Orange Mike | Talk 18:53, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- Kitty, there was a deletion review on the third (Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2007 December 3 at the bottom) that reversed the deletion, and the entire history of the article was restored. GlassCobra 18:56, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- Right. Click history on the page and then "View logs for this page" to get [2] which shows the deletion, and the restoration with a link to Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2007 December 3. PrimeHunter (talk) 19:58, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- Kitty, there was a deletion review on the third (Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2007 December 3 at the bottom) that reversed the deletion, and the entire history of the article was restored. GlassCobra 18:56, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
Adding search terms that will lead to a given article
[edit]![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/f/fb/Yes_check.svg/20px-Yes_check.svg.png)
I recently created an article entitled Centre for Research on Inner City Health. It is often referred to as CRICH, so how do I make it so that if someone searched "CRICH", then the article page would come up? And once this is possible, are there other search terms I can put in that would bring up the page (such as spelling Centre the American spelling instead)?
Thanks, Jberends (talk) 19:57, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
Make a page called CRICH and on that page, instead of text put #REDIRECT [[Insert text]], putting the article's actual name where it says 'Insert text'. Thanks, George D. Watson (Dendodge).TalkHelp and assistance 20:02, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
I thought about that at all, but when i type in CRICH it directs to the Crich page, which is a small town somewhere in Europe. How do I make the new page?Jberends (talk) 20:05, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
Do you enter it in capitals? Thanks, George D. Watson (Dendodge).TalkHelp and assistance 20:07, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
Yes, I did. Jberends (talk) 20:08, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- Edit this page. Use the search button on the left, instead of clicking go. Then click on the red link at the top of the page. Woody (talk) 20:09, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
It'll say 'redirected from CRICH' at the top. Click the word CRICH and change the redirect. Thanks, George D. Watson (Dendodge).TalkHelp and assistance 20:10, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- No it won't. CRICH redirects to Crich because of the mediawiki software as a capitalisation error. Woody (talk) 20:11, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
yep. figured it out. thanks. Jberends (talk) 20:10, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- Don't forget to add disambiguation hatnotes at the top of Crich. Confusing Manifestation(Say hi!) 21:48, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
Play character infobox
[edit]![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/f/fb/Yes_check.svg/20px-Yes_check.svg.png)
I am looking for an infobox to use in an article about a Shakespearian play character, which infobox should I use? Thanks, George D. Watson (Dendodge).TalkHelp and assistance 20:01, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- I tried to find something for this, came up with zilch. It doesn't appear that the Shakespearian play characters use infoboxes. . .I did find this generic fictional character template (here) which looks like it can be modified. I got to that link from the Category:Fictional character infobox templates page. I don't know if this helps any. R. Baley (talk) 21:26, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- Thanks, but I've made one instead (it didn't come out too well though) at Template:Stephano(Shakespeare). Thanks, George D. Watson (Dendodge).TalkHelp and assistance 21:44, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- I examined many articles in Category:Shakespearean characters but didn't find any use of infoboxes. Wikipedia:WikiProject Shakespeare#Character article expansion doesn't mention infoboxes. I suggest discussion at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Shakespeare before creating character infoboxes. PrimeHunter (talk) 21:46, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
differnce in french and englsih
[edit]why is it that when i go on the web to research an artist, in this case patrich saytour, i find him listed in the wikipedia in french, but not in english, and if i type his name in the english version of your site, it says there is nothing on him, when there is, at least in french. i scrolled through 17 pages on google, and i never saw wikipedia in english, which is what i wanted, but the french is the first article. fine, i live in france, but i need this in both. thank you for your help. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 213.44.168.14 (talk) 20:01, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- The different language Wikipedias have different articles on them. Here, we don't seem to have an article on that person, though there is one (as you say) on the French Wikipedia. You could use a tool like Google Translate to translate the article into another language if you need to read it. Hope this helps —αlεx•mullεr 20:04, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- Wikipedia isn't automatically translated into all of its languages - each article has been written separately, by different people, maybe independently of each other or maybe using a translation of one as a starting point for the other. While the English Wikipedia is the largest, it tends to have a slight bias towards articles on English-language subjects (partially because it's easier for other editors to review the sources, partially because it's what the English-speaking editors want to write about), and also has different guidelines for inclusion compared to other Wikipedias, so of course the articles available will be different. Confusing Manifestation(Say hi!) 21:46, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- We have a {{Google translation}} template which can create a link to an English (of sorts) translation of fr:Patrick Saytour:
- --Teratornis (talk) 07:56, 21 February 2008 (UTC)
- For more details about translation and Wikipedia, see: WP:EIW#Transl. --Teratornis (talk) 07:58, 21 February 2008 (UTC)
Where did my change go?
