Wikipedia:Simple talk/Archive 115

DYK

Hi all,

I've taken the step of reverting the most recent update of the DYK on our homepage. I have major concerns about this aspect of our project moving forward.

Here are the hooks before my revert. Here are the issues:

1. Rockefeller's hook's source is dead.
2. The first of two hook sources for Katrina is dead. The second does not mention anything about 80% as far as I can see. We are being linked to a Flash file so I may have missed it while clicking through but it's not obvious as a fact to me in there.
3. The Wickenheiser statement does not have a source with it. I clicked one of the sources for a later part of the article which says "Hayley broke the gender barrier in 2003 when she signed a professional contract with Salamat in Finland where she went on to play parts of two seasons" but that does not confirm she's the first non-goaltender. Goaltenders are not mentioned in the source.
4. The Florida hook's source is dead. Additionally, the hook is a misinterpretation of the article. The article says "The highest hill in Florida is Britton Hill...It is 345 feet above sea level. It is the shortest of the highest points in all other states." The hook has severely misinterpreted it to mean the entire state sits at 345 feet above sea level.
5. The Ford article is well below the 800 character requirement for an article for DYK (it sits at <400). Even if it were long enough, the source for the hook is simply "Jones, p. 211." The book is no where listed as a source on the article. Presumably, someone named Jones wrote a book, but we don't know what this book is called or what Jones' full name is.

Because of these many issues, I've reverted the entire update. As I said above, I have questions about the continuing of DYK on our homepage. If only a couple of users are involved in the process, and these kind of major oversights are occurring, I don't see how we can let this continue. Only (talk) 20:26, 5 December 2015 (UTC)

I agree, because of what all you said and that citations are almost never given. Krett12 (talk) 15:55, 6 December 2015 (UTC)

There's something wrong with the move feature

I tried moving the page "Gun" to "Firearm" but accidentally put "Firearn". It won't let me correct the spelling! Krett12 (talk) 17:27, 6 December 2015 (UTC)

I don't think there's anything wrong. I deleted the "firearn" pages. Please leave the article at "gun". Gun is not slang, and we use that name because it's a simpler word. --Auntof6 (talk)

Illustrations

Looking at Stegodon, it struck me that a number of our pages do not have illustrations, even though there are ones available at Wikimedia and/or other Wikipedias. Especially in SEW, pictures are a valuable tool. How about it we set up a group or campaign to import good pictures? Kdammers (talk) 02:44, 5 December 2015 (UTC)

we should have lots of pictures, however we source all our images through Wikimedia Commons. This means that they meet all relevant copyright laws. Some other Wikipedias, notably English Wikipedia have other rules which means that often their images can not be used here. Whenever a suitable image can be found on Commons, use it. And you can always take your own too, upload to commons, and then use it here.--Peterdownunder (talk) 03:50, 5 December 2015 (UTC)

Added one to Stegodon to start the campaign rolling.--Peterdownunder (talk) 03:56, 5 December 2015 (UTC)

I support this wholeheartedly! For some reason, articles that are brought here from enwiki often have their images (as well as infoboxes) left off. We haven't had a big weekend in a while: this would be an excellent idea for one. Anyone want to coordinate that? --Auntof6 (talk) 05:59, 5 December 2015 (UTC)

So long as illustrations add something meaningful to the page. Macdonald-ross (talk) 11:22, 5 December 2015 (UTC)

The other extreme, too many for a small text, is less common but sometimes happens. Jim.henderson (talk) 18:41, 8 December 2015 (UTC)

I have to admit that I'm curious why we don't allow, in a narrowly construed rule, the upload of logos here. Use of logos under Fair Use, solely for the article on the organization itself, seems pretty well-established in copyright law. StevenJ81 (talk) 19:07, 8 December 2015 (UTC)

It's simpler if we just use images from Commons. Why give ourselves the additional maintenance task of maintaining images? If it could be uploaded here, it can be uploaded to Commons, no? --Auntof6 (talk) 20:14, 8 December 2015 (UTC)

Simpler, yes. But the answer to "If it could be uploaded here, it can be uploaded to Commons, no?" is "not so". Commons does not allow "fair use" images at all. For the most part, such images have to be uploaded to individual projects, if the projects allow them. StevenJ81 (talk) 20:20, 8 December 2015 (UTC)

Oxford Reference Library

I have been given access to the Oxford Reference Library subscription service through a collaboration between Oxford Uni Press and Wikipedia. If you need help to find a suitable reference, I may be able to help. Please leave requests on my talk page.--Peterdownunder (talk) 11:47, 8 December 2015 (UTC)

Twinkle

Whenever I report someone for vandalism, Twinkle now places it in the "Bot-reported" section, despite the fact that I'm not a bot. Can anything be done about this? Thanks, J991 19:06, 29 November 2015 (UTC)

User:Chenzw recently switched the sections, apparently to accommodate Huggle. Maybe he will reply here. --Auntof6 (talk) 19:19, 29 November 2015 (UTC)

Fixed now. Thanks for reporting. --Glaisher (talk) 05:07, 30 November 2015 (UTC)

So sorry, dropped by rather late to see this. Just want to mention further that Huggle supposedly allows for a specific section to insert VIP/AIV reports (see "aiv-section"), but is not being implemented correctly (or even implemented at all, it seems). A while ago I looked through the Huggle source code and found no code in AIV reporting to specifically edit a page section. Chenzw  Talk  11:03, 30 November 2015 (UTC)

Twinkle note

Not too long ago, I was having trouble getting Twinkle (and Cat-A-Lot) to work here, and asked a lot of you questions. I wanted you to know I discovered the problem. I had an "old editor" js from enwiki loading from my global.js file in order to suppress VisualEditor. It turns out it also suppressed Twinkle and Cat-A-Lot. Once I removed that line from global.js, everything started working the way it was supposed to. I wanted to update whomever I asked, and to thank all for your help. StevenJ81 (talk) 17:35, 10 December 2015 (UTC)

New Wikipedia Library Accounts Available Now (December 2015)

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New Twinkle feature

How about under the TW menu there is a link to open the article on ENWiki in a popup? Krett12 (talk) 01:36, 11 December 2015 (UTC)

That doesn't seem like it fits with Twinkle functions. The best way to open the corresponding enwiki article is to click on the interwiki link on the page. If you find an article that doesn't have the interwiki links shown, you can add it in Wikidata so that it will be there for next time. --Auntof6 (talk) 01:58, 11 December 2015 (UTC)

I like to make stuff easy, so I was hoping for some'n that would always be there. Krett12 (talk) 02:00, 11 December 2015 (UTC)

Not everything needs to be done with Twinkle. It is easy to just modify the URL and change "simple" to "en". Don't be lazy. Chenzw  Talk  02:04, 11 December 2015 (UTC)

What might be easy to use could be hard to maintain. There wouldn't be a good way to know if there even was a matching article unless it were already in Wikidata anyway. --Auntof6 (talk) 02:09, 11 December 2015 (UTC)

Just add importScript('User:Djsasso/enWPTab.js'); to your skins js file. -DJSasso (talk) 14:05, 15 December 2015 (UTC)

Admin

What are the requirements of becoming an admin --— Preceding unsigned comment added by Upaltez (talk • contribs) 13 December 2015 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Criteria for adminship gives information about that. By the way, please sign your posts by putting four tildes (~~~~) at the end of the last line -- thanks! --Auntof6 (talk) 07:41, 13 December 2015 (UTC)

Saxon pages

What should we do about these Saxon pages cropping up? They appear to be a bunch of school students writing reports. I've been deleting them as test pages because they're clearly not viable articles. Should we make a filter? Salt the pages? Only (talk) 12:17, 17 December 2015 (UTC)

Contact the teacher via the account talk pages, and get the kids doing useful tasks instead? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 94.1.53.114 (talk) 16:52, 17 December 2015‎

Until this becomes more than the editors here can handle, just routinely QD them. Patrollers should catch most if not all of them. User:Rus793 (talk) 17:12, 17 December 2015 (UTC)

Get involved in Wikipedia 15!

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People around the world are getting involved in the celebration and have started adding their events on Meta Page. While we are celebrating Wikipedia's birthday, we hope that all projects and affiliates will be able to utilize this celebration to raise awareness of our community's efforts.

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Posted by the MediaWiki message delivery, 20:58, 18 December 2015 (UTC) • Please help translate to your language • Help

Template help needed: Template:1989–1997 Batman film series

The items in this template are showing up in a single column instead of being flowed across lines. Could someone see if this can be fixed? This template is currently unused, but if it is fixed I will add it to the various articles. I don't want to add it as it is, because it will make the articles unnecessarily long. Thanks. --Auntof6 (talk) 00:14, 14 December 2015 (UTC)

Auntof6, add away cheerily! I simply applied Occam's razor. ツ Fylbecatulous talk 03:02, 14 December 2015 (UTC)

I also just tested all three collapsible options in my sandbox and they work so I added that code to the template page. Fylbecatulous talk 03:16, 14 December 2015 (UTC)

Thanks! --Auntof6 (talk) 04:07, 14 December 2015 (UTC)

┌─────────────────────────────────┘
@Fylbecatulous: I just noticed that some sections that are supposed to display across the top aren't showing up now. Any thoughts on how to fix that? --Auntof6 (talk) 05:09, 14 December 2015 (UTC)

Auntof6, you know, I had a sneaking suspicion this wasn't as easy as it seemed, because the one on English Wikipedia is created with columns and copy and pasted, it appears correctly there but not here. This is one reason I tested in my sandbox. But I paid no attention to the loss of the nice sections along the top. :(( I, being the obsessive person I am will probably tinker with this some more tonight, but I am have to get up in five hours for errands. lol ツ. I yield to tomorrow or maybe someone else will know more. Sorry, very. Fylbecatulous talk 05:28, 14 December 2015 (UTC)

