Wikipedia:Help desk/Archives/2024 September 26

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September 26

C. Lloyd Morgan

References number 3 and 6 are in red - they are journals I think so I don't know what I have done wrong. Please fix if able. Thanks 2001:4479:4F03:7700:6985:18B7:638D:D873 (talk) 00:10, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

As the message in red says, for {{Cite Journal}} you need to add "|journal=" along with the name of the Journal. If they are not journals, you need to use a different template. RudolfRed (talk) 00:36, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

I have tried - but the word "Journal" is already there - I find this very hard. Sorry. Thanks regardless for your patience. 2001:4479:4F03:7700:6985:18B7:638D:D873 (talk) 01:24, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

Journals have names. If you use Template: Cite journal, then you must provide the name of the journal, or you get an error message. If the publications are not journals, then use another template. Cullen328 (talk) 01:29, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

One of these references is for the sentence "[The article subject's] son, C. Lloyd Morgan, attended Clifton College, Bristol in the 1890s alongside R.N. Middleton." Why is the reader being told which school somebody's son went to? What's significant about having had this Middleton fellow alongside you when you went to school? ("R.N. Middleton" is linked to Middleton family, but to no particular place within the latter, perhaps because it doesn't mention him.) -- Hoary (talk) 06:11, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

Hoary, I think R.N. Middleton is (Richard) Noël Middleton (1878–1951), who is mentioned in Middleton family (I searched for Clifton in the article). TSventon (talk) 01:22, 27 September 2024 (UTC)

Perhaps indeed so, TSventon. But I think my main objection stands. Depending on the meaning of "alongside", I would have had from a score to several hundred pupils "alongside" me when I was at a secondary school. I doubt that I even knew the names of more than a couple of dozen of them, and also doubt that I was influenced by, or that I influenced, more than half a dozen. If my father were the subject of an article here (he isn't), I wouldn't understand why anything about my schooling appeared in that article. (Yes, yes, of course there could be reasons: e.g. my father publicly espoused equal opportunities for all but covertly had me educated privately.) (Update: Orangemike deleted this from the article -- whereupon 175.38.37.197 reinserted much of it.) -- Hoary (talk) 03:47, 27 September 2024 (UTC)

Yeah, they dragged the Middleton trivia back into the article. I removed that, as well as a fluffy self-published source which described Morgan as having give "a fascinating lecture" somewhere. --Orange Mike | Talk 11:41, 28 September 2024 (UTC)

C. Lloyd Morgan

Refs 3 and 4 are all wrong - please fix if you can. Thank you, 175.38.37.197 (talk) 09:53, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

Have you not read the responses to your thread posted above, a few hours ago? Qcne (talk) 09:57, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

@Qcne: This is most likely Srbernadette, who is usually logged out while editing and asks at the help desk semi-frequently whenever they make the mistake of not adding |journal= when using {{cite journal}}, or when they accidentally add an extra 0 to the date and it throws an error as a result. This has been going on for years; searching for Lupton, Martineau (added 01:14, 27 September 2024 (UTC)) or Middleton in the help desk archives should give you an idea of how long this has been going on (added 01:14, 27 September 2024 (UTC)). —Tenryuu 🐲 ( 💬 • 📝 ) 13:05, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

The second support at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/IncidentArchive993 § Srbernadette topic ban from HD and indefinite block proposal (2018) summarises our frequent customer here finely: nothing but good intentions but a completely baffling incapacity for learning even the simplest fixes for their constant errors.

I've helped fix their mistakes before, and probably will again, but it is a matter of public record that all attempts to educate this editor on basic template syntax have been proven by ordeal to be strictly ineffectual. Folly Mox (talk) 04:29, 27 September 2024 (UTC)

Need guidance

Where can I report a user with promotional username and spam linking to administrators... Vestrian24Bio (TALK) 02:51, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

Perhaps Wikipedia:Usernames for administrator attention, Vestrian24Bio, but be sure to read the small print at the top of that page before posting. -- Hoary (talk) 05:59, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

Got it, thanks! Vestrian24Bio (TALK) 09:32, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

Manual of Style for "notable people" lists

Can someone help me sus out if there is any established Manual of Style or guidelines for lists of "notable people" within articles? I'm specifically looking at Chinese people in Korea#Notable people. Would this fall under the scope of WP:APO/S, or does that standard strictly concern given name/surname list articles?