[edit]I added PT Barnum to the "List of Unitarians, Universalists, and Unitarian Universalists". He was there for a few days, now he is gone. PT Barnum was a Universalist in Bridgeport, CT, at the same time as the Reverend Olympia Brown. He even wrote a bestselling book titled: "Why I am a Universalist". What do I need to do to make certain that he appears as a famous Universalist?
mdwoade:Mdwoade (talk) 20:19, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
This article from the UUA (Unitarian Universalist Association) may shed more light on Barnum:
http://www25.uua.org/uuhs/duub/articles/ptbarnum.html —Preceding unsigned comment added by Mdwoade (talk • contribs) 20:24, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- Looks like your addition was reverted because you tried to cite a pre-existing source that didn't mention Barnum. If you re-add Barnum and cite the UUA page that you listed above, you should be fine. GlassCobra 21:05, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- When something ilke that happens, you can find out more by going to the page and clicking "history" at the top. You should be able to find your username where you edited the page, and maybe you can find where someone else edited it to take your change out. Maybe they put an explanation in the edit summary, which appears in the history list. You can also click on "discussion" at the top to get to the talk page, and post a message discussing what you think the article should say. You can discuss things with the other people editing the page and try to come to an agreement about it. --Coppertwig (talk) 03:32, 21 February 2008 (UTC)
How to cite Wikipedia itself
[edit]I want to cite Wikipedia for a paper I am writing about Elizabeth I. I enjoyed using Wikipedia and thank the founders for creating the site and I also want to thank the creator of the article. I was taught to write the site's title, the adress, the date I visited it, and the date it was created. I have looked, but I cannot find the date it was founded. Help please? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.210.10.213 (talk) 20:50, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- In the article's history, keep going back in time until you reach the first entry. It's there. Thanks, George D. Watson (Dendodge).TalkHelp and assistance 20:52, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- (e/c)Most teachers today do not accept Wikipedia as a cited source due to its open nature. I would instead suggest that you use the sources used by the Wikipedia article to cite your paper. GlassCobra 20:58, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- You beat me to that answer. I get the "blah blah blah Wikipedia is not reliable blah blah blah" speech in all of my classes. I promptly inform the teacher that it's a great starting point, and that one should use the references in the Wikipedia article rather than the article itself, if the teacher does not allow its use. нмŵוτнτ 21:01, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- A Wikipedia article has a creation day in the history but that may have little or nothing to do with the current version which can be the result of thousands of edits by many different editors, spread over years. For recommended ways to cite Wikipedia, see Wikipedia:Citing Wikipedia or click "Cite this page" in the toolbox to the left when you are on an article. PrimeHunter (talk) 21:18, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- I wouldn't even bother with citing the author as there are likely a myriad editors who have helped build and shape the article you're interested in. Be sure to check with your teacher/professor that Wikipedia is acceptable - most high schools allow encyclopedias and other third party references in general as sources, while colleges discourage their use. However, Wikipedia has gained a certain notoriety in academia. I echo the above recommendations, use the external links in the article or websites/papers in the reference section to get your information. Wisdom89 (T / C) 21:33, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- Actually, it's a lot easier than that - each article has a link in the bar on the left side of your screen that reads "Cite this article". That link will provide citations in several different formats, so that you don't have to worry about manually hunting down the information. Hersfold (t/a/c) 21:38, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- To answer your question about the date it was founded: 15 January 2001 seems like the most applicable date. See History of Wikipedia. • Anakin (talk) 14:31, 21 February 2008 (UTC)
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/f/fb/Yes_check.svg/20px-Yes_check.svg.png)
This article only had a very small text on it, i've placed the A1 deletion tag on it is this tag the correct one to use for this type. Terra Who are you? 21:59, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- It's been resolved. Terra Who are you? 22:22, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
Infobox problems
[edit]There are two problems with 761st Tank Battalion (United States) that I can't figure out. First, there are the garbage characters at the beginning of the article. Second, the last line in the box says Transport, but I don't see it when editing. Clarityfiend (talk) 23:20, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- I can't seem to see the problems you're describing. It all looks OK to me. --Coppertwig (talk) 03:28, 21 February 2008 (UTC)