Not a big deal! It's definitely better than it was. :) --Auntof6 (talk) 05:55, 14 December 2015 (UTC)

I'll try to have a look. But it is much better than it was, and I'm not really sure we need those section boxes on this wiki for now anyway. StevenJ81 (talk) 15:38, 14 December 2015 (UTC)

I just cannot get anything else to work. Perhaps that part of the template is just available on English Wikipedia. I notice the missing sections are not on the Georgian nor Vietnamese language templates either. Theirs just have the plain 'navbox' without the 'column' designator. I agree ours is entirely usable as is. Thanks ツ Fylbecatulous talk 12:11, 15 December 2015 (UTC)

The problem is not in the Batman template, but in the underlying Template:Navbox with columns. Ours was last updated in 2009; the one on EnWiki has been updated a dozen or so times since then. It is because of those changes that the same template looks so much different on EnWiki. Etamni | ✉ | ✓  18:29, 17 December 2015 (UTC)

It is now updated. But yes, this is a fairly common occurrence with our code. Things will often not look the same here unless someone takes the time to go through all the related templates and updates them. -DJSasso (talk) 19:28, 17 December 2015 (UTC)

I think sometimes we're better off with simpler templates here. English Wikipedia always needs to be on the cutting edge, but I'm not sure we need or want that. And if by simplifying templates—even at the risk of separating the code from those on enwiki—we have a template that will remain valid for a long period of time, then we're doing well. StevenJ81 (talk) 22:33, 17 December 2015 (UTC)

Password Strength RFC

Hello

We have started an RFC on meta to increase password requirements for users that have accounts which can edit MediaWiki:Common.js, have access to checkuser or have access to Oversight.

These types of accounts have sensitive access to our sites, and can cause real harm if they fall into malicious hands. Currently the only requirement is the password is at least 1 letter long. We would like to make the minimum be 8 letters (bytes) long and also ban certain really common passwords.

By increasing requirements on passwords for accounts with high levels of access, we hope to make Wikimedia wikis more secure for everyone. Please read the full text of the proposal here, and make your voice heard at the RFC.

Thank you

(On behalf of the WMF security team) BWolff (WMF) (talk) 14:02, 22 December 2015 (UTC)

• How about six rather than eight letters? Six should be tough enough to catch but not as difficult to remember as the cumbersome 8-letter PWs. Kdammers (talk) 21:19, 22 December 2015 (UTC)

• Orders of magnitude different. In any case, the link in the message will take you to the discussion on Meta (a completely different Wikipedia project), where you can make your voice heard. Please understand that the proposal is for admin accounts and others with advanced permissions. Regular users would not be affected. Etamni | ✉ | ✓  15:01, 23 December 2015 (UTC)

RfD archival...

Hello,

Since the RfDs are archived by year, I propose that we make a rush and close all RfDs i such a way that on years end (UTC), there are no open RfDs. Else we face the problem that an RfD running form December 27 to January 2 will get a 2016 tag, even though most of it was in 2015. What do other people think? --Eptalon (talk) 21:58, 16 December 2015 (UTC)

I think it's a good idea. We also might consider a cutoff date for no new RfDs and notify everyone. User:Rus793 (talk) 22:05, 16 December 2015 (UTC)

Last start date for an RFD is December 25 (UTC); all RFDs close by end of December 30 (UTC)?--Eptalon (talk) 22:10, 16 December 2015 (UTC)

Could you bring this up at WP:AN where we have a similar thread? I think the consensus thete was that no special handling is needed. --Auntof6 (talk) 23:18, 16 December 2015 (UTC)

Guys, this isn't really an issue. It doesn't in anyway actually matter. As long as it is archived somewhere then it is fine. We should not be holding off on Rfds because people are concerned where they will archive. And to be honest most of the things we archive, like RfAs archive by the date they close not the date they opened. It's just because of the weird coding that someone at sometime created for Rfds that cause this issue. If it concerns you someone can easily go and move the links to the correct archive afterwards. -DJSasso (talk) 19:18, 17 December 2015 (UTC)

Less than a week left till new years, so I think we should just disallow RfDs from now 'til 2016. Krett12 (talk) 16:53, 28 December 2015 (UTC)

To add on to what Djsasso said, the current archiving system that we are using is "year-neutral": all our closed RfDs are placed in either Category:Requests for deletion that did not succeed or Category:Requests for deletion that succeeded, which do not sort by year (and frankly, are a big mess for people who are interested in past discussions, but this is a problem for another day). The only place where the year will differ will be on the deletion tab itself. This is because MediaWiki:Deletereason-dropdown uses Wikipedia:Requests for deletion/Requests/{{CURRENTYEAR}}/{{FULLPAGENAME}} to dynamically generate the deletion reason you see in the dropdown list. {{oldrfdfull}} may be affected as well, but that's only if you are using the year= parameter (to generate the RfD link, which you should) and you get the years wrong. Chenzw  Talk  17:33, 28 December 2015 (UTC)

Holidays!

To those who celebrate Christmas, I want to wish you a Merry Christmas. If you do not celebrate Christmas, then Happy Holidays! If you do not celebrate Christmas or any other holidays this time of year, then have a nice day. If you do not celebrate Christmas, nor any other holidays this time of year, and you live north of the Arctic Circle where it is perpetually dark this time of year, then have a nice night! (There, that ought to cover just about everyone!) Etamni | ✉ | ✓  11:36, 24 December 2015 (UTC)

Thank you Etamni. May you and your family have a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year :) --Grind24 (talk) 12:13, 24 December 2015 (UTC)

Happy Christmas, all. ;) --George (Talk · Contribs · CentralAuth · Log) 21:20, 24 December 2015 (UTC)

w000000000000000000000000000000t! I am leaving for vacation for a WEEEEEK! NO MORE STINKEH VANDALZ FOR ME!!!!!!!!!! (But I am taking my computer :( ) Krett12 (talk) 21:28, 24 December 2015 (UTC)

I love the vista of snow---you're lucky I'm even checking Wikipedia. Krett12 (talk) 16:51, 28 December 2015 (UTC)

VisualEditor News #6—2015

Did you know?

A new, simpler system for editing will offer a single Edit button. Once the page has opened, you can switch back and forth between visual and wikitext editing.

If you prefer having separate edit buttons, then you can set that option in your preferences, either in a pop-up dialog the next time you open the visual editor, or by going to Special:Preferences and choosing the setting that you want:

The current plan is for the default setting to have the Edit button open the editing environment you used most recently.

You can read and help translate the user guide, which has more information about how to use the visual editor.

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Since the last newsletter, the visual editor team has fixed many bugs and expanded the mathematics formula tool. Their workboard is available in Phabricator. Their current priorities are improving support for languages such as Japanese and Arabic, and providing rich-media tools for formulæ, charts, galleries and uploading.

Recent improvements

You can switch from the wikitext editor to the visual editor after you start editing. The LaTeX mathematics formula editor has been significantly expanded. (T118616) You can see the formula as you change the LaTeX code. You can click buttons to insert the correct LaTeX code for many symbols.

Future changes

The single edit tab project will combine the "Change" and "Change source" tabs into a single "Change" tab, like the system already used on the mobile website. (T102398, T58337) Initially, the "Change" tab will open whichever editing environment you used last time. Your last editing choice will be stored as a cookie for logged-out users and as an account preference for logged-in editors. Logged-in editors will be able to set a default editor in the Editing tab of Special:Preferences in the drop-down menu about "Editing mode:".

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Elitre (WMF), 00:06, 25 December 2015 (UTC)

Stub sorting

Hi, do you do stub sorting here now, or are stubs still supposed to be kept in one category? Thanks, Rubbish computer (HALP!: I dropped the bass?) 14:33, 28 December 2015 (UTC)

We do stub sort, to some extent, but not as excessively as enwiki. We have more general categories like science, music, biographies etc., but avoid specific templates that can only be used in limited instances. See here for our stub template category ;) --George (Talk · Contribs · CentralAuth · Log) 15:42, 28 December 2015 (UTC)

@Caliburn: Thanks! Rubbish computer (HALP!: I dropped the bass?) 17:20, 28 December 2015 (UTC)

We also discourage stub sorting for the sake of stub sorting. Please do it only if you're going to actively work on expanding the articles you sort. --Auntof6 (talk) 18:39, 28 December 2015 (UTC)

Template "cite web"

The "cite web" template on EnWiki has a parameter named "website" which appears to be for the same purpose as the parameter "work" on the Simple version of the template. Is it possible (without someone having to spend hours and hours on it) to get instances of "website" automatically mapped to the "work" parameter? I have no idea how many times citations from EnWiki have been copied over, but this information simply does not display the way it was intended when the citations were created, and it is unlikely that very many editors are aware that this particular template works differently here than on EnWiki. Etamni | ✉ | ✓  02:52, 25 December 2015 (UTC)

@Etamni: The only way I can think of doing that would be to copy and paste the desired text into a Microsoft Word document, use the find and replace tool there, then paste it back onto the article, replacing "website=" with "work=" to avoid replacing the word "website", which may appear in an article outside of citations. If it's a problem on a very large scale here, AWB could be used to replace "website=" with "work=". I hope this helps, Rubbish computer (HALP!: I dropped the bass?) 14:27, 28 December 2015 (UTC)

 (change conflict) @Rubbish computer: I guess I was trying to suggest that the template itself needs the term mapped differently. In other words if someone has "website=" within the "cite web" reference, our version of the template would know to put that content into the "work=" parameter. We could search and replace the text, but the next citation brought over from EnWiki might have the same thing, since that is how the template works there. Etamni | ✉ | ✓  14:40, 28 December 2015 (UTC)

