Talk:Main Page/Archive 17

message: Please add a blank line between the second and third facts in the Did You know section - or remove the blank line between the first and second. r3m0t 22:51, 5 Mar 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: Sorry, it isn't a line break problem (see Template:dyk) but something with the image. I don't know how to fix it, but at least dyk isn't protected. r3m0t 22:53, 5 Mar 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Did you know blank line 

message: Whilst I know what acetosalicylic acid is from the name (although not by diagram), I think that the majority of non-chemistry graduates would be hard pusded to match the picture given with the Aspirin article.  The addition of the word "Aspirin" in parenthesis after the chemical name in the text alternative for the image would probably be a useful addition. Syntax 01:06, 6 Mar 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Current image 

message: Now it's the 6th, but it's been reverted. It talks about Kerry, no mention of Martha Stewart, and the featured article on maths is gone. However, in page history, all is well. Strange. --Johnleemk 11:29, 6 Mar 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: Press CTRL-F5. --Jiang 11:31, 6 Mar 2004 (UTC)

text: I already tried that several times. Then I waited five minutes and tried again. Now it works. Odd. I could've sworn this happened to the 2004 page yesterday too, but maybe I wasn't reading properly then. --Johnleemk 11:33, 6 Mar 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: I'm Getting the March 5th Main Page

message: That the summer was a hot as the one in 1500 doesnt have to do something
with global warming! Its higly hipothetical. Especially cause temperature
around the world wasnt measured like we do today around the world. 62.34.50.99 15:51, 6 Mar 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: Global Warming/In the news

message: I'm not getting the March 5 page -- instead it's the March 3 version. (Obviously it's a cache thing, either on the server end or my end.) But this leads to a couple of questions:
*Are parts of the Main Page dynamicaly generated (e.g. the "Selected Aniversaries")? If so which? (BTW, I understand why this is a good thing.)
*If someone with sysop rights makes an edit to a cached image, will there be any warning that the person is altering an out-of-date page? --llywrch 19:37, 6 Mar 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Another Cache Problem Question 

message: * Well, it passed 222222 articles and I missed it.  It is at 222291 articles now. --Jeff8765 21:48, 8 Mar 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Interesting number 

message: Changing the picture would be helpful - the current page seems to imply that the picture of Costas Caramanlis is supposed to be John Allen Muhammed. -Alex S 02:38, 10 Mar 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: You can change it if you feel the need to. Perl 03:27, 10 Mar 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: How? (As a side note, the picture now looks like it's supposed to be Abu Abbas.) --Alex S 06:11, 10 Mar 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Change of picture 

message: Wikipedia has some problems with political correctness:
*There are many pages that use "she" as a generic third person pronoun, which is overtly political and totally unnatural in English. There is no way to defend this without invoking politics. And the people who are doing this don't realize how ridiculous it looks to the average non-radical person. At least use "they" instead, since that is something people actually say in real life (even though it's a bit awkward). This "she" business is pure politics and it doesn't belong in an encyclopedia that purports to be neutral.
(add more here)
----
Moved from page top...
THE MASACRE IN MADRID MUST BE IN THE NEWS  AT FIRST !!!!! NOT THAT MAN ABBU ABAS !!
While I agree that the Madrid bombings are tragic, shouting about it here does little to help.  I'm certain someone closer to the event will post a news item here soon.  I encourage you to become familiar with Wikipedia so you can add items like this yourself. - Gaz 13:27, 11 Mar 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: I would suggest replacing the Spanish flag in the main page with the one with the black ribbon  Sabbut 09:34, 13 Mar 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: Politically correct

message: Re: Nuclear weapon - Wondering why Israel was edited out of the Main Page abstract. I don't keep track of who's nuclear, and I was only glancing at the front page highlight, but Israel's absence from the list of nuke-possessing countries still jumped out at me, because: 1) I'd heard something on the news recently about Israel and weapons testing; 2) I've been under the general impression that Israel had nukes for years. I checked the Web and "Israel is widely believed to possess" is support in "mainstream" articles from, like, LA Times and Financial Times. So, it seems to be a glaring omission?
:I omitted them for the same reason I omitted North Korea (which had been listed in the article previously) - because they have not admitted it. Those are the nations we know with absolute certainty have nuclear weapons. →Raul654 16:19, Mar 13, 2004 (UTC)
::Oh, I just added Israel - I wrote this comment before I realized the abstract was editable, too (and why wouldn't it be? ;). I just came back here to remove my comment!! Anyhow, I'm not into battling over this. I really don't know much, and a five-minute Web browse certainly doesn't make be much more knowledgeable... But still, from the amount, sources and long period of time over which Israel's possible nuke arsenal seems to've been covered, putting it on a par with N.Korea would be like equating it with Iraq and WMD just a year ago...It seems disingenuous not to mention it... Tsavage 16:25, 13 Mar 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: As well as the relevant Wikipedia articles (List of countries with nuclear weapons), The Economist had a reasonable write-up of the current state of play a couple of weeks ago - . Pete/Pcb21 (talk) 12:17, 16 Mar 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: Nuclear weapon