At present, the list looks a mess and is extremely hard to read.

If it falls under WP:APO/S I think it'll be fairly straightforward to strip out all the mess and bring it in line with that standard.

If it's not under WP:APO/S, my main questions would be:

• Should entries on the list who do not have their own Wikipedia article be removed? I'd assume if they don't meet WP:NOTABILITY, they're not qualified for a "notable people" list...
• What's going on with the "(Originally from)" parts? I haven't seen that in any other "notable people" list.
• Specifically for the band members section, when one band has multiple members that would be included in the list, should they each have their own entry in the list? Right now everything listed per group, not per person.

Feel free to direct me elsewhere if there might be a better place for this discussion. RachelTensions (talk) 02:56, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

It does seem to fall under WP:APO/S, so feel free to make the changes. If another editor oppose to or revert your changes, then hold a discussion at the associated talk page. Tutwakhamoe (talk) 12:47, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

I think that the guidance you need is at MOS:LIST. The title section of APO/S shows it is about articles about surnames or given names or both. TSventon (talk) 13:03, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

I was reading MOS:LIST but I didn't see anything relating to standards for lists of people so I thought APO/S might be the closet thing we have. RachelTensions (talk) 13:11, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

Are you looking for WP:LISTCRITERIA? It is linked from MOS:LIST. TSventon (talk) 13:16, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

That helps, thanks! RachelTensions (talk) 13:18, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

Two articles on the same person

I've encountered this situation before, but it's been so long I don't exactly remember where to go. I am 100% certain that Dan Robinson (American football) and Dan Robinson (politician) are articles about the same guy. Rusted AutoParts 03:28, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

@Rusted AutoParts: I agree sources say they are the same person. You could follow the process at WP:MERGETEXT or just tag them as at WP:MERGEPROP. TSventon (talk) 03:48, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

@Jweiss11: Dan Robinson (politician) was created in 2006 and you created Dan Robinson (American football) in 2019. Would you be interested in merging your article into the older article? The 2022 obituaries in each article confirm that the politician and the American footballer are the same man. TSventon (talk) 12:23, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

TSventon, thanks for the heads up here. I went ahead and merged the two articles. Jweiss11 (talk) 20:46, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

Thank you Jweiss11, @Rusted AutoParts: now sorted. TSventon (talk) 20:55, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

Thanks much, I intended to come back and begin the merge proposal but I got waylaid. Thanks @TSventon: for spearheading this. Rusted AutoParts 21:10, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

@Rusted AutoParts: I hoped that Jweiss11 would be interested in doing the merge as they had written one of the articles and they were. One loose end was that the Wikidata items needed to be merged, but there were two bot translated ar Wikipedia articles. I asked an editor there and they merged the articles and Wikidata items. TSventon (talk) 22:37, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

Wikipedia project pages for requesting the splitting or merging of templates and modules

Which Wikipedia project pages can users like me go to, to request the splitting or merging of templates and modules, WP:TFD, or WP:SPLIT and WP:MERGE? PK2 (talk; contributions) 03:44, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

Usually you can go to the wikiproject that is relevant to the topic of the templates or modules. There is also WP:WPT, but from its talk page it doesn't seem to be very active. Tutwakhamoe (talk) 12:52, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

Can you comment on an RfC you started?

So, RfCs have to neutrally worded, unlike RM, AfD, etc. But, after you've posed the neutrally worded question, can you reply to your question with a response? Making it obvious that this is a response to the question (just by putting it in the normal format, i.e. "Support X because Y" on an indented line) </MarkiPoli> <talk /><cont /> 07:03, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

@MarkiPoli Absolutely. Like you say, the question needs to be neutral, but in the discussion itself, you can have opinions. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 09:40, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

How to criticize a Wikiproject?