Yes, there is. Are there many pages effected by this? (want to make sure before making a change on such a widely used template) --George (Talk · Contribs · CentralAuth · Log) 14:53, 28 December 2015 (UTC)

I'm not sure of the extent of the problem. Some background: The web citation tool that appears at the top of the edit window, does not work correctly for me here on Simple. When creating citations that use the "cite web" template, I've been visiting my sandbox on EnWiki and creating the citations there, then copying them over. Now if the problem is limited to just those citations I made over there, it would be easy enough to find them and change each instance of "website=" to "work=" but, and this is the kicker, a very large number of our articles here on Simple were brought over from EnWiki, so it is impossible for me to even guess how many instances of "website=" exists in all of the references in all of those articles. Looking at the documentation for the template on EnWiki, "work=" is an alias for "website=" there. Perhaps the simplest change would be to do the same here (or the opposite -- I think the result would be the same). The ideal solution would be for either term to work so that any reference brought over in the future will work the same on either project. Etamni | ✉ | ✓  15:25, 28 December 2015 (UTC) Edit to add a ping. @Caliburn: (note that I'm going offline shortly, back tomorrow.) Etamni | ✉ | ✓  15:32, 28 December 2015 (UTC)

 Done --George (Talk · Contribs · CentralAuth · Log) 15:36, 28 December 2015 (UTC)

As a curious note on the background comment, I will say that the web citation tool does not work for me either. Never has, and I have two browsers available (IE and Chrome). I have to create a reference for here on EnWiki and then copy and paste. I just thought it was a quirk for me. Fylbecatulous talk 19:01, 28 December 2015 (UTC)

┌─────────────┘
I am starting a new topic, below, to discuss the web citation tool. Etamni | ✉ | ✓  05:30, 30 December 2015 (UTC)

Shri Lakshmi Narasimha Devasthaana of Shurpali

Shri Laxmi Narasimha Devasthaana of Shurpali lies on the bank of river Krishna, the temple is said to be of historical importance. The temple is about 8 KM from Jamkhandi of Bagalkot district in the state of Karnataka —This unsigned comment was added by Rkalkeri (talk • changes) 11:30, 29 December 2015‎ (UTC)

@Bkalkeri:, I guess I'm wondering why you mentioned that here? Etamni | ✉ | ✓  15:13, 29 December 2015 (UTC)

Citation tool

The modified toolbar

An example of a template dialog

In a section above, I mentioned that the citation tool does not work for me here on Simple (although it works fine for me on EnWiki). I had been assuming it was something with how my computer is set up, or my preferences here. Then Fylbecatulous mentioned having the same issue. So now I'm wondering how common this is, and what can be done to fix the issue. (For those who are not sure what I am talking about, at the top of the edit window that opens after clicking change source, there is a toolbar. One of the options is "cite" and, when it is clicked, a dropdown box labeled "Templates" opens. On EnWiki clicking those links opens a form where the information for a reference can be entered, and the form itself will properly format the reference when the user clicks on the "insert" button.) So if anyone else is having this issue, or not having this issue, feel free to comment below. If anyone knows of a simple solution, that would be appreciated as well. If this is affecting everyone here, how do we fix it? Etamni | ✉ | ✓  05:30, 30 December 2015 (UTC)

I believe you are talking about the VisualEditor's cite tool (the one with the "Cite" text and some downward pointing arrow beside it)? They are currently not working because we did not insert the TemplateData (more info) into our citation templates when VisualEditor was introduced. I have inserted TemplateData for the most common parameters in {{cite web}}. Can you try it out now and see if you can insert a citation for a web source? Chenzw  Talk  06:10, 30 December 2015 (UTC)

Hi Chenzw. I'm pretty sure the toolbar I am referring to is not part of Visual Editor, unless it's a part that was implemented long ago. On EnWiki, the toolbar I am referring to has a help page, and here is a link to it: Edit Toolbar on EnWiki. In researching this, I also found that the very specific tool I am referring to has more information here. It is presented in an EnWiki context, but includes some information about porting the tool to other Wikis. Etamni | ✉ | ✓  08:14, 30 December 2015 (UTC)

I have updated the gadget JS, and that seems to have fixed the problem. Please purge your browser cache and take a look. Not sure which was the offending line in the previous version, though. Chenzw  Talk  08:42, 30 December 2015 (UTC)

Well that was easy! Thank you for fixing that. Etamni | ✉ | ✓  09:56, 30 December 2015 (UTC)

Chenzw and Etamni, beautiful ツ ツ This now works! I am even able to keep my favourite browser and skin. Thanks so much. It is the little things, sometimes... Thanks both, for pursuing this. Fylbecatulous talk 15:13, 30 December 2015 (UTC)

Well done everyone :) --Peterdownunder (talk) 20:56, 30 December 2015 (UTC)

Happy New Year, Everyone on Simple!

Happy New Year!

Have a great New Year everyone, and thanks for your contributions to Wikipedia.
–Etamni | ✉ | ✓  14:28, 1 January 2016 (UTC)

Happy Public Domain Day 2016!

Logo Public Domain Day

On January 1 we celebrate Public Domain Day as many works of authors who died 70+ years ago now enter the public domain and can be used freely.

Let us be aware: copyright is temporary. It only lasts during the authors lifetime and 70 years afterwards (in most countries). During those years it is limiting Wikipedia and her sister projects in showing works of art, literature, public art and buildings in countries without freedom of panorama, and more in the articles. But now a new batch is freed from copyrights!

An overview of images and texts that are restored or added to the Wikimedia Commons, are collected on: this page.

Many of these files still need a place in articles. You can help!

You can also help by uploading new files of subjects that are freed of copyrights.
You can also help by tagging all requests for deletion pages with the category when the file can be restored, which will be/was deleted.

As I follow the log of restored files this week, more images and texts will follow. If still files or texts are missing in the list, let me know or add them yourselves.

A very happy Public Domain Day! Romaine (talk) 13:20, 2 January 2016 (UTC)

• Some of the freed files:

• 
  Leif Erikson
• 
• 
  El Lissitzky
• 
• 
• 
  Alfred Ost
• 
  Leonid Pasternak
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 

New WikiProject

Hey, I noticed a bunch of red links. Those are bad! I've decided to create a new wikiproject dedicated to creating pages for a lot of computing topics. Feel free to browse the really long, unorganized list of pages that need creation or improvement, find one you know about, and edit it.

Here it is: User:Notfruit/Computing

Notfruit (talk) 04:22, 3 January 2016 (UTC)

That's a great list. I don't know if you saw, but I started tackling a couple items last night. Hopefully between us we can knock that redlink list down to a few - or zero - remaining articles soon. Lithorien (talk) 11:26, 3 January 2016 (UTC)

Red links are not bad...they are good! Think of them as doors waiting to be opened, with article to be written. When the red links have all gone, what shall we do?--Peterdownunder (talk) 11:31, 3 January 2016 (UTC)

We shall... make a lot of very good articles? Become more informative than en-wiki? WORLD DOMINATION?! Lithorien (talk) 12:54, 3 January 2016 (UTC)

Yes!--Peterdownunder (talk) 04:47, 4 January 2016 (UTC)

Sharia law lede image

Hello everyone. Just wanted to get some opinions over at Sharia law about the article image. Please feel free to come by and leave an opinion! Thank you, and thanks to Auntof6 for the idea to put this here! Lithorien (talk) 10:18, 4 January 2016 (UTC)

@Lithorien: Personally I would say that the previous image did not appear neutral; however, the current image does not appear as strictly relevant as the map of use of Sharia law by country (pictured). Thanks, Rubbish computer (HALP!: I dropped the bass?) 12:33, 4 January 2016 (UTC)

@Lithorien: I agree, the former image did not appear neutral. But the current image has little to do with the subject. In general articles on law are difficult to illustrate. The map showing which countries use Sharia → is one of the very few that are appropriate. Thanks for bringing this up. User:Rus793 (talk) 14:53, 4 January 2016 (UTC)

Stub articles

Hello. I had a question about procedures here on simple wiki - I noticed that there are a lot of redlinks and pages that need to be created. I'm not good at content creation, but I rather enjoy making stubs that take a stab at basic explanations of topics. (See my recent changes for examples.) Is that kind of thing helpful and allowed here at Simple, or am I just being unintentionally disruptive? I'd ask in a less public place, but there doesn't seem to be a Teahouse here or any kind of editor review. Thank you. Lithorien (talk) 21:56, 2 January 2016 (UTC)

Your edits are very welcome and appreciated. A short stub is nearly always better than a red link so your contributions are helpful, not disruptive. We do like our stubs to have two or three sentences, to provide some basic level of meaning, and yours are no problem. To make them better you could add a reference, and/or picture from Commons.--Peterdownunder (talk) 22:19, 2 January 2016 (UTC)

Oh, thank you so much. I was a bit worried since I've been having a hard time on en-wiki trying to find a niche. I'll also try to incorporate references and images where I can on the stubs - that's a great idea. Lithorien (talk) 22:26, 2 January 2016 (UTC)

Also, it's nice if you include appropriate categories, not just stub templates. Our categories (including stub categories) are somewhat different from enwiki's, though. If you'd like help figuring out good categories, feel free to ask: categories are sort of my specialty. :) Also, please note that I deleted the page you created for "episode" -- we prefer not to have cross-wiki links like that, either as redirects or within articles. Let me know if you have any questions, and welcome to Simple English Wikipedia! --Auntof6 (talk) 23:01, 2 January 2016 (UTC)

Understood about the categories. I'll try to incorporate those as well as the pictures and adding references. I'm surprised you don't do the cross-wiki links, but thank you for pointing that out - I'll do what I can to avoid those in future. Is it acceptable to just link (not redirect) to the Simple Dictionary, however? I've done that a couple times now but can revert if need be. Lithorien (talk) 23:09, 2 January 2016 (UTC)