message: I really like this website, and I am thinking of adding some things in both English and Dutch
... http://noodletools.com ... doesn't tell me how to specifically reference this page.  -User:Mephistophyles
: See Wikipedia:Citing Wikipedia.
: HTH.
: James F. (talk) 17:43, 14 Mar 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Referencing and Citing 

message: What is the use of this project? What is Wikipedia that Internet in itself isn't?
:It's a free encyclopedia; free as in freedom, free as in beer. The Internet is not an encylopedia. See Wikipedia:Criticisms and Wikipedia:Replies to common objections for more discussion on these points. -- The Anome 12:07, 16 Mar 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: Did I hear something about free beer?!?! :D Sam Spade 23:13, 17 Mar 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Use 

message: Could somebody please add breaks to the main page between the sections as I have done in the sandbox?
:No - that's ugly. --mav 06:09, 18 Mar 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Add Breaks 

message: How does one edit the blurb about the featured article?  (I had no trouble editing the Main Page; that's not what I'm asking about.)  <tantrum>I am shocked that the uncouth phrasal verb refers to is being used on the Main Page.  (There are legitimate uses for that phrase, but "A dog refers to an animal that barks" instead of "A dog is an animal that barks" is the style used by the at most marginally literate.)</tantrum> Michael Hardy 00:32, 22 Mar 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: Fixed. Thanks for pointing it out. For future reference, if you see  in the source text, you can edit it at MediaWiki:Something. In this case, the page you were looking for was Template:Feature. — Timwi 00:59, 22 Mar 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks.  Michael Hardy 01:14, 22 Mar 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: Editing the blurb about the featured article

message: hullo! this is Viky. Pardon my question but I'm new here! Why the random link returns mostly geography articles, like small towns in U.S. ?
Because the US census data was added en mass. Because of this a lot of articles are about small US towns. However the more articles we get the less of a problem it is. Secretlondon 20:57, 24 Mar 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  why the random link returns mostly geography articles? 

message: How can I see the strange characters that appears in the links to another wikipedia versions ? (i.e. to the chinese wikipedia ). I use Mozilla web browser.
: By installing appropriate fonts and/or, if you're using Windows, the appropriate language support (see Control Panel). — Timwi 16:43, 27 Mar 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Web browser characters 

message: Hi:
I use Firefox to browse Wikipedia everyday (is my homepage) but I got a problem: The pages doesn't change as much as the design changes. For example before I clean up the Cache minutes ago, every time I entered into the Main page, showed me the same page as was March the 28th, even today (March the 30th). Is that a browser problem or Wikipedia problem?
That's all.
: I'm on Firefox 0.8, and it WFM. Perhaps it's a cache issue —d8uv (t) 12:01, Apr 4, 2004 (UTC)
I have the same problem with Firefox 0.8, should I turn caching off?  CNN comes up new every day...  Terrible Tim
Firefoxers ahoy! I use Firefox (on both Linux and Windows) and it works fine for me. Must be something with your cache preferences. Alternatively, you could always blame the proxy, even if you're not using one. -- Itai 00:16, 8 Apr 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Problem in Firefox 0.8 

message: The main page is protected from anon users etc editing it, but the included pages arn't isn't this a bit of an anomaly? Should they be protected? Mintguy (T)
1) Ssshh! You'll break our security through obscurity
2) No, it's not an anomily. In theory, we want regular users to be able to modify the main page - it lets us be more timely and include more views. However, as a result, we open ourselves to anon vandalism. This has all been discussed before. →Raul654 16:37, Apr 1, 2004 (UTC)
Ok. In that case I think that it should be easier to edit these pages. It's not immediately obvious. I've put a copy of the main page in User:Mintguy/Sandbox  with a small edit link in the 'In The News' panel. Any comments? Mintguy (T)
:That neat trick of adding an "edit me" link to the mediawiki page (the neat bit is that you can copy and paste the link from your browser address bar because the link required is the link you are at!) is also used on vfd. Some people seem to have a really strong dislike of them, which appears to come from not being able to understand what is going on. The same may apply here, though it's not exactly the same. However I personally think it is a great idea. The main page is unreasonably difficult to edit at the moment.. hand-typed URLs and all. Pete/Pcb21 (talk) 17:07, 1 Apr 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: Exactly. Adding edit links to each section will be both ugly and open us up to vandalism. Edits to these sections are easy for anybody who knows what is going on - all you have to do is go to this talk page and click on the part you want to edit. --mav 05:36, 3 Apr 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: Protecting the included Mediawiki pages