I've been annoyed by the WikiProject for where I live: Kuwait. Why? Because no efforts were made to fix tons of misinformation, stub articles and outdated information about Kuwait. Other than vandalising, how do I criticize the Wikiproject mentioned? FSlolhehe (talk) 14:11, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

I suggest that you be bold and either join the project and / or fix the articles yourself. Let other editors know where help is needed the most, but don't make any personal attacks, and remember, there is no deadline for you or anybody else to edit Wikipedia. Also, it'd probably be wise if you didn't suggest your intentions to vandalize Wikipedia if nobody else fixes the articles. GeorgeMemulous (talk) 14:21, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

@FSlolhehe: Editors are volunteers. They are judged by what they do, not what they haven't done. WikiProject Kuwait is just a few volunteers who have added their name to the member list. It doesn't make them responsible for the state of articles about Kuwait, and anyone can edit those articles. PrimeHunter (talk) 14:30, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

(edit conflict), WP:KW is tagged as semi-active, it may actually be inactive. As suggested at WP:INACTIVEWP you could post on its talk page asking if anyone minds marking it as inactive. If there are no objections, you could then add inactive to the {{WikiProject status}} template at the top of the WikiProject page. Generally on WP, people edit articles they are interested in, so if nobody is interested, poor quality articles do not get improved. TSventon (talk) 14:28, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

Is there a way to grab whether a user is using dark mode or not?

For the purposes of a template. Just curious. Thanks in advance! Cessaune [talk] 14:16, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

Cessaune, I feel like I read somewhere that no there's no way to see another editor's preferences, but I can't remember where I read it, when, or what the context would have been. A naive search of VPT's archives came up useless.

It does seem to me that if this were possible, we probably would have had pallette switching templates for two and a half years already – when the community Dark mode gadget was first deployed – and not be all amess about fixing background colours now that an official extension is available. Folly Mox (talk) 22:27, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

Yikes. There's not even a WMF-supported way to do this? Cessaune [talk] 02:03, 27 September 2024 (UTC)

Well, there's clearly a way for the software to retrieve a user's preferences, since they usually work, and are displayed in Special:Preferences when logged in (specifically, this seems to be :mw:ResourceLoader/Core modules § user.options).

But very few of these are open to read access by other users. Gender is one, which is accessed by user templates such as {{their}} via the magic word {{GENDER}}. Whether or not you're accessing the website via the mobile frontend isn't really a preference per se, but {{if mobile}} works via <span> tags with class=mobile or class=nomobile attributes that the software interprets, rather than surfacing the user's browser type directly.

I see people asking each other which skin they're using all the time on VPT, and I'm aware that there's no way to check whether a user has enabled Special:Homepage, per this recent thread. It seems that preferences are mostly inaccessible except through specific developer-implemented endpoints.

That said, the 2022 community dark mode gadget functions by inverting the colour palette, and the class .mw-no-invert will prevent this to ensure intended colour contrast. The 2024 dark mode extension uses a separate pallette (see Wikipedia:Village pump (technical)/Archive 213 § Dark mode for logged-out users coming soon!).

mw:Recommendations for night mode compatibility on Wikimedia wikis might have a solution for your template's use case. Folly Mox (talk) 10:08, 27 September 2024 (UTC)

I need someone to find me a source cus i cant find any

Im need someone to get a source about the civil parish abolishment of Eastcotts because im trying to update the cardington page because it still says the raf is in eastcotts 94.194.31.200 (talk) 17:34, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

I think you might have better luck asking at the Talk page for the article that you're hoping to edit. At least, you'll have better odds of finding other editors who are specifically interested in that topic. Other editors might chime in here with different suggestions. Good luck! DonIago (talk) 17:51, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

94, if no one here has a source for you, you might try asking at WP:RD/H, which is more suited to requests for research assistance. Folly Mox (talk) 17:51, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

Although, refs 2 and 3 at Eastcotts seem to support the 1 April 2019 date. Folly Mox (talk) 17:55, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