If there's any chance at all that there could be an article someday, it's better to leave it as a red link. If we link to Wiktionary, and an article is created in the future, nobody is likely to go back and change all the Wiktionary links even if we could find them. If a page redirects to Wiktionary, it's less likely that an article would get created. That's because it won't show up as a red link alerting us to the need for the article.--Auntof6 (talk) 23:16, 2 January 2016 (UTC)

That makes sense. I'll do some quick changing then. Lithorien (talk) 23:19, 2 January 2016 (UTC)

I just modified what I said, because I was explaining the wrong thing. My original explanation was the reason for not having Wiktionary links in articles. Sorry for the confusion! --Auntof6 (talk) 02:46, 3 January 2016 (UTC)

No worries. I've found a way of getting the information across regardless... it actually may be more efficient in the long run. Or at least more educational. Thank you for clarifying though! Lithorien (talk) 03:04, 3 January 2016 (UTC)

• I disagree with the advice about Simple wikt. We have only agreed that links to English wiktionary should not be used. Simple wiktionary was created for this wiki, and it is an absolutely invaluable resource. Red links can and do stay red for ten years, and often for five years. So long as a wikt item exists, we should use it in preference to a red link. It's not possible to say "sorry, you'll have to wait until someone does a page" when we only have about ten people doing regular page editing, and less than five regularly editing on general subjects. Naturally, there is an overlap between the content of wikt and our content. Of course, where we need a page we should develop one, and where we have one, links should go there in preference to wikt. I'm bound to say, though, that wikt pages are often better and more correct than some of our stubs. Communicating to our readers is our prime task: if wikt helps, use it. Macdonald-ross (talk) 07:39, 3 January 2016 (UTC)
  • No, if it is a subject that would normally have an article here then a red link is always preferable to a wiktionary link. If all you are trying to do is link to a definition that is fine, but if its a topic that would normally have an encyclopedic article then you should be leaving it as a red link so as to not give the false impression that the article is already created and thus doesn't need to be. -DJSasso (talk) 14:57, 4 January 2016 (UTC)
    • DJSasso is right up to a point. But "a subject that would normally have an article here" is in and of itself a bit of a subjective call. I'm inclined to prefer a wikt link to a red link in the following situations:
      • When all I really need is a definition, and I think that an article is (at best) not going to be written here for a long while. (This is a subjective call, but many of us have a sense about this kind of thing.)
      • When there is more than one sense of the word, the Wikipedia article is about one sense only, and it is going to be extremely involved to create an article about the other sense of the word, disambiguate, and so forth. This is especially true when the Wiktionary entry already includes the other sense of the word.
      • When use of the non-simple word through inclusion of the wikt link helps substantially simplify the article. StevenJ81 (talk) 20:26, 4 January 2016 (UTC)
        • Perhaps, but the counter argument is, that if you have to rely on wikt links then you should probably be finding other phrasing to use that doesn't use that word. Wikt links when we started using them were only really ever intended for things you absolutely could not explain in any other way and were intended to be sparingly used. -DJSasso (talk) 15:59, 5 January 2016 (UTC)
          • Excellent point: I completely agree. I would add that the fact that it might be a lot of work to create an article for a term is not a good reason to use a shortcut. If anyone is considering using an inline Wiktionary link, I'd be happy to help find an alternative. --Auntof6 (talk) 17:40, 5 January 2016 (UTC) --Auntof6 (talk) 17:40, 5 January 2016 (UTC)

Wikimania 2016 Scholarships - Deadline soon!

Please help translate to your language

A reminder - applications for scholarships for Wikimania 2016 in Esino Lario, Italy, are closing soon! Please get your applications in by January 9th. To apply, visit the page below:

• Wikimania 2016 Scholarships

Patrick Earley (WMF) via MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 01:49, 5 January 2016 (UTC)

Why was Template:Page_tabs Removed?

The page Template:Page_tabs Removed?

I can't see a reason for such a page to be deleted - and In quick deletion.

I found out he writed "g6" which is "Housekeeping" in the Deletion Policy, and I just couldn't understand it.

I also found out - There is no "g6" for Templates removal, only for General - So it must be the "Housekeeping" Certia.

SleepyMode (talk) 13:24, 6 January 2016 (UTC)

Hello SleepyMode! The template known on EnWiki as "Page Tabs" is simply known as "Tabs" here (Template:Tabs). Presumably that is a simpler name, although perhaps we should have a redirect for anyone familiar with the name on EnWiki. Note that there are some differences between our version and the EnWiki version (besides the name) but it's quite possible that someone will update the template now that it has been mentioned here. Etamni | ✉ | ✓  15:08, 6 January 2016 (UTC)

Restored {{Page tabs}} as a redirect to {{Tabs}}, per the above. StevenJ81 (talk) 16:47, 6 January 2016 (UTC)

(talk page stalker) Good solution, all. @SleepyMode: The general quick deletion options, including WP:QD#G6, can be used for any kind of page, including templates. --Auntof6 (talk) 17:17, 6 January 2016 (UTC)

Use of an idiom in the QD policy

Um, the user has implied something that wasn't addressed here: The term housekeeping is probably not a simple term for someone learning the English language. While not every rule can be written using simple terms, we are using an idiom within a policy. Perhaps we should consider changing the terminology. The current G6 criteria is currently written as: "Housekeeping. Pages which do not need discussion to be deleted, for example if the page needs to be deleted to merge histories." Any suggestions? Etamni | ✉ | ✓  01:38, 7 January 2016 (UTC)

Well, it's true that we don't explain the word anywhere, but it should be clear from the sentence which follows it. The sense is "cleaning up" or "sweeping up" as in cleaning the floor. Admins were often called "mops" on English wiki, with the same analogy. Anyway, this is the only time in eight years that I have seen a query about the word 'housekeeping', and I still think it is a good word. Macdonald-ross (talk) 08:26, 7 January 2016 (UTC)

I would go and agree with Macdonald-ross about it, As I do know what Housekeeping is as I do know proffesional english but, It would be defenatly helpful if It would be changed, For every user around. SleepyMode (talk) 10:56, 7 January 2016 (UTC)

Ban proposal for Krett12

A ban proposal is currently in progress for User:Krett12. Your input on this matter is welcome on the administrators' noticeboard. Thank you for your time. Chenzw  Talk  16:48, 7 January 2016 (UTC)

Rollback Error?

Hello there,

I've recently Noticed I have the ability of 'Rollbacking in the simple english wikipedia, if I never applied for this position or got that usergroup?

SleepyMode (talk) 15:40, 9 January 2016 (UTC)

You indeed don't have rollback, and neither do you have global rollback - could it be one of your gadgets? Twinkle is one such gadget which will add rollback links which perform a reversion (by JavaScript) similar to rollback. —This unsigned comment was added by Chenzw (talk • changes) 15:47, 9 January 2016‎ (UTC) (UTC)

I do use Twinkle, I had no idea it has it, Thankes for informing me :). SleepyMode (talk) 15:51, 9 January 2016 (UTC)

WikiProject Apple Inc

I think we should have one on this wiki to help improve Apple Inc. articles as most of them are stubs. There is one on the EN Wikipedia and its helped a lot. I would like other users input please. Thanks Ipadguy (talk) 23:29, 10 January 2016 (UTC)

We already have a WikiProject for that. It's at User:Quantum4/Wikiproject Apple Inc., although it looks like it hasn't been active in a long time. (We keep WikiProjects in userspace on this wiki.) Just be aware that WikiProjects are unofficial on this Wikipedia. Some of the differences here are:

• WikiProjects are maintained in userspace (as mentioned above).
• We do not use categories for individual WikiProjects. There is Category:WikiProjects for the project pages and Category:WikiProject user templates for WikiProject user templates.
• We do not use categories for WikiProject participants. Participants can be listed on individual project pages.
• We do not use WikiProject banners on article talk pages.

Feel free to ask if you have any questions. --Auntof6 (talk) 23:50, 10 January 2016 (UTC)

Redirects

Does Simple Wikipedia allow redirects for misspellings of article names? Bossanoven has made a lot for Michael Jordan and other articles. //nepaxt 20:20, 12 January 2016 (UTC)

The short answer is "yes". It is preferable they should be based on reality rather than fantasy (based on mis-spellings which do occur, or which might reasonably occur). The cost of redirects is not significant, as far as I know. Macdonald-ross (talk) 20:48, 12 January 2016 (UTC)

Yes, just don't go overboard creating them. Most of the ones we have are probably from moving pages that were created with misspelled titles. You can tag this kind of redirect with {{R from misspelling}}. --Auntof6 (talk) 20:51, 12 January 2016 (UTC)

While I agree with the view that redirects are cheap, some of the redirects actually look rather implausible to me. Also want to add on that, in line with EN, redirects which interfere in the search box autocomplete with other legitimate articles (non-redirects) may be discussed for deletion. Chenzw  Talk  23:26, 12 January 2016 (UTC)

Thanks all for the clarification! //nepaxt 21:37, 14 January 2016 (UTC)

Moving Page back per Manual of Style

Could someone please move back Safari (Web Browser) to Safari (web browser). The page was incorrectly moved. Per Manual of Style, unnecessary words aren't supposed to be capitalized. //nepaxt 22:02, 16 January 2016 (UTC)

Alrighty, pretty sure I've done that without breaking everything. We'll just need an admin to delete the old redirect as it's probably not needed.--Gordonrox24 | ^Talk 22:18, 16 January 2016 (UTC)

Redirects (main page and talk page) deleted. --Auntof6 (talk) 22:55, 16 January 2016 (UTC)

DYK again

Some people may not have seen Only's thread in early Dec about this issue, but there has been another recent update to T:DYK, which is also problematic:

• Of the 5 hooks featured in this update, 3 hooks have used the same source (Buzzfeed), which is not even a reliable source in itself. Furthermore, the references are not even formatted properly. Since that particular Buzzfeed article has linked to other RS, the other RS should be cited instead.
• Hook 1 is inaccurate; the correct name of the gene is "happyhour" (all lowercase, without spaces).
• Hook 3 is inaccurate; Psycho was the first motion picture to feature a toilet being flushed (as stated in source).
• I am not 100% sure of this, but hook 5 may have an issue with grammar. Perhaps it should be worded "the slowest speed light ever recorded moving was at is 38 mph?"

Again, there is a major problem with DYK being maintained on a user page with almost zero peer review in the process. Page history on Template talk:Did you know and User:TDKR Chicago 101 suggests that the DYK process has been held on TDKR's user page since early August this year. DYK content goes on the Main Page; we should not be allowing such a slipshod workflow.

I did not revert this update, but have full-protected T:DYK for now. This protection will expire automatically after 2 weeks (someone will need to restore it back to semi-protection), although I hope we can come to an understanding here before then. Chenzw  Talk  08:21, 30 December 2015 (UTC)

Agree that this is an issue. I usually don't stop on the home page when loading Simple but, yes, these inaccuracies do matter. Etamni | ✉ | ✓  08:37, 30 December 2015 (UTC)

Firstly, the DYK used to be supervised better, and secondly, many would-be editors do not write simple sentences in active voice. I have edited the source page to read "The slowest light ever recorded moved at 38 mph". Macdonald-ross (talk) 16:32, 30 December 2015 (UTC)

Pff. Am I reading this right; hooks go Template talk:Did you know →‎ User:TDKR Chicago 101 →‎ Template:Did you know? Or am I seeing things? Osiris (talk) 03:56, 31 December 2015 (UTC)

I think they skip T:TDYK already. I mentioned on TDKR's user talk - I don't wish to see DYK going away either, but this is a small wiki (seems to be getting smaller in recent months) and we should not be rushing around with some deadline to get things done and push out work that is not up to previous standards. Also, I note that there was not much attempt to contact other editors to help out (with DYK). Chenzw  Talk  04:00, 31 December 2015 (UTC)

You're not kidding. The latest revision to TTDYK is an unreviewed hook being moved to the "queue". Osiris (talk) 04:06, 31 December 2015 (UTC)

• I'd like to apologize for my disruptive edits towards the DYK community. I didn't mean to cause any harm to the Wikipedia. My main goal is to improve not ruin it. I just didn't want the DYK to go dead. I thought as the only one, well I thought as the only one it was up to me to manage DYK. It was against it's rules and I understand it now. I just enjoyed updating it though. I don't know why but it'd get excited every time it'd see something interesting and think "It'd be nice for the DYK". I felt like I actually accomplished something that the community can see and be proud of. But that's not an excuse. I know I may have pissed some you users off and I'm sorry. This will never happen again. I've thought about it. I'll be retiring sometime next year, maybe summer 2016. I leave this duty due to too much tasks at hand in life, trying to achieve more things and further more to prevent causing more problems. Instead of helping it I've been a bother. This feeling has been developing a lot overtime and I'm not sure if there's a guideline about not nagging for so much so I leave with an apology. I'm sorry you guys/girls. --TDKR Chicago 101 (talk) 04:21, 31 December 2015 (UTC)

┌────────────────┘
It's not that bad, TDKR. I don't think you've been disruptive (I haven't been here in a while, but it looks like you've been keeping DYK alive pretty much single-handedly). It is kind of a shame that DYK doesn't get more traffic, so I sympathise. I don't really know what the answer is, but proposing, reviewing, queuing and then posting your own hooks on the main page is probably not it. If DYK is still anything like what it was when I left, then I'd sooner see it turned into a yearly or twice-yearly activity. Like a variation of that Big Weekend thing, where it's like one week every year or every six months or something, people sign up to focus on filling the DYK queues. Then space out the updates to last us to the next one. People used to get really into the Big Weekends. There was an incentive to edit, it was community-building and all that. And there'd be a bunch of editors involved all at once so the quality would be so much better than what we've got at the moment, which is pretty much just one editor proposing hooks that have issues but never get reviewed. Osiris (talk) 04:35, 31 December 2015 (UTC)

I would like to apologise to to TDKR Chicago 101 for not giving him the support needed to keep DYK going. The complaints about a few errors should be directed at the whole community, not TDKR. I think he has done a great job maintaining this feature of our Wikipedia, with little, if any support from the rest of us. We should be looking for solutions to assist TDKR in keeping the page going, not searching for errors in what he has done. So, TDKR, keep up the good work, and for the rest of us (me included), lets get behind him and make it work.--Peterdownunder (talk) 22:13, 1 January 2016 (UTC)

Do you have suggestions for how to make that work and have a better process? It seems that there isn't a community desire to work with DYK. How do we make users want to do it and want to contribute? Only (talk) 22:45, 1 January 2016 (UTC)

• Thanks everyone. I'll do everything that I can to work with the community in keeping the DYK community alive and working. I remember awhile ago there was a week devoted to creating rivers around the world. I was a new user and I was excited. Maybe like a big weekend event to DYK. I don't know that's the best that I can think of at this moment. In the English Wikipedia they have users solely dedicated to reviewing hooks and updating it, but the problem is there's no one nominating. Plus the DYK is not the biggest thing, there are other things. --TDKR Chicago 101 (talk) 23:02, 1 January 2016 (UTC)

For the time being, I have tried to restart the whole editorial process by sending a few problematic hooks from queue 1 back to the nomination page. Chenzw  Talk  14:51, 3 January 2016 (UTC)

Is there any reason why we can't recycle some hooks from three or more years back (assuming that they are updated and checked)?--Peterdownunder (talk) 05:21, 4 January 2016 (UTC)

And again?

While loading the page, I see the "Happy Hour" vs. "happyhour" discrepancy, and others, are still showing up in the DYK. I think we just need to recruit some Wiki-gnomes from EnWiki to help with this.... Etamni | ✉ | ✓  19:34, 10 January 2016 (UTC)

I'd be happy to help if someone would be willing to give me a little explanation on what needs to be done with DYK in general. I like to do behind the scenes work. --Lithorien (talk) 01:11, 15 January 2016 (UTC)

@Lithorien: At the moment, pretty much every item in the queues could use a check for verifiability. Osiris (talk) 10:58, 16 January 2016 (UTC)

I'm concerned that despite this conversation, the queues still seem to exist at/are being updated on a user page and not on our centralized areas. Can we address that? Only (talk) 17:53, 16 January 2016 (UTC)

@TDKR Chicago 101: Would you please move the queues right away to a non-user location? I suggest putting them in a subpage of the DYK talk page. Thanks. --Auntof6 (talk) 18:11, 16 January 2016 (UTC)

@Auntof6: I've moved them to the Hold on section for review and comments. --TDKR Chicago 101 (talk) 20:32, 16 January 2016 (UTC)

I have just finished reviewing queue 1 in the Hold section, and have opted to move the problematic hooks back to nomination. If anyone else uses the same approach (moving back to nominations), please remember to state the original queue which the hook came from. Chenzw  Talk  02:23, 17 January 2016 (UTC)

::::@Chenzw: Have you gone through the actual queues as well at Template:Did_you_know/Queue, or just the queues of the holding area? Only (talk) 19:52, 17 January 2016 (UTC)

I've now gone through the 6 queues and removed bad hooks. Only (talk) 21:20, 17 January 2016 (UTC)

There are now 20+ hooks pending on T:TDYK. In the interest of moving this forward, may I suggest that we give each hook/article 3 days to be fixed before we fail them and tag them with {{DYKno}}? Chenzw  Talk  02:33, 18 January 2016 (UTC)

Helping Wikipedia

Can anyone give me tips to Helping Wikipedia? PokestarFan (talk) 23:04, 17 January 2016 (UTC)

Take a look at this page. Ipadguy (talk) 23:07, 17 January 2016 (UTC)

Starting an article

If you can start a page with VisualEditor, than why does it make you start a page in the "Change Source" Option? Could you change this? PokestarFan (talk) 23:11, 17 January 2016 (UTC)

No, unfortunately we can not change that as it is within the Mediawiki software. Ipadguy (talk) 23:13, 17 January 2016 (UTC)

2016 WMF Strategy consultation

Please help translate to your language

Hello, all.

The Wikimedia Foundation (WMF) has launched a consultation to help create and prioritize WMF strategy beginning July 2016 and for the 12 to 24 months thereafter. This consultation will be open, on Meta, from 18 January to 26 February, after which the Foundation will also use these ideas to help inform its Annual Plan. (More on our timeline can be found on that Meta page.)

Your input is welcome (and greatly desired) at the Meta discussion, 2016 Strategy/Community consultation.

Apologies for English, where this is posted on a non-English project. We thought it was more important to get the consultation translated as much as possible, and good headway has been made there in some languages. There is still much to do, however! We created m:2016 Strategy/Translations to try to help coordinate what needs translation and what progress is being made. :)

If you have questions, please reach out to me on my talk page or on the strategy consultation's talk page or by email to mdennis@wikimedia.org.

I hope you'll join us! Maggie Dennis via MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 19:06, 18 January 2016 (UTC)

Support Symbol Issue.