Ok ill try that 94.194.31.200 (talk) 17:59, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

Courtesy links: Cardington Airfield (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) (permalink) Rotideypoc41352 (talk · contribs) 18:00, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

Requesting repeal of blacklisted title

Cary Huang, co-creator of 2010's The Scale of the Universe, redirects to the latter on WP. However, the two brothers themselves--Cary and Michael Huang--do not; page creation is blocked by the title blacklist. About to file an appeal for redirect creation as soon as I'm told where to do so. (Via WP:BFDI--h/t WP:Deletion review/Perennial requests [h/t WP:Miscellany for deletion/Draft:K. Annamalai].) --Slgrandson (How's my egg-throwing coleslaw?) 20:08, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

You can make a request at WP:ANB or WP:RFED. You might want to provide sources that show the brothers are notable together to get a better chance of getting approved. Tutwakhamoe (talk) 20:27, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

I did it. LilianaUwU ^{(talk / contributions)} 02:28, 27 September 2024 (UTC)

Need help regarding editing info box of D9-Caffeine

Hey everyone. The d9-Caffeine article that I submitted through AFC was accepted about a month. Another editor created the infobox, As I didn't know how to. The issue is as follows

There are a few things I have spotted in the infobox, that are either not working or wrong. As a new editor I don't know how can I change them, I tried but errors keep popping up. Hence, the cry for help.

1. The linked CAS Number leads to a webpage (https://commonchemistry.cas.org/detail?cas_rn=72238-85-8) which doesn't contain it. On the other hand, the webpage linked to PubChem (https://pubchem.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/compound/13001304) contains CAS number, So if that's something that should be changed.

2. The formula in the infobox is also something to look into... the formula should contain "D", instead of "H", as its a deuterium based compound. I read at Chemspider (https://www.chemspider.com/Chemical-Structure.23935581.html) that the formula is C8HD9N4O2, it contain 1 Hydrogen and 9 deuterium.

3. Subsequently, the molar mass would be 203.25g·mol−1, instead of 194.194 g·mol−1, as deuterium is heavier than the hydrogen. As a reference (https://crslaboratories.com/products/caffeine-d9) and (https://www.chemspider.com/Chemical-Structure.23935581.html)

I did mention the above issues on the Talk:D9-Caffeine a while ago, however, I haven't got any reply. If someone could change them, and teach me how to do it for the future, I will be very grateful. Thank you! Look2cool (talk) 23:06, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

Hello, I have left the CAS number as is (I assume a page may be created in the future?), and manually entered the formula and molar mass, as it was done on Heavy water

BloubDeFontenilles (talk) 09:33, 27 September 2024 (UTC)

I'm not experienced with the CAS registry but it appears that the "CAS Common Chemistry" website only contains a fraction of the substances actually registered (0.5 of 165 million). The CAS number is probably correct, I don't know if it's useful to leave it in the infobox though BloubDeFontenilles (talk) 12:42, 27 September 2024 (UTC)

The Google search CAS "72238-85-8" finds many sources which say it's the CAS number. I haven't found a source which is actually from CAS so I don't know whether it's correct. PrimeHunter (talk) 10:51, 27 September 2024 (UTC)

@Look2cool Yes, 72238-85-9 is the correct CAS number. As others have said, the Common Chemistry database only a selection of CAS numbers. I'm a member of WP:CHEM (the Wikipedia chemistry Project) and will answer any other questions you have on the Talk Page of the article. Mike Turnbull (talk) 16:34, 27 September 2024 (UTC)

Thank you Michael D. Turnbull I will correspond there. Look2cool (talk) 22:44, 27 September 2024 (UTC)

Thanks everyone for your comments. I know the CAS number is correct, the issue is/was just the website it is hyperlinked with doesn't have it. In the above comment, I provided an alternate link, and was asking, if the CAS number could be linked to that instead. Remaining issues has been solved. Thank you guys a lot. Look2cool (talk) 22:43, 27 September 2024 (UTC)