Hi

I've come across a problem that has me stumped. I first saw this on the page Who Framed Roger Rabbit, however it also applies to every page that uses Template:Disney theatrical animated features. All of the pages have the Symbol support vote.svg icon at the top right of the page, which could cause confusion between these articles and our Good Articles. I tried to dig through what may be causing this, and I thought it might have been an issue with Template:Icon. I made a change, and that didn't seem to help. Can anybody else figure out what may be causing this? --Gordonrox24 | ^Talk 20:02, 17 January 2016 (UTC)

I discovered that when you remove both of the entries at the bottom which start with "icon", the icon at the top disappears. So I suppost that is the source of the problem. Macdonald-ross (talk) 20:51, 17 January 2016 (UTC)

I have made the fixes here. Turns out that an anonymous editor was copy-pasting the template from EN, and that {{icon}} on this wiki does not work in the same way as {{icon}} on EN. Another reason we should be looking out for those editors who have a tendency to copy everything from EN without further processing. Chenzw  Talk  02:44, 18 January 2016 (UTC)

Thanks Chenzw, that was driving me crazy! --Gordonrox24 | ^Talk 00:16, 19 January 2016 (UTC)

Fair use clarification

On EnWiki, so-called "fair use" images are not permitted in userboxes. There does not seem to be a specific policy or guideline on this project that specifies the same thing (even though our overall image-use policy is more strict than EnWiki). I understand that when we don't have a policy that covers a particular situation, we defer to the EnWiki policy -- at least for guidance -- but I am wondering if I have simply overlooked a local policy that covers this. Etamni | ✉ | ✓  07:57, 19 January 2016 (UTC)

We do not have this facility. The facility needs a lot of detailed supervision, and we can't manage that on our small wiki. So we don't use fair-use images anywhere on the wiki. It would be just as much a copyright problem for images on a userpage. Macdonald-ross (talk) 08:45, 19 January 2016 (UTC)

Let me back up and rephrase the question.... I understand that they are not permitted. The question is whether or not we have a specific policy -- that is, a specific reference to something that starts off with "WP:..." -- which can be referred to as the policy or guideline that governs the situation? Of course, since we don't use local file upload very much, this is easier to enforce here than on en-wiki, but it is possible for non-free images to exist on commons (even if they are not supposed to be there), which is why I'm asking the question. Etamni | ✉ | ✓  14:58, 19 January 2016 (UTC)

You mean a situation where a file from Commons is being used here, but the file is not free to use and hence isn't supposed to be on Commons? Our image use policy is the only policy we have on images. It assumes that, since our licensing policies match, all files on Commons are free to use here. It doesn't explicitly say that all the images used here should be free to use. So you could propose an addition to our policy wording, or just go to Commons and enforce their policy locally. Osiris (talk) 15:30, 19 January 2016 (UTC)

Linux Wikigroup

I wanted to know if there were any Linux wikigroups so I could see if I could start my own. Bandideux (talk) 17:05, 19 January 2016 (UTC)

Do you mean WikiProjects? I don't see one in our WikiProject category. You might want to read Wikipedia:WikiProject to see how we manage them here. --Auntof6 (talk) 17:25, 19 January 2016 (UTC)

Yeah, I do mean wikiproject. I would like to start one. I'll go ahead. Bandideux (talk) 17:46, 19 January 2016 (UTC)

Sounds good. When you're ready to have people join you, you could announce that here. --Auntof6 (talk) 18:33, 19 January 2016 (UTC)

Linux WikiProject

I finally made that Linux WikiProject. You can find it here. Our mission is to create or fix articles about Linux distros (distributions). Bandideux (talk) 17:23, 20 January 2016 (UTC)

Bot Requests

Where would I go to find bot requests? In the English Wikipiedia, there was a page for that. Is there a page like that here and if there is, where is it? PokestarFan (talk) 21:13, 20 January 2016 (UTC)
P.S:Ping me because I barely check this talk page. PokestarFan (talk) 21:13, 20 January 2016 (UTC)

Wikipedia_talk:Bots. Only (talk) 21:51, 20 January 2016 (UTC)

ENWIKI LINK

Why can I no longer make links to pages in the English Wikipedia? PokestarFan (talk) 22:35, 21 January 2016 (UTC)

You'd have to be more specific. We don't actually want a lot of cross-wiki links, but you should be able to make them work. How are you trying to do it, and what happens when you try? One thing that people sometimes forget is to put a colon right after the opening brackets and before the "en", like this: [[:en:Enwiki article]]. Could that be the problem? --Auntof6 (talk) 23:05, 21 January 2016 (UTC)

@Auntof6:Thanks for the tip PokestarFan (talk) 23:14, 21 January 2016 (UTC)

Template:Infobox War

Can someone elaborate on the template for Infobox War I made on my Sandbox? Also, can it be made into a template? PokestarFan (talk) 23:16, 21 January 2016 (UTC)

What kind of elaboration are you looking for? Did you know we already have Template:Infobox military conflict? We use that one for wars, among other things. --Auntof6 (talk) 23:29, 21 January 2016 (UTC)

In that case, should I merge the data? PokestarFan (talk) 23:36, 21 January 2016 (UTC)

What data? --Auntof6 (talk) 23:47, 21 January 2016 (UTC)

The data on my sandbox. PokestarFan (talk) 00:05, 22 January 2016 (UTC)

I don't see any data there. What are you thinking you would merge? If you're talking about the Infobox war/killing template, I think everything there is covered by the template we already have. --Auntof6 (talk) 00:16, 22 January 2016 (UTC)

Hello

Could you give me a patrolled stat? Thanks Arifys (talk) 22:31, 11 January 2016 (UTC)

@Arifys: Are you asking for patroller rights? If so, the place to ask for that is Wikipedia:Requests for permissions/Patroller, not here. --Auntof6 (talk) 23:28, 11 January 2016 (UTC)

The answer will probably be "no", as well. Since you've neither created nor edited any new pages here. Osiris (talk) 03:14, 12 January 2016 (UTC)

The good news is that you do not need to have patroller rights (or auto-patrolled rights) to create new pages or to edit existing pages here. You can do that now. Also, if this is not what you were asking for, you may ask again in a different way. Etamni | ✉ | ✓  04:06, 12 January 2016 (UTC)

Note: on another user's talk page I suggested that Arifys ask here the question that was posed there. It was (and still is) not clear if Arifys was asking for a specific right, or perhaps to have someone look over a particular article, or for something else, thus the suggestion to post the question here. Etamni | ✉ | ✓  04:06, 12 January 2016 (UTC)

Owh ---Arifys (talk) 08:22, 23 January 2016 (UTC)

Changes to the sockpuppet template

Previously, suspected sockpuppets (no confirmation by CU, typically means tagged due to WP:DUCK) were all placed together in Category:Suspected sockpuppets, even if the (suspected) sockmaster is known. I have edited the template so that each group of socks will have their own category (Category:Suspected sockpuppets of <sockmaster>). Based on how it seems to be done in the past (Category:Suspected sockpuppets of Looneyboy6, Category:Suspected Wikipedia sockpuppets of Farsif83) and to be consistent with {{IPsock}}, to enable easy monitoring (since these user pages will not longer belong to any blue-link category, and will no longer be browse-able in the category structure), I propose that we create Category:Suspected sockpuppets of <sockmaster>. It will be a sub-cat of both Category:Suspected sockpuppets and Category:Sockpuppets of <sockmaster>.

• Category:Suspected sockpuppets of <sockmaster> will always be categorised into Category:Suspected sockpuppets.
• If there is at least 1 member in Category:Sockpuppets of <sockmaster>
  • ...then Category:Suspected sockpuppets of <sockmaster> will also be categorised into Category:Sockpuppets of <sockmaster>, and Category:Sockpuppets of <sockmaster> created as necessary.
  • ...otherwise Category:Suspected sockpuppets of <sockmaster> will only belong to Category:Suspected sockpuppets.

I intend to use my bot account to make these edits. Likely it will be a custom script so that it can calculate the number of members in each category and also add the correct DEFAULTSORT to the individual categories. There are 700+ transclusions at the moment; assuming an average of 8 socks per sockmaster, there will be around 80+ category creations. I want to run this through the community before I make such a major change. Chenzw  Talk  03:58, 20 January 2016 (UTC)

Sounds fine to me. Osiris (talk) 04:18, 20 January 2016 (UTC)

• Y Support Does this structure take into account situations where accounts are suspected of being sockpuppets, but the master hasn't been identified yet? I'm assuming the sock-masters will be in their own category or categories as well.... Anyway, I defer to the experts on dealing with sockpuppets -- if you believe the system will work for you and help you manage sockpuppet issues, then I have no problems with it and believe that it would not negatively impact the community as a whole. To whatever extent you are requesting community approval for a bot-run to manage the change, I have no problems with that either. Etamni | ✉ | ✓  08:30, 20 January 2016 (UTC)

• Yup, it will - the template will categorise the user into Category:Suspected sockpuppets if no sockmaster is defined. And speaking of sockmasters, the template currently places them all in Category:Wikipedia sockpuppeteers. Chenzw  Talk  15:01, 20 January 2016 (UTC)

• I'd support that. StevenJ81 (talk) 14:43, 20 January 2016 (UTC)
• I too support: whatever is needed for dealing with sockmasters, puppets and their related suspects. Categorisation, bot run, however you wish to handle. I foresee no negative impact and this sounds necessary. Thanks, Fylbecatulous talk 16:44, 20 January 2016 (UTC)

┌─────────────────────────────────┘
Alright, all done. Thank you Auntof6 for helping out with most of the creations! I just let the bot sweep through the remaining cats to add them under the Confirmed category as necessary. I will be going through them again over the next few days to see if any other manual adjustments are required. Chenzw  Talk  13:43, 23 January 2016 (UTC)

You're welcome; I was just taking care of redlinked categories. There are still IPs directly under Category:Suspected sockpuppets. Will you be changing the {{IPsock}} template to use the specific categories, too? --Auntof6 (talk) 17:06, 23 January 2016 (UTC)

I am actually thinking if we should scrap that particular template. If I am not wrong, checkusers are not allowed to comment regarding any possible link (or lack of) between an IP address and a named editor. Along with the dynamic nature of most IPv4 addresses, this template may no longer be as useful as intended. A random sweep of transclusions on EN show usage of this template before 2010, and never after. While on this wiki, the template is mostly either used for self-admission (Samlaptop) or not in line with the template's intended usage (linking two or more IPs together by me, oops). Perhaps the CUs would like to comment on this. Chenzw  Talk  17:33, 23 January 2016 (UTC)

I'm not a CU, but that makes sense to me. --Auntof6 (talk) 17:39, 23 January 2016 (UTC)

MiszaBot

On my talk page, I have MiszaBot archiving set up:

{{User:MiszaBot/config
| algo    = old(7d)
| archive = User talk:PokestarFan/Archive
| maxarchivesize = 100K
}}

However, MiszaBot isn't archiving my talk page. Why? PokestarFan (talk) 22:00, 22 January 2016 (UTC)

That bot hasn't been active since April 2014. Only (talk) 22:04, 22 January 2016 (UTC)

@Only:Then what bot should I use? PokestarFan (talk) 22:19, 22 January 2016 (UTC)

User:BarrasBot seems to be the archiver of choice. I don't know though. I just do it manually. Only (talk) 22:33, 22 January 2016 (UTC)

@Only:How do I use BarrasBot? PokestarFan (talk) 22:41, 22 January 2016 (UTC)

See my previous answer...I don't know....I just do it manually. Only (talk) 22:53, 22 January 2016 (UTC)

┌─────────────────────────────────┘
@PokestarFan: you don't "use" it... you just leave the above template on your talk page and the bot will archive it for you every now and then. Results will not be immediate. Chenzw  Talk  23:45, 22 January 2016 (UTC)

 (change conflict) BarrasBot will archive using that template. I don't see a problem with it the way you have it, but I will look at the defaults some more. When did you put that code on your talk page? It might just be that nothing has qualified for archive yet based on the criteria it sees. Also, archiving only happens when the bot runs, not continuously as soon as something meets the criteria. I don't know offhand what the bot's schedule is. --Auntof6 (talk) 23:49, 22 January 2016 (UTC)

Oops, looks like I wasn't reading this properly. I suspect the bot is not archiving your talk page because you specified maxarchivesize but did not specify counter. Right now your configuration is instructing the bot to archive everything to User talk:PokestarFan/Archive, and stop archiving completely once the archive page reaches 100 KB. That may not be allowed by design. The solution is to specify your archive page as User talk:PokestarFan/Archive %(counter)d and also add a new parameter counter = 1. Thus, your new configuration should look like:

{{User:MiszaBot/config
| algo    = old(7d)
| archive = User talk:PokestarFan/Archive %(counter)d
| maxarchivesize = 100K
| counter = 1
}}

Your archives will be found at User talk:PokestarFan/Archive 1, User talk:PokestarFan/Archive 2, and so on. Also, from contribution history, it looks like the bot does archiving daily at 1900 hrs UTC. Chenzw  Talk  01:32, 23 January 2016 (UTC)

Yep, Chenzw got it correctly. The bot doesn't archive due to the used settings. A detailed introduction can be found here. -Barras talk 02:43, 23 January 2016 (UTC)

Plz rename the page title "Troll (Internet)" into "Internet troll" ?

Plz rename the page title Troll (Internet) into Internet troll ? Purposely to mirror that page title rename in the Main English Wikipedia. Thanks. SomeRandomPasserby (talk) 09:24, 23 January 2016 (UTC)

Oppose It should be kept proffesionaly. SleepyMode (talk) 14:38, 24 January 2016 (UTC)

• It is now at Troll (internet): Troll is the key noun, internet just the disambiguator. What other wikis do is up to them. Macdonald-ross (talk) 17:13, 24 January 2016 (UTC)

Category changes

Hello everyone. I was watching the new changes page, and saw a bunch of categories being edited by Allixpeeke. I know that we have special rules about categories here, and was wondering if someone more experienced could take a look at them and see if it's ok? Allixpeeke's recent changes show that he made a few changes two years ago with politically-motivated categories, took a wikibreak, and is now back doing the same thing. I thought what he was doing looked strange and wanted to clarify it here. Thank you. --Lithorien (talk) 15:39, 24 January 2016 (UTC)

Hi.  So, here's an explanation behind some of my recent edits.

I noticed that Ronald Reagan (e.g.) was categorised under Category:Conservatism, even though there is a subcategory for Category:Conservatives.  So, I initially thought I would change the categorisation.  But, upon further observation, I noticed that Reagan was already categorised under Category:American conservatives, which in turn was already categorised under Category:Conservatives, which in turn was already categorised under Category:Conservatism.  Thus, the Category:Conservatism categorisation was simply redundant, and thus I removed it.

I made a similar observation with Margaret Thatcher, who was already categorised under Category:Former Conservative MPs, which in turn was already under Category:Conservative MPs (UK), which was already under Category:British conservatives, which was already under Category:Conservatives, which, as I mentioned above, was already categorised under Category:Conservatism.  Thus, I removed that redundancy as well.

I also added Liberal conservatism to Category:Conservatism for what I believe are some fairly obvious reasons.

I added the following pages to the Category:Liberalism category: Social liberalism, Economic liberalism, Libertarianism, and Conservative liberalism.  Again, that seemed fairly obvious.

I removed Socialism from Category:Political movements and added Category:Socialism to Category:Political movements in Socialism's place.

I did the same thing with Fascism, Conservatism, Liberalism, Libertarianism, and Anarchism.

Noticing that under both Category:Anarchism and Category:Socialism, there were a number of articles about concepts promoted with the respective ideologies (e.g., Working class, Class struggle), I opted to add a few articles about concepts promoted by libertarianism to the Category:Libertarianism category as well (e.g., Free market, Abolitionism).

I made a minor edit to Margaret Keane in order to simplify a word and add a comma.

Finally, I also created two new categories, Category:Libertarians and Category:Anarcho-capitalists.

All in all, I doubt anyone will find any of these edits controversial.

Cheers,
allixpeeke (talk) 16:09, 24 January 2016 (UTC)

@Allixpeeke: thank you for the detailed explanation. I don't see anything strange in any of that. The only part I'd question is that Category:Anarcho-capitalists was created with only two entries, instead of the three we want in article categories. @Lithorien: can you be more specific about what looked strange to you? --Auntof6 (talk) 18:06, 24 January 2016 (UTC)

Allixpeeke and other readers, I was going to not comment at first, but I to some extent see some controversy here. Anarcho-capitalists and Libertarians are not mainstream and they are considered political views. The same as with religions, I do not like to see any of these categorisations added to a Biography, especially of someone living without sources or at the very least, a specific mention in the article that strictly states this is true for the person. I was first alarmed when I noticed Jimbo Wales getting added to Category:Libertarians because his article says: He also says that he is a libertarian to some extent... but does not have a source of any kind for that. I see that Justin Raimondo has been added to Category:Anarcho-capitalists but his article is a one sentence stub with only a hint that he might be 'anti-war'. Also some of the people who are not still living such as Robert A. Heinlein have been added to Libertarian without a mention of this as their view in their article here. I wish the step would be taken first before just HotCat-ing in a category, that the article could be updated to support the category and please provide a source, when it might be controversial for a living person. I am just a little prickly for supporting categories with factual content. Fylbecatulous talk 18:16, 24 January 2016 (UTC)

Auntof6, it was that I knew we had more strict rules about category creation than some other wikis combined with the two year gap in editing that Allixpeeke had. I didn't want to assume bad faith and go, "Oh, that's vandalism," so I thought I'd ask here. That's all. --Lithorien (talk) 18:26, 24 January 2016 (UTC)

I was going to add but got in edit conflict..so I am adding that instead of being as described above, the ones I mention were not changing a parent category to a sub-category; they are adding freshly to an article this political concept. Thanks, Fylbecatulous talk 18:29, 24 January 2016 (UTC)

Fylbecatulous, with regards to the categorisations you mentioned, I was relying on the [standard] English Wikipedia's categorisations.  E.g., I hardly know anything about Jimmy Wales, but since en:Jimmy Wales is categorised under en:Category:American libertarians, I figured they probably did all the requisite research there to make and verify that determination.  If it turns out that any of the categorisations I made were in error, please accept that they were nevertheless in good faith.  Repectfully yours,
allixpeeke (talk) 18:35, 24 January 2016 (UTC)

In that case, Fylbecatulous, I agree with you. My comments were based on Allixpeeke's description, which didn't mention adding new cats to articles. @Allixpeeke: any category added to an article should be supported in the text. If the category is about anything that is personal or potentially controversial (for example, categories related to politics, criminal acts, sexual orientation, or religion), then it should not only be in the text, it should also have a good reference. It is not enough for it to be supported on English Wikipedia; it must also be supported here. --Auntof6 (talk) 18:46, 24 January 2016 (UTC)

Auntof6, you write, "My comments were based on Allixpeeke's description, which didn't mention adding new cats to articles."  I said I created two new categories.  I did not mean to imply that I created these categories and then just left them empty.  An empty category would likely be quickly deleted, rendering the creation of said category a waste of time.  Although it's true that I did not technically 'mention' that I added pages to Category:Libertarians or to Category:Anarcho-capitalists, I did believe it was implied by the fact that I bothered to create them.  I'm sorry I was not more clear in my description above.  Sincerely yours, allixpeeke (talk) 19:15, 24 January 2016 (UTC)

Categories can be populated with other categories, not just articles. The issue comes when people are put into the categories. At the time I wrote that, I hadn't looked at the categories to see what was in them. --Auntof6 (talk) 23:33, 24 January 2016 (UTC)

┌─────────────────────────────────┘
@Allixpeeke:Thank you for the explanation that made my mind spin. Next time, just use "category conflict". It's simple. PokestarFan (talk) 23:49, 24 January 2016 (UTC)

AWB

Where can I request for permission for en:WP:AWB? — This unsigned comment was added by PokestarFan (talk • changes).

Wikipedia talk:AutoWikiBrowser/CheckPage. Only (talk) 00:55, 25 January 2016 (UTC)

Harassment consultation

Please help translate to your language

The Community Advocacy team the Wikimedia Foundation has opened a consultation on the topic of harassment on Meta. The consultation period is intended to run for one month from today, November 16, and end on December 17. Please share your thoughts there on harassment-related issues facing our communities and potential solutions. (Note: this consultation is not intended to evaluate specific cases of harassment, but rather to discuss the problem of harassment itself.)

• Harassment consultation 2015

Regards, Community Advocacy, Wikimedia Foundation

What does it take to get this section/topic archived? Etamni | ✉ | ✓  16:25, 29 January 2016 (UTC)

A proper date and time in a signature. Now that there is one (in your post, and mine), it will get archived in time. --Auntof6 (talk) 16:43, 29 January 2016 (UTC)

:) Yep! Etamni | ✉ | ✓  16:44, 29 January 2016 (UTC)

School project coming soon

Just a note that there will be a school project Monday, February 22, 2016 from 4:00pm-6:00pm UTC. This will be the fourth such project coordinated by Castilibrary. I will be acting as ambassador for the project, so if there are any problems, queries etc., please direct them to either Castilibrary or myself. I will post further information as soon as it is available.--Peterdownunder (talk) 11:03, 29 January 2016 (UTC)

Here is last year's project Wikipedia:Schools/Projects/Notable Female Authors for those who are curious about the quality and usefulness of the project.--Peterdownunder (talk) 11:07, 29 January 2016 (UTC)

Since this section will get archived before then, would you give us a reminder closer to that date? --Auntof6 (talk) 16:13, 29 January 2016 (UTC)

I will post a reminder, and direct editors to the project page when it is created.--Peterdownunder (talk) 11:35, 30 January 2016 (UTC)

Copying

Can we copy info from other Wikipedias, such as the English Wikipedia? PokestarFan (talk) 21:30, 29 January 2016 (UTC)

Yes, but you have to put the text in Simple English. And, you have to attribute the original source. //nepaxt 22:11, 29 January 2016 (UTC)

There's some good information on how to do this at Wikipedia:How to copy from another Wikipedia. If you happen to copy from a non-English Wikipedia, never use an automated translation without checking it over -- automated translations are notoriously poor. --Auntof6 (talk) 23:47, 29 January 2016 (UTC)

Fox tail as energy store

The fox article says that a fox's tail is a "food store for wintertime". Something like a camel's hump storing water? I'm pretty sure that is nonsense, but the article is protected so I can't remove it. 94.12.81.251 (talk) 14:38, 1 February 2016 (UTC)

It was added a few years ago. Macdonald-ross, are you able to find a source for it? Google has a very low signal-to-noise ratio for anything related to a fox and its tail. Chenzw  Talk  15:49, 1 February 2016 (UTC)

Well, our page is really about the genus Vulpes of which there are 11 species. No matter how northern they are, none of them hibernates. Instead, they continue to catch prey, but at a much diminished rate in winter. They do add fat (and longer fur) in winter. Is it disproportionately added to the tail? So far, I do not see a relevant ciation. Our photo of the Arctic fox certainly looks like it is carrying round a pretty hefty tail. I think the wording on the Fox page is now defensible. Macdonald-ross (talk) 19:18, 1 February 2016 (UTC)

Weird error or phishing attempt on Wikipedia

When I click on the link to my userpage right now, I am getting an error message that starts at the top with "Wikimedia Foundation" followed by a claim that the servers are having a technical problem, a statement that there may be more info available on IRC, followed by a donation request. The same message is repeated in multiple languages. At the very bottom is a "PHP Fatal Error" message. I suspect it's not what it seems. The URL is correct, but something is fishy. Especially when I can search for my declared alt account ("Etamni-m" which redirects to my main user page) and it takes me right there without any error message. (And on the off-chance that the message is legitimate, the foundation really needs to rethink the donation request on the error page as this makes the message look like something a social engineer (i.e. a scam artist) would have written.) Etamni | ✉ | ✓  18:07, 1 February 2016 (UTC)

Are you still getting the error? I accessed your user page just now with no problems, so it could have been a temporary glitch. The donation request on the error page issue is best brought up at Meta: m:Requests for comment probably. I personally didn't know that WMF now appeals for donations on the server error page. Chenzw  Talk  00:41, 2 February 2016 (UTC)

I was not home to try accessing the account again until now, but all seems to be working correctly. If it happens again, I'll screenshot the message and then test what happens when I log in via my mobile account. Etamni | ✉ | ✓  08:41, 2 February 2016 (UTC)

Template:Cite magazine

On EnWiki, there is a template with the name "Cite magazine" which does not seem to exist here (the blue link here takes you to the template on EnWiki). I was working on an article (Flexagon) which has citations that rely on this template on EnWiki. Rather than reformat the citations, I think it would be a good idea to bring that template over to Simple. It uses Lua modules which I am not as familiar with as regular templates, so rather than boldly creating the template here, I thought it best to discuss first. Etamni | ✉ | ✓  20:58, 31 January 2016 (UTC)

@Etamni: You can create it as a redirect it to {{Cite journal}} and it should work fine. I can't really tell from the module what exactly changed, but up until Lua was implemented, the template on enwiki was just a redirect. Osiris (talk) 08:51, 4 February 2016 (UTC)

@Osiris: Done. And it seems to have worked. Thanks. Etamni | ✉ | ✓  09:08, 4 February 2016 (UTC)

Definitions of 'Property'

I could use some help at Talk:Material property from sciencey editors. Osiris (talk) 03:51, 6 February 2016 (UTC)

Block 69.115.75.25

Can we blcok the IP "69.115.75.25" for 1 week for copying articles from EN wikipedia without simplyfing them? Thanks, PokestarFan (talk) 04:08, 6 February 2016 (UTC)

@69.115.75.25:Note:Pinging user

This IP has already been blocked. Please report such cases to WP:VIP in future. Also, why would you ask for a block after you have already warned the IP, and the IP has not edited any more after your warnings? Chenzw  Talk  04:15, 6 February 2016 (UTC)

Besides that, we usually wouldn't block for a week for a first-time block. When you report a user who might get blocked, leave it to the admins to decide how long the block should be. --Auntof6 (talk) 18:37, 6 February 2016 (UTC)

Ok

As another mention related to this; IP users cannot be notified by ping. Notifications are for registered users of Wikipedia and other MediaWiki sites (those with usernames). (See en:WP:PING, the FAQ page). We have the {{Talkback}} template, which I used here: [[2]], for example to talk to an IP about content on another page they might not see. Fylbecatulous talk 22:01, 6 February 2016 (UTC)

Special Page request

I want to request a special page(Special:IPChanges because most vandalism comes from ips. It will log only IP changes. PokestarFan (talk) 19:44, 6 February 2016 (UTC)

What's wrong with Special:RecentChanges? --Lithorien (talk) 19:46, 6 February 2016 (UTC)

Yes. Just go to the new changes page (which Lithorien linked above) and click on the option to hide registered users. I don't think we can create new special pages: they're determined by the software. --Auntof6 (talk) 19:55, 6 February 2016 (UTC)

New MediaWiki feature: Catwatch

This new option lets you see when something is added to or removed from a category. (Previously, putting a category in your watchlist only told you if someone changed the category page.) You activate it separately for the "new changes" page and for your watchlist.

To activate this new feature, go to your settings (the tab at the top of the page), to the tabs for "New changes" and "Watchlist". The option is "Hide categorization of pages". It defaults to off (meaning things will work as they always have). To activate the new feature, uncheck the check box on either or both tabs. There's also a new option on the new changes and watchlist pages to show or hide page categorization: I think you have to have unchecked the relevant checkbox on the preferences tabs for those to have any effect.

So try it out and see what you think. Just be aware that if you pick a category that gets a lot of activity, you might flood your watchlist. And please don't add things to categories just to test this. You could test by adding Category:Stubs to your watchlist: you should see a few changes that were made in the last hour.

There's some documentation and examples of what it looks like at https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Manual:CategoryMembershipChanges. --Auntof6 (talk) 10:21, 6 February 2016 (UTC)

A couple of good uses I've found for this:

• Want to know when there are new requests for deletion that you might want to comment on? Add Category:Current requests for deletion to your watchlist, and you can see when new RfDs appear.
• Admins: if you want an additional way to know when there are certain admin tasks to take care of? Add Category:Quick deletion requests and Category:Requests for unblock to your watchlist. There are probably other categories like this, too.

Yes, we already have places to find all these, but you might see them sooner this way. It's just one more tool. --Auntof6 (talk) 20:57, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

QD log

Hi, how does one create a Quick Deletion nominations log? Thanks, Rubbish computer (HALP!: I dropped the bass?) 16:15, 8 February 2016 (UTC)

It's a Twinkle option -- when activated, it's populated when you use Twinkle to request a QD. Go to the quick deletion section at Wikipedia:Twinkle/Preferences and check the checkbox for "Keep a log in userspace of all QD nominations". --Auntof6 (talk) 16:35, 8 February 2016 (UTC)

@Auntof6: Thanks! --Rubbish computer (HALP!: I dropped the bass?) 16:52, 8 February 2016 (UTC)